"Obtrude" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... point it is necessary to explain that the ceremonial etiquette of these barbarian outcasts is both conflicting and involved. Upon most of the ordinary occasions of life to obtrude oneself within the conversation of another is a thing not to be done, yet repeatedly when this unpretentious person has been relating his experience or inquiring into the nature and meaning of certain ...
— The Mirror of Kong Ho • Ernest Bramah
... would be permitted to appear there in the character he had the honour to hold at Court, I replied that I had made it a rule never to interfere in the private or public amusements of the Court, and that His Eminence must be the best judge how far he, could obtrude himself upon the Queen's private parties, to which only a select number had been invited, in consequence of the confined spot where the fete ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 5 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe
... which early obtrude themselves in the consideration of Breton fairy-lore are: Are all the fays of Brittany malevolent? And, if so, whence proceeds this belief that fairy-folk are necessarily malign? Example treads upon example to prove that the Breton fairy is seldom beneficent, that he or she ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... is fitting and proper to be done in social intercourse, from ease and self-possession, from a kind heart and desire to make others happy; a politeness that is made up of a thousand little acts of self-denial for the comfort of others; that does not obtrude itself upon your notice, but is felt in making you easy; that flows, not from rules, but from good principles and a generous nature, in this sense Mr. Charless was eminently a polished and polite man. I have seen ...
— A Biographical Sketch of the Life and Character of Joseph Charless - In a Series of Letters to his Grandchildren • Charlotte Taylor Blow Charless
... satisfied needn't act," endorsed Rachel, with such a very decided glance at the door that the two delegates could no longer obtrude their presence, and were obliged to ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil
... have guarded over him; to have forced my services on his acceptance; I blame myself now when it is too late. But he sent me his letter by the Intendant of his household, whom I knew. I was fearful to obtrude myself. I learnt he was fanatically Christian, and thought perhaps he ...
— Tancred - Or, The New Crusade • Benjamin Disraeli
... will say for her'—Mrs. Freddy's brother-in-law lazily defended the honour of the house—'she doesn't, as a rule, obtrude her opinions. There are people who have known her for years, and haven't a notion she's ...
— The Convert • Elizabeth Robins
... She will not go uninvited into the private room of anyone, nor into the kitchen of her hostess where she is a visitor. All such things really inflict pain upon sensitive people; they offend because they obtrude; and all similar actions and obtrusiveness are to be carefully avoided by everyone who desires to acquire a true and genuine culture of action, speech, and manners. It is well worth your while to think earnestly and often upon these things; ...
— Letters to a Daughter and A Little Sermon to School Girls • Helen Ekin Starrett
... conspicuous accomplishment, is skill in ancient or in foreign tongues. He that has long cultivated another language, will find its words and combinations croud upon his memory; and haste and negligence, refinement and affectation, will obtrude ...
— Preface to a Dictionary of the English Language • Samuel Johnson
... be emerging from all danger? There must be some method in his madness. Can it be that he contemplates suicide? I remember that upon one occasion he spoke in a deeply reverent manner of the heinousness of the crime of self-destruction. I shall keep my eye upon him, however, and though I cannot obtrude upon the privacy of his cabin, I shall at least make a point of remaining on deck as long as he ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... of ancient kinship to the Greeks, but not recognized as belonging among them, began to obtrude herself in their affairs, and at length won that leadership for which they had all contended. A hundred and fifty years had elapsed since the Greeks had stood united against Persia. During all that time their strength had been turned against themselves. Now at last the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 2 • Various
... calm and mutual enjoyment, which seems not to have been the birth of that very moment, but prolonged from a past eternity. Thus content with an inner sphere which they inhabit together, it is not immediately that the outward world can obtrude itself ...
— The New Adam and Eve (From "Mosses From An Old Manse") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... or esteemed, at different periods of his age, will have no reason to imagine such changes of sentiment peculiar to any station or character. Every man, however careless and inattentive, has conviction forced upon him; the lectures of time obtrude themselves upon the most unwilling or dissipated auditor; and, by comparing our past with our present thoughts, we perceive that we have changed our minds, though perhaps we cannot discover when the alteration happened, or by ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson - Volume IV [The Rambler and The Adventurer] • Samuel Johnson
... the open air ourselves, finding the prices for food and drink to be both moderate and modest, and able to see nothing on the surface which suggested that the life of these people had been seriously disturbed. Two significant facts, however, did obtrude themselves on us: Every minute or two, as we dined, a young girl or an old gentleman would come to us, rattling a tin receptacle with a slot in the top through which coins for the aid of the widows and orphans of dead soldiers might ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb
... passions, it is not easy to discriminate the criminal from the accuser. But," she added, seeing his brow darken, "you have led me into a subject which can only betray my ignorance; you well know that I am wholly incompetent to judge of your public affairs; and I have never ventured to obtrude upon your ...
