"Despondency" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... failure—a sense of mistakes made with some difficult nature to which her own gives her but little clue; a sense of difficulties in vain grappled with, of shortcomings in vain striven against. Which of us have not had such moments of despondency in the face of a great task? In such moments I have often called to mind one of those parables of Nature which are everywhere around us, unseen and unheeded, like those exquisite fresco angels of the old masters, in dim corners of ancient churches, ...
— The Power of Womanhood, or Mothers and Sons - A Book For Parents, And Those In Loco Parentis • Ellice Hopkins
... right," said Jack, complacently. "I suppose I ought to feel in mortal terror and nervousness and despondency. I believe that's what's expected of a fellow before an exam. If so, I'm unorthodox. Perhaps it's a sign I shall ...
— My Friend Smith - A Story of School and City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... the cheerless voice of boding Fear or dull Despondency can find no answering tone, whether the storm, round the snow-rampart[15] howling, interweaves his solemn moans with the rejoicing shouts of the glad theatre,[16] or simple strains of homely music leave ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... that his long reverie was leading to despondency and weakness; he rose, shook himself half angrily, and strode toward the house. "I'm here, and here I'm going to stay," he growled. "As long as I'm on my own land, it's nobody's business what I am or how I feel. If I can't get decent, sensible women help, I'll ...
— He Fell in Love with His Wife • Edward P. Roe
... The despondency, with which he spoke this, affected her almost to tears, but she persisted in refusing to hear him, till he had conversed with Madame Montoni. 'Where is her husband, where, then, is Montoni?' said Valancourt, in an altered tone: 'it is he, to whom I ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... in the heat Shelton had got rid of his despondency. He felt like one who is to see his mistress after long estrangement. He, bathed, and, straightening his tie-ends, stood smiling at the glass. His fear, unhappiness, and doubts seemed like an evil dream; how much worse off would he not have been, ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... immediately the effect which had been made upon the minds of all, by what had passed. He perceived the absolute necessity of following that impulse up to action, before, by a revulsion no less sudden than the late change from despondency to fierceness, their minds should again subside into the lethargy of doubt ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 1 of 2) • Henry William Herbert
... older brother, two years older only, in fact, but ten years older, at least, in feeling, did notice a great change in Albert, mental as well as physical. The younger boy ceased to have periods of despondency. While he could not do the things that Dick did, he was improving, and he never lamented his lack of strength. It seemed to him a matter of course, so far as Dick could judge, that in due time he should be the equal of the ...
— The Last of the Chiefs - A Story of the Great Sioux War • Joseph Altsheler
... one, so insulted nature dealt with Josephine. Not only did her body pine, but her nerves were exasperated. Sudden twitches came over her, that almost made her scream. Her permanent state was utter despondency, but across it came fitful flashes of irritation; and then she was ...
— White Lies • Charles Reade
... anxiously watching the ship; but all differences of opinion were soon settled when she appeared abeam, fully as far off as the former one. As our hopes had risen to a high pitch, so they now fell proportionately low. I began to fear that despondency would seize on all hands. The ship came up on our quarter; then she got abeam of us. We could see her as clearly as we had seen the former one. Some of our people shouted and waved their hats and caps. ...
— Will Weatherhelm - The Yarn of an Old Sailor • W.H.G. Kingston
... sources of pleasurable activity open to him can realize the gloom and despondency I felt at times when cut off from the healthful energies of other men. I was no longer morbid; I would not allow myself to feel that my infirmity was a bar to the enjoyment of life; yet, all the same, I dreaded society and shrank from the fresh ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various
... painful emotions. I knew, however, that for the present he was safe; the future I confided to Him whose loving care would protect and aid us in our trials. During this time my mind was in a state of complete despondency; no bright visions of future liberty and happiness came to relieve the dreary forebodings that oppressed me. In my wildest imaginings of the suffering that might be my portion, I did not approach the realities of my future existence. Those dark days of toil and degradation ...
— Seven and Nine years Among the Camanches and Apaches - An Autobiography • Edwin Eastman
... in Mahratti, for none of the general's staff understood the Jat language. Harry saw, at once, that the terms were far less onerous than the rajah had expected; for his face brightened, and the air of despondency that it had for some ...
— At the Point of the Bayonet - A Tale of the Mahratta War • G. A. Henty
... Why this despondency? Have those two demons seized him again? It would seem so and with new and overmastering fury. After the hour of triumph comes the hour of reckoning. Orlando Brotherson in his hour of proud attainment stands naked before his own soul's tribunal and the pleader is dumb and the judge inexorable. ...
— Initials Only • Anna Katharine Green
... inheriting a not very strong mind from her father, Ophelia was a lady who needed cheering up, if ever poor lady did. He, Hamlet, was the last man on the globe with whom she should have had any tender affiliation. If they had wed, they would have caught each other's despondency, and died, like a pair of sick ravens, within a fortnight. What had become of her? Had she gone into a nunnery? He would make her abbess, if he ...
— A Midnight Fantasy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... Christians are taught to seek their election in Christ. We read: "Moreover, this doctrine gives no one a cause either for despondency or for a shameless, dissolute life, namely, when men are taught that they must seek eternal election in Christ and His holy Gospel, as in the Book of Life, which excludes no penitent sinner, but beckons and calls all the poor, heavy-laden, and troubled sinners who are disturbed ...
— Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church • Friedrich Bente
... mail from the East conveyed intelligence to our shores which struck the nation to the very heart, and spread one universal feeling of grief and dismay, approaching for a time as near to a feeling of despondency as English breasts can be taught to know. Let us describe the effect in the words of an impartial observer writing ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various
... All day long he had eaten nothing but the crust of bread found in the kitchen by the Warden's wife. The rest he had left for her and her daughter. A distress as harrowing to him as his hunger was the sight of poor Georgette's shocked despondency. She was always trying to escape from his presence in an agony ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... so confident that I would not endeavour any act without his consent; but I shared his certainty that Fanny would not. And so, in despondency, I ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens
... a sufficiently enlivening character to banish the little maidens' despondency, the fire in the drawing-room grate having died out long since from inattention, making them feel cold and comfortless, and it had got so dark within that they could not distinguish the various articles of furniture, even papa's armchair in the chimney-corner; ...
— Teddy - The Story of a Little Pickle • J. C. Hutcheson
... thraldom, a foreigner cannot understand. Were I to say that it was intended to be typical of the condition of the government, I might be considered cynical; but undoubtedly the sloughs of despond which were deepest in their despondency were to be found in localities which gave an appearance of truth to such a surmise. The Secretary of State's office, in which Mr. Seward was still reigning, though with diminished glory, was divided from the headquarters of the commander-in-chief, which are immediately opposite to it, by an opaque ...
— Volume 2 • Anthony Trollope
... at court formed new hopes from this, and dreamed of the queen's conversion and return to the true, pure faith; while the Protestant, "the heretical" party, looked to the future with gloomy despondency, and were afraid of being robbed of their most powerful support and their most ...
— Henry VIII And His Court • Louise Muhlbach
... the province. The clangor of arms ceased and no enemy to British authority appeared. The people of the lower parts of South Carolina were generally attached to the revolution, but many of their most active leaders were prisoners. The fall of Charleston and the subsequent events had sunk many into despondency, and all were overawed. This gloomy stillness continued about six weeks when the symptoms of a gathering storm began to show themselves. The oppression and insults to which the people were exposed highly exasperated them; they repented the apathy ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... able to touch on only a few of the topics that crowd Sir Erskine May's volumes. Although he has perceived more clearly than Tocqueville the contact of democracy with socialism, his judgment is untinged with Tocqueville's despondency, and he contemplates the direction of progress with a confidence that approaches optimism. The notion of an inflexible logic in history does not depress him, for he concerns himself with facts and with men more than with doctrines, and his book is a history of several democracies, ...
— The History of Freedom • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... this young lady at least as outspoken as most of her unexpatriated sisters; there was something almost comical in her despondency. But she had by no means caught, as it seemed to me, the American tone. Whatever her tone was, however, it had a fascination; there was something dainty about it, and ...
— The Pension Beaurepas • Henry James
... effort, towards the light, and are, as Mr Francis Thompson puts it, 'heartless and happy, lackeying their god.' The strains of his heredity were very curiously, but very clearly, mingled. It may surprise some readers to find him speaking of 'the family evil, despondency,' but he spoke with knowledge. He inherited from his father not only a stern Scottish intentness on the moral aspect of life ('I would rise from the dead to preach'), but a marked disposition to melancholy and hypochondria. From his mother, on the other hand, he derived, along with his ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson - a Record, an Estimate, and a Memorial • Alexander H. Japp
... Sisyphus some ever roll The same old round of things Which dwarf the mind and starve the soul, Until they long for wings To fly from dull monotony, Which carries in its train That wreck of thought—Despondency— Which ...
— Our Profession and Other Poems • Jared Barhite
... would have become a positive conviction could you have seen and heard all that was done and said upon the occasion. Every heart was evidently full of joy; every eye beamed with patriotic animation; despondency gave place to the assurance that, our late dreadful civil strife ended, the blissful reign of peace, under the protection, not of arms, but of the Constitution and laws, would have sway, and be in every part of our land cheerfully acknowledged and in perfect good faith obeyed. You would not ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Volume 6: Andrew Johnson • James D. Richardson
... for pelf, Melancholic and thoughtful, his mind Look'd inward and dwelt on itself, Still pensive, pathetic, and kind; Yet oft in despondency drown'd, He from friends, and from converse would fly. In weeping a luxury found, And reliev'd ...
— An Essay on War, in Blank Verse; Honington Green, a Ballad; The - Culprit, an Elegy; and Other Poems, on Various Subjects • Nathaniel Bloomfield
... put me into a frame of mind in which successful comedies are not written." He scribbled away; but his wife's despondency told upon the man of disappointments. Then he stuck fast; then he ...
— Peg Woffington • Charles Reade
... Piso, she has shared my tent and my fortunes, and has proved herself worthy of every confidence that has been reposed in her. She is my inseparable companion in the tent, in the field, and on the road, by night and by day. Give not way to despondency, dear Julia. Fortune, which has so long smiled upon me, is not now about to forsake me. There is no day so long and bright that clouds do not sail by and cast their little shadows. But the sun is behind them. Our army is still great and in good heart. The soldiers ...
— Zenobia - or, The Fall of Palmyra • William Ware
... much embarrassed by the hostilities of the Indians; the time appointed by Raleigh and Greenville for sending them supplies had passed; a heavy despondency fell upon their minds, and they began earnestly to wish for a means of returning home. But, suddenly, notice was given that a fleet of twenty-three sail was at hand, whether friendly or hostile no one could tell: to their great joy, it proved to be the armament of Sir ...
— The Conquest of Canada (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Warburton
... there are many who would resist effectually, if they were aware of any natural change going on silently in favor of their own efforts, such as would finally ratify the success. Towards such a result they would gladly contribute by waiting and forbearing; whilst, under despondency as to this result, they might more easily yield to some ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... not understand what it was that made it so unpleasant for the inspector, but to-day he noticed on the inspector's face an expression of despondency and hopelessness which was pitiful ...
— The Awakening - The Resurrection • Leo Nikoleyevich Tolstoy
... quickened to a deeper consciousness of itself. The witchery of space was there always, and seemed to draw from the soul the clinging mists of her indifference. It was there that I saw nature in all her moods, and felt that to each my own moods responded; there that despondency, imagining her monotony of woe, was confuted by the saving changefulness of created things. I remember one day, when a summer storm was spending its fury, I stood upon this ridge and looked across the low lands that stretched away beneath me. They lay with all their boundaries confused by a pall ...
— Apologia Diffidentis • W. Compton Leith
... slave of pleasures which she did not share; to-day the satisfaction of knowing that she purchased his contentment with her tears was hers no longer. She was alone in the world, nothing was left to her now but a choice of evils. In the calm stillness of the night her despondency drained her of all her strength. She rose from her sofa beside the dying fire, and stood in the lamplight gazing, dry-eyed, at her child, when M. d'Aiglemont came in. He was in high spirits. Julie called to him to admire Helene as she lay asleep, but ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Honore de Balzac
... other opposite qualities of the mind, which may become dangerous, though in different degrees, I have often had occasion to consider the contrary effects of presumption and despondency; of steady confidence, which promises a victory without contest, and heartless pusilanimity, which shrinks back from the thought of great undertakings, confounds difficulty with impossibility, and considers all advancement towards any ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... I echoed, in some despondency. For I began to feel it was impossible to carry on the conversation. But at this point, to my great relief, Bartlett came to the rescue, not indeed with a solution of the difficulty in which we were involved, but with a diversion of which ...
— The Meaning of Good—A Dialogue • G. Lowes Dickinson
... few pictures, and these met with small success. He looked thin and haggard, talked incoherently, gave way to bitter repinings and despondency. He resented and misinterpreted, as has been shown, Lawrence's inquiries as to his health. Certainly there is every appearance of feeling in Lawrence's letter, where he writes to a friend, 'You will be sorry to hear it. My most powerful competitor, ...
— Art in England - Notes and Studies • Dutton Cook
... so as to leave the girls at liberty, but when afternoon came he drove them out willy-nilly, and organised one excursion after another with the double intention of amusing his visitors and preventing melancholy regrets. Norah was in the depths of despondency; but her repinings were all for her beloved companion, and not for any disappointment of her own. Now that she had the interest of her music lessons, and the friendship of Rex and Edna, she was unwilling to leave home even for the delights of London and the College of Music. Poor Hilary, however, ...
— Sisters Three • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... Napoleon on the pavement, with the inscription: 'I am starving.' Very fairly are the portraits executed; very decent artists they are, and they grovel by the side of their handiwork in an attitude of broken-hearted despondency, and pocket the pennies of the charitable. Objects the most decrepit in nature, hideous, half-nude wretches, male and female, creep along the streets, shivering, too evidently starving, till your heart aches at the spectacle, and you deprive yourself of your last cent to administer relief. These ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... Maskell was in a strangely agitated condition for some time after the occurrence of these events, being alternately in a state of the greatest hilarity at Bob's return home, and despondency at the reflection that henceforth the remainder of their lives must be spent apart. Sir Richard has, however, done what he could to console the poor old man by purchasing for him a pretty little cottage and garden in the most pleasant ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood
... yard, to see a young horse of blood which had just arrived from the stud. We suddenly heard a noise of distress; I hastened down-stairs, and found the horse so unruly, that nobody durst approach or mount him. The most resolute horsemen stood dismayed and aghast; despondency was expressed in every countenance, when, in one leap, I was on his back, took him by surprise, and worked him quite into gentleness and obedience with the best display of horsemanship I was master of. Fully to show this to the ladies, ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen • Rudolph Erich Raspe
... influences of a classical education and academic pursuits, scarcely had a year elapsed from the commencement of my literary and political adventures before my mind sank into a state of thorough disgust and despondency, both with regard to the disputes and the parties disputant. With more than poetic ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... girls were leaving the primaries in twos and threes, tired but excitedly discussing the situation. Between hope and despondency the comment varied on the streets, at the supper-tables, and in the eager, waiting groups of girls on tenement steps ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... advice, his mere neighborhood. And her pale, changed face had never seemed to him so beautiful—never, in fact, truly beautiful till now. The dying down of the brilliance and energy of the strongly marked character, which had made her the life of the Bruton Street salon, into this mildness, this despondency, this hidden weariness, had left her infinitely more lovely in his eyes. But how to restrain himself much longer from taking the sad, gracious woman in his arms and coercing her into ...
— Lady Rose's Daughter • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... a time of sore trial, but it brought out in strong relief the beauty and nobility of character in both Violet and her mother. They proved themselves the most devoted of nurses, patient, cheerful, hopeful, never giving way to despondency, or wearying in efforts to relieve the little sufferers or wile them ...
— The Two Elsies - A Sequel to Elsie at Nantucket, Book 10 • Martha Finley
... bewildered; one in particular, the mildest and most undaunted of antient Worthies, who had a sufficient portion of heroic philanthropy to prefer the benefit of mankind to every selfish consideration, had yet his hours of diffidence and despondency. On a final review of his own generous labours, he is supposed to have questioned the very existence of Virtue, though he had made it the idol of his life; a striking proof, that the temperate and invariable energy ...
— The Eulogies of Howard • William Hayley
... whole work is confused, as appears in idiots and mad men; though, in some of them, the soul, by a vigorous exertion of its power, recovers its innate strength and they become right after a long despondency in mind, but in others it is not recovered again in this life. For, as fire under ashes, or the sun obscured from our sight by thick clouds, afford not their native lustre, so the soul, overwhelmed in moist or morbid matter, is darkened and reason thereby overclouded; ...
— The Works of Aristotle the Famous Philosopher • Anonymous
... the cause of liberty led him while a youth to be present in Edinburgh at the trial of Gerard and others, for maintaining liberal opinions, and to support in his maturer years the cause of the Polish refugees. Naturally cheerful, he was subject to moods of despondency, and his temper was ardent in circumstances of provocation. In personal appearance he was rather under the middle height, and he dressed with precision and neatness. His countenance was pleasing, but was ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume II. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... from the pilot's boat, which he had kindly sent to take her ashore, alone, a stranger in a foreign land, uncertain of the character of the place in which she was obliged to seek shelter, and not knowing what might occur to prevent her husband rejoining her. Instead of weakly yielding to despondency, she promptly engaged a boat to go out after the vessel, to bring their effects ashore. Then, though impenetrable darkness so shrouded their future that she could not see how the next step was to be taken, she looked for light upon their pathway, and ...
— Woman: Man's Equal • Thomas Webster
... a necessary affection, attendant upon the acclimation at this incipient stage: a feeling of regret that you left your native country for a strange one; an almost frantic desire to see friends and nativity; a despondency and loss of the hope of ever seeing those you ...
— Official Report of the Niger Valley Exploring Party • Martin Robinson Delany
... wait in the kitchen," the parson impatiently repeated. "There is no time now for these worldly arrangements. No, no!" said he. "There is no time. The woman must be convicted!" He was changed: despondency had vanished—humility gone with it. In the eye of the man—the gesture—the risen voice—appeared some high authority to overawe us. He had the habit of authority, as have all parsons; but there was now some compelling, ...
— The Cruise of the Shining Light • Norman Duncan
... wakefulness, restless nights, headache, indolence, melancholy, indisposition to study, forgetfulness, despondency, weakness in the back and private organs, no confidence in one's own abilities, a desire for seclusion from society; whites, hysterics, and inability to look any one in the face. Sometimes the muscles are relaxed, limbs ...
— Treatise on the Diseases of Women • Lydia E. Pinkham
... but business of importance, and some embarrassments too serious to be laughed out of the way, will, I fear, detain me this month. But the month is already gone before you can receive this. I hope your philosophy will not have forsaken you. Far from you be gloom and despondency. Attune your organs to the genuine ha! ha! 'Tis to me the music of the spheres; the sovereign specific that shall disgrace the physician's art, and baffle the virulence of malady. Hold yourself aloof from all engagements, even of the heart. We will deliberate unbiased, that we may decide ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis
... the impossibility, circumstances being as they were, of urging a direct suit, of making himself known to Irene. His birth, his position, the accidents of his career—all forbade it. This had been forced upon his consciousness from the very first, in hours of despondency or of torment; but he was too young and too ardent for the fact to have its full weight with him. Hope resisted; passion refused acquiescence. Nothing short of what had happened could reveal to him the vanity of his imaginings. He looked back on the years ...
— The Crown of Life • George Gissing
... however different in its degrees, is never completely wanting. Instead of every one hastening with a spirit of determination to aid in repairing the disaster, every one fears that his efforts will only be in vain, and stops, hesitating with himself, when he should rush forward; or in despondency he lets his arm drop, ...
— On War • Carl von Clausewitz
... no time for repining; still less for any yielding on my part to a feeling of despondency. I therefore called the hands under the lee of the long-boat, and in a few brief words stated to them our position, exhorted them with all the earnestness of which I was master to be cool and self-possessed at the critical moment, and to put their trust in the mercy of God; impressing ...
— The Cruise of the "Esmeralda" • Harry Collingwood
... on in good spirits for a while, though our way was slow and difficult, by reason of the steep and rocky nature of the ground and the thickness of the forest; but at last a dull despondency crept into the men's faces and it was apparent that not only they, but even the guides, were now convinced that we were lost. The fact that we still met no tourists was a circumstance that was but too significant. ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... to nothing. The strain on her nerves was at height during the first half of the walk, for during that time she knew that Mr. Lennox was expecting her; afterwards, while bargaining with the fruiterer in St. John's Road, she fell into despondency. Nothing seemed to matter now; she did not care what might befall her, and in silence she accompanied her ...
— A Mummer's Wife • George Moore
... sorrowfully to the village. Damie had been seized with a fit of his old despondency, because a thing had now to be carried out which he himself had wished. And Barefoot herself felt deeply grieved at the thought that her brother was, in a way, to be expelled from his native land. At the boundary-line Damie said aloud to the sign-post, on which the name of the village ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various
... about, after a dreadful manner).' Nothing could be done to stay its progress, and the citizens were awe-stricken and paralyzed by fear. 'The conflagration was so universal, and the people so astonish'd, that from the beginning, I know not by what despondency or fate, they hardly stirr'd to quench it, so that there was nothing heard or seene but crying out and lamentation, running about like distracted creatures without at all attempting to save even their goods; such ...
— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn
... all too dreary for me," said the young girl, in a low tone. "It reminded me of the time when my old life ceased, and this new life had not begun. There were weeks wherein my heart was oppressed with a cold, heavy despondency, when I just wished to be quiet, and try not to think at all, and it seemed to me that nature ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... irrevocable. He wondered what Monday held for him. The quiescent melancholy of the town invaded his spirit, and mingled with his own remorseful sorrow for the unstrenuous past, and his apprehensive solicitude about the future. It was not unpleasant, this brooding sadness, half-despondency and half-hope. A man and a woman, arm-in-arm, went by him as he stood unconscious of his conspicuousness under the gas-lamp that lit the post-office. They laughed the smothered laugh of intimacy to see a tall boy standing alone there, with no overcoat, gazing at naught. Edwin turned ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... growing and the iron unmined with which a navy was to be built and armored; officers without discipline were to make a mob into an army; and, above all, the public opinion of Europe, echoed and reinforced with every vague hint and every specious argument of despondency by a powerful faction at home, was either contemptuously sceptical or actively hostile. It would be hard to over-estimate the force of this latter element of disintegration and discouragement among a people where every citizen at home, ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various
... it," said I, as I struck my hand against the table; "I will do it." Suddenly a heavy cloud of despondency came over me. Could I do it? Had I the imagination requisite to write a tale or a novel? "Yes, yes," said I, as I struck my hand again against the table, "I can manage it; give me fair play, ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... temperament, divided the property into building lots, staked off the hillside, and projected the map of a new metropolis. Failing, however, to convince the citizens of San Francisco that they had mistaken the site of their city, he presently fell into dissipation and despondency. He was frequently observed haunting the narrow strip of beach at low tide or perched upon the cliff at high water. In the latter position a sheep-tender one day found him, cold and pulseless, with a map ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... do, in her room, and she knew that she could really be of use downstairs, among the intimate old friends who were protecting Annie and Leslie from annoyance, but she felt in no mood for that. She hated herself and everybody; she was half-mad with fatigue and despondency. ...
— The Beloved Woman • Kathleen Norris
... loverlike despondency, however, the time of waiting came to an end, and Frey joyfully hastened to the green grove, where, true to her appointment, he found Gerda, and she became his happy wife, and proudly sat upon ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber
... Rudolf roused himself from his despondency, drank off a glass of water, and, turning towards Francis, said in ...
— Major Frank • A. L. G. Bosboom-Toussaint
... Gay followed not long after that of Defoe. The versatile author of "The Beggars' Opera" had been sinking for some years into a condition of almost unrelieved despondency. He had had some disappointments, and he was sensitive, and took them too much to heart. He had had brilliant successes, and he had devoted friends, but a slight failure was more to him than a great success, and what he regarded as the falling-off of one friend was for the time of more ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume II (of 4) • Justin McCarthy
... any severity. The clothing and munitions of all kinds, either for maintenance or defence, were rapidly wasting away, and the want of all supplies or tidings from Spain was sinking the spirits of the well-affected into despondency. The Adelantado was shut up in Fort Conception, in daily expectation of being openly besieged by Roldan, and was secretly informed that means were taken to destroy him, should he issue from the walls of ...
— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving
... Gualtieri, Bishop of Viterbo. Gualtieri, an experienced diplomatist, learned, eloquent—and not wanting in cunning,[1186] if we may believe his successor in office—had proved himself unequal to the duties of his present position, by giving way to extreme despondency. In the gay capital of France he led a wretched life, in constant dread of future disaster, and ceaselessly uttering lugubrious prognostications. To the Pope he announced that religious matters in France were desperate; everything was rushing to ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird
... conduct himself in such a way that his merit may not be destroyed. He should also act in such a way that he may not have to succumb to his enemies.[393] Even these have been declared to be his duties. He should not sink in despondency. He should not (in times of distress) seek to rescue (from the peril of destruction) the merit of others or of himself. On the other hand, he should rescue his own self. This is the settled conclusion.[394] There is this Sruti, viz., that it is settled that ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... sins, and God's punishment for their evil deeds. Instead of comforting the terrified souls, or encouraging their faith and bidding them hope for better times, he set before them in burning words the punishment that awaited their wicked despondency. ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... the last heaviness of despondency left her face for that day. And we plunged into the delicious adventure of exploring a new city, staring into windows as only strangers can, revelling in print-shops as only they do, really seeing the ...
— If, Yes and Perhaps - Four Possibilities and Six Exaggerations with Some Bits of Fact • Edward Everett Hale
... seat, which was somewhat in the shadow, she gave a little startled exclamation. A girl was crouching at the darkest end of the seat, her face hidden in her hands. Turning away, Miriam was about to recross the campus when the utter despondency of the girl's attitude caused her to go back. Stopping directly in front of the bowed figure, she said ...
— Grace Harlowe's Second Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower
... triumphant and invincible despondency that population has decreased alarmingly. The movements of population since the time of the Union have been, it may be admitted, very remarkable, but the figures are double-edged and require a more careful handling than they generally ...
— Against Home Rule (1912) - The Case for the Union • Various
... well, that Pope warmly commended it when he saw it printed in a miscellany of poems. About this time, the hypochondriac affection, which rendered Johnson's long life a long disease, began to manifest itself. In the vacation of 1729, he was seized with the darkest despondency, which he tried to alleviate by violent exercise and other means, but in vain. It seems to have left him during a fit of indignation at Dr Swinfen (a physician at Lichfield, who, struck by the elegant Latinity of an account ...
— Poetical Works of Johnson, Parnell, Gray, and Smollett - With Memoirs, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Samuel Johnson, Thomas Parnell, Thomas Gray, and Tobias Smollett
... act with more vigor in consequence of their misfortunes. I have received letters from America, dated in the end of April, and the 1st of May, which speak of the loss of Charleston as certain, and which predict other successes of the enemy in the Northern States, but which show no despondency. ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. IX • Various
... infectious. Iris smiled again. Her sensitive highly strung nerves permitted these sharp alternations between despondency and hope. ...
— The Wings of the Morning • Louis Tracy
... heard more than one hundred miles. In that distance, there were but few families, who had not a husband, father, brother or son in the garrison; and these listened to the sound, with the deepest anxiety, and, as was natural, with no little despondency. ...
— A Sketch of the Life of Brig. Gen. Francis Marion • William Dobein James
... will he do to merit such a doom? Perhaps he'll love,—and is not Love in vain Torture enough without a living tomb? Yet it will be so—he and his compeer, The Bard of Chivalry, will both consume[311] 150 In penury and pain too many a year, And, dying in despondency, bequeath To the kind World, which scarce will yield a tear, A heritage enriching all who breathe With the wealth of a genuine Poet's soul, And to their country a redoubled wreath, Unmatched by time; not Hellas can unroll Through her Olympiads two such names, though one[312] Of hers be ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron
... letters were perfectly familiar and unsophisticated. As Mr. Sidney Colvin has written, in an excellent preface to an edition of 1891, 'he poured out to those he loved his whole self indiscriminately, generosity and fretfulness, ardour and despondency, boyish petulance side by side with manful good sense, the tattle of suburban parlours with the speculations of a spirit unsurpassed for native gift and insight.' Every now and then the level of his easygoing discourse is lit up by a flash of wit, and occasionally ...
— Studies in Literature and History • Sir Alfred Comyn Lyall
... Despondency cannot endure forever. Kind Nature has not ordained that it should be so. It may have its periods, longer or shorter as the case may be; but always to be succeeded by intervals, if not of absolute cheerfulness, at least of emotions less ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... clearly enough that the thoughts we think do actually become realities in the Unconscious. But is this a universal law, operating in every life, or merely something contingent and occasional? Sometimes irrelevant cheerfulness seems only to make despondency more deep. Certain types of individual are only irritated by the performance of a stage comedy. Physicians listen to the circumstantial accounts of their patients' ailments without being in the least upset. These facts seem at first sight at variance with the rule. But they are only apparent exceptions ...
— The Practice of Autosuggestion • C. Harry Brooks
... that is lived on swampy banks of dingy rivers, and in our smaller and more God-forgotten towns. For it would seem that in such places men have nothing to look for, nor any knowledge of how to look for anything; wherefore, they brawl and shout in vain attempts to dissipate despondency.... ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky
... before he would dirty his hands by attempting to drive them away; in proof of which he ordered the new-raised troops to be marched forthwith into winter quarters, although it was not as yet quite midsummer. Great despondency now fell upon the city of New Amsterdam. It was feared that the conquerors of Fort Goed Hoop, flushed with victory and apple-brandy, might march on to the capital, take it by storm, and annex the whole province to Connecticut. ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... and still asking questions. But he has moments of despondency, in which he is inclined to allow that the poor islanders possess, after all, something akin to that boasted inheritance of his native land, the Great American Joke. "Guess they've played it on me," is the burden of his ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, January 14, 1893 • Various
... weakness was aggravated by the excitement produced by the singular experience I had passed through. My nerves had undergone a strain quite unusual, and the interior sense of elation, reacting its fits of extreme mental despondency dislocated my system, and accelerated the gliding virus of disease inundating the capillaries of circulation and breaking down the tissues ...
— The Certainty of a Future Life in Mars • L. P. Gratacap
... pianoforte- players; he produces as novel effects as Paganini does on the violin, and performs wonders which one would never have imagined possible. Hiller, too, is an excellent player, powerful and coquettish enough. Both are a little infected by the Parisian mania for despondency and straining after emotional vehemence [Verzweif-lungssucht und Leidenschaftssucherei], and often lose sight of time and repose and the really musical too much. I, on the other hand, do so perhaps too little. Thus we made up for each other's deficiencies, ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... youth begin in gladness; But thereof comes in the end despondency and madness.' I. ...
— Early Reviews of English Poets • John Louis Haney
... believed that they were going to lay hands on the atrocious criminal, at last; to have seen him slip through their fingers—the thought of this almost brought tears to their eyes: they were in a state of the deepest despondency. ...
— Messengers of Evil - Being a Further Account of the Lures and Devices of Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... of daze of doing things; between one act and another there was no definite sequence. The town itself was in a sort of suppressed twitter, everybody's movements seemed exaggerated, the eager ones moved faster, impelled by a sort of fear; the slow ones went slower, their feet dragging in a kind of despondency. At one time we found ourselves clambering up some steps to the mayor's office, in search of bread. By a window on the far side of the room was a man with a pale face, eyes red-rimmed from lack of sleep, and light hair: Churchin. ...
— The Luck of Thirteen - Wanderings and Flight through Montenegro and Serbia • Jan Gordon
... You are to spend that before your marriage, you know." Then he shambled away, and as soon as he was alone, again became sad and despondent. He was a man for whom we may predicate some gentle sadness and continued despondency to the end of ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... matters, we found our boat had left us, and was steaming away perhaps a mile from us. Sister Backus was greatly disappointed at being left, and gave way to despondency; but I assured her it was all for the best, and that as the Lord had heretofore provided for us, so he would provide for us now. We returned to the tent of Mrs. Green, a tidy mulatto woman, where we had left our satchels. As she met us and learned of our being left, and heard ...
— A Woman's Life-Work - Labors and Experiences • Laura S. Haviland
... while we congratulate one another that we live under its benign influence, and cherish hopes of its long duration, we cannot forget who they were that, in the day of our national infancy, in the times of despondency and despair, mainly assisted to work out our deliverance. I should feel that I was unfaithful to the strong recollections which the occasion presses upon us, that I was not true to gratitude, not true to patriotism, not true to the living or ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... width of the open space separating them. Hexford's finger rose to his mouth, but Sweetwater needed no such hint. He stood, silent as his own shadow, while the coachman rubbed away with less and less purpose, until his hands stood quite still and his whole figure drooped in irresistible despondency. As he raised his face, moved perhaps by that sense of a watchful presence to which all of us are more or less susceptible, they were both surprised to see tears on it. The next instant he had started to his feet and ...
— The House of the Whispering Pines • Anna Katharine Green
... centuries say against the hours; to resist the usurpation of particulars; to penetrate to their catholic sense. Things seem to say one thing, and say the reverse. The appearance is immoral; the result is moral. Things seem to tend downward, to justify despondency, to promote rogues, to defeat the just; and, by knaves, as by martyrs, the just cause is carried forward. Although knaves win in every political struggle, although society seems to be delivered over from the hands of one set of criminals into the hands of another set of ...
— Representative Men • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... proportion as our anxiety grew more painful, our hopes diminished. What will become of us before this time to-morrow? was the general question on the evening of that day, and we looked forward with dejection and despondency to the morrow's dawn. We felt much less anxiety in the midst of the thunder of the artillery than we did at the close of this fourth day. It resembled the dead calm which precedes the impending storm. The combined troops took their leave of us for the night, as they had ...
— Frederic Shoberl Narrative of the Most Remarkable Events Which Occurred In and Near Leipzig • Frederic Shoberl (1775-1853)
... for the dampness of the evening hung about her dress, and overfatigue had made her chilly. She kept herself balanced by clasping her hands together round her knees; her head dropped a little towards her chest; the attitude was one of despondency, whatever her frame of mind might be. But when she heard her father's step on the gravel outside, she started up, and hastily shaking her heavy black hair back, and wiping a few tears away that had come on ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell |
