"Contentment" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... what the French call a belle brune, and though Longmore, who had rather a conservative taste in such matters, was but half-charmed by her bold outlines and even braver complexion, he couldn't help admiring her expression of basking contentment. ...
— Madame de Mauves • Henry James
... per cent. less for his land than it is worth—than the tenants would be able to pay. Tenant-right on his property sells for an enormous amount. He never evicts a tenant, nor even threatens to evict those who vote against him. What he has done for the contentment and prosperity of his tenants, with so much honour and happiness to himself, other landlords may do with like results. The late lord, his father, and his grandfather pursued the same course. They let their lands at a low ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin
... how may I Adore thee, Author of this Universe, 360 And all this good to man, for whose well being So amply, and with hands so liberal Thou hast provided all things: but with mee I see not who partakes. In solitude What happiness, who can enjoy alone, Or all enjoying, what contentment find? Thus I presumptuous; and the vision bright, As with a smile more bright'nd, thus repli'd. What call'st thou solitude, is not the Earth With various living creatures, and the Aire 370 Replenisht, and all these at thy command To come and play before thee, ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton
... Even his contented smile only added to the evil of his expression. His contentment, however, was by no means his whole atmosphere. In fact, it was rather studied, for his eyes were alight and watchful with the furtive watchfulness so easy to detect in those of partial color. They suggested that his ears, too, were no less alert, and now and again this suggestion received ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... she said, "we know what all that means. He has made his choice, and if I am satisfied with what he does now, surely you need not grumble." Miss Stanbury's illness had undoubtedly been a great source of contentment to the family at Heavitree, as they had all been able to argue that her impending demise was the natural consequence of her great sin in the matter of Dorothy's proposed marriage. When, however, they heard from Mr. Martin that she would certainly recover, ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... or else she will need a doctor." Habits affect looks. If one is energetic and happy in doing her work, her face will reflect the contentment. If one hates work, the face will reflect discontent, the vital organs will grow flabby and affect the health, and looks will suffer. Enthusiasm in work stimulates the vital organs, causes circulation ...
— The Colored Girl Beautiful • E. Azalia Hackley
... and liked by everyone. At Vitry she became betrothed to a woman, but, a quarrel arising, no marriage took place. Afterward "she fell in love with a woman whom she married, and with whom she lived for four or five months, to the wife's great contentment, it is said; but, having been recognized by some one from Chaumont, and brought to justice, she was condemned to be hanged. She said she would even prefer this to living again as a girl, and was hanged for using illicit inventions to supply the defects of her sex" ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... terrors and awful forebodings which the human mind could conjure up. They feared the Indians, the wild beasts, and most of all one another, for society was not yet sufficiently organized to afford that repose and contentment of spirit which they had left behind in the Old World. They had come to America to escape despotism, but they had brought despotism in their own hearts. They could escape from the Stuarts, but there was no ...
— The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne • Frank Preston Stearns
... little army which was forming. His wife, the duchess, was in grief about it. "We have just spent great sums," said she, "in buying him back from the English; if he would take my advice, he would stay at home." "Madame," said Joan, "I will bring him back to you safe and sound, nay, even in better contentment than at present; be not afraid." And on this promise the duchess took heart. Du Guesciin's widow, Joan de Laval, was still living; and she had two grandsons, Guy and Andrew de Laval, who were amongst the most zealous of those taking ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume III. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... land was every where richly cultivated, and a happier peasantry, as far as the eye of the traveller could judge, nowhere exists. The most luxuriant valleys of our own Italy are not more crowded with the evidences of plenty and contentment. Upon drawing near to the ancient Baalbec, I found on inquiry of our guide, that we were not to pass through it, as I had hoped, nor even very near it, not nearer than between two and three miles. So that in this I had ...
— Zenobia - or, The Fall of Palmyra • William Ware
... we therefore did the best we could for him. Leggins, moccasins, some articles of clothing, and a large green blanket, in addition to the blue and scarlet cloth, were lavished upon him, and to his great and evident contentment. He arrayed himself in all his colors, and, clad in green, blue, and scarlet, he made a gay-looking Indian; and, with his various presents, was probably richer and better clothed than any of his ...
— The Exploring Expedition to the Rocky Mountains, Oregon and California • Brevet Col. J.C. Fremont
... is dead now. We all cried when we found that he would never frisk again at our coming, nor put up his paw against us. But he lived long enough to preach the sermon about caution and contentment of which I have been ...
— Around The Tea-Table • T. De Witt Talmage
... that I lay incapable of movement; but this did not distress me at all, for I felt no desire to stir—only a contentment, deep as the sky outside, to rest there and let my eyes rest on her. Yet either I must have spoken or (yes, the miracle was no less likely!) she heard my thoughts; for she lifted her head and, rising, came ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine
... dish of one meal a vegetable dish whenever possible. Thick cream soups, souffles, creamed or scalloped vegetables, are all substantial and appetizing. The way to learn to like such foods is to keep trying. One may learn contentment with the proverbial dinner of herbs more easily by realizing that one is building valuable bricks into the house of diet; and in the present emergency one may, by selection of fruits and vegetables of high energy value, save less perishable foods for ...
— Everyday Foods in War Time • Mary Swartz Rose
... looked (even at 36) and how near she was to tears and a breakdown; while his eyes burned; and when he got home poor little Linda was in despair over her poor distraught Michael, who could find no happiness or contentment in Ten Thousand a year, great fame as the chief inventor of the Ductless Glands, and the man who had issued a taxonomic classification of the ...
— Mrs. Warren's Daughter - A Story of the Woman's Movement • Sir Harry Johnston
... till Zena would throw down the Pioneers of Tecumseh Township in a temper and flounce off the piazza to her room. After which the judge's manner would change instantly and he would relight his corn cob pipe and sit and positively beam with contentment. In all of which there was something so mysterious as to prove that ...
— Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town • Stephen Leacock
... this narrative Laeta Acilia lost little by little her sense of joy and contentment. Recalling the past and examining her own life, it seemed to her very monotonous in comparison to the life of the woman who had loved a god. Young and pious and a patrician, her own red-letter days were those on which she had eaten cakes with ...
— Balthasar - And Other Works - 1909 • Anatole France
... after all, Amid this tangled web of fate, If what is great may not be small, And what is small may not be great. So wondering I go my way, Yet in my heart contentment sings . . . O may I ever see, I pray, God's grace ...
— Ballads of a Bohemian • Robert W. Service
... longer used the word happy, even in his solitary thoughts. Happiness, that priceless elusive treasure, can come only to a heart at peace in the warm sunshine of love. Material things can make for contentment, but ah! how ...
— High Noon - A New Sequel to 'Three Weeks' by Elinor Glyn • Anonymous
... important as the words "Silence, in the king's name!" or the reading of the riot-act. To-day it worked even more effectually than usual. Boges' self-satisfied smile showed that he had noticed this; he then favored the assembly with a look expressive of his contentment with their conduct, promised in a flowery speech to exert all his influence with the king in behalf of his dear little white doves, and wound up by telling them to arrange themselves in ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... afterwards.[71] By his constant contributions to the Edinburgh, he was both helping forward the great causes in which he most earnestly believed, and establishing his own fame. Good health, cheerfulness, and contentment reigned in the Rectory, which might well have been called ...
— Sydney Smith • George W. E. Russell
... preponderant evidence of recent economic experience spoke for the eight-hour day. It has been adjudged by the thought and experience of recent years a thing upon which society is justified in insisting as in the interest of health, efficiency, contentment, and a general increase of economic vigor. The whole presumption of modern experience would, it seemed to me, be in its favor, whether there was arbitration or not, and the debatable points to settle were those which arose out of the acceptance of the eight-hour ...
— President Wilson's Addresses • Woodrow Wilson
... of a Cheshire family; studied at Trinity College, took orders, and became archdeacon of Clogher; is best known as the author of "The Hermit," though his odes "The Night-Piece on Death" and the "Hymn to Contentment" are of more poetic worth; he was the friend of Swift and Pope, and a member of ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... left at 9.30 A. M., after a night in which all of us slept soundly—the first sound sleep some had enjoyed for a long time. Contentment and satisfaction are great somnifacients. The Grand Basin was glorious in sunshine, the peaks crystal-clear against a cloudless sky, the huge blocks of ice thrown down by the earthquake and scattered all over the glacier gleamed ...
— The Ascent of Denali (Mount McKinley) - A Narrative of the First Complete Ascent of the Highest - Peak in North America • Hudson Stuck
... says: "there were evident impressions upon the minds of a number of my family and school which soon became universal, insomuch that scarcely one remained who did not feel a greater or less degree of it, till the whole lump seemed to be leavened by it, and love, peace, joy; satisfaction and contentment reigned through the whole. The 23d day of January (1771) was kept as a day of solemn fasting and prayer, on which I gathered a church in this college and school, ...
— The History of Dartmouth College • Baxter Perry Smith
... Doge is nothing, and at last I am again Marino Faliero: 'Tis well to be so, though but for a moment,[ft] Here was I crowned, and here, bear witness, Heaven! With how much more contentment I resign That shining mockery, the ducal bauble, Than I ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron
... found, would alter his determination. When brought into dock, he was far too weak to stand; but there was a look of calm contentment in his countenance—I might describe it almost as happiness—seldom borne by a person in his awful position. His appearance excited much interest in all those who saw him, though few were aware of the mighty change which had taken place ...
— Salt Water - The Sea Life and Adventures of Neil D'Arcy the Midshipman • W. H. G. Kingston
... either one set or the other have mistaken the mode. Take all the Baptist ministers from one end of the province to the other—the Hardings, the Dimocks, the Tuppers,—take all that have passed away, from Aline to Burton; men who have suffered every privation, preaching peace and contentment to a poor and scattered population; and the whole together never created as much strife, exhibited so paltry an ambition, or descended to the mean arts of misrepresentation to such an extent, in all their long and laborious lives, as these two arrogant professors of ...
— The Tribune of Nova Scotia - A Chronicle of Joseph Howe • W. L. (William Lawson) Grant
... serious in proposing to introduce her to the gaieties of a London life? Permit me to ask, for what end, or for what purpose? A youthful mind is seldom totally free from ambition; to curb that, is the first step to contentment, since to diminish expectation is to increase enjoyment. I apprehend nothing more than too much raising her hopes and her views, which the natural vivacity of her disposition would render but too easy to effect. The town-acquaintance of Mrs. Mirvan are all in the circle ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney
... and there on the outer lines. But when, two hours after the last Russian soldier had disappeared, the cavalry of Murat clattered through the streets, the fires attracted little attention, nor at the moment was Napoleon's contentment diminished by them, as, from the "mount of salutation," whence pious pilgrims were wont to greet the holy city, he ordered his guard to advance and occupy the Kremlin, that fortress which enshrines all that is holiest ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane
... October, 1875, was drawing to a close, as all its predecessors from time's remotest infancy have done; the cheery voice of the expedition cook had called us to our evening meal; as usual we sat down in peaceful contentment, not dreaming that death or danger was lurking near, but nevertheless, outside this peaceful scene a mighty preparation for our destruction was being made by an army of ...
— Australia Twice Traversed, The Romance of Exploration • Ernest Giles
... they live happily together in content and gladness, free from all grief and care, as though resignation and contentment formed a ...
— The Reconciliation of Races and Religions • Thomas Kelly Cheyne
... part of the plunder. The frumentaria were the permanent and steady pay of the "world conquerors." They made herding the best use of Italian land. "Where before industrious peasants prospered in glad contentment, now unfree herdsmen, in wide wastes, drove the immense herds of Roman senators and knights."[758] The Sicilian landowners left their shepherds to steal what they needed, so that they were educated to brigandage. The greatest sufferer was the small freeman.[759] ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner
... bed of the lake is but a rushy swamp and the massive ruins of the castle only serve to show what their splendor once was, and to impress on the musing visitor the transitory value of human possessions, and the happiness of those who enjoy a humble lot in virtuous contentment. ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume I. - Great Britain and Ireland • Various
... again says Epictetus. "But must I then die sorrowing? I must be put in chains. Must I then also lament? I must go into exile. Can I be prevented from going with cheerfulness and contentment? But I will put you in prison. Man, what are you saying? You may put my body in prison, but my mind not ...
— The Pleasures of Life • Sir John Lubbock
... of the East Side" was right in the Goronsky flat on Madison Street. She had been comparing that home at the same number on Madison Street with that her uncle's house boasted on Madison Avenue, with the latter mansion. The Goronsky tenement was a home, for love and contentment dwelt there; the stately Starkweather dwelling housed too many warring factions to ...
— The Girl from Sunset Ranch - Alone in a Great City • Amy Bell Marlowe
... him. If they had not set out blind in a fog of sentiment, as he had once put it, nevertheless they got on. She did not love him,—not as she defined that magic word,—but she liked him, was mildly proud of him. When he kissed her, if there were no mad thrill in it, there was at least a passive contentment in having inspired that affection. For he left her in no doubt as to where he stood, not by what he said, but wholly ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... with Spenser's description of a similar experience (An Hymne of Heavenly Beautie, 11. 253-273). Despite their poetic melody, Spenser's words sound poor and trivial. Instead of preferring to dwell on the unutterable ecstasy, contentment, and bliss of the experience, he is far more anxious to emphasise the fact that "all that pleased earst ...
— Mysticism in English Literature • Caroline F. E. Spurgeon
... whom Right and Justice are worth fighting for, suffering for, labouring for. It is the sign of a people which is willing to endure much for its ideals that the world may be a better world, wherein those who shall come hereafter may reap, in peace and contentment, the harvest this generation has sowed in ...
— Great Britain at War • Jeffery Farnol
... second gift, the gift of humour. If he could not reform the world, he could at all events laugh at it, thus attaining at least an intellectual superiority. Laughter, he read and believed, was a sign of good moral health, and he laughed on contentedly, till Lilia's marriage toppled contentment down for ever. Italy, the land of beauty, was ruined for him. She had no power to change men and things who dwelt in her. She, too, could produce avarice, brutality, stupidity—and, what was worse, vulgarity. It was on her soil and through her influence ...
— Where Angels Fear to Tread • E. M. Forster
... similarly circumstanced, a portion of that spirit of cheerfulness, and that resolute determination to make the most of things, which, after thirty years of activity and enjoyment in foreign climes, have landed me in perfect contentment at home. ...
— The Lieutenant and Commander - Being Autobigraphical Sketches of His Own Career, from - Fragments of Voyages and Travels • Basil Hall
... mountains, and appreciation of the good is swallowed up in recognition of every evil trait. Happily, this is not always the case, and the genuine mother is, as a rule, so grateful to see her child happy that for his or her sake she loves the one who causes this contentment, even if he or she be far from congenial to herself, and "not the man she would have picked out ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland
... mark of modern music-hall development. The perfect smoothness of the organization gave Barbara a great feeling of contentment for she knew how happy her father must be. Everyone had been so kind to him. "I shall feel a stranger amongst the top-liners of today, my dear," he had said to her in the car on their way to the hall. She had had no answer ready for she had feared ...
— Okewood of the Secret Service • Valentine Williams
... To serve mankind, to evince my gratitude for mercies great and undeserved, was all I asked. To know that I had gratified my wish, was peace itself. Highly as I had estimated the character of Mr Clayton, I had yet to learn his real value. I had yet to behold him the dispenser of comfort and contentment in the hovels of the wretched and the stricken—to see the leaden eye of disease grow bright at his approach, and the scowl of discontent and envious repining dissolve into equanimity, or mould itself in ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... her tenderly toward me, gazing down into her beautiful eyes where lay a world of tenderness and love. My heart was too full for words—it was all too wonderful to understand; enough that I knew Zarlah to be wholly mine, and in those few silent moments of absolute happiness and contentment, the little stream's merry laughter seemed to swell into the great joyous chorus of all creation, behind which is the ...
— Zarlah the Martian • R. Norman Grisewood
... ways of these men!" he asserted, drawing extravagant expressions of contentment from the ...
— Told in the East • Talbot Mundy
... content with what I have, Little be it, or much; And, Lord, contentment still I crave, ...
— Poems with Power to Strengthen the Soul • Various
... and envy; and practices liberality, renunciation, uprightness, kindness, subduing (of the passions), self-control; and is at peace with all creatures; and practices Yoga; and acts in an [A]ryan (noble) way; and does not hurt anything; and has contentment—qualities which, it is agreed, appertain to all the (four) stadia—he becomes s[a]rvag[a]min" (ib. 23.6), that is 'one belonging to the all-pervading' (All-soul). There appears to be a contradiction between the former passage, ...
— The Religions of India - Handbooks On The History Of Religions, Volume 1, Edited By Morris Jastrow • Edward Washburn Hopkins
... in his arms and kissed her hungrily, then stood holding her close, his cheek against her hair, in absolute contentment. He seemed to see nothing of the new quarters, though he was now just outside the living-room door, in the hall which ran between the two parts of the house. Presently she ...
— Mrs. Red Pepper • Grace S. Richmond
... From cold and hunger vs to cloath and feed; These are my sonnes, their care preserues from stealth Their father's flocks, nor servants moe I need: Amid these groues I walke oft for my health, And to the fishes, birds, and beastes giue heed, How they are fed, in forrest, spring and lake, And their contentment ...
— Lives of the Poets, Vol. 1 • Samuel Johnson
... enforce the important lesson of contentment with the existing order. This moral is perhaps less implicit in the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, Jan. 8, 1919 • Various
... kind friends to rejoice in the best solution of the problem and settlement of the vexed question. The good mother and aunt, the Duchess of Kent, rendered as secure as mortal mother could be of the future contentment and prosperity of her child; the attached kinsman beyond the Channel; the father of the bridegroom; his female relations; trusty Baron Stockmar; an early comrade, were all to be told and made happy, and in some cases sorry also, for the promotion of Prince Albert ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen V.1. • Sarah Tytler
... gratitude in his heart: their reward accordingly is a penny, and more. The first, on the contrary, go home, each with a penny in his pocket, and corroding discontent in his soul: their reward accordingly is less than a penny. Those who know how great a gain is godliness with contentment, and how small a gain is even godliness, when discontent is eating into it like rust, will allow that, while the labourers first and last alike had each his penny, yet the last were first and the first last in the real ...
— The Parables of Our Lord • William Arnot
... out. Very gently he entered the place of the soulless one. I heard a low, murmurous sound, with a deal of contentment in it. After a few moments they came out. He asked me again to carry the lamp. I went up before them. I couldn't go after; I was afraid of words, or I knew not ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... said. "It then becomes domestic contentment, and expresses itself in the shape of butcher's bills and roast ...
— A Poor Wise Man • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... my tips, yes. Don't you think it is humiliating to stretch out my hand whenever a traveller leaves us? Can't you grant me the only contentment I possess—let me enjoy my sorrow one time each year? To be able to live in memory of the most beautiful thing life ever ...
— Plays: Comrades; Facing Death; Pariah; Easter • August Strindberg
... ignorance, leaves the question open to examination; but the contagionist has solved the problem to his own mind, and closed the field of investigation, without, however, ceasing to denounce the antagonist who would disturb a conclusion which has given him so much contentment.—Let us here examine, for a moment, who in this case best befriends his fellow men. The latter, in vindication of a principle which he cannot prove, would shut the book of enquiry, sacrifice and abandon the sick, (for to this it must ever come ...
— Letters on the Cholera Morbus. • James Gillkrest
... names which the Dutch merchants give to their country houses, but they seem to me often to be chosen with more thought than those of similar villas in our country. Here are a few specimens: Buiten Gedachten (Beyond Expectation), Ons Genoegen (Our Contentment), Lust en Rust (Pleasure and Rest), Niet Zoo Quaalyk (Not so Bad), Myn Genegenhied is Voldaan (My Desire is Satisfied), Mijn Lust en Leven (My Pleasure and Life), Vriendschap en Gezelschap (Friendship and Sociability), Vreugde bij Vrede (Joy with Peace), Groot Genoeg (Large Enough), Buiten ...
— A Wanderer in Holland • E. V. Lucas
... readily enough the pipes I asked for. Diccon lit one and I the other, and sitting side by side we smoked in a contentment as absolute as the Indians' own. With his eyes upon the werowance, Diccon told an old story of a piece of Paspahegh villainy and of the payment which the English exacted, and I laughed as at the most ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... his simple philosophy of life, disciplined himself, and later his boys, to the theory that contentment was to be found in the square deal and honest labor. He was so fair and just in all relations with his neighbors that the people of the valley called him "Judge" York; and his honesty was so rugged and impartial that not infrequently was he left as sole arbiter even when his own interests ...
— Sergeant York And His People • Sam Cowan
... guesses. The Olenia had visited that harbor frequently for mail. But there was nothing for him. He strolled about the streets, nursing his melancholy, forgetting Captain Candage's commission, envying the contentment shown by others. ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... foolish, well-oiled dispositions, who take the world easy, eat white bread or brown, whichever can be got with least thought or trouble, and would rather starve on a penny than work for a pound. If left to himself, he would have whistled life away in perfect contentment; but his wife kept continually dinning in his ears about his idleness, his carelessness, and the ruin he ...
— Four Famous American Writers: Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, • Sherwin Cody
... fomenting mind of the republic the noblest ideals and the most generous incentives, which have, in a large measure, transformed public sentiment for the better. We have, at least, learned one great lesson in our history: that if we would have peace, contentment, happiness and prosperity, we must give the people a Christian education, and put all we ...
— Colleges in America • John Marshall Barker
... Nevertheless I should have been thrown into some little doubt, if some one had asked me which of them I should choose, if I must part from three of the four and keep only one for myself. But could we only have remained together, without death to separate us or disturb our sweet contentment, until ineffable eternity, in such a case I had chosen for my constant companion only my brother. He was so good to me. For he was terribly strong. I thought there could not be a stronger fellow in ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai
... my dear Louis, was in answer to one from you which crossed it on the way, and gave us, so far as your health and contentment are concerned, great satisfaction. Yet our gratification lacks something; it would be more complete had you not a mania for rushing full gallop into the future. I have often reproved you for this, and you would fare better did you pay more attention ...
— Louis Agassiz: His Life and Correspondence • Louis Agassiz
... little breakfast-table. Phillida would leave her place behind the burnished copper percolator she prized so highly and come running up the stairs. In her gentleness she would grieve, no doubt. I was sorry for that. But it was a contentment and pleasure for me to recall that I had settled my financial affairs so that my little cousin would never lack money or know any care that I could spare her. Strange, how she had been rated below more beautiful or more clever women until the waif Ethan Vere had set her dearness ...
— The Thing from the Lake • Eleanor M. Ingram
... bed and, despite the throbbing and burning of my wrist, soon lapsed into slumber. And I crawled out next morning late for breakfast, stiff, worn out, crippled, but happy. Six lions roaring a concert for me was quite conducive to contentment. ...
— Tales of lonely trails • Zane Grey
... car-wheels; the Negroes were joking with the Indians, who appeared stolidly apathetic or resigned; the Mexicans stood apart in sullen gloom, as if secretly mourning their lost estate; but Sing Lee looked about him with a cheerful calmness which seemed indicative of absolute contentment and his face wore, continually, a complacent smile. What strange varieties of human destiny these men present, I thought as I surveyed them: the Indian and the Mexican stand for the hopeless Past; the Anglo-Saxon and the Negro for the active Present; while Sing Lee is a specimen of that yellow ...
— John L. Stoddard's Lectures, Vol. 10 (of 10) - Southern California; Grand Canon of the Colorado River; Yellowstone National Park • John L. Stoddard
... man chuckled, and Daylight rode on, singularly at peace with himself and all the world. It seemed that the old contentment of trail and camp he had known on the Yukon had come back to him. He could not shake from his eyes the picture of the old pioneer coming up the trail through the sunset light. He was certainly going some for eighty-four. The thought of following his example entered Daylight's mind, but the big ...
— Burning Daylight • Jack London
... hand, and looked at last into his eyes. What he read in hers filled him with contentment. She ran across the plank and joined her father and mother, to whom Desmond had already said his adieux. At the last moment Bulger came up puffing, a miscellaneous collection of curiosities ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang
... his Old Marster, [HW: Harry] Beattie Goforth, on a farm in Claiborne County, North Carolina. His tall frame is slightly stooped, but he is not subjected to the customary infirmities of the aged, other than poor vision and hearing. Fairly comfortable, he is spending his declining years in contentment, for he is now the first consideration of his daughter, Mrs. Lola Reed, with whom he lives at 608 S. Broadway, Knoxville, Tennessee. His cushioned rocking chair is the honor seat of the household. His apology for not offering it to visitors, is that he is "not so fast on his ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Tennessee Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... laid his hand on Willie's shoulder, saying kindly, 'My boy, I understand now why you have that smile; for you have learned a secret which few people know—the secret of contentment. I shall have to call you The Contented Boy.' And with that, ...
— A Hive of Busy Bees • Effie M. Williams
... as free from guile or expediency—and of supreme importance to me. I'm just a simple woman now, with a woman's desires and affection and hopes. I've come to the parting of the ways: on one side lie power, excitement, loneliness; on the other, contentment, peace, companionship. I'll choose the latter, if you're willing. You have but to say the word and I'll give up everything, confess what I'm here for, what I've done, and what is ...
— The Cab of the Sleeping Horse • John Reed Scott
... he was dissatisfied and ill at ease, . . Sah-luma's careless contentment increased his own disquietude. Just then a curious-looking personage entered the apartment,—a gray-haired, dwarfish negro, who carried slung across his back a large bundle, consisting of several neatly rolled-up pieces of linen, one of which he ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... with such contentment fond As well the sister sits, would well the wife; His looks, the soul's own letters, see beyond, Gaze on, and fall ...
— Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins - Now First Published • Gerard Manley Hopkins
... hearts amongst the herd of seals until the sun was at its highest in the heavens. The Ancient One of the Sea came out of the ocean depths. He went amongst the seals and counted them, and us four men he reckoned amongst his herd. Then in great contentment he laid himself ...
— The Adventures of Odysseus and The Tales of Troy • Padriac Colum
... shook his head. "You have lost a great deal," he returned with unwonted tenderness: "you need much happiness, much private, individual contentment, to enable you to bear the troubles that have come upon you. Georgy was in a measure concerned in causing them: she ought to make full atonement for all the harm she has done. Ever since you came back I have felt that if I could do you any good I would cut off my right hand to ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, September, 1878 • Various
... the fancies, contentment and bliss, That drive away care in an hour such as this! When the ills of this life and the things that provoke Are lost for the while in the blue curling smoke Of a pipe and tobacco that's yellow as gold, And raptures supernal the senses unfold. O give me a chair ...
— The Old Hanging Fork and Other Poems • George W. Doneghy
... from her, any of the outbreaks against the laws of society customary with George Sand's heroines. If she had changed places with Maggie Tulliver, she would have accepted the society of the 'Mill on the Floss' with perfect contentment, respected all the family of aunts and uncles, and never repined against the tyranny of her brother Tom. She would have been conscious of no vague imaginative yearnings, nor have beaten herself against the narrow bars of stolid custom. She would have ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... within the circle of her father's and mother's acquaintance to afford her the smallest satisfaction: she saw nobody in whose favour she could wish to overcome her own shyness and reserve. The men appeared to her all coarse, the women all pert, everybody underbred; and she gave as little contentment as she received from introductions either to old or new acquaintance. The young ladies who approached her at first with some respect, in consideration of her coming from a baronet's family, were soon offended by what they termed "airs"; for, as ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... in upright breast, And freely gives to the distress'd, There sweet contentment builds her nest, And flutters round his ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... least in his own estimation. What a happy faculty it is, in this world, for a man to have a good opinion of himself! It relieves life of much of its bitterness. We thus perceive that, while JACK was tasting the sweets of a Christmas-pie, he was also enjoying the sweets of self-contentment. ...
— Punchinello, Vol.1, No. 4, April 23, 1870 • Various
... a fine, frank, hearty gentleman of some sixty years, whose appearance indicated that the world had gone well with him, and that he was satisfied with the world. The ordinary expression of his face was that of quiet contentment, though at times it betrayed a keen sagacity and shrewdness, partly the revelation of nature, and partly the product of an intimate intercourse with that world with which his business brought him, in various ways, in contact. It was however apparent, that however much the associations and experiences ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... with him a Companion who was, forsooth, to teach French and the cittern, and who was no other than Captain Richard, son to the Esquire of the West country, and who was likewise inveterately pursued by the Usurper. The brother recognised his sister—to what joy and contentment on both their parts I need not say; but ere the false Dancing-Master had played his part many days, he fell madly in love with Arabella Greenville. To her sorrow and wretchedness, my poor Grandmother returned his Flame. Not that the Lord Francis stands convicted of ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 1 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... beauty, as thou tellest me, is reduced to a shadow, I should have been exceedingly delighted to see her now, and every day till the happy one; that I might have the pleasure of observing how sweetly, hour by hour, she will rise to her pristine glories, by means of that state of ease and contentment, which will take place of the stormy past, upon her reconciliation with her friends, ...
— Clarissa, Or The History Of A Young Lady, Volume 8 • Samuel Richardson
... enjoyed the happiness of inferiour creatures, who in tranquillity possess their constitutions, as having not the apprehension to deplore their own natures; and being framed below the circumference of these hopes of cognition of better things, the wisdom of God hath necessitated their contentment. But the superiour ingredient and obscured part of ourselves, whereto all present felicities afford no resting contentment, will be able, at last, to tell us we are more than our present selves; and evacuate such hopes in the ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 6 - Reviews, Political Tracts, and Lives of Eminent Persons • Samuel Johnson
... well I know this phase! and that phase!... but we will just see what happens after they're married." Her thought was not bitter, only interested and curious, because her own hurt was over, and a wisdom, a contentment, had come. ...
— Married Life - The True Romance • May Edginton
... see the Russian soldier in his habits as he lives and fights. I have seen many thousands of them camped in the rain, swamped in bogs, or marching indefatigably over the roads which are long quagmires of mud, always with an air of stolid contentment and the look of being bent on business. They include Baltic Province men speaking German. Jews from Riga and Libau are brigaded with huge Siberians, whose marching must constitute a world record. The Cossacks are past ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol 1, Issue 4, January 23, 1915 • Various
... are nothing if not critical, and as frequently nothing when they are. The painter was descended from a Westmoreland family. Sprung from an industrious race of self-helping yeomen, whose hardy toil brought them health and contentment, Hogarth had an early advantage, derived from his father's love of letters, which eventually drew him away from field and wood to the great London mart. Like thousands of others, he was unsuccessful. ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... unshaven, and his dull and sunken eye gazed at me without a spark of recognition. I had been afraid that he would greet me with fierce reproaches, as the cruelly officious patron who had turned his contentment to bitterness, and I was relieved to find that my appearance awakened no visible resentment. "Don't you know me?" I asked, as I put out my hand. "Have ...
— The Madonna of the Future • Henry James
... A supreme contentment always made John Williamson silent. He'd been beaming at Jimmy all through the dinner, guarding him tenderly against interruptions, with pantomimic instructions to the servants. If the vague look in Jimmy's ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster
... rich, golden warmth. A hickory wood fire filled the room with additional cheerfulness, which was scarcely needed, for that awful chill had left her heart for ever. A few days of supreme happiness had given back the peach-like bloom to her cheek and the splendor to her eyes. Full of contentment, all the generous impulses of her character rose and swelled in her bosom, till she longed to share her heaven with anything that was cast down ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens
... letter, and it is a great pleasure to me to hear that my people were all so much concerned at our distress in the Leith smack; but what gave me the most contentment was the repentance of Tam Glen. I hope, poor fellow, he will prove a good husband; but I have my doubts; for the wife has really but a small share of common sense, and no married man can do well unless his wife will let him. I am, however, ...
— The Ayrshire Legatees • John Galt
... deep and fearful blight Steals from her woman's life its holiest light. My heart is not for love, though love is well, And oft it hath a dear and happy spell. Wrapped in the cherished mission of my art, Contentment dwells within my earnest heart. Within the rippling measures of my song The choicest treasures of the world belong. Why seek for more, the world and fame are mine, Then wherefore love, ...
— Love or Fame; and Other Poems • Fannie Isabelle Sherrick
... trustworthy. Had anything been wanting to prove her truthfulness and sincerity, the deep gratitude of her fervent "I thank you," when told that she had found a permanent home, would have done it effectually. But though her whole appearance indicated contentment and earnestness of purpose, though her various duties were faithfully and zealously performed, yet the deep sadness of her countenance, and the evident anxiety of her mind at first awakened a suspicion of mental ...
— Life in the Grey Nunnery at Montreal • Sarah J Richardson
... heart is the most marvellous of what is in man, since it is that which ordereth his whole affair: If covetise stir in it, desire destroyeth him, and if affliction master it, anguish slayeth him; if anger rage in it, danger is hard upon him; if it be blest with contentment, he is safe from discontent; if fear surprise it, he is full of mourning; and if calamity overtake it, affliction betideth him. If a man gain the use of wealth, peradventure he is diverted thereby from the remembrance of his Lord; if poverty choke him his heart is distracted by woe, or if disquietude ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... took the field as leader of the Romanists. But his dilatory and feeble measures betrayed his reluctance to the undertaking; and after some unsuccessful attempts, he concluded a new peace, which, though less favorable than the former to the Protestants, gave no contentment to the Catholics. Mutual diffidence still prevailed between the parties; the king's moderation was suspicious to both; each faction continued to fortify itself against that breach, which, they foresaw, must speedily ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... Mean," where the dwellings are connecting-links between the hut and the hall—fair edifices resembling manse or mansion-house, according as the atmosphere expands or contracts their dimensions—in which Competence is next-door neighbour to Wealth, and both of them within the daily walk of Contentment. ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... placed at the head of the table, and as he sat there smiling at his friends it made one of the sweetest pictures of family contentment I ...
— Skiddoo! • Hugh McHugh
... about their Christmas pudding, the luxurious scoundrels!" and the convict nearest him had laughed appreciatively, as convicts and schoolboys do laugh at the jests of the man in authority. All seemed contentment. Moreover, he had—by way of a pleasant stroke of wit—tormented Rufus Dawes with his ill-fortune. "The schooner sails to-morrow, my man," he had said; "you'll spend your Christmas at the mines." And ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... strength, and beneficence of our free institutions are unfolded, every day adds fresh motives to contentment and fresh ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... that the latter is the only point upon which the mind can settle at rest. Though not clear of inquietudes, because no earthly situation is so, they are fewer in number, and mixed with more objects of contentment, than in any other mode of life. But I must not philosophize too much with her, lest I give her too serious apprehensions of a friendship I shall impose on her. I am with very great esteem, Dear Sir, ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... important problem that presented itself during John Quincy Adams's administration. The trouble with the Creek and Cherokee Indians in Georgia brought this issue to the front. These tribes were now partially civilized, and were tilling their lands in contentment. Although they held their lands under treaty with the United States, Georgia sought to eject them. Instead of protecting the Indians the national government allowed Georgia to have its way and sent them to the Indian Territory. Thus was an individual State permitted to act in defiance ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson
... better sleep off that jag the pater presented me over the wire," he chuckled, and down he slid into the soft upholstery, raising his long legs upon another chair and sighing with deep contentment. His eyes roved about the room for a moment, when he smiled suddenly ...
— Officer 666 • Barton W. Currie
... idly attentive to his low running comment on beast and bird and tree, on forest stillness and forest sounds, on life and the wild laws of life and death governing the great out-world 'twixt sky and earth. Sunlight and shadows moving, speech and silence, waxed and waned. A listless contentment lay warm upon her, weighting the heavy white lids. The blue of her eyes was very dark now—almost purple like the colour of the sea when the wind-flaws turn the ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... in another carriage. He enjoyed the drive along that winding upward track; he admired the festal decorations of the houses, the gardens and vineyards, the many-tinted rock scenery overhead, the smiling sunburnt peasantry. There was an air of contentment and well-being about the place; ...
— South Wind • Norman Douglas
... suspended from the cross-trees in such a manner that it should not strike against the mast or any of the rigging with the roll of the ship, and then the observer drew forth a pipe, which he filled and proceeded to smoke with the greatest apparent calmness and contentment. ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood
... In eating and drinking, in singing and making merry, In parents' gladness and in children's mirth, In dear memories of those who have departed, In good comradeship with those who are here, In kind wishes for those who are far away, In patient waiting, sweet contentment, generous cheer, God bless us every one, ...
— The Spirit of Christmas • Henry Van Dyke
... forlorn horses into the sideling trot which is all they are equal to, and after flicking their ears until they are too lazy to continue, they hang their hats and stockingless feet over the carriage lamps and chew sugar-cane, looking the picture of contentment. ...
— In the Courts of Memory 1858-1875. • L. de Hegermann-Lindencrone
... penetrating the bewildered one: she hung back just enough to see better the four faces in front of her, whose good will was being reflected in hers, not in any smile, but in that undefinable change which tells us that anxiety is passing in contentment. For an instant she looked up at Deronda, as if she were referring all this mercy to him, and then again turning to Mrs. Meyrick, said with more collectedness in her sweet tones than he had ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... is modelling in clay. Euphemia tells me it is to be quite the common thing this winter. It is intended especially for the evening, after a little dinner. As the reader is aware, the evening after a little dinner is apt to pall. A certain placid contentment creeps over people. I don't know in what organ originality resides; but it's a curious thing, and one I must leave to the consideration of psychologists, that people's output of original remarks appears to ...
— Certain Personal Matters • H. G. Wells
... a condition. Since crossing your threshold I have become contentment itself. Indeed, I regard myself as the most favored man in the house, for I, first of all, am able to lay ...
— A Young Girl's Wooing • E. P. Roe
... will bring contentment to that good man's heart To see me rescued from misfortune's sea. This body, in its suffering, pain, and smart, Is saved through ...
— The Little Clay Cart - Mrcchakatika • (Attributed To) King Shudraka
... was deep and wonderful but might it not be that though the earth was eloquent to her the skies were silent? I was but a beginner myself—I knew little indeed. Dare I risk that little in a sweet companionship which would sink me into the contentment of the life lived by the happily deluded between the cradle and the grave and perhaps close to me for ever that still sphere where my highest hope abides? I had much to ponder, for how could I lose her out of my life—though I knew not at all whether she who had so ...
— The Ninth Vibration And Other Stories • L. Adams Beck
... her wise management all jealousy was avoided between the two sets of children; urged on by her stirring example, Thomas Lincoln supplied the yet unfinished cabin with floor, door, and windows, and life became more comfortable for all its inmates, contentment if not happiness reigning in ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... bullock to-day, being the first meal of fresh meat since leaving Simon's Town, nearly three months ago; and yet we have no one on the sick list! Causes—good water, temperance, strict government, and, as a consequence, a reasonable degree of contentment, and moderate and constant employment. The crew has had several runs on shore, too, without the possibility of getting drunk. A present of cocoa-nuts this morning from the Commander. This young Frenchman is very attentive ...
— The Cruise of the Alabama and the Sumter • Raphael Semmes
... spasmodic, and for a time perhaps, great intellectual and physical exertion, with a succeeding period of exhaustion. Simpler food favours long, sustained, uniform muscular strength, clearness of intellect, and contentment. Let no one misunderstand us; we do not assert that all who live on simple food have either clear intellects or are contented, because there are other factors besides food, but that such qualities are more easily retained or obtained under that condition. It is well known that the over-fed and badly ...
— The Chemistry of Food and Nutrition • A. W. Duncan
... so abruptly,' said Olinthus, 'hast thou been happy? has thy heart found contentment under these priestly robes? hast thou, still yearning for the voice of God, heard it whisper comfort to thee from the oracles of Isis? That sigh, that averted countenance, give me the ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton
... Mr. Douglas in London, he being at that time a widower. She was a beautiful woman, tall, dark, and slender, some twenty years younger than her husband; a disparity which seemed in no wise to mar the contentment of their ...
— The Valley of Fear • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... red border, an open smile rested on his thick lips, which, in parting, discovered a range of long yellow teeth. His face, otherwise, expressed nothing in particular. It was a nearly equal mixture of timidity, self-sufficiency, and contentment. It was quite impossible to concede the least intelligence to the possessor of such a phiz. One involuntarily looked for a goitre. The retail haberdashers, who, having cheated for thirty years in their threads and needles, retire with large incomes, should have ...
— The Mystery of Orcival • Emile Gaboriau
... Then he spoke sententiously. "Popular education is a contrivance of the devil, whereby he looks to extinguish every last saving grace from the life of the populace. Not poetry only, but all good things and all good feelings,—religion, reverence, courtesy,—sane contentment, rational ambition,—the right sort of humility, the right sort of pride,—they all go down before it: whilst, in the ignorance which it disseminates, blasphemy, covetousness, bumptiousness, bad taste (and bad art and bad ...
— The Lady Paramount • Henry Harland
... lightly with his fist. "I knew it!" And he leaned back in his chair with a face of contentment. He had trusted his man, and his ...
— The Virginian - A Horseman Of The Plains • Owen Wister
... with D'Artagnan in my estimation for sheer ability in a given line that hero was Sherlock Holmes. With D'Artagnan and Holmes for my companions I think I could pass the balance of my days in absolute contentment, no matter what woful things might befall me. So it was that, when I next heard the tapping keys and dulcet bell of my Enchanted Type-writer, and, after listening intently for a moment, realized that my friend Boswell was making a copy of a Sherlock Holmes Memoir thereon ...
— The Enchanted Typewriter • John Kendrick Bangs
... doing a great wrong to himself—to say nothing of the fine arts—if, when he obtains quietness and saintly peace, he does not undertake great enterprises in painting both for the ornamentation and glory of his estate and for his private contentment and the recreation of his mind. And then in times of peace there are so many things in which painting may be of use, that it seems to me that peace is obtained with so much labour of arms, for nothing else but in order ...
— Michael Angelo Buonarroti • Charles Holroyd
... barkeeper stood at a door, a huge girth circled by a soiled apron; nearer a bundle of brooms and glittering stacked paint cans marked the local store. It was, he was forced to admit, far from gay; but he found a great contentment in the sunny peace, in the limitless space of the unenclosed sky; the air, the fields, the birds ...
— The Happy End • Joseph Hergesheimer
... to be born black. But the Catholics are contented, or at least ought to be, as we are told; I shall, therefore, proceed to touch on a few of those circumstances which so marvellously contribute to their exceeding contentment. They are not allowed the free exercise of their religion in the regular army; the Catholic soldier cannot absent himself from the service of the Protestant clergyman, and unless he is quartered in Ireland, or in Spain, where can he find eligible opportunities ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... be, and ought to be its own—not its better self, infinitely higher than its present, for the sake of whose approach it exists. I do not think that the age is worse in this respect than those which have preceded it, but that vulgarity, and a certain vile contentment swelling to self-admiration, have become more vocal than hitherto; just as unbelief, which I think in reality less prevailing than in former ages, has become largely more articulate, and thereby more loud and peremptory. But whatever ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald
... one came to see her. Toward evening she felt deserted, presently even strangely depressed. As she dined, as she sat out afterward in the court with Caroline reposing on her skirt in a curved attitude of supreme contentment, she recalled the excitement and emotion of the preceding night. She had read well. She had done her part for Claude. But if all her work had been useless? If all the ingenuity of herself and Alston should be of no avail? If the opera should never be produced, or should be produced ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens
... tended to treat unrest by defining the situation in terms of the suppression or postponement of the wish; they tried to make the repudiation of the wish itself a wish. "Contentment," "conformity to the will of God," ultimate "salvation" in a better world, are representative of this. The founders of America defined the situation in terms of participation, but this has actually taken too exclusively the form of "political participation." The present ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... a man is fool enough to believe it, why undeceive him? And if he is so sure of it, may it even not be so? Selma was content to have it so, especially as the assertion did not jar with her own prepossessions; and thus they rode home in the summer night in the mutual contentment of a betrothal. ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... woman makes a doubtful bargain), and by November we return to London for the winter, and in the spring sail for America to see my mother. I have promised to live mainly on this side of the water, and shall return in the course of a year to try what contentment may be sown and reaped in ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston
... a smile of surprise. Was he merely playing for time, she wondered? But he had the air of contentment with which he usually embarked upon ...
— Witness For The Defense • A.E.W. Mason
... king of Spain's daughter, sometimes your majesty, are evident testimonies of his being carried away with every wind of hope; taught to love greatness any way gotten; and having for the motioners and ministers of the mind only such young men as have showed they think evil contentment a ground of any rebellion; who have seen no commonwealth but in faction, and divers of which have defiled their hands in odious murders. With such fancies and favorites what is to be hoped for? or that he will contain himself within ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... when his father's invalided state would have made a fractious or wilful child a serious inconvenience, his good temper and contentment were invaluable. He would sit for hours on his sister's lap, listening to whispered oft-told tales, or playing at impromptu quiet games; he could go to sleep anywhere, and the wonderful discoveries he made at each new place were the amusement of ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the one end which all created beings seek. They aim variously at (a) wealth, or (b) rank, or (c) sovereignty, or (d) glory, or (e) pleasure, because they think thereby to attain either (a) contentment, (b) reverence, (c) power, (d) renown, or (e) gladness of heart, in one or other of which they severally imagine happiness to consist.—CH. III. Philosophy proceeds to consider whether happiness can really be secured in any of ...
— The Consolation of Philosophy • Boethius
... no harm speakin' av a noble deed. An' now," he added, folding his hands upon his breast, and closing his eyes in mock contentment, "'tis me last wish an' tistament to make the good ...
— Where the Souls of Men are Calling • Credo Harris
... too apt to indulge in a desire for what is beyond our reach," said the minister, gravely; "if every one was to reside on the hills, who would cultivate the valleys? We should not forget that godliness, with contentment, is great gain. It would be far better, Mrs. Myles, if, instead of struggling to get out of our sphere, we laboured to do the best we ...
— Turns of Fortune - And Other Tales • Mrs. S. C. Hall
... until nine o'clock they watched the beauty of the moon and sea, which is constant even at Egremont Beach. When they rose to go Yetta noticed for the first time a shawl-clad figure on the adjacent bench, and immediately a pair of keen eyes flashed from a face whose plump contentment was framed in a jet black wig of ...
— Elkan Lubliner, American • Montague Glass
... down once more into the depths at the bottom of the river near the Vaskjala Bridge, but no longer alone as before. The fair face of the maiden gazed down with him into the depths, and has ever since been visible in the Moon. Above in the far sky she lives in joy and contentment, and only desires that other maidens might share her happiness. So on moonlight nights her friendly eyes gaze down on her mortal sisters, and she seeks to invite them as her guests. But none among them is so pure and modest and innocent as herself, and therefore none is worthy ...
— The Hero of Esthonia and Other Studies in the Romantic Literature of That Country • William Forsell Kirby
... we attain unless thy image show in what we are about to do. Therefore by every plant which scatters its seed and by the moist warm garden which receives and nourishes it, by the comminglement of bloodshed with pleasure, by the joy that mimics anguish with sighs and shudderings, and by the contentment which mimics death,—by all these do we invoke thee. O thou, continuous one, whose will these children attend, and whom I now adore in this fair-colored and soft woman's body, it is thou whom I honor, not any woman, in doing ...
— Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell
... said, "how disastrous is ambition! how unsatisfying its rewards! how terrible its disappointments! Behold yonder peasant tilling his field in peace and contentment! He rises with the lark, passes the day in wholesome toil, and lies down at night to pleasant dreams. In the mad struggle for place and power he has no part; the roar of the strife reaches his ear like the distant murmur of the ocean. Happy, ...
— Fantastic Fables • Ambrose Bierce
... an inner radiance, so is color the sign manual of happiness, of joy. Our cities are so dun and drab in their outward aspects, by reason of the weight of care that burdens us down. We decry the happy irresponsibility of the savage, and the patient contentment of the Oriental with his lot, but both are able to achieve marvels of color in their environment beyond the compass of civilized man. The glory of mediaeval cathedral windows is a still living confutation of the belief that in those far-off times the human heart was ...
— Architecture and Democracy • Claude Fayette Bragdon
... evidence of his rising above the plane of the smart real-estate speculator, willing to be all things to all men, if so he might realize on his investments. Happily, he was clear-sighted enough to perceive that his own interest was involved in the liberty, contentment, ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon
... madness or cruelty in conjugal love: in its normal state it is all peace, contentment, happiness, while romantic love, in its normal state, is chiefly unrest, doubt, fear, anxiety, torture and anguish of heart—with alternating hours of frantic elation—until the Yes ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck
... one unvaried round of impenetrable beef. Mr. Obabiah Oldbuck, when he decided to adopt a pastoral life, and assumed the provisional name of Thyrsis, never looked upon his flocks and herds with more unalloyed contentment than I upon that fleecy family. I had been familiar, in Kansas, with the metaphor by which the sentiments of an owner were credited to his property, and had heard of a proslavery colt and an antislavery cow. The fact that these sheep were but recently converted from "Se-cesh" ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... shade of my murdered mother, who lies beneath—I swear not to know rest, never more seek contentment, till I've punished her murderer! Night and day—through summer and winter— shall I search for him. Yes; search till I've found and chastised this man, this monster, who has brought blight on me, death to my mother, and desolation to our house! Ah! think ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid
... confirmation thereof, willed every man the next Sunday following to prepare himself to receive the communion, as Christian brethren and friends ought to do, which was done in very reverent sort, and so with good contentment every man went about ...
— Froude's Essays in Literature and History - With Introduction by Hilaire Belloc • James Froude
... more to be regretted as the law of life on the planet might then be better formulated. Essentially it seems necessary for existence here to be in unison with the conditions; contentment means longevity. Of course, the remarkable men and women I saw at the Patenta were all well known. They had made themselves known, and not only were their earthly names and lives put down on the pages of the Registers, but all their knowledge had been as inquisitively ...
— The Certainty of a Future Life in Mars • L. P. Gratacap
... sense is this: that these symposia of rustic vanity were kept entirely within the family, like some secret ancestral practice. To the world their serious faces were never deformed by the suspicion of any simper of self-contentment. Yet it was known. "They hae a guid pride o' themsel's!" was the ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... would escape death himself, it became necessary to rejoice at the death of his friend or relative. Under Nero, many went to return thanks to the gods for their relatives whom he had put to death. At least, an assumed air of contentment was necessary; for even fear was sufficient to render one guilty. Everything gave the tyrant umbrage. If a citizen was popular, he was considered a rival to the prince, and capable of exciting a civil war, and he was suspected. Did he, on the contrary, shun popularity, and ...
— History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814 • F. A. M. Mignet
... its severity was gradually relaxed. William Adolphus, sighing relief I doubt not (for I was well-nigh as tedious to him as he to me), went off to his horses. I was again encouraged to be more with Elsa, under a caution to say nothing that could excite her. She met me with a quiet gay contentment, seemed pleased to be with me, and was profuse and sincere in thanks for my kindness. Sometimes now she talked of our life after we were married, when Princess Heinrich would be gone and we alone together. She was occupied with innocent wonderings how we should get on, and professed an anxiety ...
— The King's Mirror • Anthony Hope
... transform the commonest life into harmony and beauty. The will is almost omnipotent to determine habits which virtually are omnipotent. The habit of directing a firm and steady will upon those things which tend to produce harmony of thought would produce happiness and contentment even in the most lowly occupations. The will, rightly drilled, can drive out all discordant thoughts, and produce a reign of perpetual harmony. Our trouble is that we do not half will. After a man's habits are well set, about all he can ...
— Architects of Fate - or, Steps to Success and Power • Orison Swett Marden
... frosted silver. He had liked it, tolerated it, hated it, and then, after she came, loved it. He had thought it the most beautiful scene in all the world and one never to be forgotten. The dingy old building, with its bare wooden walls, had been first a horror, then a prison, and at last a palace of contentment. With the two women, one a second mother to him, and the other dearest of all on earth, he could have lived there forever. But now the old prison feeling was coming back. He was tired of the view and of the mean little room. He felt lonely ...
— Keziah Coffin • Joseph C. Lincoln
... The Crew pulsed with contentment, and its communal singing brought a pleasant kind of glow that throbbed gently in ...
— Has Anyone Here Seen Kelly? • Bryce Walton
... me some pleasure and killed an hour. You relate the even course of your days since my departure from Cornwall, and I envy the good health and happy contentment of mind which your note indicates. I gained no slight benefit from my visit to the West Country, and it had doubtless carried me bravely through this summer but for an unfortunate event. A sharp cold, which settled on my ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts
... night duty, as our regular ones were too exhausted; every advantage of elevation for a bed ground was secured, and thus fortified against accident, we went into camp for the night. But the expected never happens on the trail, and the sun arose the next morning over our herd grazing in peace and contentment on the flowery prairies ...
— The Log of a Cowboy - A Narrative of the Old Trail Days • Andy Adams
... the ordinary affairs of life. It continued to be true, after the war as before, that each State had its own local pride, developed its own special institutions, regulated the conduct of life within its boundaries according to its own views of what was conducive to the order, the well-being, the contentment, the progress, of its own people. It has been the belief of practically all intelligent observers of our national life that this individuality and self-dependence of the States has been a cardinal ...
— What Prohibition Has Done to America • Fabian Franklin
... unrest, social, economical, political. Not contentment, but a lamentation and an ancient tale of wrong! We hear it in the continual cry over what is known as the increased cost of living, and feel its pressure in the higher standard of living. What was considered wealth by our ...
— 'Tis Sixty Years Since • Charles Francis Adams
... than I see in Prue's eyes; nor hear sweeter music than I hear in Prue's voice; nor find a more heaven-lighted temple than I know Prue's mind to be. And when I wish to please myself with a lovely image of peace and contentment, I do not think of the plain of Sharon, nor of the valley of Enna, nor of Arcadia, nor of Claude's pictures; but, feeling that the fairest fortune of my life is the right to be named with her, I whisper gently, to myself, with a smile—for it seems as if my very heart smiled within me, when ...
— Prue and I • George William Curtis
... Rose combine, To make my Jenny fair; There's no Contentment sike as mine; I'm almost void of Care: But yet I fear my Jenny's Face, Will cause more Men to woe; Which if she should, as I do fear, Still, what is that ...
— Wit and Mirth: or Pills to Purge Melancholy, Vol. 5 of 6 • Various
... cottage, nestling by the hillside; hope and contentment dwell therein; within its walls beauty and grace awaken harmony. Lured by the bright sunshine, a stranger enters the door. He sits and chats awhile with the inmates. His talk is pleasant, and as he converses a cloud falls upon the house, the sunshine becomes darkened, and ...
— Strange Visitors • Henry J. Horn |
