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Dignity   Listen
noun
Dignity  n.  (pl. dignities)  
1.
The state of being worthy or honorable; elevation of mind or character; true worth; excellence.
2.
Elevation; grandeur. "The dignity of this act was worth the audience of kings."
3.
Elevated rank; honorable station; high office, political or ecclesiastical; degree of excellence; preferment; exaltation. "And the king said, What honor and dignity hath been done to Mordecai for this?" "Reuben, thou art my firstborn,... the excellency of dignity, and the excellency of power."
4.
Quality suited to inspire respect or reverence; loftiness and grace; impressiveness; stateliness; said of mien, manner, style, etc. "A letter written with singular energy and dignity of thought and language."
5.
One holding high rank; a dignitary. "These filthy dreamers... speak evil of dignities."
6.
Fundamental principle; axiom; maxim. (Obs.) "Sciences concluding from dignities, and principles known by themselves."
Synonyms: See Decorum.
To stand upon one's dignity, to have or to affect a high notion of one's own rank, privilege, or character. "They did not stand upon their dignity, nor give their minds to being or to seeming as elegant and as fine as anybody else."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Dignity" Quotes from Famous Books



... Prussia, Russia, and Denmark, have founded medical commissions for the examination of it, and subjected its therapeutical application to certain regulations. He thought, therefore, that the Academy could follow without compromising its dignity, such good examples. He added, that the examination was absolutely necessary, unless they desired that every French practitioner should hereafter reject the whole subject, and for ever abandon its employment to jugglers and ...
— North American Medical and Surgical Journal, Vol. 2, No. 3, July, 1826 • Various

... solution to a knotty point that has puzzled commentators for the last five centuries. The wily humpback is represented in his dressing-gown and slippers, having evidently been called from his bath to listen to the suggestion of the courtiers, who desire him to accept the regal dignity. The umbrella of the Lord Mayor, we fancy, is of a later date than the supposed period of the painting, but no doubt the artist has authority for the introduction of the quaint old lamp-post illumined with the electric ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, May 30, 1891 • Various

... to about nine hundred men. The enemy were, at four o'clock yesterday evening, still remaining in their encampment at Westover and Berkeley Neck. In the mean while, Baron Steuben, a zealous friend, has descended from the dignity of his proper command, to direct our smallest movements. His vigilance has in a great measure supplied the want of force in preventing the enemy from crossing the river, which might have been very fatal. He has been assiduously employed in preparing equipments for the militia, as they should assemble, ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson

... submitted very tamely to his temporary arrest. I was taking him off to our Headquarters, where strange officers were often brought for purposes of identification, when a young Highland Captain of diminutive stature, but unbounded dignity, appeared on the scene with four patrol men. He told me that as he was patrolling the roads for the capture of spies, he would take over the custody of my victim. The Canadians were loath to lose ...
— The Great War As I Saw It • Frederick George Scott

... Much of its misery and cruelty is the result of bad workmanship, which in its turn results from the lack of imagination. A man builds his character in his work; through character alone is the stamina furnished to withstand with dignity the heavy pressures ...
— Child and Country - A Book of the Younger Generation • Will Levington Comfort

... cut some stringy roast beef and still retain my dignity, the man with the red tie said: "Put your other foot on it." I'm afraid if I don't eat potatoes again, my stomach will shrivel so that I will never be able to sit through a course dinner when I get back. Potatoes distend it all right—I feel like I have swallowed one wing of Fleischman's yeast ...
— Letters of a Dakota Divorcee • Jane Burr

... as it nighest may to setting the world afire." So hot was his scorn that he was obliged to cool it in his ale, coming to the surface slightly mollified. "However, Lord Sebert, you have cast your colt's-teeth, and I have no desire to tread upon the toes of your dignity. If I have been over-free, excuse it in your father's old servant and comrade who has guarded and guided you since—since you have had teeth ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz

... With chill dignity she withdrew, entered the house, and returned to the sick-room, leaving the young man in outer darkness to brood upon his crime—and ...
— Penrod • Booth Tarkington

... prevent her leaving the room, and trying to arrange her little plans so that too much discordance should not arise to the surface. Just then the door opened, and little Bella came in from the kitchen in all the pretty, sturdy dignity of two years old, Alice following her with careful steps, and protecting, outstretched arms, a slow smile softening the sternness of her grave face; for the child was the unconscious darling of the household, and all eyes ...
— Sylvia's Lovers — Complete • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... the Lord, obtains the princedom of ordinary power over all the other Churches; and that this, the Roman Pontiff's power of jurisdiction, which is truly episcopal, is immediate; towards which (power) all the pastors and faithful, of whatever right and dignity, whether each separately or all collectively, are bound by the duty of hierarchical subordination and true obedience, not only in the things which pertain to faith and morals, but also in those which pertain to ...
— The Purpose of the Papacy • John S. Vaughan

... importance. On the one hand it reduced to order the movements of the great globes which circulate round the sun; while on the other, it took that beautiful class of curves which had exercised the geometrical talents of the ancients, and assigned to them the dignity of defining the highways of ...
— The Story of the Heavens • Robert Stawell Ball

... then, for I had so little time to go ashore and purchase what necessaries could be remembered while narrowly watching the clock. I was astride the bulwarks again when the Windhover was free of her moorings. There was a lack of deliberation and dignity in this departure which gave it the appearance of improvisation, of not being the real thing. I could not believe it mattered whether I went or not. My first voyage had, that is, those common circumstances which always make our crises incredible ...
— London River • H. M. Tomlinson

... monarch, was beyond our knowledge; we were all hermetically sealed up in Vincennes; and if Paris had been buried in its own catacombs at the moment, the news would have been doled out to us only in the segments which suited the dignity of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 343, May 1844 • Various

... matter of manifestoes is composed of promises to those who cooperate with our designs. These promises depend in a great measure, if not wholly, on the apparent power of the person who makes them to fulfil his engagements. A time of disaster on the part of the promiser seems not to add much to the dignity of his person or to the effect of his offers. One would hardly wish to seduce any unhappy persons to give the last provocation to a merciless tyranny, without very effectual means ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IV. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... with President Kruger or to rise above division upon race lines in critical times. Shortly afterwards Mr. Christiaan Joubert, the Minister of Mines, a man totally unfit from any point of view to hold any office of responsibility or dignity, was compelled by resolution of the Second Volksraad to hand in his resignation. His place was filled by a Hollander official in the Mining Department who commanded and still commands the confidence and respect of all parties. The elevation ...
— The Transvaal from Within - A Private Record of Public Affairs • J. P. Fitzpatrick

... communities, under the control of the chief, to be redistributed whenever a new chief came into power. The taboo system thus became the means for economic distribution, for the control of the relation between the sexes, and for the preservation of the dignity of the chief class. As such it constituted as powerful an instrument for the control of the labor and wealth of a community and the consequent enjoyment of personal ease and luxury as was ever put into the hands of an organized upper ...
— The Hawaiian Romance Of Laieikawai • Anonymous

... more confidence will his admirers tell us that we have the genuine Burns, the great poet, when his strain asserts the independence, equality, dignity, of men, as in the famous song For ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various

... with the dignity of his years, she with the grace which was the perfection of dancing, the perfection of courtesy and of dignity also, as though she knew and valued to the full what was offered to her now by John Calhoun. Grave, sweet and sad Helena ...
— 54-40 or Fight • Emerson Hough

... nation would ever consent to make the settlement of the English crown a matter of bargain with France. And even had William and the English nation been disposed to purchase peace by such a sacrifice of dignity, there would have been insuperable difficulties in another quarter. James could not endure to hear of the expedient which Lewis had suggested. "I can bear," the exile said to his benefactor, "I can bear with Christian patience to be robbed by the Prince of Orange; but I never will ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... answered Miss Dora, with a sudden assumption of dignity. "It isn't nice not to go to church and to Sunday-school. I go. Pliny doesn't, because he has the headache so much. Shall I show you ...
— Three People • Pansy

... not merely by the substantial merit of what he achieved, but still more by a certain greatness of scheme and conception. This quality is not a mere idle decoration. It is not a theatrical artifice of mask or buskin, to impose upon us unreal impressions of height and dignity. The added greatness is real. Height of aim and nobility of expression are true forces. They grow to be an obligation upon us. A lofty sense of personal worth is one of the surest elements of greatness. That the lion should love to masquerade in the ass's skin is not modesty ...
— On Compromise • John Morley

... Indians, with due attention to their dignity, would make no haste in their coming, and would doubtless keep her waiting until the noonday hour which she had designated, but nevertheless her lookout up the river was never for a moment relinquished. She watched as a ...
— The Gaunt Gray Wolf - A Tale of Adventure With Ungava Bob • Dillon Wallace

... it happens sometimes that someone maliciously hinders a person from obtaining a bishopric or some like dignity. But it is lawful for a man to make good his grievance. Therefore it is lawful, seemingly, in such a case to give money for a bishopric or a like ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas

... not an accomplishment in the mind of a female more enchanting, nor one which adds more dignity and grace to her person, than constancy. Whatever share of beauty she may be possessed of, whether she may have the tinge of Hebe on her cheeks, vying in colour with the damask rose, and breath as fragrant—and the graceful and elegant ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 13, Issue 353, January 24, 1829 • Various

... their interment is thus: A mole or pyramid of earth is raised, the mould thereof being worked very smooth and even, sometimes higher or lower, according to the dignity of the person whose monument it is. On the top thereof is an umbrella, made ridgeways, like the roof of a house. This is supported by nine stakes or small posts, the grave being about 6 or 8 feet in length and 4 feet in breadth, about which is hung gourds, feathers, and other ...
— An introduction to the mortuary customs of the North American Indians • H. C. Yarrow

... impudence even if I can't say a thing worth remembering. But rather than have words with you I will ride on, not to accommodate you, but to preserve my own dignity and self-respect." ...
— The Jucklins - A Novel • Opie Read

... daughter, my mother, an old lady who had once been her governess, and had always lived with her since her marriage, the new Lord, the Abbe, my father, and my uncle. When dinner was announced, the peer advanced in new-blown dignity, to offer his arm as a matter of course to my mother. My father's pale face flushed crimson in a moment. He touched the magnificent merchant-lord on the arm, and pointed significantly, with a low bow, towards the decrepit old lady who had once been my mother's governess. Then walking to the other ...
— Basil • Wilkie Collins

... Inwardly their characteristics were as different as those of any two animals could be, the Judge having the ponderous gravity of a camel, whilst Mr. James Gollop was as sedate as a monkey and twice as ebullient. The Judge suffered from a prodigious sense of responsibility and dignity, whilst his double was given to frivolities, a distressing sense of the ridiculous and was as irresponsible and happy as a flea hurdling from one boarding house to another ...
— Mixed Faces • Roy Norton

... through the powder, wore yellow with a big-bowed sash. She was always very slim, and the only fair Mallett in the family; but even in those days Caroline was inclined to stoutness. She carried it well, however, with a great dignity, fortified by reassurances from Sophia, and Rose's recollections of the conversations of these two was of their constant compliments to each other and the tireless discussion of clothes. ...
— THE MISSES MALLETT • E. H. YOUNG

... Peter: "I beseech you, as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul." For such language would be spontaneously suggested by the fact that to be in bondage to the baser nature is hostile alike to spiritual dignity and peace, and to physical health and strength. The principles of the moral nature are at war with the passions of the animal nature; the goading vices of the mind are at war with the organic harmonies of the body; ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger

... de Brensault was angry, and he had not sufficient dignity to hide it. The Princess, in whose boudoir he was, regarded him from her sofa as one might ...
— Jeanne of the Marshes • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... heretics, and her adherents in the matter aforesaid, to have incurred the sentence of anathema, and to be cut off from the unity of the body of Christ. And, moreover, we do declare her to be deprived of her pretended title to the kingdom aforesaid, and of all dominion, dignity, and privilege whatsoever; and also the nobility, subjects, and people of the said kingdom, and all others which have in any sort sworn unto her, to be for ever absolved from any such oath, and all manner of duty or dominion, allegiance ...
— Americanism Contrasted with Foreignism, Romanism, and Bogus Democracy in the Light of Reason, History, and Scripture; • William Gannaway Brownlow

... clamorous remonstrance with each other, which voices were those of Father Magowan and our friend O'Finigan, as we must now call him, inasmuch as he is, although early in the day, expanded with that hereditary sense of dignity which will not allow the ...
— The Emigrants Of Ahadarra - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton

... heard of the chicken, as Will called her, somewhere on ahead, and we spent that night at a kahveh, which is a place with all a khan's inconveniences, but no dignity whatever. There they knew nothing of her at all. The guests, and there were thirty besides ourselves, lay all around the big room on wooden platforms, and talked of nothing but robbers along the road in both directions. Every man in the place questioned each of us individually to find out why we ...
— The Eye of Zeitoon • Talbot Mundy

... oath of office when he succeeded Washington. The hall, after being long disused, was now restored and reopened. Before Mr. Wilson spoke, Mr. Frank Miles Day, representing the committee of architects, had referred to the "delightful silence, order, gravity, and personal dignity of manner" observed by the Senators of the first Congress, and had said, "They all appeared every morning full powdered, and dressed, as age or fancy might suggest, in the ...
— President Wilson's Addresses • Woodrow Wilson

... in the young eyes as she said it, and a delicate lifting of her chin with the conviction of the truth she was speaking, that gave her a new dignity even in the moonlight. Captain Leavenworth looked at her ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz

... mingle with man in the free interchange of those sentiments which keep the soul alive, and which stimulate the noblest powers. Then only does she realize her aesthetic mission. Then only can she rise in the dignity of a guardian angel, an educator of the heart, a dispenser of the blessings by which she would atone for the evil originally brought upon mankind. Now, to administer this antidote to evil, by which labor is made sweet, and pain assuaged, and courage ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IV • John Lord

... that such ultimate truth cannot be expected, the author may be sure that his efforts made on behalf of his own book will not set matters right. If injustice be done him, let him bear it. To do so is consonant with the dignity of the position which he ought to assume. To shriek, and scream, and sputter, to threaten actions, and to swear about the town that he has been belied and defamed in that he has been accused of bad grammar or a false metaphor, of ...
— Autobiography of Anthony Trollope • Anthony Trollope

... chosen, and in this trying conjuncture he set the seal to his character as an accomplished man. He saw that Gertrude's movement was final, and he determined to respect the inscrutable mystery of her heart. He read in the glance of her eye and the tone of her voice that the perfect dignity had fallen from his character,—that his integrity had lost its bloom; but he also read her firm resolve never to admit this fact to her own mind, nor to declare it to the world, and he honored her forbearance. His hopes, his ambitions, his visions, lay ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 118, August, 1867 • Various

... India. They were formed of wicker work, and covered outside with lacquer. They also were supported by poles on the shoulders of bearers. None of the gentlemen, who sat their horses with apparently such wonderful dignity, really guided them, though they held their bridles in their hands—a groom always leading their gaily-caparisoned steeds. The soldiers, however, of whom a troop was always in attendance on any "damio," or great lord, of ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston

... Gregory assumed the tiara, than he addressed letters to different persons, in which he assured them of his earnest desire to unite with Henry in upholding the honor of the Church and the imperial dignity; to accomplish which he would embrace the first opportunity of sending legates to Henry, to acquaint the king with his views. But, while proferring his love, he declared that, if Henry should venture to offer God insult instead of honor, he would ...
— The Truce of God - A Tale of the Eleventh Century • George Henry Miles

... the common notions on decoration, it is often harder to decorate a house than it is to build it; but why decorate at all? The dull color of the natural adobe, or plaster, would have at least been true art in its simple dignity of architecture, whereas when covered with unmeaning designs in foolish colors even the ...
— The Old Franciscan Missions Of California • George Wharton James

... too much for Archie's dignity. He leaped from the deck of the Black Eagle into his own punt in a greater rage ...
— Billy Topsail & Company - A Story for Boys • Norman Duncan

... with rags and an old hat. Every thing is perfectly clean inside, swept and scrubbed continually by the poor ladies, and they are real ladies, Mary. It was pitiful to see old Mrs. Pickens sitting in her wooden chair in a dress which her former cook would have disdained, and yet with all the dignity and sad politeness of a duchess in difficulties. They make no secret of their extreme poverty; they cannot, in fact, for it stares you in the face; but they ask for nothing, and you would scarcely ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge

... "'I hereby direct that the sum of one thousand pounds a year be paid to any respectable well-connected woman of breeding and family, who will undertake the education and up-bringing of my niece, Margaret O'Connell, in accordance with the dignity and tradition ...
— Peg O' My Heart • J. Hartley Manners

... by the ignorant, the feeble-minded, or the insane. Still, the "knockings" are sufficiently mysterious, and if unexposed, sufficiently fruitful of evil, to be legitimate subjects of investigation, and he who under such circumstances is so careful of his dignity as to disregard the subject altogether, is as much mistaken as the gravest buffoon of the circus. We reviewed a week or two ago "The Phantom World," just republished by Mr. Hart; the Appletons have recently printed an original work which we believe has considerable ...
— International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. 1, No. 5, July 29, 1850 • Various

... Riley when you were quite a youngster? The good time you had?—how gay it was? How charming your host was? As nearly as I can figure it out, I was there at the same time, filling the noble office of garbage man. Now, far be it from me, believing in the dignity of all labor, to despise the office of garbage man. I can think of conditions under which I would be quite happy to serve my country in that capacity. But having enlisted because of the noble figure of a soldier carrying a flag, I grew pretty sore at the 'Damn you, we've ...
— The Visioning • Susan Glaspell

... your fiddlestick," exclaimed the baronet, with less than his usual dignity. "You could make no promise without my sanction, and that I cannot give you. You can let the girl know this ...
— Won from the Waves • W.H.G. Kingston

... of their race; and their great deeds and great thoughts are the most glorious of legacies to mankind. They connect the present with the past, and help on the increasing purpose of the future; holding aloft the standard of principle, maintaining the dignity of human character, and filling the mind with traditions and instincts of all that is most ...
— Character • Samuel Smiles

... individual, yet they reserved their highest altar and their purest ardor for the truth. They loved truth with fiery, pious hearts. Insulted by his adversaries, defamed, threatened, one of the leaders of these young men replied, with grand, calm dignity: ...
— Jean-Christophe Journey's End • Romain Rolland

... he cares not for your dignity, And touchingly reminds us of our tenets. Our nation spurns the outward shows of state, And ceremony dies for lack of service. Pomp is discrowned, and throned regality Dissolved away in our new land and laws. Man is ...
— Tecumseh: A Drama • Charles Mair

... (Hayne) asked it of him. It may be that Timrod's recognition of the fact that he could write poetry and that Simms could only try to write it led to a degree of youthful assumption which clashed with the dignity of the older man. The Nestor of Southern literature seems not to have cherished animosity, for he not only noticed Timrod favorably, but in after years, when the poet's misfortunes pressed most heavily upon him, made every possible exertion to give him practical and ...
— Literary Hearthstones of Dixie • La Salle Corbell Pickett

... replied Dora, "while it exacts nothing. It is never jealous of its own dignity. It never behaveth itself unseemly; but beareth, hopeth, and endureth all things, even from those who know nothing ...
— Be Courteous • Mrs. M. H. Maxwell

... room I heard the worthy domestic mutter something about "pretty work," and "a Howard of Hopton," and made no doubt that he regretted less the fall of my ancestral dignity than the loss to himself of a careless and easily robbed master. At all events I had been under the impression that I possessed a fuller store of linen than that which emerged from my travel-stained ...
— Dross • Henry Seton Merriman

... sleep in one room as well as another, provided it be comfortable and appropriate," said Lady Belstone, with dignity. "There are very pleasant rooms in the Dower House, and our great-aunts managed to live there in comfort, and yet keep an eye on their nephew here, as I have always been told. I don't know why we should object to doing the ...
— Peter's Mother • Mrs. Henry De La Pasture

... The real dignity of a man of genius or great intellect, the trait which raises him over others and makes him worthy of respect, is at bottom the fact, that the only unsullied and innocent part of human nature, namely, the intellect, has the upper hand in him? and prevails; whereas, ...
— The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; The Art of Controversy • Arthur Schopenhauer

... smiles and trots off; sometimes he barks back good-humouredly; sometimes he only just gives a couple of disinterested barks as if he isn't particular, but is expected, because of his dignity and doghood, to say something under the circumstances; and sometimes, if the outside dog is a little dog, he'll get away from that fence in a hurry on the first surprise, or, if he's a cheeky little dog, he'll first make sure that the inside dog can't get ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson

... sacrifice Rochester to save his own face. Sir Thomas had an accurate knowledge of the King's character. He knew the scramble James was capable of making in a difficulty that involved his kingly dignity, and what little reck he had of the faces he trod on in climbing from a pit of his own digging. By a trick Overbury contrived to smuggle a letter through to the honest Archbishop Abbot, in which he declared his possession of facts that would non-suit the ...
— She Stands Accused • Victor MacClure

... weak, I think!" she jerked out as she pranced on, shaking down tear-drops now and then. "It was burning, like a lover's—oh, it was! And I won't write to him any more, or at least for a long time, to impress him with my dignity! And I hope it will hurt him very much—expecting a letter to-morrow morning, and the next, and the next, and no letter coming. He'll suffer then with suspense—won't he, that's all!—and I am very glad of it!"—Tears of pity for Jude's approaching sufferings ...
— Jude the Obscure • Thomas Hardy

... is never dormant. He renders some of the dullest passages in colonial annals actually amusing by his witty treatment of them. He finds a laugh for his readers where most of his predecessors have found yawns. And with all this he does not sacrifice the dignity of history for ...
— Admiral Farragut • A. T. Mahan

... in her accustomed place, her knitting-needles flashing and clicking with their old-time regularity. Duke, who had been left in Mr. Britton's care during Darren's absence, occupied his old place on the top stair, but even his five years of added dignity could not restrain him from occasional demonstrations of joy at finding himself again at The Pines and with ...
— At the Time Appointed • A. Maynard Barbour

... is dwindled to intrigue, And marriage grown a money-league. Which crimes aforesaid (with her leave) Were (as he humbly did conceive) Against our Sovereign Lady's peace, Against the statutes in that case, Against her dignity and crown: Then prayed an answer ...
— The Battle of the Books - and Other Short Pieces • Jonathan Swift

... little silence in the cottage. The potatoes bubbled gaily in the pot, and the clock in the corner ticked in measured dignity. ...
— The Captain's Bunk - A Story for Boys • M. B. Manwell

... sobered them again by a mournful strain, and made them sob and sigh as if broken-hearted. The Sultan, highly delighted with his powers, entreated him to stay, offering him every inducement that wealth, power, and dignity could supply; but the alchymist resolutely refused, it being decreed, he said, that he should never repose till he had discovered the philosopher's stone. He set out accordingly the same evening, ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay

... phenomena betokening intercourse with the spirits of the dead; nor could she be repelled by anything grotesque or trivial in the manner of this intercourse, because it was no part of her belief that a spirit still inhabiting the atmosphere of our earth, should exhibit any dignity or solemnity not belonging to him while he lived upon it. The question must have been discussed by them on its general grounds at a very early stage of their intimacy; but it only assumed practical importance when Mr. Home came to Florence in 1857 or 1858. Mr. Browning found himself ...
— Life and Letters of Robert Browning • Mrs. Sutherland Orr

... cloth without the apparatus of boiler and machinery, is a question which has not commended itself to the popular mind. But it may be remarked that the Christian religion alone is that which raises the body to a dignity equal to that of the soul, and gives it a hope of ennoblement and resurrection never dreamed ...
— The Book of Were-Wolves • Sabine Baring-Gould

... favorite at Brook Farm, always equable and playful, wholly simple and frank in manner. He talked readily and easily, but not controversially. His smile was singularly attractive and sympathetic, and the earnestness of which I have spoken gave him an unconscious personal dignity. His temperament was sanguine. The whole air of the youth was that of goodness. I do not think that the impression made by him forecast his career, or, in any degree, the leadership which he afterwards held in his Church. But everybody who knew him at that time must recall ...
— Life of Father Hecker • Walter Elliott

... there was a burlesque outcry and a good-humored protest from the gentlemen around her against this manifestly leading question. "It's no fair! Ye'll not answer her—for the dignity of our sex." Yet in the midst of it, it suddenly occurred to the consul that there HAD been a slip of paper wrapped around it, which had come off and remained in the keyhole. The blue eyes of the lady were meanwhile sounding his, but ...
— The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... their sports." Presently, he amongst the lads who took the part of Ali Khwajah the plaintiff and his playmate who represented the merchant of Baghdad accused of theft, advanced and stood before the boy who as the Kazi sat in pomp and dignity. Quoth the Judge, "O Ali Khwajah, what is thy claim against this merchant?" and the complainant preferred his charge in a plea of full detail. Then said the Kazi to the boy who acted merchant, "What answerest thou to this complaint and why didst thou ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton

... discovering a rival in one of the loveliest of her dames, Jane Seymour. This fair creature, the daughter of Sir John Seymour, of Wolff Hall, in Wiltshire, and who was afterwards, it is almost needless to say, raised to as high a dignity as Anne Boleyn herself, was now in the very pride of her beauty. Tall, exquisitely proportioned, with a complexion of the utmost brilliancy and delicacy, large liquid blue eyes, bright chestnut tresses, and lovely features, she possessed charms that could not fall to ...
— Windsor Castle • William Harrison Ainsworth

... species," who had commenced the revolution in America, was making one in England, and was willing to help make one in France. His English works, translated by Lanthenas, a friend of Robespierre and co-editor with Brissot of the "Patriote Franais," had earned for him the dignity of citoyen Franais,—an honor which he shared with Mackintosh, Dr. Price, the Priestleys, father and son, and David Williams. He had furnished Lafayette with a good deal of his revolutionary rhetoric, had contributed to the Monthly Review of the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various

... long exercised by the Caribs over a great part of the continent, joined to the remembrance of their ancient greatness, has inspired them with a sentiment of dignity and national superiority which is manifest in their manners and their discourse. "We alone are a nation," say they proverbially; "the rest of mankind (oquili) are made to serve us." This contempt of the Caribs for their enemies ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V3 • Alexander von Humboldt

... more cheerful than the garret suggested by Mr. Sherman. Charles, at any rate, was delighted with them and his sticks of furniture, and elated—as thousands of undergraduates have been before his day and since—at exchanging school for college and qualified liberty and the dignity of housekeeping ...
— Hetty Wesley • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... Brothers got to the Great Kaan, he received them with great honour and hospitality, and showed much pleasure at their visit, asking them a great number of questions. First, he asked about the emperors, how they maintained their dignity, and administered justice in their dominions; and how they went forth to battle, and so forth. And then he asked the like questions about the kings and ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa

... myself at the court of Warsaw, the young starostine Wessel, Madame Potocka, and the princess Sapieha (the three chief court beauties) would be eclipsed. My aunt, the princess, remarked that I still needed more gravity in my demeanor, and more dignity ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No 3, September 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... done," replied Mr. Bentley, with simple dignity, "has brought its reward. To this day I have not ceased to derive pleasure from it, and often I go out of my way, through Burton Street, although the view is cramped. And sometimes," he added, with the hint of a twinkle in his eye, "I go in. This afternoon ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... Minister, or the Respect that so great an Assembly as a whole Parish may justly claim. I shall only tell them, that as the Spanish Cobler, to reclaim a profligate Son, bid him have some regard to the Dignity of his Family, so they as Gentlemen (for we Citizens assume to be such one Day in a Week) are bound for the future to Repent of, and Abstain from, the gross Abuses here mentioned, whereof they have been Guilty in Contempt of Heaven and Earth, and contrary to the Laws in this ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... propriety rested upon him, and he sat with his head on Lois's knee, and his drowsy eyes blinking at Mr. Forsythe. His mistress pulled his silky ears gently, or knotted them behind his head, giving him a curiously astonished and grieved look, as though he felt she trifled with his dignity; yet he did not move his head, but watched, with no affection in his soft brown eyes, the young man who talked so eagerly ...
— John Ward, Preacher • Margaret Deland

... head. Beautiful clear grey eyes she had also; and Reimers particularly remarked her delicate straight nose, by the trembling of whose nostrils one could judge if the little lady were excited about anything. She bore the dignity of being the colonel's daughter with modest pride. She handled the tea-things with the style of an accomplished matron, and led the conversation with a ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein

... thought for your consideration. It is this—that the man who devotes too much thought to 'getting even' with other folks is likely to let slip a lot of good, solid chances for getting ahead in the world. I don't blame any fellow for protecting his own rights and dignity, but just think over what I said, won't you, about the chap who spends too much of his time thinking up ways ...
— The Grammar School Boys of Gridley - or, Dick & Co. Start Things Moving • H. Irving Hancock

... of the producers of literature and art. This is in strict analogy with the action of other professions and of almost all the industries. No one doubts that literature and art are or should be leading interests in our civilization, and their dignity will be enhanced in the public estimation by a visible organization of their representatives, who are seriously determined upon raising the standards by which the work of writers and artists is judged. The association of persons having this common aim cannot ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... Blake's room," said she with dignity; "no one ever intrudes here but myself, not even ...
— A Strange Disappearance • Anna Katharine Green

... professor, with great assumption of dignity, "that you now see the necessity of forbidding that impertinent young coxcomb ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth

... we pounced down upon them and seized them unawares. They were stripping the place of everything worth carrying away, before setting it on fire. We burst into the hall, and there was a sight which filled my father and myself with anger and shame. Your grandmother was standing erect, looking with dignity mingled with disdain at my grandfather; while your mother, holding your brother's hands, stood beside her. My grandfather was standing upon a chair; in his hand he held a Bible, and was pouring out a ...
— Orange and Green - A Tale of the Boyne and Limerick • G. A. Henty

... get fevers! I believe you try to dry your Wet-brown-paperness, till you scorch it. Or do you play off fevers against the Princess's coliques? Remember, hers are only for the support of her dignity, and that is what I never allowed you to have: you must(1336) have twenty unlawful children, and then be twenty years in devotion, and have twenty unchristian appetites and passions all the while, before you may think of getting into a cradle with 'epuisements and have a Monsieur Forzoni(1337) ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole

... Eternity or Death that pretended to visual distinctness would be false. Having overlooked this, he says, "We do not anywhere meet a more sublime description than this justly celebrated one of Milton, wherein he gives the portrait of Satan with a dignity so suitable ...
— The Principles of Success in Literature • George Henry Lewes

... invites those who are far away. For as the moon by the majesty of its more brilliant mirror overwhelms the rays of the stars, not otherwise does said city raise its imperial head with its diadem of royal dignity above the rest of the cities. It is situated in the lap of a delightful valley, surrounded by a coronet of mountains which Ceres and Bacchus adorn with fervent zeal. The Seine, no humble stream amid the army of rivers, superb in its channel, throwing ...
— Readings in the History of Education - Mediaeval Universities • Arthur O. Norton

... a silk hat, morning coat, creased trousers, spats, and patent boots suddenly slipping on a piece of orange-peel and sitting, all of a heap, with silk hat flying, in a filthy gutter. The war-time humor of the soul roared with mirth at the sight of all that dignity and elegance despoiled. ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs

... as a preliminary measure; the necessity for which was founded on the statements already made to their Lordships. He considered any other mode of proceeding as inconsistent with the dignity of the Crown, and of Parliament; and as absolutely necessary, in order to reconcile to the ulterior measure which he intended to propose, the good and worthy men in this country, who viewed with dismay and disgust the violent and unconstitutional acts of the Association. He entreated ...
— Maxims And Opinions Of Field-Marshal His Grace The Duke Of Wellington, Selected From His Writings And Speeches During A Public Life Of More Than Half A Century • Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington

... wicked dead. The sincere passion of his tones not only arrested my steps but lured through the open doorway the languorous and yawning Buck Devine, who hung over the worker with disrespectful attention. I joined the pair. To Buck's query, voiced in a key of feigned mirth, Sandy said with simple dignity that it was going to be a darned good sweater for the boys in the trenches. Mr. Devine offered to bet his head that it wasn't going to be anything at all—at least nothing any one would want round a trench. Mr. Sawtelle ignored the wager ...
— Ma Pettengill • Harry Leon Wilson

... embankments so that the volatile and fugacious species should be as it were caught in a net and held behind the hedges of definitions, and he considered that superior things were, by participation, and according to similitude, reflected in those inferior, and these in those according to their greater dignity and excellence, and that the truth was in both the one and the other, according to a certain analogy, order and scale, in which the lowest of the superior order agrees with the highest of the inferior order. So that progress was from the lowest of nature to the highest, as from evil to good, from ...
— The Heroic Enthusiast, Part II (Gli Eroici Furori) - An Ethical Poem • Giordano Bruno

... though they had risked life as if death were an incident, now freed of discipline and of the exhilaration of battle, their desire to live was very human in the way that hands shot up if a sharp word were spoken to them by an officer. They were wholly lacking in military dignity as they filed by; but it returned as by a magic touch when a non-commissioned officer was bidden to take charge of a batch and march them to an inclosure. Then, in answer to the command shoulders squared, heels rapped together, and the instinct of long ...
— My Second Year of the War • Frederick Palmer

... the Church held vast estates on feudal tenure, the bishop was usually a territorial lord, owing a vassal's obligations to the king or to some powerful noble for his land and himself ruling over vassals in different parts of the country. As symbols of his power and dignity the bishop wore on his head the miter and carried the pastoral staff, or ...
— EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY • HUTTON WEBSTER

... indignation she no sooner saw me than she burst into an uncontrollable fit of laughter, and was heartless enough to declare that I looked "a perfect fright." Thoroughly disgusted with such unsisterly conduct I mustered all my dignity, and without condescending to ask for an explanation walked in contemptuous silence out of the room and ...
— The Congo Rovers - A Story of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood

... more of man in his general nature, and Pope in his local manners. The notions of Dryden were formed by comprehensive speculation, those of Pope by minute attention. There is more dignity in the knowledge of Dryden, more certainty in that of Pope. The style of Dryden is capricious and varied, that of Pope cautious and uniform. Dryden obeys the motions of his own mind; Pope constrains his mind to his own rules of composition. Dryden's page is a natural field, rising ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey

... but I must beg of you to remember where you are, sir, and to moderate your language," said the clerk, with some faint show of hieratic dignity. "And now, ma'am, what can I do for you?" he said, turning to a woman who smelt strongly of ...
— Mike Fletcher - A Novel • George (George Augustus) Moore

... stood there till the stars came out and the moon shone fully; then I went towards Bolsena under its high gate which showed in the darkness, and under its castle on the rock. There, in a large room which was not quite an inn, a woman of great age and dignity served me with fried fish from the lake, and the men gathered round me and attempted to tell me of the road to Rome, while I in exchange made out to them as much by gestures as by broken words the crossing of the Alps ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc

... sorry a figure as he cut just then, minus fur-cap and plastered with snow, alone with the shame which was his, he had an air, a certain dignity of mien, this man, Yorke, which stamped him far above ...
— The Luck of the Mounted - A Tale of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • Ralph S. Kendall

... enough. "You see, the niggers all used to call Ben's mother 'Old Miss' till she died. I'm told they started in to call Het 'Young Miss,' but when she put on crape an' begun to fling orders about they cut off the 'Young' part. I reckon they'll call you some'n or other to fit the dignity of yore position when they git it into the'r noggin's jest how close you stand to the prime head of it all. They know who me 'n Jane are, you bet yore life, an' when we call 'em they come in a tilt with the'r hats in the'r hands. I never lived before, it seems to ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben

... politely to us in permitting the gates, on the first night of our arrival, to be opened, seated on a high stool, rose conspicuously above the other musicians, and seemed indeed the first fiddle. This is an act in no way derogatory to the dignity of an officer, or a gentleman; for, throughout our travels in Scandinavia, I often recognised in the orchestra of the different theatres I visited, officers whom I had met in the streets during the day. The interior decorations of ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross

... of you, sir," said Mr. Fern, affably, but with the dignity that was a part of his nature, no more to be discarded than his eyes. "That is, if you are the same gentleman that has kindly offered to assist my daughter in arranging ...
— A Black Adonis • Linn Boyd Porter

... to him to the end. When he spoke to her, his manner assumed a faint dignity, with a slight touch of gallantry, the unmistakable air of a gentleman of the old school towards an attractive stranger of ...
— Calvary Alley • Alice Hegan Rice

... chair of office, ready to hear the case. In the tall, thin old man, with white hair and dignified aspect, I recognised a fit representative of justice—one of those venerable magistrates, who command respect not only by virtue of age and office, but from the dignity of their personal character. In spite of the noisy rabble that surrounded me, I read in the serene, firm look of the magistrate the determination to ...
— The Quadroon - Adventures in the Far West • Mayne Reid

... fishing ended, the Constitution is now placed in a conspicuous place in the hall, in a small monument for which David furnished the design.[1147]—The Convention, now, says Danton, "will rise to a sense of its dignity, for it is now invested with the full power of the nation." In other words, artifice completes what violence has begun. Through the outrages committed in May and June, the Convention had lost its legitimacy; through the maneuvers of July and August it recovered the semblance of ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 4 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 3 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... important. It should be one of our prime objects as a Nation, so far as feasible, constantly to work toward putting the mechanic, the wageworker who works with his hands, on a higher plane of efficiency and reward, so as to increase his effectiveness in the economic world, and the dignity, the remuneration, and the power of his position in the social world. Unfortunately, at present the effect of some of the work in the public schools is in the exactly opposite direction. If boys and girls are trained merely in literary accomplishments, to ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... resentment rose. She spoke with dignity: 'I begged you to be serious, Paul, and to try to understand what I mean, although I'm so fumbling, and say it so badly. As for its being impossible to change things, I've heard you say a great many times ...
— Quit Your Worrying! • George Wharton James

... wiped the beaded drops from his forehead, and he coughed and shook himself. His big fists unclosed. Passion gave place to dignity. ...
— The Desert of Wheat • Zane Grey

... favored him with a glance the dignity of which was somewhat impaired by his complexion, and in a slow and stately fashion ascended to the deck. Then he caught his breath sharply and paled beneath the coaldust as he saw Sergeant Pilbeam standing on the quay, opposite the ship. By his side stood Miss ...
— Sailor's Knots (Entire Collection) • W.W. Jacobs

... whom she has chosen without his suspecting it courts her for a long time, longs for her timidly, wins her with astonishment and possesses her with consideration. He does not notice that he is paying, she is so tactful; and she maintains her relations on such a footing of reserve and dignity that he would slap the first man who dared doubt her in the least. And all this ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant

... of "long ago" ought to be taken advantage of to deepen respect for the dignity of labour. Our lives are so very short that we are apt to get out of perspective in the ages. Reading and writing are so new—it is only about four hundred years since the first book was printed in England, the Roman ...
— The Child Under Eight • E.R. Murray and Henrietta Brown Smith

... of April, the pontifical bulls arrived from Rome, confirming the election of the Seor Posada to the Archiepiscopal dignity; and on Saturday last, the 31st of May, the consecration took place in the cathedral with the greatest pomp. The presiding bishop was the Seor Belaunzaran, the old Bishop of Linares; the two assistant bishops were the Seor Madrid, a ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca

... her after-thoughts that her husband's eyes might have been on her, extracting something to reprove—some offence against her dignity as his wife; her consciousness telling her that she had not kept up the perfect air of equability in public which was her own ideal. But Grandcourt made no observation on her behavior. All he said as they were driving ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot

... tendency, his mother's own vanity led her to indulge and spoil him, for, being hers, she was always pleased he should look his best. On his real self she neither had nor sought any influence. Insubordination or arrogance in him, her dignity unslighted, actually pleased her: she liked him to show his spirit: was it not a mark ...
— Heather and Snow • George MacDonald

... a lofty poem by some early unknown author, setting forth how Prometheus formed man of clay and animated him with fire from heaven, and how from Pandora's box the horrid crew of human vexations were let into the world. The two narratives, though most unequal in depth and dignity, belong in the same literary and philosophical category. Neither was intended as a plain record of veritable history, each word a naked fact, but as a symbol of its author's thoughts, each phrase the metaphorical dress of ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger

... consistently successful editorial being! He preferred a freer air to the mild scents of lavender and rose-ash, even though it might blow roughly at times. Nevertheless, that which was fine and fastidious in his mind recognized and admired the restraint, the dignity, the high and honorably maintained standards of the monthly. It had distinction. It stood apart from and consciously above the reading mob. In some respects it was the antithesis of that success for which ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... he turns to God, his manner undergoes a subtle and unconscious change. A load has slipped off his shoulders and has been assumed by a higher power. Into his bearing, dignified though it was, there comes an unconscious increase of the dignity. Into his voice, firm as it was before, there comes a deeper note of firmness. He is apt to fling his arms widespread as he prays, in a fine gesture that he never uses at other times, and he looks upward with the dignity of a man who, talking ...
— Acres of Diamonds • Russell H. Conwell

... narrating the earlier passages of the reign of Queen Victoria, no such incidents occur. The Court was pure; the persons of the Sovereign and her Consort profoundly respected. The monarchy itself has been strengthened in the last forty-eight years by a strict adherence to the principles of moral dignity and constitutional government. Nothing is to be found in any part of these Journals to impugn that salutary impression; and they will afford to future generations no unworthy picture of those who have played the most conspicuous part in the last ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville

... way with their horns of plenty. The sordid question of market value, however, was distinctly irritating, and yet it was justly so. Why should not a man sell the fruits of the earth for dollars and cents with artistic and honorable dignity as anything else? All commodities for the needs of mankind are marketable, are the instruments of traffic, whether they be groceries or books, boots and shoes, dishes or furniture, or pictures; whether they be songs or sermons or corn plasters or shaving-soap; whether they be food ...
— The Debtor - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... Scottish, greets you as an equal, the Wiltshire man as a superior, yet neither loses dignity thereby. The Lancashire man treats you as his inferior, and is not himself advantaged, whether it ...
— In a Green Shade - A Country Commentary • Maurice Hewlett

... as to feel anxiety that it should be immediately recognized. And the effect of the painter's conscious deference, and of the equally conscious pride of the boys, as they stood to be painted, has been somewhat to shorten the power of the one, and to abase the dignity of the other. And thus, in the midst of my admiration of the youths' beautiful faces, and natural quality of majesty, set off by all splendors of dress and courtesies of art, I could not forbear questioning with myself what the true value was, in the scales ...
— Love's Meinie - Three Lectures on Greek and English Birds • John Ruskin

... in human society. No external forms can adequately express living religious ideas; and yet there must be external forms in order that religious ideas may be perpetuated. The ministers of the new truth inevitably rise in dignity till they grow into a hierarchy. That truth inevitably seeks to establish itself as scientifically true, and with the aid of the ruling philosophical tendency of the day clothes itself in a view of the universe and in a creed. Thus the essence of Christianity came to ...
— History of Religion - A Sketch of Primitive Religious Beliefs and Practices, and of the Origin and Character of the Great Systems • Allan Menzies

... 1805 (the year of Trafalgar), it had been the fixed assumption of the four inside people (as an old tradition of all public carriages derived from the reign of Charles II) that they, the illustrious quaternion, constituted a porcelain variety of the human race, whose dignity would have been compromised by exchanging one word of civility with the three miserable delf-ware outsides. Even to have kicked an outsider might have been held to attaint the foot concerned in that operation, so that, perhaps, ...
— The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc • Thomas de Quincey

... defiance at each other, they separated; she marching off with all the dignity of an offended queen to the "sweet seclusion that a cabin grants," whilst he withdrew moodily to a bench, comforted, however, not a little by the thought that he had given Mrs. Carr a Roland ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard

... showed that he was responsive to the appeal. He was evidently moved by the almost pathetic position which the once proud nation of Spain had been forced to take, but he had his feelings well under control and behaved with great dignity. ...
— The Boys of '98 • James Otis

... Jim resolved to conquer his alarm. He bowed his head with as much dignity as he could muster toward the savage looking beasts, who in return nodded in a ...
— Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz • L. Frank Baum.

... most vicious and most depraved in the community."—Dumouriez, II. 51. "The Jacobins, taken for the most part, from the most abject and most brutal of the nation, unable to furnish men of sufficient dignity for offices, have degraded offices to their own level... They are drunken, barbarous Helots that have taken the places of the Spartans."—The sign of their advent is the expulsion of the liberals and of the refined ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... she saw that she had offended the queer little creature before her. It raised itself with an air of offended dignity that was unmistakable. ...
— Dot and the Kangaroo • Ethel C. Pedley

... rejoinder's justifiable," Father Lucien remarked, smiling; and Drummond turned to Agatha with a touch of dignity. ...
— The Lure of the North • Harold Bindloss

... know who I am?" retorted the bear, with dignity. "I am the Bear of Berne. You will find me on the shield of the city, and kept in a pit by the ...
— Harper's Young People, April 6, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... and girlish in figure that she might better have been their sister than their mother. The cloud that the sudden light had revealed on Ebbo's brow had cleared away, and he made an inclination neither awkward nor ungracious in its free mountain dignity and grace, but not devoid of mountain rusticity and shy pride, and far less cordial than was Friedel's manner. Both were infinitely relieved to detect nothing of the greasy burgher, and were greatly ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge

... flung myself upon his poor insulted form and cried my grief out upon his breast while my father and all my family scoffed at me and heaped threats and shameful epithets upon him. He bore his ill usage with a tranquil dignity which endeared him to me more than ever, and made me proud and happy to suffer with him and for him. I heard my father order that the elders of the tribe be called together to try ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... that neither his character nor Ben Jonson's knowledge of human nature is properly understood; for it certainly could not be expected that a man whose spirit glowed to encounter a whole host could, without tarnishing his dignity, if closely pressed, condescend to fight an individual. But as these remarks on courage may be felt by the reader as an invidious introduction of a subject disagreeable to him, we beg to hush it for the present and ...
— Stories by English Authors: Ireland • Various

... reproachful stare; its lips were compressed and drawn downward as if discontentedly meditating its future destinies. The nurse declared in a frightened whisper that it had uttered no cry on facing the light. It had taken possession of its cradle in all the dignity of silent sorrow. A more saddened and a more thoughtful countenance a human being could not exhibit if he were leaving the ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... He had racked his brain for a name at once sweet enough and possessing sufficient dignity. He had not found it for the good reason that no ...
— The Little Red Chimney - Being the Love Story of a Candy Man • Mary Finley Leonard

... much so with your arrogance! Could I help it?" He then began a long sermon. "The proud value themselves mightily in never exposing themselves to a refusal, in never accepting an offer, in being ashamed at a thousand little matters. Alle eselen, asses as they all are. Vain grandeur, want of true dignity, which consists in being ashamed only of bad actions!" He went off, and made the door ring ...
— My Ten Years' Imprisonment • Silvio Pellico

... a church, the part which is the center of attention is always the sanctuary—the place of the Altar. To this the other parts all lead up. It is the most elevated part, and here the dignity and beauty of the decorations center, just as {31} all our life in the fellowship of Christ's Church here on earth, our cross-bearing, and the worship by which we are prepared and trained on earth and in Paradise, all ...
— The Worship of the Church - and The Beauty of Holiness • Jacob A. Regester

... street crossings and on the sidewalks; occasionally it has been necessary to arrest the doings of disorderly persons, to the annoyance of convivial spirits and small boys, but their functions as petty guardsmen have not given police officers great dignity in the eyes of citizens. City officials have confined their efforts to the routine affairs of their office, and have so often spent their spare time and the city's money freely for the satisfaction of their personal interests that municipal government has gained the reputation ...
— Society - Its Origin and Development • Henry Kalloch Rowe

... Rachel again she might see it differently. Might she? No. He knew in his heart that she would not. It was probable that Rendel's ambition, his determined purpose, would always be hampered by his old-fashioned, almost quixotic ideas of loyalty, his conception of the seemliness, the dignity of the relations between husband and wife. In a matter that he felt was a question of right or wrong he would probably without hesitation have used his authority and decided inflexibly that such and such a course was the one to pursue; but here he felt it was impossible. ...
— The Arbiter - A Novel • Lady F. E. E. Bell

... Divine Master, that the good shepherd must be ready to lay down his life, if needful, for his flock. In his establishment, and in his personal habits, he was a model of evangelical poverty, but where the rights of the Church and the dignity of his charge were concerned, he understood perfectly how to maintain both, and his desire and aim were ever to surround the ceremonial of religion with all the pomp and majesty attainable in a country only as yet in ...
— The Life of the Venerable Mother Mary of the Incarnation • "A Religious of the Ursuline Community"

... little kitten. Don't stand on your dignity, or keep upon the roof, in a fit of the sulks; but jump down, and shake such feelings off with a game of ...
— Stories of Animal Sagacity • W.H.G. Kingston

... perfectly. If Mr. Rogers and I had been on terms of flippancy instead of dignity, at this stage we should have given each other the wink. Just what he wanted done I knew. He knew I knew what he wanted, and I knew he knew I knew, and yet we were pretending not only that we knew nothing but that there was really nothing ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson

... the Stoics, who taught that all virtue was conformity to nature, were, in this respect, eminently false to their own principle. Human nature, as revealed to us by reason, is a composite thing, a constitution of many parts differing in kind and dignity, a hierarchy in which many powers are intended to co-exist, but in different positions of ascendency or subordination. To make the higher part of our nature our whole nature is not to restore but to mutilate humanity, and this mutilation has never been attempted without producing grave evils. ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)

... fame; a reversion, though remote, is coveted by some noble minds as a substantial good. It is upon these grounds that I hope and expect the attention of gentlemen in power. These are designs consonant to the elevation of their rank, and the dignity of their stations: they are ends suitable to the nature of a free and generous government; and, connected with views of empire and dominion, suited to the benevolence and solid merit of the legislature. It is a pursuit of substantial ...
— The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African - Written By Himself • Olaudah Equiano

... were seen to handle it, not only without fear, but with the utmost familiarity. A large, civil cocked hat, like those worn by clergymen within the last thirty years, surmounted the whole, furnishing dignity to a good-natured and somewhat vacant countenance, that apparently needed such artificial aid, to support the gravity of some high and ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper

... Thackeray irreverently speaks in his "Henry Esmond," as "a little, wrinkled old man, pock-marked, and with a great periwig and red heels." Lord Lyttelton in his letters thus refers to the French king: "Louis XIV. annexed great dignity to his peruke, which he increased to an enormous size, and made a lion's mane the object of its similitude. That monarch, who daily studied the part of a king, was never seen uncovered but by the barber who shaved him. It was not his practice ...
— At the Sign of the Barber's Pole - Studies In Hirsute History • William Andrews

... Man of Sorrows, with His tall figure full of patient dignity, and His face full of love, and pity, and anguish, all bent into a ...
— Samantha at the World's Fair • Marietta Holley

... solemnly assembled from all parts of the Kingdom; he, in their presence, called forth to him Lewis King of Aquitain, (the only one of Heldegardis's Sons then living) and by the advice and consent of them all, constituted him his Associate in the whole Kingdom, and Heir of the Imperial Dignity." Thus ...
— Franco-Gallia • Francis Hotoman

... become Buddhist monks,—the successor chosen being often a mere child. There is record of an Emperor ascending the throne at the age of two, and abdicating at the age of four; another Mikado was appointed at the age of five; several at the age of ten. Yet the religious dignity of the throne remained undiminished, or, rather, continued [263] to grow. The more the Mikado was withdrawn from public view by policy and by ceremonial, the more did his seclusion and inaccessibility serve to deepen the awe of the divine legend. Like the Lama ...
— Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation • Lafcadio Hearn

... is coming now!" And we watch from the window while she goes by, She has such a bonny, smooth, white brow, And a fearless look in her long-lashed eye; And a certain dignity wedded to grace, Seems to ...
— Maurine and Other Poems • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... the chief executive magistrate of Pennsylvania to take into consideration the necessity of vindicating the outraged laws, and sustaining the dignity of the Commonwealth on this important ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still

... even from such a simple scene as this! As for Helen, what could be a more direct lesson—a lived-out exercise—in sympathy, in altruistic self-denial, in the healthy elevation of her sense of self to the dignity of kindly offices, in the sense of responsibility and agency, in the stimulus to original effort and the designing of means to ends—and all of it with the best sense of the objectivity which is quite lost ...
— The Story of the Mind • James Mark Baldwin

... smiling. "I've often noticed that each tree is like its own leaf. Have you ever heard the tops of the trees whispering to each other. They often make gestures like old women, bowing with discretion and dignity; again, one sees them talking together like children, and other times ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various



Words linked to "Dignity" :   bearing, pridefulness, dignify, self-respect, self-worth, gravitas, lordliness, comportment, self-regard, mien, status



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