"Content" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... transmuting force to the Romance of the Round Table. The date of Sir Thomas Mallory, who lived under Edward IV, is something earlier than that of the great Italian romances; he appears, too, to have been on the whole content with the humble offices of a compiler and a chronicler, and we may conceive that his spirit and diction are still older than his date. The consequence is, that we are brought into more immediate and fresher contact with the ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... as for the king of the Jews, he was not now in the temper he was in formerly towards Alexander and Aristobulus, when he had been content with the hearing their calumnies when others told him of them; but he was now come to that pass as to hate them himself, and to urge men to speak against them, though they did not do it of themselves. He also observed all that was said, and put questions, and gave ear to every one ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... which the children of the good man waited, the procession marched around to the fine music; and the workmen, having enjoyed themselves all the morning to their hearts' content, went to partake of a dinner which the family had provided for them in a large farm house. Here they sang, and laughed, and told stories till about eight o'clock in the evening, when they returned by railway to Hamburg, in a special train which the railroad directors ordered, free of expense, out ...
— The Pedler of Dust Sticks • Eliza Lee Follen
... went so far as to complain of the burdensome ceremonial discipline, hinting at the need of moderate religious reforms. Their principal task, however, was the cultivation of the Neo-Hebraic literary style and the rejuvenation of the content of that literature. They were willing to pursue the road of the emancipated Jewry of Western Europe, but only to a certain limit, refusing to cut themselves adrift from the national language or the religious and ...
— History of the Jews in Russia and Poland. Volume II • S.M. Dubnow
... for this man had come upon Cecilia. Why could not she, and Thyme, and Hilary, and Stephen, and all the people they knew and mixed with, be like him, so sound and healthy, so unravaged by disturbing sympathies, so innocent of "social conscience," so content? ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... his self-reproach was the thought that Marthy and Randy would have to pass the night alone. In spite of their bickerings, when night came Marthy was wont to dismiss her fears of the country, and rest her head upon Sam's strong arm with a sigh of peaceful content and dependence. And were her fears so groundless? Sam thought of roving, marauding Mexicans, of stealthy cougars that sometimes invaded the ranches, of rattlesnakes, centipedes, and a dozen possible dangers. Marthy would be frantic with fear. Randy would cry, ...
— Waifs and Strays - Part 1 • O. Henry
... felt herself close to and looking into the stream of recorded history, within whose banks the littlest things are great, and outside which she and the general bulk of the human race were content to live on ...
— The Trumpet-Major • Thomas Hardy
... was, as is apt to be the case, rather critical with her sons' wives, and she thought "Sam'l's kept that poor little gal too stiddy at work," and wished and wished she could shelter her under her own grandmotherly wing, and feed her with simballs to her heart's content. She was too wise to say anything to influence the child against her mistress, however. She was always cautious about that, even while pitying her. Once in a while she would speak her mind to her son, but he was easy enough—Ann would not have found ...
— The Pot of Gold - And Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins
... still my father-in-law, and that it is intolerable that I should be wanting bread, or driven into actual robbery, while my wife's father is a man of countless wealth, and has no heir except—but I will not now urge that child's cause; I am content to abandon it if so obnoxious to you. Do you wish me to cut a throat, and to be hanged, and all the world to hear the last dying speech and confession of Guy Darrell's ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... away from her. How I hated her in that moment! After all, I thought, why do you trouble to get this particular woman above everything? Fifty women that you meet in the course of a week are as pretty—possibly of more worth—probably more civil. Why not select a more accessible divinity? Or else content yourself with ...
— To-morrow? • Victoria Cross
... be sold to thee, thou shalt not compel him to serve as a bond-servant."—Id. "If thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there remember that thy brother hath aught against thee," &c.—Id. "Anthea was content to call a coach, and so to cross the brook." Or:—"and in that she crossed the brook."—Johnson cor. "It is either totally suppressed, or manifested only in its lowest and most imperfect form."—Blair cor. "But if any man is ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... thought would make us content to go through a losing season, for all the fellows in other towns who received that betrayed code sent the information right back to us," smiled Prescott. "But we're not going to lose to-day's game, Mr. Morton, nor any other day's. Drayne's treachery has just about crazed the other ...
— The High School Captain of the Team - Dick & Co. Leading the Athletic Vanguard • H. Irving Hancock
... I don't know how your mountain is—well, we can take a boat, and always be gay there; I wish we may be so at seventy-six and eighty! I abominate politics more and more; we had glories, and would not keep them: well! content, that there was an end of blood; then perks prerogative its ass's ears up; we are always to be saving our liberties, and then staking them again! 'Tis wearisome! I hate the discussion, and yet one cannot always sit at a gaming-table and never make a bet. I wish for nothing, I care not ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume I • Horace Walpole
... covered with the fallen leaves of decayed beliefs; but we fail in our supply of those men who are to follow the pioneers and do the higher and more lasting constructive work of civilization. Now, as in past times, we must be content, so far as we may, to have this work done for us by the thinkers and scholars of other lands. But how long is this to last? Is the same sort of makeshift to be allowed in the processes of American thought, which in the expanse of our territory we have allowed in ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 37, November, 1860 • Various
... has become necessary, and the moment for accomplishing it has arrived, nothing can prevent it, everything furthers it. Happy were it for men, could they then come to an understanding; would the rich resign their superfluity, and the poor content themselves with achieving what they really needed, revolutions would then be quietly effected, and the historian would have no excesses, no calamities to record; he would merely have to display the transition of humanity to a wiser, freer, and happier ...
— History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814 • F. A. M. Mignet
... be content to mine the most coal, to make the largest locomotives, to weave the largest quantities of carpets; but, amid the sounds of the pick, the blows of the hammer, the rattle of the looms, and the roar of the machinery, take care that the immortal mechanism of God's own hand—the ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... still," said Mr. Byrne. "At any rate, you must treat me so, and then I shall be quite content. But I must be going. I shall see you to-morrow after I've had it out with that donkey Norris. What a stupid idiot he is, to be sure!" and for a moment Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot looked quite fierce. "And then I must see little Vic. What time shall I ...
— Great Uncle Hoot-Toot • Mrs. Molesworth
... queen of Lydia, to whom Hercules was sold for three years for murdering Iphitus, and who so won his affection that he married her, and was content to spin her wool for her and wear the garments of a woman while she donned and ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... been doing splendidly with him; and he's used to you, and likes to have you round him. Now, do you suppose you can see to him till bedtime, and through the day to-morrow? A great deal, much more than you know, depends on his being kept quiet and content, without any worry. I will come back this evening, and sleep on the sofa here, where I can look out for him through the night. Do you think you ...
— In Blue Creek Canon • Anna Chapin Ray
... scarcely drew one breath. Her short woman's figure, with the skirts looped closely about it, merely dangled by the vibration of her swift descent, and with the knot holding true under the ear, her head leaned sideways, and her pinioned arms seemed content with their confinement. ...
— The Life, Crime and Capture of John Wilkes Booth • George Alfred Townsend
... now there was hardly a Parliament, but only the Lord Protector, Oliver Cromwell. Content with Baltimore's recognition of the Protectorate, Cromwell was not prepared to back, in their independent action, the Commissioners of that now dissolved Parliament. Baltimore made sure of this, and then dispatched ...
— Pioneers of the Old South - A Chronicle of English Colonial Beginnings, Volume 5 In - The Chronicles Of America Series • Mary Johnston
... to Billy's and sighed with sheer repletion of content. It seemed she had never lived such a wonderful day. It was as if all old dreams were coming true. Such beauty of the world she had never guessed in her fondest imagining. Billy ...
— The Valley of the Moon • Jack London
... is obliged to work out for a living she must remember that habit affects looks. If one is energetic and happy the face will reflect the content. If one shirks her duty and hates her work, her face will reflect discontent; her vital organs will weigh downward and affect her health, and her looks will suffer. One must affect enthusiasm in her work to stimulate the ...
— The Colored Girl Beautiful • E. Azalia Hackley
... did not work as hard as they do, and refrain from recreation as they do, they would have in their breasts the uneasy feeling that they have not done as much as they might have done; and what noble nature can be content to live under that accusation written against them by the supreme court in ...
— James Gilmour of Mongolia - His diaries, letters, and reports • James Gilmour
... it at first. Nothing had been further from him when he let her come to Bruges. He had meant nothing—nothing beyond looking at the Belfry. He had thought—as she did—that it would be quite possible to be content with looking at the Belfry. That was where the damned folly of the thing had come in. They began to be aware of the folly when they found themselves going together to Antwerp. He wasn't aware even then of what he meant. But he knew what ...
— The Belfry • May Sinclair
... that all was not well with this grave, taciturn being, whose personality was not less haunting than his bearing was unobtrusive. She did not remember that she had ever before felt so much concern for an indifferent person, and, being of an active temperament, she could not be content with a passive solicitude. It seemed to her that something must be done about it, and that it devolved upon her to solve the problem. Perhaps if she were to offer to give the man a gondola he would ...
— A Venetian June • Anna Fuller
... commanded. I begin to feel at home in her now; at first I didn't. I hate changes; and though the last captain I sailed with was a surly fellow, we got on very well together. I would rather sail with a man like that than with a skipper who is always talking. I am a silent man myself, and am quite content to eat my meal and enjoy it, without having to stop every time I am putting my fork into my mouth to answer some question or other. I was once six months up in the north without ever speaking to a soul. I was whaling then, and a snow-storm came on when we were fast on to a fish. It was twenty-four ...
— The Treasure of the Incas • G. A. Henty
... mind, and preventing it from being disordered. Whereas the Peripatetics bring a great many things to promote the cure of it, but have no regard to their thorny partitions and definitions. My question, then, was, whether I should instantly unfold the sails of my eloquence, or be content for a while to make less way with the oars ...
— Cicero's Tusculan Disputations - Also, Treatises On The Nature Of The Gods, And On The Commonwealth • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... not our sister the Moon I saw in the well, but by the Lord, the true countenance of sister Clare, and so pure and shining so bright with a holy joy that all my doubts were instantly dispelled, and it was made plain to me that our sister enjoys at this present hour the full content God accords his chosen vessels, loading them with ...
— The Well of Saint Clare • Anatole France
... I did not enjoy that supreme content—that philosophical calm which such beef and such ale surely warranted. But then, who ever heard of ...
— My Lady Caprice • Jeffrey Farnol
... all for somebody else; and perhaps so Lady Keith understood it, for she looked rather discomfited. But Mr. Lindsay was exceedingly pleased, and promised Ellen that as soon as the warm weather came she should have a horse and rides to her heart's content. ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner
... 'Salian' epithet may be enough; but from the interpretation of the Frankish one we are still as far as ever, and must be content, in the meantime, to stay so, noting however two ideas afterwards entangled with the name, which are of ...
— Our Fathers Have Told Us - Part I. The Bible of Amiens • John Ruskin
... from the attainments which have made them illustrious, virtuosos are for the most part very much like ordinary mortals who have to content themselves at the foot of Parnassus. It has been my privilege to know thirty or more of the most eminent artists, and some have become good personal friends. It is interesting to observe how several very different types of individuals may succeed in winning public favor as ...
— Great Pianists on Piano Playing • James Francis Cooke
... thou harpest on that: Tis sin for to deserve that banishment; But he that ne'er knew court, courts sweet content. ...
— Sir Thomas More • William Shakespeare [Apocrypha]
... calmly rest, The Christian's scorn—the Heathen's mirth— Content to live the lingering jest And by-word of a mocking Earth? Shall our own glorious land retain That curse which Europe scorns to bear? Shall our own brethren drag the chain Which ...
— The Liberty Minstrel • George W. Clark
... traits in accord with normal human nature. But curiously enough, as we learn from the argumenta (in view of the loss of the genuine end of the Aul.), Euclio at the denouement professes himself amply content to bid an everlasting farewell to his stolen hoard, and bestows his health and blessing on "the happy pair." This apparent conversion, with absolutely nothing dramatic to furnish an introduction or pretext for it, has caused Langen to depart from his usual judicious ...
— The Dramatic Values in Plautus • William Wallace Blancke
... their careers settled; some of them, perhaps, may enjoy a vacation from the wife; for you know madame, in France, with all her thrift, can be a little bossy, which is not saying that this is not a proper tonic for her lord. So the old boys seem the most content in the fellowship of winter quarters. What they cannot stand are repeated, long, hard marches; their legs give out under the load of rifle and pack. But their hearts are in the war, and right there is one very practical reason why they will fight well—and they have fought ...
— My Year of the War • Frederick Palmer
... replied that Being is alone true. But mankind had got beyond his barren abstractions: they were beginning to analyze, to classify, to define, to ask what is the nature of knowledge, opinion, sensation. Still less could they be content with the description which Achilles gives in Homer of the man whom ...
— Sophist • Plato
... on his wrists and clipped his forelock and rubbed him all over with spermacetic oil and built stables for him at every turn of the road with a gold manger in each full of the best hay in the market so that he could doss and dung to his heart's content. By this time the father of the faithful (for so they called him) was grown so heavy that he could scarce walk to pasture. To remedy which our cozening dames and damsels brought him his fodder in their apronlaps and as soon as his belly was full ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... ought each to see to his discourses but also to his actions whether he regards utility more than show, and truth more than display. For if a genuine love for youth or maiden seeks no witnesses, but is content to enjoy its delights privately, far more does it become the philosopher and lover of the beautiful, who is conversant with virtue through his actions, to pride himself on his silence, and not to need people to praise or listen to him. As that man who called his maid in the house, and cried ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... months. Helpless beyond measure in all the duties of practical statesmanship, its members or their dependants have given proof of remarkable energy in the single department of peculation; and there, not content with the slow methods of the old-fashioned defaulter, who helped himself only to what there was, they have contrived to steal what there was going to be, and have peculated in advance by a kind of official post-obit. So thoroughly has the credit of the most solvent nation in the world been ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 40, February, 1861 • Various
... through the underwood. Though so perfectly an adept at "'possuming," before attempting to practise its usual ruse it will make every effort to escape from its pursuers. When chased alone by a dog, it will content itself by scrambling up a tree, and sitting quietly on a branch, out of reach, looking down on its canine assailant with contempt as it runs barking furiously below it. The opossum is thus said to be "treed;" and before long, the barking of ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... an hour or so before dawn, lay together in a warm, panting heap, and slept, till, on the return of their mother to the "set," they were gathered to the soft comfort of her folded limbs, and fed and fondled to their hearts' content. ...
— Creatures of the Night - A Book of Wild Life in Western Britain • Alfred W. Rees
... if Servia had procrastinated in replying a time limit could have been introduced later; but, as things now stood, the terms of the Servian reply had been dictated by Austria, who had not been content to limit herself to a demand for a reply within a limit of ...
— The Evidence in the Case • James M. Beck
... of the devout soul suggests to me that our response ought to be the establishment of a close personal relation between us and God. 'Thou, O Lord! art my Refuge.' The Psalmist did not content himself with saying 'Lord! Thou hast been our Dwelling-place in all generations,' or as one of the other psalmists has it, 'God is our Refuge and our Strength.' That thought was blessed, but it was not enough for ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... empty-handed to her husband. But no sensible girl will have a grand wedding if its cost will put her father in debt. If Mary's music lessons must be intermitted, or John's entrance into college postponed because of her trousseau and her wedding, she should assume some of the sacrifice herself and be content with a more modest outfit and a simple ceremony. Thousands of thoughtless girls leave their families to recover slowly from the financial strain of their wedding. It is selfish and inconsiderate for a girl to say, "You will ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... been accustomed to assist our people in hauling the seine, and were content to wait for such reward as the person who had the direction of the boat thought proper to give them, either driven by hunger, or moved by some other cause, came down to the cove where they were fishing, and, perceiving that they had been more successful ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 1 • David Collins
... could survive without the help of Earth, and the Supreme Congress of the United Nations of Earth knew it. But they also knew that "survive" did not by any means have the same semantic or factual content as "live comfortably". If Earth were to vanish overnight, the people of the Belt would live, but they would be seriously handicapped. On the other hand, the people of Earth could survive—as they had for millennia—without the Belt Cities, and while ...
— Thin Edge • Gordon Randall Garrett
... content, however. She met Ashmead, as she came off, and said, "All is well, my friend, so far. They are sitting in judgment on me, like sensible people, and not in a hurry. I rather ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... uncanny natural knowledge of diplomacy and statecraft. Her whole life was bound up in the achievements of Charley Seguis, and she rarely, if ever, considered the question of personal perquisites should her schemes result successfully. She was content to be the background of his operations; and the background of a picture, although it be subordinate to the main object, rarely goes ...
— The Wilderness Trail • Frank Williams
... every forenoon; then, afternoons, we rode off here and there in squads a few miles, and visited the farmers' girls, and had a youthful good time, and got an honest good dinner or supper, and then home again to camp, happy and content. ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... girl! may never faithless love, Or fancied splendor, lead thy steps astray; No cares becloud the sunshine of thy day, Nor want e'er urge thee from thy cot to rove. What tho' thy station dooms thee to be poor, And by the hard-earn'd morsel thou art fed; Yet sweet content bedecks thy lowly bed, And health and peace sit smiling at thy door: Of these possess'd—thou hast a gracious meed, Which Heaven's high wisdom gives, ...
— Poetic Sketches • Thomas Gent
... danger at all. There is nothing makes him so odious, as I said, as his extortion of his subjects goods, and abuse of their women, from which he ought to forbear; and so long as he wrongs not his whole people, neither in their goods, nor honors, they live content, and he hath only to strive with the Ambition of some few: which many waies and easily too, is restrain'd. To be held various, light, effeminate, faint-hearted, unresolv'd, these make him be contemnd and thought base, which ...
— Machiavelli, Volume I - The Art of War; and The Prince • Niccolo Machiavelli
... if she had ever in the last few hours looked with misgiving upon what she felt herself impelled to do, the pressure of Jack Fyfe's lips on hers left no room for anything but an amazing thrill of pure gladness. She was happy in his arms, content to rest there, to feel his heart beating against hers, to be quit of all the uncertainties, all the useless regrets. By a roundabout way she had come to her own, and it thrilled her to her finger tips. She could not quite comprehend it, or herself. But she was glad, weeping ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... "I shall be content, then," rejoined Miriam, "if I could only forget one day of all my life." Then she seemed to repent of this allusion, and hastily added, "A woman's days are so tedious that it is a boon to leave even one of them out of ...
— The Marble Faun, Volume I. - The Romance of Monte Beni • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... feeding in a small paddock, which he knew to be all that Mr Gilpin had to feed them in. He asked Mr Gilpin how he came to have so many cows when he had so little land? 'The truth is,' said he, 'I found one cow would not do—she went dry.'—'Well,' said Lord Sidmouth, 'but why not be content with another? Two, by good management, might be made to supply you constantly with milk.'—'Oh, yes,' said the old gentleman, ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... was peaceful, that evening, and he enjoyed a game of pinochle with his wife. He indignantly told the Tempter that he was content to do things in the good old fashioned way. The day after, he went to see the purchasing-agent of the Street Traction Company and they made plans for the secret purchase of lots along the Evanston Road. But as he drove to his office he struggled, "I'm going to run things ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... expressed by that term as his experience or observation will not easily discover to be true. Instead of the meanness, distress, complaint, anxiety and dependence, which have hitherto been combined in his ideas of poverty, he will read of content, innocence and cheerfulness, of health and safety, tranquillity and freedom; of pleasures not known but to men unencumbered with possessions; and of sleep that sheds his balsamick anodynes only on the {23} cottage. Such are the blessings to be obtained by the resignation ...
— Dr. Johnson and His Circle • John Bailey
... united Kingdom. And inasmuch as we find, in our own days, that this intention has been frustrated, there can be no doubt but that it is our duty to do what we can to bring back the conditions of our life here into conformity with it. For Christian people cannot be content with a state of things which they find to be plainly contrary to God's intention. Consequently, in considering this question, it seems that the right course to take is to give prominence to the bonds of union which still exist between the different bodies of Christians in ...
— The Kingdom of Heaven; What is it? • Edward Burbidge
... settled quickly to his work. He seemed content, even happy; and at times there was a far-away, exultant look in his gray eyes. Miss Sherwood caught this on several occasions; it puzzled her, and she spoke of it to Larry. Larry understood what lay behind Joe's bearing, and since the thing ...
— Children of the Whirlwind • Leroy Scott
... diviner men among us? Well; in that case, the riddling and searching of the twenty-seven millions has been successful. Here are our ten divinest men; with these, unhappily not divine enough, we must even content ourselves and die in peace; what help is there? No help, ...
— Latter-Day Pamphlets • Thomas Carlyle
... she said as she took her seat at the table, "times have changed since I was a girl, and that isn't so very long ago. Then we used to content ourselves with sewing, and housework, and reading all the books in the Sunday school library, and making our own clothes, and enjoying ourselves as much as anybody nowadays for all I see, what with our picnics and excursions down the Bay and the clam bakes and winter lecture course and ...
— Flamsted quarries • Mary E. Waller
... fresco," my particular friend suggested. And from his tone, at once modestly content and artificially careless, I knew that that nursery-rhyme fresco was one of the sights of the pleasure quarter of New York, and that I ought to admire it. Well, I did admire it. I found it rather fine and apposite. But the free-luncheon counter, as a ...
— Your United States - Impressions of a first visit • Arnold Bennett
... Luther represented the other type, the type which feels that things are too bad for mere reform to be effective, and that what is wanted is rebellion against the old. The two types seldom agree as to means, and usually part company. One is content to be known as a conservative or a conformer; the other delights in being classed as a progressive ...
— THE HISTORY OF EDUCATION • ELLWOOD P. CUBBERLEY
... prove that for three hundred years the monarchs [of France] have not disdained to treat us as members of their family." This arrogance of race inspired the early part of his life to the exclusion, so far as we can perceive, of any other stimulus to action. He was content to be the violent and fantastic swashbuckler of the half-rebellious court of Louis XIII. In late life, he crystallized his past into a maxim, "Youth is a protracted intoxication; it is the fever of the soul." Fighting and love-making, petty politics and scuffle upon counter-scuffle—such was ...
— Three French Moralists and The Gallantry of France • Edmund Gosse
... in anger at the death of his father, slew with his battle axe the king of the Haihayas. And Rama, by cutting off the thousand arms of Arjuna (the Haihaya king), achieved a most difficult feat in the world. Not content with this, he set out on his chariot for the conquest of the world, and taking up his bow he cast around his mighty weapons to exterminate the Kshatriyas. And the illustrious scion of Bhrigu's race, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... no rent; we inherit many of our instruments and materials; lodging and victuals are cheaper than at London; and, therefore, workmanship ought, at least, not to be dearer. Our expences are naturally less than those of booksellers; and, in most cases, communities are content with less ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell
... though he thinks in his conscience that it has been due not to his own fault, but to the 'stupidity of juries.' 'There is only one thing,' he says, 'which supports me in this, the belief that God orders all things, and that therefore we can be content and ought to take events as they come, be they small or great. Whenever I turn my thoughts that way it certainly does not seem to me very important whether in this little bit of a life I can accomplish all that I wish—so long as I try to do my best. I have ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... intelligent people of the Mississippi Basin to-day the very genius of commonplaceness seems to hover. Take the great State of Iowa, with its well-to-do and homogeneous population, its fortunate absence of perplexing city-problems, its general air of prosperity and content. It is a typical state of the most typically American portion of the country; but it breeds no books. Yet in Indiana, another state of the same general conditions as to population and prosperity, and only ...
— The American Mind - The E. T. Earl Lectures • Bliss Perry
... on the borders of the majestic Hudson, in the beautiful valley of the Mohawk, a hundred miles from the good city of Albany, where you can tramp among the wild or tame things of nature to your heart's content. ...
— Wild Northern Scenes - Sporting Adventures with the Rifle and the Rod • S. H. Hammond
... fire for a little, trying to collect herself. "I knew what was right," she began at last in a low voice, "I knew we should take nothing for granted, we should never be content merely to feel and suppose and hope for the best in matters about which we should know exactly. And yet I took no trouble to ascertain. I fell in love, and liked the sensation, and gave myself up to it unreservedly. Certainly, I was a fool—there is ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... have sons and nephews that follow not advice. I have taken pains to know the state of the country's guilt as to reset; and if I make it not appear that my Lord Dundonald is one of the clearest of all that country, and can hardly be reached in law, I am content to pay his fine. I never pleaded for any, nor shall I hereafter. But I must say I think it hard that no regard is had to a man in so favourable circumstances—I mean considering others—upon my account, ...
— Claverhouse • Mowbray Morris
... explain the conception of duty in which the German poet has given such noble utterance to the thoughts of the German philosopher—viz., that moral aspiration has the same goal as the artistic,—the attainment to the calm delight wherein the pain of effort disappears in the content of achievement. Thus in life, as in art, it is through discipline that we arrive at freedom, and duty only completes itself when all motives, all actions, are attuned into one harmonious whole, and it is not striven for as duty, but enjoyed as happiness. M. ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... to the snappishness of Skinner's tone, "that though we cannot make ourselves any heavier, weight is not after all the only thing. I think we might make up for it by last. When fellows are going to row a race they don't content themselves with practice, they set to and train hard. It seems to me that if we were to go into strict training and get ourselves thoroughly fit, it ought to make a lot of difference. We might lose goals in the first half ...
— The Dash for Khartoum - A Tale of Nile Expedition • George Alfred Henty
... cabins the rest of the party managed to double, each family taking one of the two rooms in each, and the women at least drew a sigh of content that the long trail had at last found an end, ...
— The Maid of the Whispering Hills • Vingie E. Roe
... Turkish philosophy he must be content with the Turkish result. But the Western world as a whole has refused to be content with the Turkish result, and however tiresome it may be to know about things, to bother with "theories" and principles, we have come to realise that we have to choose ...
— Peace Theories and the Balkan War • Norman Angell
... you? How came Madame la Marechale to allow you to come here? Do you not see what they are doing against an unhappy man, whose death alone will content them? Alas, merciful Heaven! is this the first spectacle my dear pupil is to see? And you at that delightful period of life when friendship, love, confidence, should alone encompass you; when all around ...
— Cinq Mars, Complete • Alfred de Vigny
... social business in his own circle, much to his mother's content. He had seen quite a good deal of Elorn Sharrow; was comfortably back on the old, agreeable footing; tried desperately to enjoy it; pretended that ...
— The Crimson Tide • Robert W. Chambers
... the rest, they are assigned, babies, nurses, sheep, rattles, and railroad trains, to their separate measles, scarlet fever, and diphtheria lawns or wards, and there must be content to stay. A sheep may be transferred from the scarlet-fever ward with its patron to the mixed-measles or diphtheria, when symptoms of either of these diseases appear, as they often do; but it cannot then go back again, lest ...
— Children of the Tenements • Jacob A. Riis
... your law to tell a story upon the given theme, an it like me not, but shall be free to tell that which shall most please me. And that none may think I seek this favour as one who hath not stories, in hand, from this time forth I am content to be still the last ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... contrast is indispensable for another reason. Posterity ever has a blunt way of asking the most inquisitive questions. The inquirer for truth will not be content with the simple statement that many of the factory owners and tradesmen bribed representative bodies to give them railroad charters and bountiful largess. He will seek to know how, as specifically as the records allow, they got together that money. Their ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers
... It is always a safe plan for her to retire at the "change of horses"; for there is no pleasure in continuing to hunt on a tired animal, and there is certainly danger in so doing. Old-time sportsmen were content with one horse a day. "Scrutator" tells us that in the time of Mr. Meynell "it was not the fashion to have second horses in the field." If I may express an opinion, I think that many ladies are inclined to regard horses as machines, and expect too much from them. This is probably due to that unfortunate ...
— The Horsewoman - A Practical Guide to Side-Saddle Riding, 2nd. Ed. • Alice M. Hayes
... great end of restoration in view, it was not in his power to employ great means for its attainment. He was obliged to be content with the day of small things. When he came to Yorkshire, he—whose ancestors had owned warehouses in this seaport, and factories in that inland town, had possessed their town-house and their country-seat—saw no way open to him but to rent ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... Berlin as your plenipotentiary, I am at your disposal, and give you my word that the whole world, with the exception of envious and inimical persons, who will be reduced to a small minority, shall be content. But before I consent to this it is absolutely necessary that Herr von Hiilsen should give me an invitation to Berlin black on white, and also invest me with the powers which my responsibility will make possible and desirable. In my opinion, it behoves Berlin to find room for your three works ...
— Correspondence of Wagner and Liszt, Volume 1 • Francis Hueffer (translator)
... the author's elaborate chapter on the pedigree and the early history of the Winthrop family. He is content to begin this side of those who "came over with the Conqueror," and to accept for ancestry men and women untitled, of the sterling English stock, delvers of the soil, and spinners of the fabrics ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various
... of both mistress and servant because of his rudeness when he came to inquire after her; third, the evident condition of the poor creature's mind; and last, the longing of the two women to have her to themselves, that they might nurse and cosset her to their hearts' content. ...
— Stephen Archer and Other Tales • George MacDonald
... two ounces of brain, should be contaminated with many of the corruptions from below. Of those who seem to be concerned with spiritual perceptions there is a vast number mere charlatans and pretenders who, like the ingenious Japanese, are content to make cunning imitations of the real things adapted to sell to the best advantage. They patter the formulas of religion, of science, of art and morals, and ostentatiously display themselves in the costume of intellectuality to flatter, cajole ...
— On the Vice of Novel Reading. - Being a brief in appeal, pointing out errors of the lower tribunal. • Young E. Allison
... while he bit the whistling atrocity to his heart's content; then with it still between his fore paws he looked up into Vane's face. Surely his master had not forgotten the rules of the game. Really—it was a little steep if it was so. But Vane, as far as ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile
... Doleful outcries, and fearful sights, My sad and dismal soul affrights. All my griefs to this are jolly, None so damn'd as melancholy. Methinks I court, methinks I kiss, Methinks I now embrace my mistress. O blessed days, O sweet content, In Paradise my time is spent. Such thoughts may still my fancy move, So may I ever be in love. All my joys to this are folly, Naught so sweet as melancholy. When I recount love's many frights, My sighs and tears, my waking nights, My jealous fits; ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... and misery. How many otherwise inoffensive persons have I known implicitly to adopt an opinion to the prejudice of their less fortunate acquaintance, merely from their deficiency of the world's wealth! But, not content with this, these persons, who are the very people to esteem poverty as the worst of ills, not satiated with his destitution, must do their utmost to sink him still lower by their treatment of him; ...
— Confessions of an Etonian • I. E. M.
... no need to imprison, beat, and kill men every time the landlord collects his rents, every time those who are in want of bread have to pay a swindling merchant three times its value, every time the factory hand has to be content with a wage less than half of the profit made by the employer, and every time a poor man pays his last ruble in taxes, it is because so many men have been beaten and killed for trying to resist these demands, that the lesson has now ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy
... and an air, bursting like the spring, and gay as a village feast, filled the room with its delight. He listened, and each instant the chilly weight loosened from his heart. Her balmy voice now came upon his ear, breathing joy and cheerfulness, content and love. Could love be the savage passion which lately subjugated his soul? He rose from his seat; he walked about the room; each minute his heart was lighter, his brow more smooth. A thousand thoughts, beautiful and quivering like the twilight, glanced o'er his mind ...
— The Young Duke • Benjamin Disraeli
... properly aimed, don't endeavor at that particular moment to fire it but be content to apply additional pressure to the trigger and then hold this pressure until the gun is again steady and properly aimed when a little more pressure is added and so on until the gun is discharged. By using this system, the firer does not know the exact instant the gun is to ...
— The Plattsburg Manual - A Handbook for Military Training • O.O. Ellis and E.B. Garey
... of the new States would be made more compact, and large tracts would be sold which would otherwise remain on hand. Not only would the land be brought within the means of a larger number of purchasers, but many persons possessed of greater means would be content to settle on a larger quantity of the poorer lands rather than emigrate farther west in pursuit of a smaller quantity of better lands. Such a measure would also seem to be more consistent with the policy of ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Martin van Buren • Martin van Buren
... a knowledge of the Christ, we are bidden to acknowledge him—that is, to act-our-knowledge. Many of the world's philosophers have worked out great truths. But they have rested content with that. Many scientists, knowing that matter is unreal, nevertheless conduct themselves as if it constituted the one and only real fact of existence! Is error like truth? Decidedly no! It is truth's exact opposite. Is truth real? Certainly it is! Then its ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... ex-fellow of St. John's. I had still a little property remaining, just enough to have kept Alice always at a good school. I do not think I shall stay here much longer. I shall try to get a larger school, in some town where I may find a few young men to teach of an evening. I am content for myself; but Alice is growing up, and I should wish, for her sake, to get a step up in the world again. I need not say, my lad, that I don't want this mentioned. Alice and you alone know my story. So you see," he went on more lightly, "I may say you have had a good teacher. Now, Jack, ...
— Facing Death - The Hero of the Vaughan Pit. A Tale of the Coal Mines • G. A. Henty
... Acidalius published a book in Latin and afterwards in French, to prove that women are not reasonable creatures. Modern theologians are at worst merely sub-acid, and do not always say so, if they think so. Meanwhile most persons have been content to leave the world to go on its old course, in this matter as in others, and have thus acquiesced in that stern judicial decree, with which Timon of Athens sums up all his curses upon womankind,—"If there sit twelve women at the table, let a dozen ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various
... image of my last content: My soul shall be a little lonely lake, So hidden that no shadow of man may break The folding of its mountain battlement; Only the beautiful and innocent Whiteness of sea-born cloud drooping to shake Cool rain upon the reed-beds, or the wake Of churned cloud ...
— Modern British Poetry • Various
... send you back into that lock-up place below, and perhaps put you in irons," said the man sternly. "Be content with what I am doing for you. Now ...
— The Adventures of Don Lavington - Nolens Volens • George Manville Fenn
... job they were, because who was to do her work if she was every minute prancing round after a couple of young monkeys? This was a strained way of indicating the case; but there can be no doubt of its substantial truth. So Aunt M'riar felt at rest so long as Dave was content to set up atop of the dustbin-lid and shout till he was hoarse; all the while using a shovel, that was ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... perhaps twenty, and had almost as arid an aspect as that of the plains themselves. Only one small cluster of deciduous trees was visible, about a mile up a shallow valley or "draw." Surely this was a most unpromising field for bird study. If I had only been content to remain among the mountains, where, even though the climbing was difficult, there were brawling brooks, shady woodlands, and green, copsy vales in which many ...
— Birds of the Rockies • Leander Sylvester Keyser
... calm of the Valleys! The raptures increase With the calls of content and the pleasures of peace, And the homes of the happy their gladness engage From the rose-days of youth to the ...
— Oklahoma Sunshine • Freeman E. (Freeman Edwin) Miller
... construction of time charts; and much history also by drawing and colouring historical maps. With geometrical drawing one passes insensibly into mathematics. And so much has been done not only to revolutionize the teaching of modern languages, but also to popularize the results, that I may content myself with a mere mention of the names of Rippmann, S. Alge, Hoelzel, and Gouin as ...
— Mankind in the Making • H. G. Wells
... be silent and trouble her no more. 'You have made a choice,' he continued, addressing my mother, 'that has often strangely tempted me. The two extremes: all, or else nothing; never, or this very hour upon the clock—these have been my incongruous desires. But to accept the middle term, to be content with a half-gift, to flicker awhile and to burn out—never for an hour, never since I was born, has satisfied the appetite of my ambition.' He looked upon my mother fixedly, much of admiration and some touch ...
— The Dynamiter • Robert Louis Stevenson and Fanny van de Grift Stevenson
... bear it, and now he must wait—no matter how long—until she signified her wish to have him come. She had sent him a message of thanks by Dr. Belford, and said she would see him when she could. With that he had to be content. He felt it useless to deny the plain fact that grief had crowded every thought of him out ...
— A Beautiful Alien • Julia Magruder
... opinion of me a little," I implored her. "I can't help my appearance; but let me assure you I am willing to play the Bohemian to any extent so long as I can be with you. There isn't a thing in your life I wouldn't be content to share," ...
— An Amiable Charlatan • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... kept serpents of horrible figures, some worshipped the greatest goats they could get, some leopards, and others monstrous creatures. Some held in veneration certain unclean fowls, etc. Neither did they content themselves with worshipping the said creatures when alive, but also adored the very skins of them when they were ...
— Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development • Francis Galton
... tenderly, feeling the gentle brushing of her hair against his cheek as in the old days. He was content to wait, holding her thus. They were very silent; her eyes half closed, as if in exhaustion, yet with the strange suggestion of ...
— In a Hollow of the Hills • Bret Harte
... merry maiden marries, Sorrow goes and pleasure tarries; Every sound becomes a song, All is right and nothing's wrong! From to-day and ever after Let your tears be tears of laughter— Every sigh that finds a vent Be a sigh of sweet content! When you marry merry maiden, Then the air with love is laden; Every flower is a rose, Every goose becomes a swan, Every kind of trouble goes Where the last year's snows have gone! Sunlight takes the place of shade When you marry ...
— Bab Ballads and Savoy Songs • W. S. Gilbert
... first visit she had made here since going home; though Daisy had in truth not come often nor stayed long. All the more glad were Juanita and she to see each other now. Daisy took off her flat and sat down on the old chintz couch, with a face of content. Yet it was grave content; not joyous at all. So Juanita's keen eyes saw, through all the talking which went on. Daisy and she had a great deal to say to each other; and among other things the story of Molly ...
— Melbourne House • Elizabeth Wetherell
... replied the other, producing a copper. "Heeds, you win the siller; tails, I win the box;—heeds it is, so the kickshaws is mine. Weel, I'm content," he added, as he handed the bag of gold to his comrade, and received the ...
— The Lighthouse • R.M. Ballantyne
... concerned, no explanation is necessary. I am content not to understand. Moreover, this is a public place, in which we have accidentally ...
— Don Orsino • F. Marion Crawford
... knowest my resolve, And with this nobler vengeance art content. Father, I think in letting this man live That I am doing what thou wouldst have done. Father, I know not if a human voice Can pierce the iron gateway of the dead, Or if the dead are set in ignorance Of what we do, or do not, for their sakes. And yet ...
— The Duchess of Padua • Oscar Wilde
... Therefore it behoved God by His own paths[5] to restore man to his entire life, I mean by one, or else by both. But because the work of the workman is so much the more pleasing, the more it represents of the goodness of the heart whence it issues, the Divine Goodness which imprints the world was content to proceed by all Its paths to lift you up again; nor between the last night and the first day has there been or will there be so lofty and so magnificent a procedure either by one or by the other; for ...
— The Divine Comedy, Volume 3, Paradise [Paradiso] • Dante Alighieri
... man, a lighter character than Humphrey Crewe, would have been content to have got something; and let it rest at that. Little Mr. Butcher or Mr. Speaker Doby, with his sorrowful smile, guessed the iron hand within the velvet glove of the Leith statesman; little they knew the man they were dealing with. Once aroused, he would not be pacified by bribes of cheap olive ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... accumulated papers, half the contents of which you do not yourself know, your expression "aufraumen,"—to put in final order, is singularly inappropriate. There will always remain some burdensome residue,—last things not yet accounted for. I beg you, then, not to abuse your strength. Be content to finish only what seems to you nearest completion,—the ...
— Louis Agassiz: His Life and Correspondence • Louis Agassiz
... met. The accused women found supporters among the "best able and most understanding."[75] There were, he thought, three kinds of people who were doubters in these matters: those who attributed too much to natural causes and who were content to call clear cases of bewitchment convulsions, those who when witchcraft was broached talked about fairies and "walking ghosts," and lastly those who believed there were no witches. "Of this opinion ...
— A History of Witchcraft in England from 1558 to 1718 • Wallace Notestein
... and not being so much in accordance with man's nature, constitution, and moral character, it is very liable, finally, to generate disease, inflammation, or fever, even when it is not taken to excess." He closes by advising all persons to content themselves with "pure vegetable food;" and that in the least quantity compatible with ...
— Vegetable Diet: As Sanctioned by Medical Men, and by Experience in All Ages • William Andrus Alcott
... enclosed patterns, ten to each pattern, and can have the same to be delivered here any time in February next, I shall take them at the same price which I gave you for the last; and one month after the delivery you may draw upon me for the money, which shall be paid to your content. Your ...
— The Complete English Tradesman (1839 ed.) • Daniel Defoe
... From the thatch'd mansion's grey-hair'd sire, Wise without learning, plain and good, And sprung of Scotland's gentler blood; Whose eye in age, quick, clear, and keen, Show'd what in youth its glance had been; Whose doom discording neighbours sought, Content with equity unbought; To him the venerable priest, Our frequent and familiar guest, Whose life and manners well could paint Alike the student and the saint; Alas! whose speech too oft I broke With gambol rude and timeless joke; For I was ...
— Sir Walter Scott - (English Men of Letters Series) • Richard H. Hutton
... more of content than aught else, escaped her, and he felt how she let herself rest more fully in his supporting arm. He gave her another sip of the cordial, and she thanked him as some ...
— The Mark of the Beast • Sidney Watson
... lands, a few beasts grazing about, some signs of where flower beds and flower borders had been better cared for once on a time than now, and came to a comfortable, roomy square house finished in plaster. This was castle something, the residence of the late Lord Mountmorris. With a blessing, content and three hundred a year one could fancy that person sung of by Moore, "With the heart that is humble," being able to make out life nicely here. When a man has a title to his name with all the requirements which it implies and demands, one could imagine ...
— The Letters of "Norah" on her Tour Through Ireland • Margaret Dixon McDougall
... was never content to make mere speeches in advocacy of a principle. His aid to the Royal Colonial Institute and organization of the Imperial Institute were cases in point. When the Imperial Federation League was formed he could only help its ...
— The Life of King Edward VII - with a sketch of the career of King George V • J. Castell Hopkins
... Jollivet, not a word," whispered the Colonel once during the horrors of that long-drawn night. "She has not spoken, but her eyes are so full of reproach, and they seem to keep on asking me why I could not be content without plunging into all the excitement and trouble connected ...
— Sappers and Miners - The Flood beneath the Sea • George Manville Fenn
... thus until they lengthened into a week. Though Bobby was content enough, it was but natural that he should be a bit lonesome now and again, and eagerly wish the fortnight gone that yet must pass before the return of the ...
— Bobby of the Labrador • Dillon Wallace
... at first in the tight-packed tin, Content in the greasy gloom, Till the whisper ran there were some therein With more than their share of room; And I saw the combat from start to end, I heard the rage and the roar, For I was the special The Daily Friend Sent out to ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, April 29, 1914 • Various
... our village was in the middle of that sleep, being in the middle of Austria. It drowsed in peace in the deep privacy of a hilly and woodsy solitude where news from the world hardly ever came to disturb its dreams, and was infinitely content. At its front flowed the tranquil river, its surface painted with cloud-forms and the reflections of drifting arks and stone-boats; behind it rose the woody steeps to the base of the lofty precipice; from ...
— The Mysterious Stranger and Other Stories • Mark Twain
... forgotten what I had lightly said, And without speech, without a thought I went, Steeped in that golden quiet, all content To drink the transient beauty as it sped Out of eternal darkness into time To light and burn and know itself a fire; Yet doomed—ah, fate of the fulfilled desire!— To fade, a meteor, paying for the crime ...
— The Defeat of Youth and Other Poems • Aldous Huxley
... reason that I could offer why I should go and sit solitary in Waterton for three days, and if I had had any such reason I know it would have been treated with contempt. So I submitted—not altogether with an easy mind, and yet seeing cause for nothing but satisfaction and content. ...
— A Bicycle of Cathay • Frank R. Stockton
... it ought to be. At least, that she should know Guy's—the feeling with which Guy regards her. If, after the probation of a year, it still remains, and he is content to begin life on a small income, we have given our consent to our ...
— John Halifax, Gentleman • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik |
