"Mortifying" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... deceived where I have unguardedly trusted to the friendship and love of a man brought up in that sort of way, that you must forgive me if I could not bring my mind to think you had any concern for my happiness in the offer you made. I did indeed suppose it would be a mortifying circumstance to you, to see your cousin quite ruined by this infamous creature. I say, I did imagine you would be shocked at seeing your cousin sent to jail. That, you know, is a thing discreditable to a whole family, let it be of what sort it may. From your kindness to our children, I see ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... leave of the indignant brother and his much-injured sister, with a very ill grace; and bent his steps towards his own house, grinding his teeth with impotent rage. The loss of his money, and the mortifying disappointment he had experienced, rendered him furious, and he muttered as he strode thro' the streets with hasty ...
— Venus in Boston; - A Romance of City Life • George Thompson
... allowed ultra courtesies of Italian acknowledgment. His compliments to most people are varied with astonishing grace and ingenuity; his accounts of his condition often sufficient to bring the tears into the manliest eyes; and his ceaseless and vain efforts to procure his liberation mortifying when we think of himself, and exasperating when we think of the petty despot who detained him in so long, so degrading, and so ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Vol. 2 • Leigh Hunt
... which our Hearts have hitherto been set upon. When, we advance to Manhood, we are held wise in proportion to our Shame and Regret for the Rashness and Extravagance of Youth. Old Age fills us with mortifying Reflections upon a Life, mis-spent in the Pursuit of anxious Wealth or uncertain Honour. Agreeable to this Gradation of Thought in this Life, it may be reasonably supposed, that in a future State, the Wisdom, the Experience, and the ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... ways, ready opinions, gentle loving incapacity to become a machine, Maria was at discord with every principle of Cowan's Bridge. She incurred the bitter resentment of one of the teachers, who sought all means of humiliating and mortifying the sweet-natured, shiftless little creature. When, in September, bright, talkative Charlotte and baby Emily came to Cowan's Bridge, they found their idolised little mother, their Maria, the butt, laughingstock and ...
— Emily Bront • A. Mary F. (Agnes Mary Frances) Robinson
... was pleased. The high-spirited girl was just beginning to fear that she was unequal to the task which she had chided Bream for being unable to perform and this was mortifying her. ...
— Three Men and a Maid • P. G. Wodehouse
... if they are, never show it. A chestnut-roaster, who has sold me twice the chestnuts the same money would have bought of him in English, has not otherwise recognized the fact that Tuscan is not the dialect of Charlesbridge, and the mortifying nonchalance with which my advances have always been received has long since persuaded me that to the grinder at the gate it is not remarkable that a man should open the door of his wooden house on Benicia Street, and welcome ...
— Suburban Sketches • W.D. Howells
... of the almighty wisdom, power, and love, is indeed "full of sweet, pleasant, and unspeakable comfort to godly persons, and such as feel in themselves the working of the Spirit of Christ mortifying the works of the flesh and their earthly members, and drawing up their minds to high and heavenly things: it doth greatly establish and confirm their faith of eternal salvation, to be enjoyed through Christ, and doth fervently ...
— The Annals of the Poor • Legh Richmond
... being disturbed already by the news of Miltoun, it seemed to them both nothing less than sinister, as though the heavens were in league for the demolition of their house. To Lord Valleys it was peculiarly mortifying, because of his real admiration for his daughter, and because he had paid so little attention to his wife's warning of some weeks back. In consultation, however, they had only succeeded in deciding that Lady Valleys should talk with her. Though without much spiritual insight, they had, ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... shifting between two minds. Should he go away and leave his father to the mortifying sense that his sons were setting him at defiance? or should he return and insist on full explanations? He would have done the latter had it not been for the words, "If you knew how painful your presence is to me!" He still ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King
... to hold Boston was extremely mortifying to General Howe and the English Government. When the king's regiments first took possession of the city, one of the officers ...
— From Farm House to the White House • William M. Thayer
... a good supper ready to put on the table the night she comes. You'd better pick your asters and take 'em in for the parlor, then I'll cut the chrysanthemums for you in the middle of the week. The day she comes I'll happen in, and stay to dinner if you find it's going to be mortifying for you; but if everything is as I expect it will be, and the way Susanna always did have things, I'll make for home and leave you to yourselves. Susanna ain't one to nag and hector and triumph over ...
— Homespun Tales • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... paper,—no longer the melancholy spectacle of wise men doing unwise things, and honorable men doing things which, in any other form, they would have been the first to brand with dishonor,—it still continues a long, a wearisome, and often a mortifying struggle: men knowing their duty and refusing to do it, knowing consequences and yet blindly shutting their eyes to them. I will give but ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... made trouble in Kansas. The two elements, free and slave, were arrayed against each other, and for several years friends from other States had to come over and help Kansas bury its dead. The condition of things for some time was exceedingly mortifying to the citizen who went out to milk after dark ...
— Comic History of the United States • Bill Nye
... rather sorry about that place in the bank. Who knows but what I might have become another Rothschild? But I wasn't meant for a banker; bankers are not so easy to kill. Don't you think I have been very easy to kill? It's not like a serious man. It's really very mortifying. It's like telling your hostess you must go, when you count upon her begging you to stay, and then finding she does no such thing. 'Really—so soon? You've only just come!' Life doesn't make me any such polite ...
— The American • Henry James
... him a large popularity; but his alliance with President Johnson was fatal to his political fortunes. He had placed himself in a position from which he could not with grace retreat, and to go forward in which was still further to blight his hopes of promotion in his party. It was an extremely mortifying fact to Mr. Raymond that with the power of the Administration behind him he could on a test question secure the support of only one Republican member, and he a colleague who was bound to him by ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... probably, may have tortured more than one of the fair spectators; and mamma, perhaps, considered it extremely mortifying that an opportunity was not given to land the prize, as well as hook it; and that sailors, like jacks, were exceedingly difficult ...
— Journal of a Visit to Constantinople and Some of the Greek Islands in the Spring and Summer of 1833 • John Auldjo
... been a panacea provided for all disease," he resumed, after a moment of deep thought. "But there is none to-day—at least materia medica has never found one, and that is a mortifying fact to be obliged to admit after over four thousand years of investigation and experiment. Poor Dorrie! I'd really like to make a ...
— Katherine's Sheaves • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... the northward and westward, on the morning of the 2d, increased to a fresh gale, which continued to blow during the night, notwithstanding which, I was in hopes that the immense size of the floe to which the ships were attached would enable us to retain our station tolerably. It was mortifying, therefore, to find, on the morning of the 2d, that we had drifted more than I remember ever to have done before in the same time under any circumstances. It was remarkable, also, that we had not been set exactly ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry
... is the system ascribed to the former. As to the name of Samanean, it is precisely that of Chaman, still preserved in Tartary, China, and India. The interpretation given to it is, man of the woods, a hermit mortifying the flesh, such being the characteristic of this sect; but its literal meaning is, celestial (Samaoui) and explains the system of those who are called by it.—The system is the same as that of the sectaries of Orpheus, of the Essenians, of the ancient Anchorets of Persia, ...
— The Ruins • C. F. [Constantin Francois de] Volney
... Liverpool when these came out, wrote to desire judgement might be suspended till certain notes omitted by Urquhart had been also published, and to-day they appeared; but instead of making the case better, they have made it rather worse. It is altogether a dirty transaction, and mortifying to those who care about the character of public men, and who have some feeling of national pride and vanity in the super-eminence of English statesmen for integrity and high-mindedness. It is not very difficult ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... totally neglected it. He disdained, he said, to satisfy those who could deem him capable of so base and villanous an action. Finding that the calumny gained ground, and had made deep impression on his subjects, he was now obliged to submit to the mortifying task of ascertaining the reality of the birth. Though no particular attention had been beforehand given to insure proof, the evidence both of the queen's pregnancy and delivery was rendered indisputable and so much the more, as no argument or proof of any importance, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part F. - From Charles II. to James II. • David Hume
... meanwhile was quite happy. His picture was going splendidly, and every morning he woke to the knowledge that his image filled all the thoughts of a good little girl with gray dark charming eyes and a face that reminded one of a pretty kitten. Her drawing was not half bad either. He was spared the mortifying labour of trying to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. In one of his arts as in the other he decided that she had talent. And it was pleasant that to him should have fallen the task of teacher in both departments. Those who hunt the fox will tell you that Reynard enjoys, equally ...
— The Incomplete Amorist • E. Nesbit
... itself to both sides as the most feasible plan, and the forces of Nagamasa and Yoshikage were allowed to march away unmolested to Omi and Echizen, respectively. This result was intensely mortifying to Hideyoshi, who had devoted his whole energies to the destruction of these dangerous enemies. But the final issue was only postponed. By contrivances, which need not be related in detail, Nagamasa was ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... surprised at night by the British general Grey, a redoubtable fighter, who attacked him with the bayonet, killed a number of his men, and forced him to fall back some distance from the field of action. This mortifying experience had no effect whatever on Wayne's courage or self-reliance, but it did give him a valuable lesson in caution. He showed what he had learned by the skill with which, many years later, he conducted the famous campaign in which he overthrew the Northwestern ...
— Hero Tales From American History • Henry Cabot Lodge, and Theodore Roosevelt
... cool, tranquil tone, was mortifying and baffling enough. Had I attended to the suggestions of pride and ire, I should immediately have left him; but something worked within me more strongly than those feelings could. I deeply venerated ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... Mrs. Dodd observed, "Dear me! what if the young gentleman did cry a little, it was very excusable; after such great exertions it was disappointing, mortifying. I pity him for one, and wish he had his mother alive and ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... not hear or did not understand, and Georgina had the mortifying experience of repeating the question. It was harder to give utterance to it the second time than the first. She was relieved when Melindy answered without ...
— Georgina of the Rainbows • Annie Fellows Johnston
... Well, by the Pope why shouldn't he be a heretic? If ever a fellow had the heretical cut this fellow had; flat-faced, sanctimonious-looking, and with a fancy for dark-coloured stockings—he had observed that all heretics, male and female, wore dark-coloured stockings, perhaps by way of mortifying the flesh. He could think of only one thing against it, the young man had drunk too much last night. But there were certain breeds of heretics who did not mind drinking too much. Also the best could slip sometimes, for, ...
— Lysbeth - A Tale Of The Dutch • H. Rider Haggard
... have been taking more care of your instep than you did of your leg in old times. Don't try mortifying the flesh again. ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 2 • Leonard Huxley
... women are often illogical, and Eva certainly is. No, the fact remains that I represent, to Eva, the coward who condemned her to a severe and mortifying punishment; and she ...
— The Making of a Soul • Kathlyn Rhodes
... father of Claudia, the first wife of Caius. According to the historians of that period, Caius was jealous of him, and took every opportunity of mortifying him. Tacitus (Hist. iv. 48) mentions that the emperor deprived him of the military command of the troops in Africa in an insulting manner. Dion (lix.) states, that when, from his age and rank, Silanus was usually asked his opinion first in the senate, the emperor found a pretext for preventing this ...
— The Germany and the Agricola of Tacitus • Tacitus
... Madeleine said no more, but he thought she looked annoyed, and he felt himself in an intolerably painful situation. He was not certain that she herself might not have had some share in proposing the plan, and that his refusal might not have some mortifying consequences for her. What must she think of ...
— Democracy An American Novel • Henry Adams
... sir, said I, of another mortifying thing too; that were you to marry a lady of birth and fortune answerable to your own, all the eve to the day would be taken up in reading, signing, and sealing of settlements, and portion, and such like: But now the poor Pamela brings you nothing at all: And ...
— Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded • Samuel Richardson
... respect to any such right, ought so great a libel on our political economy to be suffered to exist, as a receptacle for the poor in the middle of an uncultivated and unappropriated waste? To dwell further on so mortifying a proof of the fallibility of human wisdom may, however, pique the pride of those who enjoy the power to organize a better ...
— A Morning's Walk from London to Kew • Richard Phillips
... attention with newer plausibility, that at last she began to give bitter and anxious heed to it. What if this constant communication between AEnone and Cleotos were to result in a mutual love? It was no uncommon thing in those days for the high-born lady to cast her eyes upon the slave. How mortifying to herself, then, if, while she had been exerting all her powers of fascination, taxing the utmost resources of her intellect, and making of her whole existence one labored study for the purpose of gaining an undue influence over the lord, Cleotos, without art or disguise ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 2, August, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... in discoursing, on the road, of God and his will concerning us, and of the disposition and readiness of our hearts, as we then felt, to bear it whatever it might be, although we foresaw that it would be mortifying enough for us. We arrived at B[olsward] about eight o'clock, where we discovered the reason why there were so few people in the boat and tavern, for by the ringing of the bells we understood that it was a holiday, namely, Ascension Day,[33] ...
— Journal of Jasper Danckaerts, 1679-1680 • Jasper Danckaerts
... an impression that a literature was something indigenous or ready-made, like any other purely native product, not needing any special period of cultivation or development, and that a nation would be in a mortifying position without one, even before it staked out its cities or built any roads. Captain John Smith, if he had ever settled here and spread himself over the continent, as he was capable of doing, might have ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... Pauline, with that accent which removes from the compassion of a woman all that is mortifying in human pity, "ought we not to feel ashamed of our happiness in ...
— A Drama on the Seashore • Honore de Balzac
... was signed between this country and America, an officer introduced himself, commissioned by Washington to call upon me, and to assure me from the general himself, that no circumstance of his life had been so mortifying as to be censured in the "Monody on Andre" as the pitiless author of his ignominions fate; that he had labored to save him; that he requested my attention to papers on the subject, which he had sent by this officer for my perusal. On examining ...
— The Friendships of Women • William Rounseville Alger
... years which followed the destruction of the Coalition were, in some respects, the most mortifying portion of Burke's troubled career. Pitt was more firmly seated in power than Lord North had ever been, and he used his power to carry out a policy against which it was impossible for the Whigs, on their own principles, to offer an effective resistance. For this is the peculiarity ...
— Burke • John Morley
... Barry Cornwall has his tritons and his nereids gamboling before him in nocturnal visions, and proclaiming sons born to Neptune—when my stretch of imaginative activity can hardly, in the night season, raise up the ghost of a fish-wife. To set my failures in somewhat a mortifying light—it was after reading the noble Dream of this poet, that my fancy ran strong upon these marine spectra; and the poor plastic power, such as it is, within me set to work, to humour my folly in a sort of dream that very night. Methought I was upon the ocean billows ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... even when surrounded with every facility for its pursuit, would still be elated at finding some well-stocked stream near at hand. Anglers, as a rule, are unable to go far a-field in search of fresh-water fishing, and for six years past it was a continual thorn in my flesh, mortifying me considerably, that no information could be obtained of any good fishing that did not necessitate an absence of ...
— Black Bass - Where to catch them in quantity within an hour's ride from New York • Charles Barker Bradford
... husband, I would learn resignation to my lot; I would enliven our frugal meal with good humour, and chase away misfortune from our cottage with a smile. At a father's command, I could almost submit to what every female heart knows to be the most mortifying, to marry a weak man, and blush at my husband's folly in every company I visited. But to marry a depraved wretch, whose only virtue is a polished exterior; [who is actuated by the unmanly ambition of conquering the defenceless; ...
— The Contrast • Royall Tyler
... finished till she has in some measure been taught to distrust others. She must learn that society is not one vast family, abounding in sympathy, and always ready to put the kindest construction on her words and actions. She must learn this sooner or later. Shall she learn it by mortifying experiences, by finding herself often in absurd and annoying positions, by having her confidence betrayed, and the outspoken utterances resulting from her very purity of thought made the occasion of coarse remarks and suspicions; or shall she be guarded against all these by being ...
— The Education of American Girls • Anna Callender Brackett
... despot, for time had not given them range of vision. Therefore, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Clinton, and his other formidable enemies have a large measure of excuse for their conduct, especially as they were seldom unstung by mortifying defeat. It is doubtful if the first three, at least, ever admitted to themselves or each other that they hated Hamilton, and were determined for purely personal reasons to pull him down. Every man ...
— The Conqueror • Gertrude Franklin Atherton
... to see. They had conceived hopes, that, if Carlos attempted the feat, some accident, such as the slipping or stumbling of his horse, might lead to that result; which to them would have been as grateful as it would have been mortifying to the cibolero. A man floundering out of a muddy ditch, and drenched to the skin, however daring the attempt that led to it, would cut but a sorry figure in the eyes of a holiday crowd; and in such a situation did they wish ...
— The White Chief - A Legend of Northern Mexico • Mayne Reid
... something else to confess about Claude; something mortifying in the extreme. For you see the poverty of all these explanations. Their very multitude makes them weak. "Many fires cannot quench love;" what was the real ...
— Bonaventure - A Prose Pastoral of Acadian Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... no remark, and she went on. "Of course we can't believe it possible that a son of ours will ever show himself a coward; but it is very trying to us, very mortifying, to have you holding back in this way till all our neighbors and friends begin to hint that you are disloyal to your native State, and look scornful and contemptuous at the very mention of ...
— Elsie's Womanhood • Martha Finley
... to say something which I had omitted in my last, and to add a word or two on the subject of an expression in your answer to it. I mean the phrase "plan of assistance." I do not suppose that you had the slightest intention of mortifying me by that phrase; but I should wish to impress upon you, that I did not consider my application to you as coming in the shape of what is ordinarily termed an application for assistance. Circumstances have certainly compelled ...
— A Publisher and His Friends • Samuel Smiles
... shaven head bound in a napkin, tossed to and fro without remission, beating the bed with his hands. His tongue never lay; his voice ran continuously like a river, so that my heart was weary with the sound of it. It was notable, and to me inexpressibly mortifying, that he spoke all the while on matters of no import: comings and goings, horses—which he was ever calling to have saddled, thinking perhaps (the poor soul!) that he might ride away from his discomfort—matters ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition, Vol. XII (of 25) - The Master of Ballantrae • Robert Louis Stevenson
... substance and in shew. Nothing solid, nothing valuable is left in his system but virtue and wisdom. What a libel is this upon mankind! What a convincing proof of misanthropy! What presumption and what malice prepense, to shew men what they are, and to teach them what they ought to be! What a mortifying stroke aimed at national glory, is that unlucky incident of Gulliver's wading across the channel and carrying off the whole fleet of Blefuscu! After that, we have only to consider which of the contending parties was in the right. What a shock to personal vanity is given in the account of ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... Mrs. Veal persisted in her request, and told Mrs. Bargrave, she must not deny her: and she would have her tell her brother all their conversation, when she had opportunity. Dear Mrs. Veal, says Mrs. Bargrave, this seems so impertinent, that I cannot tell how to comply with it; and what a mortifying story will our conversation be to a young gentleman? Why, says Mrs. Bargrave, it is much better, methinks, to do it yourself. No, says Mrs. Veal, though it seems impertinent to you now, you will see more ...
— The Best Ghost Stories • Various
... Adolphus. But he was not permitted to die prematurely, as was his great ancestor. He lived long enough to become intoxicated with success, to make great political blunders, and to suffer the most fatal and mortifying misfortunes. ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... an attachment for me? And did she, in a girlish way, express it on those letters which she never sent? To punish her, had her parents sent her to a convent? And to disgust me, and throw me off the track, had the mother invented this history of another love in which she seemed to make me play so mortifying ...
— The Deputy of Arcis • Honore de Balzac
... Medecine somewhat like Helmont's Balsamus Samech, with Distill'd Vinager instead of Spirit of Wine, wherewith he prepares it: For you would scarce Beleeve (what I have lately Observ'd) that of that acid Spirit, the Salt of Tartar, from which it is Distill'd, will by mortifying and retaining the acid Salt turn into worthless Phlegm neere twenty times its weight, before it be so fully Impregnated as to rob no more Distill'd Vinager of its Salt. And though Spirit of Wine Exquisitely rectify'd seem of all Liquors to be the most free from ...
— The Sceptical Chymist • Robert Boyle
... your own efforts with those of some great master, is indeed a severe and mortifying task, to which none will submit, but such as have great views, with fortitude sufficient to forego the gratifications of present vanity for future honour. When the student has succeeded in some measure ...
— Seven Discourses on Art • Joshua Reynolds
... judge: but the event was unfavourable, nay the action might be really wrong, and the vulgar maliciously take the opportunity of this single indiscretion, to lift themselves nearer on a level with a character, which, except in this instance, has always thrown them at the most disgraceful and mortifying distance. ...
— Essays on Various Subjects - Principally Designed for Young Ladies • Hannah More
... is mortifying to call on God for mercy when you have never used his name except in oaths, but he will not turn you away. Ask God to forgive you, if ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... forbearance from you. What I received thereupon was a most humiliating lecture in the shape of a decision in the libel case of Redfield and Pringle, and an obligation to publish it in my own and the other journal of our supposed firm. I thought and still think this lecture needlessly cruel and mortifying. The plaintiffs, after using my columns to the extent of their needs or desires, stopped writing and called on me for the name of their assailant. I proffered it to them—a thoroughly responsible man. They ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... favours of eleven little girls, offering in return, as the girls confessed, a small reward—a penny or a sweet. Many others must have been compelled by their parents to make no complaint, in order to avoid a mortifying publicity. Leo is the son of a good fellow, a shoemaker by trade, and also a lamplighter. The mother having run away, and the father being often out at work, the boy was left much alone. He would then entice into the house little girls of ...
— The Sexual Life of the Child • Albert Moll
... the most besetting sins of Miss Barrett's genius. The minor poems were incomparably more popular, and the favourite of all was that masterpiece of rhetorical sentimentality, 'Lady Geraldine's Courtship.' It must have been a little mortifying to the authoress to find this piece, a large part of which had been dashed off at a single heat in order to supply the printers' needs, preferred to others on which she had employed all the labour of her deliberate art; but with the general tone of all the critics she ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1 of 2) • Frederic G. Kenyon
... in the house to fix it. How we all came to disregard so material a point is inconceivable; but certain it is, we had been all greatly remiss. The picture, therefore, instead of gratifying our vanity, as we hoped, leaned, in a most mortifying manner, against the kitchen wall, where the canvas was stretched and painted, much too large to be got through any of the doors, and the jest of all our neighbours. One compared it to Robinson Crusoe's long-boat, too large ...
— The Ontario High School Reader • A.E. Marty
... again ordered to cross the line and take up their winter quarters in their own territory, after repeatedly suffering themselves to be defeated under the most mortifying and humiliating circumstances; with the blame of which the commander-in-chief (General Wilkinson) charged General Hampton, in consequence of his disobedience of orders, but with which the American Secretary of War more properly charged both. However, it had the effect ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 2 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Edgerton Ryerson
... twice a week; and there were many swordsmen in the elder classes who need not have feared any ordinary antagonist. Of this a fencing-master from a neighboring Canton, on occasion of a visit to our teacher, had one day tangible and somewhat mortifying proof. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 91, May, 1865 • Various
... as hundred's of boys do, "I hate books, and wish that I was not obliged to go to school. There is no use in reading and studying so much; we shall get along just as well without it." This class of boys usually will have to regret, under mortifying circumstances, in later life, that they wasted their early opportunities to acquire knowledge. Sir Walter Scott, in his boyhood, joined in the tirade of idlers against books; but in manhood he said: "If it should ever fall ...
— The Printer Boy. - Or How Benjamin Franklin Made His Mark. An Example for Youth. • William M. Thayer
... upon the play-ground, or to speak to any one, nor was any one allowed to speak to him, under the penalty of being himself similarly punished. The punishment was, of course, a severe one in itself, and was very mortifying to a boy of high spirit. It was only resorted to in extreme cases, and was limited to one day. Charlie begged that I would "exile" and "side-table" him for a week, if I pleased; only not ...
— In the School-Room - Chapters in the Philosophy of Education • John S. Hart
... How mortifying that one is never lucky enough to meet with any of these 'virtuosissimos', fifteen or twenty years of age. But perhaps they are such rare jewels, that they are always kept in cotton! The Kilcrops! I would not exchange the heart, which I myself had when a boy, while reading the life of Colonel Jack, ...
— Coleridge's Literary Remains, Volume 4. • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... mortifying enough, though not so bad as it might have been. Robert began to pack his box. But before he had finished it he shut the lid and sat upon it. To meet Miss St. John thus disgraced, was more than he could bear. If he remained, he had a chance of winning prizes at the end of the session, and ...
— Robert Falconer • George MacDonald
... the speaker. "Is it just to me for you to hide away here in want that forces you and your wife—I beg your pardon, madam—into mortifying occupations, when one word to me—a trivial obligation, not worthy to be called an obligation, contracted with me—would remove that necessity, and tide you over the emergency of ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... treatment of his wife, but such an idea never entered his brain. He was a man of few words, and generally allowed himself to be controlled by circumstances, thinking that the easiest way of getting through the world. He was very proud, and keenly felt how mortifying it would be to present his mother to his fashionable acquaintances; but that was in the future—many miles away—he wouldn't trouble himself about it now; so he passed his time mostly in rambling through the ...
— 'Lena Rivers • Mary J. Holmes
... secretary to the Congress for foreign affairs. The incompetency of the articles of confederation for the management of the affairs of the Union at home and abroad was demonstrated to them by the painful and mortifying experience of every day. Washington, though in retirement, was brooding over the cruel injustice suffered by his associates in arms, the warriors of the Revolution; over the prostration of the public credit and the faith of the nation, in the neglect ...
— The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10) • Various
... in the use of these primitive weapons they are specially expert. The arrow-head remains in the flesh when the shaft is withdrawn, and if the poison is fresh, paralysis and death very quickly follow, the skin round the wound turning yellow and mortifying within an hour or two. This deadly poison is obtained, I believe, by boiling down a particular root, the arrow-heads being dipped in the black, pitchy-looking essence which remains. I am glad to say, however, that owing to the establishment of several Mission ...
— The Man-eaters of Tsavo and Other East African Adventures • J. H. Patterson
... children, might distribute their respective shares according to the degrees of their merit or his affection; his arbitrary displeasure chastised an unworthy son by the loss of his inheritance, and the mortifying preference of a stranger. But the experience of unnatural parents recommended some limitations of their testamentary powers. A son or, by the laws of Justinian, even a daughter, could no longer be disinherited by their silence; they were compelled to name the criminal and to specify ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... Mr. Buchanan was wiser. He held the middle course. He had ably sustained our claim to the whole of Oregon, and now, in the interest of peace, gracefully yielded to a compromise which the Senate, after mature deliberation, had advised. His course saved the administration, not indeed from a mortifying position, but from a continually increasing embarrassment which seemed to force upon the country the cruel alternatives ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... the discovery to be mortifying; and after everyone had said that he, for one, had never given credit to the ghost, the subject was discreetly dropped. There was silence even at the inn, where for years it had been a fruitful source of much conversation ...
— A Pair of Clogs • Amy Walton
... thinkable! It would be too mortifying! I could not go back to Edinburgh. I could not ...
— An Orkney Maid • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... just; and for my part, had the case been mine, I could scarce have been so moderate as you, I should not have satisfied myself with the life of one woman; I verily think I should have sacrificed a thousand to my fury. I cease now to wonder at your melancholy. The cause of it was too sensible, and too mortifying, not to make you yield to it. O heaven! what a strange adventure! nor do I believe the like of it ever befel any man but yourself. But, in short, I must bless God, who has comforted you; and since I doubt not but your consolation is well grounded, be so good as let me know what it is, ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Volume 1 • Anonymous
... with marvellous rapidity. And the presence of congenial minds so stimulated the prolific power of her imagination, that she was herself astonished at the fresh beauty of her new-born thoughts. 'There is a mortifying sense,' ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. II • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... the penalty of death and prosecuted him for his deception of the Athenians: and Miltiades did not himself make his own defence, although he was present, for he was unable to do so because his thigh was mortifying; but he lay in public view upon a bed, while his friends made a defence for him, making mention much both of the battle which had been fought at Marathon and of the conquest of Lemnos, namely how he had conquered Lemnos and taken vengeance on the Pelasgians, and ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 2 (of 2) • Herodotus
... the overseer should have whipped him to his satisfaction, to have him placed between the screws of the cotton gin, to stay as long as he had been in the woods. This wretched creature was cut with the whip from his head to his feet, then washed with strong brine, to prevent the flesh from mortifying, and make it heal sooner than it otherwise would. He was then put into the cotton gin, which was screwed down, only allowing him room to turn on his side when he could not lie on his back. Every morning a slave ...
— Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl - Written by Herself • Harriet Jacobs (AKA Linda Brent)
... description, my dear M. Rameau, but I trust I have satisfactorily explained why victory obtained in the teeth of his eloquent opinions, if gratifying to him as a Frenchman, must be mortifying to ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Pig most of all was Grunty's behavior whenever Farmer Green came to the pen. It was mortifying to her to have her son actually try to scratch his back against her in the ...
— The Tale of Grunty Pig - Slumber-Town Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... deepened the feeling which I then experienced. The subject may perhaps be only unpleasant to people at home, but to me personally, who have seen the ruin and dismay brought upon the too credulous loyalists, the recollections it stirs up are more bitterly mortifying than words can describe." ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 1 (of 6) - From the Foundation of Cape Colony to the Boer Ultimatum - of 9th Oct. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... their positions; and finally, the rank and file lazy, untidy, and frankly contemptuous of the school of the soldier. Some one had once said of the Ninth that there was consolation to be found in the mortifying knowledge that the men composing it were there with the unique view of escaping jury duty. The consolation lay in the probability that such infernally bad soldiers would have made jurors quite ...
— The Lieutenant-Governor • Guy Wetmore Carryl
... cap made of black cr^pe lisse, but it is generally of white. In this country a widow's first mourning dresses are covered almost entirely with crape, a most costly and disagreeable material, easily ruined by the dampness and dust—a sort of penitential and self-mortifying dress, and very ugly and very expensive. There are now, however, other and more agreeable fabrics which also bear the dead black, lustreless look which is alone considered respectful to the dead, and which are not so costly as crape, ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... suffering acutely. I wrenched my hand out of his, grasped the arm supporting me and pushing myself free, fell plump into the sand and sat helpless. My hat had fallen off in the struggle and my hair tumbled about my face and shoulders in the most mortifying way. ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce
... the putting on record an implacability that was confessedly impotent. This was the very lunacy of malice. Mortifying it might certainly seem for the members of a supreme court, like the General Assembly, to be baffled by those of a subordinate court: but still, since each party must be regarded as representing far larger interests ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v2 • Thomas de Quincey
... to have the spot cleared, and the tomb exposed to view. To any one who was acquainted with the story of Petrarch, or who had perused his impassioned effusions, the dilapidation of this church, and the barbarous concealment of Laura's tomb, were most mortifying circumstances. But, neither the memory of Laura, nor of the brave Crillon, whose tomb is also here, had any effect in averting the progress of the revolutionary barbarians. The tomb of Crillon is now only to be distinguished by the vestiges of some warlike embellishments in the wall ...
— Travels in France during the years 1814-1815 • Archibald Alison
... Bennet was gradually converted into a sort of guarded interest. Originally he had scarcely allowed her to be pretty, but now he admired the beautiful expression of her dark eyes. To this discovery succeeded some others equally mortifying. Though he had detected more than one failure of perfect symmetry in her form, he was forced to acknowledge her figure to be light and pleasing; and in spite of his asserting that her manners were not those of the fashionable world, he was caught by their ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol. I • Various
... the "Mitre," and the incident which occurred there, were in a peculiar degree mortifying to the Black Baronet, for so he was generally called. At this precise period he had projected the close of the negotiation with respect to the contemplated marriage between Lucy and Lord Dunroe. Lord Cullamore, whose ...
— The Black Baronet; or, The Chronicles Of Ballytrain - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... attendants of her Majesty the Queen of Scots were carried off in the course of the evening by the victorious young beauty, whose triumph had the effect, which the headstrong girl perhaps herself anticipated, of mortifying the Duchesse d'Ivry, of exasperating old Lady Kew, and of annoying the young nobleman to whom Miss Ethel was engaged. The girl seemed to take a pleasure in defying all three, a something embittered her, alike against her friends and her enemies. ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... are," said Josephine, "and we beg to keep the purse as a souvenir of one who tried to do us a kindness without mortifying us. And now, Monsieur Riviere, you will permit ...
— White Lies • Charles Reade
... better say—not being a woman—John is probably made up without domestic tact, and his wife must be on her guard to cover the deficiency. For example, if by some mortifying combination of mischances, a dish is scantily supplied, he helps it out lavishly, scrapes the bottom officiously, and with innocent barbarity calls your attention to the fact that it ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland
... It was mortifying to lose such noble game after having been so sure of it, and all determined to follow out the chase if it should last them the whole day. Karl had another motive for continuing after the deer. Karl was a person of tender and humane ...
— The Plant Hunters - Adventures Among the Himalaya Mountains • Mayne Reid
... you," began Bea when she found that they were quite alone on the porch. "I don't know what I should have done, and it was so terribly mortifying, but then—" and there she came to a pause, for looking up, she met his eyes, wearing an expression, such as chased all further words from her lips, and made her forget entirely what it was that she was going to ...
— Six Girls - A Home Story • Fannie Belle Irving
... Tantalus better than ever Ovid describ'd him, condemn'd daily to see an Apparition of Meat, Food in Vision only. Faith, I had Bowels, was good-natur'd, and lent upon the publick Faith as far as 'twill go— But come, let's leave this mortifying Discourse, and tell me how the price ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. I (of 6) • Aphra Behn
... aggravation of British feelings toward the new republic, whose condition immediately after the peace was somewhat embarrassing, and not so flattering as it might have been to the advocates and promoters of the revolution, the situation of Adams was rather mortifying than agreeable. ...
— Hidden Treasures - Why Some Succeed While Others Fail • Harry A. Lewis
... that had been picked up. That appeared to her monstrous and dishonorable. She thought that such a child had a lower place in society than a cat or a dog; she manifested these sentiments by the most disdainful looks, the most mortifying silence, and the most cruel insults. If Erik was invited with her to any little social gathering at the house of a friend, she would positively refuse to dance with him. At the table she would not answer anything he said, nor pay any attention to him. She tried on all occasions, and in every possible ...
— The Waif of the "Cynthia" • Andre Laurie and Jules Verne
... of York very ill; has been at the point of death several times from his legs mortifying. Canning's speech the night before last was most brilliant; much more cheered by the Opposition than by his own friends. He is thought to have been imprudent, and he gave offence to his colleagues by the concluding sentence of his reply, when he said, 'I called into existence ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... mine which lasted for the fortnight we stayed in Dresden was mortifying for all the young officers in the place, and especially for the Comte de Bellegarde, who was not accustomed to being denied any girl to whom he chose to take a fancy. He was a fine young fellow, of great boldness and even impudence, and one day he came into our room and asked me to give him ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... feet touching the ground, being propelled simply by the effort of the will? And who of us has had not experienced that dreadful—"falling through space" sensation, in dreams, with the sudden awakening just before we actually struck earth? And who has not had the mortifying dream experience of walking along the street, or in some public place, and being suddenly overcome by the consciousness that we were in our night-clothes, or perhaps without any clothing at all? All ...
— Clairvoyance and Occult Powers • Swami Panchadasi
... do not recollect; but it is certain that the announcement at Covent-Garden reduced rather than increased the receipts. The pit was but moderately attended, and the boxes nearly deserted. This was a touchstone from which there was no escaping; and it was really a mortifying scene to witness the utter neglect with which majesty was received. But alas! the bitter cup of mortification was to be drained to the very dregs; and the Queen's own rashness, or the bad advice of wrong-headed ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, February 1844 - Volume 23, Number 2 • Various
... story, all the people had to be narrowly investigated before they could be helped. But unfortunates of the sort whom a gift of money would convert from unfortunate into fortunate people, there were none. Mortifying as it is to me to avow this, I began to get disenchanted, because I did not find among these people any thing of the sort which I had expected. I had expected to find peculiar people here; but, after making the round of all the apartments, I was convinced that the inhabitants of these ...
— What To Do? - thoughts evoked by the census of Moscow • Count Lyof N. Tolstoi
... becoming not a law but a law- giver to himself, one who commands, not one who obeys. The diseased satisfaction which some minds feel in laying burdens on themselves, is a pampering, little as they may suspect it, of the most dangerous appetite of that self which they think they are mortifying. All the creatures of God are good, received with thanksgiving; then only can any one of them become evil, when it is used in relations in which a higher law forbids it, or when it is refused for the sake of self- discipline, in relations in which no higher law forbids, ...
— Unspoken Sermons - Series I., II., and II. • George MacDonald
... mortifying to a proud spirit as to suffer by immediate comparison—men can hardly bear it, but to women the punishment is intolerable; and Miss Milner now laboured under this humiliation to a degree which ...
— A Simple Story • Mrs. Inchbald
... of sentiment that she would not swallow, but she knew from mortifying experience that Patty was ...
— Just Patty • Jean Webster
... character of poetry, it has been said, and credited almost universally, is to please. That they who have studied the laws of thought and passion should have suffered themselves to be deluded by an unmeaning word is mortifying enough; but it is more than mortifying—it perplexes and confounds—to think that poets themselves, and poets too of the highest order, have declared the same degrading belief of what is the scope and tendency, the end and aim of their ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... daughter! And Bellville, too! Both dead! How sad—how mortifying. Convey them to yonder cemetery, and bury them side by side under the weeping-willow. They were separated in life—in death let ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... out of all contentions and law-suits with each other; by which your valuable time, which should be spent in useful occupations, is grievously misapplied, your money wasted, and your character in the world, is unhappily injured and degraded:—it is a mortifying sight to your friends, to see the coloured people bringing each other before the civil officers and in courts of justice for trifling causes of contention, which by exercising an amiable and forbearing disposition might be easily settled, without ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 6, 1921 • Various
... that the Federal commander was unable to come to the mortifying resolution of recrossing the Rappahannock. The battle was fought on the 13th of December, and until the night of the 15th General Burnside continued to face Lee on the south bank of the river—his ...
— A Life of Gen. Robert E. Lee • John Esten Cooke
... were to give her a blow with his fist. Scarcely had he opened his attack when he found himself lying on his nose, while Dieterli played a vigorous tattoo on his back with no gentle fists. Or the sport would be to plant a good hard snow-ball between Veronica's shoulders, with the mortifying result to the aggressive boy, of being pelted in the face with handfuls of wet snow, until he was almost stifled, and cried out for mercy. Dieterli was not afraid of either of them; for though smaller and thinner than either, he was also much more lithe, ...
— Veronica And Other Friends - Two Stories For Children • Johanna (Heusser) Spyri
... it be rather a mortifying reflection, that the lady of our love is far past the bloom of youth, it is a consolation that she is too old-fashioned to beat us, when we return back with no more of youth or manhood than a long crusade has left. But come, follow on the ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... Montreuil, Amiens, and Clermont, about one hundred and fifty-six miles from Boulogne, the last thirty-six over a paved road, was favourable to superficial observation and the normal corollary of epigram. Smollett was much impressed by the mortifying indifference of the French innkeepers to their clients. "It is a very odd contrast between France and England. In the former all the people are complaisant but the publicans; in the latter there is hardly any complaisance but among the publicans." [In regard to two ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett
... instance of zeal and desire to facilitate whatever can promote the cause, when he undertakes a task of no less difficulty than the reconciling the mind of a young Prince to a supercession in his military command, and that too at the precise moment of moving forwards, after so mortifying a retreat. I am, however, not without hopes of his success; and, at all events, the moment was too critical to suffer any consideration to interfere with the only means ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham
... Faustus! Let me now put in a word, and tell his reverence a few mortifying truths. Brother monk, thou hast formed in thy solitary cell a phantom of perfection, and wouldst fain thrust that into people's heads, which, when there, poisons the brain, as the gangrene corrupts all the flesh around it. There were men long ago who ventured to judge ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger
... though long in a declining state, protracted its existence for more than two years, till the departure from Bristol of Mr. D., and then by its failure, it established the useful negative fact, however mortifying, that medical science was not to be improved through the medium ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle
... They were the most mortifying sight I ever beheld; and the women more horrible than the men. Besides the usual deformities in extreme old age, they acquired an additional ghastliness, in proportion to their number of years, which is not to be described; and among half a dozen, I soon distinguished which was the eldest, ...
— Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift
... without notice in the shape of an amendment to a pending measure, to propose thus to experiment with the great laws that lie at the very foundation of human society, and to do it for the most part in the trivial tone which we have witnessed during this debate, is not only mortifying, but it renders one almost hopeless of the permanence of our Government if this is to be the example set by one of the Houses of Congress, that which claims to be more sedate and deliberate, if it proposes ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... sparkle of fun and merriment surprised and puzzled her; and all the courtesy of the one gentleman, and the affection of the other, could not prevent her sometimes feeling herself the dullest and most ignorant person present. And yet the sense was never mortifying except when here and there a spark of the old conceit had lighted itself, and lured her into pretensions where she thought herself proficient. She was becoming more and more helpful to Mr. Clare, and ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... proved to be sufficient to make him the second (and, now that Napoleon is gone, the first general) of the age, but which could not make him a tolerable Minister. Confident, presumptuous, and dictatorial, but frank, open, and good-humoured, he contrived to rule in the Cabinet without mortifying his colleagues, and he has brought it to ruin without forfeiting their regard. Choosing with a very slender stock of knowledge to take upon himself the sole direction of every department of Government, he completely ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. II • Charles C. F. Greville
... need to tell me that—but neither can you ever understand how my pride was wounded, and how mortifying it was, after all my boasts of the glories in store for us, to have to confess what I was subjected to, that I might be fit to live among ...
— All Aboard - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... any truth in this statement that the public was so slow to recognize so fine a genius, is a mortifying evidence of the worthlessness of a literary popularity. But it may be said of Hawthorne's fame that it has grown steadily, and that while many who have received the turbulent applause of the multitude since he began his career are forgotten, it has widened and brightened, until ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... was made in East Africa in 1914 can only be described as deplorable. Following a custom which to my mind is more honoured in the breach than in the observance, the mortifying results of the attempted maritime descent upon Tanga which ushered in the hostilities, were for a long time kept concealed from the public. That reverse constituted a grave set-back—a set-back on a small scale perhaps, but as decided a one as we met ...
— Experiences of a Dug-out, 1914-1918 • Charles Edward Callwell
... fib," she rejoined, with increased archness. "You know it is. If a certain person entreat you to stay, you will easily comply. I see I cannot hope to prevail by my own strength. That is a mortifying consideration: but we must not part; that is a point settled. If nothing else will do, I must go and fetch my ...
— Edgar Huntley • Charles Brockden Brown
... and expense soon brings on a crisis. The victim is straitened for money; without it he must abandon his rank; for fashionable society remorselessly rejects all butterflies which have lost their brilliant colors. Which shall he choose, honesty and mortifying exclusion, or gaiety purchased by dishonesty? The severity of this choice sometimes sobers the intoxicated brain; and a young man shrinks from the gulf, appalled at the darkness of dishonesty. But to excessive vanity, high-life ...
— Twelve Causes of Dishonesty • Henry Ward Beecher
... line-drawing and flat laying of colour are irksome; but they are definite, and within certain limits, sure to be successful if practised with moderate care. But the expression of form by shadow requires more subtle patience, and involves the necessity of frequent and mortifying failure, not to speak of the self-denial which I said was needful in persons fond of colour, to draw in mere light and shade. If, indeed, you were going to be artists, or could give any great length of time to study, it might be possible for you to learn wholly in the Venetian ...
— Lectures on Art - Delivered before the University of Oxford in Hilary term, 1870 • John Ruskin
... to us," replied a black-eyed young lady, "and from seeing them at church I should think them precise. A refusal would be mortifying; and if the prim Miss Martha concludes to go, that will be still worse. We cannot act ourselves, and all the fun will be spoiled. What ...
— Be Courteous • Mrs. M. H. Maxwell
... indifferent to the idea of alliance. The real opposition to it is not in England, but in America where Anglophobes abound. There are more haters of England in America than in the countries of Europe—more lovers also. Both are sensitive, and the game of mortifying ...
— Europe—Whither Bound? - Being Letters of Travel from the Capitals of Europe in the Year 1921 • Stephen Graham
... on his side has proved too hard for him: he sails for Madeira again next week! His Doctors tell me there is no intrinsic danger; but they judge the measure safe as one of precaution. It is very mortifying he had nestled himself down at Clifton, thinking he might now hope to continue there; and lo! he has to fly again.—Did you get his letter? The address to him now will be, for three months to come, "Edward Sterling, Esq., South Place, ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, - 1834-1872, Vol. I • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson
... come, O Roman muses, Full of honey and of graces, Learned verses of good Pino; I embrace you, just Camenae, All day long I read you gladly In this mortifying season, Time of tears and time of penance, ...
— An Essay on True and Apparent Beauty in which from Settled Principles is Rendered the Grounds for Choosing and Rejecting Epigrams • Pierre Nicole
... Her own miserable weakness, so unexpected, and yet so complete and hopeless, filled her at once with anger and dismay. To find all her thoughts both by day and night filled with this one image was at once mortifying and terrible. The very intensity of her feelings, which would not stop short at death itself to gain their object, now made her own sufferings all the greater. Every thing else was forgotten except this one absorbing desire; and her complicated schemes and ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... i. e. purists or puritans, a sect of presumably Gnostic derivation, scattered here and there under different names over the S. and W. of Europe during the Middle Ages, who held the Manichaean doctrine of the radically sinful nature of the flesh, and the necessity of mortifying all its desires and affections to attain purity ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... New York, committed to jail for swindling, and died in a few months after. He ruined his father, who was a very cautious man, ruined three rich farmers of Dutchess county, and came very near ruining me. It was a sad history and mortifying to a great many. I was advised by my counsel, Seth P. Staples of New York, to contest the whole thing in law. I had five or six suits on my hands at one time, and it was nine years before I was clear from them. What ...
— History of the American Clock Business for the Past Sixty Years, - and Life of Chauncey Jerome • Chauncey Jerome
... after this recent honour, was the arrival of Captain Stephenson, to take the command of the Princess Charlotte; by which, his lordship feelingly observes, in a letter of the 7th, to Captain Ball, "poor Hardy was consequently turned adrift." He had, at this time, too, received a mortifying letter from General Sir James St. Clair Erskine: mentioning, that the twenty-eighth regiment was ordered to England; and that he was sure General Fox, who was every moment expected, would not, on any consideration, break his orders, for any object. With this disagreeable ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. II (of 2) • James Harrison
... found out, I know from my own experience, must be painful and odious, and cruelly mortifying to the inward vanity. Suppose I am a poltroon, let us say. With fierce moustache, loud talk, plentiful oaths, and an immense stick, I keep up nevertheless a character for courage. I swear fearfully at cabmen and women; brandish ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... than he betrayed his subjugation. No woman had ever received such honour from him, such homage public and private. Arnold Jacks was pricked with uneasiness; Irene had at once a new value in his eyes, and he feared he had foolishly neglected his opportunities. If she married Romaine, it would be mortifying. She refused the great man's offer, and Arnold was at first astonished, then gratified. For such refusal there could be only one ground: Miss Derwent's "heart" was already disposed of. Women have "hearts"; they really do grow fond of the ...
— The Crown of Life • George Gissing
... at Lucien while the Marquise was speaking. De Marsay, only a couple of paces away, put up an eyeglass and looked from Lucien to Mme. de Bargeton, and then again at Lucien, coupling them with some mocking thought, cruelly mortifying to both. He scrutinized them as if they had been a pair of strange animals, and then he smiled. The smile was like a stab to the distinguished provincial. Felix de Vandenesse assumed a charitable air. Montriveau ...
— A Distinguished Provincial at Paris • Honore de Balzac
... think that when a husband is present at his wife's dinner party he repeats the mortifying superfluity of a bridegroom ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... Miss Howe.— A letter full of pious reflections, and good advice, both general and particular; and breathing the true spirit of charity, forgiveness, patience, and resignation. A just reflection, to her dear friend, upon the mortifying nature ...
— Clarissa, Or The History Of A Young Lady, Volume 8 • Samuel Richardson
... Saint Cyr, who was married. She was greatly distressed at having a relation waiting woman to Madame de Pompadour, and often treated me in the most mortifying manner. Madame knew this from Colin, her steward, and spoke of it to the King. "I am not surprised at it," said he; "this is a specimen of the silly women of Saint Cyr. Madame de Maintenon had excellent intentions, but she made a great mistake. These ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 1 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe |
