"Autocrat" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... her of such overwhelming interest? I ask, did God give woman aspirations which it is a sin for her to gratify? Abnormal! No, it is to be found everywhere. The man whose soul is so callous that he can hold his fellow-man as a slave, cries out (as in excuse) that the slave is contented. The autocrat exclaims that it is only a turbulent Kossuth or a factious Mazzini who feels that uneasy discontent which preys not on the hearts of his millions of legal slaves. Will that be, to us, an argument that the tyrant is in the right? No! the aspirations to liberty ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... told, that after some meeting to arrange matters with Bradbury and Evans, the printers, Boz, ever charitable, was glad to report to Forster some hearty praise by this person, of the ability with which he (Forster) had arranged the matters, thus amiably wishing to propitiate the autocrat in his friend's interest. But, said the uncompromising Forster, "I am truly sorry, my dear Dickens, that I cannot reciprocate your friend's compliment, for a d——nder ass I never encountered in the whole course ...
— John Forster • Percy Hethrington Fitzgerald
... l'Epee, the Agassiz's Natural History Akin by Marriage American Antiquity Aquarium, my Architecture, Domestic Art Autocrat of the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... "Old Ironsides," as worshipful as the "Hymn of Trust," as nobly didactic as "The Chambered Nautilus"; his novels are studies of the obscure problems of heredity, and his most characteristic prose work, The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table, is an original commentary on almost everything ...
— Outlines of English and American Literature • William J. Long
... fretful autocrat who voices discontent. Pardon the colored water-color which is burnt. Pardon the intoning of the heavy way. Pardon the aristocrat who has not come to stay. Pardon the abuse which was begun. Pardon the yellow egg which has run. Pardon nothing ...
— Matisse Picasso and Gertrude Stein - With Two Shorter Stories • Gertrude Stein
... since Arethusa was in the habit of taking the long journey purely out of a sense of duty and to keep Lucinda up to the mark; but grateful appreciation is rarely ever a salient point in the character of an autocrat. ...
— The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary • Anne Warner
... vessel are the aborigines of the country to which she belongs, and from which she last sailed. I noticed, however, from an inscription, that the brig was built at Newburyport, Massachusetts, showing that the autocrat of all the Russias is tributary, to some extent, to the free Yankees of New England for his naval equipment. On the 11th of October, by invitation of Lieutenant Ruducoff, in company of Mr. Jacob and Captain Leidesdorff, I dined on board this vessel. ...
— What I Saw in California • Edwin Bryant
... spirit leaves him while he is in the heavens. Death comes splendidly, quickly, and until the last moment he is trying to keep control of his machine. It is not for him to envy the days of cavalry charges. He does not depend upon the companionship of other men to carry him on, but is the autocrat of his own fate, the ruler of his own dreams. All hours of daylight are the same to him. At any time he may be called to flight and perhaps to die. The glories of sunset and sunrise are his between the sun ...
— My Second Year of the War • Frederick Palmer
... thought—serious, comic, pathetic, and poetic,—of comparisons, figures, and illustrations. I have seen nothing of his preparation, but I imagine he is ready. It will be something wholly new, and his reputation as a prose writer will date from this magazine." When you recollect the success of the "Autocrat of the Breakfast Table" you cannot help remarking that ...
— Four Famous American Writers: Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, • Sherwin Cody
... 1815-1848 by Emperor Francis I.'s minister and mentor, Prince Metternich. Easily the most commanding personality in Europe, Metternich was at the same time the moving spirit in international affairs and the autocrat of Austro-Hungarian politics. Within both spheres he was, as he declared himself to be, "the man of the status quo." Innovation he abhorred; immobility he glorified. The settlement at Vienna he regarded as essentially his own handiwork, and all that that settlement involved he proposed ...
— The Governments of Europe • Frederic Austin Ogg
... his breath and changed the subject. So matters went on, with Barry still subservient, but growing daily more inclined to believe himself the autocrat he seemed, daily a little less cautious, a little more fixed in his assurance that the officeholders, the delegates and the saloon men constituted, in themselves, a sufficient prop for his dominion, and ...
— Jewel Weed • Alice Ames Winter
... possessed the strange gift of condescending majestically to Mr. Prohack while licking his boots. He listened to Mr. Prohack as to an autocrat while giving Mr. Prohack to understand that Mr. Prohack knew not the first elements of sartorial elegance. At intervals he gazed abstractedly at the gold framed and crowned portraits that hung on the walls and at the inscriptions similarly framed and crowned ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett
... from abroad one October morning several years ago, I was told that that simple spirit had passed on. His death had been little heeded; but in him had passed away an intangible genuine bit of Old Boston—as genuine a bit, in its kind, as the Autocrat himself—a personality not to be restored or replaced. Tom Folio could ...
— Ponkapog Papers • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... Perhaps the new detective perceived the state of unrest and terrible suspense in which many of the company were on account of Squire Walker's vagaries, and chivalrously sought to deliver them. Eyeing keenly the autocrat of the breakfast table, he remarked, "I'm afraid you heve fergotten ...
— Two Knapsacks - A Novel of Canadian Summer Life • John Campbell
... (like all the rest of them), 'never mind the young men! Turn thy eyes on a middle-aged autocrat, who has been considered ...
— The Rose and the Ring • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Proportional Representation as a dangerous fad. Undoubtedly the will of the people must prevail, but the exercise of that will should depend on and be the result of their own deliberate judgment. Whether what is done is a blessing or curse depends not on whether it is the act of an autocrat, of an aristocracy, or of a democracy, but on the character of the act and the spirit which prompts it. A great audience in London recently heard the true position summed up in few words—I quote Dr. Campbell Morgan ...
— Rebuilding Britain - A Survey Of Problems Of Reconstruction After The World War • Alfred Hopkinson
... dignity as of an heroic age. This gives consistency to all his utterances. The doctrinaire republican of to-day cannot understand how the man who approved the execution of the would-be despot Charles Stuart, should have been the hearty supporter of the real autocrat Oliver Cromwell. Milton was not the slave of a name. He cared not for the word republic, so as it was well with the commonwealth. Parliaments or single rulers, he knew, are "but means to an end; if that end was obtained, no matter ...
— Milton • Mark Pattison
... addressing his favourite, generally present on these occasions, with the appeal, 'Pas vrai, Dillen?' after each broken sentence,—would have been inexpressibly droll, had not the low-comedy actor of the scene been an autocrat who might, at a wink, have transformed laughter into tears. But there was a demoniacal comicality about the performance, which, if it did not convulse the spectator, made him ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 • Rupert Hughes
... ringers"! He was never known to fail in scolding any funeral procession that had kept him waiting at the church gates too long, and that in language as loud as it was vigorous. He, like his predecessor, was the autocrat of the parish. ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... real prime minister notices the transformation. The ego and the country soon become interblended in his mind. A prime minister under the party system as we have had it in Canada is of necessity an egotist and autocrat. If he comes to office without these characteristics his environment equips him with them as surely as a diet of royal jelly transforms a worker into ...
— Laurier: A Study in Canadian Politics • J. W. Dafoe
... but cries aloud saying that you must tackle the problem your own selves if you have any concern for salvation. The great privilege of a military autocrat, that he is his own Cabinet, Commander-in-Chief, and Chancellor of the Exchequer, that he is everywhere personally in service with his army, gives him an enormous advantage for the speedy and timely performance of military duties, but it makes him incapable of obtaining ...
— Authors of Greece • T. W. Lumb
... transgressions for which she had to die. I can add nothing further to what has been long known, except that the King, soon after her coronation, in November 1533, already showed a certain discontent with her.[134] Was it after all not right in the eyes of the jealous autocrat that his former wife's lady in waiting now as Queen wore the crown as well as himself? Anne Boleyn too might not be without blame in her demeanour which was not troubled by any strict rule. Or did it seem to the King a token ...
— A History of England Principally in the Seventeenth Century, Volume I (of 6) • Leopold von Ranke
... fiction could scarcely devise a more romantic meeting than this between the autocrat of Russia and the red-armed, bustling cleaner of the window-panes, and he would certainly never have ventured to build on it the romance of which it was the prelude. What it was in the young peasant-woman that attracted the Emperor it is impossible to say. ...
— Love affairs of the Courts of Europe • Thornton Hall
... government may interfere with a Parisian's freedom of speech and pen, the autocrat is yet to appear who dares place an interdict on his culinary aptitudes. The science of dining in Paris has, notwithstanding, its new mysteries; and in order to be abreast of the times, it is wise, instead of drawing on past experience, ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I. February, 1862, No. II. - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... President, an office which he continued to hold for eighteen years. His career as ruler vindicates the wisdom of that wise but unwritten provision of the American Constitution by which there is a limit to the tenure of this office. Continued rule for half a generation must turn a man into an autocrat. The old President has said himself, in his homely but shrewd way, that when one gets a good ox to lead the team it is a pity to change him. If a good ox, however, is left to choose his own direction without guidance, he may ...
— The War in South Africa - Its Cause and Conduct • Arthur Conan Doyle
... "I am autocrat of our world, and I know how to make my influence felt when I choose. I have very positive views about fighting. Fighting has to go on, on the frontiers of the Empire. My army can keep off our foes, but it cannot kill off the Moorish and Arab and Scythian nomads, nor the hordes of the German ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White
... first constitution of Indiana, and later he was made a member of the legislature. Father Rapp, who possessed rare talents as an organizer, controlled the internal affairs of the colony. Those who left the community because unwilling to abide its discipline often pronounced their leader a narrow autocrat. But there can be no doubt that eminent good sense and gentleness tempered his judgments. He personally led the community in industry, in prayers, and in faith, until 1847, when death removed him. A council of nine elders elected by the members was then charged ...
— Our Foreigners - A Chronicle of Americans in the Making • Samuel P. Orth
... that; gives us, in the lean, strong, aquiline head, startlingly, all that was abrupt, fiery, and essential in the genius of a rare and misunderstood poet. There never was a man less like the popular idea of him than the writer of The Angel in the House. Certainly an autocrat in the home, impatient, intolerant, full of bracing intellectual scorn, not always just, but always just in intention, a disdainful recluse, judging all human and divine affairs from a standpoint of imperturbable omniscience, Coventry Patmore charmed one by ...
— Figures of Several Centuries • Arthur Symons
... completed two years at Kensingtowe, of strolling across to the Preparatory School and organising a cricket match between some of the younger "Sucker-boys." Not being allowed to go down to the town, we thought there might be fun in playing the heavy autocrat at the "Nursery." ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... ascendency over hearty and careless Templandmuir, and partly by a bluff joviality which he—so little cunning in other things—knew to affect among the petty lairds. The man you saw trying to be jocose with Templandmuir was a very different being from the autocrat who "downed" his fellows in the town. It was all "How are ye the day, Templandmuir?" and "How d'ye doo-oo, Mr. Gourlay?" and the immediate ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown
... of conscience to criticise the pastor, he was autocrat of Longmeadow. One who preceded Pastor Storrs had it told about him that two of his deacons wanted him to appoint Ruling Elders. He appointed them; and asked them what they thought the duties were. ...
— Lazarre • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... An autocrat, such as the Russian Czar, can undoubtedly abdicate; but sovereignty, whether it be the sovereignty of the Czar or of Parliament, is always one and the same quality. If the Czar can abdicate, so can Parliament. The Czar again could, ...
— England's Case Against Home Rule • Albert Venn Dicey
... that, had he honestly desired to put the matter on the road to settlement, Mr. Krueger should first have come to an understanding upon it. By passing it through the Volksraad as law, he should have cut the cable, were he in reality, anything but an autocrat, and such ...
— Boer Politics • Yves Guyot
... skipper, such an autocrat on board his vessel, was by no means so under his own roof-tree, and sundry misgivings obtruded themselves as to the welcome he might receive from the wife of his bosom when a comely young lady was to be included ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... a familiar one to Mrs. Tudor's children almost ever since they could remember. "Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot" had been a sort of autocrat and benefactor in one, to the family. His opinions, his advice had been asked on all matters of importance; his approval had been held out to them as the highest reward, his displeasure as the punishment most to be dreaded. And yet ...
— Great Uncle Hoot-Toot • Mrs. Molesworth
... they, "so long as you do not criticize the exigencies of war-time. But certainly we are sorry to see you going into a country where the benighted people put up with an autocrat Who was not duly elected to His position. And why need you continue seeking your wife's society when it is so ...
— Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell
... John Ballantyne himself found in this new almanach imperial?"—"Let that flee stick to the wa'," quoth Johnny: "When I set up for a bookseller, The Crafty christened me The Dey of Alljeers—but he now considers me as next thing to dethroned." He added, "His Majesty the autocrat is too fond of these nicknames. One day a partner of the house of Longman was dining with him in the country, to settle an important piece of business, about which there occurred a good deal of difficulty. ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume V (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... political "boss," who is at the head of an inner "ring" of politicians, often decides who shall be nominated for the various offices of government, leaving no choice to the voters themselves. This makes of our government a real autocracy, and the worst kind of autocracy, because the autocrat (the "boss") acts in secret, and is in no way responsible to the people. It is the "frightful despotism" of which Washington warned his ...
— Community Civics and Rural Life • Arthur W. Dunn
... as fine and sweet as can be now," rejoined Boswell, somewhat gleefully, "and all because of golf. We are all quiet along the Styx now. All animosities are buried in the general love of golf, and every one of us, high or low, autocrat and revolutionist, is hobnobbing away in peace and happiness on the links. Why, only six weeks ago, Apollyon was for cooking Bonaparte on a waffle iron, and yesterday the two went out to the Cimmerian links together ...
— The Enchanted Typewriter • John Kendrick Bangs
... This supercilious autocrat, it must be borne in mind, all the time being more than half a negro himself, though, for that matter, his heart was better and his disposition braver than many a white man who would have ...
— The Ghost Ship - A Mystery of the Sea • John C. Hutcheson
... obliged to resign his crown. That part of Poland which is subject to Austria, bears the designation of the kingdom of Galicia and Lodomiria. Its population amounts to 4,370,000 souls. The present kingdom of Poland is hereditary in the person of the Russian autocrat and his successors, and comprises a superfices of 6,340 square leagues, having a population of 3,850,000 souls. It is divided into eight waiwodeships, namely, Warsaw, Landomir, Kalish, Lublin, Plotzk, Mascovia, Podolachia, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 486 - Vol. 17, No. 486., Saturday, April 23, 1831 • Various
... This autocrat, who had never allowed contradiction, and before whom all her dependents bowed either with or against the grain, was now led in her turn; the bronze of her character became like wax in the little pink hands ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet
... the people—serfs of this boy autocrat though they were—began to murmur, and when one Sunday morning three clergymen preached from the text "Woe to thee, O land, when thy king is a child," the young sovereign remembered the counsels of his good mother and recalled the glories of his ancestors, saw ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... Drummond was going "outside the congregation" for anything he required. It would have been on a par with a wandering tendency in his flock, upon which he systematically frowned. He was as great an autocrat in this as the rector of any country parish in England undermined by Dissent; but his sense of obligation ...
— The Imperialist • (a.k.a. Mrs. Everard Cotes) Sara Jeannette Duncan
... three. His boyish awe for the old autocrat of Paradise had mellowed into an affection that was almost filial, and there was plenty to talk about: the final dash in the technical school; the outlook in the broader world; the great strike which was filling all mouths; the ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde
... Inquiry into the State of Polite Learning, Goldsmith had given offense to David Garrick, at that time the autocrat of the Drama, and was doomed to experience its effect. A clamor had been raised against Garrick for exercising a despotism over the stage, and bringing forward nothing but old plays to the exclusion ...
— Oliver Goldsmith • Washington Irving
... to distract the future by their conflicts. He pays impartial homage to ideas which statesmen less imperious or more critical will afterwards regard as irreconcilable. He is at one and the same time an autocrat, the head of a ruling aristocracy, and a popular ruler who solicits the co-operation of primary assemblies. From the highest to the lowest his subjects must acknowledge their unconditional and immediate allegiance to his person; yet he tolerates the existence of tribal ...
— Medieval Europe • H. W. C. Davis
... office, if they have time or capacity to learn anything about the matter, they must submit to the guidance of the governor, who is elected virtually, though not formally, for life; and the members of the Derry corporation believe him to be the autocrat of the society. Mr. James P. Hamilton, now the assistant-barrister for Sligo, at the great meeting of the citizens of Derry already mentioned, pronounced the governors to be 'the most ignorant, the most incompetent, and the most careless governors that ever were inflicted on a people.' ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin
... I was tempted to sever my connection with this journalistic autocrat. My column was widely read and two publishinghouses had approached me with the idea of putting out a book, any editorial revision and emendations to be taken care of by them without disturbing me at all. I could have allied myself with almost any paper in the ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... trampled on the liberty of the rising press, which was the most hopeful educational influence in the country; and he created superfluous ministerial portfolios for his untalented brothers. In fact he reglamented Greece from his palace at Aigina like a divinely appointed autocrat, from his arrival in January 1828 till the summer of 1831, when he provoked the Hydhriots to open rebellion, and commissioned the Russian squadron in attendance to quell them by a naval action, with the result that Poros was sacked by the President's regular army and the national fleet was completely ...
— The Balkans - A History Of Bulgaria—Serbia—Greece—Rumania—Turkey • Nevill Forbes, Arnold J. Toynbee, D. Mitrany, D.G. Hogarth
... aristocratic order, were widely diffused among the numerous feudal landowners. The feeling of loyalty among them was a great advance upon the blind subjection of the slave to his master. But the weight of feudalism was heavy on the lower strata of society. The lord was an autocrat, whose will there was neither the power nor the right to resist, and who could lay hold of as much of the labor and the earnings of the subject as he might choose to exact. The petty suzerain, because ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... Frequent relays of horses carried me rapidly beyond danger of pursuit, and so, in course of time, I passed the boundaries of the empire of Russia, over which for three weeks I had ruled, an absolute autocrat." ...
— The Vizier of the Two-Horned Alexander • Frank R. Stockton
... to Lady MacGregor, and Stephen wondered if she would be afraid of the elderly fairy with the face of a child and the manner of an autocrat. But she was not in the least shy; and indeed Stephen could hardly picture the girl as being self-conscious in any circumstances. Lady MacGregor took her in with one look; white hat, red hair, blue eyes, ...
— The Golden Silence • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... Countess d'Artois, "your majesty does not know who Leonard is—Leonard the queen's hair dresser—Leonard the autocrat of fashion? He it is who imagined our lovely sister's coiffure, and ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... presents; brides were remembered by Sinclair, and babies were not forgotten. He could sit up all night with a railroad man that had been hurt, and he could play poker all night with one that was not afraid of getting hurt. In his way, he was a division autocrat, whose vices were varnished by virtues such as these. His hold on the people was so strong that they could not believe the company would not reinstate him. In spite of the appointment of his successor, ...
— Whispering Smith • Frank H. Spearman
... and material improvements, it is not necessary to confess here that a despotic energy can effect such far more readily than a Government of which the strength is diffused in many conflicting parties. No doubt, if we could create a despotical governing machine, a steam autocrat,—passionless, untiring, and supreme,—we should advance further, and live more at ease than under any other form of government. Ministers might enjoy their pensions and follow their own devices; Lord John might compose histories or tragedies at his leisure, ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... our medical autocrat say?" laughed the Prime Minister. "You are so irreverent, Charles. With a bishop one may feel at one's ease. They are not beyond the reach of argument. But a doctor with his stethoscope and thermometer ...
— Round the Red Lamp - Being Facts and Fancies of Medical Life • Arthur Conan Doyle
... same wooden indifference he always exhibited. But Patsy detected a slight twinkle in the shrewd gray eyes that made her feel they were welcome. Carg, a seaman of vast experience, was wholly devoted to his young master. Indeed, the girls suspected that young Jones was a veritable autocrat in his island, as well as aboard his ship. Everyone of the Sangoans seemed to accept his dictation, however imperative it might be, as a matter of course, and the gray old captain—who had seen much of the world—was not the least subservient to ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in the Red Cross • Edith Van Dyne
... heard the story of this famous piece of road. The engineers of the line, accustomed to map out their routes in other countries with reference to the natural obstacles and the convenience of commerce, waited upon the great autocrat, Nicholas I., a very different man from his descendant, and asked him for instructions as to laying out the first railway ...
— The International Spy - Being the Secret History of the Russo-Japanese War • Allen Upward
... the Indian Medical Service, and Civil Surgeon of Muktiarbad, was an unfriendly being of peculiar personality, whom no one could comprehend. Ordinarily, he was repellent to intimacies; a reserved autocrat, and content to be unpopular. Though elected a member of the Club, he had little use for its privileges. Having fulfilled his duty to his neighbours by calling on them shortly after his arrival in the Station that summer, he had retired into professional ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi
... the other, the only hope of Germany is in union. But this aim of the great Austrian statesman was defeated by the stupidity and greed of the Prussian king, and by his interested friendship with "the autocrat of all the Russias." Alexander got Poland, with an addition of about four ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IX • John Lord
... the quick reply. "Uncle Peter may be an autocrat in his office, but I've noticed that Aunt Hannah is the ruler ...
— Mary Louise • Edith van Dyne (one of L. Frank Baum's pen names)
... the contrary, lay the great imperial city of Kief, the capital of the realm, and the seat of a government as arbitrary as that of Novgorod was free. Here dwelt the grand prince as an irresponsible autocrat, making his will the law, and forcing all the provinces, even haughty Novgorod, to pay a tax which bore the slavish title of tribute. Here none could vote, no assembly of citizens ever met, and the only restraint on the prince was that of his warlike and turbulent nobles, who often forced ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 8 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... direct. We have no fellow-feeling for the suffering and oppressed Spaniards! Yet even them we do not reprobate. Strange! that we should have no objection to any other people or government, civilized or savage, in the whole world! The great autocrat of all the Russias receives the homage of our high consideration. The Dey of Algiers and his divan of pirates are very civil, good sort of people, with whom we find no difficulty in maintaining the relations of peace and amity. "Turks, Jews, and infidels"; Melimelli or the Little Turtle; barbarians ...
— American Eloquence, Volume I. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1896) • Various
... Autocrat? let them scoff, Who fail to comprehend That a ruler incarnate of The people must transcend All common king-born kings; These subterranean springs A sudden outlet winning Have special virtues to spend. ...
— The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume IV • Elizabeth Barrett Browning
... Last Leaf," had been pub. But in that year the Atlantic Monthly was started with Lowell for ed., and H. was engaged as a principal contributor. In it appeared the trilogy by which he is best known, The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table (1857), The Professor, The Poet (1872), all graceful, allusive, and pleasantly egotistical. He also wrote Elsie Venner (1861), which has been called "the snake story of literature," ...
— A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature • John W. Cousin
... physician in regular practice in Boston, and professor of anatomy at Harvard College—this position he held from 1847 to 1882. He was nearly fifty before he became widely known as a writer, when "The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table" was published. He was successful as essayist, novelist, poet, a kindly wit playing through much of his work. His best-known poems are "Old Ironsides," "The Chambered Nautilus," "The One-hoss Shay," "The Last Leaf," and "The ...
— Graded Poetry: Seventh Year - Edited by Katherine D. Blake and Georgia Alexander • Various
... guests," he began, "I suggest a toast to the autocrat of Hope Springs. It is the only blot on the evening, that, owing to the exigencies of the occasion, he can not be with us. Securely fastened in his room, he is now sleeping the sleep that follows a stomach attuned to prunes, a mind ...
— Where There's A Will • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... periled all for it in the wilderness, had not anticipated that they would speedily have an opportunity to extend that toleration to others which in the fatherland they had in vain sought for themselves. The town church was, therefore, in substance, the only church, and the preacher was the autocrat of ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... why the ayah was graciously exempted from financial toll by this autocrat. He knew roughly what proportion of the cook's daily bill represented the actual cost of his daily purchases. He knew what the door-peon got for consenting to take in the card of the Indian aspirant for an interview ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren
... was broken. He was no longer the autocrat of Europe, but a miserable old man, who had lived to see irreparable calamities indicted on his nation, and calamities in consequence of his ambition. His latter years were melancholy. He survived his son and his grandson. He ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... Central Office stepping from the pawnshop and blocking the door with his big figure. There was grim, triumphant purpose on the hard features of Gavegan, conceited by nature and trained to harsh dominance by long rule as a petty autocrat. ...
— Children of the Whirlwind • Leroy Scott
... we have been considering, has had two objects in view: 1. The more thorough centralization of the papacy, with a spiritual autocrat assuming the prerogatives of God at its head; 2. Control over the intellectual development of ...
— History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science • John William Draper
... continued Mr Bellamy, nodding to them very graciously; and they departed. In the course of ten minutes they were recalled by the autocrat himself. The gentlemen resumed their seats, and this time, Mr ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXIX. January, 1844. Vol. LV. • Various
... whom I was personally a stranger, wrote to me just such a letter as one might have dreamed of from the "Autocrat": "One of my elderly friends of long ago called a story of mine you may possibly have heard of—Elsie Venner—'a medicated novel,' and such she said she was not in the habit of reading. I liked her expression; it titillated more than it ...
— A Writer's Recollections (In Two Volumes), Volume II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... splendour meditating upon the short-lived peace of the waters. And I have seen him put the pent-up anger of his heart into the aspect of the inaccessible sun, and cause it to glare fiercely like the eye of an implacable autocrat out of a ...
— The Mirror of the Sea • Joseph Conrad
... again. "Never forget what I have told you, Charlotte!" he said solemnly. "I would not remove my hat, sir," he continuing, turning to Percy, "in the presence of the proudest autocrat that ever sat on a throne. I uncover, in homage to the grand law which asserts the sacredness of human liberty. When Parliament has sanctioned the infamous Bill now before it, English patriots may be imprisoned, ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... for whom I have great respect, for I owe him a charming hour at one of our literary anniversaries, and he has often spoken noble words; but he holds up a remark of my friend the "Autocrat,"—which I grieve to say he twice misquotes, by omitting the very word which gives it its significance,—the word fluid, intended to typify the mobility of the restricted will,—holds it up, ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various
... day, Mr Blackshaw, that fearsome autocrat of the Municipal Electricity Works, was saying to himself all day that at five o'clock he was going to assist at the spectacle of his wonderful son's bath. The prospect inspired him. So much so that every hand on the place was doing its utmost ...
— The Grim Smile of the Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... the most wild and romantic episodes of the world's history—a peasant boy who became a soldier, a general who became a President—a President who became a great autocrat, who raised a country from obscurity to greatness, and was finally driven from power by the very people he had educated, and to whom he had brought ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor
... developed the quality called prejudice to a powerful and even menacing degree. But these prejudices will always be found to fortify the main position of the woman, that she is to remain a general overseer, an autocrat within small compass but on all sides. On the one or two points on which she really misunderstands the man's position, it is almost entirely in order to preserve her own. The two points on which woman, actually and of herself, is most tenacious may be ...
— What's Wrong With The World • G.K. Chesterton
... by names. The power in question is too great for the chief magistrate of a free state. It is in its nature an imperial power; and if he be permitted to exercise it, his authority must become as absolute as that of the autocrat of all the Russias. To give him the power to dismiss at his will and pleasure, without limitation or control, is to give him an absolute and unlimited control over the subsistence of almost all who hold office under government. Let him have the power, and the sixty thousand who now hold employments ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... house, just after the morning meal, a slave delivered to her mistress a message. The Roman autocrat broke the ominous seal, and, turning deathly ...
— Saronia - A Romance of Ancient Ephesus • Richard Short
... other great blank verse monologues; in it we see the form, save for the scarcely appreciable presence of rhyme, already developed. The poem is a subtle study in the jealousy of egoism, not a study so much as a creation; and it places before us, as if bitten in by the etcher's acid, a typical autocrat of the Renaissance, with his serene self-composure of selfishness, quiet uncompromising cruelty, and genuine devotion to art. The scene and the actors in this little Italian drama stand out before us with the most natural clearness; there ...
— An Introduction to the Study of Browning • Arthur Symons
... I reflected, not for the first time, how strangely these natives could mix up the sublime with the ridiculous. Here was a matter that must involve the death of many men, and the token sent to me by the autocrat who stood at the back of it all, to prove the good faith of his messenger, was a box of calomel pills! However, it served the purpose as ...
— Child of Storm • H. Rider Haggard
... impervious to flattery; a hard-headed, silent man, a man without enthusiasm and without weaknesses, who kept a lavish table and ate sparingly himself, who had a wine cellar rivaling that of the Autocrat of All the Russias and yet contented himself with sipping a harmless mineral water; who kept and directed a huge gambling machine—a mighty conglomeration of gorgeously decorated halls, wine parlors and music rooms, crammed day and ...
— Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison - Fifteen Years in Solitude • Austin Biron Bidwell
... stirring the people; they were eagerly reaching after a higher and nobler life. The grand possibilities of improvement and happiness filled them with visions of better things, and they grew desperate in their purpose to obtain freedom. Continued subjection to the heartless autocrat became intolerable. ...
— Sketches of the Covenanters • J. C. McFeeters
... he did not like this—and though afterward, when he had also climbed the gate and taken up his station under a clump of trees at the autocrat's behest, he strove to soothe his ruffled feelings by the argument that it was probably the absolutely correct deportment for a shooting party, his mind remained unconvinced. Moreover, in parting from him, the keeper had dropped a blunt injunction about firing up ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... Sceptre and crown had never been imposing objects in his eyes, unless worn by a worthy man; and consequently he was wont, in the thoughtless levity of youth, to forget the dangers he ran, and to answer the king with a freedom of tone which the autocrat was all unused to hear. In turn he was detested by the monarch. As negotiator for the spendthrift Prince Ludwig, he was already obnoxious enough; and it sometimes happened that, by way of variety to the customary ...
— The Great German Composers • George T. Ferris
... of the council, and equally naturally, each member claimed the right to have his name included in the list. Sachar, the most powerful of the nobles—he who had suggested the election of one of themselves to fill the throne—seized a parchment and, with the air of an autocrat, at once inscribed his own name at the head of the list, without deigning to inquire whether such action was or was not acceptable to his colleagues. Then, still retaining the pen in his hand, he glanced round at the assemblage ...
— In Search of El Dorado • Harry Collingwood
... own tastes and demands. The owner of such an establishment is subject to no extraneous caprices about breadth of margins, size of type, quarto or folio, leaded or unleaded lines; he dictates his own terms; he is master of the situation, as the French say; and is the true autocrat of literature. There have been several renowned private presses: Walpole's, at Strawberry Hill; Mr Johnes's, at Hafod; Allan's, at the Grange; and the Lee Priory Press. None of these, however, went so distinctly into the groove afterwards ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... autocrat like Alexander III, secretive and obstinate, these personal questions became very serious. Ambitious generals might anticipate his wishes, Russian regiments might be on the march before the Ministers ...
— Victorian Worthies - Sixteen Biographies • George Henry Blore
... however was so unprecedented a step, that it brought him into trouble with Tiberius. The Emperor was half afraid that Germanicus had some designs upon the kingdom of Egypt, and as that land happened to be the granary of Rome, the jealous autocrat thought of the possibility of short-commons and a bread-riot in the Forum. But even if the tourist had no ulterior views, the Emperor thought that it did not look like business for a proconsul to be making holiday without leave,—and he accordingly ...
— Old Roads and New Roads • William Bodham Donne
... touch of harshness in his voice as he said the last words, the sound of the autocrat. Somehow Domini liked it. This man had convictions, and strong ones. That was certain. There was something oddly unconventional in him which something in her responded to. He was perfectly polite, and yet, she was quite sure, absolutely careless of opinion. Certainly he ...
— The Garden Of Allah • Robert Hichens
... the English priest was glad to be relieved from payments to the curia. But the clergyman, whose soul grew indignant against the curialists, still believed that the pope was the divinely appointed autocrat of the Church universal. Being a man, a pope might be a bad pope; but the faithful Christian, though he might lament and protest, could not but obey in the last resort. The papacy was so essentially interwoven with the whole Church of the Middle Ages, ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout
... those quiet, pretty little towns which so thickly dot the hills and valleys Of New England. Her father, who died before her marriage, had been a sea-captain, and a man of great wealth, and was looked upon as a kind of autocrat, whose opinion was a law and whose friendship was an honor. When a young lady, Miss Geraldine had chafed at the stupid town and the stupider people, as she designated the citizens of Allington, and had only ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... way to Seaford, which is nearly three miles east, sheltering under its white headland (a preliminary sketch, as one might say, for Beachy Head), we pass the Bishopstone tide mills, once the property of a sturdy and prosperous Sussex autocrat named William Catt, the grower of the best pears in the county, and the first to welcome Louis Philippe (whom he had advised on milling in France) when he landed at Newhaven in exile. A good story told of William ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... villages, captains of little garrisons, soldiers offering service, farmers, women, shepherds, foresters, peasants, who came either on her business or with their own needs—for all of which she was ready with the beneficence and decision of an autocrat. ...
— The Chaplet of Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge
... full of hard work and dangers, but also full of romance. What is the result? Why, a people off there whom you pity, and who don't need pity. Romance? See: you only get square justice out of a wise autocrat, not out of your 'twelve true men'; and duelling is the last decent relic of autocracy. Suppose the wronged man does get killed; that is all right: it wasn't merely blood he was after, but the right to hit ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... an apostolical life. It was the meeting of the eagle and the dove. What followed showed, more clearly perhaps than any other incident in his career, the stuff that Manning was made of. Power had come to him at last; and he seized it with all the avidity of a born autocrat, whose appetite for supreme dominion had been whetted by long years of enforced abstinence and the hated simulations of submission. He was the ruler of Roman Catholic England, and he would rule. The nature of Newman's influence it was impossible for him to understand, ...
— Eminent Victorians • Lytton Strachey
... man, whom they recognize as a sort of chief and whom they follow into raids on the plains or neighboring tribes of Negritos. But when living peaceably scattered through their mountains each head of a family is a small autocrat and rules his family and those of his sons who elect to remain with him. When he dies the oldest son becomes the head of the family. Usually, however, a group of families living in one locality recognizes one man as a capitan. He may ...
— Negritos of Zambales • William Allan Reed
... his bland and diplomatic manner as he spoke, and with his jaw thrust forward showed himself the unyielding autocrat, who, in the rough and tumble of politics, had ruled his party with a rod of iron. This man whose wonderful talents and personality had fitted him for his chosen position of champion of the plain people, and whose great motive power, against all odds, that had forced him into the first ...
— L. P. M. - The End of the Great War • J. Stewart Barney
... pond-lily?—not the miserable draggled green-and-mud-colored buds which enterprising boys bring into the cars for sale; but the white water-lily, floating on the silent brooks, or far out in the safe depths of the mill-ponds. The "Autocrat" knows what pond-lilies are, having visited Prospero's Isle and seen the pink-tinged sisterhood of a certain mere that lies embosomed in its hills. But to know them, you must hunt for them,—tramp off to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 27, January, 1860 • Various
... organized. St. Clair and the judges formed the first legislature; in theory they were only permitted to adopt laws already in existence in the old States, but as a matter of fact they tried any legislative experiments they saw fit. St. Clair was an autocrat both by military training and by political principles. He was a man of rigid honor, and he guarded the interests of the territory with jealous integrity, but he exercised such a rigorous supervision over the acts ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Three - The Founding of the Trans-Alleghany Commonwealths, 1784-1790 • Theodore Roosevelt
... with seeing, as I never fail to do, that each of the banqueters has a generally agreeable and peculiarly congenial companion. As for myself, I maintain that a host has his privileges; and I always place the Reverend Sydney Smith very near my right hand. On my left, I enjoy a variety. The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table is sometimes so kind as to grace that corner of my dinner table. So is a gentleman who was once two years before the mast as an uncommon sailor; and so is Sir Lainful, and a child from a neighboring ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 3, September 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... hearts again, and condoned the fellow's shortcomings. We waved our hands; I think we would have given three rousing cheers as they drove away if the omnipotent eye of Yuba Bill had not been upon us. It was well, for the next moment we were summoned to the presence of that soft-hearted autocrat. ...
— The Idler Magazine, Vol III. May 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... supervise its erection he left his palace and lived at Mingun, where he conceived the idea that he was a Buddha, an idea which had not been entirely absent from the minds of Alompra and Hsin-byu-shin. It is to the credit of the Theras that, despite the danger of opposing an autocrat as cruel as he was crazy, they refused to countenance these pretensions and the king returned to his ...
— Hinduism and Buddhism, An Historical Sketch, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Charles Eliot
... next! The thought I loathe and fear That these four letters timidly express— It beggars millionaires in happiness! If I could be the autocrat of speech But for one hour, that hateful word I'd banish; I'd send it packing out of mortal reach, As B and G from ...
— Love's Comedy • Henrik Ibsen
... sobered by our dangers, and commenced our careers at this ancient institution founded by the first Lieutenant-Governor of Massachusetts. Here reigned supreme a fiery autocrat, a fervent admirer of Greek and Latin, a cordial hater of mathematics—my weakest point—a D.D., LL.D., who was determined to drive everybody into college. He had heard of my escapades, and was fully prepared to ...
— The Gentleman from Everywhere • James Henry Foss
... eyes, he saw, through the long vista of the illuminated apartments, the Throne of the Splendor of the Sun. It stood above the moving sea of dancers; upon it sat the Autocrat of Life and Death; and above him waved the canopy of flags torn from the dying nations. The young man started, for he saw one among them dyed in gore, and tattered into rags, and from its torn streamers, drop by drop, the blood ...
— The Continental Monthly, Volume V. Issue I • Various
... first to one of his visitors, and then to the other; then whisking round on one foot, and treading without ceremony on the shoeless foot of his perspiring partner, then marching slow, with solemn gait, like the autocrat of all the Russias in a polonnaise, then, not exactly leading gracefully down the middle, but twining the hands of his visitors in his, which had very much the appearance of a piebald affair, showing at the same time an extraordinary inflation of pride, that a white man ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... Browning himself conveniently referred all persons who questioned him as to the meaning of certain passages. One Boston woman, not unknown to fame, recalls even now that she walked the Common, revolving these cryptic lines in her mind, and meeting Dr. Holmes, asked if he understood them, to which the Autocrat ...
— The Brownings - Their Life and Art • Lilian Whiting
... conferred on its employees, and they act in military fashion. How can anyone, moreover, help obeying, unhesitatingly, orders which emanate from a monarch who has the right to employ this formula at the head of his ukase: "We, by the grace of God, Emperor and Autocrat of all the Russias of Moscow, Kiev, Wladimir, and Novgorod, Czar of Kasan and Astrakhan, Czar of Poland, Czar of Siberia, Czar of the Tauric Chersonese, Seignior of Pskov, Prince of Smolensk, Lithuania, ...
— Michael Strogoff - or, The Courier of the Czar • Jules Verne
... of dishes is enumerated, which are necessarily passed over in the translation, simply, because we have no corresponding terms to express them in any Christian tongue. They would puzzle the immortal Ude himself, or the no less celebrated Soyer, the present autocrat of the culinary kingdom. But my chief reason for passing them over so lightly is the following, viz.: I have fully ascertained from officers home on furlough, that these passages are never read in India, nor is the student ever examined in ...
— Bagh O Bahar, Or Tales of the Four Darweshes • Mir Amman of Dihli
... in a niche at one end of the great pump-room, in wig, square-skirted coat, flapped waistcoat, and all the queer costume of the period, still looking ghost-like upon the scene where he used to be an autocrat. Marble is not a good material for Beau Nash, however; or, if so, it requires color to set him off adequately. . ...
— Passages From the French and Italian Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... the accused has no appeal from your decision if you decide unfairly—no redress from injustice should you be unjust. Knowing all this—knowing that, save in the magnitude of his power to do wrong, the autocrat of all the Russias possesses no authority more absolute than the citizens of New York have given to you, a single man, and a citizen like themselves—I say, knowing all this, and feeling in my own person all the injustice and all the peril ...
— The Old Homestead • Ann S. Stephens
... officials. Both aspire to a distinct jurisdiction in civil and criminal cases. Prisoners seem mere shuttlecocks between the sheriffs, with a decided advantage in favor of the county sheriff, who is autocrat in rei over the jail; and any criminal who has the good fortune to get a hearing before the city judge, may consider himself under special obligation to the county sheriff ...
— Manuel Pereira • F. C. Adams
... office boy ushered Mr. Peck into Cappy's presence. The moment he was fairly inside the door the visitor halted, came easily and naturally to "attention" and bowed respectfully, while the cool glance of his keen blue eyes held steadily the autocrat of the ...
— The Go-Getter • Peter B. Kyne
... the midst of the very earnest plea for better training, for he espied a new boat approaching camp. As it came closer, he found that among the other freight it carried was the autocrat of ...
— That Girl Montana • Marah Ellis Ryan
... had risen from the situation of a confidential scribe to the Duke of Lerma to the nominal rank of secretary to the King—to the real station of autocrat of Spain. The birth of the favourite of fortune was exceedingly obscure. He had long affected to conceal it; but when he found curiosity had proceeded into serious investigation of his origin, he had suddenly appeared to make a virtue of necessity; proclaimed of his own accord that ...
— Calderon The Courtier - A Tale • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... officer. He was such a superior personage that ordinary mortals felt a chill radiating from his person on their slightest approach. His credentials were from the War Department and were such as to leave no doubt but that he was the autocrat of the situation, before whom all should render homage. A rigid military air prevailed about the post and grounds, quite out of the ordinary, while the officers' bar was ...
— The Outlet • Andy Adams
... facts of the case show that its failure was not altogether due to the hostility of the Chinese emperor. No practical results, in all probability, would have followed; but if Lord Amherst had gone somewhat out of his way to humor the Chinese autocrat, there is no doubt that he would have been received in audience ...
— China • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... tyrannical caprices. Sometimes he broke loose from all civilized restraint, and acted like a mad savage. Governor McTavish, who was reaching the last stages of consumption, for some reason incurred the ill-will of the autocrat. One might have supposed that a man tottering on the grave's brink would have been secure from violence and insult; but the heartless Rebel ruffian was insensible to every human impulse. Bursting into the chamber of the sick man, he raged like a wild bull, stamped upon the floor, ...
— The Story of Louis Riel: The Rebel Chief • Joseph Edmund Collins
... for, you must give yourself wholly into my care." He was speaking now in a low and throbbing voice, oblivious of time and space. "I must be something more than physician or friend. I have been saying 'must' to you, but I am, after all, a very strange autocrat. My power is dependent on you." Then, in answer to her questioning eyes, he hurried on: "I love you, dear girl, and if you find you can trust yourself to me, fully, in this way, then I am sure of victory. Can you say this? I hope you can, for then I will have the most powerful magician ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland
... another great man who rejoiced in the appearance of Luther's theses; and this was Erasmus, the greatest scholar of his age, the autocrat of letters, and, at that time, living in Basle. He was born in Rotterdam, in 1467, of poor parents, but early attracted notice for his attainments, and early emancipated himself from the trammels of scholasticism, which he hated and despised as cordially as Luther himself. He also attacked, ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... custom has already disappeared from the law of the Code. It is state-law; alike self-help, blood-feud, marriage by capture, are absent; though family solidarity, district responsibility, ordeal, the lex talionis, are primitive features that remain. The king is a benevolent autocrat, easily accessible to all his subjects, both able and willing to protect the weak against the highest-placed oppressor. The royal power, however, can only pardon when private resentment is appeased. The judges are strictly ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 1 - "Austria, Lower" to "Bacon" • Various
... she is, as you say, first among nations. Her people are a great people—but it is not them you represent. You represent an hereditary monarch, the only one in western Europe who still speaks of the divine right of Kings—a man who would be an absolute autocrat, if he dared. Supporting him is a powerful circle of hereditary nobles, whose interest it is to increase in every possible way the prestige and power of the throne. At their command, ready to do ...
— The Destroyer - A Tale of International Intrigue • Burton Egbert Stevenson |
