"Proverb" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... that which I have already mentioned. Well says the proverb, that we ought to repeat twice and even thrice that ...
— Philebus • Plato
... The proverb that "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure," has been almost totally ignored in its relation to the laws which govern health. It seems quite as essential, however, to examine into the cause of disease as it is to seek for remedies which, in many instances, can work but ...
— Minnesota; Its Character and Climate • Ledyard Bill
... is a long one, says the proverb, and night came with the craft still miles away, but the sky was brilliantly clear, and the moon shone forth, showing the white-sailed schooner in a strangely weird fashion ...
— The Black Bar • George Manville Fenn
... the Brahmin's books that is in the Brahmin's heart. Neither you nor I knew there was so much evil in the world. —Hindu Proverb. ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... more seriousness than hitherto. The rifle firing ended, the hilarity lessened that afternoon. In the old times the keel-boatmen bound west started out singing. The pack-train men of the fur trade went shouting and shooting, and the confident hilarity of the Santa Fe wagon caravans was a proverb. But now, here in the great Oregon train, matters were quite otherwise. There were women and children along. An unsmiling gravity marked them all. When the dusky velvet of the prairie night settled on almost the last day of the rendezvous it brought a general feeling of ...
— The Covered Wagon • Emerson Hough
... all the guests by boat to Windsor, and very soon the little party at the Antelope was in a state of such perfect felicity as became a proverb with them all their lives afterwards. It was an inn wherein to take one's ease, a large hostel full of accommodation for man and horse, with a big tapestried room of entertainment below, where meals were taken, ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge
... much obliged if any of your correspondents or readers can inform me of the origin of the proverb "Ex pede Herculem." In what classical author is it to be found? I have looked in vain through ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 77, April 19, 1851 • Various
... cleared field or two, one of which seemed yet under cultivation and shewed corn stalks and pumpkin vines, but the other was in that poverty-stricken state described by the proverb as 'I once had.' The house was a mere skeleton. Clapboards, indeed, there were still, and shingles; but doors and windows had long since been removed—by man or Time,—and through the open spaces ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner
... and politeness always comes from within, and is born of a life of love, kindliness, and service. This is the universal language, known and understood everywhere, even when our words are not. There is, you know, a beautiful old proverb which says, "He who is kind and courteous to strangers thereby shows himself a citizen of the world." And there is nothing so remembered, and that so endears one to all mankind, as this universal language. Even dumb animals understand it ...
— What All The World's A-Seeking • Ralph Waldo Trine
... Jesuits, came into spiritual possession; and later on, episcopal rule succeeded to the influence of Loyola's disciples. The relative estimation in which these various orders of the Church were held being illustrated by a Canadian proverb: "Pour faire un Recollet, il faut une hachette, pour un Pretre un ciseau, mais pour un Jesuit, il ...
— Old Quebec - The Fortress of New France • Sir Gilbert Parker and Claude Glennon Bryan
... mercantile connexions, such as her father, if living, would have disdained. Her married life was, however, perfectly unclouded, her ample means gave her the power of dispensing joy, and her temperament was so blithe and unselfish that no pleasure ever palled upon her. Cheveleigh was a proverb for hospitality, affording unfailing fetes for all ages, full of a graceful ease and freedom that ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. I) - or, The Clue of Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... from time to time, and which were not allowed to become dead letters. A permanent committee of the three orders supervised the executive and the administration of the laws. These "twenty-two" received an appeal from the meanest citizen, and the Liege proverb "In his own home the poor man is king," was very near ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam
... Begemder, the proverb says, "is the maker and destroyer of kings;" certainly it was so in the case of Theodore. After the flight of Ras Ali, Begemder at once acknowledged him, and caused him to be looked upon as the future ruler of the land. Theodore was ...
— A Narrative of Captivity in Abyssinia - With Some Account of the Late Emperor Theodore, - His Country and People • Henry Blanc
... world's railway terminus. M. Emile Villars, who is so obliging as to make the observation, proceeds to be very clever. Scratch the Russian, and you know what you will find. I answer, a gentleman uninfluenced by a stale proverb; we have a delightful specimen in this very house. M. Villars is great at scratching, since his readers are recommended to grate Peruvians and Javanese. Under the three articles, we are told, lies the one barbarous material! The ladies of these ...
— The Cockaynes in Paris - 'Gone abroad' • Blanchard Jerrold
... the people. It required nine States to pass any measure of importance. During the war the confederacy was a pitiable failure. It issued bills which no one would take, its certificates of indebtedness and promises to pay were so worthless that it gave rise to the proverb, "Not worth a continental." Robert Morris, the financier, pleaded hopelessly for help. Alexander Hamilton denounced the confederation as "neither fit for war nor peace." Even Washington, always hopeful, wrote in 1781: "Our troops are fast approaching nakedness; our hospitals are ...
— Five Sermons • H.B. Whipple
... anxious and miserable man and I will tell you why, because you are understanding. You must not be angry if I now mention my wife in this affair. A mill and a woman are always in want of something, as our proverb says; but though we may know what a mill requires, who can guess a woman's whims? I am dazed with guessing wrong. I don't intend to be hard or cruel. It is not in me to be cruel to any woman. But how if your own woman ...
— The Red Redmaynes • Eden Phillpotts
... them watching that treasure. It'll be near where they are, and I'm going to snaffle it or break my neck—and all your necks—in the deuced desperate attempt. Is that clear? Where the carcass is, there wheel the kites and there the jackals fight, as your proverb says. The easiest part will be finding the ...
— Rung Ho! • Talbot Mundy
... boards and commissions are far less effective in getting things done than single men with clear-cut authority and equally clear-cut responsibility. Another principle, so well known that it has almost become a proverb, is to delegate everything you can, to do nothing that you can get someone else to do for you. But the wisdom of letting a good man alone is less commonly understood. It is sometimes as important for the superior officer not to worry his subordinate ...
— The Training of a Forester • Gifford Pinchot
... especially in the case of women whose life is entirely built up on certain emotions like the love and care of children; and when that is so, a nature becomes liable to the sharpest incursions of fear. It is of little use arguing such cases theoretically, because, as the proverb says, as the land lies the water flows,—and love makes very light of all ...
— Where No Fear Was - A Book About Fear • Arthur Christopher Benson
... old proverb from this time forth," said Mr. Taylor, as he leaned back against the wall and thrust his thumbs into the armholes of his vest. "Whistling girls and crowing hens will hereafter have a chance to be heard. Old saws ain't always true, ...
— Miss Dexie - A Romance of the Provinces • Stanford Eveleth
... from the hall, lest the wooers use it in the coming fray. He is to explain the removal by saying that it has been done, "Lest you fall to strife in your cups, and harm each other, and shame the feast, and this wooing; for iron of himself draweth a man to him." The proverb is manifestly of an age when iron was almost universally used for weapons, and thus was, as in Thucydides, synonymous with all warlike gear; but throughout the poems no single article of warlike gear is of iron except one eccentric mace and one arrow-head ...
— Homer and His Age • Andrew Lang
... long since passed into a proverb, that homely women are good, that plain women have strong common sense. An eminent writer asks, "Who ever saw a handsome talented woman?" There is among us a class of "strong-minded women," brave of heart and deep of soul, high of purpose and pure of life, who are stirring the country from ...
— Aims and Aids for Girls and Young Women • George Sumner Weaver
... about. A melancholy proverb, meaning that state of irritable intoxication when a man comes home and ...
— The English Gipsies and Their Language • Charles G. Leland
... wise, is but to make themselves the more remarkable fools, such an endeavor being but a swimming against the stream, nay, the turning the course of Nature, the bare attempting whereof is as extravagant as the effecting of it is impossible: for as it is a trite proverb, that an ape will be an ape, though clad in purple, so a woman will be a woman, that is, a fool, whatever disguise she takes up. And yet there is no reason women should take it amiss to be thus charged, for if they do but rightly consider, they will find to Folly they are beholden for those endowments ...
— Little Journeys To The Homes Of Great Teachers • Elbert Hubbard
... had elapsed since Madame had engaged M. Vandeloup and his friend, but as yet the Devil's Lead had not been found. Madame, however, was strong in her belief that it would soon be discovered, for her luck—the luck of Madame Midas—was getting quite a proverb in Ballarat. ...
— Madame Midas • Fergus Hume
... proverb which speaks of getting out of the frying-pan into the fire, which was indeed my unhappy case in this change of masters. This priest was, without exception, the most niggardly of all miserable devils I have ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VI. • Various
... Spanish proverb—'Subtract from a Spaniard all his good qualities, and the remainder makes a pretty fair Portuguese;' but, as there was nobody else to gamble with, she entered freely into their society. Very soon she suspected that there was foul play: all modes of doctoring dice ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... of a cup of coffee; and as the generous nectar warmed my veins my thoughts took a philosophical turn. It is fate who writes the was, the is, and the shall be. We have a proverb for every joy and misfortune. It is the only consolation fate gives us. It is like a conqueror asking the vanquished to witness the looting. All roads lead to Rome, and all proverbs are merely sign posts by which we pursue our destinies. And how was I to get to Rome? I knew ...
— Arms and the Woman • Harold MacGrath
... the case of a friend—a distinguished lawyer at the English bar. I had the circumstances from himself, which lie in a very small compass; and, as my friend is known, to a proverb almost, for his literal accuracy in all statements of fact, there need be no fear of any mistake as to the main points of the case. He was one day engaged in pleading before the Commissioners of Bankruptcy; a court then, newly appointed, and differently ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey, Vol. 2 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... There was a proverb as redoubtably popular as Solomon's "Spare the rod"; it originated in Brazil, where the natives were easily humiliated:—"Regarder un sauvage de travers, c'est le battre; le battre, c'es le tuer: battre un negre, c'est le nourrir": Looking hard at a savage is ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 65, March, 1863 • Various
... with this great body of bribery against him, was providentially freed from Nundcomar, one of his accusers, and, as good events do not come alone, (I think there is some such proverb,) it did so happen that all the rest, or a great many of them, ran away. But, however, the recorded evidence of the former charges continued; no new evidence came in; and Mr. Hastings enjoyed that happy repose which branded peculation, fixed and eternized ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. X. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... from the German natives, gets the peasant under his thumb again. Now, if any one of the young gentlemen would set us an example, would show us, "See, this is how you ought to manage!" ... What will be the end of it? Can it be that I shall die without seeing the new methods?... What is the proverb?—the old is dead, but the young ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Works of Ivan Turgenev, Vol. I • Ivan Turgenev
... etymology by following the gossamer clews that lead from sensual images to the metaphorical and tropical adaptations of them to the demands of fancy and thought. The nice optics that see what is not to be seen have passed into a sarcastic proverb; yet those are precisely the eyes that are in the heads and brains of all who accomplish much, whether in science, poetry, or philosophy. With the kind of etymologies we are speaking of, it is practically useful to have the German gift of summoning a thing ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 34, August, 1860 • Various
... know the old saying—'He that pleads his own cause has a fool for his client.' We cannot say that the proverb has held good in this case. The defendant has proved himself no fool. Never in my life have I listened to the pleadings of an opponent with deeper anxiety. Nature and the awful chances of life have made the defendant in this case more than eloquent. For a moment I actually trembled ...
— Stories of Comedy • Various
... course of time the merchant's son grew up. Praise be to Brahma! what a wonderful youth it was, with a face like a monkey's, legs like a stork's, and a back like a camel's. You know the old proverb:— ...
— Vikram and the Vampire • Sir Richard F. Burton
... the good God will arise to work miracles again, such things might be; but how can we look for Him to do so? What manner of man is the Dauphin of France that he should look for divine deliverance? 'God helps those who help themselves,' so says the proverb; but what of those who lie sunk in lethargy or despair, and seek to drown thought or care in folly and riotous living—heedless of the ruin ...
— A Heroine of France • Evelyn Everett-Green
... O Bhishma, is even like that of the old swan. These lords of earth might slay thee in anger like those creatures of the feathery tribe slaying the old swan. Persons conversant with the Puranas recite a proverb, O Bhishma, as regards this occurrence, I shall, O Bharata, repeat it to thee fully. It is even this: O thou that supportest thyself on thy wings, though thy heart is affected (by the passions), thou preachest ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... you are to room with Miss Sadie Minot, a young lady from Atlanta, Georgia, and I think you will find her an agreeable companion. However"—with a humorous twinkle in his eyes—"to use a homely proverb, 'it is Hobson's choice,' for it happens to be the only vacancy in the building; we have a very full school this year. I will call some one to show you how to find it, and have your trunk sent ...
— Katherine's Sheaves • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... darky as an inferior being," Charley had confided to Walter in a whisper. "There are rumors that there is more than one negro slave in the heart of the Everglades. The Seminoles have a proverb, 'White man, Indian, dog, nigger,' which expresses their opinion of the ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... was a proverb in Greenfield, conquered at last, and Hitty became conscious, to find herself in a chamber whose plastered walls were crumbling away with dampness and festooned with cobwebs, while the uncarpeted floor was checkered with green stains of mildew, and the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... had to wait until the rain made the ground soft enough for their ploughs to enter it, consequently many had to toil in cold, stormy, winter weather. To this the proverb alludes which says: "The sluggard will not plough by reason of the cold; therefore shall he beg in harvest, and have ...
— Mother Stories from the Old Testament • Anonymous
... the 'Seventy-two Departments that adhere to us.' And in a France begirt with Cimmerian invading Coalitions, and torn with an internal La Vendee, this is the conclusion we have arrived at: to put down Anarchy by Civil War! Durum et durum, the Proverb says, non faciunt murum. La Vendee burns: Santerre can do nothing there; he may return home and brew beer. Cimmerian bombshells fly all along the North. That Siege of Mentz is become famed;—lovers of ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... progress, and give the subject a little ventilation. We do not expect to furnish an Ariadne's thread, but we may hope to find some indication of the right way out of this labyrinth of uncertainty. Veritas nihil veretur nisi abscondi: or, as the German proverb says, "Truth creeps not into corners"; its life ...
— Moon Lore • Timothy Harley
... at the bait on Brown's hook, changed his mind, flirted his fins, and swam away—a proof of the proverb about second thoughts. A bird in the branches of the tree above the two men burst into ecstatic song. But neither heard him. "Mistah Breckenridge" had buried his black face in the cool grass, his hot tears falling fast upon it. Beside ...
— Many Kingdoms • Elizabeth Jordan
... that they may as well thy body as thy house defend. But, certes, to move war or suddenly to do vengeance, we may not deem [judge] in so little time that it were profitable. Wherefore we ask leisure and space to have deliberation in this case to deem; for the common proverb saith thus; 'He that soon deemeth soon shall repent.' And eke men say, that that judge is wise, that soon understandeth a matter, and judgeth by leisure. For albeit so that all tarrying be annoying, algates [nevertheless] it is no reproof [subject ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... through all future time,—whether they shall be blessed or banned, cursed or canonized. The judgment that shall be passed upon them and their work will be given according to the result, and from it there can be no appeal. The Portuguese have a well-known proverb, that "the way to hell is paved with good intentions;" but it is not the laborers on that broad and crowded highway who gain honorable immortality. The decisions of posterity are not made with reference to men's ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 61, November, 1862 • Various
... lesson from the life and character of Queen Victoria. Some will be surprised that this lesson should have been kept for the last one, as the kindness and sympathy of the late Queen was a proverb among her people. But, if we come to think of it, it is far best to have kept it to the last. Mere kindness, apart from sincerity, apart from moral courage, without the rainbow of purity, counts low among the virtues. We have known kind people, have we not, who were weak, ...
— The After-glow of a Great Reign - Four Addresses Delivered in St. Paul's Cathedral • A. F. Winnington Ingram
... bustled in and out of the kitchen, preparing the dinner-table in the long sitting-room, the hooks and door-handles seemed to have an unaccountable habit of thrusting themselves in her way, and she was ready to cry at each glance of Mark's laughing eyes. She had never heard the German proverb, "who loves, teases," and was too inexperienced, as yet, to have ...
— The Story Of Kennett • Bayard Taylor
... discovery himself, gossip [an intimate friend or companion (obsolete)]," said the elder personage; "it may, perchance, save a rope and break a proverb [refers to the old saw, 'Who is born to be hanged will ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... lye between Whitby and Gisborough.' The civic magnificence of Newcastle greatly struck our travellers, who, happier than their modern successors, were able to see the town miles off. The Itinerist quotes with gusto the civic proverb that the men of Newcastle pay nothing for the Way, the Word, or the Water, 'for the Ministers of Religion are maintained, the streets paved, and the Conduits kept up at the publick charge.' A disagreeable account is ...
— In the Name of the Bodleian and Other Essays • Augustine Birrell
... restored the Union. One of the regiments which came to Washington from New York, the Seventy-ninth Highlanders, becoming wretchedly disorganized, he detailed his brother, Colonel James Cameron, to command it. This settled all differences, the Scotchmen remembering the proverb that "The Camerons of Lochiel never proved false to a friend or a foe." In a few weeks, however, Colonel Cameron was killed at the Battle of Bull Run while bravely leading his men against the enemy. The weight of this great calamity fell upon Secretary Cameron at a time when the utmost powers ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... change of front when the old officer retired and a young and energetic man succeeded him. A "new broom" is eulogized in proverb; and Mr. Michael Bonar, being new to his district, and a man of youth and determination, boasted that he meant to sweep away the taint of smuggling from the neighborhood of Ardmuirland, which bore a ...
— Up in Ardmuirland • Michael Barrett
... piece of fun; and Pretty Bobby, one of Miss Mitford's delightful sketches. The Visit to the Zoological Gardens is not just what we expected; still it is attractive. Major Beamish has accommodated military tactics to the nursery in a pleasant little sketch; and the proverb of Much Coin Much Care, by Mrs. R.S. Jameson is a little ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 344 (Supplementary Issue) • Various
... so dissimilar to myself was a natural and necessary evil. I am, it is well known, of a robust and corpulent appearance, and at the same time somewhat diminutive in stature. What wonder, then, that the lath-like tenuity of my acquaintance, and his altitude, which has grown into a proverb, should have met with all due estimation in the eyes of Mrs. Lackobreath. ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 4 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... but by Danae's shower of gold, and still give thanks that you are not kept in reserve for some needy occasion? The native, whom they pretend to regard as an imbecile, is not so much so that he does not understand that it is ridiculous to work himself to death to become worse off. A proverb of his says that the pig is cooked in its own lard, and as among his bad qualities he has the good one of applying to himself all the criticisms and censures he prefers to live miserable and indolent, rather than play the part of the ...
— The Indolence of the Filipino • Jose Rizal
... reduced you sadly.' At last I spoke a little. 'I am glad to see you so merry, sir,' says I; 'but I think the doctor might have found something better to do than to make his game at his patients. If I had been ill of no other distemper, I know the proverb too well to have let him come to me.' 'What proverb?' says he, 'Oh! ...
— The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders &c. • Daniel Defoe
... Patriarchist Slavs whom they freely murdered, but even in many cases the very Exarchists, who came to dislike the komitadji bands, whom they were required to shelter and to feed and to assist with a subscription to their funds. "Still more," says a Bulgarian proverb—"still more than if you have a boat on the sea or a Roumanian wife, are you certain to sleep ill if you have a property in Macedonia." As year after year went by and the komitadji men appeared to be doing very little beyond terrorizing the country, those ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 1 • Henry Baerlein
... poor shooting of the British troop, in but little personal danger. One very unpleasant characteristic they have, and that is an absence of regard for the truth, especially where land is concerned. Indeed the national characteristic is crystallised into a proverb, "I am no slave to my word." It has several times happened to me, to see one set of highly respectable witnesses in a land case, go into the box and swear distinctly that they saw a beacon placed on a certain spot, whilst an equal number on the other side will swear ...
— Cetywayo and his White Neighbours - Remarks on Recent Events in Zululand, Natal, and the Transvaal • H. Rider Haggard
... where the proverb applies: "Measure ten times before you cut once." ... It is very painful ...
— The Live Corpse • Leo Tolstoy
... intrusted me with, that I may think of airting them your way INSTANTER; and so setting you up in practice, so far as my small business or influence may go; and, doubtless, Alan, that is a day whilk I hope may come round. But then, before I give, as the proverb hath it, "My own fish-guts to my own sea-maws," I must, for the sake of my own character, be very sure that my sea-maw can pick them to some ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... It is a proverb how different things are in theory and when reduced to practice. Agellius had thought of the end more than of the means, and had had a vision of Callista as a Christian, when the question of rites and forms would have ...
— Callista • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... might note How the popular vote, As shown in all legends and anecdote, Declares that a breach Of trust to o'erreach The devil is something quite proper for each. And, really, if you Give the devil his due In spite of the proverb—it's something you'll rue. But to lie and deceive him, To use and to leave him, From Job up to Faust is the way to receive him, Though no one has heard It ever averred That the "Father of Lies" ever yet broke HIS word, But has left this position, In every ...
— Complete Poetical Works of Bret Harte • Bret Harte
... Haydn. It was in Mannheim, on the way to Paris, that Mozart made the acquaintance of the copyist Weber, and succumbed to the charms of his daughter, Aloysia. But Leopold Mozart, wisely playing the role of stern father, soon sped the susceptible youth on his way to the French capital. It is a French proverb that tells us,— ...
— Woman's Work in Music • Arthur Elson
... good and better: think Of the choice that once a simple Mother gave her son: she said: "Egg or rasher, which will I give thee?" And he said: "The rasher, mother, But with the egg upon it, prithee". "Both are best", so says the proverb. ...
— The Two Lovers of Heaven: Chrysanthus and Daria - A Drama of Early Christian Rome • Pedro Calderon de la Barca
... did like Daniel as well as you do Billy. But we all know the proverb about old maid's daughters and old bachelor's sons. I wish you had Billy ...
— Masterpieces Of American Wit And Humor • Thomas L. Masson (Editor)
... the bamboo are available for food, and the Chinese have a proverb that it produces seed more abundantly in years when the rice crop fails, which means, probably, that in times of dearth the natives look more after such a source of food. The Hindus eat it mixed with honey as ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various
... on our hero developed into one of the most admired braves of his community. No one was more successful in battle, and it became almost a proverb that when Why-Why went on the war-path there was certain to be meat enough and to spare, even for the women. Why-Why, though a Radical, was so far from perfect that he invariably complied with the usages of his time when they seemed rational and useful. If a little tattooing ...
— In the Wrong Paradise • Andrew Lang
... vortex, tears off his clothes and dances before Samuel and David, the only self-possessed spectators of the bacchantic company, till he falls down; and he lies naked as he is a whole day and a whole night upon the ground—whence the proverb, "Is Saul also among the prophets?" But that David when he fled, fled in earnest and went in the direction of Judah, instead of amusing himself by going first towards the north, is perfectly evident, as much so as that it is a ...
— Prolegomena to the History of Israel • Julius Wellhausen
... say this that I think the same thing will be practised again, or anything like it, though I know that very homely proverb, "More ways of killing a dog than hanging him."—But I instance it to shew, the counsels of every grand juryman should be kept secret, that he may act freely and without apprehensions of resentment ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. VI; The Drapier's Letters • Jonathan Swift
... said, "alas, my poor Corinne! But consider. There is an English proverb: the horse needs must trot along, trot smart, when it ...
— The Island Mystery • George A. Birmingham
... Latin proverb,' said Mr. Ashburn, with a feeling that it was his turn—'an old Latin proverb, "Nec suetonius ...
— The Giant's Robe • F. Anstey
... reservation of a right in his successor to resume them for the public good, if he should think fit.[13] Hindoo sovereigns, or their priests for them, often tried to bar this right by invoking curses on the head of that successor who should exercise it.[14] It is a proverb among the people of these territories, and, I believe, among the people of India generally, that the lands which pay no rent to Government have no 'barkat', blessing from above—that the man who holds them is not blessed in their returns like the man ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman
... tempted by the Italian proverb about seeing Naples and then dying, were to ask us what is the most favourable moment for visiting the enchanted city, we should advise them to land at the mole, or at Mergellina, on a fine summer day and at the hour when some solemn procession is moving ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - NISIDA—1825 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... to congratulate you; I want to shake you by the hand! It's a long turn that has no lane at the end of it, as the proverb says, or somehow that way. You'll be happy yet, and Beriah Sellers will be there to see, ...
— The Gilded Age, Complete • Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner
... had promised him that a "child of God" would lead him. If he waited and trusted and just let things take their course, all things would come right. Haste comes of the devil—a true Eastern proverb, a warning far too little regarded by the Western children of speed. But his conscience rebuked him. Had he verily been one of those who do deeds of real kindness? Was he worthy to drink of the cup tempered with camphor? Had his deed been sincerely inspired by disinterested love towards ...
— There was a King in Egypt • Norma Lorimer
... fell before long; owing to treachery as tradition relates, but more probably to the improved siege artillery as the official despatches affirm. Most of the garrison were promptly hanged; a fatal blow was dealt to the insurrection. The "pardon of Maynooth" became a proverb. Skeffington, retaining the deputyship, was replaced in command of the army by Lord Leonard Grey, Kildare's brother-in-law, son of Lord Dorset; to whom ultimately Silken Thomas surrendered under a vague half-promise of lenient treatment. Kildare himself had ...
— England Under the Tudors • Arthur D. Innes
... seek the hand of Mireio for him, comes upon this evening scene. The interview of the two old men is like a Greek play; their wisdom and experience are uttered in stately, sententious language, and many a proverb falls from their lips. Ramoun has inflexible ideas as to parental authority: "A father is a father, his will must be done. The herd that leads the herdsman, sooner or later, is crunched in the jaws of ...
— Frederic Mistral - Poet and Leader in Provence • Charles Alfred Downer
... worked him for SILVER, the precious dollar that buy everything, that he send in the galleon to the Philippines for the silk and spice! THAT is good enough for HIM! For the gold he made nothing, even as my leetle wife Urania. And regard me here! There ees a proverb of my father's which say that 'it shall take a gold mine to work a silver mine,' so mooch more he cost. You work him, you are lost! Naturalmente, if you turn him round, if it take you only a silver mine to work a gold mine, you are ...
— Stories in Light and Shadow • Bret Harte
... defence thereof by Mr. Stuart, the letter of the retainers and the letters of the retained, will be a curiosity; the conduct of the whigs and democrats an amazement, and the peculiar institution a proverb amongst all the nations of the earth. In the turmoil of party politics, and of personal controversy, let us not forget continually to move the previous question, whether Freedom or Slavery is to prevail in America. There is ...
— The Trial of Theodore Parker • Theodore Parker
... for me to pass an opinion, Sir Walter. But the reverend gentleman, no doubt, understands such things. Only there's the Witch of Endor, if I may mention the creature, she fetched up more than she bargained for. And I remember a proverb as I heard in India, from a Hindoo. I've forgot the lingo now, but I remember the sense. They Hindoos say that if you knock long enough at a closed door, the devil will open it—excuse my mentioning such a thing; but ...
— The Grey Room • Eden Phillpotts
... a proverb in Gothic Christian art. One speaks of the "nave of Amiens, the bell towers of Chartres, the facade of Rheims." A month before the coronation of Charles X a swarm of masons, perched on ladders and clinging to knotted ropes, spent a week smashing with hammers every bit of jutting sculpture on the ...
— The Memoirs of Victor Hugo • Victor Hugo
... place in the year corresponding to 1 B.C. The laws of Ieyasu (1610 A.D.) likewise condemn this custom as unreasonable, together with the custom in accordance with which the retainers committed suicide upon the master's death. These same laws also refer to the proverb on revenge, given in the third paragraph of this chapter, and add that whoever undertakes thus to avenge himself or his father or mother or lord or elder brother must first give notice to the proper office of the fact and of the ...
— Evolution Of The Japanese, Social And Psychic • Sidney L. Gulick
... exact distance is a moot question), where she laid to and allowed her furnaces to cool The men were "dead tired out" after their night's work, and the captain considered that he was within the protection of French waters. But there is a very ancient proverb about a pitcher and a veil, and the period of its realization had been reached at last Whilst the San Margarita was effecting the landing, a coastguard's boat had slipped from under the heights of Fontarabia, and given notice of what was going on to the Buenaventura in Los ...
— Romantic Spain - A Record of Personal Experiences (Vol. II) • John Augustus O'Shea
... proposes and God disposes,' says the old proverb, and a very wise one too, as we proved before the next forty-eight hours ...
— The Penang Pirate - and, The Lost Pinnace • John Conroy Hutcheson
... sort of minds influenced by set sayings. A proverb is the half-way-house to an Idea, I conceive; and the majority rest there content: can the keeper of such a house ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... better or that they manage life better; the only moral that I seek to draw from these anecdotes is, that we should each understand and hence make allowance for the other fellow's way. You will admit, I am sure, be you American or English, that everybody has a right to his own way? The proverb "When in Rome you must do as Rome does" covers it, and would save trouble if we always obeyed it. The people who forget it most are they that go to Rome for the first time; and I shall give you both English and American examples of this presently. ...
— A Straight Deal - or The Ancient Grudge • Owen Wister
... sorts of queer answers to give to these questions, to quiz the passengers who ask them, and amuse themselves. For instance, if the passengers ask when any thing is going to happen, the sailors say, 'The first of the month.' That is a sort of proverb among them, and is meant only in fun. But if it happens to be near the end of the month, the passenger, supposing the answer is in earnest, goes away quite satisfied, while the sailors wink at each ...
— Rollo on the Atlantic • Jacob Abbott
... a woman in the Three Kingdoms but envied the Gunnings, and was 't not yourself told me, "the Luck of the Gunnings" was become a proverb in Ireland, and the highest wish for a girl? What will the sermonizers say now? That 'tis best to be homely and live to eighty? I know not; but 'tis as well the choice is not given, for I believe there is not ten women living but would ...
— The Ladies - A Shining Constellation of Wit and Beauty • E. Barrington
... of his discomfort. He knew now that Katy was necessary to his happiness. His feeling for her, lulled into unconsciousness by the dull round of domesticity, had been sharply stirred by the loss of her presence. Has it not been dinned into us by proverb and sermon and fable that we never prize the music till the sweet-voiced bird has flown—or in other no less ...
— The Trimmed Lamp and Others • O Henry
... said, seeing my uncertainty: "Why! don't you know me, your old college chum, your playmate in childhood, Arthur Granson! Does my turban make such a change in me? So much the better! Or are you mean enough to stick to the letter of the proverb which pretends that friends are not Turks? By Allah and his prophet Mahomet, I shall prove to ...
— The Cross of Berny • Emile de Girardin
... song, "fifteen and five make twenty-two." The signatures of Messieurs Postel and Gannerac were obviously given to oblige in the way of business; the Cointets would act at need for Gannerac as Gannerac acted for the Cointets. It was a practical application of the well-known proverb, "Reach me the rhubarb and I will pass you the senna." Cointet Brothers, moreover, kept a standing account with Metivier; there was no need of a re-draft, and no re-draft was made. A returned bill between the two ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... a thing willed, or a will.—This third meaning, which is generally given the least consideration, is the most significant. If, in truth, habit is the will of man, then this alone can be his real will. In this sense the proverb is significant that habit is called a second nature, and that man is a creature of habit. Habit is, in fact, a psychic disposition, which drives and urges to a specific act, and this is the will in its most outstanding form, as decision, ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... regiment. As soon as this process was complete, the event of the war was decided. The Cavaliers had now to encounter natural courage equal to their own, enthusiasm stronger than their own, and discipline such as was utterly wanting to them. It soon became a proverb that the soldiers of Fairfax and Cromwell were men of a different breed from the soldiers of Essex. At Naseby took place the first great encounter between the Royalists and the remodelled army of the Houses. The victory of the Roundheads was complete and decisive. It was followed ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 11 • Various
... months before would not have dared to raise their eyes from the dust before me. I lived in continual terrour, frighted by every noise at the door, and terrified at the approach of every step quicker than common. I never retired to rest without feeling the justness of the Spanish proverb, "Let him who sleeps too much, borrow the pillow of a debtor:" my solicitude and vexation kept me long waking; and when I had closed my eyes, I was pursued or insulted by ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson
... Despite the old proverb, "Never cross a bridge till you get to it," we had, because of the very absence of a bridge, been running ahead of ourselves during the entire trip, to make the dreaded crossing over this deceptive and gormandizing stream. We had now ...
— In the Early Days along the Overland Trail in Nebraska Territory, in 1852 • Gilbert L. Cole
... The other Beatrice was Ercole's half-sister, the elder daughter of Niccolo III., who had long been the ornament of her father's court, when she had been known as the Queen of Feasts, and it had become a common proverb that to see Madonna Beatrice dance was to find Paradise upon earth. In 1448, at the age of twenty-one, this brilliant lady had wedded Borso da Correggio, a brother of the reigning prince of that city, and, after her first husband's early death, had become the wife of Tristan Sforza, ...
— Beatrice d'Este, Duchess of Milan, 1475-1497 • Julia Mary Cartwright
... impressed me with so high a sense of Chilian hospitality, that, heartbroken as I had been by the infamous persecution which had driven me from the British navy, I decided upon Chili as my future home; this decision, however, being only an exemplification of the proverb ...
— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 1 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald
... who had executed such a neat manoeuvre at Gilling's. One or two of the papers actually published leaderettes upon the subject, severely criticising the incompetency of the police in such matters. I have since heard, however, that at Scotland Yard there is a proverb that the wealthier the thief the less chance of his being caught. Bindo and his friends certainly did not lack funds. The various hauls they had made, even since my association with them, must have put many thousands into ...
— The Count's Chauffeur • William Le Queux
... know about that! There's a proverb which says, "He laughs longest who laughs last," and we've yet to see who that will be. So far, the men have burnt Balmoral, but that loss is insured against; but they have not bettered their position, and they are losing money, whereas the ...
— Sarah's School Friend • May Baldwin
... myself, for having waited till I heard of your being again immerged into the land of newspapers before forwarded your key. However, as you have at length got them safe, I claim absolution under the proverb, that 'all ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... citizen of Miletus, who betrayed his country to the people of Prien. When asked what he purposed, he replied, "Nothing bad," which expression had therefore passed into a proverb. ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al
... world, I shall not raise my voice in its defence. I am aware how deficient the Poem is in point of art, and it is not without considerable misgivings that I have ventured to publish even this fragment of it. 'Enough,' says the old proverb, 'is as good as a ...
— The Suppressed Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... a bush stuck up before the door of what seemed to be a wine-shop. If so, it is the ancient custom, so long disused in England, and alluded to in the proverb, "Good wine needs no bush." Several times we saw grass spread to dry on the road, covering half the track, and concluded it to have been cut by the roadside for the winter forage of his ass by some poor peasant, or peasant's wife, who had no ...
— Passages From the French and Italian Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Latin proverb runs, 'Be on such terms with your friend as if you knew he may one day become your enemy.' Friendship, I realize, is precious and gained only after long days of probation. The tough fibers of the heart constitute its essence, ...
— The Loyalist - A Story of the American Revolution • James Francis Barrett
... always to himself, and concludes that if Persius had not been obscure, there had been no need of him for an interpreter. Yet when he had once enjoined himself so hard a task, he then considered the Greek proverb, that he must [Greek text which cannot be reproduced] (either eat the whole snail or let it quite alone); and so he went through with his laborious task, as I have done with ...
— Discourses on Satire and Epic Poetry • John Dryden
... returned with the Moors, who said, that far from wishing to do us harm, they had come to offer us their assistance, and to conduct us to Senegal. This offer being accepted of with gratitude by all of us, the Moors, of whom we had been so afraid, became our protectors and friends, verifying the old proverb, there are good people every where! As the camp of the Moors was at some considerable distance from where we were, we set off altogether to reach it before night. After having walked about two leagues through the burning sands, we found ourselves again upon the shore. ...
— Perils and Captivity • Charlotte-Adelaide [nee Picard] Dard
... that proverb long ago," said Cranfield, "by taking their galleons laden with plate from ...
— The Actress in High Life - An Episode in Winter Quarters • Sue Petigru Bowen
... wondrous pitiful. Cupid, tear off your bandage, new string your bow and tip your arrows with harder adamant. Oh! shame upon you, only hear the words of your exultant votarist—'Even Love, which according to the proverb conquers all things, when put in competition with painting, must yield the palm and be a willing captive.' Oh! fie, fie, good master Cupid, you shoot but poorly if a victim so often wounded can talk ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Samuel F. B. Morse
... advance of his contemporaries, and of most of ours too. Johnson liked satisfying food, such as a leg of pork, or veal pie well stuffed, with plum pie and sugar, and he devoured enormous quantities of fruit, especially peaches. His inordinate love of tea has almost passed into a proverb,—he has actually been credited with twenty-five cups at a sitting, and he would keep Mrs. Thrale brewing it for him till four o'clock in the morning. The following impromptu, spoken to Miss Reynolds, points ...
— Stories of Authors, British and American • Edwin Watts Chubb
... dim dawn, she lay and thought it over, Clover slumbering soundly beside her meanwhile. "Morning brings counsel," says the old proverb. In this case it seemed true. Katy, to her surprise, found a train of fresh thoughts filling her mind, which were not there when she fell asleep. She recalled her passionate words and feelings of the day before. Now that the mood had passed, they seemed to her worse ...
— What Katy Did At School • Susan Coolidge
... assured that she is received into his glory, and beyond the cares of this rough and weary world. The next thing is to watch and labor in all matters for the service of our sovereign the king, and to endeavor to alleviate his grief. His majesty is the head of Christendom. Remember the proverb which says, when the head suffers all the members suffer. Therefore all good Christians should pray for his health and long life; and we, who are in his employ, ought more than others to do this with all study and ...
— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving
... an oil-can. He's out of oil, and has come a-begging. However curious it may seem for an oil-ship to be borrowing oil on the whale-ground, and however much it may invertedly contradict the old proverb about carrying coals to Newcastle, yet sometimes such a thing really happens; and in the present case Captain Derick De Deer did indubitably conduct a lamp-feeder as Flask did declare. As he mounted the deck, ahab abruptly ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... and the President du Ronceret looked at Camusot, and one thought troubled their minds. The lady's tone, the way in which she flung her proverb in the faces of the eight conspirators against the house of d'Esgrignon, caused them inward perturbation, which they dissembled as provincials can dissemble, by dint of lifelong practice in the shifts of a monastic existence. Little Mme. Camusot ...
— The Collection of Antiquities • Honore de Balzac
... says Helen Keller, 'that when the Lord took from me one faculty, He gave me another, which is in no way impossible. I think of the beautiful Italian proverb, 'When God shuts a ...
— Crayon and Character: Truth Made Clear Through Eye and Ear - Or, Ten-Minute Talks with Colored Chalks • B.J. Griswold
... fisherman the greatest pleasure has been the certainty of something new to learn, to feel, to anticipate, to thrill over. An old proverb tells us that if you wish to bring back the wealth of the Indias you must go out with its equivalent. Surely the longer a man fishes the wealthier he becomes in experience, in reminiscence, in love of nature, if he goes out with the harvest of a quiet eye, free from the ...
— Tales of Fishes • Zane Grey
... allow him a chair, she permitted him to remain standing at the counter and smoke his cigar while they conversed. It was this indulgence which occasioned people to think that she would marry the doctor; but at last they got tired of waiting, and it became a sort of proverb in Fisher's Alley and its precincts, when things were put off to an indefinite period, to say, "Yes, that will be done when the widow ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... the mine; as is the nose, or rather face, of a lion or leopard still remaining at Stamford, which also gave name to the edifice it adorned. And hence, when Henry VIII. debased the coin by an alloy of copper, it was a common remark or proverb, that 'Testons were gone to Oxford, to study in Brasen Nose.' " -Churton's Life of Bishop Smyth, ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... amuses nor diverts his mind, that which seems to him to miss the magic and to lack the charm of happiness, let him pass on, with as much charity as he can spare for the anthologist, remembering the proverb of Terence and counting himself an infinitely happier man for this clear proof ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... punishment, Bzekiel did not believe that it would last for ever. The righteousness of God would not permit future generations to be held responsible for ever for the sins of generations past and present. "What mean ye, that ye use this proverb concerning the land of Israel, saying, The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge? As I live, saith the Lord God, ye shall not have occasion to use this proverb any more in Israel! Behold, all souls ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 9 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... those, father," replied Robert, merrily; "but, as the proverb says, you must shell the peas before you can eat them. It was necessary that I should first work in ...
— Words of Cheer for the Tempted, the Toiling, and the Sorrowing • T. S. Arthur
... Catholic, favoured the Huguenots; narrowly escaped at the Massacre of St. Bartholomew; was killed at the siege of Epernay; carried a note-book with him everywhere, and so observant was he that it passed into proverb, "You will find it in Biron's ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... BORGIA forms, with his father Pope Alexander VI., and his sister Lucrezia, one of a trio who have become a proverb for infamy of every kind. His father, Roderigo, was by birth a Spaniard, and by education a lawyer, in which profession he gained much distinction, till suddenly, with an impetuosity strange in a man who did everything ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang
... be loaded above her birth-marks, for, says a maritime proverb, a master must know the capacity of his vessel, as well as a rider the ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... pours," said Joe, quoting an old proverb. "I begin to think I shall be rich some time, ...
— Joe's Luck - Always Wide Awake • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... completed his education at Rome, and began to practise at the bar about 68. But he was chiefly distinguished as a teacher of eloquence, bearing away the palm in his department from all his rivals, and associating his name, even to a proverb, with preeminence in the art. By Domitian he was invested with the insignia and title of consul, and is, moreover, celebrated as the first public instructor who, in virtue of the endowment by Vespasian, received a regular salary from the imperial exchequer. ...
— The Training of a Public Speaker • Grenville Kleiser
... pretty, the wives and daughters of the principal merchants of Rouen, who were waiting to compliment him. He seated himself in this charming circle, and remained there perhaps a quarter of an hour; then passed into another room, where awaited him the representation of a little proverb, containing couplets expressing, as may be imagined, the attachment and gratitude of the inhabitants of Rouen. This play ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... despite of the fact that the meat was only half done. But hunger is the best cook, as the proverb says, and he was not very fastidious. Anything would have tasted good to ...
— Three Young Pioneers - A Story of the Early Settlement of Our Country • John Theodore Mueller
... proverb which tells us how poverty makes us acquainted with strange bed-fellows, this poor old shaking body has to lay herself down every night in her workhouse bed by the side of some other old woman with whom she may or may not agree. She herself can't be a very pleasant bed-fellow, poor thing! ...
— Some Roundabout Papers • W. M. Thackeray
... unwilling to take his departure for the purpose of dressing himself. Monsieur, singing, laughing, and admiring himself, passed away the time until the dinner-hour, in a frame of mind that justified the proverb of "Happy as ...
— Ten Years Later • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... Negropont. According to the proverb, the Turks of Egripo, the Jews of Salonica, and the Greeks of Athens, are the worst of their ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... the popular proverb, which very well expresses our idea: "That which is worth taking, ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to Senegal in 1816 • J. B. Henry Savigny and Alexander Correard
... "Oh, of a courage! But as the proverb says, 'If you set an Englishman by a hornets' nest they shall not remain ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... bitter enmity with them, they gather together and eat him in vengeance of his revolt, and like infernal leeches suck his blood," a custom of which a modern Mongol writer thinks that he finds a trace in a surviving proverb. Among more remote and ignorant Franks the cannibalism of the Tartars was a general belief. Ivo of Narbonne, in his letter written during the great Tartar invasion of Europe (1242), declares that the Tartar chiefs, with their dog's head followers ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... the land, so that during the first sixteen days I had only one view of the Cordillera behind Lima. These mountains, seen in stages, one above the other, through openings in the clouds, had a very grand appearance. It is almost become a proverb, that rain never falls in the lower part of Peru. Yet this can hardly be considered correct; for during almost every day of our visit there was a thick drizzling mist, which was sufficient to make the streets muddy and one's clothes damp: this ...
— A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World - The Voyage Of The Beagle • Charles Darwin
... was never mean. "Don't spoil the ship for a ha'po'rth of tar," was a favourite motto of his. She had ever thought it a proverb both pleasant and wise. She was not an extravagant woman, but she also liked to have things well done, and had no sympathy with cheese-paring ways. The house was well and handsomely furnished, she and the children had plenty of dress, their table was an excellent one, all of them indulging ...
— Mrs. Day's Daughters • Mary E. Mann
... passage in Scripture where both kinds of influence are illustrated. "Iron sharpeneth iron; so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend. As in water face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man." The first part of the proverb refers to direct influence: as "iron sharpeneth iron," so one man applying to another his powers of persuasion, his motives in the shape of money or some other inducement, moulds, fashions, sharpens him to his liking. "As in ...
— Life and Conduct • J. Cameron Lees
... who has been after me like a hungry wolf after a caribou all these years. I knew there was trouble coming, and I came home and made ready for it. I guessed I'd fight through it all right on my own, my luck was a proverb in the States about '76. I never doubted that it would be ...
— The Valley of Fear • Arthur Conan Doyle
... average strength of each corps was one thousand men. Who could have believed that the Place de l'Hotel de Ville was capable of accommodating so many! This farcical assertion of the two hundred and fifteen battalions has passed into a proverb.] ...
— Paris under the Commune • John Leighton
... know it has got to be a proverb, "When a woman hesitates, she is lost." Mollie had begun to hesitate, and Mollie ...
— The Unseen Bridgegroom - or, Wedded For a Week • May Agnes Fleming
... age of puberty for both sexes is quite as much later than in the heart of the towns, where, in order to gratify their vanity, people are often extremely parsimonious in the matter of food, and where most people, in the words of the proverb, have a velvet coat and an empty belly. It is astonishing to find in these mountainous regions big lads as strong as a man with shrill voices and smooth chins, and tall girls, well developed in other respects, without any trace of the periodic functions ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... argument, is not always painted in shadow, its horizon obscured by dark-tinted nebulosities! On the contrary, there is ever some light infused into it, to bring out the deeper tones—"a silver lining" generally "to every cloud," as the proverb has it. So, I now experienced, as I ...
— She and I, Volume 2 - A Love Story. A Life History. • John Conroy Hutcheson
... old horse. I scored heavily at the end of the visit. She'd got to the quoting-proverbs stage by that time. 'Ah, my dear,' she said to Millie. 'Marry in haste, repent at leisure.' Millie stood up to her like a little brick. 'I'm afraid that proverb doesn't apply to me, Aunt Elizabeth,' she said, 'because I haven't repented!' What do you ...
— Love Among the Chickens • P. G. Wodehouse
... bushes that in 1375 a law was passed according to which all taverners in the city of London owning ale-stakes projecting or extending over the King's highway more than seven feet in length, at the utmost, should be fined forty pence, and compelled to remove the sign. Here is the origin, too, of the proverb, "good wine needs no bush." In the later development of the inn the signs lost their Bacchic character and became most elaborate, often being ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... he is much given to;] for who can take upon him to write of the proper duty, virtue, challenge and right of EVERY several vocation, profession and place? [—truly?—] For although sometimes a looker on, may see more than a gamester, and there be a proverb more arrogant than sound, 'that the vale best discovereth the hill,' yet there is small doubt, that men can write best, and most really and materially of their own professions,' and it is to be wished, he says, 'as that which would ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... only thinking of the Swiss proverb about lightning, 'Vor den Eichen sollst du weichen.' We ought to make ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... devices of this cleanliness, which know no bounds, when it can command the labor of others? Which of the people who have become rich has not experienced in his own case, with what difficulty he carefully trained himself to this cleanliness, which only confirms the proverb, "Little white hands ...
— What To Do? - thoughts evoked by the census of Moscow • Count Lyof N. Tolstoi
... a smile of the proverb Which says you may treat as you will The vase which has once contained roses, Their fragrance will cling to ...
— Pipe and Pouch - The Smoker's Own Book of Poetry • Various
... keep quiet, because that's a bad man. Talk! He was born to talk. Don't let him get out with you; he'll skin you." I said, "I have been skinned, skinned, and skinned for years, there is nothing left." He said, "Oh, you'll find there is; that man is the very seed and inspiration of that proverb which says, 'No matter how close you skin an onion, a clever man can always peel it again.'" Well, I reflected and I quieted down. That would never occur to Tom Reed. He's got no discretion. Well, MacVeagh is just the same man; he hasn't changed ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... inconsistent with constitutional loyalty, and all weapons but those of justice and truth. "We are a loyal people, and have given abundant proof of our loyalty, but it is not an unalterable principle. There is an old proverb: 'The sweetest wine makes the sourest vinegar.'" On the departure of the delegates (Jan. 15, 1851) they were attended by the Launceston Association and a large concourse of people. The vessels in the harbour were decorated with their colours, and the ...
— The History of Tasmania, Volume I (of 2) • John West
... her and Emma. It was a bright summer afternoon; and for a wonder I was suffered to remain from school, although I received numerous charges to keep my tongue still, and was again reminded of that excellent old proverb (the composition of some old maid, I know), "Children should be seen and not heard;" so, seated in a corner, my hand pressed closely over my mouth, the better to guard against contingencies, I looked on and thought, with ineffable satisfaction, how much handsomer ...
— Homestead on the Hillside • Mary Jane Holmes
... which I acknowledge, and am sorry I did not expresse my intent, or that I was so weak as to use so foolish a proverb. ...
— Medical Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... existence of a strong spirit. Sweet-tempered, acquiescent, gentle, every one had known her alike in joy or under the burden of disappointment and disillusion. "As docile as Daisy" might have been a proverb in the neighborhood, so general was this view of her nature. Least of all did the selfish, surly-tempered, wilful young Englishman who was her husband, and who had ridden rough-shod over her tender thoughts and dreams these two years, suspect that she had in her the capabilities ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... being punished and then, after all, seeing nothing but bottles, did seem rather unfair.... So I—walked around to—to see if I could find something to look at which would repay me for the punishment.... There is a proverb, isn't there Pa-pah?—something about being executed for ...
— The Green Mouse • Robert W. Chambers
... One of these was Blackmore, at some distance from Shenfield. The manor-house of Blackmore is called Jericho; so when Harry chose to retire with his mistresses, the cant phrase among the courtiers was, "He was gone to Jericho." Hence this proverb or saying. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 338, Saturday, November 1, 1828. • Various
... more than her share of civic business; her reputation for absolute reliability caused people to get into the habit of saying "Oh, go to Miss Beach!" on every occasion, and as she invariably proved the willing horse, she justified the proverb and received ...
— The Luckiest Girl in the School • Angela Brazil
... with the lesson it is designed to teach; these are kept distinctly separate in the parable. Myths are fictitious stories, sometimes with historic basis of fact, but without symbolism of spiritual worth. A proverb is a short, sententious saying, in the nature of a maxim, connoting a definite truth or suggestion by comparison. Proverbs and parables are closely related, and in the Bible the terms are sometimes used interchangeably.[653] The Old Testament contains two parables, a ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage
... acrimonious invectives that the unlucky discovery of the three members of Parliament at the Blue Posts cost thirty honest gentlemen their seats. One of the criminals, Tredenham, escaped with impunity. For the dominion of his family over the borough of St. Mawes was absolute even to a proverb. The other two had the fate which they deserved. Davenant ceased to sit for Bedwin. Hammond, who had lately stood high in the favour of the University of Cambridge, was defeated by a great majority, and was succeeded by the glory of the Whig ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 5 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... their teaching, and the consciousness that Julie held her talent as a direct gift from GOD, and never used it otherwise than to His glory. She has penned nothing for which she need fear reproach from her favourite old proverb, "A wicked book is all the wickeder because it can never repent." It is difficult for those who admire her writings to help regretting that her life was cut off before she had accomplished more, but to still such regrets we cannot do better than realize (as a kind friend remarked) "how much ...
— Juliana Horatia Ewing And Her Books • Horatia K. F. Eden
... anxiously changed the dwelling, and went to live in the city, opposite a school, where her son found examples the most worthy of imitation, and began to profit by them. This anecdote has become incorporated by the Chinese into a proverb, which they constantly quote: The mother of Mentius seeks ...
— The Art of the Story-Teller • Marie L. Shedlock
... return to Rome he finds that a rival, profiting by his absence, has taken his place with a young girl whom he was to have married. So great a misfortune demands an heroic remedy, and Della Valle makes a vow of pilgrimage to the Holy Sepulchre. But if, as saith the proverb, there is no road which does not lead to Rome, so there is no circuit so long as not to lead to Jerusalem, and of this Della Valle was to make proof. He embarks at Venice in 1614, passes thirteen ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part I. The Exploration of the World • Jules Verne
... cheerful and hopeful men, who went about their business with a smile on their faces, and took the changes and chances of this mortal life like men, facing rough and smooth alike as it came, and so found the truth of the old proverb, that 'Good times, and bad times, and all times pass over.' Of all men, perhaps, who have lived in our days, the most truly successful was the great Duke of Wellington; and one thing, I believe, ...
— The Good News of God • Charles Kingsley
... light, which may be effectually accomplished by means of yellow calico. A free supply of water is indispensable, which may be conveyed both to and from by means of the gutta percha tubing now in such general use. We apprehend, however, that the old proverb, "You must cut your coat according to your cloth," is most especially applicable to our querist, for not only must the house be constructed according to the advantages afforded by the locality, but the amount of expense will be very differently thought of by different persons: one will be content ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 197, August 6, 1853 • Various
... the Rhodians could bear witness of it. One of the company replied, "If you speak the truth, think this place to be Rhodes, and jump here;" when it turned out that he could do nothing, and was glad to make his exit. The English proverb, "Great boast and small roast," is ...
— Talkers - With Illustrations • John Bate
... I am fairly settled at home again, and can look back over my late travels with the coolness of a spectator, it seems to me that I must have tired out all men, women and children that have had to do with me by the road. The proverb says 'there is much ado when cadgers ride.' I do not know precisely what 'cadger' means, but I imagine it to be a character like me, liable to head-ache, to sea-sickness, to all the infirmities 'that flesh is heir to,' ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury
... dedicated to Athene, and being respected at Athens, it had greatly multiplied. Hence the proverb, 'taking owls to Athens,' similar to our English 'taking ...
— The Birds • Aristophanes
... girls lonely!" retorted Mr. Wilkinson. "Ridiculous! That is certainly a fine ground on which to seek sympathy from me! I forget who it is has the proverb, 'Never pity a woman weeping or a cat in the dark.' And I am reminded of it when I look at you two. You and my fair cousin, when you have one another to talk to, are just about as much in need of sympathy as a tiger is of tea . . . Speaking of tea—" he turned to Isabel with bland inquiry ...
— White Ashes • Sidney R. Kennedy and Alden C. Noble
... Turkmans homines bestiales. In our day Ainsworth notes of a Turkman village: "The dogs were very ferocious;... the people only a little better." (J. R. G. S. X. 292.) The ill report of the people of this region did not begin with the Turkmans, for the Emperor Constantine Porphyrog. quotes a Greek proverb to the disparagement of the three kappas, Cappadocia, Crete, and Cilicia. ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa |
