"Diatribe" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... attack anything. Where Luther battered down, he undermined. [Sidenote: Methods of argument] Even when he argued against an opinion he called his polemic a "Conversation"—for that is the true meaning of the word Diatribe. With choice of soft vocabulary, of attenuated forms, of double negatives, he tempered exquisitely his Latin. Did he doubt anything? Hardly, "he had a shade of doubt" (subdubito). Did he think he wrote well? Not at all, but he confessed ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... upon Kingsley's longest and most ambitious poem—The Saint's Tragedy. With all its merits and beauties it is a mistake. It was avowedly a controversial diatribe against the celibacy and priestcraft of Romanism, and was originally designed to be in prose. That is not a safe basis for a dramatic poem, and the poem suffers from the fact that it is in great part a theological pamphlet. ...
— Studies in Early Victorian Literature • Frederic Harrison
... The famous diatribe against Jesuitism in the Latter-Day Pamphlets,[20] one of the most unfeignedly coarse and virulent bits of invective in the language, points plumb in the same direction. It is grossly unjust, because it ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Vol. I - Essay 2: Carlyle • John Morley
... second novel, pointed out "the dangers and pains of an ill-assorted marriage." Lelia (1833) was a still more outspoken diatribe against society and the ...
— Selections from the Prose Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold
... extravagance, against bribery by candidates, against the too frequent triumphs, against those who made a trade of collecting forfeited fines, against farmers of the revenue distraining for payment, against the dear prices of the oil-dealers; and once—in the -Curculio- —a more lengthened diatribe as to the doings in the Roman market, reminding us of the -parabases- of the older Attic comedy, and but little likely to cause offence(21) But even in the midst of such patriotic endeavours, which from a police point of view were entirely in ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... passage Burke, assuming his correspondent to be familiar with it, boldly claps into prose and inserts into a long diatribe against Pitt for having tamely submitted to the rebuffs of the French Directory. Thus ...
— On the Art of Writing - Lectures delivered in the University of Cambridge 1913-1914 • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... poisoned by the mere knowledge of evil. Their town maybe betrayed to the enemy, their daughters may be dishonoured or poisoned, their sons massacred; they may, in their old age, be cast starving on the world, or imprisoned or broken by torture; and they will complain and be fierce in diatribe: the fiercest diatribe written against any Pope of the Renaissance being, perhaps, that of Platina against Paul II., who was a saint compared with his successors Sixtus and Alexander, because the writer of the diatribe and his ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. I • Vernon Lee
... fingers wonderfully deft, was plaiting horsehair about a stick of hardwood to form the handle of a quirt, Sandy overhauling his two Colts and Sam furnishing orchestra on his harmonica. Now he put it to his lips, unable to find a sufficiently crushing retort to Mormon's diatribe against words of more than one syllable, breathing out the burden of "My ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn
... of investigation and deduction. Reason is slow and abstract, cold and speculative; but man is a being of feeling and action; he is not resolvable into a dictum de omni et nullo, or a series of hypotheticals, or a critical diatribe, or an algebraical equation. And this obvious fact does, as far as it goes, make it probable that, if we are providentially obliged to exercise our private judgment, the point toward which we have to direct it, is the teacher rather than ...
— Prose Masterpieces from Modern Essayists • James Anthony Froude, Edward A. Freeman, William Ewart Gladstone, John Henry Newman and Leslie Steph
... received. It appeared to jar somewhat on the nerves of the American Annex. There was a smile on the lips of the other Annex,—the English girl,—which she tried to keep quiet, but it was too plain that she enjoyed my diatribe. ...
— Over the Teacups • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... first of these, on January 12, 1848, was an elaborate defense of the Whig doctrine summarized in a House resolution passed a week or ten days before, that the Mexican War "had been unnecessarily and unconstitutionally commenced by the President," James K. Polk. The speech is not a mere party diatribe, but a terse historical and legal examination of the origin of the Mexican War. In the after-light of our own times which shines upon these transactions, we may readily admit that Mr. Lincoln and the Whigs ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay
... look sufficiently informed me that he knew what I had to say to him. I reproached him sharply, and asked him how, after all I had told him of the Emperor's susceptibility, he could permit the insertion of such an article. I observed to him that this indecorous diatribe had no official character, since it had no signature; and that, therefore, he had acted in direct opposition to a decree of the Senate, which prohibited the insertion in the journals of any articles which were not ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... when he had left the chaplain to his ferocious meditations what would have been the effect of that diatribe upon some of his brethren. He smiled to himself, as he sat over his solitary supper in the Refectory, to picture the various expressions he could imagine upon their faces when they came hotfoot from the Guest-chamber with the news of what manner of priest was in their midst. ...
— The Altar Steps • Compton MacKenzie
... increased upon him. Rive, in his "Chasse aux bibliographes," has dealt very roughly with the worthy Cambis; but Peignot tells us that this latter was a respectable literary character, and a well-informed bibliographer—and that his catalogue, in spite of Rive's diatribe, is much sought after. See the Bibliogr. Curieuse, p. 14; also Cat. de la Valliere, vol. iii., no. 5543.——CAMUS DE LIMARE. Catalogues des livres de M. le Camus de Limare, Paris, 1779, 12mo.—Des livres rares et precieux de ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... cigarette. His thoughts were occupied with Mr Fadge and The Study. He was considering whether he could aid in bringing public contempt upon that literary organ and its editor. Milvain listened to the elder man's diatribe with much amusement. ...
— New Grub Street • George Gissing
... entitled "Happy" and "Labor." In a dozen pages are summed up all Carlyle's creed. In these pages he declares that the only enduring happiness is found in good, honest work, done with all a man's heart and soul. And after caustic words on the modern craving for happiness he ends a noble diatribe with these words, which are worth framing and hanging on the wall, where they may be studied ...
— Modern English Books of Power • George Hamlin Fitch
... proceeds with the usual diatribe of Swift's desertion of the Whigs, his atheism, high-church sympathies, and sacrilegious ...
— A Letter From a Clergyman to his Friend, - with an Account of the Travels of Captain Lemuel Gulliver • Anonymous
... was at that time the object of assaults of zealous Christians and disloyal Jews, and hostile works against Judaism were the order of the day. Most of them, however, like the fabulous snake, vented their poison and died. It was different with McCaul's poignant diatribe against the cause of Judaism and the honor of the Talmud, which had been translated into many languages. Montefiore, while in Russia, urged Levinsohn to defend his people against their traducers, and the bed-ridden sage, ...
— The Haskalah Movement in Russia • Jacob S. Raisin
... intently and without defense to the diatribe against his country's weapons and the clumsy method of using them, but although he said nothing, he formed opinions of his own, believing there was some merit in strength which the Italian ignored; so, studying the subject, he himself invented a sword which, ...
— The Sword Maker • Robert Barr
... has stuck in my throat, and spoiled my palate, so that nothing put into it is swallowed with much relish,—unless it be cayenne. However, I have grievances enough to occupy me that way too;—but for fear of adding to yours by this pestilent long diatribe, I postpone the reading of ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. III - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... all within her power to avert the impending storm. Her petitions had been spurned from the foot of the English throne. Even the illustrious Dr. Franklin, venerable in years, was forced to listen to a vile diatribe against him delivered by the coarse and brutal Wedderburn, while members of the Privy Council who were present, with the single exception of lord North, "lost all dignity and all self-respect. They laughed aloud at each sarcastic sally of Wedderburn. 'The indecency of their behaviour,' in ...
— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean
... To the diatribe of the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Harris) who spoke yesterday, and who so far transcended the limits of decency and propriety as to announce upon this floor that his remarks were addressed to white men alone, I shall have no word of reply. Let him feel that a Negro was not ...
— Masterpieces of Negro Eloquence - The Best Speeches Delivered by the Negro from the days of - Slavery to the Present Time • Various
... I knew so well. It is an odd feeling, that first seeing one's self in print, and I could guess, even then, what a thrill shot through Derrick as he turned over the pages. But he would not take them into the sitting-room, no doubt dreading another diatribe against his profession; and we solemnly played euchre, and patiently endured the Major's withering sarcasms till ten o'clock sounded our ...
— Derrick Vaughan—Novelist • Edna Lyall
... into his diatribe: "No use talkin' lak dat. Our 'ciety thought you wuz a aidjucated nigger. We didn't think no white man could ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... whose ideas he had no respect and of whose nature he had no understanding. So he turned the conversation to Herbert Spencer. Judge Blount ably seconded him, and Martin, whose ears had pricked at the first mention of the philosopher's name, listened to the judge enunciate a grave and complacent diatribe against Spencer. From time to time Mr. Morse glanced at Martin, as much as to say, "There, ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... leaning back on our Easy-chair, we perform an exploit beyond the reach of Euclid—why, WE SQUARE THE CIRCLE, and to the utter demolition of our admirable friend Sir David Brewster's diatribe, in a late number of the Quarterly Review, on the indifference of Government to men of science, chuckle over our nobly-won order K.C.C.B., Knight Companion ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... that he should have been quicker. He begged my pardon. His cold voice really maddened me, and I burst out into some foolish, contemptible diatribe, called him a machine, taunted him, then—as I felt that loathsome thing nestling once more to me,—begged him to assist me, to stay with me, not to leave me alone—I meant in the company of my tormentor. Whether he was frightened, or whether ...
— Tongues of Conscience • Robert Smythe Hichens
... which nevertheless might cause some hasty future historian, unacquainted with the facts, to fall into grievous error, I may mention, "A Century of Dishonor," by H. H. (Mrs. Helen Hunt Jackson), and "Our Indian Wards," (Geo. W. Manypenny). The latter is a mere spiteful diatribe against various army officers, and neither its manner nor its matter warrants more than an allusion. Mrs. Jackson's book is capable of doing more harm because it is written in good English, and because the author, who had lived a pure ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume One - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1769-1776 • Theodore Roosevelt
... important issue was the encouraging of the peace party at Paris, with a view to the revocation of the aggressive decrees of the Convention. In private, Fox had admitted that they were wholly indefensible; and yet, in order to snatch an oratorical triumph, he fired off a diatribe which could not but stiffen the necks of the French Jacobins. At such a crisis the true statesman merges the partisan in the patriot and says not a word to weaken his own Government and hearten its opponents. To this height of self-denial Fox rarely rose; ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... growth of Borgia history is afforded in connection with this Sebastiano Pinzone by Dr. Jacob Burckhardt (in Der Cultur der Renaissance in Italien) who, in the course of the usual sweeping diatribe against Cesare, mentions "Michele da Corella, his strangler, and Sebastiano Pinzone, his poisoner." It is an amazing statement; for, whilst obviously leaning upon Giustiniani's dispatch for the presumption that Pinzone was a poisoner at all, ...
— The Life of Cesare Borgia • Raphael Sabatini
... pious, and pedantic diatribe, Abbot comes to the point. Sprot was arrested in April 1608, first on the strength 'of some words that fell from himself,' and, next, 'of some papers found upon him.' What papers? They are never mentioned in the Indictment of Sprot. They are never ...
— James VI and the Gowrie Mystery • Andrew Lang
... were congratulating ourselves that no one could understand this rude diatribe when we noticed, at the next table, our acquaintance of Langeais, Lydia's aphoristic Frenchman, if I may coin a word. This did not seem a good time to renew civilities, especially as he was evidently laughing behind his napkin. ...
— In Chteau Land • Anne Hollingsworth Wharton
... stocking of the shop; and unnecessary, for plate, house decoration, horses, grand clothes, entertainments. On this topic Agnolo inveighs with severity against household parasites, bravi, and dissolute dependents.[5] A little further on he indulges in another diatribe against great nobles, i signori, from whom he would have his sons keep clear at any cost.[6] It is the animosity of the industrious burgher for the haughty, pleasure-loving, idle, careless man of blood and high estate. In the bourgeois household ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volume 1 (of 7) • John Addington Symonds
... to a bone that strangers should build themselves fine houses! My Pablo said a little time ago that people said your father's riches were going astray. Me, I did not listen. Now I know he spoke true." The senora's tongue wagged on in a diatribe ...
— A Prairie Infanta • Eva Wilder Brodhead
... tempers to our tent, and, putting the instrument roughly away, sit down and look miserable. If Doe asked permission to feel his pulse or see his tongue, he would shut him up with the words, "Oh, stuff!" But once he laughed sarcastically and burst, with all the Monty enthusiasm and emphasis, into a diatribe against Broad Churchmanship, the ignorance of laymen, the timidity of the clergy, wishy-washy sermons—in short, the criminal lack of dogmatic teaching. Not seeing any connexion between dogmatic ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... but while Sarah wandered on in her diatribe, Tom managed to wink privily and prodigiously at his sister and to implore her to help ...
— The Valley of the Moon • Jack London
... character, had imposed upon "the South" at its close that most nefarious of all detestable forms of oppressive degradation, "the Bureau." Their orators grew magniloquent over its tyrannical oppression; the Southern press overflowed with that marvellous exuberance of diatribe of which they are the acknowledged masters—to all of which the complaisant North gave a ready and subservient concurrence, until the very name reeked in the public mind with infamous ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... with me!" groaned Finot; "I must suppress my abominable diatribe, and I haven't another notion ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... Greene, was one of them. AEdanus Burke, a judge of the Supreme Court of South Carolina, wrote a violent pamphlet against the society of the Cincinnati under the pseudonym of Cassius, the slayer of tyrants; and this diatribe, translated and amplified by Mirabeau, awakened dull echoes among readers of Rousseau and haters of privilege in all parts of Europe. A swarm of brochures in rejoinder and rebutter issued from the press, and the nineteenth century had come in before ...
— The Critical Period of American History • John Fiske
... giving a diatribe on American life, so will not pursue the matter farther. All that I am trying to do is simply this: to call attention to the fact that we are living fast—faster than our physical and mental make-up can long ...
— On the Firing Line in Education • Adoniram Judson Ladd
... skill, and staggered off wounded unto death. His sympathy for the natives of the Congo was profound and intense; and his philippic against King Leopold for the atrocities he sanctioned called the attention of the whole world to conditions that constituted a disgrace to modern civilization. His diatribe against the Czar of Russia for his inhumanity to the serfs was an equally convincing proof of his noble determination to throw the whole weight of his influence in behalf of suffering and oppressed humanity. Some years before his death, he told me that he never intended to speak in public again ...
— Mark Twain • Archibald Henderson
... appetites, they respected none of those ties, anticipated none of those home pleasures, which consecrate the animal desires in everyday existence as we know it. One of their most popular poems is a brutal monastic diatribe on matrimony, fouler in its stupid abuse of women, more unmanly in its sordid imputations, than any satire which emanated from the corruption of Imperial Rome.[35] The cynicism of this exhortation against marriage forms a proper ...
— Wine, Women, and Song - Mediaeval Latin Students' songs; Now first translated into English verse • Various
... called to church in those days, and the beat was to me as a funeral march. The pale face of the preacher in the high pulpit overtowering us all was alight with stern zeal. The elders, sitting in a row below the pulpit facing us, listened to the fierce diatribe against the dark arts with looks of approbation that boded ill for M. Picot; and at every fresh fusillade of texts to bolster his argument, the line of deacons below the elders glanced back at the preacher approvingly. Rebecca sat on that side of ...
— Heralds of Empire - Being the Story of One Ramsay Stanhope, Lieutenant to Pierre Radisson in the Northern Fur Trade • Agnes C. Laut
... curtain lecture, blow up, wigging, dressing, rating, scolding, trimming; correction, set down, rap on the knuckles, coup de bec[Fr], rebuff; slap, slap on the face; home thrust, hit; frown, scowl, black look. diatribe; jeremiad, jeremiade; tirade, philippic. clamor, outcry, hue and cry; hiss, hissing; sibilance, sibilation, catcall; execration &c. 908. chiding, upbraiding &c.v.; exprobation[obs3], abuse, vituperation, invective, objurgation, contumely; hard ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... incidents that occurred was an unsavoury one. In the course of the discussions in the House of Commons over the Bill setting up this new Department of State, Sir H. Dalziel, a newspaper proprietor and a politician of long standing, delivered on the 1st of July a violent diatribe directed against Sir S. von Donop, the Master-General of the Ordnance. The honourable member no doubt quite honestly believed that the lack of munitions was due to neglect on the part of the War Office since the beginning ...
— Experiences of a Dug-out, 1914-1918 • Charles Edward Callwell
... unburied, is said to have exclaimed "that the smell of a dead enemy is very sweet."[1068] Great was the merriment of the low populace; copious were the effusions of wit. Jacques Copp de Vellay, in his poetical diatribe, published with privilege—"Le Deluge des Huguenotz"—sings ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... this would not have satisfied the truculent M. Tremplier, and in the next number of his paper he expressed in arrogant terms an utter disbelief in Mr. Hamerton's denial, and venomously attacked him for his nationality, literary pretensions, etc., winding up his diatribe, as usual, by a challenge. This was too much, and my husband resolved to start for Autun immediately, and to horsewhip the scoundrel as he deserved. Mr. Pickering, an English artist, and friend of ours, who happened to be at La Tuilerie, offered ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... forth, what had hitherto been only a vague wish on her part became a fixed idea with her, and she began to form plans. A certain incident served as a pretext. When putting some papers in order, Aurore came upon her husband's will. It was a mere diatribe, in which the future "deceased" gave utterance to all his past grievances against his idiotic wife. Her mind was made up irrevocably from this moment. She would have her freedom again; she would go to Paris and spend three months out of six there. She had a young tutor from ...
— George Sand, Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings • Rene Doumic
... of the Frenchman's diatribe flickered through his memory, and he smiled. He smiled because his eyes were open now. He seemed to see this Christian fellow sitting on his bed, bare-footed, rumple-haired, talking dogmatically of perfumes and vials and stoppers thrown away, talking of faith in women. ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... Prussian to deliver a phosphorescent diatribe on the racial traits of the Bavarian people as comprehended ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... stranger listening to your gallant diatribe would inevitably conclude that your mother was as unnatural and unamiable as Lord Byron's; and that I, your most devoted, meek, and loving cousin, was quite as angelic as Miss Edgeworth's ...
— St. Elmo • Augusta J. Evans |
