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Constancy   /kˈɑnstənsi/   Listen
Constancy

noun
1.
The quality of being enduring and free from change or variation.  Synonym: stability.
2.
(psychology) the tendency for perceived objects to give rise to very similar perceptual experiences in spite of wide variations in the conditions of observation.  Synonym: perceptual constancy.
3.
Faithfulness and dependability in personal attachments (especially sexual fidelity).



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"Constancy" Quotes from Famous Books



... his feet, he dared not. His bounding heart half-choked him with pleasant pain. All be had not said,—all he had meant to say to Dorcas, of his well-laid plans, his good-luck, his hopes,—all he had meant to entreat of her constancy, for in the infrequent communications between the two countries there was no hope of a correspondence,—all he had meant to say to her of his fervent love, of his anguish at separation, of the joy of ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., February, 1863, No. LXIV. • Various

... other modern people offer to the meditation, and, we must say, to the admiration of the Christian reader, a more interesting spectacle? The only European nation which can almost compete with the constancy and never-dying energy of Ireland is the Spanish in its struggle of ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud

... of the mental character of humour did not necessarily imply any knowledge as to the authority, instability, or constancy of the feeling—that could only be acquired by philosophical investigation. Nor have we yet so far ascertained its character as to be able to form humorous fancies upon any fixed principle. We are guided by ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange

... than of loving; and that all the Caras and the Fannys, with whom he holds dalliance in these pages, have had each a long series of preceding lovers, as highly favoured as their present poetical paramour: that they meet without any purpose of constancy, and do not think it necessary to grace their connexion with any professions of esteem or permanent attachment. The greater part of the book is filled with serious and elaborate description of the ecstasies ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson

... the subclavian artery, at B, Plate 8, with the common carotid artery, at A, Plate 7, I believe that the former will be found to exhibit, on the whole a greater constancy in respect to the following-mentioned condition—viz., a single main arterial trunk arches over the first rib to pass beneath the middle of the clavicle, while the carotid artery opposite the thyroid piece of the larynx is by no means constantly ...
— Surgical Anatomy • Joseph Maclise

... and there in the court a judge was being softened toward Joan by her courage, her presence of mind, her fortitude, her constancy, her piety, her simplicity and candor, her manifest purity, the nobility of her character, her fine intelligence, and the good brave fight she was making, all friendless and alone, against unfair ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... the internal commotions which have distracted France during that period, and the external struggle she has had to maintain for the security of her independence, we cannot refuse our admiration to the constancy which the French have manifested in forming institutions for the diffusion of knowledge, and repositories of objects tending to the advancement of the arts and sciences. In this respect, if we except the blood-thirsty reign of Robespierre, ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon

... history of Israel. (2) To the Christian it sets forth in allegory, Christ and his church as Bridegroom and Bride and the fullness of love which unites the believer and his Savior. (3) To all the world there is shown the purity and constancy of a woman's love and devotion to her ideals. It furnishes ideal which, if properly held up, would cast out of human society all those monstrous practices that come from ...
— The Bible Book by Book - A Manual for the Outline Study of the Bible by Books • Josiah Blake Tidwell

... spoken had it not been for your brother's sake. I didn't mean to. It was chance drew you across my path just now. Though it is cruel, it is better that you should know. No man has a right to deceive you, you are too good. It is this very constancy and goodness that has taught ...
— Thoroughbreds • W. A. Fraser

... capacity for work, by experimental discoveries of the possibility of reciprocal transformations without loss, of motion, heat, electricity, and other processes. The principle of the conservation of energy affirms the quantitative constancy of that which is so transformed, measured, for example, in terms of capacity to move units of mass against gravity. The exponents of what is called "energetics" have in many cases come to regard that the quantity ...
— The Approach to Philosophy • Ralph Barton Perry

... you cannot crush the hope that my affection will, after a while, win yours in return. You are very young, and as yet scarcely know your own heart, and unshaken constancy on my part will plead for me in coming years. I will be patient, and as long as you are Edna Earl—as long as you remain mistress of your own heart—I shall cling fondly to the only hope that gladdens my future. Over my feelings you ...
— St. Elmo • Augusta J. Evans

... of Limerick. William left nothing unattempted that the art of war, the skill of a great captain and the valor of veteran soldiers could put in execution to gain the place; and the Irish omitted nothing that courage and constancy could practice to defend it. The continual assaults of the one and the frequent sallies of the other consumed a great many brave men both of the army and the garrison. On the nineteenth day, William, after fighting for every inch of ground ...
— Ireland, Historic and Picturesque • Charles Johnston

... grave import), They gain at last his unreserved assent, Till, hardened his heart's temper in the forge Of lust and on the anvil of despair, He slights the strokes of conscience. Nothing moves, Or nothing much, his constancy in ill; Vain tampering has but fostered his disease, 'Tis desperate, and he sleeps the sleep of death. Haste now, philosopher, and set him free. Charm the deaf serpent wisely. Make him hear Of rectitude and fitness: moral truth How lovely, and ...
— The Task and Other Poems • William Cowper

... in fourteen separate states like our own, the people of Argentina have preserved the sacred right of local self-government. For forty years they have maintained at the same time the sovereignty of their nation; and by the constancy of their past they have given a high and ever-increasing credit to their promise that for the future, under Southern Cross as under Northern Star, government by the people, of the people, and for ...
— Latin America and the United States - Addresses by Elihu Root • Elihu Root

... withdrawn, and Schalk Burger's commandos oozed away towards Ladysmith. But there was, however, a stalwart and not inconsiderable remnant of burghers who responded to Botha's expostulations, and stood fast as a forlorn hope determined to win back Spion Kop and the Twin Peaks. Their constancy was rewarded, and when at sunrise on January 25 they once more climbed the hill, they found to their astonishment and relief that it was still held—by more than 300 ...
— A Handbook of the Boer War • Gale and Polden, Limited

... vows of eternal devotion that kept time with the distant throbbing of a ship's engine. I fumed. I was facing little Germany and five littler Germanys strung out behind. You surely remember him? and how when I could n't see things his way he swore to a wrecked heart and a never-to-be-forgotten constancy. Mate! There was no more of a flicker of memory in the stare of his round blue eyes than there would have been in a newly baked pretzel. I stood still, waiting for some glimmer of recognition. Instead, he turned to the pincushion on his arm, whom I took to be Ma O., and I ...
— The Lady and Sada San - A Sequel to The Lady of the Decoration • Frances Little

... years did the constancy and ardour of Clarissa continue with unwearied attention, and her only happiness seemed to consist in promoting that of her friend. At the end of that period, when death relieved the unhappy Dorinda from the cares and troubles of this life, she sincerely lamented ...
— The Looking-Glass for the Mind - or Intellectual Mirror • M. Berquin

... Giovanni Galeazzo, and Eccelino. But the last is not Bracciaferro (of the same name), Count of Ravenna, whose history I want to trace. There is a fine engraving in Lavater, from a picture by Fuseli, of that Ezzelin, over the body of Meduna, punished by him for a hitch in her constancy during his absence in the Crusades. He was right—but I want to know ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron

... and, lying thus on the border of both territories, we must not be surprised that it can hardly be characterized by any definite attribute.[599] Still, this unknown recipient of forms or ideas has a reality; it has "an abiding nature," "a constancy of existence;" and we are forbidden to call it by any name denoting quality, but permitted to style it "this" and "that" (tode kai touto).[600] Beneath the perpetual changes of sensible phenomena there is, then, an unchangeable subject, which yet is neither the Deity, ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker

... faithful than I have been to you," for in truth, the recollection of his love for Ruth had utterly faded away, and he thought himself a model of constancy; "and you have tried me pretty well. What a ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... hope and pray that we may be spared persecution," spoke Magdalen gravely. "Yet truly I believe that were such misfortune to befall us, Anthony Dalaber would be one of those who would stand the test of his faith with constancy ...
— For the Faith • Evelyn Everett-Green

... Agate, the Chisel of my love, drove by the Mallet of my fidelity, would have made some impression on thee. I, that have shaped as I pleased the most untoward of substances, hoped by the Compass of reason, the Plummet of discretion, the Saw of constancy, the soft File of kindness, and the Polish of good words, to have modelled you into one of the prettiest Statues in the world; but, alas! I find you are a Flint, that strikes fire, and sets my soul in a blaze, though your heart is as cold as marble. Pity my case, ...
— Town and Country, or, Life at Home and Abroad • John S. Adams

... to advance than hinder the good cause. The persecutions—the banishments—the murders—of twenty-five years, instead of checking, had spread the Gospel far and wide over the land, for, as in the first days, 'they that were scattered abroad went everywhere preaching the Word,' and the amazing constancy, and courage, and tenderness to their enemies, of the noble army of martyrs, had given a depth and power to the Christian life which might otherwise ...
— The Fugitives - The Tyrant Queen of Madagascar • R.M. Ballantyne

... door, and there was the woman who was in his thoughts, standing in the twilight before him. He sprang to his feet and held out his hands with a smile which would have reassured her had she doubted his constancy. ...
— The Refugees • Arthur Conan Doyle

... effected, and whatever was the process of it, resembled neither the one nor the other of these. That it was not the change of a fickle mind is shown by his firmness in keeping to his new faith—by his constancy unto death, a death of martyrdom. That it was not the change of a proud and disappointed mind, quitting with disgust what he once loved too well, is evidenced by the variety of his labours, his active services, ...
— Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VIII (of 8) • John Henry Newman

... blossom on the tree, 125 With charms inconstant shine; Their charms were his, but woe to me! Their constancy ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Oliver Goldsmith • Oliver Goldsmith

... gentler fate than desertion. Truth to say, Goethe would have made but a sorry Romeo, for he wanted the great and leading virtue of constancy; and yet who can tell what Romeo might have become, after six months' exile in Mantua? Juliet, we know, had taken the place of Rosaline. Might not some fairer and newer star have arisen to eclipse the image of the other? We will not ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 57, No. 352, February 1845 • Various

... fange de Paris:' had I the power of making proverbs, I would only change destaient' into 'il put,' and make the by-word ten times more orthodox. That which most amazed me is, that in such a perpetuated constancy of stinks, there should yet be variety—a variety so special and distinct, that my chemical nose (I dare lay my life on it), after two or three perambulations, would hunt out blindfold each several street by the smell, as perfectly ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole

... to fortitude, which moderates daring and fear, not to be deterred from doing good on account of confusion or fear. Therefore it seems that confession is not an act of faith, but rather of fortitude or constancy. ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas

... with but a change of actors and of costume. There is more than a fanciful resemblance between Civilis and William the Silent, two heroes of ancient German stock, who had learned the arts of war and peace in the service of a foreign and haughty world-empire. Determination, concentration of purpose, constancy in calamity, elasticity almost preternatural, self-denial, consummate craft in political combinations, personal fortitude, and passionate patriotism, were the heroic elements in both. The ambition of each was ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... has the least knowledge of the world, will easily imagine the letter was made up of encomiums on her beauty, and vows of everlasting love and constancy; nor will he be surprised that a heart open to every gentle, generous sentiment, should feel itself warmed by gratitude for a man who professed to feel so much for her; nor is it improbable but her mind might revert to the agreeable person and ...
— Charlotte Temple • Susanna Rowson

... scruples, ask'd no vows, Nor offer'd any; she had never heard Of plight and promises to be a spouse, Or perils by a loving maid incurr'd; She was all which pure ignorance allows, And flew to her young mate like a young bird; And, never having dreamt of falsehood, she Had not one word to say of constancy. ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron

... If your nieces' constancy in following the round of monotonously recurring amusements of a Dublin season amazes me, they would certainly think it much more amazing to pass one's time as I do, wandering about the country alone, dipping one's head and hands into every wayside fountain one comes to, ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble

... and others; Ecclesiastes, which gives the sombre reflections of one who had tasted to the full the pleasures and honors of life; the Canticles, or Song of Solomon, which depicts a young woman's love in its constancy, and ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher

... he had caricatured, many a man whom he had treated with scorn in the lecture-room or crushed with his eloquence in the debating club, many of his own set who had not half his brains, but a little regularity and constancy of occupation, took high places in the honours or passed within decent credit. And where in the list was Pen, the superb; Pen, the wit and dandy; Pen, the poet and orator? Ah, where was Pen, the widow's darling and sole pride? Let us hide our heads and shut up the page. ...
— Boys and girls from Thackeray • Kate Dickinson Sweetser

... with poverty; sit down at the same dry crust, or sit without it; wear the same patched and threadbare raiment, and not complain; stay in the same circle, endure the same hunger, cold, sickness, and suffering with unmurmuring constancy, and taking more than half the load of trouble on her own neck will sit the long night through, and "sing of mercy" till the day breaks, and the light comes, and the sun shines again. "Godliness with contentment ...
— Little Abe - Or, The Bishop of Berry Brow • F. Jewell

... little gate, and then, for the first time, his meaning flashed upon her mind. He believed she loved her guardian; fancied that long absence would obliterate his image from her heart, and that, finally, grown indifferent to one who might never return, she would give her love to him whose constancy merited it. Genuine delicacy of feeling prevented his expressing all this; but she was conscious now that only this induced his unexpected course toward herself. A burning flush suffused her face as ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans

... nearest to man they had such instincts. There is a great story of some African chief who expressed his disgust at adhering to one wife, by saying it was 'like the monkeys.' The semi-brutal ancestors of man, if they existed, had very likely an instinct of constancy which the African chief, and others like him, had lost. How, then, if it was so beneficial, could they ever lose it? The answer is plain: they could lose it if they had it as an irrational propensity and habit, and not as a moral ...
— Physics and Politics, or, Thoughts on the application of the principles of "natural selection" and "inheritance" to political society • Walter Bagehot

... shepherd lad Of small regard to see to, yet well skilled In every virtuous plant, and healing herb; He would beg me sing; Which, when I did, he on the tender grass Would sit, and hearken even to constancy; And in requital ope his leathern scrip, And show me Simples, of a thousand names, Telling their strange, ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie

... you, how fares the bravest of the brave. Give me news, my cavalier; for you know how fatal to me is your least ill. I cannot sleep without sending you a thousand good nights; for I am the Princess Constancy, sensible to all that concerns you, and careless of all else in the world, good ...
— Love affairs of the Courts of Europe • Thornton Hall

... with untiring constancy to glorify antiquity. He has made excellent translations of Sophocles, Euripides, and of "Daphne and Chloe," that idyl of Longus that charmed both Goethe and Catherine II. He chooses the characters of his new poems from Greek and Latin mythology, ...
— Contemporary Russian Novelists • Serge Persky

... conduct of the Calvinists was wonderfully fine. They showed great adroitness in evading the law by all means save recantation and great astuteness in using what poor legal means of defence were at their disposal. On the other hand they suffered punishment with splendid constancy and courage, very few failing in the hour of trial, and most meeting death in a state of exaltation. Large numbers found refuge in other lands. During the reign of Henry II fourteen hundred fled to Geneva, not to mention the many who settled in the Netherlands, ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith

... of Numantian fire a swarthy spark Still lightens in the sunburnt native's eye; The stately port, slow step, and visage dark, Still mark enduring pride and constancy. And, if the glow of feudal chivalry Beam not, as once, thy nobles' dearest pride, Iberia! oft thy crestless peasantry Have seen the plumed Hidalgo quit their side, Have seen, yet dauntless stood—'gainst fortune ...
— Some Poems by Sir Walter Scott • Sir Walter Scott

... this determined disbelief on the part of the head of the family, old Wilson remained for a long time a member of the household at Shoulthwaite Moss, following his occupations with constancy, and always obsequious in the acknowledgment of his obligations. It was observed that he manifested a peculiar eagerness when through any stray channel intelligence was received in the valley of the sayings and doings in the world ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine

... other. Retrospective prophecy is therefore a legitimate function of astronomical science; and if it is legitimate for one science it is legitimate for all; the fundamental axiom on which it rests, the constancy of the order of nature, being the common foundation of all scientific thought. Indeed, if there can be grades in legitimacy, certain branches of science have the advantage over astronomy, in so far as their retrospective prophecies are not only ...
— On the Method of Zadig - Essay #1 from "Science and Hebrew Tradition" • Thomas Henry Huxley

... or four parties a night for three months, would be utterly desolate if they had to watch one night in a sick-room; and though they can exhibit any amount of physical endurance and vigor in crowding into assembly rooms, and breathe tainted air in an opera-house with the most martyr-like constancy, they could not sit one half-hour in the close room where the sister of charity spends hours in consoling the sick ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... commemorated the ancient Fanum Fortunae of tradition, and in the cathedral of San Fortunato were frescoes by Domenichino, and in the chiesa of Sant' Agostino was the celebrated painting of Sant' Angelo Custode, by Guercino, which suggested to Browning his poem "The Guardian Angel." The tender constancy of Browning's friendship for Alfred Domett is in evidence in this poem, and the beauty of his reference to ...
— The Brownings - Their Life and Art • Lilian Whiting

... orthodoxy from his bishop, and bade farewell to his people—"Beloved, if my death ought to contribute to the Master's glory, pray that it may come quickly and that He may enable me to support all my calamities with constancy. You will probably nevermore behold ...
— John Hus - A brief story of the life of a martyr • William Dallmann

... the banners of Newcastle and Rupert at first swept the eastern-counties yeomanry and the London train-bands from the field; but fiery and impetuous valor was at last overmatched by the disciplined purpose and stubborn constancy of Cromwell's Ironsides. ...
— Destruction and Reconstruction: - Personal Experiences of the Late War • Richard Taylor

... Flattery is the food of vanity. A virtuous mind loathes flattery. Vain persons are an easy prey to parasites. Vanity easily mistakes sneers for smiles. The smiles of the world are deceitful. True friendship hath eternal views. A faithful friend is invaluable. Constancy in friendship denotes a generous mind. Adversity is the criterion of friendship. Love and fidelity are inseparable. Few know the value of a friend till they lose him. Justice is the first of all moral virtues. Let justice hold, and mercy turn, the scale. A judge ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown

... supposed to have been the source from which the Romans led their aqueduct to Divona—now called Cahors. The water of this fountain, which derives its name from Polemius, a Roman functionary, is of limpid purity, and its constancy proves that it rises from a great depth. The Romans must have carried the water on arches across the valley, and probably for a considerable distance down it, before they made use of the natural wall of rock in the manner described, but not a trace ...
— Wanderings by southern waters, eastern Aquitaine • Edward Harrison Barker

... climates; and when I gazed upon the map of Africa I had the hope that I might, by perseverance, reach the heart of Africa. Had I been alone it would have been no hard lot to die upon the untrodden path before me; but my wife resolved, with woman's constancy, to leave the luxuries of home and share all danger, and to follow me through each rough step in the wild life in which I was about to engage. Thus accompanied, on April 15, 1861, I sailed up the Nile from Cairo to Korosko; and thence, by a forced ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various

... hoped the poor victim might yet relent, and rush from her fiery prison to the protection so freely offered. The command was readily obeyed; the strength of a child would have sufficed to burst the frail barrier which confined her, and a breathless pause succeeded; but the woman's constancy was faithful to the last. Not a sigh broke the death-like silence of the crowd, until a slight smoke curling from the summit of the pyre, and then a tongue of flame darting with bright and lightning-like rapidity into the clear blue sky, ...
— Celebrated Women Travellers of the Nineteenth Century • W. H. Davenport Adams

... but only the butterfly race, fit for a brief acquaintance? Believe me, Marcia, there is a reason for everything, and, with all your beauty and fascination, you must yourself have the element of constancy, to win the admiration of the best ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various

... certainly had great merit, and added to the fame of the author. There is here more variety of metre than in his other poems, and also some passages of such beauty as to make the poem immortal,—like the death of Marmion, and those familiar lines in reference to Clara's constancy:— ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord

... nothing but physical courage," she said complainingly; "you have no constancy in ...
— Paz - (La Fausse Maitresse) • Honore de Balzac

... the good and tender heart, Its girl's trust and its woman's constancy, How pure yet passionate, how calm yet kind, How grave yet joyous, how reserved yet free As light where ...
— Browning's Heroines • Ethel Colburn Mayne

... so that next day in the morning we found ourselves near seven leagues to the eastward of Staten Land. The violence of the current, which had set us with so much precipitation to the eastward, together with the force and constancy of the westerly winds, soon taught us to consider the doubling of Cape Horn as an enterprise that might prove too mighty for our efforts, though some amongst us had lately treated the difficulties which ...
— Anson's Voyage Round the World - The Text Reduced • Richard Walter

