"Digression" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... digression, and our narrative demands that we proceed to tell how a twopenny fare in a little steamboat from Uleborg brought us to the tar stores. On a Finnish steamboat one often requires change, so much paper money being in use, and the plan for procuring it is somewhat original. In neat little paper bags ...
— Through Finland in Carts • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... her, he denounced certain popish superstitions in a book recently dedicated to her majesty. He specially denounced the use of the sign of the cross. Suddenly a harsh voice was heard in the royal closet. It was Elizabeth's. She chidingly bade Mr. Dean return from his ungodly digression and revert to his text. The next day the frightened dean wrote a most abject apology to the ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... that. Well, you keep your eye on the respected Spink. If he doesn't fail some day, and make a lot of money, I'm a Dutchman. But go on. This is digression. By the way, just push that electric button. You're nearest, and it is too hot to move. Thanks. ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr
... to the reign of Edward the Fourth, from which the desire to bring down the history of Saint George's Chapel to the present time has led to the foregoing digression. About the same time that the chapel was built, habitations for the dean and canons were erected on the north-east of the fane, while another range of dwellings for the minor canons was built at its ...
— Windsor Castle • William Harrison Ainsworth
... This apparent digression was necessary to a right understanding of the character of Berlin and its neighborhood in comparison with Vienna. Berlin was at the start a frontier post, but, unlike Vienna, it soon ceased to be one. Colonization and conquest left it far to the rear as an unimportant ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XVII. No. 101. May, 1876. • Various
... digression," let us see what the ancient cemetery of the Innocents was like. Round an irregular four-sided space, about five hundred feet by two, ran a low cloister-like building, called Les Charniers, or the Charnel Houses. It had originally been a cloister surrounding ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXVI. October, 1843. Vol. LIV. • Various
... included a crusty old gardener, who was at times, especially in the spring, so particularly cross that I might have been tempted to exchange him for the undisputed possession of that stock of seeds, tools, and flower-pots which formed our chief subject of dispute. But this is a digression.) I took the lowest. Could I part with Sandy Tom for any money, or for anything that money could buy? I thought of a speaking doll, a miniature piano, a tiny carriage drawn by four yellow mastiffs, ...
— Mrs. Overtheway's Remembrances • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... the young wife, who by her gentle loveliness had endeared herself to all. But after they were out of sight Montgomery became very restless, and, remaining only a short time on the sofa where we left him, when we commenced this long digression, he arose and paced the floor in deep and anxious thought, and at length, as if to throw off the terrible weight that oppressed him, went to the door where he had parted from his darling, and oh! horror! there stands her horse, panting and riderless, quivering in every limb with fright. Without an ...
— 'Three Score Years and Ten' - Life-Long Memories of Fort Snelling, Minnesota, and Other - Parts of the West • Charlotte Ouisconsin Van Cleve
... maids in terms too Burgundian to be printed here. That inexhaustible subject carried them so far that before they knew it they saw the capital of the arrondissement over which Gaubertin reigned, and which we hope excites enough curiosity in the reader's mind to justify a short digression. ...
— Sons of the Soil • Honore de Balzac
... which the fighting horses have led me to make so long a digression, we went right up into the "bad mountains," and crossed the three tremendous passes of Lebungetoge. Except by saying that this disused bridle-track is impassable, people have scarcely exaggerated its difficulties. One horse broke down on the first pass, and we were long ...
— Unbeaten Tracks in Japan • Isabella L. Bird
... this digression to the subject of recoil, we found that sandbags placed at a certain distance in rear of each wheel not only effectually checked the carriage, but also (a great consideration) ran it out again. This ...
— With the Naval Brigade in Natal (1899-1900) - Journal of Active Service • Charles Richard Newdigate Burne
... it will not be an impertinent digression to mention and explain briefly the services above mentioned, stating first that our religious serve as chaplains in the forts of Tandag, Calamianes, Bagangan, and Linao, with notable sacrifice both of their liberty (for they are often captured and illtreated) and of their lives, because of the ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXI, 1624 • Various
... ascertain its thickness and how far under water it extended. The boys soon tired of sitting idle in the boat and, as they had been forbidden to land on the treacherous ice of the reef, cast about for something to do. The professor soon provided a digression. ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... observes that the only town at that distance is Wukiang-hien, once of some little importance but now much reduced. WUKIANG, however, is suggestive of VUGHIN; and, in that supposition, Hu-chau must be considered the object of a digression from which the Traveller returns and takes up his route to Hang-chau via Wukiang. Kiahing would then best answer to Ciangan, or Caingan, as it is written in the following ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... book about Greenwich Village and not a defence of Thomas Paine. Yet, since the reader has come with me thus far, I am going to take advantage of his courteous attention for just another moment of digression. Here is my promise: that it shall take ...
— Greenwich Village • Anna Alice Chapin
... telling stories in company, unless they are very short indeed, and very applicable to the subject you are upon; in this case relate them in as few words as possible, without the least digression, and with some apology; as, that you hate the telling of stories, but the shortness of it induced you. And if your story has any wit in it, be particularly careful not to laugh at it yourself. Nothing is more tiresome and disagreeable than a long tedious narrative; ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... has been worked out—the ground is mined—the train is laid—a foreign force, in its nature transitory, alone stays the hand of those who would complete the process by applying the match. This seems, rather than is, a digression. When that event comes, it will bring about a great shifting of parts—much super-and much subter-position. God grant it may be for good. I desire it, because I see plainly that justice requires it. Not out of malice to the popedom; for I cannot ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley
... a long digression; I must back to my intriguing lovers, who have made good use of the lesson scene to repeat their protestations of affection and lay plots for attaining their happiness. In this they are helped by Figaro, who comes to shave Dr. Bartolo in spite of his protests, and, contriving to ...
— A Book of Operas - Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... necessary digression again brings us to the occasion when Fred's chums were applauding his double hit, after he had sent two successive snowballs so cleverly into the hole Bristles had selected ...
— Fred Fenton Marathon Runner - The Great Race at Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... Ulysses with the Cyclop as once happening to this obscure individual, and that his escape was owing to the same absurd equivoque by which the Grecian chief escaped from his tormentor. Our tale, however, hath reference to weightier matters, and the brief space we possess permits no further digression. This aged but hale and sturdy beggar wore a grey frieze coat or cloak loosely about his person. Long blue stocking gaiters, well patched and darned, came over his knee, while his doublet and hosen, ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... of monotyped composition has been waiting during this digression. It is lifted off the machine by the attendant and a rough proof pulled, which is corrected by the proof-reader. The advantage of the individual types is then apparent, for the composition is corrected and otherwise ...
— The Building of a Book • Various
... Avec un trait sur la nature de l'glogue, & une digression sur les anciens & les modernes. AParis, ...
— The Library of William Congreve • John C. Hodges
... and for the deterring others from attempting innovations under their government. This discourse of the Roman military conduct may also perhaps be of use to such of the curious as are ignorant of it, and yet have a mind to know it. I return now from this digression. ...
— The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem • Flavius Josephus
... chance to meet with, and which may or may not result fatally; if he who meets it dies, he is remembered on the anniversary of his death; and if he does not die, he takes himself off to a sufficient distance from the scene of his mishap—and no more is thought about the matter. With this digression we will now resume the ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Spanish • Various
... from the main facts as this philosophical digression may seem, it is essential for a number of reasons. One of these is the continual necessity for keeping in mind a clear, balanced perspective. Another lies in the need of presenting aright the conditions in which Vanderbilt and magnates of his type were produced. Their methods ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers
... no apology for this digression, knowing that, to many minds, facts connected with the rise of the iron trade will have as much interest as notes on the scene of a battle or the birthplace of a second-rate poet, besides, as we omit to ...
— Rides on Railways • Samuel Sidney
... Which is a digression; but which may or may not enable you to keep your head, next time a mad-dog scare sweeps ...
— Further Adventures of Lad • Albert Payson Terhune
... the feminists won't have anything to do with you because you're so reactionary. We're both out of it. Fifty years ago; either of us could have been a real prophet, for the price of a hall and cleaning the rotten eggs off our clothes. Now we're too timid for any use. But this is a digression." ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... flattering appearances, to live in a state of hallucination; and can forgive every thing but the plain, downright, simple honest truth—such as we see it chalked out in the character of Emilius.—To return from this digression, which is a ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... This digression may seem to carry one away from Wimbledon, but I should mention that many of the points enunciated were touched upon by M. Zola for the first time, while we postponed further house-hunting to drive over Wimbledon Common. The historic ...
— With Zola in England • Ernest Alfred Vizetelly
... celebrated the battle of the Frogs and Mice; Virgil sung of Bees; Polycrates commended Tyranny; Phavorinus sets forth the praises of Injustice; and Cardan pronounced the eulogy of Nero. The Golden Ass of Apulcius is well known; Henry Cornelius Agrippa has employed his wit and learning on an elaborate "Digression in praise of the Asse." Other authors have discovered virtues and excellencies in this animal, though the generality of mankind have agreed in supposing it possessed nothing remarkable but dulness and obstinacy. Lucian exercised his genius on a fly; ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various
... narrative of the Crusades belongs rather to the history of Europe than of any one country, it is so closely intertwined with the history of Egypt at this period that some digression is necessary. About twenty years after the conquest of Jerusalem by the Turks, in 1076, the Holy Sepulchre was visited by a hermit of the name of Peter, a native of Amiens, in the province of Picardy, France. His resentment and sympathy were excited by ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 12 (of 12) • S. Rappoport
... it would be a great waste of time. Here am I no farther than perhaps a third of my journey, and I have already admitted so much digression that my pilgrimage is like the story of a man asleep and dreaming, instead of the plain, honest, and straightforward narrative of fact. I will therefore postpone the Story of the Hungry Student till I get into the plains of Italy, or into ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc
... digression to our experience of the asteroid. The latter being a body of some mass was, of course, able to impart to us a measurable degree of weight. Being five miles in diameter, on the assumption that its mean density was ...
— Edison's Conquest of Mars • Garrett Putnam Serviss
... "without o'erflowing full," which is fed by the exercise of the kindly affections, and soon indeed must those stagnate where there are not proper objects to excite them. I have been forced into this painful digression by ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Vol. I. Jan. 1916 • Various
... to be a digression and somewhat outside the scope of this little work. I give it, however, to show the origin of the rifle, to which, after all, the bayonet is ...
— Broad-Sword and Single-Stick • R. G. Allanson-Winn
... We have made this digression so that my young readers may know why Bobby was so much given to big talk. The desire to do something worthy of a good son turned his attention to matters above his sphere; and thinking of great things, he had come to talk great things. It was not a bad fault, ...
— Now or Never - The Adventures of Bobby Bright • Oliver Optic
... great speakers say, this is a digression. Do you know what that is? It is leaving off what you are about, to dance off to something else—just as I did up there about hope. Now I'm ...
— Little Ferns For Fanny's Little Friends • Fanny Fern
... I fear, has been the intention, of those numberless books which are daily printed and industriously spread, of the persecutions in other countries and other religious persuasions.—These observations, which are a digression, but hardly, I think, can be considered as a departure from the subject, have detained us some time: we will now come ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VI. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... digression on the peril of idolatry, to which as well the theory as the practice of {244} the Roman Catholic Church exposes her members; and willingly repeat my disclaimer of any wish or intention whatever to fasten and filiate upon the Church ...
— Primitive Christian Worship • James Endell Tyler
... for Captain Swan had already 5000 l. in Gold, which he and his Merchants received for Goods sold mostly to Captain Harris [16] and his Men: which if he had laid but part of it out in Spice, as probably he might have done, would have satisfy'd the Merchants to their Hearts content. So much by way of digression. ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898—Volume 39 of 55 • Various
... thinks that he has said enough about this rather foreign subject, and apologizes for his digression in another paragraph that should remove any lingering doubt there might be with regard to the genuineness of his monastic character. At the end of the passage he makes the application in a very few words. The personal element in his confession is so ...
— Old-Time Makers of Medicine • James J. Walsh
... dominions, is so intimately connected with the great constitutional principle, that every man, whatever be his race or nation or previous condition, whose foot is once planted on British soil, is free from that moment, that it cannot be accounted a digression to mention the subject here. To our statesmen of Queen Anne's time traffic in slaves was so far from being considered discreditable, that the ministry of that reign prided themselves greatly on what was ...
— The Constitutional History of England From 1760 to 1860 • Charles Duke Yonge
... Lasette, "this is a digression from our subject. What I meant to say is this, that in our Ward is an excellent school house with a half score of well equipped and efficient teachers. The former colored school house was a dingy looking building about a mile and a half away with only one young school teacher, ...
— Trial and Triumph • Frances Ellen Watkins Harper
... reach the document, but it illustrates so well the manner in which maternal influence passes down from age to age, and throws so much light on the strange scenes which occurred at Charles's death, and is, moreover, so intrinsically excellent, that it well merits the digression. ...
— History of King Charles II of England • Jacob Abbott
... sense a digression, for there is no criticism of contemporary work in this volume. I think, however, as I have just endeavoured to point out, that criticism of contemporary work and criticism of classics should proceed on the same lines, and I think that both require the same qualities and the same outfit. ...
— Essays in English Literature, 1780-1860 • George Saintsbury
... finished for the day, that of the Chief of the State began; and indeed it might already be said that the First Consul was the whole Consulate. At the risk of interrupting my narrative of what occurred on our arrival at the Tuileries, by a digression, which may be thought out of place, I will relate a fact which had no little weight in hastening Bonaparte's determination to assume a superiority over his colleagues. It may be remembered that when Roger Ducos and Sieyes bore the title of Consuls the ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... which, in the progress of modern degeneracy, the stately architecture of Argyle Street was formed. But not to insist at too great a length on such topics of antiquarian lore, we shall now insert Dr. Pringle's account of the funeral, and which, patly enough, follows our digression concerning the middens and magnificence of Glasgow, as it contains an authentic anecdote of a manufacturer from that city, drinking champaign at ...
— The Ayrshire Legatees • John Galt
... From this long digression we return to the government of the viceroy Don Antonio de Noronha, who arrived in the beginning of September 1564, as formerly mentioned. In consequence of the cruelties exercised on the Moors of Malabar by Mesquita, as formerly mentioned, those of Cananor had besieged the Portuguese fort ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VI - Early English Voyages Of Discovery To America • Robert Kerr
... a gloomy kind of envy; for while it lasted, I had many, many hours of pure happiness. Dream not, Coleridge, of having tasted all the grandeur and wildness of fancy till you have gone mad! All now seems to me vapid,—comparatively so. Excuse this selfish digression. Your "Monody" [3] is so superlatively excellent that I can only wish it perfect, which I can't help feeling it is not quite. Indulge me in a few conjectures; what I am going to propose would make it more compressed and, I think, more energetic, though, I am sensible, at the ...
— The Best Letters of Charles Lamb • Charles Lamb
... that time a new project was on foot which Defoe had frequently declared his intention of starting, a paper devoted exclusively to the discussion of the affairs of trade. The Review at one time had declared its main subject to be trade, but had claimed a liberty of digression under which the main subject had all but disappeared. At last, however, in May, 1713, when popular excitement and hot Parliamentary debates were expected on the Commercial Treaty with France, an exclusively trading paper was established, entitled Mercator. Defoe denied being the author—that is, ...
— Daniel Defoe • William Minto
... farm itself: VI. How conformation of the land affects Agriculture VII. How character of soil affects Agriculture VIII. (A digression on the maintenance of vineyards) IX. Of the different kinds of soils X. Of the units of area ...
— Roman Farm Management - The Treatises Of Cato And Varro • Marcus Porcius Cato
... innocence of Mr. Marmozet, who, I am told, is as much as ever in favour with the earl; a circumstance that, surely, could not be, unless he had vindicated his character to the satisfaction of his lordship. Pray forgive this long digression, and give me the hearing a little longer; for, thank heaven! I ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... Protestant countries, of pictures from churches. A second cause was the restriction of chamber decorations to portraits and engravings; and a third, the craze of the connoisseur for Hogarth's hated "Black Masters," the productions of defunct foreigners. And this naturally brings about the following digression, quite in Hogarth's own way, against that contemporary charlatan, the picture-dealer:—"English painters have an obstacle to overcome, which equally impedes the progress of their talents and of their fortune. They have to contend with a class of men whose business it is to sell pictures; and as, ...
— De Libris: Prose and Verse • Austin Dobson
... consonants very little. This is so far true that even the wisest books on Language affect one, after all, like a series of brilliant puns. More important merits than this must, no doubt, be attributed to Max Mueller; but, after all, so wayward is he and so whimsical, such a lover of paradox and of digression, that he must perpetually exasperate that sedate race of men whom Philology is supposed to have peculiarly chosen for its own. In this second series of Lectures, especially, "we have been at a great feast of languages, and have ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 93, July, 1865 • Various
... digression. After "the fall of the Charter," November, 1684, the Congregationalists of Massachusetts Bay continued their government for two years, as if nothing had happened to their Charter; they promptly proclaimed ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 1 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Egerton Ryerson
... reader will excuse this digression, due by way of condolence to my worthy brethren of Grub Street, for the approaching barbarity that is likely to overspread all its regions by this oppressive and exorbitant tax. It has been my good fortune to receive my education there; and so ...
— English Satires • Various
... there is reason to fear that this discovery, which was thought would prove so much to their advantage, may, by their imprudence, become an occasion of much mischief to them. But it were too long to dwell on all that he told us he had observed in every place, it would be too great a digression from our present purpose: whatever is necessary to be told concerning those wise and prudent institutions which he observed among civilised nations, may perhaps be related by us on a more proper occasion. We asked him ...
— Utopia • Thomas More
... I will conclude this digression and dissertation on a bird's instinct by relating the action of a hen-pheasant I once witnessed, partly because it is the most striking one I have met with of that instantaneous recovery of a bird from an extremity of ...
— Birds in Town and Village • W. H. Hudson
... digression, to the portly German middle-aged business men who met weekly in Brunswick to improve their working knowledge of French and English, I must candidly say that I never detected the faintest shadow of animosity ...
— The Days Before Yesterday • Lord Frederick Hamilton
... subject is not lost sight of, there is no digression; may we, then, be permitted to arrest the reader's attention for a moment on the two absolutely unique barricades of which we have just spoken and which characterized ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... or rugs of the Mohammedans. They are composed of rich-hued silks of purple, ruby and amber. 'Tis said their delicacy of shade is marvelous and was suggested by the meadows of variegated flowers.' But this is a digression; you wished directions for making ...
— Mary at the Farm and Book of Recipes Compiled during Her Visit - among the "Pennsylvania Germans" • Edith M. Thomas
... street, flooded the cellars of the village and hissed upon our kitchen hearth. I give the history of the great whale that was landed on Whale Beach, and whose jaws, being now my gateway, will last for ages after my coffin shall have passed beneath them. Thence it is an easy digression to the halibut—scarcely smaller than the whale—which ran out six codlines and hauled my dory to the mouth of Boston harbor before I could touch him with ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... from this long digression. When Sister Bourgeois arrived at Ville-Marie in 1672, she realized the full responsibility of governing and providing for so many young aspirants to religion, and began to think seriously of giving some regular form to the community. Her second batch of postulants had already ...
— The Life of Venerable Sister Margaret Bourgeois • Anon.
... incident connected with the Wilderness campaign of which it may not be out of place to speak; and to avoid a digression further on I will mention ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... fearing that any other expression of my wishes would lead to further digression. His lordship then, putting on his spectacles, and reading from a paper, commenced thus, I, all the while, trembling ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... cancer, and it is removed only with grave danger to the afflicted. Everything, therefore, which may lighten our burdens and tend to relieve the situation should be the aim and study of our constituents. But this may be digression. ...
— The Statesmen Snowbound • Robert Fitzgerald
... so bad as that," with a feeble attempt at a pun. He paused to light a cigar, and absent-minded as usual, continued in digression. ...
— A Breath of Prairie and other stories • Will Lillibridge
... now make a digression. It must not be assumed that every one has the same sense of color, otherwise there would be no color blindness. Part of the researches of General Festing and myself have been on the subject of color ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 595, May 28, 1887 • Various
... This digression brings us a little nearer to Banawe; we leave the terraced hills behind us, after noting how free of all plants the retaining-walls are kept, the sole exception here and there being the dongola, with its brilliant ...
— The Head Hunters of Northern Luzon From Ifugao to Kalinga • Cornelis De Witt Willcox
... Adsum like the good Colonel? There are living critics who have all Mr. George Meredith's heroines and heroes and oddities at their finger ends, and yet forget that musical name, like the close of a rich hexameter, Clare Doria Forey. But this is a digression; it is perhaps admitted that George Sand, so great a novelist, gave the world few characters who live in and are dear to memory. We can just fancy one of her dignified later heroines, all self- renunciation and ...
— Old Friends - Essays in Epistolary Parody • Andrew Lang
... digression I must continue my narrative. We shot only two or three birds, and then had to hurry back to prepare for our departure. Our new canoe floated well, but was smaller than we could have wished. Over the centre was an awning ...
— On the Banks of the Amazon • W.H.G. Kingston
... this digression illustrating an artistic law, of which Gounod has made such effective use in the church scene of his "Faust" in heightening its tragic solemnity. The wild goblin symphony in the fifth act has added some new effects to the gamut ...
— Great Italian and French Composers • George T. Ferris
... "This digression had only one point, sir: to show you that I do not count you among these unworthy scholars. You are really eager to know the origin of this name, Antinea, and that before knowing what kind of woman it belongs to and her motives for holding you and ...
— Atlantida • Pierre Benoit
... digression, which introduces the visit of the Reverend Chauncy Fairweather to Elsie Venner. It was mentioned to her that he would like to call and see how she was, and she consented,—not with much apparent interest, for she had reasons of her own for ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 42, April, 1861 • Various
... which, since 1830, the Liberals have openly confessed in all its ramifications, would trench upon the domain of history and involve too long a digression. This glimpse of it is enough to show the double part which Philippe Bridau undertook to play. The former staff-officer of the Emperor was to lead a movement in Paris solely for the purpose of masking the real conspiracy ...
— The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... as their efforts for liberty show. At the North he gained his freedom by entering the American army; at the South, only by entering the British army, which was joined by more than fifteen thousand colored men. Jefferson says 30,000 negroes from Virginia alone went to the British army. I make the digression simply to assert that had the colored men at the South possessed the same opportunity as those at the North, of enlisting in the American army, a large force of colored men would have been in the field, fighting for America's independence. Of the services of the little band, ...
— The Black Phalanx - African American soldiers in the War of Independence, the - War of 1812, and the Civil War • Joseph T. Wilson
... situation was that printing enabled Erasmus, having once become a centre and an authority, to address the world at large immediately about all that occurred to him. Much of his later mental labour is, after all, really but repetition, ruminating digression, unnecessary vindication from assaults to which his greatness alone would have been a sufficient answer, futilities which he might have better left alone. Much of this work written directly for the press is journalism at bottom, and we do Erasmus an injustice by applying to it the tests ...
— Erasmus and the Age of Reformation • Johan Huizinga
... terrier who kept a gentleman—a gentleman who had been brought up at Oxford, too. The dog kept the gentleman entirely for his glorification, and the gentleman never talked about anything but the terrier. This, however, was not in a shy neighbourhood, and is a digression consequently. ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... digression, since it is better that from the outset we should divest ourselves of all delusions and recognize existing conditions as they really are in order that it may help to eliminate these ignorant superstitions from the public ...
— Valere Aude - Dare to Be Healthy, Or, The Light of Physical Regeneration • Louis Dechmann
... digression for a moment or two while they waited for their drinks and imbibed them. And then Fred, with the air of one who utters a profound truth, and answers questions both spoken and unspoken, observed as ...
— The Philistines • Arlo Bates
... devotes a long digression to the trivial value of recitations, so styled, {62b} and gives his suggestions about the copy being made up from the Reliques. When Scott's copy of 1806 agrees with the English version, Colonel Elliot surmises that a modern person, familiar with the English, has written the coincident ...
— Sir Walter Scott and the Border Minstrelsy • Andrew Lang
... that on every other subject he is discreto, one, in fact, whose faculty of discernment is in perfect order. The advantage of this is that he is enabled to make use of Don Quixote as a mouthpiece for his own reflections, and so, without seeming to digress, allow himself the relief of digression when he requires it, as freely as in a ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... trifling, illness. Whenever the body is weak, the mind also should be allowed to rest, if the invalid be a person of thought and reflection; otherwise Butler's Analogy itself would not do her any harm. It is only "Lorsqu'il y a vie, il y a danger." This is a long digression, but one necessary to my subject; for I feel the importance of impressing on your mind that it can never be your duty to give up that which is otherwise expedient for you, on the grounds of its being a cause ...
— The Young Lady's Mentor - A Guide to the Formation of Character. In a Series of Letters to Her Unknown Friends • A Lady
... Italians come mountebanking along in an ill-fitting, machine-made suit of second-hand flourishes, as though that were the best they could lay their hands on. They have not done themselves justice. But this is not the place for a digression; before returning to Pilate and his visitors, however, let me say distinctly that the music was the Italian Marcia Reale played, not as the other scraps were played, but with a loud and jaunty heartlessness ...
— Castellinaria - and Other Sicilian Diversions • Henry Festing Jones
... or again, a tree-top excursion, as they called it, in the great swing under the chestnut-trees. Then, while they mended their stockings, Margaret would give Peggy a "talk-lesson," the only kind that she was willing to receive, on English history, with an occasional digression to the Trojan war, or the Norse mythology, as the case might be. Peggy detested history, and knew next to nothing of it, and this was a ...
— Three Margarets • Laura E. Richards
... to detail these transactions in a manner which may, to some readers, appear an impertinent digression from the narrative in which this history is at present engaged, in order to set in a clearer light some points of the greatest importance. In the first place, from the summary review of the affairs of Scotland, and from ...
— A History of the Early Part of the Reign of James the Second • Charles James Fox
... yet there is a stiffness in the regularity in which it grows, propped up by sticks; and it is so short, that one's fancy as to its luxuriance, (especially if formed from such poetry as Childe Harold,) is certainly disappointed. I made a digression from the road up the little river Aar, which falls into the Rhine near Sinzig. A more striking picture you cannot imagine. The stream is remarkably clear and rapid, the bottom rocky, and its banks, for a considerable ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 326, August 9, 1828 • Various
... I will no' deny it, At the first gliff a hantle tryit To see yoursel' in sic a station— It seemed a doubtfue' dispensation. The feelin' was a mere digression; For shuene I understood the session, An' mindin' Aiken an' M'Neil, I wondered they had duene sae weel. I saw I had mysel' to blame; For had I but remained at hame, Aiblins—though no ava' deservin' 't— They micht hae named ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 14 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the thing which it was his custom to do, feels a little scratching in the brain, a little irritating something which comes of being out of the rut, and imagines it to be the prick of conscience, the still, small voice that is urging him ever to righteousness. If the digression is unusual enough, the drag of habit will be heavy enough to cause the unreasoning victim to return and perform the perfunctory thing. "Now, bless me," says such a mind, "I have done my duty," when, as a matter of fact, it has merely done ...
— Sister Carrie • Theodore Dreiser
... this long digression, necessary to explain how a middle-aged couple of slight pedestrian ability, and loaded with a heavy knapsack and basket, should have started out on a rough walk and climb, fourteen miles in all, we will return to ourselves, standing on the little bluff and gazing out upon ...
