"Inspiring" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... inspiring, too, to remember that no great emergency in the one hundred and eight years of our eventful national life has ever arisen that has not been met with wisdom and courage by the American people, with ...
— United States Presidents' Inaugural Speeches - From Washington to George W. Bush • Various
... twenty minutes past nine in the bright, astringent morning, Edwin carried by a string a little round parcel which for him contained the inspiring symbol of his new life. By mere accident he had wakened and had risen early, arriving at the shop before half-past seven. He had deliberately lifted on to his shoulders the whole burden of the shop ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... of Porto Rico was encountered. Inside the harbor a vast squadron of American ships lay at anchor—some forty vessels in all. The spectacle of such a mighty fleet bearing our beloved colors was indeed inspiring. ...
— A Gunner Aboard the "Yankee" • Russell Doubleday
... believed that she would float off into the infinite blue of the plaster and be lost in its depths. I found my own eyes following hers. I felt, I think, that I too was conscious of some dreadful or marvelous, horrible or inspiring something behind the partition; but in light of subsequent discoveries my memory may have been distorted. Besides, I have promised none but the cold-blooded facts and I need only assert that the little girl looked, moved her lips, stretched her arms, and then suddenly, as if she had sensed some ...
— The Blue Wall - A Story of Strangeness and Struggle • Richard Washburn Child
... writing perhaps under some inspiring influence, is more figurative in his discourse. "Soldiers of Liberty!" he exclaims; "Anarchy put out its head, and your arms drowned it in a moment." This would have been a finer figure in the days of the great lakes. And again he exclaims—"Mexicans! my heart ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon De La Barca
... raised under influences that make real men. A boy's ideal, in his early life, is the father who guides him, and Sergeant York had before him a character that was picturesque in its rugged manhood and honesty, and inspiring in its devotion to right and justice. The very privations he endured and that he saw influencing his home throughout his childhood were due to principle, for William York would owe no man beyond the period of his promise to pay. In the light of the sparks from the anvil in the shop in ...
— Sergeant York And His People • Sam Cowan
... as a new pin. Then on we went to the berth of the warrant-officers, and after that down still lower to the engine-room. There the chief engineer came to the front and became responsible for the mighty cranks and gigantic cylinders and awe-inspiring beams, and complicated mazes of machinery, which raised him, in my mind, to little short of a demigod—for you must know that I, like yourself, am full of admiration and ignorance in regard to engineering forces. Next we went to the lowest depths of all, among the boilers, ...
— In the Track of the Troops • R.M. Ballantyne
... weird chorus going on in the forest and watching the stars above, and their slightly blurred reflections in the water which went whispering by the prow and side of the boat. It was all so solemn, and strange, and awe-inspiring that, in spite of a feeling of dread which he could not master, he was glad to be there, wakeful, trying to picture the different creatures prowling about in the darkness of the primeval forest. He had listened time after time on the voyage up, but then the schooner was close at hand, ...
— Rob Harlow's Adventures - A Story of the Grand Chaco • George Manville Fenn
... which he called "Morton's Hope," which had granted a decent space and a tepid recognition to his "semi-historical" romance, in which he had already given the reading public a taste of his quality as a narrator of real events and a delineator of real personages,—this old and awe-inspiring New England and more than New England representative of the Fates, found room for a long and most laudatory article, in which the son of one of our most distinguished historians did the honors of the venerable literary periodical to the new-comer, for whom the folding-doors ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... not a movement: one would think that the animal was hypnotized by her watching. At most, on the appearance of anything suspicious, she begins shaking her nest. This is her way of inspiring the intruder with awe. If I myself wish to provoke the singular alarm, I have but to tease the Epeira with a bit of straw. You cannot have a swing without an impulse of some sort. The terror-stricken Spider, who wishes to strike terror ...
— The Life of the Spider • J. Henri Fabre
... succeeded in inspiring wholesome awe in the heart of Panda, the new chieftain who occupied the place once held by his brother, the exiled Dingaan. He was not a person of bellicose disposition, and thinking discretion the better part of valour, was ready enough to swear to keep peace with his late enemies. ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 1 (of 6) - From the Foundation of Cape Colony to the Boer Ultimatum - of 9th Oct. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... age, From depth of shaggy covert peeping forth In the low vale, or on steep mountain side; And sometimes intermixed with stirring horns Of the live deer, or goat's depending beard; These were the lurking Satyrs, wild brood Of gamesome deities; or Pan himself, That simple shepherd's awe-inspiring god." ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... not, whether a less period, which would at least be recommended by greater security against ambitious designs, would not, for that reason, be preferable to a longer period, which was, at the same time, too short for the purpose of inspiring the desired firmness and independence of the magistrate. It cannot be affirmed, that a duration of four years, or any other limited duration, would completely answer the end proposed; but it would contribute towards it in a degree which would have a material influence upon the spirit and ...
— The Federalist Papers
... have seen the land travellers of the twelfth and thirteenth and fourteenth centuries who laid open that golden East to Europe, and added inspiring knowledge to a dream and a tradition. And of these land travellers the first worth notice are Saewulf of Worcester, Adelard of Bath, and Daniel of Kiev, three of that host of peaceful pilgrims who followed the conquerors of the First Crusade (1096-9). All of these left their recollections ...
— Prince Henry the Navigator, the Hero of Portugal and of Modern Discovery, 1394-1460 A.D. • C. Raymond Beazley
... overcome and subjected to the old. In a very few it breaks loose, prevails for a moment, and then is annihilated in the tragic destruction of body and soul by a death of torture, suicide, or insanity, as an inspiring example for a few, as a disheartening warning to many. In still others, as in you and me, dear reader, it finds a way of maintaining itself in the hostile world, protected by a tough hide of pretext and disguise, as the tiny seed swallowed by the birds withstands ...
— The Bride of Dreams • Frederik van Eeden
... behind them; and that, until then, the town should be made enlivening. So she went about preaching a revival of cheerfulness, waving her jewelled hand merrily from the Carewe carriage to the volunteers she saw upon the street, calling out to them with laughter and inspiring quip; everywhere scolding the mourners viciously in her husky voice, and leaving so much of heartening vivacity in her wake that none could fail to be convinced that she ...
— The Two Vanrevels • Booth Tarkington
... for a short time to obtain a little refreshment for himself and Polly. There he found a group of cow-boys discussing the affairs of their neighbours, and enlarging noisily on things in general under the brain-clearing and reason-inspiring influence of strong drink! To these he recounted briefly the incidents of the recent raid of the troops into Traitor's Trap, and learned that Jake the Flint had "drifted south into Mexico where he was plying the trade of cattle and horse stealer, with ...
— Charlie to the Rescue • R.M. Ballantyne
... at an elevation that makes the heights of accepted morality disappear in the level of the plain. With many inconsistencies to be allowed for, Emerson still remains the highest mind that the world of letters has produced in America, inspiring men by word and example, rebuking their despondency, awakening them from the slumber of conformity and convention, and lifting them from low thoughts and sullen moods of helplessness ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... himself to a single department. It is so in everything—all arts, all trades; and the novelist is not superior to the universal rule against universality. He contributes his share to a thorough knowledge of groups of the human race under conditions which are full of inspiring novelty and interest. He works more fearlessly, frankly, and faithfully than the novelist ever worked before; his work, or much of it, may be destined never to be reprinted from the monthly magazines; but if he turns to his book-shelf and regards the array of the British or other classics, he knows ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... a "jealous God," brooking no rival, and "visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation." We hear of His having been adored under the figure of a "calf,"* and of His Spirit inspiring His prophets, as well as of the anointed stones which were dedicated in His honour. The common ancestor of the nation was acknowledged to have been Jacob, who, by his wrestling with God, had obtained the name of Israel; the people were divided theoretically into as many tribes as he had sons, ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 6 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... swell still met the boat from the northwest; and as there was no moon, nor starlight, and as all lights were out but the white masthead and red and green side lights, invisible from aft, but dimly lighting the sea ahead, the sight presented was unusual and awe-inspiring. ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson
... a fast and day of public prayer, on which to supplicate God that He turn aside the sword suspended above them. The night following, the beadle in a dream saw an awe-inspiring old man, who addressed him in the following words: "Up, quickly! Hasten to the gate of the court, where lies the money you need. I am your father Abraham. I have beheld the affliction wherewith the Gentiles oppress you, but God has heard your groans." In great ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg
... nature of the senate as an institution, in so far as it rested from the outset on a representation of the clans,(18) but in the nature of aristocracy generally, in so far as statesmanly wisdom and statesmanly experience are bequeathed from the able father to the able son, and the inspiring spirit of an illustrious ancestry fans every noble spark within the human breast into speedier and more brilliant flame. In this sense the Roman aristocracy had been at all times hereditary; in fact, it had displayed its hereditary character with great naivete in the ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... Marina was, as she had always been, the gentlest influence in his reckless life,—to some slight extent an inspiring one,—steadying his daring yet generous instincts into a course that was occasionally nearer to nobility than he could ever have chanced upon without her, yet never able to instil a higher motive power than ...
— A Golden Book of Venice • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... was the first, and I suppose the most eminent, historian of any obscure village, and it is surprising, as his book has for so long been regarded as a classic, that so few have attempted a similar record. His great work remains an inspiring ideal which village historians can keep in view, not without some hope of producing a useful description of country life as ...
— Grain and Chaff from an English Manor • Arthur H. Savory
... know he loved her. It was thus the devil befooled him. Perhaps the worst devil a man can be posessed withal, is himself. In mere madness, the man is beside himself; but in this case he is inside himself; the presiding, indwelling, inspiring sprit of him is himself, and that is the hardest of all to cast out. Godfrey rose form the reading of that letter cured, as he called it. But it was a cure that left the wound open as a door to the entrance of ...
— Mary Marston • George MacDonald
... water, and that therefore he held propitious to him either element. And Patrick replied that he adored no element, but that he worshipped the Creator of all the elements. While, therefore, the dispute waxed high, and the people varied from the one side unto the other, the wisdom of the Lord inspiring them to distinguish the light of the true faith from the darkness of idolatry, and the soundness of holy doctrine from the vanity of magical delusion, a new trial by fire is sought out. Then with the agreement ...
— The Most Ancient Lives of Saint Patrick - Including the Life by Jocelin, Hitherto Unpublished in America, and His Extant Writings • Various
... welfare lines that the present and the quick-coming time before us along women's enfranchisement lines, along women's commonsense equality lines, is making her a responsible and full sharer in. And how much more valuable she makes herself, also, to her children, as well as to her community, inspiring in them greater confidence, respect, and admiration than if she allows herself to be pushed into the background by her own weak and false thoughts of herself, or by the equally foolish thoughts of her children in that she is now, or is at any time, ...
— The Higher Powers of Mind and Spirit • Ralph Waldo Trine
... sometimes playfully, sometimes in mad anger, while thousands of streamlets ran down their rugged sides afterward, as if to laugh at the anger of the sea; but never had I seen anything so fine, so awe-inspiring as this. For a moment it made me forget the objects dearest to my heart. The tide was not high enough to reach the mouth of the cave at which I stood; at the same time the angry seas rolled madly along the sand, and were churned into foam by the great rocks along the beach. I had heard ...
— The Birthright • Joseph Hocking
... facts of domestic disease and treatment; an eminently qualified staff of practicing specialists has cooeperated, with criticism and supervision of incalculable value to the reader; and the accepted classics in their field follow: Dr. Weir Mitchell's elegant and inspiring essays on Nerves, Outdoor Life, etc.; Sir Henry Thompson's "precious documents of personal experience" on Diet and Conduct for Long Life; Dr. Dudley A. Sargent's scientific and long-prepared system of exercises without apparatus; Gerhard's clear principles of pure water supply; Dr. Darlington's ...
— The Home Medical Library, Volume I (of VI) • Various
... in coming, but the delay was all in her suspense, for as the Court House clock was tolling the appointed hour Mr. Manning, alias Mr. Hartsell, walked into the office. He was, as Katherine had once described him to Old Hosie, a quiet, reserved man with that confidence-inspiring amplitude in the equatorial regions commonly observable in bank presidents and trusted officials ...
— Counsel for the Defense • Leroy Scott
... foundation of Australia's greatness—by Phillip, weakening under the racking cares of the infant state; by Sturt in the scorching desert, as the last duty of an exhausting day. They are aglow with the heat of action; they are inspiring in ...
— A Source Book Of Australian History • Compiled by Gwendolen H. Swinburne
... asking, all over this big city where the tenements abound, alleys in which generations of boys have lived and died—principally died, and thus done for themselves the best they could, according to the crusty philosopher of Skippy's set—with nothing more inspiring than a dead blank wall within reach of their windows all the days of their cheerless lives. Theirs is the account to be squared—by justice, not vengeance. Skippy is but an item on the wrong side of the ledger. The real reckoning of outraged society is not ...
— Children of the Tenements • Jacob A. Riis
... instigated the battle. We'll never know the truth, though, because they are destroyed. But their deaths did prove one thing. It allows us to find the real culprits, the creatures who are leading, directing and inspiring ...
— Deathworld • Harry Harrison
... north and south the Cascade mountains in a zigzag course lift their clustered peaks and mountain passes from four to eight thousand feet above the sea, while Mount Olympus and his colleagues higher still poke their inspiring [Page 17] front heavenward. Between these two white and green clad mountain ranges, protected from the blizzards of the southwestern plains and from the hurricanes from the ocean, lie in safety the placid waters of Washington's great ...
— A Review of the Resources and Industries of the State of Washington, 1909 • Ithamar Howell
... in the hour of victory: and if the chariot and horses of fire had been vouchsafed for Nelson's translation, he could scarcely have departed in a brighter blaze of glory. He has left us, not indeed his mantle of inspiration, but a name and an example which are at this hour inspiring thousands of the youth of England: a name which is our pride, and an example which will continue to be our shield and our strength. Thus it is that the spirits of the great and the wise continue to live ...
— The Life of Horatio Lord Nelson • Robert Southey
... the laws. You want to know if we have a government; if you have any authority to collect revenue; to wring tribute from an unwilling people? Sir, humanity desponds, and all the inspiring hopes of her progressive improvement vanish into empty air at the reflections which crowd on the mind at hearing repeated, with aggravated enormity, the sentiments against which a Chatham launched his indignant thunders nearly a century ago. The very words ...
— The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10) • Various
... largest of the great Renaissance structures, such as St. Peter's in Rome. A gigantic order furnishes no true measure for the eye: its vastness is revealed only by the accident of some human presence which forms a basis of comparison. That architecture is not necessarily the most awe-inspiring which gives the impression of having been built by giants for the abode of pigmies; like the other arts, architecture is highest when it is most human. The mediaeval builders, true to this dictum, employed stones of a ...
— The Beautiful Necessity • Claude Fayette Bragdon
... Meanwhile the Evangelists, Isaiah, Job, Moses, and he who penned, the other day, The Death of Abel, [Z] Shakespeare, and the Bard Whose genius spangled o'er a gloomy theme 565 With fancies thick as his inspiring stars, [a] And Ossian (doubt not, 'tis the naked truth) Summoned from streamy Morven [b]—each and all Would, in their turns, lend ornaments and flowers To entwine the crook of eloquence that helped 570 This pretty Shepherd, pride of all ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. III • William Wordsworth
... insisting that Blount and I should accompany them. Hoping to find some means of escaping, we did not refuse; and nearly five hundred men were collected from the neighbouring kampongs, to form the invading army. All were clothed in their most terror-inspiring attire, with as great a proportion of feathers and skins as could be mustered. Their arms consisted of sumpitans, spears and swords, daggers, with shields and padded jackets for their defensive armour, while each man carried his provisions in a basket on his back. This time ...
— Mark Seaworth • William H.G. Kingston
... spring sunshine, was walled on the west by massive buildings, while to the east stretched the shining lake. From here the city seemed truly cosmopolitan. It had dignity and wealth of color, and to the girl from Sibley Junction was completely satisfying—almost inspiring. ...
— Money Magic - A Novel • Hamlin Garland
... man wishes to understand those devious currents which make up the great, changing sea of modern life, there is hardly a single book more illustrative, more informing and more inspiring."—Current Opinion. ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... to that fatal, heart-thrilling, hope-inspiring 'yes,' loveliest of human females," continued Tom, kneeling with some caution, lest the straps of his pantaloons should give way—"Impute all to your own lucid ambiguity, and to the torments of hope that ...
— Autobiography of a Pocket-Hankerchief • James Fenimore Cooper
... walk round the train, and gets the passengers to show him their tickets, after which he returns to his box cheered and refreshed. Some people rave about sunsets and mountains and old masters; but to the German railway-guard the world can show nothing more satisfying, more inspiring, than the ...
— Diary of a Pilgrimage • Jerome K. Jerome
... his own conscience or his own soul; it was a duty which he owed to his family, to his kindred, to his country. It was not merely an opinion that there was one God and not two; it was a belief that the one and only true God was protecting him, teaching him, inspiring him and all his nation. That the true God would teach their hands to war and their fingers to fight. That the true God would cause their folds to be full of sheep. That their valleys should stand rich with corn, that they should laugh and sing. That the true God would enable ...
— The Gospel of the Pentateuch • Charles Kingsley
... present, and Mary knew it, and was greatly distressed by the fact. However, where there is a will there is a way; and Mary found the way by cunningly stealing a moustache cup from a store with the inspiring legend "To dear Father" and beautiful red and blue roses and gilt leaves. Mary had learned that it was wicked to steal and to lie, etc., but her heart was set on getting something for the teacher, not for herself, and ...
— Your Child: Today and Tomorrow • Sidonie Matzner Gruenberg
... lives!" shouted Adair, and the order was echoed along the decks. The wave struck the vessel's stern. A portion broke over her, but the next moment she was again driven forward. That fearful, dread-inspiring sound, which tells that the keel has come in contact with a hard rock, continued. Every instant Adair dreaded that the terrific crash would come which would denote the doom of all on board. Still he stood calm, and apparently unmoved, ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston
... handsome lads followed the same course of study and recreation, and felt a certain mutual attraction, founded mainly on good looks. It had never gone deep; Frank was by nature a thin, jeering creature, not truly susceptible whether of feeling or inspiring friendship; and the relation between the pair was altogether on the outside, a thing of common knowledge and the pleasantries that spring from a common acquaintance. The more credit to Frank that he was appalled by Archie's ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... work—though nothing like what they were when we first came here. Could it be otherwise? There are some of us who will carry the marks of this winter to our graves. The bright beautiful sunshine shines now, all day and all night, cheering our hearts and inspiring hope. ...
— Fast in the Ice - Adventures in the Polar Regions • R.M. Ballantyne
... that, associated with occasions of festival, they, like festivals, assumed a sacred character, and that, whether first instituted in honour of a funeral, or in celebration of a victory, or in reverence to a god,—religion combined with policy to transmit an inspiring custom to a more polished posterity. And though we cannot literally give credit to the tradition which assigns the restoration of these games to Lycurgus, in concert with Iphitus, king of Elis, and Cleosthenes of Pisa, ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... idea of a special Sunday meet with hearty response from the churches and farmers in Alberta, but it was taken up in Manitoba and Saskatchewan. In 1917 "Grain Growers' Sunday" was observed all over the West and led to many inspiring addresses. One of the most significant of these was delivered by President J. A. Maharg, of the Saskatchewan Grain Growers' Association, at a mass meeting in Moose Jaw on ...
— Deep Furrows • Hopkins Moorhouse
... upon Sir Edward inspiring the neighbouring nation "with as great a respect for the generosity of the English as they have heretofore had to dread their valour." Now the Scots neither acknowledged the Episcopacy which Seymour is here urged ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 206, October 8, 1853 • Various
... thou not the flock compel With the horn's inspiring notes? Sweet the echo of yon bell, As across the wood it floats! "Mother, mother, let me go On yon heights to ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... at Chilblains Base—so named by a wiseacre American navy man back in the twentieth century—was nothing to brag about. Thousands of square miles of powdered ice that has had nothing to do but blow around for twenty million years is not at all inspiring after the first few minutes unless one is obsessed by the morbid ...
— Unwise Child • Gordon Randall Garrett
... the well of Kadesh, he made these functions independent of his person, and thus he laid a firm basis for a consuetudinary law and became the originator of the Torah in Israel. In doing this he succeeded in inspiring the national being with that which was the very life of his own soul; through the Torah he gave a definite positive expression to their sense of nationality and their idea of God. Jehovah was not merely the God of Israel; as such he was the God at once of law and of justice, the basis, the ...
— Prolegomena to the History of Israel • Julius Wellhausen
... and he doubled out into the middle of the street with the quickness of thought; an instant later he shot round another corner and disappeared, the natives streaming after in hot chase, electrified by the inspiring strains of "Stop, thief!"—or ...
— The Black Bag • Louis Joseph Vance
... first shook the mechanical or verbal theory, which, however piously intended, really had the effect of degrading the sacred writers almost into automatons, and regarded them as the pens instead of the penmen of the inspiring Spirit.(358) Indirectly the effect of Spinoza's thought was seen even in the English church. The difficulties which, through means of the English deists, it brought before the notice of the great apologetic writers of our own country, created ...
— History of Free Thought in Reference to The Christian Religion • Adam Storey Farrar
... to think that among the teeming millions of the earth there were thousands upon thousands bound to potential outbursts of a love that may slumber quietly until death or awake, great and inspiring in ...
— Sweetapple Cove • George van Schaick
... midst of these imminent dangers, a phenomenon occurred which for the moment appalled everybody, not even excepting Mr Meldrum—it was so strange, so awe-inspiring! ...
— The Wreck of the Nancy Bell - Cast Away on Kerguelen Land • J. C. Hutcheson
... amongst whom He appeared and with whom He lived and died. Such consideration involves at least a brief review of the antecedent history of the Hebrew nation. The posterity of Abraham through Isaac and Jacob had early come to be known by the title in which they took undying pride and found inspiring promise, Israelites, or the children of Israel.[148] Collectively they were so designated throughout the dark days of their bondage in Egypt;[149] so during the four decades of the exodus and the return to ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage
... but the most effective means to use and, by the end of a few months, when they had been allowed to experiment and express themselves, they began to see that mere ranting was not force and that a sense of reserve power is infinitely more impressive and inspiring ...
— The Art of the Story-Teller • Marie L. Shedlock
... less unbearable than the Literary Man from London whom he had brought to call on his parishioners. Zora disliked to be called a parishioner. She disliked many things in Nunsmere. Her mother, Mrs. Oldrieve, however, loved Nunsmere, adored the Vicar, and found awe-inspiring in his cleverness the Literary ...
— Septimus • William J. Locke
... eloquence is a gift which exerts today an influence out of proportion to its worth. It is overestimated. A good orator must be something of a poet, which means that he cannot be a stickler for truth and mathematical accuracy. He must be inspiring, quick, and excitable, able himself to kindle the enthusiasm of others. But a good orator I fear will rarely play a good game of whist or of chess, and will be even less satisfactory as a statesman. The emotional element and ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... never debased the dignity of science by any love of intrigue, and displayed the utmost disinterestedness in his efforts to promote science. The qualities of his heart were not less estimable than those of his head, and he possessed the happy art of inspiring his friends with an unalterable attachment. His conversation was varied and animated, adapted by turns to every subject, and he may truly be said to have been the grace and ornament of society. We must not forget the great services ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 564, September 1, 1832 • Various
... make us shudder; but what they describe is something positive and self-justified, something deeply rooted in our animal nature and inspiring to our hearts, something which, like every vital impulse, is pregnant with a morality of its own. In vain do we deprecate it; it has possession of us already through our propensities, fashions, and language. Our very plutocrats and monarchs are at ease only when they are vulgar. ...
— Winds Of Doctrine - Studies in Contemporary Opinion • George Santayana
... ancient sects, received their name from the fact that their founder Zeno had lectured in the Painted Porch or Stoa Paecile of Athens. The influence of these austere and eloquent masters, teaching high lessons of morality and continence, and inspiring their young audience with the glow of their own enthusiasm for virtue, must have been invaluable in that effete and drunken age. Their doctrines were pushed to yet more extravagant lengths by the Cynics, who were so called from a Greek word meaning "dog," from what appeared to the ancients ...
— Seekers after God • Frederic William Farrar
... squad of soldiers and natives marched off towards the tents while another took their places. Were it not for the grotesque size of men and animals and the eerie silence of their movements it was hard to believe that the eyes were not witnessing actualities. The thing was fantastic, awe-inspiring, stupendous in design, but faultlessly true in color and treatment. No artist could ever hope for such a canvas. Its texture was vapor, its background the empyrean, and nature's own palette ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy
... you would read it and explain it to him, it would be so helpful to you both, and so inspiring. It deals so ably with the problems of child-training. You must be puzzled many times in the training of so many little minds, and Dr. Parker really does throw wonderful light on all the problems that confront ...
— Sowing Seeds in Danny • Nellie L. McClung
... of this unusual book, well and deservingly named: A History of the American Negro in the Great World War. Beyond merely recounting that story; than which there has been nothing finer or more inspiring since the long away centuries when the chivalry of the Middle Ages, in nodding plume and lance in rest, battled for the Holy Sepulchre, it brings to the Negro of America a message of cheer and reassurance. ...
— History of the American Negro in the Great World War • W. Allison Sweeney
... all night, and instead of one watchman, we had two, always awake—either Roger Trew and I, or the boatswain and Potto Jumbo. All night long our ears were assailed with strange sounds—the croaking of frogs, the shrieks of night-birds, and the terror-inspiring cries of beasts of prey. I went to sleep with them still ringing in my ears, and when I awoke, the same sounds were heard. I had been seated on the ground for some time, carefully making up the fire, when a loud rustling among the dried ...
— In the Eastern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... were reluctant to adopt. The landlords were unwilling to concede lower rents, and kept up those which were brought about by war prices during the great struggle with France. Hence a protectionist agitation pervaded the country, unsettling the minds of the farmers, inspiring false hopes, irritating the trading classes, producing counter agitation, and by all these means inflicting injury ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... really belong to him. Comfort himself and his friends, however, as he may, it does tax all his resources of moral and physical courage to do what is at last required of him: and it was something quite new, unseen [87] before in Greece, inspiring a new note in literature—this attitude of Socrates in the condemned cell, where, fulfilling his own prediction, multitudes, of a wisdom and piety, after all, so different from his, have ever since assisted so admiringly, this anticipation ...
— Plato and Platonism • Walter Horatio Pater
... invaluable task of making us look at life in a new light, of searching close at hand for the solution to heretofore closed mysteries of life. In this brief chapter, I can touch these ideas only as they have proved valuable to me. Professor Soddy's "Science and Life" is one of the most inspiring of recent publications in this field; for this great authority shows us how closely bound up is science with the whole of Society, how science must help to solve the great and disastrous unbalance ...
— The Pivot of Civilization • Margaret Sanger
... self-reliance about her that charmed and reassured him. She possessed the capacity for divining the sane and the ridiculous with splendid discrimination. Moreover, she could jest and be serious with an impartial intelligence that gratified his vanity without in the least inspiring the suspicion that she was merely clever. He became blissfully imbued with the idea that she had surprised herself by the discovery that he was really quite attractive. In fact, he was quite sincerely pleased with ...
— The Husbands of Edith • George Barr McCutcheon
... death, if anywhere, then in life, and in life not as it might be imagined beyond the grave, but as it had been and would be lived on earth, appears to be consonant with all that we know of the clear and objective temper of the race. It is the spirit which was noted long ago by Goethe as inspiring the sepulchral ...
— The Greek View of Life • Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson
... take advantage of your privilege of not caring for it. It imparts a look of great richness to the side of the beautiful room of the Academy on which it hangs; but the same room contains two or three works less known to fame which are equally capable of inspiring a passion. "The 'Annunciation' struck me as coarse and superficial": that note was once made in a simple-minded tourist's book. At Venice, strange to say, Titian is altogether a disappointment; the city of his adoption is far ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James
... are moments, James Thompson," she said, "when your conversation is almost inspiring," ...
— Malcolm Sage, Detective • Herbert George Jenkins
... with thoughts of Phyllis Bruce. He was rather proud of the figure he had used to Linder, of the head, hands, and heart of his organization, but to himself he admitted that that figure was incomplete. There was a soul as well, and that soul was the girl whose inspiring presence had in some way jerked his mind out of the stagnant backwaters in which the war had left it. There was no doubt of that. He had written to Murdoch to come west and undertake new work for him. He had intimated that ...
— Dennison Grant - A Novel of To-day • Robert Stead
... Revolution.—His travels on the continent in his last vacation and after his graduation brought him in contact with the French Revolution, of which he felt the inspiring influence. He was fond of children, and the sight of a poor little French peasant girl seems to have been one of the main causes leading him to become an ardent revolutionist. The Prelude tells in concrete fullness how he walked along the banks ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... that you hear?' I asked. 'I hear on the left a voice which repeats, "Enough, enough, be quiet, you are a nuisance."' Assuredly the voice which thus spoke was a reasonable one, for Leonie II. was insupportable; but I had suggested nothing of the kind, and had no idea of inspiring a hallucination of hearing. Another day Leonie II. was quite calm, but obstinately refused to answer a question which I asked. Again she heard with terror the same voice to the left, saying, 'Come, be sensible, ...
— Real Ghost Stories • William T. Stead
... change to the brisk notes of leave-taking. Her heart began to beat with fear, but not the kind of fear that makes people run away; rather the kind that makes them abdicate all reason and fan their emotions into a sort of inspiring flame. ...
— The Happiest Time of Their Lives • Alice Duer Miller
... of life was plain, his work arose before him, alluring, ennobling, inspiring. And Nancy loved him! What more could ...
— All for a Scrap of Paper - A Romance of the Present War • Joseph Hocking
... the prescriptive right of ancient usage, can boast of such an able champion in Rousseau, that it requires no common share of temerity to attack them. As far as they are the means of inspiring girls with a taste for neatness in dress, and with a desire to make those things for themselves, for which women are usually dependent upon milliners, we must acknowledge their utility; but a watchful eye ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... And mark me, Chief! unless thou ceasest to pursue the feuds of thy fathers, thy course will be brief, and bloody will be its close." Thus saying, he turned and feebly dragged his spent and tottering form into the dark and awe-inspiring cave. ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume VI • Various
... outset, during the sojourn of the Tzarewitch at Berlin, whilst he was being carefully coddled by the Emperor, the chancellor, Von Caprivi (who boasts of having no initiative of his own and of acting only under the orders of his master), was inspiring accusations, and making them himself before the military commission, charging the war party in Russia with secretly plotting against Germany. One would like to know where the war party in Russia can possibly be at ...
— The Schemes of the Kaiser • Juliette Adam
... to convulse George with inward agony, for he squirmed most effectively as he drew from his pocket a toy hatchet, which would not have cut a straw, then looking straight up into the awe-inspiring countenance of his ...
— Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott
... all men should not have the same learning; but there are some things necessary to all. It is necessary that all men should be just; and the surest way of inspiring all men with justice is to inspire in them ...
— Voltaire's Philosophical Dictionary • Voltaire
... when a player was having a sensational run of luck. But certainly there was something magnetic and fatal about this pretty young woman, who was new to the game and the place, something curiously inspiring. Not only he as well as the gamblers felt it, but the croupier at the wheel. The spinner felt in his bones that whether he wished it or not he was certain to ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... instantly at a smart walk; the rigid straddle of his legs, the turned-out feet, the stiff back, the rakish slant of the sombrero above the square, motionless set of the shoulders expressing an infinite, awe-inspiring impudence. ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... circumstance appears, the very sight of the book brought on a weakness. I feared to pick it up, a horrible dread seized me that it might be a new Bible, and I was unwilling to risk another disappointment. The footprint on the sand was not more suggestive nor more awe-inspiring to Robinson Crusoe than the appearance of that book was to me. In mood as lonely, in plight as desperate as his, there lay before me a sight as unlooked for and, as it seemed, as full of meaning as the ...
— Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison - Fifteen Years in Solitude • Austin Biron Bidwell
... said Mr. Cadbury Taylor, "is not the most inspiring place in London for the spending of a spare half hour; besides, I had some facts to get together, which are now tabulated in my note-book, and I'm quite ready to go, ...
— Jennie Baxter, Journalist • Robert Barr
... we were in some force, and this was a battle, we would have bonnily outmanoeuvred them! But it isna, Davit; and the way it is, is a wee thing less inspiring to ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the quiet street to a road that went close to the railway. And there, with beating hearts, we beheld the two-twenty Eastern freight rattle superbly by us. From the cab of its inspiring locomotive one of fortune's favorites rang a priceless gold bell with an air of indifference which we believed in our hearts was assumed to impress us. And notwithstanding our suspicion, we were impressed, for did we not know that he could reach up his ...
— The Boss of Little Arcady • Harry Leon Wilson
... must arouse the emotions. The peroration of an argument is like the finish of a race or the last charge in a battle. In the conclusion the arguer should use his greatest skill, his strongest eloquence. Here are found the most inspiring passages in ...
— Practical Argumentation • George K. Pattee
... principles on which both Tragedy and Comedy are founded, is treated in this course with much depth of philosophy. This kind of merit is often found among the German writers; but SCHLEGEL has no equal in the art of inspiring his own admiration; in general, be shows himself attached to a simple taste, sometimes bordering on rusticity; but he deviates from his usual opinions in favour of the inhabitants of the South. Their play on words is not the object of his censure; he detests the affectation ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... mysteries of Conrad, the gaieties of Barrie, the melody of Sir Thomas Browne, the urbanity of Addison, the dash in Kipling, the mobility, the mightiness, the lightness, the humor, the humanity, the everything of Shakespeare, and a world of other delicious, high, beautiful, and inspiring things that English literature has bestowed upon us. That literature is still the richest of heritages; but literature ...
— Guide to Life and Literature of the Southwest • J. Frank Dobie
... light troops then living. How gallantly he headed the forlorn hope under the icy walls of Quebec, where he was taken prisoner, and at Saratoga with his shrill whistle and stentorian voice called his dauntless braves where the fight was thickest! But Cowpens was Morgan's crowning feat. Inspiring militia and veterans alike with a courage they had never felt before, he routs Tarleton's trained band of horse, and then, skilful in retreat as he had been bold in fight, ...
— History of the United States, Volume 2 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... logic of these reformers is the work of serene-tempered and well-fed men, whose cosy library with windows facing to the south, and the open fire-place with its soothing and cheerful glow, is conducive to the developing of a red-tape reform that must be an inspiring subject for discussion at an afternoon tea. Because they are well fed is the reason why they can play a waiting game, but the despairing and maddened people, for whose benefit this single tax contract, with its long deferred payment, is being drawn up, will have as little ...
— Confiscation, An Outline • William Greenwood
... renounced it. Rooted as the individual is in a wider life than his own, it is often but a small part of himself that he can bring to distinct consciousness. Further, so little are most men accustomed to self-analysis; that they are seldom aware what it is that constitutes the inspiring power of their beliefs. Generally, at least in the first instance, they take their creed in gross, without distinguishing between essential and unessential elements. They confuse, in one general consecration of reverence, its primary principles, and the local and temporary accidents ...
— The Contemporary Review, Volume 36, September 1879 • Various
... been concluded, when M. Belmont returned with the parish priest of Valcartier, a venerable man, whose smile, as he bowed to all the members of the group, and took in the belongings of the room, was as inspiring as a spoken blessing. Its influence too must have extended to the entranced Pauline, for, as he approached her side, and sprinkled her with hyssop, breathing a prayer, she slowly opened her eyes and gazed ...
— The Bastonnais - Tale of the American Invasion of Canada in 1775-76 • John Lesperance
... fresh cut off the roll of some violet-scented Epping butter;—all have disappeared; nay, even the usual allowance of cream has degenerated into skimmed milk, and that is supplied in such cautious quantities, that I can scarce eke it out to colour my three cups of inspiring bohea. ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... ground they retired until, a little later, the Black Kendah army began to appear, marching in serried regiments and excellent order round the bend, till perhaps eight or ten thousand of them were visible, a very fierce and awe-inspiring impi. Their front ranks halted between three and four hundred yards away, which I thought farther off than it was advisable to open fire on them with Snider rifles held by unskilled troops. Then came a pause, which at length was ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard
... all the Muses. Neither from him nor from J.M. Whistler's brilliant aphorisms on art could be gathered anything more than the exquisite pleasure of the moment: the monochronos haedonae. Of the great pedagogues, I had known, but never sat at the feet of Jowett, whom I found far less inspiring than any of the great men above mentioned. Among the dead, I had studied Herbert Spencer and Matthew Arnold, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and Guyau: I had conversed with that living Neo-Latin, Anatole France, the modern Rousseau, and had enjoyed the marvellous irony and eloquence ...
— Aesthetic as Science of Expression and General Linguistic • Benedetto Croce
... about Mrs. Adams might possibly be applicable to many a colonial mother who kept no record of her daily effort to lead her children in the path of righteousness and noble service: "Mrs. Adams's influence on her children was strong, inspiring, vital. Something of the Spartan mother's spirit breathed in her. She taught her sons and daughter to be brave and patient, in spite of danger and privation. She made them feel no terror at the thought of death or hardships suffered for one's country. She read ...
— Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday
... the historian of the future shall speak of Theodore Roosevelt, he is likely to say that he did many notable things, among them that of inaugurating the movement which finally resulted in the square deal, but that his greatest work was inspiring and actually beginning a world movement for staying terrestrial waste and saving for the human race the things upon which, and upon which alone, a great and peaceful and progressive and happy race life can ...
— The Attempted Assassination of ex-President Theodore Roosevelt • Oliver Remey
... move from South Carolina with his negroes into Illinois, to settle there and hold them there as slaves, anything in the constitution and laws of Illinois to the contrary notwithstanding." Douglas further intimated broadly that the President and Cabinet were inspiring these editorials of the Administration organ, as part and parcel of the same system and object with which they were pushing the Lecompton Constitution with its odious "property" doctrine; and declared, "if my protest against this interpolation into the policy of this country or the creed ...
— Abraham Lincoln, A History, Volume 2 • John George Nicolay and John Hay
... A scene of such terrific grandeur lay That reeled the brain at what the eyes beheld; The hands would clench involuntarily And clutch from intuition for support; The eyes by instinct closed, nor dared to gaze On such an awful and inspiring sight. ...
— Mountain idylls, and Other Poems • Alfred Castner King
... felt his boat bobbing about inexplicably. He went out to look about him, and in the morning twilight he discovered that the whole aspect of the Mississippi had changed. With the invisible sunrise had come an awe-inspiring spectacle which excited in his mind forebodings ...
— The River Prophet • Raymond S. Spears
... only repartee that she could conjure at the moment was something about ancient lights which did not seem appropriate. Therefore, as she thought that she had done enough for honour, and to remind her awe-inspiring relative that he could not suppress her, ...
— Stella Fregelius • H. Rider Haggard
... the solid formula that What is, is. The Eternities and Immensities are only a kind of awful background. The highest souls are held to be deeply conscious of these vast unspeakable presences, yet even with them they are only inspiring accessories; the true interest lies in the practical attitude of such men towards the actual and palpable circumstances that surround them. This spirituality, whose place in Mr. Carlyle's teaching has been ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Vol. I - Essay 2: Carlyle • John Morley
... language and institutions, yet, under the influence of a complete system of local self-government, it has always taken as active and earnest a part as the English element in establishing and strengthening the confederation. It has steadily grown in strength and prosperity under the generous and inspiring influence of British institutions, which have given full scope to the best attributes of a nationality crushed by the depressing conditions of French rule for a ...
— Canada under British Rule 1760-1900 • John G. Bourinot
... related the whole of the conversation to his companions, which had the effect of inspiring them ...
— The Boy Slaves • Mayne Reid
... seething. She seemed ludicrously minute amid that vast unrest. The youth steered steadily; to Betty Dalrymple he seemed just going on anyhow, dashing toward a black blanket with nothing beyond. It was all very wonderful and awe-inspiring as well as somewhat fearsome. The waves had a cruel sound if one listened to them closely. A question floating in her mind found, after a long time, hesitating ...
— A Man and His Money • Frederic Stewart Isham
... a wound, suddenly sprang on his charger, drew his sword, laid his lance in rest, and with his sword in one hand, and his lance in the other, spurred against the Saracens, striking sparks from their helmets and armour, and inspiring such terror that his foes were completely routed. Naturally such an exploit made a strong impression on the imagination of aspirants to warlike fame, and the youth who had the dexterity and the equestrian skill to imitate it in mimic fray was ...
— The Boy Crusaders - A Story of the Days of Louis IX. • John G. Edgar
... fact that a prodigious amount of difficult lifting must be done in order to elevate the aliens to the American social and religious level. But the very vastness of the home mission task is inspiring rather than discouraging to heroic souls. As someone says, "The American loves a tough job." Difficulties will not hinder him a moment when once he is moved with the divine impulse, sees the thing to be done, and sets ...
— Aliens or Americans? • Howard B. Grose
... hot and turbid life—although there are plenty other ideals that I should prefer—I find my heart beat at the thought of this one. 'Tis to fail in life, but to fail with what a grace! That is not lost which is not regretted. And where—here slips out the male—where would be much of the glory of inspiring love, if there were no contempt ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... too, in the forest and along the river bank, sounding more appalling than ever, and as he listened and tried to picture the various creatures that howled, shrieked, and uttered those curious cries, he fully expected to hear that peculiar terror-inspiring sound which had puzzled even Shaddy, the old traveller and sojourner ...
— Rob Harlow's Adventures - A Story of the Grand Chaco • George Manville Fenn
... him like an immense malady; everywhere he felt fever, everywhere he heard the sound of suffering, and, without seeking to solve the enigma, he strove to dress the wound. The terrible spectacle of created things developed tenderness in him; he was occupied only in finding for himself, and in inspiring others with the best way to compassionate and relieve. That which exists was for this good and rare priest a permanent subject of sadness which ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... the inspiring power, of those architectural wonders that transport the impress of mediaeval piety across the ocean of so many centuries? Wordsworth, referring to some of the English ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson |
