"Proverb" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... With a view to eliciting material for a Note or a Query, I said to her, "You see I am as throng as Throp's wife;" to which she replied, "Aye, Sir, and she hanged herself in the dishcloth." The answer is new to me; but the proverb itself, as well as the one mentioned by "D.V.S." (No. 24. p. 382.) "As lazy as Ludlum's dog, &c.," has been an especial object of conjecture to me as long as I can remember. I send this as a pendant to "D.V.S.'s" Query, in hopes of shortly seeing the origin of both these ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 30. Saturday, May 25, 1850 • Various
... painter—who brings a light color into juxtaposition with a dark one, in order to increase its luminous effect. This method and style are indeed not amiss, and that was the least of all the things that filled me with aversion for this book, in which besides, there is many a proverb which may be pleasing to kings who desire to have submissive subjects, and to fathers who would bring up their sons in obedience to themselves and to the laws. Even mothers must be greatly comforted by them,—who ask no more than ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... Franklin is sketched from his childhood to the time he was established in business, thus showing what he was in boyhood and youth; and the achievements of his manhood are summed up in a closing chapter, to substantiate the truth of the above proverb. ...
— The Printer Boy. - Or How Benjamin Franklin Made His Mark. An Example for Youth. • William M. Thayer
... good-looking wife, because even the handsomest woman looks homely sometimes, and so you get a little variety; but a homely one can only look worse than usual. Beauty is only skin deep, but that's deep enough to satisfy any reasonable man. (I want to say right here that to get any sense out of a proverb I usually find that I have to turn it wrong side out.) Then, too, if a fellow's bound to marry a fool, and a lot of men have to if they're going to hitch up into a well-matched team, there's nothing like picking a ...
— Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son • George Horace Lorimer
... statesmanship in the treatment of his Protestant subjects as in the prosecution of disastrous wars. The Huguenots, deprived of their former military and political power, had turned to manufacture, trade, and banking; "as rich as a Huguenot" had become a proverb in France. There were perhaps a million of them among fifteen million Frenchmen, and they undoubtedly formed by far the most thrifty and enterprising part of the nation. The Catholic clergy, however, did not cease to urge the ...
— An Introduction to the History of Western Europe • James Harvey Robinson
... sir, don't be anxious; I'll answer for it that I can kill anybody as well as any doctor in the town. The proverb usually is, "after death comes the doctor," but you will see that if I have anything to do with it, it will be, "after the doctor comes death!" But now, while I think of it, it must be difficult to play the doctor; and if ...
— The Flying Doctor - (Le Medecin Volant) • Jean Baptiste Poquelin de Moliere
... every sort of disorder at them. It was an exceptionally difficult situation and that we won through as well as we did was due to the solid loyalty to constitutional and law-abiding methods of propaganda of the great mass of suffragists throughout the country. We quoted the American proverb, "Three hornets can upset a camp meeting," and we determined to hold steadily on our way and not let our hornets upset us. Our societies multiplied rapidly both in numbers and in membership. For instance, the number forming the National ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI • Various
... dogmatical, self-willed old man, who fancied he could read character, and had a natural instinct for doing the right thing; but he would have been much wiser if he had paid more heed to the proverb, "Mind your own business ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... burns I' the dull dark verdure of the bounteous tree, Dethroning, in the Rosy Isle, the rose, You shall find food, drink, odour, all at once; Cool leaves to bind about an aching brow. And, never much away, the nightingale. Sing them a strophe, with the turn-again, Down to the verse that ends all, proverb like. And save us, ...
— The Poetry Of Robert Browning • Stopford A. Brooke
... guest also," the old gentleman interrupted. "The question of new men can be solved. But there is time for everything, and now is the time for all of you to rest. As our proverb has it, 'Devagar se vae ao longe'—he goes ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel
... poor person you will become a rich one; and your name will stand so high for using good colours, that if some masters receive a ducat for painting one figure, you will certainly be offered two, and your wishes will be fulfilled, according to the old proverb, 'good work, good pay.'" Of a truth, if man cannot dip his brush in the rainbow and paint with the aerial colours of the skies, he can at least select the best pigments that earth and the sea afford him; preferring, where ...
— Field's Chromatography - or Treatise on Colours and Pigments as Used by Artists • George Field
... more and more. The horrible growl which rage and pain forced from him, brought all the inhabitants of the house and neighbourhood to the spot, and poor bruin was soon dispatched by shots from the windows. He has, however, immortalized his memory, and become a proverb amongst the town's people, for when any one injures himself by his own violence, they call him "the bear with ...
— A New Voyage Round the World, in the years 1823, 24, 25, and 26, Vol. 2 • Otto von Kotzebue
... as an instrument of dominion over the other subject nations, the Bulgarian felt the hardship of the state of things in which, as it was proverbially said, his body was in bondage to the Turk and his soul in bondage to the Greek. But we may suspect that this neatly turned proverb dates only from the awakening of a distinctly national Bulgarian feeling in modern times. The Turk was felt to be an intruder and an enemy, because his rule was that of an open oppressor belonging to another creed. The Greek, ...
— Prose Masterpieces from Modern Essayists • James Anthony Froude, Edward A. Freeman, William Ewart Gladstone, John Henry Newman and Leslie Steph
... they both rose early, and began to make bread. The mother made the loaves, but took no pains to make them the same size. Her son said to her finally, "How small you have made this loaf, mother." "Oh," said she, "it does not matter whether they are big or little, for the proverb says, 'Large and small, all must go to mass.'" "Good! good!" said her son. When the bread was made, instead of taking it to the baker's, the son took it to the church, for it was the hour for mass, saying, "My mother said that, 'large and small, all must go to mass.'" ...
— The Book of Noodles - Stories Of Simpletons; Or, Fools And Their Follies • W. A. Clouston
... known by the average man in the movement about Paul's activities, the better it would be. There is always betrayal and there are always counter-revolutionary agents within the ranks of an organization such as this. What was the old Russian proverb? When four men sit down to discuss revolution, three are police spies and the third ...
— Revolution • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... of the Austro-Hungarian troops, and cited the results of the close co-operation between his forces and the Austrian armies as striking proof of the proverb, "In union is strength." Like all other German Generals whom I had "done," he, too, had words of unqualified praise for the bravery of his enemies. "The Russians fight well; but neither mere physical bravery nor numbers, nor both together, ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... the proverb, would have chucked me out on account of my attire; but thereupon I began expressing my feelings in elevated language, and...you, too," he said, addressing Karenin and forgetting his name, "at first would have ejected me on the ground of the old coat, but ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... many sorrows in life more difficult to bear than that separation from our nearest brought by death. But those men—and especially the women—who have experienced sorrow of both varieties, do not use that proverb. ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter
... position. I was arrested by the provisional government on the order of Lieutenant Colonel Niglitsch on a most flimsy charge of traveling with false passports. In those times arrests and executions were the order of the day. The old Servian proverb of "Od Roba Ikad Iz Groba Nikad" (Out of prison, yes; out of the grave, never) was fully acted upon. There were really no incriminating papers of any description upon me, but my being seen and associating with persons opposed to the provisional government was quite ...
— The Secrets of the German War Office • Dr. Armgaard Karl Graves
... who lets herself get "down in the mouth." There is so much real, unavoidable suffering and sorrow in the world that nobody has any right to add to them unnecessarily, and "as cheerful as a Girl Scout" ought to become a proverb. ...
— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts
... long before the horse was multiplied in Virginia; and to improve that noble animal was early an object of pride, soon to be favored by legislation. Speed was especially valued, and "the planters pace" became a proverb.... ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... I could not resist a peep, and at once thought of Solomon's proverb about the "Wonderful way of a man with a Maid," and now was a chance to learn something. So kneeling behind the glass door, I slipped a little corner of the blind aside and what did I see? Your own Mother leaning forward over the scroll end of the couch, with her dress and skirts all ...
— Forbidden Fruit • Anonymous
... had serious disadvantages. That times of Regency were times of weakness, of trouble and of disaster, was a truth proved by the whole history of England, of France, and of Scotland, and had almost become a proverb. Yet, in a case of infancy or of insanity, the King was at least passive. He could not actively counterwork the Regent. What was now proposed was that England should have two first magistrate, of ripe age and sound mind, waging with each other an irreconcilable ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... the bait on Brown's hook, changed his mind, flirted his fins, and swam away—a proof of the proverb about second thoughts. A bird in the branches of the tree above the two men burst into ecstatic song. But neither heard him. "Mistah Breckenridge" had buried his black face in the cool grass, his hot tears falling fast upon it. Beside him young Brown, brought face to face ...
— Many Kingdoms • Elizabeth Jordan
... feeling beings. They quickly became sensible that in almost every point they were kindred souls, and the name of Eugene and Gertrude were ever heard together in their family. Their affection was at length a proverb among their brothers and sisters, and perhaps it was this great similarity of disposition and the regard felt for her noble brother, that first endeared Gertrude to Mrs. Hamilton, whose wishes with regard to her and Caroline promised fulfilment. Some chord of ...
— The Mother's Recompense, Volume I. - A Sequel to Home Influence in Two Volumes. • Grace Aguilar
... this had nothing to do with the question then before them. The manner of procuring slaves in Africa was the great evil to be remedied. Africa was to be stripped of its inhabitants to supply a population for the West Indies. There was a Dutch proverb, which said, "My son, get money, honestly if you can—but get money:" or, in other words, "Get slaves, honestly if you can—but get slaves." This was the real grievance; and the two honourable gentlemen, by confining their ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (1808) • Thomas Clarkson
... to her to draw nearer. "I want to speak to that lady yonder, only for a moment. Do you think she would come here?" Harwin, for it was he, was a fine illustration of the proverb that he who asks timidly, teaches denial. If he had demanded her mistress, Nancy would have spoken to her at once. Now she scanned the intruder curiously, and judged from the hesitation of his manner that ...
— The New England Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, February, 1886. - The Bay State Monthly, Volume 4, No. 2, February, 1886. • Various
... sociologists to have a free hand in their attempt to better the morality of England than for the Church to use the vast influence it still possesses to the stultifying of these plans. The homely proverb of the proof of the pudding being in the eating seems to be plainly shown here. The religious teaching has failed to influence the people to refrain from sin and to discountenance divorce, proving that its method of imparting knowledge and ...
— Three Things • Elinor Glyn
... continued in a very even condition as to worldly goods, being steadily and consistently broke,—a sad state of affairs for one who had brought so much happiness to others. History proved to the point of proverb that whenever McGinnis visited a camp,—and he had followed scores of strikes and stampedes in all the corners of the metalliferous world,—that camp was destined to witness a boom ...
— Heart's Desire • Emerson Hough
... thrown into that muck-heap of Fraser's Magazine, who would be the wiser? But this has too much wit and imagination not to strike a class who would not care for it as a faithful mirror of this very Hour. But you know the proverb, "To be fortunate, be not too wise." The great men of the day are on a plane so low as to be thoroughly intelligible to the vulgar. Nevertheless, as God maketh the world forevermore, whatever the devils may seem to do, so the thoughts of the best minds ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, - 1834-1872, Vol. I • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson
... was decided in favour of the applicant, invariably interested Mustapha in the favour of that party; and Mustapha's opinion was always coincided in by the pacha, because he had (or supposed that he had) half of the sequins so obtained. True, the proverb says, "you should be just before you are generous;" but Mustapha's arguments when he first proposed to the pacha this method of filling the royal treasury, were so excellent, that we shall hand them down to posterity. "In the first ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Frederick Marryat
... things now," says a Persian proverb; "so shall big things come to thee by and by asking to be done." God will take care of the great things if we do not ...
— Architects of Fate - or, Steps to Success and Power • Orison Swett Marden
... I know the tones—there's a shrillness in them not to be mistaken. Farewell! I must depart; you have heard the proverb, 'Those who are bound must obey.' Young Jack, I presume, is squalling, and I must either nurse him, rock the cradle, or sing comic tunes for him, though Heaven knows with what a disastrous heart I often sing, 'Begone, dull care,' the 'Rakes of Newcastle,' or, 'Peas upon a Trencher.' ...
— Stories by English Authors: Ireland • Various
... "It's an ould proverb, that 'birds of a feather flock together,' and Larry was a good proof of this, There was in the same neighborhood a young woman name Sally Lowry, who was just the other end of himself (* meaning his counterpart) for a pair of good hands, a love of dress and ...
— The Ned M'Keown Stories - Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of - William Carleton, Volume Three • William Carleton
... that fraternity. He had flourished amazingly since he succeeded to his father's business in the university city, and attained that position of independence which enabled him to force the rule that each horse in his stable was to be hired only in its proper turn, thus originating the proverb, "Hobson's choice," that is, "this or none." Despite his ever growing wealth and advanced years, Hobson continued his regular journeys to London until the outbreak of the plague caused the authorities to suspend the carrier service for a time. This is the fact upon which ...
— Inns and Taverns of Old London • Henry C. Shelley
... awake now. We are still slow to learn the lesson; but we have come to realize, at any rate theoretically, the duty of doing what we can, in the spirit not of favouritism but of justice and knowledge, to disprove the proverb that a prophet (and an artist also) has no honour in his own country and in his ...
— Recent Developments in European Thought • Various
... If Satan cast out Satan, he is divided against himself, and his kingdom cannot stand. An old play is entitled, 'The Devil is an Ass,' but he is not such an ass as to fight against himself. As the proverb has it, 'Hawks do not pick ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Mark • Alexander Maclaren
... not for a man to press these on his brethren. But even from the standpoint of this Book of Proverbs, it is certain that 'the righteous shall be recompensed in the earth, much more the wicked and the sinner.' Probably it was the earthly consequences of wrongdoing that were in the mind of the proverb-maker. And we are not to let our Christian enlightenment as to the future rob us of the certainty, written large on human life here and now, that with whatever apparent exceptions in regard to prosperous ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... with you, ye kine that you do not welcome me? I am difficult of being attained. Why then do you not accept me? It seems, ye creatures of excellent vows, that the popular proverb is true, viz., that it is certain that when one come to another of one's own accord and without being sought, one meets with disregard. The Gods, the Danavas, the Gandharvas, the Pisachas, the Uragas, the Rakshasas and human beings succeed in obtaining ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... considerable notoriety in Westminster. He had very fierce opinions; he attacked everybody and everything; his vehemence and vituperation were seasoned with a kind of wit, and he made himself, if not a power, at least an important factor in the House of Commons. Indeed, it passed into a kind of proverb at St. Stephen's that there were three parties in the State—the Ministry, the Opposition, and Lord George Gordon. Parliament had seen before, and has seen since, many a politician fighting thus ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume III (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy
... recognition of the claims of their relations might be emulated by our higher civilization; so impressed upon their natures was the duty to those who were related to them, that their language contains a proverb: "Ca-si-ri pi-rus, he wi-ti ti-ruk-ta-pi-di-hu-ru—Why, even the worms, they love each other—much more should men." They were also very hospitable, very sociable, and fond of telling stories. They really had a literature of stories and songs, which, if they could be ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... but when they found, instead of the splendid prince whom they looked for, a little old man of contemptible appearance, without all ceremony lying down upon the grass, in coarse and threadbare clothes, they fell into laughter and scorn of him, crying out, that the old proverb was; now made good, "The mountain had brought forth a mouse." They were yet more astonished at his stupidity, as they thought it, who, when presents were made him of all sorts of provisions, took only the ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... never my fortune. For time was, I had Honour without Leisure; and now I have Leisure without Honour.... But my desire is now to have Leisure without Loitering, and not to become an abbey-lubber, as the old proverb was, but to yield some fruit of my private life.... If King Henry were alive again, I hope verily he would not be so angry with me for not flattering him, as well pleased in seeing himself so truly described in colours that ...
— Bacon - English Men Of Letters, Edited By John Morley • Richard William Church
... "There is a Persian proverb which asserts a devil slips in between two winds," said Christopher. "Perhaps that is what has happened in this ...
— Red Hair • Elinor Glyn
... account of which she had disdained all manner of flattery and even the promises of love, which had been cooed into her ears, or sung in serenades by Captain Tiago. Late, it is true, she had realized her dream; but she knew well the proverb—"Better late than never," and consoled herself by repeating it again and again. "There is no complete happiness on this earth," was her other favorite proverb, but neither of these ever passed her lips in the presence of ...
— Friars and Filipinos - An Abridged Translation of Dr. Jose Rizal's Tagalog Novel, - 'Noli Me Tangere.' • Jose Rizal
... I was always taught that listeners never heard any good of themselves. Not that the proverb holds strictly true in this case; but if Uncle Mat were standing in your place, and heard what I said to Miss Ross, he would not deny I was speaking the truth—being always praised for my truthfulness and shaming the devil ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... makes you little children all like him so well," said she. "He may be funny and good-natured, but he is not a suitable playmate for anybody, especially for a small boy like you. Remember the old proverb, 'Eggs should not dance ...
— Little Grandfather • Sophie May
... lot, and told her it would be a "bad president" for her to keep house alone. A maid had, indeed, a hard time to live in colonial days, did she persevere in her singular choice of remaining single. Perhaps the colonists "proverb'd with the grandsire phrase," that women dying maids lead apes in hell. Maidens "withering on the virgin thorn," in single blessedness, were hard to find. One Mistress Poole lived unmarried to great old age, and helped to found the town of Taunton under most discouraging rebuffs; ...
— Customs and Fashions in Old New England • Alice Morse Earle
... Riccabocca, listlessly. "Are these suns more serene than ours, or the soil more fertile? Yet in our own Italy, saith the proverb, 'he who sows land, reaps more care than corn.' It were different," continued the father after a pause, and in a more irresolute tone, "if I had some independence, however small, to count on—nay, if among all ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various
... narrow passage. This place could be entered only in the night. The person returned from the cave by the same narrow passage, bat walking backwards. He appeared melancholy and defected; and hence the proverb which was applied to a person low- spirited and gloomy, "He has been consulting the oracle ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... some way involved in this failure, and lost, I fancy, a considerable sum of money; but he never talked much on the subject. He was an unflinching believer in the spilt-milk proverb. ...
— The Story of a Bad Boy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... the devices of this cleanliness, which know no bounds, when it can command the labor of others? Which of the people who have become rich has not experienced in his own case, with what difficulty he carefully trained himself to this cleanliness, which only confirms the proverb, "Little white hands ...
— What To Do? - thoughts evoked by the census of Moscow • Count Lyof N. Tolstoi
... credulity. Those who are disposed to look for them may, without much trouble, see such manifest signs, both of superstition and the disposition to believe in its doctrines, as may render it no useless occupation to compare the follies of our fathers with our own. The sailors have a proverb that every man in his lifetime must eat a peck of impurity; and it seems yet more clear that every generation of the human race must swallow a certain measure of nonsense. There remains hope, however, that the grosser faults of our ancestors are now out of date; and that whatever ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... maketh oft time the far lief to be loth": a proverb; the cunning one near at hand oft makes the loving one ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... "You mean a proverb," said Roy. "A lot you know about grammar; you don't know the difference between a proposition and an injunction. He thinks Boys' Life is a musical instrument because it's the scouts' official organ. You're lucky not to be wished onto the Ravens," ...
— Roy Blakeley in the Haunted Camp • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... theys garr the loosey Proverb on't te, when loons gang together by th' luggs, gued men get ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. I (of 6) • Aphra Behn
... Templar married the miller's daughter of the Mill o' Blink (a sad come-down, said foolish neighbours, for a Halliday of Templandmuir) there was a sudden change about the laird. In our good Scots proverb, "A miller's daughter has a shrill voice," and the new leddy of Templandmuir ("a leddy she is!" said the frightened housekeeper) justified the proverb. Her voice went with the skirl of an east wind through the rat-riddled mansion of the Hallidays. She was nine-and-twenty, and a birkie woman ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown
... the matter, that the cowl does not make the monk, that she thought herself, for all she did not wear flowers in her hat, a more honest woman than your society ladies, false jades everyone, concluding with her pet proverb: Better a good name than a ...
— The Aspirations of Jean Servien • Anatole France
... proverb. If I wished, dog, to disturb the silence of this room I'd be clever enough to choose a rickety chair; its feet would pound out a regular tic-toc, tic-toc, tic-toc, in time with my tongue as I washed myself. It's a means ...
— Barks and Purrs • Colette Willy, aka Colette
... your own funeral, gentlemen," he said curtly. "'Nothing venture, nothing have' is an old proverb, but it is as true now as it was when it was coined. With P. S-W. stock at thirty-eight and steadily declining; with another dividend about to be passed; and with the certainty that the July interest on the bonds will have to be defaulted ...
— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde
... makes it difficult for me to soberly realize that my ten-year dream is actually dissolved; and that is that it reverses my horoscope. The proverb says, ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... who has been after me like a hungry wolf after a caribou all these years. I knew there was trouble coming, and I came home and made ready for it. I guessed I'd fight through it all right on my own, my luck was a proverb in the States about '76. I never doubted that it would ...
— The Valley of Fear • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... dangerously heavy. Landed on point running out from north shore. Wigwam poles. Have diarrhoea. All chilled. Not sure of way ahead, but not worried. Camped at 5 P.M. Nice camp in clump of balsam. Not craving bread so much. Idleness and a chance to think make us hungrier. Flies about gone. Proverb—On a wet day ...
— A Woman's Way Through Unknown Labrador • Mina Benson Hubbard (Mrs. Leonidas Hubbard, Junior)
... thinking of the Swiss proverb about lightning, 'Vor den Eichen sollst du weichen.' We ought to ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... fainted. The Governor knew enough. He summoned the young man and, being convinced of his guilt, had him put in prison, while awaiting further information. It is well said in a certain proverb: "Even while you are sitting in your house with the doors shut, misfortune falls ...
— Eastern Shame Girl • Charles Georges Souli
... of the present fashion, for if it is desirable to indulge in an ornament, it is equally desirable that everybody should be gratified by the exhibition thereof. We presume that it is with this commendable feeling that pins'-heads (whose smallness in former days became a proverb) should now resemble the apex of a beadle's staff; and, as though to make "assurance doubly sure," a plurality is absolutely required for the decoration of a gentleman. In these times, when political partisanship is so exceedingly violent, why not make the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... faithfully he to whom you have sworn fidelity; obey your superiors; do not seek for favours; do not struggle after active service, but do not refuse it either, and remember the proverb, 'Take care of your coat while it is new, and of your honour while it ...
— The Daughter of the Commandant • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin
... I censure it, but only call attention to the fact that in my opinion that which makes a tragedy lies only in the struggle of the individual, never in the outcome of this struggle. The outcome is in the hands of the gods, says an old proverb, well then, acts of the gods—as events may very well be called which are the effects of fate—can never be anything else for the dramatic poet than what curtain and wings are for the stage; they limit without completing. I ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various
... great proverbs; and combine them in your mind. Remember that while England is, and ever will be, behindhand in metaphysical and scholastic science, she is the nation which above all others has conquered nature by obeying her; that as it pleased God that the author of that proverb, the father of inductive science, Bacon Lord Verulam, should have been an Englishman, so it has pleased Him that we, Lord Bacon's countrymen, should improve that precious heirloom of science, inventing, producing, exporting, ...
— Scientific Essays and Lectures • Charles Kingsley
... imagine that this sentence, [Greek omitted] was principally designed against the stewards of a feast, who are usually troublesome and press liquor too much upon the guests. For the Dorians in Sicily (as I am informed) called the steward, [Greek omitted] a REMEMBRANCER. Others think that this proverb admonisheth the guests to forget everything that is spoken or done in company; and agreeably to this, the ancients used to consecrate forgetfulness with a ferula to Bacchus, thereby intimating that we ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch
... year corresponding to 1 B.C. The laws of Ieyasu (1610 A.D.) likewise condemn this custom as unreasonable, together with the custom in accordance with which the retainers committed suicide upon the master's death. These same laws also refer to the proverb on revenge, given in the third paragraph of this chapter, and add that whoever undertakes thus to avenge himself or his father or mother or lord or elder brother must first give notice to the proper office of the fact and of the time within which he will carry out his intention; ...
— Evolution Of The Japanese, Social And Psychic • Sidney L. Gulick
... not warn you, sweet lady, that love would find a way?" he said. "We have a proverb in Spain that the way to make sure of winning a girl is to make love to her mother. As you have no mother, I made love last night to Lady Fermanagh, who, I was told, is your guardian, and she invited me to call. Hence my presence here. The fates are kind, and now I can ...
— Bandit Love • Juanita Savage
... Queen of Scots, who was the prisoner of Bess of Hardwick. It is a wonderful house, indeed—enormous, and yet completely covered with the tapestry and the pictures of the time.... The casement windows have never been touched since Queen Elizabeth was here, and are enormous. (There is a local proverb which speaks of the hall as "all window and no wall.") The result is that, in spite of heavy hanging curtains, the candles are blown out if you go near the windows.... The portrait of the first Cavendish—who was usher of Cardinal Wolsey, and ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Vol. 2 • Stephen Gwynn
... under-world, Srahmandazi, is just the same as this world in all other particulars, save that it is dimmer, a veritable shadow-land where men have not the joys of life, but only the shadow of the joy. Hence, says the Tschwi proverb, "One day in this world is worth a year in Srahmandazi." The Tschwis, with their usual definiteness in this sort of detail, know all about their Srahmandazi. Its entrance is just east of the middle Volta, and the ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... just before reaching Bideford the silencer worked loose, and so got upon Mrs. Norton's nerves that Apollo was stopped in the pouring rain for Young Nick to right the wrong. As if to prove the truth of the proverb, "the more haste the less speed," in his hurry poor Buddha burnt his hand. While he was wringing it like a distracted goblin, along came the Tyndal car, which had left Tintagel about half an hour after Apollo. To Sir Lionel's amazement, no me! Questions on his part; according to him, idiotic answers ...
— Set in Silver • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... the P. & O. steamers might be a proverb, if in these hurried days anyone ever paused to make a proverb; and therefore it is not the rapid run of the 'Thames' which excites our admiration. It is rather the capital sailing qualities, well tried and proven as they are, of the 'Sunbeam.' Though essentially a sailing vessel and ...
— The Last Voyage - to India and Australia, in the 'Sunbeam' • Lady (Annie Allnutt) Brassey
... who flourished in Provence from 1150 to 1170, quotes Joseph Zabara twice, with approval, in explaining verses in Proverbs. It would thus seem that Zabara, even in his student days, was devoted to the proverb-lore on which he draws so lavishly in his ...
— The Book of Delight and Other Papers • Israel Abrahams
... proverb isn't as true of good words as of mischief,—that a dog who will fetch a bone will carry a bone?" said Sylvie, laughing with the same impulse by which clear drops stood suddenly in her eyes, and a quick rosiness came into her face. ...
— The Other Girls • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... it. I'll offer it as a prize if you are willing to work for it on my conditions. I've heard that you will each be in business for yourselves in a small way this summer, and I'll make this offer. If each of you boys without any help from any one, will choose a good proverb or text out of the Bible for a business motto, I'll give the wheel to the boy who makes the best choice. You can select any three business men in Bardstown to be the judges; but the proof of a pudding is in the eating, you know, so you must apply that motto to your own business faithfully ...
— The Quilt that Jack Built; How He Won the Bicycle • Annie Fellows Johnston
... were too common for her to think about. Joyce looked out of the window with a sort of don't-care expression, and said something in French. Of course I couldn't understand it, but she told me afterward that it was a well-known proverb about the opinion ...
— The Little Colonel's House Party • Annie Fellows Johnston
... question how to prevent the degeneration of mankind would be a simple and natural one, if history and proverb had not taught us that as often as a new truth appears "the very oxen butt their horns against it." They cannot help this, the "disposition" is natural; for when Pythagoras had found the Master of Arts, Mathesios, he was so overjoyed ...
— Valere Aude - Dare to Be Healthy, Or, The Light of Physical Regeneration • Louis Dechmann
... he is not on the spot. I am. And a lawyer on the spot," said Mr. Wilkins, who endeavoured to make his conversation when he talked to Lady Caroline light, aware that one must be light with young ladies, "is worth two in—we won't be ordinary and complete the proverb, but ...
— The Enchanted April • Elizabeth von Arnim
... statement in his report, in which he says he was then (June 30th) "resting" his "tired and terribly jaded horses." But, in telling of his exploits, he says nothing about losing two pieces of his artillery. The saying of Bonaparte's, "False as a war bulletin," has passed into a proverb, and this bulletin of Gen. Shelby's ...
— The Story of a Common Soldier of Army Life in the Civil War, 1861-1865 • Leander Stillwell
... call to mind the accepted proverb that "Competition is the life of trade," and this will make us see that, accompanying this stupendous trade, extending over, and into, every corner of the world, there will be stupendous competition, involving ...
— The Navy as a Fighting Machine • Bradley A. Fiske
... have passed over, it may not be surprizing, that I have collected so great a variety of Things in this way; and there is no greater Happiness I enjoy, than to communicate to the World, what I love myself: but as the Proverb says, there is no disputing about Tastes, so that every one has still the Liberty of choosing or rectifying any thing as their Palate directs, when they have a ...
— The Country Housewife and Lady's Director - In the Management of a House, and the Delights and Profits of a Farm • Richard Bradley
... a change of front when the old officer retired and a young and energetic man succeeded him. A "new broom" is eulogized in proverb; and Mr. Michael Bonar, being new to his district, and a man of youth and determination, boasted that he meant to sweep away the taint of smuggling from the neighborhood of Ardmuirland, which bore a ...
— Up in Ardmuirland • Michael Barrett
... a Latin proverb, something about tots and sentences, which embodies that idea," suggested Elisabeth, ...
— The Farringdons • Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler
... (Vol. ii., p. 413.).—Ray's anecdote concerning the proverb, "Bate me an ace, quoth Bolton," is perhaps more correctly told in the Witty Aunsweres and Saiengs of Englishmen (Cotton MS. ...
— Notes and Queries, 1850.12.21 - A Medium of Inter-communication for Literary Men, Artists, - Antiquaries, Genealogists, etc. • Various
... in an attitude of respect while her mother spoke, and promised to do all that she was told. There is a proverb which says "As the soul is at three so it is at one hundred," and so Hase-Hime grew up as her mother had wished, a good and obedient little Princess, though she was now too young to understand how great was ...
— Japanese Fairy Tales • Yei Theodora Ozaki
... is not so much an oyster which you've got to open with a sword, as the old proverb has it, but a wild beast. Yes, a wild beast: and you've got to fight him at first, fight him tooth and claw. When you've beaten him, ah! then you've got ...
— At Love's Cost • Charles Garvice
... which had been granted from time to time, and which were not allowed to become dead letters. A permanent committee of the three orders supervised the executive and the administration of the laws. These "twenty-two" received an appeal from the meanest citizen, and the Liege proverb "In his own home the poor man is king," was very near the ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam
... the tyrants against their subjects and the members of their own families had produced a correlative order of crime in the people over whom they tyrannized. Cruelty was met by conspiracy. Tyrannicide became honorable; and the proverb, 'He who gives his own life can take a tyrant's,' had worked itself into popular language. At this point it may be well to glance at the opinions concerning public murder which prevailed in Italy. Machiavelli, in the Discorsi iii. 6, discusses the whole subject with ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volume 1 (of 7) • John Addington Symonds
... their dues, everyone knows that proverb," interrupted Mr. Damon, again emerging from the cabin. "But bless my quotation marks, I should think you'd have something better to do than stand ...
— Tom Swift and his Airship • Victor Appleton
... shocked at what you said about Miss —— not recognising you. It seemed almost incredible. Mr. Prentiss has persuaded me to have a family Bible-reading on Sunday afternoon, as we have no service, and studying up for it this morning I came to this proverb which originated with Huss, whose name in Bohemian signifies goose. He said at the stake: "If you burn a goose a swan will rise from its ashes"; and I thought—Well, Miss ——'s usefulness is at an end, but God can, and no doubt will, raise up a swan ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... "But does one houri make a paradise?" she bantered, while the beating, hurrying heart of her went faster and faster till she thought his ears would hear it. "We have a proverb—one swallow ...
— The Palace of Darkened Windows • Mary Hastings Bradley
... behind her, he laughed and reiterated the favorite proverb that often crossed his lips, ...
— St. Elmo • Augusta J. Evans
... array yourself for conquest and come to the school. Talk is cheap, according to a proverb more common than elegant; but it is sinful to waste the cheapest of things. While you dress, you will meditate upon the sensation which it is your intention to make in the ring, and upon the humiliation which you will heap upon your riding master by showing wonderful ability to rise in the ...
— In the Riding-School; Chats With Esmeralda • Theo. Stephenson Browne
... opening was on the tip of his tongue; but his haste made him surrender a taunt as likely to cause trouble. "You're very much in the proverb way to-day," was all he said. "I'm sure I wish I saw Inneraora as hale and complete as ever it was: it never had a more ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro
... might be considered well enough in the old proverb that two is company and three is none. This proverb is the truth put popularly: that is, it is the truth put wrong. Certainly it is untrue that three is no company. Three is splendid company: three is the ideal number for pure comradeship: ...
— Alarms and Discursions • G. K. Chesterton
... from the dust before me. I lived in continual terrour, frighted by every noise at the door, and terrified at the approach of every step quicker than common. I never retired to rest without feeling the justness of the Spanish proverb, "Let him who sleeps too much, borrow the pillow of a debtor:" my solicitude and vexation kept me long waking; and when I had closed my eyes, I was pursued or ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson
... greater part of the results hitherto obtained in the field of Indo-Germanic comparative mythology to be, as yet, a failure, premature or incomplete, my own efforts in German Myths (1858) included. That I do not, however, "throw out the babe with the bath," as the proverb goes, my essay on Lettish sun myths in Bastian-Hartmann's Ethnological ...
— Modern Mythology • Andrew Lang
... I received a note from the bishop, inviting me to partake of a family dinner, with him and his niece. So it is! And so true is the proverb: it never rains but it pours! Good fortune absolutely persecuted me! Honours fell so thick at my feet that I had not time to stoop and pick them up! In the present humour of things, I knew not whether I might not be invited, before the morrow came, to dine with a party of ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... voluntarily submitted to be chained. When the gods told him that they had finished their task, Fenrir shook himself violently, stretched his limbs, rolled on the ground, and at last burst his chains, which flew in pieces all around him. He then freed himself from Dromi, which gave rise to the proverb, 'to get loose out of Laeding, or to dash out of Dromi,' when anything is to be accomplished by ...
— The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson; and the Younger Eddas of Snorre Sturleson • Saemund Sigfusson and Snorre Sturleson
... translation Lamairesse points out the superiority of Indian erotic art to that of the Latin poets by its loftier spirit, and greater purity and idealism. It is throughout marked by respect for women, and its spirit is expressed in the well-known proverb: "Thou shalt not strike a woman even with a flower." See also Margaret Noble's Web of Indian Life, especially Ch. III, "On the Hindu Woman as Wife," and Ch. ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... by [682]Thevenot, and Herbert. In respect to the grottos I am persuaded, that they were temples, and not tombs. Nothing was more common among the Persians than to have their temples formed out of rocks. Mithras e [683]Petra was in a manner a proverb. Porphyry assures us, that the Deity had always a rock or cavern for his temple: that people, in all places, where the name of Mithras was known, paid their worship at a [684]cavern. Justin Martyr speaks to the same [685]purpose: and Lutatius Placidus mentions that this mode ...
— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume I. • Jacob Bryant
... for a clear, simple, easily grasped proof of our ethics, it is to be found in a popular proverb. Struggling upward from beast and savage into humanness, man has seen, reverenced, and striven to attain ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... tell you," said Estella. "First, notwithstanding the proverb that constant dropping will wear away a stone, you may set your mind at rest that these people never will—never would, in hundred years—impair your ground with Miss Havisham, in any particular, great or small. ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... of the Eye of the king occurs in Herodotus, in AEschylus, and in Plutarch, of the Ear in Xenophon; cf. the Persian proverb, according to which "The king has many eyes and ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 9 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... the station later," replied Joel. "The fur will keep, and we may have quite a spell of winter yet. Don't you remember the old weather proverb, of March coming in like a lion and going out like a lamb? This one came in like a lamb, and we had better keep an eye on it for fear it goes out like a lion. You can go to the ...
— Wells Brothers • Andy Adams
... inclosure, which the flood dared not touch, though it spread terror and ruin on every side of them. Wherefore the harbor of Pukoo, where this terrible event occurred, was long known as Ai Kanaka (man eater), and it has passed into a proverb among the inhabitants of that region that "when the rainbow spans Mapulehu Valley, then look out for the Waiakoloa,"—a furious storm of rain and wind which sometimes comes ...
— Hawaiian Folk Tales - A Collection of Native Legends • Various
... of airting them your way INSTANTER; and so setting you up in practice, so far as my small business or influence may go; and, doubtless, Alan, that is a day whilk I hope may come round. But then, before I give, as the proverb hath it, "My own fish-guts to my own sea-maws," I must, for the sake of my own character, be very sure that my sea-maw can pick them to some ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... Madame d'Avrigny was getting up her annual private theatricals, and wanted Jacqueline to take the principal part in the play, saying that she ought to put her lessons in elocution to some use. The piece chosen was to illustrate a proverb, and was entirely new. It was as unexceptionable as it was amusing; the most severe critic could have found no fault with its morality or with its moral, which turned on the eagerness displayed by young girls nowadays to obtain diplomas. Scylla and Charybdis was its name. ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... produce of the mine; as is the nose, or rather face, of a lion or leopard still remaining at Stamford, which also gave name to the edifice it adorned. And hence, when Henry VIII. debased the coin by an alloy of copper, it was a common remark or proverb, that 'Testons were gone to Oxford, to study in Brasen Nose.' " -Churton's Life of ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... is a little bit of outrage, after all? When I have been in England a few years more, I shall laugh at myself for having loved fair play and self-respect, in this innocent young freshness. We must wag as the world does; and you know the proverb, What makes the world wag, but the ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... mouth of the river at anchor waiting for the wind, I felt that the last link which connected me with the land of so many pleasing recollections was broken. The Paraenses, who are fully aware of the attractiveness of their country, have an alliterative proverb, "Quem vai para (o) Para para," "He who goes to Para stops there," and I had often thought I should myself have been added to the list of examples. The desire, however, of seeing again my parents and enjoying once more the ...
— The Naturalist on the River Amazons • Henry Walter Bates
... proverb says, "Salt comes from the north, gold from the south, and silver from the country of the white men, but the word of God and the treasures of wisdom are only to be found in Timbuctoo." It would be an exaggeration to put the university in the mosque of Sankore on a ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various
... be bent too much one way, says the proverb, in order to make it straight, you must bend it as much the other. The French philosophers, who have proposed the system which represents agriculture as the sole source of the revenue and wealth of every country, seem to have adopted this proverbial ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... the necessity of efforts to save herself from impending ruin; she became taunting and aggressive in her manners and acts, and resorted at length to violence, reminding one of the oft-repeated proverb, 'Whom the gods would destroy they first make mad.' History has no readings for the comfort of slavery. There is a progress in human affairs, and the tide of that progress is against her. Threatening attitudes and impetuous dashes do not appear to come with salvation; ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol V. Issue III. March, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... and behold, it is in rhyme! But the charm of this great advocate is, that, whatever side he was on, he could always find excellent reasons for it, and state them with great force, and abundance of happy illustration. He is an exception to the proverb, and is none the worse pleader than he is always pleading his own cause. The blunder about Chapman is of a kind into which his hasty temperament often betrayed him. He remembered that Chapman's "Iliad" was in a long measure, concluded ...
— Among My Books - First Series • James Russell Lowell
... of beginning at home was not in the literal sense of the proverb. It turned out that he had been neighbouring to some purpose. Old Simpson could not move himself about indoors or attend to his work without, and Jim, who had not before this attached himself by regular employment, had by some ...
— The Mermaid - A Love Tale • Lily Dougall
... that "one man may take a horse to the water, but twenty cannot compel him to drink." Though this proverb may hold good of an English horse, it has no significance when applied to an African dromedary. Proof. Our adventurers saw the owner of each camel bring his animal to the edge of the pool; but instead of permitting the thirsty creature ...
— The Boy Slaves • Mayne Reid
... explains the old proverb that "extremes meet," the materialistic doctor and the cure of Nemours were soon friends. The old man loved backgammon, a favorite game of the priesthood, and the Abbe Chaperon played it with about as much skill ...
— Ursula • Honore de Balzac
... same phenomena, nor grasp the same analogies. Why do we not preserve a like attitude towards political and philosophical questions? Why this ridiculous mania for affirming that every thing has been said, which means that we know all about mental and moral science? Why is the proverb, THERE IS NOTHING NEW UNDER THE SUN, applied exclusively to ...
— What is Property? - An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government • P. J. Proudhon
... to any other, because, even in this remote corner of the world where I live, you are considered to be the most eminent man in dignity of rank and in love of all learning and even of mathematics, so that by your authority and judgment you can easily suppress the bites of slanderers, albeit the proverb hath it that there is no remedy for the bite of a sycophant. If perchance there shall be idle talkers, who, though they are ignorant of all mathematical sciences, nevertheless assume the right to pass judgment on these things, and if they should dare ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot
... exemplary Devout in the Cloister, doing more Penance, and imposing a more rigid Severity and Task on her self, than was requir'd, giving such rare Examples to all the Nuns that were less Devout, that her Life was a Proverb, and a President, and when they would express a very Holy Woman indeed, they would say, 'She ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume V • Aphra Behn
... got into the saddle gaily, and joyously followed the chase, thinking only of the dexterity and beauty of the flight of pursuer and pursued, instead of the deadly terror and cruel death to which they condemned the created creature, the very proverb for joyousness. ...
— Unknown to History - A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland • Charlotte M. Yonge |
