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God knows how   /gɑd noʊz haʊ/   Listen
God knows how

adverb
1.
By some means not understood by the speaker.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"God knows how" Quotes from Famous Books



... not have thee think that I was entirely without sense, yet I did not make the best use of it: whereof when I bethink me, and that I am now, even as thou seest me, such a hag that never a spark of fire may I hope to get from any, God knows how I rue it. Now with men 'tis otherwise: they are born meet for a thousand uses, not for this alone; and the more part of them are of much greater consequence in old age than in youth: but women are fit for nought but this, ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio

... sit at home, under any possibility of wrong being done to this man. God knows what heavy sadness had worn her soul, through the months in which she had never for a moment flinched from the knowledge that a whole world lay between herself and him. God knows how she had struggled against the unconquerable tide of feeling as it crept slowly upon her, refusing to be stemmed and threatening to overwhelm her in its remorseless waves. She was only left endurance—yet even in this there was a gladness which she had in nothing ...
— That Lass O' Lowrie's - 1877 • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... have lost hopes of having children by my marriage with my well-beloved spouse the Empress Josephine, which urges me to sacrifice the dearest affections of my heart, to consider only the well-being of the State, and to will the dissolution of our marriage. God knows how much such a resolution has cost my heart; but there is no sacrifice which is beyond my courage, if proved to be useful to the well- ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt

... cast-off clothes, Madame la Duchesse; for in such matters every lady applies to women whose business rests on a basis of perfect secrecy. I have never betrayed anybody, though God knows how many great ladies have intrusted their diamonds to me by the month while wearing false jewels made to ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac

... she is; but I do, and I know that there is a great reward for whoever takes her back to her people. It was the only reward I wanted. But she escaped and crossed the river in one of my canoes. I followed her, but The Sheik was there, God knows how, and he captured her and attacked me and drove me back. Then came Baynes, angry because he had lost the girl, and shot me. If you want her, go to The Sheik and ask him for her—she has passed ...
— The Son of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... long time suffice my collection. The brasses for the shelves I like—but not the price: the notched ones, after all, do very well. I have had three grand hawls since I last wrote to you. The pulpit, repentance-stool, King's seat, and God knows how much of carved wainscot, from the kirk of Dunfermline, enough to coat the hall to the height of seven feet:—supposing it boarded above, for hanging guns, old portraits, intermixed with armour, &c.—it will be a superb entrance-gallery: this is hawl the first. Hawl second is twenty-four pieces of ...
— Selected English Letters (XV - XIX Centuries) • Various

... threshold and longed to go in; she was forced to turn aside, to seek admittance at one of those other doors. This it is that matters—matters greatly. Perhaps only God who made the woman heart and who Himself set that door open wide—perhaps only God knows how ...
— Their Yesterdays • Harold Bell Wright

... have doubted me, because, since Neufchatel, you are my life. Let me say this to you plainly, after having so often proved it to you. The miseries of my struggle and of my terrible work would have tired out the greatest and strongest men; and often my sister has desired to put an end to them, God knows how; I always thought the remedy worse than the disease! It is you alone who have supported me till now, . . . You said to me, 'Be patient, you are loved as much as you love. Do not change, for others change not.' We have both been courageous; ...
— Women in the Life of Balzac • Juanita Helm Floyd

... prepared; and as naturally as water runs into a hollow place, so naturally Christ must come into a heart that is full of faith. What is the hindrance with some earnest souls, who say: "I have given myself up to the Lord Jesus. I have done it often, and by His grace I am doing it every day, and God knows how earnestly and really I am doing it, and I have the sanction of God upon it, I know God has blessed me"? They have not been convicted of their unbelief. "Oh! fools, and slow of heart to believe." Do you know what Christ said about a man calling his brother a fool? Yet here ...
— 'Jesus Himself' • Andrew Murray

... well. You good people make too much of me; I do not deserve it, nor my compositions either. And what shall I say to your present, my dearest baron, that came like a star in a dark night, or like a flower in winter, or like a cordial in sickness? God knows how I am obliged, at times, to toil and labour to gain a wretched livelihood, and Staenerl, (Constance,) too, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various

... when one Saturday evening she sat down by his side and made all that was so dark, clear and plain before him. It was nothing but a startled look in Paul's wan face—a flush—a smile—and then a close embrace—but God knows how her heart leaped up at this rich payment ...
— Ten Girls from Dickens • Kate Dickinson Sweetser

... go by there will be cheering, and some of the women are sure to raise the song of Die Wacht am Rhein; and within the cars the crippled soldiers will take up the chorus feebly. God knows how many able-bodied soldiers already have gone west; how many maimed and crippled ones have gone east! In the first instance the number must run up into the second million; of the latter there must have been ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb

... now was changed. Dead winds delayed us, the sea ridged, clouds blotted out the blue. We held on. There was a great cape which we called Cape Cuba. Off this a storm met us. We lived it out and made into one of those bottle harbors of which, first and last, we were to find God knows how many in Cuba! ...
— 1492 • Mary Johnston

... then east again, all along the under-side of Europe. Then south again, God knows how far." The explanation did not enlighten Bessie in the least, but she held her tongue and looked to Dick"s patch till they ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling

... of them, he said. Young fellows from other provinces who find their way hither across country, God knows how. It was a good soil for deserters—brushwood, deep gullies, lonely stretches of land, and, above all, la tradizione. The tradition, he explained, of that ill-famed forest of Velletri, now extirpated. The deserters were nearly all children—the ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas

... love with you—and I am now; but somehow it isn't that spoony sort of love that makes a man unwholesome and sometimes drives him to drink or to suicide. I suppose I love you too well to want to marry you; but God knows how glad I am that we have met, and I hope that we shall never really ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various

... more fully, she asked me where she was. I told her she was in the ship yet, but God knows how long it might be. "Why, madam," says she, "is not the storm over?" "No, no," says I, "Amy." "Why, madam," says she, "it was calm just now" (meaning when she was in the swooning fit occasioned by her fall). "Calm, Amy!" says I. "'Tis far from calm. It may be it will be calm by-and-by, when we are ...
— The Fortunate Mistress (Parts 1 and 2) • Daniel Defoe

... had listened, straining our ears to hear the guns. Was our flag still there? Had our boys with Meade stood fast against the lion of the Confederacy, or had the Stars and Bars been flaunted victorious upon the battle ground? God knows how our hearts were strained in those hours. And when I heard the cheers of our soldiers upon the transports and thought of Francis Scott Key and how he had watched to see if Old Glory still waved, my eyes were blinded with tears. I had to suspend my inspection to dry ...
— Between the Lines - Secret Service Stories Told Fifty Years After • Henry Bascom Smith

... considerable self-possession. He took a seat near my frame, and seemed interested in my work. I had so strong a desire to appear calm that I succeeded in threading a fine needle with my heavy silk; but God knows how I trembled.... ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 5, November, 1863 • Various

... one of our schoolfellows, and had but the day before joined us in our lessons. Suddenly as, in a half-hearted way, we began our usual tasks, Dr. Bruce entered, pale and agitated. "Boys," he said, "a dreadful thing has happened to our good old town. God knows how far the mischief may extend, and what ruin may be wrought; but we know already that more than one old pupil here have lost their lives, and that some of you boys have lost those near and dear to you. There ...
— Memoirs of Sir Wemyss Reid 1842-1885 • Stuart J. Reid, ed.

... dishonor the name and commandments of their natural sovereign." Therefore, with a doubting spirit, and almost with a broken heart, had the warrior shut himself up in Namur Castle, to await the progress of events, and to escape from the snares of his enemies. "God knows how much I desire to avoid extremities," said he, "but I know not what to do with men who show themselves so ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... The arch-enemy, the eternal opponent! God knows how many times people like Queen Elizabeth have been dug out of the past, first by Snakes, then by Spiders, and kidnapped or killed and replaced in the course of our war. This is the first big operation I've been on, Greta. But ...
— No Great Magic • Fritz Reuter Leiber

... what he has been doing. I have not the heart to do it, for I think he is ashamed of himself-he must be so indeed, and such inquiries could not fail to be painful to both. My forbearance pleases him—touches him even, I am inclined to think. He says he is glad to be home again, and God knows how glad I am to get him back, even as he is. He lies on the sofa, nearly all day long; and I play and sing to him for hours together. I write his letters for him, and get him everything he wants; and sometimes I read to him, and sometimes ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte

... a store of balm in that, if I did but know. Her beauty doomed her to a creature life, which, when she had worn out, she was sold, as I may be, God knows how soon. Though far away from me, she is my mother still, in all that recollection can make her; her countenance seems like a wreath decorating our past associations. Shrink not when I tell it, for few shrink at such things now,—I saw her chained; ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams

... luminous dimness—a subtle seduction to the senses in the silence and the solitude; a bird chirruped once among the tangled roses overhead, and a soft, sighing breeze fluttered for one instant amid its long, trailing branches. And then, God knows how it came to pass, or what madness possessed the man; but suddenly there was no longer any faith, or honour, or truth for him—nothing on the face of the whole earth ...
— Vera Nevill - Poor Wisdom's Chance • Mrs. H. Lovett Cameron

... continued. "Did I not? Or was it a son? Ma foi! It were difficult—ah, yes! I remember now! A daughter. A little, red, hairless, dirty thing she was. I have a great curiosity— the blood of three kings, you know; surely that would overcome the blood of the good God knows how many peasant swine. She is not red, and hairless, and dirty now, in faith! She is clean-limbed, and straight, and white. A thousand louis to a sou, that she is!" ... His brow was creased in ...
— A Fool There Was • Porter Emerson Browne

... Pen, and my wife, &c., and very good cheer we had and merry; musique at and after dinner, and a fellow danced a jigg; but when the company begun to dance, I came away lest I should be taken out; and God knows how my wife carried herself, but I left her to try her fortune. So home, and late at the office, and then home to supper and ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... Spain, I admit, is still to pay the ninety-five thousand pounds—but how does it stand then? The Assiento contract is to be suspended; you are to purchase this sum at the price of an exclusive trade, pursuant to a national treaty, and of an immense debt of God knows how many hundred thousand pounds due from Spain to the South Sea Company. Here, Sir, is the submission of Spain, by the payment of a stipulated sum; a tax laid upon subjects of England, under the severest penalties, with the reciprocal accord of an English minister, as a preliminary ...
— Selected Speeches on British Foreign Policy 1738-1914 • Edgar Jones

... Rowley, also dismounted and struggling against the stream, which is already up to our waists, and sweeps along with it huge branches and entire trees, that threaten each moment to carry us away with them, or to crush us against the rocks. We avoid these dangers, God knows how, make violent efforts to stem the torrent and gain the side of the barranca; although, even should we succeed, it is so steep that we can scarcely hope to climb it without assistance. And whence is that assistance to come? Of the Mexicans we see or hear nothing. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various

... very cruel, mother," said Marie, sadly. "I would not complain, only excuse myself, and implore pity and indulgence, and defend myself from the reproach of having been a cold, unloving daughter. Oh! God knows how I have longed for your love; that I would willingly prove that I would joyfully do every thing to embellish your life and make you happy. It gave me such pleasure to earn something for you with my dear flowers and lessons, and ...
— Old Fritz and the New Era • Louise Muhlbach

... altogether that I'm thinking of; but the old monks with their cowls; and Merlin; and God knows how many ghosts beside;—I could fancy that I saw some of them just now at the end of these ...
— Walladmor: - And Now Freely Translated from the German into English. - In Two Volumes. Vol. II. • Thomas De Quincey

... can make no pretence (to please you) that it was a new Tommy at last. We have seen how he gave his life to her during those eighteen months, but he could not make himself anew. They say we can do it, so I suppose he did not try hard enough; but God knows how hard he tried. ...
— Tommy and Grizel • J.M. Barrie

... she's there. If she's gone, Mark has made it right with his family and taken her home. If she hasn't, why, God knows how that matter will be straightened out. Anyhow, she has a husband now, and he seems to value her; and Waitstill is alone on the top ...
— The Story Of Waitstill Baxter • By Kate Douglas Wiggin

... at arm's length, and taken a bird's-eye view of it, after reading it a great many times, but there is no greater encouragement in it this way than on a microscopic inspection. I should love to go with you—as I have gone, God knows how often—into Little Britain, and Eastcheap, and Green Arbour Court, and Westminster Abbey. I should like to travel with you, outside the last of the coaches down to Bracebridge Hall. It would make my heart glad to compare notes with you ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 3 (of 3), 1836-1870 • Charles Dickens

... neck). There spoke my daughter! Look up, my child! Thou hast lost a lover, but thou hast made a father happy. (Embracing her, and alternately laughing and crying.) My child! my child! I was not worthy to live so blest a moment! God knows how I, poor miserable sinner, became possessed of such an angel! My Louisa! My paradise! Oh! I know but little of love; but that to rend its bonds must be a bitter grief I ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... disfigurements, there was much that money could bring travel, adventure, sport, a thousand things and, at any rate, the companionship of rational beings, for which I now craved as I had craved for water in the desert. For God knows how long I had seen no human being no living creature indeed but a few birds and I had almost forgotten the sound of a human voice. Sunk in apathy I had become almost as a beast, but the sight of the diamonds had aroused me, and I recalled how poor Inyati had called them "magic stones." Magic indeed, ...
— A Rip Van Winkle Of The Kalahari - Seven Tales of South-West Africa • Frederick Cornell

... nomination of bishops, he did not see how the laws of the country could operate upon it, so as to make it an adequate security. Then as to the oath of allegiance which the bishop was to take, of what avail could it be, that the law required this oath from a bishop, appointed God knows how, or by whom? When all these circumstances were considered, the state of the Irish Catholic church, the way in which the reformation had been effected, the rivalry and enmity between the Catholics and the established church, and the inadequacy of all securities which had been ...
— Maxims And Opinions Of Field-Marshal His Grace The Duke Of Wellington, Selected From His Writings And Speeches During A Public Life Of More Than Half A Century • Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington

... what peace or comfort was. I never had a kind word spoken to me till I came to work in your factory. Mr. Wilson, you treated me well; you encouraged me to do well, and to learn to read and write, and to try to make something of myself; and God knows how grateful I am for it. Then, sir, I found my wife; you've seen her,—you know how beautiful she is. When I found she loved me, when I married her, I scarcely could believe I was alive, I was so happy; ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... again. I travelled up the river road, past our island refuge of that dark night; past the sweeping, low-voiced currents that bore me up; past the scene of our wreck in the whirlwind; past the great gap in the woods, to stand open God knows how long. I was glad to turn my face to the south shore, for in Canada there was now a cold welcome for most Yankees, and my fists were sore with resenting the bitter taunt. I crossed in a boat from Iroquois, and D'ri had been waiting for me half ...
— D'Ri and I • Irving Bacheller

... a dip in the ground and the eight-foot fence of the corral shut out all within. God knows how we got over that fence. I swear I think we leaped it. I have no memory of climbing, but I do recall landing on the ...
— Red Saunders' Pets and Other Critters • Henry Wallace Phillips

... now—like the rest of the world." She paused a moment, and her arms clasped Dinah more closely still. "I do not think I have very far to go," she said, speaking very softly. "My night has been so long that I think the dawn cannot be far off now. God knows how I am ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell

... bounding on to the grass at the road-side, threw the murderer off his balance and hurled him backwards. There was a tremendous crash, I found myself beneath the tonneau, and then, as it seemed, on the top of it again. At last I went rolling over and over on to the grass, and lay there, God knows how long, in very awe and terror of ...
— The Man Who Drove the Car • Max Pemberton

... his own. As he grew bigger he was for ever having rows with his father, and his mother was for ever interceding for him. He was idle at school; but he was a manly boy enough over games and sport, and a capital shot. Anyway, she managed to be proud of him, God knows how. I shouldn't wonder if this war was the making of him, though, poor chap, if he's spared to see the end of ...
— Peter's Mother • Mrs. Henry De La Pasture

... whatever it be (famous REDOUTE D'EU, as it turned out!),—which guards Fontenoy to north, and will take us in flank, nay in rear, as we storm the cannon of the Village. Ingoldsby, speed imperative on him, pushed into the Wood; found French light-troops ('God knows how many of them!') prowling about there; found the Redoubt a terribly strong thing, with ditch, drawbridge, what not; spent thirty or forty of his Highlanders, in some frantic attempt on it by rule of thumb;—and found 'He would need artillery' and other things. In short, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XV. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... out, The Wolf in advance, I behind him. God knows how he found the road, but he rarely halted, and then only to listen to the sound of the axe. "You see," he muttered between his teeth. "You hear? do you hear?" "But where?" The Wolf shrugged his shoulders. We decended into a ravine, the wind died down for an instant, measured blows ...
— A Survey of Russian Literature, with Selections • Isabel Florence Hapgood

... must live. It is written here." Mercy pointed at the crystal. Then she laughed her cold, mirthless laugh. "There was one power that served me, that helped me to save my reason through all those early days. God knows how it may help you—for I can't see. I loved your father with a passion nothing, no disaster could destroy. I loved him so that I could crush every other feeling down, subservient to my passion. Go you, child, and find such a love. Go you and find ...
— The Golden Woman - A Story of the Montana Hills • Ridgwell Cullum

... being dependent. It's in his bones like it is with, all of 'em—on the estate. It's a tradition. Lord, the old man would be horrified, if he knew! The Jervaises are a sort of superior creation to him. We've been their tenants for God knows how many hundred years. And serfs before that, I suppose. I get the feeling myself, sometimes. It's infectious. When you see every one kow-towing to old Jervaise as if he were the angel Gabriel, you begin to feel as if there ...
— The Jervaise Comedy • J. D. Beresford

... lost my temper and told him that I would not stand by and see her life made unhappy. Then he grew angry too, and in his anger said such cruel things of her that then and there I swore he should not live to do her harm. God knows how it came about, for in such moments of passion it is hard to remember the steps from a word to a blow, but I found myself standing over his dead body, with my hands crimson with the blood that welled from his torn throat. We were alone and he was a stranger, with none of his kin to seek for him ...
— Dracula's Guest • Bram Stoker

... well hast thou fought to-day; By the mass, so did we all.—I thank you, Richard; God knows how long it is I have to live, And it hath pleas'd him that three times to-day You have defended me from imminent death.— Well, lords, we have not got that which we have; 'T is not enough our foes are this time fled, Being opposites of ...
— King Henry VI, Second Part • William Shakespeare [Rolfe edition]

... as much as you can, and keep this from him if possible. A courier is just in who got through, God knows how, during the night. Hatton and his party were corralled yesterday beyond Rawhide Butte. Several of them are killed already. The cavalry start at once, and I go ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King

... from the world, to follow her, when young Escap'd; and, in her vesture mantling me, Made promise of the way her sect enjoins. Thereafter men, for ill than good more apt, Forth snatch'd me from the pleasant cloister's pale. God knows how after that my life was fram'd. This other splendid shape, which thou beholdst At my right side, burning with all the light Of this our orb, what of myself I tell May to herself apply. From her, like ...
— The Divine Comedy • Dante

... beginning nor the ending. But being barely one-and-twenty years of age, and having an adventurous disposition that would have carried him into almost anything that possessed a smack of uncertainty or danger about it, he contrived to say, in a pretty easy tone (though God knows how it was put on ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard I. Pyle

... now," Trefethan commanded angrily. "That's what the Goldstead did to me—God knows how many millions, but nothing left in my soul..... nor in my veins. The good red blood is gone. I am a jellyfish, a huge, gross mass of ...
— The Night-Born • Jack London

... for wicked men; God will be even with wicked men. God knows how to reserve the ungodly to the day of judgment to be punished (2 Peter 2). And this is one of his ways by which he doth it. Thus it was with ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... BROTHER brush, enamoured of the dame; Now took advantage, and declared his flame: The Ass effaced, but God knows how 'twas done; Another soon howe'er he had begun, And finished well, upon the very spot; In painting, few more praises ever got; But want of recollection made him place A saddle, where ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine

... whispered Robeckal, "God knows how it is, but neither fire nor water seems to have the slightest ...
— The Son of Monte-Cristo, Volume II (of 2) • Alexandre Dumas pere

... not here. Things are going to be interesting here.... God knows how it'll all end.... ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond

... that I have been generally in the right. You know that I am no flatterer. But I tell you, sir, from my inmost heart that you are the only man to lead the people, because you are the only man whose courage never fails. God knows how you manage it. I am of the bull-dog type and hold on because I do not know how to let go. Most of my work I do in utter hopelessness. But you, sir, you never come within a mile of despair. The blacker the clouds get the more confident you are that there is sunlight behind them. I carp and ...
— The Path of the King • John Buchan

... punishment is at hand and that the Almighty will speedily hurl vengeance on their guilty heads. Among other evils, a new tax on Property, with additions, is said to be in immediate contemplation and God knows how we shall bear all the accumulating Burdens to which this Country must ...
— A Canadian Manor and Its Seigneurs - The Story of a Hundred Years, 1761-1861 • George M. Wrong

... dared not leave the shore lest I miss the chance to signal a passing vessel. There was scarcely anything to maintain life on that rocky coast. Now and again I caught a seagull or a fish. Sometimes I ventured inland and found fruit, running back lest a ship should pass. There I stayed through God knows how many months and years. I fell ill many times. My limbs are cramped and twisted with rheumatism. Finally, I grew to hate the place beyond endurance. I determined to walk to the other end of the island. It ...
— The Splendid Idle Forties - Stories of Old California • Gertrude Atherton

... half-circle of cocoanut palms grew denser and lower as they drew away. "This is the story. It's got to be told. I should have avoided it if it had been possible. He is the owner of the plantation. Oh, I rather expected something like this. It's my run of luck. I was just recovering from the fever. God knows how he found out, but he did. It was during the rains. He told me to get out that night. Didn't care whether I died on the road or not. I should have but for my boy James. The man sent along with us a poor discarded woman, of whom he had grown tired. She died when we reached town. ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath

... to-night by the Druid stones on Marlbury Downs, about a mile or more from your house. I cannot say more, except to entreat you to come. I will explain all when you are there. The one thing is, I want to see you. Come alone. Believe me, I would not ask this if my happiness did not hang upon it—God knows how entirely! I am too agitated to ...
— A Changed Man and Other Tales • Thomas Hardy

... Do whatsoe'er it pleaseth him to do. For I am but a stranger, a lost child, And who should think of me or love me true?" Then bowed the prince and said: "In very truth, I know thou art my sister. Speak not thus. God knows how much I love thee, sister mine. If thou dost not permit me to depart I'll not resist. I'm happy here with thee, But our dear parents are in cruel doubt, And look for news of thee. Now that I know Thy ...
— Malayan Literature • Various Authors

... Calvert, warmly, touched by the nobility and earnestness of Mr. Morris's manner, very different from his usual cynical one. "And I am come to put another in your charge until the Queen sends for her," he went on. "She has ridden through this terrible night—God knows how—to give us warning that the King and Queen have abandoned us and the great plan and have chosen to remain at the palace. I must go to the Tuileries and find out what has befallen their Majesties ...
— Calvert of Strathore • Carter Goodloe

... the poor companion of your guardian's daughter he seemed to see the heiress I had been, and treated me as such. This flattered my pride and touched my heart. He was kind, I grateful; then he loved me, and God knows how utterly I loved him! A few months of happiness the purest, then he went to make home ready for me, and I believed him; for where I wholly love I wholly trust. While my own peace was undisturbed, I learned to read the language of your eyes, Manuel, to find the boy grown into the man, the friend warmed ...
— Pauline's Passion and Punishment • Louisa May Alcott

... esteem. But Lucy's a wise mother. She moves with her finger on her lip. And that, mind you, without coddling. She'll risk him to the hair's-breadth—and never a word. But she won't risk herself. Not she! Why, she might be wanted! But there it is. Women can do these things, God knows how! It's men who make a ...
— Love and Lucy • Maurice Henry Hewlett

... you know how we go on fancying, when we have nothing better to do. I gave the pistols to the servant, to clean and load. He was playing with the maid, and trying to frighten her, when the pistol went off—God knows how!—the ramrod was in the barrel; and it went straight through her right hand, and shattered the thumb. I had to endure all the lamentation, and to pay the surgeon's bill; so, since that time, I have kept all my weapons unloaded. But, my dear friend, what is ...
— The Sorrows of Young Werther • J.W. von Goethe

... everytime I hear the sound of a gun—I have been to dinner with two of the Generals, Lee & Putnam and I just took a look at pore Boston—& Charlestown—from prospect Hill Charlestown has only a few chimneys standing in it, there seems to be a number of very fine Buildings in Boston but God knows how long they will stand; they are pulling up all the warfs for fire wood—to me that never see any thing of war, the preparations are very terable indead, but I endevor to keep my fears to my self ...
— Seaport in Virginia - George Washington's Alexandria • Gay Montague Moore

... "Senor governor, I will tell you in a very few words. Your worship must know that this gentleman has just now won more than a thousand reals in that gambling house opposite, and God knows how. I was there, and gave more than one doubtful point in his favour, very much against what my conscience told me. He made off with his winnings, and when I made sure he was going to give me a crown or so at least by way of a present, as it is usual and customary to give men of quality ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

... their own poverty and the avarice of certain capitalists, to live in what are technically known as "tenement-houses," or, more pertinently, "barracks,"—hulks of brick, put up by Shylocks anxious for twenty per cent., and lived in—God knows how—by from four to ninety-four families each. Of 115,986 families residing in the city of New York, only 15,990 are able to enjoy the luxury of an independent home; 14,362 other families live in comparative comfort, two in a house; 4,416 buildings contain ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 27, January, 1860 • Various

... all different. I began to cry. Like a baby. I kept on with the water-bottle at his teeth long after I was convinced he was dead. I didn't want him to be aut of it! God knows how I didn't. I wanted my dear little Cockney cad back. Oh! most frightfully I wanted ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells

... the death of one of his saints." The friend, I remember, thought it "a curious remark about Huxley." It strikes me as a miraculous remark about anybody. It is one of those magic sayings where every word hits a chain of association, God knows how. ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward

... days," said Cumshaw, "we've travelled God knows how many miles, we've climbed up a Hades of a lot of mountains, and I don't think there's a blind creek for twenty miles that we haven't followed to the end and back again, and at the end of it all we're no nearer the Valley than we were ...
— The Lost Valley • J. M. Walsh

... 'Oshspur? And I've two cheques still on my 'ands which is marked 'No account!' 'No account' is very bad. Isn't 'No account' very bad on a cheque, Captain 'Oshspur? And then I've that cheque on Drummond, signed;—God knows how that is signed! There ain't no such person at all. Baldebeque! That's more like it than nothing else. When you brought me that, I thought there vas a Lord Baldebeque; and I know you ...
— Sir Harry Hotspur of Humblethwaite • Anthony Trollope

... her fervently, with lips that trembled. "I love you with my whole soul," he told her, with sudden passion. "God knows how ...
— The Top of the World • Ethel M. Dell

... I told you?—perched on a crag in the forest beside Zeitoon. My men have cut a passage to it through the trees, for it had stood forgotten for God knows how long. Later you shall understand. There came Arabaiji, riding a mule to death, saying you and this lady are in danger of life at the hands of my nation. I did not believe that, but ...
— The Eye of Zeitoon • Talbot Mundy

... was my festival. I felt myself as humble, meek, and poor as though I stood before my God. Every weakness or error or sin, in thought, word, and deed, was revealed to me. All stood out strangely clear in my soul, as though it were doomsday—and it was my festival. God knows how humble I felt when men ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner

... in fourteen languages! Though of seven volumes none before Could ever reach the fame of four, Henceforth I sacrifice all Glory To the Rinaldo of my Story: I've sung his health and appetite (The last word's not translated right— He's turned it, God knows how, to vigour)[98] I'll sing them in a book that's bigger. Oh! Muse prepare for thy Ascension! And generous Rizzo! thou ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron

... Peter. "You're askin' me t' pay for twenty years o' life when I can use but a few. God knows how many!" ...
— Harbor Tales Down North - With an Appreciation by Wilfred T. Grenfell, M.D. • Norman Duncan

... is not a good excuse for a failure in character; but God knows how wickedly provocative thereof it can be. The elders of the Aiken Club did not notice that Larkin was slipping from grace, because his slipping was gradual; but they noticed all of a sudden, with pity, chagrin ...
— IT and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris

... silly that all was! When they were on the floor there, and had Master Jem fastened in, be remembered how she suddenly turned, and put her arms about his neck, as shyly as when they were first married, and kissed him. "Only God knows how good you are to me, Stephen," she said. There were tears in her eyes.—Yarrow passed his hand over his forehead. Did ever a thought come into your mind like a fresh, clean air into a stove-heated, foul room? or like the first hearty, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various

... bad. She'd been carrying on with God knows how many men, both before and after she ...
— Over the Sliprails • Henry Lawson

... "And God knows how gladly I would bring him a cheering word in these sorrowful hours; but it must not be to-day. The messenger has ridden off on ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... frost-bitten claws, Olga said, and his wife, old as she was, had to help him in the fields. One whole winter, he told Olga's father, they had lived on turnips. But season after season dragged on, and still they existed, God knows how. Of Jozef they never heard again. But with Jozef himself it was a different story. The boy went up to Alaska, before the days of the Klondike strike. There he worked in the fisheries, and in the lumber camps, and still later he ...
— The Prairie Wife • Arthur Stringer

... reign. That was the time for England to have spoken. But the peace party had it by the throat; they, with their mawkish cry for peace—peace at any price!—drowned the voices of men and heroes, and the end was what it was! Queen Karma was deposed—she and her children fled, God knows how, God knows where—fled and left a dead husband and father, slain like a hero and an Englishman, fighting for his own, and with his face to the foe. Avenge his death? Nonsense, declared the old women. He had no right to defy the will of Heaven, no right to stir up strife ...
— Cleek: the Man of the Forty Faces • Thomas W. Hanshew

... the captain, "but God knows how long it will be before we sight a ship. Our only hope is for some tramp freighter that's trying to find a short cut through the reefs. Even if we sight a tramp, how'll we ...
— Harrigan • Max Brand

... make my stepfather happier than for some one to go and tell him I was dead. I always have to hide like a wicked thief when he comes, and I'm sure it is a great deal worse for poor mother than it is for me. Nobody but God knows how father uses her, and I daren't go ...
— The Young Carpenters of Freiberg - A Tale of the Thirty Years' War • Anonymous

... presence of both gives trifles a place in God's storehouse of precious things. A father is glad when his child brings him some utterly valueless present, not because he must, but because he loves; and many a parent has such laid away in sacred repositories. God knows how to take gifts from His children, not less well than we who are evil know ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... . . is sinful, and besides the fact is you are mine, and no one has the right to think that you do not belong to me but to someone else! You are mine! I will not give way to anyone! . . . I am sorry for him—God knows how sorry I am for him, Liza! It hurts me to see him! But . . . it can't be helped after all. You don't love him, do you? What's the good of your going on being miserable with him? We must have it out! We will ...
— Love and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... a familiar picture to Bob and me of late, sat at the flat desk in the centre of the room. She faced the door. Her elbows rested on the desk; in her hand was an afternoon paper that she had evidently been reading when Bob entered. God knows how long she had been reading it before he came. Bob was kneeling at the side of her chair, his hands clasped and uplifted in an agony of appeal that was supplemented by the awful groans. His face showed unspeakable terror and entreaty; ...
— Friday, the Thirteenth • Thomas W. Lawson

... suffered a very fine kind of torture wondering what would happen to the five if she broke down. Asylums and homes and hospitals don't imply any great disgrace to most of the tenement dwellers but to a woman of that type they mean Hell. God knows how she did it but she kept the five alive and clothed and in school until the boy was about fifteen and went to work. When I hear of the lone widows of the tenements, who are apt to be very husky, and who work out with ...
— One Way Out - A Middle-class New-Englander Emigrates to America • William Carleton

... of La Valliere. If there be one saying more true than another, it is this: great griefs contain within themselves the germ of their consolation. This painful wound, inflicted upon Raoul, had drawn him nearer to his father again; and God knows how sweet were the consolations which flowed from the eloquent mouth and generous heart of Athos. The wound was not cicatrized, but Athos, by dint of conversing with his son and mixing a little more of his life with that of the young man, had brought him ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas

... doesn't storm and rage, but he is angry all the time so that one can't bear him at home any longer. He breaks everything in his anger, and he scolds poor Karen so that it's wretched. He has no regard for anybody, only for his old mother, and God knows how long that will last. He doesn't work, he only drinks. He steals my hard-earned money out of my dress-pocket and buys brandy with it. He has no shame left in him, although he always used to be so honorable in his way ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo

... affectionate words, while my eyes wander over the beautiful landscape which my window commands, my mind is filled with the consideration of the great treasure of love that has been bestowed upon me out of so many hearts, and I wonder as I ponder. God knows how devoutly I thank Him for this blessing above all others, granted to me in a measure so far above my deserts, that my gratitude is mingled with surprise and a sense of my own unworthiness, which enhances my appreciation ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble

... God knows how it happened; they never knew how. He turned with a formal conventional bow, And some well chosen words of politeness, to go. Her mouth was a rose Love had dropped in the snow Of her face. It smiled up to him, luscious and sweet. In the tip of each finger he felt his heart beat, Like ...
— Three Women • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... both ways—afraid it would be discovered, but more afraid I'd be found out if I tried to get rid of it. So I buried it in the cellar of my little shop and did my level best to forget it. I'd almost succeeded when, God knows how, Paddington found me. ...
— The Crevice • William John Burns and Isabel Ostrander

... my eyes thawed him, though God knows how hard I was trying not to hurt him with pitying looks. At all events he began to explain himself of his own accord, very impetuously; indeed I rather think the ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 27, March 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various

... are afraid of Annette, old coward!" cried Marie. "When are you going to send her away? you have had her now three years. What amuses me is that your old woman still lives; the good God knows how to revenge himself." ...
— Sons of the Soil • Honore de Balzac

... their miracles, no doubt, even in that beautiful empyrean of moneyed ease in which the poor place them. Their money cannot buy all they enjoy, and God knows how much of their sorrow it assuages. As it is, one hears now and then of accidents among them, conversions to better thoughts, warding off of danger, rescue of life; and heirs are sometimes born, and husbands provided, and fortunes saved, in such surprising ...
— Balcony Stories • Grace E. King

... taste! Every fibre of me rebels at the thought of death—of inflicting it on anything. God knows how I could have done it when I had so much of happiness myself!" She swung around ...
— The Firing Line • Robert W. Chambers

... think of my darling, darling little baby, whom God is taking care of now; and how, when I see the little bed she used to lie on, and her little frocks and shoes, I feel something biting in my heart, and as if I must have her in my arms again. And about you, my own precious boy, God knows how I feel, as I never could express to you; but I can ...
— Left at Home - or, The Heart's Resting Place • Mary L. Code

... and hardly breathing, I waited with a horribly strained expectation. Nothing happened. It was maddening, but a dull, growing ache in the lower part of my face made me aware that I had been grinding my teeth madly enough, for God knows how long. ...
— The Shadow-Line - A Confession • Joseph Conrad

... murdering lot of devils, of whom you and I'll get news sooner than we want. The Tuscaroras are bad enough in themselves, but the worst part is that all the back country in the hills belongs to their cousins the Cherokees, and God knows how far north their sway holds. The Long House of the Iroquois controls everything west of the coast land from Carolina away up through Virginia to New York and the Canadas. That means that Virginia has on two sides the most powerful ...
— Salute to Adventurers • John Buchan

... anything . . . you will learn it only later on. But after all women usually have an easier time of it. We men have to fight hard to grasp our share and have to pay dearly. God knows how dearly." ...
— The Comedienne • Wladyslaw Reymont

... did not think of that when you jumped in; and no more must I in thanking you. God knows how a poor miner's son will ever reward you; but the mouse repaid the lion, says the story, and, at all events, I can pray for you. By the bye, gentlemen, I hope you have brought up ...
— Yeast: A Problem • Charles Kingsley

... find first," said Simpson, "no question of it. It's God knows how far to the next water, and we don't know how long it will take us to get there in that little boat. If we run our water entirely out before we start, we're going to be in trouble. We'll have a good look to-morrow, and if we don't ...
— Arizona Nights • Stewart Edward White

... young generation go on and on, God knows how far and whither ... perhaps to the point whence they will ...
— The Renascence of Hebrew Literature (1743-1885) • Nahum Slouschz

... Mr. Attwater," said the clerk, "and God knows how unjustly! Thou Gawd seest me, was the tex' I 'ad in my Bible, w'ich my father wrote it in with 'is own ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XIX (of 25) - The Ebb-Tide; Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson



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