"Mess of pottage" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... usual as she moved beside Mrs. Graham into the music-room. A wave of contempt was sweeping over her, as she reviewed the dinner, its gilding, its gluttony, and its unspeakable dulness, and she felt that she had sold her birthright of self-respect for a mess of pottage. ...
— Flint - His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes • Maud Wilder Goodwin
... not bread. He will get invitations to all sorts of dinners and conversaziones, but not enough income to pay his cab fare. A man of science in these times is like an Esau who sells his birthright for a mess of pottage. Again, if one turns to practice, it is still the old story—wait; and only after years of working like a galley-slave and intriguing like a courtier is there any chance of getting a decent livelihood. I am not at ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 1 • Leonard Huxley
... humble, this is doing the highest work, God's work. But chopping wood and mending shoes brings no recognition, no esteem, no applause in gorgeously-lighted parlors, as does the reading and the singing and the writing for select audiences. What, shalt thou do thy duty for the sake of the reward, the mess of pottage ...
— Lectures on Russian Literature - Pushkin, Gogol, Turgenef, Tolstoy • Ivan Panin
... wine, a certainty about the repetition of regular meals and drinks, with enough clothes and shelter to maintain relative positions with the neighbors—this year, next year, and twenty years from now ... these things are the mess of pottage for which the Esaus of the kingdoms and principalities sell their birthrights and ...
— The Ghost Breaker - A Novel Based Upon the Play • Charles Goddard
... caressing tenderness. "Think how easy it would be for me, dear friend," she cried, with a catch in her voice, "to do as other women do; to accept the HONORABLE MARRIAGE you offer me, as other women would call it; to be false to my sex, a traitor to my convictions; to sell my kind for a mess of pottage, a name and a home, or even for thirty pieces of silver, to be some rich man's wife, as other women have sold it. But, Alan, I can't. My conscience won't let me. I know what marriage is, from what vile slavery it has sprung; on what unseen horrors for my sister women it is reared and buttressed; ...
— The Woman Who Did • Grant Allen
... see Mazie in the meantime." Mr. Vandeford placed the precious "Purple Slipper" in the hands of a man who at that very moment had two successful plays running on Broadway, his interest in both of which he had sold out for a mess of pottage to be consumed in the company of Miss Mazie Villines ...
— Blue-grass and Broadway • Maria Thompson Daviess
... not unsinged), the inevitable curses which await nations who sacrifice, for a momentary convenience of bread, sacrifice for a loaf, the charter of their supremacy! This is literally to fulfil the Scriptural case of selling a birthright for a mess of pottage. ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. 1 (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... Berry. "We know they had birthrights. And I'd sooner be a birthright than a wine-cooler any day. Besides, Jonah could go as a mess of pottage. There's an idea for you. Talk ...
— The Brother of Daphne • Dornford Yates
... you to sell your chances for a mess of pottage; still less need you have thought me idiot enough to do such a thing. Now look here, you are new at the scrapping game, whereas I am not by any means. So in case of a tussle the odds are big that you'll finish underside. And, ...
— The Recipe for Diamonds • Charles John Cutcliffe Wright Hyne
... difficult struggle for life, at once, for the secure, and as it is called, fortunate dependance of the slave: the indignation with which he would spurn the offer will prove that he possesses one good beyond all others, and that his birthright as a man is more precious to him yet than the mess of pottage for which he is told to exchange it because ...
— Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation - 1838-1839 • Frances Anne Kemble
... to note the advancement that has been made with this food. The origin of soup, like that of many foods, dates back to practically the beginning of history. However, the first soup known was probably not made with meat. For instance, the mess of pottage for which Esau sold his birthright was soup made of red lentils. Later on meat came to be used as the basis for soup because of the agreeable and appetizing flavor it provides. Then, at one time in France a scarcity of butter and other fats that had been used to produce moistness ...
— Woman's Institute Library of Cookery, Vol. 3 - Volume 3: Soup; Meat; Poultry and Game; Fish and Shell Fish • Woman's Institute of Domestic Arts and Sciences
... yet offered for sale: when it is, it will be eagerly purchased; and the American Government, as it only paid the Indians at the rate of one cent and a fraction per acre, will make an enormous profit by the speculation. Well may the Indians be said, like Esau, to part with their birthright for a mess of pottage; but, in truth, they are compelled to sell—the purchase-money being a mere subterfuge, by which it may appear as if their lands were not wrested from them, although, in ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... the mischief begins. If the women get a fad for you they'll work you like a galley-slave. You'll have to do your round of 'copy' every morning. What becomes of inspiration then? How are you going to loaf and invite the soul? Don't barter your birthright for a mess of pottage! Oh, I understand the temptation—I know the taste of money and success. But look at me, Stanwell. You know how long I had to wait for recognition. Well, now it's come to me I don't mean to let it knock me off my feet. I don't ...
— The Hermit and the Wild Woman and Other Stories • Edith Wharton
... "he has sold his birthright for a mess of pottage! Don't touch that paper, Crewe, ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace
... is to be done? Friends of the slave, the question is not whether by our efforts we can abolish Slavery, speedily or remotely—for duty is ours, the result is with God; but whether we will go with the multitude to do evil, sell our birthright for a mess of pottage, cease to cry aloud and spare not, and remain in Babylon when the command of God is, "Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues." Let us stand in ...
— No Compromise with Slavery - An Address Delivered to the Broadway Tabernacle, New York • William Lloyd Garrison
... "Free? You'll never be free again, my lord. I can see that in madame's eye. What, you ha' sold your birthright for a mess of pottage, ain't you? And mighty savoury pottage, too, says you." He rolled his eyes and smacked his lips. "Softly now, softly, madame wants her certificate. Madame wants to warrant herself a lawful married wife, if you don't ... There, my lady. And happy to marry you again any ...
— The Highwayman • H.C. Bailey
... countrymen, and he compared the gains of Italy with those of her Allies. Nor was he deterred when Signor Salandra, the former Premier, called him Italy's evil spirit who, devoid of any patriotism, would have sold the Fatherland to the Central Powers for a mess of pottage. Giolitti, on whom 300 deputies had left their cards in the tragic hours before the declaration of war, had good reason to know that even if Giolittism had melted away, the House ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 2 • Henry Baerlein |
