"Dignified" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... glory or in that of your person, you may feel perfectly certain will in no circumstances remain undone. Only a friend like you is not always quite easy and convenient to serve, for those who understand you must wish, before all, to serve you in an intelligent and dignified manner. I hope that so far I have not been wanting in these two essential conditions, and I do not mean to depart from them for the future. You may therefore have full confidence in me, and listen to me, and believe me as one who is frankly and without ...
— Correspondence of Wagner and Liszt, Volume 1 • Francis Hueffer (translator)
... were to be treated with every sort of courtesy, patience, and good humour. Finn and his sister never made advances, but they would stand politely still while the stranger sniffed all round them. For pups in their first half-year they were extraordinarily dignified. Much of this, of course, they learned from gracious Tara, one of the gentlest and sweetest-mannered hounds that ever lived. Also, they had that within, in the shape of truly aristocratic lineage, which gave them great self-respect, a tradition of courtesy, and a remarkable ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson
... to his character,—one exciting abhorrence and disgust, for his pleasures were miscellaneous and coarse; a man truly abandoned to the most violent passions: the other side pleasing, exciting admiration; a man with an enormous power of work, affable, dignified, with courtly manners, and enchanting conversation, making friends with everybody, out of real kindness of heart, because he really loved the people, and sought their highest good; a truly patriotic man, and as wise as he was enthusiastic. ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IX • John Lord
... with heavy blocks of stone, and vaulted almost as massively overhead. On two sides there were doors, opening into long suites of anterooms and saloons; on the third side, a stone staircase of spacious breadth, ascending, by dignified degrees and with wide resting-places, to another floor of similar extent. Through one of the doors, which was ajar, Kenyon beheld an almost interminable vista of apartments, opening one beyond the other, and reminding him of ...
— The Marble Faun, Volume II. - The Romance of Monte Beni • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... will hardly fail to note the striking similarity between the rules that governed Elizabethan corporations and those that governed those Jews who returned to England and lived their prosperous but dignified lives in the east end of London when the eighteenth century was as young as ...
— William Shakespeare - His Homes and Haunts • Samuel Levy Bensusan
... bring a couple of men to London who can handle Lollie if she gives any trouble—no, no," said the colonel, raising his hand in dignified protest, "there's going to be nothing rough. How can there be? You'll be in charge of it all, and it is up to you as to how Lollie ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace
... education, and Russian in his sympathies, he was still an honest Greek, worthier and abler than most other influential Greeks. "He had many virtues and great abilities," says a competent critic. "His conduct was firm and disinterested, his manners simple and dignified. His personal feelings were warm, and, as a consequence of this virtue, they were sometimes so strong as to warp his judgment. He wanted the equanimity and impartiality of mind, and the elevation of soul necessary to make a great man."[A] In spite of his defects, he might ...
— The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald, G.C.B., Admiral of the Red, Rear-Admiral of the Fleet, Etc., Etc. • Thomas Cochrane, Earl of Dundonald
... man turned with a dignified drawing-together of his dressing- gown and moved back. Apparently, the renovation of a cranky lamp was the whole content of ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... laughter occasioned by the triumphant success of his visit, which had convulsed not only Mr. Weller's face, but his arms, legs, and body also, during the locking up of the pocket-book, suddenly gave place to the most dignified gravity ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... was different in the department. There had been a real miracle of transfiguration. The whole air of intercourse was changed. All the girls were gentle and dignified with each other. Catriona's eyes sparkled with pleasure. Her careworn air was gone. She was a child again. She had never had any physical loveliness before; but on that night hundreds of passing shoppers looked with attention at the delight ...
— Making Both Ends Meet • Sue Ainslie Clark and Edith Wyatt
... the noble count, while their eyes shone brighter from partaking of the generous wine. The lackeys flew up and down the hall, waiting upon the guests, the pages stood behind the count's chair, and offered his excellency food and drink in vessels of gold. At first they sat at table with grave and dignified demeanor, but gradually the delicious viands enlivened their hearts, the glowing wine loosened their tongues, and now they laughed and talked merrily and gave themselves entirely up to the pleasures of the table. Louder swelled the hum of mingled voices. Peals of laughter rang through the banquet ...
— The Youth of the Great Elector • L. Muhlbach
... a century afterwards, 1498, Mantuan published his Bucolicks with such success, that they were soon dignified by Badius with a comment, and, as Scaliger complained, received into schools, and taught as classical; his complaint was vain, and the practice, however injudicious, spread far, and continued long. Mantuan was ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. in Nine Volumes - Volume the Eighth: The Lives of the Poets, Volume II • Samuel Johnson
... a quick step on the piazza floor, Just then a loud ring was heard at the door. The little miss rose with dignified air, Quick ushered him in, and ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... Never had excitement around the Capitol run half so high. Even the Kansas-Nebraska furore had failed to pack the Senate galleries so full of men and women, struggling for seats and sitting sometimes through the night. One after another the southern leaders made their valedictories—some calm and dignified, some hot and vindictive—and left the seats they had filled for years. One after another, known and honored names were stricken from the army and navy lists, by resignation. One after another, states met in convention and, by "ordinance of secession," declared themselves ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... Sabbath evening, as the hundred or more orphans met at vespers and sang, "Onward, Christian Soldiers!" they saw a stranger seated at the speaker's desk in the home chapel. He was a venerable old Wan, straight and dignified, his hoary head a crown of honor; for he was all that ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... before going on. Shellington looked so grave, so dignified, so much more manly than he had ever seen him, that he ...
— From the Valley of the Missing • Grace Miller White
... offer, surely, but I did not see my way clear to accept it, and the song went back immediately. A little later I got another. He wrote a very dignified letter this time; he'd evidently made up his mind to forgie me for the way I'd insulted him and his song before, but he wanted me to understand he'd have nae nonsense frae me. But this time he wanted only fifteen shilling ...
— Between You and Me • Sir Harry Lauder
... the wife in her very dignified and proper view of the whole subject. Is there not something extremely charming in the highly lady-like sentiments and expressions of a Christian woman, as contradistinguished from those of a gentleman? He, with all his urbanity, is apt to show the smallest ...
— Bertha and Her Baptism • Nehemiah Adams
... judgment, business qualities—all have helped him to the equivalent of a liberal education. His love of the humorous and the ridiculous is unbounded; but he has serious moments, as well, and at such times is as dignified and refined in speech and manner as any man you'd find in a thousand. He is a good speaker, can stir a political convention to fomentation when he gets fired up; and can write an article for the press that goes spang to the spot. ...
— Pipes O'Pan at Zekesbury • James Whitcomb Riley
... with a useless correspondence, which can only awaken painful recollections, or give rise to yet more painful new anxieties. Fervently will I pray for the restoration of your happiness, to which nothing can so greatly contribute as that wise, that uniform command, so feminine, yet so dignified, you maintain over your passions; which often I have admired, though never so feelingly as at this conscious moment! when my own health is the sacrifice of emotions ...
— Cecilia vol. 3 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... rather pretty," commented Grace maliciously. "It won't do, dear. Your role is dignified comedy. O dear! O my!" She stifled a yawn behind her faultlessly gloved hand. "I'm feeling these late hours in my aged bones. It wasn't much of a dance, was it? Or am I disillusioned? Certainly that Edgeworth boy fell in ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... is inferior to the living and dignified art, so full of individuality and mystery, that we see in the ...
— The Cathedral • Joris-Karl Huysmans
... nothing, except the facility and convenience we derive from system, order and a code of procedure. To this may be added the mental force and enthusiasm of soul which such things inspire, just as men and women may feel more dignified, artistic, and refined, when dressed in accordance with their ideas. So may the average priest feel more priestly, holy; and consequently, more powerful mentally; when arrayed in the robes of his office and surrounded by the outward symbols of his power and functions. But, in themselves alone, ...
— The Light of Egypt, Volume II • Henry O. Wagner/Belle M. Wagner/Thomas H. Burgoyne
... the whole guilt rest on the Administration." Apart from the political interest of the trial, the eminence of the counsel employed would have commanded an audience anywhere. Never, since New York has had courts of justice, have so many distinguished lawyers adorned and dignified her bar as in the first twenty years of this century. In this case, nearly all of the leaders were retained: Nathan Sandford, District Attorney, and Pierrepoint Edwards, for the prosecution; for the defence, Cadwallader Colden, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 31, May, 1860 • Various
... an epoch of [70] expansion, turn against their possessors. Again and again I have said how the refinement of an aristocracy may be precious and educative to a raw nation as a kind of shadow of true refinement; how its serenity and dignified freedom from petty cares may serve as a useful foil to set off the vulgarity and hideousness of that type of life which a hard middle-class tends to establish, and to help people to see this vulgarity and hideousness in their true colours. From such an ignoble spectacle as that ...
— Culture and Anarchy • Matthew Arnold
... occasionally Mirabeau, perpetually Robespierre; also the ferret-visage of Fouquier-Tinville with other attorneys; Anacharsis of Prussian Scythia, and miscellaneous Patriots,—though all is yet in the most perfectly clean-washed state; decent, nay dignified. President on platform, President's bell are not wanting; oratorical Tribune high-raised; nor strangers' galleries, wherein also sit women. Has any French Antiquarian Society preserved that written Lease of the ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... unhappily. She had meant to be cold and dignified throughout the conversation, but the sense of her wrongs was beginning to be too much for her. A large tear splashed on to her tray of orange-sticks. She wiped it away with the ...
— The Man Upstairs and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... requested to go down the ages with no other name than "Teacher," he not only appropriately crowned his own life-work, but stamped the vocation of teaching with a royalty which can never be gainsaid. By this act he dignified with lasting honor all those to whom the name "Teacher," in its truest meaning, can ...
— Bay State Monthly, Volume I, No. 2, February, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... Masterman by one leg and staring with bright blue eyes at Mrs. Mansfield. Her countenance expressed a dignified inquiry combined, perhaps, with a certain amount of very natural surprise at so unseemly an interruption of her strictly private interview with Claude Heath and Masterman. Her left thumb mechanically sought the shelter of her mouth, ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens
... enthusiast for antiquity and a warm admirer of the Augustan writers, reverts to the more classical manner, which a little later became once more predominant in the writers of the Flavian period. His simple and dignified style is much above the level of a mere technical treatise. His prose, indeed, may be read with more pleasure than the verse in which, by a singular caprice, one of the twelve books is composed. In one of the most beautiful episodes of the Georgics, Virgil ...
— Latin Literature • J. W. Mackail
... Charlie cried, "I told you so!" and ordered an immediate retreat; Miriam objected, as undignified, but renounced the guitar; mother sprang to her feet, and closed the front windows in an instant, whereupon, dignified or not, we all evacuated the gallery and fell back into the house. All this was done in a few minutes, and as quietly as possible; and while the gas was being turned off downstairs, Miriam and I flew upstairs,—I ...
— A Confederate Girl's Diary • Sarah Morgan Dawson
... of the nursery. There is no callow, immature period in the face of the world, no "green" age for the gibes or superior airs of elders. A woodpecker out of the nest is a woodpecker in the dress and with the bearing of his fathers,—dignified, ...
— Little Brothers of the Air • Olive Thorne Miller
... money; nobody but he and I ever knew of the transaction." A Boston man writes of his visit to the Florence studio of Greenough: "My eye fell upon a bust which awakened sea and forest pictures,—the spars of an elegant craft, the lofty figure of a hunter, the dignified bearing of a mysterious pilot." It was the bust of Fenimore Cooper. Of the sculptor it was noted that "he always referred with emotion to the gleam of sunshine which encouraged him at this crisis, in the friendship of our late ...
— James Fenimore Cooper • Mary E. Phillips
... that Mrs. Hoxton should find Alan in the drawing-room, and ask afterwards about his estate; and that Meta Rivers, after being certified that this was their Mr. Ernescliffe, pronounced that her papa thought him particularly pleasing and gentlemanlike. There was something dignified in having a sister on the point ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... sweeper" goes over the ground around the altar with a broom; then the regular priest, a dignified gray-headed man with a long ungirt purple chiton, and a heavy olive garland, comes forward bearing a basin of holy water. This basin is duly passed to the whole company as it stands in a ring, and each ...
— A Day In Old Athens • William Stearns Davis
... and the fool. We shall hardly induce black men to believe that if their bellies be full it matters little about their brains. They already dimly perceive that the paths of peace winding between honest toil and dignified manhood call for the guidance of skilled thinkers, the loving, reverent comradeship between the black lowly and black men emancipated by training ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various
... herself as black as a total eclipse, tall, angular, and imposing, and as she strode down the road, clad in the sombre vestments of sorrow, she was so noble an expression of her own idea that as a simple embodiment of dignified surrender ...
— Moriah's Mourning and Other Half-Hour Sketches • Ruth McEnery Stuart
... Toures, of the which one is Caullid Rosamunde's Toure.' Also of the inner court he writes of '4 Toures, wherof the Kepe is one.' This keep and Rosamund's Tower, as well as the ruins of some of the others, are still to be seen on the outer walls, so that from some points of view the ruins are dignified and picturesque. The area enclosed was large, and in early times the castle must have been almost impregnable. But during the Civil War it was much damaged by the soldiers quartered there, and Sir Hugh Cholmley took lead, wood, and iron ...
— Yorkshire—Coast & Moorland Scenes • Gordon Home
... agonies of their Victim, and their rank tongues blossomed into foul speech. Characteristically enough, though they shared in the mockeries of the mob, they kept themselves separate. The crowd pressed near enough to the cross to speak their gibes to Jesus; the dignified movers of the ignorant crowd stood superciliously apart, and talked scoffingly about Him. Whilst the populace yelled, 'Thou that destroyest the Temple and buildest it in three days, come down,' the chief priests, with the scribes, ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren
... connection with a business house, whether he does so voluntarily or involuntarily, his departure should be pleasant, or at the least dignified. It is childish to take advantage of the fact that you are going away to tell all of the people you have grudges against how you feel about them, and it is worse than a mere breach of good manners to abuse the house that has asked you to leave. If it has done some one else an ...
— The Book of Business Etiquette • Nella Henney
... he assumed the role of peacemaker-general. When the debaters seemed to be getting too warm, he rose to order; and, in a calm dignified manner, commented on the conduct of the disputants with such ineffable insolence as to draw down their wrath on his devoted head—to the great delight of the other members. Thus he threw oil on the troubled waters, and, generally, kept the ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne
... as the mad-dog scare started the girls were all very careful about letting Tom Jonah go off the premises. He was too old and dignified a dog to run out to bark at passing teams, or to follow strange dogs to make their acquaintance. Therefore the Kenways and Neale O'Neil thought it was not necessary for poor old Tom Jonah to wear an ugly and irritating muzzle all the time. The old ...
— The Corner House Girls Growing Up - What Happened First, What Came Next. And How It Ended • Grace Brooks Hill
... could walk in mystical motherhood before the procession of some great religious order. But that she should stand on a platform in the exact altitude in which he stands; leaning forward a little more than is graceful and holding her mouth open a little longer and wider than is dignified—well, I only write here of the facts of natural history; and the fact is that it is this, and not publicity or importance, that hurts. It is for the modern world to judge whether such instincts are indeed danger signals; and whether the hurting ...
— A Miscellany of Men • G. K. Chesterton
... proper footing after a long series of years during which England had been sometimes the enemy, but never the equal friend, of France. His task had been well performed; and he now came back, leaving behind him the reputation of an excellent minister, firm yet cautious as to substance, dignified yet conciliating in manner. His last audience at Versailles was unusually long; and no third person was present. Nothing could be more gracious than the language and demeanour of Lewis. He condescended to trace a route for the embassy, and insisted that Portland should make a circuit for the purpose ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 5 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... prying world. From top to toe every square inch of the captain's clothing was altered for the worse; but the man himself remained unchanged—superior to all forms of moral mildew, impervious to the action of social rust. He was as courteous, as persuasive, as blandly dignified as ever. He carried his head as high without a shirt-collar as ever he had carried it with one. The threadbare black handkerchief round his neck was perfectly tied; his rotten old shoes were neatly blacked; he might have compared chins, ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... disposed of the seventh, up came the old abbot himself, with dignified mien. "Ah! I see now how you return," said the drudger, and he laid hold of the priest and ended his natural days. The old abbot thus suffered the fate of his ...
— Filipino Popular Tales • Dean S. Fansler
... his hotel and had dinner. After dinner he again went for a walk. He was thinking hard, and that did not render him less interesting. He was tall and muscular, yet not heavy, with a lean dark face, keen, steady eyes, and dignified walk. He wore a black soft felt hat and a red silk sash which just peeped from beneath his waistcoat—in all, striking, yet not bizarre, and notably of gentlemanlike manner. What arrested attention most, however, was his voice. People who heard it invariably turned to look or listened from sheer ...
— An Unpardonable Liar • Gilbert Parker
... distinguished-looking man of letters I had ever seen; for he had at once the distinction of race, of fine breeding, and of that delicate artistic genius which, with him, was so intimately a part of things beautiful and distinguished. He had the eyes of an old eagle; a general air of dignified collectedness; a rare, and a rarely charming, smile, which came out, like a ray of sunshine, in the instinctive pleasure of having said a witty or graceful thing to which one's response had been immediate. When he took me indoors, into that ...
— Figures of Several Centuries • Arthur Symons
... of herself, Phoebe felt a trifle chilled by their lack of enthusiasm. She went back to her butter-making in dignified silence. ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower
... dignified glance. "We will discuss our affairs at home. Here it only remains to say whether you are ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... the stagecoach for the ride to Vandalia, then the capital of the state. He looked very dignified in a new suit and high plug hat. In the crowd that gathered to tell him good-by, he could see many of his friends. There stood Coleman Smoot who had lent him money to buy his new clothes. Farther back he could see Mr. Rutledge and Ann, Hannah and Jack Armstrong, Mentor Graham, and others ...
— Abe Lincoln Gets His Chance • Frances Cavanah
... re-echoes on the porch. His mind is busied. Is he to have a closing career of unsullied honor in the Senate? He is yet in a firm, if frosty age. A dignified halo will surround his second marriage. It is better thus. Peace and silence at any cost. And Lagunitas' millions to come. The mine—his dear-bought treasure. It is coming, Philip Hardin. Peace and rest? it ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage
... doubtful, yet with a kind of half-trust in her demeanour, white, and blue-eyed, with pained mouth, and a droop of weariness and suffering in eyelids and neck—a creature to be worshipped if only for compassion of dignified distress. ...
— Thomas Wingfold, Curate • George MacDonald
... give way before these arguments, however much her heart bled. She had long felt how much of impropriety and of danger there was in the situation of a young woman divorced from her husband, and how much more dignified and expedient it would be for her to return to her father's home and to the bosom of her family. She therefore took a decided resolution; she tore herself away from her relatives, from her beloved son, whom she could not ...
— The Empress Josephine • Louise Muhlbach
... and keep up a dignified tone was not difficult, but to go home alone, see his sisters, brother, mother, and father, confess and ask for money he had no right to after giving his ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... the forces of good counsel into a single scheme. Complaints will be answered, the evildoers punished. Commerce will flow on with uninterrupted prosperity, and the navy of England receive its due meed of attention. His conduct must be dignified, and he must acquire his influence not apart from, but on account of, the affection of his people. "Concord," says Bolingbroke in rhapsodical prospection, "will appear breeding peace and prosperity on every hand"; though he prudently hopes also that ...
— Political Thought in England from Locke to Bentham • Harold J. Laski
... walked away, apparently to avoid any further conversation on the disagreeable subject. Paul did not feel quite easy about the difficulty which had occurred between him and the dignified professor. He had hoped and expected that the storm would justify his action in the opinion of the learned gentleman; but Mr. Hamblin carefully avoided him, and he was confident he intended to prefer charges against him as soon ...
— Dikes and Ditches - Young America in Holland and Belguim • Oliver Optic
... as dignified as a just-swore-in sheriff. "As I explained to you this morning, sir, nobody in Palomitas ever stands in the way of a fair fight—like the one you happened to come in on at the finish a few hours ago—any more than good citizens, elsewhere and under different conditions, interfere ...
— Santa Fe's Partner - Being Some Memorials of Events in a New-Mexican Track-end Town • Thomas A. Janvier
... His appearance was dignified and pleasing. Colonel W. S. Hatch gave the following picturesque description of him: "His height was about five feet nine inches; his face, oval rather than angular; his mouth, beautifully formed, like that of Napoleon I., as represented in his ...
— Four American Indians - King Philip, Pontiac, Tecumseh, Osceola • Edson L. Whitney
... many-sided man, acquainted with smiles and tears, complex in brain, single in heart, direct as light; and his words, candid as mirrors, gave the perfect image of his thought. He was never afraid to ask—never too dignified to admit that he did not know. No man had keener wit or kinder humor. He was not solemn. Solemnity is a mask worn by ignorance and hypocrisy—it is the preface, prologue, and index to the cunning or the stupid. He was natural in his life and thought—master ...
— Our American Holidays: Lincoln's Birthday • Various
... was Margaret herself, still only a girl of twenty, with a beautifully clear complexion and bright black eyes full of fire and spirit. She was truly a royal bride, gracious, dignified, queenly Magnificent brilliants sparkled in her glossy hair; her stomacher was set with lustrous pearls; her dress was of cloth of gold, and gold lace fringed her dainty handkerchief ...
— For The Admiral • W.J. Marx
... defenders had exhausted their ammunition. Just as Jack was about to order his men to move on and attack another part of the village, the door opened and a tall Maori stalked forth, his blanket over his head to defend himself from the flames. With a dignified step he advanced towards Jack, and presenting his war axe, he yielded himself up as a prisoner. No others came out, and the roof of the hut directly afterwards fell in. For a moment the seamen stopped, gazing at the catastrophe; then the impulse seized them to rush forward and attempt to rescue ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston
... of the highest kind; and it does justice to himself, to his own sense of propriety and principle, which, in the warmth of their friendship, professed admirers are too apt to sacrifice at the shrine of departed worth. The style is suitable to the sentiments, possessing a dignified simplicity, and an apparent rectitude of aim, which it is impossible not to consider, as, in a great degree, resulting from intimacy with the truly great character whom it so forcibly recommends to our esteem, and ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... forgotten her ancient prowess, and Jerry was delighted with his passenger. Poised on one foot, and holding firmly to his shoulders, Nan sailed down the High Street in the full glare of the lamps. It was not a dignified mode of progression, but it was ...
— The Odds - And Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... Virginia, W. Cost Johnson and Jenifer of Maryland, Pickens and Campbell of South Carolina, and we know not how many more slaveholding members of Congress have been engaged, either as principals or seconds, in that species of murder dignified with the name of duelling. But enough; we are heart-sick. What meaneth all this? Are slaveholders worse than other men? No! but arbitrary power has wrought in them its mystery of iniquity, and poisoned their better nature with ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... evident desire to remain dignified and disinterested, like a good, pious priest, was gradually growing impassioned, yielding to the hidden fire which consumed him. And this interrogatory finished him off; he could no longer restrain ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... classic comedy. It consists in so arranging events that a scene is reproduced either between the same characters under fresh circumstances or between fresh characters under the same circumstances. Thus we have, repeated by lackeys in less dignified language, a scene already played by their masters. Now, imagine ideas expressed in suitable style and thus placed in the setting of their natural environment. If you think of some arrangement whereby they are transferred to fresh surroundings, while maintaining their mutual relations, ...
— Laughter: An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic • Henri Bergson
... gave the speaker his most serious attention, and heard the narrative with surprise and mortification, somewhat modified by his habitual and dignified self-restraint. ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... would my own son if I had one. I shall not blame you if the enterprise does not succeed; so do not take it to heart, for I know that you will do your best, and no man can do more." Mr Thursby considered that it was incumbent on him to take a dignified farewell of me, and to impress on me all the duties and responsibilities of my office; but he broke down, and a tear stood in his eye as he wrung my hand, and said in a husky voice, "You know all about ...
— James Braithwaite, the Supercargo - The Story of his Adventures Ashore and Afloat • W.H.G. Kingston
... with the gentle being in whose welfare and happiness his own were shrined. It was with a bright smile, then, and animated brow he joined his Agnes early the following morning, in a stroll through a small woody inclosure dignified by the name of garden, which occupied part of the inner court. The old minstrel who had so attracted the attention of Agnes was there before them. He stood against a projecting buttress, his arms folded, his eyes fixed, it seemed on vacancy, and evidently not aware ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar
... this disclosure; but it was by one which occurred a few years later. A statement on her domestic affairs was published, in her name, in a magazine of large circulation.[A] It did not really explain anything, while it seemed to break through a dignified reserve which had won a high degree of general esteem. It was believed that feminine weakness had prevailed at last; and her reputation suffered accordingly with many who had till then regarded her with favor and ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 40, February, 1861 • Various
... first exposition to devote a separate building and one of the main group of exhibit palaces to education. The plan greatly dignified the department. Minnesota was most fortunate in the location assigned its display, as this exhibit had the first space at the principal entrance and was the first seen on entering the building from the main exposition thoroughfare. The space was 30 by 60 feet. The booth, the cabinet, the furnishings, ...
— Final Report of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission • Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission
... ruined church, built by Pisans with alternate rows of white and black marble, upon the site of an old temple of Venus. This is a modest and pure piece of Gothic architecture, fair in desolation, refined and dignified, and not unworthy in its grace of the dead Cyprian goddess. Through its broken lancets the sea-wind whistles and the vast reaches of the Tyrrhene gulf are seen. Samphire sprouts between the blocks of marble, and in sheltered nooks the caper hangs ...
— New Italian sketches • John Addington Symonds
... while their elders smiled a dignified approval of the grotesque, painted throng that trooped gayly down ...
— The Circus Boys In Dixie Land • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... whiskers were these, whose fleecy pomposity could overawe the most superior young footmen and reduce page-boys, tradesmen, and the lower orders generally, to a state of perspiring humility; to his equals how calmly aloof, how blandly dignified; and to those a misguided fate had set above him, how demurely deferential, how obligingly obsequious! Indeed, Mr. Brimberly's whiskers were all things to all men, and ...
— The Definite Object - A Romance of New York • Jeffery Farnol
... a shout of laughter at the spectacle of four men, one of whom was the dignified manager of the great White Pine Mining Company, calmly sitting on the prostrate bodies of four others, while a fifth, who had just struggled to his feet with a very rueful countenance, suddenly dropped to the deck again as he ...
— The Copper Princess - A Story of Lake Superior Mines • Kirk Munroe
... I remember when bulls were a dignified and serious matter; when we kept account of their progress from their pasture to the capital. We had accounts of their condition by couriers and carrier-pigeons. On the day when they appeared it was a high festival in the court. All the sombreros in Spain were there, the ladies in national ...
— Castilian Days • John Hay
... The noble visitor! Drawn, like his ancestors, by white horses! The reverent and dignified, Polished members of ...
— The Shih King • James Legge
... in his arms, slowly arose, love and determination being depicted upon the hitherto cold and dignified countenance. The effect was pronounced. Soon hundreds were upon their feet, while ...
— Rosa's Quest - The Way to the Beautiful Land • Anna Potter Wright
... of the capitulation approved by your Majesty, and this, when we arrived with it at Fresnois, was accepted and signed without opposition. The demeanor of General v. Wimpffen, as also that of the other French generals, during the previous night was very dignified, and this brave officer could not forbear expressing to me how deeply he was pained that he should have been called upon, forty-eight hours after his arrival from Africa, and half a day after he had assumed command, to set his name to a capitulation ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... have of murdering themselves, while continuing to live, into peace and oblivion. There is a surrender, a negation of life, a denial of total responsibilities, or human obligations, which to my mind indicates a monstrous selfishness, none the less real because its manifestations are passive and dignified by a philosophic pose. You see I am reading your last two letters by the light of certain ...
— The Jessica Letters: An Editor's Romance • Paul Elmer More
... earth doth live But to the earth some special good doth give; Nor aught so good but, strain'd from that fair use, Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse: Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied; And vice sometimes by action dignified. Within the infant rind of this small flower Poison hath residence, and medicine power: For this, being smelt, with that part cheers each part; Being tasted, slays all senses with the heart. Two such opposed kings encamp them still In man as well as herbs,—grace ...
— Romeo and Juliet • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... from an oak grove just beyond the boundary. He is a strong-scented fellow, and very tough. Yet how beautiful, as he flits about the open woods, connecting the trees by a gentle arc of crimson and white! This is another bird with a military look. His deliberate, dignified ways, and his bright uniform of red, white, and steel-blue, bespeak ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... had seemed over, and no turning back the hands of the clock likely to be necessary. Besides Governor Ballard, Mr. Hewley, Secretary and Treasurer, was sitting up too, small, iron-gray, in feature and bearing every inch the capable, dignified official, but his necktie had slipped off during the night. The bearded Councillors had the best of it, seeming after their vigil less stale in the face than the member from Silver City, for instance, whose day-old black growth blurred his dingy chin, ...
— Red Men and White • Owen Wister
... of warm and most disinterested friendship. He could descend to trickery in dealing, yet as a magistrate he had a high and most inflexible ideal of honour, honesty, and rectitude. He could be coarse in his conduct and demeanour, and yet he could occasionally be as courteous and dignified as the most polished gentleman. He was overbearing where he felt he was safe, yet where he was met by courage and firmness ...
— Personal Recollections of Birmingham and Birmingham Men • E. Edwards
... of the session, his work ended, and in the spring he visited Paul Hayne at Copse Hill. Hayne says: "He found me with my family established in a crazy wooden shanty, dignified as a cottage, near the track of the main Georgia railroad, about sixteen miles from Augusta." To Timrod, that "crazy wooden shanty," set in immemorial pines and made radiant by the presence of his poet friend, was finer than ...
— Literary Hearthstones of Dixie • La Salle Corbell Pickett
... evening costume made an eminently dignified and respectable appearance. There was an unusual lock of benignity upon his firmly moulded features, and an air of ease which rather surprised Mr. Bradshaw, who did not know all the social experiences ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... Fraide alone was perfectly calm. He sat very still, his small, thin figure erect and dignified, as his eyes scanned the message that ...
— The Masquerader • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... a dignified silence after those words of the Prophet; but his whole manner shews the Prophet that they have not made any impression upon him. If David's spirit had rested on Ahaz, he would surely, if he had wavered at all, have, on the word of the Prophet, thrown himself into the arras ...
— Christology of the Old Testament: And a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions. Vol. 2 • Ernst Hengstenberg
... softly with a broad and dignified melody. The expression soon becomes tender, but is interspersed with jocular little passages. MacDowell illustrates in his characteristic manner a lonely tramp at night, with the grotesque streaks of the moonlight breaking quaintly into the pedestrian's contemplative ...
— Edward MacDowell • John F. Porte
... diffident in speech, and more fond of his study than of the salon, he became on a sudden easy and frank, showing himself in public on all occasions, conversing right and left in a gay, agreeable, and dignified manner; presiding, in fact, over the Salon of Marly, and over the groups gathered round him, like the divinity of a temple, who receives with goodness the homage to which he is accustomed, and recompenses the mortals who ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... we had nothing to do but amuse ourselves. Our tent was within a rod of the river, if the broad sand-beds, with a scanty stream of water coursing here and there along their surface, deserve to be dignified with the name of river. The vast plains on either side were almost level with the sand-beds, and they were bounded in the distance by low, monotonous hills, parallel to the course of the Arkansas. All was one expanse of grass; there was no wood in view, except some ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... jovial and rollicking laugh which comes from deep in his chest, causing him to shake and quiver throughout his body-very cheerful and sincere. His face and stature are striking in their power, as are his muscular fingers. He moves with a dignified tread and erect posture. ...
— Autobiography of a YOGI • Paramhansa Yogananda
... greatest practical importance to the future of organ building. The author's opinion that before long every new large organ will be built upon the Diaphone as a foundation, is shared by all who have had opportunity to judge. By no other means known to-day can anything approaching such grand and dignified Diapason tone be produced. Were twenty large Diapasons added to the instrument in Ocean Grove, N. J., or to that in the Baptist Temple, Philadelphia, and were the Diaphone removed, the instrument would suffer ...
— The Recent Revolution in Organ Building - Being an Account of Modern Developments • George Laing Miller
... dignified silence, to maintain an austere demeanor, to cultivate an etiquette of reticence, has been one ...
— High Finance • Otto H. Kahn
... face now seemed pale. The bones of the cheeks stood out more now. He showed more gravity. Freed of his red fighting flush, the, flame of passion gone out of his eyes, he seemed more dignified, more of a man than had ...
— The Purchase Price • Emerson Hough
... scene of turmoil it was!" she said to herself. (You see, she was trying to express herself in a very dignified and composed manner, as if she hadn't been in the least disturbed by what had happened.) "I presume—" she went on, "I presume it was something like a riot, although I really don't see what it was all about. Of course I've never been in a riot, but ...
— The Admiral's Caravan • Charles E. Carryl
... at her head, was partly supporting her in his arms, and heedless of any sight or sound, the shadow of some one fell upon him. He looked up and saw his aunt; the old dignified, sensible expression on her face, exactly like her former self, ...
— Sylvia's Lovers — Complete • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... carry alarmed and bewildered heads, leaving the fate of their carts to the sagacity of the horses. Finding that the louder he called for help the more alarm he excited, the suspended postboy determined philosophically to endure the misery of his situation in dignified silence. But there he was suffered to hang unnoticed; or, if remarked, it was only concluded that another criminal had been added to the gibbet, as its second tassel. The circumstance, however, of a second body having been placed there speedily came to the knowledge ...
— A Walk from London to Fulham • Thomas Crofton Croker
... of all the population by the dignified recognition of our obligations to the aged, the helpless ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt • Franklin D. Roosevelt
... cut, masculine, and somewhat severe. The expression of his face is not open, like the squire's, nor has it the cold closeness which accompanies the intellectual character of young Leslie's; but it is reserved and dignified, and significant of self-control, as should be the physiognomy of a man accustomed to think before he speaks. When you look at him, you are not surprised to learn that he is not a florid orator nor a smart debater,—he is ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... but it must have been unusually inoffensive, for it left no record of itself in the travellers' consciousness. They were aware of gardened squares and avenues, bordered by stately dwellings, of dignified civic edifices, and of a vast arid splendid railroad station, such as the state builds even in minor European cities, but such as our paternal corporations have not yet given us anywhere in America. They went to the Zoological Garden, where they heard the customary Kalmucks at their ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells |
