"Forswear" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... on. To leap out of the window at the risk of breaking your neck was, my romantic young friend, a sufficient demonstration of your disinterestedness. You need not have taken a solemn oath never to marry Marguerite until you were as rich as she is. What can you do now? You cannot forswear yourself, and you cannot suddenly make ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IV. • Editors: Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... mustn't let herself slide into the danger of allowing grief and desolation to blur outlines for her. That others were blind mustn't blind her; that others did not see her as good and lovely must not make her, with cowardly complaisance, forswear her own clear consciousness of right. She was thinking this, and her sobs were becoming a little quieter, when her mother, now in her evening tea-gown, came ...
— A Fountain Sealed • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... potent as a drink in that respect; second, because our beer is nearly finished, and we have not yet the means to concoct more, so that it were ill-advised to rob you, Biarne, by helping to consume that which I do not like; and, last of all, I think it a happy occasion this in which to forswear beer altogether!" ...
— The Norsemen in the West • R.M. Ballantyne
... he was good stuff, and voted him amusing, with an ingenious emphasis of heathen oaths; but advised him, as only an insolent young scoundrel can, to forswear securing, by the seductive game of poker or euchre, larger interest on his capital than the H. B. C.; whose record, he insisted, should never be rivalled by any single man in any single lifetime. ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... would have soothed a child. "There, there," he whispered, "it is not that, it is not that, sweet. I would die for you, I love you so! It is not that, but you are the promised wife of another man. How can I turn a thief even for you, Dorothy? How can I bid you be false, and forswear yourself? There's honor ...
— Madelon - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... unless you forswear your duty. Forswear it! Do not kill my father—the father of the woman who loves you. Worse and more horrible it would be to let my father kill you! It's I who make this situation unnatural, impossible. You must forswear your duty. I can live no longer if you don't. I pray you—" Her voice ...
— The Rustlers of Pecos County • Zane Grey
... enlightened people on the face of the earth! But for one, republican as I am in principle, I think, on the whole, I would prefer the despotism of Austria, Russia, or Rome, to the freedom, if I must take with it the spit, of America. It is vice enough to tempt one to forswear home, country, kindred, friends, religion; it is ample cause for breaking acquaintance, friendship, for a divorce; in a word, it is our grand national distinction, if we did but know it. There are certainly parts of the country ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 425 - Volume 17, New Series, February 21, 1852 • Various
... vengeance. He sees the Rhinegold shining brightly, and asks the nymphs what it means. They tell him of its wonderful qualities, which would render the owner all-powerful, if he should form it into a ring and forswear love. ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley
... way, Yet his ambition once was found so bold, To offer talents of extorted gold; Could David's wants have so been bribed, to shame And scandalize our peerage with his name; For which, his dear sedition he'd forswear, And e'en turn loyal to be made a peer. Next him, let railing Rabsheka have place, So full of zeal he has no need of grace; A saint that can both flesh and spirit use, 300 Alike haunt conventicles and the stews: Of whom the question difficult ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... full of smiles; for every passion something and for no passion truly anything, as boys and women are for the most part cattle of this colour; would now like him, now loathe him; then entertain him, then forswear him; now weep for him, then spit at him; that I drave my suitor from his mad humour of love to a living humour of madness; which was, to forswear the full stream of the world and to live in a nook ...
— As You Like It • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... cratur as he was, ordered the whiskey punch out of the room, and bid 'em throw open all the windows, and cursed himself: and then my lady came to herself again, and when she saw him kneeling there, bid him get up, and not forswear himself any more, for that she was sure he did not love her, and never had: this we learned from Mrs. Jane, who was the only person left present at all this. "My dear," returns my master, thinking, to be sure, of Judy, as ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. IV • Maria Edgeworth
... strengthened by the intolerance and hatred of his old Democratic friends,—of whom Judge Black was a type,—who lost no opportunity to denounce him as a renegade to his party, as one who had been induced by place to forswear his old creed of State rights. Such hostility should, however, be accounted a crown of honor to Mr. Stanton. He certainly came to the public service with patriotic and not with sordid motives, surrendering a most brilliant position at ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... Moab! Thou art undone, O people of Chemosh,' if you light not the torch of equal rights!" exclaimed the platform patterer as Saint-Prosper drew near. "Awake, sons of the free soil! Now is the time to make a stand! Forswear all allegiance to the new patroon; this Southern libertine and despot from the land ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... since you needs will all my weakness know, I love you; and so well, that you must go. I am so much obliged, and have withal A heart so boundless and so prodigal, I dare not trust myself, or you, to stay, But, like frank gamesters, must forswear ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Volume 4 (of 18) - Almanzor And Almahide, Marriage-a-la-Mode, The Assignation • John Dryden
... all modern Jews, and he tried to make me believe that he was very devout; but I once extracted a smile of approbation from him by telling him that he would forswear Moses if the Pope would make him a cardinal. As the son of a rabbi he was learned in all the ceremonies of his religion, but like most men he considered the essence of a religion to lie in ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... chance to close thy eyes for ever, a victim to the maddened attack of the men-at-arms;—by whatsoever doom thy breath be cut off, by sword or disease, by sea or soil, I forswear every wanton and corrupt flame, and vow myself to a death like thine; that they who were bound by one marriage-union may be embraced in one and the same punishment. Nor will I quit this man, though ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... Did you such a thing? Luc. Yes marrie did I; but I was faine to forswear it, They would else haue married me to the ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... I, A. B., a thief, have stolen such a thing, or have killed such a woman, or man, or a child, and am the King's felon; and for that I have done many evil deeds and felonies in this same his land, I do abjure and forswear the lands of the Kings of England, and that I shall haste myself to the port of Dover, which you have given or assigned me; and that I shall not go out of the highway; and if I do, I will that I shall be taken as a thief and the King's felon; and that at the same place I shall tarry ...
— The Customs of Old England • F. J. Snell
... so; but he was single for your sake, and he renewed his offer that very night. Come, do not forswear yourself ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 108, October, 1866 • Various
... make trouble. They simply had not believed the tale before. Thought it was some dodge of his. I could hear their peals of laughter all the way up the harbour. These are the difficulties we have. The old girl must be protected from that sort of eye-opener, if I've to forswear my soul. I've been keeping guard over her ever since we arrived here—besides looking out for you people, as long ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... should be so called, against the Zinta, had penetrated all Martial society; and in order to destroy the votaries of religion, Science, in the persons of her most distinguished students, was this day ready to abjure her character, and forswear her most cherished tenets. As has often happened in Mars, and may one day happen on Earth as the new ideas come into greater force, proven fact was deliberately set against logical impossibility; and for once—what probably had not happened in Mars for ten thousand ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg
... say, thou dost not: therefore tell me true; But tell me, then, 'tis so:—for, look, thy cheeks Confess it, one to the other. Speak, is't so? If it be so, you have wound a goodly clue! If it be not, forswear't: howe'er, I charge thee, As heaven shall work in me for thy ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson
... Vanity! How? soul of a pickle-herring, body of a spagirical tosspot, doublet of motley, and mantle of pilgrim, how art thou transmuted! Wilt thou desert our brotherhood, fool sublimate? Shall the motley chapter no longer boast thee? Wilt thou forswear the order of the bell, and break thy vows to Momus? Have ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 12, No. 32, November, 1873 • Various
... hangings of rich brocades, the thick rugs on the polished floors, if more European than Oriental, equally resembled a palace; an effect in no wise diminished by the brilliant plumage of the guests. If the climate compelled them to forswear velvet and satin, their "muslins were from Bengal and their silks from Benares"; and as the daughters of the planters emulated these birds of fashion in all things, Nevis in winter would have been independent of its gorgeous birds and flowers: ...
— The Gorgeous Isle - A Romance; Scene: Nevis, B.W.I. 1842 • Gertrude Atherton
... phases, and then turned to the incomparable love of Christ, who would save them if they would only let him. In conclusion I asked—"Is there any one here, man, woman or child, in this congregation, who is willing to forswear the intoxicating cup henceforth and forever? If there is, let him come forward and take me by the hand." With scarcely a pause, the main body of the audience in the rear (you know what that means) rose from their seats and ...
