"Firstborn" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... such the inward vocation to the Deacon now within a month of the Priesthood. Was it not an evident call from Him by whom the whole Church is governed and sanctified? And surely the noble old man, who forced himself not to withhold 'his son, his firstborn son,' received his crown from Him who said: 'With blessing I ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge
... two years ago, in the winter when they had used one of their two demolition-bombs to blast open a cavern in the mountains. It had been a hard winter; two children had died, then—Kyna's firstborn, and the little son of Kalvar Dard and Dorita. It had been their first encounter ...
— Genesis • H. Beam Piper
... anniversary of the Death of the Firstborn, and of this matter it pleased him to talk to me. Up and down the chamber he walked and, watching him by the lamplight, I noted that of a sudden he seemed to have grown much older, and that his face had become sweeter even than it was before. He was more thin also, ...
— Moon of Israel • H. Rider Haggard
... by her nervous condition—a sleep visited by dreams that mingled in a strange way with the impressions of the storm, and more than once made her heart stop, and start again at its own stopping. One of these fancies she never could forget—a dream about little Concha,—Conchita, her firstborn, who now slept far away in the old churchyard at Barcelona. She had tried to become resigned,—not to think. But the child would come back night after night, though the earth lay heavy upon her—night ...
— Chita: A Memory of Last Island • Lafcadio Hearn
... firstborn married. The younger brothers and sisters worked under him and for him. In the lonely farms of the mountains of the South, far from all neighbours and every woman, brothers and sisters lived together, the latter serving and in all ways belonging to ...
— La Sorciere: The Witch of the Middle Ages • Jules Michelet
... learned, for services. For what services he never clearly ascertained: this was a point—one of a large number—that Mr. Moreen's manner never confided. What it emphatically did confide was that he was even more a man of the world than you might first make out. Ulick, the firstborn, was in visible training for the same profession—under the disadvantage as yet, however, of a buttonhole but feebly floral and a moustache with no pretensions to type. The girls had hair and figures and manners and small fat feet, but had never been out alone. As for Mrs. Moreen Pemberton ...
— The Pupil • Henry James
... silk shirt and a blanket, all of which could be done in five minutes. As babies lie still most of the time the first six weeks, they need no dressing. I think the nurse was a full hour bathing and dressing my firstborn, who protested with a ...
— Eighty Years And More; Reminiscences 1815-1897 • Elizabeth Cady Stanton
... our babe was some few days buried in the churchyard of this parish of Ditchingham, I dreamed a very vivid dream as I slept one night at my wife's side. I dreamed that my dead children, the four of them, for the tallest lad bore in his arms my firstborn, that infant who died in the great siege, came to me as they had often come when I ruled the people of the Otomie in the City of Pines, and talked with me, giving me flowers and kissing my hands. I looked ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard
... relic of the past; megatherium^; Sanskrit. tradition, prescription, custom, immemorial usage, common law. V. be old &c adj.; have had its day, have seen its day; become old &c adj.; age, fade, senesce. Adj. old, ancient, antique; of long standing, time-honored, venerable; elder, eldest; firstborn. prime; primitive, primeval, primigenous^; paleolontological, paleontologic, paleoanthropological, paleoanthropic^, paleolithic, primordial, primordinate^; aboriginal &c (beginning) 66; diluvian^, antediluvian; protohistoric^; prehistoric; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... believed that sacrifices of children took place in all classes of society: 'The justices of the peace were seen familiarly conversing with the foul fiend, to whom one in Dumfries-shire actually offered up his firstborn child immediately after birth, stepping out with it in his arms to the staircase, where the devil stood ready, as it was suspected, to receive the innocent victim.'[624] In the later witch-trials the sacrifice of the child seems to have been ...
— The Witch-cult in Western Europe - A Study in Anthropology • Margaret Alice Murray
... because he was of the house and family of David; 5 to enrol himself with Mary, who was betrothed to him, being great with child. 6 And it came to pass, while they were there, the days were fulfilled that she should be delivered. 7 And she brought forth her firstborn son; and she wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger, because there was no room ...
— The Gospel of Luke, An Exposition • Charles R. Erdman
... I had been neglected for the firstborn, I had enjoyed through this neglect an absolute freedom with regard to associating with fisher-boys and all the shoeless, hatless 'sea-pups' of the sands, and now, when the time had come to civilise me, my mother had found that it was too late. I was bohemian to ...
— Aylwin • Theodore Watts-Dunton
... with bare knees and ruddy cheeks. What delight her husband had taken in painting it! And now the mother mourned unceasingly the loss of those little sons, and of one other whom Mary had never seen, and of whom they had no likeness. It was indeed hard that the one son left them,—their firstborn,—their hope and pride, should now be going away to leave them, going perhaps to ...
— The Eye of Dread • Payne Erskine
... 'Jesus Christ is in the proper sense [Greek: idios] the only Son begotten of God, being His Word [Greek: logos] and Firstborn Power' [Endnote 284:1]. Again, 'But His Son who alone is rightly [Greek: kurios] called Son, who before all created things was with Him and begotten of Him as His Word, when in the beginning He created and ordered all things through Him,' &c. Again, 'Now the next Power to God the ...
— The Gospels in the Second Century - An Examination of the Critical Part of a Work - Entitled 'Supernatural Religion' • William Sanday
... 7, 1526, as he announced to his friend Ruhel, his 'dear Kate brought him, by the great mercy of God, a little Hans Luther,'—her firstborn. With joy and thankfulness, as he says in another letter, they now reaped the fruit and blessings of married life, whereof the Pope and his creatures were ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin
... set eyes upon her firstborn, and Sir Burnham, who did, readily reconciled himself to the loss of such a daughter. The announcement which should have appeared joyfully under the press-heading "Births" was unobtrusively inserted under "Deaths," ...
— The Green Eyes of Bast • Sax Rohmer
... before he got the significance of it. It hit him where he lived, and he began jerking frantically at his encased feet and sobbing low in his throat. They'd hear him if he kept that up. He stopped and covered his ears to close out the cry of his firstborn. A light went on in the house, and when it went off again, ...
— The Hoofer • Walter M. Miller
... stood for Parliament his election expenses were jubilantly paid, and his father afterwards maintained him with as generous a hand as the estate could possibly bear, often in the teeth of the grudging resentment of Robert his firstborn. Richard showed signs of making a rapid success, at any rate on the political platform. He spoke with facility, and grappled with the drudgery of committees during his first two years at Westminster in a way to win him the favourable attention of the Tory whips. ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... is clumsy morally in his love for his firstborn, it must be acknowledged that he is so physically in the manifestation ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... Primrose, firstborn child of Ver; Merry springtime's harbinger, With her bells dim; Oxlips in their cradles growing, Marigolds ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... every head; but, considering the tortures they have suffered, and the anguish the little egotistical viper they have just hatched will most likely give them, and considering further that their love of their firstborn is greater than their pride, and their pride unstained by vanity, one must make allowances ...
— A Terrible Temptation - A Story of To-Day • Charles Reade
... of the man. But this was the result of the milder manners of an age when the Phoenicians had been brought into close contact with the Greeks. In the older days of Canaanitish history human sacrifice had held a foremost place in the ritual of Syria. It was the sacrifice of the firstborn son that was demanded in times of danger and trouble, or when the family was called upon to make a special atonement for sin. The victim was offered as a burnt sacrifice, which in Hebrew idiom was euphemistically described as ...
— Patriarchal Palestine • Archibald Henry Sayce
... remembered all the rest of his life. The Moscow lady died, and Mitya passed into the care of one of her married daughters. I believe he changed his home a fourth time later on. I won't enlarge upon that now, as I shall have much to tell later of Fyodor Pavlovitch's firstborn, and must confine myself now to the most essential facts about him, without which I could ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... was in an inaccessible region when that event happened, and it was not until he was on his return journey home that he heard the good news. Two years later another child, Peter, was born; and, ardently as her firstborn had been desired, Mrs. Ogilvie showered by far the greater part of her affection upon the younger child. Everything had to give way to Peter, and she resented that even such baby privileges as a child of tender years can receive were bestowed upon the elder son and heir. Her health gave ...
— Peter and Jane - or The Missing Heir • S. (Sarah) Macnaughtan
... fulfilled her months, Her firstborn came forth like a lamb. There was no bursting, no rending, No injury, no hurt, In order to emphasise his divinity. Did not God give her comfort? Had He not accepted her sacrifice, So that thus easily she ...
— Religions of Ancient China • Herbert A. Giles
... men: the heavenly man and the earthly man.'[42] The long Life of Moses[43] represents him as the King, Lawgiver, High Priest, Prophet, Mediator. The Word, the Logos (which here everywhere hovers near, but never reaches, personality) is 'the firstborn son of God', 'the image of God'[44]; its types are 'the Rock', the Manna, the High Priest's Coat; it is 'the Wine Pourer and Master of the Drinking Feast of God'.[45] The majority of the Jews, who did not accept Jesus as the Christ, ...
— Progress and History • Various
... Guy had made themselves; the thought of his father's grief at former doings of theirs, which had fallen so far short of the atrocity of this. He knew that his father had rather have seen each one of his five sons slain, or helpless cripples like the firstborn, than have been thus avenged. Nay, had he this morning prayed for the pardon of a crime, to which he would thus become a ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge
... never looked on his firstborn with more pleasure than a barrister on his first brief. If the Tower guns were announcing the birth of an heir to the Throne, he would not look up to ask, ...
— The Reminiscences Of Sir Henry Hawkins (Baron Brampton) • Henry Hawkins Brampton
... firstborn chile and my mommer have two gal chillen, me and Hannah, and she have seven boy. Where I's born was old wild country and old Virginny run down thataway. Everything was plenty good to eat and I seed strawberries what would push you to git 'em in ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves. - Texas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... have appeared to her sons, and accosting Rhiwallon, her firstborn, to have informed him that he was to be a benefactor to mankind, through healing all manner of their diseases, and she furnished him with prescriptions and instructions for the preservation of health. Then, promising to meet him when her counsel was most needed, ...
— Welsh Folk-Lore - a Collection of the Folk-Tales and Legends of North Wales • Elias Owen
... was quiet and resolute, and glancing at the beautiful face at the end of the table, I saw in the pale lips and yearning eyes that the mother was offering up her firstborn, that ancient sacrifice. But not all the agony of sacrifice could wring from her entreaty or complaint in the hearing of her sons. That was for other ears and for the silent hours of the night. And next morning when she came down to meet us her face was wan and weary, ...
— Black Rock • Ralph Connor
... 'A Judge.' Now, therefore, say not in your hearts, 'What have we done?' Your dogs may answer that, To make whom fiercer for the chase, ye feed With captives whom ye slew not in the war, But saved alive, and living throw to them Daily. Your wives may answer that, whose babes Their firstborn ye do take and offer up To this abhorred snake, while yet the milk Is in their innocent mouths,—your maiden babes Tender. Your slaves may answer that,—the gangs Whose eyes ye did put out to make them work By night unwitting (yea, ...
— Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Jean Ingelow
... are to share your glory, Let the sons whom the South has bred Lie side by side on your battlefields With England's heroes dead. A nation is never a nation Worthy of pride or place Till the mothers have sent their firstborn To look death on ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... on them? Now, however, it is not we who are in their power, but they who are in ours. Their own sins have delivered them into my hands. You know, and the whole world knows, that that stuck-up gentleman yonder, Szephalmi, Esq., once upon a time exposed his firstborn child. He cast it forth in the wilderness, cast it forth among the wild beasts, because he feared the shame of it forsooth!—ha, ha, ha! Has a poor man ever done the like of that? Aye, and it was a poor man who found the child, it was a poor man who had compassion ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai
... can imagine evil of him, but not good. (43) The theory that God does not reveal Himself to the angry or the sad, is a mere dream: for God revealed to Moses while angry, the terrible slaughter of the firstborn, and did so without the intervention of a harp. (44) To Cain in his rage, God was revealed, and to Ezekiel, impatient with anger, was revealed the contumacy and wretchedness of the Jews. (45) Jeremiah, miserable and weary ...
— A Theologico-Political Treatise [Part I] • Benedict de Spinoza
... George Esmond, her firstborn, when this little matter was referred to him, and his mother vehemently insisted that he should declare himself, was of the opinion of Mr. Washington, and Mr. Draper, the London lawyer. The boy said he could not help himself. He did not want the money: he would be very glad to think otherwise, and ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... expound its virtues with all the fond enthusiasm of a father showing off his firstborn, and wound up with a demonstration of the illuminating appliance. I'm afraid, though, he got little encouragement from Mr. Burnham. He considered the machine with a dispassionate air, it's true, and admitted its practical advantages, but wasn't at all disposed ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... scarcely cold, when in comes me Mistress Adversity, a wee outspoken sour crabbit gizzened anatomy of an old woman—"You ne'erdoweel, Tam," quoth she, "is it no enough that you consort with that scarlet limmer, who has just yescaped thorough the winday, but ye maun smoors my firstborn, puir Conscience, atween ye? Whare hae ye stowed him, mantell me that?" And the ancient damosel gives me a shrewd clip on the skull with the poker. "That's right, mother," quoth Conscience, from beneath the straw mattrass—"Give it to him—he'll no hear me another devel, mother." And I ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... durable; and there entered into the prayers she made for him since the burning disgrace of the divorce, even the hope that he might be happy in his private life, and that his new wife might bear this child, this firstborn of his dynasty, to him whom she herself could not make ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... Ben Tarbox, as the division of the spoil was being made, "there is a young maiden whom we all know in the settlement, the firstborn here, and the only one alive of our countrymen and countrywomen who once dwelt in the land. She is dowerless and friendless, except her young brother and an old grandfather, who maybe sleeps in his grave by this time. I am ready to give half of my share, and I invite those among us who have no ...
— The Settlers - A Tale of Virginia • William H. G. Kingston
... was Adam Craig's grandson. His firstborn, Tom, was wild, and went to sea—the old story—leaving wife and unborn child for his father to look to. Six years had gone—the seventh began at New Year's; the boy was born, burnt, saved alive, and not idiotic; its ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... the only sign which would assure them that at last they themselves had been forgiven. But all was in vain. The cold, hard mother was deaf to all their entreaties, and left them under the inexorable punishment of the death of their firstborn, whom she had taken and carried away, and whom she refused to restore ...
— The Dream • Emile Zola
... son, my hope, my firstborn!"—and the mother's heart gushed forth in all the fondness of early days. "Don't speak so terribly, you ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... The ways of her days, did they seem then good to the new-souled earth? Did her heart rejoice, and the might of her spirit exult in her then, Child yet no child of the night, and motherless mother of men? Was it Love brake forth flower-fashion, a bird with gold on his wings, Lovely, her firstborn passion, and impulse of firstborn things? Was Love that nestling indeed that under the plumes of the night Was hatched and hidden as seed in the furrow, and brought forth bright? Was it Love lay shut in the shell world-shaped, having over him there Black world-wide wings that ...
— Songs before Sunrise • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... from the blind King of Bohemia, who was led into the thick of the fighting at Cressy, and died on the field. Welsh archaeologists, however, maintain that these words are Celtic, and mean "behold the man;" their theory suggests that this was the phrase used by Edward I. when he presented his firstborn son to the Welsh people as their prince, and that the words thus became the motto of the princes of Wales. This is a rather far-fetched piece of reasoning, and one would certainly prefer to accept the more picturesque tradition ...
— The Cathedral Church of Canterbury [2nd ed.]. • Hartley Withers
... and well did much to assuage the father's grief; for there had been a time when he had not thought to look upon the face of his firstborn in this life. He was also greatly pleased to learn that he had another daughter in the person of gentle Gertrude, and he gladly undertook the negotiation of the purchase of his neighbour's house, so that ...
— The Sign Of The Red Cross • Evelyn Everett-Green
... spore emits exteriorly one or several of these corpuscles, supported on very short slender pedicels, which remain after the corpuscles are detached from them. This latter circumstance evidences that new corpuscles succeed the firstborn one on each pedicel as long as there remains any plastic matter within the spore. The latter, in fact, in consequence of this labour of production, becomes gradually emptied, and yet preserves the generative pedicels of ...
— Fungi: Their Nature and Uses • Mordecai Cubitt Cooke
... never have enough of clipping and embracing her; and she would look at Birdalone's hands and her feet and her arms, and stroke them and caress them; and she wondered at her body, as if she had been a young mother eaten up with the love of her firstborn. And as for Birdalone, she was as glad of her mother as might be; and yet in her heart she wondered if perchance one of the fellowship might stray that way, and be partaker in her joy of this newfound dear friend; and she said, might it be ...
— The Water of the Wondrous Isles • William Morris
... quieten him!' Mr. Knight commanded. 'It's like him to begin making a noise just now. I'll take a look at Susan—and my firstborn.' ...
— A Great Man - A Frolic • Arnold Bennett
... 1890. She was highly honoured at her christening, for Queen Victoria acted as sponsor person, and held the baby in her arms. There is at Welbeck an autograph letter from the Queen, congratulating the parents on their firstborn. The next was the heir to the Dukedom, William Arthur Henry, Marquis of Titchfield, born March 16th, 1893, and the third Lord Francis Norwen Dallas, ...
— The Portland Peerage Romance • Charles J. Archard
... let not Nature's hand Keep the wild flood confined; let Order die, And let the world no longer be a stage, To feed contention in a lingering act; But let one spirit of the firstborn Cain Reign in all bosoms, that each heart being set On bloody courses, the wide scene may end, And darkness be the burier of ...
— The Tatler, Volume 1, 1899 • George A. Aitken
... amorous maze Those floating arms and bounding feet. But none of all the race of Cain, Save those whom he hath deigned to grace With yellow robe and sapphire chain, May pass beyond that outer space. For now within the painted hall The Firstborn keeps high festival. Before the glittering valves all night Their post the chosen captains hold. Above the portal's stately height The legend flames in lamps of gold: "In life united and in death "May Tirzah and Ahirad be, "The bravest he of all the sons of Seth, "Of all the house of Cain ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 3. (of 4) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... bosom. Amen. We have other children, happy and well, now round about us, and from the father's heart the memory of this little thing has almost faded; but I do believe that every day of her life the mother thinks of the firstborn that was with her for so short a while: many and many a time has she taken her daughters to the grave, in Saint Bride's, where he lies buried; and she wears still at her neck a little little lock of gold hair, which she took from the head of the infant as he lay smiling in his coffin. ...
— The History of Samuel Titmarsh - and the Great Hoggarty Diamond • William Makepeace Thackeray
... system worked hardship for the younger brothers, but then as now it was easier for men to find a place for themselves in the world than for women, and the army or the Church rarely failed to furnish some sort of career for all those who were denied the rights and privileges of the firstborn. The lot of the sister, however, was pitiful in the extreme (unless it happened that the older brother was kind and considerate), for if she were in the way she could be bundled off to a cloister, there to spend her days in solitude, or she could be married ...
— Women of the Romance Countries • John R. Effinger
... rich deride, the proud disdain, These simple blessings of the lowly train; To me more dear, congenial to my heart, One native charm, than all the gloss of art; Spontaneous joys, where Nature has its play, 255 The soul adopts, and owns their firstborn sway; Lightly they frolic o'er the vacant mind, Unenvied, unmolested, unconfined. But the long pomp, the midnight masquerade, With all the freaks of wanton wealth arrayed— 260 In these, ere triflers half their wish ...
— Selections from Five English Poets • Various
... The firstborn, Fritz, with his closely cropped hair and swarthy complexion, took after his dead father, who had been a Holsteiner—a mariner by profession, who had sailed his ship from the Elbe some years before for the last time, and left his wife to bring up her fatherless boys ...
— Fritz and Eric - The Brother Crusoes • John Conroy Hutcheson
... master Moses a thief or a kubiustis? Or could he not make up his accounts properly?' The critic is then informed of a certain difference between 'sacred' and other coins; and he further gets a lesson in the matter of Levites and Firstborn, which silences him. Again, the Talmud decides that, if a man have bought a slave who turns out to be a thief or a kubiustis,—which has here been erroneously explained to mean a 'manstealer,'—he has no redress. He must keep him, as he bought him, or ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume II (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... which haunt the memory and sink into the heart: "The angel which redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads." And Joseph is moved by what he thinks to be a mistake, and would correct it, so as to give the larger blessing to his firstborn. But Jacob refuses. "I know it, my son, I know it ... he also shall be great, but truly his younger brother shall ...
— The Thread of Gold • Arthur Christopher Benson
... And this child—her child and Angus's,—would be a deformity, a shame to its parents, a dishonour to its race. How should she ever bear to look upon it? Still more, how should she ever dare to show the poor cripple to its father, and say, "This is our child—our firstborn." Would he not turn away in disgust, and answer that it ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)
... to which he had been called opened pleasantly and increased in happiness and opportunity, except for the sadness of bereavements, for, in the first few years, his brilliant brothers Edward and Charles died, and soon afterward Waldo, his firstborn son, and later his mother. Emerson had left traditional religion, the city, the Old World, behind, and now went to Nature as his teacher, his inspiration. His first book, "Nature," which he was ...
— Poems - Household Edition • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... my new-budding hope that there is something somewhere which will make me what I know that I ought to be, and can be—If you shall crush that, I say, by any misdoing of yours, you had better have been the murderer of my firstborn; with such a hate—a hate which Jews alone can feel—will I hate you ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley
... the century a Dakota woman fasted and prayed, and Thunder came to her in her vision. To the god she promised to give her firstborn child. When she became a mother, she forgot in her joy that the life of her little one did not belong to her; nor did she recall her fateful vow until one bright spring day, when the clouds gathered and ...
— Indian Story and Song - from North America • Alice C. Fletcher
... In Heb. xii. 22 mount Zion is taken as the symbol of Christ's Church; and the readers are addressed as members thereof, together with the spirits of just men made perfect, who are enrolled in heaven as the general assembly and church of the firstborn. Thus the {113} Church, or Society of Saints includes the imperfect, and those who are made perfect; those who are alive there, and those who are alive here. The condition of membership is briefly described in Acts ii. 38, 42 Repentant, Baptized, having the Gift ...
— The Prayer Book Explained • Percival Jackson
... eyes closed upon the spectacle of his son, folding in his arms his firstborn, they shut out for ever the things of time and sense, and consciousness that forsook him then never reoccupied its throne. He was carried from the brilliant salon of the popular actress to the home of his son; medical skill exhausted its ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... divided among 'em it won't be much. I tell ye wot, old Duffy has a good bit of money and only two children, Susie and Mick. I could get you to meet Mick—he mayn't be so personable as our Peter," he reflected, with evident pride in his weedy firstborn, and he got no farther, for I had been as a yeast-bottle bubbling up, ...
— My Brilliant Career • Miles Franklin
... are defined all around by a simple continuous margin; and no sooner was the division effected than it was found to cast a singularly clear light on the early history of the class. The earliest fishes—firstborn of their family—seem to have been all placoids. The Silurian System has not yet afforded trace of any other vertebral animal. With the Old Red Sandstone the ganoids were ushered upon the scene in amazing abundance; and for untold ages, ...
— The Testimony of the Rocks - or, Geology in Its Bearings on the Two Theologies, Natural and Revealed • Hugh Miller
... once in a single payment—Guy little knew that Nevitt was really the chief friend and founder of the family fortunes, and was prepared to compel the "unknown benefactor" (for a moderate commission) to recognise his unacknowledged firstborn sons before all the world as the heirs to Tilgate. But yesterday, they were nameless waifs and strays, of uncertain origin, ashamed of their birth, and ignorant even whether they had been duly begotten in lawful wedlock; to-day, they were the legal inheritors of an honoured name ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... God, all things work together unto good, to such as, according to his purpose, are called to be saints. For whom he foreknew, he also predestinated to be made conformable to the image of his Son; that he might be the firstborn amongst many brethren. And whom he predestinated, them he also called. And whom he called, them he also justified. And whom he justified, them he also glorified."(580) Here we have all the elements of complete predestination: God's eternal foreknowledge (praescivit, {GREEK SMALL ...
— Grace, Actual and Habitual • Joseph Pohle
... didn't go. The latest was a cream-laid affair, from another quarter, on which I was requested in letters of gold to honour certain near and dear relatives with my presence at the christening of their firstborn. As the affair was to take place in December, and I received the pressing invitation at the end of January—I was again unable to be present at another interesting ceremony. I have also received several invitations to Terpsichorean revels. My R.S.V.P. has been ...
— A Yeoman's Letters - Third Edition • P. T. Ross
... always declamation without sense or knowledge, and ridicule without good humour or conciliation. Oh, Mr. Plymley, this never will do. Mrs. Abraham Plymley, my sister, will be led away captive by an amorous Gaul; and Joel Plymley your firstborn, will be ...
— Peter Plymley's Letters and Selected Essays • Sydney Smith
... space, Vault with careering curves her central goal, Pour forth her day and stud her evening stole, Heedless of count; their numbers still unknown, Unmeasured still their progress round her throne; For none of all her firstborn sons, endow'd With heavenly sapience and pretensions proud, No seraph bright, whose keen considering eye And sunbeam speed ascend from sky to sky, Has yet explored or counted all their spheres, Or fixt or found their past record of years. Nor can a ray from her remotest sun, Shot ...
— The Columbiad • Joel Barlow
... of the Yadus, was the father of Vasudeva. He had a daughter called Pritha, who for her beauty, was unrivalled on earth. And Sura, having promised in the presence of fire that he would give his firstborn child to Kuntibhoja, the son of his paternal aunt, who was without offspring, gave his daughter unto the monarch in expectation of his favours. Kuntibhoja thereupon made her his daughter. And she became, thenceforth, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... been terrible, my dear!" exclaimed Mrs. Herbert, so full of pity for Christopher that she was willing to give him anything short of her firstborn. She was ...
— The Farringdons • Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler
... rich in love, Love that dost pass the tenfold seven times seven, Draw Thou mine eyes, draw Thou my heart above, My treasure ad my heart store Thou in Thee, Brood over me with yearnings of a dove; Be Husband, Brother, closest Friend to me; Love me as very mother loves her son, Her sucking firstborn fondled on her knee: 30 Yea, more than mother loves her little one; For, earthly, even a mother may forget And feel no pity for its piteous moan; But thou, O Love of God, remember yet, Through the dry desert, through the waterflood (Life, death) until the Great White Throne is set. If now I am sick ...
— Goblin Market, The Prince's Progress, and Other Poems • Christina Rossetti
... Blessed Virgin—when Hans Haller, Knight, Doctor, and Town councillor, the eldest of his ancient race, my dear lord and plighted lover, was carried to the grave. The velvet pall wherewith his parents covered the bier of their beloved and firstborn son was so costly, that the price would easily have fed a poor household for years. How many tapers were burnt for him, how many masses said! Favor and good-will were poured forth upon me, and wherever I might go I was met with the highest respect. Even in my own home I was looked upon as ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... God" clearly taught,[87] but He is the agent in the creation of the universe, the vital principle upholding and pervading all that exists. "The Son," we read in the Epistle to the Colossians,[88] "is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; for in Him were all things created, in the heavens and upon the earth; all things have been created through Him, and unto Him; and He is before all things, and in Him all things consist" (that is, "hold together," as the margin of ...
— Christian Mysticism • William Ralph Inge
... father and mother were rowing across the Solent, they saw a heron. His father described this incident in the following language: "One dark heron flew over the sea, backed by a daffodil sky." Similarly, Lyall, writing with the enthusiasm of a young father for his firstborn, said: "The child has eyes like the fish-pools of Heshbon, with wondrous depth of intelligent gaze." But, though a poet, it would be a great error to suppose that Lyall was an idealist, if by that term is meant ...
— Political and Literary essays, 1908-1913 • Evelyn Baring
... one item has He been guilty of exaggeration? We were dead, but behold, we live! We spent our energies in profitless work; but now we bear fruit unto God. We were lonely and isolated, but now have come to the heavenly Jerusalem, to the innumerable company of angels, and to the Church of the Firstborn. Our prayers were aimless and ineffective; but now we have the petitions we desired. New hope and joy have filled our hearts, as the ruddy clusters hang full and ripe in the autumn. Prove Him for yourself and see if this shall not be so for you ...
— Love to the Uttermost - Expositions of John XIII.-XXI. • F. B. Meyer
... perverse children, who mother trunk thought at one time were going to ruin her life, but you know lives aren't so easily ruined after all. 'Now you go right up there at an angle of twenty-two degrees,' she said to her eldest child. 'Not at all,' said the firstborn, 'I intend to lean right over here at whatsoever angle will best express my individuality.' And though the mother grieved for a long time she knows now—Karl—how foolish we are! But listen. You hear that bird who is trying to get all of his soul into his throat ...
— The Glory Of The Conquered • Susan Glaspell
... woman could barely read and did not learn to write until her firstborn had gone away from the home nest. Then it was that she sharpened a gray goose-quill and labored long and patiently, practising with this instrument (said to be mightier than the sword) and with ink she herself had mixed—all that she might write a letter ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 1 of 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Good Men and Great • Elbert Hubbard
... loved Homer, but not with a scholar’s love. The most humble and pious among women was yet so proud a mother that she could teach her firstborn son no Watts’ hymns, no collects for the day; she could teach him in earliest childhood no less than this, to find a home in his saddle, and to love old Homer, and all that old Homer sung. True it is, that the Greek was ingeniously rendered into English, ...
— Eothen • A. W. Kinglake
... hope that God would grant them aid against the unbrotherly descendants of Esau. In many other respects, too, Joseph was the opposite of Esau, and his services stood his descendants in good stead in their battles against the descendants of Esau. Esau was the firstborn of his father, but through his evil deeds he lost his birthright; Joseph, on the other hand, was the youngest of his father's sons, and through his good deeds was he found worthy of enjoying the rights of a firstborn son. ...
— THE LEGENDS OF THE JEWS VOLUME III BIBLE TIMES AND CHARACTERS - FROM THE EXODUS TO THE DEATH OF MOSES • BY LOUIS GINZBERG
... To his eyes, Joseph is the noblest of all the sons of Jacob, before whom all the rest must bow their heads, as to a king; next to Joseph comes Reuben, to whom—rather than to Judah**—he gives the place as firstborn. He groups his characters round Bethel and Shechem, the sanctuaries of Israel; even Abraham is represented as residing, not at Hebron in Judea, but at Beersheba, a spot held in deep veneration by pilgrims belonging to the ten tribes.*** ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 7 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... sorry. I didn't want to vex you unnecessarily. I hoped against hope—" She broke off, and knelt up before him, clasping his hand tightly against her breast. "Stephen—dearest, you said—when our firstborn ...
— The Bars of Iron • Ethel May Dell
... of these States, whether republics or despotisms, lies, not the only, but the chief reason for the early development of the Italian. To this it is due that he was the firstborn among the sons ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt
... I had seen the young mother going to the pagoda on the hilltop with a little offering of a few roses or an orchid spray, and pouring out her soul in passionate supplication to Someone—Someone unknown to her sacred books—that her firstborn might recover of his fever, and be to her once more the measureless delight of her life; and it would seem to me that she must believe in a God and in ...
— The Soul of a People • H. Fielding
... ago, she said—and indeed the odour of tobacco was still strong on the close air—but he had been having a good deal of stomach trouble of late, and the children made him nervous, and he had gone out for a walk. Poor May, smiling gallantly over the difficulties of her life, drew her firstborn to her knees, brushed back the child's silky, pale hair with bony, trembling fingers, and prophesied that things would be easier when mamma's girlies got to work: Evelyn was going to be a dressmaker, and ...
— The Story Of Julia Page - Works of Kathleen Norris, Volume V. • Kathleen Norris
... is allowed upon all hands is the finest baby ever sent into this naughty world since the firstborn of Eve. At a day old he would make three of any of the new-born babes that a month since blessed the Union bf Sevenoaks. There is, however, a remarkable providence in this. The Prince of Wales is born to the vastness of a palace; the little Princes ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, December 18, 1841 • Various
... calyx—we have walked those temples; we are the sacrifice on those altars. And the future floats on the current of our blood like a secret argosy. We hear the ideals of our descendants, like songs in the night, long before our firstborn is begotten. We, in whom the pollen and the dust, sprouting grain and falling berry, the dark past and the dark future, cry and call—we ask, Who is this Singer that sends his voice through the dark forest, and ...
— Gone to Earth • Mary Webb
... ago. It was wild then. Out of broken and rocky ground rose the ancient Church of Aracoeli, the Church of the Altar of Heaven, built upon that altar which the Sibyl of Tivoli bade Augustus raise to the Firstborn of God. To the right a rude fortress, grounded in the great ruins of Rome's Archive House, flanked by rough towers, approached only by that old triumphal way, where old women slowly roasted beans in iron chafing-dishes over little fires ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 2 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... Death! Come to the mother, when she feels For the first time her firstborn's breath; Come when the blessed seals That close the pestilence are broke, And crowded cities wail its stroke; Come in consumption's ghastly form, The earthquake's shock, the ocean storm; Come when the heart beats high and warm With banquet ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... way; for dames with baskets balanced on their heads were making their way to the waterside, followed by troops of barefoot or sabot-shod children. There was one fine young woman with a baby in her arms, and the innocent firstborn was busily taking its breakfast as the mother walked calmly along, bearing on her well-poised head the family wash. And a mile farther on, as if she had seen her rival and gone her one better, was another woman with a two-year-old ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 2 of 14 - Little Journeys To the Homes of Famous Women • Elbert Hubbard
... chiefly, almost entirely, from June to October, the season when all out-of-door influences are most tempting and most needed. The weekly record of August and September is that of a pestilence. The destroying angel carries off the firstborn, and, oftener still, the last-born, out of almost every household in certain districts, as in the heaviest curse laid on Egypt. Thousands have fled the city, as they deserted London in the season of the plague; but thousands are left to follow ...
— Parks for the People - Proceedings of a Public Meeting held at Faneuil Hall, June 7, 1876 • Various
... movement of her head satisfied the mother that her four firstborn were safe and well disposed. Immediately then, with never a thought of rest, her nose thrust the new-comer into position between her fore-paws, and she proceeded to administer the life-giving and stimulating ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson
... older than Antonio, and his word had always been law to the younger brother, so although he was sick at heart at the thought of being left behind, he said nothing against the project, but tried to make it easy for Vito with their mother. The old woman could not bear the thought of her firstborn leaving her, and declared, with the tears running down her face, that she should never see him again, but at last she yielded to their persuasions and gave Vito her blessing. It would be only a little while before she and Toni would ...
— True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office • Arthur Train
... Pharaoh! Hearken to the word of Jahveh. If thou wilt not let the people go, then shall all the firstborn of Khem, of the Prince and the slave, of the ox and the ass, be smitten of Jahveh. Wilt thou let ...
— The World's Desire • H. Rider Haggard and Andrew Lang
... reveals, their laws for women were the best they could devise, and were those which led to the freedom of the women of to-day. A law of England still favors only the first-born son, and he only because he is the firstborn. What wonder that girls have been denied succession; and what an evidence of man's desire to show favor and not the "insult incident to sex," that he has placed woman on thrones upon which he has had to sustain ...
— Woman and the Republic • Helen Kendrick Johnson
... Doctor Jim, and soon he was plain "Doc" to all. By every mouth that opened he found Juno's name blessed, and many were the tales of what she had done. She had saved wild Jay Dawn's little girl and Lum Chapman's firstborn. She had brought old Aunt Sis Stidham back from the shadow of the grave, and had turned that tart, irreverent old person's erring feet back into the way ...
— In Happy Valley • John Fox
... Nature then more godlike as she smiled. Life smiled on death, and death on life: the Soul Between them shone, and soared above their strife, And left on Time's unclosed and starry scroll A sign that quickened death to deathless life. Peace rose like Hope, a patient queen, and bade Hell's firstborn, Faith, abjure her creed and die; And Love, by life and death made sad and glad, Gave Conscience ease, and watched Good Will pass by. All these make music now of one man's name, Whose life and age are ...
— A Channel Passage and Other Poems - Taken from The Collected Poetical Works of Algernon Charles - Swinburne—Vol VI • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... fear of me [to abound], and they create awe of me in those beings who dwell in their divine territories. Behold, I am exalted upon my standard, and upon my seat, and upon the throne which is adjudged [to me]. I am the god Nu, and the workers of iniquity shall not destroy me. I am the firstborn god of primeval matter, that is to say, the divine Soul, even the Souls of the gods of everlastingness, and my body is eternity. My Form is everlastingness, and is the lord of years and the prince of eternity. [I am] the creator ...
— Egyptian Literature
... genealogy has its disadvantages. There must have been great bitterness in the Brown household before its mistress obtained her own way, and even more in the heart of our poor friend as he stood at the font and heard his firstborn ...
— The Book-Hunter at Home • P. B. M. Allan
... superior.[131] Of all the mountains the great Meru is said to be the first-born. Of all the cardinal and subsidiary points of the horizon, the eastern is said to be the foremost and first-born. Ganga of three courses is said to be the firstborn of all rivers. Likewise, of all wells and reservoirs of waters, the ocean is said to be the first-born. Iswara is the supreme Lord of all the deities and Danavas and ghostly beings and Pisachas, and snakes and Makshasas and human beings and Kinnaras and Yakshas. The ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... Fable. Tamora, Queen of the Goths, whose firstborn son is sacrificed by Titus Andronicus, determines to be revenged. She succeeds in her determination. Titus and his daughter are mutilated. Two of the Andronici, ...
— William Shakespeare • John Masefield
... and Manila and would make their visits less arduous. But since that was a very painful proposition to those who governed our discalced order, namely, the abandonment of certain Indians who were the firstborn of their spirit, and a land watered by the blood of so many martyrs, the claim could never be made effectual, however much it was smoothed over by the name of exchange, our province being offered other ministries, in which was shown clearly the zeal ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 41 of 55, 1691-1700 • Various
... open hole when the gun was not firing, helped to conceal it from the prying eyes of Hun aeroplanes. Let into the ground and mounted and clamped to a stand was the mortar itself—while beside it sat a very young gunner officer, much in the attitude of a mother beside her firstborn. He was obviously new to the game, and the Sapper surveyed ...
— No Man's Land • H. C. McNeile
... says of Harriet, "If words of tender affection and motherly pride proved the reality of love, then undoubtedly she loved her firstborn child." That is, if mere empty words can prove it, it stands proved—and in this way, without committing himself, he gives the reader a chance to infer that there isn't any extant evidence but words, and that he doesn't take much stock in them. How seldom he shows ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... summer, and announced that he should keep the Agenais and La Reole, as belonging to France by right of Charles of Valois' recent conquest. Bitterly mortified at this treachery, Edward took upon himself the title of "governor and administrator of his firstborn, Edward, Duke of Aquitaine, and of his estates". By this technical subtlety, he thought himself entitled to resume the control of the ceded districts and resist the attack which was bound to follow hard upon the new breach. Once ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout
... printed in The Gem, 1829. The Gem was then edited by Thomas Hood, whose child—his firstborn—it was thatinspired the poem. Lamb sent the verses to ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb
... old gardener, a brown-black funeral cloak thrown over his homely dress, and supporting his wife with steps scarcely less feeble than her own. He had come to church that afternoon, with a promise to her that he would return to lead her to the funeral of her firstborn; for he felt, in his sore perplexed heart, full of indignation and dumb anger, as if he must go and hear something which should exorcize the unwonted longing for revenge that disturbed his grief, and made him conscious of that great blank of consolation which faithfulness produces. ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. I • Elizabeth Gaskell
... astronomy, and during the months of his engagement one of his favorite occupations was to take her out of an evening and show her the constellations. It is even said that, among the daydreams in which they indulged, one was that their firstborn might be an astronomer. Probably this was only a passing fancy, as I heard nothing of it during my childhood. The marriage was in all respects a happy one, so far as congeniality of nature and mutual regard could go. Although the wife died at the ...
— The Reminiscences of an Astronomer • Simon Newcomb
... later, with the view of serving as a new instrument for her father's ambition. As the pope was not satisfied with an empty triumph of vanity and display for his son, and as his war with the Orsini had failed to produce the anticipated results, he decided to increase the fortune of his firstborn by doing the very thing which he had accused Calixtus in his speech of doing for him, viz., alienating from the States of the Church the cities of Benevento, Terracino, and Pontecorvo to form, a duchy as an appanage to ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... wife, long estranged, met at the grave of their firstborn, the child of their youthful strength. Their strife had been bitter, their love had turned to hate, and they elected to tread life's path apart. They stood, one on either side, and looked coldly upon each ...
— Volume 12 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... of Cenel Fiachrach, and when he saw the maiden Darerca before him, he asked for her of her [friends and her][8] parents, so that she was given him to wife. Thereafter she bore five sons to him, and this is the order in which they were born: Lucoll her firstborn, Donnan the second, Ciaran the third, Odran the fourth, Cronan the fifth—he was a deacon, but the other four sons were archpresbyters. Furthermore she bore three daughters to him; two of them were virgins, to wit Lugbec and Rathbeo; Pata was the third daughter, and she ...
— The Latin & Irish Lives of Ciaran - Translations Of Christian Literature. Series V. Lives Of - The Celtic Saints • Anonymous
... not move from the cot, hoping awhile that she might come in, dew-footed, and yet kiss him. That clear shining of the face which one sometimes observes in pure-minded devotees, or in young mothers over their firstborn, gave him a look of nobility in the pallid ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, August, 1885 • Various
... as October 14th Lucretia returned to Rome. November 1, 1499, she gave birth to a son, who was named, in honor of the Pope, Rodrigo. Her firstborn was baptized with great pomp November 11th in the Sistine Chapel—not the chapel now known by that name, but the one which Sixtus IV had built in S. Peter's. Giovanni Cervillon held the child in his arms, and near ...
— Lucretia Borgia - According to Original Documents and Correspondence of Her Day • Ferdinand Gregorovius
... have committed to Him until that day." All the children of God have known, loved, and trusted their Father, and have reflected that holy light which shone with unclouded and faultless lustre in the Firstborn of all the brethren; for Jesus ever held fast His confidence in God until His last cry of faith, "Father, into Thy ...
— Parish Papers • Norman Macleod
... shall be that the firstborn which she beareth shall succeed in the name of his brother that is dead, that his name be ...
— On The Structure of Greek Tribal Society: An Essay • Hugh E. Seebohm
... Macumazahn?" he asked in a hollow voice, the tears running down his handsome face, for he had loved his firstborn. ...
— Child of Storm • H. Rider Haggard
... were ADOPTED by certain of her friends, and she was to be permitted to visit them every Saturday afternoon. The selection was a cruel trial, so cruel that, knowing her undoubted preference for her firstborn, Misery, we would not have interfered for worlds, but in her unexpected choice of "Johnny Dear" the most unworldly of us knew that it was the first glimmering of feminine tact—her first submission to the world of propriety that ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte
... the earth" (Ps. xlvii:2). "He shall judge thy people with righteousness, and the poor with judgment." "Yea, all Kings shall fall down before Him; all nations shall serve Him." "His name shall endure forever—all nations shall call Him blessed" (Ps. lxxii:1, 11, 17). "Also, I will make Him my Firstborn, higher than the Kings of the earth" (Ps. lxxxix:27). "Behold, a King shall reign in righteousness" (Is. xxxii:1). "Behold the days come, that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice ...
— The Work Of Christ - Past, Present and Future • A. C. Gaebelein
... aloud, let us proclaim it in our fall and in our defeat, this is the greatest of all ages! and do you know the reason why? because it is the mildest. This age, the immediate issue, the firstborn offspring, of the French Revolution, frees the slave in America, raises from his degradation the pariah in Asia, abolishes the suttee in India, and extinguishes in Europe the last brands of the stake, civilizes Turkey, carries the Gospel into the domain of the Koran, dignifies woman, ...
— Napoleon the Little • Victor Hugo
... the firstborn or eldest son was the heir of the father's estate and any other rights or privileges that went with that estate, unless for some cause there should be an exception to the rule. Esau having been ...
— The Harp of God • J. F. Rutherford
... all the sturdy Spartan virtues of her mind. In features and in mental characteristics, he resembled her very closely. There were six children born to her in all, but the five have been nearly lost sight of in the splendid success of the firstborn. ...
— Little Journeys To the Homes of the Great, Volume 3 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... still lay on his couch, but could speak and be glad, he rejoiced indeed, for a sore in his heart was healed, when two fair babes were brought to him,—a boy who would be as another firstborn son, and a little maiden who would bear that name which had become dear and saintly in the ...
— Modern Broods • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... defiance of those hidden perils that lurk where sanitation and hygiene are unpractised sciences, Joe's numerous family throve and multiplied. The baby carriage which had held his firstborn,—Arthur, now aged fourteen,—was still in use, the luster of its paint much dimmed and its upholstery but a memory. It had trundled a succession of little Montgomerys among the cinder piles; indeed, it was almost a feature ...
— The Just and the Unjust • Vaughan Kester
... thy people, whom thou hast called thy firstborn, thy only begotten, and thy fervent lover, are given into ...
— Deuteronomical Books of the Bible - Apocrypha • Anonymous
... most considerable of all the Roman client-states. After the death of Massinissa (605), Scipio had divided the sovereign functions of that prince among his three sons, the kings Micipsa, Gulussa, and Mastanabal, in such a way that the firstborn obtained the residency and the state-chest, the second the charge of war, and the third the administration of justice.(10) Now after the death of his two brothers Massinissa's eldest son, Micipsa,(11) reigned alone, a feeble peaceful old man, who was fond of occupying himself more with ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... this calm placidity, with an eye looking benevolence, and a considerateness that took note of your smallest want, she sustained the pangs of one yearning for her firstborn; dissatisfied and disappointed in his career, and apprehensive for his fate. The family was no longer happy. The worm was busy in all their hearts. They treated me kindly, but it was obvious that they were suffering. A visible constraint chilled and baffled conversation; and I ...
— Confession • W. Gilmore Simms
... will make him my firstborn, higher than the kings of the earth. My mercy will I keep for him for evermore, and my covenant shall stand fast with him. His seed also will I make to endure forever, and his throne as the days of heaven. If his children forsake my law and walk not in ...
— God's Plan with Men • T. T. (Thomas Theodore) Martin
... months, Her firstborn son (came forth) like a lamb. There was no bursting, nor rending, No injury, no hurt; Showing how wonderful he would be. Did not God give her the comfort? Had he not accepted her pure offering and sacrifice, So that thus easily she brought forth ...
— The Shih King • James Legge
... in attempting to define or explain the first God in the Platonic system, who has sometimes been thought to answer to God the Father; or the world, in whom the Fathers of the Church seemed to recognize 'the firstborn of every creature.' Nor need we discuss at length how far Plato agrees in the later Jewish idea of creation, according to which God made the world out of nothing. For his original conception of matter as something which has no qualities is really a negation. Moreover in the Hebrew Scriptures ...
— Timaeus • Plato
... and to be a great comfort and blessing to the parents who have done me the honour to call their firstborn for me," returned the old gentleman, a gleam of pleasure lighting up his face. "I want to see the bit bairn myself when the mother is well enough to enjoy a call from her auld kinsman. And how soon do you think that may be, doctor?" he asked, ...
— Elsie at Home • Martha Finley
... the sorrow she had known when her firstborn went from her, when the aching void came into her life and robbed it of every joy and every zest, till the waif was brought to her, the care of whom filled her life with happiness and content. Her big motherly heart was trying to understand something of the anguish she would have known had that ...
— Colonial Born - A tale of the Queensland bush • G. Firth Scott
... Sarah bear a son, though old in winters, and fate shall be fulfilled according to My word. I will bless Ishmael, thy firstborn, with My blessing as thou dost ask, that his days may be long in the land, and his race may multiply. This will I grant thee. So also will I prosper Isaac, thy younger son, who is not yet born, with every good and pleasant thing all the days of his life. And I will surely ...
— Codex Junius 11 • Unknown
... to superintend the boy's education, and Tom Pipes, at his own petition, put into livery, and appointed footman to the young squire. Mr. Pickle approved of the plan, though he durst not venture to see the boy; so much was he intimidated by his wife, whose aversion to her firstborn became every day more inveterate and unaccountable. Her second son, Gam, now in the fourth year of his age, had been rickety from the cradle, and as the deformity increased, the mother's fondness was ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... firstborn son into my arms, I had no high thoughts. I trembled, indeed, but it was with fear lest I ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett
... little less round, and of having broken it up into artificial component parts. The muster of the people is followed in Numbers iii. iv. by the dedication of the tribe of Levi to the sanctuary, in compensation for the firstborn males of the Israelites who up to that time had not been sacrificed nor yet redeemed. There are 22,273 firstborn males to be provided for, and there are 22,000 male Levites above a month old. The 273 extra firstborn males are specially redeemed at five shekels a head. ...
— Prolegomena to the History of Israel • Julius Wellhausen
... conception, and to the influence of particular circumstances. But we could not avoid showing at once that the BLOODY SOLUTION OF THE CRISIS, the effort for the destruction of the enemy's force, is the firstborn son of War. If when political objects are unimportant, motives weak, the excitement of forces small, a cautious commander tries in all kinds of ways, without great crises and bloody solutions, to twist himself skilfully into a peace through the characteristic ...
— On War • Carl von Clausewitz
... even his heritage," Falkenberg promised. "Make of him a Frenchman or an American, if you will. He is your own son. Take him. I give my firstborn for my country. You will ...
— The Mischief Maker • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... child. To you little Gazan might have seemed a hideous and repulsive creature, but to Taug and Teeka he was as beautiful and as cute as is your little Mary or Johnnie or Elizabeth Ann to you, and he was their firstborn, their only balu, and a he—three things which might make a young ape the apple ...
— Jungle Tales of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... her father was absent with me on duty.) Our English missionary sister has also been passing through woman's time of trial and honour, and we are now able to rejoice with her and her husband in the gift of a little girl, their firstborn. God bless and ...
— With the Harmony to Labrador - Notes Of A Visit To The Moravian Mission Stations On The North-East - Coast Of Labrador • Benjamin La Trobe
... to the last moment, in order to stand godfather to Nancy's healthy firstborn. John Lambert—honest man and proud father—had honoured the event with a dinner, and very nearly wrecked his own domestic peace by sending out the invitations in his own hand and including Mr. and Mrs. Wright. For weeks after, Nancy shuddered to think what might have happened ...
— Hetty Wesley • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... which is called Bethlehem, | (because he was of the house and lineage of David,) to be taxed | with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child. And so it | was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished | that she should be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn | son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a | manger; because there was no room for them in the inn. And there | were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping | watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord | came upon ...
— The Book of Common Prayer - and The Scottish Liturgy • Church of England
... he had caused; and, pointing to the Wildgrave and his myrmidon, who were scampering towards the castle, he exclaimed: "The vapours of the hellish pool will not, one day, strike him with such horror, O Faustus, as this thy deed: his young and beloved wife was a few days ago delivered of her firstborn." ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger
... insist on your supposing yourself to be a weak, superstitious, conceited, fanatical fool. You understand? Now, tell me, then. Could you keep away from your wife, when you were called back to her in the name of your firstborn child? ...
— The Black Robe • Wilkie Collins
... fine boy, whose baptism we are postponing till your return to Chantepleurs. Renee and I both earnestly hope that you may then come as far as La Crampade, and will consent to act as godmother to our firstborn. In this hope, I have had him placed on the register under the name of ...
— Letters of Two Brides • Honore de Balzac
... footsteps; Misery and ruin stand ready by his side: The limbs of his body[225] shall be gnawed, Devoured by the firstborn of death.[226] ...
— The Sceptics of the Old Testament: Job - Koheleth - Agur • Emile Joseph Dillon
... a son, her firstborn, named Cairbry, who was King of Ireland after Cormac. It was during the lifetime of Cormac that Cairbry came to the throne, for it happened that ere he died Cormac was wounded by a chance cast of a spear and lost one of his eyes, and it was forbidden that any ...
— The High Deeds of Finn and other Bardic Romances of Ancient Ireland • T. W. Rolleston
... other as if each would ask the other, "Am I awake, or do I dream?" There was a piteous helplessness. Strong men bowed down and wept. Other and common griefs belonged to someone in chief; this belonged to all. It was each and every man's. Every virtuous household in the land felt as if its firstborn were gone. Men were bereaved and walked for days as if a corpse lay unburied in their dwellings. There was nothing else to think of. They could speak of nothing but that; and yet of that they could speak only falteringly. All business was laid aside. Pleasure forgot ...
— Our American Holidays: Lincoln's Birthday • Various
... proud of them all, living or dead—here or there. So I said, 'Well, Miss Harlow, John is not my firstborn. There was a lovely little girl, who went back to God before she was quite a year old. People said I ought to think it a great honor to give my first child to God, but it was a great grief to me. Soon after her death John was born, and after John came Clara Ann. She married before ...
— The Measure of a Man • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... at their birth, and all through their infancy and childhood the old wine-merchant had been to them as father and mother in one, and the brothers had grown up to manhood, loving him and each other as dearly as heart could wish. Already Stephen, the firstborn of the twins, had become partner in his father's flourishing business, and Maurice was preparing at a military college for service in the army, which he was shortly to join, when a certain event occurred at Kensington, trifling enough in itself, but in the sequel ...
— Dreams and Dream Stories • Anna (Bonus) Kingsford |
