"Contrite" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... when she left the room, two very contrite little girls cuddled up close to each other, and took without a murmur the hot herb tea which Mrs. Dallas brought to them. And the next morning when they woke, lo! the sun was shining, and not an ache nor a pain did ...
— A Sweet Little Maid • Amy E. Blanchard
... glory, to offer sincere homage to the Sovereign of the universe, to worship and serve Him with purity of heart, to thank Him for favours received, to supplicate Him for help, to confess to Him sins committed, and to ask His pardon with contrite spirit. All these and other like acts of filial dependence and piety, find their expression in that elevated form of external worship called prayer, which, whether exercised publicly in appropriate and consecrated temples, or recited in the solitude of the domestic closet,[4] ...
— A Guide for the Religious Instruction of Jewish Youth • Isaac Samuele Reggio
... better dispensation which Christ came to establish, is the humility of contrite hearts, the innocence of little children, the purity of undefiled consciences, the fruit of good works, the truth of universal laws, the love of God, and the conscious experience of an indestructible, ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... had not moved nor had he offered a word in defence. He knew his Uncle George—better let him blow it all out, then the two could come together. At last he said in a contrite ...
— Kennedy Square • F. Hopkinson Smith
... And threw me down among the spruces. You really did everything that a contrite heart ...
— The Flaming Jewel • Robert W. Chambers
... perpetual, but ineffectual, attempts of all governments to restrain what, perhaps, cannot be restrained—criminal folly! And to punish a man for having ruined himself would usually be to punish a most contrite penitent. ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... writings of St. Augustine, and is confirmed by certain utterances of the Council of Trent. By conscientiously preparing himself with the aid of actual grace, the sinner probably merits an additional claim (in equity) to justification. Cfr. Ps. L, 19: "A sacrifice to God is an afflicted spirit: a contrite and humbled heart, O God, thou wilt not despise."(1350) Dan. IV, 24: "Redeem thou thy sins with alms, and thy iniquities with works of mercy to the poor: perhaps he [God] will forgive thy offences."(1351) ...
— Grace, Actual and Habitual • Joseph Pohle
... this by the excessive confidence with which Mr. James Smith predicted that he would treat me as Zephaniah Stockdolloger (Sam Slick calls it slockdollager) treated Goliah Quagg. He has announced his {131} intention of bringing me, with a contrite heart, and clean shaved,—4159265... razored down to 25,—to a camp-meeting of circle-squarers. But there is this difference: Zephaniah only wanted to pass the Colonel's smithy in peace; Mr. James Smith sought ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume II (of II) • Augustus de Morgan
... away with him, and contrived to circulate a report that he and she had gone to America. After her return home, she followed her nephew to this neighborhood, and that accounted for her presence there. So well, indeed, did he manage this matter, that she received a very contrite and affectionate letter, that had been sent, she thought, from Boston, desiring her to follow himself and the child there. The deceit was successful. Gratified at the prospect of joining them, she made the due preparations, and set sail. It is unnecessary ...
— The Black Prophet: A Tale Of Irish Famine • William Carleton
... Lord, to receive glory and honour and power; for Thou hast made all things, and for Thy pleasure they are and were created; and Thy pleasure is, Peace on Earth, and Goodwill toward men. Thou art the High and Holy One, who inhabitest eternity. Yet Thou dwellest with him that is of a contrite spirit, to revive the heart of the feeble, and to comfort the heart of the contrite. We adore the glory of Thy power; we adore the glory of Thy wisdom: but most of all we adore the glory of Thy justice, the glory of Thy condescension, the glory of ...
— Westminster Sermons - with a Preface • Charles Kingsley
... and divine, could not seemly otherwise terminate his wretched life than by perpetrating a last crime—suicide! And the friends of Madame de Saint-Dizier hawked about and everywhere repeated these terrible words with a contrite air, as if beatified and convinced! But this was not all. Along with ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... through the doorway and reached the passerby on the sidewalk! During that winter he pronounced all his most famous sermons—on "The Faithful Saying," on "The City with Foundations," on "Awake, Thou that Sleepest!" and on "The Broken and Contrite Heart." It was after hearing this latter most original and pathetic discourse that an eminent man exclaimed, "No such preaching as that has been heard in this land since the days of Dr. John M. Mason." I enjoy ...
— Recollections of a Long Life - An Autobiography • Theodore Ledyard Cuyler
... architecture or coinage, and no more force of its own. St. Francis expressed supreme contempt for them all, and solved the whole problem by rejecting it altogether. Adams returned to Paris with a broken and contrite spirit, prepared to admit that his life had no meaning, and conscious that in any case it no longer mattered. He passed a summer of solitude contrasting sadly with the last at Surrenden; but the solitude did what the society did not — it forced and ...
— The Education of Henry Adams • Henry Adams
... thy abode in Bauerbach has been of that latter kind. Hinc illae lacrymae! For these thou art now suffering, and that not by accident. The embarrassment thou now art in is verily a work of Higher Providence, to lead thee off from too great trust in thy own force; to make thee soft and contrite; that, laying aside all self-will, thou mayest follow more the counsel of thy Father and other true friends; must meet every one with due respectful courtesy and readiness to oblige; and become ever more convinced that our most gracious Duke, in his restrictive ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle
... moment Edmund and Egbert appeared at the door of the hut. As he had expected from the nature of the colloquy Edmund saw King Alfred standing contrite and ashamed before ...
— The Dragon and the Raven - or, The Days of King Alfred • G. A. Henty
... dramatic oratory, with plenty of thrilling incident. For my part, when I hear a convert relating the violences and oaths and blasphemies he was guilty of before he was saved, making out that he was a very terrible fellow then and is the most contrite and chastened of Christians now, I believe him no more than I believe the millionaire who says he came up to London or Chicago as a boy with only three halfpence in his pocket. Salvationists have said ...
— Bernard Shaw's Preface to Major Barbara • George Bernard Shaw
... Tom, in a low, contrite, humble voice, "let us return thanks to Heaven, for vain is ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... beat faster, and she never entered a ball-room without a sense of happy expectancy. Poor lady! she never left but she carried home heart-sickness, weariness, and a discontent of which she purged her soul, on her knees, before lying down to sleep. She had a contrite spirit; she knew that her lot was a fortunate one; but she envied her maid Polly her good looks at times. With Polly's face, she might have dancing to her heart's content. Usually she dropped some tears on her pillow after ...
— The Westcotes • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... would be so. This is well seen in Christ. And what in the Divine Light is and from the Divine Light, has neither spiritual pride nor careless license nor an independent spirit—but a great humility, and a broken and contrite heart,—and all propriety and honesty, justice and truth, peace and happiness,—all that belongs to all virtues, it must have. When it is otherwise, then he is not happy, as has been said. When this does not ...
— Memories • Max Muller
... Declining to walk to the place of detention he was placed on a stretcher, but the stretcher bearers were so inexperienced then that after a journey of about 200 yards he elected to march. On his release, the offender, very contrite and desiring to make the amende honourable, approached the warrant officer and explained that the statement previously made in regard to his figure was entirely ...
— The 28th: A Record of War Service in the Australian Imperial Force, 1915-19, Vol. I • Herbert Brayley Collett
... addressed a letter to Burghley and Walsingham, expressing himself as became a crushed and contrite man, never more to raise his drooping head again, but warmly and manfully urging upon the attention of the English government—for the honour and interest of the Queen herself—"the miserable state of the poor soldiers." The necessity of immediate ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... deeper knowledge of the world: the patient and sympathetic study of the good citizen who lives in it, or the ecstatic vision of the saint who rejects it. But probably most Christians are inclined to believe that without some failure and sense of failure, without a contrite heart and conviction of sin, man can hardly attain the religious life. I can imagine an historian of this temper believing that the period we are about to discuss was a necessary softening of ...
— Five Stages of Greek Religion • Gilbert Murray
... a strange light," answered Trendon soothingly. Slade half rose. "Lost; all lost!" he cried, and fell back unconscious. Trendon exploded into curses. "See what you've done to my patient," he fumed. Barnett looked at him with contrite eyes. ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... not ask her, as the recollection of them fills her heart with sorrow. She discloses the object of her mission, will guide him to his new master, who, they say, is going to die, and feels very bad about it. He was a desperate man on his plantation, and has become the more contrite at death's call. "I hope ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... sudden wild happiness seized her. She pressed the letter to her lips, and sobbed with relief. All the pent-up misery of the last few weeks were washed away in tears; the barriers of pride were broken down; she was as humble and contrite as a little child. She startled her maid by an unusual morning activity, and consulted the time-tables quite as eagerly as John. He wanted her; that was enough. She cared nothing now for the censorious tongues. Her gentle, sweet-spirited husband awaited her return. All else ...
— The Scarlet Feather • Houghton Townley
... more, that the prayer which is the most forcible, transcends, and far exceeds, all power of words. For St. Paul, speaking unto us of the most effectual kind of prayer, calls it sighs and groans, that cannot be expressed. Nothing cries so loud in the ears of God, as the sighing of a contrite and earnest heart." ...
— A Portraiture of Quakerism, Volume II (of 3) • Thomas Clarkson
... looked contrite. "Poor Mrs. Blackwood!" she said; "Doulton is her favourite china, and that bowl ...
— We Ten - Or, The Story of the Roses • Lyda Farrington Kraus
... suffered the people to demolish the images and all the monuments of papistry, without molestation or hinderance; so that the town was cleansed of the pollution of idolatry, and the worship of humble and contrite hearts established there, instead of the pagan pageantry of masses ...
— Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt
... during her imprisonment, having won the confidence of the religious sisters in charge of the convicts, is appointed head of one of the workshops. Marie Boyer is so contrite, exemplary in her behaviour that she is released after fifteen years' imprisonment. In some ways, perhaps, these malleable types of women, "soft paste" as one authority has described them, "effacees" in the words of another, ...
— A Book of Remarkable Criminals • H. B. Irving
... sure, sir," said Daniel, in a truly contrite tone, "I never should have done such an impudent thing against you, if I had only known what a nice gentleman you are. I took you for nothing but a haughty land-owner, without a word to fling at a poor fisherman. And now you go ever so far beyond what the Club ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... spoken not more than a dozen words to each other since sitting down to table, which was set, as usual, in the kitchen. Both were thoughtful;—one of them was contrite. ...
— Viola Gwyn • George Barr McCutcheon
... shall hold my tongue. I efface myself and intercede for him, and thou dost call it exulting. And when I am fallen from thy favor there will be none to plead my cause, none to hide her misty eyes with contrite lashes." ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller
... fortunately situated in life, who voluntarily sought the consolations of religion. I reckon the Lord knew what He was about when He turned His back and let Satan fill creation with snares and pitfalls and sorrows and temptations. If we did not fall into so many of them we should never get the proper contrite spirit to seek of our own will and accord after salvation. He would have been obliged to thrust it upon us and we might have been no better than the angels, without the great privilege of sinning our own sins or choosing ...
— A Circuit Rider's Wife • Corra Harris
... tried this primitive trick so often that its very staleness infuriated the king, who invariably sent officers to seize the trembling accomplice and lock her up in a dismal cell as a hostage for the scribe's appearance. At dusk the poor fellow would emerge, contrite and terrified, and prostrate himself at the gate of the palace. Then his Majesty (who, having spies posted in every quarter of the town, knew as well as P'hra-Alack himself what the illness or the absence signified) leisurely ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens
... money had been voted—ten times that amount was offered in a day. Every interest in life became suddenly centered in one duty—war. It touched the heart of the whole people, and for the time they arose, purified, contrite, as the armies of Moses under ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... I upset her," said the general, swelling and loftily contrite. "I don t know why it is that people never seem to be able to act natural with me." He hated those who did, regarding them as sodden, ...
— The Price She Paid • David Graham Phillips
... bishop, already a venerated Father, consulted by the whole Catholic world, and he tells us all that. He tells it in a serious and contrite way, with a manifest anxiety to attribute to God, as the sole cause, all the benefits which embellished his childhood, as well as to deplore his faults and wretchedness, fatal consequence of the original Fall. And still, we can make out clearly that these suave and far-off ...
— Saint Augustin • Louis Bertrand
... Contrite, he set her down while the audience went hysterical. He set her down on a grassy mound and she threw him a red, angry look while the traces of tears were quickly drying. And he noticed that the other stocking was in the same condition. When he returned ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... to the blaze of the sun at noonday, or a drop of water to the boundless ocean. Yet, wondrous thought! from this worthless soul of mine there may roll in a revenue of glory which He who loves the broken and contrite spirit will "not despise." "Herein is my Father glorified, that ...
— The Words of Jesus • John R. Macduff
... laid a contrite hand upon his shoulder. "You're a better man than I am, Jack," he asserted humbly. "But it's hell for me to stand back and let you go into this thing alone. I've got piles of confidence in you, old boy—but Jose never got that medal by saying ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... she had lost the grace of God out of her heart. Oh, how wretched she felt! Would God forgive her again? Yes; she knew he would; for she had read that, "The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart, and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit." This thought was a great comfort to her. But, oh! what about her teacher? How could her teacher ever love and respect her again? She would ask her pardon as soon as possible, but ...
— The value of a praying mother • Isabel C. Byrum
... Ally was contrite; she raised her face to her sister to be kissed. "I can't get up," she said, "I'm feeding Baby. He'd howl if ...
— The Three Sisters • May Sinclair
... shouting dies, The captains and the kings depart— Still stands thine ancient sacrifice, An humble and a contrite heart. Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet, Lest we ...
— Standard Selections • Various
... grew superstitious To hear the mourners wail. The great man, self-degraded, So sighed his contrite tale In notes that failed for sobbing, To feel Heaven's sentence well, That took away his Isaac And ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... understanding, are incapable of beholding the Holy One. The first lesson in the school of personal holiness is, to fear and hide our face before the Holiness of God. 'Thus saith the High and Lofty One, whose name is holy, I dwell in the High and Holy Place, and with him that is of a contrite and humble spirit.' Contrition, brokenness of spirit, fear and trembling are God's first demand of those who would ...
— Holy in Christ - Thoughts on the Calling of God's Children to be Holy as He is Holy • Andrew Murray
... simplicity in taking such a journey. But no sooner did he reach his Melchester lodging than he found awaiting him a letter which had arrived that morning a few minutes after he had left the house. It was a contrite little note from Sue, in which she said, with sweet humility, that she felt she had been horrid in telling him he was not to come to see her, that she despised herself for having been so conventional; and that he was to be sure to come by the eleven-forty-five train that very Sunday, ...
— Jude the Obscure • Thomas Hardy
... to Him for cleansing. As we do so, we shall find that His precious Blood is continuously cleansing us from sin, and that "the tide is being continuously healed at its beginning," and Jesus is continuously filling us with His Spirit. This demands that we must be men of "a humble and contrite spirit," that is, men who are willing to be shown the smallest thing. But such are the ones, God says, who "dwell with Him in the high and holy place,"[footnote13:Is.57:15] ...
— The Calvary Road • Roy Hession
... women who forgive; but Amelia does more—she not only forgives, but she forgets. The passage in which she exhibits to her contrite husband the letter received long before from Miss Matthews is one of the noblest in literature; and if it had been recorded that Fielding—like Thackeray on a memorable occasion—had here slapped his fist upon the ...
— Fielding - (English Men of Letters Series) • Austin Dobson
... inquisitorial; as seemed to him to befit one charged with the cure of souls. He proceeded to ask questions, beginning with inquiries conventional and domestic, but verging presently on points of faith. Babcock, to whom they were directly addressed, stood the ordeal well, revealing himself as flattered, contrite, and zealous to avail himself of the blessings of the church. He admitted that lately he had been ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... and had visited the Chevalier de Blois almost at cockcrow. She charged him insolently with being privy to the attachment between the young people; pursued him with vulgar rebukes about beggary, Popery, and French adventurers. Her husband had to make a very contrite apology afterwards for the language which his wife had thought fit to employ. "You forbid me," said the Chevalier, "you forbid Mademoiselle de Blois to marry your son, Mr. Thomas! No, madam, she comes of ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... gazed long on its tarnished hue, And mourned the fix he'd gotten in; Then filled his eyes with contrite dew, As in its folds his nose he blew, And thus addressed his model ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol I, Issue I, January 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... suns stifled again the vanity of human conceit and I stood with soul unbared and worshipful beneath the vista of incommensurate space wherein the birth and death of worlds marks the unending roll of time. And at my side a silent gazing woman stood, contrite and humble and the thrill and quiver of her body filled me with a joy ...
— City of Endless Night • Milo Hastings
... was no fairy princess but a contrite little girl who approached her mother's side ...
— A Book of Quaker Saints • Lucy Violet Hodgkin
... hypocrite and the no-thing the infidel.' (Q.) 'Tell me of various kinds of hearts.' (A.) 'There is the whole [or perfect] heart, which is that of [Abraham] the Friend [of God], the sick heart, that of the infidel, the contrite heart, that of the pious, fearful ones, the heart consecrated to God, that of our Lord Mohammed (whom God bless and preserve) and the enlightened [or enlightening] heart, that of those who follow him. The hearts of the learned are ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume IV • Anonymous
... when Jesus and the Virgin appeared to him with a retinue of angels. He made bold to ask an unheard-of privilege, that of plenary indulgence of all sins for all those who, having confessed and being contrite, should visit this chapel. Jesus granted this at his mother's request, on the sole condition that his vicar the pope ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier
... at once mollified by the contrite, submissive air of his future son-in-law: "Upon the foundation of the mince-meat of two hams of Westphalia,—or, if you cannot get them, of two hams of our habitans,—place scientifically the nicely-cut pieces of a fat turkey, leaving his head to stick out of the upper crust, in evidence that ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... meant, but he plays draw poker sometimes. Anyway there was eleven people came including the minister, and after they had talked about the neighbors a spell, and Ma had showed the women a new tidy she had worked for the heathen, with a motto on it which Pa had taught her: 'A contrite heart beats a bob-tailed flush,'—and Pa had talked to the men about a religious silver mine he was selling stock in, which he advised them as a friend to buy for the glory of the church, they all went in the back parlor and ...
— Peck's Compendium of Fun • George W. Peck
... written that we are to confess our sins to man, but always to God. 'A broken and a contrite heart, O Lord, Thou wilt not despise.' In the Epistle of James (chapter verse 16), he says, 'Confess your faults to one another, and pray for one another, that ye may be healed'; that is to say, if you have trespassed one against ...
— The Last Look - A Tale of the Spanish Inquisition • W.H.G. Kingston
... they reached home she was contrite and spiritless. She was Mrs Angel Clare, indeed, but had she any moral right to the name? Was she not more truly Mrs Alexander d'Urberville? Could intensity of love justify what might be considered in upright souls as culpable ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... prerogative and pardoned him? That we can never know. Some think that Peter did not intend to execute the sentence. At any rate, he was mercifully delivered from his dilemma. Alexis, frightened and apparently contrite, was seized with a fit of apoplexy, and ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VIII • John Lord
... with an object, and he was distressed by the unwonted want of wisdom through which he had been drawn to overshoot his object. His design to excite a touch of the insane emotion in Clara's bosom was too successful, and, "I was not thinking of her," he said to himself in his candour, contrite. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... the old Lavretsky could not forgive his son for his marriage. If, at the end of six months, Ivan Petrovich had appeared before him with contrite mien, and had fallen at his feet, the old man would, perhaps, have pardoned the offender—after having soundly abused him, and given him a tap with his crutch by way of frightening him. But Ivan Petrovich went on living abroad, and, apparently, troubled himself but little about ...
— Liza - "A nest of nobles" • Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
... is one long cry for pardon and restoration, one can discern an order and progress in its petitions—the order, not of an artificial reproduction of a past mood of mind, but the instinctive order in which the emotion of contrite desire will ever pour itself forth. In the psalm all begins, as all begins in fact, with the grounding of the cry for favour on "Thy loving-kindness," "the multitude of Thy tender mercies;" the one plea that avails with ...
— The Life of David - As Reflected in His Psalms • Alexander Maclaren
... o'clock I was wakened by the furious ringing of the telephone bell. It was Gordon at the station, about to resume his journey to Washington. He was in quite a contrite mood about the asylum, and apologized largely for refusing to look at my children. It was not that he didn't like orphans, he said; it was just that he didn't like them in juxtaposition to me. And to prove his good intentions, he would send ...
— Dear Enemy • Jean Webster
... deuoute prayer, sincerely vnited to a contrite heart, powring out a fountaine of teares with a stedfast beliefe to be deliuered. I found my selfe in a short space gotten at libertie, like a new day crept out of a darke and tempestuous night. My eyes ...
— Hypnerotomachia - The Strife of Loue in a Dreame • Francesco Colonna
... knew it wasn't right and I felt awfully about it—but then, Harry and I couldn't have managed otherwise, and it takes years and years to save a thousand dollars!" she looked so sweet and pitiful and contrite as she said this that I forgave her everything and hugged her till she choked. It seemed a shame to spoil her happiness with reproaches, and I couldn't but think how I'd have felt myself if it had been Mor— Not ...
— The Motormaniacs • Lloyd Osbourne
... man later," he said, "and hope that my words will make some impression upon him. There was a trace of exaltation in his recital that showed no sign of a contrite spirit." ...
— The O'Ruddy - A Romance • Stephen Crane
... enrich the believer. We cannot indeed enhance his glory by the most splendid liberalities, or the most costly offerings; but he solemnly requires, and graciously deigns to accept our penitence and our obedience. "The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise." Whatever be the present state of the world, it is pleasing to reflect that an omnipotent Providence is hastening the triumphs of Christ; and to this wise and glorious King of Israel, all the tribes of the earth shall ultimately ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. I • Francis Augustus Cox
... portion was laid aside and dedicated to their gods, with various mysterious ceremonies; for here, as in other places where the gospel is not known, the poor savages fancied that they could propitiate God with sacrifices. They had never heard of the "sacrifice of a broken spirit and a contrite heart." This offering being made, the feast began in earnest. Not only was it a rule in this feast that every mouthful should be swallowed by each guest, however unwilling and unable he should be to do so, but he who could dispose of it with greatest speed was deemed the greatest man—at ...
— The Dog Crusoe and his Master • R.M. Ballantyne
... tumult and the shouting dies— The Captains and the Kings depart. Still stands Thine ancient Sacrifice, An humble and a contrite heart.[164-1] Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet, ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... of our death-beds, Mrs. Godber,—peace, as I humbly presume to hope, the peace of christian charity and mutual forgiveness. Frail creatures that we are! the best will need forgiveness; the guiltiest, I trust, who brings a contrite heart, will not ask it in vain." Then, after a pause, he added solemnly—"You also, Mrs. Godber, will ...
— Walladmor: - And Now Freely Translated from the German into English. - In Two Volumes. Vol. II. • Thomas De Quincey
... he returned to Ahneota and told him what had occurred. The old chief seemed contrite after his debauch, but did not mention it. As Rodney left him he said: "Better be Ahneota's brother," but the boy shook his head, saying: "You know why I ...
— Rodney, the Ranger - With Daniel Morgan on Trail and Battlefield • John V. Lane
... of humanity which overthrew the old order and brought in the fraternal society was not primarily or consciously a godward aspiration at all. It was essentially a humane movement. It was a melting and flowing forth of men's hearts toward one another, a rush of contrite, repentant tenderness, an impassioned impulse of mutual love and self-devotion to the common weal. But 'if we love one another God dwelleth in us,' and so men found it. It appears that there came a moment, the most transcendent moment in the history of the race of man, when with the fraternal ...
— Equality • Edward Bellamy
... father! Pardon me! Thy love, Generous and wise as tender, shames my power To merit or repay. Fie o my lips! Look if they be not blistered. Let them smooth With contrite kisses the last frown away. We must be young to-night—no wrinkles then! Genius must show immortal ...
— The Poems of Emma Lazarus - Vol. I (of II.), Narrative, Lyric, and Dramatic • Emma Lazarus
... again by showing great devoutness, by offering bullocks and goats without number, as sin-offerings and peace-offerings; but that made him no happier. At last he found out that God required no sacrifice but a broken heart. That was what God wanted—a broken and a contrite heart; for David to be utterly ashamed of himself, utterly broken down and silenced, so that he had nothing left to plead—neither past good deeds, nor present devoutness, nor sacrifices: nothing but, 'O God, I deserve all Thou ...
— Sermons for the Times • Charles Kingsley
... exultation, gave beyond their means, and a great many of them with unintentional irony gave pickle dishes. By the time they were ready to go into their new home, it was cosily, even handsomely furnished. The General, contrite of heart, spent money lavishly in trying to make the home so attractive for Eddie that he wouldn't be likely to desert ...
— Her Weight in Gold • George Barr McCutcheon
... heard these words of conformity to the traditions of dignified betrothal. And for once in her life, so bottled and so sealed, she looked, as if through the magic crystal of her mother's words, absolutely, helplessly foolish. It is difficult for a genie in a bottle to look contrite or stricken with anything deeper than astonishment; nor is it practicable in such a situation to fall upon one's knees,—if a genie were to feel such an impulse of self-abasement. It was perhaps a comfort to all concerned, including a new-comer, that Imogen should be reduced to the silence ...
— A Fountain Sealed • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... into depths of contrite peace, no longer able to suffer the pain of dread, and sending forth, as he sank, a faint prayer. Ah yes, he would still be spared; he would repent in his heart and be forgiven; and then those above, those in heaven, would see what he would do to ...
— A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man • James Joyce
... and which I despair of being able adequately to depict. He did all that a good and true man could do to eradicate the causes of the mischief. He participated in the exercises of a day of Thanksgiving, set apart for the purpose, in 1700, to express the devout and contrite gratitude of the people to a merciful God for deliverance from the errors and passions that had overwhelmed them with such awful judgments. The removal of Mr. Parris having been effected, Joseph Green was settled near the close ...
— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham
... suggested some acts of contrition. The poor Prince repeated distinctly several words suggested to him, and confusedly answered others, struck his breast, squeezed the Cure's hand, appeared penetrated with the best sentiments, and received with a contrite and willing air ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... valise over my shoulder I returned to the hall to take leave of my hostess. Now she seemed somewhat contrite. Fate and she had conquered, I was going away, and she was ...
— A Bicycle of Cathay • Frank R. Stockton
... remembers the European War that gave it birth; it thinks of its mates scanning the sky for its coming; its frivolity ebbs suddenly. The eastern sky becomes once more its highway instead of its trapeze. It collects its wits, emits a few contrite bubbles of smoke, and ...
— Living Alone • Stella Benson
... how often he had charged too much for work done, or how often the gospodarze had refused to come to terms with the squire about rights of grazing or wood-gathering in the forests, and he felt contrite. Good Lord! how beautifully the squire had spoken to them: 'Let us help each other and live peaceably like ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... sinners not worthy of Thy care or goodness, sunk deep in the mire of evil living and evil 'abits, nevertheless, oh God, we, knowing Thy loving 'eart towards Thy sinful servants, do pray Thee that Thou wilt give us Thy blessing before we leave this Thy 'ouse this night; a new contrite 'eart is what we beg of Thee, that we may go out into this evil world taught by Thee to search out our ways and improve our thoughts, caring for nothing but Thee, following in Thy footsteps and making ready for Thy immediate Coming, which will be in Thine own good ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... letter was the one Valencia had sent him, inclosing the one written by her grandfather to her father. Her contrite little note went straight to his emotions. If not in words, at least in spirit, it pleaded for pardon. Even the telegram she had wired implied an undeniable interest in him. Dick went with a light heart to the interview she had ...
— A Daughter of the Dons - A Story of New Mexico Today • William MacLeod Raine
... Ark-steps, and stalked back solemnly to his seat. As he passed Simeon Samuels, that gentleman whipped out his hand and grasped the man of God's, and his neighbours testified that there was a look of contrite ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill
... or reject the Saviour. It is upon his shoulder the key of the house is laid (Isa 22:22). Christ only has the key, no MAN openeth or shutteth (Rev 1:18, 3:7). All that man can do, as to binding or loosening, is to warn the hardened and to invite the contrite. ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... to know that among a thousand such traditional, conventional, feeble editions of their grandfathers as Mr. Harry Robinson, you cannot find one original, independent, individualized gentleman like your Prince! Go to bed, miss, and pray to Heaven that he may be YOUR Prince indeed. Ask to have a contrite and grateful heart, and thank the Lord in particular for having sent you such a friend as Kate Van Corlear." Yet, after an imposing dramatic exit, she reappeared the next moment as a straight white flash, kissed Carry between the brows, ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte
... of it is reflected from the mirror of the understanding. She did not see that no incapacity of science to find God, even touched the matter of honest men's belief that He made His dwelling with the humble and contrite. Nothing she had learned from her father either provided her with reply, or gave hope of finding argument of discomfiture; nothing of all that went on at chapel or church seemed to have any thing to do with ...
— Paul Faber, Surgeon • George MacDonald
... therewith her confessions of her terrors for the future, pointing out to him how much they were both to blame, and discoursing so beautifully to him, gave utterance to such Christian sentences, ornamented with holy tears and contrite prayers, that Jehan was touched to the quick by the sincerity of his mistress. This love innocently united to repentance, this nobility in sin, this mixture of weakness and strength, would, as the old authors say, have changed the nature of a tiger, melting ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 3 • Honore de Balzac
... had not drunk too much, I should have stopped playing when I saw I was losing," went on Cedric in a contrite tone; "but they plied me with liquor, and I got reckless, and then I knew no more till I found myself in bed with my ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... or assumed contrite concern. "Excuse me, Latisan, but is it true that Mr. Flagg has ...
— Joan of Arc of the North Woods • Holman Day
... cheek; and his one front tooth seemed sometimes in his upper, sometimes in his lower jaw. His skull-cap and his gabardine might have been heirlooms from the Patriarch Jacob; and his poor hands seemed made for clawing. But there was a humble and contrite spirit in his sad eyes. The history of his race was written in them; but it was modern history that one read in their ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke
... have forgotten those words," said Eleanor—"'Where is the house that ye build unto me, and where is the place of my rest? ... to this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word.' You will find that ...
— The Old Helmet, Volume II • Susan Warner
... again in his mind's eye the scene in the crevasse when Bower had raised his ax to strike. "Quite serious," he replied, and the gravity in his voice was so marked that Helen placed a contrite hand on his arm ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... psalms of deep repentance, of the broken and the contrite heart, like that famous 51st Psalm, which is used in all Christian churches to this day, as the expression of all true repentance, and which, even in our translation, by its awful simplicity, its slow sadness, expresses ...
— True Words for Brave Men • Charles Kingsley
... Snorky, who was genuinely contrite and ready to make the advance, "that certainly was hard luck. I feel just as bad as—" Here he stopped before the sudden majestic indignation ...
— Skippy Bedelle - His Sentimental Progress From the Urchin to the Complete - Man of the World • Owen Johnson
... Constantinople!—Mother of God!—Christ is here!—Hosannas to the Son and to the Immaculate Mother!" With these, and other like exclamations, the mass precipitated itself forward, and, crowding near the historic symbol, flung themselves on the floor before it, grovelling and contrite, if not conquered. ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy: I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the ...
— The Approach to Philosophy • Ralph Barton Perry
... day to that contrite youth. He never believed it would all be got over so easily. He had dreaded all sorts of scenes and lectures and humiliations, but here he was, by a single word, passed back straight into friendship, ...
— The Fifth Form at Saint Dominic's - A School Story • Talbot Baines Reed
... punishment shall I fell absolved and restored in the sight of Heaven; then only shall I account myself worthy to say to Jesus my Saviour: 'Give ear to me, innocent victim, Thou who heardest the penitent thief; give ear to a sullied but contrite victim, who has shared in the glory of Thy martyrdom and been ...
— Mauprat • George Sand
... exercise that love which Christ demands of His followers. That which most particularly appealed to her in her new faith was that it did not promise joys to the rich who could make great sacrifices, but to the miserable sinner who with a contrite heart yearned for forgiveness, to the poor and abject, towards whom she felt as though they belonged to the same family as herself. And her valiant spirit could not be satisfied with intentions but longed to act upon them. In Besa she could set to work with ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... it was that Jesus was at all times ready to take upon Himself the burden of our sins, provided we came to Him with a humble and contrite spirit, and begged His help. This doctrine was new to me; I had often been at church, but had never heard it preached before, at least so distinctly. When he said that all men might be saved, I shook, for I expected he would add, all except those who had committed the ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... heart in sore distress that sighs, Looks to the Christ His succour to impart; And God receives the pleasing sacrifice, A broken spirit, and a contrite heart. ...
— Hymns from the Morningland - Being Translations, Centos and Suggestions from the Service - Books of the Holy Eastern Church • Various
... have looked frightened, for she became suddenly contrite, and, throwing her arms about me, rated herself for the things she had said, saying that she knew I wasn't to blame, and that it was only her love for me and Theobald which made her ...
— The Story of Bawn • Katharine Tynan
... rather wishest thyself a true professor, to be as they are, as thou thyself hast been heretofore; which is an evident token thou art in no such desperate case. 'Tis a good sign of thy conversion, thy sins are pardonable, thou art, or shalt surely be reconciled. "The Lord is near them that are of a contrite heart," Luke iv. 18. [6784]A true desire of mercy in the want of mercy, is mercy itself; a desire of grace in the want of grace, is grace itself; a constant and earnest desire to believe, repent, and to be reconciled to God, if ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... pardon," he said in contrite tones for his seeming awkwardness, and as he said it two darting fingers and the thumb of his right hand found and invaded the little slit of the stranger's waistcoat pocket, whisking out the check which the stranger had but a moment before, with Trencher ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... my honour—nothing worse. The money's bad enough." And the trouble came out in a quick rush of words—explanatory, contrite, despairing—all in one breath. For the Boy had Irish blood in his veins; and the initial difficulty over, he found it an unspeakable relief to disburden his soul to the man who had "brothered" him ever since ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver
... misdeed burst upon me; my step-mother's horrified countenance and the baby's frightened screams were a simultaneous and forcible indication of what awful results may spring from a trifling source. I became angry with myself, for once, and with a very contrite countenance, I went towards my step-mother and held my arms out repentantly, offering to soothe the refractory ...
— The Doctor's Daughter • "Vera"
... both demonstration and fruition, but how attenuated are our demonstration and realization of this Science! Truth, in divine Science, is the stepping-stone to the understanding of God; but the broken and contrite heart soonest discerns this truth, even as the helpless sick are soonest healed by it. Invalids say, "I have recovered from sickness;" when the fact really remains, in divine Science, that they never ...
— Unity of Good • Mary Baker Eddy
... not untrue, and in other things most earnest men amongst us, do not yet know sufficiently the weakness and the evil of their own hearts, that I wish much, if they will allow me, to put them on their guard. ''Tis hard,' said Contrite, who was a householder and had a vote in the town of Vanity, ''tis hard keeping our hearts and our spirits in any good order when we are in a cumbered condition. And you may be sure that we are full of hurry at fair-time. ...
— Bunyan Characters - First Series • Alexander Whyte
... accumulated disasters, a hint to direct his sword's point against his breast; a man of better faith would have turned his eye back on his own conduct, and having read, in his misuse of prosperity, the original source of those calamities, would have remained patient and contrite under the consequences of his ambition. Napoleon belonged to the Roman school of philosophy; and it is confidently reported, especially by Baron Fain, his secretary, though it has not been universally believed, that he designed, at this extremity, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 264, July 14, 1827 • Various
... fresh courage, as the words of the great prayer began to return to her memory, the voices now mingled in the same majestic words from, oh, such different hearts—the one, pure and confiding, and the other now contrite ...
— Paula the Waldensian • Eva Lecomte
... severely that it was a trick, a very palpable trick, and that he must ever be on the alert for all such kinds of evasion. Finally, when I had informed him how badly he had let us all down, he waddled away contrite and tearful, and fully under the impression, I think, that I should probably lose my commission through ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 156, April 9, 1919 • Various
... so that she might feel sure he wouldn't run away. When at last, rather blown and perspiring, they reached the camp, Eleanor got out of the wagon and said she wanted to "help"; but Edith, still contrite about the "thread," said: "Not I'm not going to have you hurt your lovely hands!" In the late afternoon, having saved Eleanor's hands in every possible way, she left them, and thinking, without the slightest rancor, of the rough bliss she was not asked to ...
— The Vehement Flame • Margaret Wade Campbell Deland
... drew near, Gloria promptly turned her back and studied her nails; she had had encounters with men before now and had not yet gauged the profundity of this man's emotion. She counted fully on bringing him to a full and contrite sense of his crime before she condescended so much as to look at him. But when she flashed him a quick, furtive glance she saw that he had his back upon her, and that he gave neither hint of softening ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory
... bestowed no thought on June—pretty, helpless June, watching with distressed, bewildered eyes while Dan unaccountably changed towards her, his moods alternating from sullen unresponsiveness to a kind of forced and contrite tenderness which she had found almost more difficult to meet ...
— The Lamp of Fate • Margaret Pedler
... tales; I know my 'cello could," said the Grey One. "Beth, dear, I am touching wood, and praying to preserve 'an humble and a contrite heart,' but reeking with commerce. Sold three pictures—real pictures. The one that was hanging at Torvin's so long was sold four days ago, and ...
— Fate Knocks at the Door - A Novel • Will Levington Comfort
... new and strange experience—droll in one way, grotesque in another and when everything is said, tragic: at least an adventure. Harriet looks at me accusingly, and I have had to preserve the air of one deeply contrite now for two days (no easy accomplishment for me!), even though in secret ...
— Adventures In Contentment • David Grayson
... one had accused her of feeling very meritorious over not having allowed herself to be hurt at his rudeness to her or annoyed at the way he had demolished their evening's plans, and of hoping to make him feel a little contrite by showing him how sweet she was about it, she might, with a rueful grin, have acknowledged a tincture of truth about the charge; but she didn't discover it by herself. As she dreamed out the little scene, riding down-town in the car, she'd come stealing up behind him as he sat, bent wearily ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... your raptured souls inspire. Hark how the tuneful, solemn organs blow, Awfully strong, elaborately slow; Now to you empyrean seats above Raise meditation on the wings of love. Now falling, sinking, dying to the moan Once warbled sad by Jesse's contrite son; Breathe in each note a conscience through the sense, And call forth tears ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton
... him; he felt a little contrite, too—he remembered how her voice had suddenly dragged and fallen flat at his abrupt farewell.... She was disappointed in his reception of her offers of peace—she had been incapable of appreciating the attitude his sophistication was bound to take up ...
— Joanna Godden • Sheila Kaye-Smith
... his unhappy marriage. "Took it all for granted—thought they knew it—forgot they didn't belong to that gang—your gang, my gang, Nevile's gang. Rotten of me, my dear, but there you are." Mrs. John understood him to feel more contrite than he appeared. And next he lauded Sanchia, after his own manner. As thus: "A queer young fish. You can't judge her by the rules of the game. She shows her strength by breaking 'em. She'd break anything and anybody. ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett
... at length to peer above the heads of the others in that miserable, crowded room. The dark faces of weary men and women, heavy with Old-World, inherited woe, showed in the gloom. The short, shaking man on the chair, dully contrite for his spasm of rage, was cringing before Kate, who stood there, amazingly tall among these low-statured beings. Never had she looked to Ray so like an eagle, so keen, so fierce, so fit for braving either sun or tenebrous cavern. She dominated ...
— The Precipice • Elia Wilkinson Peattie
... impulse, the contrite maiden threw her arms around her neck, saying, in a subdued voice, "You must not be so kind to me—it will ...
— Philothea - A Grecian Romance • Lydia Maria Child
... never in his life felt such repulsion as toward what seemed to him this facile, theatrical remorse. If Guion was really contrite, if he really wanted to relieve the world of his presence, he could blow his brains out. Ashley had known, or known of, so many who had resorted to this ready remedy for a desperate plight that it seemed simple. His thoughts were too complex, however, for immediate expression, and, before ...
— The Street Called Straight • Basil King
... declarations in the word of God. He sees with admiration that the high and lofty One, that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy, who dwelleth in the high and holy place, dwelleth with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit (Isa. lvii. 15); and although heaven is his throne, and the earth his footstool, yet, when a house is to be built and a place of rest to be sought for himself, he says, "To this man will I look, even to him that ...
— The Annals of the Poor • Legh Richmond
... on the contrary, when his situation is such that he may only hope for distinction by the practice of the most parsimonious frugality, he will as often appear in the social and propelling season of youth enduring voluntary privations with an equanimity which the ostentatious fanatic or contrite penitent would in vain attempt to surpass. This peculiar feature of the self-sustained mind of genius has often been misunderstood, and seldom valued as it ought to be. The presumptuous weak who mistake ...
— The Life, Studies, And Works Of Benjamin West, Esq. • John Galt
... your Holiness, not to give me so many years but so many souls." "And in what way do you desire to have souls?" rejoined the Pope. "I wish," added Francis, "that it may be the good pleasure of Your Holiness, that those persons who enter the Church of St. Mary of the Angels, are contrite, shall have confessed their sins, and have properly received absolution, may receive an entire remission of their sins, as well in this world as in the next, from their baptism, to the time of their so entering ...
— The Life and Legends of Saint Francis of Assisi • Father Candide Chalippe
... come that we shall see one another. My Lord and Saviour, it is surely time for me to be taken out of this banishment and be for ever with Thee. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart, O God, Thou wilt not despise. Cast me not away from Thy presence, and take not Thy Holy Spirit away from me. Create in me a clean heart, O God.' 'A broken and a contrite heart; a broken and a contrite heart,' was her continual cry till she died with these ...
— Santa Teresa - an Appreciation: with some of the best passages of the Saint's Writings • Alexander Whyte
... religious poems. Now, men are very seldom really religious and contrite, except after an excess. Following a debauch a man signs the pledge, vows chastity, writes fervently of asceticism and the need of living in the spirit and not in the senses. Good pictures show best on a dark back-ground. Men talk most ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard |
