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The emperor had long risen from the supper-table. The imperial suite had been allowed to withdraw. Alone he sat in a comfortable night- dress on the high, antiquated easy-chair, in front of the fire- place, in which, at his express order, notwithstanding the warm weather, a large fire had been kindled. He liked heat; the sun of Egypt and the desert had never been too warm for him; in the hottest summer days in France he frequently felt chilly, and called for a fire. It seemed as though the inflamed blood in his veins made the world appear cold to him
Napoleon and the Spectre--Charlotte Brontë
They would now have been in total darkness had it not been for a dim light which shone round the ghost and revealed the damp walls of a long, vaulted passage. Down this they proceeded with mute rapidity. Ere long a cool, refreshing breeze, which rushed wailing up the vault and caused the Emperor to wrap his loose nightdress closer round, announced their approach to the open air.
Napoleon Bonaparte--John S. C. Abbott
. Desaix, upon his arrival in Paris, found letters for him there from the First Consul. As he read the confidential lines, he was struck with the melancholy air with which they were pervaded. "Alas!" said he, "Napoleon has gained every thing, and yet he is unhappy. I must hasten to meet him."
Nathan the Wise--Gotthold Ephraim Lessing
An especial thanks to Project Gutenberg uber-volunteer David Price for moving this 18th century classic work of tolerance out so quickly.
Decrease our population, check our growth,/ Deprive us of our wealth, our liberty,/Lower the nation's conscience by a hair,/And you are less than that you were before!/You stand here in the world the man you are,/Because your country is America!
Yet there was a sentence in the letter, that, worse than all the tenderness left out, wounded her sensibility; and she could not read the line, GRATITUDE FOR ALL THE FAVOURS CONFERRED ON ME, without turning pale with horror, then kindling with indignation at the commonplace thanks, which insultingly reminded her of her innocence given in exchange for unmeaning acknowledgments.
Negro Suffrage in a Democracy--Ray Stannard Baker
Our own government is one of the freest in the world in the matter of suffrage; and yet we bar out, in most states, all women; we bar out Mongolians, no matter how intelligent; we bar out Indians, and all foreigners who have not passed through a certain probationary stage and have not acquired a certain small amount of education.
Destruction is brooding for all./ No sound of wheel or of hoof is known/ The lion to wake from his dream,/ But low from the Lido the night-winds moan/ And sea-gulls ocean-wards scream.
Tony could hardly help shouting at the idea; but, rather than trouble his little mistress, he said very soberly: "I'm afraid they wouldn't lay easy, not being used to it. Tucking up a butterfly would about kill him; the worms would be apt to get lost among the bed-clothes; and the toads would tumble out the first thing."
NEW ORLEANS SUPERSTITIONS--Lafcadio Hearn
Pillow magic alone, however, is far from being the only recognized form of maleficent negro witchcraft. Placing charms before the entrance of a house or room, or throwing them over a wall into a yard, is believed to be a deadly practice. When a charm is laid before a room door or hall door, oil is often poured on the floor or pavement in front of the threshold. It is supposed that whoever crosses an oil line falls into the power of the Voudoos. To break the oil charm, sand or salt should be strewn upon it.
MY first gift and my last, to you/I dedicate this fascicle of songs -/The only wealth I have:/Just as they are, to you.--by Robert Louis Stevenson
Let us suspend the consideration of contemporaneous testimony, and concisely review the ground we have passed over. Suppose the proceedings of the convention had been publick, and that all the panoply for the establishment of a national government, had been displayed in the newspapers. Suppose the states to have been alarmed by the exhibition, and to have remonstrated against the project. That this would have been the case, is demonstrated by the credentials to their deputies, and the opinions annexed to their ratifications.
These paint with fleeting shapes the dream of sleep,/ These swell the waking soul with pleasing dread;/ These through the glooms in forms terrific sweep,/ And rouse the thrilling horrors of the dead!
A pleasure in the dimness of the stars./ And hark! the Nightingale begins its song,/ 'Most musical, most melancholy' bird!/ A melancholy bird? Oh! idle thought!/ In Nature there is nothing melancholy./ But some night-wandering man whose heart was pierced
One day an arrogant and boisterous enemy threatens the father's kingdom, and the savage instincts of the warrior of old awaken in the Soul-Ego. It leaves its dreamland amid the blossoms of life and causes its Ego of clay to draw the soldier's blade, assuring him it is in defence of his country. --by HP Blavatsky
Mr. Bennett Addenbrooke occupied substantial offices in Wellington Street, Strand, and was out when we arrived; but he had only just gone "over the way to the court"; and five minutes sufficed to produce a brisk, fresh-colored, resolute-looking man, with a very confident, rather festive air, and black eyes that opened wide at the sight of Raffles.
NO HAID PAWN--Thomas Nelson Page
I turned in terror, but before I had gone fifty yards the storm was upon me, and instinctively I made for the only refuge that was at hand. It was a dreadful alternative, but I did not hesitate. Outside I was not even sure that my life was safe. And with extraordinary swiftness I had made my way through the broken iron fence that lay rusting in the swamp, had traversed the yard, all grown up as it was to the very threshold, had ascended the sunken steps, crossed the rotted portico, and entered the open door.
No Treason: The Constitution of No Authority--Lysander Spooner
What is the motive to the secret ballot? This, and only this: Like other confederates in crime, those who use it are not friends, but enemies; and they are afraid to be known, and to have their individual doings known, even to each other. They can contrive to bring about a sufficient understanding to enable them to act in concert against other persons; but beyond this they have no confidence, and no friendship, among themselves.
No. 252 Rue M. le Prince.--Ralph Adam Cram
Once a year the austerity of the place was broken, and the denizens of the whole quarter stood open-mouthed watching many carriages drive up to No. 252, many of them private, not a few with crests on the door panels, from all of them descending veiled female figures and men with coat collars turned up. Then followed curious sounds of music from within, and those whose houses joined the blank walls of No. 252 became for the moment popular, for by placing the ear against the wall strange music could distinctly be heard, and the sound of monotonous chanting voices now and then.
Clyde's heart sank as he saw the wrinkled face and the barrel-shaped, short-legged body of Montana. He looked nothing like the cowman whom The Shadow had seen coming out of the rooming house across the street, and whose features had been described to Clyde by Burbank, the contact man.
If the United States, like the countries of the Old World, are also to grow vast crops of poor, desperate, dissatisfied, nomadic, miserably-waged populations, such as we see looming upon us of late years - steadily, even if slowly, eating into them like a cancer of lungs or stomach - then our republican experiment, notwithstanding all its surface-successes, is at heart an unhealthy failure.
Notes of First Visit to New England
That was the heyday of lecturing, and now and then a literary light from the East swam into our skies. I heard and saw Emerson, and I once met Bayard Taylor socially, at the hospitable house where he was a guest after his lecture. Heaven knows how I got through the evening. I do not think I opened my mouth to address him a word; it was as much as I could do to sit and look at him
My notion was that which afterwards became Bartley Hubbard's. "Get a basis," said the softening cynic of the Saturday Press, when I advised with him, among other acquaintances. "Get a salaried place, something regular on some paper, and then you can easily make up the rest." But it was a month before I achieved this vantage, and then I got it in a quarter where I had not looked for it. --by William Dean Howells
Notes on a Journey from Cornhill to Grand Cairo--William Makepeace Thackeray
From this scene we rushed off somewhat discomposed to make a breakfast off red mullets and grapes, melons, pomegranates, and Smyrna wine, at a dirty little comfortable inn, to which we were recommended: and from the windows of which we had a fine cheerful view of the gulf and its busy craft, and the loungers and merchants along the shore. There were camels unloading at one wharf, and piles of melons much bigger than the Gibraltar cannon-balls at another.
Notes on the Pseudonyms Used by the Bronte Sisters
To all such 'Wuthering Heights' must appear a rude and strange production. The wild moors of the North of England can for them have no interest: the language, the manners, the very dwellings and household customs of the scattered inhabitants of those districts must be to such readers in a great measure unintelligible, and - where intelligible - repulsive. --by Charlotte Bronte
Nothing to do: a tilt at our best society
Which, bought cheap at auction, and set in new frames,/And dubbed with high-sounding and fanciful names,/At peace after many of Fortune's mutations,/ Look impressively down on their new-found relations./There's Sir Arthur Fitz-Herbert an old English knight,/Who won his gold spurs in a hardly-fought field,/
Reglar every evening there came to the "Constantanople" a young gent etired in the igth of fashn; and indead presenting by the cleanlyness of his appearants and linning (which was generally a pink or blew shurt, with a cricketer or a dansuse pattern) rather a contrast to the dinjy and whistkcard sosaity of the Diwann. As for wiskars, this young mann had none beyond a little yallow tought to his chin, which you woodn notas, only he was always pulling at it.
Beautiful as the song was, the original `Locksley Hall' of half a century ago was essentially morbid, heart-broken, finding fault with everything, especially the fact of money's being made (as it ever must be, and perhaps should be) the paramount matter in worldly affairs; Every door is barr'd with gold, and opens but to golden keys.
By the time stationary warfare had been established on the western front in trench lines from the sea to Switzerland, the British Regular Army had withered away. That was after the retreat from Mons, the victory of the Marne, the early battles round Ypres, and the slaughter at Neuve Chapelle. The "Old Contemptibles" were an army of ghosts whose dead clay was under earth in many fields of France, but whose spirit still "carried on" as an heroic tradition --by Philip Gibbs
Nuttie's Father--Charlotte M. Yonge
Miss Mary did not think a yacht a likely place for the conversion of a croon into a pound, and the utter silence of mother and aunt did not seem to her satisfactory; but she feared either to damp the youthful enthusiasm for the lost father, or to foster curiosity that might lead to some painful discovery, so she took refuge in an inarticulate sound.
O'FLAHERTY. If you'd been brought up by my mother, sir, you'd know better than to joke about her. What I'm telling you is the truth; and I wouldn't tell it to you if I could see my way to get out of the fix I'll be in when my mother comes here this day to see her boy in his glory, and she after thinking all the time it was against the English I was fighting.
Thus in the stipulation we have the substantial being of the contract standing out in distinction from its real utterance in the performance, which is brought down to a mere sequel. In this way there is put into the thing or performance a distinction between its immediate specific quality and its substantial being or value, meaning by value the quantitative terms into which that qualitative feature has been translated.
If I don't drive around the park,/ I'm pretty sure to make my mark./ If I'm in bed each night by ten,/ I may get back my looks again,/
Observations on the slaves--Antibiastes
Rest of that title is: and the indented servants, inlisted in the army, and in the navy of the United States
But hark! the portals sound and, pacing forth/ With solemn steps and slow,/ High potentates and dames of royal birth/ And mitred fathers in long order go:/ Great Edward with the lilies on his brow/ From haughty Gallia torn,
Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College
Ah, happy hills, ah, pleasing shade,/ Ah, fields belov'd in vain,/ Where once my careless childhood stray'd,/ A stranger yet to pain! I feel the gales, that from ye blow,/ A momentary bliss bestow,
With genius, wit, and science blest,/Unshaken Honour arm'd his breast,/Bade him, with virtuous courage wise,/Malignant Fortune's darts despise;/Him, ev'n black Envy's venom'd tongues commend--by Joseph Warton
Where'er the oak's thick branches stretch/ A broader browner shade;/ Where'er the rude and moss-grown beech/ O'er-canopies the glade,/ Beside some water's rushy brink/ With me the Muse shall sit, and think
Daughter of Jove, relentless power,/ Thou tamer of the human breast,/ Whose iron scourge and torturing hour,/ The bad affright, afflict the best!/ Bound in thy adamantine chain
O modest Evening, oft' let me appear/A wandering votary in thy pensive train,/List'ning to every wildly-warbling throat/That fills with farewell notes the dark'ning plain.--by Joseph Warton
Thou, to whom the world unknown/With all its shadowy shapes is shown;/Who see'st appalled the unreal scene,/While Fancy lifts the veil between:/Ah Fear! Ah frantic Fear!--by William Collins
Wild and fearful in his cavern/ Hid the naked troglodyte,/ And the homeless nomad wandered/ Laying waste the fertile plain./ Menacing with spear and arrow/ In the woods the hunter strayed/
As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need./ Oh, lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!/ I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!
Of Crimes and Punishments--Cesare Bonesana, Marchese Beccaria
If the power of interpreting laws be an evil, obscurity in them must be another, as the former is the consequence of the latter. This evil will be still greater if the laws be written in a language unknown to the people; who, being ignorant of the consequences of their own actions, become necessarily dependent on a few, who are interpreters of the laws, which, instead of being public and general, are thus rendered private and particular.
Two men travelling on the highway, the one east, the other west, can easily pass each other, if the way be broad enough: But two men, reasoning upon opposite principles of religion, cannot so easily pass, without shocking; though one should think, that the way were also, in that case, sufficiently broad, and that each might proceed, without interruption, in his own course. But such is the nature of the human mind, that it always lays hold on every mind that approaches it;
So he goeth into the square to the countryman. "Churl," quoth the apostle, "this dwelling belongeth of right to us and to the martyrs and confessors; wherein have you done such righteousness that you think to abide in it? Here you cannot stay, for this is the hostel of the true-hearted." "Thomas, Thomas, like unto a man of law ye are over quick to make answer; yet are not you he who, as is well known, spake with the apostles when they had seen the Lord after his resurrection?
OF THE DIGNITY OR MEANNESS OF HUMAN NATURE
We find few disputes, that are not founded on some ambiguity in the expression; and I am persuaded, that the present dispute, concerning the dignity or meanness of human nature, is not more exempt from it than any other. It may, therefore, be worth while to consider, what is real, and what is only verbal, in this controversy.
OF THE INDEPENDENCY OF PARLIAMENT
How much, therefore, would it have surprised such a genius as CICERO, or TACITUS, to have been told, that, in a future age, there should arise a very regular system of mixed government, where the authority was so distributed, that one rank, whenever it pleased, might swallow up all the rest, and engross the whole power of the constitution. Such a government, they would say, will not be a mixed government.
. In a government, such as that of FRANCE, which is absolute, and where law, custom, and religion concur, all of them, to make the people fully satisfied with their condition, the monarch cannot entertain any jealousy against his subjects, and therefore is apt to indulge them in great liberties both of speech and action. In a government altogether republican, such as that of HOLLAND, where there is no magistrate so eminent as to give jealousy to the state, there is no danger in intrusting the magistrates with large discretionary powers
OF THE PARTIES OF GREAT BRITAIN
In the first place, they appear to have had the genuine sentiments of BRITONS in their affection for liberty, and in their determined resolution not to sacrifice it to any abstract principle whatsoever, or to any imaginary rights of princes. This part of their character might justly have been doubted of before the revolution, from the obvious tendency of their avowed principles, and from their compliances with a court, which seemed to make little secret of its arbitrary designs.
But when we have vaguely said Education will set this tangle straight, what have we uttered but a truism? Training for life teaches living; but what training for the profitable living together of black men and white? Two hundred years ago our task would have seemed easier. Then Dr. Johnson blandly assured us that education was needed solely for the embellishments of life, and was useless for ordinary vermin.
OFT, IN THE STILLY NIGHT (SCOTCH AIR)
When I remember all/ The friends, so link'd together,/ I've seen around me fall,/ Like leaves in wintry weather;/ I feel like one/ Who treads alone/ Some banquet-hall deserted,/ Whose lights are fled,
So spake Iseult; and thus her passion found/ Far-flying words, like birds against the sunset/ That look on lands we see not. Yet I know/ It was not any argument she found,/ But that she was, the colour that life took/ About her, that thus reasoned in her stead,/ Making her like a lifted lantern borne/
But the intelligence (that more precious heirloom) was degenerate; the treasure of ancestral memory ran low; and it had required the potent, plebeian crossing of a muleteer or mountain contrabandista to raise, what approached hebetude in the mother, into the active oddity of the son. Yet of the two, it was the mother I preferred. --by Robert Louis Stevenson
Intimately connected with Casanova's life at this period was a girl named Francesca Buschini. This name does not appear in any of the literary, artistic or theatrical records of the period, and, of the girl, nothing is known other than that which she herself tells us in her letters to Casanova. From these very human letters, however, we may obtain, not only certain facts, but also, a very excellent idea of her character.
Old Creole Days--George W. Cable
THE roundest and happiest-looking priest in the city of New Orleans was a little man fondly known among his people as Pere Jerome. He was a Creole and a member of one of the city's leading families. His dwelling was a little frame cottage, standing on high pillars just inside a tall, close fence, and reached by a narrow out-door stair from the green batten gate. It was well surrounded by crape myrtles, and communicated behind by a descending stair and a plank-walk with the rear entrance of the chapel over whose worshippers he daily spread his hands in benediction.
Since early morning a gay, warlike life had reigned at Potsdam and the neighborhood of Sans-Souci. From every side splendid regiments approached, with proud and stately bearing, in glittering uniforms, to take in perfect order the places assigned to them. With flying banners, drums beating, and shrill blasts of trumpets, they came marching on to the great parade--the last, for the king was about to leave for the field. --by Louise Muhlbach
The chief called his counselors together and set before them the dream of the priest, whose prophecy, he said, was already being fulfilled in part by the westward movement of the buffalo. It was agreed that they should lay up all the dried meat they could obtain; but even for this they were too late. The storms were al- ready at hand, and that winter was more severe than any that the old men could recall in their traditions.
AFAR off upon a large level land, a summer sun was shining bright. Here and there over the rolling green were tall bunches of coarse gray weeds. Iktomi in his fringed buckskins walked alone across the prairie with a black bare head glossy in the sunlight. He walked through the grass without following any well-worn footpath.
Old John Brown--Walter Hawkins
But not long could he stay at home. The year of Jubilee for all these bondmen was his one thought, and he found friends who regarded him as a tried man and were prepared to trust him implicitly. Such men as Beecher and Theodore Parker gave him help spiritual; men like the wealthy Stearns gave him help financial to the extent of many thousand dollars
One morning when Mr. Sun was very, very bright and it was very, very warm, down on the Green Meadows Reddy Fox came hopping and skipping down the Lone Little Path that leads to the Laughing Brook. Hoppity, skip, skippity hop! Reddy felt very much pleased with himself that sunny morning. Pretty soon he saw Johnny Chuck sitting up very straight close by the little house where he lives.
OLGA ROMANOFF, OR, The Syren of the Skies
"What!" said Olga, her cheeks flushing and her eyes lighting up at the very idea of such an experience. "Do you really mean to say that you would permit a daughter of the earth, as I am told you call the women who have not the good fortune to be born in Aeria, to go on board one of those wonderful airships of yours, and taste the forbidden delights of spurning the earth and sharing, even for an hour, your Empire of the Air?" --by George Griffith (sequel to Angel o/t Revolution)
In the things of the world, he had fences, and looked at some people through palings and even over the broken bottles on the tops of walls; and I think he was the loser by this, as well as they. But then I think all fences are bad, and that God has made enough differences between men; we need not trouble ourselves to multiply them. Even behind his fences, however, Holmes had a heart kind for the outsiders
Om -- The Secret of Ahbor Valley
"The Lama is gone!" Dawa Tsering announced dramatically. "If I had had my knife I would have slain the impudent devil who gave me the news! Tripe out of the belly of a pig is his countenance! Eggs are his eyes! He is a ragyaba. The son of evil pretended not to know me! When I offered him the letter for the Lama he growled that Tsiang Samdup and his chela had gone elsewhere. When I bade him let me in, that I might see for myself, he answered ignorantly."
Omaha, the Prairie City--William R. Lighton
Towns, no less than states or nations, must have some reason for being; the birth of a hamlet is no more fortuitous than the birth of an empire. Nevertheless, it is hard to give a just reason for the beginning of Omaha. There seems to be but one word for it, -- the overworked American word "enterprise." Other towns -- many Western towns -- have sprung from an exalted thought, and been nourished by the blood of sacrifice. Omaha had no such experience.
OMOO: Adventures in the South Seas
In one corner, upon a large native couch, elevated upon posts, reclined a nymph; who, half-veiled in her own long hair, had yet to make her toilet for the day. She was the daughter of Po-Po; and a very beautiful little daughter she was; not more than fourteen; with the most delightful shape-like a bud just blown; and large hazel eyes. They called her Loo; a name rather pretty and genteel, and therefore quite appropriate; for a more genteel and lady-like little damsel there was not in all Imeeo
On a Blank Leaf in 'The Marble Faun'
Oh, learn no wisdom, for that may bring grief;/And love no woman, for 't will sure bring pain;/Be Donatello still!/Believe me, friend, this learning is a thief,/And where it thrives the simple joys are slain.
On a Favourite Cat, Drowned in a Tub of Gold Fishes
Her conscious tail her joy declared;/ The fair round face, the snowy beard,/ The velvet of her paws,/ Her coat, that with the/ tortoise vies,/ Her ears of jet, and emerald eyes,/ She saw; and purr'd applause.
When nations grow old, the Arts grow cold,/ And Commerce settles on every tree;/ And the poor and the old can live upon gold,/ For all are born poor, aged sixty-three
And yet to be found out, I know from my own experience, must be painful and odious, and cruelly mortifying to the inward vanity. Suppose I am a poltroon, let us say. With fierce mustache, loud talk, plentiful oaths, and an immense stick, I keep up nevertheless a character for courage. I swear fearfully at cabmen and women; brandish my bludgeon, and perhaps knock down a little man or two with it
He who is quick to believe that he has thrown away his benefits, does really throw them away; but he who presses on and adds new benefits to his former ones, forces out gratitude even from a hard and forgetful breast. In the face of many kindnesses, your friend will not dare to raise his eyes; let him see you whithersoever he turns himself to escape from his remembrance of you; encircle him with your benefits.
On Books and The Housing of Them
Already the increase of books is passing into geometrical progression. And this is not a little remarkable when we bear in mind that in Great Britain, of which I speak, while there is a vast supply of cheap works, what are termed "new publications" issue from the press, for the most part, at prices fabulously high, so that the class of real purchasers has been extirpated--by Gladstone
On First Looking into Chapman's "Homer"
Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold./--Then felt I like some watcher of the skies/When a new planet swims into his ken;/Or like stout Cortez, when with eagle eyes/He stared at the Pacific--and all his men--Keats
You all your youth observ'd the golden rule,/ Till you're at last become the golden fool:/ I sport with fortune, merry, blithe and gay,/ Like to the lion sporting with his prey./ Take you the hide and horns which you may wear,/ Mine is the flesh - the bones may be your share./
18. Now what is the quality to look out for as a warrant for the stability and permanence of friendship? It is loyalty. Nothing that lacks this can be stable. We should also in making our selection look out for simplicity, a social disposition, and a sympathetic nature, moved by what moves us. These all contribute to maintain loyalty. You can never trust a character which is intricate and tortuous.
This figure he saw several times, always in the same place. It was impalpable to the touch, motionless, except in its advance, and made no sign when it was addressed. Once the Chevalier took a friend with him to the spot. The same rustling was heard, the same shadow slept forth, his companion fled in horror, but the Chevalier
This liberty is incompatible and inconsistent with authority and cannot endure the least restraint of the most just authority. The exercise and maintaining of this liberty makes men grow more evil and in time to be worse than brute beasts: omnes sumus licentia deteriores. This is that great enemy of truth and peace, that wild beast, which all of the ordinances of God are bent against, to restrain and subdue it. The other kind of liberty I call civil or federal;
On Lord Holland's Seat near Margate, Kent
No tree is heard to whisper, bird to sing:/ Yet nature cannot furnish out the feast,/ Art he invokes new horrors still to bring./ Now mouldering fanes and battlements arise,/ Arches and turrets nodding to their fall,/ Unpeopled palaces delude his eyes,
What then is the purpose of such a long disquisition on Maximus? It is because you now see that an old age like his cannot conscientiously be called unhappy. Yet it is after all true that everybody cannot be a Scipio or a Maximus, with stormings of cities, with battles by land and sea, with wars in which they themselves commanded, and with triumphs to recall. Besides this there is a quiet, pure, and cultivated life which produces a calm and gentle old age
This afternoon, as Dad approached his dumb patient, he suddenly put down the bucket of water which he was carrying and ran, shouting angrily. A flock of crows flew away from Farmer and "cawed" from a tree close by. Dad was excited, and when he saw that one of the animal's eyes was gone and a stream of blood trickled over its nose he sat down and hid his face in his big rough hands. -- by Steele Rudd
We are aware that certain people live illicitly, that they find opportunity for themselves for dishonourable wealth by cruel and hateful means. They travel around the provinces and many other places, and they deceive wretched girls promising them shoes and clothing. With these they buy them and lead them back to this most blessed city. --by The Emperor Justinian
On Rousseau's Theory of the State
The distinction between good and evil, according to this system, commences only with the conclusion of the social contract. Thereafter, what was recognised as constituting the common interest was proclaimed as good, and all that was contrary to it as evil. The contracting members, on becoming citizens, and bound by a more or less solemn undertaking, thereby assumed an obligation: to subordinate their private interests to the common good, to an interest inseparable from all others.
ON THE COURTIERS AND FAMILIARS OF A KING
The courtier also must ever be in agreement with the king. Whatever he hears the king say, he must cry "Bravo!" or "Excellent!" and let him never play the pedagogue, saying "Do this," or "Don't do that," or "Why did you do that?" or "This is a thing one should not do." Such conduct will prove disagreeable to the king and may lead to dislike--by THE NIZÁMU 'L MULK
The sacred voice of inspiration has told us that there is a time for all things. There certainly has been a time for every evil that human nature admits of to be vaticinated of President Jackson's administration; equally certain the time has now come for all rational and well-disposed people to compare the predictions with the facts, and to ask themselves if these calamitous prognostications have been verified by events? Have we peace, or war, with foreign nations? --Thomas Hart Benton
On the Expunging Resolutions--Henry Clay
How is it with the President? Is he powerless? He is felt from one extremity to the other of this vast Republic. By means of principles which he has introduced, and innovations which he has made in our institutions, alas! but too much countenanced by Congress and a confiding people, he exercises, uncontrolled, the power of the State. In one hand he holds the purse, and in the other brandishes the sword of the country. Myriads of dependants and partisans, scattered over the land, are ever ready to sing hosannas to him, and to laud to the skies whatever he does.
"Yes, or Fate. What else makes a man move out of the way, just in time for the bullet to graze his cheek? He doesn't see the bullet coming; neither does the man who stops it. Both of them are busy about something else. For the man who escapes it, it is Providence; for the man who gets killed, it is Fate." --by Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller
But even in those first days I had my hours of misery. Why, for instance, should she have been born in Finmark, and why should Lars Ebbling have been her only door of escape? Why should she be silently taking leave of the world at the age when I was just beginning it, having had nothing, nothing of whatever is worth while?
On the Improvement of the Understanding
[4] (1) By sensual pleasure the mind is enthralled to the extent of quiescence, as if the supreme good were actually attained, so that it is quite incapable of thinking of any other object; when such pleasure has been gratified it is followed by extreme melancholy, whereby the mind, though not enthralled, is disturbed and dulled. --by Spinoza
On the Law of War and Peace--Hugo Grotius
But as in those early times, when men were few, and aggressions rare, there was less occasion for examples, God restrained by an express commandment the impulse of nature which appeared lawful, he forbad any one to kill the murderer, at the same time prohibiting all intercourse with him, even so far as not to touch him.
ON THE LIFE AND HISTORY OF THUCYDIDES
For answer to this, I say thus. For the mentioning of the ancient state of Greece, he doth it briefly, insisting no longer upon it than is necessary for the well understanding of the following history. For without some general notions of these first times, many places of the history are the less easy to be understood--by Thomas Hobbes
On The Medusa of Leonardo da Vinci--Shelley
Loveliness like a shadow, from which shrine,/Fiery and lurid, struggling underneath,/The agonies of anguish and of death./Yet it is less the horror than the grace/Which turns the gazer's spirit into stone;/
The manifold wonders of the world of life had a particular attraction for the lonely student; incessant and patient observation of the plants and animals about him sharpened his naturally good powers of observation and of reasoning; until, at length, he acquired a sagacity which enabled him to perceive endless minute differences among objects which, to the untutored eye, appeared absolutely alike.(essay 1)
On the Misfortune of Indentured Servants
Add to this want of provisions, hunger, thirst, frost, heat, dampness, anxiety, want, afflictions and lamentations, together with other trouble, as . . . the lice abound so frightfully, especially on sick people, that they can be scraped off the body. The misery reaches the climax when a gale rages for 2 or 3 nights and days, so that every one believes that the ship will go to the bottom with all human beings on board.--by Gottlieb Mittelberger
On the Seminole War--Henry Clay
How different has been the treatment of General Jackson and that modest, but heroic young man, a native of one of the smallest States in the Union, who achieved for his country, on Lake Erie, one of the most glorious victories of the late war. In a moment of passion he forgot himself and offered an act of violence which was repented of as soon as perpetrated. He was tried, and suffered the judgment to be pronounced by his peers. Public justice was thought not even then to be satisfied.
On the Significance of Science and Art
But this is unjust. I not only do not repudiate art and science, but, in the name of that which is true art and true science, I say that which I do say; merely in order that mankind may emerge from that savage state into which it will speedily fall, thanks to the erroneous teaching of our time,--only for this purpose do I say that which I say.
What we assert is, that, universal suffrage in itself, based as it is on economic and social inequality, will never be for the people anything but a bait, and that from the side of democratic bourgeoisedom, it will never be aught but a shameful lie, the surest implement for strengthening, with a make believe of liberalism and justice, the eternal domination of the exploiting and owing classes, and so suppression of the freedom and interests of the people.
. Besides, extended time was expiring, and the contractors were in a hurry to complete the line. But the Government inspector was a reserved man who poked round on his independent own and appeared in lonely spots at unexpected times - with apparently no definite object in life - like a grey kangaroo bothered by a new wire fence, but unsuspicious of the presence of humans. He wore a grey suit, rode, or mostly led, an ashen-grey horse; the grass was long and grey, so he was seldom spotted until he was well within the horizon and bearing leisurely down on a party of sub-contractors, leading his horse.
We went down the river that led into it, with awe, as though we were trespassers against God Himself, - as though He had made it too beautiful and too fruitful 103 for the toilers of this earth. And you who read this an hundred years hence may not believe the marvels of it to the pioneer, and in particular to one born and bred in the scanty, hard soil of the mountains. Nature had made it for her park, - ay, and scented it with her own perfumes.
As soon as ever Mother had given way, I rushed at Grannie. I got hold of her hand, and, dancing with delight, dragged her inside my mosquito curtain on to the bed. I clutched hold of the bolster with both hands in my excitement, and jumped up and down with joy, and when I had got a little quieter, said: "Now, Grannie, let's have the story!" --translated from Bengali by Tagore
This was Orville Platt's method of attack: first, he chipped off the top, neatly. Then he bent forward and subjected it to a passionate and relentless scrutiny. Straightening--preparatory to plunging his spoon therein--he flapped his right elbow. It wasn't exactly a flap; it was a pass between a hitch and a flap, and presented external evidence of a mental state.
"Tha knows what I ha' getten to say," she answered, her tone strained and husky with repressed fierceness. "Aye! tha knows it well enough. I ha' not much need to tell thee owt. He comn here this morning an' he towd me aw I want to know about thee, Seth Lonas -- an' more too."
When Jerome Searing recovered consciousness he did not at once understand what had occurred. It was, indeed, some time before he opened his eyes. For a while he believed that he had died and been buried, and he tried to recall some portions of the burial service. He thought that his wife was kneeling upon his grave, adding her weight to that of the earth upon his breast. The two of them, widow and earth, had crushed his coffin.
A single flow'r he sent me, since we met./ All tenderly his messenger he chose;/ Deep-hearted, pure, with scented dew still wet -/ One perfect rose.
The work of excavation was not difficult: the earth with which the grave had been loosely filled a few hours before offered little resistance and was soon thrown out. Removal of the casket from its box was less easy, but it was taken out, for it was a perquisite of Jess, who carefully unscrewed the cover and laid it aside, exposing the body in black trousers and white shirt. At that instant the air sprang to flame, a cracking shock of thunder shook the stunned world and Henry Armstrong tranquilly sat up.
At house after house they tried, not, of course, with a view of the sea or anywhere near it; the highways and byways along which they trudged might well have been part of some London suburb, save, perhaps, for an unusual freshness in the air. The wonted noises, the familiar accents, everywhere protected these Londoners against the unpleasant feeling of strangeness. Numbers of people strayed hither and thither on the same errand as themselves; every snatch of talk that fell upon their ears was concerned with rent of 'apartments.'
"No, no, Cibber. These fellows are professionals. I am only an amateur. Never took pen in hand before to indite more than a few notes. I preach always impromptu. No, no; they'd treat me as the barnyard fowls would a wild bird if it came to peck at their corn."
Poor little hands! And little heart/ That ached so long alone,/ With none to ease its secret smart/ And none to hear its moan;/ As he lay where they had cast him/ In the dark upon the floor,/ And heard the feet go past/ him/ Outside his prison door.
Opinion as to the Constitutionality of the Bank of the United States
Alexander Hamilton's argument for.
Opinion on the Constitutionality of a National Bank
Thomas Jefferson's opinion against.
"'Listen,' says Patrick Shane, with the sweat coming out on his brow. ' I'm confidant with you, as you have, somehow, enlisted my regards. Did you ever,' he says, 'feel the avoirdupois power of gold-not the troy weight of it, but the sixteen-ounces-to-the-pound force of it?'
The incompetency of the Articles of Confederation for the management of the affairs of the Union at home and abroad was demonstrated to them by the painful and mortifying experience of every day. Washington, though in retirement, was brooding over the cruel injustice suffered by his associates in arms, the warriors of the Revolution; over the prostration of the public credit and the faith of the nation--by John Quincy Adams
A mortal hand will wound one of these goddesses, unless she vanish from my sight. Do ye not heed me, or mark the feathered shaft of my far-shooting bow ready to wing its flight? What! do ye linger still? Spread your pinions, skim the sky, and blame those oracles of Phoebus.
ORIGINAL PAPERS IN THE CASE OF ROUX DE MARSILLY.--Andrew Lang
Roux Marsilly has prudently declared hee had some what of importance to say but it should bee to the King himselfe wch may be means of respiting his processe and as he hopes intercession may bee made for him; but people talk so variously of him that I cannot tell whether hee ought to bee owned by any Prince; the Suisses have indeed the greatest ground to reclayme him as being taken in theirs.
Oscar Wilde, His Life and Confessions
By talent and conviction he was the natural pet of the aristocracy whose selfish prejudices he defended and whose leisure he amused. The middle class, as has been noted, disliked and despised him: but its social influence is small and its papers, and especially "Punch", made him notorious by attacking him in and out of season. The comic weekly, indeed, helped to build up his reputation by the almost inexplicable bitterness of its invective. --by Frank Harris
He barked commands, and the march got started toward the end of the valley where Ost lay. Lupp had no hesitancy about following the trail. He simply made his captives walk ahead, so that they would fall into any trap of poisoned thorns or hidden arrow-guns which might be planted.
Mrs. Lidcote returned his smile. "It's extraordinary. Everything's changed. Even Susy has changed; and you know the extent to which Susy stood for old New York. There's no old New York left, it seems. She talked in the most amazing way. She snaps her fingers at the Purshes. She told me - me, that every woman had a right to happiness, that self-expression was the highest duty. She accused me of misunderstanding Leila; she said my point of view was conventional!
First published in 1877 as a "Household History for All Readers--American history by Benson J. Lossing
. In the meantime Colonel Francis Marion (soon afterward a brigadier-general), a soldier of the French and Indian war, a hero at Fort Sullivan in 1776, a brave combatant at Savannah in 1779, and an active partisan leader in his native State (South Carolina) afterward, was smiting the enemy with sudden and fierce blows among the swamps in the low country, on the borders of the Pedee.
Naturally, Sir Spencer and Lady Ogram were not bidden to the wedding; in fact, they knew nothing about it until a couple of years after, when, on the birth to him of a son and heir, Quentin took his courage in both hands and went down to Rivenoak to make the confession. He avowed somewhat less than the truth, finding it quite task enough to mitigate the circumstances of Mrs. Ogram's birth and breeding. The exhibition of a portrait paved his way.
Nowadays the tendency of the Supreme Court is to restrict its own jurisdiction rather than to enlarge it. Under this policy, and with a gradual increase in the Circuit Court of Appeals, the present system will probably be adequate for all requirements as long as the government shall last.
One other person there was who had a decided opinion as to John Jupp's domestic behaviour. Martha Pimm knew the family through having lodged in the same house with them some years ago; she kept up an acquaintance with Ada Jupp, and learnt from her all about the brother's gross selfishness. 'I wish I was his sister, that's all!' she often remarked, and her eyes twinkled with scorn.
Subtitled: Sketches from the Life of a Free Black, In A Two-Story White House, North.
It is as good as a coronation to see him and Mrs. Bumpsher go to Court. I wonder the carriage can hold them both. On those days Mrs. Bumpsher holds her own drawing-room before her Majesty's; and we are invited to come and see her sitting in state, upon the largest sofa in her rooms. She has need of a stout one, I promise you. Her very feathers must weigh something considerable. The diamonds on her stomacher would embroider a full-sized carpet-bag.
Then Claxton received at the hands of destiny his second chance. He was enabled, and encouraged by Mary, to begin business on his own account. He looked up once more, recovered the note of hopefulness. When a third child was born to him, he felt justified in removing to a better house. And Mary's music presently sounded again.
In that room, his master Heraklas knelt and carefully drew a brick from its place in the wall. Putting his hand into some hole that seemed to be behind the bricks, Heraklas produced a roll of papyrus. He glanced stealthily around, and, kneeling still, unrolled the writing, and read in eager haste, one hand on the brick, ready at the sound of any coming footsteps to thrust the papyrus quickly into the wall again. --by Mary Bamford
Over the Sliprails--Henry Lawson
The Oracle and I were camped together. The Oracle was a bricklayer by trade, and had two or three small contracts on hand. I was "doing a bit of house-painting". There were a plasterer, a carpenter, and a plumber - we were all T'othersiders, and old mates, and we worked things together. It was in Westralia - the Land of T'othersiders - and, therefore, we were not surprised when Mitchell turned up early one morning, with his swag and an atmosphere of salt water about him.
JUNO. I sinned in intention. [Mrs. Juno abandons him and resumes her seat, chilled]. I'm as guilty as if I had actually sinned. And I insist on being treated as a sinner, and not walked over as if I'd done nothing, by your wife or any other man.
He could feel the piece of smooth-moving machinery under him flatten out in a long rhythmic stride, and his heart sank, for he knew it was the old Waster he had ridden to victory more than once; that same powerful stride that ate up the course with little friction. He was rating his horse. "Clatawa will come back," he kept thinking: "Clatawa will come back!"
Charming oysters I cry:/ My masters, come buy,/ So plump and so fresh,/ So sweet is their flesh,
He sat in the buckboard, given up to a moment or two of reflection. The result was that he turned away from the river, and entered the road that led between two fields back to the woods and into the heart of the country. He had determined upon taking a short cut to the Beltrans' plantation, and on the way he meant to keep an eye open for old Aunt Tildy's cabin, which he knew lay in some remote part of this cut-off.
I met a traveller from an antique land,/ Who said-"Two vast and trunkless legs of stone/ Stand in the desart . . . Near them, on the sand,/ Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,/ And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,/ Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Pagan and Christian Creeds: Their Origin and Meaning
Observations of this kind were naturally made by the ablest members of the tribe--who were in all probability the medicine-men and wizards--and brought in consequence power into their hands. The road to power in fact--and especially was this the case in societies which had not yet developed wealth and property--lay through Magic. --by Edward Carpenter
Few of us would exchange our memories for those of others. They have become a part of our personality, and we could not part with them without losing something of ourselves. Neither would we part with our own particular childhood, which, however difficult it may have been at times, seems to each of us more significant than the childhood of any one else. I can run over in my mind certain incidents of my childhood as if they were chapters in a much-loved book
"Oh! Mr. Cameron, how can you?" Mrs. Bouverie-Barton cried, quite pettishly; for even advanced ladies are still feminine enough at times to be distinctly pettish. "I take the greatest trouble to keep all such rubbish out of Joyce's way; and then you men of science come down here and talk like this to her, and undo all the good I've taken months in doing."
The grave with deathless flow'rs have dress'd,/ Of him whose virtue-kindling mind/ Their ev'ry charm supremely bless'd;/ Who trac'd the mazy warblings of the lyre/ With all a critic's art, and all a poet's fire
It affected him indeed as all right that he should be Count Otto Vogelstein; this appeared even rather a flippant mode of disposing of the fact. By way of rejoinder he asked her if she desired of him the surrender of his seat.
Pannomial Fragments--Jeremy Bentham
For justification of the legislative arrangements necessary to afford security against maleficent acts affecting the person, what it is necessary to show is, that by them pain will not be produced in such quantity as will cause it to outweigh the pleasure that would have been produced by the maleficent acts so prevented.
Now had the great Proclaimer, with a voice/More awful than the sound of trumpet, cried/Repentance, and Heaven's kingdom nigh at hand/To all baptized. To his great baptism flocked/With awe the regions round, and with them came/From Nazareth the son of Joseph deemed --Milton
I thought that my newly-found cousin was unknown to me, but when I looked at her with more attention, I fancied I recollected her features. She was the Catinella, a dancer of reputation, but I had never spoken to her before. I easily guessed that she was giving me an impromptu part in a play of her own composition, and I was to be a 'deux ex machina'.
At these words I rose and went to the window, where I stayed for more than a quarter of an hour reflecting on her infatuation. When I returned to the table where she was seated she scanned my features attentively, and said, with much emotion, "Can it be done, my dear friend? I see that you have been weeping."
And what unto them is the world beside,/ With all its change of time and tide?/ Its living things - its earth and sky -/ Are nothing to their mind and eye./ And heedless as the dead are they/ Of aught around, above, beneath;/
To The Shadow, certain facts were beginning to shape themselves out of the concealing murk of a planned murder. Already he had formed shrewd, accurate opinions about this girl and man-opinions that would be tested later in swift, purposeful action on his part. But for the present, he was content to lurk behind the curtain and let his sharp ears add testimony to his sight.
As he raced down the gangway, he pulled the collar of his coat high about his face. It was a desperate chance. But he was alive, and alive, he had a chance. He dared not think of the danger he was subjecting Alice and the baby to, for fear he'd turn back. For, somehow, he felt that he could not win.
PATRIOTISM: A MENACE TO LIBERTY
If that were patriotism, few American men of today could be called upon to be patriotic, since the place of play has been turned into factory, mill, and mine, while deafening sounds of machinery have replaced the music of the birds. Nor can we longer hear the tales of great deeds, for the stories our mothers tell today are but those of sorrow, tears, and grief.
"He has no right to speak, and certainly no inclination to think hardly of Miss Hauton," replied Godfrey gravely, but with an emotion, which he in vain endeavored to suppress. To change the conversation, he asked her opinion about a figure in the print. She took out her glass, and stooped to look quite closely at it.--"Before you utterly condemn me," continued she, speaking in a low voice,--"consider how fashion silences one's better taste and feelings, and how difficult it is when all around one ...
Paul Prescott's Charge: a story for boys
Poor Paul! his back ached dreadfully, for he had never before done any harder work than trifling services for his father. But the inexorable Mr. Mudge was in sight, and however much he wished, he did not dare to lay aside his hoe even for a moment.
Paul Revere's Ride--Longfellow
Lonely and spectral and sombre and still./ And lo! as he looks, on the belfry's height/ A glimmer, and then a gleam of light!/ He springs to the saddle, the bridle he turns,/ But lingers and gazes, till full on his sight/ A second lamp in the belfry burns.
"War," exclaimed Lathrop morosely, "is always cruel to the innocent." He sped toward Carver Centre. In his motor car, he had travelled the road many times, and as always his goal had been the home of Miss Beatrice Farrar, he had covered it at a speed unrecognized by law. But now he advanced with stealth and caution. In every clump of bushes he saw an ambush. Behind each rock he beheld the enemy.
Peacock Pie, A Book of Rhymes--Walter de la Mare
Bakers' are warm, cobblers' dark,/ Chemists' burn watery lights;/ But oh, the sawdust butcher's shop,/ That ugliest of sights!
Pearlin Jean--CHARLES KIRKPATRICK SHARPE
"After this, for many years, the house was haunted; doors shut and opened with great noise at midnight; the rustling of silks and pattering of high-heeled shoes were heard in bedrooms and passages. Nurse Jenny said there were seven ministers called in together at one time to lay the spirit; 'but they did no mickle good, my dear.'
Novelization of the incredibly popular early 20th century comedy, by J. Hartley Manners
PEN, PENCIL AND POISON: A Study in Green--Oscar Wilde
Some dark antique bronzes contrast "with the pale gleam of two noble Christi Crucifixi, one carved in ivory, the other moulded in wax." He has his trays of Tassie's gems, his tiny Louis-Quatorze bonbonnìere with a miniature by Pettitot, his highly prized "brown-biscuit teapots, filagree-worked," his citron morocco letter-case, and his "pomona-green" chair.
I confess that I know not what to think of all these singularities. I know so little of women! What the vicar tells me of Pepita surprises me; and yet, though on the whole I believe her to be good rather than the contrary, she inspires me at times with a certain fear on my father's account. Notwithstanding his fifty-five years, I believe that he is in love;--by Juan Valera
It would be an endless and perhaps no very agreeable task, to enumerate all the unlucky pranks he played upon his uncle and others, before he attained the fourth year of his age; about which time he was sent, with an attendant, to a day-school in the neighbourhood, that (to use his good mother's own expression) he might be out of harm's way. Here, however, he made little progress, except in mischief, which he practised with impunity, because the school-mistress would run no risk of disobliging a lady of fortune, by exercising unnecessary severities upon her only child. Nevertheless Mrs. Pickle was not so blindly partial as to be pleased with such unseasonable indulgence.
Perfect Behavior--Donald Ogden Stewart
The first thing to do on arriving at a symphony concert is to express the wish that the orchestra will play Beethoven's Fifth. If your companion then says "Fifth what?" you are safe with him for the rest of the evening; no metal can touch you. If, however, he says "So do I"-this is a danger signal and he may require careful handling.
Perilous Play--Louisa May Alcott
At tea, the initiated glanced covertly at one another, and saw, or fancied they saw, the effects of the hashish, in a certain suppressed excitement of manner, and unusually brilliant eyes. Belle laughed often, a silvery ringing laugh, pleasant to hear; but when complimented on her good spirits, she looked distressed and said she could not help her merriment; Meredith was quite calm, but rather dreamy; Evelyn was pale, and her next neighbor heard her heart beat; Norton talked incessantly, but as he talked uncommonly well, no one suspected anything.
Perils of Certain English Prisoners
We contrived to keep afloat all that night, and, the stream running strong with us, to glide a long way down the river. But, we found the night to be a dangerous time for such navigation, on account of the eddies and rapids, and it was therefore settled next day that in future we would bring-to at sunset, and encamp on the shore.
Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant v2
Soon after his return from Knoxville I ordered Sherman to distribute his forces from Stevenson to Decatur and thence north to Nashville; Sherman suggested that he be permitted to go back to Mississippi, to the limits of his own department and where most of his army still remained, for the purpose of clearing out what Confederates might still be left on the east bank of the Mississippi River to impede its navigation by our boats.
Personal Recollections of Anton Pavlovitch Chekhov--Maxim Gorky
He stopped, threw back his shoulders and stared scrutinizingly into the face of Anton Pavlovitch. He was dressed in a brand new uniform and his breast buttons shone as self-consciously and stupidly as the eyes in the neat little face of the youthful zealot of justice.
Peter Rugg, the Missing Man--William Austin
Just at twilight last summer a person stopped at the door of the late Mrs. Rugg. Mrs. Croft on coming to the door perceived a stranger, with a child by his side, in an old weather-beaten carriage, with a black horse. The stranger asked for Mrs. Rugg, and was informed that Mrs. Rugg had died at a good old age, more than twenty years before that time.
PETTICOAT INFLUENCE: (A FOOTBALL STORY)
"Why, I met the Oxford captain at Aunt Edith's dance, and I said how anxious you were to get your Blue, and I begged him to put you in the team. And the very next Saturday you were tried for the first time." -- special thanks to Dagny and the Blandings Group for providing this text.
But of one spirit all her own;-/ She, she herself, and only she,/ Shone through her body visibly.
Below, somewhere in the swirling gray cotton, the roar of the auxiliary motor began to draw away. Side by side at the rail, leaning over the Galleon's black side, the pair from the Agency strained their eyes for a glimpse of the escaping pirates. The fog was even gray, with no solid shadows moving in it.
But I scarcely heard him. The knowledge that my darling was the victim of the scourge that was ravaging all Europe drove me back against the wall faint and speechless with terror. "If she dies," he had said, and the words rang in my ears like a funeral knell. But she should not die. If any power in the world could save her, it should be found.
HIPPOLYTE/ Le dessein en est pris, je pars, cher Théramène,/ Et quitte le séjour de l'aimable Trézène./ Dans le doute mortel où je suis agité,/ Je commence à rougir de mon oisiveté./ Depuis plus de six mois éloigné de mon père,
Philip Vasilyevich's Story--Maxim Gorky
In the opposite corner sat a telegraphist, with his cap moved up to the back of his head. He leaned his chest heavily on the table and scrutinized sternly the bottle of vodka which stood before him. Big black flies were flying around over him, filling the air with a discontented and disturbing buzz. They now lost themselves amidst the dust-covered leaves of the flowers on the windows, and now with a swing struck bluntly against the window panes. A suffocating smell of tobacco, sour cabbage, geranium and of vodka filled the room.
NEOPTOLEMUS: And yet I wonder not; for if aright/I judge, from angry heaven the sentence came,/And Chrysa was the cruel source of all;/Nor doth this sad disease inflict him still/Incurable, without assenting gods?
This universal reappearance of self-consciousness - the notion which is aware of itself in its objectivity as a subjectivity identical with itself and for that reason universal - is the form of consciousness which lies at the root of all true mental or spiritual life - in family, fatherland, state, and of all virtues, love, friendship, valour, honour, fame. But this appearance of the underlying essence may also be severed from that essence, and be maintained apart in worthless honour
Eudora drew more closely to her friend, and said, timidly: "Oh, Philothea, do not talk of the gods. Such discourse has a strange and fearful power when the radiant daughter of Zeus is looking down upon us in all her heavenly majesty. Even the midnight procession of the Panathenaia affected me less deeply."
Piccolissima--Eliza Lee Follen
"It was hardly worth while," said a small, sharp voice, "it was hardly worth the trouble it cost me to leave my cradle. I have come into the world where all is dead around me. Ah! if I had only known that this world was so cold and dull, I should not have made efforts which almost destroyed me, to break the roof and leave my narrow house."
Pieces in Early Youth, 1834-'42--Walt Whitman
He dragg'd his guardian to the earth and fell crushingly upon him, choking the shriek the poor victim but just began to utter. Then, with monstrous imprecations, he twisted a tight knot around the gasping creature's neck, drew a clasp knife from his pocket, and touching the spring, the long sharp blade, too eager for its bloody work, flew open.
Pierre and Jean had remained in the little outer drawing-room; the younger still sore under the criticism passed on his taste, and the elder chafing more and more at seeing his brother in this abode. They both sat smoking without a word. Pierre suddenly started to his feet.
By some strange arts, Isabel's wonderful story might have been, some way, and for some cause, forged for her, in her childhood, and craftily impressed upon her youthful mind; which so-like a slight mark in a young tree-and now enlargingly grown with her growth, till it had become this immense staring marvel. Tested by any thing real, practical, and reasonable, what less probable, for instance, than that fancied crossing of the sea in her childhood, when upon Pierre's subsequent questioning of her, she did not even know that the sea was salt.
Mr. Morehouse went home raging. His boy, who had been awaiting the guinea-pigs, knew better than to ask him for them. He was a normal boy and therefore always had a guilty conscience when his father was angry. So the boy slipped quietly around the house. There is nothing so soothing to a guilty conscience as to be out of the path of the avenger.
There! I have given it him in earnest now; I don't think he will forget that thrashing! What do you say?-And I say that you are an injudicious mother! You make excuses for him, and countenance any sort of rascality on his part-Not rascality? What do you call it, then? Slipping out of the house at night, going out in a fishing boat, staying away till well on in the day, and giving me such a horrible fright when I have so much to worry me!
Pioneers Of France In The New World
The monk, the inquisitor, and the Jesuit were lords of Spain,-- sovereigns of her sovereign, for they had formed the dark and narrow mind of that tyrannical recluse. They had formed the minds of her people, quenched in blood every spark of rising heresy, and given over a noble nation to a bigotry blind and inexorable as the doom of fate. Linked with pride, ambition, avarice, every passion of a rich, strong nature
Ata. (Draws his sword.) Now, my brethren, my sons, my friends, I know your valour.- Should ill success assail us, be despair the last feeling of your hearts.-If successful, let mercy be the first. Alonzo, to you I give to defend the narrow passage of the mountains. On the right of the wood be Rolla's station. For me, strait forwards will I march to meet them, and fight until I see my people saved, or they behold their Monarch fall. Be the word of battle -God! and our native land. (A march.)
No man will ever know the exact truth of this story; though women may sometimes whisper it to one another after a dance, when they are putting up their hair for the night and comparing lists of victims. A man, of course, cannot assist at these functions. So the tale must be told from the outside--in the dark--all wrong.
Plan of a Novel according to Hints from Various Quarters
From this outset, the Story will proceed, and contain a striking variety of adventures. Heroine and her Father never above a fortnight together in one place, he being driven from his Curacy by the vile arts of some totally unprincipled and heart-less young Man, desperately in love with the Heroine, and pursuing her with unrelenting passion. -- No sooner settled in one Country of Europe than they are necessitated to quit it and retire to another
PLUTUS: Zeus inflicted it on me, because of his jealousy of-mankind. When I was young, I threatened him that I would only go to the just, the wise, the men of ordered life; to prevent my distinguishing these, he struck me with blindness' so much does he envy the good!
"Sandy en Tenie hadn' b'en libbin' tergedder fer mo' d'n two mont's befo' Mars Marrabo's old uncle, w'at libbed down in Robeson County, sent up ter fine out ef Mars Marrabo couldn' len' 'im er hire 'im a good han' fer a mont' er so. Sandy's marster wuz one er dese yer easy-gwine folks w'at wanter please eve'ybody, en he says yas, he could len' 'im Sandy.
It was you, Atthis, who said/"Sappho, if you will not get/up and let us look at you/I shall never love you again!
I've quench'd my lamp, I struck it in that start/Which every limb convulsed, I heard it fall--/The crash blent with my sleep, I saw depart/Its light, even as I woke, on yonder wall;/Over against my bed, there shone a gleam/Strange, faint, and mingling also with my dream./
With that same chest on door he smote,/For the lack of flesh and skin;/"O hearken, maiden Else,/And let thy true-love in!" --by William Morris
You stand in the village and look up to Heaven;/ The precious stones glitter on flights seventy-seven;/ And my brother is there, and my friend and thine/ Descend and ascend with the bread and the wine./
POEMS FROM THE ROSSETTI MANUSCRIPT PART I
Shall I cast it on the sand/ And turn it into fruitful land?/ For on no other ground/ Can I sow my seed,/ Without tearing up/ Some stinking weed.
POEMS FROM THE ROSSETTI MANUSCRIPT PART II
`And, to end thy cruel mocks,/ Annihilate thee on the rocks,/ And another form create/ To be subservient to my fate.
POEMS FROM THE ROSSETTI MANUSCRIPT PART III
Thine is the Friend of all Mankind;/ Mine speaks in parables to the blind./ Thine loves the same world that mine hates;/ Thy heaven doors are my hell gates./ Socrates taught what Meletus/ Loath'd as a nation's bitterest curse,
Rencontré soit des bestes feu gectans/ Que Jason vit, querant la toison d'or,/ Ou transmué d'omme en beste sept ans/ Ainsi que fut Nabougodonosor,/ Ou il ait guerre et perte aussi villaine/ Que Troies ot pour la prise d'Elayne,
For that is the way with a poet. If he gets interested in somebody's point of view, he steps in and pushes the owner out of the way and lives his life for a while. The scullery-maid below stairs did not know that the blond young man on the fourth floor was washing her dishes, peeling her potatoes, and dreading with her the harsh voice of the cook; but so he was. In the evening he stood beside her as she listened to the song of the river
Thou fair-hair'd angel of the evening,/ Now, whilst the sun rests on the mountains, light/ Thy bright torch of love; thy radiant crown/ Put on, and smile upon our evening bed!/ Smile on our loves, and while thou drawest the/ Blue curtains of the sky, scatter thy silver dew
Poetry and the Gods--Lovecraft and Crofts
Then in his arms Hermes bore the dreaming maiden through the skies. Gentle breezes from the tower of Aiolas wafted them high above warm, scented seas, till suddenly they came upon Zeus, holding court upon double-headed Parnassus, his golden throne flanked by Apollo and the Muses on the right hand, and by ivy-wreathed Dionysus and pleasure-flushed Bacchae on the left hand.
Poganuc People: Their Loves and Lives
"For my part I don't care so very much for these 'ere town-hill aristocracy," said Tim Hawkins. "They live here in their gret houses and are so proud they think it's a favor to speak to a farmer in his blue linsey shirt a drivin' his team. I don't want none on 'em lookin' down on me. I am as good as they be; and I guess you make as much in your trade by the farmers out on the hills as you do by the rich folks here in town."
These critics greatly deceive themselves and, "consciously or unconsciously," endeavour to deceive the public concerning us. We love liberty much more than they do. We love it to the point of wishing it complete and entire. We wish the reality and not the fiction. Hence we repel every bourgeois alliance, since we are convinced that all liberty conquered by the aid of the bourgeoisie, their political means and weapons, or by an alliance with their political dupes, will prove profitable for Messrs. the bourgeois, but never anything more than a fiction for the workers.
WHEN John Douglas's uncle offered to educate his nephew for the ministry, the boy was less enthusiastic than his mother. He did not remonstrate, however, for it had been the custom of generations for at least one son of each Douglas family to preach the gospel of Calvinism, and his father's career as an architect and landscape gardener had not left him much capital. --by Margaret Mayo
When Ngatoro-i-rangi's people saw this, one of them ran off with all speed to tell his master, who was then at work with some of his servants on his farm, and having found him be said: 'There is a stranger just arrived at your residence, who carries a travelling bag as if she had come from a long journey, and she would not come in at the gate of the fortress, but climbed right over the wooden defences--by George Grey
In spite of Herrick's disparagement of Dean- bourn, which he calls "a rude river," and his characterization of Devon folk as "a peo- ple currish, churlish as the seas," the fullest and pleasantest days of his life were prob- ably spent at Dean Prior. He was not un- mindful meanwhile of the gathering political storm that was to shake England to its foun- dations.--by Thomas Bailey Aldrich
Poor and Proud, or The Fortunes of Katy Redburn
Katy began to cry, as the last hope of redemption from the fangs of Dr. Flynch fled. Even Master Simon Sneed was alarmed at the idea of being handed over to the police; but his sense of dignity compelled him to enter his earnest protest, against the proceeding of the broker, and even to threaten him with the terrors of the law. The money-lender repeated his menace, and even went to the door, for the apparent purpose of putting it into execution. --by Oliver Optic
It was the fat man! Eddie was bedded down on him as comfortable as a Persian princess on forty-seven sofa-pillows. The fat man was speaking extemporaneously, and the form of his remarks was an argument for the use of a manuscript. The tenor of his speech was something like this:
POPEAU INTERVENES--Marie Belloc Lowndes
What would they both have felt had it suddenly been revealed to them that their every word had been overheard, each passionate gesture witnessed, by an invisible listener and watcher? Yet such was the strange and almost incredible fact. Hercules Popeau, but lately retired on a pension from the C.I.D. branch of the French Police, had long made the Hotel Paragon his home, and his comfortable study lay to the right of the stately drawing-room which terminated Lord and Lady Waverton's suite.
Your mind and you are our Sargasso Sea,/ London has swept about you this score years/ And bright ships left you this or that in fee:/ Ideas, old gossip, oddments of all things,/ Strange spars of knowledge and dimmed wares of price./ Great minds have sought you - lacking someone else./ You have been second always. Tragical?/ No. You preferred it to the usual thing:
WE have seen that the Socialist ideal of reconstructing society on some co-operative or communal basis had its origin in the fact that the unrestricted use of machinery was found to be incompatible with a competitive society; that the problems growing out of machine production found a central position in Socialist theory from the days of Owen to Marx, but were lost sight of and forgotten by the Fabians,--by ARTHUR J. PENTY
Nothing is more dangerous for man's private morality than the habit of command. The best man, the most intelligent, disinterested, generous, pure, will infallibly and always be spoiled at this trade. Two sentiments inherent in power never fail to produce this demoralisation; they are: contempt for the masses and the overestimation of one's own merits.
The steward and his wife, with the other servants, came to me immediately; all clinging together, with a number of lights in their hands. It seems they had all been waiting to see the issue of the interview betwixt me and the apparition. They asked me what was the matter. I told them the foregoing circumstances, and showed them the box. The steward durst not meddle with it, but his wife had more courage, and, with the help of the other servants, tugged it out, and found the key.
Lady Moseley smiled through her tears, and turning to her husband, said, "we will go early, my dear, that we may see the improvements Francis has been making before we dine;" the baronet nodded assent, but his heart was too full to speak; and apologising to the colonel for his absence, on the plea of some business with his people, left the room.
"Words are wanting to express the sensations which have been excited by Mr. Benfield's letter; but it would be impossible for any man to be so base as to avail himself of such liberality; the recollection of it, together with his many virtues, will long continue deeply impressed on the heart of him, who Mr. Benfield would, if within the power of man, render the happiest amongst human beings."
The month of APRIL will be observable for the death of many great persons. On the 4th will die the Cardinal de Noailles, Archbishop of Paris; on the 11th, the young Prince of Asturias, son to the Duke of Anjou; on the 14th, a great peer of this realm will die at his country house; on the 19th, an old layman of great fame for learning, and on the 23rd, an eminent goldsmith in Lombard Street. I could mention others, both at home and abroad, if I did not consider it is of very little use or instruction to the reader, or to the world.
Preface to Androcles and the Lion--George Bernard Shaw
All this will become clear if we read the gospels without prejudice. When I was young it was impossible to read them without fantastic confusion of thought. The confusion was so utterly confounded that it was called the proper spirit to read the Bible in. Jesus was a baby; and he was older than creation. He was a man who could be persecuted, stoned, scourged, and killed; and he was a god, immortal and all-powerful, able to raise the dead and call millions of angels to his aid.
"They are battering the palace-doors," said Eugene, who, in spite of the steward's entreaties, had approached the window and was looking down upon the mob. The palace de Soissons fronted the Poie Deux Ecus, from which it was separated by a tall iron railing. The enclosure was filled with a throng so dense that there was scarcely room for them to move a limb; and yet, in their regular assaults upon the palace-doors, they seemed to be obeying the commands of some unseen chief.
MIMI. You would like to see them dancing in the moonlight, and hear the clatter of their trinkets and shields? You would like to meet old King Alberich, and Mimi the smith? You would like to see that cavern yawn open . . . [points to right] and fire and steam break forth, and all the Nibelungs come running out? Would you like that? ha? --by Upton Sinclair
He was within two feet of the girl who had been called "Aline." She raised her head to speak, and saw Carlton staring open-eyed at her. She glanced at him for an instant, as if to assure herself that she did not know him, and then, turning to her brother, smiled in the same tolerant, amused way in which she had so often smiled upon Carlton from the picture.
No more to wait the twilight of the moon/ In this sequestrated vale of star and spire;/ For one, eternal morning of desire/ Passes to time and earthy afternoon./ Here, Heracletus, did you build of fire/ And changing stuffs your prophecy far hurled/ Down the dead years; this midnight I aspire
PRISONS: A SOCIAL CRIME AND FAILURE
The most horrible aspect is that our national crime is murder, not robbery, embezzlement, or rape, as in the South. London is five times as large as Chicago, yet there are one hundred and eighteen murders annually in the latter city, while only twenty in London. Nor is Chicago the leading city in crime, since it is only seventh on the list, which is headed by four Southern cities, and San Francisco and Los Angeles. In view of such a terrible condition of affairs, it seems ridiculous to prate of the protection society derives from its prisons.
PROOF THAT THE DIVINITY OF THE SAVIOUR IS IMPASSIBLE
4. The nature of men is compounded of body and soul. But it sinned and stood in need of a sacrifice free from every spot. So if the Creator took a body and a soul, and keeping them clean from the stains of sin for men's bodies gave His body and for their souls His soul. If this is true, and true it is, for these are words of truth itself, then wild and blasphemous are they who ascribe passion to the divine nature. --by Theodoret
PROOFS THAT THE UNION WAS WITHOUT CONFUSION
2. We too assert the union, and ourselves confess that it took place at the conception; if then by the union the natures were mixed and confounded, how was the flesh after the birth not seen to possess any new quality, but exhibited the human character, preserved the dimensions of the babe, was wrapped in swaddling clothes, and sucked a mother's breast? --by Theodoret
THE man who seeks to create a better order of society has two resistances to contend with: one that of Nature, the other that of his fellow-men. Broadly speaking, it is science that deals with the resistance of Nature, while politics and social organization are the methods of overcoming the resistance of men. --by Bertrand Russell
Prufrock and Other Observations
Let us go then, you and I,/When the evening is spread out against the sky/Like a patient etherized upon a table;/Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,/The muttering retreats Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
When I gaze at your broad, bulging forehead, when I see the clear light of intelligence in your eyes, and hear the grey matter splashing restlessly about in your cerebellum, I say to myself without hesitation, 'Comrade Windsor must have more scope.'" He looked at Mike, who was turning over the leaves of his copy of Cosy Moments in a sort of dull despair. "Well, Comrade Jackson, and what is your verdict?"
If you are a philosopher you can do this thing: you can go to the top of a high building, look down upon your fellow-men 300 feet below, and despise them as insects. Like the irresponsible black waterbugs on summer ponds, they crawl and circle and hustle about idiotically without aim or purpose. They do not even move with the admirable intelligence of ants, for ants always know when they are going home. The ant is of a lowly station, but he will often reach home and get his slippers on while you are left at your elevated station.
'Nay. My venture was South. Farther South than any man has fared, Hugh and I went down with Witta and his heathen.' He jerked the tall sword forward, and leaned on it with both hands; but his eyes looked long past them.
Ce bâtiment était monté par un équipage français, mais faisait partie de la flottille anglaise placée en station et comme en sentinelle à la pointe orientale de l'île. Le prince de la Tour-d'Auvergne, qui était de la maison de Bouillon, commandait la flottille anglaise, et c'était par ses ordres, et pour un service urgent et spécial, que la corvette en avait été détachée.
One monkey man launched a stab he felt certain would end the fray. It was aimed directly for the bronze giant's heart. But the monkey man felt a terrible paralysis seize his wrist and arm. He did not have time to realize a steel-thewed hand had grasped his darting knife fist and turned it toward his own vitals--the blade was in his heart before he could realize that fact.
AT the wall of the execution area, The Shadow was standing with hands behind his back. His chin was raised; his eyes wore a smile. Those glinting gun muzzles that caught the sun from the Sierras did not perturb Senor Jose Rembole. The Shadow's disguised lips had curled in a disdainful smile.
But soon tiring of this,/She gave it into the hands of a skilful carver,/Who fashioned out of it an intaglio of great beauty;/This the lady set in a band of gold
We need scarcely explain that this procession was formed by Ruggiero's wild troop, and that the two leaders were the stern captain himself and the fair Bandelora, who, dissembling her hate, had unwillingly accompanied him to the Ruined Chapel. The body, which was that of the lieutenant, bore witness to the captain's regard for the treasury of the band. --author uncertain
Gregory had an habitual severity with his own behavior which did not stop there, but was always passing on to the behavior of others; and his days went by in alternate offence and reparation to those he had to do with. He had to do chiefly with the dining-room girls, whose susceptibilities were such that they kept about their work bathed in tears or suffused with anger much of the time.
The entertainment was to be the second night after that, and Mrs. Milray at first took the whole affair into her own hands. She was willing to let the others consult with her, but she made all the decisions, and she became so prepotent that she drove Lord Lioncourt to rebellion in the case of some theatrical people whom he wanted in the programme.
Hearing these words, Ramona came to the window, and leaning out, whispered, "Are you talking about Alessandro's staying? Let me come and talk to him. He must not go." And running swiftly through the hall, across the veranda, and down the steps, she stood by Alessandro's side in a moment. Looking up in his face pleadingly, she said: "We can't let you go, Alessandro. The Senor will pay wages to some other to go in your place with the shearers.
It began to be borne in upon Mrs. Pool that Minnie sometimes varied from the truth. A few days more, and she seriously doubted whether the girl ever uttered a veracious word. In her ceaseless gossip Minnie had contradicted herself times innumerable. More than that, she seemed to be yielding to a physical languor which made her useless in the house; once, on returning from shopping, Mrs. Pool found her asleep, with her head on the kitchen table, and beside it a penny novelette.
REALITY OR DELUSION?--Mrs. Henry Wood
THIS is a ghost story. Every word of it is true. And I don't mind confessing that for ages afterwards some of us did not care to pass the spot alone at night. Some people do not care to pass it yet.
REBECCA AND ROWENA: A ROMANCE UPON ROMANCE
It was not until the King wanted to interfere with the sport of every gentleman in England (as we know by reference to the Historic Page that this odious monarch did), that Athelstane broke out into open rebellion, along with several Yorkshire squires and noblemen. It is recorded of the King, that he forbade every man to hunt his own deer; and, in order to secure an obedience to his orders, this Herod of a monarch wanted to secure the eldest sons of all the nobility and gentry, as hostages for the good behavior of their parents.
Rebecca Mary had evolved the name from her inner consciousness and her intense gratitude to Aunt Olivia and the minister's wife. She had put Aunt Olivia first with instinctive loyalty, though in the secret little closet of her soul she had longed to call the beautiful being Felicia, intact and sweet. --by Annie Hamilton Donnell
"Which, then, should be this direction? What would be the main purpose and task of the organization? To help the people achieve self-determination on a basis of complete and comprehensive human liberty, without the slightest interference from even temporary or transitional power...
RECENT CHANGES IN AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONAL THEORY--JOHN W. BURGESS
I hold that the Spanish War of that year was the turning point in our political and constitutional history. Down to that date, the movement of that history had been an almost unbroken march in the direction of a more and more perfect individual liberty and immunity against the powers of government, and a more and more complete and efficient organization and operation of the sovereignty back of both government and liberty, limiting the powers of government and defining and guaranteeing individual liberty.
Recent Writings By American Indians--Elisabeth Luther Cary
An interesting pendant to his "Recollections of the Wild Life" is a little book, published a couple of years ago by Francis La Flesche, son of the former head chief of the Omaha tribe, giving his experience at the Presbyterian Mission School, where he was educated. In the main it is an account of this school-life, but in its references to the author's pre-civilized existence it tallies with the impression given by Dr. Eastman.
Recollections of My Childhood--Louisa May Alcott
The girlish folly did not last long, and the letters were burned years ago; but Goethe is still my favorite author, and Emerson remained my beloved "Master" while he lived, doing more for me, as for many another young soul, than he ever knew, by the simple beauty of his life, the truth and wisdom of his books, the example of a good great man untempted and unspoiled by the world which he made nobler while in it, and left the richer when he went.
Such are the limitations of the common mind, and so thoroughly engrossing are the cares of common life, that only the few among men can discern through the glitter and dazzle of present prosperity the dark outlines of approaching disasters, even though they may have come up to our very gates, and are already within striking distance. The yawning seam and corroded bolt conceal their defects from the mariner until the storm calls all hands to the pumps.
After travelling for seventeen days, a distance we may calculate of about 1500 le, (the pilgrims) reached the kingdom of Shen-shen,[1] a country rugged and hilly, with a thin and barren soil. The clothes of the common people are coarse, and like those worn in our land of Han,[2] some wearing felt and others coarse serge or cloth of hair;-- this was the only difference seen among them. --by Fa-Hien
The only thing in the world that could have made her toss up her reporter's job was the one to which she had gone with "Big Tim" Noonan's outfit. Her father had died in action on the city force, and it had taken five bullets to drop him. The tracking of malefactors, the swift action of cornering them and the thrill of bringing them in for justice, were as much in her blood as is speed in that of a finely-bred race horse.
Red Tape in Washington--Horace Towner
The record showed that a man of that name had served in the company and regiment given. So far, all right; but the application stated that the soldier claimed a disability rating on account of an injury to his head, which he had received in line of duty, and as a result of which he was now totally disabled. There was no mention in the man's military record of any wound or other injury.
Red-Headed Windego--EDWARD WILLIAM THOMSON
Strangest of all, at the front of each print were five narrow holes which suggested that the mysterious creature had travelled with bare, claw-like toes. An irregular drip or squirt of blood went along the middle of the indentations! Nevertheless, the whole thing seemed of human devising.
Yes, I will go to sea; cut my kind uncles and aunts, and sympathizing patrons, and leave no heavy hearts but those in my own home, and take none along but the one which aches in my bosom. Cold, bitter cold as December, and bleak as its blasts, seemed the world then to me; there is no misanthrope like a boy disappointed; and such was I, with the warmth of me flogged out by adversity. But these thoughts are bitter enough even now, for they have not yet gone quite away; and they must be uncongenial enough to the reader; so no more of that, and let me go on with my story.
She left them crowded into the narrow strip of shade on the porch of the long, low house; the white sunlight was beating in on the white old boards; some chickens were scratching in the grass at the foot of the steps, and one had boldly mounted, and was stepping heavily, solemnly, and aimlessly across the gallery. There was a pleasant odor of pinks in the air, and the sound of negroes' laughter was coming across the flowering cotton-field.
Eyes wide with fear, the man staggered out of his bed. His foot caught in the bedclothes. He pitched forward. As he fell the man who had awakened him lashed out and his hand smashed down on the nape of the other man's neck.
Religio Medici, Hydriotaphia, and the Letter to a Friend
Sect. 2.--But, because the name of a Christian is be- come too general to express our faith,--there being a geography of religion as well as lands, and every clime distinguished not only by their laws and limits, but circumscribed by their doctrines and rules of faith,--to be particular, I am of that reformed new-cast religion, wherein I dislike nothing but the name--by Sir Thomas Browne
Reminiscences of Captain Gronow
"Monk" Lewis, unable to stand against the outcry thus raised against him, determined to try the effects of absence, and took his departure for the island in which his property was; but unfortunately for those who dissented from the ferocious judgment that was passed upon him, and for those who had discrimination enough to know that after all there was nothing very objectionable in his romance, and felt assured that posterity would do him justice, this amiable and kind-hearted man died on his passage out; leaving a blank in one variety of literature which has never been filled up.
Reminiscences of Ralph Waldo Emerson--Louisa May Alcott
Here, too, in the pleasant room with the green hills opposite, and the pines murmuring musically before the windows, Emerson wrote essays more helpful than most sermons; lectures which created the lyceum; poems full of power and sweetness; and better than song or sermon has lived a life so noble, true and beautiful that its wide-spreading influence is felt on both sides of the sea.
The bronze man could see the spot where the Repel lay. Only the water was not parted. Two boats, power cruisers, were anchored at the spot, and divers were over the side. They seemed to be hauling something to the surface.
Razors pain you;/ Rivers are damp;/ Acids stain you;/ And drugs cause cramp.
The woman who shewing little succeeds in making a man want to see more, has accomplished three-fourths of the task of making him fall in love with her; for is love anything else than a kind of curiosity? I think not; and what makes me certain is that when the curiosity is satisfied the love disappears. Love, however, is the strongest kind of curiosity in existence, and I was already curious about Annette.
Momolo took the money, and promised to buy the garden the following day, and the young man shedding tears of joy and gratitude fell on his knees and kissed my hand. All the girls wept, as I myself did, for there's a contagion in such happy tears. Nevertheless, they did not all proceed from the same source; some were virtuous and some vicious, and the young man's were the only ones whose source was pure and unalloyed.
I went to see her every morning, and as my interest in her condition was genuine, she could have no suspicion that I was acting a part, or attribute my care of her to anything but the most delicate feelings. For her part she seemed well pleased in the alteration of my behaviour, though her satisfaction may very probably have been assumed. I understood women well enough to know that though she did not love me she was probably annoyed at seeing my new character sit upon me so easily.
. The duchess told me as much on the occasion of my third visit. She did not give me the information in a complaining tone, or as if she was fain to be consoled, but merely to defy her confessor, who had threatened her with excommunication if she went on telling people about her husband's condition, or if she tried to cure him of it.
In the first month of her hurry and flurry Mrs. Arkwright was a happy woman. She would see her mother again and her sisters. It was now four years since she had left them on the quay at Southampton, while all their hearts were broken at the parting. She was a young bride then, going forth with her new lord to meet the stern world.
II. Replacing the cult of God by respect and love of humanity, we proclaim human reason as the only criterion of truth; human conscience as the basis of justice; individual and collective freedom as the only source of order in society.
Now you can understand their indignation when, one blowy July afternoon, as they were going up for a potato-roast, they saw somebody moving among the trees. They hurled themselves over the gate, dropping half the potatoes, and while they were picking them up Puck came out of a wigwam.
My sister gave a yell of despair, and dashed out with a rag and a pan of water, weeping wildly. She sat in the middle of the yard with the befouled puppy, and shedding bitter tears she wiped him and washed him clean. Loudly she reproached my mother. "Look how much bigger you are than he is. It's a shame, it's a shame!"
RHETORIC and STYLE--THOMAS DE QUINCEY
Many years ago, when studying the Aristotelian rhetoric at Oxford, it struck us that, by whatever name Aristotle might describe the main purpose of rhetoric, practically, at least, in his own treatment of it, he threw the whole stress upon finding such arguments for any given thesis as, without positively proving or disproving it, gave it a colorable support. We could not persuade ourselves that it was by accident that the topics, or general heads of argument, were never in an absolute and unconditional sense true
We started out for God Knows Where, we started out a-roarin';/We 'ollered: "'Ere We Are Again", and 'struth! but we was dry./The dust was gummin' up our ears, and 'ow the sweat was pourin';/The road was long, the sun was like a brazier in the sky./We wondered where the 'Uns was -- we wasn't long a-wonderin',
Have ever you heard of the Land of Beyond,/That dreams at the gates of the day?/Alluring it lies at the skirts of the skies,/And ever so far away;/Alluring it calls: O ye the yoke galls,/And ye of the trail overfond,/With saddle and pack, by paddle and track,/Let's go to the Land of Beyond!
I was amazed at his insight. And for the moment was impelled to make a clean breast of my suspicions,-nay, of my convictions of the whole devil's plot. But I had no proofs. I remembered that to the colonel my uncle was a gentleman of respectability and of wealth, and a member of his Excellency's Council. That to accuse him of scheming for my inheritance would gain me nothing in Mr. Washington's esteem.
Richard Hurdis, volume 1--William Gilmore Simms
"I would be unwilling to believe, and am quite as unwilling to hear, any thing which could be prejudicial to the good name of any of your family, your brother or yourself. I have loved them all too long, and too truly, Richard, to find pleasure in any thing which spoke against their worth. I should be not less unwilling, Richard, to think that you could say anything, which did not merit and command belief. I might think you guilty of error, never of falsehood."
Richard Hurdis, volume 2--William Gilmore Simms
The murderer hurried homewards when this dark conference was ended. The affair in which he had acted so principal, yet secondary a part, had exercised a less obvious influence upon him than upon the yet baser person who had egged him on to the deed. There was no such revulsion of feeling in his bosom, as in that of John Hurdis. Endowed with greater nerve at first, and rendered obtuse from habit and education, the nicer sensibilities--the keener apprehensions of the mind
The charwoman now appeared at the door with her pail of hot water. Margaret looked into her face, as if to read guilt or innocence. She was a protegee of Christie's, who was not apt to accord her favour easily, or without good grounds; an honest, decent widow, with a large family to maintain by her labour - that was the character in which Margaret had engaged her; and she looked it.
The right of a Parliament is only a right in trust, a right by delegation, and that but from a very small part of the Nation; and one of its Houses has not even this. But the right of the Nation is an original right, as universal as taxation. The nation is the paymaster of everything, and everything must conform to its general will.
October passed out and the dreary days of November and December dragged by. The world shook with the thunder of contending armies; Antwerp fell -Turkey declared war-gallant little Serbia gathered herself together and struck a deadly blow at her oppressor; and in quiet, hill-girdled Glen St. Mary, thousands of miles away, hearts beat with hope and fear over the varying dispatches from day to day.
Rio Grande's Last Race & Other Verses
He followed up and blazed the trees, to show the safest track,/ Then drew his belt another hole and turned and started back./ His horses died - just one pulled through with nothing much to spare;/ God bless the beast that brought him home, the old white Arab mare!/ We drove the cattle through the hills, along the new-found way,/ And this was our first camping-ground - just where I live to-day./
Rise of the New West, 1819-1829--Frederick Jackson Turner
The effect of all this upon New York City was revolutionary. Its population increased from 123,000 in 1820 to 202,000 in 1830. Its real and personal estate rose in value from about seventy million dollars in 1820 to about one hundred and twenty-five million dollars in 1830. The most significant result of the canal was the development of the commerce of New York City, which rose from a market town for the Hudson River to be the metropolis of the north.
Perhaps, if he had known that Adele had stood at the gate on that unlucky night, where she had followed, lingering, to await the return of her brother and lover, wondering why they had chosen so tempestuous an hour and so black a spot to hold converse-if he had known that a sudden flash of lightning had revealed to her sight that short, sharp struggle as Victor was sinking under his hands, he might have explained everything, and she-
The other boys had tied Shargar's feet to the desk at which he sat--likewise his hands, at full stretch; then, having attached about a dozen strings to as many elf-locks of his pale-red hair, which was never cut or trimmed, had tied them to various pegs in the wall behind him, so that the poor fellow could not stir. They were now crushing up pieces of waste-paper, not a few leaves of stray school-books being regarded in that light, into bullets
But we on this side are the poorer - by how much we can never know. What strengthens the conviction that he might yet have surpassed himself and dwarfed his own best work is, certainly no immaturity, for the flavour of wisdom and old experience hangs about his earliest writings, but a vague sense awakened by that brilliant series of books, so diverse in theme, so slight often in structure --by Sir Walter Raleigh
Robert Louis Stevenson, A Record, An Estimate, A Memorial
"In years to come, when his grave is perchance forgotten, a rugged ruin, home of the lizard and the bat, Tusitala - the story-teller - 'the man with a heart of gold' (as I so often heard him designated in the Islands), will live, when it may be his tales have ceased to interest, in the tender remembrance of those whose lives he beautified, and whose hearts he warmed into gratitude." --by A.H. Japp
Robin Redbreast--Selma Lagerlof
Robin redbreast told the little ones all about that wonderful day of creation, and how the Lord had given names to everything, just as each redbreast had told it, ever since the first redbreast had heard God's word and gone out of God's hand. "And mark you," he ended sorrowfully, "so many years have gone, so many roses have bloomed, so many little birds have come out of their eggs since Creation day, but robin redbreast is still a little grey bird. He has not yet succeeded in gaining his red feathers."
I understood him in many things, and let him know I was very well pleased with him. In a little time I began to speak to him; and teach him to speak to me: and first, I let him know his name should be Friday, which was the day I saved his life: I called him so for the memory of the time. I likewise taught him to say Master; and then let him know that was to be my name: I likewise taught him to say Yes and No and to know the meaning of them.
Wonderful! Such had been the precision of the shots that the measures gave no appreciable difference. If they were not exactly in the mathematical center of the line, the distance between the needles was so small as to be invisible to the naked eye. (prequel to Master of the World)
The brilliant Roman winter came round again, and Rowland enjoyed it, in a certain way, more deeply than before. He grew at last to feel that sense of equal possession, of intellectual nearness, which it belongs to the peculiar magic of the ancient city to infuse into minds of a cast that she never would have produced. He became passionately, unreasoningly fond of all Roman sights and sensations
The attachment of Strap, flowed from a voluntary, disinterested inclination, which had manifested itself on many occasions in my behalf, having once rendered me the same service as I had afforded to Gawky, by saving my life at the risk of his own; and often fathered offences I had committed, for which he suffered severely, rather than I should feel the the weight of the punishment I deserved. --These two champions were the more willing to engage in this enterprize, as they intended to leave the school next day, as well as I; the first being ordered by his father to return into the country, and the other being bound apprentice to a barber, at a market town not far off.
Not one hour, but nearly three, had passed before Rolf sighted the Pipestave Pond, as it was called. He had never been there before, but three short whoops, as arranged, brought answer and guidance. Quonab was standing on the high rock. When Rolf came he led down to the wigwam on its south side. --by Ernest Thompson Seton
This sudden apparition, spewed from the silent house, reached the bottom of the steps as Doctor James came opposite. Her brain transferring its energies from sound to sight, she ceased her clamor and fixed her pop-eyes upon the case the doctor carried.
There was nothing left but to mother her daughter; and dear Jenny was such a perfect daughter that she needed no excessive mothering. "Now with Babs Ansley I don't know that I should be so quiet," Mrs. Slade sometimes half-enviously reflected; but Jenny, who was younger than her brilliant friend, was that rare accident, an extremely pretty girl who somehow made youth and prettiness seem as safe as their absence. It was all perplexing-and to Mrs. Slade a little boring.
Romantic Ballads Translated from the Danish and Miscellaneous Pieces
Said he, "If thou art valiant, Knight,/My murder soon will see the light;/For thou wilt ride to Heddybee,/Where live my youthful brothers three:/"And there, too, thou wilt surely find/My father dear and mother kind;/And there sits Kate, my much-loved wife,/Who with her women took my life.--translated by George Borrow
There was a rising sob in Romola's voice as she said the last words, which touched the fatherly fibre in Bardo. He stretched his hand upward a little in search of her golden hair, and as she placed her head under his hand, he gently stroked it, leaning towards her as if his eyes discerned some glimmer there.
RONDEAU REDOUBLE (AND SCARCELY WORTH THE TROUBLE, AT THAT)
My heart beats low in loneliness, despite/ That riotous Summer holds the earth in sway./ In cerements my spirit is bedight;/ The same to me are sombre days and gay.
So simple too, like all good things. He had poisoned sticks of gum, carefully rewrapped them in their gaudy paper coverings and then, a careless approach to the chewing gum dispenser... a penny inserted... the switch of the poisoned gum for the real... push it up a little into the inside of the machine... and the next person who bought a piece of gum got two pieces for his penny.
Rosmer. I think it might be done. What happiness it would be to live one's life, then! No more hateful strife-only emulation; every eye fixed on the same goal; every man's will, every man's thoughts moving forward-upward-each in its own inevitable path Happiness for all-and through the efforts of all!
On July 3, 1947, William "Mac" Brazel (rhymes with "frazzle") and his 7-year-old neighbor Dee Proctor found the remains of the crashed flying saucer. Brazel was foreman of the Foster Ranch. The pieces were spread out over a large area, perhaps more than half a mile long. When Brazel drove Dee back home, he showed a piece of the wreckage to Dee's parents, Floyd and Loretta Proctor. They all agreed the piece was unlike anything they had ever seen.
"Mr. Roundabout," says a lady sitting by me, "how comes it that in your books there is a certain class (it may be of men, or it may be of women, but that is not the question in point)-how comes it, dear sir, there is a certain class of persons whom you always attack in your writings, and savagely rush at, goad, poke, toss up in the air, kick, and trample on?"
The empress, who was a woman of moderate height and yet of a majestic appearance, thoroughly understood the art of making herself loved. She was not beautiful, but yet she was sure of pleasing by her geniality and her wit, and also by that exquisite tact which made one forget the awfulness of the sovereign in the gentleness of the woman. A few days after, Count Partin told me that the empress had twice asked after me, and that this was a sure sign I had pleased her.
There was, of course, a dreadful scrimmage about getting away. Several people were not ready at the last minute. Only one motor was obtainable for nine persons with their light luggage, and a motor lorry for the heavy things. --by Arthur Ransome