"Befit" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... shall leave it. But I tell you, King, that I had rather die as your father would have killed me in the old days, or your brother would kill me now, did either of them hate or fear me, than live on in safety, owing my life to a new law and a new mercy that do not befit the great ones of the world. King, I am your servant," and giving him the royal salute, Hokosa rose and ...
— The Wizard • H. Rider Haggard
... sense to undervalue them. That men generally have over-estimated their worth, is a reason why we should reduce them to their true position, and not sink them below it. The palace of the soul should befit its possessor. And as God has taken pleasure in scattering images of beauty all over the earth, and made us susceptible of pleasure therefrom, it is right that in the education of our children we should seek for the unfolding of the noblest and most beautiful forms. Shall we beautify ...
— Mrs Whittelsey's Magazine for Mothers and Daughters - Volume 3 • Various
... but," declares this most staid biographer, with a refreshing candor, "as it is a matter which is not without its effect on the Fortunes of many, it is not always to be passed over in the Silence which would befit a Sober Pen. Mary Twining's Hair was of a golden Colour and wound itself in small, and not always tidy, Rings about her Neck and Forehead. Her eyes were of a darker appearance than is common, and her Mouth, though not without a certain ...
— A Christmas Accident and Other Stories • Annie Eliot Trumbull
... Yes, JOSEPH, slanginess, carelessness and extravagance of speech will not befit your present position, ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 102, Jan. 9, 1892 • Various
... young to be described simply as a big man with a beard. But it is already plain that middle life will find him in that category. He has still some of the slimness of youth; but youthfulness is not the effect he aims at: his frock coat would befit a prime minister; and a certain high chested carriage of the shoulders, a lofty pose of the head, and the Olympian majesty with which a mane, or rather a huge wisp, of hazel colored hair is thrown back from an imposing brow, suggest Jupiter rather than Apollo. He is prodigiously fluent of speech, ...
— Man And Superman • George Bernard Shaw
... before they were well laid on,—all these may vanish now, and leave me to mould a fresh existence out of sunshine, Brooding Meditation may flap her dusky wings and take her owl-like Right, blinking amid the cheerfulness of noontide. Such companions befit the season of frosted window-panes and crackling fires, when the blast howls through the black-ash trees of our avenue and the drifting snow- storm chokes up the wood-paths and fills the highway from stone wall to stone wall. In the spring and summer time all sombre thoughts should ...
— Buds and Bird Voices (From "Mosses From An Old Manse") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... their elevated position. And why? Because the king, who has the power to give palaces, wealth, magnificent dresses, and tables loaded with every imaginable luxury, has not the power to bestow the elevation of mind, polish of manners, and other graces which befit queens and royal children. Hence, they would feel out of place, and be unable to enjoy the happiness to which they have been elevated. Besides, they would see themselves despised, and even ridiculed, by those whose birth and education ...
— The Happiness of Heaven - By a Father of the Society of Jesus • F. J. Boudreaux
... head upon his shoulder, no more twisting of her fingers through his locks, no more looking into his eyes, no more amorous pressing of her lips against his own. Much as she loved him she must remember now that such outward signs of love as these would not befit her. "Walter," she said, "I am so glad to see you! And yet I do not know but what it would have been better that you should ...
— The Vicar of Bullhampton • Anthony Trollope
... an extreme of courtesy was shown. It seemed as though I were treated with almost royal honour. This, I felt, was paid to me as being President of the republic, and I endeavoured to behave myself with such mingled humility and dignity as might befit the occasion; but I could not but feel that something was wanting to the simplicity of my ordinary life. My wife, on the spur of the moment, managed to give the gentlemen a very good dinner. Including the chaplain ...
— The Fixed Period • Anthony Trollope
... greater hopes, Virginia, I frankly confess, regarding the stability of your character than when I last conversed with you. You may depend on whatever assistance lies in my power; but let me impress upon you that the cultivation which your talents befit you to attain, cannot be reached without strenuous exertions ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant
... sad, Mark, and should you not be sad? Gloom and sorrow befit our situations alike; though for you I feel more than for myself. I think not so much of our parting, as of your misfortune in having partaken of this crime. There is to me but little occasion for grief in the temporary separation ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... concert, as, for instance, the clashings of quoits, fire-beacons, and the shadows on sun-dials, every one of which things has its cause, and by that cause and contrivance is a sign of something else. But these are subjects, perhaps, that would better befit another place. ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... on his hill he's lying to await What added honors may befit his state— The monument, the statue, or the arch (Where knaves may come to weep and dupes to march) Builded by clowns to brutalize the scenes His genius beautified. To get the means, His newly good traducers all are dunned For contributions to the conscience fund. If ...
— Shapes of Clay • Ambrose Bierce
... Valerius, And none wist where he lay. For shivered arms and ensigns Were heaped there in a mound, 410 And corpses stiff, and dying men, That writhed and gnawed the ground, And wounded horses kicking, And snorting purple foam: Right well did such a couch befit ...
— Narrative and Lyric Poems (first series) for use in the Lower School • O. J. Stevenson
... entrailes hath this prodigy burst forth, so please your grace. Naught doth so befit ye grete as grete performance; and haply shall ye finde yt 'tis not from mediocrity this ...
— 1601 - Conversation as it was by the Social Fireside in the Time of the Tudors • Mark Twain
... consonant to, and nothing that is not compatible with, reason, the harmony of Holy Writ, and the idea of Christian faith. The second would consist of puerilities and anilities, some impossible, most incredible; and all so silly, so sensual, as to befit a dreaming Talmudist, not a Scriptural Christian. And this latter column would be found grounded ...
— Coleridge's Literary Remains, Volume 4. • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... tall young man, with long dark hair and with well-made features and a certain diffidence in his manner which did not befit his calling. ...
— Kate Bonnet - The Romance of a Pirate's Daughter • Frank R. Stockton
... befit it for cleansing carbuncles, and for benefiting baldness. When mixed with honey it has removed freckles with success; the leaves, dried and powdered, serve, when applied, to dispel obstinate ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie
... scratch wig.... I quitted them all (the House of Commons) with the highest contempt.' Of Thomas Campbell, the poet, it is written that 'his talk is small, contemptuous, and shallow; his face has a smirk which would befit a shopman or an auctioneer.' Wordsworth, 'an old, very loquacious, indeed, quite prosing man.' Southey 'the shallowest chin, prominent snubbed Roman nose, small carelined brow, the most vehement pair of faint hazel eyes I have ever seen.' There is a savage ...
— Studies in Literature and History • Sir Alfred Comyn Lyall
... the best life of Athens. Nor, indeed, do I marvel at Aurelius for trusting him. As a scholar or a jurist he will always be negligible, but as a man he is naively sincere and candid and with all the strength of his Roman will he is determined that both his work and his pleasures shall be such as befit a gentleman of honour and refinement. He may bore you, but, if I do not misread you, the pleasures that are within his gift will have a finer edge for you than those of the Colosseum and the ...
— Roads from Rome • Anne C. E. Allinson
... off ten lances, under a stout kinsman who had campaigned in France before—Sir Robert Douglas of Harside—with all their followers, and full equipment, such as might befit the heir of a branch of the great House of the Bleeding Heart. But their voyage had not been prosperous, and after riding from Flanders they had found the wedding over, and no one in the hostel having heard of the ...
— Two Penniless Princesses • Charlotte M. Yonge
... by Babrias was exceedingly popular among the Romans. It was the favourite book of the Emperor Julian. Only six of these fables, and a few fragments, remain; but they are sufficient to show that their author possessed all the graces of style which befit the apologue. Some critics place him in the Augustan age; others make him contemporary with Moschus. His work was versified in Latin, at the instance of Seneca; and Quinctilian refers to it as a reading-book for boys. Thus, at all times, ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine
... certain extent our mode of speech should consort with our mode of living. You would not expect to hear from a pulpit the phrases which belong to a racecourse, nor would the expressions which are decorous, perhaps, in aristocratic drawing-rooms befit the humble parlours ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope
... race? The ordinary burden of the Jamaica negro is far from a light one. The yearly expense of his government is not less than a million dollars, or about three dollars for every man, woman, and child on the island. The executive and judicial departments are on a scale of expense which would befit a continent. The Governor receives a salary of forty thousand dollars, the Chief Justice fifteen thousand dollars, the Associate Justices ten thousand dollars. The ecclesiastical establishment, which ministers little or nothing ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various
... was of his most privity, "what ponderest thou so much? Forsooth, all these words well befit a good lady and wise to say; and so, may help me God, she is both wise and valiant. Wherefore I counsel thee in good faith that thou look to a day when thou canst be there; that thou send greeting to her that thou ...
— Old French Romances • William Morris
... roses now,— Leafless thorns befit the brow. In this crowd my voice is weak, But ye force me now to speak. Know ye not King Richard groans Chained 'neath Austria's dungeon-stones? What care I to sing of aught Save what presses on my thought? Over laughter, song, and shout From these windows swelling out, Over passion's ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... almost, or rather intirely effected already) to distinguish yourself from the promiscuous crowd of Pleaders with which I have loaded the little history I have been giving you. For it would ill befit you, (richly furnished as you are with those liberal Arts, which, unable to acquire at home, you imported from that celebrated city which has always been revered as the seat of learning) to pass after all as an ordinary ...
— Cicero's Brutus or History of Famous Orators; also His Orator, or Accomplished Speaker. • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... constancy compatible with keeping his presence in the prison a secret; and it was not till the crisis was safely past, that he began to visit the cell less frequently, and re-assumed the harsh manners which he held to befit his office. ...
— Frances Kane's Fortune • L. T. Meade
... dishevelled hair, and his woman's face, had about him at that moment something of the antique Themis. His dilated nostrils, his downcast eyes, gave to his implacable Greek profile that expression of wrath and that expression of Chastity which, as the ancient world viewed the matter, befit Justice. ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... near, thick bordered by the scented flowers That lured the honeyed bee, when spring declines, Thick swarming o'er the meadows. There all day A huge man sat, of savage, wild aspect; His breast stood roundly forward, his broad back Seemed as of iron, such as might befit A vast Colossus sculptured. Full to view The muscles of his brawny shoulders stood, Like the round mountain-stones the torrent wave Has polished; from his neck and back hung down A lion's skin, held ...
— The Poetical Works of William Lisle Bowles, Vol. 1 • William Lisle Bowles
... better to play upon the hills in boyish sport than to rule over men who are my elders. If it be that I am indeed to be your king, then do I deem your choice made only because I am my dear father's son, and not that I have any virtue or prowess that would befit me for that high office. And now I ask you, men of Bute, whether you have ever found any fault with the manner in which the late king, Earl Hamish, ruled this land, and whether you know of anything deserving blame ...
— The Thirsty Sword • Robert Leighton
... to argue in a circle," said the lawyer. "I cannot be convinced till I have heard you. I cannot be your friend till I am properly informed. If you were more trustful, it would better befit your time of life. And you know, Mr. Balfour, we have a proverb in the country that ...
— Kidnapped • Robert Louis Stevenson
... was only a lady-clock, child, 'flying away home.' I wish to remind you that it was you who first said to me, with that discretion I respect in you—with that foresight, prudence, and humility which befit your responsible and dependent position—that in case I married Miss Ingram, both you and little Adele had better trot forthwith. I pass over the sort of slur conveyed in this suggestion on the character ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... knightly greeting unto him known until now as Robert Earl of Carrick, and bids him, an he would proclaim and prove the rights he hath assumed, come forth from the narrow precincts of a palace and town, which ill befit a warrior of such high renown, and give him battle in the Park of Methven, near at hand. He challenges him to meet him there, with nobles, knights, and yeomen, who proclaiming Robert Bruce their sovereign, cast ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar
... Woelfing, to-day; Till the dawn shelter they show; A flawless sword Will befit thee at sunrise, By day be ready for fight, And pay thy debt ...
— Stories of the Wagner Opera • H. A. Guerber
... lordship has an outline of my brief story, excepting my deportment in those passages of action in the field, in leaguers, storms, and onslaughts, whilk would be wearisome to narrate, and might, peradventure, better befit any other tongue than ...
— A Legend of Montrose • Sir Walter Scott
... observed that there is no action and no dramatic effect in the whole; but those who have seen the cartoon lack words to describe the noble beauty of the figures. Nearly all are men, but such majesty and harmony of form and feature, of outline and movement, well befit an age and people that produced the very ideal of manly beauty. The nymphs in the foreground are also said to be unspeakably lovely, and endowed with the most intimate charm of maidenly innocence. Of course it is impossible to appreciate the full effect of the picture, until it is executed in colors; ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 5, No. 3, March, 1852 • Various
... scenes confine my roving vers, To this Horizon is my Phoebus bound, His Godlike acts, and his temptations fierce, And former sufferings other where are found; Loud o're the rest Cremona's Trump doth sound; Me softer airs befit, and softer strings Of Lute, or Viol still, more ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton
... concurrence &c. 178; cooperation &c. 709. right man in the right place, very thing,; quite the thing, just the thing. V. be accordant &c. adj.; agree, accord, harmonize; correspond, tally, respond; meet, suit, fit, befit, do, adapt itself to; fall in with, chime in with, square with, quadrate with, consort with, comport with; dovetail, assimilate; fit like a glove, fit to a tittle, fit to a T; match &c. 17; become one; homologate[obs3]. consent &c. (assent) 488. render accordant &c. adj.; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... that even the King himself, despite his fine phrases on divine right, has to sue something humbly to his good citizens of London and his lowlier subjects for those very supplies that insure his kingly pomp. So, saucy girl, put not into young Cuthbert's head notions that ill befit one who has naught to call his own save the clothes upon his back. If he goes to these kinsfolk, as I believe it will be well for him to do, it will behove him to go right humbly and reverently. Remember this in talking with him. It were an ill thing to do to teach him to ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green
... be But that one tutored thus should look with awe Upon the faculties of man, receive 240 Gladly the highest promises, and hail, As best, the government of equal rights And individual worth. And hence, O Friend! If at the first great outbreak I rejoiced Less than might well befit my youth, the cause 245 In part lay here, that unto me the events Seemed nothing out of nature's certain course, A gift that was come rather late than soon. No wonder, then, if advocates like these, Inflamed by passion, blind with prejudice, ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. III • William Wordsworth
... unskilful in the poet's trade, 170 I kept no Naiads by me ready made; Ne'er did I colours high in air advance, Torn from the bleeding fopperies of France;[87] No flimsy linsey-woolsey scenes I wrote, With patches here and there, like Joseph's coat. Me humbler themes befit: secure, for me, Let play-wrights smuggle nonsense duty free; Secure, for me, ye lambs, ye lambkins! bound, And frisk and frolic o'er the fairy ground. Secure, for me, thou pretty little fawn! 180 Lick Sylvia's hand, ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill
... so thick together into my mouth that they fall to fighting among themselves to get out; that's why my tongue lets fly the first that come, though they may not be pat to the purpose. But I'll take care henceforward to use such as befit the dignity of my office; for 'in a house where there's plenty, supper is soon cooked,' and 'he who binds does not wrangle,' and 'the bell-ringer's in a safe berth,' and 'giving ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... 1878, in New York, and his playing caused an unusual demonstration. He was described in the following words: "His figure is stately, his face and attitude suggest reserve force and that majestic calm which seems to befit great power.... A famous philosopher once said that beauty consists of an exact balance between the intellect and the imagination. The violin performance of Wilhelmj exhibits this just proportion more perfectly than the work of ...
— Famous Violinists of To-day and Yesterday • Henry C. Lahee
... peculiarities, which to some extent mar our pleasure in Mr. Morris's translations. In his version of the rich Virgilian measure they are especially out of place. The "AEneid" is rendered with a roughness which might better befit a translation of Ennius. Thus the reader of Mr. Morris's poetical translations has in his hands versions of almost literal closeness, and (what is extremely rare) versions of poetry by a poet. But his acquaintance with Early English and Icelandic has added to the poet a strain of the philologist, ...
— Adventures among Books • Andrew Lang
... of Charlemagne, In the free schools of Aix, how kings should reign, And with them taught the children of the poor How subjects should be patient and endure, He touched the lips of some, as best befit, With honey from the hives of Holy Writ; Others intoxicated with the wine Of ancient history, sweet but less divine; Some with the wholesome fruits of grammar fed; Others with mysteries of the stars o'er-head, ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... painter who taught people how they ought to look, to befit an admirer's view of their aristocratic rank. His portraits thus express the social position of the sitter as well as the individual character. Although this has been an aim of portrait-painters in modern times, when they have ...
— The Book of Art for Young People • Agnes Conway
... are, and have perception like theirs, and voice and form." But this naive opinion Xenophanes corrects because it is not consistent with the new enlightenment concerning the arche, or first principle of nature. "And he [God] abideth ever in the same place, moving not at all; nor doth it befit him to go about, now hither, now ...
— The Moral Economy • Ralph Barton Perry
... rare days of ease—for the learned priest, mindful of the words of the wise, did not wish to dull them by everlasting work— they were enjoined to disport themselves with the gravity and the decorum that befit young Samditats, not to engage in night frolics, not to use free jests or light expressions, not to draw pictures on the walls, not to eat honey, flesh, and sweet substances turned acid, not to ...
— Vikram and the Vampire • Sir Richard F. Burton
... venerated, or be alive and wagging its tail in the mud?" "It would rather be alive and wagging its tail in the mud," said the officials. "Begone" said Chung. "The tortoise is a symbol of longevity and great wisdom. It would not befit me to aspire to greater wisdom than the tortoise. I, ...
— My Lady of the Chinese Courtyard • Elizabeth Cooper
... graver care, From Muse or Sylvan was he wont to ask, In phrase poetic, inspiration fair; Careless he gave his numbers to the air, They came unsought for, if applauses came: Nor for himself prefers he now the prayer; Let but his verse befit a hero's fame, Immortal be the verse!—forgot the ...
— Some Poems by Sir Walter Scott • Sir Walter Scott
... from the Princess, and a warning growl from De Gourdon, admonished Richard that he was on perilous ground; but the Prince responded in a tone of deep feeling, "Well said, Richard: the term does not befit that worthy name. I should have said that I would fain help thee to maintain its honour. My page once, wilt thou be so again? and one day ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge
... husband, children, home, to her influence in the social circle where the Christian graces are best employed. Suppose with a tremulous voice and a few stray tears in her blue eyes, her head drooping on one side, she had said she knew nothing of the science of government; that a crown did not befit a woman's brow; that she had not the physical strength even to wave her nation's flag, much less to hold the scepter of power over so vast an empire; that in case of war she could not fight and ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... the Abbe Bulteau thinks it may be a full-length statue of Saint Radegonde. But other princesses have been canonized, and, like her, hold books. At the same time, the monastic aspect of this queen, her emaciated figure, her eye vaguely fixed on the region of internal dreams, would well befit Clotaire's wife, who retired to ...
— The Cathedral • Joris-Karl Huysmans
... formal dissolution of their house the monks sung the last service in the abbey church. It was held late in the evening, partly because this time seemed to befit such a farewell, and partly that less public attention might be attracted; for there was a doubt whether the King's servants would permit any further ceremonies. Six tall candles burnt upon the altar, and the usual sconces lit the service-books that lay before the brothers in ...
— The Nebuly Coat • John Meade Falkner
... count you of our household [He holds out his hand for GUIDO to kiss. GUIDO starts back in horror, but at a gesture from COUNT MORANZONE, kneels and kisses it.] We will see That you are furnished with such equipage As doth befit your ...
— The Duchess of Padua • Oscar Wilde
... life than that he should incline his mind to move in Charity, rest in Providence, and turn upon the poles of Truth. This condition, says he, is Heaven upon Earth; and although what touches truth may better befit the philosopher who uttered it than the vulgar and unlearned, for whom perhaps it is a counsel too high and therefore dangerous, what comes before should surely be graven by each of us on the walls of our hearts. ...
— Simon Dale • Anthony Hope
... this act befit a Prince like thee, Right worthy is it of thine ancestry. Thy guerdon be a son of peerless worth, Whose wide ...
— Sakoontala or The Lost Ring - An Indian Drama • Kalidasa
... of Kali befit her character. Fury is in her countenance and in her three red eyes. Her tongue lolls from her mouth. In one of her four hands is the dripping, bloody head of a slaughtered enemy. Her necklace is of the heads of her slain. Her girdle is the severed hands of the dead ...
— Where Half The World Is Waking Up • Clarence Poe
... Varchi's commentary on one of his own sonnets, Michel Angelo says: "Since I perceive by his words and praises that I am esteemed by the author to be that which I am not, I pray you to offer such words to him from me as befit such love, affection, and courtesy." This Mr. Harford translates as follows: "And since I am almost persuaded by the praises and commendations of its author to imagine myself to be that which I am not, I must entreat you to convey to him some expressions from me appropriate to such ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, February, 1858 • Various
... ears of those who uttered the other. But each was wholly natural to the years of the two classes. Sad memories gather, like evening mists, round aged lives, and the temptation of the old is unduly to exalt the past, and unduly to depreciate the present. Welcoming shouts for the new befit young lips, and they care little about the ruins that have to be carted off the ground for the foundations of the temple which they are to have a hand in building. However imperfect, it is better to them than the old house ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... how hard it is that they may not be natural. This form of affectation, once begun, continues through life, being too convenient to be lightly discarded; and youthful matrons not long out of their teens assume a tone and ways that would about befit middle age counselling giddy youth, and that might by chance be dangerous even then if the "Indian summer" ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous
... with her Volscian train, And by the gate dismounting then and there (Down likewise leap her followers to the plain), "Turnus," she cries, "if confidence can e'er Befit the brave, I venture and I swear Singly to face yon Trojans in the fray, And stem the Tuscan cavalry. My care Shall be the war's first hazards to essay; Thou guard the walls afoot, and ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil
... heard the key turn, and the bars and bolts slowly removed. The opening of intervening passages permitted sounds from the interior of the palace to reach me; and I heard the clock strike one. They come to murder me, I thought; this hour does not befit a public execution. I drew myself up against the wall opposite the entrance; I collected my forces, I rallied my courage, I would not fall a tame prey. Slowly the door receded on its hinges—I was ready to spring forward to seize and grapple ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... the world in the simple natural style in which he wrote it. The book had been "edited" by Franklin's loyalist grandson, and had been cut and tortured into the pompous, stilted periods that were supposed to befit the dignity of so important a personage. When John Bigelow published the original with all its naivete and homely turns of phrases and suppressed passages, he shed a flood of light upon ...
— Washington's Birthday • Various
... mutches with lace borders, and side-knots of blue three-ha'penny ribbon—long muslin frockies, vandyked across the breast, drawn round the waist with narrow nittings and tucked five rows about the tail—Welsh-flannel petticoaties—demity wrappers—a coral gumstick, and other uncos, which it does not befit the like of me to particularize. I trust, on my part, as far as in me lay, I was not found wanting; having taken care to provide a famous Dunlop cheese, at fivepence-halfpenny the pound—I believe I paled fifteen, in Joseph Gowdy's shop, before I fixed on it;—to say ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - tailor in Dalkeith • D. M. Moir
... but Stuart was keen enough to grasp that a man who smiles when he is insulted must either be a craven or a dangerous man with an inordinate gift of self-control. Cecil could not be a coward, or such men as Manuel and Leborge would not so evidently fear him, therefore the other character must befit him. ...
— Plotting in Pirate Seas • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... who is greatest? Can you tell? Sad tales befit my woe: I 'll tell you one. A salmon, as she swam unto the sea. Met with a dog-fish, who encounters her With this rough language; 'Why art thou so bold To mix thyself with our high state of floods, Being no eminent courtier, but one That for the calmest ...
— The Duchess of Malfi • John Webster
... of running along the terrace listen to me and lie down. Thou wilt see Sleep that is a deliberate divinity, and it does not befit him to chase after those who run with the pace of a deer. If Thou wilt lie down on a comfortable couch, Sleep, who loves comfort, will sit near thee and cover thee with his great mantle, which covers not only men's ...
— The Pharaoh and the Priest - An Historical Novel of Ancient Egypt • Boleslaw Prus
... erudition across dinner-tables. Rubens' great picture, "The Descent from the Cross," is in Antwerp; you will go to see it, and in Munich Mr. Poole will treat you to the works of Wagner and Mozart. You are very happy; everything has gone well with you, and it would ill befit me, who brought so much unhappiness upon you, to complain that you are too happy, too much intent on the things of this world. Yet, if you will allow me to speak candidly, I will tell you what I really ...
— The Lake • George Moore
... formed, for Nature has often made a female child, and it has remained so for a month or two, in its mother's womb; but afterwards the heat greatly increasing in the genital organs, they have protruded and the child has become a male, but nevertheless retained some things which do not befit the masculine sex, such as female gestures and movements, a high voice, and a more effeminate temper than is usual with men; whilst, on the other hand, the genitals have become inverted through cold humours, ...
— The Works of Aristotle the Famous Philosopher • Anonymous
... entertain not the slightest feeling of resentment towards them. Influenced as they must have been by the charge of the Lord Chief Justice, they could perhaps have found no other verdict. What of that charge? Any strong observations on it I feel sincerely would ill-befit the solemnity of this scene; but I would earnestly beseech of you, my lord—you who preside on that bench—when the passions and the prejudices of this hour have passed away, to appeal to your own conscience, and ...
— Speeches from the Dock, Part I • Various
... Father, loving the creatures He has made, with a love immeasureable and exhaustless; Who feels for us, and sympathizes with us, and sends us pain and want and disaster only that they may serve to develop in us the virtues and excellences that befit us to live ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... the public was advised, rather more than a year ago, by an editorial rescript in the Evening Journal, formally reading me out of the Whig party, that I was esteemed no longer either useful or ornamental in the concern, you will, I am sure, indulge me in some reminiscences which seem to befit the occasion. ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... into position, they came slowly together, with grim and angry looks; but suddenly Little John lowered his point. "Hold, good Cook!" said he. "Now, I bethink me it were ill of us to fight with good victuals standing so nigh, and such a feast as would befit two stout fellows such as we are. Marry, good friend, I think we should enjoy this fair feast ere we fight. ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... I would oppose that in the fifteenth Psal. v. 5. He that sweareth to his neighbor, and disappointeth him not, though it were to his own hindrance. It was a King that writ it, and me thinks the rule he gave, should well befit both King and Subject: and surely this perswades against all taking of advantages. A man may reduce all the causes of faith-breaking to three heads. One may be, because he that promised, had no intention to ...
— Machiavelli, Volume I - The Art of War; and The Prince • Niccolo Machiavelli
... to their state of holiness and everlasting peace, the damned appear in every realistic aspect of most stringent agony and terror. The colossal forms of flesh with which the multitudes of saved and damned are equally endowed, befit that extremity of physical and mental anguish more than they suit the serenity of bliss eternal. There is a wretch, twined round with fiends, gazing straight before him as he sinks; one half of his face is buried in his hand, the ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds
... It would ill-befit one of the ruder sex to attempt to write critically about the needlework of the maidens of Gidding, but we may sing their praises for the skill, the industry, and the artistic results exhibited by this branch of ...
— Little Gidding and its inmates in the Time of King Charles I. - with an account of the Harmonies • J. E. Acland
... overrun by this engrossing anomaly, to the annihilation of every wonderful and beautiful variety of animal existence which does not administer to his wants, principally as laboratories of preparation to befit cruder elemental matter for ...
— Evolution, Old & New - Or, the Theories of Buffon, Dr. Erasmus Darwin and Lamarck, - as compared with that of Charles Darwin • Samuel Butler
... in labour. We bear divided thought one way and hearing in other: 15 Vanquish't by right we must be, since Victory loveth the heedful. Therefore at least d'ye turn your minds the task to consider, Soon shall begin their say whose countersay shall befit you. Hymen O ...
— The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus • Caius Valerius Catullus
... forbearance, and let even a little compassion be mingled with it. You are young, fair and good; but you are human, and because of this capable of much suffering. If then something of compassion does not enter into the feelings you have one for the other, these feelings will not always befit all the circumstances of your life together; they will be like festive robes that will not shield you from wind and rain. We love truly only those we love even in their weakness and their poverty. To forbear, to forgive, to console, that alone ...
— Honey-Bee - 1911 • Anatole France
... happier thought of what a brilliant marriage on her part would mean to the little girls who were so busily cleaning an eight-room house in a little Jersey suburb. Josephine and Julia should come to visit her, they should have little frocks that would befit the pretty nieces of Mrs. Ward Carter; they should have a taste of polo games and country clubs, and in a winter or two Josephine's first formal dance should be given in ...
— Harriet and the Piper - (Norris Volume XI) • Kathleen Norris
... the stately men. In lordly wise they rode to Brunhild's hall, their saddles set with precious stones, with narrow martingales, from which hung bells of bright and ruddy gold. So they came to the land, as well befit their prowess, with newly sharpened spears, with well-wrought swords, the which hung down to the spurs of these stately men. The swords the bold men bore were sharp and broad. All this Brunhild, the ...
— The Nibelungenlied • Unknown
... triclinium, choke Vinicius, and, should the need come, Caesar himself; but he feared to sacrifice thereby his mistress, and was not certain that such an act, which to him seemed very simple, would befit a ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... is made of the excesses and crimes of any ecclesiastic or religious, their superiors do not punish them. On the contrary, saying that it does not befit the dignity of religion to say that they have committed crimes and that they have received punishment, they let the ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume X, 1597-1599 • E. H. Blair
... are here," he went on glibly. "Recent events call for a full discussion between you and me, do you agree? But before we come to close quarters, as you say in England, I wish to know whether the argument is to be conducted on lines that befit gentlemen. On the last occasion when we differed, you used ...
— Cynthia's Chauffeur • Louis Tracy
... South Sea Company. He is no longer alive to defend himself from the accusations—from the impeachment which has been levelled against him by our enemy, the Duke of Wharton. Therefore, it might be possible to make it appear as if his dealings were—ah—not—ah—quite such as should befit an upright gentleman. There is that, and there is this greater matter against him. Between the two, I should never again be able to look my fellow-countrymen in the face. Yet this is the more important since the safety of the kingdom is involved; whilst the other is but a personal affair, ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini
... to tell is so strange and wild, that it would seem better to befit the cloudy times when history had not yet been disentangled from fable, than the comparatively clear light ...
— A Book of Golden Deeds • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the East; this sign portended to him his defeat, for the Sun was eclipsed in the region of its rising, and Xerxes was also marching from that quarter." So far as words go these accounts admirably befit a total eclipse of the Sun, but regarded as such it has given great trouble to chronologers, and the identification of the eclipse is still uncertain. Hind's theory is that the allusion is to an eclipse and in particular to the eclipse of February 17, 478 B.C. ...
— The Story of Eclipses • George Chambers
... a dark way to travel, and I will give her a surprise. While thinking a lonely walk lies before her, Elinor will find an old but devoted cavalier to keep her company. First," added he with a laugh, "I'll fetch my blade; for 'twould ill befit a gallant in quest of beauty ...
— The Fifth of November - A Romance of the Stuarts • Charles S. Bentley
... answered the queen, "what you say may befit you, but not me, who well know that this book is the true and faithful version of the word of the Lord, a version made by a very wise divine, a very good man, and ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... "Truth do you speak, Thorfinn! that was indeed a cleansing! It would befit us well to accept the compensation for your sake. Grettir, too, is a fine fellow, and noted for his strength ...
— Grettir The Strong - Grettir's Saga • Unknown
... at the overhanging boughs of a tree above their heads. A squirrel was poised thereon, gazing down motionless. Then, suddenly—a frightful thing happened. The creature seemed to speak. A strange falsetto voice, such as might befit so eerie a chance, sounded on the air—loud, distinct, heard far up the slope, and electrifying the assemblage near at hand that was gathering about the stand and awaiting ...
— Una Of The Hill Country - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... "I think that you may perhaps be best suited to the work of deciding what sort of life will best befit the souls who are prepared to take up their life upon earth again. That is a task of deep and infinite concern; it may surprise you," he added, "to learn that this is left to the decision of other souls. But ...
— The Child of the Dawn • Arthur Christopher Benson
... indisposition. In vain did Mrs. Lear try and cosset and comfort her with potions both hot and cool; Primrose knew well that beneath the kindness of the farmer's wife lurked the feeling that it was not for one in her station to indulge in such vapours as might well befit the gentry, and that she would be cured sooner by taking a broom to the best carpet than by sitting and keeping the fire warm. Primrose sulked, and even handsome Willie, leaning by the window, wanting to be away yet dreading the outburst did ...
— The White Riband - A Young Female's Folly • Fryniwyd Tennyson Jesse
... platform—from that I totally dissent. Marriage has ever been a one-sided matter, resting most unequally upon the sexes. By it, man gains all—woman loses all; tyrant law and lust reign supreme with him—meek submission and ready obedience alone befit her."[115] ...
— Susan B. Anthony - Rebel, Crusader, Humanitarian • Alma Lutz
... solar system forth to be Finished by beings who befit each sphere. Not ours to pry the secrets out of Mars; Our work lies here. To star-folk leave the stars. There must be many worlds that give God care: Young worlds that glow and burn, Old worlds that freeze and fade. This ...
— Hello, Boys! • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... subject or his mood; his attitude is intellectual, his sentiments are maxims, his conclusions are advisory. His world is the sphere of thought, and his poems have the distance and repose and also the coldness that befit that sphere; and the character of his imagination, which lays hold of form and reason, makes natural to him ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... settled in the forests of Hessen and built a monastery at Amoeneburg. From his old friends in England he received sound advice as to the treatment of heathen customs and the gentle methods of conversion which befit the gospel of {137} Christ. [Sidenote: His mission from Rome, 723.] From Rome he received affectionate support; and in 722 he was summoned to receive a new mission from the pope himself. On S. Andrew's Day, 723,[3] after a solemn ...
— The Church and the Barbarians - Being an Outline of the History of the Church from A.D. 461 to A.D. 1003 • William Holden Hutton
... Black robes befit our age. Once they were white; Next many-hued; now dark as Afric's Moor, Night-black, infernal, traitorous, obscure, Horrid with ignorance and sick with fright. For very shame we shun all colours bright, Who mourn our end—the tyrants we endure, The chains, the noose, ...
— Sonnets • Michael Angelo Buonarroti & Tommaso Campanella
... incomparable antiquity. I suspect that one of these is of Flemish make, and reaches back to Robert the Pious, just such a one did I see in the museum at Cluny. Finally, a number of images; some girdles and brocades; some old weapons, which would befit John of Dresden very well; this is my booty. Here we have discovered one Overbeck and one Steinle; but Maryan, during my absence, found, somewhere, Saxon porcelain, of incredible age, in perfect preservation. But this is only the beginning. There will be ...
— The Argonauts • Eliza Orzeszko (AKA Orzeszkowa)
... Gonzales," he replied coolly, "thou art a good knight, but such words befit not this place. We must fight with our hands, and not with empty words." And grasping his sword, he suddenly brought it down on the helmet of his foe with such tremendous force that it wellnigh drove the head ...
— With Spurs of Gold - Heroes of Chivalry and their Deeds • Frances Nimmo Greene
... I totally dissent. Marriage has ever been a one-sided matter, resting most unequally upon the sexes. By it man gains all; woman loses all; tyrant law and lust reign supreme with him; meek submission and ready obedience alone befit her. Woman has never been consulted; her wish has never been taken into consideration as regards the terms of the marriage compact. By law, public sentiment, and religion,—from the time of Moses down to the present day,—woman ...
— Eighty Years And More; Reminiscences 1815-1897 • Elizabeth Cady Stanton
... Holy Scripture should not use metaphors. For that which is proper to the lowest science seems not to befit this science, which holds the highest place of all. But to proceed by the aid of various similitudes and figures is proper to poetry, the least of all the sciences. Therefore it is not fitting that this science should make use ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... on any contemporary in subsequent schools; it still remains on the continent as useless as if it had never existed; and at this moment German and Italian landscapes, of which no words are scornful enough to befit the utter degradation, hang in the Venetian Academy in the next room to the Desert of Titian and the Paradise ...
— Modern Painters Volume I (of V) • John Ruskin
... desire." Then came forward the Persian sage and, prostrating himself before the King, presented him with a horse[FN5] of the blackest ebony-wood inlaid with gold and jewels, and ready harnessed with saddle, bridle and stirrups such as befit Kings; which when Sabur saw, he marvelled with exceeding marvel and was confounded at the beauty of its form and the ingenuity of its fashion. So he asked, "What is the use of this horse of wood, and what is its virtue and what the secret of its movement?"; ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... the side of his adopted mother and retaining fast hold of her hand, assumed a grave and decorous demeanor such as might befit a person of matured taste and understanding who should find himself in a temple dedicated to some worship which he did not recognize, but felt himself bound to respect. The exercises had not yet commenced, however, when the boy's attention was arrested by an event apparently of trifling interest. ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... esteemed for having left them, than we were while they were wedded with us. Now then, Sir, there is no reason why we should do battle upon this matter with any one. And Diego Gonzalez his brother arose and said, You know, Sir, what perfect men we are in our lineage, and it did not befit us to be married with the daughters of such a one as Ruydiez; and when he had said this he held his peace and sate down. Then Count Don Garca rose and said, Come away, Infantes, and let us leave the Cid sitting like a bridegroom in his ivory chair:... he lets his beard grow and thinks ...
— Chronicle Of The Cid • Various
... surely a fruit perfectly endowed with the qualities which fit it to be regarded as conventionally a feminine symbol. In the apple, on the other hand, I can see all sorts of qualities which should better befit a masculine symbol. But it was not so ...
— Impressions And Comments • Havelock Ellis
... heart, but jealously held by every noble of the Republic within confines which lessened with each succession, until the crown was assumed in trembling and ignominious restriction—if with external pomp and honor that might befit a king. ...
— A Golden Book of Venice • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... noticeable is the peculiar attitude of popular sentiment toward this movement. The unreasonable prejudice which has been displayed, and the flippant condemnation that it has generally received in advance of any investigation, illy befit the boasted impartiality and liberality of the closing decade of the nineteenth century. When the "Fatherhood of God" and the "Brotherhood of Man" are so much on men's lips, and when the spirit of altruism is supposed to be at the floodtide, here is what claims to be the ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 23, October, 1891 • Various
... them. Influenced, as they must have been, by the charge of the lord chief justice, they could have found no other verdict. What of that charge? Any strong observations on it I feel sincerely would ill befit the solemnity of this scene; but I would earnestly beseech of you, my Lord,—you who preside on that bench,—when the passions and prejudices of this hour have passed away, to appeal to your own conscience, and ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... de hombres honestos: it is not (the characteristic) of honorable men, i.e. it does not befit good men. ...
— Novelas Cortas • Pedro Antonio de Alarcon
... the cabin, if I can shoot, an' drop a redskin every time," said Dana Marden stubbornly; but no redskin would consent to be dropped, and naturally no settler could yield. It would ill befit that glorious day to see the log cabin taken; but, on the other hand, what loyal citizen could allow himself to be defeated, even as a skulking redman, at the very hour of Tiverton's triumph? For a time a peaceful solution was promised by the doctor, who proposed ...
— Tiverton Tales • Alice Brown
... earnest care, to lead in the march of human progress, and not rest content with any secondary place. Moreover, if this be due to ourselves, it is no less due to the great French nation whose guests we become, and which has in so many ways testified its wish and hope that our participation shall befit the place the two peoples have won in ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents • William McKinley
... and to advance proof of what he then alleged to me, which is not unknown to yourself, since I have clearly imparted it to you. When I shall have seen his answers, and the reasons he advances, I shall give order that such measures be taken as may befit. ...
— The Historical Nights' Entertainment • Rafael Sabatini
... sternly: "Ye are a mean-spirited varlet, unworthy of the degree of knighthood. Here I ordain that ye shall yield unto your brother the moiety of the lands that ye had of your father and, in payment for it, yearly ye shall receive of Sir Ontzlake a palfrey; for that will befit you better to ride than the knightly war-horse. And look ye well to it, on pain of death, that ye lie no more in wait for errant knights, but amend your life and live ...
— Stories from Le Morte D'Arthur and the Mabinogion • Beatrice Clay
... angel and behold his wings," said Robinson, with a faint smile. "I come on a visit which might befit an angel. Mr. Brown, I consent that your daughter's dowry shall be paid from the funds of ...
— The Struggles of Brown, Jones, and Robinson - By One of the Firm • Anthony Trollope
... stature at the bow. His classic face was turned upward to the peaks, and with a look as if he felt their power. He waved his arms toward them as if in a salutation to things sentient. The man seemed to befit the ...
— The Last Leaf - Observations, during Seventy-Five Years, of Men and Events in America - and Europe • James Kendall Hosmer
... to-day hold such language. I have too much respect for myself, I have too much respect for the person and misfortunes of the Emperor, to report to him your words; go yourself, M. marshal, it will befit you better than me."—The Prince of Eckmuhl, irritated at this, reminded him, that he was speaking to the minister at war, to the general in chief of the army: and enjoined him, to repair to Fontainebleau, where he should receive his orders.—"No, sir," replied ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. II • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon |
