"Docility" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... many hard gallops, and some ugly falls, before it came to this; but both the Bushman Swartboy and the Bush-boy Hendrik were expert in the manege of horses, and soon tamed the quaggas to a proper degree of docility. ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid
... millions—of our fellow-men and women in this country. Can the Cab Horse Charter be gained for human beings? I answer, yes. The Cab Horse standard can be attained on the Cab Horse terms. If you get your fallen fellow on his feet again, Docility and Discipline will enable you to reach the Cab Horse ideal, otherwise it will remain unattainable. But Docility seldom fails where Discipline is intelligently maintained. Intelligence is more frequently lacking to direct than obedience to follow direction. At ...
— "In Darkest England and The Way Out" • General William Booth
... administration, much as they had been inclined to bluster at first about their privileges. The governor soon reported that matters were proceeding very, smoothly. There was a general return to the former docility now that such a disciplinarian as ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... velleities of resistance on the part of their governments, they were notified that America's economic aid, of which they were in sore need, would depend on their docility. It is important to remember that it was the motive thus clearly presented that determined their formal assent to a policy which they deprecated. A Russian statesman summed up the situation in the words: "It is an illustration of one of our sayings, 'Whose ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... suddenness of the blow, and were also ignorant of the aims of the men who dealt it; and while they were waiting to see the import of events, power passed rapidly into the hands of Bonaparte and his coadjutors. Such is an explanation, in part at least, of the strange docility now shown by a populace which still vaunted its loyalty to the democratic republic. But there is another explanation, which goes far deeper. The revolutionary strifes had wearied the brain of France and had predisposed it to accept ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... stun and astonish the intruding rabble of men and books and institutions, by a simple declaration of the divine fact. Bid the invaders take the shoes from off their feet, for God is here within. Let our simplicity judge them, and our docility to our own law demonstrate the poverty of nature and fortune beside our ...
— Essays, First Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... thinking. There were times when the flame of that strange exaltation burned low indeed; times when it seemed almost to expire. There were moments—hours—of misgivings. She could not understand the strange docility which had come over her; the unprecedented willingness to have her course shaped by another. That strange willingness came as near to frightening Zen as anything had ever done. She felt that she was being ...
— Dennison Grant - A Novel of To-day • Robert Stead
... a noble animal. His docility is perfect. He climbed up and down places so steep that a good horse would have bungled at them, pulled down trees when he was told to do it, held others which were slanting dangerously across the track high above our heads till ...
— The Golden Chersonese and the Way Thither • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs. Bishop)
... now quiet Vega, rode to an Indian village, near Concepcion. He had twenty behind him, well-armed, but arms were not needed. The people came about him with an eagerness, a docility. They told their stories. He sat his horse and listened with a benignant face. Certain harshnesses in times and amounts of their tribute he redressed. Forever, when personal appeal came to him, he proved magnanimous, often tender, fatherly and brotherly. At a distance ...
— 1492 • Mary Johnston
... of life he did not realize. Though beauty meant little to his practical nature, he sought, in his great love for Margaret, to appreciate the works which excited her to such charming ecstasy. He walked by her side with docility and listened, not without deference, to her outbursts. He admired the correctness of Greek anatomy, and there was one statue of an athlete which attracted his prolonged attention, because the muscles were indicated with the precision ...
— The Magician • Somerset Maugham
... of a few days my thoats were the wonder of the entire community. They would follow me like dogs, rubbing their great snouts against my body in awkward evidence of affection, and respond to my every command with an alacrity and docility which caused the Martian warriors to ascribe to me the possession of some earthly ...
— A Princess of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... they were; for from that hour my diligence in study, my docility of conduct, every thing that is usually regarded as praiseworthy in a child, sprung from a new motive. I wanted to earn a reward, and that was no longer a sweet story from the Bible, but permission to carry into ...
— Personal Recollections • Charlotte Elizabeth
... lips seemed to resemble two frayed, red, wet rags, and she walked with a sort of timid, uncertain step, just as though with one foot she were making a large step, and with the other a small one. She walked with docility up to the divan and with docility laid her head down on the pillow, without ceasing to smile faintly and insanely. Even at a distance it was apparent ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin
... d'hote, the day-old Times and the British or American gossip as a reward for his having conscientiously done whatever Murray or Baedeker bade him. Cook has only transformed the tourist's mental docility into a bodily one: the guidebook had long drilled his mind before the tour-contractor thought of drilling his body and driving willing gangs of his species ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 20, August 1877 • Various
... coolly stepped on one side, and was on his back again the instant he had recovered himself. That was too much for the obstreperous animal; he knew he was conquered and gave in to the inevitable, allowing himself to be handled and put through his paces with suspicious docility. ...
— Australia Revenged • Boomerang
... Noblesse, Clergy, and greater part of the Bourgeoisie," he wrote, "have given Government every Assistance in their Power." But the habitants refused to follow their appointed leaders with the old docility, and some even mobbed the seigneurs who tried to enroll them. Ten years of freedom had worked a democratic change in them, and they were much less enthusiastic than their betters about the restoration of seigneurial privileges. Carleton, like many another, had ...
— The Canadian Dominion - A Chronicle of our Northern Neighbor • Oscar D. Skelton
... his arm, and supported her to the carriage, followed with great docility by Armstrong, who broke out into occasional snatches of music, once a common habit, but in which he had not been known to indulge for ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... learned doctor who has had considerable experience in these islands, namely, Doctor Blas Nunez de Prado. [He observed] that there was no difference, but a great similarity, in the humors of those who had been treated, and a fine natural docility in responding to the medicine; in whatever remedy it was applied to them. For they have not the great rebelliousness and changeableness of the Europeans, because of the infinite combinations made in them by the four humors. The cause of this is the similarity ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55 • Francisco Colin
... empire firm on the ground and in the blood of the people, instead of an empire of aliens, that would bear comparison to a finely fretted cotton-hung palanquin balanced on an elephant's back, all depending on the docility of the elephant (his description of Great Britain's Indian Empire). 'And mind me,' he said, 'the masses of India are in character elephant all over, tail to proboscis! servile till they trample you, and not so stupid as they look. But you've done wonders ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Division (arith.) dividado. Divisor dividonto. Divorce (judicial) eksedzigxo. Divorce (judicial) eksedzigxi. Divorced, to be eksedzigxi. Divulge konigi. Dizziness kapturno. Do fari. Do away with, to forigi. Docile obea. Docility obeemo. Dock sxipejo. Docket karteto, bileto. Doctor Doktoro. Doctor (med.) kuracisto. Doctrine dogmaro. Document dokumento. Doff demeti. Dog hundo. Dogged obstina. Doghouse hundodometo. Dog kennel hundejo. Dogma dogmo. Dole disdoni. Doleful funebra. Doll pupo. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... thought was not the result of reflection, impulse, or reasoning. It came so to speak, of itself. The possibility of a lay career never so much as occurred to me. Having adopted with the utmost seriousness and docility the principles of my teachers, and having brought myself to consider all commercial and mercenary pursuits as inferior and degrading, and only fit for those who had failed in their studies, it was only natural that I should wish to be what they were. They were my patterns in life, and my ...
— Recollections of My Youth • Ernest Renan
... an insipid mess of pottage: sold our right to choose and to spare, to slay and to leave alive, to be glad and to be sorry, to be martyrs if we would be, to explore, to risk, to win. We shall be docile and respectable, and the standard of our docility and respectability will have been set by men no better and no worse than we are. We shall be sober by act of Parliament, and moral—if it be morality—because we have lost the notion of being anything else. We shall be of no use whatever ...
— Nonsenseorship • G. G. Putnam
... measure of freedom from burdens which they enjoyed as compared with their friends at home. To speak of them as 'slaves to the corvees and unpaid military service, debarred from education and crammed with gross fictions as an aid to their docility and their value as food for powder,' [Footnote: A. G. Bradley, The fight with France for North America (London, 1905, p. 388).] is to display a rare combination of hopeless bigotry and crass ignorance. The habitant of the old regime in Canada was ...
— The Seigneurs of Old Canada: - A Chronicle of New-World Feudalism • William Bennett Munro
... precisely what Bonaparte had expected, did not avail to lessen the contempt he entertained for the heads of the Government, nor to change his conviction of their envy and mistrust of himself. To their alleged affection he made no return. Bottot assured the hero of Italy of "the Republican docility" of the Directory, and touched upon the reproaches Bonaparte had thrown out against them, and upon his demands which had ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... unsound and that all religious men are hypocrites and allies of their sweaters and oppressors. They know that the large subscriptions which help to support the Army are endowments, not of religion, but of the wicked doctrine of docility in poverty and humility under oppression; and they are rent by the most agonizing of all the doubts of the soul, the doubt whether their true salvation must not come from their most abhorrent passions, from murder, envy, greed, stubbornness, rage, and terrorism, rather than from ...
— Bernard Shaw's Preface to Major Barbara • George Bernard Shaw
... hand, put in attendance with laudable docility, claiming a place beside Honor; and all through the sermon occupied himself with the marriage service, till a gloved hand recovered possession of the prayer-book and a pair of brown eyes ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi
... excessive partiality. These degrees of refinement, it must be allowed, do not indicate superlative talents; yet, if one may judge from the advancement in Frenchification made by many who have visited Paris from other countries, they may not depreciate the docility of poor Aotourou, much below the common average! He embarked at Rochelle in 1770, on board the Brisson, which was to take him to the Isle of France, whence, by orders of the ministry, he was to be conveyed home, which, as already ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr
... to Chip after that evening—the one, that the fight with Old Piper was ended; and the other, that in the matter of Edith's marriage, once the immediate shock had spent its strength, he bowed to the accomplished fact with a docility he himself could not understand. As for the fight with Old Piper, there was no longer a reason for waging it. In the new situation Old Piper had lost its appeal, from sheer inadequacy to meet the new need. ...
— The Letter of the Contract • Basil King
... Madame Montlusin, anxious to give full effect to the medical orders and assist in the recovery of her husband's health, offered him a large glass of the finest and clearest water. The patient took it with docility, and began to drink it with resignation; but stopping short at the first mouthful, he handed back the glass to his wife. "Take it, my dear," said he, "and keep it for another time; I have always heard it said that we should not ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... Dot submitted. She had not the faintest inkling of his intentions or her docility would have vanished on the instant. As it was, fortified by Anne's presence, she yielded ...
— The Knave of Diamonds • Ethel May Dell
... milker, for her size; of quiet temper; docile in her habits; a quick feeder; and a most satisfactory animal in all particulars. From the Devons, spring those beautifully matched red working-oxen, so much admired in our eastern states; the superiors to which, in kindness, docility, endurance, quickness, and honesty of labor, no country can produce. In the quality of their beef, they are unrivaled by any breed of cattle in the United States; but in their early maturity for that purpose, are not equal ...
— Rural Architecture - Being a Complete Description of Farm Houses, Cottages, and Out Buildings • Lewis Falley Allen
... cast Himself down, to do it would have been right. As He had not, to do it was not faith, but self-will. To cast Himself into dangers needlessly, and then to trust God (whom He had not consulted about going into them) to get Him out, was to 'tempt God.' True faith is ever accompanied with true docility. He had come to do His Father's will. A divine 'must' ruled His life. Was He to begin His career by throwing off His allegiance on pretext of trust? If the Captain of our Salvation commences the campaign by rebellion, how can He lead the rank and file to that surrender of ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... book of the actual words of Bergson are a tribute to the excellence and essential rightness of his style. The Frenchman, himself a free and candid spirit, would be the last to require unquestioning docility in others. He knows that thereby is the philosophic breath choked out of us. If we read him in the spirit in which he would wish to be read, we shall find, however much we may diverge from him on particular issues, that our labour has been far from wasted. He undoubtedly ...
— Bergson and His Philosophy • J. Alexander Gunn
... critic said that Irving was much more relished and admired in England than in his own country, and added: "It is only recently critics on the lookout for a literature have elevated him to his proper and almost more than his proper place. This docility to English guidance in the case of their best, or almost their best, prose writer, may perhaps be followed by a similar docility in the case of their best, or almost their best, poet, Poe, whom also ...
— Literary and Social Essays • George William Curtis
... the large group of excellent qualities which are associated with affectionate respect for a more fully informed authority. In a world where necessity stands for so much, it is no inconsiderable gain to have learnt the lesson of docility on easy terms in our earliest days. If in another sense the will of each individual is all-powerful over his own destinies, it is best that this idea of firm purpose and a settled energy that will not be denied, should grow up in the young soul in connection with a riper ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley
... The supposed docility of the American Negro was counted among the reasons why it was thought he could never gain his freedom on this continent. But this was a misinterpretation of his real character. Besides, it was next to impossible to learn the history of the Negro during ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams
... went into the hall. She had learned from her father and the servants not to dispute the authority of Miss Chris, though she yielded to it with a mild surprise at her own docility. ...
— The Voice of the People • Ellen Glasgow
... I was noted for the docility and humanity of my disposition. My tenderness of heart was even so conspicuous as to make me the jest of my companions. I was especially fond of animals, and was indulged by my parents with a great ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... one by one, in the most detailed and interesting fashion. During all this "mamma" kept up a stream of baby talk to her infant: "Now your stockings, my darling; now your skirt, sweetness—O! no—not yet—your shoes first," etc., etc. Baby acceded to all the details with more than the docility which real infants usually show. When this was done—"Now we must go tell papa good-morning, dearie," said mamma. "Yes, mamma," came the reply; and hand in hand they started to find papa. I, the spectator, carefully read my newspaper, thinking, however, ...
— The Story of the Mind • James Mark Baldwin
... than they will overtake the Liath Macha and Black Shanglan, whose going truly is like the going of eagles. O storm-footed steeds, great is my love for you, and inexpressible my pride in your might and your beauty, your speed and your terror, and sweet docility and affection." ...
— The Coming of Cuculain • Standish O'Grady
... up to the full height of her indignation. Secretly, silently, in misery and isolation, harshly treated by the people and the things about her, the girl had built up a resolute, straightforward character; tears had tempered instead of softening it. Beneath filial docility and humility, beneath passive obedience, beneath apparent gentleness of disposition, she concealed a character of iron, a man's strength of will, one of those hearts which nothing bends and which never bend themselves. When her father demanded that she lower herself to that extent, she reminded ...
— Germinie Lacerteux • Edmond and Jules de Goncourt
... was accompanied by turbulence within. Schisms occurred. Branches were broken off from the Church. The great temporal power and wealth to which, owing to the obedience and docility of the rank and file, the leaders had fallen practically sole heirs, had gone to their heads. The Mormon Church gave every indication of breaking up into disorganized smaller units, when fortunately for it the prophet Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum were killed ...
— The Forty-Niners - A Chronicle of the California Trail and El Dorado • Stewart Edward White
... the people she lived with might out of kindness have concealed part of the news from her. However that might be, I determined to save the horse, and explained this to Aline, with a brotherly warning not to allow emotion to get the better of her judgment in future. She listened with a docility that promised future reprisals, and then, agreeing that it would be well to secure the horse, said that she should not mind being left alone. Indeed, unless something very unexpected happened, she would be as safe alone at Fairmead as ...
— Lorimer of the Northwest • Harold Bindloss
... With a surprising docility Mary V accepted the somewhat patronizing invitation. Perhaps she really appreciated the fact that Johnny was proving how much confidence he had in her. Presently she urged that confidence to further disclosures. What did he really and truly intend to do with his ...
— Skyrider • B. M. Bower
... Santa Rosa, of which beautiful town his patron, Mr. White, was then the marshal. Jack came to my Sunday-school, and was taken into a class of about twenty boys taught by myself. They were the noisy element of the school, ranging from ten to fifteen years of age —too large to show the docility of the little lads, but not old enough to have attained the self-command and self-respect that come later in life. Though he was much older than any of them, and heavier than his teacher, this class suited Jack. The white boys ...
— California Sketches, Second Series • O. P. Fitzgerald
... about 'what ought to be.'[232] Occasionally, it would seem, they descended lower, and made a little fun of the shy and over-sensitive intruder.[233] The ladies, however, made it up to him. Shelburne made him read his 'dry metaphysics' to them,[234] and they received it with feminine docility. Lord Shelburne had lately (1779) married his second wife, Louisa, daughter of the first earl of Upper Ossory. Her sister, Lady Mary Fitz-Patrick, married in 1766 to Stephen Fox, afterwards Lord Holland, was the mother of the Lord Holland of later days and of ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume I. • Leslie Stephen
... habit of being led, of awaiting an impulsion, of turning towards the accustomed center, towards Paris, from which his orders have always arrived. Arthur Young[5417] is struck with this mechanical movement. Political ignorance and docility are everywhere complete. He, a foreigner, conveys the news of Alsace into Burgundy: the insurrection there had been terrible, the populace having sacked the city-hall at Strasbourg, of which not a word was known at Dijon; "yet it is nine days since it happened; ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... such sleek and glossy coats, that they look as if brushed and put on by a valet every morning. They march with a slow and stately step, lifting their ponderous hoofs like royal Siam elephants. Thou shalt not lay stripes upon these Roman citizens; for their docility is such, they are guided without rein or lash; they go or come, halt or march on, at a whisper. So grave, dignified, gentlemanly, and courteous did these fine truck-horses look—so full of calm intelligence and sagacity, that often I endeavored to get into conversation with them, ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... insistence. His hand held the Frenchman's arm. It was obvious that he would listen to no refusal. And the man in rags attempted none. He went with him meekly, as if bewildered into docility. His single flash of pride had died out like the ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... their faces to avoid the cannonade which they might presently expect. The insurgents ceased to resist or to remonstrate; but the awe which had silenced their discords had dismayed their courage. They suffered themselves to be formed into ranks with the docility of a flock of sheep, but without possessing, for the time, more resolution or energy; for they experienced a sinking of the heart, imposed by the sudden and imminent approach of the danger which they ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... scouring the town, at earning twenty-five sous an hour from ignorant architects, who treated him like a hodman. What course should he adopt? How was he to guess at the shortest route? He might leave the School; he would get a lift from his master, the influential Dequersonniere, who liked him for his docility and diligence; only what a deal of trouble and uncertainty there would still be before him! And he bitterly complained of the Government schools, where one slaved away for years, and which did not even provide a position for all those whom ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola
... indulgent to the memory of Gallus, and even Julian himself, though he wished to cast a veil over the frailties of his brother, are obliged to confess that the Caesar was incapable of reigning. Transported from a prison to a throne, he possessed neither genius nor application, nor docility to compensate for the want of knowledge and experience. A temper naturally morose and violent, instead of being corrected, was soured by solitude and adversity; the remembrance of what he had endured disposed him to retaliation rather than to sympathy; and the ungoverned sallies of his rage were ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... looked up dreamily, then opened his eyes wide, with surprising docility rolled out and, uttering no word, lurched to the fan-tan table. The tall man took his place, lay down, and drew together the unclean curtains of sleazy stuff provided to afford privacy to shrinking souls. This done, he turned ...
— Red Masquerade • Louis Joseph Vance
... Milly was advancing in her uncle's favor. Her extreme docility and great fearlessness, added to her quaintness of speech and action, attracted him greatly. He became interested in watching her little figure as it flitted to and fro, and the sunny laugh and bright childish voice about the house were no longer ...
— Probable Sons • Amy Le Feuvre
... would suffer from hunger, and perhaps starve to death. He got them to promise that they would begin this new way of life. As they were feeling very comfortable while feasting on his bounties, they were in the humour of promising everything he desired. Very much delighted at their docility, he said he would send them axes to clear more of their land, and oxen and ploughs to prepare it for seed; and when all was ready he would send them seed grain. Great were their rejoicings at these words, and with stately ceremony the ...
— By Canoe and Dog-Train • Egerton Ryerson Young
... concentrated essence of feminine witchery. Intuition strong, logic weak, and the two qualities so balanced as to produce an indefinable charm; will-power large, but docility equal, if a man is clever enough to know how to manage her; knowledge of facts absolutely nil, but she is exquisitely intelligent in spite of it. She has a way of evading, escaping, eluding, and then gives you an intoxicating hint ...
— A Cathedral Courtship • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... an admiring, sympathizing wife, and an admirable housekeeper. She still utters inadvertencies now and then, commits new errors at odd times, but never repeats them when exposed. Observing which docility, Uncle Philip has been heard to express a fear that, in twenty years, she will be the wisest woman in England. "But, thank heaven!" he adds, "I shall be ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade
... reappeared amid the accomplishments of the petit-maitre, and poor Mrs. Allison's spirits revived. Then the golden-haired Lady Madeleine was asked to stay at Castle Luton. When she came Ancoats devoted himself with extraordinary docility. He drew her, made songs for her, and devised French charades to act with her; he even went so far as to compare her with enthusiasm to the latest and most wonderful "Salome" just exhibited in the Salon by the latest and most wonderful of the impressionists. But Lady ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... hours. She opened her eyes and looked around the room, and remembered how she had run away and how her mother was not there, and she remembered the strange lady with that same odd combination of terror and attraction and docility with which she had regarded her the night before. It was a very cold morning, and there was a delicate film of frost on the windows between the sweeps of the muslin curtains, and the morning sun gave it a rosy glow and a crusting sparkle as of diamonds. The sight of the frost had broken ...
— The Portion of Labor • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... moment—as pensioners on God's grace and love, following in all things His directing hand! As the servant has his eyes on his master, or the child on its parent, "so should our eyes be on the Lord our God." Howsoever He speaks, be it ours with all docility to follow the voice, indorsing every utterance of providence, and every precept of Scripture, with our Lord's own words, ...
— The Mind of Jesus • John R. Macduff
... some degree his pupil, and may even have considered it his duty to start him on the proper path. Quenu was an absolute novice in politics, but after spending five or six evenings in the little room he found himself quite in accord with the others. When Lisa was not present he manifested much docility, a sort of respect for his brother's opinions. But the greatest charm of the affair for him was really the mild dissipation of leaving his shop and shutting himself up in the little room where the others shouted so loudly, and where Clemence's presence, in his opinion, gave a tinge ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola
... manysidedly awake, all attempts at any such constraint only arrest or deflect the growth of these intimations. Yet the dispositions necessary for the sufficient apprehension of these religious intimations—sincerity, conscientiousness, docility—are not, even collectively, already Religion, any more than they are Science or Philosophy. With these dispositions on our part, objective facts and living Reality can reach us—and, even so, these facts reach us practically ...
— Progress and History • Various
... confidence of youth in those it loves, explains Elizabeth's docility at that time. But underneath her submission that day was a growing uneasiness, fiercely suppressed. Buried deep, the battle between absolute trust and fear was beginning, a battle which was so ...
— The Breaking Point • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... thinking people,—Quae maxima semper censetur nobis, et ERIT quae maxima semper;—his confidence in Mr. Fox was such, and so ample, as to be almost implicit. That he was not ashamed to avow that degree of docility. That, when the choice is well made, it strengthens, instead of oppressing our intellect. That he who calls in the aid of an equal understanding doubles his own. He who profits of a superior understanding raises his powers to ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. III. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... was not quite sane; and certainly he was not quite sane, if we place sanity in justness of external perception, adaptation to matter, and docility to the facts; but his lack of sanity was not due to any internal corruption; it was not even an internal eccentricity. He was like a child, like a Platonic soul just fallen from the Empyrean; and the child may be dazed, credulous, and fanciful; but he is not mad. On ...
— Winds Of Doctrine - Studies in Contemporary Opinion • George Santayana
... Ambrogio hath little learning; but Paolo will cover us with honor. In learning he is never weary, yet hath he an understanding greater than mine own, and in docility he hath no equal. In his duty in the convent and in the church he is even ...
— A Golden Book of Venice • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... had taken a great hold upon his fancy, and his whole heart was wrapped up in it. He was captain, of course, and all the other boys obeyed him implicitly. Their docility ministered to his pride, and he showed his appreciation by fairly showering his bounty upon them. There positively seemed no end to his pocket money. All sorts of expenses were indulged in. A fine tent was set ...
— Bert Lloyd's Boyhood - A Story from Nova Scotia • J. McDonald Oxley
... courses, it was always so. After the long and tedious voyaging it was their Elysium. Not only are the sweet surroundings of the lake most charming, but the Indians of the neighborhood have always been noted for their good character, their docility and their industry. ...
— The Romantic Settlement of Lord Selkirk's Colonists - The Pioneers of Manitoba • George Bryce
... beating drums. It was a spectacle to stir the dullest soul when this gallant band marched out of the yard in full regimentals, with Captain Dove a solemn, big-headed boy of eleven issuing his orders with the gravity of a general, and his Falstaffian regiment obeying them with more docility than skill. The little Snow children did very well, and Lieutenant Jack Dove was fine to see; so was Drummer Frank, the errand-boy of the house, as he rub-a-dub-dubbed with all his heart and drumsticks. Jamie had "trained" ...
— Eight Cousins • Louisa M. Alcott
... Foresti in regard to his treatment of all three of the little girls sent by us to the school; telling him that if they are idle or wanting in docility and respect, he is simply to report them for discipline at home. Will that ...
— The Two Elsies - A Sequel to Elsie at Nantucket, Book 10 • Martha Finley
... the Philippines under Spanish rule was quite a different being to the obstinate, self-willed, riotous coolie in Hong-Kong or Singapore. In Manila he was drilled past docility—in six months he became even fawning, cringing, and servile, until goaded into open rebellion. Whatever position he might attain to, he was never addressed (as in the British Colonies) as "Mr." or ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... absence of daylight, enabling us to see plainly our landmarks. We jogged along toward the spring and I sang Oh the Lone Starry Hours, Give Me Love, when I was suddenly interrupted by old Thunderbolt's pack loosening. Thunderbolt was a horse that waited for such an event with remarkable docility and when it arrived he made the best of the opportunity to get even with us for drawing the lash-rope so tight. Before I could dismount and lay hands on him the pack slipped back over his rump which was the signal he watched for. Joyously flinging his heels in the moonlit air, jumping ...
— A Canyon Voyage • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh
... Brahma breed. They come early, grow fast, sell readily, are tender, and have no disposition to forage; they are not all the time wandering round and flying over the garden fence, and scratching up flower and vegetable seeds. In fact, if you'll notice, there is a docility about my live-stock that is very attractive. The cows and chickens only need articulation to carry on conversation. You didn't see the hatching department of my chicken-house? I modeled the building after one used by a Madame de Linas, a French ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... scholars, had gone in procession to seek, in the cupboard of the law clerks' company, the cardboard tiara, and the derisive robe of the Pope of the Fools. Quasimodo allowed them to array him in them without wincing, and with a sort of proud docility. Then they made him seat himself on a motley litter. Twelve officers of the fraternity of fools raised him on their shoulders; and a sort of bitter and disdainful joy lighted up the morose face of the cyclops, when he beheld beneath his deformed feet all those heads of handsome, straight, ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo
... people, half monk and half soldier, who had carved his way through the world by murder, rapine, and abject submission to his superiors, soon began to stretch an iron hand over the town's-people. The Montereyans will bear much, yet under their apparent docility and moral apathy there lurks a fire which, once excited, pours forth flames of destruction. Moreover, the foreigners established in Monterey had, for a long time, enjoyed privileges which they were not willing to relinquish; ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat
... himself was a mere child of nature, indolent, and led by the whim of the moment, rather than by any fixed principle. He was desired by his father to take charge of the domain of which he was the keeper, and to unite himself in marriage with a family relative. With unthinking docility he consented to both, but neglected alike his official duties and domestic obligations with an innocent unconsciousness of wrong. He was taken to Paris by the Duchess of Bouillon and passed his ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... in his hind quarters, and possessed much of the plumpness and sleekness which distinguish that breed, but looking in his eyes you would have been undeceived in a moment; a wild savage fire darted from the restless orbs, and so far from exhibiting the docility of the other noble and loyal animal, he occasionally plunged desperately, and could scarcely be restrained by a strong curb and powerful arm from resuming his former headlong course. The rider was a youth, apparently ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... any other person of true imagination—would call abominable a wonderful piece of mechanism with the power of flattening mountains into plains, triumphing over space, annihilating distance; a machine combining fiercest energy with the mildest docility. No, only old fogies would close their hearts to a machine fit for the gods, and pride themselves on being motophobes forever. We felt ourselves, car and all, to be worthy of this magic way, lined with blossoms that played like rosy children among the ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... silent, characterless man, taking the lead from his wife with admirable docility, and asking nothing from fortune but regular work and time to read the newspaper. He had worked for the same firm since he was a boy, disliking change; but since his second marriage he had been dragged from one house to another. Sometimes he ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone
... lovely child. She bade me have no alarms for her, that all was well, she was reconciled to her lot; indeed, she added that she could not now wish things otherwise. Amazed, but also enchanted with her docility and sweetness, I gave her an old man's blessing, and my prayers that the rigour of the holy Sisters might be softened toward her tender and high-spirited youth. She replied that she had no fear of the Sisters; that in truth she thought they would give her no trouble of any kind. I was ravished ...
— Rita • Laura E. Richards
... was Atufal's offense, Don Benito?" asked Captain Delano; "if it was not something very serious, take a fool's advice, and, in view of his general docility, as well as in some natural respect for his spirit, ...
— The Piazza Tales • Herman Melville
... docility, staying out, however, somewhat longer than usual. Picard, impatient at the delay, spoke roughly to him when he returned, and ordered him to go upstairs to his work. Adolph departed meekly, leaving ...
— Revenge! • by Robert Barr
... of those which depend on the will, and are more often spoken of by their proper name of virtues; whose great excellence is attributed to the mind as a subject of praise. Now in the former class are docility, memory, and others, nearly all of which are called by the one name of ingenium, and those who possess them are called ingeniosi. The other class consists of those which are great and real virtues; ...
— The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero
... hinted that unless a reformation occurred some others of the community might find themselves in the same evil and perilous case. Having thus pointed the moral and reduced his flock to a fitting state of docility, he dismissed them once more to their labors and withdrew himself to his own private chamber, there to seek spiritual aid in the discharge of the duties of ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle
... With the docility of that complete indifference which is bred of deadening weariness, she submitted to being helped to her seat, arranged her veil to protect her face and sat back with folded hands, submissive to endure whatsoever chance or mischance ...
— The Bandbox • Louis Joseph Vance
... about the matter, but sent back an answer by his wife, that the price of transporting the freight from one railway to another at Breslau, Berlin, Magdeburg, and Cologne, would render the scheme impossible. Balzac showed unusual docility at this juncture; he was evidently already half-hearted about the enterprise, and remarked that since his first letter he had himself thought of the objections pointed out by M. Surville, and had remembered hearing that a forest purchased in Auvergne, had ruined the ...
— Honore de Balzac, His Life and Writings • Mary F. Sandars
... partial. He is driven to join himself on. He obeys decision and the appearance of strength as a horse obeys its rider's voice. One thinks of the pride, the uncontrolled frantic will of this black ape of all Emperors, and one forgets the universal docility that made him possible. Usurpation is a crime to which men are tempted by human dirigibility. It is the orderly peoples who create tyrants, and it is not so much restraint above as stiff insubordination below that has to be taught to men. There are kings and ...
— The Research Magnificent • H. G. Wells
... of these little wanderings, she would go through her recitations with as much correctness and docility as a sharp-witted child of twelve years. She felt a childlike pride in gaining the approval of her teacher. When she was under Miss Pillbody's instructions, and knew that every mistake would be courteously but firmly corrected on the spot (the teacher's invariable ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton
... of the power of story-telling to develop attentiveness comes to my mind, but the most prominent in memory is a rather recent incident, in which the actors were boys and girls far past the child-stage of docility. ...
— How to Tell Stories to Children - And Some Stories to Tell • Sara Cone Bryant
... the person that discovers Arjuna to me, I shall make him a more valuable gift, viz., five hundred steeds, adorned with trappings of gold and decked with jewelled ornaments. I shall also give eighteen other steeds of great docility. I shall also give the person that discovers Arjuna to me a bright car made of gold and adorned with diverse ornaments and having foremost of Kamboja steeds yoked unto it. If that does not satisfy ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... day, therefore, I obeyed all my brother's military commands with the utmost docility; and happy it made me that every sort of doubt, or question, or opening for demur was swallowed up in the unity of this one papal principle, discovered by my brother, viz., that all rights and duties of casuistry were transferred from me to himself. His was the judgment—his ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... women peculiarly fitted them for the work. They were a mixed race. The fiery enthusiasm of the Sclaves was in them blended with the steadfast energy and patient docility of the Germans. The fire of their natures was a holy fire—a lambent flame which lighted but did not destroy. Their creed was one of love; it was a joyful persuasion of their interest in Christ and their title to His purchased ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... position guarantees his access to the best information will content himself with gloomy dogmatism, striking the table with his fist, and saying in a terrific voice, "It is so, and there's an end of it," one bows deferentially, and submits. But, if, unhappily for himself, won by this docility, he relents too amiably into reasons and arguments, probably one raises an insurrection against him that may never be crushed; for in the fields of logic one can skirmish, perhaps, as well as he. ...
— The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc • Thomas de Quincey
... sudden emotions, and never able to conceal what he felt if he had cared to do so. Marcello had inherited his father's character and his mother's face, as often happens; but his unquiet disposition was tempered as yet by a certain almost girlish docility, which had clung to him from childhood as the result of being brought up almost entirely by the mother he worshipped. And now, for the first time, comparing him with her second husband, she realised the boy's girlishness, and wished him to outgrow it. Her own ideal of what even a young man ...
— Whosoever Shall Offend • F. Marion Crawford
... morality also very different. But in truth the morality of these conventional worlds differs from the morality of the real world only in points where there is no danger that the real world will ever go wrong. The generosity and docility of Telemachus, the fortitude, the modesty, the filial tenderness of Kailyal, are virtues of all ages and nations. And there was very little danger that the Dauphin would worship Minerva, or that an ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... prophecy, and under the influence of the apparition which he saw, or thought he saw always—in asserting that the corpse of Stephen Monkton, wherever it was, lay yet unburied. On every other topic he deferred to me with the utmost readiness and docility; on this he maintained his strange opinion with an obstinacy which set reason and ...
— The Queen of Hearts • Wilkie Collins
... Valentine lot and monument were very beautiful; that there never had been any cremations in the family connection; and that she hoped he would not break a long-established custom and leave behind him a positively irreligious request. Various stories of Mr. Valentine's docility had crept into circulation, and it is said that on this occasion he turned his head meekly to the wall and sighed: "Very well, Emma! Do just as you think best; ...
— Ladies-In-Waiting • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... was sobered by this unexpected flash of spirit. They had been married nearly three years by this time, and Beth's habitual docility had deceived him. Hitherto men have been able to insult their wives in private with impunity when so minded, and Dan was staggered for a moment to find himself face to face with a mere girl who boldly refused ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... by him who is willing to hear instruction and can perceive right and wrong when they are shown to him by another;—but he who hath neither acuteness nor docility—who can neither find the way by himself, nor will be led by others, is a wretch without ...
— Valere Aude - Dare to Be Healthy, Or, The Light of Physical Regeneration • Louis Dechmann
... habit of obedience to his superior, and the instinctive docility of his temper compelled Adone to submit; he drew a long, deep breath and the blood faded ...
— The Waters of Edera • Louise de la Rame, a.k.a. Ouida
... good disposition and a reasonable degree of handiness, and the housekeeper understands her profession, a good servant may be made out of an indifferent one. Some of the best girls have been those who came directly from the ship, with no preparation but docility and some natural quickness. The hardest cases to be managed are not of those who have been taught nothing, but of those who have been taught wrongly—who come self-opinionated, with ways which are distasteful, and contrary to the genius of one's housekeeping. ...
— The American Woman's Home • Catherine E. Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe
... into the faces of the two men, then with touching docility he did as Roger bade him. In a moment he was blowing foam violently into the fire. The two men looked at ...
— The Forbidden Trail • Honore Willsie
... still holding the athaleb's wing, pulled at him, and thus guided him toward the portal. I was amazed at the docility of this terrific monster; yet, after all, I thought that it was no more astonishing than the docility of the elephant, which in like manner allows itself to be guided by the slightest pressure. A child may lead a vast elephant with ease, and here with equal ...
— A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder • James De Mille
... of means toward an end, it cumulates efforts resulting in definite achievement. In so far as we do accomplish anything of significance, we must move along stable and determinate lines; we must be able to count on the future.[1] It has already been pointed out that it is man's docility to learning, his long period of infancy[2] which makes his eventual achievements possible. But it is man's persistence in the habits he has acquired that is in part responsible for his progress. In individual life, the utility of persistence, and concentration ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman
... danger the differences of convention disappeared. The man really superior having shown himself, acted as a rallying point to the crowd, who grouped themselves around him, while the general-in-chief remained mute and confounded, receiving with docility the impulse the other had given, and acknowledging his superiority, which, after the danger was over, he disputed, but of which he did not, as too often happens, ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur
... the enclosure. Clerambault knew only too well the supercilious smile with which the ideas of inventors are put aside by learned men from the official schools. There are certain forms of science which accord perfectly with docility. David's manner showed no irony; it expressed rather a stoical, baffled kind of melancholy. In abstract questions he did not lack courage of thought, but when faced with the facts of life he was a mixture, or rather a succession, of timidity ...
— Clerambault - The Story Of An Independent Spirit During The War • Rolland, Romain
... are not nearly so superior as they suppose they are. They think "Irreverence for the dreams of youth" always comes from "the hardening of the heart." But youth has some fantastic as well as some noble dreams, so that docility is a better quality than independence in a very young person. If a worldly minded mother inculcates worldliness in her daughter, the daughter certainly ought to stand firm against the teaching; but if the daughter merely thinks she would rather ...
— Girls and Women • Harriet E. Paine (AKA E. Chester}
... order to prevent them. How these people can best be led to the true knowledge of God and of the Mediator Christ, is hard to say. I cannot myself wonder enough who it is that has imposed so much upon your Reverence and many others in the Fatherland, concerning the docility of these people and their good nature, the proper principia religionis and vestigia legis naturae which are said to be among them; in whom I have as yet been able to discover hardly a single good point, except that they do not speak so jeeringly and so scoffingly of the godlike and glorious ...
— Narrative of New Netherland • Various
... of mind, and an uncommon receptivity and docility, and soon became to all that got acquainted with her a dear and precious object. To declaim passages from her Brother's Poems was her greatest joy; she did her recitation well; and her Swabian accent and naivety of manner gave her an additional charm for her new relatives, and even exercised ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle
... the court of the hotel—he sat a great deal in the court of the hotel—and had gone up to him with characteristic directness and asked him for Miss Francina. Poor Mr. Dosson had with the greatest docility disposed himself to wait on the young man: he had as a matter of course risen and made his way across the court to announce to his child that she had a visitor. He looked submissive, almost servile, as he preceded the visitor, thrusting his head forward in his quest; but it ...
— The Reverberator • Henry James
... wedding she surprised herself by her docility and acquiescence in all that was proposed for her. She even accepted without demur the white swiss and blue ribbons that a week before she had considered entirely too infantile for an adult maid ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... large mission village from many scattered hamlets; but dies soon after its foundation. The fathers are welcomed in Ogmuc, and a school for the children is at once begun; they are delighted at the cleverness and docility of these little ones. Many of those people are ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XII, 1601-1604 • Edited by Blair and Robertson
... too much or too little—according to the point of view—to assume that Fouchette was patient under her yoke and that she went about her tasks with the docility of a well-trained animal. On the contrary, she not only rebelled in spirit, but she often resisted with all her feeble strength, fighting, feet, hands, and teeth, with feline ferocity. Having been brought to the level of brutes, she had become a brute in ...
— Mlle. Fouchette - A Novel of French Life • Charles Theodore Murray
... sight than that of untimely care in children, and it was particularly observable in one whose disposition had heretofore been mirthful. Yet there was so much sweetness and docility about Clara, that your admiration was excited; and if the moods of mind are calculated to paint the cheek with beauty, and endow motions with grace, surely her contemplations must have been celestial; since every lineament was moulded into loveliness, and her motions were ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... embarrassment. "Don't talk about your wife, and this house, but just say you've made the thing up with me,—with ME, you know, and I'll see you through." An idea, as yet vague, that he could turn Collinson's unexpected docility to his own purposes, possessed him even in his embarrassment, and he was still more strangely conscious of his inordinate vanity gathering a fearful joy from Collinson's evident admiration. It was heightened ...
— In a Hollow of the Hills • Bret Harte
... down in well-meant concern for Christopher's well-being, and received certain emphatic instructions, which he took with shrewd docility, and a wink of his ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant
... "self-acting mule" came into use he adds triumphantly: "This invention comprises the great doctrine already propounded, that when capital enlists science in her service the refractory hand of labour will always be taught docility" (p. 368). ...
— The Evolution of Modern Capitalism - A Study of Machine Production • John Atkinson Hobson
... correcting his taste, subduing his enthusiasm, and modifying even his behaviour. The tourist would presumably pay off the unwelcome guide, but the children cannot pay off the teacher: they can and do rebel, but docility and adaptability seem to play a large part in self-preservation. For the young child freedom must precede docility, because the only reasonable and profitable docility is one that comes after initiative and experiment have been satisfied, ...
— The Child Under Eight • E.R. Murray and Henrietta Brown Smith
... of a twofold part; The first of nature, and the next of art; Art presupposes nature; nature, she Prepares the way for man's docility. ...
— A Selection From The Lyrical Poems Of Robert Herrick • Robert Herrick
... the animal's docility Cleek could not but remember what the creature had done, and, in consequence, did not feel quite at ease when it came lumbering out of the cage with the attendant and ranged up alongside of him, rubbing its huge head against the chevalier's arm after the ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... her waiting-maid and her cabinet of rarities were her boasts, and equally shewn to every visitor: for besides the beauty of her figure, and the genteel air of her person, the dear girl had a surprising memory, a solidity of judgment above her years, and a docility so unequalled, that she took all parts of learning which her lady, as fond of instructing her as she of improving by instruction, crowded upon her; insomuch that she had masters to teach her to dance, sing, and play on the spinnet, ...
— Pamela (Vol. II.) • Samuel Richardson
... a wife approved by my judgment, cultivating the moral fruit of which I have sown the seed—this will content me. But, my son, I wish to clear this bright vision from the shadow of a doubt. I believe in your docility; I believe I may trust the salutary force of your respect for my memory. But I must remember that when I am removed you will stand here alone, face to face with a hundred nameless temptations to perversity. The ...
— Eugene Pickering • Henry James
... his commands anticipated. As he went, his four generals parted off, to examine the forts on either hand, and to inspect and animate the militia. Everywhere the same story was told, and everywhere was it received with the same eagerness and docility. "The French are coming to make slaves of us again; but there shall never more be a slave in Saint Domingo. They are coming; but they are our countrymen till they have struck the first blow. We will demand of them an account of our brethren in Cayenne, in Guadaloupe, ...
— The Hour and the Man - An Historical Romance • Harriet Martineau
... that she was scolding; but, in truth, she was merely giving them directions. Having no other object of contemplation or subject of discourse, she always found, in their postures and looks, occasion for praise, or blame, or command. The readiness with which they understood, and the docility with which they obeyed, her movements and ...
— Edgar Huntley • Charles Brockden Brown
... the timid of giants he can confront, the poor of treasures he spends, the most humble peasant, in the height of his pride, calls himself Jupiter. Whether Noirtier understood the young man's indecision, or whether he had not full confidence in his docility, he looked uneasily at him. "What do you wish, sir?" asked Morrel; "that I should renew my promise of remaining tranquil?" Noirtier's eye remained fixed and firm, as if to imply that a promise did not suffice; then it passed from ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... gathering the clusters with zeal and joy. She show'd, as I was told afterward, a sort of infatuation for them, and every year placed and kept profuse bunches high and low about her room. They had a strange charm on her uneasy head, and effected docility and peace. (She was harmless, and lived near by with her well-off married daughter.) Whether there is any connection between those bunches, and being out of one's wits, I cannot say, but I myself entertain ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman
... prodigious age, having been in the service of the Dutch and English Governments in succession for upwards of a century.[1] The other, called by her keeper "Siribeddi," was about fifty years old, and distinguished for gentleness and docility. She was a most accomplished decoy, and evinced the utmost relish for the sport. Having entered the corral noiselessly, carrying a mahout on her shoulders with the headman of the noosers seated behind him, she moved slowly along with a sly ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent
... short, without prominent beetling ridges above the eyes, or a strong crest along the middle line of the back of the skull; and the tusks of the old males are of no very great length and prominence. Moreover, there is no very marked difference in the size of the two sexes. Gentleness and docility are specially characteristic of the species, even when full-grown; while in the native state ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various
... with which I before and since have regarded her sex. Her gentleness, her docility, her pleasure in the studies which I pointed out to her, attached my affections more than became my age though that was not then much advancedor the solidity of my character. But I need not remind your lordship of ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... exhausted: and, if so, what might not have been the effect of his obstinacy (if such a term could be applied to unshaken intrepidity,) on men exasperated by opposition, and eager for revenge. In the outset he had admitted his gentle cousin Gertrude to his confidence, as one most suited, by her docility, to soothe without appearing to remark on his alarm, but when, little suspecting the true motive of her agitation, he saw her evince an emotion surpassing his own, and admitting and giving way to fears beyond any he would openly avow, he grew impatient and disappointed, and ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... identical with the famed "Basuto pony," for which long prices are given today. It is a great pity that these ponies have been allowed to become practically extinct in the Cape Colony. For hardiness and docility they were unequalled. Like so much else, they melted away in the coffers of ...
— Reminiscences of a South African Pioneer • W. C. Scully
... appetite. He would clutch eagerly all the food offered him, and crouch, huddled over it, with his face to the rock-wall, while he devoured it with frantic haste and bestial noises. But as he found himself treated with invariable kindness, he began to develop an anxious gratitude and docility. On A-ya's tall form his little round eyes, shy and fierce at the same time, came to rest with an adoring awe. The smell of him being extremely offensive to all this cleanly tribe, and especially to A-ya and Grom, who were more fastidious than their fellows, A-ya had ...
— In the Morning of Time • Charles G. D. Roberts
... acquaintance any one would very impatiently covet for his conversation: on the contrary, I agree that his humour is fantastical, and his manners not of the pleasing cast; but there is nothing so savage and inhuman, which a little care, attention, and complaisance may not tame into docility. I must repeat to you some verses upon the subject: I have got them by heart, because they contain a little advice, which you may accommodate, if you ...
— The Memoirs of Count Grammont, Complete • Anthony Hamilton
... evince and justify the pure and enlightened confidence of his spirit! All dangers, all difficulties, vanish before his gentleness, his regularity, his perseverance. Insolence and ferocity seem to turn, at his approach, into docility and respect. Every hardship he endures, every step he advances, in his wide and laborious career of Beneficence, instead of impairing his strength, invigorates his frame; instead of diminishing his influence, increases the utility of his conduct, by making ...
— The Eulogies of Howard • William Hayley
... was much more congenial than the thought of returning to the big, desolate house where Rob reigned in solitary state and the sitting-rooms were shrouded in holland wrappings. He allowed himself to be persuaded, submitted to the sponging and binding which ensued with a docility which advanced him far in the host's good graces, and ate his luncheon on the sofa in approved ...
— More About Peggy • Mrs G. de Horne Vaizey
... her. But he left the question unspoken, fearing lest he might suggest to so sensitive a subject those hallucinations of the sense of hearing, which, by reason of their imperious nature, he dreaded far more than visual hallucinations. He was familiar with the docility of the sick in obeying orders given them by voices. Abandoning the idea of questioning Felicie, he resolved, at all hazards, to remove any scruples of conscience which might be troubling her. At the same time, having observed that, generally speaking, ...
— A Mummer's Tale • Anatole France
... man, on whom she already began to ground her hopes of success. She found him to exceed her most sanguine expectations; so comely did he appear in his person, so graceful in his air, so courtly in his address, so full of docility and good sense in his behavior and conversation. The lessons necessary to be taught him, in order to his personating the duke of York, were soon learned by a youth of such quick apprehension; but as the season seemed not then ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. - From Henry VII. to Mary • David Hume
... contradictions of a traveller from the East, when describing the characters and manners of the inhabitants of Hindostan. If, for instance, he alludes to our gallant sepoys, he pours forth unmeasured praise, and appears altogether charmed with their docility, courage, honour, and fidelity. On the other hand, his opinion of the natives in the aggregate is often as exactly the reverse as it is possible to imagine. They are described, perhaps, in the strongest terms, as at once servile, cowardly, treacherous, and ungrateful. The fact is, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, - Issue 269, August 18, 1827 • Various
... madder, and de modder ask him to trink a glass of vine." "Hier is de beach at Skavening—now dey puild houses on de dunes—bot de beach is schdill dere." Such are BOSCH's valuable and instructive comments, to which, as representing Sandford and Merton, I listen with depressed docility. All the same, can't help coming to the conclusion that Art is not BOSCH's strong point. Shall come here again—alone. We go on to the Municipal Museum, where he shows me what he considers the treasures of the collection—a ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, June 18, 1892 • Various
... strong hand disposes of vermin. Laura listened to them, pallid with silent torture. "Since the rascals have taken to assassination, we know that we have them at the dregs," said Count Lenkenstein. "A cord round the throats of a few scores of them, and the country will learn the virtue of docility." ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... application of organization to German character. Naturally phlegmatic, naturally disinclined to initiative, the Germans before the era of modern Germany had far less of the martial instinct than the French. German army makers, including the master one of all, von Moltke, set out to use German docility and obedience in the creation of a machine of singular industry and rigidity and ruthless discipline. Similar methods would mean revolt in democratic France and individualistic England where every man ...
— My Second Year of the War • Frederick Palmer
... chief peril of the republic—which is the strength of legitimism and imperialism and all other conspiracies against the liberty of the French people—is only the visible and inevitable result of this dangerous docility. ...
— Women and the Alphabet • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... wrangled more than all Military virtue in the support of an infamous cause Not distinguished for their docility Repentance, as usual, had ...
— Quotations From John Lothrop Motley • David Widger
... occasional instances of immoderate instinct, closely approximating to intellect, or even intellect itself, and moral worth, or the absence of ferocity, or the presence of positive amiability, render it possible that the barbarian is not a fiend, or that he may be schooled to tolerable docility, while the general tenor of barbarism is to wrong, cruelty, violence, ...
— The Right of American Slavery • True Worthy Hoit
... wonderful indifference to the things of earth and an extraordinary development of the spiritual nature. There is a perfect literature of their biographies, all alike in their essentials; the same "disinclination to the usual amusements of childhood "; the same remarkable sensibility; the same docility; the same conscientiousness; in short, an almost uniform character, marked by beautiful traits, which we look at with a painful admiration. It will be found that most of these children are the subjects of some constitutional unfitness for living, the most frequent of which I need not mention. ...
— The Professor at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes (Sr.)
... hereafter reckoned. The whole business, though connected with the destinies of a nation, takes inevitably a tinge of the ludicrous. The vast preparation of men and warlike material,—the majestic patience and docility with which the people waited through those weary and dreary months,—the martial skill, courage, and caution, with which our movement was ultimately made,—and, at last, the tremendous shock with which we were brought suddenly up against nothing ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... Sulpice, to St. Lazare, to the Christian doctrine, and even to the Oratoire, as regarded consistency in reasoning and talent in writing, but which lacked the most essential of Catholic virtues, docility. Port-Royal, like Protestantism, passed through every phase of misfortune. It was distasteful to the majority, and was always in opposition. When you have excited the antipathy of your country you are too often led to take a dislike to your ...
— Recollections of My Youth • Ernest Renan
... account, it appears that he had never brought the boy to confide in him. This was a capital fault, for the young are naturally ingenuous; so that the acquisition of their confidence is the very first step towards their docility; and, for maintaining parental authority, there is no need to overawe them. "As far as I can judge of my son," says Petrarch, "he has a tolerable understanding; but I am not certain of this, for I do not ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch
... docility and looked towards the two horses standing patiently where he had left them on the brown slope ...
— The Safety Curtain, and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... and without beauty—was an unconsidered object to be as little regarded as the pavement upon which one walks. The pavement had its uses, and such women had theirs. They could, at least, obey the orders of those Heaven had placed above them, and, if they showed docility and intelligence, might be re warded by a certain degree ...
— The Head of the House of Coombe • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... developed. During seven years he was at Oxford, where his mother lived with him and watched over him; until her death in his fifty-second year she always continued to treat him like a child, an attitude to which, habit and affection led him to submit with a matter-of-course docility that his usual wilfulness and his later fame render at first sight astonishing. At Oxford, as throughout his life, he showed himself brilliant but not a close or careful student, and he was at that time theologically too rigid a Puritan to be interested in ...
— A History of English Literature • Robert Huntington Fletcher
... is all. But if she respects him, she cannot be deceived; respect is her embrace of a man's character. Aminta's vision was clear. She had therefore to juggle with the fact revealed, that she might keep her heart from rushing out; and the process was a disintegration of her feminine principle of docility under the world's decrees. At each pause of her mental activity she was hurled against the state of marriage. Compassion for her blameless fellow in misery brought a deluge to ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... appearing upon the streets of London and are showing an extraordinary and unexpected docility ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, March 3rd, 1920 • Various
... to go; but she had given her word that she would return that same evening. Moreover, Charles expected her, and in her heart she felt already that cowardly docility that is for some women at once the chastisement ...
— Madame Bovary • Gustave Flaubert |
