"Heroism" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... well to speak of the bravery of the President's wife, but you know that these incidents we have related, and incidents you have seen in your own experiences, show as great, if not greater bravery and heroism than that of the first woman of the land. O, the country is full of women who are braver than the bravest man that ...
— Peck's Sunshine - Being a Collection of Articles Written for Peck's Sun, - Milwaukee, Wis. - 1882 • George W. Peck
... traveler comes over what is practically the long known and historic overland stage-road, over which so many thousands of gold-seekers and emigrants came in the days of California's gold excitement. Every mile has some story of pioneer bravery or heroism, of hairbreadth escape from hostile Indians or fortuitous deliverance from storm or disaster. It was over this route the pilgrims came who sought in Utah a land of freedom where they might follow their own peculiar conceptions of religion and duty, untrammeled and uninterfered with by hostile ...
— The Lake of the Sky • George Wharton James
... displayed anywhere. The faces of old and young were wreathed with smiles, and glowed with happiness at their sacrifices for the good of their country. Many have lost EVERYTHING. What the fire and shells of the enemy spared, their pillagers destroyed. But God will shelter them, I know. So much heroism will not be unregarded. I can only hold oral communication with your sister [His daughter Mary, in King George county, within the lines of the enemy], and have forbidden the scouts to bring any writing, and have taken some back that I had given them for her. If caught, ...
— Recollections and Letters of General Robert E. Lee • Captain Robert E. Lee, His Son
... some to have simply run away after the manner of undisciplined youth aiming at mock heroism; but where, or with whom? for, said the keen-eyed women and large-mouthed men, incredulous of maiden meditation fancy free, a pretty young thing of nineteen would never have left her comfortable home, her father, friends and good name, without ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - Vol. XVII, No. 102. June, 1876. • Various
... is characteristic of the race of men that the first design should have centred on the Pole—the top of the earth, the focus of longitude, the magic goal, to reach which no physical sacrifice was too great. The heroism of Parry is a type of that adamant persistence which has made the history of the conquest of the Poles a volume in which disaster and death have played a large part. It followed on years of polar experience, it resulted from ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... executed) how much, and for what reasons, the man that is skillful in painting modern life, and the most secret foibles and follies of his contemporaries, is, THEREFORE, disqualified for representing the ages of heroism, and that simple life which alone epic poetry can gracefully describe. . . Wit and satire are transitory and perishable, but nature and passion are eternal." The largest portion of Pope's work, says the ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... abandoned them in the hour of trial. As the lives of the faithful became less mortified and austere, they were every day less ambitious of the honors of martyrdom; and the soldiers of Christ, instead of distinguishing themselves by voluntary deeds of heroism, frequently deserted their post, and fled in confusion before the enemy whom it was their duty to resist. There were three methods, however, of escaping the flames of persecution, which were not attended with an equal degree of guilt: first, indeed, was generally ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... foreign country, not only bravely supporting themselves, but sending home in every ship remittances to impoverished friends left behind. If our daughters did as much for us, should we not be proud of their energy and heroism? ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... found fuller expression in words. But there was no time for argument or admonition; for at that moment the Saracens made one of their fiery charges, and though the French warriors defended themselves and their king with heroism, they could not hope that valour would ultimately save them. While Chatillon and Bisset, now charging singly, now side by side, did wonders in keeping a space clear around the king and the royal standard, Geoffrey de Segrines, adhering to the side of ...
— The Boy Crusaders - A Story of the Days of Louis IX. • John G. Edgar
... there to her dolls, rushed into the burning building, groped through the stifling smoke of the loft, and seizing the sleeping child, threw her out upon a pile of straw. When he attempted to jump after her, a falling rafter struck him to the earth, and left an honorable scar in attestation of his heroism. ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... play-mates of my youth, my bosom friends, my acquaintance?—the idea makes me shudder! Must I be called a parricide, a traitor, a villain, lose the esteem of all those whom I love, to preserve my own; be shunned like a rattlesnake, or be pointed at like a bear? I have neither heroism not magnanimity enough to make so great a sacrifice. Here I am tied, I am fastened by numerous strings, nor do I repine at the pressure they cause; ignorant as I am, I can pervade the utmost extent of the calamities ...
— Letters from an American Farmer • Hector St. John de Crevecoeur
... the last year has the imperial household of Germany been visited by death; and I have hastened to express the sorrow of this people, and their appreciation of the lofty character of the late aged Emperor William, and their sympathy with the heroism under suffering of his son the ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... heard of the false alarm, (said Roger Goldie,) which, for the space of wellnigh four and twenty hours, filled the counties upon the Border with exceeding great consternation, and at the same time called forth an example of general and devoted heroism, and love of country, such as is nowhere recorded in the annals of any nation upon the face of the globe. Good cause have I to remember it; and were I to live a thousand years, it never would be effaced from my ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland Volume 17 • Alexander Leighton
... Heroism did not excite the respect of our fathers. The man who would not recant was not forgiven. They screwed the thumbscrews down to the last pang, and then threw their victim into some dungeon, where, in the throbbing ...
— The Ghosts - And Other Lectures • Robert G. Ingersoll
... death, saved from the scaffold by conjugal affection, and the heroism of three Englishmen, Sir Robert Wilson, Mr. ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. II • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... capital. All these facts are necessary in inferring the causes of the importance of Ottawa. In a literature lesson in a Form III class on The Charge of the Light Brigade, the preparation would involve a recall of some deed of personal heroism with which the pupils are familiar, such as that of John Maynard, Grace Darling, or any similar one nearer home. Recall how such a deed is admired and praised, and the memory of the doer is cherished and revered. Then the teacher should tell the story of Balaklava ...
— Ontario Normal School Manuals: Science of Education • Ontario Ministry of Education
... expedition under General Wolfe entered the St. Lawrence and anchored below Quebec. Wolfe was already a veteran soldier, for he had fought at Dettingen, Fontenoy, and Laffeldt, and had played the first part in the capture of Louisburg. Pitt had discerned the genius and heroism which lay hidden beneath the awkward manner and occasional gasconade of the young soldier of thirty-three whom he chose for the crowning exploit of the war. But for a while his sagacity seemed to have ...
— History of the English People, Volume VII (of 8) - The Revolution, 1683-1760; Modern England, 1760-1767 • John Richard Green
... around him. He reentered that building four times. He saved the lives of three women. He's here with us this evening, and I want to recognize Richard and applaud both his public service and his extraordinary personal heroism. ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... constitution than truth-saying, they are for ever concocting dodges with the view, which they glory in of successfully cheating people. Sometimes they will show great kindness, even bravery amounting to heroism, and proportionate affection; at another time, without any cause, they will desert and be treacherous to their sworn friends in the most dastardly manner. Whatever the freak of the moment is, that they adopt in the most thoughtless ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... Somali country, as amongst the Kafirs, after murdering a man or boy, the death of an elephant is considered the act of heroism: most tribes wear for it the hair-feather and the ivory bracelet. Some hunters, like the Bushmen of the Cape [30], kill the Titan of the forests with barbed darts carrying Waba-poison. The general way of hunting resembles ...
— First footsteps in East Africa • Richard F. Burton
... although condemned on circumstancial evidence under a law of peculiar severity, Effie Deans is really innocent, whereas Hetty Sorrel is guilty. In the novel of the last generation we see little of Effie, and our attention is chiefly drawn to the simple heroism of her sister Jeanie. In the novel of the present day, everything about Hetty is most elaborately described: her thoughts throughout the whole course of the seduction, her misery on discovering that there is evidence of her frailty, her sufferings ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... remorse; and he expressed such a lively sorrow for the injuries he had done to Valentine that Valentine, whose nature was noble and generous, even to a romantic degree, not only forgave and restored him to his former place in his friendship, but in a sudden flight of heroism he said: ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... I behaved very well," he said to himself; "and having made up my mind to stop anything like a flirtation with that perilously fascinating Clarissa, I shall stick to my resolve with the heroism of an ancient Roman; though the Romans were hardly so heroic in that matter, by the way—witness the havoc made by that fatal Egyptian, a little bit of a woman that could be bundled up in a carpet—to say nothing of the general ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon
... literally fulfilled. This, however, was accomplished in Singonahully by our little friend Daniel. We have seen that Daniel's heathen name was 'Chickka,' and his father's name was 'Veera Chickka,' that is hero Chickka; but whether any deeds of heroism were ever displayed, either by Daniel's father or by any of his ancestors, is not upon record. However, we do know that when his old grandfather left his native town and came to live at Goobbe, though he did not bring the image of the family goddess with him, he ...
— Old Daniel • Thomas Hodson
... at that time, in order that, though we saw not, we may still, hearing and believing, obtain the blessing of the Lord. But since all have not a knowledge of letters nor time for reading, it appeared good to the Fathers that those events, as acts of heroism, should be depicted on images(329) to be a brief memorial of them. Often, doubtless, when we have not the Lord's passion in mind and see the image of Christ's crucifixion, we remember the passion and we fall down and show reverence not to the material but to that which is imaged; just as we do not ...
— A Source Book for Ancient Church History • Joseph Cullen Ayer, Jr., Ph.D.
... stories, anecdotes and general fund of bright reading matter is such as excites the vivid imagination of the young, without leaving a trace of wild and unbridled adventure to torture their minds to a longing for border acts of cowboy heroism. There is a moral precept in every page, and an abundance of thrilling adventure to awaken the lethargy of any boy or girl. We cheerfully commend it to parents as a valuable ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls, Vol. XII, Jan. 3, 1891 • Various
... looking-glass on her left hand—an action she repeated, with a solemn aspect, four times; at which point Gainsford gave way. The ladies accorded him every extenuation for the offence. They themselves, but for the heroism of exalted natures, must have succumbed to the gross temptation. "It is difficult, dear papa, to bring one's mind to religious thoughts in her company, even when she is quiescent," they said. Thus, by the prettiest exercise of charity that can be ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... thrills through all nature a subtle electric vibration which is the supreme form of physical energy, so there runs through the history of mankind a current of spiritual inspiration and power. To possess this magnetism of soul, this heroism of life, this flame-like flower of character, is to be Victor in the great combats of the race. It is the spirit of courage, energy, and love. Nothing is too hard for it, nothing too distasteful, nothing too insignificant. Through all the course of duty it spurs one ...
— The Warriors • Lindsay, Anna Robertson Brown
... showing sympathy with their natural right of choice, should have burdened himself with all this unnecessary complication of special foolishness on the part of his heroine which alienates our sympathy; and special illegality on the man's position. Perhaps this is to add heroism to her effort to secure the right mate, to indicate how small are any other considerations in comparison to this primary demand ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... There is no doubt but this Friedrich also, like his ancestor Friedrich III., the First Hereditary Burggraf, was an excellent citizen of his country: a man conspicuously important in all German business in his time. A man setting up for no particular magnanimity, ability or heroism, but unconsciously exhibiting a good deal; which by degrees gained universal recognition. He did not shine much as Reichs-Generalissimo, under Kaiser Sigismund, in his expeditions against Zisca; ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. III. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Hohenzollerns In Brandenburg—1412-1718 • Thomas Carlyle
... devotion of Pomponius,[735] who turned, and single-handed kept the pursuing enemy at bay until trampling on his prostrate body they rushed in the direction of the wooden bridge which spanned the river. Here Laetorius imitated the heroism of his comrade. Standing with drawn sword at the head of the bridge, he thrust back all who tried to pass until Gracchus had gained the other bank. Then he too fell, pierced with wounds. The fugitive had now but a single slave to bear him company ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge
... field-glasses, and was an unusually long time in scoring the last shot. At last he said "A bull," and scored a five, which gave Knudsen a perfect record; but he, suspecting something, made the man admit that the bulleye was in the wrong target. Knudsen changed the score himself, a bit of personal heroism that roused the wonder of Pickle, who told me the tale, and ended "Chee, I ...
— At Plattsburg • Allen French
... instructions was strongly impressed on his character. In early childhood he was sent for change of air to the country seat of his maternal grandfather, where he first developed his extraordinary powers of memory by learning the traditionary legends of border heroism and chivalry, which used to be recited at the fireside on a winter's evening. His early taste for the romantic was a little checked when he returned to Edinburgh, in his eighth year, for his father ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne
... this extraordinary woman leads a secluded life, rarely venturing outside her doors, and never giving any one a chance of judging for themselves of her rumoured beauty. She is, no doubt, meditating some bold design worthy of the heroism she has proved herself to possess, for she is said still to retain hope where hope is ...
— A Journey to Katmandu • Laurence Oliphant
... perhaps, the one person most disturbed by her parson's heroism. She would have gone to the shanty immediately had not Dr. Parker prevented. Even as it was, she did go as far as the ropes, but there she was warded off by Ebenezer until Ellery came running out and bade ...
— Keziah Coffin • Joseph C. Lincoln
... seem to care so much just now about being the biggest person in the house. Something awful has happened. Zillah Forsyth is dead. Really dead, I mean. And she died in great heroism. You remember Zillah Forsyth, don't you? She was one of my room-mates,—not the gooder one, you know,—not the swell,—that was Helene Churchill. But Zillah? Oh you know! Zillah was the one you sent out on that Fractured Elbow case. It was a ...
— The White Linen Nurse • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... detest the discrimination it implies. We do not call the devout Christian woman a saintess, nor the eloquent woman an oratrix, but the woman who excels in endurance and bravery and in the virtues that constitute a man a hero, is only a heroine, as if heroism was a manly virtue, to which woman may lay no claim. I long ago expunged it from my vocabulary. It is entirely too feminine for me. Out upon ...
— The Heroic Women of Early Indiana Methodism: An Address Delivered Before the Indiana Methodist Historical Society • Thomas Aiken Goodwin
... Ideals in Art. There are seven figures, the Greek ideal of beauty dominating all in a classic nude. Below this Religion is portrayed, in a Madonna and Child. Heroism is shown in Jeanne d'Arc, mounted on a war-horse and flinging abroad her victorious pennant. A young girl represents youth and material beauty, while at her side a flaunting peacock stands for absolute ...
— The Art of the Exposition • Eugen Neuhaus
... roused to storm by any noble passion, never thrilled by an electric touch of sympathy. Some lives are complete within narrow limits: in the few years which are all they have, they ripen into perfect sweetness, or expend themselves in such a flash of heroism, as would make subsequent days, were they given, mean and poor by contrast. What shall we say of that nameless engine-driver in America, who last week, measuring his own life against six hundred more, rushed through the flames ...
— Strong Souls - A Sermon • Charles Beard
... I doubt it. And there is something else. If I may I should like to tell you how I have admired you for your steady facing of each day's routine. There is no heroism in the world, Miss Georgiana, equal to ...
— Under the Country Sky • Grace S. Richmond
... find a home. That Man is the product of causes which had no prevision of the end they were achieving; that his origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, his loves and his beliefs, are but the outcome of accidental collocations of atoms; that no fire, no heroism, no intensity of thought and feeling, can preserve an individual life beyond the grave; that all the labours of the ages, all the devotion, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human ...
— Mysticism and Logic and Other Essays • Bertrand Russell
... Paul of Tarsus; who can study the lives of Francis of Assisi, or of Catherine of Siena, without wishing that, for the furtherance of his own ideals, he might be even as they; or who can contemplate unmoved the steadfast veracity and true heroism which loom through the fogs of mystical utterance in George Fox. In all these great men and women there lay the root of the matter; a burning desire to amend the condition of their fellow-men, and to put aside all other things for that end. If, in spite of all ...
— Evolution and Ethics and Other Essays • Thomas H. Huxley
... left me for that man—and at a time when by her own action it was impossible for me to defend either her or myself. What course of action remained to me? I did remember her temperament, her antecedents, and the certainty that this man, whatever might be his moments of heroism, was a selfish and incorrigible brute in his dealings with women. So I wrote to her, through this same consul at Trieste. I let her know that if she wished it, and if there were any chance of his marrying her, I would begin divorce proceedings at once. She had only to ...
— The Marriage of William Ashe • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... stainless hands in blessing over us, let history proclaim, and let our people reverently remember, that to the uncomplaining fortitude and sublime devotion of the private soldiers of the Confederacy, not less than to the genius of our generals and the heroism of our subordinate officers, we are indebted ...
— Macaria • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... cost and that he, too, would come in for a measurable share of their censure. But deep and lasting as his sympathy was for those who had been brought into this maelstrom of war, yet, pessimism found no lodgment within him, rather was his great soul illuminated with the thought that with splendid heroism they had died in order that others might live the better. Twice before had the great republic been baptized in blood and each time the result had changed the thought and destiny of man. And so would it be now, only to greater purpose. Never again would the Selwyns ...
— Philip Dru: Administrator • Edward Mandell House
... knew how to elude the danger, and that any one else who braved it without using precautions met with death for their temerity. This is, in fact; the whole point of the question. Either those privileged persons took indispensable precautions; and in that case their boasted heroism is a mere juggler's trick; or they touched the infected without using precautions, and inoculated themselves with the plague, thus voluntarily encountering death, and then the story ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... remembered, or even recorded, and who were yet heroes of a quality not inferior to their commanders and leaders. All men of that age whose calling led them to adventure and enterprise could scarcely fail to find opportunity for heroism, self-denial, and sacrifice, and thus the Elizabethan Englishman of whatever station stands out to us of these later days as a great figure—the type and emblem of the England that was to be. It is this ...
— In the Days of Drake • J. S. Fletcher
... true story of one of Nelson's captains, he of whom Nelson wrote as "the gallant and good Riou"—high meed of praise gloriously won at Copenhagen—but Riou, eleven years before that day, performed a deed, now almost forgotten, which, for unselfish heroism, ranks among the brightest in our brilliant naval annals, and in the sea ...
— "The Gallant, Good Riou", and Jack Renton - 1901 • Louis Becke
... prejudice. We live in an age when personal interest seems to be the only principle of all the actions of men, and what sympathy, what emotion, what enthusiasm, can ever result from such a principle? It is sweeter to dream of those days of devotion, of personal sacrifice and heroism, which however, have existed, and of which the earth still bears some ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael
... the old lion Ali for a long while and was by him raised to a Pachalick which was confirm'd to him by the Porte after the death of Ali; he commanded the 12,000 men that landed at Psara. Another desperate act of heroism took place in the strong fort situated on an eminence at the West End of the Island, it held out till the last and was not destroy'd until everything was lost. The Turks had made a forlorn hope to storm it, the Greeks allowed them easy access, then fired the magazine. Thus perish'd 1000 ...
— Charles Philip Yorke, Fourth Earl of Hardwicke, Vice-Admiral R.N. - A Memoir • Lady Biddulph of Ledbury
... perilous incidents and conditions. But the original penciled pages show that, even in copying, the strong bent of the writer to be brief has often led to the exclusion of facts that enhance the interest of exciting situations, and sometimes the omission robs her own heroism of due emphasis. I have restored one example of this in the short paragraph following her account of the night she spent fanning her sick husband on their perilous voyage ...
— Strange True Stories of Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... American Missionary Association, in the fall of 1866, and successfully carried on up to the present time. Its first teachers were Miss M. L. Root, of Sheffield, Ohio, and Miss M. F. Battey, of Providence, R. I., who labored here for two years, with a Christian heroism, wisdom and success that have left their names indelibly engraved upon the grateful hearts of all those for whom they toiled. During the second year, Miss M. C. Day, of Sheffield, Ohio, aided them, and was a ...
— A Letter to Hon. Charles Sumner, with 'Statements' of Outrages upon Freedmen in Georgia • Hamilton Wilcox Pierson
... evening of Margaret's original presentation of her merit badge," the captain said, "but this time we have merely to call attention to that great occasion and our minds are filled with its pleasant memories. The noble deed done to acquire this badge was one of unusual heroism and peculiar wisdom," she went on, "for Margaret stayed at her post in a dreary, lonely room, guarding her hats and cloaks with the same spirit of attention to duty which at that same hour was bringing her ...
— The Girl Scout Pioneers - or Winning the First B. C. • Lillian C Garis
... how much more enlightened the world would have been now! We, alas, can only fight. France is unconquerable. We impose our narrow ideas, our prejudices, our obsolete institutions, our insufferable pedantry on the world by brute force—by that stupid quality of military heroism which shews how little we have evolved from the savage: nay, from the beast. We can charge like bulls; we can spring on our foes like gamecocks; when we are overpowered by reason, we can die fighting like rats. And we are foolish enough to be proud of ...
— Fanny's First Play • George Bernard Shaw
... nations and that they have talked to them generally, too, for the glory of the whole earth. They could not get their souls geared smaller than a whole earth. Shakspeare feels the generations stretching away like galleries around him listening—when he makes love. It was no particular heroism or patience in the man Columbus that made him sail across an ocean and discover a continent. He had the girth of an earth in him and had to do something with it. He could not have helped it. He discovered ...
— The Voice of the Machines - An Introduction to the Twentieth Century • Gerald Stanley Lee
... although this casino almost convinces me that I am mistaken, but what does love care for riches? Do not imagine that I consider you endowed with less merit than he, because you confess yourself incapable of his heroism in allowing me to enjoy another love. Quite the contrary; I know that you would not love me as you do, if you told me that you could be as indulgent as he is for one of ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... women that will remind him of Bible scenes and characters. These are to be cut out, explained, and arranged in the order of time, as they happened, every member of the family helping. The same plan may be applied to scenes of missionary work, using blank books for stories of heroism which children will illustrate with ...
— Religious Education in the Family • Henry F. Cope
... old ships, of sea-accidents, of break-downs, dismastings; and of a man who brought his ship safe to Liverpool all the way from the River Platte under a jury rudder. We talked of wrecks, of short rations and of heroism—or at least of what the newspapers would have called heroism at sea—a manifestation of virtues quite different from the heroism of primitive times. And now and then falling silent all together we gazed at the sights ...
— Falk • Joseph Conrad
... little. It suffices me. It is a spiritual gift worthy of him to give and of me to receive. It profanes nobody. In these warm lines the heart will trust itself, as it will not to the tongue, and pour out the prophecy of a godlier existence than all the annals of heroism ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... attainments and inconsiderable adventures may loom to proportions that are quite picturesque when given a background of tossing waves, "all sails set," and a few jolly tars to sing and fight and heave the rope. And when you have a hero who needs no augmenting of heroism, no spectacular embellishment as it were,—what a gorgeous figure he becomes, to ...
— Greenwich Village • Anna Alice Chapin
... all fairly to be taken into account; nor should resistance be protracted where it means merely loss of life. Yet it may be questioned whether the moral tone of a military service, which is its breath of life, does not suffer when the attempt is made to invest with a halo of extraordinary heroism such a resistance as Decatur made, by his own showing. Unless the "President" was really thrashed out by the "Endymion," which was the British assertion,[468] she might have put one of his Majesty's thirty-eight-gun ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 2 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... softest chair and be babied. Poor little toiler-Billy, created to have a mother and a home, to sit always in soft chairs and be taken care of! Yet without them all she was making a splendid struggle for independence, with the best of them, and they were conscious of a certain element of heroism in her toiling that none of the rest of them laid claim to in their own. The other B.'s ...
— Four Girls and a Compact • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... Sept. 25, "was such as might be expected from a mind capable of forming the daring project which he had conceived." The United-States Gazette for Oct. 9 states, more sarcastically, that "the general is said to have manifested the utmost composure, and with the true spirit of heroism seems ready to resign his high office, and even his life, rather than gratify the officious inquiries of ...
— Black Rebellion - Five Slave Revolts • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... a horrified spectator of his brother's rash heroism, and had remained speechless until Rumple was picked up, burst into the very noisiest crying of which he was capable, and, standing with his legs very wide apart and his mouth as far open as it would go, howled his very loudest, ...
— The Adventurous Seven - Their Hazardous Undertaking • Bessie Marchant
... pugnacious man; and yet he confesses that at certain times, had one proceeded to horsewhip him, he would not have had the hardihood to resist. Shelley, who, in a tremendous storm, behaved with dauntless heroism, and who would at any time have acted on the example of his own character in 'Prometheus,' ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... perpetual state of violence, every time we undertake to resist their advances. One of our friends said: 'There is not an honest woman who is not tired of being so.' And what recompense do they offer us for the cruel torments to which they have condemned us? Do they raise up an altar to our heroism? No! The most honest woman, they say, is she who is not talked about, that is to say, a perfect indifference on the part of a woman, a general oblivion is the price of our virtue. Must women not have much of it to preserve it at such a price? Who would not be tempted ...
— Life, Letters, and Epicurean Philosophy of Ninon de L'Enclos, - the Celebrated Beauty of the Seventeenth Century • Robinson [and] Overton, ed. and translation.
... authority. Thus the schoolboy hears both sides, and is so far better off than the homebred boy who hears only one. But the two sides are not fairly presented. They are presented as good and evil, as vice and virtue, as villainy and heroism. The boy feels mean and cowardly when he obeys, and selfish and rascally when he disobeys. He looses his moral courage just as he comes to hate books and languages. In the end, John Ruskin, tied so close to his mother's apron-string that he did not escape even when he went to Oxford, and John ...
— A Treatise on Parents and Children • George Bernard Shaw
... over him; his heart beat rapidly, and his body seemed to be very hollow. Unceasing panoramas of heroism cast on his mental screen were one thing, but the military company in the broad daylight of cold, hard fact did not appeal to him at all. Embarking for a distant shore where men were torn by shells, where the ground was slippery with the blood of countless thousands, where ...
— Where the Souls of Men are Calling • Credo Harris
... wanted," replied Montalais, who was just in time to see the agitation of the actors of these four characters; for De Guiche had consistently carried out his part with heroism. ...
— Louise de la Valliere • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... so pitiably silly, that in an age of great mental activity their strongest thinkers should have sunk under an abortion of fear and folly, should have allowed it to absorb into itself whatever of heroism, of devotion, self-sacrifice, and moral nobleness there was among them; surely there were nothing better for a wise man than to make the best of his time, and to crowd what enjoyment he can find into it, sheltering ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude
... hundred-bottle cases of champagne, at five guineas a bottle, on the veldt and so on. Besides, she preferred to see how Edward was spending his five hundred a year. I don't mean to say that Edward had any grievance in that. He was never a man of the deeds of heroism sort and it was just as good for him to be sniped at up in the hills of the North Western frontier, as to be shot at by an old gentleman in a tophat at the bottom of some spruit. Those are more or less his ...
— The Good Soldier • Ford Madox Ford
... said, "I think I can understand it, and because I understand I can appreciate more than you imagine the heroism you have shown in your endurance of all that you have passed through. There can be no bravery where there is no fear. A child might walk into a lion's den, but it would take a very brave man to go ...
— Tarzan the Untamed • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... all those strange scenes of levity and blood, buffoonery and heroism, which the history of Parisian revolutions has familiarized to the imagination, but which, nevertheless, have an inexhaustible interest. The people arm themselves wheresoever and howsoever they ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 347, September, 1844 • Various
... civilians who sneer at the acquirements of the army read Sir Harry Smith's account of the Battle of Aliwal. A noble deed was never told in nobler language. And you who doubt if chivalry exists, or the age of heroism has passed by, think of Sir Henry Hardinge, with his son, 'dear little Arthur,' riding in front of the lines at Ferozeshah. I hope no English painter will endeavour to illustrate that scene; for who is there to do justice to it? The history ...
— The Book of Snobs • William Makepeace Thackeray
... personally experienced may just conceivably be untrue. But when one has seen—so long as memory does not disappear—this agnostic instinct is an impossibility. Every single act therefore has a new significance. There is no venture about it any more; there is, indeed, very little opportunity for heroism. Once it is certain, by the evidence of the senses, that death is just an interlude, this life becomes merely part ...
— The Necromancers • Robert Hugh Benson
... what man should be—manly, physically perfect, grand in character, and true to the instincts of his conscience—than any other race of beings, civilized or uncivilized. Where do we hear such noble sentiments or meet with such examples of heroism and self-sacrifice as the history of the American Indian furnishes? Where shall we go to hear again such oratory as that of Black Hawk and Logan? Certainly the records of our so-called civilization do not furnish it, and the present century is ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye
... 'Edward! I don't know what to say! Of course it makes my blood run cold to realise what you have been through, and to think what might have happened; but I think you behaved splendidly. Why, I never heard of such perfect heroism! You needn't tell ME that he made no resistance. There was a deadly struggle—your necktie and everything about you shows it. And you needn't think there was only one ...
— The Garotters • William D. Howells
... more so as the years, in their flight, had rather enriched than blighted those peculiarities which had been humorously criticised by persons less interested than Isabel, and which were still marked enough to give loyalty a spice of heroism. Henrietta was as keen and quick and fresh as ever, and as neat and bright and fair. Her remarkably open eyes, lighted like great glazed railway-stations, had put up no shutters; her attire had lost none of its crispness, her opinions ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 2 (of 2) • Henry James
... and reckless daring, mingled with a dash of finer feeling, there is Macpherson's Farewell. For patriotic heroism— ...
— Robert Burns • Principal Shairp
... Beaumont-Hamel—and the writer is able to associate with each immortal name the regiments there engaged, all heroes, for "there were no stragglers." Indeed, if there is a weakness in the book it is that the insistent recording of the individual heroism of different battalions tends to become monotonous. But what a fault! It is a monotony of British valour crowned by a monotony ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, June 20, 1917 • Various
... A name to conjure up such visions of glory as few battlefields have ever shown. Heroism and determination on the part of the Athenians, supported by the small but ever noble band of Plataeans who came to their aid; who can read the repulse of the Persians on this ever memorable plain without experiencing a thrill of admiration and delight at ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 • Various
... the leading part, and it is what she does in your play that really makes the story, it would be best to feature the girl and her deed of cleverness or daring in your title, as in "The Ranch Girl's Heroism," "A Daughter's Diplomacy," or "A Wife of the Hills." Or you may attach most importance to the locale of your story, the background against which the rest of your picture is painted, and call it, for instance, "A Tragedy of the Desert," "In the North Woods," ...
— Writing the Photoplay • J. Berg Esenwein and Arthur Leeds
... courage, naturally require, and therefore as naturally prefer, the man who has most of it, as the most able to give them the requisite protection? That the greater their own cowardice, as it would be called in a man, the greater is their delight in subjects of heroism? As may be observed in their reading; which turns upon difficulties encountered, battles fought, and enemies overcome, four or five hundred by the prowess of one single hero, the more improbable the better: in short, that their ...
— Clarissa, Volume 2 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... way, as ground often does, and that there was difficulty in filling up the chasm. A grand opportunity was thus offered for a good story-teller to build up a romance, or to touch up the early history with an interesting tale of heroism. The temptation to do this would have been very strong ...
— The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic • Arthur Gilman
... a blooded hound! Without fear! He always quoted Uncas and his father, who from his wisdom was called the Great Serpent, as models of heroism ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper
... said Betty. "Bad habits and an impaired digestion as a reward for heroism! Never! Extra meat, and an extra-choice bone at supper-time, if you like; but no plum cake for my Jan boy, if I ...
— Jan - A Dog and a Romance • A. J. Dawson
... tell of their previous records," said Enoch. "Let the world know the heroism and the self-sacrifice of those men. And at the end let him give the lie direct to the Brown papers. Tell him I'll sign it ...
— The Enchanted Canyon • Honore Willsie Morrow
... materialism of this age, with all its faults, is better than the chivalry of an age gone by. It tends to keep the world at peace; that tended to perpetual turmoil. The supposition all rich, according to modern ideas, is not so flat a contradiction as the supposition all glorious, in military heroism. As the past age estimated life's supreme good, the enjoyment of a few required the exclusion of the many from its benefits: as this age estimates the enjoyment of some, admits the exclusion of others. Whether the mercantile ...
— The Growth of Thought - As Affecting the Progress of Society • William Withington
... death, he fell! His bones, and all his trappings, the wooden shaft of his arrows, had disintegrated and disappeared. Only these bits of flint enmeshed in the clinging tendrils of Indian tobacco, or kinnikinic, were left to tell the tale of his heroism. ...
— A Mountain Boyhood • Joe Mills
... contemplation of the audience. There have been "supers" who have approached very near to death by suffocation, from the hurtful nature of their attire, rather than fail in the discharge of their duties. For there is heroism everywhere. ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... But if I don't go through with it, where will the heroism be? I shall simply have tricked them; and they'll hang me for that like a ...
— The Devil's Disciple • George Bernard Shaw
... suffered with their sufferings and exulted in their exploits, followed with a keen, personal, unfaltering interest the efforts made for their relief. "Tell these poor, noble wounded and sick men that no one takes a warmer interest, or feels more for their sufferings, or admires their courage and heroism more than their Queen. So does the Prince," was the impulsive, heart-warm message which Her Majesty sent for transmission through Miss Nightingale to her soldier-patients. Her deeds proved that these ...
— Great Britain and Her Queen • Anne E. Keeling
... a deliciously pretty girl, who is always sulky, and the thoughtless beseech her to be bright, not witting wherein lies her heroism. She was born the merriest of maids, but, being a student of her face, learned anon that sulkiness best becomes it, and so she has struggled and prevailed. A woman's history. Brave Margaret, when night falls and thy ...
— The Little White Bird - or Adventures In Kensington Gardens • J. M. Barrie
... said Jim. "I don't know why or how, but I guess we go on somewhere; and I rather think our best moments here—our moments of happiness or heroism, if we ever have any—are going to be the regular thing." Jim laughed a little, partly at his own lame ending, and partly because he felt Agatha's hand closing more tightly over his. He didn't want her to get blue just yet, after her ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... mistaken, if we had wished to inspire any other sentiment than that of horror, we should have chosen a more imposing personage from the annals of crime. There have been deeds which required audacity, a sort of grandeur, a false heroism; there have been criminals who held in check all the regular and legitimate forces of society, and whom one regarded with a mixture of terror and pity. There is nothing of that in Derues, not even ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - DERUES • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... some children, were riding in one of the foremost waggons, came fearlessly up to where the wounded lay, and, tearing strips from her clothing, helped the surgeon to bandage the wounds. The sergeant-major's wife was severely wounded, as was also Fox himself. There was no lack of heroism during those awful ten minutes, whilst men were being shot down like dogs. Lieutenant Harrison was shot through the head while cheering on his men; Lieutenant Hume was equally conspicuous for his coolness. An orderly-room clerk named Maistre and the Sergeant-Master-Tailor ...
— The Transvaal from Within - A Private Record of Public Affairs • J. P. Fitzpatrick
... listened in silence, with only a casual interjection, until Obed had finished his story. Then he made some appropriate remarks, very coolly, complimentary to the heroism of his friend; which remarks were at once quietly scouted by Obed ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... humiliation—"let him that standeth take heed lest he fall." But what would the wisdom of Ogniben be worth in its pronouncements on a Luria or a Colombe? Perhaps even in such a case not wholly valueless. The self-pleased, keen-sighted Legate might after all have applauded a moral heroism or a high-hearted gallantry which would ill accord with his own ingenious and versatile spirit. Bishop Blougram—sleek, ecclesiastical opportunist—was not insensible to the superior merits of "rough, grand, old ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden
... ago wrote a book which he called The Hero God. The publishers objected to the title because they saw in it a touch of sensationalism. No title, however, could have more adequately set forth the biblical God. God is the hero of the Bible. His heroism appears in growing revelation from the beginning. It shows itself superbly in his willingness to bear the burdens of mankind and in the appeals which he makes for response from men. The picture is of a God who dares to believe in men and who dares to call on them for the extremes of self-sacrificing ...
— Understanding the Scriptures • Francis McConnell
... was ordered to march against Thebes in 371. Cleombrotus was defeated at Leuctra and the Spartan supremacy overthrown. In 370 Agesilaus tried to restore Spartan prestige by an invasion of Mantinean territory, and his prudence and heroism saved Sparta when her enemies, led by Epaminondas, penetrated Laconia that same year, and again in 362 when they all but succeeded in seizing the city by a rapid and unexpected march. The battle of Mantinea (362), ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... tells us about the Englishman of 1840 is equally true of the Englishman of today—is true, indeed, of all peoples in all ages of history. Heroism has nearly always been taken to imply physical courage; physical courage has always found its most terrible and dramatic expression in warfare; and, therefore, by a natural association of ideas, ...
— Heroes in Peace - The 6th William Penn Lecture, May 9, 1920 • John Haynes Holmes
... in reverent awe, it is insolubly mysterious, irrational, crazy perhaps, but superb. For in it we do not deliberate. We hear a call, we shut our ears to prudence, and with courageous blindness as regards damage of our own, we hasten headlong to meet the needs of others. To reckon heroism, to count, up opposing gains and losses, balancing them one against another in order clear-sightedly to act, is to render heroism impossible. Into it there enters an element of insanity. The sacrificer must feel that he cares nothing for what is rational, but ...
— The Nature of Goodness • George Herbert Palmer
... began to take a prominent part in that maritime enterprise which was to lead to such remarkable results in the course of three centuries. The names of the ambitious navigators, Frobisher and Davis, are connected with those arctic waters where so much money, energy, and heroism have been expended down to the present time. Under the influence of the great Ralegh, whose fertile imagination was conceiving plans of colonization in America, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, his brother-in-law, took possession of Newfoundland on a hill overlooking the harbour of St. John's. ...
— Canada under British Rule 1760-1900 • John G. Bourinot
... that no man without the moral idea ever wrought our country lasting service or won himself a place in the hearts of mankind. On the other hand, most of the men whose names are associated in your mind with courage and heroism are those who keenly appreciated the value of Conduct, and strove valiantly to keep themselves above the demoralising and vulgarising influences of ...
— The Story of Baden-Powell - 'The Wolf That Never Sleeps' • Harold Begbie
... skill and character of Lee and his associates would however of course have been in vain and the lines would have been broken not in 1865, but in 1863 or in 1862, if it had not been for the magnificent patience and heroism of the rank and file that fought in the grey uniform under the Stars and Bars and whose fighting during the last of those months was done in tattered uniforms and with a ration less by from one quarter to one half than that which had been ...
— Abraham Lincoln • George Haven Putnam
... abandoning the argument; "but it must be allowed that there are cases when such an act would require a heroism beyond ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds
... left us to fight the good fight! How sourly we looked upon Plooie continuing his peaceful rounds. Whence arose the rumor, I cannot say, but it was noised about just at that time of wrath and tension that Plooie was born in Liege. Liege, that city of fire and slaughter and heroism, upon which the eyes and hopes of the world were turned in wonder and admiration. Somebody had seen the entry on the marriage register! The Bonnie Lassie told me of it, pausing at my bench with a little furrow between ...
— From a Bench in Our Square • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... ennoble, and all the more because of its prejudices? Does not the very meanest feel himself higher, more worthy, more self-respecting, because he is one of a strong, great, free people, with a grand inheritance of heroism from the past, and grand possibilities for the future? Who will quarrel with the Frenchman, the Englishman, or the Japanese, for holding his land the fairest land, his nation the noblest nation the sun shines on? Is it not my fixed faith that ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol IV, Issue VI, December 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... impostors, who are anxious for your ruin, and whom you know to be capable of anything. And the task is a mighty one—to brave unknown dangers, perilous seductions, perfidious counsels, and perhaps even violence, at the same time retaining a calm eye and smiling lips. Yet such was the heroism that Marguerite, although scarcely twenty, displayed when she left the Hotel de Chalusse to accept the hospitality of the Fondege family. And, to crown all, she took Madame Leon with her—Madame Leon, whom she knew to be the ...
— Baron Trigault's Vengeance - Volume 2 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau
... of Women's Anti-Tea Leagues, and the many instances of their heroism during the Revolutionary period, equaling, as they did, any deeds of self-sacrifice and bravery that man ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... our quiescent happiness is disturbed. In that sense we know even tragedies are pleasing. We may, however, paint a martyr on his gridiron, and paint that which is only disgusting; the firmness, the devotion through faith of the martyr, are of the noblest heroism. If to represent that be the sole object, and it succeeds, such a work would ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 334, August 1843 • Various
... Drake's discoveries; the name of the hero often will produce a ludicrous effect, but one of the most unlucky of his chief heroes must be Thomas Doughty! One of Blackmore's chief heroes in his Alfred is named Gunter; a printer's erratum might have been fatal to all his heroism; as it is, he makes a sorry appearance. Metastasio found himself in the same situation. In one of his letters he writes, "The title of my new opera is Il Re Pastor. The chief incident is the restitution ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli
... intelligence, slew the Asura Samvara in days of yore, my spouse Jamvavati addressed me. Indeed, beholding Pradyumna and Charudeshna and other sons born of Rukmini, Jamvavati, desirous of a son, said these words unto me, O Yudhishthira,—Grant me, O thou of unfading glory, a son endued with heroism, the foremost of mighty men, possessed of the most agreeable features, sinless in conduct, and like unto thyself. And O, let there be no delay on thy part in granting this prayer of mine. There is nothing in the three worlds that is unattainable by thee, O perpetuator of ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... falling cause, with a sense of duty which was as admirable as her courage, and at last she died with the devoted heroism which so well became her mother's daughter. But what we now look on as virtues, were vices in the eyes of the republicans, who were her judges. Her constancy was stubbornness, and her courage was insolence. Her innocent mirth was called licentiousness, and the royal splendour ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope
... with the opinion of the missionary, as given on a former page, the testimony of one, who knew them as Adair did, to their heroism under torture. ...
— Summer on the Lakes, in 1843 • S.M. Fuller
... filled with quicksilver. And then he had a very good voice and a fair notion of singing, and right merrily he could troll forth some of those stirring sea-songs which have animated the gallant tars of Old England to perform deeds of the greatest heroism, and have served to beguile and soothe many an hour of their existence on the ocean, far away from home and all ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston
... believe at times that it's the women more than the men who make a country great," she thought as she heard of the women ploughing, planting, reaping. To Mary's mind each stoical figure glowed with the light of heroism, and she nodded her ...
— Mary Minds Her Business • George Weston
... cheeks all pink with blushes like any new bride, her husband with not less pride than passion in his noble countenance, and Dawson and I as blithe and jolly as schoolboys on a holiday. For now had Moll by this act of heroism and devotion redeemed not only herself, but us also, and there was no further reason for concealment or deceit, but all might be themselves and fear ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett
... labourers. You hardly ever address a labouring man upon his prospects in life, without quietly assuming that he is to possess, at starting, as a small moral capital to begin with, the virtue of Socrates, the philosophy of Plato, and the heroism of Epaminondas. "Be assured, my good man,"—you say to him,—"that if you work steadily for ten hours a day all your life long, and if you drink nothing but water, or the very mildest beer, and live on very plain food, and never lose your temper, and go to church every Sunday, and always ...
— The Two Paths • John Ruskin
... prevent either inspiration or heroism that I know of," the General affirmed stoutly, his fine old head up, his eyes gleaming with ...
— The Militants - Stories of Some Parsons, Soldiers, and Other Fighters in the World • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... irons used in this barbarous punishment, the Swiss are fond of saying, went deeper than the tyrant intended, and penetrated to the hearts and aroused the sympathies of their ancestors to perform such acts of heroism that tyranny fled in fear from the land. The conduct of Arnold, however, can hardly at this period of his life warrant the eulogies bestowed upon his memory, though he subsequently figures as one of the "Men ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... and lit a cigarette after passing me the case. "Everybody calls me Buzz the Bumble Bee because of a historic encounter of mine with a whole nest of bumblebees right out here in the General's garden. It is a title of heroism and I'd like to have you use it as if we'd been kids together as we were slated to have been. Gee, I bet you could have beat the bees down some. You looked all soft to me when I first saw you but you are so quick and ...
— The Daredevil • Maria Thompson Daviess
... is much more to approve and admire: and while a feeling or sorrow lingers over the one, the other is so marked and prominent that it secures your sympathy, and you are drawn towards the man with an ineffable affection. There is a candour, and honesty, and generosity, and heroism, which gives to his character a most healthy tone. The qualities of his mind and heart, when sanctified by grace, become really noble; and if it were right, you would like to forget his failings in presence of so much that is both ...
— The Wesleyan Methodist Pulpit in Malvern • Knowles King
... their impending fate. Talavera was fought and won whilst he was in Spain, but he is convinced that the "Scourge of the World" will prevail, and that Britain, "the fond ally," will display her blundering heroism in vain. Being against the government, he is against the war. History has falsified his politics, but his descriptions of places and scenes, of "Morena's dusky height," of Cadiz and the bull-fight, retain their freshness ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... could see that a man's duty might lie from home, but in that home both were alike ready to dare anything and to suffer everything. It was a narrow form of patriotism, yet it had nobleness, endurance, and patience in it; in song it has been oftentimes deified as heroism, but in modern warfare it is punished ...
— Stories By English Authors: France • Various
... Hyppolito; but we think the chronicles exaggerate the virtues of Dianora's character; for how many a girl unchronicled by fame has, before the still tribunal of her own sense of duty to God and her parents, sacrificed her dearest hopes rather than offend them; and this, with all her heroism, Dianora did not, but gave up all these dear early claims ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 433 - Volume 17, New Series, April 17, 1852 • Various
... fastidiousness makes all parts of the work easy to him; for when you have to teach boys how to wash themselves, and to wear clothes for the first time, the romance of missionary work disappears as completely as a great man's heroism before his valet ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge
... fearless letter to Louis XIV., which was not discovered until 1825, and which the most earnest of his eulogists, not even Channing, we believe, seems to have noted. Than these intrepid words, Christian heroism cannot ...
— Gifts of Genius - A Miscellany of Prose and Poetry by American Authors • Various
... chronologically with King John and ends with Richard III. (Henry VIII. stands apart), we find that Shakespeare makes the central features of the national history the persons of the kings. Only in the case of Henry V. does he clothe an English king with any genuine heroism. Shakespeare's kings are as a rule but men as we are. The violet smells to them as it does to us; all their senses have but human conditions; and though their affections be higher mounted than ours, yet when they stoop they stoop with like wing. Excepting Henry V., ...
— Shakespeare and the Modern Stage - with Other Essays • Sir Sidney Lee
... different from the physiological and phrenological ideas heretofore current, but they are sustained by universal experience, which recognizes the power of heroism, hope, religion, and love to exalt our powers of endurance and achievement, whether intellectual or physical; and they are sustained by the records of pathology, which show that softening or ulceration of the superior regions of the brain impairs, paralyzes, ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, March 1887 - Volume 1, Number 2 • Various
... it sounds; but we shall find that the romance of the Navy did not go out with the last of the sailing frigates, and that the age of steam and electricity, of enormous ironclads and rapid cruisers, affords as great a scope for individual daring, resource, and heroism as the days of sailing frigates and boarding parties; and that though in recent years our sailors have not had many chances of using their weapons on the sea, the Naval Brigade has taken its part ...
— Our Sailors - Gallant Deeds of the British Navy during Victoria's Reign • W.H.G. Kingston
... George came home to his mother with a black eye, and bragged prodigiously to his parent and his delighted old grandfather about his valour in the fight, in which, if the truth was known he did not behave with particular heroism, and in which he decidedly had the worst. But Amelia has never forgiven that Smith to this day, though he is now a peaceful ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... no fancy for making myself a martyr when it is honorably and conscientiously possible to avoid it; and I always measure out my heroism very accurately according to the exigencies of the occasion, and should be the last man in the world to throw away a bit of it needlessly. So I have looked over the concluding paragraph and have amended it in such a way that, while doing what I know to ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields
... it over" in the pre-war days will not have so easy a time. "Guff" will not be well received. The leaders on the battle-field have been men who could look death in the face without flinching, so the political leaders at home must be men of heroism, who will travel the path of righteousness even though they see it leads by ...
— Three Times and Out • Nellie L. McClung
... cried the lady; "I remember perfectly well the great heroism with which your Amelia ...
— Amelia (Complete) • Henry Fielding
... least of her anxieties was the condition of her brother-in-law, Esther's father. He was now a confirmed invalid, grateful for society and amusement, and almost every day he expected his sister-in-law to take him to drive, if the weather was tolerable. The tax was severe, but she bore it with heroism, and his gratitude sustained her. When she came for him the next morning, she found him reading as usual, and waiting for her. "I was just wondering," said he, "whether I could read five minutes longer without a stimulant. Do you know that indiscriminate reading is a fiendish torture. No convict ...
— Esther • Henry Adams
... happiness or the ruin of millions of men! Naseby and Worcester are important places truly, venerable for great deeds. Cromwell and Blake are names not likely to perish while men can appreciate the heroism which sheds blood. But Westminster Hall has rung with more important thunder than cannon ever spoke, and Pym and Selden, St. John and Hampden—nay, Penn, Bunyan, Fox, Lilburne—have done great service for mankind. Gentlemen of the Jury, it is a matter of ...
— The Trial of Theodore Parker • Theodore Parker
... first sight rather dull. It suggests little of that poignant and unearthly beauty, that heroism, that immense attraction, which really belong to the spiritual life. Here indeed we are dealing with poetry in action: and we need not words but music to describe it as it really is. Yet all the forms, all the various beauties and achievements of this ...
— The Life of the Spirit and the Life of To-day • Evelyn Underhill
... degrading appetite in his neighbours! Nothing could have made him put up with him but the love of Mercy, his dove in a crow's nest! But it would be all in vain, for he could not lie! Truth, indeed, if not less of a virtue, was less of a heroism in the chief than in most men, for he COULD NOT lie. Had he been tempted to try, he would have reddened, stammered, broken down, with the full shame, and none of the success of ...
— What's Mine's Mine • George MacDonald
... that excited boundless admiration and pride throughout all Dorfield. Joe had driven a milk wagon before he left home and went to Canada to join the first contingent sent abroad, but no one remembered his former humble occupation. A hero has no past beyond his heroism. The young man's empty sleeve and his decoration admitted him to intercourse with the "best society" of Dorfield, which promptly ...
— Mary Louise and the Liberty Girls • Edith Van Dyne (AKA L. Frank Baum)
... a fair raid, God be thanked, and are come again to Saint-Jean, whence we propose to return to Bordeaux." This exploit ended Lancaster's Gascon career. In January, 1347, he was back in England, having restored the reputation of his king in Gascony, and set an example of heroism soon to be emulated by his cousin, ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout
... on man, in those who conceived the desire and executed the determination to be free. The heroic was most prominent: woman seemed to forget her feebleness and timidity, and boldly to dare, and with increased fortitude to bear every danger, every misfortune, with a heroism scarcely compatible with the delicacy of her nature. To this, or some other inexplicable cause, nature seemed to resort in preparation for coming events. In every State there came up men, born during the war or immediately thereafter, of giant minds—men seemingly destined ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... to circumstances. A resolve to continue worthy of her history and of her family lent her heroism and dignity. She called Mrs. Wake, and explained to that worthy woman as much of what had occurred as she deemed necessary. Mrs. Wake was too amazed to reply; she retreated slowly, her lips parted; till at the door she said with a dry mouth, 'And ...
— A Changed Man and Other Tales • Thomas Hardy
... fortunes of Miss Jessie's tenants, the chief objects of her ministrations. In the end an air-raid, of which the details are surely unusual, provides Miss Jessie with the opportunity for a deed of heroism that I am still trying to visualize (her nephew had thrown her down and was protecting her body with his own; but the heroine, seeing this, changed places with her defender "between the flash of the shell's impact and the explosion") and finishes, with an ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, May 21, 1919. • Various
... "Isn't heroism beautiful—and self-sacrifice?" he said. "And this war's full of it. Sometimes, when I read the newspapers, I think God Himself must be surprised at the splendid things the men He made ...
— The Hermit of Far End • Margaret Pedler
... splendour of resolve," the feast, wine, song, and garlands, and girds himself to fight with Death for her rescue And Balaustion, looking after him as he goes, cries out the judgment of her soul on all heroism. It is Browning's judgment also, one of the deepest things in his heart; a constant motive in his poetry, ...
— The Poetry Of Robert Browning • Stopford A. Brooke
... of Manassas, proud of the heroism of our troops in battle, and of the conduct of the officers who led them. Anxious to recognize the claim of the army on the gratitude of the country, it was my pleasing duty to bear testimony to their merit in every available form. Those ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis
... hence the mere act of fighting is termed honourable, although it is obvious that, abstractedly, it should excite only feelings of shame. Even the late Afghan war is looked upon as a calamity, relieved throughout by flashes of heroism and gleams of success—a war which, rightly viewed, is either one of the greatest crimes, or one of the most ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 425 - Volume 17, New Series, February 21, 1852 • Various
... reporters and letter-writers for the press, and other sensationists, make me enraged with their sneers at the poverty of the rebels. If so, the more heroism. They forget the "beggars" of the Dutch insurrection ...
— Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862 • Adam Gurowski
... accustomed to move among subject and trembling populations, could ill brook their change of circumstance. There was one man of the name of Goguelat, a brute of the first water, who had enjoyed no touch of civilisation beyond the military discipline, and had risen by an extreme heroism of bravery to a grade for which he was otherwise unfitted—that of marechal des logis in the 22nd of the line. In so far as a brute can be a good soldier, he was a good soldier; the Cross was on his breast, and gallantly earned; but in all things outside his line of duty the ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the heart. "All in the day's duty!" The sheer heroism of it, the dauntless facing of Nature's grimmest terrors, the steady patience, the uncalculated sacrifice, the thought of all that lay behind these simple words held him silent for many minutes as he kept ...
— Corporal Cameron • Ralph Connor
... chief export, was one of the principal sources of revenue to the American government, in the Union. The defence of this town was entrusted to General Jackson, afterwards President of the United States, and whose elevation to the chief magistracy is as much to be attributed to the skill and heroism displayed by him in the defence of the chief cotton mart as to any other cause. Jackson was a shrewd, obstinate, and energetic man. On ascertaining that the British had landed, he threw every possible ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger
... and yellow melancholy," would never surely occur to us, when thinking on the enamoured and impassioned Juliet, in whose bosom love keeps a fiery vigil, kindling tenderness into enthusiasm, enthusiasm into passion, passion into heroism! No, the whole sentiment of the play is of a far different cast. It is flushed with the genial spirit of the south; it tastes of youth, and of the essence of youth; of life, and of the very sap of life. We have indeed the struggle of love against evil destinies and a thorny world; the pain, the grief, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 563, August 25, 1832 • Various |