— A Chosen Few - Short Stories • Frank R. Stockton
... had passed between them upon the subject of Cynthia's recognition. West adhered strictly to business during his brief interviews with his chief. The smallest digression on Babbacombe's part he invariably ignored as unworthy of his attention, till even Babbacombe, with all his courtly consideration for others, began to regard him as a mere automaton, and almost ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... legs, d—d the pigs, and, taking her husband's arm, hastened down the hatchway; so that I lost the kiss to which I was entitled for my services. I consoled myself by the reflection that, "please the pigs," I might be more fortunate the next time that I officiated in my clerical capacity. This is a digression, I grant, but I cannot help it; it is the nature of man to digress. Who can say that he has through life kept in the straight path? This is a world of digression; and I beg that critics will take no notice of mine, as I have an idea that my digressions in this work are as agreeable to my readers, ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... with my own: I know it is one not liable to take infection: it is a peculiar mind: it is a unique one. Happily I do not mean to harm it: but, if I did, it would not take harm from me. The more you and I converse, the better; for while I cannot blight you, you may refresh me." After this digression he proceeded— ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... wandering affections, nor of the attempt made by Mwres to utilise hypnotism as a corrective to this digression of her heart; he conceived he was on the best of terms with Elizabeth, and had made her quite successfully various significant presents of jewellery and the more virtuous cosmetics, when her elopement with Denton threw the world out of gear for him. His first aspect of the matter was rage ...
— Tales of Space and Time • Herbert George Wells
... proceed from that attitude," Lee explained, "it was a sort of digression. I want to do whatever is possible to break it up; ...
— Cytherea • Joseph Hergesheimer
... their life away; and, while they remain addicted to their delights, or rather corrupt tastes, let them leave me to follow my own bent during the brief life that is accorded us. But this has been a long digression, fair ladies, and 'tis time to retrace our steps to the point where we deviated, and continue in the ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio
... is interesting to compare with Copleston's remarks what Thackeray says on the same subjects in the twenty-fourth chapter of Pendennis, entitled 'The Pall Mall Gazette.' This brochure is evidently modelled on Swift's 'Digression Concerning Critics' in the third section of the Tale of a Tub, and owes something also to the Treatise on the Bathos in Pope's and Swift's Miscellanies, as the title may have been suggested by Shaftesbury's Advice to an Author. The Advice itself and the supplementary critique of Milton ...
— An English Garner - Critical Essays & Literary Fragments • Edited by Professor Arber and Thomas Seccombe
... perhaps may, at some future period, write volumes on this subject, we return for the present from a digression into which we have been insensibly led by the temporary excitement of ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson
... Consequent phrase is a complete affirmation of its Antecedent, agreeing in its melodic form with the latter until the cadence is nearly due, when an extra measure is inserted (as extension), and the usual digression into the necessary perfect cadence is made. The condition of Unity predominates, but a noticeable ...
— Lessons in Music Form - A Manual of Analysis of All the Structural Factors and - Designs Employed in Musical Composition • Percy Goetschius
... that at the time at which Moses spoke, God had chosen for Himself the tribe of Levi in order that He may point out the reason for their election, and for the fact of their not sharing in the inheritance; after this digression, he resumes the thread of Moses' speech. (111) To these parentheses we must add the preface to the book, and all the passages in which Moses is spoken of in the third person, besides many which we cannot now distinguish, though, doubtless, they would have been plainly ...
— A Theologico-Political Treatise [Part II] • Benedict de Spinoza
... of Alexander the Great to the time of Ptolemy the Geographer; with a digression on the Inland Trade between India and the Shores of the Mediterranean, through Arabia, ...
— Robert Kerr's General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 • William Stevenson
... though, in following your bent, you were compelled to climb an occasional fence or cross a chance puddle, the satisfaction of coming suddenly upon some pleasant view, or unexpectedly entering an apparently previously unexplored nook, more than atoned for such trifling annoyances. Without digression in some degree, neither spoken nor written language can be made entertaining to the person addressed. Who is more discursive than the Autocrat, the Czar of table-talkers; and whose productions are more charming or wiser? We do not do our everyday thinking in ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 2, August, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... Father Montfort was away from home the first day; the second day he came home, and went up after Master James. He was a powerful man, Father Montfort, and an excellent climber. Yes, poor old Jim! he did not climb again for several days. Well, as I was saying, after all this very egotistical digression, I found the box in question some forty years ago. I withdrew the—a—contents—and substituted for them my ...
— Fernley House • Laura E. Richards
... vegetation, and of course can give no crop. This is the reason why manure is spread upon land—the manure consisting of substances that are for the most part organic, and contain the principles of life and vegetation. Of course, gentlemen, these things are known to you; but you will pardon my digression, as my children are listening to me, and I never lose an opportunity of instructing them in facts that may hereafter ...
— The Desert Home - The Adventures of a Lost Family in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... its blind and sightless course. All at table were speaking of this man's villainy and bloody counsels, when the Emperor himself said: "I wonder what his fate would be if he were alive to-day," to which Mauricus replied, "He would be dining with us." I have made a long digression, but willingly. The Council resolved that the contest should be abolished, because it had corrupted the morals of Vienne, just as our contests have corrupted the whole world. For the vices of Vienne go no further ...
— The Letters of the Younger Pliny - Title: The Letters of Pliny the Younger - - Series 1, Volume 1 • Pliny the Younger
... answer or conclusion. In other cases a second phrase follows along the track of a closely related chord, but I have never noticed a case in which a third phrase appeared, corresponding to the first, after a digression of the second phrase into another chord. Generally the rhythm runs out with a series of what might be called inarticulate drum-beats, as if an impulse existed still unsatisfied, blindly making itself felt in these insignificant pulsations; ...
— The Masters and their Music - A series of illustrative programs with biographical, - esthetical, and critical annotations • W. S. B. Mathews
... Wainwright is gone, and I am an elderly woman with an increasing tendency to live in the past. The contrast between my old doctor at home and the Casanova doctor, Frank Walker, always rouses me to wrath and digression. ...
— The Circular Staircase • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... writer of so much inspiration and promise as the author of this poem, and exhort him once again, to greater clearness of expression and less quaintness in the choice of his phraseology; but this is not the time or place for digression.' ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1 of 2) • Frederic G. Kenyon
... he had written nothing else, would have placed him among the first critics and the first poets, as it exhibits every mode of excellence that can embellish or dignify didactic composition, selection of matter, novelty of arrangement, justness of precept, splendour of illustration, and propriety of digression. I know not whether it be pleasing to consider that he produced this piece at twenty, and never afterwards excelled it: he that delights himself with observing that such powers may be soon attained, ...
— Lives of the English Poets: Prior, Congreve, Blackmore, Pope • Samuel Johnson
... excellence and divinity of Michael Angelo in great part to the training he received from his father: he received absolutely no assistance from him;(9) nevertheless, Michael Angelo does not complain of it, nay, even praises Domenico both for his art and his manners. But this is a slight digression; let us return ...
— Michael Angelo Buonarroti • Charles Holroyd
... the Academy—to return from this digression—is the famous Madonna of Cimabue. This picture is astonishing. Although considered by many critics to manifest lingering traces of the Byzantine bandages, it seems to us, on the contrary, to be ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... seldom that honest industry will thus accumulate. The letters I shall publish will be accompanied with explanatory notes. The persons concerned will recognise their own productions, and I hope to see such a change in their future life as shall deserve a charitable silence. But I return from my digression. ...
— Secret Band of Brothers • Jonathan Harrington Green
... a doubtful day off from where it is customary to take a boat. We had started somewhat late, stopped for the lack of umbrella, and now were committed to a digression for letters I expected at Shimonosuwa. I never order my letters to meet me on the line of march but I bitterly repent having chosen that special spot. There is always some excellent reason why it turns out most inconvenient. But as yet I was hopeful, for I thought I knew the speed of ...
— Noto, An Unexplored Corner of Japan • Percival Lowell
... characteristic is his profound belief that his failure in another line is owing to the malignity of the world at large. In one of his most characteristic Essays he asks whether genius is conscious of its powers. He writes what he declares to be a digression about his own experience, and we may believe as much as we please of his assertion that he does not quote himself as an example of genius. He has spoken, he declares, with freedom and power, and will not cease ...
— Hours in a Library - New Edition, with Additions. Vol. II (of 3) • Leslie Stephen
... run away from myself, and what most concerns myself, if I could! This digression brings me back again to the occasion of it—and that to the impatience I was in, when I ended my last letter, for my situation is not altered. I renew, therefore, my former earnestness, as the new day approaches, and will bring with it perhaps new trials, that you ...
— Clarissa, Volume 2 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... digression. We remained encamped on this spot five days, during three of which the hunters were at work incessantly, and immense quantities of meat and hides were brought in. Great alarm, however, prevailed ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... passively endure the succession of impulses which are evolved out of the original exciting cause; they are passed on from one idea to another and go steadily forward, plodding along one line of thought in spite of the amplest concessions of the hearer, or wandering from it in endless digression in spite of his remonstrances. Now, if, as is very certain, no one would envy the madman the glow and originality of his conceptions, why must we extol the cultivation of that intellect which is the prey, not indeed of barren fancies but of barren facts, of random intrusions ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)
... was totally insensible to his surroundings; his mind was very busy with the interview from which he had come, and the interview to which he was speeding. Once he permitted himself a digression, that he might point a moral for the ...
— St. Martin's Summer • Rafael Sabatini
... of the digression to state his business. He briefly recounted the circumstances of the discovery of the hidden wealth of Smith's Pocket, and exhibited the memorandum he had shown the doctor. When he had concluded, Judge Plunkett looked at him ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... this digression: having fair weather and the winds hanging southerly I jogged on to the eastward to make the Cape. On the third of June we saw a sail to leeward of us, showing English colours. I bore away to speak with her, and found her to be the Antelope of London, commanded ...
— A Voyage to New Holland • William Dampier
... happens, we must wait; for no man unites the experience and the temperament necessary. This could be proved, if proof were required; but, happily, proof of assertions is not always required, and proof of this one would lead us into a long digression, bristling with disputable matter, and requiring perhaps hardly less rare qualities than the task of writing the treatise itself. The modest scribe is reduced to telling how Claudia behaved, without pretending to tell why she behaved so, far less attempting to group ...
— Father Stafford • Anthony Hope
... tell you why, even at the price of digression. Long ago, when Billy Louise was twelve or so, and lived largely in a dream world of her own with Minervy for her "pretend" playmate, she had one day chanced upon a paragraph in a paper that had come from town wrapped around a package of matches. It was ...
— The Ranch at the Wolverine • B. M. Bower
... sanctity, written as they were upon his brow and gait, have given rise to the above digression, reached at length the extremity of the principal street, which terminates upon the park of Woodstock. A battlemented portal of Gothic appearance defended the entrance to the avenue. It was of mixed ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott
... time to return from this digression. Matters being now in a good train at Cape Palmas, we go to use our ...
— Journal of an African Cruiser • Horatio Bridge
... Maria, Shirley's Royal Mistress, the reader will pardon a digression, which flows from tenderness, and is no more than an expression of humanity. Her life-time in England was embittered with a continued persecution; she lived to see the unhappy death of her Lord; she witnessed her exiled sons, not only oppressed with want, but obliged to quit ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume II • Theophilus Cibber
... risk of its being regarded as an unpardonably wide digression, reference may here be made, not to another cross, but to a monumental stone of another kind and of a much later date (although no date is inscribed upon it.) It is what is known as the "Ebenezer" stone of the parish. Though at one time lying flat and covered with crop-bearing soil, ...
— Chronicles of Strathearn • Various
... protestations. Before my mother wrote last to him, and that a considerable time, he had sent me a solemn Contract of Marriage, wherein he declared he never had been married before, and stiled me therein "Mrs. Cranstoun." But to put an end to this digression, and proceed to what happened after ...
— Trial of Mary Blandy • William Roughead
... This digression, suggested by the remembrance of the poet under his trees, breaks my narrative, but gives me the opportunity of paying a debt of gratitude. For I have owned many beautiful trees, and loved many more outside of my own leafy ...
— Our Hundred Days in Europe • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... investigates and refutes the first principles of other philosophers, notably Heraclitus, Empedocles, and Anaxagoras; and the book ends with a short proof that the atoms are infinite in number and space infinite in extent. The Second Book opens with a digression on the folly of ambition; but, returning to the atoms, treats of the combination which enables them to form and perpetuate the present variety of things. All change is ultimately due to the primordial motion of the atoms. This motion, naturally in a straight line, is occasionally deflected; ...
— A History of Roman Literature - From the Earliest Period to the Death of Marcus Aurelius • Charles Thomas Cruttwell
... continuing this digression from the narrative, to speak particularly of the disorder in the medical department. The surgeons of regiments were, as a general rule, men of ability, and who were earnestly devoted to the duties of their position. Of course, in so large an army, there were some who were not fitted for their ...
— Three Years in the Sixth Corps • George T. Stevens
... sort of "deadlock" situation such as she loves, and in the interval, while Cyrus is gathering forces to attack Thomyris, the author, as is her fashion likewise, surrenders herself to the joys of digression. We have a great deal of retrospective history of Aryante, and at last the famous Scythian philosopher, Anacharsis, is introduced, bringing with him the rest of the Seven Ancient Sages—with whom we could dispense, but are not allowed to do so. There is ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... deeply resented the insulting terms in which Byron wrote of Polidori, and, although h deeply admired the genius of Byron, did not fail to note where any weakness of form could be found in his work—such is human nature, and so is poetic justice meted out. This might appear to be a slight digression from our subject, if it were not for the fact that when Mary wrote Frankenstein at Secheron, as one of the tales of horror that were projected by the assembled party, it was only John Polidori's story of The Vampire which was ...
— Mrs. Shelley • Lucy M. Rossetti
... stature. It was partly made good by the ingenuity with which he explained how he had come to make the mistake. And if there was loss in intellectual prestige, there was an increased sense of intellectual comradeship. But this is a trifling and not wholly serious digression. ...
— The School and the World • Victor Gollancz and David Somervell
... about Christina are a digression, and Burnet is now returning to the respect in which Cromwell was held by ...
— How to Write Clearly - Rules and Exercises on English Composition • Edwin A. Abbott
... the succession of notes differs in each case. Brahms's theme, already at the eighth bar, recommences in a key a tone lower; a similar proceeding, by the way, is to be found in Beethoven's Sonata in G (Op. 31, No 1). After a few points of imitation, and digression through various keys, we meet with a new theme in A minor, the soft, tender character of which contrasts well with the bold opening one. But unity amid diversity is Brahms' aim; and here the contrast does ...
— The Pianoforte Sonata - Its Origin and Development • J.S. Shedlock
... This is a digression, but, it came from contemplating the singular beauty of one woman's soul, among the tarnished multitude of victims to that social levity and those superficial virtues that society honors, and with which our modern fashionable women ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera
... this preliminary digression to the examinations. These examinations are of the most practical character and serve to develop the mental abilities and intelligent understanding of the clerks. To clearly understand the method, the clerk should ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Vol. 1, Issue 1. - A Massachusetts Magazine of Literature, History, - Biography, And State Progress • Various
... digression into the discussion of two special points, to the question as to those whose condition of life involves chastity. The above Stra declares that as persons of that class are referred to by Scripture as specially concerned with meditation ('He who is founded on Brahman reaches immortality;' 'those ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut
... say, a picture, and said, "I have just done it." Apelles replied, "Without your telling me, I should know it was painted quickly; I only wonder you haven't painted more such in the time." As then (for I now return from my digression), I advise to avoid stilted and bombastic language, so again do I urge to avoid a finical and petty style of speech; for tall talk is unpopular, and petty language makes no impression. And as the body ought to be not only sound but in good condition, so speech ought to be not only not feeble but ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... Wi' social nose whiles snuff'd an' snowkit; Whiles mice an' moudieworts they howkit; Whiles scour'd awa' in lang excursion, An' worry'd ither in diversion; Until wi' daffin' weary grown Upon a knowe they set them down. An' there began a lang digression. About the "lords ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... (1) Saxo now goes back to the history of Denmark. All the events hitherto related in Bk. III, after the first paragraph, are a digression in retrospect. (2) M. conjectures that this was a certain Harald, the bastard son of Erik the Good, and a wild and dissolute man, who died in 1135, not long before the probable date of Saxo's birth. (3) Shakespere's tragedy, "Hamlet", is ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned") |