— American Missionary, Volume 43, No. 4, April, 1889 • Various
... such money as he had upon the ladies of the company to facilitate their flight to New York. His father, a successful manufacturer of codfish packing-boxes at Newburyport, telegraphed money for the prodigal's return with the stipulation that he should forswear the inky cloak and abase himself ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson
... Places of their Capital City, for the Mob to laugh at him for a Fool: This is a Punishment not unlike our Pillory, and was appointed for mean Criminals, Fellows that Cheat and Couzen People, Forge Writings, Forswear themselves, and the like; and the People, that it was expected would have treated this Man very ill, on the contrary Pitied him, wisht those that set him there placed in his room, and exprest their ...
— The Consolidator • Daniel Defoe
... in a hollow voice. "He who could murder, could well stoop to forswear! Without proof before man; but did he try the ordeals of God?—did his feet pass the ploughshare?—did his hand grasp the seething iron? Verily, verily, thou didst wrong to name to me Alfred my brother! I shall see his sightless and gore-dropping sockets in the ...
— Harold, Complete - The Last Of The Saxon Kings • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... bear true allegiance to King William, does, by necessary implication, abjure King James. There may doubtless be among the servants of the State, and even among the ministers of the Church, some persons who have no sense of honour or religion, and who are ready to forswear themselves for lucre. There may be others who have contracted the pernicious habit of quibbling away the most sacred obligations of morality, and who have convinced themselves that they can innocently make, with a mental reservation, a promise which it would be sinful to make without such a ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... party of three men. So, you see, she and I will have a man to protect us, and I shall have a woman to wait upon me; and if such a gallant company cannot travel from this to Peking in safety, I'll forswear boots and trousers and will retire into the ...
— Stories by English Authors: Orient • Various
... Father Francis came to be held in so great veneration through the Indies, they swore solemnly by his name; and such an oath was generally received for the highest attestation of a truth. Neither did any of them forswear themselves unpunished after such an oath; and God authorized, by many proofs, this religious practice, even by manifest prodigies. Behold a terrible example of it: An Idolater owed a Christian a considerable sum of money; ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Volume XVI. (of 18) - The Life of St. Francis Xavier • John Dryden
... another story!" answered our host, wagging his head and spreading out his hands. "It would take too long were I to tell you all, messires; but so much will I tell. They did find a man who had long desired the pretty Jeanne for his wife, and he did forswear himself and vow that he had been betrothed to Jeanne with her own free will and consent, and that now he claimed her as his wife. Jeanne, whose courage is high, though she be so quiet and modest in her daily life, did vehemently deny the charge, whereupon the angry father and his ...
— A Heroine of France • Evelyn Everett-Green
... Were it not to improve my Int'rest with the Ladies, I wou'd forswear all manner of Bus'ness, and grow perfectly idle, like a Dancing-Master's Brains. I have been squeez'd up at the Custom-House, 'mongst Jews, Swedes, Danes, and dirty Dutchmen, that were entering ...
— The Fine Lady's Airs (1709) • Thomas Baker
... enemy is neurasthenia, doubt. A man can and must be tolerant and human. But no man may doubt what he believes to be good and true. A man must believe in what he thinks. And he should maintain what he believes. Whatever our powers may be, we have no right to forswear them. The smallest creature in the world, like the greatest, has his duty. And—(though he is not sufficiently conscious of it)—he has also a power. Why should you think that your revolt will carry so little weight? A sturdy upright conscience which ...
— Jean Christophe: In Paris - The Market-Place, Antoinette, The House • Romain Rolland
... could hear what they said. My very heart seemed to still its beating, for did not their questions embrace the whole riddle of mine own life. God and Caesar! I, the servant of Caesar—the recipient of rich gifts from his hands—should I forswear the Caesar and follow ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... have said. It spares my brother and it does not belie me. The effect of a letter is often most important. I cannot but consider this letter very ingenious. But the moment I hear it is jesuitical I forswear it. But then my dilemma remains. I cannot consent to give pain to my brother Edward: nor will I speak an untruth, though it be to save him from a wound. I am indeed troubled. Mr. Patrick, I cannot consent to despatch ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... recalled the language of the Declaration of Independence. One of the first measures of the Americans had been to boycott English goods; one of the first measures of the Patriotes was a resolution passed at St Ours binding them to forswear the use of imported English goods and to use only the products of Canadian industry. At the short and abortive session of the legislature which took place at the end of the summer of 1837, nearly all the members of the Assembly appeared in clothes ...
— The 'Patriotes' of '37 - A Chronicle of the Lower Canada Rebellion • Alfred D. Decelles
... had married, it was by no means her intention to forswear prophesying and chivalry. During her trial Jeanne had been asked by the examiner: "Jeanne, was it not revealed to you that if you lost your virginity your good fortune would cease and your Voices desert you?" She ...
— The Life of Joan of Arc, Vol. 1 and 2 (of 2) • Anatole France
... wines and brandies I detest, Here's richer juice from barley press'd. It is the quintessence of malt, And they that drink it want no salt. Come, then, quick come, and take this beer, And water henceforth you'll forswear." ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... whole being." God burns her with His fire and still trembling with delight, she says to Him: "Oh, Lord! The greatest libertine, if Thou didst make him experience Thy love as Thou didst make me experience it, would forswear carnal pleasure and strive only after Thy divine love." "I was like a person intoxicated with wine or love, unable to think of anything but my passion," etc. The fact that she sought in this love the pleasure of the ...
— The Evolution of Love • Emil Lucka
... the way of bringing forth fruits meet for repentance." You see what I mean. Now, you are just here, some of you—you know you are. If you are addicted to any evil habit, it is just the same. Jesus Christ wants you to forswear that habit in your will, determination, and purpose. You have not the power to deliver yourself from it. You may struggle, as some of you tell me you are doing, but it overcomes you, and down you go. ...
— Godliness • Catherine Booth
... the king. "I have enough to disturb me. I will never love again. I will forswear the whole sex. Harkee, Suffolk, you are my brother, my second self, and know all the secrets of my heart. After the passionate devotion I have displayed for Anne Boleyn—after all I have done for her—all I have risked for her—I have ...
— Windsor Castle • William Harrison Ainsworth
... the "Drusus," a part of the name which was omitted in formal address, "you can choose here and now. Forswear your Caesarian connections, or consider my niece's betrothal at ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis
... wandered carelessly through the world, but chiefly she loved an island in the north; and in its capital she has her palace, and the inhabitants of the isle have given themselves over, body and soul, to her domination; they pander and lie and cheat, and forswear themselves; to gain her smile they will shrink from no base deed, no meanness; and she, too, makes women widows and children orphans.... But her subjects care not; they are fat and well-content; the goddess smiles on them, and they are the richest ...
— Orientations • William Somerset Maugham
... Pulcheria the princess stood with her younger sisters, Arcadia and Marina, and with all the impressive ceremonial of the Eastern Church, made a solemn vow to devote their lives to the keeping of their father's heritage and the assistance of their only brother; to forswear the world and all its allurements; never to marry; and to be in all things faithful and constant to each other in this their ...
— Historic Girls • E. S. Brooks
... on his knees and pleaded with them for his life, so that when Bud put the proposition squarely up to him that he forswear everything in regard to the Larkin family, he could not accept ...
— The Free Range • Francis William Sullivan
... by the nose." Christison and his son were present. "I had hoped to spend some years in my native land, and renew the friendship I formed in my youth," observed the former; "but I tell thee, Wenlock, if this trial goes against those twelve honest men, I will forswear my country, and go and seek thy fortune and mine in some other land, where knaves do not, as here, 'rule the roost.'" When, however, the twelve judges gave an almost unanimous verdict in favour of the jurymen, Christison agreed that, after all, there were more honest men in the country than ...
— A True Hero - A Story of the Days of William Penn • W.H.G. Kingston
... you your misconduct to forswear; The wife of poor old Ibycus should have more savoir faire. A woman at your time of life, and drawing near death's door, Should not play with the girly girls, and ...
— Echoes from the Sabine Farm • Roswell Martin Field and Eugene Field
... the strange guest. "What if your young lord could not forswear himself that my name is Theurdank! Are you foes to all ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge
... fair hands into the burdock leaves which served as platters; and last, but not least, jacks of ale and wine, appearing mysteriously from a cool old stone quarry. Abbot Thorold ate to his heart's content, complimented every one, vowed he would forswear all Norman cooks and take to the greenwood himself, and was as gracious and courtly as if he had been at the new palace ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... with them without foreign aid, and the magnitude of the danger which subjection to them implies, find it necessary to ask help from you and from every other power. And we hope to be excused if we forswear our old principle of complete political isolation, a principle which was not adopted with any sinister intention, but was rather the consequence of ...
— The History of the Peloponnesian War • Thucydides
... Glengarry (himself) in the third person. His account of an envoy sent to make proposals to Charles, like those made to the Prince of Orange in 1688, is an error. Perhaps Pickle was not trusted. The envoy from Scotland to Charles only proposed, as we shall see, that he should forswear sack, and live ...
— Pickle the Spy • Andrew Lang
... ye have heard that it was said to them of old time, Thou shalt not forswear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord thine oaths: but I say unto you, Swear not at all; neither by the heaven, for it is the throne of God; nor by the earth, for it is the footstool of His feet; nor by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King; neither shall thou swear by thy ...
— Mystic Christianity • Yogi Ramacharaka
... risible lime, calcimine fear, trepidation coal, lignite live, exist man, anthropology bridal, nuptial winter, hibernate wed, marry gap, hiatus husband/wife, spouse right, ethical shore, littoral showy, ostentatious forswear, perjure spelling, orthography steal, peculate time, chronology steal, embezzle handbook, manual lockjaw, tetanus hole, cavity mistake, error dig, excavate mistake, erratum boil, tumor wink, nictation tickle, ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... "you'll forgive me if in public, at least, I forswear your company? You're plague-spotted, Captain Percy, and your friends may wish you well, but they must stay at home and burn juniper before their ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... than it deserves. Adelaide Kemble was not the true artist, or she could not so soon or so lightly have stept into another sphere. It is enough to paint her as a lovely woman, and a woman-genius. The true artist cannot forswear his vocation; Heaven does not permit it; the attempt makes him too unhappy, nor will he form ties with those who can consent to such sacrilege. Adelaide Kemble loved art, but was ...
— Woman in the Ninteenth Century - and Kindred Papers Relating to the Sphere, Condition - and Duties, of Woman. • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... mark is at the fairest. Forswear her love, and seal it with a kiss Upon the burnish'd splendour of this blade, Or it shall rip the entrails of thy ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. IX • Various
... should make answer, that I understood it not; or the place of a leader of pioneers, I would say, that I was called to a more honourable employment; so likewise, he that would employ me to lie, betray, and forswear myself, though not to assassinate or to poison, for some notable service, I should say, "If I have robbed or stolen anything from any man, send me rather to the galleys." For it is permissible in a man of honour to say, as the Lacedaemonians did,—[Plutarch, ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... you—I forget—did you have a kick at the stern works of that melancholy puppy and humbug Daniel Deronda himself?—the Prince of Prigs; the literary abomination of desolation in the way of manhood; a type which is enough to make a man forswear the love of women, if that is how it must be gained.... Hats off all the same, you understand: a ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... once can dream a dream so fair, And so henceforth love thoughts I do forswear; Since faith in love has crumbled to the dust, In fame alone, I ...
— Poems of Progress • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... If it be so, you have wound a goodly clue; If it be not, forswear't: howe'er, I charge thee, As heaven shall work in me for thine avail, To tell ...
— The Old Helmet, Volume II • Susan Warner |
