"Sternness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... appear in all likenesses of him, that a stranger could not be mistaken in the man; he was remarkably dignified in his manners, and had an air of benignity over his features which his visitant did not expect, being rather prepared for sternness of countenance.... his smile was extraordinarily attractive. It was observed to me that there was an expression in Washington's face that no painter had succeeded in taking. It struck me no man could be better formed ...
— The True George Washington [10th Ed.] • Paul Leicester Ford
... listened, and her beautiful face grew anxious, for the sternness of her husband's voice, in answer to those feeble plaints, gave little hopes of conciliation. Directly Mellen came through the boudoir and sat down on a couch near his wife, shading his face with one hand, not wishing her to see how much he was disturbed. Elizabeth ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens
... history familiarly vivid; and end with the epic glorification of a typical English hero-king in 'Henry V.' The comedies include the charmingly fantastic 'Midsummer Night's Dream'; 'The Merchant of Venice,' where a story of tragic sternness is strikingly contrasted with the most poetical idealizing romance and yet is harmoniously blended into it; 'Much Ado About Nothing,' a magnificent example of high comedy of character and wit; 'As You Like It,' the supreme delightful achievement of Elizabethan and all English pastoral romance; ...
— A History of English Literature • Robert Huntington Fletcher
... and ruled the kirk with sternness; they had dealt faithfully with more than one who sought to restore the reign of the token against the expressed ruling of the session. They ...
— St. Cuthbert's • Robert E. Knowles
... at a slop dealer's by the precious Harry, a rope, a midnight flitting, a passage taken on board an English ship; the anchor weighed; and the lovers were free on the bounding main. A most refreshing story! I put on a sudden air of sternness, and shot a question at ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... by what right you interfere with either me or my amusements," says Cecil, hotly, after a decided pause. Never has he addressed her with so much sternness. She raises her eyes to his and colors richly all through her creamy skin. ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... the Baron, instantly relaxing the doubtful sternness of his features, 'I can take naickle frae a man to whom I have unhappily rendered sic a displeasure as that. Ye were right to apprise me, Glennaquoich; he may look as black as midnight at Martinmas ere Cosmo Comyne Bradwardine ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... is born a Roman Catholic, for instance, though his father and mother may be the sternest Protestants. He cannot help it; it is his nature! And you"—she looked up at him with infinite tenderness in her brown eyes,—"you were born a Presbyterian, dear; you can't help it. Perhaps you need the sternness and the horror of some of the doctrines as a balance for your gentleness. I never knew any one as ...
— John Ward, Preacher • Margaret Deland
... the past are past." Then, with a new sternness: "Make no mistake. Whether through your agency or another, Countess, when the Cathedral bell rouses the city to the King's death, and the people wait in the Place for their new King to come out on the ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... But he who is crushed by the masses themselves, must look beyond the limits of his earthly being for consolation and support. The wrongs committed by democracies are of the most cruel character; and though wanting in that apparent violence and sternness that marks the course of law in the hands of narrower governments, for it has no need of this severity, they carry with them in their course all the feelings that ...
— New York • James Fenimore Cooper
... respect, and devotion of the head of the home, get a valuable lesson. There is more than that. The sight of pain and suffering and the imminence of sorrow and danger, if it be not too terrifying, is good for children. It makes them early acquainted with the realities of life and its essential sternness. Then, when death or sorrow makes its inevitable descent, the child is prepared to meet it, or knows, at any rate, the spirit in which it ought to be met. Those who have never seen Death or heard the swing of his scythe, till he suddenly ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey
... her husband, and had liked him much. Then what other woman's tongue should be brought to speak of the man's softness and tender bearing! It was out of the question that Lady Laura Kennedy should appear. She did not even propose it when her brother with unnecessary sternness told her it could not be so. Then his wife looked at him. "You shall go," said Lord Chiltern, "if you feel equal to it. It seems to be nonsense, but they say that ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... their awe of the master, and asked a thousand eager questions, which he answered with brief sternness. ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens
... you in your senses or out of them?" demanded Mr. Carlyle, a certain sternness in his tone. "Your lady miserably unhappy! What do ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... naturally averse to control, and are unable to discern between sternness of manner, and a cold unfeeling hardness of heart; and construe into insults and injuries the necessary restraint imposed upon their actions for their good. Yours, I admit, was a painful situation, which you rendered still more unpleasant ...
— The Monctons: A Novel, Volume I • Susanna Moodie
... and assumed his more normal look of set sternness. This was the man she knew and she preferred him that way, rather than buoyant because of some other woman, even though that other was as lovable and innocent of any deliberate mischief as her niece. Not that she was jealous so much as she was hurt. When ...
— Dust • Mr. and Mrs. Haldeman-Julius
... benefactors of mankind the figure of Calvin is perhaps the least attractive. He was, so to speak, the constitutional lawyer of the Reformation, with vision as clear, with head as cool, with soul as dry, as any old solicitor in rusty black that ever dwelt in chambers in Lincoln's Inn. His sternness was that of the judge who dooms a criminal to the gallows. His theology had much in it that is in striking harmony with modern scientific philosophy, and much in it, too, that the descendants of his Puritan converts have learned to loathe as sheer ...
— The Beginnings of New England - Or the Puritan Theocracy in its Relations to Civil and Religious Liberty • John Fiske
... seminary that ecclesiastic sternness that turns the priest into a warrior more intent on the interest of the Church than on the concerns of his family. For this reason he did not feel the death of his father very greatly; besides, much greater misfortunes soon occurred to ...
— The Shadow of the Cathedral • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... than the others, his richer vesture and arms, but, above all, the gold collar about his neck and the gold bracelets upon his arms, marked the chief. Standing by the rheda, he met Marcia's look of proud defiance, for a moment; then his eyes shifted and seemed to wander; but, cloaking with martial sternness the embarrassment of the ...
— The Lion's Brood • Duffield Osborne
... with a mock sternness, "you're evading my questions. Answer me, child! Isn't there any one that you—care for? Weren't you out with ...
— The Island of Faith • Margaret E. Sangster
... All the Pyrran sternness was gone from her face as she listened to what he said, letting herself follow these alien concepts. He had put his hand out automatically as he talked, and had taken hers. It was warm and her pulse ...
— Deathworld • Harry Harrison
... criminal, and Miss Edgeworth was in doubt whether it would be becoming under the circumstances to laugh or to cry, so she made no speech in reply. She said afterwards to Mrs. Martin, "Mr. Philip must have been a most severe master; I can see sternness on his brow." Moreover, she was secretly aware that she did not deserve his compliments, and that her learning was limited, especially in arithmetic; she had often to blame the figures for not adding up correctly. For this reason she had a horror of examinations, and every time the inspector ...
— The Book of the Bush • George Dunderdale
... snow-cloaked, the trees chilly and naked, the houses standing out as though they were freezing and longing for their summer wrap of ivy. And naked were the rattling trees on their side of the river, on the Palisades. But the cold breeze enlivened them, the sternness of the swift, cruel river and miles of brown shore made them gravely happy. As they tramped briskly off, atop the cliffs, toward the ferry to New York, five miles away, they talked with a quiet, quick seriousness which discovered them to each other. It was too cold for conversational fencing. ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... heads of countrymen, who, though no members of the council, felt no scruple in intruding themselves upon deliberations in which they were so deeply interested. By expostulation, by threats, and even by some degree of violence, Burley, the sternness of whose character maintained a sort of superiority over these disorderly forces, compelled the intruders to retire, and, introducing Morton into the cottage, secured the door behind them against impertinent curiosity. At ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... not have any to be spied out, Dolly," Faith answered, with some sternness, and a keen look at her sister, whose eyes fell beneath her gaze. "You will be sorry, when you think of what you said to me, who have done nothing whatever to offend you. But that is a trifle compared with acting unfairly to our father. Father is the kindest man that ever lived; but he can ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... again, with a fresh mind, the last chapter, I am struck by the opposition of states which seem best to fit a weed for a weed's work,—stubbornness, namely, and flaccidity. On the one hand, a sternness and a coarseness of structure which changes its stem into a stake, and its leaf into a spine; on the other, an utter flaccidity and ventosity of structure, which changes its stem into a riband, and its leaf into a bubble. ...
— Proserpina, Volume 1 - Studies Of Wayside Flowers • John Ruskin
... which ripened later into the rarest union of activity and strength that I have ever known. His features were very dark and pale, too strongly marked to be called handsome; about the lips and lower jaw especially there was a set sternness that one seldom sees before the beard is grown. The eyes were very dark gray, nearly black, and so deeply set under the thick eyebrows that they looked smaller than they really were; and I remember, even at that early age, their expression, ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence
... bison, and had only parched corn and the remains of a buffalo steak for supper, as the meal was mouldy from its wetting, and running low. When Weldon had gone a little distance up the creek to scout, Tom relented from the sternness which his vigilance imposed and came and sat down on a log beside Polly ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... authoritative voice from the General. Mrs. Melwyn was used to the sternness, and most agreeably surprised at the politeness, and quite grateful for it. Lettice thought the voice and look too terrible to take pleasure in ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... a face of profound melancholy; his expression had in it, oddly, a trace of sternness; and I was somewhat taken aback by this evidence that he was still bearing vicariously the troubles of his client. So deep had been the thought I had apparently interrupted that he did not realize ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... as if the play of every muscle was nerved to harmony. His heavy black hair was worn a trifle long on the upper part of his head and fell in masses above his forehead. His eyes were black and keen under heavy black brows. Every feature was strong and massive, but saved from sternness by a genial kindliness and sense of humor. Whoever came into his presence felt that magnetic power only a king of ...
— A Master's Degree • Margaret Hill McCarter
... sitting on the sofa, his head crushed down upon his hands. Nathanael stood at a little distance, by the fireplace. The attitude of the elder brother indicated deep humiliation, that of the younger was freezing in its sternness. Agatha had never seen such an expression on Nathanael ...
— Agatha's Husband - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik (AKA: Dinah Maria Mulock)
... set, rather stern features, and a thinning of the dark hair upon the top of his head, which was worth quite a hundred a year to him. He was particularly happy in his management of ladies. He had caught the tone of bland sternness and decisive suavity which dominates without offending. Ladies, however, were not equally happy in their management of him. Professionally, he was always at their service. Socially, he was a drop of ...
— Round the Red Lamp - Being Facts and Fancies of Medical Life • Arthur Conan Doyle
... he suddenly paused, and, regarding his wife with great sternness, observed, in a severe tone, "You have done very wrong in concealing ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth
... not concealing from them his grief at the death of their mother, he feared he might have given them to understand that they would be unable to console him; now supposing that he had not shown himself sufficiently tender, and that had chilled them with his military sternness; and now repeating with bitter regret, that, having always lived away from them, he must be always a stranger to them. In a word, the most unlikely suppositions presented themselves by turns to his mind, and whenever such seeds of doubt, suspicion, ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... like as not, Sir Charles, in shorts and sweater, might be seen very precisely preparing tea on the landing-stage for the deserving valiant. His little kindnesses had an added and affecting quality from his reserve and sternness. A rare figure of an athlete he was, and a rare athlete's day his was in that retreat. For hours before he called and turned out the morning guard he had been up busy gardening, or reading, or writing. At a quarter to nine he breakfasted. Very shortly after breakfast ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Vol. 2 • Stephen Gwynn
... heavenward-ascending Virgin, all harshness and sternness are effaced, even to the last trace; and, indeed, does not Painting itself seem in it to soar upward, transfigured on its own pinions, as the liberated Psyche delivered from the severity ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... of triumph softened the sternness of the woman's features. "You go and tell General George Washington for me," said she, "that his mother says he cannot have ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... advanced into the salon, and his sombre eyes passed from the Marquis to Mademoiselle. As they rested upon her some of the sternness seemed to fade from their glance. He found in her a change almost as great as that which she had found in him. The lighthearted, laughing girl of nineteen, who had scorned his proffered love when ...
— The Trampling of the Lilies • Rafael Sabatini
... that gleamed from the spring. Miss Frances, regarding him with some timidity, thought: How much younger he looks without his hat! He had that sensitive fairness which in itself gives a look of youth and purity; the sternness of his face lay in the curves which showed under his mustache, and in ...
— In Exile and Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... were there that day that he raved like a demoniac, and that his black eyes shone with a vivid vindictive brightness which was scarce human. The jury shrank from him as from a venomous thing when he turned his baleful glance upon them. At times, as I have been told, his sternness gave place to a still more terrible merriment, and he would lean back in his seat of justice and laugh until the tears hopped down upon his ermine. Nearly a hundred were either executed or condemned to death ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... does not hurt; that he fails to find the conscience. The fact is, there exists in the heart of man an instinctive expectation that the messenger of God will do these things. It is one of the criticisms of to-day that sternness has died out of theology. The preacher is no longer the representative of a judge; no longer in God's stead the accuser of men. In every age the Church displays favouritism in her doctrinal attachments. In our time it is the doctrine of the divine Fatherhood ...
— The Message and the Man: - Some Essentials of Effective Preaching • J. Dodd Jackson
... humour that saves the book from its very obvious danger of becoming pedantic. In his brief preface Mr. CHAPMAN has crystallised very happily into a couple of words his ideal for the British attitude towards the War—buoyant sternness. It is the reflection of that quality in its pages that gives this little book its ...
— Punch, 1917.07.04, Vol. 153, Issue No. 1 • Various
... if the gold of her hair had passed over her face and left some little deal behind there. In all her face was a look half piteous, as though she craved the love of folk; but yet both mirth and swift thought brake through it at whiles, and sober wisdom shaded it into something like sternness. Low-bosomed she was yet, and thin-flanked, and had learned no tricks and graces of movement such as women of towns and great houses use for the beguiling of men. But the dear simpleness of her body ...
— The Sundering Flood • William Morris
... flung back my accusation in my teeth, lacked neither vigour nor the semblance of innocence. While Henry was puzzled, La Varenne was appalled. I saw that I had gone too far, or not far enough, and at once calling into my face and form all the sternness in my power, I bade the traitor remain where he was, then turning to his Majesty I craved leave to ...
— Stories By English Authors: France • Various
... Parliament for having infringed upon his authority in publishing decrees without his sanction. He commanded them to quash the decree, which was done; and to confirm the authority of the Keeper of the Seals, which they did also. He then ordered them with some sternness not to interfere with the affairs of the Government beyond their province; and as the Duc du Maine had excited the Parliament against the King, he was deprived of the care of His Majesty's education, and he with his brothers were degraded from the rank of Princes ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... statesman had suddenly vanished out of public life and taken refuge here, for his head was of the statesman-class, and his demeanor that of one who had exercised influence over large numbers of men. He sometimes endeavored to set on foot a familiar relation with this old man, but there was even a sternness in the manner in which he repelled these advances, that gave little encouragement for their renewal. Nor did it seem that his companions of the Hospital were more in his confidence than Middleton himself. They regarded him with a kind of awe, ...
— The Ancestral Footstep (fragment) - Outlines of an English Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... I am bitterly grieved to remember that you have systematically urged me to act against my conscience." It was an unexpected answer, almost awful in its unflinching sternness, and Lilias greeted it by a burst ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... sobs, the beauty and the grace of the hero were so far beyond anything he had yet seen. His fluted armour was inlaid with gold, his plumed helmet hung at his saddle-bow, and his thick fair hair framed a face gracious and gentle beyond expression till you caught the sternness in his eyes. He drew rein in front of the little inn, and the villagers crowded round with greetings and thanks and voluble statements of their wrongs and grievances and oppressions. The Boy heard the grave gentle ...
— Dream Days • Kenneth Grahame
... for her intimated that she wouldn't look too closely at her watch. Honoria came too—with Mrs. Warren—but after kissing her friend and leaving some beautiful flowers (which the wardress took away at once with pretended sternness and brought back in a vase after the visitors had left) Honoria with glistening eyes and a smile that was all tremulous sweetness, intimated that Mrs. Warren had so much to say that she, Honoria, was not going to stay more ...
— Mrs. Warren's Daughter - A Story of the Woman's Movement • Sir Harry Johnston
... authority and sternness. He had pity for men, who were capable of redemption, but His words and demeanour to the spirits are always severe. He accepts the most imperfect recognition from men, and often seems as if labouring to evoke it, but He silences the spirits' clear recognition. The ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... of the carriage broken!' cried Elfride. She was disappointed: Stephen doubly so. The vicar showed more warmth of temper than the accident seemed to demand, much to Stephen's uneasiness and rather to his surprise. He had not supposed so much latent sternness could co-exist with Mr. ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy
... he said, with some of his old sternness, when condemning wrong; "there is a fever at your brain. You have come too long to ...
— The Maid of the Whispering Hills • Vingie E. Roe
... prodigal ones were older than he. Should he show them the fearful mistake they were making in condemning everything that was not purely a religious worship? Should he tell them by reason of their sternness and their narrow prejudices, which seemed more to them than the souls of their children, they were driving their children away from them and from God? Would they bear this from him, even though as Christ's ambassador he were to ...
— 'Our guy' - or, The elder brother • Mrs. E. E. Boyd
... princess Mary herself was at first the object of his hopes or wishes: but if this were really the case, she must speedily have quelled his presumption by the lofty sternness of her repulse; for it is impossible to discover in the history of his life at what particular period he could have been occupied ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... He never went near the mill again, but would shudder and lift up his hands and his eyes when the miller's name was mentioned. It was not that Brattle used rough language, or became violently angry when accosted; but there was a sullen sternness about the man, and a capability of asserting his own mastery and personal authority, which reduced those who attacked him to the condition of vanquished combatants, and repulsed them, so that they would retreat as beaten dogs. Mr. Fenwick, indeed, had always been ...
— The Vicar of Bullhampton • Anthony Trollope
... married man." This dislike is easily accounted for. Exeter was very far from London, the new ideas travelled slowly, and the west was staunchly conservative. As with many reformers, too, his zeal was spoilt by indiscretion; the sternness of the Puritan militated against his success, and people preferred the old errors more becomingly supported. His successor, Turberville, was a man quite after the heart of the people, and he won praise from Protestant and ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Exeter - A Description of Its Fabric and a Brief History of the Episcopal See • Percy Addleshaw
... rocks beyond! The broad, spreading picture slowly impressed itself upon his brain, effacing and taking the place of personal animosity. In so fair a world Hope is ever a returning angel with healing in his wings; and Winston's face brightened, the black frown deserting his forehead, all sternness gone from his eyes. There surely must be a way somewhere, and he would discover it; only the weakling and the coward can sit down in despair. Out of the prevailing silence he suddenly distinguished voices at ...
— Beth Norvell - A Romance of the West • Randall Parrish
... The sternness fell away from him. He looked at her and sighed. Then, with bowed head, and hands clasped behind him, he moved away from ...
— The Strolling Saint • Raphael Sabatini
... might have read the aristocratic pride of his soul in the haughty curl of his short upper lip,—the harshness of his domineering character in the lines that marked his forehead,—and the cruel sternness of his disposition in the expression of his ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... and find a young man instead of the old one whom we leave. He is tall, but not so strong; and, like the old man, he wears his brown hair cut short at the back and brushed into a "corkscrew-curl" above his high white forehead. The sternness of the old man does not yet appear in his face, and the scar of mental pain endured has not yet been stamped upon his good-humored expression. Yet he is far from showing the light-hearted carelessness usually ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various
... with sternness. "I think you are out of bounds, Miss Peckham. I do not ask you to tell me how to take care of my little daughter. And I am sure I do not believe that you are rightly informed about her actions, even if ...
— Janice Day, The Young Homemaker • Helen Beecher Long
... been an outburst of admiration. The old woman looked sternly at her for a moment. Then she relented, and her hand stole among the girl's clustering curls. The little burst of temper gave way to a semi-humorous look of feigned sternness. ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... remarked with some sternness. "Kindly attend to that little matter, Professor, as soon as you have corrected the feverishness. And, by the way, Professor!" (The Professor left his distinguished pupil standing at the door, and meekly returned.) "There is ...
— Sylvie and Bruno • Lewis Carroll
... thoughts with deep interest, and not without some degree of awe, when she considered that she was entirely in his power; but forbore even to hint her fears, or her observations, to Madame Montoni, who discerned nothing in her husband, at these times, but his usual sternness. ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... hearer. The Persians are notoriously the Frenchmen of the East; the same gaiety, the same levity, the same want of depth both as to feeling and principle. The Turks are much nearer to the English: the same gravity of temperament, the same meditativeness, the same sternness of principle. Of all European nations, the French is that which least regards truth. The whole spirit of their private memoirs and their anecdotes illustrates this. To point an anecdote or a repartee, there ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v1 • Thomas de Quincey
... will, my son," she cried, with a wildly hysterical burst of tears, which she checked in a few moments. "There, your mother is very weak, you see, dear; but I am going to be strong now. Then that explains the sternness of the arrest. Let us look the matter in the face. Your father struck this German nobleman, the guest of the regiment. They fought this morning, and the cause of the trouble is badly hurt. The King and the Prince will be furious. They will look upon it as a mutinous attack upon one of their favourites. ...
— In Honour's Cause - A Tale of the Days of George the First • George Manville Fenn
... go this time?" said Wibberly, quite bewildered by this unexpected sternness on the part of ...
— The Willoughby Captains • Talbot Baines Reed
... hill Pretty found himself alone, and turned and looked at the on-coming trio with defiant sternness. After a moment, which gave him some much-needed rest and a chance to gain new breath, he realized that one half a battle is with the warrior that is wise enough to make the first onslaught. So, after a tremor ...
— The Dozen from Lakerim • Rupert Hughes
... sternly upon the new-comer's face; but straightway the sternness vanished away, and gave place to an expression of wondering surprise. This thing happened also to the other great officers. They glanced at each other, and retreated a step by a common and unconscious impulse. The thought in ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... little of the delicacy and sentiment of individual attachment—attachment was chiefly for their own sex [78]. The Ionians, on the contrary, were susceptible, flexile, and more characterized by the generosity of modern knighthood than the sternness of ancient heroism. Them, not the past, but the future, charmed. Ever eager to advance, they were impatient even of the good, from desire of the better. Once urged to democracy— democracy fixed their character, as oligarchy fixed the Spartan. For, to change is the ambition of a democracy—to conserve ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... when he perceived that that pugilistic gentleman was not possessed of the full complement of academical attire, the duties of the Proctor rose superior to the gratitude of the Man; and, with all the sternness of an ancient Roman Father, he said to the Pet, "Why have you not on your ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... very grave, as he did not look even when Kuzmitchov gave him a scolding or threatened him with a stick; listening intently, he dropped quietly on one knee and an expression of sternness and alarm came into his face, such as one sees in people who hear heretical talk. He fixed his eyes on one spot, raised his hand curved into a hollow, and suddenly fell on his stomach on the ground and slapped the hollow of his ...
— The Bishop and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... difficult to prove that, Mr. Burnit," said Sharpe, with a sternness which could not quite ...
— The Making of Bobby Burnit - Being a Record of the Adventures of a Live American Young Man • George Randolph Chester
... hair—the latter growing in short soft ringlets all over his head—and he inherited a fair share also of his mother's beauty, although in his case it was tempered and made manly by a very square chin, firm, close-set lips, and a certain suggestion of sternness and even fierceness in the steady intent gaze of the eyes. He was garbed, like his captain, in doublet, trunk hose, and cap, but in George's case the garments were made of good serviceable cloth, dyed a deep indigo blue colour, and his cap—which he now ...
— The Cruise of the Nonsuch Buccaneer • Harry Collingwood
... raised the poet's head and Rankin poured the brandy into him. Rankin's hand was gentle, but there was a sternness about Maddox and his ministrations. And as the brandy brought the blood back to his brain, Rickman sat up on Rankin's bed, murmuring apologies that would have drawn pity from the nether mill-stone. But ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... her story and put her scarlet flower face in her hands, while Jed groaned and dropped his own face down upon his arm. The old judge's face took on a grim sternness, the jury stopped whittling and the face of every woman in the court room gazed upon the ...
— The Heart's Kingdom • Maria Thompson Daviess
... her lover; this so-called pride, for which she has been censured, is clearly only a very wise precaution to protect her from herself. Being aware that, unfortunately, her own temperament is inflammable, she dreads the least spark, and keeps out of reach so far as she can. Her sternness is due not to pride but to humility. She assumes a control over Emile because she doubts her control of herself; she turns the one against the other. If she had more confidence in herself she would be much less haughty. With this exception is there anywhere on earth a gentler, sweeter ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... manner that I had formerly done. The similarity indeed forced itself upon me as I was quitting the door, and I knew not whether to accuse myself of pettishness, obstinacy, and want of candour; or him of singularity, and an inflexible sternness of opposition. At all events, my purpose of publishing my pamphlet as soon as it should be written was fixed; and to that labour ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... vain And an unthinking grief! The tenderest mood [1] Of that Man's mind—what can it be? what food Fed his first hopes? what knowledge could he gain? 'Tis not in battles that from youth we train 5 The Governor who must be wise and good, And temper with the sternness of the brain Thoughts motherly, and meek as womanhood. Wisdom doth live with children round her knees: Books, leisure, perfect freedom, and the talk 10 Man holds with week-day man in the hourly walk Of the mind's business: ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. II. • William Wordsworth
... sailed back from New York with a company of American officers; they consisted in the main of trained airmen, Navy experts and engineers. Before my departure the extraordinary sternness of America, her keenness to rival her allies in self-denial, her willing mobilisation of all her resources, had confirmed my optimism gained in the trenches, that the Allies must win; the mere thought of compromise ...
— Out To Win - The Story of America in France • Coningsby Dawson
... to abide and shades of pleasure were dim; he might have suggested a stone bench in the dusty Tuileries or a penny chair at the back part of the Champs Elysees. These things would have been a trifle stern, and sternness alone now wouldn't be sinister. An instinct in him cast about for some form of discipline in which they might meet—some awkwardness they would suffer from, some danger, or at least some grave inconvenience, they would incur. This would give a sense—which the spirit required, rather ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... felt it was ungrateful; but the influence of the day fell even on the Charitable Grinders, and she could hardly help regarding his pewter badge, number one hundred and forty-seven, as, somehow, a part of its formality and sternness. She spoke, too, in the nursery, of his 'blessed legs,' and was again troubled by ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... said Grannie, looking up at the girl with her bright blue eyes, and a determined expression steeling her sweet old mouth almost to sternness. "Jest see the manager, Mr. Squire, and tell him the simple truth. Take him back this underclothing; it is finished beautiful all but the feather-stitching. I know he'll be put out, but I suppose he'll give me half pay—o' course, I don't expec' more. Ef ...
— Good Luck • L. T. Meade
... on the part of the citizens subsided, and the detective returned to Chicago to other mysteries, demanding his attention. Adam Goodrich refused to talk of the matter, and gave no sign of his sorrow, save an added sternness in his manner. But the mother's health was broken; while Frank, declaring that he could not stand the disgrace, went for a long visit to a friend in a neighboring city. Finally Dick himself was forced to give up the search; but though baffled ...
— That Printer of Udell's • Harold Bell Wright
... battlements, the shadow-dappled champaign girdling their bastions mortised on the naked rock. Except for the blue lights across the distance, and the ever-present sea, these earthy Apennines would be too grim. Infinite air and this spare veil of spring-tide greenery on field and forest soothe their sternness. Two rivers, swollen by late rains, had to be forded. Through one of these, the Foglia, bare-legged peasants led the way. The horses waded to their bellies in the tawny water. Then more hills and vales; green nooks with rippling corn-crops; secular oaks attired in golden ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series • John Addington Symonds
... its moving power for your heart, is as important an element in education as gymnastics, and, strange as it may sound, has an equal share in effecting the perfection of both body and mind. The man who devotes his attention exclusively to music will, if he be of a violent disposition, lose his savage sternness at first; he will become gentle and pliable as metal in the fire. But at last his courage will disappear too; his passionate temper will have changed into irritability, and he will be of little worth ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... It took but a few months of complete non-restraint to make of a shrewd, bright, half-educated, spoiled boy a little brute, as to whose sanity there seemed to be some doubt. He was easily made well, and has lived to thank the sternness which won back the health of mind and body his parents had so foolishly helped to lose ...
— Doctor and Patient • S. Weir Mitchell
... true I have known you only a little while, but all that time—ever since I saw you, in fact, and even before, when your father showed me your picture—I have loved you. Nay, hear me out." There was an unusual sternness in his voice. My lord appeared to be in the imperative mood,—something to which she had not been accustomed. He meant to be heard, and with beating heart perforce she listened. "Quiet that spirit of mockery but a moment, and attend my words, I pray ...
— For Love of Country - A Story of Land and Sea in the Days of the Revolution • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... as it were, a form of flesh, and blood, the Poet will lend his divine spirit to aid the transfiguration, and will welcome the Being thus produced, as a dear and genuine inmate of the household of man."[50:9] As respects truth, philosophy has an indubitable priority. The very sternness of the philosopher's task is due to his supreme dedication to truth. But if validity be the merit of philosophy, it can well be supplemented by immediacy, which is the merit of poetry. Presuppose in the poet conviction of a sound philosophy, ...
— The Approach to Philosophy • Ralph Barton Perry
... her?" repeated the old gentleman, with a mixture of sternness and astonishment, his forehead reddening. "What else do ...
— Bressant • Julian Hawthorne
... servant, Bridget Greggs, who was perhaps the sole person in the world who entertained affection for the lone gaunt woman, and who held Jasper Losely in profound detestation, she said, with tranquil sternness, "That man has crossed my life, and darkened it. He passed away, and left Night behind him. He has dared to return. He shall never escape me again till the grave yawn for one ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... hail-storms. New saints also were wantonly manufactured. The journeyman-tailors proclaimed St. Goodman as their patron, left off work, and went dancing about to the music of a drum. The authorities were compelled to interfere with sternness. All this shows the difficulties, that met the Reformer, on the part of the people, ...
— The Life and Times of Ulric Zwingli • Johann Hottinger
... looked straight into hers, and the voice had that little tone of sternness in it which she had noted ...
— The Brown Mask • Percy J. Brebner
... Damer thought that he saw his way out of the wood. "Wherever I go, Miss Dawkins, I am always the paymaster myself," and this he contrived to say with some sternness, palpitating though he still was; and the sternness which was deficient in his voice he endeavoured to ...
— An Unprotected Female at the Pyramids • Anthony Trollope
... at Mrs. Wilson laughing and jesting, she watched the comedy proceed as the black domino covered the white shoulders and the gown of gold and crimson, yet most of all was she conscious of how straight and strong Maurice stood among the gay group which surrounded him. The sternness of his mouth, the gravity and indignation of his look, seemed to her most manly and noble. She felt that he had by his bearing mastered the absurd circumstances in which he was placed; she smiled bitterly to think how poor and flippant ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates
... The sternness of the hour was brought home to me by one obscure incident. Straggling across Trafalgar Square in mufti and commanded by a sergeant came a little procession of recruits. They were roughly dressed men of the navy and ...
— The Glory of the Trenches • Coningsby Dawson
... himself on the couch, angrily, as if displeased by this intrusion. 'How now, madam,' he said, with some sternness; 'why have we the ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... 16. It was then the senate and the people unanimously agreed to send deputies to him, with proposals for his restoration, in case he would draw off his army. 17. Coriola'nus received these proposals at the head of his principal officers, and, with the sternness of a general that was to give the ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... distinguished the hours of business from those of relaxation. When the court or tribunal demanded his presence, he was grave, intent, awful, yet generally inclined to lenity. When the duties of his office were over, the man of power was instantly laid aside. Nothing of sternness, arrogance, or rapaciousness appeared; and, what was a singular felicity, his affability did not impair his authority, nor his severity render him less beloved. To mention integrity and freedom from corruption in such a man, would be an affront to his virtues. He did not even court ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume II (of X) - Rome • Various
... Sixteenth, Marie Antoinette, and other victims of the Revolution, which took place about a century since. Historic recollections crowd upon us as we stand within this small but beautiful chapel. Time has softened the sternness of judgment relating to the king and queen; and we all pause to admire their bearing in adversity, but are forced to the conclusion "that nothing in their life so well became them as the manner of their leaving it." The queen was ...
— Foot-prints of Travel - or, Journeyings in Many Lands • Maturin M. Ballou
... the lord and cultivator of the soil. And herein I must say, the feudal system(as also in its courtesy towards womankind, in which it exceeded)herein, I say, the feudal usages mitigated and softened the sternness of classical times. No man, Caxon, ever heard of a Spartan attending the funeral of a Helotyet I dare be sworn that John of the Girnelye ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... into the distance. "I shall fare forth some day," he said, "and lead my armies to victory proudly, yet disdainfully. I shall have no love in my heart, only sternness." ...
— Suzanna Stirs the Fire • Emily Calvin Blake
... would be over in ten minutes, and yet for ten minutes how miserable a man he was! Whilst she was trembling with joy, a joy that was only dashed by a vague fear of his possible sternness, he was blaming his fate as it shortened by every step the distance between him and his wife. At last he had entered the path of the little garden, and the door of the house was open before him. He ventured to look, ...
— Kept in the Dark • Anthony Trollope |
