"Fault" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... 'It wasn't 'is fault,' put in Sally, amidst her sobs; 'it's only because 'e's 'ad a little drop too much. ...
— Liza of Lambeth • W. Somerset Maugham
... times, he was not destitute of good qualities. These, had they been properly applied, might have served to distinguish him among men in what is pedantically called the higher walks of life. But he had a fault, and one that is very unpopular even at this day: he would get vexed at the short-comings of his neighbors, at whom he would level truths exceedingly unpalatable. Indeed, he never failed to put very keen edges on his sayings. Even now, I have the old man in my mind's eye, as in the hey-day of youth ...
— The Adventures of My Cousin Smooth • Timothy Templeton
... sister-in-law, to my daughter. Was that a time to consider whether a clergyman may be justified in putting out his strength? No; my lord. Old as you are you would have attempted it yourself. I took him up and smote him, and it is not my fault if he is not a cripple for life." The Bishop gazed at him speechlessly, but felt quite sure that it was not in his power to rebuke his fellow clergyman. "Now, my lord," continued the Dean, "you have heard the story. I tell it to you, and I shall tell it to no one else. I tell it you, not because ...
— Is He Popenjoy? • Anthony Trollope
... son of a harlot, my father even unknown; yet cursed with early aspirings and restlessness, and a half glimmering of knowledge, and an entire lust of whatever seemed enterprise,—what wonder that I chose anything rather than daily labour and perpetual contumely? After all, the fault is in fortune and the world, not me! Oh, Lucy! had I but been born in your sphere, had I but possessed the claim to merit you, what would I not have done and dared and ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... fault of yours that I was not, you treacherous rascal!" returned Frobisher, so savagely that the Korean involuntarily stepped backward a pace. "If ever I get out of this and can get my hands on you, I'll make you sorry for ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... into a fault, in what matter soever it be do not trouble nor afflict thyself for it. For they are effects of our frail Nature, stained by Original Sin. The common enemy will make thee believe, as soon as thou fallest into any fault, that thou walkest in error, and therefore art out of God and his favor, ...
— The Varieties of Religious Experience • William James
... much addicted to cards, but when she proposed in the evenings to teach me the Hungarian game of Tarok I should not have been human had I failed to become her pupil. But I was never long in her company without being conscious of a feeling that she was a woman who, through no fault of her own, had already had a history, or was certain to have one some day. This feeling did not mislead me. A year later it was justified. I learned, by accident, that her history had been short, forlorn, and fatal. ...
— Memoirs of Life and Literature • W. H. Mallock
... woman's reason and no more," admitted Amos. "Ernest have got a glide in his eye, poor chap, and God knows that's not a fault, and yet I never can abide that affliction and it would put me off an angel from heaven if the ...
— The Torch and Other Tales • Eden Phillpotts
... of Expression, without falling into such ways of Speech as may seem stiff and unnatural; he must not swell into a false Sublime, by endeavouring to avoid the other Extream. Among the Greeks, AEschylus, and sometimes Sophocles, were guilty of this Fault; among the Latins, Claudian and Statius; and among our own Countrymen, Shakespear and Lee. In these Authors the Affectation of Greatness often hurts the Perspicuity of the Stile, as in many others the Endeavour after Perspicuity ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... native resident relatives. Maiorano v. Baltimore & O.R. Co., 213 U.S. 268 (1909). The treaty in question having been amended in view of this decision, the question arose whether the new provision covered the case of death without fault or negligence in which, by the Pennsylvania Workmen's Compensation Act, compensation was expressly limited to resident parents; the Supreme Court held that it did not. Liberato v. Royer, ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... more might have been done to save the lost one. An excellent observer,[12] in describing the behaviour of a girl at the sudden death of her father, says she "went about the house wringing her hands like a creature demented, saying 'It was her fault;' 'I should never have left him;' 'If I had only sat up with him,' " &c. With such ideas vividly present before the mind, there would arise, through the principle of associated habit, the strongest tendency to energetic action ...
— The Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals • Charles Darwin
... for me to do. But Manetho was a man who was by birth an Egyptian, yet had he made himself master of the Greek learning, as is very evident; for he wrote the history of his own country in the Greek tongue, by translating it, as he saith himself, out of their sacred records; he also finds great fault with Herodotus for his ignorance and false relations of Egyptian affairs. Now this Manetho, in the second book of his Egyptian History, writes concerning us in the following manner. I will set down his very words, as if I were to bring the very man himself into a court for a witness: "There was a ...
— Against Apion • Flavius Josephus
... poor fellow, repented of his folly, and then, like a man, submitted to the fate he had asked for. He never intentionally added to the difficulty or delicacy of the charge of those who had him in hold. Accidents would happen; but never from his fault. Lieutenant Truxton told me that, when Texas was annexed, there was a careful discussion among the officers, whether they should get hold of Nolan's handsome set of maps and cut Texas out of it—from the map of the world and the map of Mexico. The United States had been ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... order has nothing in it but what is pleasant to me. I receive such a companion with joy, and it will not be my fault if the friendship which exists between those we love does not exist also between ...
— The Impostures of Scapin • Moliere (Poquelin)
... aghast at this unexpected point of view, but her next words enlightened me. "It's Maida's fault, I know that, though I don't see how she managed the thing. She was wild with me because I stood up for the Prince carrying us off like this, and I suppose she just thought she'd punish me by somehow cheating me out of the pleasure I'd been looking forward to. I can't think of anything ...
— My Friend the Chauffeur • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... purchase when the good cause should have triumphed. The Rougons had, in the end, regarded their royalism as very serious. Felicite went as far as to say, when Roudier was not present, that if they had not made a fortune in the oil business the fault lay in the monarchy of July. This was her mode of giving a political tinge to their poverty. She had a friendly word for everybody, even for Granoux, inventing each evening some new polite method of waking him up when it was ...
— The Fortune of the Rougons • Emile Zola
... government the annual amount of the land and malt taxes, which are frequently not paid up till some years thereafter. In these different operations, its duty to the public may sometimes have obliged it, without any fault of its directors, to overstock the circulation with paper money. It likewise discounts merchants' bills, and has, upon several different occasions, supported the credit of the principal houses, not only of England, but of Hamburgh and Holland. Upon one occasion, in 1763, it is said ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... is deeply distressed, for she thinks I have been blaming you or finding fault with you about something. But most assuredly that cannot be. I tell her that although I am prone to write hasty and regrettable things to other people I am not a bit likely to write such things to you. I can't believe ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... as it chanced, was a man of long experience with wild animals, in one of the chief zoological parks of the country. Long familiarity, however, had given him that most dangerous gift, contempt. And he had lost his position through that fault most unforgivable in an animal keeper, drunkenness. Owing to this fact, the inexperienced authorities of this little "Zoo" had been able to obtain his services at a comparatively moderate wage—and were congratulating themselves on the ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
... to them both, half cold with anger. "Do you think I'd leave him out there to die, perhaps? It was my own fault, not to see him in ...
— The Lady and the Pirate - Being the Plain Tale of a Diligent Pirate and a Fair Captive • Emerson Hough
... girl like you," he muttered. "If you are deliberately trying to make men mad to get you you are succeeding infuriatingly well. If I catch you to-night it will be your fault if I tell you what I think of you. I'll tell you now, for I suppose you are hiding somewhere in this undergrowth till I give it up and you can get away home. You shall listen to me if you are here, ...
— The Indifference of Juliet • Grace S. Richmond
... coal,—the stored up fuel of a world,—forms but a comparatively small part of the produce of this wonderful flora. Amid much that was so strange and antique of type in its productions as to set the analogies of the botanist at fault, there occurred one solitary order, not a few of whose species closely resembled their cogeners of the present time. I refer, of course, to its ferns. And these seem to have formed no small proportion of the entire flora of the period. Francis estimates the recent dorsiferous ...
— The Testimony of the Rocks - or, Geology in Its Bearings on the Two Theologies, Natural and Revealed • Hugh Miller
... both, as it were, off their guard, had read in the face of each the same bitter pain, the same look of unsatisfied longing. Possessing in so high a degree everything that life could give they appeared to have yet missed the happiness that should by all reasoning have been theirs. Whose was the fault? Caring for them both it was a question that he turned from in aversion, he had no wish to judge between them, no desire to probe their hidden affairs. Thrown constantly into their society while guessing much he shut his eyes to more. But anxiety remained, fostered by the ...
— The Shadow of the East • E. M. Hull
... thing! but here comes Alice. Dear Alice, you have been very uneasy, but it was not my fault," said Edward, kissing her. "If I had not been where I was, this poor boy would have been killed as well as his father. Make him welcome, Alice, for he is an orphan now, and must live with us. I have brought many things in the cart, and tomorrow we will bring more, for we have no bed for him, ...
— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat
... the fault must have been with your choice of bravos?" jeered the subordinate. "Why did you pick out alleged bravos who would allow themselves to be put ...
— Dave Darrin on Mediterranean Service - or, With Dan Dalzell on European Duty • H. Irving Hancock
... beam to which the motion side rod is attached is too far out, and must be shifted nearer to the main centre; if at the extremities the cross head is thrown too far in, the stud in the beam is not out far enough. If the cross head be thrown in at the one end, and out equally at the other, the fault is in the motion side rod, which must be lengthened or shortened to remedy ...
— A Catechism of the Steam Engine • John Bourne
... named after our dear nurse, mine and Harry's, is a child whom you would love. She is like me as I used to be, but far gentler and sweeter than I ever was. Let me put her in your arms. Let me feel that I am forgiven for my great fault, and I will bless you every day that I live. Dear father, say yes. ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... point. Our colonial friends still suffer from an abundance of vitality and the too daring use of the initiative. That is a good fault, and yet a bad one. In guerilla warfare it would be a tremendous asset. In a concerted scheme it might prove disastrous. No matter how daring and clever the individual soldier or officer, if he forgets that there are men, sections, regiments, and brigades to his right or left—if he fails to appreciate ...
— The Kangaroo Marines • R. W. Campbell
... cost. Many and many a gross of arrowheads have I sold him, and he is well-nigh as particular in their make as he is over the spring and temper of his own bows. Many a friendly wrangle have I had with him over their weight and finish, and it is not many who find fault with my handiwork, though I say it myself; and now, madam, ...
— Saint George for England • G. A. Henty
... minute-men of whom Bud had spoken, he came back and took his stand beside the open door out of sight. The slaves were all eavesdroppers in those days, and if anything escaped their notice and hearing, it was not their fault. They were better posted and took a deeper interest in the affairs of the day than many people supposed. The Northern papers, which now and then in some mysterious way came into their hands, just as the Tribune came into Uncle Toby's hands, told them the truth; while the white people around them ...
— True To His Colors • Harry Castlemon
... which prompted his immediate retirement from before Mons. When the full official history of the war comes to be written, few things will prove of more credit to the Expeditionary Force and its command than the way in which this belated division—belated through no fault of the soldiers—was incorporated with the already existing organization, in the very midst of its retreat, and helped to support the army. There are few parallels in history to the successful accomplishment of so delicate and ...
— A General Sketch of the European War - The First Phase • Hilaire Belloc
... sinners, and willeth not the death of a sinner, but that he should be converted and live? No. 'God our Saviour,' says St. Paul to Timothy, 'willeth that all men should be saved, and come to the knowledge of the truth;' and therefore if they are not saved it must be their own fault, and not God's; it must be they who will not be saved, though God wills that they should be, as Isaiah goes on to show. For he says—God cries to men, Peace! I create the fruit of the lips; that is, I give men cause to thank me. I create ...
— Town and Country Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... afraid you'd not understand. You've often reproached me,' she said, her voice quickening a little, 'with coldness. I'm cold; it is not my fault. I'm afraid I'm not like other girls. ... I don't think ...
— Celibates • George Moore
... traders, many of whom were hostile to him, the Indians considered him responsible for the acts of the soldiers.[293] If a provision of a treaty was not carried out, the Indians thought it was Taliaferro's fault "for they know nothing of Congress or of their Multifarious and ...
— Old Fort Snelling - 1819-1858 • Marcus L. Hansen
... into one small net? I know there is a consoling fashion of ascribing our blunders to the inscrutable wisdom of a long-suffering Providence; but common-sense forbids I should call evil good, deify my errors, and give thanks for what befalls me solely through my own fault. ...
— Lords of the North • A. C. Laut
... Sultan of Egypt, Malek-Saleh, who was ill, and almost dying, "Couldst thou not have held out for at least an instant?" said the sultan. "What! not a single one of you got slain!" Having become masters of Damietta, St. Louis and the crusaders committed the same fault there as in the Isle of Cyprus: they halted there for an indefinite time. They were expecting fresh crusaders; and they spent the time of expectation in quarrelling over the partition of the booty taken in the city. They made away with it, they wasted it blindly. "The barons," said Joinville, ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... my fault!" exclaimed mother. "I gathered the sheets up in such a hurry this morning that I quite forgot ...
— Mary Jane: Her Book • Clara Ingram Judson
... it was all my fault," he explained. "I told her not to talk. To just say that she was to wait. I wanted to have an opportunity to explain matters ...
— Peg O' My Heart • J. Hartley Manners
... perilous journey over the bridge. Slowly and fearfully, and with as much care as possible, she set step by step upon the slippery log. Already half of the danger was passed, when, reaching forward to grasp Nancy's outstretched hand, she missed it—perhaps that was Nancy's fault—poor Ellen lost her balance, and went in head foremost. The water was deep enough to cover her completely as she lay, though not enough to prevent her getting up again. She was greatly frightened, but ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner
... exceedingly asked him, 'Why criest thou so? Who hath beaten thee?' And being thus questioned, he said unto his mother, 'I have been belaboured by the brothers of Janamejaya.' And his mother replied, 'Thou hast committed some fault for which hast thou been beaten!' He answered, 'I have not committed any fault. I have not touched the sacrificial butter with my tongue, nor have I even cast a look upon it.' His mother Sarama hearing this and much distressed at the affliction of her son went to the place ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)
... exemplarily punished; and that their high mightinesses should confirm the stipulations agreed upon immediately after the action by the directors of the respective companies, in consideration of which agreement the Dutch ships were restored, after their commanders acknowledged their fault, in owning themselves the aggressors. To this remonstrance the states-general replied, that nothing of what was laid to the charge of their subjects had yet reached their knowledge: but they requested his Britannic majesty to suspend his judgment until he should be made perfectly acquainted ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... stones, as pumice or sandstone, after which it is allowed to dry, the strings by which the skewers are secured being tightened from time to time. If this parchment be used for writing, it will be found rather greasy, but washing it will oxgall will probably remedy this fault. (See "Ox-gall," p. 331.) In the regular preparation of parchment, the skin is soaked for a short time in a lime-pit before taking off the hairs, to get rid of ...
— The Art of Travel - Shifts and Contrivances Available in Wild Countries • Francis Galton
... Geneva. The situation, though it dissolved of itself in a brief space, was awkward. It discredited the Hotel Beau-Site. It was in the nature of a repulse for the Hotel Beau-Site (franc a day cheaper than the Metropole) and of a triumph for the popinjay. The fault was utterly Denry's. Yet he said ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... been beguiled by him. It is too much the custom of young people now, to think themselves wise enough to make their own choice; and that they need not ask counsel of those that are older, and also wiser than they; but this is a great fault in them, and many of them have paid dear for it. Well, to be short, in little time Mr. Badman obtains his desire, gets this honest girl, and her money, is married to her, brings her home, makes a feast, entertains her royally, but her portion ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... said, 'I know you are a good man.... God reward you,' he kissed his hand; 'but my Stasiek died through your fault all the same: ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... and but for the many occupations which swallow up my time would have been duly receipted ere this. Thank you very much for them, for they are very elegant outside, and the dedication page, with which I should have been most ungracious to find any fault. The little sketch on that leaf differs from the design you had described to me some time ago, and I felt the full meaning of the difference. I read through your preface all in a breath; there are many ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... intentions of the original framers of the law, expressed the same opinion, and that opinion was ultimately confirmed by the decision of the twelve judges in 1840. The Bishop is, therefore, as much at fault in his facts on this point, as he is in the language he employs in reference to Imperial legal opinions, and an ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... another letter. This was from one of the students of Stoughton University to a friend whose name as it was written on the envelope was Mr. Frank Mayfield. The old postmaster who found fault with Miss "Lulu's" designation would probably have quarrelled with this address, if it had come under his eye. "Frank" is a very pretty, pleasant-sounding name, and it is not strange that many persons use ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... Place. Having despatched this note, Clare felt much pleased with himself. It would have been very rude, he thought, and almost offensive, to refuse the invitation of an old friend, given in all kindliness of heart. Perhaps it was he, after all, who was in fault respecting that unhappy affair of the portrait, which he took to be a gift, though it was meant only as a loan. He owed an apology to Mrs. Emmerson, that was quite clear; and for this reason alone, if for no other, ought to become her guest during ...
— The Life of John Clare • Frederick Martin
... typewriter, which Mrs. Spaniel had—too late—put out of reach. Half the keys were sticking upright, jammed together and tangled in a whirl of ribbon; the carriage was strangely dislocated. And yet even this mischance, which would once have horrified him, left him unperturbed. It's my own fault, he thought: I shouldn't have left it where they could play with it. Perhaps God thinks the same when His creatures make a mess of ...
— Where the Blue Begins • Christopher Morley
... say, all my fault. It might have been wrong—I think now that it was—but the temptation was hard. My life here is dull; I long sometimes for ...
— John Halifax, Gentleman • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... it," said Agnes. "I know what you mean, and am ready to take you as you are, and if other people don't, it is their own fault." ...
— The Two Guardians • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... But the heads have the air of portraits: Christ has a dark, earnest, altogether Spanish physiognomy; the Virgin has dark hair; and the Padre Eterno, with a long beard, has a bald head,—a gross fault in taste and propriety; because, though the loose beard and flowing white hair may serve to typify the "Ancient of Days," baldness expresses not merely age, but ...
— Legends of the Madonna • Mrs. Jameson
... them all off on Zaspar Makann, though. Some of them thought he had a few good ideas, but was damaging his own case by extremism. One of the wealthier nobles said that he was a reproach to the ruling class; it was their fault that people like Makann could gain a following. One old gentleman said that maybe the Gilgameshers were to blame, themselves, for some of the animosity toward them. He was immediately set upon by all the others and verbally torn to pieces ...
— Space Viking • Henry Beam Piper
... she said drily; "my wits and four swift horses will serve the necessary purpose. But I must know where to find him. See," she added, while her eyes filled with tears, "I have humbled myself before you, I have owned my fault to you; shall I also confess my weakness?—My husband and I have been estranged, because he did not trust me, and because I was too blind to understand. You must confess that the bandage which he put over my eyes was a very ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... Baker was liberal to a fault, and eminently improvident. He made a fortune by his work, but at the annual rendezvous of the traders, at Bent's Fort or the old Pueblo, would throw away the earnings of months in a ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman
... But I have more than once heard it said that Wordsworth had not a genuine love of Shakspeare,—that, when he could, he always accompanied a "pro" with his "con," and, Atticus-like, would "just hint a fault and hesitate dislike." Truly, indeed, we are all of "a mingled yarn, ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 39, January, 1861 • Various
... opening chapter. I was urged to the undertaking by valued friends. At every step in its progress I have been helped by those friends, and others. For much of that which is valuable in it, they deserve credit. For its imperfections and lack, I alone am at fault. ...
— A Lie Never Justifiable • H. Clay Trumbull
... 25.—When any commandant of a detachment shall receive notice of an individual in the service having committed a fault or having performed any act reputed to be a military misdemeanour, he shall inform the Commandant of the District of the same, and this officer shall appoint a judge and secretary to constitute a Court ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... told him on the night that he decided to marry, that he would come to such a pass—to be afraid, to hide himself from her who brought him the calmness of sleep; and that by his fault, by a chain of imprudences and stupidities, as if it were written that in everything he would owe his sufferings to himself, and that if he ever succumbed to the whirlwind that swept him along, it would be by his own deed, by his own hand? At last he had assured the tranquillity ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... The fault of incorrect impressions lies mainly in the want of knowledge and want of thought of home speakers and preachers. I remember, thirty years ago, an eloquent Bishop in Exeter Hall triumphantly flinging in the face of critics of missions the question, ...
— Things as They Are - Mission Work in Southern India • Amy Wilson-Carmichael
... course known that a cabinet was in formation, and the daily papers reported to the public the diurnal visits of certain noble lords and right honourable gentlemen to the new first minister. But the world of high politics had suddenly become so cautious that nothing leaked out. Even gossip was at fault. Lord Marney had not received the Buckhounds, though he never quitted his house for ride or lounge without leaving precise instructions with Captain Grouse as to the identical time he should return home, so that his acceptance should not be delayed. Ireland was ...
— Sybil - or the Two Nations • Benjamin Disraeli
... a way, in such a form, and under such circumstances as almost naturally to create in their minds a really honest doubt and distrust of it. What shall be said of these honest unbelievers, and, scarcely through their own fault, blind? As to these, let us ask whether the doctrine of the Intermediate State can help to give ...
— The Life of the Waiting Soul - in the Intermediate State • R. E. Sanderson
... that way. Looking back, I could see plainly that if I had taken her advice all through, instead of now and again, things would have been all right with me. I had come away and left her crying in the hut, and James telling her, in a brotherly way, that it was all her fault. The trouble was that I never liked to 'give in' or go half-way to make it up—not half-way—it was all the way or nothing ...
— Joe Wilson and His Mates • Henry Lawson
... vexatious fault to the kindly-welcome, well-filled sheet which I owe to your and Charlotte's goodness,—it contains too much sense, sentiment, and good-spelling. It is impossible that even you two, whom I declare to my God I will give credit for ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... name one might call them, is shewn not alone by Libya, which has become plunder under their hands, nor by the inhabitants of this land, who have been wrongfully slain, but also by the multitude of Roman soldiers whom these enemies have dared to kill, though they have had but one fault to charge them with—loyalty to their government. And it is to avenge these their victims that we have now come against them, having with good reason become enemies to those who were once most dear. For nature has made no men in the ...
— History of the Wars, Books III and IV (of 8) - The Vandalic War • Procopius
... All these things are roasted or baked to the proper color and consistency, and then mixed in. No great sympathy need be expended on those who suffer from this particular humbug, however; for when it is so easy to buy the real berry, and roast or at least grind it one's self, it is our own fault if our laziness leaves us to eat all those sorts ...
— The Humbugs of the World • P. T. Barnum
... little resources—my father wore himself out in fruitless appeals—we scarcely ever saw him—our house was wretched—and my mother, to whom a victim was necessary, vented her discontent and ill-humor upon me: she even reproached me with what I ate, and for the slightest fault I was unmercifully beaten. The neighbors, thinking to serve me, told my father of the treatment I experienced. He endeavored to protect me, but his interference only served to embitter her ...
— The Queen's Necklace • Alexandre Dumas pere
... too-strong word. For instance, "gnarled," "strength," "thrust," and so on are very much longer than "may," "well," "the," "for," and many other of the one-syllabled words. When a line scans correctly but "somehow sounds wrong," in nine cases out of ten the fault can be traced to a long syllable that should have been short or a short syllable ...
— Rhymes and Meters - A Practical Manual for Versifiers • Horatio Winslow
... like Pamela,—Richardson is happiest: in his descriptions of high life he has failed from ignorance. He was not acquainted with the best society, and all his grandees are stilted, artificial, and affected; but even in this fault he is of value, for he shows us how men of his class at that time regarded the ...
— English Literature, Considered as an Interpreter of English History - Designed as a Manual of Instruction • Henry Coppee
... I was surprised to find how different, in fact, the anatomy of the two great families was. Scarcely in any great natural family do we find Cuvier's favourite theory of anatomical and physiological co-relations so entirely at fault as in the Cetacea. The teeth or whalebone, as natural-history characters, lead to no results; the whole structure of the interior defies all a-priori reasoning. The brain in whalebone-whales does not fill the interior of the cranium; so that the capacity ...
— Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society - Vol. 3 - Zoology • Various
... custom, is still placed in the category of tumours, is to be regarded as a disorder of growth, dating from intra-uterine life and probably due to a disturbance in the function of the glands of internal secretion, the thyreoid being the one which is most likely to be at fault (Arthur Keith). The disorder of growth is confined to those elements of the skeleton where a core of bone formed in cartilage comes to be encased in a sheath of bone formed beneath the periosteum. To indicate this abnormality the name diaphysial ...
— Manual of Surgery - Volume First: General Surgery. Sixth Edition. • Alexis Thomson and Alexander Miles
... one book, children, as well as Mr. Ward does. It is your wicked pride—the pride of all the Esmonds—which prevents you from listening to him. Go down on your knees in your chamber and pray to be corrected of that dreadful fault." Ward's discourse that evening was about Naaman the Syrian, and the pride he had in his native rivers of Abana and Pharpar, which he vainly imagined to be superior to the healing waters of Jordan—the moral being, that he, Ward, was the keeper and guardian of the ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... He had some great and rare literary qualities. One was a clear and vivid style, more flexible and Saxon than that of his great model. Another was a remarkable discretion which hardly once permitted a fault of taste in this whole enormous book where he must have had to pick his steps with pitfalls on every side of him. They say that he was a fool and a coxcomb in private life. He is never so with a pen in his hand. Of all his numerous arguments with Johnson, where he ventured some little squeak of ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle
... a crate of grapes, but honest as to his own weaknesses and shortcomings. I can never forget how he admired an exclamation attributed to General Lee at Gettysburg. Pickett had made his famous charge and his veterans had come back, a few of them, defeated, and Lee said to them, "It's all my fault, boys!" "That is the true spirit of greatness," Father said, thoughtfully. And when the Titanic went down in mid-ocean with such a loss of life, and the order was for the women and children first to the lifeboats, men to keep back, Father ...
— My Boyhood • John Burroughs
... confidence as to the route, and follow the trail we had come out on, each time a different trail be it remembered, with ridiculous exactitude; yet there was no visible track or sign of any kind. Indeed, I would often find myself puzzled as to our whereabouts and feel quite confident we were at fault, when suddenly some familiar tree or landmark, noticed on ...
— Ranching, Sport and Travel • Thomas Carson
... By the way, the vulgar notion of singing ensemble is totally exploded by these gentry—each professional singer, as a professional singer, sings his very loudest, in justice to himself; if his brethren want physical power, that's no fault of his, he don't. Professional singers indulge in small portions of classic lore: among the necessary acquirements is, "Non nobis," &c. &c.; that is, they consider they ought to know the airs. The words are generally delivered as follows:—Don—dobis—do—by—de. A clear enunciation ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... executors should find a difficulty in realizing one quarter of the values so speciously set forth, they could only say that dividends had shrunk and investments proved unreliable. It was not his fault. He had meant well. Besides, he had no thought of dying for years. There was plenty of time for skillful financing. Other men had done the same and prospered. ...
— A Beautiful Possibility • Edith Ferguson Black
... "Are you loony? Of course, it was all my fault! I've been with her hundreds of times. I knew perfectly well that I wasn't to let anything—NOT ANYTHING—scare her bird away! I was so crazy I forgot. The blame is all mine, and she'll ...
— Freckles • Gene Stratton-Porter
... or a haze, of self-complacency, through which their perception cannot penetrate. The charitable were ready to testify that there was no harm in her. Hers was merely one of a million lives in which man can find no fault and ...
— The Velvet Glove • Henry Seton Merriman
... they, in their address to Governor Bernard,) "in so full a manner as will be expected, to show our respectful gratitude to the mother country, or to make a dutiful, affectionate return to the indulgence of the King and Parliament, it shall be no fault of ours; for this we intend, and hope shall be able ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... had finished with their presentation, the scientists had questions. None of the panel members were trying to find fault with the work the Navy people had done, but they weren't going to accept the study until they had meticulously searched for every loophole. Then they ...
— The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects • Edward Ruppelt
... next endeavour to show what is that fault in States which is the cause of their present maladministration, and what is the least change which will enable a State to pass into the truer form; and let the change, if possible, be of one thing only, or, if not, of two; at any rate, let the changes ...
— The Republic • Plato
... to blame now. I tell you plainly that that is my opinion. If evil comes of it, it will be your own fault." ...
— The Last Chronicle of Barset • Anthony Trollope
... you are all a little inclined to be frightened; you gave me a proof of this last campaign; you should have behaved as the men of Chalons did; you did not maintain the honour of the Burgundians."—"It was not our fault, Sire," said one of the party: "we were badly commanded; you had not given us a good mayor."—"That is very possible; we have all been guilty of foolish actions, and they must be forgotten: the safety and happiness of France are henceforward the only objects, to ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. I • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... love of beauty, and his exquisite melody which have caused him to be known as "the poets' poet." Nearly all our subsequent singers acknowledge their delight in him and their indebtedness. Macaulay alone among critics voices a fault which all who are not poets quickly feel, namely that, with all Spenser's excellences, he is difficult to read. The modern man loses himself in the confused allegory of the Faery Queen, skips all but the ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... My greatest fault was imitation of everything that struck me, not by its beauty but by its strangeness, and not wishing to confess myself an imitator I resorted to exaggeration in order to appear original. According to my idea nothing was good ...
— The Confession of a Child of The Century • Alfred de Musset
... The contrary, however, is probably true. The former idea is due to the fact that much acceptance, as of political and religious doctrine, for example, is only nominal or verbal; it is not intelligent or critical enough to be genuine. Any one can find fault, it is often declared; but the recognition of merit requires special insight. Rejection, therefore, is no more aggressive or positive than acceptance; and if one of these calls for a more critical attitude and more mental ...
— How To Study and Teaching How To Study • F. M. McMurry
... partly my fault, that I did not pay the rent to-day—I will do so at once. I will get your goods back to-night, if I can. If not, you hale fellows can rough it, and we'll take the women and children in till ...
— John Halifax, Gentleman • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... boy—one can't be brutal with the little darlings, so that is the only course open to one, for their limited reasoning power does not enable them to grasp that it is not one's fault at all when one ceases to care—the trouble lies with their own weakening attraction.—So one has to go on bluffing until they themselves weary, or find out inadvertently that one's ...
— Man and Maid • Elinor Glyn
... last words audibly, and looked hard at the Intendant. Bigot cursed him twenty times over between his teeth, for he knew La Corne's indomitable energy and sagacity, that was never at fault in finding or forcing a way to whatever he was in search of. It would not be long before he would discover the presence of a strange lady at Beaumanoir, thought Bigot, and just as certain would he be to find out that she was the lost daughter of ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... see ministers of religion finding fault with the Scriptures, it makes me think of a fortress terrifically bombarded, and the men on the ramparts, instead of swabbing out and loading the guns and helping to fetch up the ammunition from the magazine, are trying ...
— In His Image • William Jennings Bryan
... replied she, coolly, "if you prefer the king to me, it's not my fault; when your side beats, you can ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... and on, for the last three years, but I don't know anything about him except just what I have seen for myself, what anybody can see; of course his way isn't my way, but then, we don't any of us think alike, and I've never had any fault to find with him, and we've got along together first rate. I suppose," he continued, "you will give directions in the morning for that fellow and his machines, for it isn't likely that Morgan will be ...
— The Award of Justice - Told in the Rockies • A. Maynard Barbour
... interruption. I am indeed the daughter of the Duc de Verneuil,—but his natural daughter. My mother, a Demoiselle de Casteran, who became a nun to escape the reproaches of her family, expiated her fault by fifteen years of sorrow, and died at Seez, where she was abbess. On her death-bed she implored, for the first time and only for me, the help of the man who had betrayed her, for she knew she was leaving me without friends, without fortune, without a future. The duke accepted the charge, and ...
— The Chouans • Honore de Balzac
... has been pronounced a fault by some who believed they detected in him the potential capacity of rivalling Dante, Petrarch, and Ariosto on their own ground, had he only conserved his energies. This is a foolish supposition. Lorenzo's ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 8 - The Later Renaissance: From Gutenberg To The Reformation • Editor-in-Chief: Rossiter Johnson
... absolutely the diamond, and so it proved. I went to see her seven or eight times, always in parts that required great force of soul and purity of taste even to conceive them, and only once had reason to find fault with her. On one single occasion I saw her violate the harmony of the character to produce effect at a particular moment; but almost invariably I found her a true artist, worthy Greece, and worthy at many moments to have her ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... say it to them in the world—never! In the first school I went to they used to tease the children who were timid, and bother them so much that they would forget their lessons and get punished when it was not their fault. But I looked after them," declared Anna, proudly. "I fought their battles for them, until the others left them alone, because they were afraid to fight me, I was so strong. Oh, sir," she cried, "why can't people always be fair ...
— Ten American Girls From History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... skins, and hunted them with dogs; who had covered them with pitch, and burnt them; who had beheaded St. Paul and crucified St. Peter; who had murdered his own wife; who had put to death every good man whom he could seize, simply for being good; who had committed every conceivable sin, fault, and cruelty that can disgrace a man, while he made the people worship him as God. He saw that great Emperor Nero hunted down by his own people, who were weary of his crimes; condemned to a horrible ...
— Discipline and Other Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... tenacious gentleman found fault with his (p. 098) neighbor, Michael of Tver, for entering into an alliance with Lithuania. To settle the difficulty, he invaded the dukedom, and annexed it to Moscow. Then, having his hands free, he thought of Novgorod. The Germans of the Hanseatic ...
— The Story of Russia • R. Van Bergen
... peaceful and happy Uvea had been in the days preceding Professor No No's arrival. There were some who wanted to have him killed as a punishment; and others who voted against Salesa, saying it was she who was at fault; and still others who burned with resentment against Billy Hindoo, declaring that he was the worst of all. Thus, like a battle rolling to and fro, Salesa, Professor No No, and Billy Hindoo were each in turn imperiled; and when day broke, their fate, though they knew it not, had been ...
— Wild Justice: Stories of the South Seas • Lloyd Osbourne
... that! The children just run out and get in the way of the cars to tantalize the drivers. I've seen them myself. Why, our chauffeur has been arrested three or four times and charged with running over children and dogs, when it wasn't his fault at all; the people were just trying to get some money out of us! I don't suppose the little child was run over. It was probably his ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... do, and wou'd not be mistaken for a Kingdom: But if thou art not, I can soon mend that fault, And make thee so.—Come, I'm impatient to begin the Experiment. [Offers again to ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn
... keynote of the whole music is struck by them, Amadeo, the master of the Colleoni chapel at Bergamo, was both sculptor and architect. If the facade of the Certosa be not absolutely his creation, he had a hand in the distribution of its masses and the detail of its ornaments. The only fault in this otherwise faultless product of the purest quattrocento inspiration, is that the facade is a frontispiece, with hardly any structural relation to the church it masks: and this, though serious from the point of view of architecture, is no abatement of its sculpturesque ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece • John Addington Symonds
... catalogue of her Harry's virtues is thus discounted. Name a virtue in a man and it was Harry's. Declare too much perfection is as ill to live with as too much fault, and it is precisely just before too much is reached that Harry's dowry stopped. Suggest she was blind to defects, and it is to be answered that there was no man who knew him that ever had a thought ...
— This Freedom • A. S. M. Hutchinson
... freeholders in boroughs—persons voting as householders in boroughs and as freeholders in the counties in which the boroughs are constituted. I am in favour of one man one vote, and told him so." Our not getting one man one vote was entirely Mr. Gladstone's fault, for the Cabinet expected and would have taken it, Hartington alone opposing, as ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Vol. 2 • Stephen Gwynn
... an amount of misrepresentation had been practised by the vendor, which annulled the sale. The House of Lords was of opinion that if the purchasers had paid too much for the property, it was their own fault. This decision rested, of course, on the special circumstances of the case. It was argued with great ability by Serjeant Wilde and Mr. Sugden, who received fees in this case to an amount previously unknown to the Bar. It is remarkable that Lord Lyndhurst sat on the ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... you regard yours as hopeful. It would be hypocritical of me not to acknowledge that the churches are losing ground, and that those who ought to be connected with them are not. I am ready to admit that the churches are at fault. But what you tell me of people reading these books gives me more courage than I ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... of the principles of government, which renders people more attached to that which they ought to love. Even the men who have indecently attacked this work perhaps owe more to it than they imagine. Ingratitude, besides, is their least fault. It is not without regret and mortification that we expose them; but this history is of too much consequence to M. de Montesquieu and to philosophy to be passed over in silence. May that reproach, which at last covers his enemies, ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... but for Mr. Baron to give his directions to Perkins, or for the ladies to make preparations for the improvised hospital. Miss Lou gratefully recognized that Scoville did not intend to compromise her in the least nor reveal his previous acquaintance unless it should become known through no fault of his. She lingered a moment as Dr. Williams stepped forward and asked, "May I be permitted to ...
— Miss Lou • E. P. Roe
... that may be true, mamma; but that is not my fault. He came here among us on such sweetly intimate terms that the feeling grew up with me before I knew what it meant. As to any idea of cutting out Arabella, my conscience is quite clear. If I thought there had been ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... good man's son continues his father's character, he will prolong his father's blessings; and in normal conditions, a parent's wisdom passes on to his children. Something is wrong when, as is so often the case, it does not; and it is not always the children's fault. ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... shot up into this capricious beauty; her brother, a handsome, high-spirited, brave lad, generous and frank and kind to everybody, save perhaps Beatrix, with whom he was perpetually at war, and not from his, but her, fault; adoring his mother, whose joy he was. And Lady Castlewood was no whit less gracious and attractive to Harry than in the old days when as a lad he had first ...
— Boys and girls from Thackeray • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... "Is it the fault of a woman?" he asked gently, as they crossed the drawbridge and entered the desolate old ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... feet of film spoiled through no real fault of his own, and with the expenses he knew he must meet looming inexorably before him, he simply could not afford a leading woman. Therefore, he must change his story, making it a "character" lead instead of the conventional ...
— The Phantom Herd • B. M. Bower
... who sees a thing grand And does not fit himself to it! But the meanest act, on sea or on land, Is to find a fault, and then do it! ...
— Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Vol. 2 • George MacDonald
... first whitening of the dawn was seen, Armed, in a moment leapt on horseback all; Short parley past the puissant foes between. There was no stop; there was no interval; For they have laid in rest their lances keen: But I into too foul a fault should fall Meseems, my lord, if, while their deeds I tell I let Rogero ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... toleration would be a blight and a lethargy.' So long as this was conceded, scarcely any one wished that the ancient union of Church and State should be dissolved. With rare exceptions, even Nonconformists did not wish it. However much fault they might find with the existing constitution of the Church, however much they might inveigh against what they considered to be its errors, however much they might point to the abuses which deformed it, and to the uncharitable spirit of ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton
... by the urgency of the case, having promptly bethought herself of that which was to do, particularly acquainted the maid therewith, who first betook herself to the physician and weeping, began to say to him, 'Sir, it behoveth me ask you pardon of a great fault, which I have committed against you.' 'In what?' asked the doctor, and she, never giving over weeping, answered, 'Sir, you know what manner young man is Ruggieri da Jeroli. He took a liking to me awhile agone and partly ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... independent ushers (some 20 in number) put on their hats and walked off; leaving us absolutely devoid and destitute of a staff for to-night. One has since been improvised: but it was a small matter to raise a stir and ill-will about, especially as one of our men was equally in fault; and really there is little to be done at night. American people are so accustomed to take care of themselves, that one of these immense audiences will fall into their places with an ease amazing to a frequenter of St. James's Hall; and the certainty with which they are all in, before ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... Frederick knows just how to take them out without breaking the candy. He is more careful than I am," said Rose, who lost no opportunity of praising her little brother and sister, and who never seemed to see any fault in them. ...
— A Little Maid of Massachusetts Colony • Alice Turner Curtis
... blue for water, and light blue for sky, and green for the farther bank, with occasional palm trees looking like long-handled pickaxes, seemed to satisfy them. At any rate they looked on, and found no fault in words; which both Tiffles and Patching took for an auspicious sign. Tiffles ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton
... errors, his death was worthy of the name he bore, and he sustained his fate with calmness and resignation. Seven children were left to deplore his loss. The Chevalier St. George, kindly passing over his fault, wrote of him in these terms. "I am a stranger to the motives which carried poor Archibald Cameron into Scotland; but whatever they may have been, his fate gives me the more concern, as I own I could not bring myself to believe that the English Government would carry their rigour ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745. - Volume I. • Mrs. Thomson
... many of the reasons for the misfit and failure. Some of them are chargeable to parents, teachers, and employers. But the most serious belong rightfully at the door of the individual himself. "The fault, dear Brutus," says Cassius, "is not in our stars, but in ourselves, that ...
— Analyzing Character • Katherine M. H. Blackford and Arthur Newcomb
... said so, I told him so; but it would not do. It was not my fault, indeed, ma'amselle, for I could not get out. That rogue ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... fault with his song; it first rings out loud like a shout, then ends as clearly as the bubbling of the stream near which he likes ...
— Citizen Bird • Mabel Osgood Wright and Elliott Coues
... Must be a world of caves. Or perhaps these mole-men can follow up a mere crack or a fault line and open it out with their flame-throwers to make a tunnel they ...
— Two Thousand Miles Below • Charles Willard Diffin
... "I'm sorry I was rude, Alonzo—all my fault. I may write a letter to my dear old mother tonight, and if you would mail it ...
— —And Devious the Line of Duty • Tom Godwin
... might, by the exercise of a little tact, have lived down an unpopularity that was the result of circumstances rather than arising from any personal animosity. That they did not do so may be ascribed partly, anyhow, to their own fault. ...
— Lady Mary Wortley Montague - Her Life and Letters (1689-1762) • Lewis Melville
... entered his heart with a very positive reproach. This reproach, short lived as it was, had the effect of enkindling his imaginary picture of her; and the eagerness with which he now looked forward to his visit completely crowded from his mind the recollection that, but for his own fault, he might have seen her with as little effort ...
— The Wheel of Life • Ellen Anderson Gholson Glasgow
... not presuming to find fault with her, Mademoiselle; heaven forbid! Of course, if she couldn't love him, she could do nothing but refuse him. But, heigho! it's a very dreadful thing to think of that a nice young man like him—for I'm told that ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope
... a much less vivid idea of the actual appearance of the country, the people, or the principal cities, than the rough crayon sketches of Timm and Mitreuter, which I had seen in the shop windows of Paris. This may not be the fault of the writers, who, of course, are not bound to furnish their own eyes or their own understanding to other people, but it seems to me that elaborate detail is inimical to strong general impressions. I would ...
— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne |
