"Taint" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... law requires to be systematised and made clear rather than to be substantially altered. It is, on the whole, a 'generous, humane, and high-minded system, eminently favourable to individuals, and free from the taint of that fierce cowardice which demands that, for the protection of society, somebody shall be punished when a crime has been committed.' Though English lawyers are too apt to set off 'an unreasonable hardship against an unreasonable indulgence,' 'to trump one quibble by another, and to suppose that ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... that be a propagation of the distemper which was the best means to prevent it; and this too is an evidence of it, and brings me back to what I only hinted at before, but must speak more fully to here, namely, that men went about apparently well many days after they had the taint of the disease in their vitals, and after their spirits were so seized as that they could never escape it, and that all the while they did so they were dangerous to others; I say, this proves that so it ...
— A Journal of the Plague Year • Daniel Defoe
... young fireman brushed them aside quickly, removed the adornments from the horses and wagon, sprang to the vehicle, threw the sign overboard, and, lifting up the unconscious driver, placed him out of view under the wagon seat. As he did so, Ralph noticed the taint of liquor on the ...
— Ralph on the Engine - The Young Fireman of the Limited Mail • Allen Chapman
... labor disputes without allowing itself to be employed as an ally of either side. Its proper role in industrial strife is to encourage the processes of mediation and conciliation. These processes can successfully be directed only by a government free from the taint of any suspicion that ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... the truth, prompted by feelings of gratitude and good will towards my kind friends the savages. I have wished to illustrate the customs and character of a people very much calumniated, amongst whom I have found strong and devoted friendship free from every taint of ...
— My Friends the Savages - Notes and Observations of a Perak settler (Malay Peninsula) • Giovanni Battista Cerruti
... leering looks, bull-faced, and freckled fair, With two left legs, and Judas-colored hair, And frowsy pores that taint the ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... and those in great abundance, which are likeliest to taint both life and doctrine, cannot be suppressed without the fall of learning and of all ability in disputation, and that these books of either sort are most and soonest catching to the learned, from whom to the common people whatever is heretical or dissolute ...
— Areopagitica - A Speech For The Liberty Of Unlicensed Printing To The - Parliament Of England • John Milton
... and the King; at York, at Oxford (where the King held a little Parliament of his own), and at Uxbridge. But they came to nothing. In all these negotiations, and in all his difficulties, the King showed himself at his best. He was courageous, cool, self-possessed, and clever; but, the old taint of his character was always in him, and he was never for one single moment to be trusted. Lord Clarendon, the historian, one of his highest admirers, supposes that he had unhappily promised the Queen never to make peace without her consent, and that this must often be taken as his excuse. ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens
... owes a measure of confidence to his child's lover, and there are some warnings that it is cruel to withhold, notably where there is any taint of insanity in the family. In the case of a fatherless girl the suitor must address himself to her mother, nearest relative, ...
— The Etiquette of Engagement and Marriage • G. R. M. Devereux
... husband's business and interests, as well as in his recreative enjoyments. The household affairs were under her skilful guidance. She conducted them with economy, and yet with generous liberality, free from the least taint of ostentation or extravagance. The home fireside was a scene of cheerfulness. And most of our family have been blest with this sunny gift. Indeed, a merrier family circle I have never seen. There were twelve persons ...
— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth
... came about that I carried no taint of the dread associations of the Wolfsberg about me as I went down the bustling street to the Weiss Thor to call on that learned and well-reputed lawyer, Master Gerard von Sturm. So great was the fame of Master Gerard that he was often called in to settle the mercantile quarrels of the burghers ...
— Red Axe • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... growth the elm and plane Fling their huge arms across my way, Gray, old, and cumbered with a train Of vines, as huge, and old, and gray! Free stray the lucid streams, and find No taint in these fresh lawns and shades; Free spring the flowers that scent the wind Where never scythe has ...
— Poems • William Cullen Bryant
... Allen G. Thurman for Vice-President brought to the ticket what its head seemed to lack—popularity among the people of the West—and did much to hearten all such Democrats as insisted upon voting a ticket free from all taint ...
— History of the United States, Volume 5 • E. Benjamin Andrews
... the hartes of your ennemyes, than they had beene able to haue done in your castel, with their thundring ordinaunce." The Countesse somewhat shamefast and abashed, to heare herselfe so greatly praysed of a Prince so greate, began to blushe and taint with roseall colour, the whitenesse of her alablaster face. Then lifting vp her bashfull eyes, somewhat towards the king, she said vnto him: "My soueraigne Lord, your grace may speake your pleasure, but I am well assured, ...
— The Palace of Pleasure, Volume 1 • William Painter
... the quagmire which held them fast. They ran after the stone that was to turn all to gold, or the elixir that should conquer death, or the signs in the heavens that should foretell their destinies; and the taint of this may be traced even when the dark period that followed was clearing away. Four hundred years after Roger's death, his illustrious namesake, Francis Bacon, was formulating his Inductive Philosophy, and with complete cock-sureness was teaching mankind all about everything. ...
— The Dominion of the Air • J. M. Bacon
... shaved; he rejected all attempts of consolation; and remained deaf to the most earnest and respectful remonstrances of those who had a right to render their advice. In this case, the affliction of the mind must have been reinforced by some peculiarity in the constitution. He inherited a melancholy taint from his father, and this seems to have been dreaded as a family disease; for the infant don Louis, who likewise resided in the palace of Villa-Viciosa, was fain to amuse himself with hunting and other diversions, to prevent his being infected with the king's ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... Blackey's place to-night. They're a goin' to ast you if they kin. Blackey's found out as you've got respectable relations as wouldn't like to see your name in the papers, and he's goin' to 'ave a new lay on. 'Taint no bloomin' error neither. The gal—Tilley, don't-cherknow—she'll say, 'I'll walk home with you a bit,' when Blackey's out. He meets you, and he says, 'Wot 'cher doin' 'long o' my wife? Didn't I trust you at home? I'll expose you.' She ain't no more ...
— The Chequers - Being the Natural History of a Public-House, Set Forth in - a Loafer's Diary • James Runciman
... little; Not that I like them so much, or care a bajocco for Vernon, But I am slow at Italian, have not many English acquaintance, And I am asked, in short, and am not good at excuses. Middle-class people these, bankers very likely, not wholly Pure of the taint of the shop; will at table d'hote and restaurant Have their shilling's worth, their penny's pennyworth even: Neither man's aristocracy this, nor God's, God knoweth! Yet they are fairly descended, they give you to know, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, February, 1858 • Various
... Cornet, they would deserve to be handed down to posterity as poltroons and cowards. He would, he said, go still further; they would not only deserve to be thus branded with infamy, but they would actually be so; and their pusillanimity would be a taint in the blood of their children's children. He begged, he prayed, he intreated, he implored that they would not disgrace the name of man by conduct at once so cowardly and so foolish. But he begged, prayed, intreated and implored in vain—his venerable character ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 1 • Henry Hunt
... charge as with those she bought for herself. She sedulously sent up remainders till they were expressly countermanded. Less economical by nature, and hungrier by habit, Mary Ann had much trouble in restraining herself from surreptitious pickings. Her conscience was rarely worsted; still there was a taint of dishonesty in her soul, else had the stairs been less of an ethical battleground for her. Lancelot's advent only made her hungrier; somehow the thought of nibbling at his provisions was too sacrilegious to be entertained. ...
— Merely Mary Ann • Israel Zangwill
... refined with perfect harmony and the chastest good keeping—compared with which, the fabled gorgeousness of Eastern fairyland itself would appear to be clothed in as many dark and murky colours, as must be the mind of the splenetic and unmanly being who could presume to taint with the venom of his envy, the preparations made by the virtuous and highly distinguished lady at whose shrine this humble tribute of admiration was offered.' This last was a piece of biting sarcasm against the INDEPENDENT, ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... no pang at the thought my sister could be entirely happy without any participation on my part in her bliss. We are all so selfish that it is hard to say how far even our most innocent longings are free from the taint of ...
— Miles Wallingford - Sequel to "Afloat and Ashore" • James Fenimore Cooper
... houses of ill-fame in the city—probably not over fifty in all—but they are located in the best neighborhoods, and it is said that Fifth avenue itself is not free from the taint of their presence. As a rule, they are hired fully furnished, the owners being respectable and often wealthy people. The finest of these houses command from ten to twelve thousand dollars rent. The neighbors do not suspect the true character of the place, ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... have emanated to some extent from the Dutch papers in Cape Colony and the Transvaal, but in a much fuller and more substantial form from the Continental papers, notably the Parisian Press. On the other hand, our own journalists have not been altogether free from this taint. Let us take one or two concrete instances, e.g., violation of the white flag, firing on ambulances, the use of "explosive" bullets, looting. Just after the first reverse at the Tugela, a correspondent wired home that the Boers ...
— With Methuen's Column on an Ambulance Train • Ernest N. Bennett
... of this lower world to the contemplation of that imperishable existence, which Christianity has opened beyond the grave. A tenderness pervades the piece, which may remind us of the best manner of Petrarch; while, with the exception of a slight taint of pedantry, it is exempt from the meretricious vices that belong to the poetry of the age. The effect of the sentiment is heightened by the simple turns and broken melody of the old Castilian verse, ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V2 • William H. Prescott
... political character is about on a par with Whittle Harvey's moral character; his insolence and swaggering, bullying tone in the House of Lords have excited as much disgust out of the House as they have given offence in it, and the only excuse for him is—what many people believe—that there is a taint of madness about him. The other night, in his reply to the Duke of Wellington's violent and foolish speech, he chose to turn upon Lord Rolle, a very old man and a choleric, hard-bitten old Tory. Rolle was greatly exasperated, and after he sat down ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville
... content simply to enjoy it. It does not really matter how close to anything else something which possesses independent goodness is; the very utmost technical originality, the most spotless purity from the faintest taint of suggestion, will not suffice to confer merit on what does not otherwise possess it. Whether, as I rather think, Fielding pursued the plan he had formed ab incepto, or whether he cavalierly neglected it, or whether the current of his own genius carried him off his legs and landed ...
— Joseph Andrews Vol. 1 • Henry Fielding
... education which is to blame, but the inborn sinfulness of their corrupt and fallen natures. Such an education is regarded by those who advocate it as pre-eminently useful. There is no nonsense about it, no cant of idealism, no taint of socialism. It keeps the "lower orders" in their places, and forbids them to dream of rising above "that state of life unto which it" has pleased "God to call them." As it is a reductio ad absurdum of the conventional type of education, my objection to it is that ...
— What Is and What Might Be - A Study of Education in General and Elementary Education in Particular • Edmond Holmes
... He had sold his freedom for gold, and although outwardly he appeared calm and happy, inwardly he was racked with contending emotions. What would he now not have given to be back in his old position, free from the taint of crime, free to do as he wished? But the fatal step had been taken; he could not retrace it, he must go on, and when he won, as he now felt sure he would, could he not find some quiet way to get ...
— The Expressman and the Detective • Allan Pinkerton
... white asses laden with the freight Of Tyrian vessels, purple, gold and balm, To bribe my will: I'll bid them chase him forth, Nor let him breathe the taint of his surmise On my secure resolve. Ay, 'tis secure: And therefore let him come to spread his freight. For firmness hath its appetite and craves The stronger lure, more strongly to resist; Would know the touch of gold to fling it off; Scent wine to feel its lip the soberer; ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... And hath divine Intelligence designed That noisome dungeon for her own restraint— By her own act to galling bonds consigned,— Self-doomed, with wilful purpose, to acquaint Herself with sin and sorrow, and pollute Aethereal essence with corporeal taint? How doth thy helpless misery confute That frantic boast of vain conceit, untaugh The paltriest of ...
— Old-Fashioned Ethics and Common-Sense Metaphysics - With Some of Their Applications • William Thomas Thornton
... then as a good, pious prince, who knew how to speak in princely fashion. The Duke, however, told him at that audience, that the Bohemians entertained great expectations of him; and yet George, who on his mother's side was grand-son to Podiebrad, King of Bohemia, was anxious to have all taint of the hateful Bohemian heresy most carefully avoided. On this point Luther remarked to him that he knew well how to distinguish between the pipe and the piper, and was only sorry to see how accessible princes might ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin
... the union, who promise to perpetuate the virtues of their parents. And it is to be hoped, and we believe it to be a fact which the passage of so many years may be considered to have tolerably settled, that the fatal blood-taint of insanity, which had seemed hereditary on the side of one ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... the business quietly, and even rated some of their former officers as midshipmen, in special token of esteem. At the Nore, however, and in Duncan's squadron at Yarmouth, the mutiny was marked by bloodshed and taint of disloyalty, little surprising in view of the disaffected Irish, ex-criminals, impressed merchant sailors, and other unruly elements in the crews. In the end 18 men were put to ...
— A History of Sea Power • William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott
... perform his will. Now all the Gods had gathered there, Each one for his allotted share— Brahma, the ruler of the sky, Sthanu, Narayan, Lord most high, And holy Indra men might view With Maruts for his retinue; The heavenly chorister, and saint, And spirit pure from earthly taint, With one accord had sought the place The high-souled monarch's rite to grace, Then to the Gods who came to take Their proper share, the hermit spake:— "For you has Dasaratha slain The votive steed, a son to gain; Stern penance-rites the King has tried, ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson
... all nourishment convert. Ah! happy she, whose wisdom learns to find A healthful fancy, and a well-trained mind. A sick man's wildest dreams less wild are found Than the day-visions of a mind unsound. Disordered phantasies indulged too much. Like harpies, always taint whate'er they touch. Fly soothing Solitude! fly vain Desire! Fly such soft verse as fans the dang'rous fire! Seek action; 'tis the scene which virtue loves; The vig'rous sun not only shines, but moves. ...
— Excellent Women • Various
... body shaking him to the heart. But no matter how inviting the opening, a man could not speak what rose in his heart to say, standing as he stood, a debtor in such measure. To say what he would have said to Joan, he must stand clear and towering in manliness, no taint of humiliation on ...
— The Flockmaster of Poison Creek • George W. Ogden
... de Rennepont's will; the latter having declared his desire to the grandfather of the Samuels, that the capital should only be augmented by interest at five per cent.—so that the fortune might come to his descendants free from all taint ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... university ball-player making himself famous here, and then playing during the summer months at a resort, is laying himself open to suspicion. I have no doubt that many players are innocent of the taint of professionalism, but unfortunately they have become members of these summer teams after being first requested, then ...
— The Young Pitcher • Zane Grey
... these cases appear here, and are the result of a want of a perfect equability in the climate, and to this extent it must be held answerable. We might, however, conclude that even this final fraction could be accounted for in the hereditary taint, but we forbear, as we likewise do to claim entire exemption here from this complaint. No climate, perhaps, in any portion of the whole habitable earth, could be found to be utterly exempt. Then, too, consumption ...
— Minnesota; Its Character and Climate • Ledyard Bill
... most true— All this is very true. When saw you, sir, When saw you now, Baldazzar, in the frigid Ungenial Britain which we left so lately, A heaven so calm as this—so utterly free From the evil taint ...
— Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works • Edgar Allan Poe
... he has to address. His powers are uncommon and unfettered in their play; his aim is worthy. He is fulfilling and will fulfil an important task as an educator of the people, if all be not marred by a taint of self-love and arrogance now obvious in his discourse. This taint is not surprising in one so young, who has done so much, and in order to do it has been compelled to great self-confidence and light ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... positions which appeared preposterously out of accord alike with his early career and with his later opportunities for development. In trying to explain this, it is easier to say what was not the underlying quality than what it was. Certainly there was no taint whatsoever of that vulgar self-confidence which is so apt to lead the "free and equal" citizens of the great republic into grotesque positions. Perhaps it was a grand simplicity of faith; a profound instinctive confidence ...
— Abraham Lincoln, Vol. I. • John T. Morse
... head deprecatingly. "Don't seem lak I evah able to rickermembah dat boy's name, nohow. His grampa' 'uz a Hynds, likewise his ma, but she 'sisted on marryin' er furriner, an' de boy takes atter de furriners 'stead er we-all. 'Taint de po' boy's fault, but ol' Mis' Scarlett hated 'im wuss 'n pizen. De only notice she take er de boy is ter warrant 'im fo' trispassin'. Dat 's how come folkses ...
— A Woman Named Smith • Marie Conway Oemler
... crime deserving the severest punishment." From which representation (if the said Warren Hastings did not falsely and unjustly accuse and slander the Company's service) it appeared that the peculation which infected the whole army, derived from the taint which it had in Oude, and so fatal to the discipline of the troops, would be dangerously increased by his treaty and agreement aforesaid with the Nabob, and by his own said evil counsel to the ...
— The Works Of The Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IX. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... BLESSING.—Where one parent is consumptive and the other vigorous, the chances are just half as great. If there is a scrofulous or consumptive taint in the blood, beware! Sickly children are no comfort to their parents, no real blessing. If such people marry, they had better, in ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis
... his luckier brothers and cousins, got neither a peerage nor a gentle breeding. Instead he was reared meagrely, if not harshly, under the maternal roof and name, until he grew old enough to realize that he was on an island where bad birth is not forgiven, even if the taint be royal. Then he ran away, reached the coast of France, and made his way to the French court, where his father was now, and properly enough, an exile. He was a fine youth, with a prompt tongue and clever head, and some attention was finally shown him. They gave him ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... Pomp. de parricid. cited by Mr. Ray. Here might come in (or be nam'd at least) wild-cornel, or dog-wood, good to make mill-cogs, pestles, bobins for bone-lace, spokes for wheels, &c. the best skewers for butchers, because it does not taint the flesh, and is of so very hard a substance, as to make wedges to cleave and rive other wood with, instead of iron. (But of this, see chap. II. book II.) And lastly, the viburnum, or way-faring-tree, growing ...
— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn
... Burke, and Mill, and to all manner of people dangerous to the back-veld views of Lacedaemon. He opened the way to Tolstoy's rediscovery of the Christian Law, amongst other northern treasures, didn't he? And I, with the Arcadian taint in my veins, saw the way open and went northwards. Now it has come to pass that I remember my own people as Moses did, and use the wisdom of Oxford as he used the wisdom of Egypt, to help one's own people towards a promised land. They want leaders, don't they? Is there ...
— Cinderella in the South - Twenty-Five South African Tales • Arthur Shearly Cripps
... night soil, or human excrement. There has always been a false delicacy about mentioning this fertilizer, which has caused much waste, and great loss of health, from the impure and offensive odors which it is allowed to send forth to taint the air. ...
— The Elements of Agriculture - A Book for Young Farmers, with Questions Prepared for the Use of Schools • George E. Waring
... sent my love to thee, Thou with a smile didst take it in, And entertain'dst it royally, Though grimed with earth, with hunger thin, And leprous with the taint ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... sophist who would work for wages. A gift was legitimate, but pay ignoble; and the stigma of asking for and taking pay rested upon all labor. The abolition of slavery made small difference, for the taint had sunk in too deeply to be eradicated. A curse rested upon all labor; and even now, after four thousand years of vacillating progress and ...
— Women Wage-Earners - Their Past, Their Present, and Their Future • Helen Campbell
... "'taint much use o' tryin', I guess. I know that critter. You might as well try to squeeze ile out of Bunker Hill Monument as to c'lect a debt out of him. But any how, Squire, what'll you give, sposin' I ...
— The Book of Anecdotes and Budget of Fun; • Various
... all white meat, is quick to taint, and never should be kept long before cooking. If you have the slightest doubt about pork, it is best to reject it, for unlike other meat which may be quite wholesome and usable, though not of precisely prime quality, pork must be in really first class ...
— The Story of Crisco • Marion Harris Neil
... on the other, the frozen sea. With neither food nor shelter, he could not run far. All they had to do was to wait till he wandered back to the tent, as he inevitably must, when the frost and hunger laid hold of him. But these men did not stop to think. There was a certain taint of madness running in the veins of all of them. Besides, blood had been spilled, and upon them was the blood- lust, thick and hot. "Vengeance is mine," saith the Lord, and He saith it in temperate climes where the warm sun steals away the energies of men. But in the Northland they have ...
— The God of His Fathers • Jack London
... woman, and bowed to the ascendency of a celestial purity. Now I am happy and blessed indeed; for I have in you precisely what I needed, without knowing it—this pure affection, free from all earthly taint—unalterable—eternal. I possess at last the love of ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... memory of the past, no fear of the future. The delicious present monopolised his existence. The ties of duty, the claims of domestic affection, the worldly considerations that by a cruel dispensation had seemed, as it were, to taint even his innocent and careless boyhood, even the urgent appeals of his critical and perilous situation; all, all were forgotten in one ...
— Henrietta Temple - A Love Story • Benjamin Disraeli
... high principle was in the balance against it, no qualms whatsoever. It was the inevitable result of his harsh training in the life that was his. The hot, rich blood of strong manhood ran in his veins, but it was the hot blood tempered with honesty and courage, and without one single taint of meanness. ...
— The Golden Woman - A Story of the Montana Hills • Ridgwell Cullum
... Mephistopheles galloping hard to be in season at the witches' Sabbath-gathering? That must be the cousin of Elsie's who wants to marry her, they say. A dangerous-looking fellow for a rival, if one took a fancy to the dark girl! And who is she, and what?—by what demon is she haunted, by what taint is she blighted, by what curse is she followed, by what destiny is she marked, that her strange beauty has such a terror in it, and that hardly one shall dare to love her, and her eye glitters always, ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... stood stock-still for a time. Then, coming to himself, he prostrated himself at my feet in acceptance of the relationship and did me reverence. When he rose his eyes were full of tears ... O little brother mine! I am fast going to my death—let me take all your sin away with me. May no taint from ...
— The Home and the World • Rabindranath Tagore
... the other. For we see that it is the manner of men to scandalise and deprave that which retaineth the state and virtue, by taking advantage upon that which is corrupt and degenerate, as the heathens in the primitive Church used to blemish and taint the Christians with the faults and corruptions of heretics. But nevertheless I have no meaning at this time to make any exact animadversion of the errors and impediments in matters of learning, which are more secret and ...
— The Advancement of Learning • Francis Bacon
... There is peril abroad, suspicion, anger, and distrust. A spark might fire a mighty blaze. The cardinal's warning and rebuke to the heads of colleges has wrought great consternation and anger. They are eager to purge themselves of the taint of heresy, and to ...
— For the Faith • Evelyn Everett-Green
... know that those who wait upon the Great Kaan with his dishes and his drink are some of the great Barons. They have the mouth and nose muffled with fine napkins of silk and gold, so that no breath nor odour from their persons should taint the dish or the goblet presented to the Lord. And when the Emperor is going to drink, all the musical instruments, of which he has vast store of every kind, begin to play. And when he takes the cup all the Barons and the rest of ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... Middleton's life shall be a reproduction of the attempt made two hundred years before; and Middleton's knowledge of that incident shall be the means of his salvation. That would be a good idea; in fact, I think it must be done so and no otherwise. It is not to be forgotten that there is a taint of insanity in Eldredge's blood, accounting for much that is wild and absurd, at the same time that it must be subtile, in his conduct; one of those perplexing mad people, whose lunacy you are continually mistaking for wickedness or vice versa. This shall ...
— The Ancestral Footstep (fragment) - Outlines of an English Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... all public men then living, the one most deeply imbued with the spirit of our free constitution. Its checks and balances jumped with his humour. His nature was without any taint of fanaticism, nor was he anything of the doctrinaire. He was neither a Richard Baxter nor a John Locke. He had none of the pure Erastianism of Selden, who tells us in his inimitable, cold-blooded way that "a King is a King men have made ...
— Andrew Marvell • Augustine Birrell
... had more than once changed the fate of the world. It might be now on its way only to change that fate once more. The cause, too, was a noble one. It was sustained by no aggression, perfidy, or desire of change. It was to protect a friendly nation, and to sustain an inspired cause. There was no taint of cruelty or crime to degrade the soldiership of England. We were acting in the character which had already exalted her name as protectors of the weak and punishers of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 347, September, 1844 • Various
... nor from their fellows, how to receive with gratitude what is valuable beyond appraisement" (Goethe). An intense Philistinism underlay the great spiritual reaction that followed the Revolution, and not even such of its apostles as Wordsworth and Carlyle wholly escaped the taint. ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists (Vol 1 of 2) • John Morley
... of the world where such might be expected, there is, in truth, not a taint of it in her veins. The olivine tint is Hispano Moriscan—a complexion, if not more beautiful, certainly more picturesque than ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid
... the life of the nation which has resulted in the conscious ideal of the Britain of to-day. The "separation" from Rome fifty years after Bosworth had no conscious imperial purpose, but it rescued the rising empire of England from the taint of medievalism which sapped the empires of Spain, of the Bourbons, and of the Hapsburgs. The Reformation in England owes much of its character amongst the people at large, apart from the government, above all in ...
— The Origins and Destiny of Imperial Britain - Nineteenth Century Europe • J. A. Cramb
... been, one of its benefactors. His travels are interesting, not merely to those who care about Africa, or the great schemes to his zeal for which he fell a martyr, but to all who take delight in the spectacle of unbounded courage and heroic ardour, unalloyed with any taint of ferocity, selfishness, ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park
... and was very kind-hearted; but was subject to peculiar fits of insanity, during which he did wild and foolish things for the mere love of notoriety. He had two natures—one bright and good, the other sullen and criminal. A taint of madness ran in the family—came down from drunken and unprincipled fathers of dead generations; under different conditions, it might have developed into genius in one or ...
— Over the Sliprails • Henry Lawson
... seeming paradox by asserting that "a vice sanctioned by the general opinion is merely a vice, while a vice condemned by the general opinion produces a pernicious effect on the whole character." "One," says Macaulay, "is a local malady, the other is a constitutional taint." I have quoted the famous historian in this connection because his observations are, I think, illustrative of my contention, viz., that morality is largely a matter of convention, sanctioned or condemned by what Macaulay terms ...
— The Empire of the East • H. B. Montgomery
... unphilosophical taint, which marked the earliest heavenward cries of terrified man, has clung to the petitions which he offers up at this hour for material favours and blessings. At the close of a prolonged drought, the Archbishops ...
— Morality as a Religion - An exposition of some first principles • W. R. Washington Sullivan
... should give my support. It is by the force of reason, and by considering facts, that I have come to the conviction that a people, who, after ten centuries of slavery, have re-conquered liberty, have need of war. War is necessary to consolidate liberty, and to purge the constitution from all taint of despotism. War is necessary to drive from amongst us those men whose example might corrupt us. You have the power of chastising the rebels, and intimidating the world; have the courage to do so. The emigres persist in their rebellion, the sovereigns persist in supporting them. ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine
... "No, 'taint likely, Tom. He had liquor in him; I could see that; and besides, he always has. Well, when pap's full, you might take and belt him over the head with a church and you couldn't phase him. He says so, his own self. So it's the same with Muff Potter, of course. But if a man was dead sober, I reckon ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... which I do, unless it is motived by this regard to Him as its 'chief end,' loses its noblest consecration, and is degraded from its loftiest beauty. The Altar sanctifies, and not only sanctifies but ennobles, the gift. That which has in it the taint of self-regard so pronouncedly and dominantly as that God is shut out, is like some vegetation down in low levels at the bottom of a vale, which never has the sun to shine upon it. But let it rise as some tree above the brushwood ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren
... few are more beautiful, and in some respects more touching, than a friendship between two boys, unalloyed by any taint of selfishness, indiscriminating in its genuine enthusiasm, delicate in its natural reserve. It is not always because the hearts of men are wiser, purer, or better than the hearts of boys, that "summae puerorum amicitia: saepe cum ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar
... on the next section of corridor wall when he caught that faint taint in the air, the very familiar scent of wolverines. Now it provided Shann with a guide as well ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... not always a willful breach of duty on the part of the father, but usually comes from ignorance as to how to broach this subject to the boy. A great many growing lives would be saved from moral taint and become a blessing instead of a curse if the father discharged his whole duty to his growing son, by putting at his disposal the knowledge which is necessary to an understanding of the ...
— The Boy and the Sunday School - A Manual of Principle and Method for the Work of the Sunday - School with Teen Age Boys • John L. Alexander
... the lodge, fearing that some taint of Nuflo's evil-smelling den and dinner might still cling to me, I turned aside to where a streamlet in the wood widened and formed a deep pool, to take a plunge in the water. After drying myself in the air, and thoroughly ventilating my garments ...
— Green Mansions - A Romance of the Tropical Forest • W. H. Hudson
... could not make, And give her, for her comfort's sake! He would beat his weary, empty hands Upon the table, would hold up strands Of silver and gold, and ask her why She scorned the best which he could buy. He would pray as to some high-niched saint, That she would cure him of the taint Of failure. He would clutch the wall With his bleeding fingers, if she should fall He could catch, and hold her, and make her live! With sobs he would ask her to forgive All he had done. And broken, spent, He would call himself impertinent; Presumptuous; a tradesman; a nothing; driven To madness ...
— Sword Blades and Poppy Seed • Amy Lowell
... influence Dame Reason, but it will be useless. And now, Reason, you are to remember, as of course you do, for Reason forgets nothing, that you are to think neither of brothers or of sisters. You are entirely to drop your feelings as Agatha, and to be pure Reason undefiled by mortal taint. You are to say, whether, were you, Reason, placed as I am now, you would marry this unreasonable young man as soon as he gets to Chatillon, which means tomorrow, or the day after, or the day after that at the very latest. Now, Reason, speak, ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope
... mounseers, and persuaded ourselves that their whole literature consisted in atheism and murder, and though we now know that frogs are by no means the common food of the peasantry—costing about a guinea a dish—and that it is possible for a Frenchman to be a strapping fellow of six feet high, the taint of our former persuasion remains with us still as to their books; and, in some remote districts, we have no doubt that Peter Pindar would be thought a more harmless volume in a young lady's ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 337, November, 1843 • Various
... at length " 'taint the folks that thinks themselves the best that is the best always if you ain't good, I should like to know what goodness is. There's somebody that thinks you be," said he, a minute or two afterwards, as the horses were ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... doubt with me, if it be always in the power of the most skilful of the faculty to pronounce, with any certainty, whether a person who has been under their care, in certain stages of this malady, is so effectually cured, as to leave no possibility of his being still capable of communicating the taint. I think I could mention some instances which justify my presuming to hazard this opinion. It is likewise well known, that amongst a number of men, there are, generally, to be found some so bashful as to endeavour to conceal their labouring under any symptoms of this disorder. And there are ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... was a big, broad-chested, muscular man, whose neck rose like a mortised beam out of his shoulders, straight with the back of his head. His face was handsome in a bold, shrewd mold, but dark as if his blood carried the taint of a baser race. He went about always dressed in a long frock coat, with no vest to obscure the spread of his white shirt front; low collar, with narrow black tie done in exact bow; broad-brimmed white sombrero tilted back from his forehead, a cigar that ...
— Trail's End • George W. Ogden
... awful cold. Its so cold that the tooth past rolls right offen your brush in the morning. The Captin has a cold in his nose. He says he wont take the men out in such bad wether as today. Taint nothin gainst him Mable but I hope he has ...
— Dere Mable - Love Letters Of A Rookie • Edward Streeter
... indeed," said his mother; "she is so free from the least taint of hypocrisy or deceit; so perfectly honest and truthful; so warm-hearted, too; so diligent and energetic in anything she undertakes to do—very painstaking and persevering—and a brave, womanly ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley
... with heroism; this loses no lustre through time and distance. Good is gold; it is rare, but it will not tarnish. Evil is like dirty water—plentiful and foul, but it will run itself clear of taint. ...
— Erewhon Revisited • Samuel Butler
... I s'pose we must call a gentleman 'mister' who speaks so fine an' looks so fine, tho' he be's an Injun—it's mighty easy to settle who hut the bird. That thing's a fifty or tharabouts; Killbar's a ninety. 'Taint hard to tell which has plugged the varmint. We'll soon see;" and, so saying, the hunter stepped off towards the tree on which ...
— The Scalp Hunters • Mayne Reid
... "Well 'taint me," said Rose shrinking. "Look here — I've got a delicious plan in my head — I'm going to make them take us in the boat ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner
... topsy-turvy; where things sometimes come miraculously, without any return for them in labor, and where they sometimes do not come at all. They are born, moreover, with diseased bodies, often with the taint of alcoholism in their veins; too often with some other inherited malady, such as epilepsy or unsound mind, as a direct result of parental excesses. How can we say that we 'do not let children suffer,' so long as alms keeps together thousands of these so-called homes in our large ...
— Friendly Visiting among the Poor - A Handbook for Charity Workers • Mary Ellen Richmond
... Us two'll walk, me and him," announced the patrolman. "'Taint so far where we're goin', and the walk'll do this fresh guy a little good—maybe'll sober him up. And never mind about any of the rest of you taggin' along behind us neither. This is a pinch—not a free street parade. Go on home now, the lot of ...
— The Life of the Party • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... times high winds in gusts swept over the highlands with a bullying noise, and disappeared, leaving everything still as the grave. I felt once more "at home in the wilderness"—such, indeed, it appeared after Boma, where the cockney-taint yet lingered. ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... too often disgraced. It has been turned into an engine of cruelty, and amidst the bitterness of persecution, every trace has disappeared of the mild and beneficent spirit of the religion of Jesus. In what degree must the taint have worked itself into the frame, and have corrupted the habit, when the most wholesome nutriment can be thus converted into the deadliest poison! Wishing always to argue from such premises as are not only really sound, but from such ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce
... championess of her race, of all who are oppressed, in every capital in Europe, save, alas! Italy and the Austria who crushes her. I have taken, I should tell you, an Italian name. It was better, I thought, to hide my African taint, forsooth, for awhile. So the wise New Yorkers have been feting, as Maria Cordifiamma, the white woman (for am I not fairer than many an Italian signora?), whom they would have looked upon as an inferior being under the name of Marie Lavington: though there is finer ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley
... discovered or suspected. We have undertaken a difficult and painful task, and we shall accomplish it; unrestrained by a false delicacy, we shall drag forth from the dark and mysterious labyrinths of great cities, the hidden iniquities which taint the moral atmosphere, and assimilate human ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn
... "'Taint only that, sir; for it's enough to frighten a man to death or send him mad to be all alone here in ...
— Mother Carey's Chicken - Her Voyage to the Unknown Isle • George Manville Fenn
... for refreshing country drives. Quite evidently she enjoyed Claire's society, quite evidently also she preferred to enjoy it when other visitors were not present. Claire was not offended, for she knew that there was no taint of snobbishness in this decision; she was just sorry, and, in a curious fashion, remorseful into the bargain. She did not argue out the point, but instinctively she felt that Janet, not herself, was the one to ...
— The Independence of Claire • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... errand-boy, daguerreotypist, teacher, doctor;—so he came into the Gurney garden that night, shrewd, defiant, priding himself on detecting shams. His waistcoat and trousers were of coarser stuff than suited his temperament; a taint of vulgarity in his talk, his whiskers untrimmed, the meaning of his face compacted, sharpened. It was many a year since a tear had come into his black eyes; yet tears belonged there, as much as to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, Issue 67, May, 1863 • Various
... not here concerned with the severe forms of the disease which prove fatal, but with the milder forms in which the infant is apparently healthy when born, but after from two to six weeks begins to show evidence of the syphilitic taint. ...
— Manual of Surgery - Volume First: General Surgery. Sixth Edition. • Alexis Thomson and Alexander Miles
... keep off the demon of remorse or the cloud of sorrow, like the forgery or the robbery to save from want. "The brilliant position she had longed for, the imagined freedom she would create for herself in marriage"—these "had come to her hunger like food, with the taint of sacrilege upon it," which she "snatched with terror." Grandcourt "fulfilled his side of the bargain by giving her the rank and luxuries she coveted." Matrimony as a bargain never had and never will have ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot
... sympathy was keen and most sensitive, her modesty and humility were almost excessive, and her tenderness of nature was a woman's own. She gave her sympathy readily and freely to the humble and unfavored. She had no taint of intellectual aristocracy, says one of her friends. Faithful, devoted love; the sacredness of simple duties and plain work; earnest help of other souls,—these were among the daily lessons of her life and teaching. "How strong was the current of ...
— George Eliot; A Critical Study of Her Life, Writings & Philosophy • George Willis Cooke
... "Jest yet 'taint easy to tell. Thar's somethin' on foot among 'em—some darned Injun trick. Clar as I kin see, that big chief wi' the red cross on his ribs, air him they call the Horned Lizard; an' ef it be, thar ain't a cunniner ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid
... object indicating that some convulsion had disturbed the general order of nature at this place. We had passed a portage above it and after two long portages below it we encamped. Near the last was a small stream so strongly impregnated with sulphur as to taint the air to a great distance around it. We saw two brown bears on the hills in ...
— The Journey to the Polar Sea • John Franklin
... the highest bidder; and have even now no civilization except what they have acquired in this condition of abject slavery; separated, too, from the dominant class, not only by this stigma of slavery, but by complexion and features so marked and peculiar, that a small taint of the blood of the servile class can be detected with unerring certainty. If history decides anything, it is that a system of political equality cannot be formed out of such elements. The experience of the ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No. V, May, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... their backs. As the season advances and the water becomes chilled, they are flung in myriads on the shores, where the wolves and bears assemble to banquet on them. Often they rot in such quantities along the river banks as to taint the atmosphere. They are commonly from two to three ...
— The Adventures of Captain Bonneville - Digested From His Journal • Washington Irving
... Or on the floor my sabre smote, The sound went through her like a pang. I saw this; and the days to come Forewarned me with an iron clang, That drowned the music of the drum, That made the rousing bugle faint; And yet I sternly left my home,— Haply to fall by noisome taint Of foul disease, without a deed To sound in rhyme or shine in paint; But, oh, at least, to drop a seed, Humble, but faithful to the last, Sown by my Country in her need! O Death, come to me, slow or fast; I'll do my duty while I may! Though sorrow burdens every blast, And want ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... late to scold arterward. Wot I sez is, do you' scoldin' an' yo' whippin' 'fo' dere's any cause fer it—'taint no good to do it arterward; 'twon't ondo nuffin' wot's done," said Henny; but her wisdom was lost on the party, who had already started on their way, aunt and niece riding double, and Dan ...
— Her Mother's Secret • Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... always talking about heredity, like Mr. Blatchford. Sandwich Islanders are always talking about environment, like Mr. Suthers. Savages—those that are truly stunted or depraved—dedicate nearly all their tales and sayings to the subject of physical kinship, of a curse on this or that tribe, of a taint in this or that family, of the invincible law of blood, of the unavoidable evil of places. The true savage is a slave, and is always talking about what he must do; the true civilised man is a free man and is always talking about what he may do. Hence ...
— All Things Considered • G. K. Chesterton
... sphere of morality. By statistic methods of sociology the social problems of immorality and crime have been opened up, and external facts have been studied; and criminal anthropology has revealed the "inferior types" who by hereditary taint are those who have a predisposition to all the moral infection of their surroundings. Morel's theories concerning degeneration and the resulting theories of Lombroso concerning criminals have undoubtedly brought light into this ...
— Spontaneous Activity in Education • Maria Montessori
... saloup, portable soup, sugar, molasses, vegetables (at all times when they could be got) were, some in constant, others in occasional use. These were of such infinite service to the people in preserving them from a scorbutic taint, that the use of the malt was (with respect to ...
— Captain Cook's Journal During the First Voyage Round the World • James Cook
... but I has my point before me all the same, and I'm comin' to it. Ac-knowledgin' our error, it'd done, and bein' done, it's writ aloft. Oh! if you ony knew what a sweet young creature she be! Indeed; 'taint all of humble birth that's unworthy, Sir Austin. And she got her idees, too: She reads History! She talk that sensible as would surprise ye. But for all that she's a prey to the artful o' men—unpertected. And it's a young marriage—but there's no fear for her, as ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... on their efforts. In truth, Mr Brooke belongs not to the present generation. His energy, his perseverance, which nothing can subdue, his courage which no dangers can appal, his simplicity which no possession of power and authority can taint, his integrity and honest mind, all belong to a more masculine and primitive age, and constitute a rare exception for our respect and gratitude in this. We take the earliest opportunity afforded us to pay our humble tribute to worth that cannot be questioned, ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846 • Various
... business in her voice that struck him as amusingly delightful—and such a sweet, clear voice, too, untinged with the slightest taint ...
— A Young Man in a Hurry - and Other Short Stories • Robert W. Chambers
... doubt that he has that pullet on his conscience yet, unless he has paid for it. He was of a race which elsewhere has so immemorially plundered hen-roosts that chickens are as free to it as the air it breathes, without any conceivable taint of private ownership. But the spirit of New England had so deeply entered into him that the imbecile broiler of another, slain by pure accident and by its own contributory negligence, was saddening him, while I was off in my train without ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... her now that she could not define: the warmth of Love, the sense of protection and security—almost as if unseen arms, that were strong and devoted and selfless, held her closely, shielding her from evil and from the taint of selfish human passions. ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy
... and put it under one of the waterfalls that the play might keep it sweet. There was plenty more dead fish in the numerous holes, and I picked out two and put them in the shade; but I knew that the great heat must soon taint them and rot the rest, whence would come a stench that might make ...
— Stories by English Authors: The Sea • Various
... "'Taint no gal's picture," offered the man at the fire. He had removed his tin cup and was engaged in stirring its grimy contents with a small stick. "That's a charm; some kind of hoodoo business that one o' them ...
— The Awakening and Selected Short Stories • Kate Chopin
... Mathieson," called one of the men from the inside of the frame, "I s'pose 'taint worth carrying any of this stuff—Jackson'll have enough without it?" The words were explained to Nettie's horror by a jug in the man's hands, which he lifted to ...
— The Carpenter's Daughter • Anna Bartlett Warner |
