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Congregation   /kˌɑŋgrəgˈeɪʃən/   Listen
Congregation

noun
1.
A group of people who adhere to a common faith and habitually attend a given church.  Synonyms: faithful, fold.
2.
An assemblage of people or animals or things collected together.  "A great congregation of birds flew over"
3.
The act of congregating.  Synonym: congregating.



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"Congregation" Quotes from Famous Books



... evening. Sing Sing became an inquirer himself while translating the gospel to others. He was soon able to hold cottage lectures in the town, and after some years the Bishop had the happiness to ordain him as minister to his people. There was a large congregation of Chinese at the Sunday services before we left, and it was a good proof of the sincerity of these converts, that while all their heathen countrymen worked at their trades on Sunday as well as other days, our ...
— Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak • Harriette McDougall

... quiet, in that age when subordination was broken, and awe was hissed away; when any unsettled innovator, who could hatch a half-formed notion, produced it to the publick; when every man might become a preacher, and almost every preacher could collect a congregation. ...
— Lives of the Poets, Vol. 1 • Samuel Johnson

... expedition was equally fortunate, as he sailed in twenty-three days from Cape Florida to the Scilly islands. Arriving at Plymouth on Sunday, the 9th August, 1573, during divine service, the news of his return was carried to church, on which few persons remained with the preacher, all the congregation running out to welcome the adventurous Drake, who had been absent fourteen months and sixteen days in ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr

... this sober light, the red sash round his waist, or the amethyst on the third finger of his right hand—was his rank in the Roman hierarchy. I have the honour of presenting his Eminence Egidio Maria Cardinal Udeschini, formerly Bishop of Cittareggio, Prefect of the Congregation of Archives and Inscriptions. ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland

... {opp. 73} assemblage; collection, collocation, colligation[obs3]; compilation, levy, gathering, ingathering, muster, attroupement[obs3]; team; concourse, conflux[obs3], congregation, contesseration|, convergence &c. 290; meeting, levee, reunion, drawing room, at home; conversazione &c. (social gathering) 892[It]; assembly, congress; convention, conventicle; gemote[obs3]; conclave &c. (council) 696; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... which commanded a view of all these several avenues, I used sometimes for a while to watch my congregation gradually assembling together at the hour of Sabbath worship. They were in some directions visible for a considerable distance. Gratifying associations of thought would form in my mind, as I contemplated their approach, and successive ...
— The Annals of the Poor • Legh Richmond

... and pledge of their suspected fidelity; by property, when you make each of these build a house or two inside your city which may yield some revenue and he shall have...; 10 towns, five thousand houses with thirty thousand inhabitants, and you will disperse this great congregation of people which stand like goats one behind the other, filling every place with fetid smells and sowing seeds of pestilence ...
— The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci, Complete • Leonardo Da Vinci

... whispered Mrs. Robinson; "but if you give 'em anything they'd turn right round and give it to the heathen. His congregation up to Parsonsfield clubbed together and give him that gold watch he carries; I s'pose he'd 'a' handed that over too, only heathens always tell time by the sun 'n' don't need watches. Eudoxy ain't comin'; now for massy's sake, Rebecca, ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... expounded from experience. Elijah Rasba, grandson of Old Abe, thus came honestly by reverence and religion, but the strange glory which had surrounded the old Temple had departed from the ruin, and of all the congregation, only ...
— The River Prophet • Raymond S. Spears

... their largest, with as yet no spot upon their fair skin, and the nightingales singing out of their very bones, the season, the hour, the blossoms, and the moon had invaded every chamber in the castle, seized every heart of both man and beast, and turned all into one congregation of which the nightingales were the priests. The cocks were crowing as if it had been the dawn itself instead of its ghost they saw; the dogs were howling, but whether that was from love or hate of the moon, I cannot tell; the pigeons were cooing; the peacock had turned his train into ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald

... children in order to be taught the truths of immortality. Certainly the reasoning was clear and forcible, the philosophic allusions seemed very apropos, and the language was elegant and impassioned. The closing hymn was sung; the organ hushed its worshiping tones; the benediction was pronounced; the congregation dispersed. ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans

... appears again with a tray and marks the brows of the women with a finger-tip of vermilion, his own brow being marked by them in turn. He places a cake of camphor on the tray and sets light to it; and as the clear flame bursts forth in front of the Mother, the whole congregation rises and shouts "Devi ki Jaya" (Victory to the Goddess). Then Moti takes the tray and, balancing it on her head, dances slowly with long swinging stride round the Mother, while the music bursts out with renewed vigour, ...
— By-Ways of Bombay • S. M. Edwardes, C.V.O.

... by a reporter who is a scab; whereupon, when the belly-need presses, the displaced reporter goes to another paper and scabs himself. The minister who hardens his heart to a call, and waits for a certain congregation to offer him say $500 a year more, often finds himself scabbed upon by another and more impecunious minister; and the next time it is his turn to scab while a brother minister is hardening his heart to a call. The scab is everywhere. The professional strike-breakers, ...
— War of the Classes • Jack London

... gives the true Theosophist more delight than when he sees the Theosophical teachings coming out in some other garb which gives them a different name, but hands them on to those who might be frightened perhaps by the name "Theosophy." And so, when we find a clergyman scattering broadcast to his congregation Theosophical teaching as Christian, we say: "See, our work is bearing fruit"; and when we find the man who does not label himself "Theosophist" giving any of these truths to the world, we rejoice, because we see that our work is being done. We have no desire to take the credit ...
— London Lectures of 1907 • Annie Besant

... lessons in the religion they profess. If they want instruction in other sciences or arts, they apply to other instructers; and this is generally the business of early life. But I suppose there is not an instance of a single congregation which has employed their preacher for the mixt purpose of lecturing them from the pulpit, in Chemistry, in Medicine, in Law, in the science and principles of Government, or in any thing but Religion exclusively. Whenever, therefore, preachers, instead of a lesson in religion, put them off ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson

... of citizen regulators than that of wife-beating and the abuse of small children. So it came about that after the wife had forgiven her indignities and returned to her ascendency of henpecking, which was a more chronic if a less acute cruelty than that which she had suffered, a congregation of masked men knocked at the door and ordered the quaking Jerry to come forth and face ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck

... don't really think so at all. As soon as you break the ice, you will be all right. There was Lemenueville. He started in here the right way, took to the Presbyterian church, the fashionable one on Parkside Avenue, and made himself agreeable. He's built up a splendid practice, right there in that congregation!" ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... just turned twenty-one, and looked younger, and the zeal of his calling was strong upon him. Moreover he was shaken with nervous anxiety for the success of his sermon; so that it is no marvel if he carried away but blurred and misty impressions of the little port and the congregation that sat beneath him that morning, ostensibly reverent, but actually on the pounce for heresy or any sign of weakness. Their impressions, at any rate, were sharp enough. They counted his thumps upon the desk, noted his one reference to "the original Greek," ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... the Yankees drove a clean two-bagger down the right foul line; the second man laid down his life nobly with a beautiful bunt; the Boston pitcher gave a correct imitation of Orville Wright and presented free rides to the next two Highlanders; big Sweeney stalked to bat—and the congregation prayed, standing. Under cover of all this quivering excitement, and with Gresham more absorbed than ever upon the foul which might yet slay him, Constance turned to Polly with an intent decisiveness which was ...
— Five Thousand an Hour - How Johnny Gamble Won the Heiress • George Randolph Chester

... psalm, and hymn, and to offer prayer or thanksgiving. If we are silent we are defrauding God. God's Priest does not say, "let me pray for you," he says, "let us pray." We cannot worship God by proxy, we cannot give God what He asks by means of a choir, whilst the congregation is silent. Let us, each one of us, for the future, remember why we have come to Church, and that it is our individual business to worship God with reverence and holy fear. And in all you sing or say here, be in ...
— The Life of Duty, v. 2 - A year's plain sermons on the Gospels or Epistles • H. J. Wilmot-Buxton

... against spiritual dictation. Republicanism levels in religion as in everything. It might have been expected, therefore, that soon after civil liberty had been established there would be conflicts between the traditional, authority of the minister and the claims of the now free and independent congregation. So it was, in fact, as for instance in the case which follows, for which the reader is indebted to Miss ...
— Pages From an Old Volume of Life - A Collection Of Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... unaccountable phenomenon had preceded Mr. Hooper into the meeting-house, and set all the congregation astir. Few could refrain from twisting their heads towards the door; many stood upright, and turned directly about; while several little boys clambered upon the seats, and came down again with a terrible racket. There was a general bustle, a rustling of the women's gowns and shuffling ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne

... the service was over, and a brief sermon on Amos and his good deeds, the congregation separated, and Pearl went back to the brown house with a heavy heart, and the cry of her soul was that God would show her a way of making the people understand. "Plough a fire-guard, O Lord," she prayed, as she walked, "and let these ...
— Purple Springs • Nellie L. McClung

... the choir to a sort of gateway, which was opposite to the side on which they came in, and where, through the spaces which opened between the great columns that intervened, a congregation were seen assembled. They were in a chapel which was situated in that part of the church. The chapel itself was full, and a great many persons were seated in the various spaces rear. Mr. George and Rollo walked across the choir, and joined this congregation by taking a position ...
— Rollo on the Rhine • Jacob Abbott

... by the author to his Sunday evening congregation in the spring of 1892. The chapters were given one at a time on consecutive Sundays, and the way in which the story was received encouraged the pastor in his attempt to solve the problem of the Sunday evening ...
— Robert Hardy's Seven Days - A Dream and Its Consequences • Charles Monroe Sheldon

... there wasn't a gal in the Lowell factories, that warn't in love with him. Sometimes, at intermission, on Sabbath day, when they all came out together (an amazin' hansom sight too, near about a whole congregation of young gals), Banks used to say, 'I vow, young ladies, I wish I had five hundred arms to reciprocate one with each of you; but I reckon I have a heart big enough for you all; it's a whapper, you may depend, and every mite and morsel ...
— The Clockmaker • Thomas Chandler Haliburton

... annihilation. To take the life of a tribe comrade was for a long time an act which needed high motive and authority and required expiation. The ritual of execution was like the ritual of sacrifice. In the Hebrew law some culprits were to be stoned by the whole congregation. Every one must take a share in the great act. The blood guilt, if there was any, must be incurred by all.[1070] Primitive taboos are put on acts which offend the ghosts and may, therefore, bring woe on the whole group. Any one who breaks a taboo commits a sin and a crime, and excites ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner

... must remark a convenience attached to them, which it might be well to imitate in those of our own churches which are situated in out-of-the-way districts, such as the Highlands of Scotland, where many of the congregation have to come from a considerable distance. The convenience I allude to is simply a long, broad shed, open all one side of its length, and fitted with rings, &c., for tethering the horses of those who, from fancy, distance, age, or sickness, are unwilling or ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray

... teachers in the mission—there are fifty of us, and we do have the most delightful times. It is like a family—rather a large family, perhaps you think—but it doesn't seem so when we come on Sabbath, from the great congregation, and gather in our dear little chapel—we seem like a company of brothers and sisters, shutting ourselves in at home, to talk and pray together for a little, before we go out into the world again. Is Thursday ...
— Ester Ried • Pansy (aka. Isabella M. Alden)

... which man owes to God; it is this general conception which has shaped the architecture of the temple, cast out statues, dispensed with paintings, effaced ornaments, shortened ceremonies, confined the members of a congregation to high pews which cut off the view, and governed the thousand details of decoration, posture, and all other externals. This conception itself again proceeds from a more general cause, an idea off human conduct in general, inward and outward, prayers, actions, dispositions of every sort ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot

... supernatural about her terrifies the beholders, who throw themselves on their faces. Her outline flows and waves: she is almost distinct at moments, and again vague and shadowy: above all, she is larger than life-size, not enough to be measured by the flustered congregation, but enough to affect them with a dreadful sense ...
— Back to Methuselah • George Bernard Shaw

... largely become mere sentimentalism. The average man has a horror of being considered a namby-pamby, religiously weak, wishy-washy, so-called Christian. It makes him ashamed of himself to stand up in a congregation and sing 'My Jesus, I love Thee,' and 'In mansions of glory and endless delight.' What does he know about Jesus? And he is far more concerned about his little brick bungalow and next month's rent than he is about celestial mansions. And I don't blame him. No; he leaves religion to ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking

... Having thus purified himself, he returned home; but, on passing the hill where he had minced the Friar, he was astonished to see the same man celebrating mass, attended by a very penitential looking congregation of spirits. ...
— Phil Purcel, The Pig-Driver; The Geography Of An Irish Oath; The Lianhan Shee • William Carleton

... curiosity as to what this disquieting collector of bugs and snakes might offer in the way of a sacred song. The "nighty" was, perforce, absent, much to the sorrow of Ann; but the witchery of the glorious voice entered again into the woman's soul, and, indeed, sent the entire congregation home in an awed silence that was the height of ...
— The Tangled Threads • Eleanor H. Porter

... place, full of all sorts of humbugs and falsenesses and pretensions. And while the moralist, who is holding forth on the cover ( an accurate portrait of your humble servant), professes to wear neither gown nor bands, but only the very same long-eared livery in which his congregation is arrayed: yet, look you, one is bound to speak the truth as far as one knows it, whether one mounts a cap and bells or a shovel hat; and a deal of disagreeable matter must come out in the course ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray

... conclusion of the religious service, before the congregation had dispersed, "the general rose up," says the chaplain's record, "and ordered each captain to appoint a certain number of men out of his company to draw the boats from the lake and string them along the Susquehanna below the dam, and load them, that they might be ready to ...
— The Story of Cooperstown • Ralph Birdsall

... studies, and received that title in these provinces. In another statement is contained the number of the religious in this province who have taken the habit in the Indias; these are thirty-three. Six of them should be excluded: two of these are of Portuguese nationality, sons of the Congregation of Yndia—who, by a decree of his Majesty, and the decision of a full definitory of this province, are commanded to return to their own congregation. Two others are prevented from saying mass—one by old age, and the other by having been insane more ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 (Vol 28 of 55) • Various

... conception of a sacrificial ministrant has been retained in those churches (the Greek and the Roman) which regard the eucharistic ceremony as a sacrifice. In the West the "presbyter" (such is the New Testament term), the head of the congregation, took over the function of the old priest as conductor of religious worship, and the word assumed the form "priest" in the Latin and Teutonic languages. Among Protestants it is employed only in the Church ...
— Introduction to the History of Religions - Handbooks on the History of Religions, Volume IV • Crawford Howell Toy

... early as 1571, its pastor, Richard Fitz, had died in prison. Dr. Brown believes he can still farther trace its origin to Queen Mary's reign, when a Mr. Rough, its pastor, suffered martyrdom, and one Cuthbert Sympson was deacon. [l4] After the death of Greenwood and Barrowe, this London congregation was sore pressed. Their pastor, Francis Johnson, having been thrown into prison, they began to make their way secretly to Amsterdam. There Johnson joined them in 1597, soon after his release. To ...
— The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut • M. Louise Greene, Ph. D.

... Christian church and a Christian congregation established in Britain full 415 years before Augustin's arrival; but as St. Martin, bishop of Tours, died in the year 395, this church could not have been erected in his honour; but it might afterwards have been dedicated ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 281, November 3, 1827 • Various

... has turned over old folios to any extent knows that Martin Verga founded in 1425 a congregation of Bernardines-Benedictines, with Salamanca for the head of the order, and Alcala as the ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

... certainty with which it is responded to, use this illustration: "As Serjeant Buzfuz said to Sam Weller, 'There is little to do and plenty to get.'" Needless to say, an amused smile, if not a titter, passed round the congregation. But it is the Barrister who most appreciates the learned Serjeant. For the topics he argued and his fashion of arguing them, bating a not excessive exaggeration, comes home to them all. Nay, they must have a secret admiration, and fondly think how excellently ...
— Bardell v. Pickwick • Percy Fitzgerald

... lingered at the door, the other men, crowding closer to the man at the table, grew into a charmed circle about him, a picturesque congregation in their underclothes of grey and white and washed out pinks and blues. Within five minutes after the defeat of Big Bill every man of them was either making or smoking a cigarette with all thought of their tumbled bunks ...
— The Short Cut • Jackson Gregory

... women and children thronging the market-place. The same abhorrent scenes which a few years after stirred the spirit of the excellent Hopkins to denounce the slave- trade and slavery as hateful in the sight of God to his congregation at Newport were enacted in the full view and hearing of the annual convocation of Friends, many of whom were themselves partakers in the shame and wickedness. "Understanding," he says, "that a large number of slaves had been imported from Africa into the town, and were then on sale by a member ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier

... at the sound, but recollecting the voice, he screened his friend by his presence of mind. Without a moment's pause he stopped and indulged in a prolonged fit of coughing, while the little congregation, which had been startled by the groan, attributed the noise to a premonitory symptom of the attack, and thought ...
— Heiress of Haddon • William E. Doubleday

... the hour, the jovial face of the clock looking sterner than was its wont. It glowered now like a preacher in his pulpit upon a sinful congregation. Enough of "snatch-and-catch'em;" enough of Hull's Victory or the Opera Reel; let the weary fiddler descend from his bull-rush chair, for soon the touch of dawn will be seen in the eastern sky! The merry-making began to wane and ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham

... scene before her, was for ever humming or singing. She had even sung in the church choir till she declined to do so any longer, because strangers stared at her so; which goes to show that she was not so vain as people of her colouring sometimes are. It was just as bad, however, when she sat in the congregation; for then, too, if she sang, people stared at her. So it was that she seldom went to church at all; but it was not because of this that her ideas of right and wrong were quite individual and not conventional, as the tale of ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... domestic, and the perpetual spawn of books called novels of society. Not only is everything turned into a story, real or so called, but there must be a story in everything. The stump-speaker holds his audience by well-worn stories; the preacher wakes up his congregation by a graphic narrative; and the Sunday-school teacher leads his children into all goodness by the entertaining path of romance; we even had a President who governed the country nearly by anecdotes. The result of this universal demand for fiction is necessarily ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... and his congregation decided to move away and found a new colony. They were the more ready to do this, as the land round Boston was not fertile, and so many new settlers had come, and their cattle and flocks had increased so rapidly, that it was ...
— This Country Of Ours • H. E. Marshall Author: Henrietta Elizabeth Marshall

... I was taken into the bar-room, the news having gone as by electricity, the house and yard were crowded with gossippers, who had left their business to come and see "the runaway nigger." This hastily assembled congregation consisted of men, women, and children, each one had a look to give at, and a word to ...
— The Fugitive Blacksmith - or, Events in the History of James W. C. Pennington • James W. C. Pennington

... old man; we both thought we saw a striking resemblance in him to our friend Dr. Woods, of Andover. He is still quite active in body and mind, and officiates to his congregation with great acceptance. I fear, however, that he is in ill health, for I noticed, as we were passing along to church, that he frequently laid his hand upon his heart, and seemed in pain. He said he hoped he should be able to get through the ...
— Sunny Memories Of Foreign Lands, Volume 1 (of 2) • Harriet Elizabeth (Beecher) Stowe

... thatched villages nestling in the folds of the hills, each with its Buddhist temple, lifting a tilted roof of blue-grey tiles above the congregation of thatched homesteads, and its miya, or Shinto shrine, with a torii before it like a great ideograph shaped in stone or wood. But Buddhism still dominates; every hilltop has its tera; and the statues of Buddhas or of Bodhisattvas appear by the roadside, as we travel on, with the regularity ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan - First Series • Lafcadio Hearn

... so it is a company and fellowship, not onely of the godly, but also of hypocrites professing alwayis outwardly ane true religion. Uther tymes it is takin for the godlie and elect onlie, and sumtymes for them that exercise spiritual function amongis the congregation of them that professe the truth."[273] These last, ministers, doctors, elders, and deacons, are taken to represent the church in its wider sense, and must have a lawful calling from it. This lawful calling is said to consist of two parts—viz., election and ...
— The Scottish Reformation - Its Epochs, Episodes, Leaders, and Distinctive Characteristics • Alexander F. Mitchell

... Mr. Foker came for the purpose of inspecting the nursery-maids who frequent the Elms Walk there, and who are uncommonly pretty at Chatteris, and here they strolled until with a final burst of music the small congregation was played out. ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray

... at Laracor, he gave public notice that he would read prayers every Wednesday and Friday. On the first of those days after he had summoned his congregation, he ascended the desk, and after sitting some time with no other auditor than his clerk Roger, he rose up and with a composure and gravity that, upon this occasion, were irresistibly ridiculous, began—"Dearly beloved Roger, the Scripture moveth you and me in sundry places," and so ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous

... Then the congregation dispersed, each family departing for the cabins and quarters where they lodged during the long, long ...
— Three Young Pioneers - A Story of the Early Settlement of Our Country • John Theodore Mueller

... Gottes and others, were as familiar to me as the English hymns of today, such as Nearer my God to Thee and All Hail the Power of Jesus' Name. We were not blessed with children's songs, as are the children of today, but sang the same hymns as the older members of the congregation. ...
— Sixty Years of California Song • Margaret Blake-Alverson

... of age, was gaunt with recent sickness, patient and unimaginative in aspect. He preached extemporarily, with the aid of notes; and it cannot be said that his discourse was remarkable for interest, at any rate in its beginning. Doubtless the sparse congregation, so prone to slumber, discouraged him; for offering exhortations to empty benches is but weary work. Indeed he was meditating the advisability of bringing his argument to an abrupt conclusion when, chancing to glance ...
— The Wizard • H. Rider Haggard

... the breathings of the ocean. Te Deum Laudamus, "We praise thee, O God! we acknowledge thee to be the Lord!" "All the earth doth worship thee, the Father everlasting;" closed the offices, when Mr. Effingham dismissed his congregation with the usual ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper

... The little congregation gradually dispersed. Then Elder Dean arose, and, creaking heavily down the aisle, closed and locked the front door, and put out four of the lamps in the back of the room for economy's sake. After that he sat down again ...
— John Ward, Preacher • Margaret Deland

... into the psychology of theatre audiences. This subject presents two phases to the student. First, a theatre audience exhibits certain psychological traits that are common to all crowds, of whatever kind,—a political convention, the spectators at a ball-game, or a church congregation, for example. Second, it exhibits certain other traits which distinguish it from other kinds of crowds. These, in turn, will be considered in ...
— The Theory of the Theatre • Clayton Hamilton

... her head away again, and five minutes afterwards the service was over and the congregation clattering out of the church. As she stood in the porch waiting for the Chelwood children the strange woman came quickly up to her, and, bending ...
— A Pair of Clogs • Amy Walton

... is dated December 8, 1864. It was drawn up by learned ecclesiastics, and subsequently debated at the Congregation of the Holy Office, then forwarded to prelates, and finally gone over ...
— History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science • John William Draper

... look at my congregation," said a London preacher, "I say, 'Where are the poor?' When I count the offertory in the vestry I say, 'Where are ...
— Life and Literature - Over two thousand extracts from ancient and modern writers, - and classified in alphabetical order • J. Purver Richardson

... The inspector had now boarded the car; she had opened her purse to take out the ticket, and, lo, the gold had gone! It was a most embarrassing situation. I was ruefully speculating as to how I should again face my congregation after being shadowed by such a dark suspicion. When, as abruptly as it had arisen, the mystery happily cleared. With the most profuse apologies, the lady explained that it was her birthday; her daughter had that morning presented ...
— Mushrooms on the Moor • Frank Boreham

... shines out a Christian Divine, who, in the inestimable individual Dr. Madden, collects a whole Society of Patriots; a venerable Man, not alone the Guide of his particular Congregation, but a pure, also clear and lasting Light of Perfection, and noble Imitation, ...
— An Essay on the Antient and Modern State of Ireland • Henry Brooke

... courteous and gentle, ready and willing, and always inspired the children with a liking, which old Dr. Potts, with his blue glasses and loud voice, could never do. Dr. Walter also taught the bible-class, and won the flinty hearts of the congregation, and the susceptible ones of the young ladies. He also frequently walked home with Beatrice Dering, and had fallen into the way of occasionally stopping in the evenings, if he happened to be passing and saw them in the yard. The old house, with its shady porches, ...
— Six Girls - A Home Story • Fannie Belle Irving

... case extreme in every respect, and in no respect more so than in the extraordinary narrowness of the man's intellectual horizon. His God was, as he often said, his business partner. He seems to have been for Muller little more than a sort of supernatural clergyman interested in the congregation of tradesmen and others in Bristol who were his saints, and in the orphanages and other enterprises, but unpossessed of any of those vaster and wilder and more ideal attributes with which the human imagination elsewhere has invested him. Muller, in short, was absolutely unphilosophical. ...
— The Varieties of Religious Experience • William James

... The congregation dispersed slowly with the conviction that there had been created one of those memories to which in later years the reflective mind delights to return. Quite naturally, and as they often did, Mrs. Manson and Mrs. Bowers dropped into the Dibbott house with its mistress. Dibbott was already ...
— The Rapids • Alan Sullivan

... preferment. Sarah was obliged to thank the Lord for her kindness, instead of tearing her eyes out, or treading her dog-face level with the ground. Yet Iskender was robbed of his birthright. It had always been known that one boy of the little congregation would be made a clergyman; and Iskender was clearly designated, his parents having been the first converts, and himself the spoilt child of the Mission till six months ago. Furthermore, he was fatherless, a widow's only son. Yet Asad son of Costantin was put before him. Asad ...
— The Valley of the Kings • Marmaduke Pickthall

... of St. John and St. Augustine, the angel figures add an element of beauty to the picture. Each one seems attracted by some distant object. The cherub holding St. Matthew's book looks towards the worshippers in the church. Some one in the congregation also seems to attract the attention of the angel with the cardinal's hat, and he smiles shyly, as if in reply to a gesture of admiration. His companion on the other arch turns his eyes towards the figures ...
— Correggio - A Collection Of Fifteen Pictures And A Portrait Of The - Painter With Introduction And Interpretation • Estelle M. Hurll

... had heard him had prophesied great things of Mr. Ferrers—he had the rare gift of eloquence; he was a born orator, as they said—a rising light in his profession; it was absurd that such powers should be wasted on a village congregation, made up of rustics and old women; he must preach from some city pulpit; he was a man fitted to sway the masses in the east end of London, to be a leader among his fellows; it was seldom that one saw such penetration and power united ...
— Wee Wifie • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... tell you what I do. When I first came to Plymouth Church I gave the sexton strict orders that if he saw any person asleep in my congregation he should go straight to the pulpit ...
— Good Stories from The Ladies Home Journal • Various

... too, which is taken to express joy and attachment upon these occasions, is by going to the eight o'clock prayers at the royal chapel. The congregation all assemble, after the service, in the opening at the foot of the great stairs which the royal family descend from their gallery, and there those who have any pretensions to notice scarce ever fail ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay

... abstracted the dollar. How quickly his cheek flushed! How troubled became, instantly, the beatings of his heart! Unhappy Mr. Levering! He could not make the usual responses that day, in the services; and when the congregation joined in the swelling hymn of praise, his voice was heard not in the general thanksgiving. Scarcely a word of the eloquent sermon reached his ears, except something about "dishonest dealing;" he was too deeply engaged in discussing the question, whether or no he should get rid ...
— Home Lights and Shadows • T. S. Arthur

... an excellent sermon, and at the close of the exercises conducted a Bible class attended by nearly every one belonging to the congregation. ...
— Elsie's Vacation and After Events • Martha Finley

... was preaching, some of the congregation smoked, talked to each other, and answered the shouts of their companions outside, greatly to the disgust of Toyatte and Kadachan, who regarded the Kakes as mannerless barbarians. A little girl, frightened at the strange ...
— Travels in Alaska • John Muir

... the three years that you have been in the habit of visiting us,—and partly because Mr. Axtell, and his sister, too, I think, have a very decided way of avoiding us. What induces Mr. Axtell to perform the office of sexton is more than any one in the congregation can divine." ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various

... were members of the Covenanter Congregation, of which Dr. John Black was pastor for forty-five years. He was a man of power, a profound logician, with great facility in conveying ideas. To his pulpit ministrations I am largely indebted for whatever ...
— Half a Century • Jane Grey Cannon Swisshelm

... used to go to church—for my inn is too far removed from it to admit of my attendance there nowadays—matters were very different. Heaven and Hell were, in the eyes not only of our congregation, but of those who hung about the doors in the summer sun, or even played leap-frog over the grave-stones, as distinct alternatives as the east and west highways on each side of my inn. If you did not go one way, you must go the other; and not only so, but an immense desire was ...
— Some Private Views • James Payn

... congregation was infuriated and soon hustled the impudent scoundrel out. If services had not been going on, and if it had not been Sunday, there is no telling what would have happened. As it was they turned him loose. I came here to tell you, as he is our ...
— Imperium in Imperio: A Study Of The Negro Race Problem - A Novel • Sutton E. Griggs

... but after having solicited in their favour various privileges which were accorded by the Sovereign-Pontiff, she dispossessed them in the year 1613, and established in their place the Augustine Fathers of the Congregation of Bourges. ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe

... church in which he officiated so decayed and crumbling, that he was obliged to close it. It had long been in a ruinous condition. The walls were cracked, and pieces of plaster and even brick fell down upon the heads of the congregation; and for their sake as well as for his own, the Abbe Masson was obliged to discontinue the services. At length he resolved to pull down the ruined building, and erect another church in ...
— Jasmin: Barber, Poet, Philanthropist • Samuel Smiles

... of this diary was published in the Moravian, Bethlehem, Penn., in 1876, with notes prepared by Rev. A.A. Reinke, present pastor of the Moravian congregation in New York. The extracts for 1775 appear in print now for the first time, and, of the whole, only those which bear upon public affairs are given here. In 1776, the Moravian Church stood in Fair street (now Fulton), ...
— The Campaign of 1776 around New York and Brooklyn • Henry P. Johnston

... explicit as to the intention of the English authorities. It declares that nothing in this Act "shall be hereafter interpreted or expounded that your grace, your nobles and subjects intend, by the same, to decline or vary from the congregation of Christ's Church in any things concerning the very articles of the Catholic ...
— Our Lady Saint Mary • J. G. H. Barry

... before service. We pressed each other's hands most tenderly, looked up at the singers' seats, and then trusted ourselves to look at each other. It was more than we had hoped for. There were also a violin and sometimes a flute, and a choir of men and women singers, though the congregation were expected to join in the psalm-singing. The ...
— Deephaven and Selected Stories & Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett

... as pray; so, no sooner had the chaplain finished than his congregation dispersed instantly to their stations, the commander singing out from the poop, the moment he had reached that coign of vantage, the long-delayed but welcome order, for which we had all been waiting in expectancy since ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson

... perhaps unisonously or with extempore chords. It was not until early in the last century that Vincent Novello wrote to it the noble arrangement now in use. It is a strong, even-time harmony with lofty tenor range, and very impressive with full choir and organ or the vocal volume of a congregation. In Cheetham's Psalmody is it written ...
— The Story of the Hymns and Tunes • Theron Brown and Hezekiah Butterworth

... to them to follow him. He quietly led them beneath the branches of the very biggest tree in the garden. He pointed his finger upwards. It was a very short sermon—a sermon from a text set up by Nature which the tiniest mite amongst this tattered congregation ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 25, January 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various

... called the precentor. There was no choir of singers, as with us, but when the minister gave out a hymn the precentor rose and commenced the singing, and when he had got near the end of the first line all the congregation joined in, and sang the hymn with him to the end. The third pulpit was only a sort of chair, enclosed at the sides and above. What the man did who sat in it the boys ...
— Rollo in Scotland • Jacob Abbott

... to still weather the day before Miss Ethel's funeral. But that was all now over, so was the Sunday morning sermon wherein the Vicar referred to the good works of the departed, and during which members of the congregation felt for their pocket-handkerchiefs who had not troubled to go near the Cottage ...
— The Privet Hedge • J. E. Buckrose

... Vay di Vaya, the only cleric whom I met in New York society was one of distinguished aspect and exceedingly charming manners, who was certainly not an apostle of Christian or any other form of Socialism; but an anecdote was told me of another whose congregation, according to a reporter, was "the most exclusive in New York," and had the honor of comprising Mr. J. Pierpont Morgan. This clergyman was one morning surprised by receiving a visit from a negro, who expressed ...
— Memoirs of Life and Literature • W. H. Mallock

... of time, Abel Sampson, probationer of divinity, was admitted to the privileges of a preacher. But, alas! partly from his own bashfulness, partly owing to a strong and obvious disposition to risibility which pervaded the congregation upon his first attempt, he became totally incapable of proceeding in his intended discourse, gasped, grinned, hideously rolled his eyes till the congregation thought them flying out of his head, shut the Bible, stumbled down the pulpit-stairs, trampling ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott

... dozen boys, dressed in white surplices, were chanting sweetly; a dull-looking clergyman read the service indifferently; and a score of poor people, with one or two well-dressed persons, formed the congregation. We then departed for Westminster Abbey, which must form the subject of ...
— Young Americans Abroad - Vacation in Europe: Travels in England, France, Holland, - Belgium, Prussia and Switzerland • Various

... given to me that came out as the tears come, because our hearts are full and we can't help it. And those were always times of great blessing, though I had never thought it could be so with me before a congregation of people. But, sir, we are led on, like the little children, by a way that we know not. I was called to preach quite suddenly, and since then I have never been left in doubt about the work that ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot

... chance investigator might have listened in dismay to solemn pronouncements of everlasting damnation, to statements about rich men and the eyes of needles, and the lilies of the field which did not spin. But the congregation of St. Cecilia's understood that these things were to be taken in a quixotic sense; sharing the view of the French marquis that the Almighty would think twice before ...
— The Metropolis • Upton Sinclair

... up well-informed and pious young priests with a capacity for devoting themselves to the education of children as well as the edification of the people. " It is a body," said Bossizet, " in which everybody obeys and nobody commands." No vow fettered the members of this celebrated congregation, which gave to the world Malebranche and Massillon. It was, again, under the inspiration of Cardinal B6rulle, renowned for the pious direction of souls, that the order of Carmelites, hitherto confined ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume V. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... away. At the far end of the apse, Augustin rises from his throne with its back to the wall, his pale face distinct against the golden hue of the mosaic. From that place, as from the height of a pulpit, he commands the congregation, looking at them above the altar, which is a plain wooden table placed at the ...
— Saint Augustin • Louis Bertrand

... throwed his conversational lariat at the yearling. He urbanes at her, and then comes his 'firstly,' it being a speculation as to her late grazing-ground, which he concludes to be the East. His 'secondly' ain't nothing startling, words familiar to us all from our mother's knee—'nice weather'—the congregation ain't visibly moved. His 'thirdly' is insinuating. In it he hints that it ain't good for man to be alone ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning

... and the demonstration of the Rev. Solomon Snow, it was not expected that Mr. Belcher would visit the church of the latter for some months. During the first Sabbath after this event, there was gloom in that clergyman's congregation; for Mr. Belcher, in his routine, should have illuminated their public services by his presence, but he ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland

... however, mistook his case, reducing him to great weakness. A specialist who then undertook him restored his strength somewhat by more generous diet, although the relapse which followed was so serious that his friends thought him to be dying, and his congregation sang an intercessory hymn composed for ...
— Fletcher of Madeley • Brigadier Margaret Allen

... that his only congregation from the Chateau consisted of Mr. Cloudwater and Madame Imogen; and he thanked the good God—as he sent up a fervent prayer ...
— The Man and the Moment • Elinor Glyn

... prohibited books, ii. 216; Expurgatory, ib.; Congregation of the, ib.; reprinted by the heretics with annotations, 217; effect of, in raising the sale ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... heard. The place was awful; it was like the ghost of a church; all the life out of it. But how, then, came it to be warm? Somebody must have made the fires; where was somebody gone? And had none of all the congregation come to church that day? was it too bad for everybody? Diana began to wake up to facts, as she heard the blast drive against the windows, and listened to the swirl of it round the house. And how was she going to get home, if it was so bad as that? ...
— Diana • Susan Warner

... would have the church do about the evils of our time. I find him praising the sermons of Dr. Westcott, Bishop of Durham, as being the proper sort for clergymen to preach. Bishop Westcott, whether he is talking to a high society congregation, or to one of workingmen, shows "an exquisite sense of knowing always where to stop." So I consulted the Bishop's volume, "The Social Aspects of Christianity" and I see at once why he is popular with the anti-Socialist ...
— The Profits of Religion, Fifth Edition • Upton Sinclair

... States-General. The two Reformed pastors used the most strenuous endeavors through the classis of Amsterdam to defeat the petition, under the fear that the concession of this privilege would tend to the diminution of their congregation. This resistance was successfully maintained until at last the petitioners were able to obtain from the Roman Catholic Duke of York the religious freedom which Dutch Calvinism had failed to ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon

... had, in the very commencement of her conversion, a most salutary influence on the feeble struggles of Alvira. Her confidence in the Blessed Virgin was much enhanced by a severe act of St. Francis towards one of the members of the Congregation ...
— Alvira: the Heroine of Vesuvius • A. J. O'Reilly

... quaint shape, and built of red brick, the foundation of which had been laid by Sir Charles Warren in 1884. One Sunday afternoon we attended service in this edifice, and were immensely struck with the devotion of the enormous congregation of men and women, who all followed the service attentively in their books. The singing was most fervent, but the sermon a little tedious, as the clergyman preached in English, and his discourse had to be divided into short sentences, with a long ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson

... and soon afterwards was invited to become assistant to Daniel Williams in Hand Alley, Bishopsgate. In 1702 he was chosen one of the lecturers in Salters' Hall, and in 1703 he succeeded Vincent Alsop as pastor of a large congregation in Westminster. In 1709 Calamy made a tour through Scotland, and had the degree of doctor of divinity conferred on him by the universities of Edinburgh, Aberdeen and Glasgow. Calamy's forty-one publications ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various

... in a quiet street where a service flag hung, thick with dark stars, and the congregation were passing out from a special service for its boys who were going off to camp. The boys were there on the steps, surrounded by people eager to touch their hands, a little group of eight or ten with serious bright faces, and a look in their ...
— Joy in the Morning • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews

... as usual coming down the hill. Theodore Parker had not then become famous, but preached in a little square, wooden church, to his small country congregation, and once on a time, being on a visit to a friend at a distance (we will call the friend's name Smith, for convenience sake), Mr. Smith asked Mr. Parker how Mr. Ripley was getting along with his "Community." "Oh," said the faithless Parker, "Mr. Ripley ...
— Brook Farm • John Thomas Codman

... the capitals are equally massive and grotesque, being sometimes composed of human beings, and sometimes of birds and beasts, especially towards the choir—the rising up and sitting down of the congregation, and the yet more frequent movements of the priests—the swinging of the censers—and the parade of the vergers, dressed in bag wigs, with broad red sashes of silk, and silk stockings—but, above all, the most scientifically touched, ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Two • Thomas Frognall Dibdin

... blood they might be called upon to shed for Christ; and lastly, in long black cloaks, emblems of the death that must be endured by all. This done, their armour was brought in and piled before them upon the steps of the altar, and the congregation departed homeward, leaving them with their esquires and the priest to spend the long winter ...
— The Brethren • H. Rider Haggard

... turns all the evening, the bell-ringers being escorted from one church to another with May garlands and a sort of triumphal procession. The churches were decorated, and flags put out on the towers, and everybody in the congregation was expected to ...
— A Great Emergency and Other Tales - A Great Emergency; A Very Ill-Tempered Family; Our Field; Madam Liberality • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing

... noises through the smashed and battered windows. It was all very impressive. General Rawlinson and his staff came over from Bertangles, a few natives of Amiens came into the town for it, otherwise the whole congregation was British. It was strange! Australian bugles blaring away ...
— An Onlooker in France 1917-1919 • William Orpen

... sea. As I write, the bell tolls for church. Our missionary will have a small congregation, for there are only twenty-two passengers. I trust he will be moved to speak to us, away in mid-ocean, of the great works of the Unknown, the mighty deep, the universe, the stars, at which we nightly wonder, and not drag us ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie

... an American rather than a Scottish influence necessitated by the absence of sufficient numbers of ministers. In Scotland, the minister chose his elders and thus dominated the session; in America, the selection was made by the congregation. See James G. Leyburn, The Scotch-Irish: A Social History (Chapel Hill, 1962), ...
— The Fair Play Settlers of the West Branch Valley, 1769-1784 - A Study of Frontier Ethnography • George D. Wolf

... see that he was not going to remain behind like a mere slave. He remembered that he had still certain remnants of his past finery in his trunk; he would array himself in them, walk to Oakdale, and make one of the congregation. He managed to change his clothes without attracting the attention of his ...
— A Protegee of Jack Hamlin's and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... make the Skipping Sensei well, and help me to keep my mouth shut so it will be quiet, for she has been good to us and we all do love her much." Heaven knows the "Skipping Sensei" needs all the prayers of the congregation! ...
— Lady of the Decoration • Frances Little

... they ought to go to chapel, and they go. I go likewise, from habit, although I have long ago lost the power of following a discourse. In my pew, and whilst the clergyman is going on, I think of the strangest things—of the tree at the window, of the congregation of the dead outside, of the wheat-fields and the corn-fields beyond and all around. And the odd thing is, that it is during sermon only that my mind flies off at a tangent and busies itself with things removed from the place and the circumstances. Whenever it is finished fancy returns from ...
— Dreamthorp - A Book of Essays Written in the Country • Alexander Smith

... with the violent changes effected apart from the Act during the two or three years that followed. One incident, however, calls for notice. There were in London at this time numerous refugees of the reformed persuasion, chiefly from the Belgic provinces. These men organized themselves into a congregation, worshipping after their own rites. The King granted them the disused church of the Austin Friars. Here they came under the notice of the Lord Mayor, and of Ridley, the bishop of London, who attempted to enforce the Act of Uniformity against ...
— The Acts of Uniformity - Their Scope and Effect • T.A. Lacey

... formerly to have read a printed account of Mr. Greenshields's case, who has been prosecuted and silenced for no other reason beside reading divine service, after the manner of the Church of England, to his own congregation, who desired it: though, as the gentleman who writes to me says, there is no law in Scotland against those meetings; and he adds, that the sentence pronounced against Mr. Greenshields, "will soon be affirmed, if some care be not taken to prevent it." I am ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IX; • Jonathan Swift

... being rarely church-goers, get little good by the statistics and eloquent appeals of the preacher. Every now and then, however, the Reverend Mr. Fairweather let off a polemic discourse against his neighbor opposite, which waked his people up a little; but it was a languid congregation, at best,—very apt to stay away from meeting in the afternoon, and not at all given to extra evening services. The minister, unlike his rival of the other side of the way, was a down-hearted and timid kind of ...
— Elsie Venner • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... himself in a large armchair that stood in the study at that time, and which still stands there with a single change; the congregation has placed upon ...
— Short Stories of Various Types • Various

... great organ spoke, and the choir of sailors, soldiers, and nurses led the singing of the National Anthem. The first bar was sung by the choir alone, but by the time the third bar was reached thousands among the standing congregation were singing with them, and the volume of sound was most impressive. I think that a good many people besides myself found this solemn singing of the Anthem, from its first line to its last, something of a revelation. It made "God Save the King" ...
— The Message • Alec John Dawson

... prayer, that it might be "grafted inwardly" in his hearers' minds, it sounded very like a mockery—at least to Olive, who for the moment had almost forgotten that she was in a church. During the silent pause of the kneeling congregation, she raised her eyes and looked at the minister. He, too, knelt like the rest, with covered face, but his hands were not folded in prayer—they were clenched like those of a man writhing under some strong and secret agony; and when he lifted his head, his rigid features ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)

... tell you that it is the most northerly town in Europe, I think I have mentioned its only remarkable characteristic. It stands on the edge of an enormous sheet of water, completely landlocked by three islands, and consists of a congregation of wooden houses, plastered up against a steep mountain; some of which being built on piles, give the notion of the place having slipped down off the hill half-way into the sea. Its population is so and so,—its ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)



Words linked to "Congregation" :   congregate, collection, gathering, denomination, flock, assemblage, social group, assembly, aggregation, accumulation



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