... think that the Bishop of Manchester need have been so much alarmed, as he evidently has been, by the objections which have often been raised to prayer, on the ground that a belief in the efficacy of prayer is inconsistent with a belief in the constancy of the order ...
— Collected Essays, Volume V - Science and Christian Tradition: Essays • T. H. Huxley

... eye of the public, and whose name, for that reason, was never praised. Without Assessor Munter's unwearied care and assistance—so say the sisters—the undertaking could never have gone forward. What a wonderful affectionate constancy lies in the soul of this man! He has been, and is still, the benefactor of our family; but if you would see and hear him exasperated, tell him so, and see how he quarrels with all thanks to himself. The whole city is now deploring that it is about to lose him. He is going to reside on his estate ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer

... which are never interrupted, are in general only made with extreme and almost inappreciable slowness, but they are in ceaseless operation, and with such constancy that the ocean bottom, which necessarily loses on one side while it gains on another, has already, without doubt, spread over not only once, but even several times, every point of the surface of ...
— Lamarck, the Founder of Evolution - His Life and Work • Alpheus Spring Packard

... investigations of Lombardini that the rate of elevation of the bed of the Po has been much exaggerated by earlier writers, and in some parts of its course the change is so slow that its level may be regarded as nearly constant. Observation has established a similar constancy in the bed of the Rhone and of many other important rivers, while, on the other hand, the beds of the Adige and the Brenta, streams of a more torrential character, are raised considerably above the level of the ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh

... say of the domestic life of these people? Unfortunately, marriage is practically unknown among them. The father gives his son a few cattle, and the young man, after building himself a house, conducts thither his chosen one. Unhappily, constancy in either man or woman is a ...
— Through Five Republics on Horseback • G. Whitfield Ray

... work with an eulogy upon woman, who has ever been distinguished for her perseverance, her constancy, and her devoted attention to those upon whom she has been pleased to place her AFFECTIONS. Many have been the themes upon which writers and public speakers have dwelt with intense and increasing interest. Among these delightful themes stands that of woman, ...
— The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories • Mark Twain

... after the major took leave, pressed me to give him some assurance of my constancy, I only reminded him of the terms of our engagement. Seeing me decided, he was silent on the subject, and soon bade me an affectionate adieu, not expecting, as he told me, the pleasure of a personal interview again for two or ...
— The Coquette - The History of Eliza Wharton • Hannah Webster Foster

... of the great Garden were out; the benches in the Square were filled with sleepers in postures so strange that beside them the writhing figures in Dore's illustrations of the Inferno would have straightened into tailor's dummies. The statue of Diana on the tower of the Garden—its constancy shown by its weathercock ways, its innocence by the coating of gold that it has acquired, its devotion to style by its single, graceful flying scarf, its candour and artlessness by its habit of ever drawing ...
— Sixes and Sevens • O. Henry

... "Considering the constancy of their exposure to all sorts of weather, and the number of light-vessels afloat, it is amazin' how few accidents take place. There has been nothing of the kind as long as I can remember anything about the service, but my father has told me ...
— The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands • R.M. Ballantyne

... transcribed, both because reference is so often made to them, and because they throw light upon the marvelous and rapid propagation of the gospel, the manners of the early Christians, the treatment to which their constancy exposed them, and the severe jealousy with which they ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta

... we returned from an absence of nearly two years, Calvin welcomed us with evident pleasure, but showed his satisfaction rather by tranquil happiness than by fuming about. He had the faculty of making us glad to get home. It was his constancy that was so attractive. He liked companionship, but he wouldn't be petted, or fussed over, or sit in any one's lap a moment; he always extricated himself from such familiarity with dignity and with no show of temper. If there was any ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... omission of her name in the Liturgy it seems doubtful whether the green bag will ever be opened, so strong is the repugnance of the House of Commons to enter upon such an investigation. It is this feeling in the House which emboldens the Queen to hold out with the firmness and constancy she has hitherto displayed. The House of Lords cuts a most ridiculous figure, having precipitately agreed to go into the Committee. They have since been obliged to put off the investigation by repeated ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville

... palpable distinctness to my view, and afterwards, in memory of that day, called the channel Escape—to the sound itself we gave the name of King's, in the full confidence that all for whom the remembrance of skill and constancy and courage have a charm, will unite in thinking that the career of such a man should not be without a ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1. • J Lort Stokes

... artificial place; it is so by our choice and for our sins. The subjection of women; the ideal imposed upon them from the cradle, and worn, like a hair-shirt, with so much constancy; their motherly, superior tenderness to man's vanity and self-importance; their managing arts—the arts of a civilised slave among good-natured barbarians—are all painful ingredients and all help to falsify relations. It is not till we get clear of that amusing ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson

... This—which is called the Expulsion of the Pisistratids—was viewed by the Athenians as the beginning of their freedom. They paid yearly honours to the memory of the murderers Harmodius and Aristogeiton; and as Leoena means a lioness, they honoured that brave woman's constancy with the statue of a lioness ...
— Aunt Charlotte's Stories of Greek History • Charlotte M. Yonge

... of a good friend, this wise man has very justly singled out constancy and faithfulness as the principal; to these, others have added virtue, knowledge, discretion, equality in age and fortune, and, as Cicero calls it, morum comitas, a ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore

... rigid in respect only of the constancy of the dynamic process of transmutation in which cohesion consists. The sun shines eternally steady only in consequence of the ceaseless kinetic energies ...
— Essays Towards a Theory of Knowledge • Alexander Philip

... avoid saying that we had found a "life work," perhaps with an instinctive dread of expending all our energy in vows of constancy, as so often happens; and yet it is interesting to note that of all the people whom I have recalled as the enthusiasts at that little conference have remained attached to Settlements in actual residence ...
— Twenty Years At Hull House • Jane Addams

... the representation of constancy under suffering, and that the never-ending suffering of a god. Exiled in its scene to a naked rock on the shore of the earth-encircling ocean, this drama still embraces the world, the Olympus of the gods, and the earth, the abode of mortals; all as yet scarcely ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel

... minute diminishes. For a woman burdened with the disability of a high-strung nervous system, it is a martyrdom. Yet these women, brought up on the froth of an enervating, pleasure-seeking society, held out—held out with a martyr's courage and constancy—against the torture of inactivity, of an imagination which penetrated the sheltering walls out into the night where fifty men writhed in a death-struggle with hundreds—saw every bleeding wound, heard ...
— The Native Born - or, The Rajah's People • I. A. R. Wylie

... The constancy of this wretched young man (Bevan) was astonishing. He most steadily denied knowing any thing of the transaction, treating with equal indifference both promises of rewards and threats of punishment. Crow, who was executed in December last, declared a short time before he suffered, that ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 1 • David Collins

... man is rich or powerful is he better: riches and power may come from luck, constancy is from virtue. I hold that woman base who weds a rich man rather than a poor one, and takes a husband for her own gain. Whoever marries with such a motive—why, she will follow his prosperity rather than the man, and be willing to sell herself ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner

... of absence is an age of love lost. I enclosed the letter in one to Filippo, who was the channel of our correspondence. I received a reply from him full of friendship and sympathy; from Bianca full of assurances of affection and constancy. ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving

... answer to prayer may be effectually given without any infringement on the known regularities of Nature." Dr. Chalmers adverts to this second solution in replying to an objection which might possibly be raised against the first, namely, that "we see no evidence of the constancy of visible nature giving way to that invisible agency, the interposition of which it is the express object of prayer to obtain;" and he suggests that, in the vast scale of natural sequences, which ...
— Modern Atheism under its forms of Pantheism, Materialism, Secularism, Development, and Natural Laws • James Buchanan

... degenerated into passion or rashness, his constancy into obstinacy, his benevolence into weakness, nor his tenderness into sentimentality. His unworldliness was free from indifference and unsociability, his dignity from pride and presumption, his affability from undue familiarity, his self-denial from moroseness, his ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No. 6, December 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... sue for pardon. I bow low and lay my open heart before the truest woman in the world." He kissed the black lace hem of her gown and arose. "I am your friend and ally; Axphain and Graustark will live no more with hatred in their hearts. From you I have learned a lesson in justice and constancy." ...
— Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon

... had acquired profited me as nothing; seven years did I pass in your royal court, disputing the case with persons of great authority and learned in all the arts, and in the end they decided that all was vain. In your Highnesses alone remained faith and constancy. Who will doubt that this light was from the Holy Scriptures, illumining you, as well as myself, with ...
— The Life of Christopher Columbus from his own Letters and Journals • Edward Everett Hale

... his duty, but rather like a knight in quest of dragons and giants. My own country has furnished of late a chief of a very different order, and quite an opposite genius. I scarce know which to admire most. The Briton's chivalrous ardour, or the more than Roman constancy of our great Virginian." ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray

... Kingston and Montreal, he became seriously ill. It is not very certain what ailed him. He was said to have been bitten by a fox. However, he died, in a few hours, of excruciating suffering. He supported, for the brief period, a disease, supposed to be hydrophobia, with undaunted constancy, and yielded up his spirit on the 28th of August, 1819. His remains were brought to Quebec, and there interred with great pomp and ceremony, beneath the altar of the Church of England Cathedral, but as yet no monument has ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger

... proceedings, such the eloquence, force, and precision with which they set forth their grievances, such the temperate and dignified tone that marked their petitions to the king, and such the manliness, firmness, and unwavering constancy with which they persisted in battling for their right as freemen to be represented in the councils of the nation, that thousands of their brothers across the Atlantic were filled with wonder and admiration. And here, for once and for all, be it known to you, my dear children, ...
— The Farmer Boy, and How He Became Commander-In-Chief • Morrison Heady

... roughly nor yet with too much of shame-faced diffidence. And when he told her how he had sworn to himself after seeing her that once,—that once when all before him in life was enveloped in doubt and difficulty,—that he would come home and make her his wife, she thought that the manly constancy of his heart was almost divine. Of course she loved him with all her heart. He was in all respects one made to be loved by a woman;—and then what else had she ever had to love? When once it was arranged that he should be allowed to speak to her, the thing was done. She did not at once tell him ...
— John Caldigate • Anthony Trollope

... into the market-place, who on that day did put on the man's gown, called toga virilis, and from thence they came all in a troop together unto Pompey's porch, looking that Caesar would straight come thither. But here is to be noted, the wonderful assured constancy of these conspirators, in so dangerous and weighty an enterprise as they had undertaken. For many of them being Praetors, by reason of their office, whose duty is to minister justice to everybody: they did not only with great quietness and courtesy hear them that spake unto them, or that ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume I (of X) - Greece • Various

... Granger was going to be married, blest with her papa's consent and approval, of course, and in a manner becoming a damsel whose first consideration was duty. After refusing several very fair offers, during the progress of her girlhood, she had at last suffered herself to be subjugated by the constancy and devotion of Mr. Tillott, the ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon

... future punishment, or that the soul can suffer evil after its separation from the body; but they assert that bad men will be punished in this world by a complication of misfortunes, and that the good will be rewarded by health, constancy of friends, increase of ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne

... the greatness of the house of Kuru, the virtuous principles of Gandhari, the wisdom of Vidura, and the constancy of Kunti. The noble Rishi hath also described the divinity of Vasudeva, the rectitude of the sons of Pandu, and the evil practices of the ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... mission of the Hurons was established, and here the indomitable Breheuf, with a band worthy of him, toiled amid miseries and perils as fearful as ever shook the constancy of man; while Champlain at Quebec, in a life uneventful, yet harassing and laborious, was busied in the round of ...
— Pioneers Of France In The New World • Francis Parkman, Jr.

... signally frustrated by the noble constancy, and calm, self-sustained intrepidity of the noble prisoner, who, to borrow the words of his detractor, Hume, "being educated amid naval and military enterprises, had surpassed, in the pursuits of literature, even those of the most recluse and ...
— Godey's Lady's Book, Vol. 42, January, 1851 • Various

... King, the former was preferred without hesitation, although many of them had young families and the choice was made at the risk of life, and also with the change of habit from the peaceful yeoman to the bustle of a camp.—As however the choice was made with promptness so it was persevered in with constancy. ...
— First History of New Brunswick • Peter Fisher

... its libretto, which, though a brisk little comedy of intrigue, is almost too slight to bear a musical setting. The plot turns upon a wager laid by two young officers with an old cynic of their acquaintance to prove the constancy of their respective sweethearts. After a touching leave-taking they return disguised as Albanians and proceed to make violent love each one to the other's fiancee. The ladies at first resist the ...
— The Opera - A Sketch of the Development of Opera. With full Descriptions - of all Works in the Modern Repertory • R.A. Streatfeild

... from James, who wrote occasionally, evincing so much interest in "Cousin Maude" that he always succeeded in making her cry, though why she could not tell, for his letters gave her more real satisfaction than did those of J.C., fraught as the latter were with protestations of constancy and love. Slowly dragged the weeks, and the holidays were at hand, when she received a message from J.C., saying he could not possibly come as he had promised. No reason was given for this change in his plan, and with a sigh of disappointment Maude turned to ...
— Cousin Maude • Mary J. Holmes

... secretly nourished in this manner, to be able, on the stage, which represents the world, to contribute to the glory of her Brother, seized her now after his return with such force and constancy, that Schiller's Sister-in-law, Caroline von Wolzogen, urged him to yield to the same; to try his Sister's talent; and if it was really distinguished, to let her enter this longed-for career. Schiller had no love for the Player ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle

... remarkable intelligence. The old philosopher feared that family pride might cause domestic infelicity. The girl on her part steadfastly refused to marry any one else, declaring that unless she married Liang Hung, she would not marry at all. This unexpected constancy touched the old man's heart and he married her. She dressed in the most common clothing, always prepared his food with her own hand, and to show her affection and respect never presented him with the rice-bowl without raising it to the level ...
— The Chinese Boy and Girl • Isaac Taylor Headland

... the hand, or rather when released from the hand, it refused to fall and remained in the air. It is safe to say that no amount of evidence, no number of witnesses, could convince an intelligent man to-day that such a thing occurred. We believe too thoroughly in the constancy of nature. While men will not believe witnesses who testify to the happening of miracles now, they seem to have perfect confidence in men whom they never saw, who have been dead for two thousand years. Of course it is known that Mr. Gladstone has published a few remarks ...
— The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Volume VIII. - Interviews • Robert Green Ingersoll

... talking of Love, Constancy, the Ideal. "Who ever loved like the poets?" cried Lady Violet Lebas, her pure, pale cheek flushing. "Ah, if ever I am to love, he shall ...
— Adventures among Books • Andrew Lang

... monastick life is permitted, every order finds votaries, and every monastery inhabitants. Men will submit to any rule, by which they may be exempted from the tyranny of caprice and of chance. They are glad to supply by external authority their own want of constancy and resolution, and court the government of others, when long experience has convinced them of their own inability to govern themselves[1079]. If I were to visit Italy, my curiosity would be more attracted by convents than ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell

... "Constancy to the ideal, though perhaps out of place in a man, is alike woman's privilege and her duty. I should be sorry—indeed I should be deeply shocked if the Esmeralda were to ...
— Happy Pollyooly - The Rich Little Poor Girl • Edgar Jepson

... this was not the work of fairy enchantment, but that love alone brought about the transformation. They say that the princess, as she mused upon her lover's constancy, upon his good sense, and his many admirable qualities of heart and head, grew blind to the deformity of his body and the ugliness of his face; that his hump back seemed no more than was natural in a man who could make the courtliest of bows, and that the dreadful limp which had formerly distressed ...
— Old-Time Stories • Charles Perrault

... gave promise of brilliant realization. Daniel Boone's glowing descriptions of Kentucky excited in their minds, says a gifted early chronicler, the "spirit of an enterprise which in point of magnitude and peril, as well as constancy and heroism displayed in its execution, has never been paralleled in the ...
— The Conquest of the Old Southwest • Archibald Henderson

... justice shown towards them, he made it clear that this violence and injury was a commendable and politic exploit to establish a society; by which he intermixed and united both nations, and made it the fountain of after friendship and public stability. And to the reverence and love and constancy he established in matrimony, time can witness; for in two hundred and thirty years, neither any husband deserted his wife, nor any wife her husband; but, as the curious among the Greeks can name the first case of parricide or matricide, ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough

... is not, constancy is not. This perspicuous proverb from the Persian (which I made up myself for the occasion) is cited in mitigation of the Tyro's regrettable fickleness, he—to his shame be it chronicled—having practically ...
— Little Miss Grouch - A Narrative Based on the Log of Alexander Forsyth Smith's - Maiden Transatlantic Voyage • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... us to the Cachots, in which the prisoners of the Inquisition were confined for forty-eight hours after their capture, without food or drink, that their constancy might be shaken, even before they were confronted with their gloomy judges. The day has not got in there yet. They are still small cells, shut in by four unyielding, close, hard walls; still profoundly dark; still massively doored ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 3 • Various

... frozen mountaintop, the demons of thirst, starvation, and savage warfare. Our foremost scientific men, for the sake of the great national enterprise, have taken their lives in their hands, going out to meet peril and privation with the cheerful constancy of apostles and martyrs. The record of expeditions bearing either directly or indirectly on the subject of the Pacific Railroad is one to which every American citizen must point with a pride none the less hearty for the fact ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various

... "Is there so much constancy in the world?" she asked musingly. "Can such singleness of heart exist? Like this flower which would bloom and die at my window? A bold flower, though! Day by day has it been growing nearer. Here," she added, breaking it from the stem and holding ...
— Under the Rose • Frederic Stewart Isham

... during the afternoon other-men went out and returned with recruits on various pretexts, all of which Nehemiah believed masked the marshalling of witnesses to incriminate him as one of themselves, in order to better secure his constancy to the common interests, and in case he was playing false to put others into possession of the facts as to the identity of the informer. His liability to the law for aiding and abetting in moonshining was very complete ...
— The Moonshiners At Hoho-Hebee Falls - 1895 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)

... he hath spoken to you to Revolt from the Lord your God." In which words two things are to be observed, First, that God wil not have miracles alone serve for arguments, to approve the Prophets calling; but (as it is in the third verse) for an experiment of the constancy of our adherence to himself. For the works of the Egyptian Sorcerers, though not so great as those of Moses, yet were great miracles. Secondly, that how great soever the miracle be, yet if it tend to stir up revolt against the King, or him that governeth by the Kings authority, ...
— Leviathan • Thomas Hobbes

... probable, though, that you can have forgotten me. My position would certainly be a very awkward one if you had. But, remembering as I do so well those happy times, and particularly your juvenile vows of constancy at the moment of our parting, I cannot believe that I am mistaken in trusting in ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, November 1885 • Various

... Herod, Paul at the bar of Nero, Ignatius in the amphitheatre, Latimer at the stake. Among the many facts which prove that the standard of honour and virtue among the public men of that age was low, the admiration excited by Rochester's constancy ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... intact. Good old machine! Nice old craft! . . . I felt like patting it on the nose and stroking 30 its sleek fabric back—that is, if it remained constant. If ever I craved constancy in anything, it ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell

... fight, his faith made plain, He won his rank and lands again; And charged his old paternal shield With bearings won on Flodden Field. 1160 Nor sing I to that simple maid, To whom it must in terms be said, That King and kinsmen did agree, To bless fair Clara's constancy; Who cannot, unless I relate, 1165 Paint to her mind the bridal's state; That Wolsey's voice the blessing spoke, More, Sands, and Denny, pass'd the joke: That bluff King Hal the curtain drew, And Catherine's hand the stocking threw; 1170 And afterwards, for many a day, That it ...
— Marmion • Sir Walter Scott

... glass was intent on a programme of the rapidly successful Metropolitan forces, of the new German Opera, with Seidl-Krauss singing Elizabeth, and Brandt in Fidelio. Even here, after so long, he vibrated again to the exquisite beauty of Lenore's constancy and love. Then Dr. Damrosch dead, the sonorous funeral in the Opera House ... That had been changed with the rest; the baignoires were gone, the tiers of boxes newly curved; gone the chandeliers and Turkey red carpet and gold threaded ...
— The Three Black Pennys - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer

... and feel. My true and faithful lover, where is your 'eternal constancy,' 'unalterable trust,' and 'reverent devotion'? I remember those phrases; you seem to have forgotten them. I ...
— Under the Deodars • Rudyard Kipling

... Dearest, you entirely fill my life! But I forget; we have resolved not to go VERY FAR. But the fact is I am half afraid lest, with such reticence, you should not remember how very much I am yours, and with what a dogged constancy I shall always remember you. Paula, sometimes I have horrible misgivings that something will divide us, especially if we do not make a more distinct show of our true relationship. True do I say? I mean the relationship which I think exists between ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy

... appears to me that the heart which is capable of receiving an impression at all, and can distinguish, will turn to a new object when the first is found unworthy. I am convinced it is practicable, when a respect for goodness has the first place in the mind, and notions of perfection are not affixed to constancy." ...
— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell

... trait, no characteristic, no inherited tendency that is not marked on the palm of the hand and can be traced with unerring accuracy by following the instructions given in this book. Even a casual reading will enable one to know his own character better and give convincing proof of the constancy of friends, or the professing ones. The Bible attests the truth ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey

... sudden one evening, as though weary of a constancy so unusual, the wind shifted and in the morning came the rain. It fell off and on for a week, and when it ceased and the wind hauled again to the north-west, ...
— Maria Chapdelaine - A Tale of the Lake St. John Country • Louis Hemon

... Evangelists! They never speak injuriously of the enemies of Jesus Christ, of his judges, nor of his executioners. They speak the facts without a single reflection. They comment neither on their Master's mildness, nor on his constancy in the hour of his ignominious death, which they thus describe: 'And they crucified Jesus.'" "Men cannot be well educated without the Bible," says Dr. Nott. "It ought, therefore, to hold a chief place in every situation of learning ...
— The Golden Censer - The duties of to-day, the hopes of the future • John McGovern

... mother had with her and the high value she placed upon virtue, required an outward marriage; though she well knew that a union with her proscribed race was unrecognised by law, and therefore the ceremony would give her no legal hold on Horatio's constancy. But her high poetic nature regarded reality rather than the semblance of things; and when he playfully asked how she could keep him if he wished to run away, she replied, "If the mutual love we have for each other, and the dictates of your own conscience do ...
— Clotel; or, The President's Daughter • William Wells Brown

... sell to new comers upon long time, but with conditions as to clearing, residence, etc., that are difficult of observance. I believe there is much trouble in carrying out this plan, arising in some measure from the peculiarities of negro character—a want of constancy or steadiness of purpose, as well as from a feeling of distrust as to their having the land secured to them. If the land is not purchased from any of these societies, a parcel of ten or fifteen colored families get together and purchase and settle ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various

... nephew and heir. Mademoiselle Constance de Montmorenci! ah, I've heard of her before to-day. Nanette, the head-chambermaid here, was once her lady's-maid. She's known her for more than a fortnight. Constance is a fine name, but it ain't quite the same as Constancy. Poor Mr. Nokes! What a mistake it was in him to drive all thoughts of matrimony off to the last, and then to come to Paris—of all places—to do it! What a curious thing is sympathy! He met her in the tidal train, and they were taken ill together on board ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December, 1885 • Various

... the approximate constancy of the Lorenz-Lorentz formula over wide temperature differences, but in some cases the deviation exceeds the errors of observation. The values are ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 1 - "Chtelet" to "Chicago" • Various

... lay beauty, intelligence, and constancy, pale and silent, And little that hermit guessed who was so near him. The little birds hopped on her now, and one nearly entangled his little feet ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade

... It turns its brilliant lining on the setting day. And these are the accents of their worship. "Ye sons of women, such as ye are now, such once were we. Through many scenes of trial, through heroic constancy, and ever-during patience, have we attained to this bright eminence. Large and mysterious are the paths of heaven, just and immaculate his ways. If ye listen to the siren voice of pleasure, if upon the neck of heedless youth you ...
— Imogen - A Pastoral Romance • William Godwin

... factor depends. Situations which are potentially beneficial to the animal attract it in varying degrees according to its internal condition; situations which are potentially disagreeable or injurious repel it with a constancy which is remarkable. The favorable stimulus solicits a positive response; the unfavorable stimulus demands ...
— The Dancing Mouse - A Study in Animal Behavior • Robert M. Yerkes

... magic of a woman's art, Kate consoled him. He had one great comfort—he had been a loyal friend; such fidelity, such constancy, such affection, forgetting the difference of place, ...
— The Manxman - A Novel - 1895 • Hall Caine

... on my body, ye rulers of men, should I be burnt!'—Hearing these words of his, thy son Duryodhana dismissed those physicians, having honoured them as they deserved. Then those kings of diverse realms, beholding that constancy in virtue displayed by Bhishma of immeasurable energy, were filled with wonder. Having given a pillow to thy sire thus, those rulers of men, those mighty car-warriors, viz., the Pandavas and the Kauravas, united together, once ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... blocks and iron-work." Chauncey subsequently fell ill, which may have had something to do with his lapse of energy. The whole career of this naval commander on Lake Ontario had disappointed expectations, even though the Secretary had commended his "zeal, talent, constancy, courage, and prudence of the highest order." The trouble was that Chauncey let slip one chance after another to win the control of Lake Ontario in pitched battle. Always too intent on building more ships instead of fighting ...
— The Fight for a Free Sea: A Chronicle of the War of 1812 - The Chronicles of America Series, Volume 17 • Ralph D. Paine

... 1600, for which she was execute on Saturday following; Containing an Account of her Obstinacy, Earnest Repentance, and her Turning to God; of the Odd Speeches she used during her Imprisonment; of her Great and Marvellous Constancy; and of her Behaviour and Manner of Death: Observed by One who was both a Seer and Hearer of what ...
— She Stands Accused • Victor MacClure

... man! the brute creation see! Thy constancy oft needs the spur! While lessons of fidelity Are found in every ...
— Broad Grins • George Colman, the Younger

... this age, that he was indomitable, sure of success, and fitted in all respects to take the high position which he would certainly win for himself. But she did not presume him to be endowed with such a constancy as would make him come to seek her hand again. Had Nora at this time of her life been living at the West-end of London, and going out to parties three or four times a week, she would have been quite easy about his coming. The springs would not have been weighted so heavily, ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope

... at any rate less reluctant to show it—gave her a keener sense of recovered power. None of the men who had been in love with her before had been so frankly possessive, or so eager for reciprocal assurances of constancy. She knew that Ralph had suffered deeply from her intimacy with Van Degen, but he had betrayed his feeling only by a more studied detachment; and Van Degen, from the first, had been contemptuously indifferent to what she ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton

... were I possessing, Priceless were my property; Jesus! did Thy hand such blessing Graciously bestow on me, Were such friend, Lord! ever near me, By His constancy to cheer me; Who doth honour Thee, and fear He hath such a ...
— Paul Gerhardt's Spiritual Songs - Translated by John Kelly • Paul Gerhardt

... fail not to record some weaknesses in our people, or some flagrant errors of their leaders, they yet endeavor to chronicle faithfully heroic constancy of men, and selfless devotion of women, whose peers the student of History may challenge that vaunting ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon

... of a very Honourable, and that very numerous acquaintance, so that he was noway undisciplined in the Arts of Civility; yet he continued semper idem, which constancy made him alwaies acceptable to them. At his Diet he was very sparing and temperate, but yet he allowed himself the repasts and refreshings of two Meals a day: but no lover of Danties, or the Inventions of Cookery: solid meats ...
— Characters from 17th Century Histories and Chronicles • Various

... it, to fix upon others the responsibility which justly belongs to itself. And while the President anxiously wishes to abstain from the exercise of doubtful powers and to avoid all interference with the rights and duties of others, he must yet with unshaken constancy discharge his own obligations, and can not allow himself to turn aside in order to avoid any responsibility which the high trust with which he has been honored requires him to encounter; and it being the duty of one of the Executive Departments to decide in the first instance, subject to the future ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 2) of Volume 3: Andrew Jackson (Second Term) • James D. Richardson

... the residence of virtue and happiness! In this city may that piety and virtue, that wisdom and magnanimity, that constancy and self-government, which adorned the great character whose name it bears be forever held in veneration! Here and throughout our country may simple manners, pure morals, and ...
— State of the Union Addresses of John Adams • John Adams

... answered the other. "Jealousy constrained him, while constancy of soul was lacking unto me. I know not if it was but taken from me for a time, or if, despite all seeming, I never did possess it. I know that the dead are dead, and I know not to what ambuscade I, their leader, sent them.... ...
— Sir Mortimer • Mary Johnston

... another effort to win over the City, and in this he was promised the support of Sir Basil Brooke. Whilst accepting the services of one who was a warm Catholic, Charles addressed a letter to the mayor and aldermen, in which he assured them of his "constancy in religion." He foolishly imagined that such an assurance would induce the City to break at once with parliament and declare for peace. The letter, as luck would have it, fell into the hands of the Committee of Safety. The plot was discovered, and full ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume II • Reginald R. Sharpe

... whether, after what I have seen, I ought to give the message; and the pleasure I anticipated in meeting you again is destroyed by what I have now witnessed. How disgraceful is it thus to play with a man's feelings—to write to him, assuring him of your regard and constancy, and at the ...
— Jacob Faithful • Captain Frederick Marryat

... made tender towards the sorceress. She commands a consecrated cake to be broken over the image, and crackling laurels to be burned before it, that as Daphnis had tormented her by his infidelity, so he in his turn may be agitated with a returning constancy. She prays that as the wanton heifer pursues the steer through woods and glens, till at length, worn out with fatigue, she lies down on the oozy reeds by the banks of the stream, and the night-dew is unable to induce ...
— Lives of the Necromancers • William Godwin

... that their subjects should be poor in spirit (compare Arist. Politics), and that there should be no strong bond of friendship or society among them, which love, above all other motives, is likely to inspire, as our Athenian tyrants learned by experience; for the love of Aristogeiton and the constancy of Harmodius had a strength which undid their power. And, therefore, the ill-repute into which these attachments have fallen is to be ascribed to the evil condition of those who make them to be ill-reputed; that is to say, to the self-seeking of the governors and the cowardice ...
— Symposium • Plato

... ear—and all, all are accursed! At heart I have betrayed my brother's trust, Francesca's openly. Turn where I will, As if enclosed within a mirrored hall, I see a traitor. Now to stand erect, Firm on my base of manly constancy; Or, if I stagger, let me never quit The homely path of duty, for the ways That bloom and glitter with seductive ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: Francesca da Rimini • George Henry Boker

... complete diagram giving the variations in any property must be in three dimensions, although by the use of contour lines the essential facts can be represented in a plane diagram. The following method, depending on the constancy of the sum of the three perpendiculars from any point on to the sides of an equilateral triangle, can be adopted:—Let ABC (fig. 8) be an equilateral triangle, the angular points corresponding to the three pure metals A, B, C. Then the composition of any alloy ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... abhors in the same degree with obstinacy. Obstinacy, Sir, is certainly a great vice; and in the changeful state of political affairs it is frequently the cause of great mischief. It happens, however, very unfortunately, that almost the whole line of the great and masculine virtues, constancy, gravity, magnanimity, fortitude, fidelity, and firmness, are closely allied to this disagreeable quality, of which you have so just an abhorrence; and, in their excess, all these virtues very easily fall into it. He who paid such a punctilious attention to all your feelings certainly ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... own constancy in the first—he very chearfully betook himself to the second; and though he could very well have explained it, as I said, to his honour,—yet, for that very reason, he had a spirit above it; choosing rather to bear the contempt of his enemies, and the laughter of his friends, than undergo the ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne

... with what she writes, one prefers, without hesitation, her conversation to her works. Although she has a wonderful mind, her heart outweighs it. It is in the heart of this illustrious woman that one finds true and pure generosity, an immovable constancy, a sincere ...
— The Women of the French Salons • Amelia Gere Mason

... attentions, his liveliness, his manners! It had been a very happy fortnight, and forlorn must be the sinking from it into the common course of Hartfield days. To complete every other recommendation, he had almost told her that he loved her. What strength, or what constancy of affection he might be subject to, was another point; but at present she could not doubt his having a decidedly warm admiration, a conscious preference of herself; and this persuasion, joined to all the rest, made her think that she must be a little in love with him, ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen

... my mind involuntarily reverted to the extremity I had been brought to by my youthful folly in coming into such a desert waste. About three hundred yards from the camp I saw two teal ducks; I levelled my rifle, and handsomely decapitated one. This was a temptation to my constancy; appetite and conscientiousness had a long strife as to the disposal of the booty. I reflected that it would be but an inconsiderable trifle to the mess of four hungry men, while to roast and eat him myself would give me strength to hunt for more. A strong inward ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman

... light's not purer: The constancy and goodness of all women That ever liv'd, to win the names of worthy, This noble Maid has doubled in her: honour, All promises of wealth, all art to win her, And by all tongues imploy'd, wrought as much on her As one may doe upon the Sun at noon day By ...
— Beaumont & Fletcher's Works (2 of 10) - The Humourous Lieutenant • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... rise to the sanctities of obedience and faith, let us at least resist our temptations; let us enter into the state of war, and wake Thor and Woden,[219] courage and constancy, in our Saxon breasts. This is to be done in our smooth times by speaking the truth. Check this lying hospitality and lying affection. Live no longer to the expectation of these deceived and deceiving people with whom we converse. Say to them, O father, O mother, O wife, O brother, O friend, I have ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... mainly responsible, and which occurred when he was mentally in a very morbid condition, caused him to contemplate suicide. It is due, however, to the memory of "Patty" to say that Clare's latest volume of poems ("The Rural Muse," 1835) contains an address "To P * *" which is honourable to the constancy of both parties. It is ...
— Life and Remains of John Clare - "The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet" • J. L. Cherry

... or forbearance. There is not a page of the national history even in its local subdivisions which they have not stained with the atrabilious hue of their wounded remembrances: hardly a town in England, which stood a siege for the king or the parliament, but has some printed memorial of its constancy and its sufferings; and in nine cases out of ten the editor is a clergyman of the established church, who has contrived to deepen 'the sorrow of the time' by the harshness of his commentary. Surely it is ...
— The Notebook of an English Opium-Eater • Thomas de Quincey



Words linked to "Constancy" :   unchangeability, psychology, psychological science, perception, faithfulness, inconstancy, constant, fidelity, unchangeableness, unchangingness, changelessness, monotony, inconstant, metastability, invariance



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