— The Rivals of Acadia - An Old Story of the New World • Harriet Vaughan Cheney
... man like Bluewater could really contemplate carrying off with him the ships he commanded; yet he knew the authority his friend wielded over his captains, and the possibility of such a step would painfully obtrude itself on his mind, at moments. "When a man can persuade himself into all the nonsense connected with the jus divinum," thought Sir Gervaise, "it is doing no great violence to common sense to persuade himself into all its usually admitted consequences." Then, again, would interpose his recollections ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... will be commonplace, but—you congratulate yourself on this—they will certainly be short, and he will neither be surprised nor hurt if nobody listens to them. There will be nothing mawkish about his religion and he will not obtrude it over much, but when he starts the men singing "Fight the good fight," that hymn will go with a swing. In the officers' mess, when the shyness of the first few days has worn off, he will be recognised as "a good sort." The ...
— A Padre in France • George A. Birmingham
... supporters I ever had around me were my wife and family besides a few others in the service of the State. When I announced my war aims on the Pacific for the benefit of my people my leading Minister had the audacity to obtrude upon my privacy at Tsarskoye Selo and demand that I withdraw the manifesto. This piece of impudence cost me the decision in that war. That magniloquent Minister, with his versatile Irish amanuensis, not only turned my mother against me, but he had ...
— Rescuing the Czar - Two authentic Diaries arranged and translated • James P. Smythe
... persecution, that such of them as did not think fit to engage in the rash schemes of Monmouth or Argyle, held it to be their interest to interfere as little as possible in public affairs, and by no means to obtrude upon unwilling hearers opinions and sentiments which, ever since the dissolution of the Oxford parliament, in 1681, had been generally discountenanced, and of which the peaceable, or rather triumphant, accession ...
— A History of the Early Part of the Reign of James the Second • Charles James Fox
... history of what is," and forbids all inquiry into reasons why it is. The question whether there be any intelligent purpose in the order and arrangement of the universe, is not a subject of scientific inquiry at all; and whenever it has been permitted to obtrude itself, it has thrown a false light over the facts, and led ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker
... thus for more than four years, sharing the awfulness of his burden only with Almighty God, must needs have passed to a spiritual plane whereon such self-considerations as still sway the rest of us have ceased to obtrude themselves. ...
— Foch the Man - A Life of the Supreme Commander of the Allied Armies • Clara E. Laughlin
... the consul had the courage to obtrude any serious subject upon her. The disagreeable task was at length assumed by Ishmael, who never permitted himself to shrink from a duty merely because it was ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... mind, Flowing thro' thy free pen, shows thee endu'd With taste so just for all of wise, and good, As bids me hope thy spirit does not find, Young as thou art, with solitude combin'd That wish of change, that irksome lassitude, Which often, thro' unvaried days, obtrude On Youth's rash bosom, dangerously inclin'd To pant for more than peace.—Rich volumes yield Their soul-endowing wealth.—Beyond e'en these Shall consciousness of filial duty gild The gloomy hours, when Winter's turbid Seas Roar ...
— Original sonnets on various subjects; and odes paraphrased from Horace • Anna Seward
... of ideas turned. Perceiving they paid no attention to me, the recollection of the full security my disguise afforded recurred strongly to my thoughts; and I began inwardly to exult, though I did not venture to obtrude myself to examination. By degrees I began to be amused at the absurdity of their tales, and the variety of the falsehoods I heard asserted around me. My soul seemed to expand; I felt a pride in the self-possession and lightness of heart with which I could listen to the scene; and I determined ...
— Caleb Williams - Things As They Are • William Godwin
... with their parents, depended upon their own capricious will: if they chose to 'take' me, I went; if, for reasons best known to themselves, they chose to go alone, I took my seat in the carriage. I liked walking better, but a sense of reluctance to obtrude my presence on anyone who did not desire it, always kept me passive on these and similar occasions; and I never inquired into the causes of their varying whims. Indeed, this was the best policy—for to submit and oblige was the governess's part, to consult their own pleasure was that ...
— Agnes Grey • Anne Bronte
... peace and quietness somewhere, anywhere, away from the two who represented Randolph Schuyler's tyranny and carping criticism without his right to obtrude ...
