"Egotism" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... over the pages of the Misogallo, and collate with its epigrams a certain passage in Alfieri's memoirs and letters, that when we meet it in this particular man, in this hard, savage, narrow, pedantic doctrinaire, whose very magnanimity is vanity and egotism, we can no longer sympathise with the hatred of the French, which in juster and more modest men, as for instance Carlo Botta, invariably elicits our sympathy. Much as we dislike the republican French who descended into Italy, the Misogallo makes ...
— The Countess of Albany • Violet Paget (AKA Vernon Lee)
... anxiety to hear anything that could be told of her was almost as striking in Continental society and in the United States as in her own country. Yet she had neither genius, nor conspicuous beauty, nor "a mission," nor any quality of egotism which could induce her to brave the observation of the world for any personal aim. She had good abilities, well cultivated for the time when she was young; she was rather pretty, and her countenance was engaging from its expression of mingled thoughtfulness and brightness; she ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 40, February, 1861 • Various
... thoughts, fancies, opinions, and varying moods of Lamartine, as awakened by the objects which met his eye. These objects, which a great poet would consider of the first importance, are with the Frenchman only secondary to the exhibition of himself. If this mingled egotism and vanity were affected, it would disgust the reader, but as it is the natural action of the author's mind, and is accompanied with much eloquence and beauty of composition, it is more likely to fascinate than to offend. At the present moment, when the author is with the public a more ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 2 August 1848 • Various
... that after the rare occasions when the pitiful curtain of his egotism had been blown aside by some chance breeze of destiny, and Francis Madigan had stood for a moment face to face with himself and his shirked responsibilities, he made the spasmodic effort to fulfil his paternal obligations, ...
— The Madigans • Miriam Michelson
... with a tantalizing approach and flight; now he had gripped it tight, there was no more wandering from the point than may be seen in the vacillations of a well-behaved barometer; the slender topic seemed to grow under his touch, to take on the proportions of his own enormous egotism; he spoke of last autumn and the next parish as if he were dealing with immensities of time and space. And now the Colonel was merged and lost in his theme; he was whirled along with the stream of things, with moons and meteors, winds ...
— The Return of the Prodigal • May Sinclair
... talking to people in his own class of life there was always in his bearing a kind of shy, defiant egotism. What Carlyle called the 'armed neutrality' of social intercourse oppressed him. He felt himself to be in the enemy's camp. In his eyes there was always a kind of watchfulness, as if he were taking ...
— The Life of George Borrow • Herbert Jenkins
... himself (Sir George) about the time when he had reached the meridian of his fame as an orator, and should therefore have become blase to the extremity of being absolutely seared and case-hardened against all impressions whatever appealing to his vanity or egotism, did absolutely (credite posteri!) blush like any roseate girl of fifteen. And that this was no accident growing out of a momentary agitation, no sudden spasmodic pang, anomalous and transitory, ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... to grant this to England!" cried Napoleon, with a sneer. "In their blind hatred against me they grant more territory in Germany to their most dangerous enemy, that England may spread still further the vast net of her egotism, and catch all Germany in it, flood the country with her manufactured goods, and drive the commerce of the continent into British hands! Ah, those gentlemen will soon perceive what a mistake they have committed in yielding to the demands of those greedy English traders. For ...
— NAPOLEON AND BLUCHER • L. Muhlbach
... in the course of our drive than those that loomed so large to me in the egotism of my love. We had spoken of Mr. Hornby and his affairs, and from our talk there had emerged certain facts of no little moment to the inquiry on which I ...
— The Red Thumb Mark • R. Austin Freeman
... Berger toward those who have followed and supported him; the gross, incredible savagery of his egotism in turning to rend those he had discipled into revolutionaries the moment their allegiance to the principles he taught them stood in the way of his cowardice and ambition; his butcher insensibilities in making his party's Constitution a "scrap of paper" and the party a shambles for the ...
— The Red Conspiracy • Joseph J. Mereto
... by this prologue, which seemed to spring partly from the egotism of a self-made man, partly from an instinctive unwillingness to embark upon the confession to which he was committed. However, he was far from being bored. "I'm about thirty myself," he remarked, "and I'm worth about thirty cents. ...
— The Mayor of Warwick • Herbert M. Hopkins
... game fair throughout my term of office. I hate dishonesty instinctively. I like the approval of my own conscience and the approval of men. This is egotism, of course. I claim nothing else for it. I am no prophet. I do not claim to be inspired. The weaknesses that all flesh is heir to, I am not immune from. I write this story not to vindicate my own wit nor to point out new paths for human thought to follow. I am a follower ...
— The Iron Puddler • James J. Davis
... had let loose the Avenging Goddesses. She repelled them with scorn; yet all the same they hurtled round her. After all, she was no monster. She had done a monstrous thing in a sudden brutality of egotism; and a certain crude state of law and opinion had helped her to do it, had confused the moral values and falsified her conscience. But she was not yet brutalized. Moreover, do what she would, she was still in a world governed by law; a world at the heart of which broods a power ...
— Marriage a la mode • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Lane's thoughts for some time before he attempted to move. The past, save and except the dim memory of his having been in some trouble in a mist and losing his way, had no existence for him, and the young man lay there in a state of the most intense egotism, utterly prostrate, but ...
— Fire Island - Being the Adventures of Uncertain Naturalists in an Unknown Track • G. Manville Fenn
... wouldn't! They can all call me proud and lazy but I'll show them—old Henri Jacques and Martini himself said I would! But I've had to fight to make people believe me—and I s'pose I'll have to go on fighting." To the egotism of sixteen years these words sounded very grand; it stirred Beryl to think she had fought for every advantage that was hers, to read the admiration in Robin's eyes. She had no thought of disloyalty in claiming the credit that really belonged to the little mother who ...
— Red-Robin • Jane Abbott
... who has had the patience to follow the enforced, but unwilling, egotism of this veritable history (especially if his studies have led him in the same direction), will now see why my mind steadily gravitated towards the conclusions of Hume and Kant, so well stated by the latter in a sentence, which I have ...
— Lectures and Essays • Thomas Henry Huxley
... indication of insanity about him. He thinks the prisoner knows the difference between right and wrong. The person suffering from megalomania often imagines he is a king, divinely inspired, has the world at his feet—supreme egotism in fact. It is one of the ...
— The Story of Louis Riel: The Rebel Chief • Joseph Edmund Collins
... love you, whether you deserve it or not, and this warm-hearted, enthusiastic creature really did me good. Dr. Skinner sent us an extraordinary book to read called "God's Furnace." There is a good deal of egotism in it and self-consciousness, and a good deal of genuine Christian experience. I read it through four times, and, when I carried it back and was discussing it with him, he said he had too. It seems almost incredible that a wholly sanctified character could publish such a book, made up as ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... sincerely for what seems like whining egotism, and hardly daring to hint about days when, in your company, I could sometimes sink the thoughts which 'remind me of departed days,' I fear 'departed never to return,' I ...
— Emily Bront • A. Mary F. (Agnes Mary Frances) Robinson
... the interests of her oppressed countrymen, and preserving her name absolutely untouched by scandal through a long and brilliant career, she deserves a place among distinguished women. She evidently had no idea of being forgotten, and completed twenty chapters of autobiography—its florid egotism at once its fault and its charm—besides keeping a diary in later years, and preserving nearly all the letters written to her, and even cards left at her door. But on those cards were the names of Humboldt, Cuvier, Talma and ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various
... they ought to forget their old religious superstitions and realize that in free America we don't need any religions, for all men are brothers. (Here again we would perhaps give more heed to his sentiment for its boundless idealism, were we not afraid it was but a cover for boundless egotism.) ...
— The Menorah Journal, Volume 1, 1915 • Various
... lies all the power that we have mastered," boasted Garboreggg with supreme egotism. "It connects with the ...
— Raiders of the Universes • Donald Wandrei
... expectations of Messmer, and induced him to extend his original plan further than it is likely he first intended. We find him soon after assuming a more dogmatical and mysterious air, when, for the purpose of shining exclusively, he appeared in the character of a magician:—his pride and egotism would ...
— Thaumaturgia • An Oxonian
... on the retina which, I understand, your brain is at infinite though unconscious labour to set back on its feet. A tangible object passes complete into my brain with the warmth of life upon it, and occupies the same place that it does in space; for, without egotism, the mind is as large as the universe. When I think of hills, I think of the upward strength I tread upon. When water is the object of my thought, I feel the cool shock of the plunge and the quick ...
— The World I Live In • Helen Keller
... in all things fortunate, but in nothing more fortunate than in this, that so unique a companion should have been ready to devote herself to him with an affection wholly free from egotism or jealousy, an affection that yearned only to satisfy his subtlest needs, and to transfuse all that was best in herself into his larger being. And indeed that fortunate admixture or influence, whencesoever derived, which raised the race of Wordsworth to poetic fame, was almost more ...
— Wordsworth • F. W. H. Myers
... mean to irritate her master, but instantly the man's brutal egotism was aroused. The savage jest became a fearful reality, and ...
— Black Ivory • R.M. Ballantyne
... would be only one war of all against all, was gone; politicians had already thrown off the mask in Poland; the lust of aggrandizement had prevailed . . . . The indissoluble bond connecting morals and politics being broken, the result was to make egotism the prevailing principle of public ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud
... likely to beset a young writer. So long ago as the publication of the second number of the Monthly Magazine, under the name of Nehemiah Higginbottom, I contributed three sonnets, the first of which had for its object to excite a good-natured laugh at the spirit of doleful egotism, and at the recurrence of favourite phrases, with the double defect of being at once trite and licentious;—the second was on low creeping language and thoughts, under the pretence of simplicity; the third, the phrases ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... for despising him, and could not bear to lose her. He followed her, and put forth all those powers of persuading and soothing, which had so often proved irresistible. But this time it was in vain. The insult was too savage, and his egotism too brutal, for honeyed ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade
... King was frank in the extreme; and he seemed to me to avoid, at once that slight tendency to repetition which may have been observed in the conversation of His Majesty King George the Third, and - that slight under-current of egotism which the curious observer may perhaps detect in the conversation of ...
— Reprinted Pieces • Charles Dickens
... man's blunt statement was uttered with a conviction as uncompromising as her own. The egotism of it repelled the woman. There was a hint of menace in her ...
— Making People Happy • Thompson Buchanan
... the person he addresses with a capital V. I believe, indeed—though I am not sufficiently acquainted with foreign languages to speak with certainty on the point—that the Englishman is the only person in the world who applies a capital letter to himself. That "I" strikes me as the triumph of egotism. It is tall, commanding, and so brief! "I"—and that suffices. ...
— With Zola in England • Ernest Alfred Vizetelly
... creature as a fact or a thing, but not as an existence like his own. He feels no more hate than love. For him there is no one but himself: all other creatures are mere ciphers. The force of his will consists in the imperturbable calculations of his egotism: he is an able chess-player whose opponent is all humankind, whom he intends to checkmate. His success is due as much to the qualities he lacks as to the talents he possesses. Neither pity, nor sympathy, nor religion, nor attachment to any idea whatsoever would have power to turn him ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VII (of X)—Continental Europe I • Various
... what chill of fear Raven believed he knew. Tenney went on lashing himself into the ecstasy of his emotional debauch. His eyes glittered. He was happy, he asserted, because he had found salvation. His conversion was akin to that of Saul. To his immense spiritual egotism, Raven concluded, nothing short of a story colossally dramatic would serve. He had been a sinner, perhaps not as to works but faith. He had kept the commandments, all but one. Had he loved the Lord his God with all his heart, all his soul, all his might? No: for he had not accepted ...
— Old Crow • Alice Brown
... steadfastness—his loyalty to purpose, that is, himself. But as he recalled during his homeward walk her glad welcome, her wistful, pleading looks, and then, as she realized the truth, her pain, her contempt, and her meaning words of scorn, his miserable egotism was swept aside, and for the first time the selfish man saw the question from her standpoint, and as we have said he was not so shallow but that he saw and loathed himself. He lost his self-respect as he never had done before, ...
— What Can She Do? • Edward Payson Roe
... Cardinal—"Yes, WE! that is, OURSELVES;—the Church— WE think, when we hear of heresies and blasphemies that it is we who are 'suffering for righteousness' sake,' but in our egotism we forget that WE are not suffering at all if we are able to retain our faith! It is the very heretics and blasphemers whom we condemn that are suffering—suffering absolute tortures—perchance 'for ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... it does not much matter to the universe either what you were, or are; think how many people are noble, if you cannot be; and rejoice in THEIR nobleness. An immense quantity of modern confession of sin, even when honest, is merely a sickly egotism; which will rather gloat over its own evil, than lose the centralization of its ...
— The Ethics of the Dust • John Ruskin
... it, nor countenance him to do it, in any conceivable way. It can't be fairly inferred from my past career." I, for one, am not interested to hear you define your position. I don't know that I ever was, or ever shall be. I think it is mere egotism, or impertinent at this time. Ye needn't take so much pains to wash your skirts of him. No intelligent man will ever be convinced that he was any creature of yours. He went and came, as he himself ...
— A Plea for Captain John Brown • Henry David Thoreau
... good ambition. I shall never work again, I suppose, in any way that counts. So that's that.... Why do I want to work and to do something? Other wives and mothers don't.... Or do they, only they don't know it, because they don't analyse? I believe they do, lots of them. Or is it only my horrible egotism and vanity, that can't take a back seat quietly? I was always like that, I know. Nan and I and Gilbert. Not Jim so much, and not Pamela at all. But Rodney's worse than I am; he wouldn't want to be counted out, put on the shelf, in the forties; he'd be frightfully sick if he had to stand by ...
— Dangerous Ages • Rose Macaulay
... monuments of Yucatan and Copan are of much more recent date than has generally been supposed, and such I am inclined to believe is the fact. At any rate, I think I may fairly claim, without rendering myself chargeable with egotism, that my discovery in regard to the two plates so frequently mentioned will throw some additional light on this ...
— Notes on Certain Maya and Mexican Manuscripts • Cyrus Thomas
... whatever be the reason, most men have a very strong and active prejudice, in favor of their own vocation, always working upon their minds and influencing their action." Let us be thankful for that laughable egotism which is born with us, and within us, and which, in this natural and unobtrusive affair of contentment, becomes a true anchor, holding ...
— The Golden Censer - The duties of to-day, the hopes of the future • John McGovern
... after a little, with his heart on his sleeve. This made him piquant; and the same character makes his writings piquant. Hence, too, he is often quaint,—a word which describes what no other word does,—always conveying a sense of originality, and of what, when we wish to be condemnatory, we call egotism, but which, when it belongs to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... coquetry, affectation, and vulgarity I had formerly remarked in her, in consideration of the intuitive delicacy and good feeling she now displayed. Truly, thought I, it is humbling to us, the bearded and baser moiety of humankind, to contrast our vile egotism with the beautiful self-devotion of woman, as exhibited ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 • Various
... Wilberforce must be protected against herself. And he disagreed heartily. Nobody must be protected against himself. The attitude of a man towards his fellows should be that of non-intervention, of benevolent egotism. Every person of healthy digestion was aware of that cardinal truth. Unfortunately persons of healthy digestions were not as common as they might be. That was why straight thinking, on these and other subjects, was at a discount. Nobody had a right to call himself well-disposed towards society ...
— South Wind • Norman Douglas
... faults of the American character is a propensity to brag. Brother Jonathan's egotism long since passed into a proverb. In no section of this land of the alleged free and home of the ism does the blowhard blow longer and louder than in the South. We are the people, the nonpareil; there are none like us beneath the sun! From the ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... were permitted to hope that in their sure growth they would come to be superior to the pitfalls and seamy sides of this character. And now they have proved inferior, inferior to the old evil of a brutal national egotism which recognizes no rights on the part of others, which, unconcerned about morality or unmorality, ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol. 1, January 9, 1915 - What Americans Say to Europe • Various
... THE national egotism that characterizes the French mind is not without its compensations. It leads, for example, to the tangible recognition of the merits of the great men of the nation and to the promulgation of their names in many public ways. Thus it would be hard to mention a truly distinguished Frenchman ...
— A History of Science, Volume 5(of 5) - Aspects Of Recent Science • Henry Smith Williams
... term—in the cloisters and around the altars of the Temple, built an edifice of hope far overtopping the dream of the Macedonian. His but covered the earth; theirs covered the earth and filled the skies; that is to say, in their bold, boundless fantasy of blasphemous egotism, God the Almighty was in effect to suffer them for their uses to nail him by the ear to a door in sign ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... assistance, and would, no doubt, willingly exchange a good deal of the former for a little of the latter." Still, one must not be too confident of this; the bodily requirements of a wrinkled old seyud would be very trifling, while his egotism would, on the other hand, be insufferable. This is a grazing village chiefly, and the gravelly desert comes close up to the walls, so that there is no difficulty about pushing on immediately after it ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... citation from some one else. He once complained of the writer of the article on Comte in the Encyclopaedia for speaking with too much deference as to Comte's personality. 'That overweening French vanity and egotism not only overshadows great gifts, but impoverishes the character which nourished such a sentiment. It is not one of the weaknesses which we overlook in great men, and which are to go for nothing.' Of overweening egotism Pattison himself at any rate had none. This was partly due to his theory of ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 3 of 3) - Essay 5: On Pattison's Memoirs • John Morley
... physical awakening that pulses through the nerve-sick townsman when city airs and bald routine are left behind him, combined to provide me, however thankless a subject, with a solid background of resignation. Stowing this safely away, I could calculate my intentions with cold egotism. If the weather held I might pass a not intolerable fortnight with Davies. When it broke up, as it was sure to, I could easily excuse myself from the pursuit of the problematical ducks; the wintry logic of facts would, in any case, decide him to lay up his yacht, for ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers
... 1884, nothing has befallen me worthy of a polite reader's attention. I have endured the drudgery incident to earning a living; I have enjoyed the relaxations every wise man makes for himself. But I should be guilty of unpardonable egotism if I supposed that I myself was the only, or the most, interesting subject presented in the foregoing pages, and I feel I shall merely be doing my duty in briefly recording the facts in my possession concerning ...
— A Man of Mark • Anthony Hope
... have," said Lankford with calm egotism, "but it was necessary for me to do it. I've got an inquirin' mind, I have, and also a calculatin' one. When I saw your little troop comin', an' then that big troop of the Yankees comin' on behind, I knowed that you needed help. ...
— The Star of Gettysburg - A Story of Southern High Tide • Joseph A. Altsheler
... Writing," he generalised, and possibly not without some reason, "when it is n't the sordidest of trades, is a mere fatuous assertion of one's egotism. Breaking stones in the street were a nobler occupation; weaving ropes of sand were better sport. The only things that are worth writing are inexpressible, and can't be written. The only things that can be written are obvious and worthless—the very crackling ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... All egotism and insanity, this, gentlemen. Hard words to use; but not too hard to define the faults which rendered so much of Duerer's great genius abortive, and to this day paralyze, among the details of a lifeless and ambitious precision, the student, no less than the artist, of German blood. ...
— Ariadne Florentina - Six Lectures on Wood and Metal Engraving • John Ruskin
... remainder of this hour I invite you to seek with me some principle to make our tolerance less chaotic. And, as I began my previous lecture by a personal reminiscence, I am going to ask your indulgence for a similar bit of egotism now. ...
— Talks To Teachers On Psychology; And To Students On Some Of Life's Ideals • William James
... at him with those blue, ecstatic eyes, so oblivious to his pain that for a moment a sort of impersonal amazement at such self-centredness held him silent. But after the first shock he spoke with a slow fluency that pierced Athalia's egotism and stirred an answering astonishment in her. His weeks of vague misgiving, deepening into keen apprehension, had given him protests and arguments which, although they never convinced her, silenced her temporarily. She had never ...
— The Way to Peace • Margaret Deland
... opinion these signs speak pretty clearly, though not so as to authorise them to anticipate the final judgment absolutely. Genius, all but of the highest, can hardly be denied to Mr. Meredith: but it is genius marred, perhaps by unfortunate education, certainly by undue egotism, by a certain Celtic tapage, and by a too painful and elaborate endeavour to be unlike ...
— The English Novel • George Saintsbury
... person (his favourite figure) he shadows forth the forlorn estate of a country-boy placed at a London school, far from his friends and connections—in direct opposition to his own early history. If it be egotism to imply and twine with his own identity the griefs and affections of another—making himself many, or reducing many unto himself—then is the skilful novelist, who all along brings in his hero, or heroine, speaking of themselves, ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... sadly resigned were their faces. They were all of an age when mankind is sulky and fretful, and natural sensibilities are chiefly exercised at table and on the things relating to personal comfort. Religious egotism had long dried up those hearts devoted to narrow duties and entrenched behind pious practices. Silent games of cards occupied the whole evening, and the two young girls under the ban of that Sanhedrim enforced by maternal severity, came to hate ...
— A Daughter of Eve • Honore de Balzac
... honest industry in which you ever took part; to one single act of yourself that ever contributed to the welfare or the advancement of the working people? Can you point to one single act in your career that was ever based on any other motive than absolute egotism and selfishness; to one single utterance, act, word, or deed of yourself that was not based on selfishness and a desire to rob or misrepresent or, in some other manner, attach the earnings of the people to your coffers ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson
... think,— he must certainly have grown inordinately, outrageously selfish!— his irritation at the prospective return of Miss Vancourt proved it. He determined to brace himself together and put the lurking devil of egotism down. ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... field I would gladly have yielded him all honors, but his attentions to Esther were altogether too marked to please either me or my employer. I am free to admit that I was troubled by this turn of affairs. The junior mail contractor made up in egotism what he lacked in appearance, and no doubt had money to burn, as star route mail contracting was profitable those days, while I had nothing but my monthly wages. To make matters more embarrassing, a blind man could ...
— A Texas Matchmaker • Andy Adams
... in haste, to find friends and players waiting. Emphasize his egotism and self-centeredness as they start off ...
— Writing the Photoplay • J. Berg Esenwein and Arthur Leeds
... experience the dangers of frankness and friendly criticism, and that even the most patriotic and unselfish men in these modern times, like those of antiquity "have their ambitions which neither seas nor mountains nor unpeopled deserts can limit;" their egotism and personal interests "which neither victory nor far-reaching fame can suppress;" their secret motives and purposes which "cause them to injure one another when they touch and are close together." After all, generals and ...
— Heroes of the Great Conflict; Life and Services of William Farrar - Smith, Major General, United States Volunteer in the Civil War • James Harrison Wilson
... directing its energies for re-election, and yet compelling that result by the logic of events and by the imperious necessities of the situation. To that most desirable consummation I feel that, next to yourself, I can possibly contribute as much influence as any other one man. I say this not from egotism or vainglory, but merely as a deduction from a plain analysis of the political forces which have been at work in the country for five years past, and which have been significantly shown in two great national ...
— Bay State Monthly, Vol. II, No. 1, October, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... misery she would cause, reckless of what future might be in store for herself. But the first sign of yielding on her father's part touched the gentler elements of her nature. Thus was she constituted; merciless in egotism when put to the use of all her weapons, moved to warmest gratitude as soon as concession was made to her. To be on ill terms with her father had caused her pain, the only effect of which, however, ...
— The Nether World • George Gissing
... some sentiment of compassion softened Lady Audley's glance as it fell upon that noble, reposing figure. For a moment the horrible egotism of her own misery yielded to her pitying tenderness for another. It was perhaps only a semi-selfish tenderness after all, in which pity for herself was as powerful as pity for her husband; but for once in a way, her thoughts ran ...
— Lady Audley's Secret • Mary Elizabeth Braddon
... should be told the absolute truth. But—is that possible? I haven't been able to do it, and all my life I've loved the truth, and I've prided myself upon being truthful. Maybe that was only egotism. I'm learning much, my friend. Some of those blinding scales have fallen from my eyes. And—and as to caring for you, I think I care a great deal. How much, how little, I couldn't say. My heart is almost broken. Lassiter. So now is not a good time to judge of affection. I can still play and be merry ...
— Riders of the Purple Sage • Zane Grey
... had not lost a single one of the tortures she had endured for the last four days. Now he thought that he had discovered enough to allow him to risk a step that, until then, he would have deemed dangerous; and with the egotism common to all men, even the best of lovers, he trusted in the weakness ...
— Gerfaut, Complete • Charles de Bernard
... sex. Mrs. TODD has not as yet been irresistibly seized by the movement; but if TIMOTHY knows himself, he longs for the day when the seizer may come. Although TODD—who is the writer of this epistle—says it, who perhaps shouldn't, lest the shaft of egotism be hurled mercilessly at him, he does unhesitatingly say that to aid this movement he would make the greatest of sacrifices. He is willing to sacrifice his wife and other female relations upon the sacred altar of the movement, and contribute liberally to the expense thereof. ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 5, April 30, 1870 • Various
... you probably all make one mistake about me: you take me for the alumni of some university. Not so. I'm a self-made man. I made myself; and considering that I'm the first man I ever made, I think—pardon the seeming egotism—I think I've done well. A few years ago there dwelt in humble obscurity among the granite hills of New England, earning his bread by the sweat of his brow upon his father's farm, a youth to fortune and to fame unknown. ...
— Bonaventure - A Prose Pastoral of Acadian Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... patriots. What happened in the last century will happen again whenever and wherever human society ceases to be held together by the idea of Duty. It is not the discontent of Labour which makes me most anxious as to the future. It is the egotism of Capital, educated and encouraged into egotism by the false doctrines of what is called Liberalism in this country, and provoked into egotism by the equally egotistic discontent of Labour. What I most value in the work of ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert
... think Mr. Dale liked it," he remarked, smiling. "They are not bad fellows at heart, but they've got the poison in their systems which seems, somehow or other, to become part of the equipment of the politician—self-interest, over-egotism, contraction of interest. It makes one ...
— A People's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... have something to do with their having groups wars. The egotism of their individual spirits is allowed scant expression, so the egotism of the groups is extremely ferocious and active. Is this one of the reasons why ants fight so much? We have seen the same phenomenon occur in certain nations ...
— This Simian World • Clarence Day Jr.
... an article on "Jealousy" (Free Review, Sept., 1896), in opposition to those who believe that jealousy "makes the home," declares that, on the contrary, it is the chief force that unmakes the home. "So long as egotism waters it with the tears of sentiment and shields it from the cold blasts of scientific inquiry, so long will it thrive. But the time will come when it will be burned in the Garden of Love as a noxious weed. ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... one weak spot in his armour—and the world never suspected it: the consuming passion with which he loved his two children. This was the side of his nature he had hidden from the eyes of man. A refined egotism, this passion, perhaps—for he meant to live his own life over in them—yet it was the one utterly human and lovable thing about him. And if his public policy was one of stupendous avarice, this dream of millions of confiscated wealth he meant to seize, ...
— The Clansman - An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan • Thomas Dixon
... the Arab, is hospitably inclined, without any sentiment of egotism, and certainly without any other idea than that of relieving suffering humanity: so that when a stranger appears before an Indian hut at meal-time, were the poor Indian only to have what was strictly necessary for his family, it is his greatest pleasure to invite and press the ...
— Adventures in the Philippine Islands • Paul P. de La Gironiere
... self-forgetfulness, when one's mind is dwelling on life's purposes and aims—that the spirit shines through the face, as through a transparency, and the true character is seen. Lottie saw Hemstead's face grow so noble and manly, so free from every trace of the meanness of egotism and selfishness, that in the depths of her soul she respected him as she had never any man before. Instinctively she placed Julian De Forrest, the rich and elegant idler, beside this earnest man, self-consecrated ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe
... no doubt; but what matter, provided the sentiment that gives birth to this weakness is the strongest and purest of all? What matter if a limpid stream springs up between two paving stones? Are we to be blamed for being generous out of egotism, and for devoting ourselves to others for ...
— Monsieur, Madame and Bebe, Complete • Gustave Droz
... implicitly relied. In the first revulsion of feeling, I was perhaps unjust to my associates. I see now, more clearly, the causes of those vagaries, which originated in a genuine aspiration, and failed from an ignorance of the true nature of Man, quite as much as from the egotism of the individuals. Other attempts at reorganizing Society were made about the same time by men of culture and experience, but in the A.C. we had neither. Our leaders had caught a few half-truths, which, in their minds, were ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 • Various
... is a bank in which you deposit certain funds of character, intellect and heart; or other funds of egotism, hard-heartedness and unconcern; or deposit—nothing! And the bank honors your deposit, and no more. In other words, you can draw nothing out but ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... initiate any law; amendments on laws submitted to it by the President cannot even be discussed until they have received the sanction of the Council of State. All these bodies are mere instruments of the despotic will and selfish egotism of M. Bonaparte. ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 5, No. 3, March, 1852 • Various
... the chin, an eager glance in the eye, a sensitive curve of the lip attracted his boyish egotism. The portrait was an ideal, something to live up to. Involuntarily he ...
— The Fortunate Youth • William J. Locke
... passage, and an unabashed magnificent masculine egotism speaks in every line of it. Whenever I read it I think of the little girl in Punch whose little brother called to her, "Come here, Effie. I wants you." And Effie answered, "Thank you, Archie, but I wants myself!" Herr Riehl quotes the passage at the end of his own exhortations to his countrywomen, ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... altercation with Brachiano and Flamineo, Webster clearly intended her to pass for a magnificent vixen, a beautiful and queenly termagant. Her boldness is the audacity of impudence, which does not condescend to entertain the thought of guilt. Her egotism is so hard and so profound that the very victims whom she sacrifices to ambition seem in her sight justly punished. Of Camillo and Isabella, her husband and his wife, ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series • John Addington Symonds
... he said to Dart, as they stood and talked together afterward, "Faith as a little child. That is literally hers. And I was shocked by it—and tried to destroy it, until I suddenly saw what I was doing. I was—in my cloddish egotism—trying to show her that she was irreverent BECAUSE she could believe what in my soul I do not, though I dare not admit so much even to myself. She took from some strange passing visitor to her tortured bedside what was to her a revelation. ...
— The Dawn of a To-morrow • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... has no peculiarity, no importunate topic; but all is duly given; no views, no curiosities; no cow-painter, no bird-fancier, no mannerist is he: he has no discoverable egotism; the great he tells greatly; the small, subordinately. He is wise without emphasis or assertion; he is strong, as nature is strong, who lifts the land into mountain slopes without effort, and by the ...
— Elementary Guide to Literary Criticism • F. V. N. Painter
... and great for man to do, who had consecrated his every hour and minute to the attainment of his end; and though his aim was in itself a good one, the undivided concentration which the pursuit of it required had driven him into a state outwardly resembling extreme egotism. He had loved his own purposes as he had loved nothing else, and as he had been persuaded that he could love nothing else, in the whole world. Now, suddenly, ...
— An American Politician • F. Marion Crawford
... and fear are great enemies of human life. A depressed, sour, melancholy soul, a life which has ceased to believe in its own sacredness, its own power, its own mission, a life which sinks into querulous egotism or vegetating aimlessness, has become crippled and useless. We should fight against every influence which tends to depress the mind, as we would against a temptation to crime. It is undoubtedly true that, as a ...
— Cheerfulness as a Life Power • Orison Swett Marden
... conscious of the baseness of the mere weighing of such a choice; but he was engulfed in his overmastering egotism; his sense of obligation was dulled by the supreme selfishness of a lifetime, of a lifetime of unbridled temper and appetite, of a swaggering self-esteem which the remorseless operation of fate had ignored, had passed indifferently by, leaving him ...
— Mountain Blood - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer
... From that egotism he was awakened to a different one, by the thought that this day meant war and the change of all things he knew. He realised, with increasing resentment, that music would be neglected. And he wouldn't be able, for example, to camp out. He might have to volunteer for military training and service. ...
— Letters from America • Rupert Brooke
... in their gorgeous egotism. We are the braggarts, and ascribe egotism to God Himself; while we are the sole objects of interest in the universe. God was and is on our account only; and when men fancy that they have found a way of running ...
— Bart Ridgeley - A Story of Northern Ohio • A. G. Riddle
... condemned is a fatal deviation of this sentiment which destroys its effect and narrows its actions. What we need to prevent is the degeneration of personal interest into an egotism which parches, instead of fertilizing, and which compromises the future by the exclusive search after present advantage; for egotism is short-sighted. On the other hand, the broader and more generous feeling ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • William Roscher
... people may be brilliant, but they can never be agreeable. You feel that they are impatient to have their own turn come, and have none of the gentle receptiveness so pleasing to our own ego that rebels against their egotism. ...
— Social Life - or, The Manners and Customs of Polite Society • Maud C. Cooke
... fashion, taste, and many other fooleries, in imitation of their betters, and had a very decided and becoming horror of anything which could, by possibility, be considered low. He was hospitable from ostentation, illiberal from ignorance, and prejudiced from conceit. Egotism and the love of display induced him to keep an excellent table: convenience, and a love of good things of this life, ensured him plenty of guests. He liked to have clever men, or what he considered such, ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... savour of vanity and egotism my recording this conversation, but I do it chiefly for the purpose of showing how much of hearty gratitude there is for mere trifles among the poor, for the woman who was thus complimentary to me never received a farthing ...
— My Doggie and I • R.M. Ballantyne
... the warmth of the author's feeling may appear ill- advised to the reader; it may be that he will find his opinions ridiculous and beside the mark on every page. I have merely sought to sun my vanity and egotism, to bring them forth into the air, so that my aesthetic susceptibilities might ...
— Youth and Egolatry • Pio Baroja
... "Pardon the egotism, in consideration of the occasion, when I say to you that my father and my uncles fought through the Revolution of 1776, giving their youth, their blood, and their little patrimony to the constitutional freedom which I claim as my inheritance. Three of my brothers fought in ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis
... for money, downright hypocrisy, would-be gentility, self-sufficient vanity, fashionable swindling, misanthropy, heartlessness, plain common-sense, knowledge of the world, coarse jealousy, irresolution, impudence, pride of birth, egotism, self-conceit, pusillanimity, ingenuity, roguery, affectations, homeliness, thoughtlessness, pedantry, arrogance, and many more faults and vices, find their representatives. The language which they employ is always natural to them, and is neither too gross nor over-refined. ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 11 • Various
... that Byron's moral perversion never paralysed or obscured his intellectual powers, though it might lower their aims. With regard to the plan and style of his works, he showed strong good sense and clear judgment. The man who indulged such narrowing egotism, such irrational scorn, would prime and polish without mercy the stanzas in which he uttered them." (Wonderful! that an egotist and a misanthrope should have been kept from defacing his own verses. Then ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 385. November, 1847. • Various
... and at home; George on circuit, always obliged by your proffered hospitality; and Charles John and Henry returning from a voyage to Alexandria in papa's own vessel, the 'Statira.' I set you an imperfect example of egotism, and hope that you will double my I's and we's, and kindly trust to me for ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1 of 2) • Frederic G. Kenyon
... the beautiful Lady Stutfield, who was always obliged to wear a black velvet band round her throat to hide the mark of five fingers burnt upon her white skin, and who drowned herself at last in the carp-pond at the end of the King's Walk. With the enthusiastic egotism of the true artist, he went over his most celebrated performances, and smiled bitterly to himself as he recalled to mind his last appearance as "Red Reuben, or the Strangled Babe," his debut as "Guant Gibeon, the Blood-sucker of Bexley Moor," and ...
— The Canterville Ghost • Oscar Wilde
... to inform you of what I had done and ask your advice. But my egotism got the better of me. I felt that I ought to make sure that I was not the victim of a coincidence. Such a respectable house! Such a respectable maidservant! Should she recognize the parasol as belonging to her mistress, then, indeed, I might boast of my success. So praying you for a loan of ...
— The Circular Study • Anna Katharine Green
... fragrance of a late-blooming flower of hereditary honour. His violence indeed had been subdued and he had learned to be irreproachably polite; but he had lost the fineness of his generosity, and his politeness, which in the long run society paid for, was hardly more than a form of luxurious egotism, like his fondness for ciphered pocket-handkerchiefs, lavender gloves and other fopperies by which shopkeepers remained out of pocket. In after-years he was terribly polite to his wife. He had formed himself, as the ...
— Madame de Mauves • Henry James
... enlighten the house with a modicum of information. The last time I heard him hold forth was as an apologist for the tumultuary loyalists at the Mansion House Meeting, when he delivered himself in a manner so heterogeneal of commonsense, and so completely in a style of egotism, as to excite the ridicule and risibility of the whole house, and discompose the gravity of even ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... seemed to me, was her perfect frankness. As we whirled along on our way across England, she told us everything about herself, her family, her friends, her neighbours, and the population of Kansas City in general. Not obtrusively or egotistically,—of egotism Melissa would be wholly incapable,—but in a certain timid, confiding, half-childlike way, as of the lost little girl, that was absolutely captivating. "Oh no, ma'am," she said, in answer to one of Lucy's earliest questions; ...
— Stories by English Authors: The Sea • Various
... from infancy, who had loved her in obscurity, and to whom her fame gave the purest and most exquisite delight. Nothing can be more unjust than to confound these outpourings of a kind heart, sure of perfect sympathy, with the egotism of a bluestocking, who prates to all who come near her about her own novel or ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... wish to show how, at Tuskegee, we are trying to work out the plan of industrial training, and trust I shall be pardoned the seeming egotism if I preface the sketch with a few words, by way of example, as to the expansion of my own life and how I came to undertake the ...
— The Future of the American Negro • Booker T. Washington
... miles, to a station of the same name, took us from Madrid to the Escurial, which the Spaniards in their egotism call the eighth wonder of the world. This vast pile of buildings, composed entirely of granite, and as uniform as a military barrack, is nearly a mile in circumference,—tomb, palace, cathedral, monastery, ...
— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou
... old man," he said, with supreme egotism, "and you cannot expect to have me with you ...
— From One Generation to Another • Henry Seton Merriman
... Because human nature is filled with egotism. There is nothing so interesting to oneself as oneself; and journals cannot yawn in one's face, no matter how lengthy the expression ...
— Man and Maid • Elinor Glyn
... but the character of recalls and results. Its immediate effect had been indeed rather to lighten insistence—almost to provoke a reaction; as if their topic had dropped by its own weight and as if moreover, for that matter, Marcher had been visited by one of his occasional warnings against egotism. He had kept up, he felt, and very decently on the whole, his consciousness of the importance of not being selfish, and it was true that he had never sinned in that direction without promptly enough trying to press the scales the other way. He often repaired his fault, the season permitting, by inviting ...
— The Beast in the Jungle • Henry James
... analysis of the inner life, the estimated intentions and emotions, of the beings nearest to him. It was inhuman stuff. But Worth was right; there was no soil for suicide in this matter written by a hand guided by a harsh, censorious mind; too much egotism here to willingly give over the role of conscience for his friends. Friends?—could a man have friends who regarded humanity through such unkindly, wide open, ...
— The Million-Dollar Suitcase • Alice MacGowan
... life): tombs, pictures, silver hearts and votive pictures of accidents and illnesses, paper flowers, marbled woodwork pews, hangings. And each generation also wearing something away, the bricks and marble discs into unevenness, the columns into polish, effacing with their tread the egotism of the effigies, reducing them to that mere film, mere outline of rigid feet, cushioned head and folded hands which is ...
— The Spirit of Rome • Vernon Lee
... to the intelligent reader, and that they may delineate Landor in more truthful colors than those in which he has heretofore been painted. In repeating conversations, I have endeavored to stand in the background, where I very properly belong. For the inevitable egotism of the personal pronoun, I hope to be pardoned by all charitable souls. That Landor, the octogenarian, has not been photographed by a more competent person, is certainly not my fault. Having had the good fortune to enjoy opportunities beyond my deserts, I should have shown a great want ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various
... feeling—his temper so even and kindly—his courage so heroic—that he is unquestionably the most amiable and interesting of the dramatis personae, preferable to D'Artagnan, to whom premature worldly wisdom gives a hardness bordering upon egotism. While Aramis is sighing sonnets to his mistress, and Porthos parading on the crown of the causeway in all the glory of gold lace and embroidery, Athos sits tranquilly at home, and says, like Gregory in ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... Balzac's relations to his mother, Mr. F. Lawton (Balzac) states: "Madame Balzac was sacrificed to his improvidence and stupendous egotism; nor can the tenderness of the language—more frequently than not called forth by some fresh immolation of her comfort to his interests—disguise this unpleasing side of his character and action. . . . And ...
— Women in the Life of Balzac • Juanita Helm Floyd
... wrote mostly in German, in which he was quite at home; his chief works, a pastoral epic, "Parthenais oder die Alpenreise," and a mock epic, "Adam and Eve"; his minor pieces are numerous and popular, though from his egotism and irritability he was ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... disputed by learneder clerks than I. So I quietly let it occupy the place it had usurped upon my shelves, and should never have thought of issuing an ejectment against it; for why should I be so bigoted as to allow rites of hospitality to none but my own books, children, &c.?—a species of egotism I abhor from my heart. No; let 'em all snug together, Hebrews and Proselytes of the gate; no selfish partiality of mine shall make distinction between them; I charge no warehouse-room for my friends' commodities; ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas
... charged, or half-charged, with suppressing facts, 'because they do not reflect credit upon the subject of his biography.' Now, there were really no facts to suppress. Borrow was at times a very irritable man, he was a very self-centred one. His egotism might even be pronounced amazing by those who had never met an author. But those of us who have, recognise that with very few exceptions they are all egotists, although some conceal it from the unobservant more deftly than ...
— George Borrow and His Circle - Wherein May Be Found Many Hitherto Unpublished Letters Of - Borrow And His Friends • Clement King Shorter
... type, and rigorously to deny him the use (except in their accustomed and orthodox places) of capitals, small capitals, and italics. And I cannot think that any irreverence could be charged against an editor who had the courage to put a moist pen through those expressions of egotism and naive self-satisfaction and vanity which do occasionally ...
— My Contemporaries In Fiction • David Christie Murray
... whose grand-daughter, Isabella of Aragon, had married Giovanni Galeazzo Sforza, and was now the rightful Duchess of Milan. When the Florentine ambassador at Milan asked him how he had the courage to expose Italy to such peril, his reply betrayed the egotism of his policy: "You talk to me of Italy; but when have I looked Italy in the face? No one ever gave a thought to my affairs. I have, therefore, had to give them such security as ...
— New Italian sketches • John Addington Symonds
... Too full of egotism and self-importance to note her sarcasm, the young man beamed with self-satisfaction as ...
— Bought and Paid For - From the Play of George Broadhurst • Arthur Hornblow
... For all the papers, which discussed Your wedding plans, shall turn your cake to crust, Publish your letters and your photographs, And trail your Egotism in the dust! ...
— The Rubaiyat of a Bachelor • Helen Rowland
... thought "There's a difference somewhere." Being a supreme egotist Ardita frequently thought about herself; never having had her egotism disputed she did it entirely naturally and with no detraction from her unquestioned charm. Though she was nineteen she gave the effect of a high-spirited precocious child, and in the present glow of her ...
— Flappers and Philosophers • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... I shall give no anecdotes of others, but I shall simply recall scenes in which I myself have shared, preferring even a character for egotism rather than relate the statements of hearsay, for the truth of which I could not vouch. This must be accepted as an excuse for the unpleasant use ...
— The Rifle and The Hound in Ceylon • Samuel White Baker
... animated, began to be innovated upon and abandoned by those grosser characters who centred their sum of happiness in procuring the personal objects on which they had fixed their own exclusive attachment. The same egotism had indeed displayed itself even in more primitive ages; but it was now for the first time openly avowed as a professed principle of action. The spirit of chivalry had in it this point of excellence, that, however overstrained and fantastic many of its doctrines ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... it on the face, and their ears were singularly minute. The mouths were small, with bright red, rather thin lips, and the little chins ran to a point. The eyes were large and mild; and—this may seem egotism on my part—I fancied even that there was a certain lack of the interest I ...
— The Time Machine • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... hero in the eyes of the ignorant and dissipated classes. Betwixt the fumes of the brandy which he so freely drank and the folly of the melodramatic parts which he was wont to act, his brain became saturated with a passion for notoriety, which grew into the very mania of egotism. His crime was as stupid as it was barbarous; and even from his own point of view his achievement was actually worse than a failure. As an act of revenge against a man whom he hated, he accomplished nothing, for he did not inflict upon Mr. Lincoln so much ...
— Abraham Lincoln, Vol. II • John T. Morse
... on this subject, we should remember with gentleness the order of society from which our nurses are drawn; and that those who make their duty a study, and are termed professional nurses, have much to endure from the caprice and egotism of their employers; while others are driven to the occupation from the laudable motive of feeding their own children, and who, in fulfilling that object, are too often both selfish and sensual, performing, without further ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... the outrage on the Queen proved to be the morbid egotism of an ill-conditioned, ignorant, half-crazy lad; showing that one more danger exists for sovereigns—a peril born entirely of their high and solitary rank with its fascination for envious, irritable, ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen V.1. • Sarah Tytler
... own good. Do you want me to minister to his insufferable vanity? Hasn't he egotism enough already? I saw in a paper a while ago that his most popular book had sold to the extent of over 100,000 copies in America. I suppose that is something wonderful; but what does it amount to ...
— One Day's Courtship - The Heralds Of Fame • Robert Barr
... lieutenants of our frigate call for no special characterization. If egotism, the most amusing of traits where it is not offensive, existed among them to any unusual degree, it was modified and concealed by the acquired exterior of social usage. Their interests also were wider. With them, talk was less of self and personal ...
— From Sail to Steam, Recollections of Naval Life • Captain A. T. Mahan
... a few words, and, so to speak, in parenthesis, as an event long foreseen without much importance. And yet he owed him a great deal. Patricius was hard pressed, and he took immense trouble to provide the means for his son's education. But with the fine egotism of youth, Augustin perhaps thought it enough to have profited by his father's sacrifices, and dispensed himself from gratitude. In any case, his affection for his father must have been rather lukewarm; the natural differences between them ...
— Saint Augustin • Louis Bertrand
... marriage, it is interesting, if nothing more, to consider the efforts of the priest to give it an attribute of sanctity, to call it a sacrament. In truth, marriage is the most artificial of the relations which exist in the social body. It is a device of man at his worst—a mixture of slavery, savage egotism and priestcraft. It is indicated by nothing in the physical constitution of either male or female. It is an anomaly; a contract which can be freely entered into by the most unfit, but which cannot be broken, though both parties ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 2, April 1906 - Monthly Magazine Devoted to Social Science and Literature • Various
... far away from those of vanity and dissipation. In the first place, he seems to have been a passionate reader. To his love of books he is constantly referring; indeed, this may be said to be the only kind of egotism which he seems to take a pleasure in indulging. At the opening of his earliest extant poem of consequence, the "Book of the Duchess," he tells us how he preferred to drive away a night rendered sleepless through melancholy thoughts, by means of a book, which he thought better entertainment than ...
— Chaucer • Adolphus William Ward |
