"Awful" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... mouth, which would have been without parallel but for that of his opponent, who, far from being intimidated, opened an identical one. The dragon dashed furiously against his intrepid adversary, giving such an awful blow with his head against the mirror that he was completely stunned; and as he had broken the glass, and in every piece saw a piece of his own body, he fancied that with one blow he had dashed his ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various
... to think each thoughtless youth Contained of wickedness a skinful, And burnt to teach the awful truth, That walking out ...
— The Bab Ballads • W. S. Gilbert
... thing, we shan't have so much risk of coming across drifting icebergs, most of them will be frozen up hard and fast down in the south. They don't matter much when the weather is clear, but if it is thick one has an awful time of it. On my first voyage it was like that, and I tell you I didn't think I was going to see England again. We ...
— The Treasure of the Incas • G. A. Henty
... had good qualities, and I know for certain that he never did half the bad things laid to his charge; for example, he never bribed Tom Oliver to fight cross, as it was said he did on the day of the awful thunder-storm. Ned Flatnose fairly beat Tom Oliver, for though Ned was not what's called a good fighter, he had a particular blow, which if he could put in he was sure to win. His right shoulder, ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow
... imagination, which are at first pursued by one who has freed himself from the power of the senses. He has got so far that his spirit acts freely, but is not initiated. He pursues illusions, from the power of which he must break loose. Odysseus has to accomplish the awful passage between Scylla and Charybdis. The Mystic, at the beginning of the path wavers between spirit and sensuousness. He cannot yet grasp the full value of spirit, yet sensuousness has already lost its former attraction. ...
— Christianity As A Mystical Fact - And The Mysteries of Antiquity • Rudolf Steiner
... himself with the awful duties imposed on him, the new juror resolved to mingle with the throng and look on at a case before the Tribunal as a member of the general public. He climbed the great stairs on which a vast crowd was seated as in an amphitheatre and pushed his way into the ...
— The Gods are Athirst • Anatole France
... saw me, and she looked at Sir Joseph—so she told me afterward—and then they got up and stole 'way up front just as I left the stage—to make a quick change, you know. I came back—in tights, playing a big trombone, prancing round and making an awful noise. Lady Webling gave a little scream; nobody heard her because I made a loud blat on the trombone in the ear of the black-face clown, and he gave a shriek and did a funny ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... leave thee as a prey. But at least, thou hast returned, and only just in time: for hadst thou stayed away another day, I could not have endured. I thought thee dead, for day by day, I waited, and day by day, thou didst not come: and each night was longer, and more awful than the last. And I sought thee in every quarter of the wood, but thou wert not to be found. And now, lo! there before my eyes, hardly to be believed, thou art; and now I am almost ready once more to die, for joy, that is mingled, I know not how, with an agony of grief. And yet, I ...
— Bubbles of the Foam • Unknown
... that his whole family, were sold as slaves? The truth was, we stopped the natural progress of civilization in Africa. We cut her off from the opportunity of improvement. We kept her down in a state of darkness, bondage, ignorance, and bloodshed. Was not this an awful consideration for this country? Look at the map of Africa, and see how little useful intercourse had been established on that vast continent! While other countries were assisting and enlightening each other, Africa alone had none of these benefits. We had obtained as yet only so much ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... who marched behind Major J. Brooks Nichols between solid crowds of cheering home-folks on July 4th at Belle Isle could not help feeling that the city of Detroit was proud of the record of the men who had weathered that awful campaign. It was a greeting that we had not dreamed of those days away up there in the northland when we were watching the snow and ice melt and waiting news of the ...
— The History of the American Expedition Fighting the Bolsheviki - Campaigning in North Russia 1918-1919 • Joel R. Moore
... of bad news for you, then," added the first speaker. "It ain't so awful bad, though. One of your friends—Winter, I think ...
— The Submarine Boys' Lightning Cruise - The Young Kings of the Deep • Victor G. Durham
... as she called it; and she scolded the beadle soundly for neglecting his duty towards it. He promised obedience for the future, dug out all the weeds that were creeping round the family vault, and (having charge of the key) entered that awful place, and swept and dusted the melancholy contents of ...
— Stories of Comedy • Various
... window that throws its beams so far when we are bewildered in a murky night. For the place was now a moral coal-hole. The dungeons at Rome that lie under the wing of Roderick Borgia's successors are not a more awful remnant of antiquity or a fouler blot on the age, on the law, on the land, ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... to see you, Carey," he said. "My people don't feel inclined to hold those shares any more, the market's in such an awful state, and they want ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham
... careful in wrapping yourself as you go downstairs," said Bell, who stood by the tray on which she had brought up the toast and tea. "The cold is what you would call awful." ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... house to house,—first to fifteen, then to forty, then to sixty. Some were armed with muskets, some with axes, some with scythes, some came on their masters' horses. As the numbers increased, they could be divided, and the awful work was carried on more rapidly still. The plan then was for an advanced guard of horsemen to approach each house at a gallop, and surround it till the others came up. Meanwhile, what agonies of terror must have taken place within, shared alike by innocent and by guilty! what memories of wrongs ...
— Black Rebellion - Five Slave Revolts • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... teased her about being afraid of the crystal, so she said she would just look in it once more. She took the ball, but immediately laid it down again, saying, "No, I won't look, as the bed with the awful man in ...
— The Making of Religion • Andrew Lang
... you, is it, Sol? I didn't know but what it was—Do, for mercy's sake don't be talking about the last judgment, and such awful things—I declare to man, you put me all of a trimble," said Miss Nancy, by way of accounting for her palpitations, as she unbarred the door, and admitted her learned nephew. Dr. Solomon Weismann seemed dreadfully downhearted ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... look up to him and respect him as one of the cleverest newspaper men in the country. Personally, I like old Smith fine, though nobody ever gets close to him a bit. He's mighty good to me—lets me write little editorials two or three times a week, and says I'm not so awful at it. As for sympathizing with his policies—well, you know I'm not sure Smith sympathizes with 'em much himself. I have a kind of private hunch that he's gotten sore on his job and would sell out if somebody—well, suppose we say our friend Ryan—would ...
— Captivating Mary Carstairs • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... "They're something awful, that's what I say," said Lizzie presently in a cautious undertone. "But I've been here twelve years, and I say there's worse places! Miss Ella may be a little raspy now, Miss Brown, but don't you take it to heart!" Susan, the better for hot coffee and human sympathy, laughed ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... escape his grasp. I believed that my last moment had come. I gave myself up in despair, and thought of Flora—what would become of her. I asked God to forgive all my sins—which seemed like a mountain to me in that awful moment. ...
— Down The River - Buck Bradford and His Tyrants • Oliver Optic
... "and your life is saved. My sons stand at the threshold of the inn, ready to fall upon you when you leave. I countermand the order for your destruction. Here you shall stay, an honoured guest, till the end of your days, as a recompense for saving my life on that awful night." ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes
... varied with shades and scented with flowers: the composition of Shakespeare is a forest in which oaks extend their branches, and pines tower in the air, interspersed sometimes with weeds and brambles, and sometimes giving shelter to myrtles and to roses; filling the eye with awful pomp, and gratifying the ...
— Whitman - A Study • John Burroughs
... hand on his forehead, charm away his pain, and bring sleep to his horror-stricken bed. He had done nothing to vex her; nay, every petition she had urged—But suddenly the image rose before him of old Vindex and his nephew, whom he had sent to execution in spite of her intercession; and again the awful word, "the deed," rang in his inward ear. Were these hideous thoughts to haunt him ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... in a tone of compassion, "thy crisis is past, and thy choice made! I can only bid thee be bold and prosper; yes, I resign thee to a master who HAS the power and the will to open to thee the gates of an awful world. Thy weal or woe are as nought in the eyes of his relentless wisdom. I would bid him spare thee, but he will heed me not. Mejnour, receive thy pupil!" Glyndon turned, and his heart beat when he perceived that the stranger, whose footsteps he had not heard upon the pebbles, ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... story am not a long one. Dat man dat bought me he rode in two days someting like one hundred miles. It wor a lucky ting dat Jake had tramp on his feet de last four years, else soon enough he tumble down, and den de rope round him neck hang him. Jake awful footsore and tired when he git to de end ob dat journey. De Kentucky man he lib in a clearing not far from a village. He had two oder slaves; dey hoe de ground and work for him. He got grown-up son, who look after dem while him fader away fighting. Dey not ...
— True to the Old Flag - A Tale of the American War of Independence • G. A. Henty
... the plaintive chant which follows the play, during which all the dead men rise to their feet in a silent and awful manner, like the ghosts of Napoleon's soldiers in the Midnight Review. Afterwards the door opened, and Fairway appeared on the threshold, accompanied by Christian and another. They had been waiting outside for the conclusion of the ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy
... authority still more imposing and awful. When little children were brought into the presence of the Son of God, his disciples proposed to send them away; but he said, "Suffer little children to come unto me." Unto me; he did not send them first for lessons ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... fifty-ninth and sixtieth chapters of Isaiah. The former of these two chapters is occupied with a description in very dark lines of the sins of God's covenant people (ver. 1-15), and of God's interposition in awful majesty to vindicate his own cause (ver. 16-21). Immediately upon this follows, in the sixtieth chapter, a vision of the latter-day glory that has no parallel in the Old Testament for brightness, extending down to the full establishment of the millennial age. But when shall ...
— Companion to the Bible • E. P. Barrows
... attached to the religion that was by law established. It is true that many Episcopalians, in the reign of Charles II, charged the Puritans, not only as being the mainspring, but as possessing the overwhelming force in that awful struggle, forgetting that the Nonconformists were then but a handful of men, neither possessed of wealth nor influence. To attribute victory to so small a band, must refer it to the immediate interposition of the Most High, as ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... thunders of thy voice, As if across the billows unenthralled Thy Alps unto the Alleghanies called, Bid Liberty rejoice! Proclaim upon this trans-Atlantic strand The deeds which, more than their own awful mien, Make every crag of Switzerland sublime! And say to those whose feeble souls would lean, Not on themselves, but on some outstretched hand, That once a single mind sufficed to quell The malice of a tyrant; let them know That each may crowd in every ...
— Poems of Henry Timrod • Henry Timrod
... Eastern shepherd says that out of his great flock he can miss the individual face. A face is missing, as though a child were absent from the family circle. When a soul is wandering in the far country there is an awful gap in the Father's house! Is thy place ...
— My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year • John Henry Jowett
... including the command with which it ends. With a particular clearness did he seem to see the picture of the Great White Road, "straight as the way of the Spirit, and broad as the breast of Death," and of the little Hare travelling towards the awful Gates. ...
— The Mahatma and the Hare • H. Rider Haggard
... awful day, both outside and inside the prison—for all the prisoners knew what a savage death old Giles Corey was meeting. It seemed to Dulcibel afterwards, that if she had not been sustained by the power ...
— Dulcibel - A Tale of Old Salem • Henry Peterson
... 3. Hark! With what awful cry, His Spirit takes its flight; That cry, it smote His Mother's heart And wrapt her ...
— The St. Gregory Hymnal and Catholic Choir Book • Various
... go to one," answered the other; "I have a private tutor. I think schools are awful rot, where you're under masters, and have to do as you're told, like a lot of kids. I'm seventeen now. I'm going abroad this winter to learn French, then I'm coming home to read for the law. I say, why don't you ...
— Soldiers of the Queen • Harold Avery
... broken. Whether this had been the cause of his fall, could not be told; but ever when he races, as race he will, till the day of doom, along that mountain side, his gallop is mingled with the clank of the loose and broken shoe. For, like the sin, the punishment is awful; he shall carry about for ages the phantom-body of the girl, knowing that her soul is away, sitting with the soul of his brother, down in the deep ravine, or scaling with him the topmost crags of the towering mountain peaks. There are some who, from time to time, see the doomed man careering ...
— The Haunters & The Haunted - Ghost Stories And Tales Of The Supernatural • Various
... man, but I heard he was worn to a shadow, when he got back. He must have had an awful time of it, in the bush. What with hunger and thirst, and dodging the blacks, I don't know how he lived through it; but he looked contented and happy, in spite of his starvation, and they say it was wonderful to see how patient he was ...
— A Final Reckoning - A Tale of Bush Life in Australia • G. A. Henty
... that she was a stupid or a near-sighted woman—the mother of clever sons never is—but she was a perfectly immovable rock of social and political orthodoxy. The three Le Breton boys—for there was a third at home—would gladly have reformed the terrors of that awful drawing-room if they had dared; but they knew it was as much as their places were worth, Herbert said, to attempt a remonstrance, and they wisely left it alone, ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... silence; stillness &c (quiet) 265; peace, hush, lull; muteness &c 581; solemn silence, awful silence, dead silence, deathlike silence. V. be silent &c adj.; hold one's tongue &c (not speak) 585. render silent &c adj.; silence, still, hush; stifle, muffle, stop; muzzle, put to silence &c (render mute) 581. Adj. silent; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... said he, raising his cap to the commander, "under the influence of my awful disappointment at the failure of the Raven to outsail you, I was rude and ungentlemanly, and some of my forecastle habits came back to me. I beg your pardon; and I shall show you that I know how to be a gentleman, if I did forget ...
— A Victorious Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... it accounted for the origin of mankind, of the sun, moon, and stars, of the earth and the trees, it accounted for them as creations of a higher power than man, or, at all events, of a great and specially endowed man, and higher powers than man were of the unknown realm. The unknown was the awful. Primitive science and primitive belief were therefore on one and the same plane.[192] They were subjects to be treated with reverence and with awe. The story into which the myth was so frequently woven is not a story to those who believe in the truth of the myth. It assumes the personal shape, ...
— Folklore as an Historical Science • George Laurence Gomme
... Dominion over us, but now thou alone shalt be our Lord for ever. Then instead of your Perishing under the wrath of the Devils, God will fetch you to a place among those that fill up the Room of the Devils, left by their Fall from the Ethereal Regions. It was a most awful Speech made by the Devil, Possessing a young Woman, at a Village in Germany, By the command of God, I am come to Torment the Body of this young Woman, tho I cannot hurt her Soul; and it is that ...
— The Wonders of the Invisible World • Cotton Mather
... throng the doctor's offices with both their real and imaginary complaints. These patients always feel that they are different from other people, that something terrible is the matter with them or that something awful is about to happen to them. Their brains constantly swarm with fears and premonitions of disease, disaster, and despair, while their otherwise brilliant intellects are confused and handicapped because of these "spoiled" and "hereditary" nervous disturbances—with ...
— The Mother and Her Child • William S. Sadler
... his attire, he added with an absent-minded smile, "I haven't time to dress either; it takes an awful slice out ...
— A Collection of Stories, Reviews and Essays • Willa Cather
... river was growing awful, yet it attracted and held the girls. The study bell rang unheeded. Miss Burkham came from her room to call their attention ...
— Hester's Counterpart - A Story of Boarding School Life • Jean K. Baird
... who at this time inhabited the banks of the Danube could not be made to part with money without some strong reasons for doing so. The Titanic and renowned captain, having exhausted a vocabulary that was awful to listen to, proceeded to lock the office door on the inside. That having been satisfactorily done, he proceeded to unrobe himself of an article of apparel; which movement, under certain conditions, is always suggestive of coming trouble. ...
— Windjammers and Sea Tramps • Walter Runciman
... and laying her hand firmly on Winnie's shoulder, said quietly, but with an awful meaning underlying her words, "Apologize at once, Miss Blake, or I shall resort to stronger measures, and also complain to your parents"—a threat which terrified ...
— Aunt Judith - The Story of a Loving Life • Grace Beaumont
... inspiration of the High Priest, and Racine anticipated that his boldness in presenting this might be censured by his contemporaries. The unity of place, which had been disregarded in Esther, is here preserved; the scene is the temple at Jerusalem; and by its impressive grandeur, and the awful associations of the place, the spectacle may be said to take part in the action of the play. Perhaps it would be no exaggeration to assert that grandeur and beauty are nowhere else so united in French dramatic art as in Athalie; perhaps it might ...
— A History of French Literature - Short Histories of the Literatures of the World: II. • Edward Dowden
... following me as soon as he saw that you too were gone from where he had left us tied." She shuddered as she looked down at the Xoranian's mangled body. "I saw most of your fight with him, Blair. It was terrible; awful. But, Blair, we've won!" ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science January 1931 • Various
... the remainder of the herd finally galloped away over the plain, "you boys see what curiosity does. Yer kin allers fetch 'em with a red hankercher, and gin'rally by jist layin' down on yer back, and holdin' up yer feet. They're awful curious critters, them antelopes is. I reckon we'd better quit this trail, and git them air carcasses inter ...
— The Young Trail Hunters • Samuel Woodworth Cozzens
... "What an awful sight it must have been to behold the blowing up of the 'L'Orient' French three-decker, with upward of a thousand men on board! Merciful Heaven! so many poor fellows launched into eternity in one moment! They say there ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... Temple. The silence fell again. Not a ripple broke on the beach. Not a leaf rustled in the forest. Nothing moved but the reflected flashes of the volcano on the main island over the black sky. It was an airless and an awful calm. ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... murder, rapine, and pillage—a danger always threatening, and yet never assuming shape; intangible, and yet real; impossible, and yet not improbable. Across the serene and smiling front of safety, the pale outlines of the awful shadow of insurrection sometimes fell. With this invisible panorama as a background, it was natural that the figure of Free Joe, simple and humble as it was, should assume undue proportions. Go where he would, do what he might, ...
— Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches • Joel Chandler Harris
... hankered after the Science people; but she kind of took to Jelly, and our friends think an awful sight of him," ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... some of our modern scientists tell us there can be no awakening. His condition was unchanged,—the wan beams of the early clay falling cross his features intensified their waxen stillness and pallor,—the awful majesty of death was on him,—the pathetic helplessness and perishableness of Body without Spirit. Presently the monastery bell began to ring for matins, and as its clear chime struck through the deep silence, the door opened, and Heliobas, accompanied by another monk, whose gentle ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... rebellious spirit of a most guilty wretch, who has been brought, through the instrumentality of a faithful follower of Christ, to see his wretched and guilty state, inasmuch as hitherto he has led an awful and wretched life, and through the assurance of this faithful soldier of Christ, he has been led and also believes that Christ will yet receive and cleanse him from all his deep-dyed and bloody sins. I lie under the imputation which says, 'Come now and let us reason ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... together through an immensity of space, and could discover the world below as one small darkened spot, when my Guide interrupted the awful silence that had been preserved, by the following exclamation: "Approach, O man, the place of thy destination—compose thy perturbed spirits, and let all thy senses be awakened to a proper understanding of the scene which thou art about to behold." So saying, ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... short one, but Elizabeth was spared to reign over England for the long period of forty-four years. Foxe's Book of Martyrs describes the horrible sufferings of many of these martyrs, and, though an awful book to read, was one of the few books extensively published in our early days, chained copies being placed in many churches, some of which we ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... carry't aff wi' his heid in the air," she said, "but I can see he's fell shamefaced, an' nae wonder. Ay, I'se uphaud he's mair ashamed o't in his heart than she is. It's an awful like thing o' a lassie to marry an auld man. She had dune't for the siller. Ay, there's pounds' worth ...
— A Window in Thrums • J. M. Barrie
... pledge, arm and shoulder; nor aught of help could the cursed one thus procure at all. None the longer liveth he, loathsome fiend, sunk in his sins, but sorrow holds him tightly grasped in gripe of anguish, in baleful bonds, where bide he must, evil outlaw, such awful doom as the Mighty Maker shall mete ...
— Beowulf • Anonymous
... something solemn and awful in the thought that there is not an act done or a word uttered by a human being but carries with it a train of consequences, the end of which we may never trace. Not one but, to a certain extent, gives a colour to our life, and insensibly influences the lives of those ...
— Self Help • Samuel Smiles
... eyes of the others it seemed to happen slowly. The mustang was halted in the midst of a leap, tugged at a leg that seemed glued to the ground, and then buckled suddenly and collapsed on one side. They heard that awful, muffled sound of splintering bone and then the scream ...
— The Rangeland Avenger • Max Brand
... your mind and time are constantly occupied with the duties of your command, which almost deters us from asking your attention to this matter, but thought it might be that you had not considered this subject in all of its awful consequences, and that on more reflection you, we hope, would not make this people an exception to all mankind, for we know of no such instance ever having occurred —surely never in the United States—and what has this helpless ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... wonders of it. Such was the depth of the precipices below, and the height of the mountains above, with the rude and wild magnificence of the scenery around, that I shall not attempt to describe such an astonishing and awful combination of objects.... Even at this place, which is only, as it were, the first step towards gaining the summit of the mountains, the climate was very sensibly changed. The air that fanned the village which we left at noon, was mild and cheering; the grass was verdant, and the wild fruits ...
— Pioneers in Canada • Sir Harry Johnston
... village belongs to you, sir. There's only the church and vicarage, and one farm-house, with a couple of cottages attached, that are not yours. But you'll find your property in an awful state. I've done what I could to patch it up; but what can you do ...
— The Golden Shoemaker - or 'Cobbler' Horn • J. W. Keyworth
... "Goodness, it's awful," exclaimed Walter. "I wish I had a clothes-pin on my nose. Smells just like as island of Limburger cheese set in a lake of broken ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... obtaining a heavy ransom. He was sentenced to be imprisoned in a place called the Baths. The Moorish dungeons had three depths of caverns, like underground granaries. In mockery of the light of heaven, there was one small window, and that was crossed with iron bars. The sun and air never entered this awful place. The only sights were harrowing; the only company was that of convicts, thieves, murderers, and the lowest Moorish rabble; and the sounds and voices, mixed with blasphemies and oaths, were re-echoed as if from the vaults of the dead. Every sense was outraged by ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne
... carcass,' repeated he, scratching his head and eyeing it as it lay; 'this is all the consequence of your nasty brewers' hapron weshins—blowin' of one out, like a bladder!' and, thereupon, he placed his hand on his stomach to feel how his own was. 'Never see'd sich a house, or sich an awful mean man!' continued he, stooping and pommelling the package with his fists. It was of no use, he could not get it as small as he wished—'Must have my jacket out on you, I do believe,' added he, seeing where the ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... Under-Secretary for the Colonies, Chief Secretary for Ireland, and Steward of the Jockey Club. In this last capacity he, a year ago, temporarily assumed judicial functions. How well he bore himself! with what dignity! with what awful suavity! with ...
— Punch, or, the London Charivari, Volume 98, March 8, 1890. • Various
... be included the plum, cherry, withered roses, walnut, hemp, cypress, dandelion, &c. Beans are still said to produce bad dreams and to portend evil; and according to a Leicestershire saying, "If you wish for awful dreams or desire to go crazy, sleep in a bean-field all night." Some plants are said to foretell long life, such as the oak, apricot, apple, box, grape, and fig; and sickness is supposed to be presaged by such plants as the elder, onion, ...
— The Folk-lore of Plants • T. F. Thiselton-Dyer
... Union have not been executed; the delinquencies of the States have, step by step, matured themselves to an extreme which has at length arrested all the wheels of the national government and brought them to an awful stand."... For "in our case the concurrence of thirteen distinct sovereign wills is requisite, under the confederation, to the complete execution of every important measure that proceeds from the Union." How could it be otherwise, he asked: "The rulers of the respective members... ...
— Public Opinion • Walter Lippmann
... Dacrefield. My only comfort is to go to the old bookstalls and look for books about moths and butterflies. Imagine! The other day when your aunt was out, I took Polly with me. She said she would give anything on earth to go. So we went. We went into some awful streets, and had some oysters at a stall, and came back carrying no end of books; and just as we got in at the door there were your aunt and Lady Chelmsfield coming out. What a rage your aunt was in! I tried to take all the blame, but she shut ...
— A Flat Iron for a Farthing - or Some Passages in the Life of an only Son • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... that colonnade she lies dead. Good God! isn't it awful! We shall never see her. But ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... come, 'cause we're playing soldier and Indian," said Sue. "Bunny's been shot by an Indian arrow and I'm his nurse. He's just got over the fever, same as I did when I had the measles, and he's asleep. And it's awful dangerous to wake anybody up that's just got to sleep after a fever. That's what our doctor said, ...
— Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue in the Big Woods • Laura Lee Hope
... Even in the midst of her stolen joys at Manchester or London, this mere name, the mere mental image of Catherine moving through life, wrapped in a religious peace and certainty as austere as they were beautiful, and asking of all about her the same absolute surrender to an awful Master she gave so easily herself, was enough to chill the wayward Rose, and fill her with a kind of restless despair. And at home, as the vicar said, the two sisters were always on the verge of conflict. Rose had enough of her father in ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... you must lie alone in the sage brush near the pool in the hollow of the low hills by moonlight; it will never reach your ears through the bars of the menagerie cage. To know the mountain, you must confront the avalanche and the precipice uncompanioned, and stand at last on the breathless and awful peak, which lifts itself and you into a voiceless solitude remote from man and yet no nearer to God; but if you journey with guides and jolly fellowship to some Mountain House, never so airily perched, you would as well visit a panorama. To comprehend the ocean, ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... dense darkness fell upon the place, and with it a silence that was awful. For a time that he could not reckon, that might have been years or might have been moments, he sat there in the utter ...
— Smith and the Pharaohs, and Other Tales • Henry Rider Haggard
... different from the idols of the Psalmist are the gods of property: the former had hands and felt not; the latter, on the contrary, manus habent et palpabunt. The right of increase is conferred in a very mysterious and supernatural manner. The inauguration of a proprietor is accompanied by the awful ceremonies of an ancient initiation. First, comes the CONSECRATION of the article; a consecration which makes known to all that they must offer up a suitable sacrifice to the proprietor, whenever they ...
— What is Property? - An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government • P. J. Proudhon
... from the tunnel rolled in a thick cloud about them, stifling them. The girl, dazed with the roar and blinded by the smoke, could only cling to her protector. For an instant they felt as if they were about to be drawn into the awful power of the rushing monster. Then it had passed, and a roar of silence followed, as if they were suddenly plunged into a vacuum. Gradually the noises of the world began again: the rumble of a trolley-car on the bridge; the "honk-honk" ...
— The Mystery of Mary • Grace Livingston Hill
... Avenging and Bright in the song," said Phyllis. "I should like to look at her if it wasn't so awful. She looks so beautiful ...
— The Railway Children • E. Nesbit
... exorcisms, it may be induced to leave. What with the shaking, the tapping, the clapping, the drums and the howls, the wretched "spotted" woman really begins to feel that she has something in her, and, possessed—not by the spirits—but by the most awful fright, she disburses the extra money required, after which the ...
— Corea or Cho-sen • A (Arnold) Henry Savage-Landor
... water being also much charged with the phosphorescent appearance which is familiar to every one on shipboard, the waves, as they dashed upon the rock, were in some degree like so much liquid flame. The scene, upon the whole, was truly awful! ...
— Records of a Family of Engineers • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the bronze figure lifted its arm, slowly, silently, and pointed at the boy. But this was more than flesh and blood could stand; little John uttered a choking cry, and turning his back on the awful portent, ran home as fast as he could lay foot to ground. And on seeing this the bronze figure laughed, and its teeth glistened, even as ...
— Nautilus • Laura E. Richards
... as thy name's name leaves my tongue, The very life-drops from my heart are wrung! Thy sanctuary—where, veil'd in mystic light, For ever burning, and for ever bright, Jehovah's awful majesty reposed, And shone for aye heaven's azure gates unclosed— Thy sanctuary!—where from the Eternal flow'd The radiance of his glory, in whose power Noonday itself like very darkness show'd, And stars were ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various
... of all the sovereigns of the earth; His Excellency, the Eagle Monarch; the Cause of the never-changing order of things; the Source of all honor; the Son of the Sultan of Sultans, under whose feet we are dust, whose awful shadow protects us; Abdul Hamid II., Son of Abdul Medjid, whose residence is in Paradise; our glorious Lord, to whose sacred body be given health, and strength, and endless days; whom Allah keeps in his palace, and on his throne with ...
— Across Asia on a Bicycle • Thomas Gaskell Allen and William Lewis Sachtleben
... long I watched him, and thanked God that Polly Ann could not see him thus. And yet, how the pride would have leaped within her! Humor came not easily to him, but charity and courage and unselfishness he had in abundance. What he suffered none knew; but through those awful hours he was always among the stragglers, helping the weak and despairing when his strength might have taken him far ahead toward comfort and safety. "I'm all right, Davy," he would say, in answer to my look as he passed ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... cumbered with its burdens, they have lost neither the patience from which comes clearness, nor the faith from which comes courage. Nor, sir, when in passionate moments is disclosed to them that vague and awful shadow, with its lurid abysses and its crimson stains, into which I pray God they may never go, are they struck with more of apprehension than is needed to ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol II, After-Dinner Speeches E-O • Various
... no gun, so they each picked up a good big stone and both threw at once; and one of them hit the bear, thump, on his back! It took him by surprise, I expect, and his mouth being so full of leaves and cherries, he sucked some of them down the wrong way, maybe; for they said the old fellow gave an awful cough!—and then started to slide down the tree. At that they both turned and ran, like sport, for the house; for they imagined the old bear meant to pay them back for that stone that ...
— When Life Was Young - At the Old Farm in Maine • C. A. Stephens
... were various evolutions withinside the pale, and the scarlet figures got up and sat down, and this kind of thing continued for some time; at length the figure which I had seen in the principal stall came forth and advanced towards the people; an awful figure he was, a huge old man with a sugar-loaf hat, with a sulphur-coloured dress, and holding a crook in his hand like that of a shepherd; and as he advanced the people fell on their knees, our poor old governor amongst them; the sweet young ladies, the sharking ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... must fall back on the Gospel. We must not be afraid of the terror of such awful events, but sanctify the Lord God, in our hearts, and say, Whatever may happen I know that God is love; I know that his glory is charity; I know that his mercy is over all his works; for I know that Jesus Christ, who was full of perfect charity, is the express image of his Father's ...
— The Good News of God • Charles Kingsley
... no time," murmured Angy very quickly, with a catch in her voice. "Lookin' ahead, though, seven days seems awful long when yer old; but—Oh, law, yes; a week'll pass in no time," she repeated. "Only dew be keerful, ...
— Old Lady Number 31 • Louise Forsslund
... An awful stillness followed the words. Stiff and rigid the King sat, as though stricken by sudden paralysis, giving no sign. Minute after minute slipped away,—and he uttered not a word, nor did he raise his eyes from the fixed study of the carpet ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... our poetasters talk with Wordsworth of the dignity and pathos of the commonest human things, they will find them there in perfection; if they talk about the cravings of the new time, they will find them there. If they want the truly sublime and awful, they will find them there also. But they will find none of their own favourite concetti; hardly even a metaphor; no taint of this new poetic diction into which we have now fallen, after all our abuse of the far more manly and sincere ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... When sun and storm contend together—when the thick clouds are broken up and pierced by arrows of golden daylight—there will be startling rearrangements and transfigurations of the mountain summits. A sun-dazzling spire of alp hangs suspended in mid-sky among awful glooms and blackness; or perhaps the edge of some great mountain shoulder will be designed in living gold, and appear for the duration of a glance bright like a constellation, and alone "in the unapparent." ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... about it," she said with a shudder, covering her face with her hands. "It was too awful, and it might have been the end of you." Her ...
— The Sky Pilot in No Man's Land • Ralph Connor
... marster'll get a letter this time, for he don't seem no more like the wide-awake chap he did when he first come from Kentuck, than nothin'. I don't want him to have Miss Mabel nohow; for their niggers say she's awful spunky." ...
— Tempest and Sunshine • Mary J. Holmes
... Christian homes, compassed by moral and religious restraints, do not realize the gulf of iniquity that bounds you on the north and the south and the east and the west. While I speak there are tens of thousands of men and women going over the awful plunge of an impure life; and while I cry to God for mercy upon their souls, I call upon you to marshal in the defense of your homes, your Church and your nation. There is a banqueting hall that you have never heard described. You know all about the feast of Ahasuerus, ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage
... would look if they wore such hues in reality as are accepted on canvas at the galleries! Imagine these canvas tints transferred to the sward, the woods, the hills, the streams, the sky! Dies irae, dies illae—it would, indeed, be an awful day, the Last Day of Doom, and we should need the curtain at Drury Lane drawn before our eyes to ...
— Amaryllis at the Fair • Richard Jefferies
... only fifty-eight, strong and tall as a giant, might have lived to a hundred and one; but he bothered himself about the affairs of this world far too much. That statue shop [of Chantrey's] was his bane! Took to bookmaking likewise—in a word, was too fond of Mammon. Awful death—no preparation—came literally upon him like a thief in the dark. I'm thinking of writing a short life of him; old friend of twenty years' standing. I know a good deal about him; "Traditional Tales," his best work, first appeared in London Magazine, Pray send ...
— A Publisher and His Friends • Samuel Smiles
... led well known to fame, And called, 'The Monument of Vanished Minds,' Where when they thought they saw in well-sought books The assembled souls of all that men thought wise, It bred such awful reverence in their looks, As if they saw the buried writers rise. Such heaps of written thought; gold of the dead, Which Time does still disperse but not devour, Made them presume all was from deluge freed Which long-lived authors ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... affection; while it was propped up by his love of praise and immediate power, so long it stood erect and no longer. He became a member of the Parliament, supported the popular opinions, and in a few years, by the influence of the popular party, was placed in the high and awful rank in which he now is. The fortunes of his country, we had almost said the fates of the world, were placed in his wardship—we sink in prostration before the inscrutable dispensations of Providence, when we reflect in whose wardship the fates ...
— The Life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - 1838 • James Gillman
... again a cold sense of fear. He grew weak in all his being. He reeled when the gray shaggy giant laid a huge hand on his shoulder and with one pull dragged him close. Was this his kind Mormon benefactor, this man with the awful eyes? ...
— The Heritage of the Desert • Zane Grey
... in higher taste, by throwing dead animals at one another, before they disperse; in which they have as much joy, as in the former part of the triumph: while they will attend us with all the marks of an awful or silent (at most only a whispering) respect; their mouths distended, as if set open with gags, and their voices generally lost ...
— Clarissa, Volume 4 (of 9) - History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... with his brave Colorado troops, in New Mexico last year, as most people know. At the commencement of the action, which was hotly contested, a shell from the enemy exploded near him, tearing up the ground, and causing Captain Rogers to swear in an awful manner. ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 4 • Charles Farrar Browne
... "The awful tow'rs which seem for science made; The solemn chapels, which to prayer invite, Whose storied windows shed a ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... the gods that I could not. One cry for mercy did he utter, one cry of horror when first he felt himself uplifted and looked down into the awful face of Death which awaited him below. Then mayhap he lost consciousness for I heard not a sound, and the whole city lay still in the hush of the noonday sleep. Less than one minute had intervened since first I saw that avenging figure outlined ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... had just got the man's fortune in its beak, when Faithful took a standing jump from behind the woman at it. It was awful, Jimmy says. The woman gave a scream and grabbed at the parrot, the man grabbed at Faithful, and Faithful—well, Jimmy says he never knew quite what Faithful did or how he did it, but he emerged with the man's fortune sticking ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, May 3, 1916 • Various
... time - with a broadside - and a terrible battle began. The carnage was awful. The decks were soon cumbered with dead and dying. The two ships were so near that the muzzles of the guns almost touched each other. Both were soon riddled with shot, and leaking so that the pumps could hardly keep pace with rising water. Still ...
— This Country Of Ours • H. E. Marshall Author: Henrietta Elizabeth Marshall
... mortal motion," said the sergeant, regarding it with awful reverence. "It glides along, but no feet have been seen by ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... has happened to him. He would never have deserted me like this in my misery if he were free. And I can do nothing to help him—nothing. How shall I live through the day? How can I bear it? And this awful trouble has come upon him just because he was kind to another artist. The world is very, very, very cruel. I wish I were dead!" She blotted the words and locked away the book. Then she burnt that farewell note and went and sat in the window-seat ...
— The Incomplete Amorist • E. Nesbit
... completely as if the awful appellation had never existed it was wiped from the tablets of their memory and Christopher Mark Antony Burton fourth became ...
— Christopher and the Clockmakers • Sara Ware Bassett
... an author see, Who says, 'The awful war I'll sing Of Titans with the Thunder-King:' Of this grand promise the result, ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part I. The Exploration of the World • Jules Verne
... time in my life that I had witnessed the awful scene of a battle, when man was engaged to destroy his fellow man. I well remember my sensations on the occasion, for they were solemn beyond description, and very hardly could I bring my mind to be willing to attempt ...
— The Campaign of 1776 around New York and Brooklyn • Henry P. Johnston
... I wish I had stayed home a bit longer," he said slowly. "My head isn't just as clear as it might be. That whack Pelter gave me with that footstool was an awful one." ...
— The Rover Boys in Alaska - or Lost in the Fields of Ice • Arthur M. Winfield
... Writing of mosquitos, let me say these Indian specimens were a terror to us all. What numbers we killed! I could write this account in their blood. It was my blood, though—before they got it! Men who hunt the tiger in cool bravery boiled with indignation before these awful pests, which stabbed and stung with marvellous persistency, and disturbed the solitude of nature with their incessant humming. I write the word incessant advisedly, for I learned that there are several kinds of mosquitos. Some work by day and ...
— Through Five Republics on Horseback • G. Whitfield Ray
... yearling!" said the Sea Lion, who could appreciate good swimming. "I suppose it is rather awful from your way of looking at it, but if you seals will come here year after year, of course the men get to know of it, and unless you can find an island where no men ever come you ...
— The Jungle Book • Rudyard Kipling
... found Mrs. Brownlow shaking hands with a youth whom Jock upheld as a genius, but who laboured under the double misfortune of always coming too soon, and never knowing what to do with his arms and legs. He at once perceived Captain Evelyn to be an "awful swell," and became trebly wretched-in contrast to Jock's open-hearted, genial young dalesman, who stood towering over every one with his broad shoulders and hearty face, perfectly at his ease (as he would have been in Buckingham Palace), and only ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge
... you'd killed him. I wisht you'd killed him!" she cried. "I wisht I had a gun—or a knife! I hate him—hate him—hate him! When he says he was ever in a deal with Dad, he lies. Dad stood for him and that was all. He purtended to be awful strong for Dad, purtended to be fond of me, jest to swarm 'round Dad, for some reason. Brought me a doll once. I was thirteen. What in hell did I want with a doll?" she panted. "I burned the damn thing that night ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn
... hour from Thusis, on the Splagen road, "opens the awful chasm of the Nolla which a hundred years ago poured its peaceful waters through smiling meadows protected by the wooded slopes of the mountains. But the woods were cut down and with them departed the rich pastures, the pride of the valley, now covered with piles of ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... first thing banged against the door of a wardrobe, which had swung open. It nearly knocked my brains out, and hurt something awful. So I straightway forgot all about the noise, and after groping a while for matches, presently found one and lighted the candle. Then I filled the basin on the wash-stand and ...
— The Paternoster Ruby • Charles Edmonds Walk
... "Terrible it's awful," said the gentleman. "Think of the cattle on the western plains. Choked with thirst in summer, and starved and frozen in winter. Dehorned and goaded on to trains and steamers. Tossed about and wounded and suffering ...
— Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders
... chamber a headless body lay upon the floor—a body that had been partially devoured—while over and upon it crawled a half a dozen heads upon their short, spider legs, and they tore at the flesh of the woman with their chelae and carried the bits to their awful mouths. They were eating ...
— The Chessmen of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... the confusion there arose an instant of great and awful silence. One of those silences that come even into great sound and claim attention ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... doubt that Abel, when he saw his brother rising up against him, entreated and implored him not to pollute himself with this awful sin. However, a mind beset by Satan pays no regard to entreaties, nor heeds uplifted hands, but as a father's admonition had been disregarded, so now the brother is spurned as he pleads upon ...
— Commentary on Genesis, Vol. II - Luther on Sin and the Flood • Martin Luther
... to have the same awful thought, and had sent a telegraphic summons from the new station, ten miles away, to a physician in Sioux Falls. To them a cloud far heavier and darker than the engine's breath was hanging, day and night, over the farm-house, shutting out all ...
— The Biography of a Prairie Girl • Eleanor Gates
... estimate of themselves as they are by nature. But over and against the fell power of sin he magnified the greater power of divine grace. "Where sin abounded, grace hath much more abounded" (Rom. 5, 20),—along this line Luther found the solution for the awful difficulty which confronts every man when he studies the Bible-doctrine of original sin, and when he discovers, moreover, that this Bible-doctrine is borne out fully by his own experience. Just for this reason, because man can do ...
— Luther Examined and Reexamined - A Review of Catholic Criticism and a Plea for Revaluation • W. H. T. Dau
... grasp loosen, struck some mysterious chill through her from head to foot. She glanced round at him affrightedly, and saw his eyes looking straight into the drawing-room. They were fixed in a strange, unwavering, awful stare, while, from the rest of his face, all expression, all character, all recognizable play and movement of feature, had utterly gone. It was a breathless, lifeless mask—a white blank. With a cry of terror, she looked where he ...
— After Dark • Wilkie Collins
... to be very reasonable, 'Thalia, to stand a community life, or else you've got to be an awful fool. You are neither one nor ...
— The Way to Peace • Margaret Deland
... agitated, by my importunity. I intimated to him plainly, that the only way to do justice to his own assertion and arguments regarding the present state of the Inquisition, was to show me the prisons and the captives. I should then describe only what I saw; but now the subject was left in awful obscurity. "Lead me down," said I, "to the inner building, and let me pass through the two hundred dungeons, ten feet square, described by your former captives. Let me count the number of your present captives, and converse ...
— Life in the Grey Nunnery at Montreal • Sarah J Richardson |