— Vicky Van • Carolyn Wells
... further reflection, it seemed more decorous that, as a member of the 'conference,' I should first appear before the Senate committee now in possession of all the papers, and there render any proper explanations, and not obtrude myself as a combatant in the newspapers, prematurely and only partially defending my official action. If, however, you should think that the articles should be answered without delay, I could readily cause it to ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... spring campaign opens, I wish to express, in this way, my entire satisfaction with what you have done up to this time, so far as I understand it. The particulars of your plans I neither know, or seek to know. You are vigilant and self reliant; and, pleased with this, I wish not to obtrude any constraints or restraints upon you. While I am very anxious that any great disaster, or the capture of our men in great numbers, shall be avoided, I know these points are less likely to escape your attention ...
— Lincoln Letters • Abraham Lincoln
... It is a fact that Christ never demanded, yet never declined the worship of men during His earthly sojourn. The Apostles shrunk from it, Angels rebuked it when offered to them, Christ never did. It was sometimes given, it was never declined. He did not obtrude Himself upon the attention of the multitude as the Saviour of the world; but ate, and drank, and slept, and walked, and lived amongst them, and was in every respect a man with men. He sometimes escaped from the society of the rich, that He might mitigate the sorrows, and ...
— The Wesleyan Methodist Pulpit in Malvern • Knowles King
... already commented on the Toelatings Kaart. This relic of a past age, which did not add much to the revenue, and impressed one unfavourably with a rigid officialism at the port of entry that did not obtrude itself upon one's notice in the interior, may now be avoided by the traveller registering at the Tourist Bureau. In our own case, we were never called upon to produce ...
— Across the Equator - A Holiday Trip in Java • Thomas H. Reid
... on his part, Lacy Bassett did not personally obtrude himself upon my remembrance until a month later. One dazzling afternoon, when the dust and heat had driven the pride of Gilead's manhood into the surreptitious shadows of the temperance hotel's back room, and had even cleared the express office of its loungers, and left me alone with ...
— The Heritage of Dedlow Marsh and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... technique is simply that these may be expressed in the best and most intelligible manner. Indeed the artist himself is secondary in importance to the message, it is the spirit that works in and through him that must ever come first. The true artist never seeks to obtrude, or to make his own personality the first thing. He will, of course, endeavour to make his technique fully equal to all demands that can be made of him, but he will realise that he is doing his work in trust. "No MAN ever did any great work yet: he became a free channel through ...
— Spirit and Music • H. Ernest Hunt
... not permit me to evade an opinion, called upon by no ruling power, without authority as I am, and without confidence, I should ill answer my own ideas of what would become myself, or what would be serviceable to others, if I were, as a volunteer, to obtrude any project of mine upon a nation to whose circumstances I could not be sure it ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IV. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... Surely he knew them, too, he had studied them this very morning with painful attention, but why need she obtrude them upon him? This was unkind, almost malicious. He released her hand, which he had held in his own since his entrance, and silently went to an arm-chair. She followed, took a seat on a stool at his feet, ...
— How Women Love - (Soul Analysis) • Max Simon Nordau
... Pierre, assert Herself and her son on the Virgin's window, perhaps she thought the Virgin would resent Pierre's boldness the more by contrast with her own good taste. So far as is known, nowhere does Blanche appear in person at Chartres; she felt herself too near the Virgin to obtrude a useless image, or she was too deeply religious to ask anything for herself. A queen who was to have two children sainted, to intercede for her at Mary's throne, stood in a solitude almost as unique as that of Mary, and might ignore the raw brutalities of a man-at-arms; but ...
— Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres • Henry Adams
... a thing worth remarking, that, although Shelley's diction is at other times singularly rich, it ceases in these poems to be rich, or to obtrude itself at all; it is imperceptible; his Muse has become a veritable Echo, whose body has dissolved from about her voice. Indeed, when his diction is richest, nevertheless the poetry so dominates the expression that we feel the latter only as an ...
— Shelley - An Essay • Francis Thompson
... explanation which suggests itself to my mind is that I lead so circumscribed and guarded a life that these matters do not obtrude themselves on me. I am not brought into contact with the maimed, the halt and the blind; if I were I should probably behave toward them like a gentleman. The people I am thrown with are all sleek and well fed; but even among those ...
— The "Goldfish" • Arthur Train
... book of adventure is interesting reading, especially when it is all true, as is the case with "Boots and Saddles." ... Mrs. Custer does not obtrude the fact that sunshine and solace went with her to tent and fort, but it inheres in her narrative none the less, and as a consequence "these simple annals of our daily life," as she calls them, are never dull ...
— A Manifest Destiny • Julia Magruder
... Harden; he challenged Dick to a race across the frozen ground. But beneath his lightness lingered a grave depression which betokened to those who knew him best that something was wrong. Yet he was evidently determined the cloud should not obtrude itself and spoil the happiness of the day. Probably some business annoyance that could not be remedied had arisen; or possibly Havens had given notice. Such contingencies were of course to be deplored but as they could not be helped, why let ...
— Steve and the Steam Engine • Sara Ware Bassett
... of the corpses that are brought hither for interment, or to hearken if the brothers there within, whose number is now almost reduced to nought, chant their offices at the canonical hours, or, by our weeds of woe, to obtrude on the attention of every one that enters, the nature and ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio
... useful man hitherto I had always been refused any sort of office, because of the extreme views which I professed—on platforms in the constituencies—or so those in authority alleged. Now, however, these views were put down to amiable eccentricity; moreover, I was careful not to obtrude them. Responsibility sobers, and as we age and succeed we become more moderate, for most of us have a ...
— Doctor Therne • H. Rider Haggard
... there is any conscious simulation of feeling in this Nampont scene; it is that the feeling itself is overstrained—that Sterne, hugging, as usual, his own sensibilities, mistook their value in expression for the purposes of art. The Sentimental Traveller does not obtrude himself to the same extent as in the scene at Moulines; but a little consideration of the scene will show how much Sterne relied on the mere presentment of the fact that here was an unfortunate peasant who had lost his dumb companion, and here ...
— Sterne • H.D. Traill
... consistency and public principle. If the writers to whom we are alluding will not condescend to this unstudied and familiar mode of communing with the public, let them at least have the art to conceal their art, and not obtrude the conviction that they are more anxious to display themselves than inform their readers; and let them, above all things, consent to be intelligible to the plainest capacity; for though speech, according to the averment of a wily Frenchman, was given to us to conceal our thoughts, ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... remained there with his family. The pastoral scenery seldom, except in the ninth Eclogue, pretends to be Mantuan. Even where, as in the first, the poem is intended to convey a personal expression of gratitude for Vergil's exemption from harsh evictions, the poet is very careful not to obtrude a picture of himself or his own circumstances. Tityrus is an old man, and a slave in a typical shepherd's country, such as could be seen every day in the mountains near Naples. And there were as many evictions near Naples as in the North. Indeed it is the Neapolitan country—as picturesque ...
— Vergil - A Biography • Tenney Frank
... them and did not obtrude his presence, but often in the twilight when she started away, he would slip out of some corner and ...
— The Strength of Gideon and Other Stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... shall not proceed from me. You need only apply to Colonel Morden who shall command me in every thing that the will allows me to oblige your family in. I do assure you, that I am as unwilling to obtrude myself upon it, as any of ...
— Clarissa Harlowe, Volume 9 (of 9) - The History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... Unwilling to obtrude himself on the princess, Rostov did not go back to the house but remained in the village awaiting her departure. When her carriage drove out of the house, he mounted and accompanied her eight miles from Bogucharovo to where ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... asked Mr. Balfour if she could have the liberty to obtrude a matter of business upon him. She did not like to interfere with his home enjoyments, but he would oblige her much by giving her half an hour of private conversation. Mr. Balfour looked at his wife, received a significant glance, and invited ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland
... fortunate man, with one thousand dollars in his pocket! Why should he remember he was handicapped by a pretty woman and a pathetic episode? It did not make the proximity less pleasant as he helped her into the coach that evening, nor did the recollection of another ride with another woman obtrude itself upon those consolations which he felt it his duty, from time to time, to offer. It was arranged that he should leave her at the "Red Chief" Hotel, while he continued on to Blazing Star, returning at noon ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte
... relations in the picture. This is where the working for detail is most likely to lead you astray. It takes great ability and power to keep detail where it belongs. Detail is always the search for small things, and they are almost sure to obtrude themselves to the neglecting of the more important things. Details which do not stay in their places had better be left out of the picture. There is such a thing as values in facts as well as other parts of your work. And this applies to breadth ...
— The Painter in Oil - A complete treatise on the principles and technique - necessary to the painting of pictures in oil colors • Daniel Burleigh Parkhurst
... emptied from an upper window. Pipes, with branches to the windows, come down the sides of the houses. They are of generous size, as in cities of northern countries where much snow lies on the roofs. Since wall-angles are many, the pipes generally find a place in corners. They do not obtrude. They do not suggest zinc or tin. They were painted a mud-gray color a long ...
— Riviera Towns • Herbert Adams Gibbons
... ten-stringed instrument, surmounting square shoulders that end in knobs that obtrude above unfilled hollows, is an unpleasing vision that looms up conspicuously too ...
— What Dress Makes of Us • Dorothy Quigley
... at least serve, we should suppose, as a working hypothesis, upon the basis of which we may consider in detail a variety of questions of the day. New problems have arisen before the eyes of the teacher, and indeed obtrude themselves upon all who must take part in the practical life of others. Some of these problems are due to changed external relations of countries to one another. Some are problems of internal adjustment and reconstruction. At least they may so be classified for purposes of discussion. ...
— The Psychology of Nations - A Contribution to the Philosophy of History • G.E. Partridge
... to do. At times, and often too, wondering speculations on the cause of this change in Edith, would obtrude themselves upon her mind and frighten her; but in the calm of its abandonment once more to silent grief and loneliness, it was not a curious mind. Florence had only to remember that her star of promise was ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... deference to her desire in this respect. Should she recognize him, he should raise his hat a little from his head, with the hand furthest from her, and return her salutation with a slight inclination of the body. He may not obtrude himself upon her notice even if he thinks she has ...
— Frost's Laws and By-Laws of American Society • Sarah Annie Frost
... pipes,—they bothered themselves about his meal hours,—they even inspected his wash when it hung on the line! Some of them, that is. The rest were totally different; they let every one alone. They did not intrude nor obtrude—they went their way, and permitted every one to ...
— In Her Own Right • John Reed Scott
... such a distance from the scene of the fight, and were in such an out-of-the-way place, that the thought of being overtaken did not obtrude itself for an instant, either upon their minds ...
— The Red Acorn • John McElroy
... took the matter very seriously. The Commission was in the habit of carrying on its functions perfunctorily and unobtrusively. But nothing could be perfunctory where Roosevelt was. He would never permit things to be done—or left undone unobtrusively, when what was needed was to obtrude the matter forcibly on the public mind. He was a profound believer ...
— Theodore Roosevelt and His Times - A Chronicle of the Progressive Movement; Volume 47 in The - Chronicles Of America Series • Harold Howland
... attempt to obtrude his presence upon her during those three days. The man's patience was immense, cloaking him as with a garment of passive strength. He was merely a guest in Colonel Everard's house, and a silent guest ...
— The Odds - And Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... began to obtrude. But liberty or death; peace and independence; or glory and a grave. The enemy's van was soon driven to their line, and our troops displayed. Our militia, which composed the front line, seconded the ...
— A sketch of the life and services of Otho Holland Williams • Osmond Tiffany
... sexual relations of men and women determine in a great degree their happiness or misery in life. This subject, then, deserves due attention and careful consideration. It is of no use to scout it; for it will inevitably obtrude itself upon us, no matter now sedulously we attempt to avoid it. It can be rightly considered only with the most perfect candor, with the mind unbiased by passion, and prayerfully anxious to know and do ...
— Plain Facts for Old and Young • John Harvey Kellogg
... the only entire letter of my own that, in the course of this work, I mean to obtrude upon my readers. Being short, and in terms more explanatory of the feeling on which I acted than any others that could be substituted, it might be suffered, I thought, to form the single exception to my general rule. In all other ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. II - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... influence and fame abide. They are supremely interesting because, through absorption in their work, they are largely free from self-consciousness, and because they bring with them the air and stir of growth and movement. They rarely obtrude their interests or pursuits upon others, but they give the impression of a definiteness of aim which cannot be obscured or blurred, and a concentration of energy which steadily reacts in increase of power. They are not only the heroic workers of the world, but ...
— Essays On Work And Culture • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... of Stuart Farquaharson always obtrude themselves on every revery?... Was there no key she could turn against him, whom it was her duty ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... slip back after they had started for the station, on the last day, and hang the picture in the little sunny dining-room. She did not want the girls to know there was a picture. But still—a new thought had begun to obtrude itself unwelcomely. Was painting Amelia's portrait a breach, too, of the Compact? She had undertaken it as a little "offering" to Mrs. Camp, to show her own individual gratitude for her own share of the dear little green cottage all these beautiful ...
— Four Girls and a Compact • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... be rigidly and literally obeyed, for Cuthbert Laurance is far too proud to obtrude his presence or his homage on any woman; but Mrs. Orme's interdict does not include that public realm, where she has repeatedly assured me that gold always secures admission to her smiles, and from ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... appreciation, in which all poetry should be read. But it is not necessary to turn to the footnotes, and to mark what may be called the literary growth of a poem, while it is being read for its own sake: and these notes are printed in smaller type, so as not to obtrude themselves on ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth - Volume 1 of 8 • Edited by William Knight
... deliberation; so that the object of the whole work is to correct popular errors, and to distinguish the semblance of virtue and vice from the reality. Its subordinate design is to expose the monstrous fictions, which some authors obtrude upon us in ...
— Niels Klim's journey under the ground • Baron Ludvig Holberg
... same time—for I will tell you the truth, and it will give you a notion of the extent of my wretchedness—I could not make up my mind to see him, devotedly attached to me as he is, and a man of most tender feelings, or to obtrude upon him my miseries and ruin in all their wretchedness, or to endure their being seen by him. And I was besides afraid of what certainly would have happened—that he would not have had the resolution to leave me. I had ever before ...
— The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1 - The Whole Extant Correspodence in Chronological Order • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... where Mrs. Norton and he spent the baking hours of the afternoon absorbed in making music or singing duets. For Violet had a well-trained voice which harmonised well with his. No thought of sex seemed to obtrude itself on them. They were just playmates, comrades, ...
— The Jungle Girl • Gordon Casserly
... system is so apt to be deranged by going from home, that I am by no means sure that I should not be so much of a dependent invalid, I mean a person obliged to manage himself, as to make it absolutely improper for me to obtrude myself where neither my exertions of mind or body, could enable me to be tolerable company. I say nothing of my family, because a short absence would be abundantly recompensed by the pleasure of a 'sweet return.' At all events, I must express my sincere thanks ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... you don't want to be admired for your feet and hands, what points of your beauty may we venture to obtrude our ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December 1878 • Various
... well preserved; she was still a young woman, and she looked even younger than her age. There was a shade of melancholy in her expression, and an undertone of suffering in her voice—enough, in each case, to indicate that she had known trouble, but not enough to obtrude that trouble on the notice of others. She brought with her a fine, fair-haired boy of eight years old, whom she presented as her son, and who was sent out of the way, at the beginning of the interview, to amuse himself in the rectory garden. Her card had preceded her entrance into the ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... Unc., and follow the detours of the unconscious excitations. But what is the relation of the foreconscious day remnants to the dream? There is no doubt that they penetrate abundantly into the dream, that they utilize the dream content to obtrude themselves upon consciousness even during the night; indeed, they occasionally even dominate the dream content, and impel it to continue the work of the day; it is also certain that the day remnants may just as well have any other character as that of wishes; but it is highly ...
— Dream Psychology - Psychoanalysis for Beginners • Sigmund Freud
... knew what honesty was, and liked it—that is, when it did not obtrude its clumsy scruples in the way of her will and interest. She had a respect for "Angleterre;" and as to "les Anglaises," she would have the women of no other country about her own children, if she could ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... house gowns in the same key as the hangings and upholstery of your room. White is safe in any room, black is at times too strong. It depends in part upon the size of your room. If it is small and in soft tones, delicate harmonising shades will not obtrude themselves as black can and so reduce the effect of space. This is the case not only with black, but with emerald green, decided shades of red, royal blue, and purple or deep yellows. If artistic creations, these colours are all decorative in ...
— Woman as Decoration • Emily Burbank
... light and commonplace. You do not know what miracles love works! But now, what is there left for me? What matters it how frivolous and poor the occupations which can distract my thoughts, and bring me forgetfulness? Forgive me; I have no right to obtrude all this egotism ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book X • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... the sigh of the bystanders whose commerce was impeded, whose international relations. were complicated, and whose own security was endangered in the course of the bloody conflict. It was however not very much the fashion of that day for governments to obtrude advice upon each other; or to read to each other moral lectures. It was assumed that when the expense and sacrifice of war had been incurred, it was for cause, and the discovery had not yet been made that those not immediately interested in the fray were better acquainted with its merits ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... He had no right to linger and watch her: poorly-dressed, melancholy women are common sights; it was only the delicate beauty, picturesque lines and color of the image that was exceptional, and these conditions made it more markedly impossible that he should obtrude his interest upon her. He began to row away and was soon far up the river; but no other thoughts were busy enough quite to expel that pale image of unhappy girlhood. He fell again and again to speculating on ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... president, was silent. They asked him, "Why do you not join us in this discussion?" He replied, "Such ministers of state are like physicians, and a physician will prescribe a medicine only to a sick man; accordingly, so long as I see that your opinions are judicious, it were ill-judged in me to obtrude a word.—While business can proceed without my interference, it does not behoove me to speak on the subject; but were I to see a blind man walking into a pit, I would be much to ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 2, Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous
... press correspondents, or at any rate those representing the big dailies, except the Times, discovered they had a grievance. The news agencies shared that feeling with their colleagues. Even into war the affairs of business life obtrude. It is not an unmixed evil to have a grievance; trouble and ridicule come of having too many at the same time. I drafted a letter to Colonel Wingate on the subject—a sort of "Round Robin" which the majority of the correspondents ...
— Khartoum Campaign, 1898 - or the Re-Conquest of the Soudan • Bennet Burleigh
... would sweep him with an unseeing look. He would stretch five very long fingers toward the facade of the farm-house, muttering, "Of course not the dormers; they obtrude, I think, and the note is pseudo-foreign. We should try to evolve something absolutely American, don't you think? But the pilasters, the door paneling, positively Doric in their clean sobriety! The eastern development, now; there may have been reason for the extreme slant toward the east—it orients ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1919 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... cause such serious disappointment as the Bats. Indeed, it may fairly be questioned whether one half of the visitors are aware that the Gardens contain specimens of these really interesting animals. The fact is, the creatures do not obtrude themselves upon any person's notice, and those who do not know their whereabouts, but want to see them, might spend a day in vainly looking for them, unless they invoked the aid of one of the keepers. Yet the bats are ...
— Little Folks - A Magazine for the Young (Date of issue unknown) • Various
... clear of the woods, but safely remote from the fire, a pack of huge cave-hyenas sat up on their haunches, their long, red tongues hanging out. With jaws powerful enough to crack the thigh-bones of the urus, they nevertheless hesitated to obtrude themselves on the notice either of the crouching saber-tooth or of ...
— In the Morning of Time • Charles G. D. Roberts
... not from any idle wish to obtrude my humble person with undue prominence upon the publick view that I resume my pen upon the present occasion. Juniores ad labores. But having been a main instrument in rescuing the talent of my young parishioner from being buried in the ground, by giving it such warrant ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... without passion, you must concede that I am not doing a rash thing, a thoughtless, wilful thing, with nothing substantial behind it to justify it. I did not create the American claimant to the earldom of Rossmore; I did not hunt for him, did not find him, did not obtrude him upon your notice. He found himself, he injected himself into ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... indeed, not at all unlikely that there is one, for the trick was ingrained in the literature and the society of the time. But if so, it is a sleeping dog that neither bites nor barks; and if you let it alone it will stay in its kennel, and not even obtrude ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... Maso decorously raised his cap, and pursued his straitened walk with the industry of a caged tiger. It was so unusual for one of his condition to obtrude on the discourse of the fair and noble, that the party exchanged looks of surprise; but, the Signor Grirnaldi, more accustomed than most of his friends to the frank deportment and bold speech of mariners, from having dwelt long on the coast of the Mediterranean, felt disposed ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper
... he said, with some irritation, 'that you will not obtrude remarks of that nature, which, however harmless and well-intentioned, are quite out of place, and cannot be expected to be very agreeable to strangers. I am ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... them; he must submit to be hunted by the gods to the end. Before he parts from Festus at the Alsatian inn, a softer mood overtakes him. Blinded by his own passion, Paracelsus has had no sense to divine the sorrow of his friend, and Festus has had no heart to obtrude such a sorrow as this. Only at the last moment, and in all gentleness, it must be told—Michal is dead. In Browning's earliest poem Pauline is no more than a name and a shadow. The creator of Ottima and Colombe, of Balaustion ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden
... a laughing subject: and I am heartily concerned at the loss we all have in poor Belton: and when I get a little settled, and have leisure to contemplate the vanity of all sublunary things (a subject that will now-and-then, in my gayest hours, obtrude itself upon me) it is very likely that I may talk seriously with thee upon these topics; and, if thou hast not got too much the start of me in the repentance thou art entering upon, will go hand-in-hand with thee in it. If thou hast, thou wilt let ...
— Clarissa, Or The History Of A Young Lady, Volume 8 • Samuel Richardson
... would obtrude that Jessie deserved something more than the drear life of the northland. But the girl herself dispelled these thoughts. Like her mother, she had no desire beyond the home she ...
— The Triumph of John Kars - A Story of the Yukon • Ridgwell Cullum
... I did forget that the poor miller's child had no right to obtrude her comeliness in the presence of the banker's daughter. I confess my 'high crime and misdemeanor' against the pet of fortune, and await my condign punishment. Is it your sovereign will that I shear my shining locks like royal Berenice, and offer them in propitiation? ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson
... he knew. He was dealing with a woman who could sacrifice all to the well-being and happiness of those she loved. With Nan self held a particularly subservient place to every other emotion. And when it did manage to obtrude itself it was her way to fight her battle alone, at a time when no prying eyes were there to witness her sufferings. To the daylight she presented a pair of sweet brown smiling eyes, and lips as full, and ripe, and firm as though no shadow of doubt and unhappiness ...
— The Forfeit • Ridgwell Cullum
... spoke he looked at Cleo again, and her eyes and lips gleamed at him strangely. He was aware she wished to say a good deal to him, but that the presence of Ingram hindered. And as the same constrained silence once more fell upon them, the elusive odour of her perfume seemed to obtrude again, as though taking the opportunity ...
— Cleo The Magnificent - The Muse of the Real • Louis Zangwill
... twelve thousand lines," is received with intense gratitude, and caught at like manna by a famished multitude? Eugene Sue is another writer who has taken the world by storm, but in quite a different fashion. The ex-lieutenant of marine does not obtrude his personality upon public notice, and relies more upon the powerful calibre of his guns than upon their number. Two books, lengthy ones certainly, established his reputation. He had been many years a cultivator of literature, and had produced sundry romances of little more than average ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 379, May, 1847 • Various
... not comply. Yet, if he did, inevitably his own act of obedience to the public pleasure took the shape of an ostentatious self-parading under the construction of those numerous persons who knew nothing of the public importunity, or of Sir Sidney's unaffected and even morbid reluctance to obtrude himself upon the public eye. The thing was unavoidable; and the sole palliation that it admitted was—to break the concentration of the public gaze, by associating Sir Sidney with some alien group, no matter of what cattle. Such a group would relieve both parties—gazer and gazee—from ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... longer obtrude upon your Lordship on this occasion than to solicit that whenever the representation of what has taken place here shall be communicated to my Gracious Sovereign, your Lordship will have the goodness to offer my humble assurances ...
— A Source Book Of Australian History • Compiled by Gwendolen H. Swinburne
... "I had no intention to obtrude myself upon you. I merely called at Wilton Street in order to learn what I could, and I came away quite satisfied, even though your butler ...
— Hushed Up - A Mystery of London • William Le Queux
... adulterous woman fell into a voluptuous reverie, in which she pictured to herself the delights which she anticipated from her approaching interview with her sable lover. The possibility of her husband's remaining at home that evening, thereby preventing that interview, did not once obtrude itself upon her mind—so regularly had he absented himself from home every night during the preceding two or three weeks; and as he had never returned before midnight, she apprehended no difficulty in getting her paramour out of the ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn
... Wilmot says: "It is the concurrence and acceptance of the university that gives the force to the charter of the crown." In the King v. Pasmore,[54] Lord Kenyon observes: "Some things are clear: when a corporation exists capable of discharging its functions, the crown cannot obtrude another charter upon them; they may either accept ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... How does he pull off the trick? It is not a question to be lightly answered. In the first place the personality of the listener is bound to obtrude itself; dissociation from one's ego—if such a thing were possible—would be intellectual death; only by the clear, persistent image of ourselves do we exist—banal psychology as old as the hills. And the ear, ...
— Ivory Apes and Peacocks • James Huneker
... deeper religious significance to learn from the East than the appreciation of such graces of life as patience and endurance under evil. We stand always prepared to fight manfully for our convictions, and to obtrude them at all points upon friend and foe alike. It is not in the nature of the East to do this. We say that he has no stamina. We call him, in opprobrium, "the mild Hindu." But let us not forget that ...
— India, Its Life and Thought • John P. Jones
... and conscientious to the last degree in handling the classics, and, although he has great individuality, passion, and fire, he would consider it a sacrilege to obtrude his own personality upon the listener. He is distinguished for elegance rather than perfection of technique. He may be considered a representative of ...
— Famous Violinists of To-day and Yesterday • Henry C. Lahee
... like to obtrude my aristocratic tendencies too much into this narrative, but when I found myself in the streets alone with Lena, I could not help feeling some secret qualms lest my conduct savored of impropriety. But the thought that I was working in the cause of truth and justice came to sustain me, ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green
... city to live in, is stately and handsome at a fair distance, but close at hand one notes that the architecture is mostly old-fashioned, many streets are made up of decaying, smoke-grimed, wooden houses, and the barren sand-hills toward the outskirts obtrude themselves too prominently. Even the kindly climate is sometimes pleasanter when read about than personally experienced, for a lovely, cloudless sky wears out its welcome by and by, and then when the longed for rain does come it ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain |
