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More "Hymen" Quotes from Famous Books



... as Fritz is an inveterate bachelor receives from the latter a loan of 1200 francs which is to enable a poor girl to marry her lover. Fritz gives it very graciously, congratulating himself, that he is free from hymen's bonds. ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley

... really cared—" and then she began to cry most steadily and whole-heartedly into her napkin and Oliver in spite of all the generous plaudits he was receiving from various parts of his mind for having carried delicate business successfully to a most dramatic conclusion, wondered what in the name of Hymen his cue was now. Some remnants of diplomacy however kept him from doing anything particularly obtrusive and, after he had received an official explanation of nervous headache with official detachment, the end of tea found them being quite cheerful together. Neither alluded directly ...
— Young People's Pride • Stephen Vincent Benet

... altar with my virgin blood; I thought to have selected the white flowers To please the nymphs, and to have asked of each By name, and with no sorrowful regret, Whether, since both my parents willed the change I might at Hymen's feet bend my clipt brow; And (after these who mind us girls the most) Adore our own Athene, that she would Regard me mildly with her azure eyes,— But, father, to see you no more, and see Your love, ...
— Practical English Composition: Book II. - For the Second Year of the High School • Edwin L. Miller

... Is Hymen then ambassador divine, His mission, matrimonial and benign, The heart to counsel, ardor to incite, Convert the nun, rebuke the eremite? As if were this his mandate from the throne: "It is not good for them to be alone; Behold the land! its ...
— Poems - Vol. IV • Hattie Howard

... reader, between you and me,) respectfully conducting the ever sweet and placid Queen Woodbine; and after them a troop of merry and gayly-dressed fairies, both ladies and gentlemen, but very demure and solemn; while Puck, in the united capacity of Hymen and Grand Usher, was dodging about with his flaming torch, now in front, now in rear, now here, now there, and every where imparting an air of grotesqueness to the ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 4 October 1848 • Various

... of Herouville, carved in white marble with their mantle and supporters, gave the appearance of a tomb to this species of edifice, which formed a pendant to the bed, another erection raised to the glory of Hymen. Modern architects would have been puzzled to decide whether the room had been built for the bed or the bed for the room. Two cupids playing on the walnut headboard, wreathed with garlands, might have passed for angels; and columns of the same wood, supporting the ...
— The Hated Son • Honore de Balzac

... which can thus bring the pure and loving together, and acts as the best ally of Hymen! The announcement of the rank and titles of Madame de St. Bertrand—"veuve de la grande armee"—is very happy. "La grande armee" has been a father to more orphans, and a husband to more widows, than it ever made. Mistresses of cafes, old governesses, keepers of boarding-houses, genteel ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray

... in these days of reform and disestablishment, of hereditary and other conservative grievances, something ought to be done to abolish the persons in question, or at least handicap them so that other deserving young men might have a fair chance in the race for beauty's smile and Hymen's chain. They have an enormous advantage, at present, over outside men-folk. Girls like to have a sort of good-natured lap-dog about them, to play with occasionally and run their errands, "do this" and "that" for the asking—like Cornelius the centurion's ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson

... white man of whalers' ways of trading is supposed to be of monetary use to her second lord. Moreover, the tent, utensils, and cooking-kit which she shared with her spouse from the ships makes a substantial dower when she again essays Hymen's lottery. ...
— The New North • Agnes Deans Cameron

... I swear by yonder flame which burneth, Fann'd by Hymen, lost thou shalt not be; Droop not thus, for my sweet bride returneth To my father's mansion back with me! Dearest! tarry here! Taste the bridal cheer, For ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various

... COWEN, FREDERICK HYMEN, a popular English composer, born in Kingston, Jamaica; his works consist of symphonies, cantatas, oratories, as well as songs, duets, &c.; is conductor of the Manchester Subscription Concerts in succession to Sir ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... and Hymen wave their torches high, Precursive of their joys: each hearth is heap'd With odorous incense: every roof is hung With flowery garlands: pipes, and harps, and lyres, And songs which indicate their festive souls, Resound aloud. Each portal ...
— The Metamorphoses of Publius Ovidus Naso in English blank verse Vols. I & II • Ovid

... or "whites," may occur in girls as well as in married women. It can also result from catching cold during the menstrual period. Another mistaken idea is that girls should not take douches for fear of injuring the hymen. This is erroneous, and while they are entirely unnecessary in a vast majority of cases it is sometimes absolutely essential to douche in order to cure leucorrhea. When they are given, it is advisable to ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol 2 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague

... had recourse to invectives, and even to spells; but all in vain. This disappointment had such effect upon him that he could neither eat nor drink; this did not signify to him; but his passion at length became so violent, that he could neither play nor smoke. In this extremity love had recourse to Hymen; the Earl of Oxford, one of the first peers of the realm, is, you know, a very handsome man: he is of the order of the garter, which greatly adds to an air naturally noble. In short, from his outward appearance, you would suppose he was really possessed of some sense; but as soon as ever you ...
— The Memoirs of Count Grammont, Complete • Anthony Hamilton

... thus, he gave Emilia's hand. 1140 Smiled Venus, to behold her own true knight Obtain the conquest, though he lost the fight; And bless'd with nuptial bliss the sweet laborious night. Eros, and Anteros, on either side, One fired the bridegroom, and one warm'd the bride; And long-attending Hymen from above, Shower'd on the bed the whole Idalian grove. All of a tenor was their after-life, No day discolour'd with domestic strife; No jealousy, but mutual truth believed, 1150 Secure repose, and kindness undeceived. ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol II - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden

... warning to the devout woman. Mrs. Berry, in her circle, was known as a certificated lecturer against the snares of matrimony. Still that was no reason why she should not like a wedding. Expectant, therefore, she watched the one glowing cheek of Hymen, and with pleasing tremours beheld a cab of many boxes draw up by her bit of garden, and a gentleman emerge from it in the set of consulting an advertisement paper. The gentleman required lodgings for a lady. Lodgings for a lady Mrs. Berry could produce, and a very roseate smile for ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... Chewed-ear Jenkins got hitched up to Guinneyveer McGee, His flowin' locks, ye recollect, wuz frivolous an' free; But in old Hymen's jack-pot, it's a most amazin' thing, Them flowin' locks jest disappeared like snow-balls in the Spring; Jest seemed to wilt an' fade away like dead leaves in the Fall, An' left old Chewed-ear balder than ...
— Rhymes of a Rolling Stone • Robert W. Service

... entire possession of the lady could allay. The affair of Lord A- and Mrs. B- is too well known to need repetition—it could not succeed a second time. Abelard F- having paid the debt of nature, there was no impediment but a visit to the temple of Hymen, on which point the lady was determined; and the yielding suitor, wounded to the vital part, most readily complied. It is due to the countess to admit, that since her present elevation, her conduct has ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle

... dimmed Her polisht altar with my virgin blood; I thought to have selected the white flowers To please the Nymphs, and to have asked of each By name, and with no sorrowful regret, Whether, since both my parents willed the change, I might at Hymen's feet bend my clipt brow; And (after those who mind us girls the most) Adore our own Athena, that she would Regard me mildly with her azure eyes. But, father! to see you no more, and see Your love, O father! go ere I am gone.' ... Gently he moved her ...
— Lyra Heroica - A Book of Verse for Boys • Various

... JANE, my dearest JANE, Ah, never look so shy, But meet me, meet me in the market, When the price of wheat rules high. The glut is waning fast, my love, And corn is getting dear; Good (Hymen) times are coming, love, Ceres our hearts shall cheer. Then pretty JANE, though poorish JANE, Ah, never pipe your eye, But meet me, meet me at the Altar, For the price ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, Sept. 27, 1890 • Various

... being of the opinion that the virginity is altogether lost when this membrane is fractured and destroyed by violence; when it is found perfect and entire, however, no penetration has been effected; and in the opinion of some learned physicians there is neither hymen nor expanded skin which contains blood in it, which some people think, flows from the ruptured membrane at the ...
— The Works of Aristotle the Famous Philosopher • Anonymous

... the fair nymph Eurydice, whom he loved dearly, and who returned his love. But at their marriage the omens were not favorable. Hymen, the marriage god, came to it with a gloomy countenance and the wedding torches smoked and would not give ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various

... undutiful towards kind old Pa; and that, unless desperate measures were resorted to, quamprimum, in the twinkling of a bed-post she would be under the disagreeable necessity to bundle and go with the disabled man of war to the temple of Hymen. Sacrilegious thought! I could not permit it to enter my bosom, and (pardon me for a moment, sir) when I looked down, and caught a glance of my own natty-looking, tight little leg, and dapper Hessians, I recommended her strongly to act on the principle of the Drury-lane play-bill, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 339, Saturday, November 8, 1828. • Various

... said from smooth-faced ingle train (Anointed bridegroom!) hardly fain Hast e'er refrained; now do refrain! O Hymen ...
— The Satyricon, Complete • Petronius Arbiter

... into sunshine, and it withers and ends. Strephon and Chloe languish apart; join in a rapture: and presently you hear that Chloe is crying, and Strephon has broken his crook across her back. Can you mend it so as to show no marks of rupture? Not all the priests of Hymen, not all the incantations to the gods, ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray

... anguish. But by and by their feelings got the better of them, and when he was asleep in his chair after dinner Mrs. Millborne's irritation broke out. The embittered Frances joined her in reproaching the man who had come as the spectre to their intended feast of Hymen, and turned its promise to ...
— Life's Little Ironies - A set of tales with some colloquial sketches entitled A Few Crusted Characters • Thomas Hardy

... models or similes. How Ramsay succeeded in keeping Venus and Cupid out of it, in forgetting all eclogues and pastorals, Virgil or Theocritus, and indulging in nothing that was out of place in Scotland, it is hard to tell. The Mantuan bard, the oaten reed, Philomela and her songs, Hymen, Ganymede, Bacchus, and all the Olympian band disport themselves in his other verses: but The Gentle Shepherd is void of those necessary adjuncts of the eighteenth-century muse. The wimpling burn is never called Helicon ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant

... Bagabornabou, and would follow thee as a pilgrim through the wide world. The sun shall sooner lose his splendour, the pale moon drop from her orb, the sea forget to ebb and flow, and all things change their course, than Sabra prove inconstant to Saint George of England. Let, then, the priest of Hymen knit that gordian knot, the knot of wedlock, which death alone ...
— The Seven Champions of Christendom • W. H. G. Kingston

... said the Count, "mysterious forebodings that with a secret impulse urge me to foreign lands and to unwonted deeds. I confess that to-day I wished in honour of Telimena to light the flame on the altars of Hymen, but this youth has given me too fair an example by tearing off his marriage wreath of his own free will and rushing to test his heart amid the hindrances of changeful fortune and amid the bloody chances of war. To-day for me, too, a new epoch is opened! ...
— Pan Tadeusz • Adam Mickiewicz

... campaign against the Turks, undertaken by him in the autumn of 1532, under the leadership of Croy, at the behest of his imperial master. They hazard the surmise that the picture, though painted after Alfonso's return, symbolises his departure for the wars, "consoled by Victory, Love, and Hymen." A more natural conclusion would surely be that what Titian has sought to suggest is the return of the commander to enjoy the hard-earned fruits ...
— The Later works of Titian • Claude Phillips

... your sheriffs and your mayors, Your registrars and proctors! We'll live without the lawyer's cares, And die without the doctor's. No discontented fair shall pout To see her spouse so stupid: We'll tread the torch of Hymen out, And live content ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 87, March, 1875 • Various

... scarce he sees Spio with sparkling eyes, and Beroe Demure, and young Ione, less renowned, Not less divine, mild-natured; Beauty formed Her face, her heart Fidelity; for gods Designed, a mortal too Ione loved. These were the nymphs elected for the hour Of Hesperus and Hymen; these had strewn The bridal bed, these tuned afresh the shells, Wiping the green that hoarsened them within: These wove the chaplets, and at night resolved To drive the dolphins from the wreathed door. Gebir surveyed the concourse from the tents, The Egyptian men around him; ...
— Gebir • Walter Savage Landor

... fair Aurelia, cease to mourn; Lament not Hannah's happy state; You may be happy in your turn, And seize the treasure you regret. With Love united Hymen stands, And softly whispers to your charms, 'Meet but your lover in my bands, You'll find your sister in ...
— Lives of the Poets: Gay, Thomson, Young, and Others • Samuel Johnson

... she was beloved, when her existence was so necessary to that of another, when at every moment she was supported and protected? What isolation must succeed this season of delight! How happy are they whom the sacred hand of Hymen has conducted from love to friendship, without one painful moment having ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael

... And Hymen shook his fragrant torch on high, Till all its waves of smoke and tongues of flame, Like clouds of rosy gold fulfill'd the sky; And all the Nereids from the waters came, Each maiden with a musical sweet name; Doris, and Doto, and Amphithoe; And ...
— Helen of Troy • Andrew Lang

... men, do not imagine this will forever continue. In the confusion and readjustments of war, and the calamities of many, the affairs of some, one time enemies of Fortune, come to a happy issue. Do not say that Mars may not lead Amor and Hymen in his train. All things come to them who wait. I wait. Remember the life you spend in the Temple is no longer obligatory. Be no cage bird who will not fly out into the sunlight when the door is opened freely. Be surprised ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis

... no resentment against me; but who can ensure me against the wrath of Nyssia, she who is so reserved and chaste, so apprehensive, fierce, and virginal in her modesty that she might be deemed still ignorant of the laws of Hymen? Should she ever learn of the sacrilege which I am about to render myself guilty of in deferring to my master's wishes, what punishment would she condemn me to suffer in expiation of such a crime? Who could place me beyond the reach ...
— King Candaules • Theophile Gautier

... my vision glows, But not in Hymen's hand it shines; A flame that to the welkin goes, But not from holy offering-shrines; Glad hands the banquet are preparing, And near, and near the halls of state I hear the God that comes unsparing; I hear the steps ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. III • Kuno Francke (Editor-in-Chief)

... art which women alone possess of making their own everything that has been told them, she blends all shades and variations of character so as to create a manner peculiarly her own. You received from the hands of Hymen only one woman, awkward and innocent; the celibate returns you a dozen of them. A joyful and rapturous husband sees his bed invaded by the giddy and wanton courtesans, of whom we spoke in the Meditation on The First Symptoms. These goddesses come in groups, they smile and sport under the graceful ...
— The Physiology of Marriage, Part III. • Honore de Balzac

... Hymen oft appear In saffron robe, with taper clear, And pomp, and feast, and revelry, And mask, and antique pageantry; Such sights as useful poets dream On ...
— Scenes and Characters • Charlotte M. Yonge

... have not been able to learn; nor how she has been able, with the vinegar of her disposition, to soften the stony heart of old Nimrod; so, however, it is, and it has astonished every one. With all her ladyship's love of match-making, this last fume of Hymen's torch has been too much for her. She has endeavoured to reason with Mrs. Hannah, but all in vain; her mind was made up, and she grew tart on the least contradiction. Lady Lillycraft applied to the squire for his interference. "She did not know what she should do without ...
— Bracebridge Hall • Washington Irving

... alas! for years gone by, And for the friends I've lost; When no warm feeling of the heart Was chill'd by early frost. If these be Hymen's vaunted joys, I'd have him shun my door, Unless he quench his torch, and ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume VI - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various

... in European galleries. There is an excellent opportunity to study his manner in the pictures at the South Kensington Museum, where there are several portraits, some pictures of children, and the "Graces Decorating a Statue of Hymen." ...
— A History of Art for Beginners and Students: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture - Painting • Clara Erskine Clement

... Trinite," responded the girl, hesitating. Then with an odd side look, she went on rapidly: "The bridal party made an imposing cavalcade: the princess in her litter, behind a number of maids on horseback. At the castle gates several pages, dressed as Cupids, sent silver arrows after the bridal train. 'Hymen; Io Hymen!' cried the throng. 'Godspeed!' exclaimed Queen Marguerite, and threw a parchment, tied with a golden ribbon, into the princess' litter; an epithalamium, in verse, written in her own fair ...
— Under the Rose • Frederic Stewart Isham

... generals, and even the Minister Chaptal. But she has politely declined all their offers, preferring her liberty and the undisturbed right of following her own inclination to the inconvenient ties of Hymen. A gentleman, whom she calls, and who passes for, her brother, Chevalier de M de T——, a Knight of Malta, assists her in doing the honours of her house, and is considered as her favourite lover; though report and the scandalous chronicle ...
— Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, Complete - Being Secret Letters from a Gentleman at Paris to a Nobleman in London • Lewis Goldsmith

... had my way," announced Major Hymen, "every woman in England should have a dozen children ...
— The Mayor of Troy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... woman; "and I am to dress up as Hymen and speak the Epilogue in a saffron robe. It has some good ...
— The White Wolf and Other Fireside Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... boy Hymen had, with his lighted torch, driven the boy Cupid out of doors, that is to say, in common phrase, when the violence of Mr. Wild's passion (or rather appetite) for the chaste Laetitia began to abate, he returned to visit his friend Heartfree, who was ...
— The History of the Life of the Late Mr. Jonathan Wild the Great • Henry Fielding

... years, Lids never wet, unless with joyous tears, A life remote from every sordid woe, And by a nation's swelled to lordlier flow. What lurking-place, thought we, for doubts or fears, When, the day's swan, she swam along the cheers Of the Acala, five happy months ago? The guns were shouting Io Hymen then That, on her birthday, now denounce her doom; The same white steeds that tossed their scorn of men To-day as proudly drag her to the tomb. Grim jest of fate! yet who dare call it blind, Knowing what life is, what ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 23, October, 1891 • Various

... No sweet aspersion shall the heavens let fall To make this contract grow; but barren hate, Sour-eyed disdain and discord shall bestrew 20 The union of your bed with weeds so loathly That you shall hate it both: therefore take heed, As Hymen's lamps ...
— The Tempest - The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.] • William Shakespeare

... young husband may have read in some treatise on physiology that the hymen in a virgin is the great obstacle to be overcome. He is apt to conclude that this is all, that some force will be needed to break it down, and that therefore an amount of urgency even to the degree of inflicting considerable pain is justifiable. This is usually wrong. It rarely constitutes ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis

... hair, put up without any order. Many a one courted her; she hated all wooers; not able to endure, and quite unacquainted with man, she traverses the solitary parts of the woods, and she cares not what Hymen,[75] what love, {or} what marriage means. Many a time did her father say, "My daughter, thou owest me a son-in-law;" many a time did her father say, "My daughter, thou owest me grandchildren." She, utterly abhorring the nuptial torch,[76] as though a crime, has ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Vol. I, Books I-VII • Publius Ovidius Naso

... a stayer as Jabberwock-slayer, mere Angry Boy he, not a Beamish One! These Oracles windy do raise such a shindy, and kick such a doose of a dust up, One would think without them we were wrong stern and stem, and the whole of creation would bust up. But verily why men should new worship Hymen,—who, just as unshackled as Cupid,— (See decision Re JACKSON), take burdens their backs on, I cannot conceive. It seems stupid Beyond all expression to have a "possession" whose "ownness" there's ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, May 23, 1891 • Various

... the fact was probably kept hidden to gratify some whim of the poet. The very situation is tinged with the romantic, the old adage about stolen sweets was undoubtedly as true in that time as it is to-day, and the poet had a restless nature which could ill brook the ordinary yoke of Hymen. So long as he could live in the Via Mirasole, and Alessandra in the stately Casa Strozzi, Ferrara had charms for him, and his muse was all aflame. Would this have been true if one roof ...
— Women of the Romance Countries • John R. Effinger

... want to know about milady and me? But let me not, as Roderick Random says, 'profane the chaste mysteries of Hymen'[65]—damn the word, I had nearly spelt it with a small h. I like Bell as well as you do (or did, you villain!) Bessy—and that is (or ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. III - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore

... wife whose charms attract the admiring eyes of men may not depart one step from the straight and narrow path, but her husband's honor stands ever within the pale of danger. Let that husband whose courtship ceased at Hymen's shrine, who is a gallant abroad and a boor at home, keep watch and ward, for homage is sweet even to ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann

... different features that should be noted are the clitoris, a small erectile organ located at the inferior portion of the opening, the meatus urinaris, the external opening of the urethra, situated in a depression in the floor of the vulva, and the hymen, an incomplete membranous partition that may be found separating the vulva ...
— Common Diseases of Farm Animals • R. A. Craig, D. V. M.

... a psychical secondary sexual character. In this sense, and in this sense only, we may say, with Colin Scott, that "the feeling of shame is made to be overcome," and is thus correlated with its physical representative, the hymen, in the rupture of which, as Groos remarks, there is, in some degree, a disruption also of modesty. The sexual modesty of the female is thus an inevitable by-product of the naturally aggressive attitude of the male in sexual relationships, and the naturally defensive attitude of the female, this ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... had spoken before said, "By Hymen, the bride should kiss something. If the lord's not good enough, let her kiss the churl!" At this the revelers, wild with delight, beat on their trenchers and shouted, ...
— Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard • Eleanor Farjeon

... hand to John Lyth at Hymen's sacred altar. I endeavoured to do it by faith, as well as I could; but felt extremely stupified. We went to spend the day at Newton upon Derwent. With me it passed more pleasantly towards the close, indeed, while we ...
— Religion in Earnest - A Memorial of Mrs. Mary Lyth, of York • John Lyth

... two cities, fair to see and busy with the hum of men. In the one were weddings and wedding-feasts, and they were going about the city with brides whom they were escorting by torchlight from their chambers. Loud rose the cry of Hymen, and the youths danced to the music of flute and lyre, while the women stood each at her ...
— The Iliad • Homer

... light, swift, elemental; they share in the life of nature; they are fond of dancing and singing; they are invisible and immortal; they prefer night, and midnight is their favourite hour; they fall in love with mortals, steal babies and leave changelings, and usurp the function of Hymen in blessing the marriage-bed. Oberon, "king of shadows," can apparently see ...
— The Sources and Analogues of 'A Midsummer-night's Dream' • Compiled by Frank Sidgwick

... divorce, bachelorhood, maidenhood. Associated Words: misogamy, misogamist, affiance, affianced, affinity, intermarriage, conjugality, misalliance, agamist, benedict, betroth, betrothal, desponsory, ante-nuptial, sponsal, hymeneal, schatchen, connubial, connubiality, fiance, Hymen, fiancee, troth, plight, nuptial, nuptiality, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming

... bid the world revere Thy learned pair, Le Fevre and Dacier: Britain may boast, this happy day unites, Two nobler minds, in Hymen's sacred rites. What these have sung, while all th' inspiring nine, Exalt the beauties of the verse divine, Those (humble critics of th' immortal strain,) Shall bound their fame to comment ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. IV • Theophilus Cibber

... hard to play the agreeable; but Hannah could scarcely endure him. And the week passed away, as all weeks will pass, whether laden with joy or sorrow; and the pale bride stood trembling by the altar of Hymen, and the solemn words were passed that united the destinies of two immortal spirits, and the recording angel ...
— Withered Leaves from Memory's Garland • Abigail Stanley Hanna

... than the sacristan addicted exclusively to the pleasure of inspiring his auditors with fear; he delights in raising a laugh; and is jocose and sentimental by turns, when he comes to speak of love and Hymen. He is the man to collect and store up in memory the most ancient songs, and to hand them down to posterity; and, as usual, he was in the present instance the person charged with the presentation of the wedding-gifts at ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 444 - Volume 18, New Series, July 3, 1852 • Various

... life, I should have revelled in the enjoyment of anticipation before I had destroyed the hymen; but youth, want, liquor, drove me on, and I don't remember thinking much about the virginity, only that the cunt looked different from the two others I had known. The next instant I laid my belly on hers. "Oh! you are heavy, you smother me," ...
— My Secret Life, Volumes I. to III. - 1888 Edition • Anonymous

... please you. Who ever thought that bridge would be opened for my girl's wedding? Well! I am glad that it was not finished before. But we must be silent' You will notice that part about the bridge; it is in the fifth verse, I am told, beginning with something about Hymen, and ending with ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield

... and as He sat on the burning sand in the middle of the desert, He pondered upon one thing and another, and played with a handful of pebbles which He had collected. Until presently from afar, there descried Him the devils Hymen, Demon, Igamon, and Zmiulan—devils of equal ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky

... cathedral of Toledo, I occasionally smoke a cigarette. God gave us tobacco to allay our passions and our pains. You seem to be downcast, or at any rate, you carry the symbolical flower of sorrow in your hand, like the rueful god Hymen. Come! all your troubles will vanish away with the smoke," and again the ecclesiastic held out his little straw case; there was something fascinating in his manner, and kindliness towards Lucien lighted up ...
— Eve and David • Honore de Balzac

... pure, so soft, with sweet attraction shone Fair PSYCHE, kneeling at the ethereal throne; Won with coy smiles the admiring court of Jove, 50 And warm'd the bosom of unconquer'd LOVE.— Beneath a moving shade of fruits and flowers Onward they march to HYMEN'S sacred bowers; With lifted torch he lights the festive train, Sublime, and leads them in his golden chain; 55 Joins the fond pair, indulgent to their vows, And hides with mystic veil their blushing brows. Round their ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin

... in Hymen's Bands unite, Our merry peals produce delight; But when Death goes his dreary Rounds, We send ...
— English Villages • P. H. Ditchfield

... girls perpetuate the ancient but absurd emphasis on the virginal significance of the hymen; and a recent book from a prominent publisher goes so far as to try to frighten girls into remaining chaste by stating that a physician could discover if they have been unchaste. This is far from being always true, for the structure may be congenitally ...
— Sex-education - A series of lectures concerning knowledge of sex in its - relation to human life • Maurice Alpheus Bigelow

... ancient jingling chain of bells which induced the mincing steps of the virgins of Judea,—an invention which confined the lower limbs within certain limits by being worn just below the knees, and calculated to prevent the rupture of the hymen by any undue length of step or violent exercise; hence a tinkling noise and a mincing step always denoted a virgin. In Du Bisson's cases, however, virgins were out of the question; they might be the victims of enforced continence, ...
— History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present - Moral and Physical Reasons for its Performance • Peter Charles Remondino

... to bed; come Hymen, lead the Bride, And lay her by her Husbands side: Bring in the Virgins every one That grieve to lie alone: That they may kiss while they may say, a maid, To morrow 'twill be other, kist and said: Hesperus be long a shining, Whilst ...
— The Maids Tragedy • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... a party, Nature's pride, Was lovely POLL;[Footnote: MARY RAYNER, of Ixworth Thorp.] who innocently try'd, With hat of airy shape and ribbons gay, Love to inspire, and stand in Hymen's way: But, ere her twentieth Summer could expand, Or youth was render'd happy with her hand, Her mind's serenity was lost and gone, Her eye grew languid, and she wept alone; Yet causeless seem'd her grief; for quick restrain'd, Mirth follow'd loud, or indignation reign'd: Whims wild and simple ...
— The Farmer's Boy - A Rural Poem • Robert Bloomfield

... natural enough, 'tis true; To wait for him a hundred years, And all that while asleep, appears A thing entirely new. Now at this time of day, Not one of all the sex we see Doth sleep with such profound tranquillity: But yet this Fable seems to let us know That very often Hymen's blisses sweet, Altho' some tedious obstacles they meet, Are not less happy for approaching slow. 'Tis nature's way that ladies fair Should yearn conjugal joys to share; And so I've not the heart to preach A ...
— The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault • Charles Perrault

... Polecat stink and are secure; Toads with their venom, doctors with their drug, The Priest, and Hedgehog, in their robes are snug! Oh, Nature! cruel step-mother, and hard, 5 To thy poor, naked, fenceless child the Bard! No Horns but those by luckless Hymen worn, And those (alas! alas!) not Plenty's Horn! With naked feelings, and with aching pride, He hears th' unbroken blast on every side! 10 Vampire Booksellers drain him to the heart, And Scorpion Critics cureless ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... opening of the vagina is situated just back of the meatus urinarius, also within the folds of the labia. In the virgin it is partly closed by a membranous fold called the hymen or maidenhead. The shape and size of the hymen varies greatly in different individuals, sometimes being entirely absent. After marriage it usually persists as notched folds. The presence of an intact hymen is not necessarily a sign of virginity, ...
— Herself - Talks with Women Concerning Themselves • E. B. Lowry

... his heart may be wrenched and riven By a maiden coquette who has led him along, She can be pardoned, excused, and forgiven, For innocence blindfolded walks into wrong. But she who has willingly taken the fetter That Cupid forges at Hymen's command— Well, she is the woman who ought to know better; She needs no mercy at any ...
— The Kingdom of Love - and Other Poems • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... Well, there's one comfort, he cannot take his money-bags with him, and the doctor says that he cannot last much longer. Ten years have I been his slave—ten years have I been engaged to be married to Sergeant-Major O'Callaghan of the Blues—ten years has he kept me waiting at the porch of Hymen,—and what thousands of couples have I seen enter during the time! Oh dear! it's enough to drive a widow mad. I think I have managed it;—he has now quarrelled with all his relations, and Doctor Gumarabic intends this day to suggest the propriety of ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat

... Danes in their veneration of the predictions of old women, whom the after ungallantry of a hard age would have burned for witches. Marriage act and poor act have, as you believe, extinguished the holy light of Hymen's torch, and re-lighted it with Lucifer matches in Register offices; and out it soon goes, leaving worse than Egyptian darkness in the dwellings of the poor—the smell of its brimstone indicative of its origin, and ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 337, November, 1843 • Various

... is, I understand, to wed the Neapolitan, I think I must even try my chance with the dejected maid. After all, the lamp of Hymen will be gilt, and the vessel will reconcile one to the odor of the flame. I shall only protest, my Sallust, against Diomed's making thee trustee ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton

... service of the altar in their early days, should, like the Emperor Charles V, rather think of their coffins than the nuptial couch, that prelate married a young woman. Whether the glowing love of truth or Hymen's torch induced him to change the Roman Pontifical for the Book of Common Prayer, and the psalms he and I often sang together for a bridal hymn, his own conscience is the most competent to determine: certain however, it is, that, if the charms of the fair sex can ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous

... O Hymen! who burnest precious gums and scented woods in thy torch at the melting of aristocratic hearts, with what a pitiful penny-dip thou hast lighted up our little back-street ...
— Humorous Masterpieces from American Literature • Various

... is imagined by the rest of the company to be brought by enchantment, and is therefore introduced by a supposed aerial being in the character of Hymen. ...
— Johnson's Notes to Shakespeare Vol. I Comedies • Samuel Johnson

... every child has his virgin, and at the commencement of life a marriage of souls is always consummated in the plenitude of innocence. Dea was his wife, for theirs was the same nest on the highest branch of the deep-rooted tree of Hymen. Dea was still more—she was his light, for without her all was void, and nothingness; and for him her head was crowned with rays. What would become of him without Dea? What could he do with all that was himself? Nothing in him could live ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo

... part of 1806 Napoleon might flatter himself with his brilliant success as a match-maker. Yet, after all, he was less concerned with the affairs of Hymen than with those of Mars and Mercury. He longed to be at Paris for the settlement of finances; and he burned to hear of the expulsion of the Bourbons from Naples. For this last he had already sent forth his imperious mandates ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose

... that another, Sailing far from Hymen's port, A forlorn, unmarried brother, Seeing, shall take heart, ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various

... feathered nets, thick sleet-storms will I shower And rend all heaven with thunder. Here and there The rest shall fly, and in the darkness cower. One cave shall screen both lovers in that hour. There will I be, if thou approve, meanwhile And make her his in wedlock. Hymen's power Shall seal the rite."—Not adverse, with a smile Sweet Venus nods assent, and gladdens ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil

... of choir boys would sing an epithalamium, as is now done in England. These fresh young voices hailing the youthful couple would be in keeping with the child bridesmaids and the youthful brothers. Nay, they would suggest those frescoes of the Italian villas where Hymen and Cupid, two immortal boys, always precede ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood

... John Russell on his approaching union with Lady Fanny Elliot. His lordship is such a persevering votary of Hymen, that we think he ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various

... decreed it is, We human creatures should enjoy that bliss. One is no number; maids are nothing, then, Without the sweet society of men. Wilt thou live single still? one shalt thou be, Though never singling Hymen couple thee. Wild savages, that drink of running springs, Think water far excels all earthly things; But they, that daily taste neat wine, despise it: Virginity, albeit some highly prize it, Compar'd with marriage, had you tried them both, Differs as much as ...
— Hero and Leander and Other Poems • Christopher Marlowe and George Chapman

... the architrave, were three little statues—one held a torch, another a bow, and a third a bag; they were therefore rumoured, I know not with what justice, to be the artistical representatives of Hymen, ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... piece in the Louvre, in which Mary of Arragon, the lovely wife of da Valos, is parting with her husband, who is bound on one of the desperate expeditions against the terrible Turks. Da Valos is dressed in armour, and the couple are encircled by Hymen, Victory, and the God of Love. The composition was repeated more than once, but never with quite the same success. We again suspect the influence of Michelangelo in the altarpiece painted before Titian next left Venice, of St. John the Almsgiver, for the Church ...
— The Venetian School of Painting • Evelyn March Phillipps

... nay, we must have all friendes, Jarring discords are no marriage musick; Throw not Hymen in a cuckstoole; dimple Your furrowed browes; since all but mirth was ment, Let us not then conclude in discontent, Say, shall we all In friendly straine measure our ...
— A Collection Of Old English Plays, Vol. IV. • Editor: A.H. Bullen

... again. But this time, in spite of her harshness, La Briere thought he walked on air; the earth softened under his feet, the trees bore flowers; the skies were rosy, the air cerulean, as they are in the temples of Hymen in those fairy pantomimes which finish happily. In such situations every woman is a Janus, and sees behind her without turning round; and thus Modeste perceived on the face of her lover the indubitable symptoms of a love like Butscha's,—surely ...
— Modeste Mignon • Honore de Balzac

... lintels of the door has Hymenaeus quenched, and hath torn to shreds the bridal crown, and Hymen no more, Hymen no more is the song, but a new song is ...
— Theocritus, Bion and Moschus rendered into English Prose • Andrew Lang

... wrought of art sublime Where antique paintings haunt the walls, And gilded foot as silent falls In depths of plush, as flight of time, And liquid music softer blows Than Hymen's mellow golden chime: They plighted troth beneath the sword Of the knight that wore the blood red rose; But they drank of the cup that never flows From the bowl ...
— The Loom of Life • Cotton Noe

... confidence; in his travelled experience they anticipated the permanency of a corrected taste; nor, was it a disagreeable consideration to either, that as the silken cord of paternal discipline was to be loosened, it was to be succeeded by the fetters of hymen cast in polished gold. In what manner their daughter regarded the evident admiration of Mr. Delafield will appear, by her ...
— Tales for Fifteen: or, Imagination and Heart • James Fenimore Cooper

... Loves and Graces have been preparing this torch for Hymen, which is to be kindled to-morrow, Mr Twemlow has suffered much in his mind. It would seem that both the mature young lady and the mature young gentleman must indubitably be Veneering's oldest friends. Wards of his, perhaps? Yet that can scarcely be, for they are older than himself. Veneering ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens

... eyebrows, and left her without those dark arches that had helped to make the radiant sun of her once maidenly beauty. With tweezers and razor the fell work, after many a wince, was done. With denuded brows and changed coiffure surely the Japanese Hymen demands no more sacrifices at his shrine? Surely Kiku can still keep the treasures of a set of teeth that seem like a casket of pearls with borders of coral? Not so. The fashion of all good society from remotest antiquity demands that the teeth ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 86, February, 1875 • Various

... 'Ay, and light Hymen's torch with some thriving tallow chandler, who would marry a domestic slave as a good speculation, without one spark of ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. I) - or, The Clue of Life • Charlotte M. Yonge

... torch let Hymen light, And let the god our hearts unite! This day would then before its end, See me your ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

... weather, And shake their leafless heads and drop together: So two cold limbs, touch'd by Galvani's wire, Move with new life, and feel awaken'd fire; Quivering awhile, their flaccid forms remain, Then turn to cold torpidity again. "But ever frowns your Hymen? man and maid, Are all repenting, suffering, or betray'd?" Forbid it, Love! we have our couples here Who hail the day in each revolving year: These are with us, as in the world around; They are not frequent, but they may be found. Our farmers too, what though they ...
— The Parish Register • George Crabbe

... proved, it is necessary to keep in his proper place in society by wholesome restrictions; and we have often thought it a matter of regret that some well understood regulations did not exist by which it became not only customary, but incumbent on him, to proceed in his road to the temple of Hymen. We know that it is ungenerous, ignoble, almost unprecedented, to doubt the faith, the constancy, of a male paragon; yet, somehow, as the papers occasionally give us a sample of such infidelity; as we have sometimes seen a solitary ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper

... 20 } His soul, alas, what fortunes have essay'd; } What feats of war!—and in what words convey'd! Were it not fix'd, determin'd in my mind, That me no more the nuptial tye shall bind, Since Death deceiv'd the first fond flame I knew: 25 Were Hymen's rites less odious to my view, To this one fault perhaps I might give way; For must I own it? Anna since the day Sicheus fell, (that day a brother's guilt, A brother's blood upon our altars spilt); 30 He, ...
— The Fourth Book of Virgil's Aeneid and the Ninth Book of Voltaire's Henriad • Virgil and Voltaire

... gay and good-humour'd, complying and kind, Turn the chief of your care from your face to your mind; 'Tis thus that a wife may her conquests improve, And Hymen shall ...
— Sketches of the Fair Sex, in All Parts of the World • Anonymous

... "You shan't, Oh Percy, you'll ruin me, do get away; you'll kill me.—Oh—Ah-r-r-re!" as struggling and wriggling to resist me, her motions actually helped to accomplish the rape, for thrusting fiercely just as she heaved a little to throw me off, the hymen was broken, and my Cock triumphed over that ...
— Forbidden Fruit • Anonymous

... I see that you have never known love. That which you call love's grave is the sanctuary in which it receives life, the abode which makes it immortal. Give way to my prayers, my lovely friend, and then you shall know the difference between Love and Hymen. You shall see that, if Hymen likes to die in order to get rid of life, Love on the contrary expires only to spring up again into existence, and hastens to revive, so as to savour new enjoyment. Let me undeceive you, and ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... indeed, but she who could pay highest for it; and who could pay with a handsome income but a well-dowered widow? A widow it must be—a widow it should be. Noble indeed was the sentiment which inspired this great man to sacrifice himself on the altar of Hymen for the good of his creditors. Ye young men in the Guards, who do this kind of thing every day—that is, every day that you can meet with a widow with the proper qualifications—take warning by the lamentable history of Mr. Robert ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 1 • Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton

... discover that he was worth more'n an assistant bartender and almost as much as a fourth-rate movie actor. Then, too, Myra's father had something lingerin' the matter with him, and wouldn't let anybody manage him but her. Hymen hobbled by both hind feet, ...
— Wilt Thou Torchy • Sewell Ford

... gossips entertains, With stories of her child-bed pains, And fiercely against Hymen rails: But Hymen's not so much to blame; She knows, unless her memory fails, E'er she was wed, ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. III • Theophilus Cibber

... interview he ought to venture upon nothing that might frighten a young girl so ignorantly pure, so imprudent by virtue rather than from desire, postponed all further action to the future, relying on his beauty, of which he knew the power, and on this innocent ring-marriage, the hymen of the heart, the lightest, yet the strongest of all ceremonies. For the rest of that night, and throughout the next day, Juana's imagination was the accomplice ...
— Juana • Honore de Balzac

... maidenhead, consisting of a duplicature of the mucous membrane. It is very variable in form, but in the great majority of instances it diminishes the size of the vaginal inlet to such an extent as to render coitus impossible until the hymen has been torn. Through the vaginal orifice access is gained to the interior of the vagina, a tubular structure, but flattened from before backwards, so that in the quiescent state the anterior and posterior walls of the passage are in apposition. ...
— The Sexual Life of the Child • Albert Moll

... miscellaneous fragments in the saloon, the visitor has yet to notice a fine torso of a nude Venus; a statue of Discobolus, who is throwing a quoit, found in Hadrian's Villa Tiburtina; part of a statue of Hymen; and at the ends of the saloon the visitor should notice some specimens from the old temple of Selinus, which are valued as probably representing some of the earliest extant specimens of Greek art. Among the subjects represented ...
— How to See the British Museum in Four Visits • W. Blanchard Jerrold

... proud Sparta with their wheels resounds, Sparta whose walls a range of hills surrounds; At the fair dome the rapid labour ends; Where sate Atrides 'midst his bridal friends, With double vows invoking Hymen's power, To bless his son's and ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer, translated by Alexander Pope

... you, ye matrons, ever on the watch To mar a son's, or make a daughter's match; To you, ye children of—whom chance accords— Always the ladies, and sometimes their lords; To you, ye single gentlemen, who seek Torments for life, or pleasures for a week; As Love or Hymen your endeavours guide, To gain your own, or snatch another's bride;— To one and all the lovely stranger came, And every ball-room echoes with ...
— English Satires • Various

... his folly like a stalking-horse, and vnder the presentation of that he shoots his wit. Enter Hymen, ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... impatience, I broke from the company, burst into her chamber, pushed out her confidante, and locked the door, and found her—O heaven and earth!—a feast a thousand times more delicious than my most sanguine hopes presaged! But, let me not profane the chaste mysteries of Hymen. I was ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett

... perfumed it with sweetest of sighs; 'Tis feather'd with ringlets my mother might wear, And the barb gleams with light from young eyes; But it falls without touching—I'll break it, I vow, For there's Hymen beginning to pout; He's complaining his torch burns so dull and so low, That Zephyr might puff it ...
— Successful Recitations • Various

... of Love in 'As You Like It.' Examples of love at first sight in Shakespeare. Note Orlando's surprise at the suddenness of Oliver's and Celia's love. Was his own less sudden? Consider Hymen's song and Jaques's remarks in the last scene as descriptive of the various couples. Does the comic element of the play, as represented by Touchstone, discredit sentiment in the play? Notice the madrigal in Lodge's novel (given in Poet-lore, Vol. III., in the article on Lodge, Dec, 1891), ...
— Shakespeare Study Programs; The Comedies • Charlotte Porter and Helen A. Clarke

... thro' my veins since first I look'd on thee. But wherefore slur the perfect ceremony? The sovereign of Galatia weds his Queen. Let all be done to the fullest in the sight Of all the Gods. Nay, rather than so clip The flowery robe of Hymen, we would add Some golden fringe of gorgeousness beyond Old use, to make the day memorial, when Synorix, first King, Camma, first Queen o' the Realm, Drew here the richest lot from Fate, to live And die together. This pain—what is it?—again? I had a touch of this last ...
— Becket and other plays • Alfred Lord Tennyson

... shamed? Or my despair, my day of slavery? Oh, the grim fates have caught me in a net Of manifold ills! O child, they have spun for thee Dread weird of unimagined misery! They have thrust thee away, when near was Hymen's hymn, From thine espousals, marked thee for destruction Dark, unendurable, unspeakable! For lo, a dead man's heart, Achilles' heart, Is by our blood made warm with life to-day! O child, dear child, that I might die with thee, That earth might swallow ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus

... came laden with rich stuffs and gems from the East; cups and dishes of virgin gold, crusted with uncut jewels; statuettes of Bacchus, the god of feasts, crowned with grapes of purple amethyst and leaves of emerald; of Fortuna, with the horn of Amalthea; of Hymen the torch-bearer, god of marriage; cups of figured and embossed glass, inscribed with sentiments such as "Bibe feliciter!" or "Ex hoc amici bibunt,"—all intended to be bestowed upon the guests as souvenirs during the feasts at which they were ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor

... glorious destinies. Let your nuptial hymns, your nuptial songs, greet him and his Basileia! 'Twas in the midst of such festivities that the Fates formerly united Olympian Here to the King who governs the gods from the summit of his inaccessible throne. Oh! Hymen! oh! Hymenaeus! Rosy Eros with the golden wings held the reins and guided the chariot; 'twas he, who presided over the union of Zeus and the fortunate Her. ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al

... ceaseless drain Of outpour'd water, ever spilt, And all the pain Reserved for sinners, e'en when dead: Those impious hands, (could crime do more?) Those impious hands had hearts to shed Their bridegrooms' gore! One only, true to Hymen's flame, Was traitress to her sire forsworn: That splendid falsehood lights her name Through times unborn. "Wake!" to her youthful spouse she cried, "Wake! or you yet may sleep too well: Fly—from the father of your bride, Her sisters fell: They, ...
— Odes and Carmen Saeculare of Horace • Horace

... a period in my life, at which the novelist would pause,—believing the history of woman ceases to interest as soon as an accepted lover and consenting friends appear ready to usher the heroine into the temple of Hymen. But there is a life within life, which is never revealed till it is intertwined with another's. In the depth of the heart there is a lower deep, which is never sounded save by the hand that wears the wedding-ring. There is a talisman ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz

... voluptuary, the smiling debauchee, secretly lament the health they have so inconsiderately damaged so prodigally thrown away: see disdain, joined to hatred, reign between those adulterous married couples, who have reciprocally violated the sacred vows they mutually pledged at the altar of Hymen; whose appetencies have rendered them the scorn of the world; the jest of their acquaintance; polluted tributaries to the surgeon. See the liar deprived of all confidence; the knave stript of all trust; the hypocrite fearfully avoiding the penetrating looks of his inquisitive neighbour; ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 2 • Baron D'Holbach

... Heliconii Cultor, Vraniae genus, Qui rapis teneram ad virum Virginem, o Hymenaee Hymen, ...
— The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus • Caius Valerius Catullus

... also a fact, a human fact eternal among humanity, and of this fact he took account as of a fact observed and proved, saying if man is on one side a "fierce and lascivious gorilla," on the other side he is a mystic animal, and that in "a double nature, mysterious hymen," as Hugo wrote, lay the explanation of all the baseness in ideas and actions as well as all the sublimity in ideas and actions of humanity. Personally he was a Stoic and his practice was the continuous development ...
— Initiation into Philosophy • Emile Faguet

... in manners. In fact this softening process is quite obvious throughout. There is plenty of "impropriety" but no mere nastiness, and the impropriety itself is, so to speak, rather indicated than described. As nearly the last sentence announces, "Hymen hides the faults of love" wherever it is possible, though it would require a most complicated system of polygamy and cross-unions to enable that amiable divinity to cover them all. There is a villain, but ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury

... state of debate, quarrels sometimes occur between the lovers the gentleman's caution sometimes takes alarm, and more frequently the lady's pride is aroused at the too obvious preference given to worldly gain over heavenly beauty; Cupid shies at Mammon, and Hymen is upset ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover

... crowns and Hymen's band) Would neither men obey, nor men command: Great pleasure from rough seas to see the shore Or from firm land to hear ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume II • Theophilus Cibber

... by Hymen's silken chain What other States by doubtful battle gain, And while fierce Mars enriches meaner lands, Receives possession from fair ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne

... could hold out no longer, and I yielded down my erotic tribute to her virginal charms, without having actually deflowered her. So far, perhaps, it was fortunate, because I poured into her a torrent of sperm which was not only balm to her partially wounded hymen, but so relaxed and lubricated the interior of her cunt as greatly to facilitate ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous

... the happy bridegroom—'one cup to Hymen, and then let us seek his joys in each other's arms. I have a chamber prepared for us, which I have dedicated to Venus and to Cupid; there hath Love spread his wing, and beneath it shall we enjoy ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn

... afraid To bind her fate in Hymen's fetter, She vow she means to die a maid, In answer to my loving letter? Quoth Echo, ...
— Journeys Through Bookland V3 • Charles H. Sylvester

... "Cupid and Hymen. The little brown cottage at Cambridge, Pa., is the place to call to have the marriage-knot promptly and strongly tied. Inquire ...
— Punchinello, Vol. II., No. 33, November 12, 1870 • Various

... am a canon of the cathedral of Toledo, I occasionally smoke a cigarette. God gave us tobacco to allay our passions and our pains. You seem to be downcast, or at any rate, you carry the symbolical flower of sorrow in your hand, like the rueful god Hymen. Come! all your troubles will vanish away with the smoke," and again the ecclesiastic held out his little straw case; there was something fascinating in his manner, and kindliness towards ...
— Eve and David • Honore de Balzac

... never a ruffle. When she applied the soft pedal the Bacchic revel became a silent prayer. So far as we can gather, the cultured gentlemen of Judea did not fall over each other in a frantic effort to ensnare her with Hymen's noose. If the Apostles recommended her life to the ladies of their congregations as worthy emulation the stenographer must have been nodding worse than Homer. If the elite of Jerusalem named their daughters for her and made her the subject of public ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann

... lad,[1] that lately taught His oaten reed the trumpet's silver sound, Young Thyrsilis; and for his music brought The willing spheres from heaven, to lead around The dancing nymphs and swains, that sung, and crowned Eclecta's Hymen with ten thousand flowers Of choicest praise; and hung her heavenly bowers With saffron garlands, ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan

... HYMEN, late, his love-knots selling, Called at many a maiden's dwelling; But he found too well they knew him; None were prompter to pooh-pooh him. "Who'll buy my love-knots? Who'll buy my love-knots?" Soon as that old cry resounded. How his baskets ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 100, May 2, 1891 • Various

... youth, "does the choice beseem you upon whom the moon of your nuptials is beaming still. My beloved and I are riper in Hymen's lore by not less, I ween, than one fortnight. Prudence impels us towards ...
— The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales • Richard Garnett

... with hirsute honors doffed, succinct Of saponaceous locks, the Priest who linked In Hymen's golden bands the torn unthrift, Whose means exiguous stared from many a rift, Even as he kissed the virgin all forlorn, Who milked the cow with implicated horn, Who in fine wrath the canine torturer skied, That dared to vex the insidious muricide, Who let ...
— English as She is Wrote - Showing Curious Ways in which the English Language may be - made to Convey Ideas or obscure them. • Anonymous

... to Royal Academy Exhibition, including Lady Cockburn and her Children, Three Ladies adorning a Term of Hymen, and the Baby Princess ...
— Sir Joshua Reynolds - A Collection of Fifteen Pictures and a Portrait of the - Painter with Introduction and Interpretation • Estelle M. Hurll

... and the lofty. We are beyond earth's story as 'tis told, sir. All's shallower than the heart of man.... Indeed, 'twas one more shattered altar to Hymen." ...
— Henry Brocken - His Travels and Adventures in the Rich, Strange, Scarce-Imaginable Regions of Romance • Walter J. de la Mare

... of nature; they are fond of dancing and singing; they are invisible and immortal; they prefer night, and midnight is their favourite hour; they fall in love with mortals, steal babies and leave changelings, and usurp the function of Hymen in blessing the marriage-bed. Oberon, "king of shadows," can apparently see ...
— The Sources and Analogues of 'A Midsummer-night's Dream' • Compiled by Frank Sidgwick

... The very situation is tinged with the romantic, the old adage about stolen sweets was undoubtedly as true in that time as it is to-day, and the poet had a restless nature which could ill brook the ordinary yoke of Hymen. So long as he could live in the Via Mirasole, and Alessandra in the stately Casa Strozzi, Ferrara had charms for him, and his muse was all aflame. Would this have been true if one ...
— Women of the Romance Countries • John R. Effinger

... of the Rue Vanneau and the Rue de Babylone, he looked back at the Eden whence Hymen had expelled him with the sword of the law. Valerie, at her window, was watching his departure; as he glanced up, she waved her handkerchief, but the rascally Marneffe hit his wife's cap and dragged her violently away from the window. A tear rose to ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac

... are in the first row, let us pick up the bridegroom and carry him in triumph. Oh! Hymen! oh! Hymenaeus! ...
— Peace • Aristophanes

... warm before its flame Our yearning hands, or from its tempting tree Yield fruit we may consume, or let us claim In Hymen's scroll of happy heraldry The twining glyphs of perfect you and me — May kindle social fires whence curls no blame, Find gardens where no fruits forbidden be, And mottoes weave, unsullied ...
— An Anthology of Australian Verse • Bertram Stevens

... navire la-haut conclut le grand hymen, Il mele presque a Dieu l'ame du genre humain. Il voit l'insondable, il y touche; Il est le vaste elan du progres vers le ciel; Il est l'entree altiere et sainte du reel Dans ...
— La Legende des Siecles • Victor Hugo

... felt the darts of Alcmene's eyes; and, whilst Amphitryon, her husband, commands the Theban troops on the plains of Boeotia, Jupiter has taken his form, and assuaged his pains, in the possession of the sweetest of pleasures. The condition of the couple is propitious to his desire: Hymen joined them only a few days ago; and the young warmth of their tender love suggested to Jupiter to have recourse to this fine artifice. His stratagem proved successful in this case; but with many a cherished object a similar disguise would not be of any use: ...
— Amphitryon • Moliere

... sordid woe, And by a nation's swelled to lordlier flow. What lurking-place, thought we, for doubts or fears, When, the day's swan, she swam along the cheers Of the Acala, five happy months ago? The guns were shouting Io Hymen then That, on her birthday, now denounce her doom; The same white steeds that tossed their scorn of men To-day as proudly drag her to the tomb. Grim jest of fate! yet who dare call it blind, Knowing what life ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 23, October, 1891 • Various

... arrived at a period in my life, at which the novelist would pause,—believing the history of woman ceases to interest as soon as an accepted lover and consenting friends appear ready to usher the heroine into the temple of Hymen. But there is a life within life, which is never revealed till it is intertwined with another's. In the depth of the heart there is a lower deep, which is never sounded save by the hand that wears the wedding-ring. There is a talisman ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz

... Malateste, that, that torrent wracks me. But Hymen's torch, held downward, shall drop out, And for it, the mad Furies swing their ...
— The Noble Spanish Soldier • Thomas Dekker

... is a motley procession of sailors, sweeps, jockeys, Greenwich pensioners, Jew clothesmen, flunkies, and others more illustrious, chained to the chariot wheels of Cupid, who, preceded by cherubic acolytes and banner-bearers, winds round the top of the picture towards an altar of Hymen on the table. When, by the aid of a pocket-glass, one has mastered these swarming figures, as well as those in the foreground, it gradually dawns upon one that all the furniture is strangely vitalised. Masks laugh round the border ...
— The Library • Andrew Lang

... iii. 211), where also we find the pigeon slaughtered (p. 289). I have mentioned that the blood of this bird is supposed throughout the East, where the use of the microscope is unknown, and the corpuscles are never studied, most to resemble the results of a bursten hymen, and that it is the most used to deceive the expert eyes of midwives and old matrons. See note ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton

... animals. The different features that should be noted are the clitoris, a small erectile organ located at the inferior portion of the opening, the meatus urinaris, the external opening of the urethra, situated in a depression in the floor of the vulva, and the hymen, an incomplete membranous partition that may be found separating the ...
— Common Diseases of Farm Animals • R. A. Craig, D. V. M.

... Ride and Tie Jeremy Taylor Criticism Public Instruction Picturesque Words Toleration War Parodies M. Dupuis Origin of the Worship of Hymen Egotism Cap of Liberty Bulls Wise Ignorance Rouge Hasty Words Motives and Impulses Inward Blindness The Vices of Slaves no excuse for Slavery Circulation of the Blood 'Peritura Parcere Chartae' To have ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge

... fair nymph Eurydice, whom he loved dearly, and who returned his love. But at their marriage the omens were not favorable. Hymen, the marriage god, came to it with a gloomy countenance and the wedding torches smoked and would not give ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various

... lords, let's now to court, Where we may finish up the joyfullest day That ever happ'd to a distressed king.[197] With mirth and joy and great solemnity We'll finish up these Hymen's rites ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various

... quia non metuunt anim discrimen, Principes in habitum verterunt hoc crimen, Varium viro turpiter jungit novus hymen, Exagitata ...
— Early English Meals and Manners • Various

... &c. (promise) 768; wedding, nuptials, Hymen, bridal; espousals, spousals; leading to the altar &c. v.; nuptial benediction, epithalamium[obs3]; sealing. torch of Hymen, temple of Hymen; hymeneal altar; honeymoon. bridesmaid, bridesman[obs3], best man; bride, bridegroom. married man, married woman, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... although instances have occured of fecundation being effected without the introduction of the male organ. Thus cases have been found of women who have been fecundated, and have even arrived at the term of pregnancy, having been obliged to submit to a surgical operation for the removal of the Hymen, which membrane had not been broken in the acts which had nevertheless effected the fecundation. Lastly, the excessive length, when it does exist, of the clitoris, also opposes the conjugal act, by the difficulty it presents to the introduction ...
— Aphrodisiacs and Anti-aphrodisiacs: Three Essays on the Powers of Reproduction • John Davenport

... sleet-storms will I shower And rend all heaven with thunder. Here and there The rest shall fly, and in the darkness cower. One cave shall screen both lovers in that hour. There will I be, if thou approve, meanwhile And make her his in wedlock. Hymen's power Shall seal the rite."—Not adverse, with a smile Sweet Venus nods assent, and gladdens ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil

... to her might. None other is there To which to look but Cherson; and I know, From trusty friends among them, that even now, Perchance this very day, an embassy Comes to us with design that we should sink Our old traditional hate in the new bonds Which Hymen binds together. For the girl Gycia, the daughter of old Lamachus, Their foremost man, there comes but one report— That ...
— Gycia - A Tragedy in Five Acts • Lewis Morris

... woman, is gone to heaven; he shuns the report of having descended to the realm of Pluto, being consumed as to his body in the terrible flame of fire; and he embraces the lovely bed of Hebe in the golden hall. O Hymen, you have honored two children of Jupiter. Many things agree with many; for in truth they say that Minerva was an ally of their father, and the city and people of that Goddess has saved them, and has restrained the insolence of a man to whom passion ...
— The Tragedies of Euripides, Volume I. • Euripides

... perceiving their mutual wishes, suffered them not to languish in expectation of a blessing he had resolved on; but gave immediate orders for the marriage preparations, and a few days after it was celebrated with the magnificence the occasion deserved. Hymen, in agreement with love, only rendered their flames more lasting; possession was so far from extinguishing them, that it seemed to be the torch which kindled them. The Count was charmed with the happy union he saw between them, and his ...
— The Princess of Ponthieu - (in) The New-York Weekly Magazine or Miscellaneous Repository • Unknown

... 1532, under the leadership of Croy, at the behest of his imperial master. They hazard the surmise that the picture, though painted after Alfonso's return, symbolises his departure for the wars, "consoled by Victory, Love, and Hymen." A more natural conclusion would surely be that what Titian has sought to suggest is the return of the commander to enjoy ...
— The Later works of Titian • Claude Phillips

... accomplished by perseverance—of crying themselves to sleep. These were our bridal compliments; much more flattering, I imagine, if not quite so honey-accented, as the courtly phrases with which the votaries and the victims of Hymen are ...
— The Experiences of a Barrister, and Confessions of an Attorney • Samuel Warren

... you want to know about milady and me? But let me not, as Roderick Random says, 'profane the chaste mysteries of Hymen'[65]—damn the word, I had nearly spelt it with a small h. I like Bell as well as you do (or did, you villain!) Bessy—and that is (or was) saying ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. III - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore

... as usual, except that she was now engaged in substituting for her green kid gloves a pair of white. The Aged was likewise occupied in preparing a similar sacrifice for the altar of Hymen. The old gentleman, however, experienced so much difficulty in getting his gloves on, that Wemmick found it necessary to put him with his back against a pillar, and then to get behind the pillar himself and pull ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens

... Sodom, God would have spared had there been found ten righteous men within its walls. The world is saved by its just men. History sees them not; she is but the newspaper, a report of accidents. Judge you life by that? Then you shall believe that the true Temple of Hymen is the Divorce Court; that men are of two classes only, the thief and the policeman; that all noble thought is but a politician's catchword. History sees only the destroying conflagrations, she ...
— The Second Thoughts of An Idle Fellow • Jerome K. Jerome

... by setting you right. Then, instead of the natty primness of your bachelor's apartment, you have your eyes feasted by that elegant confusion of the little sanctuary—the charm of which cannot, unseen, be apprehended, and is only known to those who are privileged to enter, by the passport of Hymen. A bit of bobbin here—a thread-paper there—here a hat feather—there a scrap of silk.—Besides," [drawing his chair closer to mine and looking very tender] "when you love her, you know—." He paused and sighed, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, - Issue 275, September 29, 1827 • Various

... feet walked him riverward, reading. Are you saved? All are washed in the blood of the lamb. God wants blood victim. Birth, hymen, martyr, war, foundation of a building, sacrifice, kidney burntoffering, druids' altars. Elijah is coming. Dr John Alexander Dowie restorer of the ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce

... out into sunshine, and it withers and ends. Strephon and Chloe languish apart; join in a rapture: and presently you hear that Chloe is crying, and Strephon has broken his crook across her back. Can you mend it so as to show no marks of rupture? Not all the priests of Hymen, not all the incantations to the ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray

... to close her eyes; Eyes which so far all other lights control, They warm our mortal parts, but these our soul! Let her free spirit, whose unconquer'd breast Holds such deep quiet and untroubled rest, Know that though Venus and her son should spare Her rebel heart, and never teach her care, Yet Hymen may in force his vigils keep, And for another's ...
— Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham • Edmund Waller; John Denham

... years, And all that while asleep, appears A thing entirely new. Now at this time of day, Not one of all the sex we see Doth sleep with such profound tranquillity: But yet this Fable seems to let us know That very often Hymen's blisses sweet, Altho' some tedious obstacles they meet, Are not less happy for approaching slow. 'Tis nature's way that ladies fair Should yearn conjugal joys to share; And so I've not the heart to preach A moral that's ...
— The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault • Charles Perrault

... while, surmounting the architrave, were three little statues— one held a torch, another a bow, and a third a bag; they were therefore rumoured, I know not with what justice, to be the artistical representatives of Hymen, Cupid ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 3 • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... resentment against me; but who can ensure me against the wrath of Nyssia, she who is so reserved and chaste, so apprehensive, fierce, and virginal in her modesty that she might be deemed still ignorant of the laws of Hymen? Should she ever learn of the sacrilege which I am about to render myself guilty of in deferring to my master's wishes, what punishment would she condemn me to suffer in expiation of such a crime? Who could place me beyond the ...
— King Candaules • Theophile Gautier

... 250 They carry stones to poise them in their flight, As ballast keeps the unsteady vessel right. But, of all customs that the bees can boast, 'Tis this may challenge admiration most; That none will Hymen's softer joys approve, Nor waste their spirits in luxurious love, But all a long virginity maintain, And bring forth young without a mother's pain: From herbs and flowers they pick each tender bee, And cull from plants a buzzing progeny; 260 From these they choose out subjects, and create A ...
— The Poetical Works of Addison; Gay's Fables; and Somerville's Chase • Joseph Addison, John Gay, William Sommerville

... to throw my earthly rest And quiet all away in jest— I could not love except where Death Was mingling his with Beauty's breath— Or Hymen, Time, and Destiny, Were stalking between ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 5 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe

... their veneration of the predictions of old women, whom the after ungallantry of a hard age would have burned for witches. Marriage act and poor act have, as you believe, extinguished the holy light of Hymen's torch, and re-lighted it with Lucifer matches in Register offices; and out it soon goes, leaving worse than Egyptian darkness in the dwellings of the poor—the smell of its brimstone indicative of its origin, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 337, November, 1843 • Various

... trading is supposed to be of monetary use to her second lord. Moreover, the tent, utensils, and cooking-kit which she shared with her spouse from the ships makes a substantial dower when she again essays Hymen's lottery. ...
— The New North • Agnes Deans Cameron

... next morning the stains are displayed in the Harem. In Darfour this is done by the bridegroom. "Prima Venus debet esse cruenta," say the Easterns with much truth, and they have no faith in our complaisant creed which allows the hymen-membrane to disappear by any but ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton

... are clad in yellow. Amber is yellow; so is the orange; and so were stage-coaches and many dashing things of the old time; and pink is yellow by lamplight. But gold-mines, it has been proved, are not so yellow as is popularly supposed. Hymen's robe is Miltonically 'saffron,' and the dearest petticoat in all literature—not forgetting the 'tempestuous' garment ...
— Prose Fancies (Second Series) • Richard Le Gallienne

... less ingenuity, Hymen's Triumph is as a whole an original composition. The play is preceded by a prologue in which Daniel departs from his models in employing the dialogue form, the speakers being Hymen, Avarice, Envy, and Jealousy[252]. In the opening scene we find Thirsis lamenting the loss of his love Silvia, who is supposed to have been devoured by wild beasts while wandering alone upon the shore—we are once again on the ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg

... return his passion, her vanity is flattered by his addresses, and a woman must be very little disposed to be pleased, who receives no pleasure from one who is continually endeavouring to oblige and amuse her; but the most whimsical of the poets never fancied a grey-bearded Cupid, or represented Hymen with a torch in one hand, and a crutch in the other. ...
— A Description of Millenium Hall • Sarah Scott

... the old toothless gossips in Sparta were ever laconic?) I am truly sorry for Erle Palma. That beautifully crystallized quartz heart of his is no doubt being ground between the upper and nether millstones of his love and his pride; and Hymen ought to charge him heavy mill-toll. My dear, have you seen Elliott Roscoe's little tinted-paper poem? Of course his apostrophe to 'violet eyes, overlaced with jet!' will sound quite Tennysonian to a certain little shy girl, now hiding at Como, and who 'inspired the strain.' ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson

... nothing but the entire possession of the lady could allay. The affair of Lord A- and Mrs. B- is too well known to need repetition—it could not succeed a second time. Abelard F- having paid the debt of nature, there was no impediment but a visit to the temple of Hymen, on which point the lady was determined; and the yielding suitor, wounded to the vital part, most readily complied. It is due to the countess to admit, that since her present elevation, her conduct has ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle

... passion for his work had left him time or wish to explore this field which roused only an impatient contempt when thrust on his notice. Of Love itself, as before stated, he held vague theories: regarding it rather as a far-off event which would meet him in future years and land him eventually at Hymen's feet. And here he found all such theories suddenly reversed. The first moment the idea of marriage was presented to his notice the vision of the only possible bride for him stood out with quite definite distinctness. Instead of Love being a prelude to the thought of Marriage, ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant

... sure," said the woman; "and I am to dress up as Hymen and speak the Epilogue in a saffron robe. It has some good lines; ...
— The White Wolf and Other Fireside Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... "Should I seek Hymen's tie, As a poet I die - Ye Benedicks, mourn my distresses! For what little fame Is annexed to my name Is derived from ...
— Rejected Addresses: or, The New Theatrum Poetarum • James and Horace Smith

... me, kind Hymen, teach, for thou Must be my only tutor now,— Teach me some innocent employ, That shall the hateful thought destroy, That I this whole long night must pass In exile from my love's embrace. Alas, thou hast no wings, oh Time! [Footnote: ...
— Memoirs of the Life of the Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan V1 • Thomas Moore

... congratulate Lord John Russell on his approaching union with Lady Fanny Elliot. His lordship is such a persevering votary of Hymen, that we think he ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, July 24, 1841 • Various

... reply, And brazen front and stubborn tone, Show all her native virtue's flown. By her the thoughtless youth is ta'en, Impoverished, disgraced, or slain: Through her the marriage vows are broke, And Hymen proves a galling yoke. Diseases come, destruction's dealt, Where'er her poisonous breath is felt; Whilst she, poor wretch, dies in the flame That runs through ...
— Cottage Poems • Patrick Bronte

... go, cursed damosells, Whose bridale torches foule Erynnis tynde*, And Hymen, at your spousalls sad, foretells 395 Tydings of death and massacre unkinde**: With them that cruell Colchid mother dwells, The which conceiv'd in her revengefull minde With bitter woundes her owne deere babes to slay, And ...
— The Poetical Works of Edmund Spenser, Volume 5 • Edmund Spenser

... early part of 1806 Napoleon might flatter himself with his brilliant success as a match-maker. Yet, after all, he was less concerned with the affairs of Hymen than with those of Mars and Mercury. He longed to be at Paris for the settlement of finances; and he burned to hear of the expulsion of the Bourbons from Naples. For this last he had already sent forth his imperious mandates from Vienna; and, after a brief sojourn at the Swabian capitals, ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose

... Our hero was some days at Dudstone before he received a letter from Spikeman, who informed him that he had arrived safely at Gretna (indeed, there was no male relation of the family to pursue him), and the silken bands of Hymen had been made more secure by the iron rivets of the blacksmith; that three days after he had written a letter to his wife's father, informing him that he had done him the honour of marrying his daughter; ...
— The Poacher - Joseph Rushbrook • Frederick Marryat

... distress? As such Ma'am, allow me to recommend this satin—intended for grief when it has subsided; alleviated, you see, Ma'am, from a dead black to a dull lead color. It's a Parisian novelty, Ma'am, called 'Settled Grief,' and is very much worn by ladies of a certain age, who do not intend to embrace Hymen a second time.' ('Old women, mayhap, about seventy,' mutters the Squire.) 'Exactly so, Sir; or thereabout. Not but what some ladies, Ma'am, set in for sorrow much earlier; indeed, in the prime of life; and for such cases it is a very durable wear; but praps it's too lugubre: now here's another—not ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, April 1844 - Volume 23, Number 4 • Various

... other, I am sorry to say that there seemed no likelihood of its realisation. In spite of sacrificing many comforts to dress expenses, and frequenting the promenades, and the Quinones' balls with a regularity deserving success, the precious gifts of Hymen were not attained. ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds

... to behold her own true knight Obtain the conquest, though he lost the fight; And bless'd with nuptial bliss the sweet laborious night. Eros, and Anteros, on either side, One fired the bridegroom, and one warm'd the bride; And long-attending Hymen from above, Shower'd on the bed the whole Idalian grove. All of a tenor was their after-life, No day discolour'd with domestic strife; No jealousy, but mutual truth believed, 1150 Secure repose, and kindness undeceived. Thus Heaven, beyond the compass ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol II - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden

... which induced the mincing steps of the virgins of Judea,—an invention which confined the lower limbs within certain limits by being worn just below the knees, and calculated to prevent the rupture of the hymen by any undue length of step or violent exercise; hence a tinkling noise and a mincing step always denoted a virgin. In Du Bisson's cases, however, virgins were out of the question; they might be the victims of enforced continence, but a Soudanese harem contains ...
— History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present - Moral and Physical Reasons for its Performance • Peter Charles Remondino

... as hospitable, kind, and gay. He was at several balls; found the belles well-mannered, and their dress, like that of their fair countrywomen farther west, an object of peculiar study. He describes the ceremonies of a Siberian wedding, which may amuse the votaries of Hymen, whose matrimonial customs are varied by half the circumference ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various

... ruin me, do get away; you'll kill me.—Oh—Ah-r-r-re!" as struggling and wriggling to resist me, her motions actually helped to accomplish the rape, for thrusting fiercely just as she heaved a little to throw me off, the hymen was broken, and my Cock triumphed over that ...
— Forbidden Fruit • Anonymous

... be sweet, But Hymen's tenderness is sweeter; And though all virile love be meet, You'll find the poet's love ...
— Echoes from the Sabine Farm • Roswell Martin Field and Eugene Field

... experience they anticipated the permanency of a corrected taste; nor, was it a disagreeable consideration to either, that as the silken cord of paternal discipline was to be loosened, it was to be succeeded by the fetters of hymen cast in polished gold. In what manner their daughter regarded the evident admiration of Mr. Delafield will appear, by her ...
— Tales for Fifteen: or, Imagination and Heart • James Fenimore Cooper

... voice and expression—though she was a dull woman—that if you had been married, you were not so pernickitty about such things; and, finally, that if Emerald Avenue cared to go to that trouble it was welcome, because she remained always invested with the mantle of Hymen. ...
— The Privet Hedge • J. E. Buckrose

... oh! ye gentlemen who have already Some chaste liaison of the kind—I mean An honest friendship with a married lady— The only thing of this sort ever seen To last—of all connections the most steady, And the true Hymen (the first 's but a screen)— Yet for all that keep not too long away, I 've known the absent ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron

... fair to see and busy with the hum of men. In the one were weddings and wedding-feasts, and they were going about the city with brides whom they were escorting by torchlight from their chambers. Loud rose the cry of Hymen, and the youths danced to the music of flute and lyre, while the women stood each at her house ...
— The Iliad • Homer

... in general, and from oogly German husbands in particular may Hymen defend me! Never again will I attempt to select "echt Amerikanische" clothes for a woman who must not weary her young husband. But how was I to know that the harmless little shopping expedition would resolve itself into a domestic tragedy, with Herr Nirlanger as the villain, ...
— Dawn O'Hara, The Girl Who Laughed • Edna Ferber

... upon my shame will gloat,— Your eyes on your defeated slave will doat. I see the altar—Fo-hi's grand official Prepared to bind the victim sacrificial. My glory's dead—disgraced is Turandot! Condemned to wear the chain of Hymen's knot. ...
— Turandot: The Chinese Sphinx • Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller

... aisle, if a chorus of choir boys would sing an epithalamium, as is now done in England. These fresh young voices hailing the youthful couple would be in keeping with the child bridesmaids and the youthful brothers. Nay, they would suggest those frescoes of the Italian villas where Hymen and Cupid, two immortal boys, always ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood

... emotions, he will ever cheer at the sight of the Union Jack, and the strains of Rule Britannia bring patriotic tears to his eyes. Of late, (like myself,) he has become an Imperialist. His intentions are always strictly honourable, and he would not kiss the tip of a woman's fingers except Hymen gave him the strictest rights to do so. If he became enamoured of a lady with whom such tender sentiments should not be harboured, he would invariably remember his duty at the psychological moment, and with many moving expressions renounce her: ...
— The Land of The Blessed Virgin; Sketches and Impressions in Andalusia • William Somerset Maugham

... in front the customary band, playing a lively air which use has long appropriated to the festivities of Hymen. The lord of the manor, or, as he was termed, the baron, and his lady-partner led the train, both apparelled in the rich and quaint attire of the period. Six ancient couples, the representatives of happy married ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper

... regret which attaches to those days when she was beloved, when her existence was so necessary to that of another, when at every moment she was supported and protected? What isolation must succeed this season of delight! How happy are they whom the sacred hand of Hymen has conducted from love to friendship, without one painful moment having ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael

... think of Socraticus and Eutyches, or Hymen, and when Euphrates, think of Eutychio, and Sylvanus, when Alciphron, of Tropaeophorus, when Xenophon, of Crito, or Severus. And when thou doest look upon thyself, fancy unto thyself some one or other of the Caesars; and so for every one, some one or other that ...
— Meditations • Marcus Aurelius

... I mean to spend my leisure With some young couple, fresh in Hymen's bands; Or 'mongst relations, who in equal measure Have had bequeathed to them house ...
— Books for Children - The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 3 • Charles and Mary Lamb

... heard you was just going to be married, and as a poet, I durst not approach you without an Epithalamium, and an Epithalamium was a thing, which at that time I could not compass. It was all in vain, that Cupid and Hymen, Juno and Luna, offered their assistance; I had no sort ...
— Boswell's Correspondence with the Honourable Andrew Erskine, and His Journal of a Tour to Corsica • James Boswell

... very large, and in the form of the letter B. The service was magnificent; in the centre stood a sugar pyramid four feet high; a French cook had been at work upon it for two weeks; it represented the temple of Hymen, adorned with allegorical figures, and surmounted by the united arms of Krasinski and Swidzinski, encircled by French inscriptions. There were, besides, quantities of other fancy articles: porcelain figures, gold and silver baskets, ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No 3, September 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... naming hour? Who gave her a name, This daughter of strife, this daughter of shame, The spear-wooed maid of Greece! Helen the taker! 'tis plain to see, A taker of ships, a taker of men, A taker of cities is she! From the soft-curtained chamber of Hymen she fled, By the breath of giant Zephyr sped, And shield-bearing throngs in marshalled array Hounded her flight o'er the printless way, Where the swift-flashing oar The fair booty bore To swirling Sim'o-is' leafy shore, And stirred the crimson ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson

... (with clitoridian spasms), especially near menstruation, with copious flow of mucus, characteristic pains, and hyperexcitability. Menstruation was irregular and profuse. Examination showed tumid and elongated nymphae, with brown pigmentation; rather large vagina, with rudimentary hymen; and retroflexion of uterus. After much persuasion the patient confessed that, when a girl of 12, and as the result of repeated attempts at coitus by a boy of 16, she had been impelled to frequent masturbation. This had caused great shame and remorse, which, however, had not sufficed to restrain ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... and Cupid out of it, in forgetting all eclogues and pastorals, Virgil or Theocritus, and indulging in nothing that was out of place in Scotland, it is hard to tell. The Mantuan bard, the oaten reed, Philomela and her songs, Hymen, Ganymede, Bacchus, and all the Olympian band disport themselves in his other verses: but The Gentle Shepherd is void of those necessary adjuncts of the eighteenth-century muse. The wimpling burn is never called Helicon nor the heathery ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant

... light hang the chain, For Hymen now hath bound ye, O'er thee and thine may pleasure reign, And smiling friends surround ye. Then fare ye well, and may each time The sun smiles, find ye wiser: Pray kindly take the well-meant ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, February 1844 - Volume 23, Number 2 • Various

... on the lintels of the door has Hymenaeus quenched, and hath torn to shreds the bridal crown, and Hymen no more, Hymen no more is the song, but a new ...
— Theocritus, Bion and Moschus rendered into English Prose • Andrew Lang

... no Frenchman could possibly catch it. Swinburne could fit the metres, I dare say, but he couldn't fit the feeling. It shall be a song without words, unless I write some Italian lines for it myself. Animula, blandula vagula—that's the sort of ring for it, but Latin's mostly too heavy. Io, Hymen, Hymenae, Io; Io, Hymen, Hymenae! What's that? A wedding song of Catullus—absit omen. I must be in love with her indeed.' He got up from the piano, and paced quickly and feverishly up ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen

... availed himself in the fullest measure, going quite beyond the bounds of sanity in his idealization of the Greeks, Well might the indignant Stolberg ask him if he really believed that the 'eternal bonds of the heart were gentler and holier when Hymen tied them'. Whatever else may be said of them, the amours of the Greeks (gods and men) were not remarkably strong on the side ...
— The Life and Works of Friedrich Schiller • Calvin Thomas

... pay highest for it; and who could pay with a handsome income but a well-dowered widow? A widow it must be—a widow it should be. Noble indeed was the sentiment which inspired this great man to sacrifice himself on the altar of Hymen for the good of his creditors. Ye young men in the Guards, who do this kind of thing every day—that is, every day that you can meet with a widow with the proper qualifications—take warning by the lamentable history ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 1 • Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton

... the existence of this the most universal—the most powerful—of human passions, when venturing to offer our counsel and guidance to those of both sexes who, under its promptings, have resolved to become votaries of Hymen, but who, from imperfect knowledge of conventional usages, are naturally apprehensive that at every step they take, they may render themselves liable ...
— Routledge's Manual of Etiquette • George Routledge

... creation; and, in these days of reform and disestablishment, of hereditary and other conservative grievances, something ought to be done to abolish the persons in question, or at least handicap them so that other deserving young men might have a fair chance in the race for beauty's smile and Hymen's chain. They have an enormous advantage, at present, over outside men-folk. Girls like to have a sort of good-natured lap-dog about them, to play with occasionally and run their errands, "do this" and "that" for the asking—like Cornelius the centurion's obedient ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson

... Rosalind is imagined by the rest of the company to be brought by enchantment, and is therefore introduced by a supposed aerial being in the character of Hymen. ...
— Johnson's Notes to Shakespeare Vol. I Comedies • Samuel Johnson

... pity in that steel-grey glance which gleamed At the poor hoof's protesting as it stamped Idly the granite? Let me glide unseen From thy proud presence: well may'st thou be queen Of all those strange and sudden deaths which damped So oft Love's torch and Hymen's taper lit For happy marriage till the maidens paled And perished on the temple-step, assailed By—what except to envy must man's wit Impute that sure implacable release Of life from warmth and joy? ...
— An Introduction to the Study of Browning • Arthur Symons

... picturesque, it was charming, it was socially and politically important, it was everything that could appeal to the taste of London society, which, as the season advances, is apt to become jaded by the monotonous process of Hymen in High Life and by the continued demand ...
— Kimono • John Paris

... keep these rites, ye widowed dames, The marriage time a purer season claims; Pause, ye fond mothers, braid not yet her hair, Nor the ripe virgin for her lord prepare. O, light not, Hymen, now your joyous fires, Another torch nor yours the tomb requires! Close all the temples on these mourning days, And dim each altar's spicy, steaming blaze; For now around us roams a spectred brood, Craving and keen, and snuffing mortal food: They feast and ...
— Folk Lore - Superstitious Beliefs in the West of Scotland within This Century • James Napier

... thousands of years have come and gone, And still the moon is shining on, Still Hymen's torch is lighted; And hitherto, in this land of the West, Most couples in love have thought it best To follow the ancient way of the rest, And quietly ...
— Little Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor - Volume I • Various

... is hard to preserve these wretched puns. In the original we have "O spray (or branch) of capparis-shrub (araki) which has been thinned of leaf and fruit (tujna, i.e., whose fruit, the hymen, has been plucked before and not by me) I see thee (araka) against ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton

... female. This would alone serve to account for the existence of modesty as a psychical secondary sexual character. In this sense, and in this sense only, we may say, with Colin Scott, that "the feeling of shame is made to be overcome," and is thus correlated with its physical representative, the hymen, in the rupture of which, as Groos remarks, there is, in some degree, a disruption also of modesty. The sexual modesty of the female is thus an inevitable by-product of the naturally aggressive attitude of the male in sexual relationships, and the naturally defensive ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... safe landed at the grave. We can do nothing (but be poisoned) with impunity. What is worst of all, we must marry certain relatives and connexions, be they distorted, blear-eyed, toothless, carbuncled, with hair (if any) eclipsing the reddest torch of Hymen, and with a hide outrivalling in colour and plaits his trimmest saffron robe. At the mention of this indeed, friend Plato, even thou, although resolved to stand out of harm's way, beginnest to make a wry mouth, and findest it difficult to pucker and purse it up again, without an astringent store ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor

... deeply demoralizing effect. Even offices under government are less sought for from motives of ambition than as a means of subsistence; the arts and sciences have been degraded to mere sources of profit, envious trade decides questions of the highest importance, the torch of Hymen is lit by Plutus, not at the shrine of Love; and in the bosom of the careworn father of a family, whose scanty subsistence depends upon a patron's smile, the words "fatherland" and "glory" find no ...
— Germany from the Earliest Period Vol. 4 • Wolfgang Menzel, Trans. Mrs. George Horrocks

... cease to mourn; Lament not Hannah's happy state; You may be happy in your turn, And seize the treasure you regret. With Love united Hymen stands, And softly whispers to your charms, 'Meet but your lover in my bands, You'll find your sister ...
— Lives of the Poets: Gay, Thomson, Young, and Others • Samuel Johnson

... nous prouver que cette belle Trouve l'hymen un noeud fort doux Le peintre nous la peint fidelle A suivre le ...
— Six Centuries of Painting • Randall Davies

... et belle! C'est celle d'un objet charmant: Fille heureuse, amante fidle, On l'accorde au plus tendre amant. Des fleurs ceignent son front nubile, Et de l'hymen l'autel est prt.... —Encore une toile qui file, Qui file, ...
— French Lyrics • Arthur Graves Canfield

... prevail, Nor hope expel these sullen fits? Cannot mirth wring if but a forged smile From those sad drooping looks of thine? Rely on hope, whose hap will lead thee right To her, whom thou dost call thy heart's delight: Look cheerly, man; the time is near at hand, That Hymen, mounted on a snow-white coach, Shall tend on Sophos ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. IX • Various

... thou sweet king-killer, and dear divorce 'Twixt natural son and sire! thou bright defiler Of Hymen's purest bed! thou valiant Mars! Thou ever young, fresh, lov'd, and delicate wooer, Whose blush doth thaw the consecrated snow That lies on Dian's lap! thou visible god, That solder'st close impossibilities, And mak'st them kiss! that speak'st with every tongue, To ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson

... of marrying now? I do not promise you to live like a monk of La Trappe, but at my age, a man put together like I am can find enough to talk to around the garrisons without marrying anybody. Mars does not borrow the torch of Hymen to light the little aberrations of Venus! Why does man ever tie himself in matrimonial bonds?... For the sake of being a father. I am one already, in the comparative degree, and in a year, if our brave Leon does a man's part, I shall assume the superlative. ...
— The Man With The Broken Ear • Edmond About

... were to be signed and sealed by all the parties in interest, and each was to possess a copy. Frank Sterling read over the paragraphs which settled enormous masses of funds around the sacred altar where Hymen was so soon to apply his torch, with great professional coolness, as well as commendable rapidity; but when he came to the conclusion, and, looking at both father and daughter, said, that all that remained, if the draught now met their approbation, was, to have ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various

... gave my hand to John Lyth at Hymen's sacred altar. I endeavoured to do it by faith, as well as I could; but felt extremely stupified. We went to spend the day at Newton upon Derwent. With me it passed more pleasantly towards the close, indeed, while we were ...
— Religion in Earnest - A Memorial of Mrs. Mary Lyth, of York • John Lyth

... of the virgin Phoebe. A fillet tied together[74] her hair, put up without any order. Many a one courted her; she hated all wooers; not able to endure, and quite unacquainted with man, she traverses the solitary parts of the woods, and she cares not what Hymen,[75] what love, {or} what marriage means. Many a time did her father say, "My daughter, thou owest me a son-in-law;" many a time did her father say, "My daughter, thou owest me grandchildren." She, utterly ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Vol. I, Books I-VII • Publius Ovidius Naso

... Though fools spurn Hymen's gentle pow'rs, We who improve his golden hours, By sweet experience know, That marriage, rightly understood, Gives to the tender and the good A paradise ...
— Many Thoughts of Many Minds - A Treasury of Quotations from the Literature of Every Land and Every Age • Various

... before my vision glows, But not in Hymen's hand it shines; A flame that to the welkin goes, But not from holy offering shrines: Glad hands the banquet are preparing, And near and near the halls of state, I hear the god that comes unsparing, I hear ...
— The Growth of Thought - As Affecting the Progress of Society • William Withington

... Alexander; they were clasping each other's hands in pledge of marriage, and a winged Hymen fluttered above their ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... 'as Glaucus is, I understand, to wed the Neapolitan, I think I must even try my chance with the dejected maid. After all, the lamp of Hymen will be gilt, and the vessel will reconcile one to the odor of the flame. I shall only protest, my Sallust, against Diomed's making thee trustee to ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton

... vses his folly like a stalking-horse, and vnder the presentation of that he shoots his wit. Enter Hymen, ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... you call love's grave is the sanctuary in which it receives life, the abode which makes it immortal. Give way to my prayers, my lovely friend, and then you shall know the difference between Love and Hymen. You shall see that, if Hymen likes to die in order to get rid of life, Love on the contrary expires only to spring up again into existence, and hastens to revive, so as to savour new enjoyment. Let ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... fine, fear not to lead To Hymen's shrine a clown: Love cannot level up, indeed, But he ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce

... whole-heartedly into her napkin and Oliver in spite of all the generous plaudits he was receiving from various parts of his mind for having carried delicate business successfully to a most dramatic conclusion, wondered what in the name of Hymen his cue was now. Some remnants of diplomacy however kept him from doing anything particularly obtrusive and, after he had received an official explanation of nervous headache with official detachment, the end of tea found them being quite cheerful together. Neither alluded directly to what both ...
— Young People's Pride • Stephen Vincent Benet

... art constrained them to come to closer quarters than usual with this or that famous artist; liberal-minded amazons, who extended their tender relations beyond the chains of Hymen; lively dames, who loved to see around them good-humoured, free-and-easy folks, instead of the usual dull and dignified drawing-room loungers; foreign millionaires, who desired to be regaled with an exhibition of beauty and enjoyment; ...
— A Hungarian Nabob • Maurus Jokai

... have revelled in the enjoyment of anticipation before I had destroyed the hymen; but youth, want, liquor, drove me on, and I don't remember thinking much about the virginity, only that the cunt looked different from the two others I had known. The next instant I laid my belly on hers. "Oh! you are ...
— My Secret Life, Volumes I. to III. - 1888 Edition • Anonymous

... secret to tell you: Endymion and the moon shall meet us upon Mount Latmos, and we'll be married in the dead of night. But say not a word. Hymen shall put his torch into a dark lanthorn, that it may be secret; and Juno shall give her peacock poppy-water, that he may fold his ogling tail, and Argus's hundred eyes be shut, ha! ...
— Love for Love • William Congreve

... beauty and elegance of manners, have been numerous, and among them several Senators and generals, and even the Minister Chaptal. But she has politely declined all their offers, preferring her liberty and the undisturbed right of following her own inclination to the inconvenient ties of Hymen. A gentleman, whom she calls, and who passes for, her brother, Chevalier de M de T——, a Knight of Malta, assists her in doing the honours of her house, and is considered as her favourite lover; though report and the scandalous chronicle say that she bestows her favours on every person who wishes ...
— Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, Complete - Being Secret Letters from a Gentleman at Paris to a Nobleman in London • Lewis Goldsmith

... rearrangement of marriage proves that the new-made millionnaires value their recently acquired "old wines" and "ancient pictures," more than their aging wives. They bring much warmth of social color into the local breezy atmosphere of this animated Western picture, these new arrangements of Hymen. ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage

... beautiful morning, and at about 10 they all set off from Berlin, leaving Mama, Papa, Bob'm and I to follow after in the coach. After they went, there were two long hours of going backwards and forwards through the empty rooms, then having said a sad good-bye to Senden,[9] Hymen,[9] Mr. Lettsom and Fitz, though we know we shall see them again soon, we got into the coach with the squirrel in a bag and drove off. I could not help feeling very sorry to leave it all, though it will be so very nice ...
— Lady John Russell • Desmond MacCarthy and Agatha Russell

... innocence, Long bound in Hymen's ties, One goes to distant battlefields, One sits at ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIV • John Lord

... much softened, if not in morals, in manners. In fact this softening process is quite obvious throughout. There is plenty of "impropriety" but no mere nastiness, and the impropriety itself is, so to speak, rather indicated than described. As nearly the last sentence announces, "Hymen hides the faults of love" wherever it is possible, though it would require a most complicated system of polygamy and cross-unions to enable that amiable divinity to cover them all. There is a villain, but he is a villain of straw, and outside of him there is no ill-nature. ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury

... carried on, I have not been able to learn; nor how she has been able, with the vinegar of her disposition, to soften the stony heart of old Nimrod; so, however, it is, and it has astonished every one. With all her ladyship's love of match-making, this last fume of Hymen's torch has been too much for her. She has endeavoured to reason with Mrs. Hannah, but all in vain; her mind was made up, and she grew tart on the least contradiction. Lady Lillycraft applied to ...
— Bracebridge Hall • Washington Irving

... Charleston and Georgetown; and even so great an event shall only postpone, but not defeat the project I am sorry, however, to add that I have no expectations or decided views on this subject. I mean Hymen. ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis

... by the gods decreed it is We human creatures should enjoy that bliss. One is no number; maids are nothing then Without the sweet society of men. Wilt thou live single still? One shalt thou be, Though never singling Hymen couple thee. Wild savages, that drink of running springs, Think water far excels all earthly things, But they that daily taste neat wine despise it. Virginity, albeit some highly prize it, Compared with marriage, had you tried them both, Differs as much as wine ...
— Hero and Leander • Christopher Marlowe

... stage[2], The loud long plaudits of a trifling age, Where dost thou wander? Exil'd in disgrace, Find'st thou in foreign realms some happier place[3]? Or dost thou still though banish'd from the town, In Britain love to linger, though unknown? Light Hymen's torch through ev'ry blooming grove,[4] And tinge each flow'ret with the blush of love? Sing winter, summer-sweets, the vernal air, Or the soft Sofa, to delight the fair[5]? Laugh, e'en at kings, and mock each prudish rule, The merry motley priest ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas

... in 'As You Like It.' Examples of love at first sight in Shakespeare. Note Orlando's surprise at the suddenness of Oliver's and Celia's love. Was his own less sudden? Consider Hymen's song and Jaques's remarks in the last scene as descriptive of the various couples. Does the comic element of the play, as represented by Touchstone, discredit sentiment in the play? Notice the madrigal in Lodge's novel (given in Poet-lore, Vol. III., in ...
— Shakespeare Study Programs; The Comedies • Charlotte Porter and Helen A. Clarke

... and the husband who lords it in his little harem, thinks only of his pleasure or his convenience. To such lengths, indeed, does an intemperate love of pleasure carry some prudent men, or worn out libertines, who marry to have a safe companion, that they seduce their own wives. Hymen banishes modesty, and chaste love ...
— A Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Title: Vindication of the Rights of Women • Mary Wollstonecraft [Godwin]

... blaspheme the muse! But great is song Used to great ends: ourself have often tried Valkyrian hymns, or into rhythm have dashed The passion of the prophetess; for song Is duer unto freedom, force and growth Of spirit than to junketing and love. Love is it? Would this same mock-love, and this Mock-Hymen were laid up like winter bats, Till all men grew to rate us at our worth, Not vassals to be beat, nor pretty babes To be dandled, no, but living wills, and sphered Whole in ourselves and owed to none. Enough! But now to leaven play with profit, you, Know you no song, the true growth of your soil, ...
— The Princess • Alfred Lord Tennyson

... should Hymen ever blight The roses Cupid wore? Or why should it be ever night Where it was day before? Or why should women have a tongue, Or why should it be cursed, In being, like my Second, long, And louder than ...
— "Stops" - Or How to Punctuate. A Practical Handbook for Writers and Students • Paul Allardyce

... not dimmed Her polished altar with my virgin blood; I thought to have selected the white flowers To please the nymphs, and to have asked of each By name, and with no sorrowful regret, Whether, since both my parents willed the change I might at Hymen's feet bend my clipt brow; And (after these who mind us girls the most) Adore our own Athene, that she would Regard me mildly with her azure eyes,— But, father, to see you no more, and see Your love, O father! go ere I am gone!" Gently he moved her off, and drew her back, Bending his lofty ...
— Practical English Composition: Book II. - For the Second Year of the High School • Edwin L. Miller

... perhaps, a little too much of me. One owes consideration to one's position. In the world's eyes a matrimonial slip outweighs a peccadillo. No. To much the maid might wheedle me, but to Hymen! She's decidedly fresh and pert—the most delicious little fat lips and cocky nose; but cease we to dwell on her, or of us two, to! one ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... 4. "When men in Hymen's Bands unite, Our merry peals produce delight; But when Death goes his dreary Rounds, We send ...
— English Villages • P. H. Ditchfield

... his virgin; because every child has his virgin, and at the commencement of life a marriage of souls is always consummated in the plenitude of innocence. Dea was his wife, for theirs was the same nest on the highest branch of the deep-rooted tree of Hymen. Dea was still more—she was his light, for without her all was void, and nothingness; and for him her head was crowned with rays. What would become of him without Dea? What could he do with all that was himself? Nothing in him could live without her. How, then, could he have lost sight ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo

... a half from tip to tip of his wings.—Crops suffering for want of rain [Always just so. "Dry times, Father Noah!"] The editors had received a liberal portion of cake from the happy couple whose matrimonial union was recorded in the column dedicated to Hymen. Also a superior article of [article of! bah!] steel pen from the enterprising merchant [shopkeeper] whose advertisement was to be found on the third page of this paper.—An interesting Surprise Party [cheap theatricals] had transpired [bah!] on Thursday evening last at the house ...
— The Guardian Angel • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... quarters without care and without ceasing. Night and day it urges from the outside to the inside. It gathers ever to the centre. From the far without to the deep within, trembling from the body to the soul until the head of a woman and the heart of a man are filled with the Divine Imagination. Hymen, Hymenaea! I sing to the ears that are stopped, the eyes that are sealed, and the minds that do not labour. Sweetly I sing on the hillside. The blind shall look within and not without; the deaf ...
— The Crock of Gold • James Stephens

... old Pa; and that, unless desperate measures were resorted to, quamprimum, in the twinkling of a bed-post she would be under the disagreeable necessity to bundle and go with the disabled man of war to the temple of Hymen. Sacrilegious thought! I could not permit it to enter my bosom, and (pardon me for a moment, sir) when I looked down, and caught a glance of my own natty-looking, tight little leg, and dapper Hessians, I recommended ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 339, Saturday, November 8, 1828. • Various

... 'Nor Hymen nor the Graces here preside, Nor Juno to befriend the blooming bride; But fiends with fun'ral brands the process led, And furies waited ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... despair, my day of slavery? Oh, the grim fates have caught me in a net Of manifold ills! O child, they have spun for thee Dread weird of unimagined misery! They have thrust thee away, when near was Hymen's hymn, From thine espousals, marked thee for destruction Dark, unendurable, unspeakable! For lo, a dead man's heart, Achilles' heart, Is by our blood made warm with life to-day! O child, dear child, that I might die with thee, That earth might swallow me, ere I see thy doom!" ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus

... variance with the thoughts and actions—"the sayings and doings" we may be most intent upon at the moment. How many a gay and brilliant bridal party has wended its way to St. George's, Hanover-square, amid a downpour of rain, one would suppose sufficient to quench the torch of Hymen, though it burned as brightly as Capt. Drummond's oxygen light; and on the other hand, how frequently are the bluest azure of heaven and the most balmy airs shed upon the heart bursting with affliction, or the head bowed with grief; and without any desire to impugn, as ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)

... every sordid woe, And by a nation's swelled to lordlier flow. What lurking-place, thought we, for doubts or fears, When, the day's swan, she swam along the cheers Of the Acala, five happy months ago? The guns were shouting Io Hymen then That, on her birthday, now denounce her doom; The same white steeds that tossed their scorn of men To-day as proudly drag her to the tomb. Grim jest of fate! yet who dare call it blind, Knowing what life is, what ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 23, October, 1891 • Various

... unimagined ills my sons, my king Have suffered? or my city, or daughters shamed? Or my despair, my day of slavery? Oh, the grim fates have caught me in a net Of manifold ills! O child, they have spun for thee Dread weird of unimagined misery! They have thrust thee away, when near was Hymen's hymn, From thine espousals, marked thee for destruction Dark, unendurable, unspeakable! For lo, a dead man's heart, Achilles' heart, Is by our blood made warm with life to-day! O child, dear child, that I might die with thee, That earth might swallow me, ere ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus

... the cathedral of Toledo, I occasionally smoke a cigarette. God gave us tobacco to allay our passions and our pains. You seem to be downcast, or at any rate, you carry the symbolical flower of sorrow in your hand, like the rueful god Hymen. Come! all your troubles will vanish away with the smoke," and again the ecclesiastic held out his little straw case; there was something fascinating in his manner, and kindliness towards Lucien lighted up ...
— Eve and David • Honore de Balzac

... to join her protest to Will's silent antagonism. A terrific thunder-storm came up with the noon hour of the wedding. So deep and sullen were the clouds that we were obliged to light the candles. When the wedding pair took their places before Hymen's altar, a crash of thunder rocked the house ...
— Last of the Great Scouts - The Life Story of William F. Cody ["Buffalo Bill"] • Helen Cody Wetmore

... slaughtered (p. 289). I have mentioned that the blood of this bird is supposed throughout the East, where the use of the microscope is unknown, and the corpuscles are never studied, most to resemble the results of a bursten hymen, and that it is the most used to deceive the expert eyes of midwives and old matrons. See note to vol. ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton

... light Hymen's torch with some thriving tallow chandler, who would marry a domestic slave as a good speculation, without one spark of ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. I) - or, The Clue of Life • Charlotte M. Yonge

... have laid down my hair before Benignant Artemis, and not dimmed Her polished altar with my virgin blood; I thought to have selected the white flowers To please the nymphs, and to have asked of each By name, and with no sorrowful regret, Whether, since both my parents willed the change I might at Hymen's feet bend my clipt brow; And (after these who mind us girls the most) Adore our own Athene, that she would Regard me mildly with her azure eyes,— But, father, to see you no more, and see Your ...
— Practical English Composition: Book II. - For the Second Year of the High School • Edwin L. Miller

... which I think will please you. Who ever thought that bridge would be opened for my girl's wedding? Well! I am glad that it was not finished before. But we must be silent' You will notice that part about the bridge; it is in the fifth verse, I am told, beginning with something about Hymen, and ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield

... all law-abiding men, do not imagine this will forever continue. In the confusion and readjustments of war, and the calamities of many, the affairs of some, one time enemies of Fortune, come to a happy issue. Do not say that Mars may not lead Amor and Hymen in his train. All things come to them who wait. I wait. Remember the life you spend in the Temple is no longer obligatory. Be no cage bird who will not fly out into the sunlight when the door is opened freely. Be surprised ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis

... love, denied a dove, Forbidden bow and dart; Without a groan to call my own, With neither hand nor heart; To Hymen vowed, and not allowed To flirt e'en with your fan, Here end, as just a friend, I must— I'm not a ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 4 (of 4) • Various

... with which she staunches the blood and next morning the stains are displayed in the Harem. In Darfour this is done by the bridegroom. "Prima Venus debet esse cruenta," say the Easterns with much truth, and they have no faith in our complaisant creed which allows the hymen-membrane to disappear ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton

... husband. Whereupon Mary answered me, with her accustomed smiling manner, 'There is but one fidelity which one must recognize, and that is to the god of gods—Love! Where he is not, I will not be. The god Hymen is a tedious, pedantic fellow, who burns to ashes all the fresh young love of the heart, and all the enthusiasm of the soul, with his intolerable tallow torch, for Love stands not at his side. I am faithful to the god Amor, therefore I can never be faithful to the god Hymen, as it ...
— Old Fritz and the New Era • Louise Muhlbach

... pretty JANE, my dearest JANE, Ah, never look so shy, But meet me, meet me in the market, When the price of wheat rules high. The glut is waning fast, my love, And corn is getting dear; Good (Hymen) times are coming, love, Ceres our hearts shall cheer. Then pretty JANE, though poorish JANE, Ah, never pipe your eye, But meet me, meet me at the Altar, For the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, Sept. 27, 1890 • Various

... Golden—by what name shall I call my goddess?" Hermione drew back a step. There was danger in his eyes. "I have loved you, loved you long. Before Glaucon took you in marriage I loved you. But Eros and Hymen hearkened to his prayers, not mine. You became his bride. I wore a bright face at your wedding. You remember I was Glaucon's groomsman, and rode beside you in the bridal car. You loved him, he seemed worthy of you. Therefore I trod ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis

... honors doffed, succinct Of saponaceous locks, the Priest who linked In Hymen's golden bands the torn unthrift, Whose means exiguous stared from many a rift, Even as he kissed the virgin all forlorn, Who milked the cow with implicated horn, Who in fine wrath the canine torturer ...
— English as She is Wrote - Showing Curious Ways in which the English Language may be - made to Convey Ideas or obscure them. • Anonymous

... towards him. Repentance for an unmerited blame is much nearer akin to love than any depths of pity. Then to repentance was added gratitude, to gratitude admiration, and to all three propinquity. Blessed be propinquity! If Hymen ever raises an altar to his most devoted hand-maid it will be to the dear goddess Propinquity! Yes! these days had been ...
— The Justice of the King • Hamilton Drummond

... Glows thro' my veins since first I look'd on thee. But wherefore slur the perfect ceremony? The sovereign of Galatia weds his Queen. Let all be done to the fullest in the sight Of all the Gods. Nay, rather than so clip The flowery robe of Hymen, we would add Some golden fringe of gorgeousness beyond Old use, to make the day memorial, when Synorix, first King, Camma, first Queen o' the Realm, Drew here the richest lot from Fate, to live And die together. This pain—what is it?—again? ...
— Becket and other plays • Alfred Lord Tennyson

... and elegant home of that crown prince of hospitality, the big hearted and noble souled Ab. Weaver, was a radiant scene of enchanting loveliness, for Cupid had brought one of his finest offerings to the court of Hymen, for the lovable Miss Maude, the beautiful daughter of Mr. Weaver and his refined and most excellent wife, who is a lady of rarest charms and sweetest graces, dedicated her life's ministry to Dr. James E. Hobgood, the brilliant and gifted and talented son of that ripe scholar and renowned ...
— The So-called Human Race • Bert Leston Taylor

... the May! for happy Spring To-day shall all her dowry bring, The love of kind, the joy, the grace, Hymen of element and race, Knowing well to celebrate With song and hue and star and state, With tender light and youthful cheer, The spousals of ...
— Poems - Household Edition • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... triumphal arch was a representation of Isabella (or Elizabeth) trampling Mars under foot, with the mottoes Sacer hymen pacem nobis contulit and Deus nobis haec otia fecit, ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird

... among humanity, and of this fact he took account as of a fact observed and proved, saying if man is on one side a "fierce and lascivious gorilla," on the other side he is a mystic animal, and that in "a double nature, mysterious hymen," as Hugo wrote, lay the explanation of all the baseness in ideas and actions as well as all the sublimity in ideas and actions of humanity. Personally he was a Stoic and his practice was the continuous development of the intelligence regarded as the condition ...
— Initiation into Philosophy • Emile Faguet

... some even turned and accompanied them, crying out the name of Talasius through their friendship for him. From this circumstance the Romans up to the present day call upon Talasius in their marriage-songs, as the Greeks do upon Hymen; for Talasius is said to have been fortunate in his wife. Sextius Sulla of Carthage, a man neither deficient in learning or taste, told me that this word was given by Romulus as the signal for the rape, and so that all those who carried off maidens cried "Talasio." ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume I (of 4) • Plutarch

... and mature them. He was so devoted to his pupil, that she on her part became anxious to anticipate his wishes, and never felt so happy as when he was satisfied with her efforts. In truth it was the old story of Hymen and Iphigenia reversed. Her wayward and wilful nature was subdued by the influence of love; and at the cost of not a few tears, she renounced her childish caprices in order to please him, and occupied herself with the pursuits she had previously regarded so ...
— Celebrated Women Travellers of the Nineteenth Century • W. H. Davenport Adams

... of an old Roman nuptial song. Hymen, the son of Apollo and the Muse Urania, was the ...
— Spenser's The Faerie Queene, Book I • Edmund Spenser

... necessary and homogeneous vehicle of his peculiar manner of thinking. His is not the style of the age. More particularly, Shakspeare's blank verse is an absolutely new creation. Read Daniel[1]—the admirable Daniel—in his "Civil Wars," and "Triumphs of Hymen." ...
— Specimens of the Table Talk of S.T.Coleridge • Coleridge

... ashore, in fashion steady, Hymen will defray the fare, For a clergyman is ready To unite the ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan

... the lintels of the door has Hymenaeus quenched, and hath torn to shreds the bridal crown, and Hymen no more, Hymen no more is the song, but a new song is ...
— Theocritus, Bion and Moschus rendered into English Prose • Andrew Lang

... harmony. Well therefore by the gods decreed it is, We human creatures should enjoy that bliss. One is no number;[16] maids are nothing, then, Without the sweet society of men. Wilt thou live single still? one shalt thou be, Though never-singling Hymen couple thee. Wild savages, that drink of running springs Think water far excels all earthly things; 260 But they, that daily taste neat[17] wine, despise it: Virginity, albeit some highly prize it, Compar'd with marriage, ...
— The Works of Christopher Marlowe, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Christopher Marlowe

... hang the chain, For Hymen now hath bound ye, O'er thee and thine may pleasure reign, And smiling friends surround ye. Then fare ye well, and may each time The sun smiles, find ye wiser: Pray kindly take the well-meant ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, February 1844 - Volume 23, Number 2 • Various

... is an inveterate bachelor receives from the latter a loan of 1200 francs which is to enable a poor girl to marry her lover. Fritz gives it very graciously, congratulating himself, that he is free from hymen's bonds. ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley

... smiling debauchee, secretly lament the health they have so inconsiderately damaged so prodigally thrown away: see disdain, joined to hatred, reign between those adulterous married couples, who have reciprocally violated the sacred vows they mutually pledged at the altar of Hymen; whose appetencies have rendered them the scorn of the world; the jest of their acquaintance; polluted tributaries to the surgeon. See the liar deprived of all confidence; the knave stript of all trust; the hypocrite fearfully ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 2 • Baron D'Holbach

... ever on the watch To mar a son's, or make a daughter's match; To you, ye children of—whom chance accords— Always the ladies, and sometimes their lords; To you, ye single gentlemen, who seek Torments for life, or pleasures for a week; As Love or Hymen your endeavours guide, To gain your own, or snatch another's bride;— To one and all the lovely stranger came, And every ...
— English Satires • Various

... Jack, and the strains of Rule Britannia bring patriotic tears to his eyes. Of late, (like myself,) he has become an Imperialist. His intentions are always strictly honourable, and he would not kiss the tip of a woman's fingers except Hymen gave him the strictest rights to do so. If he became enamoured of a lady with whom such tender sentiments should not be harboured, he would invariably remember his duty at the psychological moment, and with many moving expressions renounce her: in fact he is a devil at renouncing ...
— The Land of The Blessed Virgin; Sketches and Impressions in Andalusia • William Somerset Maugham

... of Yorkshire, surpassed themselves. The young bride and bridegroom had the felicity of contemplating one whose crust was elevated into the altar of Hymen, with their own selves united thereat, attended by numerous Cupids, made chiefly in paste and sugar, and with little wings from the feathers of the many slaughtered fowl within. As to the jellies, the devices and the subtilties, the pen refuses to describe them! It will be enough ...
— Unknown to History - A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland • Charlotte M. Yonge

... the entire possession of the lady could allay. The affair of Lord A- and Mrs. B- is too well known to need repetition—it could not succeed a second time. Abelard F- having paid the debt of nature, there was no impediment but a visit to the temple of Hymen, on which point the lady was determined; and the yielding suitor, wounded to the vital part, most readily complied. It is due to the countess to admit, that since her present elevation, her conduct has ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle

... the Anthology. What you need for verses of society is a period in which the social equality is recognized, and in which people are peaceable enough and comfortable enough to "play with light loves in the portal" of the Temple of Hymen, without any very definite intentions, on either part, of going inside and ...
— Letters on Literature • Andrew Lang

... from oogly German husbands in particular may Hymen defend me! Never again will I attempt to select "echt Amerikanische" clothes for a woman who must not weary her young husband. But how was I to know that the harmless little shopping expedition would resolve itself into a domestic tragedy, with ...
— Dawn O'Hara, The Girl Who Laughed • Edna Ferber

... Kinds of Love in 'As You Like It.' Examples of love at first sight in Shakespeare. Note Orlando's surprise at the suddenness of Oliver's and Celia's love. Was his own less sudden? Consider Hymen's song and Jaques's remarks in the last scene as descriptive of the various couples. Does the comic element of the play, as represented by Touchstone, discredit sentiment in the play? Notice the madrigal in Lodge's ...
— Shakespeare Study Programs; The Comedies • Charlotte Porter and Helen A. Clarke

... most being of the opinion that the virginity is altogether lost when this membrane is fractured and destroyed by violence; when it is found perfect and entire, however, no penetration has been effected; and in the opinion of some learned physicians there is neither hymen nor expanded skin which contains blood in it, which some people think, flows from the ruptured membrane at the first ...
— The Works of Aristotle the Famous Philosopher • Anonymous

... torrent wracks me. But Hymen's torch, held downward, shall drop out, And for it, the mad Furies swing their brands About ...
— The Noble Spanish Soldier • Thomas Dekker

... sunshine, and it withers and ends. Strephon and Chloe languish apart; join in a rapture: and presently you hear that Chloe is crying, and Strephon has broken his crook across her back. Can you mend it so as to show no marks of rupture? Not all the priests of Hymen, not all the incantations to the ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray

... Senators and generals, and even the Minister Chaptal. But she has politely declined all their offers, preferring her liberty and the undisturbed right of following her own inclination to the inconvenient ties of Hymen. A gentleman, whom she calls, and who passes for, her brother, Chevalier de M de T——, a Knight of Malta, assists her in doing the honours of her house, and is considered as her favourite lover; though report and the scandalous chronicle say that she bestows her favours ...
— Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, Complete - Being Secret Letters from a Gentleman at Paris to a Nobleman in London • Lewis Goldsmith

... letter-writing. Besides, I heard you was just going to be married, and as a poet, I durst not approach you without an Epithalamium, and an Epithalamium was a thing, which at that time I could not compass. It was all in vain, that Cupid and Hymen, Juno and Luna, offered their assistance; I had no sort of employment ...
— Boswell's Correspondence with the Honourable Andrew Erskine, and His Journal of a Tour to Corsica • James Boswell

... water, ever spilt, And all the pain Reserved for sinners, e'en when dead: Those impious hands, (could crime do more?) Those impious hands had hearts to shed Their bridegrooms' gore! One only, true to Hymen's flame, Was traitress to her sire forsworn: That splendid falsehood lights her name Through times unborn. "Wake!" to her youthful spouse she cried, "Wake! or you yet may sleep too well: Fly—from the father of your bride, Her sisters fell: They, as she-lions bullocks rend, Tear each ...
— Odes and Carmen Saeculare of Horace • Horace

... found ten righteous men within its walls. The world is saved by its just men. History sees them not; she is but the newspaper, a report of accidents. Judge you life by that? Then you shall believe that the true Temple of Hymen is the Divorce Court; that men are of two classes only, the thief and the policeman; that all noble thought is but a politician's catchword. History sees only the destroying conflagrations, she takes no thought ...
— The Second Thoughts of An Idle Fellow • Jerome K. Jerome

... and, having bathed the three of them, made them part and parcel of her home. This was after the demise of the second husband, and at a time when Nora felt that she had done all a woman could be expected to do for Hymen. ...
— The Shape of Fear • Elia W. Peattie

... joined," you know, "let no man"—don't you know? I cannot allow my friend Feeder to be married—especially to Mrs Feeder—without proposing their—their—Toasts; and may,' said Mr Toots, fixing his eyes on his wife, as if for inspiration in a high flight, 'may the torch of Hymen be the beacon of joy, and may the flowers we have this day strewed in their path, be ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens

... long in the larger animals. The different features that should be noted are the clitoris, a small erectile organ located at the inferior portion of the opening, the meatus urinaris, the external opening of the urethra, situated in a depression in the floor of the vulva, and the hymen, an incomplete membranous partition that may be found separating ...
— Common Diseases of Farm Animals • R. A. Craig, D. V. M.

... while the torch of Hymen newly fired Becomes extinguished,—soon—too soon expires; But thine, within the closing grate retired, Eternal captive, to ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron

... the Kentish lad,[1] that lately taught His oaten reed the trumpet's silver sound, Young Thyrsilis; and for his music brought The willing spheres from heaven, to lead around The dancing nymphs and swains, that sung, and crowned Eclecta's Hymen with ten thousand flowers Of choicest praise; and hung her heavenly bowers With saffron garlands, dressed ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan

... command Her brethren's blood must ne'er be reinforced By sons of hers; he dreads a single shoot From stock so guilty, and would fain with her Bury their name, that, even to the tomb Content to be his ward, for her no torch Of Hymen may be lit. Shall I espouse Her rights against my sire, rashly provoke His wrath, and launch ...
— Phaedra • Jean Baptiste Racine

... STANLEY'S DOROTHY? Loyal like her of Ithaca, and dowered With charms that in the Greek less fully flowered, The charms of talent and of character, Which blend in her Who, won, long waited, and who, waiting, won The virile, valiant son Of our adventurous England. May the bays Blend well with Hymen's roses, and long days Of happiness and honour crown the pair For whom to-day loud plaudits rend the air. "Hymen, Io Hymen, Hymen, they do shout,"— Health to brave DOROTHY ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, July 12, 1890 • Various

... marriage-settlement, of which the three beautifully engrossed copies were to be signed and sealed by all the parties in interest, and each was to possess a copy. Frank Sterling read over the paragraphs which settled enormous masses of funds around the sacred altar where Hymen was so soon to apply his torch, with great professional coolness, as well as commendable rapidity; but when he came to the conclusion, and, looking at both father and daughter, said, that all that remained, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various

... whilst Amphitryon, her husband, commands the Theban troops on the plains of Boeotia, Jupiter has taken his form, and assuaged his pains, in the possession of the sweetest of pleasures. The condition of the couple is propitious to his desire: Hymen joined them only a few days ago; and the young warmth of their tender love suggested to Jupiter to have recourse to this fine artifice. His stratagem proved successful in this case; but with many a cherished object a similar disguise would not be of any use: it is not always a sure means ...
— Amphitryon • Moliere

... too!" mused Miss Sally. "'Solomon' and 'Hymen'; they certainly suggest—they would almost seem to give promise of, at ...
— The Mayor of Troy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... He vses his folly like a stalking-horse, and vnder the presentation of that he shoots his wit. Enter Hymen, Rosalind, ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... want of rain [Always just so. "Dry times, Father Noah!"] The editors had received a liberal portion of cake from the happy couple whose matrimonial union was recorded in the column dedicated to Hymen. Also a superior article of [article of! bah!] steel pen from the enterprising merchant [shopkeeper] whose advertisement was to be found on the third page of this paper.—An interesting Surprise Party [cheap theatricals] ...
— The Guardian Angel • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... hope expel these sullen fits? Cannot mirth wring if but a forged smile From those sad drooping looks of thine? Rely on hope, whose hap will lead thee right To her, whom thou dost call thy heart's delight: Look cheerly, man; the time is near at hand, That Hymen, mounted on a snow-white coach, Shall tend on Sophos ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. IX • Various

... laughing, sir, I might have resisted, but smiles are far too feeble to express one's approbation, on such a day as this; you may, therefore, trust to my discretion. Is it then true, however, that Hymen ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper

... hast seen Satyron[A] the Socratic, think of either Eutyches or Hymen, and when thou hast seen Euphrates, think of Eutychion or Silvanus, and when thou hast seen Alciphron think of Tropaeophorus, and when thou hast seen Xenophon, think of Crito[B] or Severus, and ...
— Thoughts of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus • Marcus Aurelius Antoninus

... art sublime Where antique paintings haunt the walls, And gilded foot as silent falls In depths of plush, as flight of time, And liquid music softer blows Than Hymen's mellow golden chime: They plighted troth beneath the sword Of the knight that wore the blood red rose; But they drank of the cup that never flows From the bowl of ...
— The Loom of Life • Cotton Noe

... family home Is the destiny of men, and The prerogative(?) of the nobles. For the city(?) load the workbaskets! Food supply for the city lay to one side! For the King of Erech of the plazas, Open the hymen(?), perform the marriage act! For Gish, the King of Erech of the plazas, Open the hymen(?), Perform the marriage act! With the legitimate wife one should cohabit. So before, As well as in the future. [147] By the decree pronounced ...
— An Old Babylonian Version of the Gilgamesh Epic • Anonymous

... we will now, my friend, Return the shortest road and poaching end; If false our mates, yet we'll console ourselves, That many others have inconstant elves. Perhaps, in things a change will be one day, And only tender flames LOVE'S torch display; But now it seems some evil star presides, And Hymen's flock the devil surely rides. Besides, vile fiends the universe pervade, Whose constant aim is mortals to degrade, And cheat us to our noses if they can, (Hell's imps in human shape, disgrace to man!) Perhaps these ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine

... choose. They chose to halt at the small, shabby tenement-house by the river, through the doorway of which the bridal pair disappeared with a reeling, eccentric gait; for Mr. O'Rourke's intoxication seemed to have run down his elbow, and communicated itself to Margaret. O Hymen! who burnest precious gums and scented woods in thy torch at the melting of aristocratic hearts, with what a pitiful penny-dip thou hast lighted up ...
— A Rivermouth Romance • Thomas Bailey Aldrich

... They warm our mortal parts, but these our soul! Let her free spirit, whose unconquer'd breast Holds such deep quiet and untroubled rest, Know that though Venus and her son should spare Her rebel heart, and never teach her care, Yet Hymen may in force his vigils keep, And for another's joy suspend her ...
— Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham • Edmund Waller; John Denham

... on the way," cried Kallias, whose old cheerfulness had now returned. "Neither can we allow the niece of the greatest of Hymen's poets to be married without the sound of song and music. The young husband's house is, to be sure, too far off for our purpose, so we will suppose that the andronitis is ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... days of reform and disestablishment, of hereditary and other conservative grievances, something ought to be done to abolish the persons in question, or at least handicap them so that other deserving young men might have a fair chance in the race for beauty's smile and Hymen's chain. They have an enormous advantage, at present, over outside men-folk. Girls like to have a sort of good-natured lap-dog about them, to play with occasionally and run their errands, "do this" ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson

... Hymen] Rosalind is imagined by the rest of the company to be brought by enchantment, and is therefore introduced by a supposed aerial being in the character of Hymen. ...
— Johnson's Notes to Shakespeare Vol. I Comedies • Samuel Johnson

... features blent. Again, as on that sunny morn, When white-winged angels stood, To see her, of bright water, born, Before the preacher good. Again within the chancel's gloom, She sweetly, gently stands; With marriage hymn, with rich perfume, With Hymen's happy bands; With wild-rose wreaths, with gayest bloom, And wreathed maiden's hands. But, now she stands with me even there, With sweetly downcast eyes, So purely white, so passing fair, Like one of Paradise. The preacher speaks the solemn words, Yet ...
— Lays of Ancient Virginia, and Other Poems • James Avis Bartley

... for the year: One and all they determined to seek for a mate, And thought it a folly for seasons to wait, So even agreed, before Valentine's day, To join hearts in love; but the ladies said, Nay! Yet each one consented at once to resign Her heart unto Hymen on St. Valentine; While Winter, who only pretended to go, Lapt himself out of sight in some hillocks of snow, That behind all the rest 'neath the wood hedges lay So close that the sun could not drive them away: Yet the gentlemen birds on their love ...
— Life and Remains of John Clare - "The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet" • J. L. Cherry

... walked him riverward, reading. Are you saved? All are washed in the blood of the lamb. God wants blood victim. Birth, hymen, martyr, war, foundation of a building, sacrifice, kidney burntoffering, druids' altars. Elijah is coming. Dr John Alexander Dowie restorer of the church ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce

... virtue came. } Degenerate spirits are by fear betray'd, 20 } His soul, alas, what fortunes have essay'd; } What feats of war!—and in what words convey'd! Were it not fix'd, determin'd in my mind, That me no more the nuptial tye shall bind, Since Death deceiv'd the first fond flame I knew: 25 Were Hymen's rites less odious to my view, To this one fault perhaps I might give way; For must I own it? Anna since the day Sicheus fell, (that day a brother's guilt, A brother's blood upon our altars spilt); 30 He, none but he, my feelings could awake, Or with one doubt my wav'ring bosom shake. Yes! ...
— The Fourth Book of Virgil's Aeneid and the Ninth Book of Voltaire's Henriad • Virgil and Voltaire

... inform you that your hope has a better basis to rest on, and that there is as fair a prospect of its being shortly swallowed up in fruition as ever Cupid and Hymen presented to a happy mortal's view.—For your farther comfort, I have the pleasure to acquaint you, that Mr. Trueman is equally fond ...
— The Politician Out-Witted • Samuel Low

... who remained to pester her. Now Talboys, spurred by uncle, had often all but popped; only some let, hindrance, or just impediment had still interposed: once her pony kept prancing at each effort he made towards Hymen; they do say the subtle virgin kept probing the brute with a hair pin, and made him caracole and spill the treacle as fast as it came her way. However, now Talboys elected to pop by sea. It was the element his ancestors had invaded fair England by; and on its tranquil bosom a lover is ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade

... conveyed in a style too figurative for prose composition. Chalmers's own remarks are wholly mistaken;—too silly for any criticism, drunk or sober, and in language too flat for any thing. In Daniel's Sonnets there is scarcely one good line; while his Hymen's Triumph, of which Chalmers says not one word, exhibits a continued series of first-rate beauties in thought, passion, and imagery, and in language and metre is so faultless, that the style of that poem may without extravagance be declared ...
— Literary Remains, Vol. 2 • Coleridge

... Louvre, in which Mary of Arragon, the lovely wife of da Valos, is parting with her husband, who is bound on one of the desperate expeditions against the terrible Turks. Da Valos is dressed in armour, and the couple are encircled by Hymen, Victory, and the God of Love. The composition was repeated more than once, but never with quite the same success. We again suspect the influence of Michelangelo in the altarpiece painted before Titian next left Venice, of St. John the Almsgiver, ...
— The Venetian School of Painting • Evelyn March Phillipps

... me; but who can ensure me against the wrath of Nyssia, she who is so reserved and chaste, so apprehensive, fierce, and virginal in her modesty that she might be deemed still ignorant of the laws of Hymen? Should she ever learn of the sacrilege which I am about to render myself guilty of in deferring to my master's wishes, what punishment would she condemn me to suffer in expiation of such a crime? Who could place me beyond the reach of ...
— King Candaules • Theophile Gautier

... 'There let Hymen oft appear In saffron robe, with taper clear, And pomp, and feast, and revelry, And mask, and antique pageantry; Such sights as useful poets dream On summer eves, by ...
— Scenes and Characters • Charlotte M. Yonge

... have come and gone, And still the moon is shining on, Still Hymen's torch is lighted; And hitherto, in this land of the West, Most couples in love have thought it best To follow the ancient way of the rest, And ...
— Little Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor - Volume I • Various

... visible form on a fine antique sarcophagus in the gallery of Florence, which exhibits, in relief, the whole series of ceremonies attending a wedding in ancient times, from the formal offer to the evening when Hymen's torch lights the happy couple home. Compare with that the Christian coffin, draped in mournful black and surmounted with a crucifix! How much significance there is in these two ways of finding comfort in death. They are opposed ...
— The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; Studies in Pessimism • Arthur Schopenhauer

... Night and day it urges from the outside to the inside. It gathers ever to the centre. From the far without to the deep within, trembling from the body to the soul until the head of a woman and the heart of a man are filled with the Divine Imagination. Hymen, Hymenaea! I sing to the ears that are stopped, the eyes that are sealed, and the minds that do not labour. Sweetly I sing on the hillside. The blind shall look within and not without; the deaf shall hearken to ...
— The Crock of Gold • James Stephens

... evidently exhorts us, taking away the arrogance of the unjust forever. Your son, O old woman, is gone to heaven; he shuns the report of having descended to the realm of Pluto, being consumed as to his body in the terrible flame of fire; and he embraces the lovely bed of Hebe in the golden hall. O Hymen, you have honored two children of Jupiter. Many things agree with many; for in truth they say that Minerva was an ally of their father, and the city and people of that Goddess has saved them, and has restrained the insolence of a man to whom passion was before ...
— The Tragedies of Euripides, Volume I. • Euripides

... rummage and twitch us, until they see us safe landed at the grave. We can do nothing (but be poisoned) with impunity. What is worst of all, we must marry certain relatives and connexions, be they distorted, blear-eyed, toothless, carbuncled, with hair (if any) eclipsing the reddest torch of Hymen, and with a hide outrivalling in colour and plaits his trimmest saffron robe. At the mention of this indeed, friend Plato, even thou, although resolved to stand out of harm's way, beginnest to make ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor

... the ancient but absurd emphasis on the virginal significance of the hymen; and a recent book from a prominent publisher goes so far as to try to frighten girls into remaining chaste by stating that a physician could discover if they have been unchaste. This is far from being always ...
— Sex-education - A series of lectures concerning knowledge of sex in its - relation to human life • Maurice Alpheus Bigelow

... he said slowly, 'these tuckets that they blow from the gate signify that the new Queen cometh with a great state.' He bit his under lip and looked at her meaningly. 'But a great state ensueth a great heaviness to the head of the State. Principis hymen, principium gravitatis.... 'Tis a small matter to me; you may make it a great one to your ...
— The Fifth Queen • Ford Madox Ford

... leucorrhea or a discharge. It must be remembered that leucorrhea, or "whites," may occur in girls as well as in married women. It can also result from catching cold during the menstrual period. Another mistaken idea is that girls should not take douches for fear of injuring the hymen. This is erroneous, and while they are entirely unnecessary in a vast majority of cases it is sometimes absolutely essential to douche in order to cure leucorrhea. When they are given, it is advisable to use the small nozzle that comes with every ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol 2 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague

... from the company, burst into her chamber, pushed out her confidante, and locked the door, and found her—O heaven and earth!—a feast a thousand times more delicious than my most sanguine hopes presaged! But, let me not profane the chaste mysteries of Hymen. I was the happiest ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett

... to be a prisoner in Hymen's chains, as the lovers have it. I've got Rip's consent, I've got Alice's consent, and I've ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Rip van - Winkle • Charles Burke

... young Ione, less renowned, Not less divine, mild-natured; Beauty formed Her face, her heart Fidelity; for gods Designed, a mortal too Ione loved. These were the nymphs elected for the hour Of Hesperus and Hymen; these had strewn The bridal bed, these tuned afresh the shells, Wiping the green that hoarsened them within: These wove the chaplets, and at night resolved To drive the dolphins from the wreathed door. Gebir surveyed the concourse from ...
— Gebir • Walter Savage Landor

... similes. How Ramsay succeeded in keeping Venus and Cupid out of it, in forgetting all eclogues and pastorals, Virgil or Theocritus, and indulging in nothing that was out of place in Scotland, it is hard to tell. The Mantuan bard, the oaten reed, Philomela and her songs, Hymen, Ganymede, Bacchus, and all the Olympian band disport themselves in his other verses: but The Gentle Shepherd is void of those necessary adjuncts of the eighteenth-century muse. The wimpling burn ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant

... world—the ardent and the lofty. We are beyond earth's story as 'tis told, sir. All's shallower than the heart of man.... Indeed, 'twas one more shattered altar to Hymen." ...
— Henry Brocken - His Travels and Adventures in the Rich, Strange, Scarce-Imaginable Regions of Romance • Walter J. de la Mare

... dare say, but he couldn't fit the feeling. It shall be a song without words, unless I write some Italian lines for it myself. Animula, blandula vagula—that's the sort of ring for it, but Latin's mostly too heavy. Io, Hymen, Hymenae, Io; Io, Hymen, Hymenae! What's that? A wedding song of Catullus—absit omen. I must be in love with her indeed.' He got up from the piano, and paced quickly and feverishly up ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen

... very small, light, swift, elemental; they share in the life of nature; they are fond of dancing and singing; they are invisible and immortal; they prefer night, and midnight is their favourite hour; they fall in love with mortals, steal babies and leave changelings, and usurp the function of Hymen in blessing the marriage-bed. Oberon, "king of shadows," can apparently see things ...
— The Sources and Analogues of 'A Midsummer-night's Dream' • Compiled by Frank Sidgwick

... thy poor fenceless, naked child, the Bard! A thing unteachable in worldly skill, And half an idiot too, more helpless still: No heels to bear him from the op'ning dun, No claws to dig, his hated sight to shun: No horns, but those by luckless Hymen worn, And those, alas! not Amalthea's horn: No nerves olfact'ry, true to Mammon's foot, Or grunting, grub sagacious, evil's root: The silly sheep that wanders wild astray, Is not more friendless, is not more a prey; Vampyre—booksellers drain him ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns

... Statesman subtle wiles ensure, The Cit, and Polecat stink and are secure: Toads with their venom, Doctors with their drug, The Priest, and Hedgehog, in their robes are snug! Oh, Nature! cruel step-mother, and hard, To thy poor, naked, fenceless child the Bard! No Horns but those by luckless Hymen worn, And those, (alas! alas!) not Plenty's Horn! With naked feelings, and with aching pride, He bears th' unbroken blast on every side! Vampire booksellers drain him to the heart, And ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle

... her hand, as if in menace. "Know, Christopher, that little Hymen tolerates no man who has secrets from his wife. You tried to be silent, but betrayed yourself in your sleep. You do not know how often during the night you have called Eurydice in tones of plaintive music. Nor do you know how, as you appealed to the deities of the infernal regions, I ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach

... nuptial songs, greet him and his Basileia! 'Twas in the midst of such festivities that the Fates formerly united Olympian Here to the King who governs the gods from the summit of his inaccessible throne. Oh! Hymen! oh! Hymenaeus! Rosy Eros with the golden wings held the reins and guided the chariot; 'twas he, who presided over the union of Zeus and the fortunate Here. Oh! ...
— The Birds • Aristophanes

... bridal party made an imposing cavalcade: the princess in her litter, behind a number of maids on horseback. At the castle gates several pages, dressed as Cupids, sent silver arrows after the bridal train. 'Hymen; Io Hymen!' cried the throng. 'Godspeed!' exclaimed Queen Marguerite, and threw a parchment, tied with a golden ribbon, into the princess' litter; an epithalamium, in verse, written in her own fair hand. 'Esto perpetua!' murmured the red cardinal. ...
— Under the Rose • Frederic Stewart Isham

... way or to what extent, if any, the relations between the young mariner and his wife were affected after Hymen had stepped in and chained them together, there are data for determining. If we are to unqualifiedly accept the averments of the captain's affidavit we should come to the conclusion that Marie's nature and disposition ...
— Danger! A True History of a Great City's Wiles and Temptations • William Howe

... la-haut conclut le grand hymen, Il mele presque a Dieu l'ame du genre humain. Il voit l'insondable, il y touche; Il est le vaste elan du progres vers le ciel; Il est l'entree altiere et sainte du reel ...
— La Legende des Siecles • Victor Hugo

... auspicious hour, Sannie," he said, "shall have arrived, when, panting, I shall lead thee, lighted by Hymen's torch, to the connubial altar, then upon thy fair amaranthine finger, my joyous ...
— The Story of an African Farm • (AKA Ralph Iron) Olive Schreiner

... speed, came laden with rich stuffs and gems from the East; cups and dishes of virgin gold, crusted with uncut jewels; statuettes of Bacchus, the god of feasts, crowned with grapes of purple amethyst and leaves of emerald; of Fortuna, with the horn of Amalthea; of Hymen the torch-bearer, god of marriage; cups of figured and embossed glass, inscribed with sentiments such as "Bibe feliciter!" or "Ex hoc amici bibunt,"—all intended to be bestowed upon the guests as souvenirs during the feasts at which they were to be used. Lustrous silks came from far-away Serica; ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor

... sooner lose his splendour, the pale moon drop from her orb, the sea forget to ebb and flow, and all things change their course, than Sabra prove inconstant to Saint George of England. Let, then, the priest of Hymen knit that gordian knot, the knot of wedlock, which death alone has ...
— The Seven Champions of Christendom • W. H. G. Kingston

... conquest, though he lost the fight; And bless'd with nuptial bliss the sweet laborious night. Eros, and Anteros, on either side, One fired the bridegroom, and one warm'd the bride; And long-attending Hymen from above, Shower'd on the bed the whole Idalian grove. All of a tenor was their after-life, No day discolour'd with domestic strife; No jealousy, but mutual truth believed, 1150 Secure repose, and kindness undeceived. Thus Heaven, beyond the compass of his thought, ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol II - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden

... a new Court will make Florence lively, the only beauty it wants. You divert me with my friend the Duke of Modena's conscientious match: if the Duchess had outlived him, she would not have been so scrupulous. But, for Hymen's sake, who is that Madame Simonetti? I trust, not that old painted, gaming, debauched Countess from Milan, whom I saw ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume I • Horace Walpole

... busy hum of men, Where throngs of knights and barons bold, In weeds of peace high triumphs hold. With store of ladies, whose bright eyes Rain influence, and judge the prize Of wit or arms, while both contend To win her grace, whom all commend. There let Hymen oft appear In saffron robe, with taper clear, And pomp, and feast, and revelry, With mask and antique pageantry. Such sights, as youthful poets dream On summer eves by haunted stream. Then to the well-trod stage anon, If Jonson's learned sock be on. Or sweetest Shakspeare, ...
— MacMillan's Reading Books - Book V • Anonymous

... also two cities, fair to see and busy with the hum of men. In the one were weddings and wedding-feasts, and they were going about the city with brides whom they were escorting by torchlight from their chambers. Loud rose the cry of Hymen, and the youths danced to the music of flute and lyre, while the women stood each at her house door ...
— The Iliad • Homer

... though grave, eyed them; and let their eyes Rove without rein; till, in the amorous net Fast caught, they liked; and each his liking chose; And now of love they treat, till the evening-star, Love's harbinger, appeared; then, all in heat They light the nuptial torch, and bid invoke Hymen, then first to marriage rites invoked: With feast and musick all the tents resound. Such happy interview, and fair event Of love and youth not lost, songs, garlands, flowers, And charming symphonies, attached the heart Of Adam, soon inclined ...
— Paradise Lost • John Milton

... delight, Shook high her flaming torch in open sight, And danced around, and smiled on every knight: 330 Pleased her best servant would his courage try, No less in wedlock than in liberty. Full many an age old Hymen had not spied So kind a bridegroom, or so bright a bride. Ye bards! renown'd among the tuneful throng For gentle lays, and joyous nuptial song, Think not your softest numbers can display The matchless glories of this blissful day; The joys are such as far transcend ...
— Poetical Works of Pope, Vol. II • Alexander Pope

... that crew, so difficult to obtain; while their own waiting-maid, who was to have accompanied the young ladies on their voyage, failed them at the eleventh hour; having preferred undertaking a journey of a different kind—not to Spain, but the altar of Hymen. At the last moment of embarkation, she was missing; her Californian amante having persuaded her to ...
— The Flag of Distress - A Story of the South Sea • Mayne Reid

... And his new-pointed shafts more deeply wound, 100 Nor Dian's self escapes him now untried, Nor even Vesta9 at her altar-side; His mother too repairs her beauty's wane, And seems sprung newly from the Deep again. Exulting youths the Hymenaeal10 sing, With Hymen's name roofs, rocks, and valleys ring; He, new attired and by the season dress'd Proceeds all fragrant in his saffron vest. Now, many a golden-cinctur'd virgin roves To taste the pleasures of the fields and groves, ...
— Poemata (William Cowper, trans.) • John Milton

... kind old Pa; and that, unless desperate measures were resorted to, quamprimum, in the twinkling of a bed-post she would be under the disagreeable necessity to bundle and go with the disabled man of war to the temple of Hymen. Sacrilegious thought! I could not permit it to enter my bosom, and (pardon me for a moment, sir) when I looked down, and caught a glance of my own natty-looking, tight little leg, and dapper Hessians, I recommended her strongly ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 339, Saturday, November 8, 1828. • Various

... suffered them not to languish in expectation of a blessing he had resolved on; but gave immediate orders for the marriage preparations, and a few days after it was celebrated with the magnificence the occasion deserved. Hymen, in agreement with love, only rendered their flames more lasting; possession was so far from extinguishing them, that it seemed to be the torch which kindled them. The Count was charmed with the happy union he saw between them, and his heart could scarce decide which ...
— The Princess of Ponthieu - (in) The New-York Weekly Magazine or Miscellaneous Repository • Unknown

... power, and became a mighty prince of Thrace. Not his lute alone, but he himself played on the heart of the fair Eurydice and held it captive. It seemed as though, when they became man and wife, all happiness must be theirs. But although Hymen, the god of marriage, himself came to bless them on the day they wed, the omens on that day were against them. The torch that Hymen carried had no golden flame, but sent out pungent black smoke that made their eyes water. They feared they knew not what; but when, soon afterwards, ...
— A Book of Myths • Jean Lang

... now arrived at a period in my life, at which the novelist would pause,—believing the history of woman ceases to interest as soon as an accepted lover and consenting friends appear ready to usher the heroine into the temple of Hymen. But there is a life within life, which is never revealed till it is intertwined with another's. In the depth of the heart there is a lower deep, which is never sounded save by the hand that wears the wedding-ring. There is a talisman in its golden circle, ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz

... parted, contrasting the present, the past. Yet no memory marr'd their light converse. Lucile Question'd much, with the interest a sister might feel, Of Lord Alfred's new life,—of Miss Darcy—her face, Her temper, accomplishments—pausing to trace The advantage derived from a hymen so fit. Of herself, she recounted with humor and wit Her journeys, her daily employments, the lands She had seen, and the books she had read, and the hands She had shaken. In all that she said there appear'd An amiable irony. Laughing, she rear'd ...
— Lucile • Owen Meredith

... which roused only an impatient contempt when thrust on his notice. Of Love itself, as before stated, he held vague theories: regarding it rather as a far-off event which would meet him in future years and land him eventually at Hymen's feet. And here he found all such theories suddenly reversed. The first moment the idea of marriage was presented to his notice the vision of the only possible bride for him stood out with quite definite distinctness. Instead of Love being ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant

... bed; come Hymen, lead the Bride, And lay her by her Husbands side: Bring in the Virgins every one That grieve to lie alone: That they may kiss while they may say, a maid, To morrow 'twill be other, kist and said: Hesperus be long a shining, Whilst these Lovers ...
— The Maids Tragedy • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... youth the indulgence of those passions, those coquetries, love and its terrors, love and its delights, and that fascinating company which followed the coming of the Franks. At this vernal season of life no fault is irreparable, and Hymen will come forth from the bosom of experiences, armed with confidence, stripped of hatred, and love in marriage will be justified, because it will have ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac

... whispered; "it's a matter of four thousand francs, a hundred and sixty pounds, eight hundred dollars, a new ceiling for the Cafe de l'Univers, the dream of a woman's life, and the happiest omen for my wedded felicity. The fair goddess Hymen invites you with uplifted torch. You ...
— The Joyous Adventures of Aristide Pujol • William J. Locke

... rare as beautiful! But theirs was love in which the mind delights To lose itself, when the old world grows dull. And we are sick of its hack sounds and sights, Intrigues, adventures of the common school, Its petty passions, marriages, and flights, Where Hymen's torch but brands one strumpet more, Whose husband only knows ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli

... knew and liked, and, in a way, respected her, as 'Miss Dolly.' Old Reverend John Chubley, D.D., who had been in love with his wife from the period of his boyhood; and yet so grudging was Fate, had to undergo an engagement of nigh thirty years before Hymen rewarded their constancy; being at length made Vicar of Huddelston, and master of church revenues to the amount of three hundred pounds a year—had, at forty-five, married ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... pert reply, And brazen front and stubborn tone, Show all her native virtue's flown. By her the thoughtless youth is ta'en, Impoverished, disgraced, or slain: Through her the marriage vows are broke, And Hymen proves a galling yoke. Diseases come, destruction's dealt, Where'er her poisonous breath is felt; Whilst she, poor wretch, dies in the flame That runs through her ...
— Cottage Poems • Patrick Bronte

... attired as usual, except that she was now engaged in substituting for her green kid gloves a pair of white. The Aged was likewise occupied in preparing a similar sacrifice for the altar of Hymen. The old gentleman, however, experienced so much difficulty in getting his gloves on, that Wemmick found it necessary to put him with his back against a pillar, and then to get behind the pillar himself and pull away at them, while I for my part held the old gentleman round the waist, that he might ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens

... terror fled Thrust from dwelling of the pure: She who erst had dwelt unwed Subject to her spouse was led, Bidden Hymen's ...
— The Hymns of Prudentius • Aurelius Clemens Prudentius

... non metuunt anim discrimen, Principes in habitum verterunt hoc crimen, Varium viro turpiter jungit novus hymen, Exagitata procul non ...
— Early English Meals and Manners • Various

... affianced lord could desire, was not averse to gratify the wishes of her fond Henry. Lady Clavering came up from Tunbridge. Milliners and jewellers were set to work and engaged to prepare the delightful paraphernalia of Hymen. Lady Clavering was in such a good humour, that Sir Francis even benefited by it, and such a reconciliation was effected between this pair, that Sir Francis came to London, sate at the head of his own table ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray

... knit in childhood's innocence, Long bound in Hymen's ties, One goes to distant battlefields, One ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIV • John Lord

... temptation. Christ was then young; and as He sat on the burning sand in the middle of the desert, He pondered upon one thing and another, and played with a handful of pebbles which He had collected. Until presently from afar, there descried Him the devils Hymen, Demon, Igamon, and Zmiulan—devils of equal age ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky

... while we keep these rites, ye widowed dames, The marriage time a purer season claims; Pause, ye fond mothers, braid not yet her hair, Nor the ripe virgin for her lord prepare. O, light not, Hymen, now your joyous fires, Another torch nor yours the tomb requires! Close all the temples on these mourning days, And dim each altar's spicy, steaming blaze; For now around us roams a spectred brood, Craving and keen, and ...
— Folk Lore - Superstitious Beliefs in the West of Scotland within This Century • James Napier

... time, so oft by truth Promis'd should come to crown your youth. Then, fair ones, do not wrong Your joys by staying long; Or let love's fire go out, By lingering thus in doubt; But learn that time once lost Is ne'er redeem'd by cost. Then away; come, Hymen, guide To the bed the ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick

... gave her a name, This daughter of strife, this daughter of shame, The spear-wooed maid of Greece! Helen the taker! 'tis plain to see, A taker of ships, a taker of men, A taker of cities is she! From the soft-curtained chamber of Hymen she fled, By the breath of giant Zephyr sped, And shield-bearing throngs in marshalled array Hounded her flight o'er the printless way, Where the swift-flashing oar The fair booty bore To swirling Sim'o-is' leafy shore, And stirred the ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson

... used to throw my earthly rest And quiet all away in jest— I could not love except where Death Was mingling his with Beauty's breath— Or Hymen, Time, and Destiny, Were ...
— Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works • Edgar Allan Poe

... the large human sense. His range is far short of the mark, he suggests nothing of the great work to which he is but the pleasing preliminary. Even for marriage we must bring in another god little heard of—Master Hymen. This personage has made but small impression upon literature and art; we have concentrated our interest on the God of First Sensation, leaving none ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman

... town—it is something unusual to see three couples standing before the altar. In the present case there is this number, none of the pairs strangers to the other two, but all three, by mutual agreement and understanding, to take Hymen's oath ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid

... they sang in their dithyrambs, "weaves flowery chains to unite forever Austria and Gaul. Peoples shed tears, but tears of enthusiasm and gratitude. Long live Louise and Napoleon!" In every street, in every square, there were transparencies, mottoes, flags, mythological emblems, temples of Hymen, angels of peace and concord, ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand

... the names of the bride and bridegroom. It also gives—and I think this is very friendly of it—a list of useful synonyms for the principal subjects, animate and inanimate, of description. The danger of calling the protagonists at the court of Hymen (this one is not from the book; I thought of it myself just now)—the danger of calling them "the happy pair" more than once in a column is that your readers begin to suspect that you are a person of extremely ...
— Not that it Matters • A. A. Milne

... and good-humour'd, complying and kind, Turn the chief of your care from your face to your mind; 'Tis thus that a wife may her conquests improve, And Hymen shall rivet ...
— Sketches of the Fair Sex, in All Parts of the World • Anonymous

... Torch. The shadowy Marriage-god "Hymen" was a torch and a cry as much as anything more personal. As a torch he is the sign both of marriage and of death, of sunrise and of the consuming fire. The full Moon was specially connected with ...
— The Trojan women of Euripides • Euripides

... verse, he evidently could not stomach the elder poet's conception of a hostile universe, or his glorification of unwedded bliss. Accordingly he constructed in Philos and Licia a world in which all goes well provided one follows the rules, and where one of the key rules is that Hymen's rites must precede love's consummation. One of Licia's chief responsibilities, in addition to summing up all feminine perfections, is to enforce this rule. Philos, though severely tempted to violate it, soon yields to Licia's ...
— Seven Minor Epics of the English Renaissance (1596-1624) • Dunstan Gale

... should have revelled in the enjoyment of anticipation before I had destroyed the hymen; but youth, want, liquor, drove me on, and I don't remember thinking much about the virginity, only that the cunt looked different from the two others I had known. The next instant I laid my belly on hers. "Oh! you are heavy, you smother me," said she rousing herself, "you're going to hurt ...
— My Secret Life, Volumes I. to III. - 1888 Edition • Anonymous

... at the will of the wind. The arms of the family of Herouville, carved in white marble with their mantle and supporters, gave the appearance of a tomb to this species of edifice, which formed a pendant to the bed, another erection raised to the glory of Hymen. Modern architects would have been puzzled to decide whether the room had been built for the bed or the bed for the room. Two cupids playing on the walnut headboard, wreathed with garlands, might have passed for angels; and columns of the same wood, supporting the tester were carved ...
— The Hated Son • Honore de Balzac

... ii. 489; Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication, i. 469. If injuries are inherited, why has the repeated rupture of the hymen produced no inherited effect? ...
— Are the Effects of Use and Disuse Inherited? - An Examination of the View Held by Spencer and Darwin • William Platt Ball

... king-killer, and dear divorce 'Twixt natural son and sire! thou bright defiler Of Hymen's purest bed! thou valiant Mars! Thou ever young, fresh, lov'd, and delicate wooer, Whose blush doth thaw the consecrated snow That lies on Dian's lap! thou visible god, That solder'st close impossibilities, And mak'st ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson









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