"Pusillanimity" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... King's ministers were treacherously negotiating with false Burgundy, some say with the Regent Bedford himself. They cared not to save France. They cared only to keep out of harm's way—to avoid all peril and danger, and to thwart the Maid, whose patriotism and lofty courage was such a foil to their pusillanimity and cowardice. ...
— A Heroine of France • Evelyn Everett-Green
... through life and to this catholicity; no feeling for the fact that such a man is too prone to consume himself rapidly, like a flame; nor any indignation at the thought that the vulgar narrowness and pusillanimity of his whole environment, especially of his learned contemporaries, so saddened, tormented, and stifled the tender and ardent creature that he was, that the very universality for which he is praised should give rise to feelings of the deepest compassion. "Have ...
— Thoughts out of Season (Part One) • Friedrich Nietzsche
... him, having lent his cloak to the king in the morning; and as it had been pouring all day, the ground could not have afforded very luxurious quarters. The same extraordinary luck which had attended the French in their whole expedition now favored their retreat; and the same pusillanimity which the allies had shown at Fornovo prevented them from re-forming and engaging with the army of Charles upon the plain. One hour before daybreak on Tuesday morning the French broke up their camp and succeeded in clearing the ...
— New Italian sketches • John Addington Symonds
... grave, but the ministry stood. The spirit of the nation, justly proud of its triumphs, disdained to listen to the whispers of a party, who murmured defeat with victory before their eyes; who conjured up visions of ruin, only to be rebuked by realities of triumph; and to whom the national scorn of pusillanimity, and the national rejoicing in the proudest success, could not unteach the language of despair. Perceval, the overthrower of the Foxite ministry, perished; but the political system of the cabinet remained unchanged. Castlereaghperished—Liverpool perished; but the political ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 360, October 1845 • Various
... father-in-law's lodgings in the High Street, and hearing from the servant that Mr. Harding was at his daughter's, followed him to Mrs. Bold's house, and there found him. The archdeacon was fuming with rage when he got into the drawing-room, and had by this time nearly forgotten the pusillanimity of the bishop in the villainy of ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... brought the question to the decision of war was the habit of concession on the part of the North, and the inability of its representatives to say No, when policy as well as conscience made it imperative. Without that confidence in Northern pusillanimity into which the South had been educated by their long experience of this weakness, whatever might have been the secret wish of the leading plotters, they would never have dared to rush their fellow-citizens into a position where further ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell
... Royal, the theatre of political commotions—Mutual enmity of the queen and the duke of Orleans, which, in the sequel, brought these great personages to the scaffold—Their improper example imitated by the nobility of both sexes—The projects of each defeated—The duke's pusillanimity was a bar to his ambition—He exhausted his immense fortune to gain partisans, and secure the attachment of the people—His imprisonment, ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... I very well know, understand their rights and will defend them, and if they find the government will not protect them, they will attempt at least to protect themselves;" and he concluded, "I cannot be thankful to that gentleman for coming all the way from Geneva to give Americans a character for pusillanimity." He held it madness to suppose that if the treaty were defeated war could be avoided. Called to order, he said that he might have been too personal, and asked pardon of the gentleman ...
— Albert Gallatin - American Statesmen Series, Vol. XIII • John Austin Stevens
... who knew her, especially Mrs. Finn, were aware that her hatred and her ideas of revenge were not laid aside; but she went on from day to day anathematizing her special enemies and abstained from reproaching her husband for his pusillanimity. Then came the question as to the autumn. "Let's have everybody down at Gatherum, just as we had before," said ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... waited for him that saved me from pusillanimity and a storm. He who believes himself to be far advanced in the ways of God has not yet even made ...
— The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales • Jean Pierre Camus
... climate, it is impossible to mistake the likeness between the Greek and the Northern conceptions of a dignified and reasonable way of life. The magnificence of the Homeric great man is like the magnificence of the Northern lord, in so far as both are equally marked off from the pusillanimity and cheapness of popular morality on the one hand, and from the ostentation of Oriental or chivalrous society on the other. The likeness here is not purely in the historical details, but much more in the spirit ...
— Epic and Romance - Essays on Medieval Literature • W. P. Ker
... the Royalist camp, could rival him as a 'partisan soldier.' His first distinguished exploit was his defence of Prior's Hill fort, at the siege of Bristol—which contrasts so remarkably with the pusillanimity of his chief, Colonel Fiennes. Next comes his yet more brilliant defence of Lyme—then a little fishing-town, with some 900 inhabitants, of which the defences were a dry ditch, a few hastily-formed ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 439 - Volume 17, New Series, May 29, 1852 • Various
... Bastille, where he should spend the rest of his days in misery and horror, and never see the light of God's sun, nor the face of a friend; but perish in a foreign land, far removed from his family and connexions. Pickle d—d him for his pusillanimity; and the exempt hearing a lady bemoan herself so piteously, expressed his mortification at being the instrument of giving her such pain, and endeavoured to console them by representing the lenity of the French government, and the singular generosity of the prince, ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... conviction. Sheridan, not satisfied with eluding, determined to mock the justice of his country, and composed a Masque called 'The Foresters,' containing a circumstantial account of some of the robberies he had committed, and a good deal of sarcasm on the pusillanimity of those whom he had robbed, and the inefficacy of the penal laws of the kingdom. This piece was acted at Drury-Lane Theatre with great applause, to the astonishment of all sober persons, and the scandal of the ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Vol 2 • Thomas Moore
... from which it was taken, the largest that Europe had ever seen. But that army had sustained a long succession of defeats and disgraces, unredeemed by a single brilliant achievement. It was the fashion, both in England and on the Continent, to ascribe those defeats and disgraces to the pusillanimity of the Irish race, [433] That this was a great error is sufficiently proved by the history of every war which has been carried on in any part of Christendom during five generations. The raw material out of which a good ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... my numerous associates that diversity of fortitude which I should have expected would mark their conduct—forming, as it were, a descending series, from the decided heroism exhibited by some, down to the lowest degree of pusillanimity and frenzy discoverable in others,—I remarked that the mental condition of my fellow-sufferers was rather divided by a broad but, as it afterwards appeared, not impassable line; on the one side of which were ranged all whose minds were greatly elevated by the ...
— The Loss of the Kent, East Indiaman, in the Bay of Biscay - Narrated in a Letter to a Friend • Duncan McGregor
... courage or of want of zeal. For though I did not share the toils or perils of the war I was engaged in a service not less hazardous to myself and more beneficial to my fellow citizens; nor in the adverse turns of our affairs, did I ever betray any symptoms of pusillanimity and dejection; or show myself more afraid than became me of malice or of death: For since from my youth I was devoted to the pursuits of literature, and my mind has always been stronger than my body, I did not ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... century entered Paris, burnt some of the churches, and meeting with scarcely any resistance, made themselves masters of all they could find, whilst the Emperor Charles the Bald, at the head of an army, had the pusillanimity to treat with them, and finally to give them seven thousand pounds of silver to quit Paris, which was only an encouragement for them to return, which they did in a few years after, carrying devastation wherever they appeared, the poor citizens ...
— How to Enjoy Paris in 1842 • F. Herve
... SMALL LETTER MU}{GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA}{GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA}), it is longanimous or magnanimous and there is indeed no great, truly great, mind but is patient and long suffering. It is a great weakness and pusillanimity to be soon angry. Such a spirit hath not the rule of itself, but is in bondage to its own lust, but "he that ruleth his spirit is greater than he that taketh a city." Now, it is much of this affection of love that overrules passion. There is a ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning
... recall orders reached him. Joyous that the situation entitled him to disobey them, he gave instead the word to charge. As the Afghans came down at no great pace, they fired occasionally; either because of the bullets, or because of an access of pusillanimity, Fraser's troopers broke and fled ignominiously. The British gentlemen charged home unsupported. Broadfoot, Crispin and Lord were slain; Ponsonby, severely wounded and his reins cut, was carried out of the melee by his charger; Fraser, covered ...
— The Afghan Wars 1839-42 and 1878-80 • Archibald Forbes
... which the mass of mankind quaffs its floods of joy and sorrow. Well, the long and short of it all is, that I honestly pity him. He may have given sly knocks in his life, but he can't hurt any one now. I pity his ignorance, his weakness, his pusillanimity. He has tasted the real sweetness of life no more than its bitterness; he has never dreamed, nor experimented, nor dared; he has never known any but mercenary affection; neither men nor women have risked aught for him—for his good spirits, his good ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 5 • Various
... men so circumstanced. The gilt of the world had not eaten into his soul; his heart was not as yet wedded to the splendour of pinchbeck. This is saying much for him; for how seldom is it that the hearts and souls of the young are able to withstand pinchbeck and gilding? He was free from this pusillanimity; free as yet as regarded himself; but he was hardly free as regarded his betrothed. He had promised her, not in spoken words but in his thoughts, rank, wealth, and all the luxuries of his promised high position; and now, on ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope
... was fiercely prosecuted. Henry III. remained most of the time in the gilded saloons of the Louvre, irritable and wretched, and yet incapable of any continued efficient exertion. Many of the zealous Leaguers, indignant at the pusillanimity he displayed, urged the Duke of Guise to dethrone Henry III. by violence, and openly to declare himself King of France. They assured him that the nation would sustain him by their arms. But the duke was not prepared to enter upon so bold a measure, as he hoped that the death of the king would ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... hiss and roar like thunder the hurricane struck us. The schooner heeled over to the gale; I thought she was going over altogether. Many fancied so likewise, and cries of terror escaped from several of the Frenchmen. Lieutenant Preville uttered an expression of annoyance at the pusillanimity of ...
— Marmaduke Merry - A Tale of Naval Adventures in Bygone Days • William H. G. Kingston
... permitted to leave the country; General Freire having, meanwhile, been elected to the Supreme Directorate, in the midst of internal dissensions in Chili, and disasters in Peru, where the Spaniards, under Cantarac—emboldened by the pusillanimity of the Protector in permitting them to relieve Callao unmolested, and elated with their decisive victory over a division of his army, as narrated in a previous chapter—had availed themselves of the treasure carried away from Callao in reorganising their forces, which ...
— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 1 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald
... that he felt the dreadful consequences of the awful position in which he was placed, became the very picture of despair and pusillanimity; his complexion turned haggard, his eyes wild, and his hands trembled so much that he was not able to bring the tea or bread and butter to his lips; in fact, such an impersonation of rank and I unmanly cowardice could not be witnessed. He rose up, exclaiming, in a faint and hollow ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... presumed to trifle in such a manner with any ministry but one which they thought wanted either courage or inclination to resent such treatment?" He accused the Ministry of "a scandalous breach of duty" and "the most infamous pusillanimity." Later in the same day Sir John Barnard moved an Address to the Crown, asking for papers to be laid before the House. Walpole did not actually oppose {155} the motion, and only suggested a modification of it, but he earnestly entreated the House not, at that moment, to press the Sovereign ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume II (of 4) • Justin McCarthy
... his own. Doubtless they all were solicitous about the general good, but their love for it was so general and so diluted with attachment to others' goods as to be hardly discernible. The reproach that can hardly be spared to Mr. Wilson, however, is that of pusillanimity. If his faith in the principles he had laid down for the guidance of nations were as intense as his eloquent words suggested, he would have spurned the offer of a sequence of high-sounding phrases in lieu of a resettlement of the world. And ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... air. I dissimulated, I hesitated to announce my own belief, reflecting how far it were seasonable thus to contradict my companion, and persuading myself that it would be useless, and that I was perfectly justified in remaining silent. What vile pusillanimity! why thus respect the presumptuous power of popular errors and opinions, resting upon no foundation. True it is that an ill-timed zeal is always indiscreet, and calculated to irritate rather than convert; but to avow with frankness and ...
— My Ten Years' Imprisonment • Silvio Pellico
... loved our patroness St. Agnes the Virgin with a special devotion. In the beginning he suffered many weaknesses and temptations, but afterward, by the help of God, he was changed into another man, mightily uplifted from pusillanimity of spirit, and endowed with much grace of devotion. He died happily after a good struggle, and on the next day his body was buried next to Brother Nicholas Kreyenschot on the eastern side of the cloister, and Mass and prayers were said ...
— The Chronicle of the Canons Regular of Mount St. Agnes • Thomas a Kempis
... gazed out straight before him, as if through the bare, white-washed walls of this humble hotel room he saw the vision of the brilliant halls of the Tuileries, the imperial throne, the Empress beside him, all her faithlessness and pusillanimity forgiven, his son whom he worshipped, his marshals grouped around him; and with a gesture of proud defiance he threw back ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy
... "hasty person" be one who thinks eleven years rather long to have his button held by a biographer ere he begin his next sentence, I take to myself the sting of Mr. Masson's covert sarcasm. I confess with shame a pusillanimity that is apt to flag if a "to be continued" do not redeem its promise before the lapse of a quinquennium. I could scarce await the "Autocrat" himself so long. The heroic age of literature is past, ...
— Among My Books • James Russell Lowell
... which Flavius looked for did not appear. In the meanwhile Epicharis became more and more impatient of the delay. She urged the conspirators to do their work, and chided in the strongest terms their irresolution and pusillanimity. At length finding that her invectives and reproaches were of no avail, she determined to leave them, and to see what she could do herself toward ...
— Nero - Makers of History Series • Jacob Abbott |
