"Honorific" Quotes from Famous Books
... especially the "literati," have reason to look down upon the barbarians of the West. Politeness has been likened generally to an air-cushion. There is nothing in it, but it eases the jolts wonderfully. As a mere ritual of technicalities it has perhaps reached its highest point in China. The multitude of honorific titles, so bewildering and even maddening to the Occidental, are here used simply to keep in view the fixed relations of graduated superiority. When wishing to be exceptionally courteous to "the foreigners," the more experienced mandarins would lay their ... — Across Asia on a Bicycle • Thomas Gaskell Allen and William Lewis Sachtleben
... bankers, moneylenders and dealers in grain, ghi (butter), groceries and spices. The name Bania is derived from the Sanskrit vanij, a merchant. In western India the Banias are always called Vania or Vani. Mahajan literally means a great man, and being applied to successful Banias as an honorific title has now come to signify a banker or moneylender; Seth signifies a great merchant or capitalist, and is applied to Banias as an honorific prefix. The words Sahu, Sao and Sahukar mean upright or honest, and ... — The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume II • R. V. Russell
... (which is the Hungarian for "brave") in front of the name. Thus if Koranji Sandor is decorated he is to call himself henceforward Vitez Koranji Sandor, and that is the correct address on an envelope. Not only is the honorific awarded to him, but is to be used by all his sons and by their sons. We might imagine that a man would shrink from permanently calling himself Brave John Smith, especially if he has been very brave, but the average Magyar will not feel ... — The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 2 • Henry Baerlein
... He regarded Plato as his master above all others. We find Platonicus attached to him as an honorific title in ... — The Apologia and Florida of Apuleius of Madaura • Lucius Apuleius
... should be owned absolutely,—by allodial possession, as the phrase is. The feudal services, in fact, were often more onerous to those who paid them than they were beneficial to those who received them. It was time that they should be abolished. Those which were purely honorific, although valued by the nobility, who possessed them, outraged the sense of equality in the nation. They were felt to be badges and marks of the inferiority of the tenant to the landlord, of the poor to the rich. There is but one king, and we cannot all ... — The Eve of the French Revolution • Edward J. Lowell |