"Popular opinion" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... public spirit, noble ambition not that vile scramble for places and pensions, which some men call ambition; not that bawling, brawling, Thersites character, which other men call public spirit; not that marketable commodity with which Wharton, and such as he, cheat popular opinion for a season;—but that fair virtue which will endure, and abide by its cause to the last; which, in place or out, shall be the same; which, successful or unsuccessful, shall sustain the possessor's character through all changes of party; which, ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. V - Tales of a Fashionable Life • Maria Edgeworth
... were equally indebted (hear! from Sir Peter Laurie, Peter Borthwick, and Pre-Adam Roebuck) to this jocular benefactor. "It was PUNCH," said the gallant gentleman, with much feeling, "who first convinced me that the popular opinion of my asinine capabilities was erroneous. It was PUNCH who discovered that there was as much in my head as on it(loud cheers, produced doubtlessly by the aptness of the simile, the gallant Colonel being perfectly bald). I should, therefore, be the most ungrateful of Members for ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... need for them. We shall demand not only men who can lead in action, but men who can prevent unwise action. Often the policy which seems most attractive to the majority is full of danger for the future. We need men who can face popular opinion, and, if need be, to face it down. The best citizen is one not afraid to cast his vote away by ...
— The Call of the Twentieth Century • David Starr Jordan
... intimations when he is speaking of the daemonium of Socrates. He recognizes the lower form of right opinion, as well as the higher one of science, in the spirit of one who desires to include in his philosophy every aspect of human life; just as he recognizes the existence of popular opinion as a fact, and the Sophists as the expression ...
— Meno • Plato
... were to judge by that expression of popular opinion which the press pretends to convey, I should reply without hesitation that never in any other known age of the world have such pernicious ...
— Colloquies on Society • Robert Southey
... One, although Buddie was not a professional critic, and neither knew how to wound nor enjoyed wounding, even she found the Donkey's voice harsh; but she did not wish to hurt his feelings—for donkeys have feelings, in spite of a popular opinion to the contrary. And, after all, it was pretty good singing for a donkey. Critics should not, as they sometimes do, apply to donkeys the standards by which nightingales are judged. So Buddie was able to say, ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume III. (of X.) • Various
... the tide of popular opinion. This act turned it most effectually in Fred's favor, and he was now lionized by all ...
— Under Fire - A Tale of New England Village Life • Frank A. Munsey
... man was very far from satisfied with himself, or with the position in which the trial left him. It was apparent to all the world that he had attempted to defraud Mrs. Wittleworth out of the block of stores, and ten years' income upon it; but the banker was not a man to bend before the storm of popular opinion. He took the trouble to define his position, and to explain away what was dark and unsatisfactory. He did not believe his child was dead. He was satisfied that Marguerite Poulebah was Marguerite Checkynshaw, though he could not find her. The ...
— Make or Break - or, The Rich Man's Daughter • Oliver Optic
... exhibit fickleness in pursuits and affection. Greenish eyes, it is asserted, have the same general meaning as gray eyes, with the addition of selfishness or a sinistrous disposition. These statements, however, though based on some general truths, and supported by popular opinion, are liable to so many exceptions as to be unreliable and valueless ...
— The Ladies Book of Useful Information - Compiled from many sources • Anonymous
... was said of Desmond, remarking that it was little more than he expected. Sir Ralph's cast of mind was perhaps narrow and ungenerous, but, since the sympathy so usually shown to the open-handed spendthrift was not forthcoming in this case, it must be assumed that popular opinion condemned Desmond Ellerey, and sympathized with Sir Ralph. It had been easy, therefore, for Desmond to become a stranger to his native land; it was impossible for him to forget that he was an Englishman: ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner
... they had nothing for it but to keep themselves out of the current and refuse to be swept along by it. Even under Hyrcanus, however, they gained more prominence, and under Jannaeus their influence upon popular opinion was paramount. For under the last-named the secularisation of the hierocracy no longer presented any attractive aspects; it was wholly repellent. It was looked upon as a revolting anomaly that the king, ...
— Prolegomena to the History of Israel • Julius Wellhausen
... combination of Executive power and patronage; this alarm and this anxiety at head quarters, does not lead to a violation of private rights and personal liberty. I think there is a pressure brought to bear against the free expression of popular opinion, against the exercise of private judgment—a pressure felt even in the courts of law, intimidating counsel, overawing witnesses, and making the defence of liberty a peril. There is the pressure of fear of political disfranchisement, of ...
— Report of the Proceedings at the Examination of Charles G. Davis, Esq., on the Charge of Aiding and Abetting in the Rescue of a Fugitive Slave • Various
... which to his own judgment might seem to confer much less discretionary power over the rights of prisoners, he had been suspected of directing the course of law and of punishment into channels that would not brook the public knowledge. Darker dealings were imputed to him in the popular opinion. Gloomy suspicions were muttered at the fireside, which no man dared openly to avow; and in the present instance the conduct of the Landgrave was every way fitted to fall in with the worst of the public fears. At one time he talked of bringing ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... at the Congress. Its Personnel and its Work. Party Hacks in Place. Wind vs. Work. What People said of the Solons. The New Cabinet. Heads of Departments Sketched. The President's Advisers. Popular Opinion. The First ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... hell. Humanity insists that these time honored institutions be treated with due respect. I have an equal respect for those who believe as I do and those who do not; therefore if anything in this book is not in accord with popular opinion it is a crack at the head of the idol rather than that ...
— The Head Voice and Other Problems - Practical Talks on Singing • D. A. Clippinger
... restricted to excessive interest, and this alone was prohibited. Yet the practice of receiving interest for the loan of money was still generally condemned by writers on morals till quite the end of this period; though lawyers, merchants, and popular opinion no longer disapproved of it if the ...
— An Introduction to the Industrial and Social History of England • Edward Potts Cheyney
... of Orange, afterwards King William the 3rd, took place soon after Bunyan's decease. It was probably on this account that this paragraph was omitted from the edition of September, 1688, and all the subsequent ones to the present time. The popular opinion, in those times, was, that Dutchman and extortioner were ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... assured the editor, that he remembered the insignia of the unicorns, &c. so often mentioned in the ballad, in existence upon the old tower at Hangingshaw, the seat of the Philiphaugh family; although, upon first perusing a copy of the ballad, he was inclined to subscribe to the popular opinion. The tower of Hangingshaw has been demolished for many years. It stood in a romantic and solitary situation, on the classical banks of the Yarrow. When the mountains around Hangingshaw were covered with the wild ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish border (3rd ed) (1 of 3) • Walter Scott
... directors taken into custody was Sir John Blunt, the man whom popular opinion has generally accused of having been the original author and father of the scheme. This man, we are informed by Pope, in his epistle to Allen Lord Bathurst, was a dissenter, of a most religious deportment, and professed to be a great believer.[24] He constantly declaimed ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... light had begun to glimmer upon the understanding of this interpreter of the laws. Sagacious in the signs of the times, he began to see that the tide was turning; and that Court favour at least, and probably popular opinion also, were likely, in a short time, to declare against the witnesses, and in favour ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... there is one thing that can be done anywhere, and whenever enough votes can be assembled to carry through the necessary legislation. At present the law regards with an austere disapproval that reflects a popular opinion (now happily tending towards decay), what are known as "denominational schools" and other institutions of learning. Those that maintain the necessity of an intimate union between religion and education, as for example the great majority of Roman Catholics and an increasing ...
— Towards the Great Peace • Ralph Adams Cram
... the eventual repayment of the principal of the loan act in the opposite direction. Accruing interest must be offset annually by exports from the debtor country and the repayment of the principal requires that either money or goods be exported equal in value to the original obligations. In popular opinion an excess of exports of merchandise is an index, if not the real cause, of national prosperity; but evidently it is no true index whatever on this point. An excess of exports may at any given moment indicate that the country is rich ...
— Modern Economic Problems - Economics Vol. II • Frank Albert Fetter
... and Abelard were the two leaders of popular opinion in France. To attach them, Innocent could refuse nothing. Probably Abelard remained with Innocent, but in any case Innocent gave him, at Auxerre, in the following November, a diploma, granting to Heloise, prioress of the Oratory ...
— Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres • Henry Adams
... means of the fish-pugh—a sort of one-pronged, piscatory pitchfork—and cleaned, salted, and cured there; then spread out to dry on the flake, or on the beach, and packed for market. Nothing can be neater and cleaner than the whole system of curing the fish! popular opinion to the contrary notwithstanding. The fishermen of Louisburgh are a happy, contented, kind, and simple people. Living, as they do, far from the jarring interests of the busy world, having a common revenue, for the ocean supplies each and all alike; pursuing an occupation which ...
— Acadia - or, A Month with the Blue Noses • Frederic S. Cozzens
... such miserable preconceived opinions to grow up in his mind as that his understanding is totally unable to comprehend works like Fichte's "Science of Knowledge," the "Metaphysics" of Aristotle, or Hegel's "Phenomenology." No science suffers so much as Philosophy from this false popular opinion, which understands neither itself nor its authority. The youth must learn how to learn to understand, and, in order to do this, he must know that one cannot immediately understand everything in its finest subdivisions, and that on this account he must have patience, and must resolve to ...
— Pedagogics as a System • Karl Rosenkranz
... disastrous. Mr. Knibbs is not so pessimistic and is much more precise; though he defers the disastrous culmination, he has no doubt as to its inevitability. The limits of human expansion, he assures us, are much nearer than popular opinion imagines; the difficulty of food supplies will soon be most grave; the exhaustion of sources of energy necessary for any notable increase of population, or advance in the standards of living, or both combined, is perilously near. The present rate of increase ...
— The Idea of Progress - An Inquiry Into Its Origin And Growth • J. B. Bury
... contentions of Reuchlin. It was a war between two opposing schools—the Theologians and the Humanists; and, unfortunately for the Theologians, they had selected their ground badly, and were but poorly equipped for a battle in which victory was to be decided by popular opinion. ...
— History of the Catholic Church from the Renaissance to the French • Rev. James MacCaffrey
... from Rev. Anson Green, at Augusta, it was apparent that the tide of popular opinion against Dr. Ryerson had ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... so calculated that the police was rather the police of Fouche than that of the Minister of the General Police. Throughout Paris, and indeed throughout all France, Fouche obtained credit for extraordinary ability; and the popular opinion was correct in this respect, namely, that no man ever displayed such ability in making it be supposed that he really possessed talent. Fouche's secret in this particular is the whole secret of the greater part of those persons who are ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... unpaid, and the papers he held didn't seem to impress the functionaries nearly so much as he had expected. It began to look as though Bi had missed his chances in life once more, and when he took his old seat in the fire-house and smoked, he said very little. Popular Opinion was still crouching with her eye in his direction and it behooved him to walk cautiously and do nothing to offend. So while he smoked he cogitated in his cunning little brain, and hatched out a plan by which he might get in with the heiress later, perhaps, when things had quieted ...
— Exit Betty • Grace Livingston Hill
... generosity have been too much overlooked, and they could not redeem the writer's savagery in popular opinion, being overshadowed by that cruel indignation which ate his flesh and exhausted his spirit. Yet it was, perhaps, just from such elements of intuitive sympathy and affectionate goodwill that the indignation sprang. Like most ...
— Essays in Rebellion • Henry W. Nevinson
... study of earth, air, and water involves the study of plant, animal, and human life. Popular opinion has given the name of geography to these ...
— Uncle Robert's Geography (Uncle Robert's Visit, V.3) • Francis W. Parker and Nellie Lathrop Helm
... exchanges of books became common. It was war; and like every war was carried on for victory and not for profit. It is perhaps fortunate that such contests cannot in the nature of things last long. In the long run business must show a profit or fail. Contrary to popular opinion, a book war is not profitable in itself; but it is a form of competition that has existed for fully a century. It presents ...
— A History of the McGuffey Readers • Henry H. Vail
... will explain: When the king saw that our actions had life, and that there was much virtue in them and much vice, and that the soul and body, although not, like the Gods of popular opinion, eternal, yet having once come into existence, were indestructible (for if either of them had been destroyed, there would have been no generation of living beings); and when he observed that the good of the soul was ever by nature designed to profit ...
— Laws • Plato
... Popular opinion, which in the worst times is some restraint upon the arbitrary oppressions of kings, in this case would rather applaud the utmost barbarity of the monarch than commiserate the wretchedness of the victims; for a new tale of the crucifixion of a Christian child, called Hugh of Lincoln, was ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various
... it is of interest to learn that the danger to life from bites and stings of poisonous reptiles and insects has been greatly exaggerated. According to popular opinion, anyone bitten by a rattlesnake, gila monster or tarantula is doomed to die, while as a matter of fact the statistics show that only from two to seven per-cent succumb to the effects of the wounds inflicted by the bites ...
— Nature Cure • Henry Lindlahr
... his death Galton wrote (Preface to Essays in Eugenics): "The power by which Eugenic reform must chiefly be effected is that of Popular Opinion, which is amply strong enough for that purpose whenever it shall ...
— The Task of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... fanaticism wields. In midsummer, 1862, Pollard published a book entitled The First Year of the War, which was commended by his allies in Charleston as showing no "tendency toward unfairness of statement" and as expressing views "mainly in accordance with popular opinion." ...
— The Day of the Confederacy - A Chronicle of the Embattled South, Volume 30 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Nathaniel W. Stephenson
... won and the negro had gained his freedom, Wendell Phillips remained the foremost critic of public men and measures in America, and year after year, he devoted his great gifts to guiding popular opinion. A champion of temperance, of the rights of labor, of the Indians, of equal suffrage, he stood forth until his death an inspiring and august figure—a man who devoted his life wholly to ...
— American Men of Mind • Burton E. Stevenson
... the sum of popular opinion; and it was further the opinion of Mrs. Gerrish, who gave more attention to the case than many others, that Annie had first taken the child because she hoped to get Mr. Peck, when she found she could not get Dr. Morrell; and that she would ...
— Annie Kilburn - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... erring brother seventy and seven times. If, as some maintain, wrongfully, we believe, the Indian is not, in a genealogical sense, of the same stock, yet is he not, in a moral sense, a brother? If the knowledge of his story-telling faculty has had any tendency to correct the evils of false popular opinion respecting him, it has been to show that the man talks and laughs like the rest of the human family; that it is fear that makes him suspicious, and ignorance superstitious; that he is himself the dupe of an artful forest priesthood; and that his cruelty and sanguinary fury are the ...
— The Myth of Hiawatha, and Other Oral Legends, Mythologic and Allegoric, of the North American Indians • Henry R. Schoolcraft
... strengthened by these interrogations: 'Is any thing too hard for the Lord?' Is Error, though unwittingly supported by a host of good men, stronger than Truth? Are Right and Wrong convertible terms, dependant upon popular opinion? Oh no! Then I will go forward in the strength of the Lord of Hosts—in the name of Truth—and under the banner of Right. As it is not by might nor by power, but by the Spirit of God, that great moral changes are effected, I am encouraged to fight valiantly in this good cause, believing that I ...
— Thoughts on African Colonization • William Lloyd Garrison
... reflections was, that the next day, Monday, he went into the town, and artfully learnt all he could hear about Mr Dunster's character and mode of going on; and with still more skill he extracted the popular opinion as to the embarrassed nature of Mr. Wilkins's affairs—embarrassment which was generally attributed to Dunster's disappearance with a good large sum belonging to the firm in his possession. But Mr. Corbet thought otherwise; he had accustomed himself to seek out the baser motives for ...
— A Dark Night's Work • Elizabeth Gaskell
... Irish naturalists, Molyneux's "Case of Ireland," Effect of its publication, Death of Molyneux, Dean Swift, His position in Irish politics, The "Drapier Letters," Their line of attack, Effect on popular opinion, Wood's halfpence suspended. ...
— The Story Of Ireland • Emily Lawless
... referred, says Laborde, (Itineraire Descriptif de l'Espagne, (Paris, 1827-1830,) tom. iv. p. 47,) to the middle of the fourteenth century, when the great plague, which devastated the country so sorely, left large depopulated tracts open to pasturage. This popular opinion is erroneous, since it engaged the attention of government, and became the subject of legislation as anciently as 1273, under Alfonso the Wise. (See Asso y Manuel, Instituciones, Introd. p. 56.) Capmany, however, dates the great improvement in the breed of Spanish ...
— History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella V1 • William H. Prescott
... ideas as to the interests of Hanover. Carteret had the weakness of many highly cultured and highly gifted men; he believed far too much in the supremacy of intellect and culture. The great rising wave of popular opinion was unnoticed by him. He did not see that {241} the transfer of power from the hereditary to the representative assembly must inevitably come to mean the transfer of power from the representatives to ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume II (of 4) • Justin McCarthy
... a fire here, but our people put it out before the parish-engine arrived, like a drivelling perambulator, with the beadle in it, like an imbecile baby. Popular opinion, disappointed in the fire having been put out, snowballed the beadle. God ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 2 (of 3), 1857-1870 • Charles Dickens
... Cooktown used a copper boiler. Several Chinese epicures died after partaking of soup made from a particular parcel, and "red prickly" was forthwith credited with poisonous qualities. The consignment was traced to its origin, and popular opinion at the time was that the boiler had, unknown to the proprietor of the station, induced verdigris. Investigation, however, gave ground for the belief that the fish in the boiling exuded juices of such corrosive qualities that the copper was chemically acted upon. Beche-de-mer, is now invariably ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... with great learning, and generally with great justness, of the derivation and changes of languages; but, like other men of multifarious learning, he receives some notions without examination. Thus he observes, according to the popular opinion, that the Spaniards have retained so much Latin as to be able to compose sentences that shall be, at once, grammatically Latin and Castilian: this will appear very unlikely to a man that considers the Spanish terminations; and Howell, who was eminently skilful ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 6 - Reviews, Political Tracts, and Lives of Eminent Persons • Samuel Johnson
... inspiring beings; intense, marvellously capable, peerless, free-born creatures panoplied in chastity and endowed with congenital mental power and bodily charms, who were able to cook, educate children, control society and write literature in the course of the day's employment. The newspapers and popular opinion had given her to understand that these were the true Americans, and caused her to ask herself whether the circle to which she herself belonged was not retrograde from a nobler ideal. In what way she did not precisely understand, ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... did a belief in liberty, and an unconquerable love of independence, grow up among that simple people. No feudal despots oppressed the unprotected, for all were noble and udal born; no standing armies enabled the Crown to set popular opinion at defiance, for the swords of the Bonders sufficed to guard the realm; no military barons usurped an illegitimate authority, for the nature of the soil forbade the erection of feudal fortresses. Over the rest of Europe despotism rose up rank under the tutelage of a corrupt ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... better test of the popular opinion of a man than the character assigned to him on the stage; and till the close of the sixteenth century Sir John Oldcastle remained the profligate buffoon of English comedy. Whether in life he bore ...
— History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth. Vol. II. • James Anthony Froude
... servants of Christ, we shall be set free, in the measure in which we are His, from the slavery which daily becomes more oppressive as the means of communication become more complete, the slavery to popular opinion and to men round us. Dare to be singular; take your beliefs at first hand from the Master. Never mind what fellow-slaves say. It is His smile or frown that is of importance. 'Ye are bought with a price; be not servants of men.' And ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) • Alexander Maclaren
... resulted in an acquittal, though the public attitude towards you was dubious. The judge, in summing up, said that the evidence against you 'might be deemed insufficient.' In these words he conveyed the popular opinion. I see I have noted here that Miss Margaret Hume-Frazer was at a Covent Garden Fancy Dress Ball on the night of the murder. But the tragic deaths of her father and brother had a marked influence on the young lady. She, of course, succeeded to the estates, ...
— The Stowmarket Mystery - Or, A Legacy of Hate • Louis Tracy
... they proceeded gradually, but not slowly, to destroy everything of strength which did not derive its principal nourishment from the immediate pleasure of the Court. The greatest weight of popular opinion and party connection were then with the Duke of Newcastle and Mr. Pitt. Neither of these held his importance by the new tenure of the Court; they were not, therefore, thought to be so proper as others for the services which were ...
— Thoughts on the Present Discontents - and Speeches • Edmund Burke
... of laughter at this characteristic remark drowned the conclusion of the speech, but the announcement that the toast was given up appeared to produce general satisfaction; for, since I had spoken, the popular opinion had been decidedly ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... writing on his daily topics with strenuous original vigour, even though, like Rockney, he sets the teeth of the Celt gnashing at him, goes a step nearer to the bourne of pacification than Press and Parliament reflecting the popular opinion that law must be passed to temper Ireland's eruptiveness; for that man can be admired, and the Celt, in combating him, will like an able and gallant enemy better than a grudgingly just, lumbersome, dull, politic friend. The material points ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... a trying time—it ranges above mere party—and this movement to call a halt and turn our steps backward needs all the help and good counsels it can get; for unless popular opinion makes itself very strongly felt, and a change is made in our present course, blood will flow on account of Nebraska, and brother's hands will be ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... In Germany, the rise in prices was first observed in the price of foreign groceries, which partly rose 400 per cent. Popular opinion looked for the cause in the evil disposition of the large commercial houses. In order to facilitate the competition of the smaller houses with the larger, the Reichstag, in 1522, prohibited all companies with a capital of more than 50,000 florins; and, in 1524, ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • William Roscher
... colonel, as he was carried home on a shutter; nothing short of a court martial was his slightest menace. But no court martial ever took place. The military pride and glory of Dogtown were wounded to the quick; the force of popular opinion compelled Slorkey to resign, and to consummate his chagrin, his treacherous rival was chosen colonel of the regiment. So unstable are human honors—so ungrateful ...
— The Three Brides, Love in a Cottage, and Other Tales • Francis A. Durivage
... foster, and which might make them ready to support the cause of the King, especially now that it was in the ascendant. Amidst the strong tides which were running under the influence of shifting currents of popular opinion, principles were thrust to the wall, and each party, like each individual, was chiefly occupied in looking after personal interests, and adjusting views so as to suit the change of the national situation. No one was sure of anything except that the political quicksands were moving rapidly, ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik
... report of his crimes supplied by the extraordinary issue of the Yarraman Mercury, many of the ladies were compelled to admit that this extreme view was probably the correct one; besides, it possessed the advantage of coinciding admirably with long-established popular opinion about Dick's end. They generously admitted, however, that they were sorry for his mother, ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson
... we read the testimony of contemporaries that the majority of England was still Catholic by the middle of the sixteenth century, a further analysis of popular opinion must be made to account for the apparently spontaneous rush of the Reformation. Some of these estimates are doubtless exaggerations, as that of Paget who wrote in 1549 that eleven Englishmen out of twelve were Catholics. But conceding, as we must, that a considerable ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... to think that there will be, Jack, although this is not the popular opinion. We have so long, in England, been talking about the iniquity of war that I believe that the Emperor Nicholas has persuaded himself that we will not fight at any price. In this I am sure that he is wholly mistaken. So long as there was no probability ...
— Jack Archer • G. A. Henty
... thought dull, we have only repaid popular estimates in their own coin; for these sweeping generalisations, which condemn whole centuries as periods of depression, have been largely made for us by popular opinion, and like all generalisations, they have to be very considerably whittled down as soon as we descend to particulars. On a nearer view we find that the curves of literary progress have not been rolled smooth by any steamroller, ...
— Fifteenth Century Prose and Verse • Various
... we can implicitly rely. After that which has happened with respect to the Treaty of 1852, and after that which has happened with respect to the treatment of the Danes after the pledges given, but more as I am afraid owing to German popular opinion, which Austria is desirous to conciliate, which Prussia is desirous to conciliate, which the German Confederation, above all, is anxious to conciliate, I am sorry to say that, greatly as I have respected Austria, greatly as I have respected ...
— Selected Speeches on British Foreign Policy 1738-1914 • Edgar Jones
... the sheriff, rising and turning his hat in his hand and methodically prodding new and geometrically perfect indentations in its high crown, "but you've got a strong popular opinion to buck. Most people believe them Injuns and the breed have a ...
— Mystery Ranch • Arthur Chapman
... with a gentle smile. "A public man has to commit himself to many things nowadays. But my opinion is, that—that you may hold the popular opinion about free trade, and be not a whit the less useful to Sir Robert ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... to understand how an authority upon the Contrat Social could make such a statement though in accord with popular opinion. ...
— The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of Citizens • Georg Jellinek
... growingly delivered from errors and misconceptions, in the measure in which we keep close to Christ as our Master. The Lord is that Teacher, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there, and there only, is liberty; freedom from self, from the dominion of popular opinion, from the coterie-speech of schools, from the imposing authority of individuals, and from all that makes cowardly men say as other people say, and fall in with the majority; and freedom from our own prejudices and our own errors, which are cleared ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren
... self-sacrifice, his apostolic fervor of spirit, and the power of his influence."[11] Joseph Story spoke of the ministry at large as being one of "extraordinary success." "I deem it," he wrote, "one of the most glorious triumphs of Christian charity over the cold and reluctant doubts of popular opinion." The labors of Dr. Tuckerman "initiated a new sphere of Protestant charity," as his nephew well said.[12] "This has been the most characteristic, the best organized, and by far the most successful co-operative ...
— Unitarianism in America • George Willis Cooke
... of the most vital and permanent of the requirements of the social life. Dickinson says that the time has gone by for entrusting the destinies of nations to the wisdom of experts. If this be true, and popular opinion is to supersede the wisdom of the experts, if the people are really to have power, and be competent critics of good government, or merely to become good material in the hands of constructive statesmanship, ...
— The Psychology of Nations - A Contribution to the Philosophy of History • G.E. Partridge
... the arguments I invoke for the support of my thesis: in the first place, popular opinion, which identifies matter with what we see, and with what we touch—that is to say, with sensation. This popular opinion represents a primitive attitude, a family possession which we have the right to retain, so long as it is not proved to us to be false: next, this remark, that by its ...
— The Mind and the Brain - Being the Authorised Translation of L'me et le Corps • Alfred Binet
... urged on by the force of strange passions. His inward consciousness betokens a general distrust; he has no friend on whom he can rely. Poles and Cossacks, by their insolent licentiousness, injure him in the popular opinion. Even that which is creditable to him—his popular manners, simplicity, and contempt of stiff ceremonial, occasions dissatisfaction. Occasionally he offends, through inadvertency, the usages of the country. He persecutes the monks because he suffered severely under them. Moreover, ...
— Demetrius - A Play • Frederich Schiller
... "child-like" native will turn out and shoot you with a gun to attract your attention to the fact that a tribe you never heard of has been and stolen one of his ladies, whom you never saw. It's the sweet infant's way of "rousing up popular opinion," but I do not admire or approve of it. If I am to be shot for a crime, for goodness sake let me commit ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... one of the leading journals here. We want you to write openly of these German spies who infest Paris. We want you first to hint and then to speak openly of the purchase of Le Jour by means of German gold. We want you to combat the popular opinion here that our army is a wooden box affair, and that we as a nation are too crassly selfish to risk our fleet for the benefit of France. We want you to strike a great note and tell the truth. Julien, those articles signed by you and ...
— The Mischief Maker • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... active and ardent mind: but the virtues that arise from this source are as unsteady, and as precarious, as the reward they pursue. He who acts only as a candidate for the applause of mankind, will find his spirit vary with all the variations in the ever-changing atmosphere of popular opinion. He will be subject to hot and cold fits of action and inactivity, of confidence and distrust, in proportion as the illusive vapour, that he follows, may either sparkle or fade before him. Hence proceeded much of that inconsistency and weakness, which appear in some of the ...
— The Eulogies of Howard • William Hayley
... any law to authorize it, slavery existed in England, and was sustained and perpetuated by popular opinion, universal custom, and the acquiescence of all departments of the government as well as by the subjects of its oppression. A few fearless champions of liberty struggled against the universal sentiment, and ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... with God, he didn't only preach righteousness, he acted it. He went through water and didn't melt. He breasted the current of the popular opinion of his day, scorning alike the hatred and ridicule of the scoffers who mocked at the thought of there being but one way of salvation. He warned the unbelieving and, entering the ark himself, didn't open the door an inch when once ...
— The Chocolate Soldier - Heroism—The Lost Chord of Christianity • C. T. Studd
... quest will, unaided by the catalogue, discover for us the real, and sift it free of the spurious if we have settled with ourselves what art is and what its purpose. If we hold to the present popular notion that art is imitation, the results will come out at variance with the popular opinion of five centuries. If, on the other hand, we delegate to its proper place fidelity to the surface of nature, we must of necessity seek still further for its essence. This ...
— Pictorial Composition and the Critical Judgment of Pictures • Henry Rankin Poore
... and having lighted his pipe, continues his pacing. "As for this jail," he mutters to himself, "I've no great respect for it; but there is a wide difference between a man who they put in here for sinning against himself, and one who only violates a law of the State, passed in opposition to popular opinion. However, you seem brightened up a few pegs, and, only let whiskey alone, you may be something yet. Keep up an acquaintance with the pump, and be civil to respectable prisoners, ...
— Justice in the By-Ways - A Tale of Life • F. Colburn Adams
... definite wisdom with which she discusses the movement of events in the outer world. It is surely significant to the psychologist that a woman in the throes of such an experience as the next letters present, could write in such a strain. The whole life of Catherine, indeed, refutes the popular opinion that mystics cannot be trusted to sane judgment or sustained wisdom of action in the confused affairs of ...
— Letters of Catherine Benincasa • Catherine Benincasa
... statement that every sentence in Austria's ultimatum "was a whip-lash across Serbia's face;" a phrase expressing so aptly the great mass of popular opinion. This expression met with unstinted approval, for it corresponded with German ideals and standards in dealing with an opponent. Yet there was no lack of warnings, and very grave ones too. A glance at German newspapers will suffice to prove ...
— What Germany Thinks - The War as Germans see it • Thomas F. A. Smith
... popular opinion throughout this great dairy country, and from its being insisted on by those ...
— The Harvard Classics Volume 38 - Scientific Papers (Physiology, Medicine, Surgery, Geology) • Various
... hedgerows were starry with blackthorn, and the Pyrus japonica over the dining-room windows was a mass of rosy blossom. Spring was always a delightful season at The Woodlands; with the longer days came rambles and greater freedom. Popular opinion ran high in extolling country life, and any girl who ventured to prefer town pleasures found ...
— For the Sake of the School • Angela Brazil
... specimen, a country belle, visited in the neighbourhood; but popular voice (and there is a popular voice, be it loud or gentle, everywhere) soon discovered that blonde, and feathers, and flowers, had a good deal to do with this disturbing of popular opinion; and after a few days, the good people invariably returned to their allegiance. "Ah! ah!" old Mrs. Myles would observe on these occasions—Ah! ah!"—I told you they'd soon find the fair lady was shaded by her fine laces. I daresay ...
— Turns of Fortune - And Other Tales • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... errors, mistakes, and perversions which have grown about Will in popular opinion, like those which have accumulated round Christianity, are too often mistaken for the truth. Pure Will is, and must be by its very nature, perfectly free, for the more it is hindered, or hampered, or controlled in any way, the less is it independent volition. Therefore, pare Will, free ...
— The Mystic Will • Charles Godfrey Leland
... pronounced it entirely devoid of character, and it has long since passed into oblivion. Yet it is an instance how an inferior production, by dint of puffing and trumpeting, may be kept up for a time on the surface of popular opinion, or rather of popular talk. What had been done for False Delicacy on the stage was continued by the press. The booksellers vied with the manager in launching it upon the town. They announced that the first impression of three thousand copies was exhausted ...
— Oliver Goldsmith • Washington Irving
... just shown the popular opinion of ministerial honesty. The Attorney-General has prosecuted, and brought to conviction, a fellow in some low trade, who, hearing that Mr Addington was prime minister, and thinking of course that a prime minister could do ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various
... that his needs were well taken care of. But before we can draw any conclusion we must study certain conditions. We must know something of the character of the men who were to enforce the law, of the desire of the Negroes for an education, of popular opinion concerning public education, and of the distribution of the ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 5, 1920 • Various
... just consequence of incurable defects. The time will come, however, when they will be reconciled with the Papacy, and with its presence as a Power among them. It was the dependence of the Pope on the Austrian arms, and his identification in popular opinion with the cause of the detested foreigner, that obscured his lofty position as the moral bulwark and protector of the nation. For 1500 years the Holy See was the pivot of Italian history, and the source of the Italian influence in Europe. The nation and the See shared ...
— The History of Freedom • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... both thought and passion. From The Wide, Wide World to Pollyanna, however, she has taken habitual advantage of the reverence for the virgin which is one of the most pervasive elements in American popular opinion. That reverence has many charming and wholesome aspects; it has given young women a priceless freedom of movement in America without the penalty of being constantly suspected of sexual designs which they may not harbor. It must be remembered that the Daisy Millers ...
— Contemporary American Novelists (1900-1920) • Carl Van Doren
... efforts, popular opinion has it that Wenceslaus is not dead, but fast asleep inside a mountain, making up for nights spent in prayer no doubt. I do not believe ...
— From a Terrace in Prague • Lieut.-Col. B. Granville Baker
... sole lord of France, did not hastily attempt to cut prejudice against the grain. Feeling his way gradually, he sounded popular opinion for three years, on the subject of changing the royal dynasty, and placing the crown on the head of one who had a good right arm to defend it. Finding himself strong enough at last to take decided measures, he quietly ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 1 of 8 • Various
... popular opinion and the well-known wishes of the President relative to freedom of speech and of the press, I have forborne until, in my belief, further forbearance would lead to disastrous results. I am thoroughly convinced of the necessity for prompt and decided measures ...
— Forty-Six Years in the Army • John M. Schofield
... part that each should play in the social system. Generally speaking the advantage of status is in its power to give order and continuity. As Gibbon informs us, "The superior prerogative of birth, when it has obtained the sanction of time and popular opinion, is the plainest and least invidious of all distinctions among mankind," and he is doubtless right in ascribing the confusion of the later Roman Empire largely to the lack of an established rule for the transmission of imperial authority. The chief danger of status is that of ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... child of her secret love,) he even brought out his earliest pieces under others' names. He appeared for the first time without this disguise with the Knights, and here he displayed the undaunted resolution of a comedian, by an open assault on popular opinion. His object was nothing less than the overthrow of Cleon, who, after the death of Pericles, was at the head of all state affairs, a promoter of war, and a worthless man of very ordinary abilities, but at the same time the idol ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel
... of temper, in the pleasure of the creation of beautiful things, and the long contemplation of them, in disdain of what in life is common and ignoble and in such felicitous sense of humour as enables one to see how vain and foolish is all popular opinion, and popular judgment, upon the wonderful things of art. These qualities Mr. John Gray possesses in a marked degree. He needs no other protection, nor, indeed, would he accept it.—I remain, Sir, your ...
— Miscellanies • Oscar Wilde
... for the most part are your princes, potentates, great philosophers, historiographers, authors of sects or heresies, and all our great scholars, as [1925]Hierom defines; "a natural philosopher is a glorious creature, and a very slave of rumour, fame, and popular opinion," and though they write de contemptu gloriae, yet as he observes, they will put their names to their books. Vobis et famae, me semper dedi, saith Trebellius Pollio, I have wholly consecrated myself to you and fame. "'Tis all ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... evidence that they divide the gods into classes of good and evil, and am persuaded that those persons who represent them as doing so, do it inconsiderately, and because it is so natural to subscribe to a long cherished popular opinion." ...
— The Myths of the New World - A Treatise on the Symbolism and Mythology of the Red Race of America • Daniel G. Brinton
... been almost universal in the minds of protestants. So deep-seated is this conviction in the popular belief, that one is deemed chargeable with temerity, if not something worse, who would call its grounds in question. Popular opinion, or belief in matters of this spiritual and mystical nature, is, however, of very little weight in the estimation of such as are accustomed to "try the spirits." Although the mark was to be received at the instance and by the authority of the ...
— Notes On The Apocalypse • David Steele
... working in the collar of the world's condemnation. The slave States of America were very comfortable with slavery so long as they could hold it with self-respect, and so long as the world regarded them rather with sympathy and pity than with condemnation. As the popular opinion against slavery strengthened and became intensified, both in this and other countries, they became sore and sensitive. First, they tucked a constitutional rag between the collar and the skin; and as that did not seem to relieve them, they lined it with leaves from human philosophy; ...
— Lessons in Life - A Series of Familiar Essays • Timothy Titcomb
... talents engaged the friendship of the Arian bishops, till they were forced to renounce, and even to persecute, a dangerous ally, who, by the accuracy of his reasoning, had prejudiced their cause in the popular opinion, and offended the piety of their most devoted followers. 2. The omnipotence of the Creator suggested a specious and respectful solution of the likeness of the Father and the Son; and faith might humbly receive ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... the calling of the skilled mechanic, should alike be recognized as professions, just as emphatically as the callings of lawyer, doctor, merchant, or clerk. The schools recognize this fact and it should equally be recognized in popular opinion. The young man who has the farsightedness and courage to recognize it and to get over the idea that it makes a difference whether what he earns is called salary or wages, and who refuses to enter the crowded field of the so-called professions, ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... to the artisans of England what Burns was to the peasantry of Scotland. His Corn-law Rhymes contributed not a little to that overwhelming tide of popular opinion and feeling which resulted in the repeal of the tax on bread. Well has the eloquent author of The Reforms and Reformers of Great Britain said of him, "Not corn-law repealers alone, but all Britons who moisten their scanty bread with the sweat of the brow, are largely indebted to his ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... cherished, and to the interests and projects of the Southern States. The character and principles of Mr. Adams were not adapted to become subservient to her views, and she saw with little complacency his elevation to the office of Secretary of State, which was in popular opinion a proximate step to the President's chair. Yet it could not be doubted that his appointment had the assent, if not the approbation, of Jefferson and Madison, without whose concurrence Monroe would scarcely have ventured to raise a citizen of ...
— Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams. • Josiah Quincy
... that a private education can work the wonders which some sanguine writers have attributed to it. Men and women must be educated, in a great degree, by the opinions and manners of the society they live in. In every age there has been a stream of popular opinion that has carried all before it, and given a family character, as it were, to the century. It may then fairly be inferred, that, till society be differently constituted, much cannot be expected from ...
— A Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Title: Vindication of the Rights of Women • Mary Wollstonecraft [Godwin]
... service, to concentrate his thoughts on his own spiritual emotions, and to breed in him a contempt for the present life which he regarded merely as a probation for a better and an eternal. The saint and the recluse, disdainful of earth and rapt in ecstatic contemplation of heaven, became in popular opinion the highest ideal of humanity, displacing the old ideal of the patriot and hero who, forgetful of self, lives and is ready to die for the good of his country. The earthly city seemed poor and contemptible to men whose eyes beheld the City of God coming in the clouds of heaven. Thus ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... I don't believe there is a man in the country that can gauge popular opinion as accurately as you! Let us sit down and have a ...
— Three Dramas - The Editor—The Bankrupt—The King • Bjornstjerne M. Bjornson
... Contrary to the popular opinion of the present day, the general trend of Siouan migration has been westward. In comparatively late prehistoric times, probably most of the Siouan tribes dwelt east ...
— Seventh Annual Report • Various
... think only of truth. It will often be a question when a man is or is not wise in advancing unpalateable opinions, or in preaching heresies; but it can never be a question that a man should be silent if unprepared to speak the truth as he conceives it. Deference to popular opinion is one great source of bad writing, and is all the more disastrous because the deference is paid to some purely hypothetical requirement. When a man fails to see the truth of certain generally accepted views, there is no law compelling him to provoke animosity by announcing his dissent. He ...
— The Principles of Success in Literature • George Henry Lewes
... have never been considered in relation to the general finances of the commonwealth. While some states have hesitated, and others have vacillated, Massachusetts has had a consistent, uniform, progressive policy, which is due in part to the consideration already named, and in part, no doubt, to a popular opinion, traditional and historical in its origin, but sustained and strengthened by the measures and experience of the last quarter of a century, that a system of public instruction is so important an element of general prosperity as to justify all needful ...
— Thoughts on Educational Topics and Institutions • George S. Boutwell
... of bergs which throng these seas should keep the air and water in perpetual commotion— one fearful succession of explosive detonations and propagated waves. But it is only the lesser masses falling into deep waters which could justify the popular opinion. The enormous masses of the Great Glacier [of Greenland] are propelled step by step, and year by year, until, reaching water capable of supporting them, they are floated off, to be lost in the temperatures ...
— The Ocean and its Wonders • R.M. Ballantyne
... foremost, and the intermediate ones can never be superior to them. For all that, intermediate ones are observers of the duties of caste; the foremost ones are not so, they having transcended such distinctions; hence, tentatively, the ignorant or popular opinion is first taken, to the effect that the observers of caste are superior to those ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... opinion among thoughtful physicians is that this basis is much narrower than was at one time supposed, and is becoming still more restricted with the progress of scientific knowledge. For instance, fifty years ago, popular opinion, and even the majority of medical belief, was that consumption and all of its attendant miseries were chiefly due to exposure to cold. Now we know that, on the contrary, abundance of pure, fresh, cold air is the best cure for the disease, and foul air and overcrowding its ...
— Preventable Diseases • Woods Hutchinson
... in Florence, where he resided till his death. His works are varied and include an immense number of busts. The best are, perhaps, the group of Charity, the "Hercules and Lichas" and the "Faith in God," which exemplify the highest types of Bartolini's style. Popular opinion in Italy associates his qualities as a sculptor with those of Thorwaldsen ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various
... more essentially Chinese in an educational sense than any other city in China. Public speech in Hong Kong reflects the control of Britain, and in Shanghai popular opinion is held to be tainted with German or British opinion. At Pekin the game of diplomacy is played too consummately to allow an expressed utterance to have any national significance, for the capital is looked upon as a city eddying with cross currents and rival influences. ...
— East of Suez - Ceylon, India, China and Japan • Frederic Courtland Penfield
... the country there were "the goodmane's land and the guidman's fauld," to cultivate which it was supposed would be followed by dire calamities. These places were, according to popular opinion, frequented by fairies and other supernatural beings. Music was often heard, and dancing seen, at such places. There, too, people are reported to have been enticed into subterranean abodes, and retained for years. Places dedicated ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant |
