"Almsgiving" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... spent largely, especially in almsgiving without considering his purse finds himself very hard pressed. He has only two thousand ducats a month from the Duke of Burgundy and that seems to force him into peace with the king. The duke expects ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam
... In Leslie Stephen's English Thought in the Eighteenth Century we have a vivid picture of the retreat at Kingscliffe—the devotional exercises, the unstinted almsgiving, and Law's little study, four feet square, furnished with its chair, its writing-table, the Bible, and the works of Jacob Behmen. 'Certainly a curious picture in the middle of that prosaic eighteenth century, which is generally ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton
... duty of almsgiving, another gospel performance; but how poorly is it done in our days! We have so many foolish ways to lay out money, in toys and fools' baubles for our children, that we can spare none, or very little, for the relief of the poor. Also, do not many give that to their dogs, yea, let it lie in their ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... and in Ireland I am sure it is much inferior. I allude to the former state of England; for at present the accumulation of national wealth only increases the cares of the poor, and hardens the hearts of the rich, in spite of the highly extolled rage for almsgiving. ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... 34), "Almsgiving exalteth a nation, but benevolence is a sin to nations." "Almsgiving exalteth a nation," that is to say, the nation of Israel; as it is written (2 Sam. vii. 23), "And what one nation in the earth is like thy people, even like Israel?" but "benevolence" is a sin to nations, ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various
... the post. Every man is not so lucky as to have two tables. Not what thou sayest about thyself, but what thy companions say. The whole and broken tables of the Law lie in the ark. The salt of money is almsgiving. He who walks four cubits in the land of Israel is sure of being a child of the world to come. The plague lasted seven years, and no man died before his time. Let the drunkard only go, he will fall of himself. Be rather the ...
— Hebrew Literature
... where the practical wisdom of the Church comes in as regards fasting. One day in every week is set apart, beside other days and seasons, as a reminder of the fact that fasting is a duty of the Christian life, just as much as almsgiving and prayer—a duty sanctified by the example enjoined by the ...
— The Discipline of War - Nine Addresses on the Lessons of the War in Connection with Lent • John Hasloch Potter
... benediction, which was received by the kneeling communicants, to the astonishment of D'Artagnan, who recognized in the priest the coadjutor* himself, the famous Jean Francois Gondy, who at that time, having a presentiment of the part he was to play, was beginning to court popularity by almsgiving. It was to this end that he performed from time to time some of those early masses which the common people, generally, ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... dwelt in the humble, low, shedlike buildings, which clustered round the Saxon thane's dwelling-place. An illustration of such a house appears in an ancient illumination preserved in the Harleian MSS., No. 603. The lord and lady of the house are represented as engaged in almsgiving; the lady is thus earning her true title, that of "loaf-giver," from which her name "lady" ...
— English Villages • P. H. Ditchfield
... one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ!' Think not, O my brethren, that this applies only to almsgiving—to that relief of distress which is commonly called charity—to the obvious duty of devoting, from our superfluities, something that we scarcely miss, to the wants of a starving brother. No. I appeal to the poorest amongst ye, if the worst burdens are those of the body—if the kind word ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... power only because the Protectionists had chosen to send Peel about his business, and the Irish problem was growing more and more acute. The potato crop of 1846 was even worse than that of 1845, and Peel's system of public works had proved an expensive failure, more pauperising than almsgiving. The Irish population fell from eight millions to five, and those who survived handed down an intensified hatred of England, which lives in some of their descendants ...
— Lady John Russell • Desmond MacCarthy and Agatha Russell
... Scriptures, which distinguishes the people of the East, bore rich fruit in him. He offered himself a whole offering to God, by prayer and study of the Scriptures, by spareness of diet and simplicity of clothing, by liberal almsgiving. He was bashful and retiring, shunning the busy throngs of men, and consorting only with those who needed his assistance. When he met an aged wood-carrier outside the walls, he would purchase his burden, would carry it himself to the city, and would give it to the widows living near the ...
— The Quarterly Review, Volume 162, No. 324, April, 1886 • Various
... same frugal instinct is exercised to our advantage and comfort in other things, for G. makes a great show and merit of denying our charity to those bold and adventurous children of sorrow, who do not scruple to ring your door-bell, and demand alms. It is true that with G., as with every Italian, almsgiving enters into the theory and practice of Christian life, but she will not suffer misery to abuse its privileges. She has no hesitation, however, in bringing certain objects of compassion to our notice, and she procures small services to be done for us by many lame and halt of ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells
... open to almsgiving, so was his heart tender to those who wanted relief, and his soul susceptible of gratitude, and of every kind impression: yet though he had refined his sensibility he had not endangered his quiet, by encouraging in himself a solicitude ...
— Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson, LL.D. - during the last twenty years of his life • Hester Lynch Piozzi
... monastic customs at St. Genevieve,' said the young man, blushing. 'There is an almsgiving ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli
... against luxury, against gambling, against monasticism, quoting the remark of Segrais, that "the mania for a monastic life is the smallpox of the mind." He spent his whole income in acts of charity—not in almsgiving, but in helping poor children, and poor men and women, to help themselves. His object always was to benefit permanently those whom he assisted. He continued his love of truth and his freedom of speech to the last. ...
— Character • Samuel Smiles
... pewter, and have an interesting history. They had a guild in 1472, when they began their career with "twenty-four poor, honest men." Their ancient ordinances contain directions about masses, burials, and almsgiving, the carrying of wares to fairs, hawking them, and the governing of apprentices. Their young men caused much difficulty. They loved riots and sport, and one of the ordinances of 1608 prohibited the playing of bowls, betting at cards, dice, table and shovel-board. One ...
— Memorials of Old London - Volume I • Various
... with very inconclusive arguments. * Note: This is not the general judgment on Mosheim's learned dissertation. There is no trace in the latter part of the New Testament of this community of goods, and many distinct proofs of the contrary. All exhortations to almsgiving would have been unmeaning if ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... Bimbisara, who was one of the first royal converts to Buddhism. Ajasat murdered his father, or at least wrought his death; and was at first opposed to Sakyamuni, and a favorer of Devadotta. When converted, he became famous for his liberality in almsgiving.] ...
— Chinese Literature • Anonymous
... of this miracle spread far and wide; and, in spite of her humility, Francesca did not object to its being divulged, as it testified to the Divine virtue of almsgiving, and encouraged the rich to increase their liberality, and minister more abundantly to ...
— The Life of St. Frances of Rome, and Others • Georgiana Fullerton
... only place of rest was the floor, on a blanket. These outrages were committed in a family where the mistress daily read the scriptures, and assembled her children for family worship. She was accounted, and was really, so far as almsgiving was concerned, a charitable woman, and tender hearted to the poor; and yet this suffering slave, who was the seamstress of the family, was continually in her presence, sitting in her chamber to sew, or engaged in her other household work, with her lacerated and bleeding ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... a strange power in the human voice. My money fell back into my purse. I was ashamed of the precarious assistance. I felt that here was a call for something more than mere almsgiving—the charity of a day. ...
— Friends and Neighbors - or Two Ways of Living in the World • Anonymous
... detailed autobiographical confession. But the more authentic sayings and doings of William's death-bed enable us to follow his course as an English statesman almost to his last moments. His end was one of devotion, of prayers and almsgiving, and of opening of the prison to them that were bound. All save one of his political prisoners, English and Norman, he willingly set free. Morkere and his companions from Ely, Walfnoth son of Godwine, hostage for Harold's faith, Wulf son of Harold and Ealdgyth, taken, we can hardly doubt, as a ...
— William the Conqueror • E. A. Freeman
... serfs, and even slaves by other means than open force, in a country where, legally, all are free, where the impossibility of slavery is the boast of the law. Of late benevolence has been, abroad in the English parish, almsgiving and visiting have increased, good landlords have taken up cottage improvements. There have been harvest-homes, at which the young squires have danced with cottagers. But now Hodge has taken the matter into his own hands, ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... Apostles constantly celebrated the Holy Communion; Acts ii.46; xx.7; &c. This was always accompanied by a set form of prayer, traces of which we may even find in the New Testament—Acts ii.42; 1 Cor. x.16; 1 Cor. xiv.16. Justin Martyr, who wrote A.D. 140, gives an account of a Sunday Service. Almsgiving usually, if not always, accompanied a celebration of the Holy Communion. As the number of Christians increased, the various Churches throughout Europe compiled for their own use forms of prayer for the celebration of the Holy Eucharist; ...
— The Church Handy Dictionary • Anonymous
... have been I can only suggest: but I shall not be surprised if it should turn out that they were formerly erected on the anniversary of St. James by poor persons, as an invitation to the pious who could not visit Compostella, to show their reverence for the Saint by almsgiving to their needy brethren. ...
— Notes And Queries,(Series 1, Vol. 2, Issue 1), - Saturday, November 3, 1849. • Various
... ascended, and where the groans of the tormented were distinctly audible. The pilgrim, on his return, told the Abbot of Clugny of this, and the Abbot appointed the second day of November to be set apart for the benefit of souls in purgatory, which was to be kept by prayers and almsgiving." It is easy to perceive that, while in the festival of Hallowe'en we have the survival of the old Druidical festival of thank-offering to the sun-god for the ingathering of the fruits of the earth, we have also in these two festivals of All Saints and ...
— Folk Lore - Superstitious Beliefs in the West of Scotland within This Century • James Napier
... however, Freethinkers are not inclined to attach so much importance as Christians to organised almsgiving. At the best it is but a clumsy way of alleviating the worst effects of social disease. The Freethinker attaches more importance to the study of causes. He is like the true health reformer who believes a great deal more in exercise, fresh air, and wholesome diet, than in physic. For ...
— Flowers of Freethought - (Second Series) • George W. Foote
... considerable age withdraws to the desert, fasts, watches, refrains from speech, exposes himself naked to the rain, holds himself erect between four fires under the burning sun. After some years, the solitary becomes "penitent"; then his only subsistence is from almsgiving; for whole days he lifts an arm in the air uttering not a word, holding his breath; or perchance, he gashes himself with razor-blades; or he may even keep his thumbs closed until the nails pierce the hands. By these mortifications he destroys ...
— History Of Ancient Civilization • Charles Seignobos
... eyes upon me at this. Her ideas of doing good in the world were the old-fashioned ones of visiting and almsgiving; she had no more conception of modern remedies than she had of modern diseases. "Oh, I couldn't possibly make ...
— Sylvia's Marriage • Upton Sinclair
... Hesketh saw with dismay, instead of a walk, there was a prayer-meeting. Cowper himself was made to do violence to his intense shyness by leading in prayer. He was also made to visit the poor at once on spiritual missions, and on that of almsgiving, for which Thornton, the religious philanthropist, supplied Newton and his disciples with means. This, which Southey appears to think about the worst part of Newton's regimen, was probably its redeeming feature. The effect of doing good to others on any mind was ...
— Cowper • Goldwin Smith
... Queen's chamber, that is to say, vesper and compline."[272] The best theologians and doctors in his kingdom were regularly required to preach at his Court, when their fee for each sermon was equivalent to ten or twelve pounds. He was generous in his almsgiving, and his usual offering on Sundays and saints' days was six shillings and eightpence or, in modern currency, nearly four pounds; often it was double that amount, and there were special offerings besides, such as the twenty shillings he sent every ...
— Henry VIII. • A. F. Pollard
... exemplary of true religious fervour, but which attracted to them envious eyes. Heavy subsidies to the Crown and the Pope oppressed them. Then again, many houses indulged in unwise and excessive almsgiving, which the monks might well believe to be right, but which brought them only the interested friendship of the needy. And in the management of their estates much litigation obstinately pursued caused internal dissension, was costly, and gained them only bitter ...
— Old English Libraries, The Making, Collection, and Use of Books • Ernest A. Savage
... once an emperor and empress who were childless. So they sought out all the wizards and witches, all the old women and astrologers; but their skill proved vain, no one knew how to help them. At last the royal pair devoted themselves to almsgiving, praying, and fasting, until one night the empress dreamed that the Lord had taken pity on her, and appearing to her, said: "I have heard your prayers, and will give you a child whose like can not be found on earth. Your husband, ...
— Roumanian Fairy Tales • Various
... sanctity. Consequently it was necessary that He should lead back His hearers to the real meaning of these duties; and set forth the principle which must guide His subjects in all their religious acts—almsgiving, prayer, and fasting—namely, this; the desire to please their "Father which is in Heaven" (S. Matt. vi. 1-18). And that there might be no mistake about the kind of rewards which they might look for, He declared that they must "lay up for themselves treasures in Heaven" (S. Matt. ...
— The Kingdom of Heaven; What is it? • Edward Burbidge
... so meagrely—Paris, for example, contributed only 424 francs 90 centimes—that Liszt, on reading this in a paper, immediately formed the noble resolution mentioned in the above letter. "Such a niggardly almsgiving, got together with such trouble and sending round the hat, must not be allowed to help towards building our Beethoven's monument!" he wrote to Berlioz. Thus the German nation has in great measure to thank Franz Liszt for the monument ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 1, "From Paris to Rome: - Years of Travel as a Virtuoso" • Franz Liszt; Letters assembled by La Mara and translated
... were not without their effect, and when Grimbart went on to declare that, ever since Nobel proclaimed a general truce and amnesty among all the animals of the forest, Reynard had turned hermit and spent all his time in fasting, almsgiving, and prayer, the complaint ...
— Legends of the Middle Ages - Narrated with Special Reference to Literature and Art • H.A. Guerber
... to your warships now, and a merry Christmas all of you! And the merrier both for rich and poor, when gentlemen see their almsgiving. Lest you deny yourselves the pleasure, I will aid your warships. And to save you the trouble of following me, when your guns be loaded—this is my strawberry mare, gentlemen, only with a little cream on her. Gentlemen all, in the name of the ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... honours that gainsay The right of way: For almsgiving through a door that is Not open enough for two friends ...
— The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume IV • Elizabeth Barrett Browning
... born at Meun on the Loire about the year 1240; he died before the close of 1305; his continuation of Guillaume's Roman was made about 1270. His later poems, a Testament, in which he warned and exhorted his contemporaries of every class, the Codicille, which incited to almsgiving, and his numerous translations, prove the unabated energy of his ...
— A History of French Literature - Short Histories of the Literatures of the World: II. • Edward Dowden
... even Lady Drummond summoned by them as she intended, but there was a conglomeration of the night services in the morning, with beautiful singing, that delighted Eleanor, and the festival mass ensuing was also more ornate than anything to be seen in Scotland. And that the extensive almsgiving had not been a vain boast was evident from the swarms of poor of all kinds who congregated in the outer court for the attention of the Sisters Almoner and Infirmarer, attended by two or three ...
— Two Penniless Princesses • Charlotte M. Yonge
... difficulty, his loss disappears in his gain; he who understands quickly and forgets with difficulty, his is a good portion; he who understands with difficulty and forgets quickly, his is an evil portion. 16. As to almsgiving there are four dispositions: he who desires to give, but that others should not give, his eye is evil toward what appertains to others (41); he who desires that others should give, but will not give himself, his eye is evil against what is his own; he who gives and wishes others ...
— Pirke Avot - Sayings of the Jewish Fathers • Traditional Text
... infrequency—absence, I am inclined to say—of cabarets. Soberest of the sober, orderliest of the orderly, appear these good folks of La Charite, les Caritates as they are called, nor, apparently, has tradition demoralised them. One might expect that a town dedicated to the virtue of almsgiving would abound in beggars. Not one ...
— East of Paris - Sketches in the Gatinais, Bourbonnais, and Champagne • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... dwells again and again throughout these letters on the advantages to such a neighbourhood of the presence of a "gentleman" in the midst of it. He lost little, in the end he gained much, by the resolute stand he made against the indiscriminate almsgiving which has done so much to create and encourage pauperism in the East of London. The poor soon came to understand the man who was as liberal with his sympathy as he was chary of meat and coal tickets, who only aimed at being their friend, at ...
— Stray Studies from England and Italy • John Richard Green
... are the chief means by which we satisfy God for the temporal punishment due to sin? A. The chief means by which we satisfy God for the temporal punishment due to sin are: Prayer, Fasting, Almsgiving, all spiritual and corporal works of mercy, and the patient suffering of the ills ...
— Baltimore Catechism No. 2 (of 4) • Anonymous
... leadership the church will continue to be a minister to human want and suffering. The charitable work which has always been emphasized in its administration will not be neglected, but it will take on a new character. There will be less almsgiving, and more of the kind of help which saves manhood and womanhood. The young men and women who are called to this leadership will understand the worth of souls—that is, of men and women; and they will be careful lest, in their relief of want, they undermine the character. Above all, they will feel ...
— The Church and Modern Life • Washington Gladden
... seem that almsgiving is not an act of charity. For without charity one cannot do acts of charity. Now it is possible to give alms without having charity, according to 1 Cor. 13:3: "If I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor . . . and have not charity, it profiteth me ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... importunities or threats, can be neither coaxed nor bribed by offerings to abate or alter one jot or tittle of its inexorable course. Am I told that Buddhist laymen display vanity in their worship and ostentation in their almsgiving; that they are fostering sects as bitterly as Hindus? So much the worse for the laymen: there is the example of Buddha and his Law. Am I told that Buddhist priests are ignorant, idle fosterers of superstitions grafted on their religion by foreign ...
— The Life of Buddha and Its Lessons • H.S. Olcott
... works for the nourishment of the body or for the common welfare, and whether they believe that God takes pleasure in them because of such works, you will find that they say, "No"; and they define good works so narrowly that they are made to consist only of praying in church, fasting, and almsgiving. Other works they consider to be in vain, and think that God cares nothing for them. So through their damnable unbelief they curtail and lessen the service of God, Who is served by all things whatsoever that are done, spoken or ...
— Works of Martin Luther - With Introductions and Notes (Volume I) • Martin Luther
... and food distributed every morning to the most destitute, at the gates of the royal palace, where he lived with a frugality that scandalised the aged servants of royalty whom he kept, out of kindness, at their posts. Theoretically, he disapproved of indiscriminate almsgiving, but in the misery caused by the recent bombardment, such theories could not be strictly applied, or, at any rate, Garibaldi was not the man to so apply them; whence it happened that though, as de facto head of the State, he allowed himself a civil list of eight francs a day, the morning had ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... good face to poverty. He paid his bills punctually whenever the remittance came, and was charitable to the mendicants who, probably for the last thousand years, have made Calais their headquarters. The general name for him was the Roi de Calais. An anecdote of his pleasantry in almsgiving reached the public ear. A French beggar asked him for a two-sous piece. "I don't know the coin," said Brummell, "never having had one; but I suppose you mean a franc. There, take it." His former celebrity ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 344, June, 1844 • Various
... of the kingdom of God by Jesus in Galilee: iv. 12-xiii. 58.—The call of the four fishermen, Jesus preaches and heals (iv.). The Sermon on the Mount—Jesus fulfils the law, the deeper teaching concerning the commandments (v.). False and true almsgiving, prayer and fasting, worldliness, trust in God (vi.). Censoriousness, discrimination in teaching, encouragements to prayer, false prophets, the two houses (vii.). The ministry at Capernaum and by ...
— The Books of the New Testament • Leighton Pullan
... Amateur night is a kindly boon. It is charity divested of almsgiving. It is a brotherly hand reached down by members of the best united band of coworkers in the world to raise up less fortunate ones without labelling them beggars. It gives you the chance, if you can grasp ...
— Rolling Stones • O. Henry
... had remained silent on the subject. Far from advocating communism, the Founder of Christianity had urged the practice of many virtues for which the possession of private property was essential. 'What Christ recommended,' says Sudre,[1] 'was voluntary abnegation or almsgiving. But the giving of goods without any hope of compensation, the spontaneous deprivation of oneself, could not exist except under a system of private property ... they were one of the ways of exercising such rights.' Moreover, as the same author points out, private property was fully ...
— An Essay on Mediaeval Economic Teaching • George O'Brien
... confiscated as a result of the reformation activities. The groundwork of the old system of religious charity was thus swept away, and the relation which had for so long existed between prayer and penance and almsgiving and charity was altered. The nation was thus forced to deal with the problem of poor-relief, and with the care of the children of the poor. In the place of the old system the people were forced, by circumstances, to develop a new conception ...
— THE HISTORY OF EDUCATION • ELLWOOD P. CUBBERLEY
... Addison. In No. 549, which is by Addison, Sir Andrew is made to found 'an almshouse for a dozen superannuated husbandmen.' I have before (ii. 119) contrasted the opinions of Johnson and Fielding as to almsgiving. A more curious contrast is afforded by the following passage in Tom Jones, book i. chap. iii:—'I have told my reader that Mr. Allworthy inherited a large fortune, that he had a good heart, and no family. Hence, ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell
... immorality, are the three children of this same barbarous self-indulgence in almsgiving. Leave the poor alone. Let want teach them the need of self- exertion, and misery prove the ...
— The Saint's Tragedy • Charles Kingsley
... which far surpasses mere almsgiving, however liberal, the charity of the gospel, our friend was conspicuous. The love of God shed abroad in her own heart by the Holy Ghost, drew forth her love to his people wherever she found them. Assuredly she had in herself ...
— The Power of Faith - Exemplified In The Life And Writings Of The Late Mrs. Isabella Graham. • Isabella Graham
... doings of these good St. Ives folk were evidently very numerous and very varied; but these entries are not all of almsgiving. Thus, in the same year as above, ...
— The Cornwall Coast • Arthur L. Salmon
... being willing to be entreated, we tippled and chopined together most theologically. In the meantime came Cyrus to beg one farthing of him for the honour of Mercury, therewith to buy a few onions for his supper. No, no, said Epictetus, I do not use in my almsgiving to bestow farthings. Hold, thou varlet, there's a crown for thee; be an honest man. Cyrus was exceeding glad to have met with such a booty; but the other poor rogues, the kings that are there below, as Alexander, Darius, and others, stole ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... the see of St. Cromadaire, the apostle of Vervignole, and first Bishop of Trinqueballe. He exercised his pastoral ministry with piety, governed his clergy with wisdom, taught the people, and feared not to remind the great of Justice and Moderation. He was liberal, profuse in almsgiving, and set aside for the poor the ...
— The Miracle Of The Great St. Nicolas - 1920 • Anatole France
... frequently returned home with an empty purse; indeed, so aware was she of her weakness, she took out little money with her as a rule, so that she might not be tempted too far. When people remonstrated with her on this indiscriminate almsgiving, she used to say, "I would rather give to ten rogues than turn one honest man away; I should be amply repaid if there were one fairly good one amongst them." She was very fond of children —that is, en bloc; she did not care to be troubled with them at too close quarters. ...
— The Romance of Isabel Lady Burton Volume II • Isabel Lady Burton & W. H. Wilkins
... see, that came as almsgiving, in the way which brings a blessing. We want nothing to make us give money and work to Cocksmoor. We do all we can already; and I don't want to get a fine bag or a ridiculous ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... eyes were partially turned upward. It is curious to notice that this mode of acting on the brain is of very ancient date, at least among the Hindoos. In their old poem, the Bhagavad-Gita, it is recommended as a religious exercise, superior to prayer, almsgiving, attendance at temples, &c.; for the god Crishna, admitting that these actions are good, so far as they go, says: 'but he who, sitting apart, gazes fixedly upon one object until he forgets home and kindred, himself, and all created ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 446 - Volume 18, New Series, July 17, 1852 • Various
... a conception of Christianity is quite fully developed according to which the Gospel was a new law of life, with its prescribed holy seasons and hours for prayer; its sacrifices, though as yet only sacrifices of prayer; its fasts and almsgiving, which had propitiatory effect, atoning for sins committed and winning merit with God; its sacred rites, solemnly administered by an established hierarchy; and all observed for the sake of a reward which God in justice owed those who kept His commandments. ...
— A Source Book for Ancient Church History • Joseph Cullen Ayer, Jr., Ph.D.
... in the days of my cub-hood, I know I was very wicked. I killed cows, Brahmans, and men without number—and I lost my wife and children for it—and haven't kith or kin left. But lately I met a virtuous man who counselled me to practise the duty of almsgiving—and, as thou seest, I am strict at ablutions and alms. Besides, I am old, and my nails and fangs are gone—so who would mistrust me? and I have so far conquered selfishness, that I keep the golden bangle for whoso comes. Thou ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson
... gave us the Cheeryble brothers—men with soft hearts, giving pennies to all beggars, shillings to poor widows, and coal and loaves of bread to families living in rickety tenements. The Dickens idea of betterment was the priestly plan of dole. Dickens did not know that indiscriminate almsgiving pauperizes humanity, and never did he supply the world a glimpse of a man like Robert Owen, whose charity ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 11 (of 14) - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Businessmen • Elbert Hubbard
... without hinderance, that the bestower of all things may be cheerfully worshipped in return for the gifts that He has bestowed, that our neighbour may be relieved of his burden, and that the guilt contracted by sinners every day may be redeemed by the atonement of almsgiving. ...
— The Philobiblon of Richard de Bury • Richard de Bury
... enough," says Barere,[2164] "to bleed the rich, to pull down colossal fortunes; the slavery of poverty must be banished from the soil of the Republic. No more beggars, no more almsgiving, ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 4 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 3 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... seen so much almsgiving as here. Alms-boxes are hung up in various places, where in Europe you would see only ornaments. For every joy or blessing and for those who have relatives or friends ill or in danger, money is freely dropped into the box. This money is given towards the up-keep of the hospital for the very poor, ...
— Pictures of Jewish Home-Life Fifty Years Ago • Hannah Trager
... Northam was soon resplendent with a new surplice, and what was more, the altar with a splendid flagon and salver of plate (lost, I suppose, in the civil wars) which had been taken in the great galleon. Ayacanora could understand that: but the almsgiving she could not, till Mrs. Leigh told her, in her simple way, that whosoever gave to the poor, gave to the Great Spirit; for the Great Spirit was in them, and in Ayacanora too, if she would be quiet ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... States-General to his most Christian Majesty. These Borrellists do for the most part maintain the opinions of the Mennonites though they come not to their assemblies. They have made choice of a most austere kind of life, spending a considerable part of their Estates in almsgiving and a careful discharge of all the duties incumbent on a Christian. They have an aversion for all Churches, as also for the use of the Sacraments, publick prayers, and all other external functions of God's Service. They maintain that all Churches which ...
— Spiritual Reformers in the 16th & 17th Centuries • Rufus M. Jones
... gentleman, although professing what I consider an erroneous creed, has touched upon the right point in exhorting Bridget to acts of love and mercy, whereby to wipe out her sin of hate and vengeance. Let us strive after our fashion, by almsgiving and visiting of the needy and fatherless, to make our prayers acceptable. Meanwhile, I myself will go down into the north, and take charge of the maiden. I am too old to be daunted by man or demon. I will bring ...
— Curious, if True - Strange Tales • Elizabeth Gaskell
... almsgiving and his apology for it, and understood a good deal of the marquis's way of thinking. I could easily imagine that his writings must have given great offence at Rome, and that with sounder judgment he would have avoided this danger. Of course the marquis was ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... the herald king went to seek Bourgoin and his companions, who were walking in the cloisters, and told them that the almsgiving was about to begin, inviting them to take part in this ceremony; but they replied that being Catholics they could not make offerings at an altar of which they disapproved. So the herald king returned, much put out at the harmony of the assembly being disturbed by this dissent; but the alms-offering ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... improvements both inside and outside the house had been recently inaugurated to please the coming bride. Already Helbeck realised—and not without a secret chafing—the restraints that would soon be laid upon the almsgiving of Bannisdale. A man who marries, who may have children, can no longer deal with his money as he pleases. Meanwhile he found his reward in Laura's half-reluctant pleasure. She was at once full of eagerness and full of a proud shyness. No bride less grasping or more ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... house and posse of the domestics to raise a poor crown; at last all that flutter ends in sending Jack or Tom out to change a guinea, and then 'tis reckoned over half-a-dozen times before the fatal crown can be picked out, which must be taken as it is given, with all the parade of almsgiving, and so to be received with all the active and passive ceremonial of mendication and alms-receiving—as if the books, printing and paper, were worth nothing at all, and as if it were the greatest charity for ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... idols, and felt their sinfulness, and, consequently, heard with joy the simple plan of salvation which God in His mercy has prepared for man. In Sydney, I found people so well satisfied with their forms and ceremonies, their attendance at their churches and chapels, and their almsgiving and moral conduct, that they stared when I spoke of the love of Jesus, which brought Him down from heaven to suffer for man, and of the utter inability of man to save himself; they apparently believing that they themselves were doing the ...
— Charley Laurel - A Story of Adventure by Sea and Land • W. H. G. Kingston
... her mother and the crosses of every-day life served still further to solemnize her mind, and to turn her aspirations heavenwards. She followed strictly her plan for private prayer twice a day; she kept watch over herself continually, and in almsgiving and other ways endeavoured to do as much good ...
— Excellent Women • Various
... custom of monogamy was legalised in Western Jewish communities. Connected with the fraternity of the Jewish communal organisation and the incomparable affection and mutual devotion of the home-life was the habit of charity. Charity, in the sense both of almsgiving and of loving-kindness, was the virtue of virtues. The very word which in the Hebrew Bible means righteousness means in Rabbinic Hebrew charity. 'On three things the world stands,' says a Rabbi, 'on law, on public worship, and ...
— Judaism • Israel Abrahams
... first side St. Stephen receives the Communion from St. Peter, and distributes alms to the poor: on the second are his preaching and justification before the high priest: in the third his lapidation. Below on the first wall is the consecration of St. Laurence, and his almsgiving to the poor and maimed; second, his imprisonment and the conversion of the ...
— Fra Angelico • J. B. Supino
... there by any necessity for almsgiving in a civilized community? It is not the charitable mind to which I object. Heaven forbid that we should ever grow cold toward a fellow creature in need. Human sympathy is too fine for the cool, calculating attitude to take its place. One ...
— My Life and Work • Henry Ford
... democracy expand as they are understood. Both thrive under opposition and are retarded only by unfaithful friends. I caught the spirit, then studied the forms. I got tired of doling out alms. It became degrading to me either to take them from the rich or to give them to the poor. Almsgiving deludes the one and demoralizes the other. I had distributed the crumbs that fall from rich men's tables until my soul became sick. I expected Lazarus the legion to be grateful; I expected him to become pious, ...
— From the Bottom Up - The Life Story of Alexander Irvine • Alexander Irvine
... Almighty Allah and our lord the Kazi." When the judge heard this tale he asked Hubub the nurse, "Is this indeed thy lady and are ye strangers and is she unmarried?", and she answered, "Yes." Quoth he, "Marry her to me and on me be incumbent manumission of my slaves and fasting and pilgrimage and almsgiving of all my good an I do you not justice on this dog and punish him for that he hath done!" And quoth she, "I hear and obey." Then said the Kazi, "Go, hearten thy heart and that of thy lady; and to-morrow, Inshallah, I will send for this miscreant and do you justice ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 8 • Richard F. Burton
... Stow calls it, was in two parts, of which the larger was again subdivided in two portions, parallel to the two Tothill Streets. The distribution of the Royal maundy which takes place in Westminster Abbey yearly, with much ceremony, is a reminder of the ancient almsgiving. The address of the present Royal Almonry is ...
— Westminster - The Fascination of London • Sir Walter Besant
... and Shams al-Nahar, iii. Ali of Cairo, The Adventures of Mercury, vii. Ali Nur al-Din and Miriam the Girdle-Girl, viii. Ali the Persian and the Kurd Sharper, iv. Ali Shar and Zumurrud, iv. Ali bin Tahir and the girl Muunis, v. Al Malik al-Nasir (Saladin) and the Three Chiefs of Police, iv. Almsgiving, The Woman whose hands were cut off for, iv. Amin (Al-) and his uncle Ibrahim bin al-Mahdi, v. Anushirwan, Kisra, and the village damsel, v. Anushirwan, The Righteousness of King, v. Angel of Death and the King of the Children of Israel, The, v Angel of Death with the Proud ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 10 • Richard F. Burton
... not think,' says FitzStephen, 'that there is any city with more commendable customs of church attendance, honour to God's ordinances, keeping sacred festivals, almsgiving, hospitality, confirming, betrothals, contracting marriages, celebration of nuptials, preparing feasts, cheering the guests, and also in care for funerals and the interment of the dead. The only pests of London are the immoderate drinking of ...
— The History of London • Walter Besant
... Jews of the world the news that the Messiah had passed from a far-off aspiration into a reality fell like a thunderbolt; they were dazed with joy; then they began to prepare for the great journey. Everywhere self-flagellation, almsgiving, prophetic ecstasies and trances, the scholars and the mob at one in joyous belief. And everywhere also profligacy, adultery, incest, through the spread of a mystical doctrine that the sinfulness of the world could only be overcome by the ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... inherit the Kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance, sanctification of soul and body, lowliness of heart and contrition, almsgiving, forgiveness of injuries, loving-kindness, watchings, perfect repentance of all past offences, tears of compunction, sorrow for our own sins and those of our neighbours, and the like. These, even as steps and ladders that support one another ...
— Barlaam and Ioasaph • St. John of Damascus
... 'Then on the occasion of an almsgiving, O king, Kunti fed on a certain night a large number of Brahmanas. There came also a number of ladies who while eating and drinking, enjoyed there as they pleased, and with Kunti's leave returned to their respective homes. Desirous of obtaining ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... works of charity, such as almsgiving and brotherly correction, etc., that may be obligatory upon us to a degree of Serious responsibility. We must use prudence and intelligence in discerning these obligations, but once they clearly stand forth they are as binding on us as obligations of justice. We are our ...
— Explanation of Catholic Morals - A Concise, Reasoned, and Popular Exposition of Catholic Morals • John H. Stapleton
... well that she ought to be grateful for the kindness shown her by these two women, and yet she had a sense of having a deed of almsgiving forced upon her acceptance, and she answered quickly, still with the blood mounting to her cheeks. "I am very grateful for your good intentions, of course, very grateful; but here each one must work for herself, and it would ill-become me to allow you to ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... pleaded that on such a point there might be differing views, and that men should be known for Christians by their faithfulness in duty, by their practice of almsgiving and of the sacraments and of all other good and Christian works; but the answer came swiftly, "Naught ...
— A Golden Book of Venice • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... outbalanced by pain and vexation, so far more evil acts are done than good ones: history is a collection of misdeeds, with scarcely one virtuous act for a thousand crimes. It is not the external action that constitutes the ethical character of a deed, but the motive or disposition; almsgiving from motives of pride is a vice, and only when practiced out of love to one's neighbors, a virtue. God looks only at the act of the will; our highest duty, and one which admits of no exceptions, is never to act contrary ...
— History Of Modern Philosophy - From Nicolas of Cusa to the Present Time • Richard Falckenberg
... Lord so practised secrecy Himself in His fasting, in His praying, and in His almsgiving, and He makes so much of that same secrecy in all His teaching, as almost to make the essence of all true religion to stand in its secrecy. "When thou prayest," says our Lord, "shut thy door and pray in secret." As much as to say that we are scarcely praying at all when we are praying in ...
— Bunyan Characters (Second Series) • Alexander Whyte
... The Empress had been left in Normandy to avoid the revival of old quarrels. Hated in England for her proud contempt of the burgher, her scorn of the churchman, her insolence to her adherents, she won in Normandy a fairer fame, as "a woman of excellent disposition, kind to all, bountiful in almsgiving, the friend of religion, of honest life." The political activity of Queen Eleanor was brought to an abrupt close by her marriage. In Henry she found a master very different from Louis of France, and her enforced withdrawal from public affairs during ...
— Henry the Second • Mrs. J. R. Green
... "dignities," and she, as far as the village was concerned, was to be his "dignity" henceforward. Moreover, he humbly and truly hoped that she might be able to enlighten him as to a good many modern conceptions and ideas about the poor, for which, absorbed as he was, either in almsgiving of the traditional type, or spiritual ministration, or sacramental theory, he had little time, and, if the truth were ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... indulgent giving amounts to. The indulgent and indiscriminate giver becomes a partner in the production of poverty. This indulgent giving is a phase of sentimentality; and the relief of one's own feelings, rather than the real good of a fellow-man is at the root of all such mischievous almsgiving. It is the form of benevolence without the substance. It does too much for the poor man just because it loves him too little. Indulgence measures benefactions, not by the needs and capacities of the receiver, but by the sensibilities and emotions of the giver. What wonder that it ...
— Practical Ethics • William DeWitt Hyde
... man can't draw on his bank account for the price of a corner lot in the New Jerusalem. He cannot acquire so much as a souphouse ticket in that city not made with hands by dying for the faith in the auto-da-fe. Almsgiving and charity may have no more affinity than the philosophy of Plato and the political conversation of a poll parrot! Had you ever made the acquaintance of that idea? If not, I advise you to exchange visiting ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... their own conversion (p. 262). 36. He is the only child of Abraham, who in the purity of his heart obeyeth those substantial laws, that are by God imposed upon him (p. 283). 37. There is NO duty more affectionately commanded in the gospel, than that of almsgiving (p. 284). 38. It is impossible we should not have the design of Christianity accomplished in us, &c., if we make our Saviour's most excellent life, the pattern of our lives (p. 296). 39. To do well is better than believing (p. 299). 40. To be imitators of Christ's righteousness, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... not a really poor population. The men were seafaring, the women lacemaking, and just well enough off to make dissent doubly attractive as an escape from some of the interfering almsgiving of the place. Over-visiting, criticism of dress, and inquisitorial examinations had made more than one Primitive Methodist, and no severe distress had been so recent as to render the women tolerant of troublesome weekly inspections. The Curtis sisters were, however, regarded as an exception; ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... a nation, but benevolence is a sin to nations." "Almsgiving exalteth a nation," that is to say, the nation of Israel; as it is written (2 Sam. vii. 23), "And what one nation in the earth is like thy people, even like Israel?" but "benevolence" is a sin to nations, that is to say, for the Gentiles to exercise charity ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various
... 5,880 lire for the Captain of the people and his train, 3,600 for the maintenance of the Signory in the Palazzo, and so on down to a sum of 2,400 for the food of the lions, for candles, torches, and bonfires. The amount spent publicly in almsgiving; the salaries of ambassadors and governors; the cost of maintaining the state armory; the pay of the night-watch; the money spent upon the yearly games when the palio was run; the wages of the city trumpeters; ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volume 1 (of 7) • John Addington Symonds
... his fellows; but the conditions of such service were not what he had dreamed. How different a calling it had been in Saint Francis's day, when hearts inflamed with the new sense of brotherhood had but to set forth on their simple mission of almsgiving and admonition! To love one's neighbour had become a much more complex business, one that taxed the intelligence as much as the heart, and in the course of which feeling must be held in firm subjection ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... christening babies, marrying adults, conducting a ritual, and making the best he can (when he has any conscience about it) of a certain routine of school superintendence, district visiting, and organization of almsgiving, which does not necessarily touch Christianity at any point except the point of the tongue. The exceptional or religious clergyman may be an ardent Pauline salvationist, in which case his more cultivated parishioners ...
— Androcles and the Lion • George Bernard Shaw
... your minister was held, and I have dealt largely in the way of public charity. But I doubt that I have been governed by a spirit of ostentation, and not with that lowly-mindedness, without which all almsgiving is but a serving of the altars of Belzebub; for the chastening hand has been laid upon me, but with the kindness and pity which a tender father hath ...
— The Ayrshire Legatees • John Galt
... This was the system which all attempted, which all resolved to adopt who were then living in the south of Ireland. But the system was impracticable, for it required frames of iron and hearts of adamant. It was impossible not to waste money in almsgiving. ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope
... with her daily round. Neither did Leslie work for her father, because the professor would as soon have employed her canary bird. She was not thoughtful and painstaking for the poor, because, though accustomed to a species of almsgiving, she heard nothing, saw nothing of nearer or higher association with her neighbours. Yet there was capacity enough in that heart and brain for good or ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... said, 'that an eviction scene should be our last glimpse of Ireland. Let us pay the rent for them, Edward,' and as she spoke the words the thought passed through her mind that her almsgiving was only another form of selfishness. She wished her departure to be associated with an act of kindness. She would have withdrawn her request, but Edward's hand was in his pocket and he was asking the agent how much the ...
— Muslin • George Moore
... that the friendliness of country neighbors appears in its most beautiful light. There is no thought of almsgiving on their part, nor a sense of accepting charity on the part of the recipients. Benevolence and gratitude were not called upon to exchange compliments. Farmer Bosworth is going our way and leaves a jug of milk; he stops to chat a while and relight his pipe with a coal ...
— Confessions of Boyhood • John Albee
... inhabitants of the district he was soon a great favorite; but he was feared and abhorred by the others. Felix belonged to the new school of philanthropic economy, which discerns, and protests against thoughtless almsgiving; and above all, against doles to street beggars. He would have made giving equally illegal with begging. But he soon began to despair of effecting a reformation in this direction; for even Phebe could not always refrain from ...
— Cobwebs and Cables • Hesba Stretton
... his prison work. It seemed to be all and altogether for the masses, and not for individuals. No record is left of personal almsgiving, save when resorted to as a ruse to obtain entrance to the French prisons. That his interest was not in individuals is further shown by the calm and deliberate manner in which he prosecuted his investigations, taking years for the accumulation of materials and months to their careful watching ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 5 of 8 • Various
... nevertheless true that you are deprived of the just remuneration of your labor, while no one thinks of causing justice to be rendered to you. If you could be consoled by the noisy appeals of your champions to philanthropy, to powerless charity, to degrading almsgiving, or if the high-sounding words of Voice of the People, Rights of Labor, &c., would relieve you—these indeed you can have in abundance. But justice, simple justice—this nobody thinks of rendering you. For would it not be just that after a long day's ...
— What Is Free Trade? - An Adaptation of Frederic Bastiat's "Sophismes Econimiques" - Designed for the American Reader • Frederic Bastiat
... institution! The ineffable William and Mary had merely turned it into a charitable institution because they did not know what else to do with it. The mighty halls which ought to have resounded to the laughter of the mistresses of Charles II were diverted to the inevitable squalor of almsgiving. The mutilated victims of the egotism and the fatuity of kings were imprisoned there together under the rules and regulations of charity, the cruellest of all rules and regulations. And all was done meanly—that is, all that interested George. Christopher Wren, ...
— The Roll-Call • Arnold Bennett
... given in this faith to the duty of almsgiving, and the effective way with which it is carried out among its members, is another praise-worthy feature. At the time of their political rule and extensive sway there was a well-known tax whose purpose was to carry relief to the poor and the suffering. And Mohammedans feel to-day that ...
— India, Its Life and Thought • John P. Jones
... thus there has been deliverance for all. Tathagata, when in the world; and now his relics—after his Nirvana; those who worship and revere these, gain equal merit; so also those who raise themselves by wisdom, and reverence the virtues of the Tathagata, cherishing religion, fostering a spirit of almsgiving, they gain great merit also. The noble and superlative law of Buddha ought to receive the adoration of the world. Gone to that undying place, those who believe his law shall follow him there; therefore let all the Devas and men, without exception, worship and adore the one ...
— Sacred Books of the East • Various |
