"Fault" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... time her one fault had vanished. She was simple and modest and self-respecting, while she retained the courage and cheerfulness which had made her attractive as a girl. "If you wish to cure a girl of conceit," she once said to a friend, "let her try to earn her living. As long as she does not ask to be paid, ...
— Girls and Women • Harriet E. Paine (AKA E. Chester}
... that when we find our Tench cover'd with black Scales, they Will always taste muddy, which is the fault of the River-Tench about Cambridge; but where we find Tench of a golden Colour, we are sure of good Fish, that will eat sweet without the trouble of putting 'em into clear ...
— The Country Housewife and Lady's Director - In the Management of a House, and the Delights and Profits of a Farm • Richard Bradley
... our family affairs peaceably and affectionately! (Jumps up and turns to HARALD.) The whole thing is your fault! ...
— Three Dramas - The Editor—The Bankrupt—The King • Bjornstjerne M. Bjornson
... it is your misfortune rather than your fault, Mr. Temple. It is because you do not know ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... myself look at it, there is no fault nor folly of my life—and both have been many and great—that does not rise up against me, and take away my joy, and shorten my power of possession of sight, of understanding. And every past effort of my life, every gleam of rightness or good in it, is with me now, to help me in my grasp ...
— The Queen of the Air • John Ruskin
... it," said Mrs. Eben sorrowfully. "Sara hasn't any more notion of taking Lige than ever she had. I'm sure it's not MY fault. I've talked and argued till I'm tired. I declare to you, Amelia, I am terribly disappointed. I'd set my heart on Sara's marrying Lige—and now to ...
— Further Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... post-chaise. Mr Ramsden's servant shall come with me to conduct you to the asylum, and I trust in a quarter of an hour to see you clear of these foolish people of Overton, who think that you are the party in fault: you had better remain in your room, and not appear again at the window; the crowd will disperse when they are tired of watching: good-bye, my ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... device recognised by Mohammadan law for protecting married women from capricious repudiation. The husband binds himself to refund a fictitious dowry, generally far above his means, in case he should divorce his wife for no fault of hers. Ramzan was accepted by Sadhu, and the marriage was duly celebrated. Maini Bibi was a handsome girl; but beauty was among the least of her gifts. She was sweet-tempered, thrifty, and obedient, winning sympathy on all sides. The one discordant note was struck by Ramzan's ...
— Tales of Bengal • S. B. Banerjea
... dark man, whose outward appearance was in keeping with his position as the Vulcan of such an undertaking as he was then engaged in. "You'll find him not a bad feller if you only don't cross him." He added, with a wink, "His only fault is that he's given to spoilin' good victuals, being raither floored by sea-sickness if it comes on to ...
— The Lighthouse • R.M. Ballantyne
... "It is mere pride, and the desire to be thought more rigid than any of us. Nay, I will not quit my advantage. You know well that when she has us at fault no one can, in a civil way, lay your error before you more precisely than can my Lady Edith. ...
— The Talisman • Sir Walter Scott
... Barrake herself, I believe, were the only people who really enjoyed this little event. "Ha!" Mahomet exclaimed, "this is your own fault! You insisted upon speaking kindly, and telling her that she is not a slave; now she thinks that she is one of your WIVES!" This was the real fact; the unfortunate ** Barrake ** had deceived herself. Never having been free, she could not understand the use ...
— In the Heart of Africa • Samuel White Baker
... The only fault to be found with the paragraph in the Cologne Gazette quoted by your Berlin Correspondent, supposing it to be correctly transcribed, would be that it seems to imply that the above-mentioned Art. 7 legitimatises the supply of war ...
— Letters To "The Times" Upon War And Neutrality (1881-1920) • Thomas Erskine Holland
... extremely ill of a fever, in consequence of the scenes to which she had lately been a witness, and particularly the catastrophe of her late playmate. The affection of the glee maiden rendered her so attentive and careful a nurse, that the glover said it should not be his fault if she ever touched lute again, save for her ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... mistress. Not that I cared much for giving up my post, for, in spite of my father's great kindness, I always feared that I did not manage well for so large a family (with the men, and a girl under Kaetchen, we sat down eleven each night to supper). But when Babette began to find fault with Kaetchen, I was unhappy at the blame that fell on faithful servants; and by-and-by I began to see that Babette was egging on Karl to make more open love to me, and, as she once said, to get done with it, and take me off to a home of my own. My father was growing ...
— Curious, if True - Strange Tales • Elizabeth Gaskell
... assert we captured in a time of truce. Of such a truce we wish to inform you we are ignorant. He was lawfully taken, inasmuch as he was one of Norby's men.... As to our ammunition you say that it was captured from you and carried off to Gotland. If so, it was no fault of ours. We have written frequently about it, but have met with nothing but delays. If Norby, who you say has sworn allegiance to you, holds this ammunition in Visby Castle, it is unquestionably in your power to order that it be returned. ...
— The Swedish Revolution Under Gustavus Vasa • Paul Barron Watson
... sure you will forgive me that I cannot do all I promised. It does not grieve you more than it humiliates me. To think that I should offer so much and perform nothing! But it is not my fault, nor is it the fault of any ...
— The Old Countess; or, The Two Proposals • Ann S. Stephens
... me, in a way. And yet it wasn't our fault, Zoeth. You know as well as I do that Marcellus didn't want to see us. We was over to see him last and he scarcely said a word while we was there. You and me did all the talkin' and he just set and looked at us—when he wasn't lookin' at the floor. ...
— Mary-'Gusta • Joseph C. Lincoln
... "It was my fault," said Harry presently. "I never could say the half I wanted to when she was with me. My tongue is too slow. She gave me a chance and I wasn't man enough to take it. That's all I've got to say on ...
— A Man for the Ages - A Story of the Builders of Democracy • Irving Bacheller
... found against the tedium of long confinement and daily monotony. I do not say this reproachfully, as I consider it arises from the peculiarity of their profession, and must be considered to be more their misfortune than their fault. They enter upon a military life just after they have left school,—the very period at which, from previous and forced application, they have been surfeited with books usque ad nauseam. The parade, dress; the ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... many proofs of it. Surely this disposition is normal; it departs from the average only by an excess of imagination that is replaced in others by an excessive tendency to observe, to analyze, or to criticise, reason, find fault. In order to take the decisive step and become abnormal one condition more ...
— Essay on the Creative Imagination • Th. Ribot
... to your heaven, you heavenly quires! Earth hath the heaven of your desires; Remove your dwelling to your God, A stall is now His blest abode; Sith men their homage do deny, Come, angels, all their fault supply. ...
— In The Yule-Log Glow, Vol. IV (of IV) • Harrison S. Morris
... I must not blame her parents: it was her dear Miss Howe's fault to do so. But what an enormity was there in her crime, which could set the best of parents (they had been to her, till she disobliged them) in a bad light, for resenting the rashness of a child from whose education they had reason to expect better fruits! There were some hard circumstances ...
— Clarissa, Volume 7 • Samuel Richardson
... men," said Captain Garland; "if you haven't got a ship, I shall be very glad if you will join the Ruby. I do not believe that there are many frigates in the service will beat her in any way, and I promise you it will not be my fault if ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston
... (though there are those who call him Brave by analogy, because he somewhat resembles the Brave man who agrees with him in being free from fear); but poverty, perhaps, or disease, and in fact whatever does not proceed from viciousness, nor is attributable to his own fault, a man ought not to fear: still, being fearless in respect of these would not constitute a man Brave in the proper sense ...
— Ethics • Aristotle
... 'No fault of yours,' the manager answered; 'but we find that you have not been regularly apprenticed to the trade. This is a Union house, and we are under Union rules.' Paul took up the half-sovereign and the small mound of silver the manager pushed towards ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray
... after all. Yes—in the letters that compose it, but not in the spirit; not in the special sense up to this time attached to it in the "Origin of Species." The expression as used here is one with which Erasmus Darwin would have found little fault, for it means not as elsewhere in Mr. Darwin's book and on his title-page the preservation of "favoured" or lucky varieties, but the preservation of varieties that have come to be varieties through the causes assigned ...
— Luck or Cunning? • Samuel Butler
... not more than a few hours since I heard you were here, so I've come to tell you that I'm alive and all right, and all that I've done that wasn't very nice was your fault; but, look here, I've something else to say: I don't know why you've come here to see this old preacher, or who he is, or what you have to do with him; but it would be cruel and mean of you now, after driving me to do what I did, to tell the people here ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall
... he said nodding toward an untidy tray. "I hate to seem to be finding fault all the time, but really her breath was enough to set the house on fire! Can't you keep her down to ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... he had passed his fiftieth year with fortune as far away as ever, and he caught at the bait of a thousand dollars, though he knew he was breaking the laws of his country. But he's dead," added the revenue officer, uncovering his head for a moment; "therefore we won't discuss his fault further." ...
— The Meadow-Brook Girls by the Sea - Or The Loss of The Lonesome Bar • Janet Aldridge
... men on deck. Their sea bath and the struggle had brought them to their senses; but when, after staring around for some time, they saw that the ship was a hopeless wreck, cast away on an apparently barren island, they very nearly lost them again. To find fault with them at such a moment would have been folly. "Come, I advise you to go on shore, for very likely the ship will go to pieces during the night, if the wind rise again," I said quietly. They were far from disposed to thank me for my advice, though, after looking about for a few minutes, they ...
— James Braithwaite, the Supercargo - The Story of his Adventures Ashore and Afloat • W.H.G. Kingston
... climax is opposed to or in contrast with a climax. In rhetoric it is a figure or fault of style consisting of an abrupt descent (down the ladder) from stronger ...
— Orthography - As Outlined in the State Course of Study for Illinois • Elmer W. Cavins
... months of expectancy is very annoying and often spoils an otherwise restful night's sleep. This is probably also a pressure symptom, if the physician's analysis of the urine proves that the kidneys are not at fault. If you have electric lights in the home, a very useful contrivance can be made which will give you great relief. The light end of an extension cord, five to seven feet in length, is soldered into the center of the ...
— The Mother and Her Child • William S. Sadler
... "It's our own fault," an Englishman said to me, speaking somewhat sardonically of the failure of the Rumanians to go in with Italy in spite of having accepted a timely loan from England. "We put our money on the wrong horse! No, they'll keep on talking—they're ...
— Antwerp to Gallipoli - A Year of the War on Many Fronts—and Behind Them • Arthur Ruhl
... at a time, weeping without knowing why. Her digestion was poor; for weeks her stomach refused all nourishment. At night she would toss about in bed, unable to sleep and at daybreak she was up flitting about the house with a feverish activity, turning things upside down, finding fault with the servant, with her husband, with herself, until suddenly she would collapse from the height of her excitement and ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... cannot pretend to prophesy your fate; but I offer you an opportunity to escape from the wreck. Join the Patriot army, and I pledge my word that San Martin shall give you the rank of colonel at once. In a year it will be your own fault if you are not a general. Come, what do ...
— At the Point of the Sword • Herbert Hayens
... bloodshed, why didn't you come out last night when the second mate tried to kill some of us. We are willing to turn to again; but not under that hound. We meant to kill him, he deserved it and if he is not dead it is not our fault. We are well aware that there is no law for a sailor before the mast, so at times the sailor has to take the law in his own hands. Now me and my mates are willing to work ship under you and the first mate but you must keep that brute out of ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... courteous, so gentle, so seeming tender, that others spoke easily to him of their troubles and seemed to find help in his words; then had come the day when the Bishop had sent him to St. Mary's, and there too everything had been as easy to him as before. Yes, that had been the fault all through! he had won by a certain grace what ought to have been won by deep purity and eager desire and ...
— Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories - Reprinted from The Hill of Trouble and The Isles of Sunset • Arthur Christopher Benson
... always safely trust them. What he expected to have done, he found was done, in good season, and in the best manner. His men never made so few mistakes, had so few disputes among themselves; they never injured and destroyed so few tools, found so little fault with their manner of living, or were, on the whole, so pleasant to one another, and to their employer. The men appeared, more than ever before, like brethren of the same family, satisfied with their ...
— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society
... excuse is my ardent passion, which has lasted in spite of time and contempt. I have no motive for my fault but my sad interest in your suffering, the cruel progress of which I have read on your features since the commencement of the entertainment;—that ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... that this was my fault—the result of my own reckless neglect. I had grown so used to sitting back dozing in my shroud in the dentist's chair, listening to the twittering of the birds outside, my eyes closed in the sweet half sleep of perfect ...
— Behind the Beyond - and Other Contributions to Human Knowledge • Stephen Leacock
... barrenness is a condition of inability to have children. In former years the opinion prevailed generally, whenever a couple was childless, that the fault was exclusively the woman's. It wasn't even thought that the man could be to blame. We now know that in at least fifty per cent. of cases of sterility, or childless marriages, the fault is not the woman's but the man's. It is therefore very unwise in conditions of sterility to subject ...
— Woman - Her Sex and Love Life • William J. Robinson
... delights of the sea temporarily denied to her. Perhaps not quite all, when she came to think of it. She could not paddle, but she might manage to hobble down to the shore, and sit on the sun-baked rocks. Even Mademoiselle could surely find no fault with this. And she might possibly find someone to talk to. She was so fond of talking, and it was a perpetual regret to her that she could not understand the speech of the ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... the period would figure. He would let all the windows, which would, at the rate of three francs for each person, produce a handsome profit. In short, he dreamed of a great stroke of fortune by means of a monopoly. He assumed a moral tone, nevertheless, found fault with excesses and all sorts of misconduct, spoke about his "poor father," and every evening, as he said, made an examination of his conscience before offering his ...
— Sentimental Education, Volume II - The History of a Young Man • Gustave Flaubert
... careless youths with all the world like an untrodden race-course before us. SHE had not then darkened the heaven of our confidence; she had not come with her false fair face to make of ME a blind, doting madman, and to transform him into a liar and hypocrite. It was all her fault, all the misery and horror; she was the blight on our lives; she merited the heaviest punishment, and she would receive it. Yet, would to God we had neither of us ever seen her! Her beauty, like a sword, ...
— Vendetta - A Story of One Forgotten • Marie Corelli
... the fault was mine—I—I frightened you, and indeed the pain is quite gone," he stammered, holding aside the brambles for her passage. Yet she stood where she was, and her face was hidden in her hood. At last she spoke and ...
— The Amateur Gentleman • Jeffery Farnol et al
... Mrs. Barbauld could ever have complained, as Coleridge tells us she did, that the poem "had no moral." His reply is worth recording: "I told her that in my opinion the poem had too much; and that the only, or chief fault, if I might say so, was the obtrusion of the moral sentiment so openly on the reader as a principle or cause of action in a work of such pure imagination. It ought to have had no more moral than the Arabian Nights' tale of the merchant's sitting down to eat dates by the side ...
— Coleridge's Ancient Mariner and Select Poems • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... life-giving; the epitome this of a grand and fundamental diversity among men; but did any truly great man ever," he asks, "go through the world without offence, all rounded in, so that the current moral systems could find no fault in him? most likely ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... "Tain't her fault, Pa," I said, relenting. "She never went to any good school. I want to go somewhere where the teachers know a real lot; not just a little bit more than me. I want to go"—I paused to gain courage— "I want to go to ...
— The Bacillus of Beauty - A Romance of To-day • Harriet Stark
... Dale put on the new suit when it came, and imagined that it was the old one. But, scholar as he was, he was learning to appreciate the excellent meals Miss Tredgold provided for him. On this occasion he was so human as to find fault ...
— Girls of the Forest • L. T. Meade
... which he would like to expend elsewhere. Often, too, he is a rebel who cannot submit to being fixed all his life to a work-bench in order to procure a thousand pleasures for his employer, while knowing himself to be far the less stupid of the two, and knowing his only fault to be that of having been born in a hovel instead of coming into the ...
— The Conquest of Bread • Peter Kropotkin
... am not at all disappointed; or, if I am, it is not your fault or hers—quite the reverse. Nothing but the perversity of human nature. Shall I own the truth? All these years I have kept in my mind a dear little girl in a shabby old frock which she had outgrown—a dear, affectionate little soul, with so few ideas on people and things, that she actually ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter
... was unable to say anything. I was like a bottle suddenly turned upside down, from which the water does not run because it is too full. I wanted to insult the man, and to drive him away, but I could do nothing of the kind. On the contrary, I felt that I was disturbing them, and that it was my fault. I made a presence of approving everything, this time also, thanks to that strange feeling that forced me to treat him the more amiably in proportion as his presence was more painful to me. I said that I trusted to his taste, and I advised my ...
— The Kreutzer Sonata and Other Stories • Leo Tolstoy
... fool as to put to sea on a crazy raft it ain't my fault," he said. "I couldn't help it, ...
— Robert Coverdale's Struggle - Or, On The Wave Of Success • Horatio, Jr. Alger
... had such an experience before," complained the professor, looking at Walter reproachfully, as if he thought that somehow it was the fault of his ...
— Walter Sherwood's Probation • Horatio Alger
... strongest phases. His thought is far above the great sea level of humanity, where stand most of the world's masters. He is like one of those marvelously clear mountain lakes whose water-line runs above all the salt seas of the globe. He is very precious, taken at his real worth. Why find fault with the isolation and the remoteness in view of the sky-like purity ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... are hurt, although it is no fault of our prisoners. A dozen of us have gone out and risked our lives to capture these men. You men have not seen fit, for what motives we will not discuss, to help us. Now, I tell you right here that any who want can come, but the first ...
— The Red-Blooded Heroes of the Frontier • Edgar Beecher Bronson
... of diamond-dust to set it sparkling; with ten million singing birds to form its orchestra; sunset clouds and sunrise mists to drape it, and countless flowers to make it sweet while the hand of God himself upholds it on its way among the clustering stars, what right has a man to find fault with his surroundings, or lament himself that all things do not go to suit him here below? When it shall be in order for the glow-worm to call the midday sun to account, or for the wood-tick to find fault with the century old oak that protects ...
— A String of Amber Beads • Martha Everts Holden
... Mouse. The lamented cost more than twenty pounds. I had been thinking whether I could afford the requisite garments—not quite so costly—and thought I might get them for about sixteen, with contrivance; but you see I feel it my fault that I let Dolores go and lead Constance to get cheated, and I cannot take the money out of what papa gives for household expenses and your education, so it must come out of my own personal allowance. ...
— The Two Sides of the Shield • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Under the mistaken impression that the value of individuals consists in what they are in themselves, he could not possibly comprehend the value of Stevie in the eyes of Mrs Verloc. She was taking it confoundedly hard, he thought to himself. It was all the fault of that damned Heat. What did he want to upset the woman for? But she mustn't be allowed, for her own good, to carry on so till she got ...
— The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale • Joseph Conrad
... it were a duty, lift his cap, and then march off relieved. But by-and-by he began to make acquaintances in the hotel; and as he was a handsome, English-looking lad, who bore a certificate of honesty in his clear gray eyes and easy gait, he was rather made much of. Nor could any fault be decently ...
— Stories By English Authors: Germany • Various
... Mrs. Adams protested. "That isn't his fault, poor child! The boys he knew when he was younger are nearly all away ...
— Alice Adams • Booth Tarkington
... and ice with great shovels and pick-axes. It was on a grey day that a Beech tree made me see that all the rocks, bugs, flowers, trees, and people are only one. These grey days that people find so much fault with, if they are not so important as the days when the sun cooks you, they are far more wonderful! One's imagination can wander through the whole universe on grey days. The pictures in the sky give one hints of other worlds, for there are so many different ...
— Child and Country - A Book of the Younger Generation • Will Levington Comfort
... law-makers always disregard the latter. As long as man is opposed to man, property offsets property, and the two forces balance each other; as soon as man is isolated, that is, opposed to the society which he himself represents, jurisprudence is at fault: Themis has lost ...
— What is Property? - An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government • P. J. Proudhon
... boat, we had to wade ashore and carry the women, Coutlass attending to his own inamorata. Lady Saffren Waldon's picric acid rage exploded by being dropped between two porters waist-deep into the water. It was her fault. She insisted one was not enough, yet refused to explain how two should do the work of one. Sitting on their two shoulders, holding on by their hair, she frightened the left-hand man by losing her balance and clutching his nose and eyes. She insisted ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy
... mortality. Riddle of destiny, who can show What thy short visit meant, or know What thy errand here below? Shall we say, that Nature blind Check'd her hand, and changed her mind Just when she had exactly wrought A finish'd pattern without fault? Could she flag, or could she tire, Or lack'd she the Promethean fire (With her nine moons' long workings sicken'd) That should thy little limbs have quicken'd? Limbs so firm, they seem'd to assure Life of health, and days ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... forward, and found, as his companion held up the light, that the fault in the rock shot off sharply now to the left, and sloped up at an angle ...
— Cormorant Crag - A Tale of the Smuggling Days • George Manville Fenn
... old man's shrewdness was at fault. He did not suspect that the ragged street boy was likely to become a customer, and merely suffered his glance ...
— Sam's Chance - And How He Improved It • Horatio Alger
... seem to see old Hannibal Outwit some Roman general, And sit securely in his tent, The legions on some other scent. But certain dogs, kept back To tell the errors of the pack, Arriving where the traitor hung, A fault in fullest chorus sung. Though by their bark the welkin rung, Their master made them hold the tongue. Suspecting not a trick so odd, Said he, "The rogue's beneath the sod. My dogs, that never saw such jokes, Won't bark ...
— A Hundred Fables of La Fontaine • Jean de La Fontaine
... were these daily notes; and these carry to her his assurance that she is "the beautifullest object in the world. I know no happiness in this life in any degree comparable to the pleasure I have in your person and society." "But indeed, though you have every perfection, you have an extravagant fault, which almost frustrates the good in you to me; and that is, that you do not love to dress, to appear, to shine out, even at my request, and to make me proud of you, or rather to indulge the pride I have ...
— Essays • Alice Meynell
... think there is only one thing I dislike more than sitting in an hotel bedroom and learning a new language, and that is sitting in an hotel bedroom and nursing a cold in my head. Lately I have been learning Russian—and now I am sniffing. My own fault. I would sleep with my window open in this unhealthiest of cities, and smells and marsh produced a ...
— My War Experiences in Two Continents • Sarah Macnaughtan
... their purpose in order to save their commercial interests, they are going to put in her way all the obstacles they can to overthrow the new Constitution, and if Turkey fails in her reformation this time, it would not be only her own fault. A great share of the responsibility rests upon the shoulders of every American man and woman who solemnly declares to stand by and be a protector of the principles laid down by Washington, the father not only of his own country, but most of the civilized world. Unless America arises ...
— Conversion of a High Priest into a Christian Worker • Meletios Golden
... at work, he said; this skin was never torn, nor is this the mark of a hounds tooth. No, noHector is not in fault, ...
— The Pioneers • James Fenimore Cooper
... an' consequent they're cheerful-hearted an' friendly. Likewise, they mind their own business, which is also why they've be'n let grow to onhuman proportions. But, not to seem oncivil to a stranger, an' by way of gettin' acquainted, I'll leak it out that it ain't no fault of Texas that I come away from there—but owin' only to a honin' of mine to see more of the world than ...
— The Texan - A Story of the Cattle Country • James B. Hendryx
... by these words concerning the amiable philosopher of Salisbury, I am at a loss to understand. A friend suggests, that Johnson thought his manner as a writer affected, while at the same time the matter did not compensate for that fault. In short, that he meant to make a remark quite different from that which a celebrated gentleman made on a very eminent physician: 'He is a coxcomb, but a satisfactory coxcomb.' BOSWELL. Malone ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 3 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... generality of peers, far from supporting themselves in a state of independent greatness, are but too apt to fall into an oblivion of their proper dignity, and to run headlong into an abject servitude. Would to God it were true, that the fault of our peers were too much spirit. It is worthy of some observation that these gentlemen, so jealous of aristocracy, make no complaints of the power of those peers (neither few nor inconsiderable) who are always ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. I. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... bit like any of the forty-seven varieties of Vee I thought I was so well acquainted with. No. I'll admit she'd shown whims and queer streaks now and then, and maybe a fault or so; but nothing that had anything to do with any tendency of the ego to stick its elbows out. Yet, when it comes to listenin' to flatterin' remarks about our son and heir—well, no Broadway star readin' over what his press-agent had smuggled into the dramatic notes had anything on her. ...
— The House of Torchy • Sewell Ford
... Och! man, sure that's an ould story; but I declare it to you, Jerry, it isn't my fault; it's a nateral gift wid me, for I take no pains to make them fond o' me; that I may never ...
— The Tithe-Proctor - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... mother in this poem, a writer in the "Browning Society's Papers," Miss E.D. West, said justly: "There is discernible in her no soul which could be cleansed from guilt by any purgatorial process.... Her fault had not been moral, had not been sin, to be punished by pain inflicted on the soul; it was merely the uncounteracted primary instinct of self-preservation, and as such it is fitliest dealt with by the simple depriving her, without further penalty, of the very life which she had secured for herself ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden
... submits as a question of policy whether it is right to change the whole domestic economy of those eleven States, in the absence of any representation upon this floor from them. My honorable friend asks whose fault it is that they are not represented. Why are they not here? He says their hands are reeking with the blood of loyal men; that they are unable to take the oath which a statute that he assumes to be constitutional has provided; and he would have the country and the ...
— History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States • Wiliam H. Barnes
... how strong was your aversion. In your letters to me this was still more evident. What then? I was proud and impetuous, and what you merely hinted at I expressed openly and unmistakably. You found fault with this. You may be right, but my conduct was after ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... she has been false to me as no woman was ever false before, that is not your fault. As for the jewels, tell your wife to lock them up,—or to throw them away if she likes that better. My brother's wife will have them some day, I suppose." Now his brother was in India, and his brother's ...
— The Vicar of Bullhampton • Anthony Trollope
... topics, for the benefit of his children. When he had no guest at his table, he would call the attention of his children to some subject calculated to improve their minds, thinking, at the same time, that it would serve to draw off their attention from their humble fare. Children are apt to find fault with the food set before them, and perhaps the reader himself has more than once fretted over an unpalatable dish, and murmured for something else. Sometimes they beg for an article of food that is not on the table, declining to eat what is furnished for the family. It was ...
— The Printer Boy. - Or How Benjamin Franklin Made His Mark. An Example for Youth. • William M. Thayer
... said, looking around at them, "I feel that it must be my fault that there has never been any sympathy between us. Sometimes I am sure that it is yours. Don't you ever look a little way beyond the actual wants of your own constituents? Don't you ever peer over the edge ...
— A People's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... inhabitant of the land of Egypt who is delivered up to Ramessu Mi-Amun, the great prince of Egypt, his fault shall not be avenged upon him, his house shall not be taken away, nor his wife nor his children. He shall not be put to death, neither shall he be mutilated in his eyes, nor in his ears, nor in his mouth, nor on the soles of his ...
— Early Israel and the Surrounding Nations • Archibald Sayce
... particularly in respect to the meaning of the former response, in order to ascertain whether they had, by possibility, misinterpreted it, and made their settlement on the wrong ground. Or, if this was not the case, to learn by what other error or fault they had displeased the celestial powers, and brought upon themselves such terrible judgments. AEneas determined to adopt this advice, but he was prevented from carrying his intentions into effect by the ...
— Romulus, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... keep him from being cold. He felt himself, with some impatience, at the mercy of the most tender, but the most sharp-eyed of nurses, a prisoner to her devotion, and made conscious of her power every moment. Her attentions worried him; he knew that they all meant "It is your own fault, my poor boy, that you are in this state, and that your mother is so unhappy." He felt it. He knew as well as if she had spoken that she was asking him to return to reason, to marry, without more delay, their little neighbor in Normandy, Mademoiselle d'Argeville, a niece ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... to give all my time and thoughts to it; I don't wish to be extravagant: and yet I wish to be lady-like—it annoys and makes me unhappy not to be fresh and neat and nice, shabbiness and seediness are my aversion. I don't see where the fault is. Can one individual resist the whole current of society? It certainly is not strictly necessary for us girls to have half the things we do. We might, I suppose, live without many of them, and, as mamma says, look just as well, because girls did so before these things ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... betraying a false estimate of Christ, Martha's principal fault becomes glaringly conspicuous. She is full of bustle, full of eagerness. Her servants were, probably, dispatched in every direction to prepare a sumptuous meal. Every thing must be in order; every dish in place. The food, ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. II • Francis Augustus Cox
... In short, there are two standards of morals: that of the world, and that of the Code. Where the Code is weak, as I admit with our dear Abbe, the world is audacious and satirical. There are so few judges who would not gladly have committed the fault against which they hurl the rather stolid thunders of their "Inasmuch." The world, which gives the lie to the law alike in its rejoicings, in its habits, and in its pleasures, is severer than the Code and the ...
— Honorine • Honore de Balzac
... a moment prepared to accord the terrible gift of an independent responsibility to Lady Harman. In that direction lay regions that Mr. Brumley had still to explore. Lady Harman he considered was married wrongly and disastrously and this he held to be essentially the fault of Sir Isaac—with perhaps some slight blame attaching to Lady Harman's mother. The only path of escape he could conceive as yet for Lady Harman lay through the chivalry of some other man. That a woman ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... not pretend to have acquired the power it is claimed we may attain to; but I am satisfied that the fault is in me, and not in the Principle. I think I can almost hear you ask, What! do you believe in miracles? I answer unhesitatingly, Yes; I believe in the manifestations of the power of Mind which the world calls miraculous; but which those who claim to understand the Principle ...
— Miscellaneous Writings, 1883-1896 • Mary Baker Eddy
... has come," he said, "for Princess Moonlight to return to the moon from whence she came. She committed a grave fault, and as a punishment was sent to live down here for a time. We know what good care you have taken of the Princess, and we have rewarded you for this and have sent you wealth and prosperity. We put the gold in the bamboos ...
— Japanese Fairy Tales • Yei Theodora Ozaki
... In the handling of his sheets and oars I like the author better, though even here I miss what might have brought me into a companionship with his people as close as I could wish on a most adventurous journey of nearly four hundred pages. But perhaps that is my fault; and, at the least, here is a straightforward sea story—as honest as the ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, December 16, 1914 • Various
... his arms from her suddenly, and had recoiled a little. "Is it my fault? I didn't even look at them, I tell you straight. Never! Have I looked at you? Tell me. It was you that ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... to be overruled, and now I must only trust to your honour, forbearance, and prudence to protect my child from what might possibly be the ill effects of her own affectionate feelings. That she is romantic,—enthusiastic to a fault, I should perhaps rather call it—I need not tell you. She thinks that your misfortune demands from her a sacrifice of herself; but you, I know, will feel that, even were such a sacrifice available to ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope
... with the author for having wished, during the reading of several pages, to make us believe an impossible thing—that he was deceiving us. It is true that he has done it in a masterly manner—it is true that he could not have done otherwise, but at the same time there is a fault in the conception, and although Sienkiewicz has covered the precipice with ...
— So Runs the World • Henryk Sienkiewicz,
... would seem that sin cannot be in the reason. For the sin of any power is a defect thereof. But the fault of the reason is not a sin, on the contrary, it excuses sin: for a man is excused from sin on account of ignorance. Therefore sin ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I-II (Pars Prima Secundae) - From the Complete American Edition • Saint Thomas Aquinas
... so confident that here could be no reasonable fault found with the Prince, he was pronounced competent to enter upon the Monks' service. Peter they knew a great deal about before—indeed, a glance at his face was enough to satisfy any one of his goodness; for he did look more like one ...
— Our Boys - Entertaining Stories by Popular Authors • Various
... speared in print in the year 1519, and again it was the congregation which Luther sought primarily to serve. If the bounds of his congregation spread ever wider beyond Wittenberg, so that his writings found a surprisingly ready sale, even afar, that was not Luther's fault. Even the Tessaradecas consolatoria,[2] written in 1519 and printed in 1530, a book of consolation, which was originally intended for the sick Elector of Saxony, was written by him only upon solicitation ...
— Works of Martin Luther - With Introductions and Notes (Volume I) • Martin Luther
... now before Me, which must Say have Given me Much Concern, seeing I Thought it was All Made up betwixt us That was of Such an Unpleasant Nature on Tuesday night (ultimo) w^h I most humbly Own (and Acknowledge) was all alone and intirely of My Own Fault, and Not in the Least Your's which behaved to me, Must say, In the most Respectful and superior manner that was possible to think Of, for I truly Say I never was In the Company of Such Imminent and Superior Gents before In my Life w^h will take my Oath ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... are doing it against their own natural and better instincts, because they dare not forsake the tradition in which they have been dyed. "I try to love God and I can't," has been said to me many a time by conscientious people who felt that the fault must lie in themselves. There was no fault in themselves. If their God could have been loved ...
— The Conquest of Fear • Basil King
... are, I wonder just how much we'll be at fault," Jack mused soberly. "I think we should have warned them that we had put the ...
— Boy Scouts in Southern Waters • G. Harvey Ralphson
... display held in Milan, at the marriage of her Most Serene Highness the Queen of the Romans, and I certainly desired the chancellor to send you this account. But since you write that it has never reached you, the fault must rest with the said chancellor, and you must excuse me for ...
— Beatrice d'Este, Duchess of Milan, 1475-1497 • Julia Mary Cartwright
... fell open. For a minute he looked startled, and then he bulged one large round eye suspiciously at the French black while he inwardly debated on the possibility that he had become color-blind. Having reassured himself, however, that his vision was not at fault, he made a sudden decision and ...
— History of the American Negro in the Great World War • W. Allison Sweeney
... was anxious to clean the ship's bottom, which was very foul; and he desired to take advantage of the full moon in these dangerous waters. They landed to take some observations and look for water. The observations were unsatisfactory, for the compass was unreliable, a fault attributed to the ironstone in the neighbourhood, of which signs were very evident, and water was not to be found. The country is reported on as follows: "No signs of fertility is to be seen upon the Land; the soil of the uplands is mostly ...
— The Life of Captain James Cook • Arthur Kitson
... "Illustrated History of Ireland," within three months from the date of the publication of the First, consisting of 2,000 copies, is a matter of no little gratification to the writer, both personally and relatively. It is a triumphant proof that Irishmen are not indifferent to Irish history—a fault of which they have been too frequently accused; and as many of the clergy have been most earnest and generous in their efforts to promote the circulation of the work, it is gratifying to be able to adduce this fact also in reply to the imputations, even lately cast upon the ecclesiastics of Ireland, ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... "But if I were at the head, like you, I would not carry my apprehensions so very far; for to give an opinion on a matter of such evident necessity, and so innocuous to government, would never be esteemed a mighty fault." ...
— My Ten Years' Imprisonment • Silvio Pellico
... "Philoctetes" has always been ranked by critics among the most elaborate and polished of the tragedies of Sophocles. In some respects it deserves the eulogies bestowed on it. But one great fault in the conception will, I think, be apparent on the simple statement of ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... describing, Hermione touched everything, and did her best to cast over the various objects some grace, some air of harmony, which should make the contrasted tastes of the rest of her family less glaring and unpleasant to the eye. Her task was not easy, and it was no fault of hers if the room was out of joint. Her love of flowers showed itself everywhere, and she knew how to take advantage of each inch of room on shelf, or table, or window-seat, filling all available spaces with a profusion of roses, geraniums, and ...
— Paul Patoff • F. Marion Crawford
... of future happiness, but which became slightly tinctured with the sternness of her vigorous mind, and possibly, at times were more unbending than was compatible with the comforts of this world; a fault, however, of manner, more than of matter. Warmly attached to her brother and his children, Mrs. Wilson, who had never been a mother herself, yielded to their earnest entreaties to become one of the family; and although left by the ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper
... the fault of human nature? it is not caused by the accident, as it were, of there being a pretty metal, like gold, to be found by digging. If people could not find that, would they not find something else, and ...
— The Ethics of the Dust • John Ruskin
... that," said Connor. "The sun in heaven is not purer than she is. The only fault she ever could be charged with was her love for me; and heavily, oh! far too heavily, has she suffered ...
— Fardorougha, The Miser - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... partner! No, it was not my fault. I'd have had that bottle out of him. Was it to be borne that he should come, like a thief in the dark, digging among stuff that was far more ours than his (seeing that we could deprive him of every grain of it, if he didn't buy us at our own figure), and carrying off treasure from its bowels? ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... day, with the postmark of the town in New Jersey where Mr. Broke's locomotive works were; and she answered them now (but oh, how scrupulously!), though not every day. If the waters of love rose up through the grains of sand, it was, at least, not Cynthia's fault. Hers were the letters of a friend. She was reading such and such a book—had he read it? And he must not work too hard. How could her letters be otherwise when Jethro Bass, her benefactor, was at the capital working to defeat and ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... leadership in this labor war, he forced, by his own motion, women unfit to be seen in public, much less to fight his battles, under the hoofs of the horses in Sands Park this morning, and if the Greek woman, who claims she was dragooned should die, the fault, the crime of her death in revolting circumstances, will be upon Grant ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... an "outsider," I knew, but not by any fault of his own. He lived in Florence mostly on the charity of his friends. A tall, lithe, good-looking fellow of thirty-two, he came of a Yorkshire stock, and for seven or eight years had lived the gay life of town, and been a member of the Stock Exchange. ...
— The Count's Chauffeur • William Le Queux
... boy return'd And told them of a chamber, and they went; Where, after saying to her, "if ye will, Call for the woman of the house," to which She answer'd, "Thanks, my lord;" the two remain'd Apart by all the chamber's width, and mute As creatures voiceless thro' the fault of birth, Or two wild men supporters of a shield, Painted, who stare at open space, nor glance The one at other, ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... late emperor had obtained an arbitrary grant of her patrimony. This general was Claudius himself, who had not entirely escaped the contagion of the times. The emperor blushed at the reproach, but deserved the confidence which she had reposed in his equity. The confession of his fault was accompanied with immediate and ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... misunderstanding," he consoled her. "Perhaps Mr. Smith has telephoned, and we have not received the message. I hope it is not the fault of the hotel. We do not often make mistakes; yet it is possible. We have had a few early dinners before the theatre and there is one small table disengaged. Would madame care to take it—it is here, close to the door—and watch for the gentleman ...
— The Second Latchkey • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... would my heart were Stone, before my softness Against my mother, a more troubled thought No Virgin bears about; should I excuse My Mothers fault, I should set light a life In losing which, a brother and a King Were taken from me, if I seek to save That life so lov'd, I lose another life That gave me being, I shall lose a Mother, A word of such a sound in a childs ears That it strikes ...
— A King, and No King • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... she quietly replied. 'My father knew the late Mr. Somers well, and thought very highly of him, He was charitable to a fault, and yet remarkable for discernment. His bounty was ...
— Friends and Neighbors - or Two Ways of Living in the World • Anonymous
... most other things, opposite exaggerations are to be avoided. There is such a thing as looking forward too rigidly and too exclusively to the future—to a future that may never arrive. This is the great fault of the over-educationist, who makes early life a burden and a toil, and also of those who try to impose on youth the tastes and pleasures of the man. Youth has its own pleasures, which will always give it most enjoyment, and a happy youth is in itself an end. It is the ...
— The Map of Life - Conduct and Character • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... from a slave's point of view. Murat was a good master. The old man had heard him say that he kept servants "for the like of the thing." He didn't abuse them. He "never was for barbarizing a poor colored person at all." Whipping? Oh, yes. "He didn't miss your fault. No, sah, he didn't miss your fault." But his servants never were "ironed." He "didn't believe ...
— A Florida Sketch-Book • Bradford Torrey
... not adjusted previous to my departure from Chili, was no fault of mine, as I was, in self-defence, compelled to quit the country, unless I chose to take part with the late Supreme Director, in supporting a ministry which, unknown to him, were guilty of the most avaricious ...
— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 1 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald |
