"Modest" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Maliko," said he, "thou art a mighty magician!" Bakahenzie grunted modest assent. "Even as I am." Another grunt. "Give unto me thine ears and thine eyes that I may reveal unto thee that which is known to the mightiest of magicians." Commanding the delighted Mungongo to bring out the phonograph, he continued: "Thou hast ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... stranger, doe I not affect: It is the vse for Turen maides to weare Their bowe and quiuer in this modest sort, And suite themselues in purple for the nonce, That they may trip more lightly ore the lawndes, And ouertake the tusked Bore in chase. But for the land whereof thou doest enquire, It is the punick kingdome rich ...
— The Tragedy of Dido Queene of Carthage • Christopher Marlowe
... thereby quite overshot my mark. When he learned that he was sitting in a wretched corner of an irregular house, with a felon, who had so lately been scourged and banished as a swindler and impostor, his modest nature took the alarm, and he was shocked, instead of being moved with pity. His eye fixed on some of the casual stripes on my arm, and from that moment he became restless and impatient to be gone. I tried some gentle arts to ...
— The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner • James Hogg
... faint crowing of wounded cocks! What tinkling of guitars and blowing of horns come upon the ear! Some, indeed, there be, who can look round upon their well-stored hacienda and easy-rolling carriages, and remember the day, when with threadbare coat, and stake of three modest ounces, they first courted Fortune's favours, and who, being then indigent, and enjoying an indifferent reputation, found themselves, at the conclusion of a few successive San Agustins, the fortunate proprietors of gold, and land, and houses; and, moreover, with an unimpeachable fame; ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon De La Barca
... and bent over him her happy, humming head. Zip-zip-zip, went the scissors, zip-zip—and a soft white fluff that looked like the stuffing of a pillow (an A-one pillow; not the kind upon which Charles-Norton and Dolly laid their modest heads) eddied slowly to Charles-Norton's feet while he shivered slightly to the coldness of the steel. (Dolly ...
— The Trimming of Goosie • James Hopper
... shook it, but not half so affectionately as the Professor shook his, while agreeing very simply that the day was remarkably fine; and then, oddly enough, Morris, though the Professor gave him no reason for his thoughts in words, began thinking of a quiet little place in the town where modest dinners were provided, one of which Morris did not require in the least, inasmuch as a repast would be provided for him gratuitously in the Doctor's establishment. Item, he began thinking, too, of half-crowns. But his thoughts were turned in ...
— Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn
... naturally pure and righteous is scarce. Yielding to the fear of chastisement, man becomes disposed to observe rules and restraints. Chastisement was ordained by the Creator himself for protecting religion and profit, for the happiness of all the four orders, and for making them righteous and modest. If chastisement could not inspire fear, then ravens and beasts of prey would have eaten up all other animals and men and the clarified butter intended for sacrifice. If chastisement did not uphold and protect, then nobody would have studied the Vedas, nobody would have milked a milch cow, and ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... his father, bit his lip, and retired to the window. William nodded to Edmund, and was silent. All the company had their eyes fixed on the young man, who stood in the midst, casting down his eyes with modest respect to the audience; while Sir Philip related all the material circumstances of his life, the wonderful gradation by which he came to the knowledge of his birth, the adventures of the haunted apartment, the discovery of the fatal closet, and the presumptive proofs that Lord Lovel was buried ...
— The Old English Baron • Clara Reeve
... into his head to ride out from Hartford to Belfield; and perhaps he would also request permission to visit her regularly, with the ultimate purpose of asking her hand in marriage; in which case, she said, it was to be hoped her parents would not refuse his modest petition; for that the young gentleman was a very good and worthy young gentleman, a law-student of extraordinary promise, of as old and respectable a family as any other in the State, and, withal, a young ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... to come to her house. For weeks she has not been over to Abeih, except to invite us to her wedding, and when Anna asked her on what day she was to be married, she professed not to know anything about it. They think it is not modest for a bride to care anything about the wedding, and she will try to appear unwilling to go when they are ready to start. The ...
— The Women of the Arabs • Henry Harris Jessup
... of the tapestries woven from models of Raphael, Giulio Romano and the classicists, cartoons in great favour after the hampering of Lebrun's imagination. The naked gods from Olympus must be clothed, said this pious and modest lady. ...
— The Tapestry Book • Helen Churchill Candee
... born at Ipswich, described in his biography as 'a very large and populous town in the county of Suffolk,' in 1632. He was of Puritan parentage, and bound apprentice in the city of London, and then began business as a linen-draper on the modest capital of 100 pounds. In a little while he married and was enabled to dispense a generous hospitality, seeking all opportunities of becoming acquainted with persons of worth, whether foreigners or his fellow-countrymen. Amongst ...
— East Anglia - Personal Recollections and Historical Associations • J. Ewing Ritchie
... bringin' th' lass back into th' Church. Hoo's noan o'er modest, or hoo would never ax us ...
— Lancashire Idylls (1898) • Marshall Mather
... campaign so early as he did. On 11 January, the day on which the Allies answered President Wilson's note, British troops began to nibble at the point of the salient on the Ancre which had been created by the battle of the Somme. It was a modest sort of offensive; for it was no part of the Allies' combined plan of operations, which had been settled in conference during November, to launch a first-class attack across the devastated battlefield ...
— A Short History of the Great War • A.F. Pollard
... of a gentlewoman," said Mrs Seaton. "She was perfectly self-possessed, yet simple and modest. I assure you I was ...
— Christie Redfern's Troubles • Margaret Robertson
... biggest break in the traditions of the woodcut since the 16th century. He broadened the scope of the chiaroscuro print and launched the color woodcut as a distinct art form that rivaled the polychrome effects of painting while retaining a character of its own. These were not modest little pieces of purely technical interest. The set of 24 sheets reproducing 17 paintings by Venetian masters made up the most heroic single project in chiaroscuro, and the 6 large landscapes, completed ...
— John Baptist Jackson - 18th-Century Master of the Color Woodcut • Jacob Kainen
... monk, and had been twenty years a Carthusian at the opening of the troubles of the Reformation. He is described as "small in stature, in figure graceful, in countenance dignified." "In manner he was most modest; in eloquence most sweet; in chastity without stain." We may readily imagine his appearance; with that feminine austerity of expression which, as has been well said, belongs so peculiarly to the features of the ...
— History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth. Vol. II. • James Anthony Froude
... valley, hop-ground and meadow, wherein the sweet fragrance of the newly-mown grass was wafted at intervals to the spot where they stood. Wild flowers of various kinds were around them; the hawthorn appearing like a tree of snow in the centre of a dark green hedge; the modest primrose and the hidden violet yet lingered, as if loth to depart, though their brethren of the summer had already put forth their budding blossoms. A newly-severed trunk of an aged tree invited them to sit and rest, and the most tasteful art could not have ...
— The Mother's Recompense, Volume I. - A Sequel to Home Influence in Two Volumes. • Grace Aguilar
... beyond reach of my modest protestations, blurting out his complicated interests, crying up his new acquaintances, and ever and again hungering to introduce me to some "whole-souled, grand fellow, as sharp as a needle," from whom, and the very thought of whom, my spirit ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... to honour according to nature similarity and equality and sameness and agreement, as regards number and every good and noble quality. And, above all, observe the aforesaid number 5040 throughout life; in the second place, do not disparage the small and modest proportions of the inheritances which you received in the distribution, by buying and selling them to one another. For then neither will the God who gave you the lot be your friend, nor will the legislator; ...
— Laws • Plato
... matter what particular black art; the latter called in person one morning to witness an experimental display. The apparatus was produced, the Brigadier inspected it delicately, and the section was fallen in, standing near by in an attitude of modest pride. From them the Brigadier eventually singled out a private to do a star turn; silence was enjoined while the subaltern should give the private the necessary detail orders. Now the subaltern was one of the many ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, February 16, 1916 • Various
... against these sins, to be utterly dead to them. For they are sensual, acknowledged such even among the gentiles; while we strive after the perfect purity becoming souls who belong to Christ and in heaven. It is incumbent upon the Christian to preserve his body modest, and holy or chaste; to refrain from polluting himself by fornication and other unchastity, after the ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. II - Epiphany, Easter and Pentecost • Martin Luther
... may see the whole universe in its smallest part, all his theory can not reproduce educational wholes from fragments of it. The real merits of sloyd have caused its enthusiastic leaders to magnify its scope and claims far beyond their modest bounds; and although its field covers the great transition from childhood to youth, one searches in vain both its literature and practise for the slightest recognition of the new motives and methods that puberty suggests. Especially in its partially ...
— Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene • G. Stanley Hall
... him what the Tempter said, And what her frightened self had seen, (That form in loveliness arrayed, With modest face, and graceful ...
— Fringilla: Some Tales In Verse • Richard Doddridge Blackmore
... his young antagonist, however, one cannot help noticing that the generous and modest but astute counsel for the defence ...
— Daniel Webster • Henry Cabot Lodge
... forth their clusters of creamy buds, when the white blossoms of the dogwoods line the banks of little streams, when the azaleas and rhododendrons, lovely and delicate as orchids, blaze a bed of glory, and the modest little oxalis has thrust itself up through the brown carpet of pine-needles and redwood-twigs, these wonderful forests cast upon one a potent spell. To have seen them once thus in gala dress is to yearn thereafter to see them again and still again and grieve always in the knowledge of their ...
— The Valley of the Giants • Peter B. Kyne
... letter to Atterbury of April 18th we catch the spirit which, four years later, showed itself in "The Proposal for the Universal Use of Irish Manufactures" and the "Drapier's Letters," and culminated in 1729 in the terrible "Modest Proposal for Preventing the Children of Poor People from being a Burthen to their Parents." To ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... Will felt more impressed than ever with the hopelessness of his case, as he walked slowly and silently to church beside the modest Flora and her mother. He also became impressed with the ridiculousness of his position, and determined to "overcome his weakness." He therefore looked at Flora with the intention of cutting a joke of some sort, but, suddenly ...
— Sunk at Sea • R.M. Ballantyne
... Captain was modest. Everybody agreed to that. Nevertheless he certainly had at his tongue's end an astonishing amount of information which came hither when occasion arose for ...
— Carl and the Cotton Gin • Sara Ware Bassett
... called, and in answer the door opened and a young woman entered. She was a sweet-faced, modest-appearing girl, and when she pushed back her veil, Mr. Gubb saw she had been weeping, for her eyes were red. Mr. Gubb hastily pulled out his ...
— Philo Gubb Correspondence-School Detective • Ellis Parker Butler
... the sixteenth I know, if a modest maiden's favour and affection I desire to possess, the soul I change of the white-armed damsel, and wholly ...
— The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson; and the Younger Eddas of Snorre Sturleson • Saemund Sigfusson and Snorre Sturleson
... came up alongside of us. What a contrast to our royal simplicity of form and colour in this plebeian wretch! The single ornament on our dark ground of chocolate colour was the mighty shield of the imperial arms, but emblazoned in proportions as modest as a signet-ring bears to a seal of office. Even this was displayed only on a single panel, whispering, rather than proclaiming, our relations to the mighty state; whilst the beast from Birmingham, our green-and-gold friend from false, fleeting, ...
— The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc • Thomas de Quincey
... Harry, with modest confidence. His heart beat high at the thought of the important position which was likely to be opened to him; and plans of what he would do to make the paper interesting already began to be ...
— Risen from the Ranks - Harry Walton's Success • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... him, but her marriage to a rich man had not given her the command of much money. She and Amherst, choosing to regard themselves as pensioners on the Westmore fortune, were scrupulous in restricting their personal expenditure; and her work among the mill-hands brought many demands on the modest allowance which her husband had insisted on her accepting. In reply to Wyant's first appeal, which reached her soon after her marriage, she had sent him a hundred dollars; but when the second came, some two months later—with ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton
... a modest clerk, who had come from the young University of Oxford, poor, patched, threadbare, with hollow cheeks, mounted on a lean horse, and whose little ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... state. We, on the contrary, paid for everything—round prices too—in bright American dollars. The ricos and merchants preferred this system, and had no objections to making it permanent. Outrages were few on the part of our soldiery, and severely punished by the general. Our enemies contrasted the modest bearing of the American soldier with the conceited strut and insolent swagger of their own gold-bedizened militarios, who were wont on all occasions to "take the wall" of them. It was only outside the lines, between stragglers and leperos, that the retaliation system was carried on so fiercely. ...
— The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid
... But it's true. You never ken what thae quate kin' o' modest folk will dae. They look that bashfu' that butter wadna' melt in their mouths; an' a' the time they are just as like to ...
— The Underworld - The Story of Robert Sinclair, Miner • James C. Welsh
... exquisitely modest and diffident, and yet had an almost permanent humorous smile. But the paramount expression on his face was honesty. She had never hitherto missed the expression of honesty on Louis' face, but she realized now that it was not there.... And she had been adjudged worthy ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... are modest, sir," the Spaniard said. "You are one of those who belittle your own good deeds. I feel indeed more grateful than I can express to you as well as ...
— By England's Aid • G. A. Henty
... an idea, I might say a brilliant idea and when I say I like the idea better than any idea I can remember—you know me—I'm modest, but Al, it's a wonder. You'll like it. No, change that line, you may not like it but you'll respect it. Al, I'm going to let you in, give you the first chance. Conover would double the commission. Appleby would go wild over it. But, Al, I'm ...
— Skippy Bedelle - His Sentimental Progress From the Urchin to the Complete - Man of the World • Owen Johnson
... a voice expressive of the temperament which kept him content with his modest fortune and his village circumstance, when he might have made so much more and spent so much more in the world outside, "did you get ...
— The Coast of Bohemia • William Dean Howells
... she hurried through the street in her tan mackintosh with its yellow velveteen collar turned high up, and one of those modest round hats to which she was addicted. For then you were aware only of the pale-gold hair fluffing round her school-mistress eye-glasses, her gentle air of respectability, ...
— The Job - An American Novel • Sinclair Lewis
... the first time, but at such a moment, in such surroundings and in such a dress, that his memory retained a very different image of her. Now she was a modestly and poorly-dressed young girl, very young, indeed, almost like a child, with a modest and refined manner, with a candid but somewhat frightened-looking face. She was wearing a very plain indoor dress, and had on a shabby old-fashioned hat, but she still carried a parasol. Unexpectedly finding the room full of people, she was not so much embarrassed as completely overwhelmed ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... all access against it in any rougher or more homely form. He will make it his business to set on foot and forward benevolent and useful schemes; and where they require united efforts, to obtain and preserve for them this co-operation. He will endeavour to discountenance vice, to bring modest merit into notice; to lend as it were his light to men of real worth, but of less creditable name, and perhaps of less conciliating qualities and manners; that they may thus shine with a reflected lustre, and be useful in their turn, when invested with their just estimation. ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce
... maintained a solitude around it. It was the district of the "little river Loir"—the Vendomois; and here, in its own country, the new poetry, notwithstanding its classic elegance, might seem a native wild flower, modest enough. ...
— Gaston de Latour: an unfinished romance • Walter Horatio Pater
... there's no place like home." In Lexington, Kentucky, there is a modest looking house, nestled mid linden and locust trees. Visitors who pass in quest of historic spots about the far-famed city, seldom give even a glance at that humble abode. Yet when I am far away, ...
— Wit, Humor, Reason, Rhetoric, Prose, Poetry and Story Woven into Eight Popular Lectures • George W. Bain
... then in English (which, after all, you find is more convenient). What can express your gratitude to this gentleman for all his goodness towards your family and yourself—you talk to him, he has served under the Emperor, and is, for all that, sensible, modest, and well-informed. He speaks, indeed, of his countrymen almost with contempt, and readily admits the superiority of a Briton, on the seas and elsewhere. One loves to meet with such genuine liberality in a foreigner, and ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... events had been going on beneath the modest roof of the Widow Hopkins, affairs had been rapidly hastening to a similar conclusion under the statelier shadow of The Poplars. Clement Lindsay was so well received at his first visit that he ventured ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various
... finish my modest supper," Elmer answered, with a nod at the great stack of food which Tommy had piled up on his plate, "I'm going to give you boys ...
— The Call of the Beaver Patrol - or, A Break in the Glacier • V. T. Sherman
... the Virgin Mary, had most beautiful eyes, as amiable eyes as any persons, saith Baradius, that ever lived, yet withal so modest, so chaste, that whosoever looked on them was freed from that passion of burning lust, if we may believe Gerson and Bonaventure; there was no such antidote against it ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck
... ii. 5) had borne also the second death (Apoc. xx. 6), the death of the soul, the death to grace, that accompaniment only of sin and damnable blasphemy! In comparison with this insanity, Bucer, impudent fellow that he is, will appear modest, for he (on Matth. xxvi.), by an explanation very preposterous, or rather, an inept and stupid tautology, takes hell in the creed to mean the tomb. Of the Anglican sectaries, some are wont to adhere to their idol, Calvin, others to their great master, Bucer; some also murmur ...
— Ten Reasons Proposed to His Adversaries for Disputation in the Name • Edmund Campion
... daughters beautiful and blooming. Olivia, the elder daughter, was open, sprightly, and commanding; Sophia's features were not so striking at first, but often did more certain execution, for they were soft, modest, and alluring. ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IV. • Editors: Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... be better than with you, Carry?' said the young Duke, determined not to leave her, and loving her still more for her modest kindness; and thereon he turned round, and, to show that he was sincere, began talking with his usual spirit. Mr. Bulkley of course never returned, and Lady Fitz-pompey felt as satisfied with her diplomatic talents as a plenipotentiary ...
— The Young Duke • Benjamin Disraeli
... him. Poor man though he was, he would not send me to the village school frequented by peasant children, but carried me to Rome, that I might be educated with sons of knights and senators. He pinched himself to dress me well, himself attended me to all my lecture-rooms, preserved me pure and modest, fenced me from evil knowledge and from dangerous contact. Of such a sire how should I be ashamed? how say, as I have heard some say, that the fault of a man's low birth is Nature's, not his own? Why, were I to begin my life again, with ...
— Horace • William Tuckwell
... ruined merchant condescended to plead with him. He represented that the tie between them was very different from the merely convenient connections which were so common; that Loo Loo was really good and modest, and so sensitive by nature, that exposure to public sale would nearly kill her. The selfish creditor remained inexorable. The very fact that this delicate flower had been so carefully sheltered ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various
... Jones, though an unusually modest man, was as redoubtable in the boudoir as at sea, and it would be hard to say which type of engagement most ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense
... splitting trees on the verges of awful precipices; hurricanes, shipwrecks, waves, and whirlpools follow each other on his canvas, without an intervening glimpse of quiet everyday nature to relieve the succession of pictorial horrors. When I see him at his easel, so neat and quiet, so unpretending and modest in himself, with such a composed expression on his attentive face, with such a weak white hand to guide such bold, big brushes, and when I look at the frightful canvasful of terrors which he is serenely ...
— The Queen of Hearts • Wilkie Collins
... life, my dear Quintana. And now we'll take a little inventory of these marvellous gems before we part. ... Sit very, very still, Quintana, — unless you want to lie stiller still. ... I'll let you take a modest peep at the Flaming Jewel——" busily unwrapping the packet — "just one ...
— The Flaming Jewel • Robert Chambers
... former writers into modern language that a new system of public law seems likely to be useful. The age in which we live possesses many advantages which are peculiarly favourable to such an undertaking. Since the composition of the great works of Grotius and Puffendorff, a more modest, simple, and intelligible philosophy has been introduced into the schools; which has indeed been grossly abused by sophists, but which, from the time of Locke, has been cultivated and improved by a succession of disciples worthy ...
— A Discourse on the Study of the Law of Nature and Nations • James Mackintosh
... daimyo's goten (palace of feudal lord) of some six hundred years ago. The architectural style of the building was what is termed Heike, a style prevailing at the time when a military family called Heike held a paramount power. The artistically curved roofs, projecting one upon another, were a modest representation of architectural accomplishment already attained in Japan several centuries ago. Hanging on the inner wall of the hall was the portrait of Her Majesty the Empress of Japan, and occupying a section of the room were the exhibits of the Red ...
— Final Report of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission • Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission
... tiniest of men—pale, with soft, light hair, much in disorder, very red lips, and fingers yellowed by cigarettes. Frau Lichtenfeld shone in a gown of emerald green, fitting so closely as to enhance her natural floridness. However, to do the good lady justice, let her attire be never so modest, it gave an effect of barbaric splendor. At her left sat Herr Schotte, the Assyriologist, whose features were effectually concealed by the convergence of his hair and beard, and whose glasses were continually ...
— The Troll Garden and Selected Stories • Willa Cather
... catechism, and was confirmed just before she went to boarding-school, as was the custom with Ashurst young women, and sung in the choir, while Mr. Denner drew wonderful chords from the organ, and she was a very well-bred and modest young woman, taking her belief for granted, and giving no more thought to the problems of theology than ...
— John Ward, Preacher • Margaret Deland
... such consideration as is possible to their capacities, the suggestions in the text. But to the true lovers of the drama I would submit, as another subject of inquiry, whether they ought not to separate themselves from the mob, and provide, for their own modest, quiet, and guiltless entertainment, the truth of heartfelt impersonation, and the melody of the unforced and delicate voice, without extravagance of adjunct, unhealthy lateness of hours, or appeal to degraded passions. Such entertainment might be obtained ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... very modest man," said Ronder, laughing. "In fact, to tell you the truth, I don't believe very much in modesty. But there are times when it's just as well to admit one's incompetence. This is ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole
... us, was powerless. All he could do was to request them to make room around the palace courtyard for the coming exhibition. Thousands of thumbs were uplifted that afternoon, in praise of the wonderful twee-tah-cheh, or two-wheeled carts, as they witnessed our modest attempt at trick riding and special manoeuvering. After refreshments in the palace, to which we were invited by the viceroy, we were counseled to leave by a rear door, and return by a roundabout way to the inn, leaving ...
— Across Asia on a Bicycle • Thomas Gaskell Allen and William Lewis Sachtleben
... of her having always been so modest in her personal expenses that her husband used to jestingly say that he was afraid she would end by being a miser; and her judicious, well-regulated management of household expenditures, causing her to spend much the same amount each year—prevented ...
— File No. 113 • Emile Gaboriau
... with her whole body and with all her soul to the very depths of her poor, weak soul, and with all her heart, that poor heart of some grateful animal. It was really a delightful and innocent picture of simple passion, of carnal and yet modest passion, such as nature had implanted in mankind, before man had complicated and disfigured it by all the various shades of sentiment. But he soon grew tired of this ardent, beautiful, dumb creature, ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... a modestly opulent office on Madison Avenue, where he did his modest best to pretend to the world at large that he was only a small cog—indeed, an almost invisible cog—in a large advertising machine. His best was, for ...
— Supermind • Gordon Randall Garrett
... in knowing them. Henry B. is—while not a man of any enormous wealth—regarded as one of the keenest intellects in New York wholesale circles. But beyond that, he is a scholar, and a man of the broadest interests. Of course the Boltwoods are too modest to speak of it, but he was chiefly instrumental in the establishment of the famous Brooklyn Symphony Orchestra. And his ancestors clear through—his father was a federal judge, and his mother's brother was a general in the Civil War, and afterwards an ambassador. So you can guess ...
— Free Air • Sinclair Lewis
... A modest ring at the bell at length allayed her fears, and Miss Benton, hurrying into her own room and shutting herself up, in order that she might preserve that appearance of being taken by surprise which is so essential ...
— Master Humphrey's Clock • Charles Dickens
... this oversight in her behaviour, which, by the demon of intelligence, was in a moment conveyed to all the private companies in town; so that she was absolutely excluded from all polite communication, and Peregrine, for the present, disgraced among the modest part of his female acquaintance, many of whom not only forbade him their houses, on account of the impudent insult he had committed upon their honour, as well as understanding, in palming a common trull ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... disappeared until a slight hesitation at times was all that remained. Five years of college, two abroad—one with Helen, one with Doctor Ledyard—and then Richard Thornton Travers (Helen had, when he went to college, insisted for the first time upon the middle name) hung out his modest sign—it looked brazenly glaring to him—under that of Thomas R. Ledyard, and nervously awaited the first call upon him. He was twenty-five when he started life, and Priscilla Glenn, back in forgotten ...
— The Place Beyond the Winds • Harriet T. Comstock
... went with him round the garden, inspected both roses and puppy, and manifested great interest in a trellis he was constructing for the accommodation later in the summer of some climbing cucumbers, at present only visible as modest leaves in flower-pots. Neither made any reference to the little scene of the night before. Morning had brought to Dick the conviction that in refusing her hand and slamming the door he had behaved in ...
— Viviette • William J. Locke
... were to be seen, and her face grew so drawn and strange that it was a grief to look upon it, and still she kept on screaming in the deep, gruff man's voice—"For a bridegroom! a bridegroom!" she that was so modest, and had such a delicate, gentle voice. Whereupon all the sisters rushed in to hear her the moment the sermon was over; item, the ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... for 140 guineas a gross. Gilt buttons also came into fashion about the same period. In this "Augustan age" of the Birmingham button industry, when there was a large export trade, the profits of manufacturers who worked on only a modest scale amounted to L3000 and L4000 a year, and workmen earned from L2 to L4 a week. At one time the buttons had each to be fashioned separately by skilled artisans, but gradually the cost of production was lessened by the adoption of mechanical processes, and instead ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... Hoisted, where they had to pass the night. The modest little inn did its best for them, and the Pastor was glad to rest; but after dinner his enjoyment of his pipe was great. It is not understood in England that such is good or necessary. Tot homines ...
— A Danish Parsonage • John Fulford Vicary
... manners made him feel shy before his civilized friends, he announced, the very next day, his determination to leave Ajaccio, and to return to Pietranera. But he made the colonel promise that when he went to Bastia he would come and stay in his modest manor-house, and undertook, in return, to provide him with plenty of buck, pheasant, boar, ...
— Columba • Prosper Merimee
... and pictures which she had come all the way from England to admire; and, as Venice was an old haunt of mine, she very excusably expected me to act as cicerone to her, and allowed me but little rest between the hours of breakfast and of the table d'hote. At last, however, she conceived the modest and felicitous idea of making a copy of Titian's "Assumption"; and, having obtained the requisite permission for that purpose, set to work upon the first of a long series of courageous attempts, all of which ...
— Stories By English Authors: Italy • Various
... conscience had no part in urging him to speak. That warning voice proved vain; the Party from whom he separated, proceeded—confiding in splendid oratorical talents and ardent feelings rashly wedded to novel expectations, when common sense, uninquisitive experience, and a modest reliance on old habits of judgement, when either these, or a philosophic penetration, were the only qualities that ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... in mediocre poetry, or else in nothing. By insisting on rearing nothing short of a great monument more durable than brass, they are cutting themselves off from building the useful little mud-hut, or some of the other modest performances by which only they are capable of serving their age. It is only one volume in a million that is not meant to perish, and to perish soon, as flowers, sunbeams, and all the other brightnesses of the earth are meant to perish. There are some forms of composition in which perfection ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 3 of 3) - Essay 6: Harriet Martineau • John Morley
... separate the lovers that appeared in the remotest degree to savour of violence. When, on the other hand, he reflected upon the whole course of Jonathan's previous life, he was obliged to admit that all the virtues of a good, industrious, and modest youth could not easily be so happily united in another as they were in Jonathan, albeit his handsome expressive face bore the impress of traits which were perhaps a little too soft, and almost effeminate, ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... they themselves shall be made happy. Because of the crime his father committed years ago—because of the shame of that hidden crime—he had tried the more to make himself a good citizen, and had formed the modest ambition of making one human being happy. Always keeping this near him in past years, a supreme cheerfulness of heart had welled up out of his early sufferings and his innate honesty. Hope had beckoned him on from year ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... was one of those men who are popularly spoken of as unwilling to harm a fly. Modest, incapable of harboring an unkind thought, in bygone days he would have been made a missionary. His stay in the country had not given him the conviction of grand superiority, of great valor, and of elevated importance that the greater part of his countrymen acquire ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... Groundsel) in England, as well as on the mainland of Europe, affords a proof that Britain, when repeopled after the great Ice age, must have been united somewhere to the continent; and its having lasted from earliest times throughout Europe, North America, and Siberia, seems to show that this modest plant must be possessed of some universal utility which has enabled it to hold its own [106] until now in the great evolutionary struggle. It grows wild allover the earth, and serves as food for ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie
... should bring light and counsel. They knew so little, and needed so much. True, his own knowledge was not great; but it was all freely at their service. His heart swelled with good-will as he prepared to open his modest campaign of usefulness. ...
— Judith of the Cumberlands • Alice MacGowan
... Well, the modest little Blue-curls long had had a working agreement with the Meadow Bees, and got on nicely. But one summer Blue-curls became discontented. She saw all the other plants with wonderful gifts that had power to cure pain and sickness; while she ...
— Woodland Tales • Ernest Seton-Thompson
... is reversed. VII. Conjugial love resides with chaste wives; but still their love depends on the husbands. VIII. Wives love the bonds of marriage if the men do. IX. The intelligence of women is in itself modest, elegant, pacific, yielding, soft, tender; but the intelligence of men is in itself grave, harsh, hard, daring, fond of licentiousness. X. Wives are in no excitation as men are; but they have a state of preparation for reception. XI. Men have abundant ...
— The Delights of Wisdom Pertaining to Conjugial Love • Emanuel Swedenborg
... this campaign is also very modest and unique, and is worthy of a place in this record. In it ...
— Three Years in the Federal Cavalry • Willard Glazier
... daresay fifteen dollars a week would cover her expenses, including her art materials. Of course this would mean literally the 'hall bedroom' in a very modest boarding-house." ...
— Patty's Success • Carolyn Wells
... also frequently exhibited by the Aborigines in their natural state, in the modest unassuming manner in which they take their positions to observe what is going on, and in a total absence of any thing that is rude or offensive. It is true that the reverse of this is also often to be met with; but I think it will usually be found that it is among ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre
... door of his bare little room, and tell him to come out and look at a pony—the very thing to suit him. Dicky could not afford ponies. He had to explain this. Dicky could not afford living in the chummery, modest as it was. He had to explain this before he moved to a single room next the office where he worked all day. He kept house on a green oil-cloth table-cover, one chair, one charpoy, one photograph, one tooth-glass, very strong and thick, a seven-rupee eight-anna filter, and ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... a little sketch, as you requested. There is not much of it, for the reason, I suppose, that there is not much of me. If anything be made out of it, I wish it to be modest, and not to go beyond the material. If it were thought necessary to incorporate anything from any of my speeches I suppose there would be no objection. Of course it must not appear to have ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... tones. While the elder Bach in his arias often chases the human voice in the most ruthless manner from one extreme to the other, his sons and pupils in their little German songs confine themselves to the most modest compass. Most of the later composers proceeded in the same way up to the time of the Romanticists; then the bonds were snapped, even in this respect. Schubert, on the one hand, could compose the most moderate songs, on the other, the most immoderate. It often seems (and this is also the ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various
... towers, and taper spires above, The pinnets, and the gray embattled walls, And masts that throng around the southern pier, Shine all distinct in light; and mark, remote, O'er yonder elms, St Mary's modest fane. Oh! if such views may please, to me they shine How more attractive! but few years have passed, Since there I saw youth, health, and happiness, All circling round an aged sire,[97] whose hairs 30 Are now in peace gone down; he was to me A ...
— The Poetical Works of William Lisle Bowles, Vol. 1 • William Lisle Bowles
... not a mere machine. When not actively engaged in Dick Varley's service, he busied himself with private little matters of his own. He undertook modest little excursions into the woods or along the margin of the lake, sometimes alone, but more frequently with a little friend whose whole heart and being seemed to be swallowed up in admiration of his big companion. Whether Crusoe botanized or geologized on these excursions ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... Bobinot's that I sat in the front row of the stage-box, and by me a very pretty, modest, and respectable young girl, with her elder relations or friends. How it happened I do not know, but they all went out, leaving the young lady by me, and I did not ...
— Memoirs • Charles Godfrey Leland
... of the vast unknown fell upon our ears with the question of lodging still unsettled. The captain was for going to the Star and Garter, the inn the gentleman had mentioned. I was in favour of seeking a more modest and ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... what is committed to thy care! If God had entrusted thee with an orphan, wouldst thou have thus neglected him? He hath delivered thee to thine own care, saying, I had none more faithful than myself: keep this man for me such as Nature hath made him—modest, faithful, high-minded, a stranger to fear, to passion, to perturbation. . ...
— The Golden Sayings of Epictetus • Epictetus
... the prayers and tears of his good wife Nella; and then he burst into a strain of indignation against the contrast exhibited to her virtue by the general depravity of the Florentine women, whom he described as less modest than the half-naked savages in the mountains ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Volume 1 • Leigh Hunt
... and magic shadows, become inspired, and preach to us of heaven. A softness settles on features that were harsh to us while the sun shone; a mellow "light of love" reposes on the complexion which by day we would have steeped "full fathom five" in a sea of Mrs. Gowland's lotion. What, then, thou modest hypocrite! to those who already and deeply love,—what, then, of danger and ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... sound conservative methods. The American business man had greater opportunities and a freer hand than his European prototype; but he was also beset by more severe, more unscrupulous, and more dangerous competition. The industrious and thrifty farmer could be tolerably sure of a modest competence, due partly to his own efforts, and partly to the increased value of his land in a more populous community; but the business man had no such security. In his case it was war to the knife. He was presented with a choice between aggressive daring business operations, ...
— The Promise Of American Life • Herbert David Croly
... his stint. He unfastened the barrier and admitted Hinton, the scout, who bore in a tray of eatables, ordered by Forbes from the college store-room for the refreshment of his coming guests. Forbes, like most men of modest means, made it a point of honour to entertain lavishly when it was his turn as host, and the display set out by Hinton made an attractive still life under the droplight. A big bowl of apples and oranges stood in the centre; tin boxes from Huntley and Palmer, a couple of large ...
— Kathleen • Christopher Morley
... of them, for example, in the case of the London County Council's steamboats, defended that enterprise in spite of its financial failure, on the ground that the steamboats were a convenience to certain travellers at all events, who in all probability were persons of modest means, while the loss would be made good out of the pockets of the ratepayers who were presumably rich. But even if this argument were plausible as applied to a state of society in which the incomes of some men were greater than those of others, it would be ...
— A Critical Examination of Socialism • William Hurrell Mallock
... took her down into the cellar and showed her the same two great jars that he had showed Lizina. 'In which of these shall I dip you?' he asked; and she made haste to answer: 'In the liquid gold,' for she was no more modest than she ...
— The Crimson Fairy Book • Various
... Green and one of his friends, little Mr. Bouncer, were lounging in the gateway of Brazenface, when a modest-looking young man came towards them. He seemed so ill at ease in his frock coat and high collar that he looked as if he were wearing these articles for the ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books - Vol. II: Fiction • Arthur Mee, J. A. Hammerton, Eds.
... but few periods of history. Coming in regular succession, their systems sprang from Kant's philosophy, and constituted the growth of his wonderful achievement. They tended to withdraw the flippant spirit of criticism to a more serious and modest path of inquiry, and to make men look more at their own weakness than at their greatness. But what a mass of subtleties do we have to pass through to get at the substance of their speculations! There is something so unsatisfactory in the study of them, that we find relief only in the knowledge that ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst
... also the tillers of the soil, the followers of those countless trades implied by a civilized society—the peasants, artisans, and merchants of every kind, who fed, clothed, and equipped the armies; the men who carried on the useful but modest work without which the fighting machine must soon have come to a standstill. And yet they are entirely absent from the sculptures in which the artist seems to have included everything that to him seemed worthy of interest. We ...
— A History of Art in Chaldaea & Assyria, v. 1 • Georges Perrot
... is a military man capable of directing operations in the field everywhere. I think Lee is such a man. But can he, a modest man and a Christian, aspire to such a position? Would not Mr. Benjamin throw his influence against such a suggestion? I trust the President will see through the mist ...
— A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital • John Beauchamp Jones
... mentioned the modest Liberty I have here and there taken of animadverting on my Author, but that I was willing to obviate in time the splenetick Exaggerations of my Adversaries on this Head. From past Experiments I have Reason to be conscious, ...
— Preface to the Works of Shakespeare (1734) • Lewis Theobald
... modest pride, for his first attempt had been inspired by sincere affection and pronounced "lovely" by the ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, V. 5, April 1878 - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... remains deposited under its marble floor. Even literary genius has a little corner assigned it—the mighty aristocracy whose mortal remains it is the main function of the building to protect having so far condescended toward intellectual greatness as to allow to Milton, Addison, and Shakspeare modest monuments behind a door. The place is called the Poets' Corner; and so famed and celebrated is this vast edifice every where, that the phrase by which even this obscure and insignificant portion of it is known is familiar to every ear and every tongue throughout ...
— Queen Elizabeth - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... women, who had been long prepared for its expected opening. They appreciated at once the lofty influence of these examples, and the reverent respect they always showed was impressed upon every succeeding class. These teachers were in every detail of their lives, what intelligent, modest, and cultivated ...
— The Education of American Girls • Anna Callender Brackett
... so becomes a man As modest stillness and humility. But when the blast of war blows in his ears, Then imitate the action of ...
— Shakespeare and the Modern Stage - with Other Essays • Sir Sidney Lee
... pantomime, which she did so realistically that the campers sat in shivering fascination. Tiny, still grave and unsmiling, sat down amid shouts for encore, and refused to repeat her performance, pretending to be overcome with bashfulness. Dr. Grayson then rose and said that since Tiny was too modest to appear in public herself, he would bring out her most cherished possession to respond to the encore, and held up the gaudy blanket that Katherine and Oh-Pshaw had already made merry over in the tent, explaining that Tiny ...
— The Campfire Girls at Camp Keewaydin • Hildegard G. Frey
... and obtrusive. But confront one of these silent heroes with the swaggerer of real life, and his confidence in the theory quickly vanishes. Pretensions do not uniformly bespeak non-performance. A modest inoffensive deportment does not necessarily imply valour; neither does the absence of it justify us in denying that quality. Hickman wanted modesty—we do not mean him of Clarissa—but who ever doubted his courage? Even the poets—upon whom this equitable ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... haired, round figured, modest in her shabby gown. I proceeded to the outfit with a new sense of disease. If she—if Mrs. Montoyo really had yielded, if she were out of the game—but she never had been in it; not to me. And still I conned the matter over and over, vainly convincing myself that ...
— Desert Dust • Edwin L. Sabin
... in a nutshell, is the secret of the whole matter. Given a fairly normal state of health to begin with, that health may be maintained by a little wise direction of our actions towards supplying the really very moderate demands of Nature, upon which, however, modest as they are, she insists, to enable her to carry on the process of healthy life. Deprive her of that little, and the results are such as we too frequently see—broken-down health from overwork (so-called) of many of our busy sisters. It is our ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII, No. 357, October 30, 1886 • Various
... in the capital city of the Empire State, knocking for admission at the doors of the Normal School. He was alone and among strangers in a great city, with a purse containing the sum of eight dollars! For a course of seven or eight months instruction this was certainly a modest estimate of expenses! In fact, young Glazier had based his financial arrangements on a miscalculation of the amount furnished by the State. He did not then know that the only provision made by the ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens
... aware of. I never preserve any but business letters. If I understand you, Ellen, Fitz's modest claim is for the block of stores and the income of them for ...
— Make or Break - or, The Rich Man's Daughter • Oliver Optic
... to bodily eyes. For if Bruno must needs look forward to the future, to Bacon, for adequate knowledge of the earth, the infinitely little, he could look backwards also gratefully to another daring mind which had already put that earth into its modest place, and opened the full view of the heavens. If God is eternal, then, the universe is infinite and worlds innumerable. Yes! one might well have divined what reason now demonstrated, indicating those endless [151] spaces which a real ...
— Gaston de Latour: an unfinished romance • Walter Horatio Pater
... and stony pathway in untiring effort to reach its gravitational centre, is a symbol of the Pilgrim's progress, impelled by love to seek God within his heart. The modest daisy by the roadside, and the wanton sunflower in the garden alike seek to image the sun, the god of their worship, a core of seeds and fringe of petals representing their best effort to mimic the flaming disc and far-flung corona of the sun. Man seeks less ardently, ...
— Architecture and Democracy • Claude Fayette Bragdon
... which she watched over thy infancy. Remain always virtuous; virtue is a treasure of happiness, the straight path, and a glory surpassing all the goods of the earth. Be ever prudent and discreet in thy words, modest and amiable in thy actions, and never cease to render thanks to God. Love and obey thy husband as thou hast always loved and obeyed thy parents; fly all evil, be steadfast in self-government, and resigned to all the ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No 3, September 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... 16th, under the management of John Sparrow, with the play of The Revenge and the entertainment of The Hotel. They had fitted up the house with more theatrical propriety than could have been expected, and their performance was far above contempt. Their motto was modest and well chosen—'We cannot command success, but will endeavour to deserve it.' Of their dresses the greater part was made by themselves; but we understood that some veteran articles from the York theatre were among the ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 1 • David Collins
... eaters, and they gathered round the board, whereon were displayed an enormous ox roasted whole, a vast dish of salmon and various other dainties. But because the bride was a woman, and modest withal, they brought her tiny morsels on a dainty ...
— Told by the Northmen: - Stories from the Eddas and Sagas • E. M. [Ethel Mary] Wilmot-Buxton
... the sardines Oliver had brought from Maltby. He was relieved, too, to find that his brother was not greatly exasperated on hearing of the various raids which had been made on his provisions, or greatly disconcerted at Mr Bullinger's modest request for half ...
— The Fifth Form at Saint Dominic's - A School Story • Talbot Baines Reed
... has raged round the name of Malthus, the great modern analyst of the population problem. He published his first essay on population in 1798, a modest pamphlet, which fed so voraciously on the criticism supplied to it, that it developed into a mighty contribution to a great social problem, second only in time and in honour to the work of his great predecessor ...
— The Fertility of the Unfit • William Allan Chapple
... pray'r, with modest pace, A youth advancing mounts the desk with grace, To all the audience sweeps a circling bow, Then from his lips ten thousand graces flow. The next that comes, a learned thesis reads, The question states, and then a war succeeds. Loud major, minor, and the consequence, Amuse the crowd, ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... worth making. Bidding good-bye to our Free State colleagues, we left the little village that was later to become famous as the scene of the capture of the Free State Government, and retraced our way to Frankfort. The send-off given us took the form of a little reunion in the parlour of the modest hotel. Here there were gathered together some dozen young Free Staters, and an impromptu smoking concert was held. Everyone present was compelled to give a song or recite something. The first on the programme was Byron's ...
— With Steyn and De Wet • Philip Pienaar
... war-ships she might not disclose her position, she sent no wireless messages. But she could receive them; and at breakfast in the ship's newspaper appeared those she had overnight snatched from the air. Among them, without a scare-head, in the most modest of type, we read: "England and Germany have declared war." Seldom has news so momentous been conveyed so simply or, by the Englishmen on board, more calmly accepted. For any exhibition they gave of excitement or concern, the news the radio brought them might have been ...
— With the Allies • Richard Harding Davis
... just begins to give you a hint at it. I ain't filled with the lust of vanity, nor I ain't overly much given to tootin' my own horn; but in my humble an' modest way I guarantee to be able to do anything on this good, green earth 'at don't require ...
— Happy Hawkins • Robert Alexander Wason
... language is amusing but decorous and whose plots are virtuous. This insistence on decorum and virtue indicates a concession to Collier and to the public. Thus in the preface to Love's Contrivance (1703), she reiterates her belief that comedy should amuse but adds that she strove for a "modest stile" which might not "disoblige the nicest ear." This modest style, not practiced in early plays, is achieved admirably in The Busie Body. Yet, as she says in the epilogue, she has not followed the critics who balk the pleasure of the audience to refine their taste; her play will ...
— The Busie Body • Susanna Centlivre
... And her virtues grace her birth: Lovely as all excellence, Modest in her most of mirth: Likelihood enough to prove ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... and put many searching questions. He answered all in a remarkable way, and gave proofs of intellect, knowledge, and perception beyond the masters who had passed through the required ordeals, and was so gentle and modest withal, that it was delightful to ...
— Another World - Fragments from the Star City of Montalluyah • Benjamin Lumley (AKA Hermes) |
