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More "Adversity" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... complete his list with officers of inferior rank. Once at Valley Forge he permitted his aides to give a dinner for junior officers on condition that none should be admitted that had on a whole pair of breeches. This was making the most of adversity. While wearing two stars and serving as Inspector General of the Army, he would still devote his whole day to the drilling of a squad of 10 or 12 men to get his system going. To a former Prussian associate he wrote this ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense
... dealt largely in satire and humor; but joyousness deals in infinitely more. Mirth and laughter are all very well, but they are not all in all. Cheerfulness requires something more than a well-balanced Rabelaisian nonchalance in adversity and a keen relish for ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3 No 2, February 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... which is due to him in every way—due to him as the heir in direct line to the wealth, and, above all, to the honor of the Bassetts; due to him as Sir Charles Bassett's heir at law; and due to him on account of the decency and fortitude with which he has borne adversity, and with which ...
— A Terrible Temptation - A Story of To-Day • Charles Reade
... one questions whether pain is a positive sensation or not; no one at least whose head has been bowed by adversity until his lips have touched the bitter waters, and tasted perhaps largely of their unpleasantness! Pain is vastly more to the human heart than the absence of pleasure; pain is not merely an emptiness, or void, ...
— The Doctor's Daughter • "Vera"
... effect of his presence was almost magical. The Romans flocked to welcome their former liberator, and he was reinstalled in power with the title of senator, conferred upon him by the Pope. But his character was not improved by adversity, and his rule was more arbitrary and selfish ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... Prussia was completely realizing the idea of a nation in arms. In 1914, when they were commanders, France was inferior to a still greater degree in point of numbers to Prussianized Germany. In armament, France was inferior at first to her enemy. The French High Command has thus been trained by adversity to do all that human intellect can against almost overwhelming hostile material forces. General Joffre, General Castelnau—and, later, General Petain, who at a moment's notice displaced General Herr—had to display genius where the Germans ...
— History of the World War - An Authentic Narrative of the World's Greatest War • Francis A. March and Richard J. Beamish
... world is this we live in! We view with calm indifference the downfall of our fellow-mortals. We see them struggling in the billows of adversity, and as our proud bark of wealth glides swiftly by, we extend no helping hand to the worn swimmer. And yet we can look upon our past life with complacency, can delight to recall the hours of happiness we have past, and if some scene of penury and grief is recalled ...
— The Trials of the Soldier's Wife - A Tale of the Second American Revolution • Alex St. Clair Abrams
... shown in her deeds as well as her writings. And thus commenced the literary career of another successful author, who, but for the existence of the Era, would probably have been left to struggle on in the adversity from which her pen has so creditably ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866 • Various
... this lower ideal of happiness, and teaches us that there is something higher. His ministry began with declaring, "Blessed are they that mourn." It has been well said that prosperity was the blessing of the Old Testament, and adversity of the New. Christ came to show us a nobler style of living and bearing; and so far as he had a personal and earthly life, he buried it as a corner-stone on which to erect a new ...
— The Pearl of Orr's Island - A Story of the Coast of Maine • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... sincerity as first principles," surprised his disciples; and Tsze-kung, who was generally the spokesman on such occasions, asked him whether it was right to violate the oath he had taken. But Confucius, who had learned expediency in adversity, replied, "It was an oath extracted by force. The spirits ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 • Various
... the crown jewels of one of the Turkish princesses; and of the buskin of another, which she dropt in her flight from Bokhara, as being worth two thousand pieces of gold.[34] Such had been the prosperity of the barbarian invaders, such was its end; but not their end, for adversity did them service, as well as ...
— Historical Sketches, Volume I (of 3) • John Henry Newman
... pause also she saw him as he was—a man broken before his prime, haggard and tired and old, with the fire of his genius quenched for ever in the bitter waters of adversity. ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... marrow of your master when he is fortunate,' writes Milo of Poictiers: 'if it lasts him, he is a slow spender of his force; but on that account all the more dangerous in adversity, having the deeper funds. By this I would be understood to imply that the devil of Anjou, turned to fighting uses in King Richard's latter years, found him a habitable fortalice.' With the best reasons in life for the reflection, he might ...
— The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay • Maurice Hewlett
... defaces, and dethrones the Christ-image that you should reflect. Whatever purifies, sanctifies, and consecrates human life, is not an enemy, however much we suffer in [20] the process. Shakespeare writes: "Sweet are the uses of adversity." Jesus said: "Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake; ... for so persecuted they the prophets which were ...
— Miscellaneous Writings, 1883-1896 • Mary Baker Eddy
... the means of opening the negotiations with his father—Sir George Burnley, baronet, of Chudleigh Grange, Devon—that resulted in a complete and permanent reconciliation between the two. Gurney—or Burnley, to give him his correct name—had learned his lesson while passing through the fires of adversity. He had learned, in the school of experience—that best of all schools—that the so-called pleasures of sin endure but for a very brief season and are inevitably followed by misery, suffering, shame, and self-contempt beyond all power of words to express; and he had the resolution ...
— Overdue - The Story of a Missing Ship • Harry Collingwood
... Angier of Cambridge, poor man, making his moan, and obtained of me that I would send his son to sea as a Reformado, which I will take care to do. But to see how apt every man is to forget friendship in time of adversity. How glad was I when he was gone, for fear he should ask me to be bond for him, or to borrow ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... are frequently linked together, more often in later life, when adversity has blunted the faculties, or the drill routine of an uneventful existence has destroyed all romance. Then the writing has short, up and down strokes, the curves are round, the bars short and straight; there ...
— Disputed Handwriting • Jerome B. Lavay
... on multiplying corpses in ourselves; for all of which, are resurrections. Every thought's a soul of some past poet, hero, sage. We are fuller than a city. Woe it is, that reveals these things. He knows himself, and all that's in him, who knows adversity. To scale great heights, we must come out of lowermost depths. The way to heaven is through hell. We need fiery baptisms in the fiercest flames of our own bosoms. We must feel our hearts hot—hissing in us. And ere their fire is revealed, it must ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. II (of 2) • Herman Melville
... philosophy had its legitimate parent in Hume, or in themselves, were labelled "Comtists" or "Positivists" by public writers, even in spite of vehement protests to the contrary. It has cost Mr. Mill hard rubbings to get that label off; and I watch Mr. Spencer, as one regards a good man struggling with adversity, still engaged in eluding its adhesiveness, and ready to tear away skin and all, rather than let it stick. My own turn might come next; and, therefore, when an eminent prelate the other day gave currency and authority to the popular confusion, I took an opportunity of incidentally revindicating ...
— Lay Sermons, Addresses and Reviews • Thomas Henry Huxley
... the one Brahma. He also cultivated Yama, that is, inoffensiveness, truth, honesty, the forsaking of all evil in the world, and the refusal of gifts except for sacrifice, and Nihama, i.e., purity relative to the use of water after defilement, pleasure in everything whether in prosperity or adversity, renouncing food when hungry, and keeping down the body. Thus delivered from these four enemies of the flesh, he resembled the unruffled flame of the lamp, and by Brahmagnana, or meditating on the ...
— Vikram and the Vampire • Sir Richard F. Burton
... competing North: ground into oblivion between the clashing trades of the competing men and the clashing jewels and chandeliers of their competing wives—while yours have lingered on, spared by your very adversity. And that's why I shall miss your old people when they follow mine—because they're the last of their kind, the end of the chain, the bold original stock, the great race that made our glory grow and saw that it did grow through thick and thin: ...
— Lady Baltimore • Owen Wister
... those mysteries which raise men above the passions, the mischances, the pains, the sorrows of life, a state only to be attained by rivalling the firmness of the ancient Stoic, and dost thou shrink from the first pressure of adversity, and forfeit the glorious prize for which thou didst start as a competitor, frightened out of the course, like a scared racer, by shadowy and ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... pictures. We have reason to believe, that children, who have not been accustomed to read a vast deal of poetry, are not, for that reason, less likely to excel in poetic language. The reader will judge from the following explanations of Gray's Hymn to Adversity, that the boy to whom they were addressed, was not much accustomed to read even the most popular English poetry; yet this is the same child, who a few months afterwards, wrote the translation from Ovid, of the Cave of Sleep, and who gave the extempore description of a summer's evening ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... different, O Spotless Lamb of God, those pangs which rent Thy guiltless bosom! How sweet those comforts Thou hast promised to the comfortless, when I think of them as flowing from an Almighty Fellow-Sufferer,—"A brother born for adversity,"—the "Friend that sticketh closer than any brother!"—one who can say, with all the refined sympathies of a holy exalted human nature, "I know your sorrows!" My soul! calm thy griefs! There is not a sorrow thou canst experience, but Jesus, in the treasury of grace, has an ...
— The Faithful Promiser • John Ross Macduff
... of Angouleme. The uniquely mournful history of her girlhood, and her subsequent marriage with her cousin, the son of the Count of Artois, made her the natural object of a warmer sympathy than could attach to either of the brothers of Louis XVI. But adversity had imprinted its lines too deeply upon the features and the disposition of this joyless woman for a moment's light to return. Her voice and her aspect repelled the affection which thousands were eager to offer to her. Before the close of the first days of the restored ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... grateful; I cannot desert my native State in the hour of her adversity. I must abide her fortunes, ...
— Recollections and Letters of General Robert E. Lee • Captain Robert E. Lee, His Son
... threaten us, there is but one course for men of God to take; that is, to keep inviolate the holy covenants they have made in the presence of God and angels. For the remainder, whether it be life or death, freedom or imprisonment, prosperity or adversity, we must trust in God. We may say, however, if any man or woman expects to enter into the celestial kingdom of our God without making sacrifices and without being tested to the very uttermost, they have not understood the Gospel ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... always plain and modest. And thus have we impartially described the internal and external parts of a person, whose death hath been much regretted; a person who had tried the smiles and frowns of time; not puffed up in prosperity, nor shaken in adversity, always holding the ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... deities! can he That has a wife e'er feel adversity? Would men but follow what the sex advise, All things would prosper, all the world grow wise. Twas by Rebecca's aid that Jacob won His father's blessing from an elder son: 70 Abusive Nabal owed his forfeit life To the wise conduct of a prudent wife: ...
— Poetical Works of Pope, Vol. II • Alexander Pope
... and equipped with the ready casuistry to justify any transgression of the moral code, Hajji Baba never strikes a really false chord, or does or says anything intrinsically improbable; but, whether in success or adversity, as a victim of the roguery of others, or as a rogue himself, is faithful to a type of human character which modern times and a European surrounding are incapable of producing, but which is natural to a state of society in which ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier
... of his resolution, he, as it were, put his shoulder to the falling commonwealth, and kept it up from foundering through the failings and weakness of others. Perhaps it may be more easy to govern a city broken and tamed with calamities and adversity, and compelled by danger and necessity to listen to wisdom, than to set a bridle on wantonness and temerity, and rule a people pampered and restive with long prosperity as were the Athenians when Pericles held the reins of government. But then again, not to be daunted ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... have full enjoyment of prosperity, unless with one whose pleasure in it was equal to your own? Nor would it be easy to bear adversity, unless with the sympathy of one on whom it rested more heavily than on your own soul. Then, too, other objects of desire are, in general, adapted, each to some specific purpose,—wealth, that you may use it; power, that you may receive the homage of those ...
— De Amicitia, Scipio's Dream • Marcus Tullius Ciceronis
... obligations. During her prosperity, and consequent idleness, she did not, I am told, enjoy a good state of health, having a train of nervous complaints, which, though they have not a name, unless the significant word ennui be borrowed, had an existence in the higher French circles; but adversity and virtuous exertions put these ills to flight, and dispossessed her of a devil who ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... Holy Word teaches us to pray for others, as well as for ourselves, we most humbly beseech Thee, of Thy goodness, O Lord, to comfort and succour all those who are in trouble, sorrow, need, sickness, or any other adversity, especially such as may now be exposed to the dangers of the deep, or afflicted with cold and hunger. Bestow upon them Thy rich mercies, according to their several wants and necessities, and deliver them out of their ...
— Stray Leaves from an Arctic Journal; • Sherard Osborn
... because of her likeness to her mother. Her temper, her vanity, her headstrong trickiness are Catherine Earnshaw. But Catherine Linton is a healthy animal, incapable of superhuman passion, capable only (when properly chastened by adversity) of quite ordinary pity and devotion. She inspires bewilderment, but terror and fascination never; and never the glamour, the magic evoked by the very name of Catherine Earnshaw. Her escapades and fantasies, recalling Catherine Earnshaw, are all on ...
— The Three Brontes • May Sinclair
... rise again, and that if the next American city to sustain disaster shall but have this simple lesson learned in advance, it may thereby register a new high mark in municipal intelligence and a new record among the rebuilt cities, by making more sweet than any other city ever made them, the uses of adversity. ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street
... the poor was not caused directly by the desire for wealth (people, as a general thing, do not covet that which they deem it illegitimate to acquire), but by a natural instinct of the plebeians, which led them to seek the cause of their adversity in the constitution of the republic. So we are doing to-day; instead of altering our public economy, we demand an electoral reform. The Roman people wished to return to the social compact; they asked for reforms, and demanded ...
— What is Property? - An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government • P. J. Proudhon
... resistance. No prince ever suffered a severer humiliation than did the Saxon monarch during the dreary winter of 878; but, according to Asser, it was for his ultimate good. Alfred was deeply and sincerely religious, and like David saw the hand of God in all his misfortunes. In his case adversity proved the school of greatness. For six months he was hidden from public view, lost sight of entirely by his afflicted subjects, enduring great privations, and gaining a scanty subsistence. There are several popular legends about his life in ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VIII • John Lord
... melancholy, was too bad. At first I was for giving all up and going home. But, after a little reflection, I determined to summon what energy I had, and to weather the storm. I said to myself, 'I have never yet quitted a place without gaining a friend; adversity is a good school; the poor are born to labour, and the dependent to endure.' I resolved to be patient, to command my feelings, and to take what came; the ordeal, I reflected, would not last many weeks, and I trusted it would do me good. I recollected the fable of the willow and the oak; I bent ...
— Selected English Letters (XV - XIX Centuries) • Various
... victories, is the way of a quiet and sincere submission. It is easy to submit to the Will of God when it sends us joy and peace, when it makes us courageous, high-hearted, and just. The difficulty is to acquiesce when He sends us adversity, ill-health, suffering; when He permits us to sin, or if that is a faithless phrase, does not grant us strength to resist. But we must try to be patient, we must try to interpret the value of suffering, the meaning of failure, the ...
— From a College Window • Arthur Christopher Benson
... said Harper, in a low tone. "How grand! how awfully sublime!—may such a quiet speedily await the struggle in which my country is engaged, and such a glorious evening follow the day of her adversity!" ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... fighting rather than by a consideration of expediency. Now in engaging in war we ought to make it appear that we have no other view than peace. But the character of a brave and resolute man is not to be ruffled with adversity, and not to be in such confusion as to quit his post, as we say, but to preserve a presence of mind, and the exercise of reason, without departing from his purpose. And while this is the characteristic of a lofty spirit, so this also is that of a powerful intellect; namely, to anticipate ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume II (of X) - Rome • Various
... outward signs. Conscience has been described as a most importunate monitor, paying no respect to persons, and making cowards of us all. Now, as far as I have been able to judge from external evidence, there is not a greater courtier than conscience. It is true, that, when in adversity, he upbraids us, and holds up the catalogue of our crimes so close to our noses, that we cannot help reading every line. It is true, that, when suffering with disease, and terrified with the idea of going we know not where, ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat
... belong to her, and attracted those who did. With men and women her relations were noble,—affectionate without passion, intellectual without coldness. The world was free to her, and she lived freely in it. Outward adversity came, and inward conflict; but that faith and self-respect had early been awakened which must always lead, at last, to an outward serenity and an ...
— Woman in the Ninteenth Century - and Kindred Papers Relating to the Sphere, Condition - and Duties, of Woman. • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... to children: Genius, exercise, and instruction. When asked the difference between the learned and the ignorant, he replied: "The same as between the living and the dead." "Knowledge," he said, "is an ornament in prosperity, and in adversity a refuge. Those who give children a good education, are much more their fathers than those who have begotten them; the latter communicate mere life to them; the former put it in their power to spend it comfortably." "Beauty," said he, "is a recommendation infinitely stronger ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 3 of 8 • Various
... the acts of some gifts are not possible in heaven; for Gregory says (Moral. i, 15) that "understanding . . . penetrates the truths heard . . . counsel . . . stays us from acting rashly . . . fortitude . . . has no fear of adversity . . . piety satisfies the inmost heart with deeds of mercy," all of which are incompatible with the heavenly state. Therefore these gifts will not remain ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I-II (Pars Prima Secundae) - From the Complete American Edition • Saint Thomas Aquinas
... genius and brings forth valuable inventions, is by no means favorable to their adoption and general use. On the contrary, by a sort of fatality which seems to be a law of their existence, they are doomed to struggle with adversity and fierce opposition, and they are left by the occasion which gave them birth as its repudiated offspring—a legacy to the future emergency which will cherish and perfect them, make them available, and enjoy the full benefit to be ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... little doubt that a new era has dawned upon old Erinn's shores. It remains to be proved if her sons shall be as faithful in prosperity as they have been in adversity. It remains to be proved, if opportunities are afforded us of obtaining higher intellectual culture without the danger of the moral deterioration which might have attended that culture under other circumstances, whether we ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... should be kept from the evil. There is but one evil. They were not to be kept from persecution, from earthly suffering and loss, from pain or sorrow: these are not the evils from which men's lives need to be guarded. The only real evil is sin. Our danger in trouble or adversity is not that we may suffer, but that we may sin. The pleading of Jesus was that his friends might not be hurt in their souls, in ...
— Personal Friendships of Jesus • J. R. Miller
... I cannot, for they are far worse off than these. Having been reared in affluence, with tenderer feelings and weaker muscles, as well as more delicate health, they are much less able to fight the battle of adversity than the lower poor, and I happen to know that the dear Misses Seaward are reduced just now to the very last extreme of poverty. But ...
— The Young Trawler • R.M. Ballantyne
... his two heroes, Wilfred and Etienne, if heroes they can be called, as types of the English and Norman youth of the period, alike in their merits and in their vices. The effects of adversity on the one, and of success and dominant pride on the other—happily finally subdued in each case beneath the Cross on Calvary—form the chief attempt at ...
— The Rival Heirs being the Third and Last Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... and squabble and jander at each other, but when trouble comes, they cling together. That's what the psalmist means when he says 'A brother is born for adversity.' It's the day of trouble that proves what your ...
— Purple Springs • Nellie L. McClung
... whom had been hit, hastily regained the boats. Thus perished the illustrious Magellan on the 27th of April, 1521. "He was adorned with every virtue," says Pigafetta, "and ever exhibited an unshaken constancy in the midst of the greatest adversity. At sea he always condemned himself to greater privations than the rest of his crew. Better versed than any one else in the knowledge of nautical charts, he was perfect in the art of navigation, as he proved by making the tour of the world, which none before him had ventured to do." Pigafetta's ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part I. The Exploration of the World • Jules Verne
... how good and pious you are, because it may happen that those who, like you, are flung into the storms of life upon the perilous waves of human interests might be tempted to utter blasphemies in the midst of their adversity,—carried away as they are by anguish. Curse neither the men who injure you nor the God who mingles, at His will, your joy with bitterness. Look not on life, but lift your eyes to heaven; there is comfort for the ...
— Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau • Honore de Balzac
... in gladness, If any drop of pity in you be, Remember you for old past heaviness, For Godde's love, and on adversity That others suffer; think how sometime ye Founde how Love durste you displease; Or elles ye have won it ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... a courage and manliness which he had not formerly shown. It was clear that adversity had ...
— Chester Rand - or The New Path to Fortune • Horatio Alger, Jr
... one remembers when he stood in such sore need of friends that he dislikes even the appearance of passing by on the other side. There are no riches in the world like stanch friends who prove themselves to be such in your need, your adversity, or your weakness. I have some treasured letters received after it had been telegraphed throughout the land that I was a bankrupt and had found myself many thousands of dollars worse off than nothing. The kindly words and looks, the cordial grasp of the hand, and the temporary ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... deep Tragedy, touches the Soul with as much delicate Sensibility, and, in the irrefrainable Sallies of the more boisterous Passions, soars with as majestick Wings, as any one of them, I will not say higher. To behold Mr. Barry, sublimely struggling in a Storm of Adversity, with the sudden Shocks, and unexpected Blows of Fortune; then, (when all human Efforts must yield to inevitable Necessity) sinking in the irretrievable Plunge of Sorrow and Calamities, with that calm Resignation ever attendant on true Heroism; must convince ...
— An Essay on the Antient and Modern State of Ireland • Henry Brooke
... and the poets do not understand it. You can't go along sweeping a clear path for your feet with a bunch of flowers. What you need is a good, sound club. When a hairy shin impedes, whack it, or make a feint and a bluff. You'll be surprised how easily the terrifying hulks of adversity are charmed out of the highway ahead of you by a little impertinence, a little ginger, and ...
— Claim Number One • George W. (George Washington) Ogden
... the many days of his adversity Captain Kettle had never shunned any risks which came in his way, with this new prosperity fresh and pleasant at his feet, he was beginning to tell himself that risks were foolish things. He arrived off Dunkhot and rang off his engines, and ...
— A Master of Fortune • Cutcliffe Hyne
... the property of another, and were they sold to make restitution for their crimes? No! Did their present masters, as an act of kindness, redeem them from some heathen tyrant to whom they had sold themselves in the dark hour of adversity? No! Were they born in slavery? No! No! not according to Jewish Law, for the servants who were born in servitude among them, were born of parents who had sold themselves for six years: Ex. xxi, 4. Were the female slaves of the South sold by their fathers? How shall I answer ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... Second, though he passed his youth in the school of adversity, learned no other lesson from it than the following one—take care of yourself, and never do an action, either good or bad, which is likely to bring you into any great difficulty; and this maxim he ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow
... rendered to labor the introduction of the sliding scale is chief. It is the solution of the capital and labor problem, because it really makes them partners—alike in prosperity and adversity. There was a yearly scale in operation in the Pittsburgh district in the early years, but it is not a good plan because men and employers at once begin preparing for a struggle which is almost certain to come. It is far better for both employers and employed to set no date for an agreed-upon ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie • Andrew Carnegie
... woe?" cried the old man, in answer to her request. "Ah, no! why should your tender heart be wounded by another's griefs? I have been buffeted by the storms of affliction—I have struggled against the billows of adversity—every wave of sorrow has rolled over me; but," added he, while a glow of conscious integrity suffused his furrowed cheek, "I have always done my duty; and that conviction has buoyed me up when ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 10, No. 272, Saturday, September 8, 1827 • Various
... am I stronger and mightier in my soul. Lo, of such hate cometh virtue, of such feebleness cometh strength, and of such displeasaunce cometh pleasaunce. This holy hate maketh a man meek, and to feel meek things of himself. It maketh him patient in adversity, temperate in prosperity, and setteth him in all honesty of virtue, and maketh him to be loved both of God and man. And where this holy hate is not, there is inordinate love, which is the stinking canal of all sin, ...
— The Cell of Self-Knowledge - Seven Early English Mystical Treaties • Various
... killed his thousands, prosperity hath killed his ten thousands; therefore adversity is to be preferred. The one deceives, the other instructs; the one miserably happy, the other happily miserable; and therefore many philosophers have voluntarily sought adversity and so much ...
— Pearls of Thought • Maturin M. Ballou
... of buckwheat. It is then their stores are greatest. As soon as a stock is pretty well supplied with this world's goods, like some bipeds, they become very haughty, proud, aristocratic, and insolent. A great many things are construed into insults, that in their days of adversity would pass unnoticed; but now it is becoming and proper for their honor to show a "just resentment." It behooves us, therefore, to ...
— Mysteries of Bee-keeping Explained • M. Quinby
... the first of these distinctions that the life of the average man is essentially one of the greatest boredom; and thus we see the rich warring against boredom with as much effort and as little respite as fall to the poor in their struggle with need and adversity. And from the second of them it follows that the life of the average man is overspread with a dull, turbid, uniform gravity; whilst the brow of genius glows with mirth of a unique character, which, although he has sorrows of his own more poignant than those of the average man, nevertheless ...
— The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; The Art of Controversy • Arthur Schopenhauer
... for his attempts to restore the religious peace of Christendom: all the violent condemned him, and opposed his projects. The contradictions, which he met with, chagrined him; so that he sometimes lost that tranquillity of mind, which he had possessed in his deepest adversity. But, to use his own words, he looked to the blessed Peacemaker for his reward, and trusted that posterity would do justice ...
— The Life of Hugo Grotius • Charles Butler
... the work of God, but you will find nothing in anything that you can see that shall enable you to forecast the future with any certainty. Adversity follows prosperity, and my counsel is to make the best use of both,—enjoy this when it comes, and let that teach you that God's ways are inscrutable, nor can you straighten out the tangle of His providences. Evidently he intends these vicissitudes that still follow no definite ...
— Old Groans and New Songs - Being Meditations on the Book of Ecclesiastes • F. C. Jennings
... adversity,'" Mr. Murray quoted, with a peculiar smile. "There was talent and good sense in Eddie after all, though I sometimes half doubted it. Some day he will see the wisdom of his choice, and be glad to feel that he laboured with his hands to do the thing ...
— Little Folks (December 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... Adversity had sharpened her intuitions, developed her sensibilities; what others might fear, she knew, and this commonplace held all her disappointment, all the chagrin and hopelessness that in an instant had dissipated the roseate dreams she ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... their rigour; so that revenge, their only justice, was still prosecuted with some regard to humanity and generosity. The lessons of the worthy old monk, better attended to, perhaps, during a long illness and adversity, than they might have been in health and success, had given young Durward still farther insight into the duties of humanity towards others; and considering the ignorance of the period, the general prejudices entertained in favour of a military life, and ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... of that Great Man and was lost in admiration and amazement. "He is unimpeachably Honest, Trustworthy and True," said I. "He is Humble and Modest even in his Superiority, and has Hope of Improvement; he is Brave in meeting adversity and Patient in bearing it. He is Chaste and Temperate, he is Generous and Unselfish and Self-sacrificing, he is Persevering and Diligent, Faithful and Enduring. He ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... unpleasing, even degenerate characters, about him, is brightened by the thought of his loyalty to his court painter and life-long friend. When the king's favourites fell, those who had been the friends of Velasquez, the artist loyally remained their friend in adversity as he had been while they were powerful. This constancy, even to the royal enemies, was never resented by Philip. He honoured the faithfulness of his artist, even as he himself was faithful in this friendship. Philip's court was such that there ...
— Pictures Every Child Should Know • Dolores Bacon
... of moral health, is impossible; they have always, at least, the art by which they live—agriculture or seamanship; and in these industries, skilfully practised, you will find the law of their moral training; while, whatever the adversity of circumstances, every rightly-minded peasantry, such as that of Sweden, Denmark, Bavaria, or Switzerland, has associated with its needful industry a quite studied school of pleasurable art in dress; and generally also in song, and simple ...
— Lectures on Art - Delivered before the University of Oxford in Hilary term, 1870 • John Ruskin
... no great hope of life, but youth at length got the victory of sickness. Palladius, having gotten his health, Kalander, who found in him a piercing wit, void of ostentation, high-erected thoughts seated in a heart of courtesy, and a behaviour so noble as gave a majesty to adversity, and enamoured with a fatherly love towards him, proceeded to tell ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... a little what I meant by saying that Englishmen are muddle-headed, because they never have been forced by political adversity to mistrust their tempers and depend on a carefully stated case as Irishmen ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various
... of nature to man by which his biotic life is sustained, his food, drink, clothing and shelter. These bounties come not in a never-changing stream, but are apparently fitful and capricious. Seasons of plenty are accented by seasons of scarcity, and thus prosperity and adversity are strangely commingled in the history of the people. To secure this prosperity and avert this adversity seems to be the second great motive in the development of the superstitious practices of the people. Athird occasion for the development of this primitive religion ...
— Seventh Annual Report • Various
... breeding—clothing and shelter, and the means to live fittingly.... For it is not condescension, not the lesser charity I ask, or she could receive; it is the countenance that birth lends to its equal in dire adversity." ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers
... his lordship sent to them they should have been so unfortunate as to want the present means to oblige so honorable a friend. But Timon begged them not to give such trifles a thought, for he had altogether forgotten it. And these base, fawning lords, though they had denied him money in his adversity, yet could not refuse their presence at this new blaze of his returning prosperity. For the swallow follows not summer more willingly than men of these dispositions follow the good fortunes of the great, nor more willingly leaves ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... because intricate. They were swept without a breathing pause down to the bottom. Those who have always been accustomed to prosperity have no reserve of experience or courage to enable them to recuperate from sudden and extreme adversity. In an amazingly short time the Cassatts had become demoralized—a familiar illustration of how civilization is merely a wafer-thin veneer over most human beings as yet. Over how many is it more? They fought after ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips
... cheerfulness with which Henry had ever given him joy upon every happy occasion—even amidst all the politer congratulations of his other friends—seemed to the dean mournfully wanting. This derogation from his felicity he was resolved to resent; and for a whole year these brothers, whom adversity had entwined ...
— Nature and Art • Mrs. Inchbald
... behaviour, or compared with those of other sectaries. Under the former head they were fully silenced by our author in 'The Presbyterians' Plea of Merit Impartially Examined'. They are now put in the balance with Papists, whom though they have sometimes styled their brethren in adversity, yet when placed in competition, they will hate as brethren likewise. But let them here dispute the preference, and then put in their claim to be part of the establishment." "The arguments pretended to be urged by the Roman ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IV: - Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Volume II • Jonathan Swift
... welcome the poor fellows home, and the Mayor entertained them at a banquet, to which also he invited some two hundred townsmen. Among the guests he was good enough to include me; for it has been a consolation to me, ladies, and a source of pride, that my friends in Falmouth have not withdrawn in adversity the respect which in old ...
— Poison Island • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... and listens with an ill-concealed grin as each in turn boasts of the rat-catching powers of his dog at home. Then the War dog retreats hurriedly as a mouse appears; and you, his victim, apologise for him and explain how he has been shaken by adversity and what a noble creature a few days of good food and kind treatment will make of him. The rest is simple. The War dog (with his court) invades your bed and home parcels, and brings you into disrepute with all and sundry—especially the Cook and Quarter. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Sept. 26, 1917 • Various
... to Paris in 1818 a ruined man. He had no interest, and wished for none. He would have died twenty times over sooner than ask a favour of anyone; he would not even press the recognition of his claims. Adversity and hardship had developed his energy even in trifles, while the habit of preserving his self-respect before that spiritual self which we call conscience led him to attach consequence to the most apparently trivial actions. His merits and adventures became known, however, through his acquaintances, ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac
... he do—this hero in gray with a heart of gold? Does he sit down in sullenness and despair? Not for a day. Surely God, who had stripped him of his prosperity, inspired him in his adversity. As ruin was never before so overwhelming, never was restoration swifter. The soldier stepped from the trenches into the furrow; horses that had charged Federal guns marched before the plow, and fields that ran red with human blood in April were green ...
— America First - Patriotic Readings • Various
... her treasurer's report said the past year had been an unusually hard one financially not because of adversity but because of prosperity. Formerly the States had sent their money to the national treasury to be used as the Official Board thought best, but now there were so many campaigns and new lines of work in various ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume V • Ida Husted Harper
... was with Pharaoh. We are amazed at it till we think how infinitely patient He has been with ourselves. By storm, by black night, by adversity after adversity, God is doing His best to fight Pharaoh back from the Bed Sea. He is doing all He can to turn him away from committing suicide in body and suicide in soul. But Pharaoh, as some of ourselves, seemed absolutely greedy for damnation. He seemed ...
— Sermons on Biblical Characters • Clovis G. Chappell
... long time," he said quickly, "Mademoiselle Phillis has inspired me with a deep sentiment of esteem and tenderness; I have not been able to see her so courageous, so brave in adversity, so decided in her character, so good to you, so charming, without loving her, and I have come to ask you to give her to me ...
— Conscience, Complete • Hector Malot
... the third day the confinement was growing irksome in the extreme; and the Doctor, after his daily visit, gave Singh permission to come down into the grounds if he liked. But the boy did not like. A glance at his companion in adversity revealed a disappointed look, and as soon as the Doctor was gone he picked up one of the books with which they were ...
— Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn
... tempestuous life, drawn on to the very evening ere I began. But those inmost and soul-piercing wounds, which are ever aching while uncured; with the desire to satisfy those few friends, which I have tried by the fire of adversity, the former enforcing, the latter persuading; have caused me to make my thoughts legible, and myself the subject of every ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot
... our brave daughter, and your young courage will be invaluable to us now. Your talents will be our flowers by the way-side. We shall take the keenest possible delight in watching them expand, as, even under the cloud of financial adversity, we know they will." ...
— A Daughter of To-Day • Sara Jeannette Duncan (aka Mrs. Everard Cotes)
... not envy you your triumph—we will not participate in your victory. Small in numbers, and, it may be, uninfluential in debate, we will yet stand forward to protest against your measures. You will triumph; yes, and you will triumph over men whose moderation in prosperity, and whose patience under adversity has commanded admiration—but whose fatal fault was, that they trusted you. You will triumph over them in strange coalition with men, who, true to their principles, can neither welcome you as a friend, nor respect you ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846 • Various
... the shore, and displaying the British flag, floating in the morning breeze, evidently preparing to hoist sail. Now is their chance. This must be their ark of safety if they are ever to escape such billows of adversity as they have been struggling with for some days past. To get on board is that upon which their hearts are set, and all that is required in order to defy all enemies and pursuers. Not thinking that there is anything in the wind, in this pretty hamlet, they make straight for the vessel, ...
— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean
... who exercised the most important influence upon the life of Mme. de Sevigne was Corbinelli, the wise counselor, who, with a soul untouched by the storms of adversity through which he had passed, devoted his life to letters and the interests of his friends. No one had a finer appreciation of her gifts and her character. Her compared her letters to those of Cicero, but he always sought to temper her ardor, and to turn her thoughts toward an elevated Christian ...
— The Women of the French Salons • Amelia Gere Mason
... made friends of, etc.: i.e., let Winter (Adversity) estrange those whom Summer (Prosperity) made friends of, but let it not ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson
... old church in Siena, but which certainly can bear no relation and hold no message for the modern reader. For the electric life of the hour,—full of color and vitality; throbbing with achievement; the life that craves prosperity as its truest expression, and finds adversity a poor and mean failure quite unsuitable to a man of brilliant gifts and energy; the life that believes in its own right of way and mistakes possessions for power,—what has it to do with "tribulation" except to refuse it? If it comes it is met with indignant protest ...
— The Life Radiant • Lilian Whiting
... intimacy was fully renewed. I was not very well off, and adversity was hanging heavily on him; his resources frequently failed him. We passed our time like two young fellows of twenty-three who have little money and less occupation. Bonaparte was always poorer than I. Every day we conceived some new ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... over, Mary showed not only more courage, but more sound sense than I could have believed. All the frivolity of her former character vanished at the first touch of adversity; just as of old, Harry, we left the tinsel of our gay jackets behind, when active service called upon us for something more sterling. She advised, counselled, and encouraged me by turns; and in half an hour the most poignant regret I had was in not having sooner ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... places aforetime assigned to beauty and splendour—these are our daily and hourly reminders of the "great tribulation" through which the nation is passing. Of course, one ought not to wish it otherwise. Not, indeed, "sweet," but eminently salutary, are these "uses of adversity," for they prevent us from forgetting, even if we were inclined to such base obliviousness, the grim realities of the strife in which we are engaged. And yet, and in spite of all this, beauty retains ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell
... become ennobled under the pressure of adversity; but limited means and petty money cares had no good effect upon Ronald Earle. He fretted under them. He could do nothing as other people did. He could not purchase a magnificent bouquet for the countess; his means would not permit it. He could not afford ...
— Dora Thorne • Charlotte M. Braeme
... of the British army!" roared Jack. "It is blind adversity to the luck of the Boy Scouts! Here we've got the pirates bunched! As soon as we communicate with a man-of-war, we'll turn 'em over to Uncle Sam and go back ...
— Boy Scouts in a Submarine • G. Harvey Ralphson
... have little wealth to lose; A man I am cross'd with adversity; My riches are these poor habiliments, Of which if you should here disfurnish me, You take the sum ...
— The Two Gentlemen of Verona • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]
... confidence, vigorous animal spirits, and the perseverance and indefatigable industry, supplied by corporal strength, the obstructions must be numerous and great that can prevent the possessor from rising. In Hodgkinson those requisites were united in an eminent degree. No adversity could crush his energies, no prosperity impair his industry. It was but a few months before his death that old Mr. Whitlock under whose management Hodgkinson had early in life played in the north of England, said to this writer, ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various
... breast with a ball, the last convulsions of death were upon him, and he expired almost immediately after our arrival. The frightful, the appalling truth now burst upon me, that I was alone in the desert. He who had faithfully served me for many years, who had followed my fortunes in adversity and in prosperity, who had accompanied me in all my wanderings, and whose attachment to me had been his sole inducement to remain with me in this last, and to him alas, fatal journey, was now no more. For an instant, I was almost tempted to wish that it had been my own fate ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre
... to be a hard schoolmaster, but I should be sorry to feel that this great lesson in adversity has not brought forth fruits of some value. I needed the discipline this tribulation has given me, and I really feel, after all, that this, like many other apparent evils, was only a blessing in disguise. Indeed, I may mention that the very clock factory ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... on suppressing riots, by saying, "It has long been my opinion, that in times of national adversity, those citizens are entitled to the highest praise, who, by personal exertions and active valor, promote, at their private hazard, the ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. VIII • Various
... is to the man whom they are devouring. But the man survives the smoke, while the insects succumb to it, being destroyed or driven away. Therefore the smudge, dark and bitter in itself, frequently becomes, like adversity, sweet in its uses. It must be regarded as a form of fire with which man has made friends under the pressure of ...
— Fisherman's Luck • Henry van Dyke
... Thus prosperity and adversity, success and failure, continually test a man. If he can rise superior to these, can subjugate them and make them subserve his moral progress, he survives; if he is mastered by them, he perishes. Through these does natural selection mainly work ...
— The Whence and the Whither of Man • John Mason Tyler
... is first clubbed on the head and then stroked on the back by these foreigners, her dear friends. Friends! It is only when the cold season comes that we know the pine-tree and the cypress to be evergreens, and friends are known in adversity. The foreigners who profess to be our friends are waiting and hoping for adversity to come upon us, that they may profit by it. They want our untouched wealth, our mines of coal and iron and gold, and it is upon them they have cast ...
— My Lady of the Chinese Courtyard • Elizabeth Cooper
... his, may well be excused the utterance of its pains, when wounded by those for whom it would so cheerfully have poured forth its blood. We repeat, that Cowley's misfortune was his devotion to a family, who invariably forgot, in their prosperity, those who had defended them in the day of adversity. ED.] ...
— Lives of the Poets, Vol. 1 • Samuel Johnson
... desire to help her, as I will show you presently," Rosmore returned. "Tell me what she has said to you. Two women in adversity ever ...
— The Brown Mask • Percy J. Brebner
... now to look round for danger, but, unstopping his water-bottle, he crept closer to his companion in adversity, passed the strap of the boy's shako from under his chin, thrust his cap from his head to lie amongst the grass, and then opened the collar of his coatee and began to trickle a little water between the poor fellow's lips and sprinkled a ...
— !Tention - A Story of Boy-Life during the Peninsular War • George Manville Fenn
... the masterful race that overran the world under the names of a dozen different peoples. Ice and snow made the tough fiber, mental and physical, which the hot sun of southern climes afterward melted into the viciousness of more luxurious nations. Man is scourged into greatness by adversity, and leveled into mediocrity by prosperity. This little fellow, whose groans die between his set teeth, has in him the blood of ...
— Caesar's Column • Ignatius Donnelly
... pitiful face had completely aroused her to the need for prompt action. Re-entering the library she approached the massive writing table with the quick assured step, so characteristic of the brave spirit with which she had always faced adversity. From a drawer of the table she selected note paper and an envelope to match and seating herself, prepared to plunge intrepidly into the writing of the most difficult letter she had ever been ...
— Grace Harlowe's Golden Summer • Jessie Graham Flower
... let him do what seemeth him good." "Shall we receive good at the hand of the Lord, and shall we not receive evil?" And what a glorious spectacle is this? Did it not constrain even a heathen to cry out, "Ecce spectaculum Deo dignum! See a sight worthy of God: a good man struggling with adversity, and superior to it." Here is the ground for confidence in God, both with regard to what we feel, and with regard to what we should fear, were it not that our soul is calmly stayed on him. What room could there be for trust in God ...
— The world's great sermons, Volume 3 - Massillon to Mason • Grenville Kleiser
... to literary labours in the capital. In this belief, Mr Tennant, author of "Anster Fair," addressed to him the following characteristic letter, intended, by its good-humoured pleasantries, to soothe him in his contendings with adversity:— ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume II. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... though she seemed to make peace with them; but to place all things she gave them, so as she might ask them again without their trouble, she might take them from them, not pull them: to keep always a distance between her and themselves. He knows not his own strength that hath not met adversity. Heaven prepares good men with crosses; but no ill can happen to a good man. Contraries are not mixed. Yet that which happens to any man may to every man. But it is in his reason, what he accounts ...
— Discoveries and Some Poems • Ben Jonson
... disposed of by pelting his memory with unsavory epithets. * * * The most vital questions Americans are asking each other today, have to deal with this man and what he has left us. * * * Joseph Smith, claiming to be an inspired teacher, faced adversity such as few men have been called to meet, enjoyed a brief season of prosperity such as few men have ever attained, and finally * * * went cheerfully to a martyr's death. When he surrendered his person to Governor Ford, in order to prevent the shedding ...
— The Story of "Mormonism" • James E. Talmage
... company, had evidently been sent by Fate to make his fortune for him. The sudden success at Guichen, hitherto unrivalled, should be repeated and augmented elsewhere. There would be no more sleeping under hedges and tightening of belts. Adversity was behind him. He placed a hand upon Scaramouche's shoulder, and surveyed him with a smile whose oiliness not even his red paint and colossal false nose ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... transpired with him you loved best and trusted most, and remember that he was always true, never capricious, always wise, never foolish, always sincere, never equivocal, and who never failed you in the darkest hours of adversity, but was always the same to you in kindness, forbearance, and devotion, remember such was ever to me Alexander Barrow, and forgive this wild outpouring of the heart to the virtues of the friend, tried so long, and loved so well. For more than twenty years he has ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... box and, with economy born of adversity, stooped and filled up first with the plug he had thrown away. Then he resumed his seat and, leaning back luxuriously, bade ...
— Captains All and Others • W.W. Jacobs
... the play was bad and the audience indulgent. It was very severe on Carlo Trent, and very kind to the players, whom it regarded as good men and women in adversity—with particular laudations for Miss Rose Euclid and the Messenger. The next newspaper said the play was a masterpiece—and would be so hailed in any country but England. England, however—! Unfortunately this was a newspaper whose political opinions Edward Henry despised. The ...
— The Regent • E. Arnold Bennett
... A likely thing that: and at the very moment when he was coming off such a hard night's duty, and supporting a character which a classical Roman has pronounced to be a spectacle for Olympus—viz., that of 'Puer bonus cum mala-fortuna compositus' (a virtuous boy matched in duel with adversity)! The sequel of the adventure is thus reported: 'I was put to bed, and recovered in a day or so. But I was certainly injured; for I was weakly and subject to ague for many years after.' Yes; and to a worse thing than ague, as not so certainly to be cured, viz., ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... with sincere indignation, and was perhaps unconscious himself of experiencing that nameless, shadowy satisfaction which Rochefoucauld says we find in the adversity of our best friends. Certainly Richard looked very seedy in his suit ...
— The Stillwater Tragedy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... harsher surroundings, runs to the home of sacred memories, clambers to the attic, and spends the night in anguished solitude. This was his first Gethsemane. For ten years buffeted and beaten, battling with adversity, sometimes losing but never lost, snatching learning here and there, hating sham, loving passionately, misunderstood, misapprehended, too stubbornly proud to ask apologies or make useless explanations, fighting poverty in the depths of privation, wrestling ...
— The Re-Creation of Brian Kent • Harold Bell Wright
... Jarl Hacon applies for aid to Thora of Rimmol, a lady whom he had once dearly loved; she is faithful in adversity to the friend of happier days, and conceals the Jarl and his companion in a hole dug for this purpose, in the swine-stye, and covered over with wood and litter; as the only spot likely to elude the hot search of his enemies. Olaf and the Bonders seek for him in Thora's house, but in vain; and finally, ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... monastery. But perhaps everyone is not able to stem the temptations of public life, and if he cannot conquer he may properly retreat. Some have little power to do good, and have likewise little strength to resist evil. Many are weary of the conflicts with adversity, and are willing to eject those passions which have long busied them in vain. And many are dismissed by age and diseases from the more laborious duties of society. In monasteries the weak and timorous may be happily sheltered, the weary may repose, and the penitent may meditate. Those retreats of ...
— Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia • Samuel Johnson
... your first glimpse of Prague, and it was beautiful, so you set about endeavouring to enter into the spirit of the place, to absorb its atmosphere and to study its character. For every ancient city that has stood up against adversity and overcome it has a very definite character of its own. And it is a mysterious, wonderful thing this character, this cachet of a great city; the charm of Paris or the grandeur of London, the glittering stillness of Venice or the insistent ...
— From a Terrace in Prague • Lieut.-Col. B. Granville Baker
... pages, the scenes depicting the anguish of separation, the bliss of reunion, and the fortunes of prosperity and of adversity are all, in every detail, true to human nature, and I have not taken upon myself to make the slightest addition, or alteration, which might lead to the ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... also, that though I do, thy spirit of remorse and compunction shall never depart from me. Thy holy apostle, St. Paul, was shipwrecked thrice,[345] and yet still saved. Though the rocks and the sands, the heights and the shallows, the prosperity and the adversity of this world, do diversely threaten me, though mine own leaks endanger me, yet, O God, let me never put myself aboard with Hymenaeus, nor make shipwreck of faith and a good conscience,[346] and then thy long-lived, thy everlasting ...
— Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions - Together with Death's Duel • John Donne
... matter of fact, since he had proved himself her friend through thick and thin, through storms and adversity, through high winds and blizzards, the Post Mistress had at last, after much persuasion, awarded him the privilege of standing by her throughout the rest ...
— The Way of the Wind • Zoe Anderson Norris
... that I can not compose my mind to think {upon it}. Wherefore it is the duty of all persons, when affairs are the most prosperous,[39] then in especial to reflect within themselves in what way they are to endure adversity. Returning from abroad, let him always picture to himself dangers and losses, either offenses committed by a son, or the death of his wife, or the sickness of a daughter,— that these things are ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence
... I have known in public affairs, General Banks was in his personality one of a small number who were always agreeable and permanently attractive. He was the possessor of an elastic spirit; he was always hopeful of the future and in adversity he saw or fancied that he saw, days of prosperity for himself, for his party, for the commonwealth and for the country. His interest in the fortunes of the laboring classes was a permanent interest, and they ...
— Reminiscences of Sixty Years in Public Affairs, Vol. 2 • George S. Boutwell
... are our daily and hourly reminders of the "great tribulation" through which the nation is passing. Of course, one ought not to wish it otherwise. Not, indeed, "sweet," but eminently salutary, are these "uses of adversity," for they prevent us from forgetting, even if we were inclined to such base obliviousness, the grim realities of the strife in which we are engaged. And yet, and in spite of all this, beauty retains its sway over "the common heart of man." Even war cannot destroy, though ...
— Prime Ministers and Some Others - A Book of Reminiscences • George W. E. Russell
... the adverse wind, and, rapid as the lightning, the telegraph cripples time. The once savage land is the nucleus of the arts and civilization. The nation that from time to time was oppressed, invaded, conquered, but never subjected, still pressed against the weight of adversity, and, as age after age rolled on, and mightier woes and civil strife gathered upon her, still the germ of her destiny, as it expanded, threw off her load, until she at length became a nation envied ...
— Eight Years' Wandering in Ceylon • Samuel White Baker
... clearly put than De Maistre's answers to the question which the circumstances of the time placed before him to solve. What is the law of the distribution of good and evil fortune in this life? Is it a moral law? Do prosperity and adversity fall respectively to the just and the unjust, either individually or collectively? Has the ancient covenant been faithfully kept, that whoso hearkens diligently to the divine voice, and observes all the commandments to do them, shall be blessed in his basket and his ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 2 of 3) - Essay 4: Joseph de Maistre • John Morley
... wonderful hands: they looked eloquent with the histories of generations; their youthfulness seemed centuries old. Yet all over them, barely to be seen, were the marks of life's experience, the delicate but dread sculpture of adversity. ...
— A Cathedral Singer • James Lane Allen
... English mariners were too much for an old man like me. Manuel should have been made dumb—dumb forever, I say. What mattered he—that gutter-born offspring of an evil Gitana, whom I have seen, Senor! I, myself, have seen her in the days of my adversity in Madrid, Senor—a red flower behind the ear, clad in rags that did not cover all her naked skin, looking on while they fought for her with knives in a wine-shop full of beggars and thieves. Si, senor. That's his mother. Improvisador—politico—capataz. ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer
... in another part of the great city, sunk to a lower depth of misery than ever. To him it seemed now that his bad name had taken form in the face of young Forrester, and was dogging him in adversity more relentlessly even than in prosperity. It comforted him not at all to think it had saved him from a drunkard's ruin. He despised himself, when he came to himself, for having been scared so weakly. Yet he avoided his old quarters, and turned his back on the ...
— A Dog with a Bad Name • Talbot Baines Reed
... to denote that it is not her old friend still alive. One of the first things the apparition does is "to remind Mrs. Bargrave of the many friendly offices she did her in former days, and much of the conversation they had with each other in the times of their adversity; what books they read, and what comfort in particular they received from Drelincourt's Book on Death. Drelincourt, she said, had the clearest notions of death and of the future state of any who had handled ...
— The Great English Short-Story Writers, Vol. 1 • Various
... Then he lifted his head quickly. "'Er's bound to last 'nother year." For the first time there was concern in his voice. Adversity does not grip the mind of the Cornish fisherfolk suddenly. It filters slowly through the chinks of the armour God has given them. Cornish men (and surely Cornish maids) were kind to the survivors of the wrecked Armada. It may be that they, ...
— A Tall Ship - On Other Naval Occasions • Sir Lewis Anselm da Costa Ritchie
... might hope for the accomplishment of great things. What the Pope wants is the peace of decay and temporal and spiritual supremacy for the church throughout the land. Experience has taught me that adversity is a great teacher. It tolerates no compromises and rewards only patience and strength. Therefore a state is most fortunate that occupies a position of bare supremacy in arms, where it is punished for mistakes and grows strong ...
— Chit-Chat; Nirvana; The Searchlight • Mathew Joseph Holt
... night," said Jasmine; "I called it 'The Uses of Adversity.' It was very mournful indeed; it was a sort of story in blank verse of people who were cold and hungry, and I mixed up London fogs, and attic rooms, and curtains that were once white, and had now turned yellow, and sloppy streets covered with snow, with the story. It was really very ...
— The Palace Beautiful - A Story for Girls • L. T. Meade
... we have described. The last scene of his life was, perhaps, the most scandalous. Ten days before his death, at seventy-five, he married a young girl merely in order to injure his nephew, an act which proves that neither years, nor adversity, nor what he called his philosophy, nor either of the religions which he had at different times professed, had taught him the rudiments of morality. He died in December, 1715, and lies in the vault under the church of St. Paul ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... you a right proper fool; for a man, merry in adversity, is as wise as Master Rabelais. Many the time have I heard him say a fit of laughter drives away the devil, while the groans of flagellating saints seem as music to Beelzebub's ears. Thus, a wit-cracker is the demon's enemy, and the band of Pantagruel, an evangelical ...
— Under the Rose • Frederic Stewart Isham
... wise that they have given it a name by which it is known over half the world. One of the sovereign virtues of this famous law is its simplicity, which is such that all hearing must understand; and obedience is so easy that any nation refusing is unfit to exist except in the turbulence and adversity that will surely come to it. When a people would avert want and strife, or having them, would restore plenty and peace, this noble commandment offers the only means—all other plans for safety or relief are as vain as dreams, and as empty as the crooning of fools. And behold, here it is: ...
— The Shadow On The Dial, and Other Essays - 1909 • Ambrose Bierce
... men of the United States! "in the days of adversity consider." Are not the signs of the times indicative of the necessity of a change ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various
... been fought, were exceedingly disheartened. This experience of the terrible power and vengeance of the English appalled them, and they were quite disposed to abandon Philip. But the great Wampanoag chief was not a man to yield to adversity. This calamity only nerved him to more undying resolution and to deeds of more desperate daring. He had still about two thousand warriors around him, but, being almost entirely destitute of provisions, they for ...
— King Philip - Makers of History • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott
... added that none of the princesses who had left France to share the British throne had to endure such misfortunes. Her son was captured and slaughtered under her eyes; then and then only, the strong purpose and high courage, that had supported her during years of adversity, deserted her. She lost heart. After being dragged from prison to prison, Margaret was restored to her country and her family, upon which King Rene, being more of a poet than a king, wrote a madrigal to celebrate his ...
— In Chteau Land • Anne Hollingsworth Wharton
... he adds that unless congress comes valiantly to his assistance at once the country will sink into irretrievable ruin. Again he writes: 'Every idea you can form of our distresses will fall short of the reality. I have almost ceased to hope.' These were dark days, and the winds of adversity were beating mercilessly against the man into whose hands had been placed the cares of the great struggle for national existence. He was like the kite bravely battling against the wind. But he was made of ...
— Crayon and Character: Truth Made Clear Through Eye and Ear - Or, Ten-Minute Talks with Colored Chalks • B.J. Griswold
... mind some soothing phrases, some word of comfort and encouragement, Desmond waited till the first paroxysm had passed. What he said then shall not be set down in cold print. You may be sure he proved that friendship between two strong, vigorous boys is no frail thread, but a golden chain which adversity strengthens and refines. Scaife rose up with his heart softened, not by his own tears, but by the tears he saw in ...
— The Hill - A Romance of Friendship • Horace Annesley Vachell
... saw him as he was—a man broken before his prime, haggard and tired and old, with the fire of his genius quenched for ever in the bitter waters of adversity. ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... kingdom of heaven, and all other things shall be added unto you,' Doubt it not, and consider also how sweet is the tie that doth bind consenting hearts with one true faith—a faith consoling exceedingly—a faith to lift high above the tempests of adversity—to heal the wounds of earth, and to be crowned with glory and ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams
... Presbyterian, or Puritan—can cast in another's teeth. Each of us committed it in our day of triumph. "What fruit had we then in those things whereof we are now ashamed?" The memory—one-sided, and carefully cultivated—of what each suffered in its turn of adversity has hitherto been a potent agency for keeping us apart. To-day those memories are fading. I was much struck by a remark I heard last spring from the Bishop of Southwark, that one reason why we are more ready nowadays ...
— The War and Unity - Being Lectures Delivered At The Local Lectures Summer - Meeting Of The University Of Cambridge, 1918 • Various
... urged the horse on, for he could think of no definite plan. He was half way to the Diamond K when he suddenly started and sat rigid and erect in the saddle, drawing a deep breath, his nerves tingling from excitement. He laughed lowly, exultingly, as men laugh when under the stress of adversity they devise sudden, bold plans of action, and responding to the slight knee press Nigger turned, reared, and then shot like a black bolt across the plains at an angle that would not take him ...
— 'Firebrand' Trevison • Charles Alden Seltzer
... When I allowed you to use me like an old shoe? But now you are my superior—and now I can't strive to be honorable any longer. Do you know that this adversity will also change our economic relations? I cannot think of painting any more, but must give up my life's dream and become a pot-boiler ...
— Plays: Comrades; Facing Death; Pariah; Easter • August Strindberg
... Mr. Preston, he obtained three other pupils, from whom he was able to obtain a higher price, and occasionally he effected the sale of a picture, so that he was able to occupy more comfortable rooms, and provide himself with better clothing. The days of his adversity were over, and he now enjoyed a moderate degree of prosperity. Little Mary regained her lost flesh and color, and once more looked as she did when she sat for the figure of the girl in her father's picture, which Paul had sold to Mr. Preston. She came often with her father, when he was ...
— Slow and Sure - The Story of Paul Hoffman the Young Street-Merchant • Horatio Alger
... did so many circumstances of that kind concur in uniting two young souls by one and the same sentiment. The friendship of Ginevra for Luigi and that of Luigi for Ginevra made more progress in a month than a friendship in society would make in ten years. Adversity is the touchstone of character. Ginevra was able, therefore, to study Luigi, to know him; and before long they mutually esteemed each other. The girl, who was older than Luigi, found a charm in being courted by ...
— Vendetta • Honore de Balzac
... of Sir Walter Raleigh, who had many faults, but who never showed so many merits as in trouble and adversity, may bring me at once to the end of his sad story. After an imprisonment in the Tower of twelve long years, he proposed to resume those old sea voyages of his, and to go to South America in search of gold. His Sowship, divided between his ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens
... sunk by the Americans, and some retaken by the British. And so, after nearly two years' uninterrupted success, the career of the Essex terminated amid disasters of all kinds. But at least her officers and crew could reflect that they had afforded an example of courage in adversity that it would be ...
— The Naval War of 1812 • Theodore Roosevelt
... can read Hopeful's remarkable history without discovering this about him, that he showed best in adversity and distress, just as he showed worst in deliverance and prosperity. It is a fine lesson in Christian hope to descend into Giant Despair's dungeon and hear the older pilgrim groaning and the younger pilgrim consoling ...
— Bunyan Characters (Second Series) • Alexander Whyte
... less welcome to Undine. If there was one point on which she was doggedly and puritanically resolved, it was that no extremes of social adversity should ever again draw her into the group of people among whom Madame Adelschein too conspicuously figured. Since her unsuccessful attempt to win over Indiana by introducing her to that group, Undine had been righteously resolved to remain aloof from it; and she was ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton
... first lesson in that school where we all are called to study sooner or later—the school of Adversity; where some of us pass creditably, whilst others are ploughed, and a few—a ...
— The Grey Lady • Henry Seton Merriman
... convulsions of death were upon him, and he expired almost immediately after our arrival. The frightful, the appalling truth now burst upon me, that I was alone in the desert. He who had faithfully served me for many years, who had followed my fortunes in adversity and in prosperity, who had accompanied me in all my wanderings, and whose attachment to me had been his sole inducement to remain with me in this last, and to him alas, fatal journey, was now no more. For an instant, I was almost ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre
... neighbours is one of the natural things of life. In the case of individuals how beautifully it shows between two dwellers in the same street or townland. They rejoice together in prosperity; give mutual aid in adversity; in the ordinary daily round work together in a spirit of comradeship; at all times they find a bond of unity in their mutual interests. Consider, then, the sundering of their friendship by some act of evil on either side. The old friendship is turned ...
— Principles of Freedom • Terence J. MacSwiney
... one of that company was to remember the words in days of adversity and triumph. Soon after that dinner the memories of the little community began to register an unusual procession ...
— A Man for the Ages - A Story of the Builders of Democracy • Irving Bacheller
... mark upon him. The mouth had lost something of the smile that once lurked about its corners, but had gained in strength. The eyes, always direct and steady, had more depth. The shoulders had a squarer set, as though they had been braced against adversity. Experience of ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... to this very hour, I have been dependent only on my own head and hands for everything—for very bread. Long years ago—ay, even in childhood—adversity made me think, and feel, and suffer; and would pride allow me, I could tell the world many a deep tragedy enacted in the heart of a poor, forgotten, uncared-for boy . . . But I thank God, that though I felt and suffered, ...
— Literary and General Lectures and Essays • Charles Kingsley
... select society. She would perhaps be able indirectly, through her sons' influence with the Almighty, to have a voice in most of the arrangements both of this world and of the next. If all this were to come true (and things seemed very like it), those friends who had neglected us in our adversity would not find it too easy to be restored to favour, however greatly they might desire it—that is to say, they would not have found it too easy in the case of one less magnanimous and spiritually-minded ...
— Selections from Previous Works - and Remarks on Romanes' Mental Evolution in Animals • Samuel Butler
... its place in history as the home of the Colquhouns, whose feud with the MacGregors led to such murderous results. But perhaps its associations with Robert Bruce in his days of adversity form its greater claim to fame, and the yews on Inch Lonaig, just above, are said to have been planted by him to ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... the soft, childish voice, charmed simple-hearted Nellie, who willingly grasped the hand extended, with these words, "I shall be only too pleased indeed." So the compact was sealed—a compact which remained unbroken through the long months and years that followed. Time and adversity only served to strengthen the bond, and the gray twilight of life found the friends of childhood's ...
— Aunt Judith - The Story of a Loving Life • Grace Beaumont
... been left executor to a friend—you are to pay over his last legacy to X, though a dissolute scoundrel; and you are to give no shilling of it to the poor brother of X, though a good man, and a wise man, struggling with adversity. You are absolutely excluded from all contemplation of results. It was your deceased friend's right to make the will; it is yours simply to see it executed. Now, in opposition to this primary class of actions stands another, such as the habit of intoxication, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... Scotland, differed in no essential particular from the Church of England except that she did not lean upon apolitical Episcopacy—an Episcopacy directed and controlled by parliamentary legislation. She was now in the lowest depths of depression and adversity. Her bishops had become reduced to four and her clergy to forty, and these ministered, it is true without molestation for the most part, to the little remnants of faithful churchmen scattered through the cities and villages of the land. Probably the feeling among outsiders was that ...
— Report Of Commemorative Services With The Sermons And Addresses At The Seabury Centenary, 1883-1885. • Diocese Of Connecticut
... an apple tree is Pyrus Malus, of which schoolboys are wont to make ingenious uses by playing on the latter word. Malo, I had rather be; Malo, in an Apple tree; Malo, than a wicked man; Malo, in adversity. Or, again, Mea mater mala est sus, which bears the easy translation, "My mother is a wicked old sow"; but the intentional reading of which signifies "Run, mother! the sow is eating the apples." The term "Adam's Apple," which is applied to the most prominent part of a ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie
... command of his ships and when everything went prosperously with him, was so overbearing and cruel that some of his men, in desperation at the treatment they received, mutinied against him. But the story shows another side of his character in adversity which it is impossible not ...
— The Red True Story Book • Various
... guns. His warlike ardor of the first few days had dampened. He had seen and heard too many foolish things said and done since the beginning of this horrible siege; had taken part too many times in one of the most wretched spectacles in which a people can show vanity in adversity. He was heart broken to see his dear compatriots, his dear Parisians, redouble their boasting after each defeat and take their levity for heroism. If he admired the resignation of the poor women standing in line before the door of a butcher's shop, he was ...
— A Romance of Youth, Complete • Francois Coppee
... death was cleared afterwards by the success of his annotated edition of his novels. No tale of physical strife in the battlefield could be as heroic as the story of the close of Scott's life, with five years of a death-struggle against adversity, animated by the truest sense of honour. When the ruin was impending he wrote in his diary, "If things go badly in London, the magic wand of the Unknown will be shivered in his grasp. The feast of fancy will be over with the feeling of ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... to myself that our present King had been most unlucky in one thing—debts all over the kingdom. Not a man who had struck a blow for the King, or for his poor father, or even said a good word for him, in the time of his adversity, but expected at least a baronetcy, and a grant of estates to support it. Many have called King Charles ungrateful: and he may have been so. But some indulgence is due to a man, with entries few on the credit side, and a ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... more distressed at any disasters which could have befallen himself or his own kingdom; and accordingly, though he was well aware that the greatness of the Roman people was almost more admirable in adversity than prosperity, he had nevertheless sent every thing which good and faithful allies are wont to contribute to assist the operations of war, which he earnestly implored the conscript fathers not to refuse to accept. First of all, for the sake of the omen, they had ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... do something for the little maid, for she had so bravely struggled with adversity of fortune and perversity of family. So there were four flower girls, and the music teacher played at the wedding march! In spite of her efforts, Lohengrin seemed suffering as it came from ...
— The Lady and Sada San - A Sequel to The Lady of the Decoration • Frances Little
... they sold to make restitution for their crimes? No! Did their present masters, as an act of kindness, redeem them from some heathen tyrant to whom they had sold themselves in the dark hour of adversity? No! Were they born in slavery? No! No! not according to Jewish Law, for the servants who were born in servitude among them, were born of parents who had sold themselves for six years: Ex. xxi, 4. Were the female slaves of the South sold by their fathers? How shall ...
— An Appeal to the Christian Women of the South • Angelina Emily Grimke
... Minnesota great pride to know that, under all phases and conditions of our territory and state, whether in prosperity or adversity, the school fund has always been held sacred, and neither extravagance, neglect nor peculation has ever assailed it, but it has been husbanded with jealous care from time to time since the first dollar was realized from it until the ...
— The History of Minnesota and Tales of the Frontier • Charles E. Flandrau
... Arctic explorers were not, it is true, searchers for the North Pole. That quest—which has written in its history as many tales of heroism, self-sacrifice, and patient resignation to adversity, as the poets have woven about the story of chivalry and the search for the Holy Grail—was begun only in the middle of the last century, and by an American. But for three hundred years English, Dutch, and Portuguese explorers, and the stout-hearted American whalemen, had been pushing ...
— American Merchant Ships and Sailors • Willis J. Abbot
... been wasted amid sterile surroundings. Greta Williams had one of those strong womanly characters that are meant to be the prop of weaker natures, that are veritable towers of strength in hours of adversity. It was for this that Olivia grew to love her when she ...
— Doctor Luttrell's First Patient • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... uses of adversity, Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, Yet wears a precious ...
— Rambles of an Archaeologist Among Old Books and in Old Places • Frederick William Fairholt
... incessant, profitless effort. I feel very sorry for this friend, and perhaps it is hardly fair to insist upon the pleasure of dreaming in the presence of one whose dream-experience is so unhappy. Still, it is true that my dreams have uses as many and sweet as those of adversity. All my yearning for the strange, the weird, the ghostlike is gratified in dreams. They carry me out of the accustomed and commonplace. In a flash, in the winking of an eye they snatch the burden from my shoulder, the trivial task from my hand and ...
— The World I Live In • Helen Keller
... stood waiting, a man unimposing of height and build yet possessing that innate dignity which no adversity can impair. He said nothing, merely stood and watched the squire with half-comic resignation ...
— The Obstacle Race • Ethel M. Dell
... too volatile, too impassioned; we want a ruler, a master who knows how to make himself obeyed. Hark you, M. Werner, I must continue to speak to you frankly: the only chief, that suits us, is Napoleon: no longer Napoleon the ambitious and the conqueror, but Napoleon corrected by adversity. The desire of reigning will render him docile to the will of France, and of Europe. He will give them both such pledges, as they may require: and I believe the Duke of Otranto will then esteem himself very happy, to be able to concur with M. de ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. II • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... some general outdoor activity (and Frederick's ski were pronounced perfect) a thaw occurred. I am bound to say that the event was received philosophically. Not a single member of the company made any complaint; they faced adversity like true Britons and boldly sat in the warm hotel to save themselves for the evening. Nor did their distress put them off their feed; they punished the tea unmercifully, showing scarcely a sign of the aching sorrow which ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, March 17, 1920 • Various
... and oppression shall no more cover the earth to the destruction of your race; but seedtime and harvest shall never fail, and the laborer shall eat the fruit of his hands. Is not your cause developing like the spring? Yours has been a long and rigorous winter. The chill of contempt, the frost of adversity, the blast of persecution, the storm of oppression—all have been yours. There was no substance to be found—no prospect to delight the eye or inspire the drooping heart—no golden ray to dissipate the gloom. The waves of ...
— Phrases for Public Speakers and Paragraphs for Study • Compiled by Grenville Kleiser
... all. She was on the point of calling him by his former name, when the remembrance of what he had been arrested the words on her lips. He was proud; would he not dread to have it known that, in his days of adversity, he had been a servant? For if she betrayed her knowledge of his past, she would be forced to tell where and how that knowledge was gained. No, better wait till they met alone, she thought; he would thank ...
— The Mysterious Key And What It Opened • Louisa May Alcott
... heart than Maud Beaudesart's, and will break many more. It is a cruel question; but not to put it would be more cruel still. For while this or that gentlewoman is in danger, no gentlewoman is safe. And the basest type of mind is that which gloats on the adversity of the world's spoiled child; the next basest is that which concentrates its sympathy on the same adversity; the least base, I think, is that which, goaded by a human compassion for all human distress, longs to get a lever under the order of things ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... believe it all,' the old lady calmly replied. 'It is very wonderful; there must be a good strain somewhere in the blood, and struggle and adversity are grand teachers, we are told. It is very interesting, and I am most ready to help them in any way you advise, my dear Eugenia, or that you think would be accepted. But understand me, I would do the same if I had never heard ...
— Robin Redbreast - A Story for Girls • Mary Louisa Molesworth
... Antigone, Unto what land, whose city, have we come? Who is there for this day to entertain With scanty fare the wanderer, Oedipus, Who asks but little and still less receives, Yet with his dole is fain to be content— For time and suffering and a noble heart Have taught me how to bear adversity. But, daughter, if thou seest a resting-place, Either in common ground or hallowed grove, There guide me to a seat, that we may ask What place is this: strangers, we come to learn Of citizens and ...
— Specimens of Greek Tragedy - Aeschylus and Sophocles • Goldwin Smith
... be a hard schoolmistress, but she is generally found the best. Though the ordeal of adversity is one from which we naturally shrink, yet, when it comes, we must bravely and manfully encounter it. ...
— Self Help • Samuel Smiles
... profess to be. But it is self-evident that he who obeys the Bible in sincerity and truth is thus made a thoroughly good man; good in his inward principles and feelings, and good in his outward life; good in his relations to God and man; good in prosperity and adversity, in honor and dishonor, in life and death; a good husband and father, a good neighbor, a good citizen. If there is ever to be a perfect state of society on earth, it must come from simple obedience to the precepts of the Bible, ...
— Companion to the Bible • E. P. Barrows
... filly had given her all and questioned not. For Sis, by Rex out of Reine, two-year filly, blooded stock, was a thoroughbred. And a thoroughbred, be he man, beast, or bird, does not welch on his hand. A stranger only in prosperity; a chum in adversity. He does not question; ...
— Garrison's Finish - A Romance of the Race-Course • W. B. M. Ferguson
... absurdity. The hero of this piece unites in himself the three greatest characters upon earth; he is a priest, an husbandman, and the father of a family. He is drawn as ready to teach, and ready to obey, as simple in affluence, and majestic in adversity. In this age of opulence and refinement whom can such a character please? Such as are fond of high life, will turn with disdain from the simplicity of his country fire-side. Such as mistake ribaldry for humour, will find no wit in his harmless conversation; and such as have ...
— The Vicar of Wakefield • Oliver Goldsmith
... younger days. She was a lady of great accomplishments, and charming from her frank and affectionate nature. She had the most intense love of knowledge, a delicate and trembling sensibility, and preserved freshness of mind after a life of considerable adversity. As a favourite friend of my father, we had sought her with eagerness; and the most open and cordial friendship was ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... disposition has melted even the stern and selfish;—who, thus rendering life around her happier and better, attracting more closely the hearts of relatives, and making every acquaintance a friend, has, chief of all, beautifully discharged the sacred offices of wife and mother; encountering the day of adversity with a noble self-devotion, enriching the hour of prosperity with wise counsel and faithful love; unwearied in the time of sickness, patient and trustful beneath the dispensation of affliction; in short, by her many ...
— The Crown of Thorns - A Token for the Sorrowing • E. H. Chapin
... had known adversity, Though born in such a high degree; In pride of power, in beauty's bloom, Had wept o'er ...
— The Poetical Works of Addison; Gay's Fables; and Somerville's Chase • Joseph Addison, John Gay, William Sommerville
... conspicuously because of the naked branches around. The life within is too strong to fear the shortened day, the cold blast, or the falling snow. So with the man of GOD whose life is maintained by hidden communion through the Word; adversity only brings out the strength and the ...
— A Ribband of Blue - And Other Bible Studies • J. Hudson Taylor
... Work's begun, now I am made or lost; He runs the best who holds out to the Post: And all the Comfort in Adversity, Is to see others as miserable ...
— The City Bride (1696) - Or The Merry Cuckold • Joseph Harris
... You have been wicked men, and therefore weak men; your own vices, and not the Goths, have been your true conquerors.' As I said in my inaugural lecture—that is after all the true theory of history. Men may forget it in piping times of peace. God grant that in the dark hour of adversity, God may always raise up to them a prophet, like good old Salvian, to preach to them once again the everlasting judgments of God; and teach them that not faulty constitutions, faulty laws, faulty circumstances of any kind, but the faults of ...
— The Roman and the Teuton - A Series of Lectures delivered before the University of Cambridge • Charles Kingsley
... good man struggling with adversity," said Member for Sark, looking at RATHBONE. "Nothing to goody goody man struggling ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 98, May 24, 1890 • Various
... challenging the golden gates of God. 'We bear the burden of the years Clean-limbed, clear-hearted, open-browed; Albeit sacramental tears Have dimmed our eyes, we know the proud Content of men who sweep unbowed Before the legionary fears; In sorrow we have grown to be The masters of adversity. ...
— Georgian Poetry 1911-12 • Various
... no secret stories, there is no secret world, there are no secret friends. The House by the Sea has been drowned, and even its ghosts have forgotten it. After all, there was nothing to remember. The gate to the House is barred, not by a lock but by a laugh. Reality and not adversity has ...
— This Is the End • Stella Benson
... did make a few great singers. If the principles of the old school had not been changed or lost, if they had been retained and developed up to the present day, what a wonderful legacy the vocal profession might have inherited in this age, the beginning of the twentieth century. Adversity, however, develops art as well as individuality; hence the vocal art has much to expect in ...
— The Renaissance of the Vocal Art • Edmund Myer
... many sins I have to atone for,' replied the Duchess, 'from the follies of youth; but now, at an age of discretion and in adversity, oh, how bitterly do I reproach myself for my past levities! But,' continued she, 'has ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 6 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe
... village, surrounded by a garden of whose claims on my solicitude it was not jealous. There was time for both. It gave me for a wife the maiden that I had ever loved; and it gathered my children round my hearth with plenteousness and peace. I was content: I sought no other lot. It is not adversity that makes me look back upon ...
— Sybil - or the Two Nations • Benjamin Disraeli
... was still evident from the manner of the gentleman, and the speed at which he drove the horse, that some dreadful event had occurred. His conscience smote him for his disobedience to his mother, and he was not in a fit moral condition to meet the shock of adversity with courage and fortitude. He would have given the world, in that anxious moment, to have undone the work of the last three hours, and effaced their ...
— Little By Little - or, The Cruise of the Flyaway • William Taylor Adams
... their envy, at honest peoples' heels every day. Let them bark. Mr. Benton was right. They are 'dirty dogs.' But a dog that looks you honestly and frankly in the face, that stands by his master and friend, in all times of trial, in sorrow as in joy, in adversity as in prosperity, in dark days as in bright days, always cheerful, always sincere, earnest, and truthful, and so that his kindness be met, always happy, I like. He is your true nobility of nature below the human. But there are 'curs of low degree;' dogs of neither genial instinct ...
— Wild Northern Scenes - Sporting Adventures with the Rifle and the Rod • S. H. Hammond
... the moment Phillip Lawson uttered these words he was a richer man, though he knew it not. He had to drink deeper of the dregs of adversity ere he shall have cause ...
— Marguerite Verne • Agatha Armour
... but added, with almost prophetic insight, "But I have remarked that when great outward prosperity is granted it is often permitted to precede great trials." This was in the summer of 1828; before that year ended the family was struggling in the waves of adversity, losses, and trials—struggling, indeed, to preserve that honest name which had hitherto been the pride of Mr. ...
— Elizabeth Fry • Mrs. E. R. Pitman
... perfect equanimity of mind, and her sweet and endearing manners; she is no trifling support to Abolitionism, inasmuch as she lightens my labors, and enables me to find exquisite delight in the family circle, as an offset to public adversity." ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke
... of fact, however, Jack was not insensible to the awkward complication of his predicament. Grief as a mantle is difficult to adjust to the shoulders of the young. It is melted by the ardor of companionship as swiftly as it is spun by the loom of adversity. His interest in the strange scenes that the war brought to pass, his association with people—intimate in a sense with the leading forces of rebellion, the airs of incipient grandeur, these raw instruments of government gave themselves—all these things engrossed the observant faculties ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... He was not inclined to give way to trouble. It has already been seen that he was a boy of obstinate courage, resolute will, and invincible determination. He was capable of struggling to the last against any adversity; and even if he had to lose, he knew how to lose without sinking into complete despair. These moods of depression, or even of despair, which now and then did come, were not permanent. In time he shook them off, ...
— Lost in the Fog • James De Mille
... been sure the agent had helped Aqua Marine to swallow the ring, she would have let them smash his boxes. And I think she was a little in love with Shot-gun Smith. But what a pity we shall soon have no more Mrs. Brewtons! The causes that produced her—slavery, isolation, literary tendencies, adversity, game blood—that combination is broken forever. I shall speak to Mr. Howells about her. She ought ...
— The Jimmyjohn Boss and Other Stories • Owen Wister
... York City, enjoyed every advantage in education and training; his family had been for many generations respected in the city; his father was cultivated and had distinction as a citizen, who devoted his wealth and his energies to serving his fellow men. But, just as incredible adversity could not crush Abraham Lincoln, so lavish prosperity could not keep ...
— Theodore Roosevelt; An Intimate Biography, • William Roscoe Thayer
... weeping. He was losing the only friend he had. Elsewhere the servants wandered about restlessly, waiting for news from the front, to learn if they, too, were to join in the mad flight from the city. Few servants love masters in adversity. Self-interest is the keynote ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... is soon told; the pride of both husband and wife was humbled by adversity, and in their heavy affliction each was made to feel what a strength and comfort it was to have a companion who could sympathize not only with the joys but with the sorrows of the other. The boy ...
— The Mysteries of Montreal - Being Recollections of a Female Physician • Charlotte Fuhrer
... save his expeditions from disastrous failure. In the Seventh Crusade he attacked, not Jerusalem, but Egypt, then the centre of Mahometan power. He was defeated and made prisoner; his army was practically exterminated. Yet by a personal heroism, which shone even more brilliantly in adversity than in success, he has won lasting fame. His captivity disrupted an empire. The mamelukes, the slave soldiers of Egypt, who had fought most valiantly against him, were wakened to a realization of their own power. They overthrew their sultan, and founded ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various
... own spiritual development. And as time went on I was more and more convinced that this was an evidence of a lower imaginative faculty in me rather than in him. He had less humor, but he had infinitely more of the grace that belongs to immortality. He had a spirit that withstood adversity, hardship, failure, with a sort of ancient dignity and that could face tragedy with Promethean fortitude. And I love best to think of him in relation to the bare and awful sorrows that show so nakedly in the lives of poor, simple ...
— A Circuit Rider's Wife • Corra Harris
... ripe for the role that fate held in store for him in Thueringen. His education was to proceed yet a while longer by the process of flaying. He was to suffer and grow strong; to battle further with the goblins of despair; to tread the quicksands of adversity and fight his way through to a firm footing among the sons of men. Who shall say that it ...
— The Life and Works of Friedrich Schiller • Calvin Thomas
... world are said to tempt as the instruments or matter of temptations; inasmuch as one can know what sort of man someone is, according as he follows or resists the desires of the flesh, and according as he despises worldly advantages and adversity: of which things the devil ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... many occasions passed through periods of great distress from failures widespread and panics severe, but it must also be borne in mind that these very bankruptcies are more often the abuse of prosperity than the product of adversity. Over-confidence in men and things has resulted in speculation and precipitated bankruptcy. And if it be urged that to the undue expansion of credit is traceable the greater number of our financial disasters, it may be said with still greater force that all our impetus to industrial achievement ...
— Up To Date Business - Home Study Circle Library Series (Volume II.) • Various
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