"Meddle" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... poets—and then go, fresh from teaching Juvenal and Ovid, to declaim at Exeter Hall against poor Peter Dens's well-meaning prurience! Had we not better take the beam out of our own eye before we meddle with ...
— Yeast: A Problem • Charles Kingsley
... this? A Whig? Then why are you here with Alan's button? and what kind of a black-foot traffic is this that I find ye out in, Mr. Whig? Here is a forfeited rebel and an accused murderer, with two hundred pounds on his life, and ye ask me to meddle in his business, and then tell me ye're a Whig! I have no mind of any such Whigs before, though ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... glad you feel that way," said Whitwell, with a little apparent surprise. "I don't want to meddle, any; but I know what Cynthy is—I no need to brag her up—and I don't feel so over and above certain 't I know what he is. He's a good deal of a mixture, if you want to know how he strikes me. I don't mean I don't like ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... learns from infancy? To punish a man for his errors, is it not to punish him for having been educated differently from you? If I am an unbeliever, is it possible for me to banish from my mind the reasons that have shaken my faith? If your God gives men leave to be damned, what have you to meddle with? Are you more prudent and wise, than this God, whose ...
— Good Sense - 1772 • Paul Henri Thiry, Baron D'Holbach
... of my wife's bed-chamber. I am resolved to go through with this matter, let what will come of it: which again I solemnly swear before Almighty God; therefore if you desire to have the continuance of my friendship, meddle no more in this business, except it be to bear down all false and scandalous reports, and to facilitate what, I am sure, my honour is so much concerned in; and whosoever I find to be my Lady Castlemaine's ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik
... from between set teeth. "If that is one of their pieces of precious knowledge, we're as well off without it—" he stopped short. Perhaps he had said too much. But Terra had been racked by the torrid horror of atomic war, until all his kind had been so revolted that it was bred into them not to meddle again with such weapons. And war by fire aroused in them that old horror. Surely Soriki must feel it too, and when the com-tech did not comment, Raf was sure of that. He hoped that the slaughter had made some impression on the captain and on ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton
... Voltaire is applying, on all points of the compass, to Legal and Influential Persons, for help in a Court of Law. To Chancellor Cocceji; to Jarriges (eminent Prussian Frenchman), President of Court; to Maupertuis, who knows Jarriges, but "will not meddle in a bad business;"—at last, even to dull reverend Formey, whom he had not called on hitherto. Cocceji seems to have answered, to the effect, "Most certainly: the Courts are wide open;"—but as to "help"! December 30th, the Suit, Voltaire VERSUS Hirsch, "comes to Protocol,"—that is, Cocceji, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVI. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Ten Years of Peace.—1746-1756. • Thomas Carlyle
... vacant. The ladies, of whom, fortunately, there were only half a dozen on board, were permitted for the present to retain possession of their state-rooms, being given to understand, however, that it was only upon the express condition that they were to make no attempt whatever to meddle with the arrangements of the mutineers, nor to communicate in any way with the male passengers confined ...
— The Voyage of the Aurora • Harry Collingwood
... quo' Buccleuch; "Let's waken Lord Scroop, right merrilie!" Then loud the warden's trumpet blew— "O whae dare meddle wi' me?"[167] ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish border (3rd ed) (1 of 3) • Walter Scott
... reached an unalterable decision never again to meddle with the mighty, awe inspiring secrets of creation; but with returning health and balance he found himself viewing his recent triumph with feelings of renewed ...
— The Monster Men • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... livin'! Yet I'm no deid—that's what maks the diffeeclety o' the situation! Gien I war deid—weel, I kenna what than! I doobt there wad be trible still, though some things micht be lichter. But that's neither here nor there; I maun live; I hae nae ch'ice; I didna mak mysel', an' I'm no gaein' to meddle wi' mysel'! I think mair ...
— Donal Grant • George MacDonald
... in the most convenient manner. Cementing the transparency to a piece of plain, clear glass with Canada balsam, as suggested by Mr. Woodworth, I found in practice to be open to two formidable objections. One of these was that Canada balsam used in this manner is a sticky, unpleasant substance to meddle with, and takes a long time—nearly a month—to harden when confined between plates in this manner. The other objection was of extreme importance, namely, that, in consequence of commercial gelatine plates not being prepared on perfectly flat glasses in all cases, I found that, after squeezing ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 288 - July 9, 1881 • Various
... though he was, was nigh the breaking. "It's no chancy, what ye say micht come to pass if ye believe it. Whatever the evil spirit said in the veesions o' the nicht—oh! my laddie, for laddie ye have been to me since I learned ye to ride your pony and fire your first shot, ye mauna give heed or meddle wi' Providence. Ye have been awfu' favored wi' the bonniest face ever I saw on a man, so that there's no a lass looks on ye but she loves ye, and the hardiest body ever I kenned. Ye have the best blood of Scotland in your veins, and I never saw ye ...
— Graham of Claverhouse • Ian Maclaren
... see these yellow counters? I am going to make a hole in the stable underneath the cows' manger and bury them; see that you do not meddle with them, or it will ...
— Household Stories by the Brothers Grimm • Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm
... about my cousin, who will meddle in the affair' of his relatives. Well, that gentleman, he make a marriage for me with a good and accomplish' lady, very noble and very beautiful—and amiable." (The young count at his elbow started slightly at this, but immediately ...
— Monsieur Beaucaire • Booth Tarkington
... "Is it an ould beggar man they'd meddle with? Off with you, unless you wish to sleep in Sligo ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... three till sixe. Thus farre I have advised you, because I pitty your passions, as my selfe being once a lover, but now I charge thee reveale it to none whomsoever, least it doo disparage my credit to meddle ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... drink it," said Lydia, "and eat a bit too, or you'll be good for nothing." And while Percival hastily obeyed she glanced round the room: "Nobody'll meddle with your things while you're gone: ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December 1878 • Various
... was indignant, and called the priest a deceiver and a liar. Huascar answered to Quiz-quiz, "Leave off these arguments. This is a question between me and my brother, and not between the parties of Hanan-cuzco and Hurin-cuzco. We will investigate it, and you have no business to meddle between us on ...
— History of the Incas • Pedro Sarmiento de Gamboa
... then unless thy heart less beauteous be Than thy sweet face, mar not my pious care; Take my steel buckler, this I give to thee, And take that horse, which flies so fast in air, Nor meddle with my castle more; or free One or two captive friends, the rest forbear — Or (for I crave but this) release them all, So that ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... not to be mixin' yerself up with my business at all, Pat Rooney. Nobody asked you to meddle." ...
— North, South and Over the Sea • M.E. Francis (Mrs. Francis Blundell)
... additional bond between them. The command of the vital river is an irresistible weapon. The influence of France over the native mind in Egypt has been completely destroyed by the result of the Fashoda negotiations; and although she still retains the legal power to meddle in and obstruct all financial arrangements, that power, unsupported by real influence, is like a body whence the soul has fled, which may, indeed, be an offensive encumbrance, but must ultimately decompose ...
— The River War • Winston S. Churchill
... hindering others from following theirs. Let the shoemaker abide by his last, the peasant by his plough, and let the king know how to govern; for, this is also a business which must be learned, and with which no one should meddle who does ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. II • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... States when needed to preserve Cuban independence and the maintenance of an adequate government; and it shall sell or lease necessary coaling stations to the United States. When satisfied that the purpose of the Amendment was not to enable the United States to meddle in affairs in Cuba, but merely to secure Cuban independence and set forth a definite understanding between the two nations, the convention incorporated it in the final constitution. On May 20, 1902, the control of Cuba was formally relinquished to the people of the island, ...
— The United States Since The Civil War • Charles Ramsdell Lingley
... thought proper to give Catholic Europe a warning not to meddle with Catholic Ireland. In the words of the official report immediately sent home to Walsingham, as soon as the fort was yielded, 'all the Irish men and women were hanged, and 600 and upwards of ...
— Raleigh • Edmund Gosse
... Puss durst not meddle with rats for a long time after this, but at length she got stronger and would kill them and many other such vermin. She had plenty of work, for there were many rats at the farm house. While pursuing a large rat one day, she set her foot into a trap which had been set to catch them, and though ...
— The Life and Adventures of Poor Puss • Lucy Gray
... and the river not to be gone into but by small pinnaces, having a bar affording but six feet at high water, and for that no vessel can get in for seven months in the year, partly by reason of the ice, and then the violent stream, we thought not fit to meddle with it."[4] ...
— Peter Stuyvesant, the Last Dutch Governor of New Amsterdam • John S. C. Abbott
... intemperance and the vagrancy and the immorality that flourish under our very noses. Yes, and the machine-politics that keep them flourishing. Oh, there is so much to be done, and our good men too busy, or—as they claim—too high-minded to meddle with it." ...
— A Woman for Mayor - A Novel of To-day • Helen M. Winslow
... co-operation was reasonably practicable, it came to be interpreted by average public opinion as meaning that America had no concern with the politics of the Old World, and that the states of the Old World must not be allowed to meddle in any of the affairs of either American continent. The world of civilisation was to be divided into water-tight compartments; as if it were not indissolubly one. Yet even in this rather narrow form, the Monroe ...
— The Expansion of Europe - The Culmination of Modern History • Ramsay Muir
... in the grass. Then there was every man ready with clubs and staves, with halberts, and with other weapons, to go and kill the grasshopper. When they did come to the place where the grasshopper should be, said the one to the other, "Let every man cross himself from the devil, or we will not meddle with him." And so they returned again, and said, "We were all blessed this day that we went no farther." "Ah, cowards," said he that had his scythe in the mead, "help me to fetch my scythe." "No," said they; "it is good to sleep in a whole ...
— The Book of Noodles - Stories Of Simpletons; Or, Fools And Their Follies • W. A. Clouston
... folk followed after the Romans again, and again did them some hurt, and at last drew so nigh, that once more the Romans stormed forth, and once more smote a stroke in the air; nor even so would the Markmen cease to meddle with them, though never would Otter suffer his men to be mingled with them. At the last the Romans, seeing that Otter would not walk into the open trap, and growing weary of this bickering, began to take ...
— The House of the Wolfings - A Tale of the House of the Wolfings and All the Kindreds of the Mark Written in Prose and in Verse • William Morris
... up my cartridges," returned the angry old seaman; "but if you'll be so good, sir, as to hit him a crack or two, now and then, as he goes by you to the magazine, the monkey will learn his manners, and the schooner's work will be all the better done for it. A young herring-faced monkey! to meddle with a tool ye don't know the use of. If your parents had spent more of their money on your edication, and less on your outfit, you'd ha' been a gentleman to ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... Confederates, who could not be moved, had lain there for many days. I asked the good wife how she felt while the Southern army was marching past her doors, "Well," she said, "I wasn't greatly skeared, only I thought I'd pull down the new parlor-curtains; but they behaved right well, and didn't meddle with nothin' to signify; not like them Yankees, who are always pickin' and stealin'. But I'd like to get right out of this country, anyhow; we'll never do no good ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence
... consulate? Do we then deem it impossible that a man of the commons can be a person of fortitude and activity, qualified to excel both in peace and war, tyke to Numa, Lucius Tarquinius, and Servius Tullius? Or, should such appear, shall we not suffer him to meddle with the helm of government? or shall we have consuls like the decemvirs, the most abandoned of mortals, who were, however, all patricians, rather than like the best of ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius
... children," said the alcalde, turning toward the witnesses, "I cannot explain what fancy the Countess may have had in going out by the window—for the door of the chamber, bolted inside, leaves no room to doubt that she went that way. Some woman's caprice, perhaps, which justice has no business to meddle with." ...
— Wood Rangers - The Trappers of Sonora • Mayne Reid
... and plenty of ammunition; revolvers too. I am going to have the same, because there is no knowing what sort of fellows we may meet. But, as the dad says, if they see we are well-armed they won't meddle with us. In these revolutionary times, though, every one is on the rampage and spoiling for a fight. Pity you can't go ...
— Fitz the Filibuster • George Manville Fenn
... very often passed your time with them amongst honourable ladies and gentlewomen, telling them fair long stories, when you were out of all other talk, for which you are worthy of great praise and sempiternal memory. And I do heartily wish that every man would lay aside his own business, meddle no more with his profession nor trade, and throw all affairs concerning himself behind his back, to attend this wholly, without distracting or troubling his mind with anything else, until he have learned them without book; ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... Colin; and to Sir Keith Macleod, too; and he will not forget it. But as for this young lady, or that young lady, what has that to do with it? You know what the bell of Scoon said, 'That which concerns you not, meddle not with.'" ...
— Macleod of Dare • William Black
... gentle blood, on the spindle side. An ancestress of his mother was a granddaughter of Sir Gilbert Elliot (as a "law lord," or judge, Lord Minto), and so he could say: "I have shaken a spear in the debatable land, and shouted the slogan of the Elliots": perhaps "And wha dares meddle wi' me!" In "Weir of Hermiston" he returns to "the auld bauld Elliots" with zest. He was not, perhaps, aware that, through some remote ancestress on the spindle side, he "came of Harden's line," so that he and I had a common forebear with Sir Walter ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... neither the right nor the desire to meddle in affairs I know nothing of; but I must say that only a person of unimpeachable reputation should attempt the rescue of such a man as ...
— Three Comedies • Bjornstjerne M. Bjornson
... the church in dealing with this question, would consent to meddle less with its details, and leave them more where they properly belong, with the individual conscience. No one man can decide these things for another. No man has a right to insist that his standard of expediency ...
— Amusement: A Force in Christian Training • Rev. Marvin R. Vincent.
... Pringle, after some deliberation, "I find it impossible to express such an opinion of this story as will be likely to gratify, in the smallest degree, your pride of authorship. Pray let me advise you never more to meddle with a classical myth. Your imagination is altogether Gothic, and will inevitably Gothicize everything that you touch. The effect is like bedaubing a marble statue with paint. This giant, now! How can you have ventured to ...
— The Three Golden Apples - (From: "A Wonder-Book For Girls and Boys") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... saying to me, when first I saw him after the discovery of "Evelina"...... I see what it is you can do, you little witch—it is, that you can hang us all up for laughing- stocks; but hear me this one thing—don't meddle with me. I see what they are, your powers; but remember, when you provoke an Italian you run a dagger into your own ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madam D'Arblay Volume 2 • Madame D'Arblay
... the world laughing, merry, observant, kind-hearted. He should love everything in the world, because his profession regards everything. With books of lighter literature (for I do not recommend the genteel auctioneer to meddle with heavy antiquarian and philological works) he should be elegantly conversant, being able to give a neat history of the author, a pretty sparkling kind criticism of the work, and an appropriate eulogium upon the binding, which ...
— The Fitz-Boodle Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... apprehend that the contents of that bundle were of much more importance to him than if they had consisted of Miss Lindon, either dead or living. More. I am inclined to suspect that if the bundle was placed on the roof of the cab, and if the driver did meddle with it, and did find out the contents, and understand them, he would have been driven, out of hand, ...
— The Beetle - A Mystery • Richard Marsh
... said he; "I should not think of mentioning it. But those brigands in Italy always take away what you have about your person, but they don't meddle with the ...
— The Man Who Kept His Money In A Box • Anthony Trollope
... vernal bow'r The rising game, and chas'd from flow'r to flow'r. It fled, I follow'd, now in hope, now pain; It stopt, I stopt; it mov'd, I mov'd again. At last it fixed, 'twas on what plant it pleas'd, And where it fixed, the beauteous bird I seiz'd: Rose, or carnation, was below my care; I meddle, Goddess! only in my sphere. I tell the naked feet without disguise, And, to excuse it, need but show the prize; Whose spoils this paper offers to our eye, Fair ev'n death! this ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 358, August 1845 • Various
... affair I am only a passive spectator. I've tried once to help things along and made an awful mess of it. So I shall not meddle again. I'll tell you all ...
— Anne Of The Island • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... leave my tent standing as it was, and all the things which I had purchased of the tinker, just as they were. "I need not be apprehensive on their account," said I to myself; "nobody will come here to meddle with them—the great recommendation of this place is its perfect solitude—I dare say that I could live here six months without seeing a single human visage. I will now harness my little gry and ...
— Isopel Berners - The History of certain doings in a Staffordshire Dingle, July, 1825 • George Borrow
... things. It will have nothing. And yet it will have everything, and whatever one takes from it, it will still have, so rich will it be. It will not be always meddling with others, or asking them to be like itself. It will love them because they will be different. And yet while it will not meddle with others, it will help all, as a beautiful thing helps us, by being what it is. The personality of man will be very wonderful. It will be as wonderful as the personality ...
— The Soul of Man • Oscar Wilde
... friendly by me," says he, when we had brought him aboard, "and I will be plain with thee, whether I came willingly to thee or not. But thou knowest it is not my business to meddle when thou art ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol III • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... was blind of the one eye, but she could see with the other, and I told Tadini that I did not care to meddle with such ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... man believing that he ought to have spoken and making explanations to those around him. It was a very dangerous thing, he protested, to meddle in diplomatic affairs. Furthermore, he had not instructions from his government. And for a few hours he believed that he had been on the point of playing a ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... to believe for a moment that you were not an honest friend of mine." We shook hands.—"Come here, Harry," he went on with perfect good-nature: "I promise to forgive and forget this talk of yours on condition that you do not meddle in future between Georgy and me. You never liked her—you never did her justice. Come, now, are you prepared to hold your tongue ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various
... that you have any right either to meddle in my affairs, or to make me waste a cigarette," said Lucien, throwing away his cigarette ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... illogical writer. To have said this of him formerly on another ground, was accounted a heresy and a piece of presumption not easily to be forgiven. Indeed Mr. Malthus has always been a sort of "darling in the public eye," whom it was unsafe to meddle with. He has contrived to make himself as many friends by his attacks on the schemes of Human Perfectibility and on the Poor-Laws, as Mandeville formerly procured enemies by his attacks on Human Perfections and on Charity-Schools; and among other instances that we might ...
— The Spirit of the Age - Contemporary Portraits • William Hazlitt
... says Gladstone was an Irishman, Sir. What call would he have to meddle with Ireland as ...
— O'Flaherty V. C. • George Bernard Shaw
... idiots—the stupid idiots! or rather, the kind, blessed, adorable idiots! They think they have crushed us, when they say to us men of the church: 'You take the spiritual, but we will keep the temporal!'—Oh, their conscience or their modesty inspires them well, when it bids them not meddle with spiritual things! They abandon the spiritual! they despise it, they will have nothing to do with it—oh, the venerable asses! they do not see, that, even as they go straight to the mill, it is by the spiritual that we go straight to the temporal. ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... causes the animal no inconvenience it is best not to meddle with it; when it does the animal ought to be fattened for beef, the meat being perfectly harmless ...
— Special Report on Diseases of Cattle • U.S. Department of Agriculture
... give these people, so to speak, a right to meddle and dabble in her heart? Was she to be wept over by Sister Angela—to confess her sins to Father Bowles—still worse, to Father Leadham? As she asked herself the question, she shrank in sudden passion from ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... laughed bitterly: "A Greek! Ah, ha! perhaps some relation to Bartja's faithful fair one! What can this stranger know of my family affairs? I know these beggarly Ionians well. They are impudent enough to meddle in everything, and think they can cheat us with their sly tricks. How much have you had to pay for this new witness, uncle? A Greek is as ready with a lie as a Magian with his spells, and I know they'll do anything for gold. ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... suppose anyone will say that in this great German event Prussian ambition had no share, or that force and conquest did not act side by side with the impulse of national sentiment. But I do not now meddle with what has been done in Germany; that has nothing in common with the present pretensions of Prussia to Alsace and Lorraine. Have these provinces given any manifestation, any appearance, of a desire to be included in the German unity? Is not the Prussian policy in this ...
— Memoirs of the Life and Correspondence of Henry Reeve, C.B., D.C.L. - In Two Volumes. VOL. II. • John Knox Laughton
... the convent, and [thus] many tricks and tyrannies were avoided. But for some years the governors who have come from Espana have desired that the parish priests should keep to their houses and say mass and preach and not meddle with the temporal government; without taking heed that in a whole province there is no other Spaniard who governs than the alcalde-mayor himself, who generally comes from Europa and goes without reflection to take his charge without any knowledge whatever of the country or knowing ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXXVI, 1649-1666 • Various
... that any more such ignorant meddling as this obnoxious Tuly did well result almost certainly in failure and death. Therefore we can not and will not meddle again." ...
— Masters of Space • Edward Elmer Smith
... fact which seems to be an explanation of everything in Spain,—the power and the tyranny of the House of Austria. The period of the vast increase of Spanish dominion coincided with that of the meridian glory of Italian art. The conquest of Granada was finished as the divine child Raphael began to meddle with his father's brushes and pallets, and before his short life ended Charles, Burgess of Ghent, was ...
— Castilian Days • John Hay
... turned out upon examination that the discoveries of profligacy which it enabled them to make, lay chiefly in those upper regions of society which their well-bred regulations forbid them to molest or meddle with.—In consequence they gained but very few victims by their prize, and after lying for a week or two under Mr. Hatchard's counter the Bag with its violated contents was sold for a trifle to ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... this question presented to a man, with as nice a perception of moral duty as perhaps ever lived, it is said by Bishop Burnet, of Sir Matthew Hale: "If he saw a cause was unjust, he for a great while would not meddle further in it, but to give his advice that it was so; if the parties after that would go on, they were to seek another counsellor, for he would assist none in acts of injustice; if he found the cause doubtful or weak in point of law, ...
— An Essay on Professional Ethics - Second Edition • George Sharswood
... said, and with a little inner smile he added dryly to himself, "He's getting ready to meddle again." But whatever amusement Baird had in this thought was concealed behind his sober gray eyes. Soon after that he took ...
— His Family • Ernest Poole
... over and above, it must only have served it to contemplate the happy constitution of its nature, to admire it, to congratulate itself thereon, and to feel thankful for it to the beneficent cause, but not that it should subject its desires to that weak and delusive guidance and meddle bunglingly with the purpose of nature. In a word, nature would have taken care that reason should not break forth into practical exercise, nor have the presumption, with its weak insight, to think out for itself the plan ...
— Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysic of Morals • Immanuel Kant
... eunuchs! Get ye, then, And hear the flute, harsh-grating, that invites With twy-mouthed music to her lewd delights, Where boxen pipe and timbrel from afar Shriek forth the summons to her sacred rites. Put by the sword, poor dotards as ye are, Leave arms to men, like us, nor meddle with ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil
... party in the great Thirty Years' War (1618-1648), which had begun between the Catholics and Protestants in Germany. The House of Commons implored the King not to humiliate himself and the nation at the feet of Spain. The King replied by warning the House not to meddle with matters which did not concern them, and denied their right to freedom of speech. The Commons solemnly protested, and James seized their official journal, and with his own hands tore out the record of ...
— The Leading Facts of English History • D.H. Montgomery
... organization and spirit. I want a body whose teaching is far above the fads of the moment, goes straight on even when the government is asleep, and whose administration and statutes become so national that one can never lightly resolve to meddle with them.... There will never be fixity in politics if there is not a teaching body with fixed principles. As long as people do not from their infancy learn whether they ought to be republicans or monarchists, Catholics or sceptics, the State will never form ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... had seen the soldiers at Jamestown. But he dried it so long, they peeping over it to see his skill, it took fire, and blew him to death, and one or two more, and the rest so scorched they had little pleasure any more to meddle with gunpowder." ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... "How dare you meddle in people's affairs like this and put us into such dreadful trouble?" Elsie asked of the one who would help her. Then to her mother, pulling away from her longing clasp, "You understand that at a time like this my place ...
— Little Lost Sister • Virginia Brooks
... was preparing, one whom Bunyan bitterly styles "an old enemy to the truth," Dr. Lindall, Vicar of Harlington, Wingate's father-in-law, came in and began "taunting at him with many reviling terms," demanding what right he had to preach and meddle with that for which he had no warrant, charging him with making long prayers to devour widows houses, and likening him to "one Alexander the Coppersmith he had read of," "aiming, 'tis like," says Bunyan, "at me because I was a tinker." The mittimus was now made out, and Bunyan in the constable's ...
— The Life of John Bunyan • Edmund Venables
... stare out of the window. Somehow I was stirred. There seemed to me something ominous in my own preoccupation with these affairs, affairs in which I could not, even had I the right, to meddle. My friend's laconic exposition only deepened the dramatic quality of the situation. For an author I had been singularly luckless in meeting drama in my life. I had often had my artistic cupidity excited by Mr. Carville, ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... on the heels of the Schwyzer, who tripped, and both went headlong into a ditch. Feklitus was the only one who kept his ground. He knew who he was; Fortunatus, the only son of Mr. Bickel. No one would dare to meddle with him. He knew, too, that he was by no means nimble, and the sudden appearance of the men in uniform had given him a strange feeling of heaviness in his legs. He had no mind to stay alone, however, and so he seized the shoemaker's boy by the ...
— Gritli's Children • Johanna Spyri
... place I could lodge in. The man I met in the doorway told me as much, and so I am here. If my company is not agreeable, or if you wish this room to yourselves, let me go into the kitchen. I promise not to meddle with the supper, hungry as I am. Or perhaps you wish me to join the crowd outside; it ...
— The House in the Mist • Anna Katharine Green
... their resources. Munificence is a benefit to society, that we grant willingly. Let us even allow that the prodigality of certain rich men is a safety-valve for the escape of the superabundant: we shall not attempt to gainsay it. Our contention is that too many people meddle with the safety-valve when to practice economy is the part of both their interest and their duty: their extravagance is a private misfortune and ...
— The Simple Life • Charles Wagner
... from any place nearer than Constantinople people would have smiled and perhaps laughed at him; as it was, he was an exotic, and besides, he had the reputation of being dangerous to women's peace, and extremely awkward to meddle with in ...
— The Primadonna • F. Marion Crawford
... it up," remarked Mr. MacGlue. "The first words she addressed, sir, to the man who had dragged her out of the very jaws of death were these: 'How dare you meddle with me? why didn't you leave me to die?' Her exact language—I'll take my Bible oath of it. I was so provoked that I gave her the change back (as the saying is) in her own coin. 'There's the river handy, ma'am,' ...
— The Two Destinies • Wilkie Collins
... simplest thing to do was to send the body of Flatbush to the gang. It would serve, Ted hoped, as a terrible warning to the other members of the gang not to meddle with the affairs of ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor
... every grain of Plutus' gold, Finds bottom in th' incomprehensive deeps, Keeps place with thought, and almost, like the gods, Does thoughts unveil in their dumb cradles. There is a mystery (with which relation Durst never meddle) in the soul of state, Which hath an operation more divine Than breath or pen can give expressure to." (Act 3, ...
— Tolstoy on Shakespeare - A Critical Essay on Shakespeare • Leo Tolstoy
... now nearly thirty years since I ate fish, flesh, or fowl, or took fermented liquor of any kind whatsoever. I find, from continued experience, that abstinence is the best medicine. I don't meddle with fermented liquors of any kind, even as medicine. I find I am capable of doing better without them than when I was in the ...
— Vegetable Diet: As Sanctioned by Medical Men, and by Experience in All Ages • William Andrus Alcott
... attained an eminence such as that of Shakespeare in letters or of Darwin in science, we may question whether Shakespeare would have been Shakespeare or Darwin Darwin if the society which surrounded them had insisted that it was a sin for them to use their minds and that they should not presume to meddle with knowledge. When a girl for the first time in America took a public examination in geometry, in 1829, men wagged their heads gravely and prophesied the speedy dissolution of family ...
— A Short History of Women's Rights • Eugene A. Hecker
... Hogs for themselves, yet they would beg the Panches of the Goats that they themselves did sell to us: And if any of our surly Seamen did heave them into the Sea, they would take them up again, and the Skins of the Goats also. They would not meddle with Hog-guts, if our Men threw away any beside what they made Chitterlings and Sausages of. The Goat-skins these People would carry ashore, and making a Fire they would singe oft all the Hair, and afterwards ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898—Volume 39 of 55 • Various
... after accepting, rather more easily than usual, her son's apologies for coming in late to lunch, and also being distinctly gracious to Mrs. Iggulden about the beefsteak-pudding. "Your father disapproved of it, and the whole of my family. The words 'never meddle' were on their lips from morning till night. Is it wonderful that I abstain from speaking, as I so often do? Whatever I see, I am silent." And accordingly was ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... the Chartreuse monks, the woods swarmed with wild boars, hares and foxes. No one hunts there now, because it belongs to the government; and the government at present is nobody. In my capacity as General Bonaparte's aide-de-camp I'll fill the vacancy, and we'll see who dares meddle with me, if, after chasing the Austrians on the Adige and the Mamelukes on the Nile, I hunt the boars and deer and the hares and foxes on the Reissouse. One day of archeology, one day of fishing, and one of hunting, that's three already. You see, my dear fellow, we have only fifteen or sixteen ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas
... settlers were generally poor and hard-working men. Young men with a little capital had not as yet been attracted here, so there was but little inducement for the escaped convicts to meddle with them. There were, of course, some notorious scoundrels, who seemed to murder for the pure love of the thing. The worst of them, I think, was a fellow who went by the name of Cockeye. What his real ...
— A Final Reckoning - A Tale of Bush Life in Australia • G. A. Henty
... I lay eighteen days till our officers, who had been on business to Dublin, came on board. The captain inquired for the prisoners, and on being informed of my situation came down with the doctor to set my bones, but finding them callussed they concluded not to meddle with me. ...
— American Prisoners of the Revolution • Danske Dandridge
... Yankee hogs who meddle in our affairs humiliate us to the last degree, and for still greater taunt order to us one of the ships of war of their rotten squadron, after insulting us in their newspapers and driving us from ...
— The Boys of '98 • James Otis
... were merely visited by traders from foreign countries; for at this era it was a maxim with them, never to leave their own country. The low opinion they entertained of commerce may be gathered from Herodotus, who mentions, that the men disdained to meddle with it, but left it entirely to ...
— Robert Kerr's General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 • William Stevenson
... to entertain pleas of witchcraft, the sturdy Parliament of Normandy with its sound Norman logic pointed out the dangerous drift of such a decision. The Devil is nothing less than a dogma holding on to all the rest. If you meddle with the Eternally Conquered, are you not meddling with the Conqueror likewise? To doubt the acts of the former, leads to doubting the acts of the second, the miracles he wrought for the very purpose of withstanding the ...
— La Sorciere: The Witch of the Middle Ages • Jules Michelet
... monument, to respect the name chiselled there. To you he did only good. On you he conferred his whole treasure of beauties, nor added to them one dark defect. All you derived from him is excellent. You owe him gratitude. Leave, between him and me, the settlement of our mutual account. Meddle not. God is the arbiter. This world's laws never came near us—never! They were powerless as a rotten bulrush to protect me—impotent as idiot babblings to restrain him! As you said, it is all over now; ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... they hugged and kissed him. And there was no one ever so happy as poor little Tom, and he gaily swam away with them to their home in the caves beneath St. Brandan's fairy isle. But I wish Tom had given up all his naughty tricks. He would meddle with the creatures, frighten the crabs, and put stones in the anemones' mouths to make them fancy ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume V. • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... letters, that a deed of appointment had been made by the said Richard, and Eleanor his wife, under the powers of their settlement. Luckily they had not been employed in the matter, and possessed not so much as a draft or a letter of instructions; and now it was no concern of theirs to make, or meddle, or even move. Neither did they know that any question could arise about it; for they were a highly antiquated firm, of most rigid respectability, being legal advisers to the Chapter of York, and clerks of the Prerogative Court, and able to charge twice as much as ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... last with Congress, I often proposed to members to do this, by making of the committee of the States, an executive committee during the recess of Congress, and, during its sessions, to appoint a committee to receive and despatch all executive business, so that Congress itself should meddle only with what should be legislative. But I question if any Congress (much less all successively) can have self-denial enough to go through with this distribution. The distribution, then, should be imposed on them. I find Congress have ...
— The Writings of Thomas Jefferson - Library Edition - Vol. 6 (of 20) • Thomas Jefferson
... going away? He places himself in front of a French lady, well-known for her beauty and wit and the vivacity of her opinions, "like the stiffest of German generals, and says: 'Madame, I don't like women who meddle with politics!'" Equality, ease, familiarity and companionship, vanish at his approach. Eighteen months before this, on his appointment as commander-in-chief of the army in Italy, Admiral Decres, who had known him well at Paris,[1137] ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 5 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 1 (of 2)(Napoleon I.) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... Whether I do or not, my dear, is my own business. Furthermore, I do not like to have any one meddle in my arrangements. ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky
... alms or was destitute of money, of which, indeed, he gave away to those whom he considered poorer than himself. But whatever was the truth, or however anxious the good people of Hillsdale might be to discover the secret, no one ventured to meddle with him, though more than one old woman had hinted that it was a shame he should be allowed to run about with so long a beard, and a resolute fellow even once suggested the expediency of arresting him on suspicion. ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... time was Cyrus, the son of Darius, the Great King, a clever prince, who understood something of Greek courage, and saw that the best thing for Persia was to keep the Greeks fighting with one another, so that no one state should be mightiest, or able to meddle with the Persian domains in Asia Minor. He gave Lysander the means of adding to his forces, and with his new fleet he plundered the shores of the islands of Salamis and Euboea, and even of Attica itself, to insult the Athenians. Their fleet came out to ...
— Aunt Charlotte's Stories of Greek History • Charlotte M. Yonge
... as health, and is itself a state of being, and yet is arrayed against being, then Mind, or God, does not meddle with it. Disease becomes indeed a stubborn reality, and man is mortal. A "kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation;" therefore the mind that attacks a normal and real condition of man, is profanely ...
— No and Yes • Mary Baker Eddy
... meddle where you aren't asked! For my part, my dear Agrafena Kondratyevna, this is what I think: wouldn't it be nicer to ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky
... to say to you?" she curtly replied. "I may have seen that you were inclined to meddle with me, but I do not choose to be on people's wicked tongues for nothing. I do not mean to have you for a husband—neither you ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: German • Various
... suddain Rush of Blood to the Head, and woulde not be dissuaded from going out; but Mother was playnly smote at the Heart, and having lookt after him with some anxietie, exclaimed, "I shall neither meddle nor make more in this Businesse: your Father's suddain Seizures shall never be layd at my Doore;" and soe left me, till we met at Dinner. After the Cloth was drawne, enters Mr. Milton, who goes up to Mother, ...
— Mary Powell & Deborah's Diary • Anne Manning
... roared with rage. "I will seek this impudent Thrym!" he cried. "I will crush him into bits, and teach him to meddle with the ...
— Myths That Every Child Should Know - A Selection Of The Classic Myths Of All Times For Young People • Various
... hold fast with their claws, but with their tails also, by which they often hang to the boughs, either to rest themselves or to sport. It happened that one Ballaster brought one of these cats out of a wood, having knocked him from a tree, and not daring to meddle with it when down because of its fierceness, he cut off one of its fore paws and brought it on board in that mutilated condition. Even in that maimed state, it terrified a good dog we had on board, but put one of the Indian ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. III. • Robert Kerr
... that twilight through which alchemy was passing into chemistry. "This Dr, for a Dr he is, brags that if he have but the hint or notice of any useful thing not yet invented, he will undertake to find it out, except some few which he hath vowed not to meddle with as vitrum maliabile, perpet. motus, via proxima ad Indos & lapis philosi: all, or anything else he will undertake, but for his private gain, to make a monopoly thereof & to sell the use or knowledge thereof at too high rates." This breed of pedlers ...
— Among My Books - First Series • James Russell Lowell
... spread like a tree—and I hoped it might! But it's no good being disappointed—that's childish—you can't do what you mean to do in this world, only what you are meant to do. I expect the weakness has been that I meddle too much—I don't leave things alone enough. I trust too much to myself, and not enough to God. It's been too much a case of "See me do it!"—as the ...
— Father Payne • Arthur Christopher Benson
... ought to understand about such matters, but may one suppose that the English authorities would deliberately allow an innocent woman to remain in prison? They must know that the friends of Mrs. Hamilton believe her innocent. Why should we on this side of the water meddle simply because she ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... marry her, and to put up with these people. I shall make up my mind what to do myself, and I don't want anybody to meddle with me.' ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... I'm thinkin' about? He came in to see me to-day for the first time. He hates smallpox, and he smelt so of iodoform he nearly made me sick. About all he had to say was that it was very foolish of me to meddle with the clothes of them patients, and he could hardly believe I was so crazy's not to be vaccinated when the other nurses were. Just as if it wasn't him that admired my lovely arms. ...
— The Making of Mary • Jean Forsyth
... [Sidenote: Jesuit mission] It is unfair to say that the primary purpose {337} of the Curia was to get all the privileges of loyalty for English Catholics while secretly inciting them to rise and murder their sovereign. But the very fact that the Jesuits were instructed not to meddle in politics and yet were unable to keep clear of the law, proves how inextricably politics and religion were intertwined. Immediately drawing the suspicion of Burghley, they were put to the "bloody question" and illegally tortured, ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... good-hearted, and had always taken the jokes patiently; but they had been jokes which did not humiliate him, did not bring him to shame; whereas, this would be a cruel one in that way, and to play it was to meddle with fire; for with all his good nature, Ed was a Southerner—and the English of that was, that when he came back he would kill as many of the conspirators as he could before falling himself. However, the chances must be taken—it ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... lord," interposed Mohi, "is not our philosopher getting off soundings; and may it not be impious to meddle with ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. II (of 2) • Herman Melville
... principle yourself. I wish you would let this ridiculous Barker of yours alone from this time forth. He has found a good place, where he is of use, and where he is doing very well. Now I think your responsibility is fairly ended. I hope you won't meddle with his love affairs, if he has any; for if you do, you will probably have your hands full. He is very good looking, and all sorts of silly little geese will be falling ...
— The Minister's Charge • William D. Howells
... as he hoped, to go privately to England for the purpose of kissing her royal hand. Don John further informed the King, upon the envoy's authority, that Elizabeth had refused assistance to the estates, saying, if she stirred it would be to render aid to Philip, especially if France should meddle in the matter. As to France, the Governor advised Philip to hold out hopes to Alencon of espousing the Infanta, but by no means ever to fulfil such a promise, as the Duke, "besides being the shield of heretics, was ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... yet did they undergo many and great wars for the sake of liberty, nor were they so far overcome by the power of the Egyptians, or the Medes, but that still they did what they thought fit, notwithstanding their commands to the contrary. And what occasion is there now for a war with the Romans? [I meddle not with determining whether it be an advantageous and profitable war or not.] What pretense is there for it? Is it not that we may enjoy our liberty? Besides, shall we not bear the lords of the habitable ...
— The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem • Flavius Josephus
... sir, I can brooke much injurie but not that; meddle with me but not with my trade; shee is mine owne, shee's meus, tuus, suus, no man's else, I assure ye, ...
— A Collection Of Old English Plays, Vol. IV. • Editor: A.H. Bullen
... it. You see they have a way of pushing long, slender needles into you for the cure of rheumatism and other complaints, and it seems there is a choice of spots for the operation, though it is very strange how little mischief it does in a good many places one would think unsafe to meddle with. So they had a doll made, and marked the spots where they had put in needles without doing any harm. They must have had accidents from sticking the needles into the wrong places now and then, but I suppose they did n't say a great ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... you chattering about?" said Norman fiercely. "Why did you meddle in my affairs? Why did you ...
— The Grain Of Dust - A Novel • David Graham Phillips
... Elements, known to all, concealing the most necessary Rules for Singing well. It is no Excuse to say, that the Composers intent on Composition, the Performers on Instruments intent on their Performance, should not meddle with what concerns the Singer; for I know some very capable to undeceive those who may think so. The incomparable Zarlino, in the third part of his Harmonick Institution, chap. 46, just began to inveigh against those, who in his time sung with some Defects, but he stopped; and I am apt to believe ...
— Observations on the Florid Song - or Sentiments on the Ancient and Modern Singers • Pier Francesco Tosi
... him that he knew nothing about equality and the rights of men, &c. How could I forget to tell you, that his master the smith, who was one of your guards, and who assisted you to escape, has returned without suspicion to his former trade? and he declares that he will never more meddle with public affairs. I gave him the money you left with me for him. He is very kind to my brother. Yesterday Maurice mended for Annette's mistress the lock of an English writing-desk, and he mended ...
— Murad the Unlucky and Other Tales • Maria Edgeworth
... have no instructions to meddle with such things. Let me now give the house a blessing, and withdraw. But I can tell you for your comfort," he added, seeing the disappointment in her wrinkled face, "if, as you assure me, this is a house of ...
— The Dragon Painter • Mary McNeil Fenollosa
... my marster don't 'low nuttin like dat—I'se too val'eble er nigger. Nobum, dey ain't none ob 'em gwine ter pester me, an' I ain't gwine ter meddle wid dem—dey kin des ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon
... meddle with destiny," returned the prince, straightening up again. "I shall be satisfied and ask no questions if Vajdar brings back a leaden casket containing the unhappy woman's remains. I shall render ...
— Manasseh - A Romance of Transylvania • Maurus Jokai
... should be added that the sportsman, who finds himself on cultivated lands, should rigidly keep his hands off the fruits of the season, and leave springs and streams alone. To meddle with them is ugly and base, not to speak of the bad example of lawlessness set to the beholder. During the close season (58) all hunting gear should be taken down and ...
— The Sportsman - On Hunting, A Sportsman's Manual, Commonly Called Cynegeticus • Xenophon |
