"Fault" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... which, if I understood her right, you thought of introducing the notice which you wrote for Hayter's drawings of me in Juliet. She said that you wished to know whether I had any objection or dislike to your doing so, and I answered directly to yourself, "None in the world." I had but one fault to find with that notice of me, that it was far too full of praise; I thought it so sincerely. But, without wishing to enter into any discussion about my merits or your partiality, I can only repeat that you are free to write ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... create the "impression" wished. I have to acknowledge some obligations to Messrs. Seccombe & Scott's /Praise of Oxford/, a book the pages of which an Oxford man can always turn over with pleasure, and to Mr. J. B. Firth's /Minstrelsy of Isis/; it is not his fault that the poetic merit of so much of his collection is poor. Oxford has not on the whole been fortunate in her poets. My own quotations are more often chosen for their local colour than for ...
— The Charm of Oxford • J. Wells
... Mr. Skillcorn, with the air of a person who was at fault on no other point;—"the big trees give more ...
— Queechy • Susan Warner
... really believed all they say about wimmen, and I think some on 'em do in a dreamy sentimental way—If wimmen are angels, give 'em the rights of angels. Who ever hearn of a angel foldin' up her wings and goin' to a poor-house or jail through the fault of somebody else? Who ever hearn of a angel bein' dragged off to police court for fightin' to defend her children and herself from a drunken husband that had broke her wings and blacked her eyes, got the angel into the fight and then she ...
— Samantha on the Woman Question • Marietta Holley
... Finally, fault was found with Jesus Christ, as with His Church, on precisely these two points. When He was living the life of retirement in the country He was rebuked that He did not go up to the feast and state His claims plainly—justify, ...
— Paradoxes of Catholicism • Robert Hugh Benson
... achieve something approaching skill in handling their brushes, so that parents might be satisfied. For, poor girl, she found what most teachers do, that when a child does not progress, it is always the instructor's fault, not that of ...
— The Bag of Diamonds • George Manville Fenn
... of this story 'His One Fault' was absent-mindedness. He forgot to lock his uncle's stable door, and the horse was stolen. In seeking to recover the stolen horse, he unintentionally stole another. In trying to restore the wrong horse to his rightful owner, he was himself ...
— Breaking Away - or The Fortunes of a Student • Oliver Optic
... the vicar. "What has occurred to John is not owing to any fault of his." In his own mind the good man excused himself by saying that John could not have helped falling in love with Mrs. Goddard. But his wife turned ...
— A Tale of a Lonely Parish • F. Marion Crawford
... in India, if he can help it. Every mark of obedience to the legal authority of the Company is by him condemned; and if there is any virtue remaining in India, as I think there is, it is not his fault that it ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XI. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... tried to assure her that the fault was not hers, was convinced that the money would be found, and went on talking a lot of nonsense until Mrs. Hopkins ...
— The Rebel of the School • Mrs. L. T. Meade
... First cherished his memory as warmly as his life, advanced his friends, and designed to raise a magnificent monument to his memory;[244] and if any one accused the duke, the king always imputed the fault to himself. The king said, "Let not the duke's enemies seek to catch at any of his offices, for they will find themselves deceived." Charles called Buckingham "his martyr!" and often said the world was much mistaken in ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli
... amiable and gracious as his lively emotion would permit. M. Moriaz was obliged to confess to himself that Count Larinski was as good company at Cormeilles as he had been at Saint Moritz, and had no other fault than having taken it into his ...
— Samuel Brohl & Company • Victor Cherbuliez
... not," replied Edgar, as he sat down to have his helmet affixed to the dress. "The best made articles are liable to possess flaws. Even the most perfect railway-wheel, in which the cleverest engineer alive might fail to detect a fault, may conceal a dangerous flaw. There is no certainty in human affairs. All we can say is that, when we consider the thousands of divers who are daily employed all over the world, accidents of the kind you have just witnessed are not numerous. If I were to refrain from going down ...
— Under the Waves - Diving in Deep Waters • R M Ballantyne
... "It's all my fault," she said. "I'm to blame more than anybody else. It was me that brought her here in the first place and me that kept you from tellin' her the truth in the beginnin'. So it's me who must ...
— Kent Knowles: Quahaug • Joseph C. Lincoln
... well, colonel," said the count, "that no one suspected you. The absence of secrecy in the duel put the police at fault. Had you been supposed to be carrying those papers, you would never have reached ...
— A Diplomatic Adventure • S. Weir Mitchell
... said Mr. Slope, "but that was because nobody else happened to be in the room. Surely it was no fault of mine if the rest of the family ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... roadhouse down yonder," I said, pointing towards a resort which yet goes by the LaHume name, and one which does not enjoy a reputation any too savory. Of course this is not the fault of the elder LaHume, who has since made a fortune in the hotel business. I could see that the ...
— John Henry Smith - A Humorous Romance of Outdoor Life • Frederick Upham Adams
... it's so silly!" said Marjorie; "I don't know what to make of Delight. It isn't a bit Glad's fault. She was as sweet as pie; but Delight ...
— Marjorie's New Friend • Carolyn Wells
... be making them feel that you are their partner and friend in a mighty difficult business. You told us yesterday that your ancestors not only made the trail but also the law of the trail. What are you doing? It's your own fault if you ...
— Still Jim • Honore Willsie Morrow
... wasn't I told? Is he married? Has he children? What does it matter whose fault it was?" she cried, her questions pouring out disconnectedly on a wave of anger ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton
... leaders in fashion; it directs invention to the minuti of dress, and confirms the sway of the conventional, so as to give la mode the force of social law to an extent unknown elsewhere. The tyranny and caprice of fashion were as characteristic in Montaigne's day as at present. "I find fault with their especial indiscretion," he says, "in suffering themselves to be so imposed upon and blinded by the authority of the present custom as every month to alter their opinion." "In this country," writes Yorick, "nothing must be spared ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... the reply, "but it will be the fault of the patient, not the cure. Besides, what does it matter whether you ...
— In the Forbidden Land • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... her sweet pale face and soft voice! He thought of all this, and of his own love and friendship for her,—of Edith's love for her! He thought of it all, and he could not believe that she was guilty. There was some other fault, some much lesser fault than that, with which she charged herself. But there she lay at his feet, and it was necessary that he should do something towards lifting her ...
— Orley Farm • Anthony Trollope
... it; but, reflecting upon our meeting, I was not able to deny that she had been very much moved. Now, should it be true, I thought to myself, what on earth was I to do? What, indeed, were the MERITS of the case? Was the fault mine—and how could I best repair it? These questions were beyond my then powers of resolution while I was uncertain of Aurelia's fate and prospects, and I deliberately put them aside. I turned all my powers of mind and ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... a nuisance; but for all that it must not be allowed to interfere with the course that lay before the rising lawyer. Business is business after all, and if Cruden is a swindler, whose fault is it if Cruden's mother breaks her heart? Not S.S.'s, at any rate. But S.S.'s fault it would be if he made a mess of this "big job"! That was a reproach no one should lay at ...
— Reginald Cruden - A Tale of City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... trying to find a short way to Little Hintock this last half-hour, Mrs. Dollery," he said. "But though I've been to Great Hintock and Hintock House half a dozen times I am at fault about the small village. You can help me, ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... you," Tiger answered. "And I'll give it to you straight. I'm partly at fault. Mostly so, it may be. Let me assume all the blame, at any rate. I'm not sparing myself and have no intention of doing so. My conduct, I admit, was beastly. No excuses offered. All I want to do, now, is to make ...
— The Air Trust • George Allan England
... images compressed together. But the idea expressed is a fine one—the courage of the insect challenging the sun, and only chanting more and more as the heat and the thirst increase. The poem has, if you like, the fault of exaggeration, but the colour and music are very fine; and even the exaggeration itself has the merit of making the ...
— Books and Habits from the Lectures of Lafcadio Hearn • Lafcadio Hearn
... Thoreau's ear was sometimes at fault, I do not recall that his eye ever was, while his mind was always honest. He had an instinct for the truth, and while we may admit that the truth he was in quest of in nature was not always scientific truth, or the truth of natural history, but ...
— The Wit of a Duck and Other Papers • John Burroughs
... of the old bondage of pure force. True. And the best and the wisest servants would now fall to the wisest and kindest masters. Oh, for power to hasten to-morrow's morning, that he might call to him again that menial band down in the yard, speak to them kindly, even of Cornelius's fault, bid them not blame the outcast resentfully, and assure them that never while love remained stronger in them than pride, need they shake the light dust of Rosemont from ...
— John March, Southerner • George W. Cable
... dragging of heavy bodies under the floors, the insecure rope-ladders, the trap-doors, cellars, underground passages, smugglers, murderers, victims, and all sorts of mixed mysteries, become tiresome. There is yet another fault, which is, that the story is not told in so convincing a style as to make the reader feel quite sure that the authoress is not "getting at him" all the time, and just trying to see what quantity of old melodramatic stuff ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, April 8, 1893 • Various
... may, my pretty dears, Add a pair of little ears; And, if Art is not in fault, There's a bag of ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... Evil of fault must not be done, that good may ensue; but evil of punishment must be inflicted for the sake ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I-II (Pars Prima Secundae) - From the Complete American Edition • Saint Thomas Aquinas
... been skimming through an illustrated book called "Noa Noa," by a Frenchman, which describes, or pretends to describe, a visit to Tahiti. There is not much fault to be found with it as a narrative, but the pictures of the natives are atrocious. Many of the figures are distorted, and all of them have a smutty look, as if they had been rubbed with lampblack or coal-dust. There is not one simple, honest presentation of the natural human form in the book. ...
— The Last Harvest • John Burroughs
... tale with a little salt, But it needs none, nevertheless, I was foil'd completely, fairly at fault, Dishearten'd, too, I confess. At the splitters' tent I had seen the track Of horse-hoofs fresh on the sward, And though Darby Lynch and Donovan Jack (Who could swear through a ten-inch board) Solemnly swore he had not been there, I was just as sure that they lied, For to ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... ordered last year. He wished his father to call together a ting[FN424] in order that he might show openly how he had performed his tasks. This was done, and the king and the queen and other great folk were assembled. First the tent was put forward and nobody could find fault with it. Secondly the young king gave the wondrous healing water to his father. The queen was prayed to taste it and see if it was the right water, taken at the right time. She said that both things were as they should be. Then said the old king, "Now the third ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... out and overheard him and made a scene in the gallery before Pinkney, the footman, who was bringing in the schoolroom tea. She said Eliot was clever enough and old enough to know better. They were all old enough. And Jerrold said it was his fault, not Eliot's, and Anne said it was hers, too. And Adeline declared that it was all their faults and she would have to speak to their father. She kept it up long after Eliot and Jerrold had retreated to the bathroom. If it had been anybody ...
— Anne Severn and the Fieldings • May Sinclair
... some oyster and broiled chicken, not however without paying for it an exorbitant price. I rather think, however, I shall go to the Stacy House again when next I visit Zanesville, for, on the whole, I have no fault to find with it. Starting at eight the next morning, we were four hours making the distance (59 miles) from Zanesville to Columbus. The road passes through a country of unsurpassed loveliness. Harvest fields, the most luxuriant, were everywhere in view. At nearly ...
— Minnesota and Dacotah • C.C. Andrews
... And I am tired of you. It's not your fault, and it's not mine. It is the fault of any house-party. People see too much of each other. I am glad I am going away to-morrow, and you'll be glad. And when we have been separated a month, you will rush up to see me, and say ...
— The Trumpeter Swan • Temple Bailey
... hair on her head at this moment. There is some peculiarity about them, perhaps some pride, too; but that is an amiable weakness," he added, laughing, as he rose to go: "Mrs. Gillespie, I am sure will not find fault with ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... freely acknowledged his fault and suggested flight homewards. Nestor advised him to call an Assembly and depute some of the leading men to make up the quarrel with Achilles. The King listened to him, offering to give Achilles his own daughter ...
— Authors of Greece • T. W. Lumb
... don't want to live for dress, to give all my time and thoughts to it; I don't wish to be extravagant: and yet I wish to be lady-like—it annoys and makes me unhappy not to be fresh and neat and nice, shabbiness and seediness are my aversion. I don't see where the fault is. Can one individual resist the whole current of society? It certainly is not strictly necessary for us girls to have half the things we do. We might, I suppose, live without many of them, and, as mamma says, look just as well, because girls did so before these things were invented. Now I ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... of the sandstones of the Foreland is not yet clearly made out, as they are cut off by a great fault ...
— The Student's Elements of Geology • Sir Charles Lyell
... pronounced a fault by some who believed they detected in him the potential capacity of rivalling Dante, Petrarch, and Ariosto on their own ground, had he only conserved his energies. This is a foolish supposition. Lorenzo's ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 8 - The Later Renaissance: From Gutenberg To The Reformation • Editor-in-Chief: Rossiter Johnson
... their effusively gracious condescension subsequently develops into snobbishness, or when an austere stiffness of demeanor belies the friendliness which they really intend to manifest. The latter fault is often due to diffidence or awkward self-consciousness; the former is usually traceable to the caprice of an undisciplined nature, and is a significant mark ...
— Etiquette • Agnes H. Morton
... and had understood it, and wished to give Orsino another opportunity of discussing his project. But if Del Ferice had seen the quick sign, he had probably interpreted it in a way compromising to Madame d'Aranjuez. This was serious, though it was assuredly not Orsino's fault if she compromised herself. She might have let him go without question, and since an explanation of some sort was necessary she might have waited until the next day to demand it of him. He resented what she had done, and yet within the last quarter of an hour, he had been making ...
— Don Orsino • F. Marion Crawford
... oracle of the democracy—one of those memorable demagogues who made use of the people to forward his ambitious projects. He was also the opponent of Cleon, whose office it was to supervise official men for the public conduct—a man of great eloquence, but fault-finding and denunciatory. ...
— Ancient States and Empires • John Lord
... "Leave fault-finding to Fleet Street," said Barron; "let the press people tell you where you are wrong. I am no critic and I know what a mountain of hard ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts
... down to the fault of the Septuagint or the allegorists or Philo that the Alexandrian development of Judaism led on to Roman Christianity. It is to be ascribed rather to the infirmity of human nature, which requires the ideas of its inspired teachers and peoples to be brought down ...
— Philo-Judaeus of Alexandria • Norman Bentwich
... slipped forward, letting him down, and, when he rose he saw the white tail whisking round a corner in the reeds. On he dashed down a narrow path, which twisted and turned so sharply that he could only see a few yards ahead; but he was never in fault, as when he could not see the game he could hear it plainly, so he never slackened. The chase went on always with the prospect of success tantalizingly before him, until at last he was at fault in a little clearing where the reeds had been beaten down, and from which there ...
— In Search of the Okapi - A Story of Adventure in Central Africa • Ernest Glanville
... to say in it regarding this affair of the singers. It shall be sent back to you. The term "indiscreet" had reference only to your second visit, and demand from the King of the fulfilment of his promise. I had no fault whatever to find with your first visit. The term "private" must have had reference, not to the promise or to the person to whom it was made, but to the offence with which the singers stood charged. It was an affront offered ...
— A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II • William Sleeman
... away into helpless laughter. "That would not be your fault, honey, even if it were true," she said. "But what has he been ...
— Little Citizens • Myra Kelly
... that of his readers, the profoundly important crisis in the midst of which we are living. The moral and social dissolution in progress about us, and the enormous peril of sailing blindfold and haphazard, without rudder or compass or chart, have always been fully visible to him, and it is no fault of his if they have not become equally plain to his contemporaries. The policy of drifting has had no countenance from him. That a society should be likely to last with hollow and scanty faith, with no government, with a number of institutions hardly one of them ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Vol. I - Essay 2: Carlyle • John Morley
... gave rise to a feeling of sadness that I could no longer conceal; so I at last opened my heart to my friend Becke. What other cause could I possibly have? I have done nothing to cause me to dread reproach from you; I am guilty of no fault; (by a fault I mean that which does not become a Christian, and a man of honor;) in short, I now rejoice, and already look forward to the most agreeable and happy days, but only in the society of yourself and my dear sister. ...
— The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, V.1. • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
... saw this picture at Venice in 1761, it was then in the same state of purity as when the Bologna artists saw and studied it; and it is recorded that Caracci declared this picture to be without fault. But we have to lament the fatal effects which the goddess Bellona has ever occasioned to the fine arts when she mounts her iron chariot of destruction. When this picture fell under her rapacious power, on board a French vessel passing down the Adriatic sea from ...
— The Life, Studies, And Works Of Benjamin West, Esq. • John Galt
... parlour, I only found three of all the gentlemen in the house,—Father, Mr Keith, and Ambrose Catterall. I thought Father seemed rather cross, and he was finding fault with everybody for something. Sophy's hair was rough, and Hatty had put on a gown he did not like, and Fanny's ruffle had a hole in it; and then he turned round and scolded my Aunt Kezia for not having us in better order. My Aunt ...
— Out in the Forty-Five - Duncan Keith's Vow • Emily Sarah Holt
... once be found. Milton also for the most part avoids it, and this, though in his time others freely allowed it. How soon all this was forgotten we have striking evidence in the fact that when Dryden, in one of his fault-finding moods with the great men of the preceding generation, is taking Ben Jonson to task for general inaccuracy in his English diction, among other counts of his indictment, he ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench
... the money in his own pocket"—said Maryllia,—"But, after all, the loss is quite my own fault. I ought to have enquired into the management of the property myself. And I certainly ought not to have stayed away from home so many years. But it's never too late to mend!" She smiled, and advancing a step ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... that the cause of our misfortunes," said Muller; "the want of one ruler has not produced them, and it is not so bad that we have not got but one neck, and cannot consequently be struck down at one blow. The fault, on the contrary, is our own. If we had a single great man, even though he were neither an emperor nor a king, if he were only a Maurice of Saxony, a Stadtholder of Holland, he would attract the nation in times of danger and distress; it would ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach
... momentary theme; or they betray themselves in the embarrassments of the central government, whether at Rome or at Constantinople, when arguing at one time a pestilence, at another an insurrection, or an inroad of barbarians. It is not the fault of Mr Finlay, but his great disadvantage, that the affairs of Greece have been thus discontinuously exhibited, and that its internal changes of condition have been never treated except obliquely, and by men aliud agentibus. The Grecian race had a primary importance ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 348 • Various
... childless. No son would any more come sauntering in with his long slouch in the gloamin'; and whether she would ever see him again—to know him—who could tell! For the common belief does not go much farther than paganism in yielding comfort to those whose living loves have disappeared—the fault not of Christianity, ...
— Donal Grant • George MacDonald
... one of the most valuable articles of export from Morocco. It is strong, dark, and fit only for manufacturing purposes. This is, perhaps, not so much the fault of the olive as of the methods by which it is prepared. No care is taken in collecting the olives. They are beaten from the trees with poles, as in Portugal and Spain, suffered to lie on the ground in heaps until half putrified, then put into uncleaned presses, ...
— The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom • P. L. Simmonds
... and indulgent, devoted to his home, seldom leaving us, except in the hunting season. He was a great hunter, I have been told, and a celebrated shot. Next to his family he loved his dogs and gun. His hospitality was great, almost to a fault, and he seldom came home without bringing a guest. His special pride was the big garden where, it was said, he raised the finest watermelons and strawberries in the county; and to me he brought the first ripe grapes and the choicest berries. I remember ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller
... postern and had well nigh overtaken him, but Vellido got in; and then the Cid said in his anger, Cursed be the knight who ever gets on horseback without his spurs. Now in all the feats of the Cid never was fault found in him save only in this, that he did not enter after Vellido into the town; but he did not fail to do this for cowardice, neither for fear of death, or of imprisonment; but because he thought that peradventure ...
— Chronicle Of The Cid • Various
... them; they might be suddenly taken off; besides, they have excellent restaurant-cars, and there is, moreover, always the fascinating and often the memorable landscape which they pass through. By no fault of ours that I can remember, our train was rather crowded; that is, four or five out of the eight places in our corridor compartment were taken, and we were afraid at every stop that more people would get in, though I do not ...
— Familiar Spanish Travels • W. D. Howells
... shall be declared by the Umpire in favor of the club not in fault, at the request of such club, in ...
— Spalding's Baseball Guide and Official League Book for 1889 • edited by Henry Chadwick
... pleasure, and indeed his favour is faded and his charms changed. What is his crime that he should merit such pains and penalties? Indeed, others than he were to blame, and hereto Allah hath given thee the victory over them, and there is no fault in this poor lad." Quoth Bahluwan, "Verily, 'tis as ye say; but I fear his machinations and am not safe from his mischief; haply the most part of the folk will incline unto him." They replied, "O king, ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... it was more just to change the law than to violate it. The ballot gave birth to the Commune, and in completing itself without it, the Commune commits suicide. I will not be an accomplice in the fault." ...
— Paris under the Commune • John Leighton
... his actions were under supervision, and that a single grave breach of usage might cause his social ruin,—in which case he would be given to understand that he was not merely a social, but also a religious offender; that the communal god was angry with him; and that to pardon his fault might [163] provoke the divine vengeance against the entire settlement. But it yet remains to be seen what rights were left him by the central authority ruling his district,—which authority represented a third form of religious despotism ...
— Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation • Lafcadio Hearn
... Jeremiads. Yet I must not give you the impression that the poor fellow was the least wanting in PLUCK—far from it. Surely it requires the highest order of courage to anticipate every species of disaster every moment of the day, and yet to meet the impending fate like a man—as he did. Was it his fault that fate was not equally ready to meet him? HIS share of the business was always done: he was ever prepared for the worst; but the most critical circumstances never disturbed the gravity of his carriage, ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... me. If you have been guilty of any such act, the best thing that you can do is to confess it to me at once; and if you wish to do it, you may wait till I come, for that purpose. So you may wait till I come either to ask me a question, or to confess a fault. If you do not wish to do either, you may go out without waiting for me; but you must not go a-fishing unless you can truly say that you have been faithful and honest, whenever I ...
— Marco Paul's Voyages and Travels; Vermont • Jacob Abbott
... as if she thought I was crazy; but I explained that what I really was glad of was that the quarrel had been Rood's, and not Johnny's fault; indeed that it had shown Johnny to be in the right, ...
— The Other Side of the Door • Lucia Chamberlain
... perspective—week upon week—two columns to the week! The mischief was, it did not appear to lead to anything: and for the first mile or two even the casual graces of the colonnade were hopelessly marred through that besetting fault of the young journalist, who finds no satisfaction in his business of making bricks without straw unless he can go straightway and heave ...
— Adventures in Criticism • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... did not punish the guilty." That is to say, although the priests were non-jurors, and, therefore, criminals in the eye of the law, the courts would not enforce the law because of political bias.[43] "It is your fault," I said to them, "since you elected them [the judges], but that is no reason why you should do ...
— The Theory of Social Revolutions • Brooks Adams
... and Italian. But the truth is, Burton's brilliant requirements were really a hindrance to him. The morbid distrust of genius which has ever been incidental to ordinary Government officialism, was at that time particularly prevalent. The only fault to be found with Burton's conduct at Damascus, was that, instead of serving his own interest, he had attempted to serve the interests of his country and humanity. By trimming, temporizing, shutting his eyes to enormities, and touching ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright
... glad,' cried Philip among the grass. 'I couldn't have borne it if she'd been lost for ever, and all my fault.' ...
— The Magic City • Edith Nesbit
... once to the shelf upon which lay the self-liberating diving-suit. He took the suit down and examined its every detail minutely. As he did so he became more and more enthusiastic and he could find no fault ...
— The Master Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve and John W. Grey
... another form of punishment, was directed against a particular locality, for the fault of some of the inhabitants who could not be reached directly. In time of interdict the priests closed the churches and neither married the living nor buried the dead. Of the sacraments only Baptism, Confirmation, and Penance were permitted. All the inhabitants of the afflicted district were ...
— EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY • HUTTON WEBSTER
... not hitherto published anywhere. Many of them are as nourishing, weight for weight, as ordinary dishes made with meat, those containing beans, peas, eggs, and the various sorts of grain, being the most nourishing. If they are not all found to be palatable, the fault must be in the individual cook, who cannot have put in the important ingredient of feeling, without which no work can ...
— New Vegetarian Dishes • Mrs. Bowdich
... Jeremiah's fault, and I really can't think what he was doing. He admits that he was seedy, and had had a bad night. Anyhow, it was like this: I followed him down to the pier very early before breakfast, and you remember ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... favorable consideration of our case. I can promise you that the tribute shall be paid regularly. I regard Egypt as the greatest power in the world, and I am most desirous to continue in friendly relations with it, and I swear to you that it will be no fault of mine if any complaint reach you of ...
— The Cat of Bubastes - A Tale of Ancient Egypt • G. A. Henty
... recurred to me the words of a popular yet melancholy ballad I had once heard reproduced on a talking machine which dealt with the tragic and untimely fate of a noble youth who, through misapprehension and no discernible fault of his own, perished at the hands of a drum-head court-martial in time of hostilities, the refrain being: "The ...
— Fibble, D. D. • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... brake, First lowly rendering reverence meet; And downcast looked, and gently spake, Still standing at the Pacha's feet: 50 For son of Moslem must expire, Ere dare to sit before his sire! "Father! for fear that thou shouldst chide My sister, or her sable guide— Know—for the fault, if fault there be, Was mine—then fall thy frowns on me! So lovelily the morning shone, That—let the old and weary sleep— I could not; and to view alone The fairest scenes of land and deep, 60 With none to listen and reply To thoughts with which my heart beat high Were irksome—for ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... already found fault with for the shocking description Jack Belford gives of that levy of damsels who attended mother Sinclair on her death-bed, such a scene must certainly be shocking enough, yet could not be near so much on the part of the ladies ...
— Critical Remarks on Sir Charles Grandison, Clarissa, and Pamela (1754) • Anonymous
... in quest of the absconding marbles, we positively feel so much the more inclined to shed tears of sympathy, from the very fact that we must needs turn aside and laugh at her. For here,—and if we fail to impress it suitably upon the reader, it is our own fault, not that of the theme, here is one of the truest points of melancholy interest that occur in ordinary life. It was the final throe of what called itself old gentility. A lady—who had fed herself from childhood with the shadowy food of aristocratic ...
— The House of the Seven Gables • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... has said ironically is the truth. But it is not our fault if science overturns day after day the vain idols of the past: its superstitions, its sophisms, its innumerable fables—beautiful, some of them, ridiculous others—for in the vineyard of the Lord grow both good fruit and bad. The world of illusions, ...
— Dona Perfecta • B. Perez Galdos
... wordless stories, an hour at a time, without making any demands on anybody, so that grandma and the aunties declared that half the time they would not know there was a baby in the house. Perhaps it is sometimes a fault to be too good-natured; for there came a certain afternoon when Lily-toes would have been pleased if somebody had remembered there was ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, September 1878, No. 11 • Various
... exemplarily punished; and that their high mightinesses should confirm the stipulations agreed upon immediately after the action by the directors of the respective companies, in consideration of which agreement the Dutch ships were restored, after their commanders acknowledged their fault, in owning themselves the aggressors. To this remonstrance the states-general replied, that nothing of what was laid to the charge of their subjects had yet reached their knowledge: but they requested his Britannic majesty to suspend his judgment until he should be made ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... 'It's my fault, Martha,' faltered Betty, in explanation, 'it was me he was with, and I couldn't stop him doing it. And he's got nobody but us to look to, you know, and how are we ever going ...
— Two Maiden Aunts • Mary H. Debenham
... has only heroines. In his labored and perfect plays you find no hero, but almost always a perfect woman; steadfast in grave hope and errorless purpose. The catastrophe of every play is caused always by the folly or fault of a man; the redemption, if there be any, is by the wisdom and virtue of a woman, and ...
— St. Elmo • Augusta J. Evans
... boy, offensively young," he said. "A bad fault, but one you may hope to grow out of. One thing I'm sure of. You do your friend a great injustice. He won't leave that despatch-bag in our hands till he's forced to at the ...
— The Gentleman - A Romance of the Sea • Alfred Ollivant
... fortunate than myself. 'The divine order was not to desist from getting wealth'—thus the Father continued—'for Christ knew there were who, labor as they might, could not accumulate or retain; circumstances would be against them, or the genius might be wanting. Poor without fault, were they to suffer, and curse God with the curse of the sick, the cold, the naked, the hungry? Oh, no! Christ was the representative of the Infinitely Merciful. Under his dispensation they were to be partners ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... that my brother Henry died, and his loss inflicted on me a terrible mental blow, which went far, subsequently, to bring about a great crisis in my health. My dear brother was the most remarkable illustration of the fact that there are men who, by no fault of their own, and who, despite the utmost honour or integrity, deep intelligence, good education, and varied talents, are overshadowed all their lives by sorrow, and meet ill-luck at every turn. He went at sixteen as employe into a Cuban importing ...
— Memoirs • Charles Godfrey Leland
... not turn out well, it will not be the fault of their mother, who took them so early under good influences. In the temple of old the swallow found a nest for herself where she might lay her young; but this is the first time we ever knew of the conference of such ...
— Around The Tea-Table • T. De Witt Talmage
... but hardly succeeds. He intends to plead that any fault in his approach must be laid to the charge of his love. Duty here means homage—so used ...
— The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark - A Study with the Text of the Folio of 1623 • George MacDonald
... Pinto gravely. "But I am not seeking their gratitude. We find that many of these women are in terrible circumstances owing to no fault of their own. For example, this woman in Wales, whose husband is supposed to have deserted her—now, there is ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace
... in the farmyard. I paid them a visit the next day, but, alas! I saw four little corpses lying about in the grass, the remaining four were chirping piteously, and the hen was in despair at being unable to comfort her uncanny children. Evidently their diet was in fault; I thought I would take them in hand, and therefore had the coop brought round to the garden, and placed under the drooping boughs of a deodar near the drawing-room window, where I ...
— Wild Nature Won By Kindness • Elizabeth Brightwen
... you or I or any other seaman; but I don't believe he had ever been on board the Helen B. before, or had his hand on her wheel till then; and he didn't know her ways. I don't mean to say that what happened was his fault. I don't know whose fault it was. Perhaps nobody was to blame. But I knew something happened somewhere on board when we shipped that sea, and you'll never get it out of my head. I hadn't any spare time myself, for I was becketing the rest of the trysail to the mast. We were on the starboard tack, ...
— Man Overboard! • F(rancis) Marion Crawford
... like a South American poncho, or the tabard of a herald. These ends he tied together, under the armpits; and thus arrayed, presented himself once more before the captain, with an air of perfect self-satisfaction, as though he thought it impossible for any fault to be found ...
— The Adventures of Captain Bonneville - Digested From His Journal • Washington Irving
... him astray; for no temptation is stronger than the desire to indulge in rhetorical displays. Even the author of Bothwell, despite his wonderful command of language, wearies us at times by his vehement iteration. Our unknown playwright has guarded himself against this fault; and, steeped as he was to the lips in classical learning, his abstinence must have cost him some trouble. My notes will shew that he had not confined himself to Tacitus, but had studied Suetonius and Dion Cassius, Juvenal and Persius. He makes no parade ...
— Old English Plays, Vol. I - A Collection of Old English Plays • Various
... inclined to think my parents were intellectually superior to that common type of the South. Both were foreign born, my mother being Scotch and my father a north of Ireland man,—as I remember him, now, impulsive, hasty in action, and slow to confess a fault. It was his impulsiveness that led him to volunteer and serve four years in the Confederate army,—trying years to my mother, with a brood of seven children to feed, garb, and house. The war brought me my initiation as a ...
— The Log of a Cowboy - A Narrative of the Old Trail Days • Andy Adams
... an' sence then till I come here, I've run away with more men than 'u'd fill a boardin'-house. Why, the man that sold me here he says to the boss, s' he: 'Mind, now, I've warned you. 'Twon't be none of my fault if she sheds you daown the road. Don't you drive her in a top-buggy, ner 'thout winkers,' s' he, 'ner 'thought this bit ef you look to come home behind her.' 'N' the fust thing the boss did was to git ...
— The Day's Work, Volume 1 • Rudyard Kipling
... Arkel. "She must have silence now. Come; come. It is terrible, but it is not your fault. It was a little being, so quiet, so timid, and so silent. It was a poor little mysterious being like everyone. She lies there as though she were the elder sister of her baby. Come; the child should not stay here in this room. She must live, now, in ...
— Debussy's Pelleas et Melisande - A Guide to the Opera with Musical Examples from the Score • Lawrence Gilman
... as the mercury in the thermometer during the next two months seldom reached zero—upward I mean—the opening of this famous deposit was made under difficulties. That so much "head cheese," as we called it, was shipped to Professor Marsh was more the fault of the weather and his importunities than our carelessness. However, we found some of the types of dinosaurs ...
— Dinosaurs - With Special Reference to the American Museum Collections • William Diller Matthew
... and surveyed the work critically. Luckily there was no fault to find, for Mrs. Hoffman was ...
— Paul the Peddler - The Fortunes of a Young Street Merchant • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... you take it that way!" said Isobel. "A young man utterly ruined in fortune—partly at least through his own fault—came to us and asked to be hired. He has been a hard worker and a gentleman. His name ...
— Out of the Depths - A Romance of Reclamation • Robert Ames Bennet
... struck with the model of the Water Lily; the only fault he found with her being the deficiency of head-room below. This fault, however, was inseparable from her peculiar shape, for, as I have already stated, she had a very shallow body, and a flat floor; and although she drew ...
— For Treasure Bound • Harry Collingwood
... said "Judge B-Day," smiling at her tenderly, "caution was never yet a fault to my mind—and Nelson possesses it. It may go well with your impulsiveness. After all, I think your Nelson is a good ...
— The Mission of Janice Day • Helen Beecher Long
... wall, with first one position of the head and then another, like a listening bird. It is impossible to be wise on the subject of ear-rings as one looks at her; what should those delicate pearls and crystals be made for, if not for such ears? One cannot even find fault with the tiny round hole which they leave when they are taken out; perhaps water-nixies, and such lovely things without souls, have these little round holes in their ears by nature, ready to hang jewels in. And Hetty must be one ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot
... of her knowing, and chuckled over it as a love joke. The next moment, in a flashing vision of multitudinous detail, he sighted the whole sea of life's nastiness that he had known and voyaged over and through, and he forgave her for not understanding the story. It was through no fault of hers that she could not understand. He thanked God that she had been born and sheltered to such innocence. But he knew life, its foulness as well as its fairness, its greatness in spite of the ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... "for Mr. Hastings! But I should not have presumed to own it just at this time,—so little as I am able to do honour to my prepossession by any materials to defend it,—but that you have given me courage, by appearing so free from all malignity in the business. Tis, therefore, Your own fault!" ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madam D'Arblay Volume 2 • Madame D'Arblay
... English. It is Dryden, a poet in the reign of Charles II.—a writer whose genius was too exuberant, and not accompanied with judgment enough. Had he written only a tenth part of the works he left behind him, his character would have been conspicuous in every part; but his great fault is his having endeavoured ...
— Letters on England • Voltaire
... with all whom he approached; for a suspicious temper creates an atmosphere of distrust around it that kills every kindly affection. His first step was to alienate the members of the Audience who were sent to act in concert with him. But this was their fault as well as his, since they were as much too lax, as he was too severe, in the interpretation of the law.31 He next alienated and outraged the people whom he was appointed to govern. And, lastly, he disgusted his own friends, and too often turned them into enemies; so that, in his final struggle ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... and extended a weatherbeaten hand, several sizes larger than Donald's, and boomed out in a deep voice that matched his physical proportions, "Yo're suttinly welcome, stranger. What happened warn't no fault o' yourn, and I'm plumb obleeged ter ye fer fixin' up my granddarter's hurt. Draw up a cheer fer the stranger, Smiles, he'll jine us in a bite er supper. The fare's simple, but I war raised on't, and 'pears ter me ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... tyranny which had been twice tried and twice repudiated. At the same time, however, he felt for the exiled monarch. But he felt still more for his noble wife, and for his unhappy son. His own heart told him that those two had been unjustly dealt with, the one calumniated, the other punished without a fault. Nor did he blame the true and faithful servants whom adversity could not shake, and who were only loyal to a crime, who still adhered to their old allegiance, loved still the sovereign, who had never ill-treated ...
— The King's Highway • G. P. R. James
... unto ten thousand elephants. He will be an illustrious royal sage, possessed of great learning and intelligence and energy. The high-souled one shall have in his time a century of sons. But from the fault of his mother he shall be blind 'At these words of her son, Satyavati said, 'O thou of ascetic wealth, how can one that is blind become a monarch worthy of the Kurus? How can one that is blind become the protector of his ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... has blamed you for the retrograde movement from Springfield, nor for the information you gave General Cameron; and this you could readily understand, if it were not for your unwarranted assumption that the ordering you to Leavenworth must necessarily have been done as a punishment for some fault. I thought then, and think yet, the position assigned to you is as responsible, and as honorable, as that assigned to Buell—I know that General McClellan expected more important results from it. My impression is that at the ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... strung his bow, took a handful of arrows from his quiver, and said: "This is my fault. I have brought you to this. It is right that I should die first," and he started to ...
— Blackfoot Lodge Tales • George Bird Grinnell
... she whispered, "'twas not my fault. I slept heavily; she must have unlocked the door, for it was undone at dawn; her bed is empty, she ...
— The Waters of Edera • Louise de la Rame, a.k.a. Ouida
... was ready to promise anything; insolent in his pride, he swallows down his promises as soon as fear is eased, his repentance and his retractation of it combined to add new weights about his neck. He was but a conspicuous example of a universal fault. Every nation, I suppose, has its proverb scoffing at the contrast between the sick man's vow and the recovered man's sins. The bitter moralist of the Old Testament was sure not to let such an instance of man's ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... oath which oligarchs take in certain cities. "I swear to be always the enemy of the people and never to counsel any thing that I do not know to be injurious to them." "This," he continues, "is the very opposite of what they ought to do or to pretend to do ... It is a political fault which is often committed in oligarchies as well as in democracies, and where the multitude has control of the laws, the demagogues make this mistake. In their combat against the rich, they always divide the State into two opposing parties. In a democracy, on the contrary, ...
— The Cult of Incompetence • Emile Faguet
... Phineas, in company with others of his breed, appeared to have experienced a change of heart. At all events he kept his anti-war opinions to himself and, except that his hatred for the captain was more virulent than ever since the affair of the postmastership, he found little fault with the war preparations in the village, the organizing of a Home Guard, the raising of funds for a new flag and flagpole and the recruiting meeting in ...
— Shavings • Joseph C. Lincoln
... institution the principles of social life such as it has been able to discover them. These principles being finally accepted, we must assume that they are eternal or else we are compelled to admit that society may be for ever at fault, that its development does not correspond with the true development of man, and that this present life is in no wise preparatory for a future. Though we declare that the principles of society are eternal, the social institutions which embody them are merely temporal, and may change ...
— A Plea for the Criminal • James Leslie Allan Kayll
... She is not affected, for nobody talks to you with more earnestness, or more of natural impulse and spontaneousness; but still, she is always listening to herself. She is the person who is attracting, who is charming you, natural to a fault, unguarded to excess (she says to herself). Then, she is not a bad sort of woman; she has a great regard for her husband, and takes great pains with her little girls; but she is always playing with edged tools; she is always lingering on the line of demarcation. She is eternally ...
— Ellen Middleton—A Tale • Georgiana Fullerton
... why pain is not an evil, they tell him that to be in pain is a bitter, annoying, odious, unnatural condition, and one difficult to be borne; but, because there is in pain no fraud, or dishonesty, or malice, or fault, or baseness, therefore it is not an evil. Now, the man who hears this said, even if he does not care to laugh, will still depart without being a bit more courageous as to bearing pain than he was when he came. But you affirm that no one can be courageous who thinks pain ...
— The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero
... particular, having spent much of his time as a hunter before setting up his school, had the eyes of a lynx. He could distinguish marks when his companions could see nothing until they were pointed out, and although frequently at fault, he never failed to recover the trail sooner ...
— The Red Man's Revenge - A Tale of The Red River Flood • R.M. Ballantyne
... "He is really very kind to me. He may appear a little stern at times, but I know that he means it for my own good, and I should be a very foolish girl if I resented it. Besides, he is so pious and good that what may seem a little fault to us would appear a ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... to thank you, sir, for that document. The heart of an unselfish patriot speaks through every word. I came here to criticise and find fault. I'm going home to stand by you through thick and thin. You've given ...
— The Southerner - A Romance of the Real Lincoln • Thomas Dixon
... not ten words that he said, after all," Newson pleaded. "And how could he know that I should be such a simpleton as to believe him? 'Twas as much my fault ...
— The Mayor of Casterbridge • Thomas Hardy
... fault, Mis' Smith. I declare I 'm too astonished to speak. You know I was a-standin' in my window, not a-thinkin' nor expectin' nothin', jest like any ...
— The Uncalled - A Novel • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... fail you," Tom assured the Mexican. "I believe that the visiting Americans will buy. If they don't it won't be our fault." ...
— The Young Engineers in Mexico • H. Irving Hancock |
