"Fool" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... himself for a stupid fool for telling her. Fatigue was ruining what judgment he had. From now on, he'd have to watch her every minute. Or had she really seen the value of the research by now? She wasn't a fool. It should have registered on even her stubborn mind. But he ...
— Badge of Infamy • Lester del Rey
... isn't easy to tell it, but I'm going to; I feel as if an X-ray had been turned upon my mentality, showing me what a blamed fool I've made of myself during the last few years, making me wish I could blot it all out and take a sharp turn in another direction. How's that for humble pie! I declare, I don't know myself!" ...
— Katherine's Sheaves • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... a step or two forward, but Lady Chillington waved her fiercely back. "Fool! fool! why don't you go away?" she cried. "Why do you stare at me so? Go away, and send Dance to me. You have spoilt ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 4, April, 1891 • Various
... beateree, an' I'm a nat'ral-born fool. You're goin' to marry me right off as soon as ...
— Country Neighbors • Alice Brown
... "You fool! I tell you it wasn't me," returned the other passionately. "Ricks often catch fire of their own accord. I'm not going to be made pay for what ...
— Soldiers of the Queen • Harold Avery
... The squire grew purple and all, And every little chorister bestrode his carven stall. The parson flapped like a magpie, but none could hear his prayers; For Tom Fool flourished his tabor, Flourished his nut-brown tabor, Bashed the head of the sexton, and stormed the ...
— The Lord of Misrule - And Other Poems • Alfred Noyes
... you!" exploded his lordship anew. "And, make it worse, no longer young fools. Young and a fool, people make excuses. Say, 'Fool? Yes, but so young!' But old and a fool—not a word to say, what, what! Silly rot at forty." He clutched his side-whiskers with frenzied hands. He seemed to comb them to a ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... Samuel, expressly disapproved. To the evil of monarchy we have added that of hereditary succession; and as the first is a lessening of ourselves, so the second might put posterity under the government of a rogue or a fool. Nature disapproves it, otherwise she would not so frequently turn it into ridicule. England since the Conquest hath known some few good monarchs, but groaned beneath a much larger number of bad ones." "In short, ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 1 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Egerton Ryerson
... absently. He was asking himself: "Does he believe, or does he believe that he believes?" And yet his own faith, his own passionate desire for faith was not shaken. Not the mediocrity of soul, and the poverty of argument of a fool like Leonard could ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland
... what is disagreeable, should be constantly made the victim of calumnies; that I should be presented as an object of ridicule to the eyes of the European powers; that the commissioners of the great powers should say to me themselves, that Count Bertrand had declared to them that I was a fool; that I could not be sure that the Emperor was at Longwood; that I had been forty days without seeing him; and that he might be dead without my knowing any thing of it." He further said that the newspapers, and particularly the Edinburgh Review, were full of articles which represented him as ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various
... nearest me again ventured the remark that he thought our number was up, and I just had enough vocal power left to curse him roundly for a damn fool. "You know what happened Lawrence, don't you? Cheer up, you mutt! They ...
— S.O.S. Stand to! • Reginald Grant
... stirred again, and "No," he said steadily, "that's not true. We're not friends—couldn't be. You think I'm a fool, but I can see you're despising me all the time. I can see ...
— Moor Fires • E. H. (Emily Hilda) Young
... themselves in his face. Jeanne became happier as their journey approached its end. She was alive every moment, joyous, expectant, looking ahead to Fort o' God; and this in itself was a bitterness to Philip, though he knew that he was a fool for allowing it to be so. He reasoned, with dull, masculine wit, that if Jeanne cared for him at all she would not be so anxious for their comradeship to end. But these moods, when they came, passed quickly. And on this ...
— Flower of the North • James Oliver Curwood
... if somebody was thrashing the underbrush with sticks. It seemed to be some hundreds of yards away, beyond the farthest fence of the pasture. For a moment the boy wondered tremulously what it could be. Then he thought he understood. "Some fool steer's got through the fence and gone stumbling through the brush piles," he muttered to himself. The explanation had the merit of explaining; and when the sound had ceased the boy once more set the bark trumpet to his lips and ...
— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts
... If you weren't a big fool you wouldn't heed them this hour, Martin Doul, for they're a bad lot those that have their sight, and they do have great joy, the time they do be seeing a grand thing, to let on they don't see it at all, and to be telling fool's lies, the like ...
— The Well of the Saints • J. M. Synge
... humour did not run very long, though some of them were impudent enough to murder a keeper or two afterwards. Yet in the space of a twelvemonth, the whole nation of Blacks was extinguished, and these country rakes were contented to play the fool upon easier terms. The last blood that was shed on either side was that of a keeper's son at Old Windsor, whom some of these wise people fired at as he looked out of the window, by which means they drew on their own ruin and that of several ...
— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward
... half-a-mile off when we entered the bed of the river to get at this island. I told you," added he, "that we should have entered two miles higher up; but neither you nor Fabian wished it, and like a fool, I ...
— Wood Rangers - The Trappers of Sonora • Mayne Reid
... saying that I respect you for that. [Benevolently.] You know, Hochstetter, every man is liable to make a fool of ...
— Moral • Ludwig Thoma
... you fool!" he said with a roar, as he dived under his seat and brought out his brandy flask. "Give him a swallow of that—be quick, do you hear? Pour it into your cup, sir, and give him that corn pone in your pocket. I see it sticking out. There, now hoist him up beside ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow
... "I don't got to show it, because I couldn't help myself, Mr. Flugel. Glaubmann claims that I made a verbal lease for one year, and he's right. I was fool enough to ...
— Elkan Lubliner, American • Montague Glass
... up to the edge of Irene's white brow. So that was Jack Darcy. What a blind fool she had been, not to think! She had laughed and chatted with him, smiled on him, worn the costume of his designing,—a common workingman! For a moment she could have torn her hair, or beaten her slender white hands against the ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas
... never learn that. I once posed the First Lord by simply asking the question. I went up just to ask for my promotion—for there's nothing like asking, you know, youngsters. The First Lord received me with wonderful civility. He took me for another Fitzgerald, and I was fool enough to tell him which I really was, or I believe he would have handed me out my commission and appointment to a fine brig I had in my eye, there and then. I saw by his change of countenance that ...
— Marmaduke Merry - A Tale of Naval Adventures in Bygone Days • William H. G. Kingston
... they did, Andy. They made me carry all the things for 'em, and made me cut the wood and wash the dishes and everything. I was a big fool to leave home, where I might have had a ...
— The Rover Boys on a Hunt - or The Mysterious House in the Woods • Arthur M. Winfield (Edward Stratemeyer)
... scarcely had the question been put, when the old, grave host broke out in a furious storm of abuse, especially against the interpreter, who was overwhelmed with bitter reproaches for helping a "foreign devil" to make a fool of his own countrymen. All my protestations were in vain, and I had to go away with my object ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold
... some time since they had been to the opera. Now the tenderfoot had misunderstood these friends at the beginning, supposing himself to be among good fellows, and they therefore naturally set him down as a fool. But even while dancing you may learn much, and suddenly. The boy, besides being limber, had good tough black hair, and it was not in fear, but with a cold blue eye, that he looked at the old gentleman. The trouble had been that his own revolver had somehow hitched, so he could ...
— Red Men and White • Owen Wister
... sign," I said, "but it'll come off. Do you happen to remember a story of Tolstoi's called Ivan the Fool'?" ...
— Adventures In Contentment • David Grayson
... Jack!" he exclaimed, momentarily forgetful of his anger at his friend. "Help me to think what can be done to head off that crazy fool, will you? It isn't half-past two o'clock, yet, and he will succeed in catching at least one of the newspapers, before it goes to press; God only knows how many others he will connect with, by ...
— The Last Woman • Ross Beeckman
... fumble mysteriously under the heaviest of blue jackets, saying as he did so, "Not so much noise, young masters, not so much noise! The boy was a fool ...
— Hans Brinker - or The Silver Skates • Mary Mapes Dodge
... Squire, "and a bilin o' lemons and sugar. Mr. W.," sez he, "there's not much of me left. Let's liquor up! Let's have a smoke and a cocktail." So we mixes, and had an entertaining discorse on polite literatoor. "Dod-rabbit the sworrick," says Squire. "Say no more about it. I was a fool, Mr Ward, to prefare it to your amusin ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 7 • Charles Farrar Browne
... was," said the housekeeper. "I say nothin' agin other country people, only to be sorry for 'em; but I get put out o' my patience when I see one of the right stock makin' a fool of himself. Well, honey, what about ...
— Opportunities • Susan Warner
... Corresponded with 'Frisco, Japan, and Russia; so I hope you'll allow we've been "up and doing." (Not up and saying, be't well understood). As TUPPER (the Honourable C.H., Minister Of Fisheries) said, in the style of his namesake, "The fool imagines all Silence is sinister, "But the wise man knows that it's often dexterous." Be sure no inquisitive shyness or bounce'll Make us "too previous" with our Report, which goes first to the QUEEN and the Privy Council. Some bigwig's motto is, "Say and Seal," but ...
— Punch, or The London Charivari, Volume 101, October 31, 1891 • Various
... sight!" he exclaimed in a tone of chagrin. "I was a fool to let thee talk so long, Swart; but there is still a chance of catching the boat before it rounds ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... no fool, he would draw a very clear, hard distinction between the reckless endowment of the building trade and the dissemination of books. He would distinguish, too, between a library and a news-room, and would find no great attraction in the prospect of supplying the national youth ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells
... fear than wisdom. He had wit, indeed, together with a most insinuating address and a gay, courtly behaviour; but a villainous heart appeared constantly through all, to such a degree as betrayed him to be a fool in adversity and a knave in prosperity. In short, he was the first minister that could be called a complete trickster, for which reason his administration, though successful and absolute, never sat well upon him, ...
— The Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz, Complete • Jean Francois Paul de Gondi, Cardinal de Retz
... things that terminate in human life, the world is the proper judge: to despise its sentence, if it were possible, is not just; and if it were just, is not possible. Pope was far enough from this unreasonable temper; he was sufficiently A FOOL TO FAME, and his fault was that he pretended to neglect it. His levity and his sullenness were only in his letters; he passed through common life, sometimes vexed, and sometimes pleased, with the natural emotions of common men. His scorn of the great is repeated too often to be ...
— Lives of the English Poets: Prior, Congreve, Blackmore, Pope • Samuel Johnson
... know it," said he, calmly, and with far greater happiness. "Of course I haven't. Who said I was? O, Lord! you can't fool a woman any way ...
— The Law of the Land • Emerson Hough
... yonder presumptuous fool a lesson; fire as your guns come to bear, and not before. I want that ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... he loved me tenderly, yet I never spoke to him of my sufferings. One of my relations, who loved me very much, perceived the little moderation they used toward me. They spoke very roughly to me before him. He was highly displeased, and told my father of it, adding, that I would pass for a fool. Soon after I went to see my father, who, contrary to his custom, sharply reprimanded me, "for suffering them to treat me in such a manner, without saying anything in my own defence." I answered, "If they knew what my husband said to ...
— The Autobiography of Madame Guyon • Jeanne Marie Bouvier de La Motte Guyon
... springing to his feet, he thundered out: "The parol shall not demur—the parol shall not demur. I have got this simpleton where I wanted him! I didn't 'spose he was fool enough to run into this trap; I set it on purpose for him: anybody else would have seen it; anything will catch him. The case can go no farther; the phrase, may it please the court, is Latin, and means that the case shall be dismissed. The parol, the plaintiff ...
— Bart Ridgeley - A Story of Northern Ohio • A. G. Riddle
... written (Prov. 14:16): "A wise man feareth and declineth from evil, the fool leapeth over and is confident." Now what is done wisely is no sin. Therefore no matter how a man declines from evil, ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... trifle to know historically and authentically, who was the greatest fool that ever lived. I would certainly give him in a bumper. Marry, of the present breed, I think I could without much difficulty name ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... save all you earn, you're a miser. If you spend all you earn, you're a fool. If you lose it, you're out. If you find it, you're in. If you owe it, they're always after you. If you lend it, you're always after them. It's the cause of evil. It's the cause of good. It's the cause of happiness. It's the cause of sorrow. If the government makes it, it's all right. ...
— More Toasts • Marion Dix Mosher
... succeed, will secure his intended prize or victim by marriage rather than not obtain her at all. Very flattering, truly! and this is the man to whom my mother would induce me to confide my future happiness—a man who, independent of his want of probity, is a fool into the bargain. But the persecution on his part and on that of my mother now becomes so annoying that I have requested Mrs. St. Felix to speak to Mr. Sommerville the tutor, who, if he does his duty—and I have every reason to believe that he will do so—will take some measures to remove his pupil ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... to be expected," said Mrs. Rush-Marvelle, rearing her head, and heaving her ample bosom to and fro in rather a tumultuous manner. "Of course it was to be expected that Bruce-Errington would behave like a fool—his father was a fool before him. But I say it was not to be expected that he would outrage society by bringing that common wife of his to London, and expecting us to receive her! The thing is perfectly scandalous! He has had the decency to keep away from town ever ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... community was engaged in what he took to be a funeral. He could not in decency leave them till it was over. Verse-making out of the question, this was to be a genuine poet, though, with commonplace mortals, it was also to be a fool." ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine
... "They thought only;" he exclaimed, "of making me stupid, and of stifling all my powers. I was a younger son. I coped with my brother. They feared the consequences; they annihilated me. I was taught only to play and to hunt,: and they have succeeded in making me a fool and an ass, incapable of anything, the laughing-stock and disdain of everybody." Madame de Saint-Simon was overpowered with compassion, and did everything to calm M. de Berry. Their strange tete-a-tete lasted ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... all the brains a fool cow puncher has got. Do you reckon a hair lariat, or a new pair of spurs, is any decent remedy for a girl's wownded affections? No, sir, not none. No, you go on down and take your old hair rope with you, and give it to the girl. That's all right; but you're goin' to take something ...
— Heart's Desire • Emerson Hough
... rose up. 'If I cannot spike this wheel of vice, trust me never. By my soul, a plot indeed. Oh, horrible, horrible thief!' He turned gnashing upon his brother. 'Now, Eustace, what do you say to your greatest knight in the world? And what now of your sister, hey? Little fool, do you not catch the measure of it now? Two honey years of Jehane Saint-Pol, gossamer pledges of mouth and mouth, of stealing fingers, kiss and clasp; but for the French King's daughter—pish! the thing of naught ...
— The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay • Maurice Hewlett
... found his packet of fine-cut and thrust a large helping into his left cheek. "'For as the crackling of thorns under a pot,'" he quoted, "'so is the laughter of a fool.'" ...
— Old Man Curry - Race Track Stories • Charles E. (Charles Emmett) Van Loan
... doubt of that. But Andrew has a good heart, and a good heart breaks bad fortune. Say nothing at all to him. He is wise enough to guide himself; though God knows! even the wisest of men will have a fool in his ...
— A Knight of the Nets • Amelia E. Barr
... voice made a word and said: "Why paceth the fool up and down our hall, doing nothing, even as the Ravens flap croaking about the crags, abiding the war-mote and the clash of ...
— The Story of the Glittering Plain - or the Land of Living Men • William Morris
... the best part of life—that he has deliberately turned his back on all that makes our existence here worth having. I should call him a fool, but that one so dislikes having ...
— A Little Rebel • Mrs. Hungerford
... personally in a creature was cited by the Greek Fathers in their controversies with the Pneumatomachians to prove the divinity of the Holy Ghost. St. Athanasius writes to Serapion:(1137) "If we by receiving the Holy Ghost are allowed to participate in the Divine Nature, no one but a fool will assert that the Holy Ghost is not of divine but of human nature. For all those in whom He abides become deified(1138) for no other reason. But if He constitutes them gods, there can be no doubt that His nature is divine." St. Basil comments as follows on Ps. LXXXI, 6 (Ego dixi, ...
— Grace, Actual and Habitual • Joseph Pohle
... as a grain of sand Is the small sense of a fool; Very unequal is human wisdom. The world is made ...
— Ten Great Religions - An Essay in Comparative Theology • James Freeman Clarke
... saw it all, going out without your hat and standing there like a silly fool cleaning that bit of paper. I wonder what ...
— Pages from a Journal with Other Papers • Mark Rutherford
... Compubs to try out what we told 'em. But I don't believe it. It coulda been a kinda monster from some other planet wanting us wiped out. But he learned him a lesson, if he did! And o' course, it coulda been the Compubs themselves, trying to fool us into committing suicide so they'd—uh—inherit the earth. I wouldn't know! But I bet there ain't any more broadcasts ...
— The Machine That Saved The World • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... you be such a fool as to provoke him! By Heaven, and the other place too, he'll tear you to ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... say what you have said, unless it was so clear that he couldn't help but know," he replied. He turned to the neighbors. "I'm afraid," he said, "I have in part spoiled your pleasure, and," he added, with a twitch of the muscles of his face, "made a fool of myself, besides. Come, ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Fisheries • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... Lord was fallen upon them .... 21. Then said Saul, I have sinned: return, my son David: for I will no more do thee harm, because my soul was precious in thine eyes this day: behold, I have played the fool, and have erred exceedingly. 22. And David answered and said, Behold the king's spear! and let one of the young men come over and fetch it. 23. The Lord render to every man his righteousness and his faithfulness; for the ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... that Parr Is only like all new boys are. I know when I first came to school I wasn't such a jolly fool! ...
— The Railway Children • E. Nesbit
... opposite sides of the valley, battle—or I should rather say the noise of battle—raged all the afternoon: the shots and insults of the opposing clans passing from hill to hill over the heads of Mr. Stewart and his Chinamen. There was no genuine fighting; it was like a bicker of schoolboys, only some fool had given the children guns. One man died of his exertions in running, the only casualty. With night the shots and insults ceased; the men of Haamau withdrew; and victory, on some occult principle, was scored to Moipu. Perhaps, in consequence, there came a day when Moipu made a feast, and ...
— In the South Seas • Robert Louis Stevenson
... rapists had been so very widely read and commented upon during the past year. This particular article referred to the exposure of and the protection of white girls in the isolated districts of the South from lustful brutes. "Narrow-souled fool!" exclaimed the editor, throwing the paper upon the floor; "I wonder does she ever think of the Negro girls in isolated districts of the South exposed to lustful whites! Does she think of those poor creatures shorn of all protection by the men of her race! I guess her soul is ...
— Hanover; Or The Persecution of the Lowly - A Story of the Wilmington Massacre. • David Bryant Fulton
... Barbe! Don't cry. I'm a brute. I'm a fool. I'm not satisfied with breaking my own heart, but I must go to work and break yours. Oh, Barbe, forgive me. I'm all to pieces. Forgive me and let me go away and shoot myself. What's the good of a poor, wrecked creature like me hanging ...
— The Dust Flower • Basil King
... and delicacy; open, broad ones of elevation or extension (airy, flee; large, far). The consonants which are hard to pronounce will give the impression of effort, of shock, of violence, of difficulty, of heaviness,—"the round squat turret, black as the fool's heart;" those which are easy of pronunciation express ease, smoothness, fluidity, calm, lightness, (facile, suave, roulade);—"lucent syrops, tinct with cinnamon," a line like honey on the tongue, of which physical organ, indeed, one becomes, with ...
— The Psychology of Beauty • Ethel D. Puffer
... staring and staring, and then she suddenly leaned forward and put her arms around me and kissed me. Then she sat back in her chair again, slapped her two hands upon her knees, and said, speaking to herself, 'It shall be done. I am a fool to have a doubt about it.' And then she went without another word. Now was not that simply amazing? Did she come here, and did she act ...
— The Girl at Cobhurst • Frank Richard Stockton
... question about,' answered Emilius, in high indignation. 'Making a caricature of yourself, and making a fool of yourself, are among the pleasures you are always driving ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey, Vol. 2 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... paper, told Mr. Ruddall, that he was the author of it; but it occurring to him afterwards, that he might be called upon to produce the original, he brought to him one day a piece of parchment about the size of a half-sheet of fool's-cap paper: Mr. Ruddall does not think that any thing was written on it when produced by Chatterton, but he saw him write several words, if not lines, in a character which Mr. Ruddall did not understand, which he says was totally unlike ...
— Cursory Observations on the Poems Attributed to Thomas Rowley (1782) • Edmond Malone
... and reached for a cigarette, brushing the crumpled newspaper from his lap. He'd been a fool to think Flannery would bother with him, just as he'd been a fool to turn down Queeth's offer. He'd wasted his day off from the ...
— Victory • Lester del Rey
... headache nor to settle your stomach. These are but timely ting-a-lings—Nature's warnings—look out! And the doctor tells you so, and charges you a fee sufficient to impress you with the fact that he is no fool, but that you are. ...
— Love, Life & Work • Elbert Hubbard
... chair. "So help me God!" he cried, "I have nothing in my life with which to reproach myself. Do you think that I would be such a fool as to come here and tell you lies. Once for all, I have nothing to regret." He was a pitiful, half-tragic and half-grotesque figure, as he stood with one trouser leg rolled to the knee, and that ever present horror still lurking in his eyes. A burst of merriment came from the card-players in ...
— Round the Red Lamp - Being Facts and Fancies of Medical Life • Arthur Conan Doyle
... two classes—one was spielers and the other was the mugs. He reckoned that he wasn't a mug. At first I thought he was a spieler, and afterwards I thought that he was a mug. He used to say that a man had to do it these times; that he was honest once and a fool, and was robbed and starved in consequences by his friends and relations; but now he intended to take all that he could get. He said that you either had to have or be had; that men were driven to be sharps, and there was no help ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson
... The wise fool took a kiss. We had a second supper and hot grog. We were merry. But when I said Good night, I saw in Tony's eyes a recognition that I had understood (so he felt, I think) some part of what he seldom, if ever, brings ...
— A Poor Man's House • Stephen Sydney Reynolds
... fool I am!... the murder of Susy d'Orsel, the imprisonment of the King, are both the work of Fantomas! Fantomas must have known this hiding place a long time ago.... It was he who tried the experiment of making the statues sing to find out whether the sound could be heard above.... ...
— A Royal Prisoner • Pierre Souvestre
... and leave your speeches that would choke a fool. MICHAEL — slowly and glumly. — And it's you'll go talking of fools, Sarah Casey, when no man did ever hear a lying story even of your like unto this mortal day. You to be going beside me a great while, and rearing a lot of them, and then to be setting ...
— The Tinker's Wedding • J. M. Synge
... minimum period to be devoted to sleep. There is much conflict of opinion as to the amount of sleep necessary for the average adult. We have in mind an old saying which runs as follows: "Six hours' sleep for a man, seven for a woman, and eight for a fool." This is somewhat arbitrary, and, moreover, is not in harmony with physiological law. In the first place, no hard and fast rule can be laid down that will cover all cases. Apart from the difference of sex, there are temperamental conditions which vary ...
— The Royal Road to Health • Chas. A. Tyrrell
... along, for a fool! You're a purty looking objick to denounce into the parlor, a'n't you now?" said ...
— Victor's Triumph - Sequel to A Beautiful Fiend • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... mention Degas's name before a member of the Institute. "What!" exclaimed he, "you know him? Why didn't you speak to me about him?" And when he received the reply, that I did not consider Degas to be an agreeable topic for him, the illustrious official answered vivaciously, "But do you think I am a fool, and that I do not know that Degas is one of the greatest draughtsmen who have ever lived?"—"Why, then, my dear sir, has he never been received at the Salons, and not even been decorated at the age of sixty-five?"—"Ah," replied the Academician ...
— The French Impressionists (1860-1900) • Camille Mauclair
... a fool," she said abruptly. "Can I come with you? Could you wait ten minutes while I put my riding things on? Miss Dacre said I could take her horse when I wanted to—will you wait for me, Margaret? I'll ride down to ...
— A Tall Ship - On Other Naval Occasions • Sir Lewis Anselm da Costa Ritchie
... his departure from among 'em, poor little BILLY was werry severely flogged for setting down to dinner with a smiling countinghouse! Of course ewery time as his unfortnit Birthday came round he was made a April Fool of, all his six lovin Brothers jining in the sport, one arter the other, nearly all day long. When he went to school, ewerybody knowed of his afflickshun, and made a fool ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98 February 15, 1890 • Various
... Harland (Mrs. Terhune), declaring I could never appear in public, that I should be frightened out of my wits, and that I must decline. My voice would all go, and my heart jump into my mouth. She exclaimed, 'For a sensible woman, you are the biggest fool I ever met!' This set me thinking, and with many ...
— Memories and Anecdotes • Kate Sanborn
... "Ye'r a fool to stay," was the expostulation of an outside friend, calling one day to see and condole with and exasperate the aforesaid nurse. "When ther's places yer might have three an' a half a week, an' a nurse for the baby separate, an' not a stitch to wash, ...
— The Other Girls • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... crying, and very urgently, I called upon your Highnesses' war-captains in every direction for help, but there was no reply. At length, groaning with exhaustion, I fell asleep, and heard a compassionate voice address me thus: "O fool, and slow to believe and to serve thy God, the God of all! what did He do more for Moses, or for David his servant, than He has done for thee? From thine infancy He has kept thee under His constant and watchful care. When He saw thee arrived at an age which suited His designs ...
— The Northmen, Columbus and Cabot, 985-1503 • Various
... ago—at Oxford, I think. That's enough for Adrien. If a cat or dog, or even a one-eyed monkey, placed itself under his protection, Adrien Leroy would stick to it through thick and thin. You know his little way; and this Vermont is no fool. He intends to make ...
— Adrien Leroy • Charles Garvice
... deep crevice and waited. Whenever he felt for me with his trunk, I'd belt him with the hand-axe till he pulled out, shrieking fit to split my ear drums, he was that mad. He knew he had me and didn't have me, and it near drove him wild. But he was no man's fool. He knew he was safe as long as I stayed in the crevice, and he made up his mind to keep me there. And he was dead right, only he hadn't figured on the commissary. There was neither grub nor water around that spot, so on the face of it he couldn't ...
— The Faith of Men • Jack London
... stood on an upturned lintel, ten feet above Mark's head. As Mark jerked to a stop at the cry, Jarvis jumped into his path. "You fool! Don't ...
— Operation Lorelie • William P. Salton
... you are as great a fool as the rest. Adieu, friend Derues; go on as you have begun, and I shall be selling your 'sentence' some day," and dispersing the crowd with a few twirls of her right arm, ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - DERUES • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... was and he made his prayer (Even as you and I!) To a rag and a bone and a hank of hair (We called her the woman who did not care), But the fool he called her his lady fair (Even ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... she obeys, The custom of her class; 'Tis Land not Love the trothing sways— For Land he sells his lass. Her fair white hand, young lord, is thine, Her soul, proud fool, her soul is mine, Ride ...
— The Book of American Negro Poetry • Edited by James Weldon Johnson
... bedchamber men. How is it that the man becomes all at once wise, when Caesar has made him superintendent of the close stool? How is it that we say immediately, Felicion spoke sensibly to me? I wish he were ejected from the bedchamber, that he might again appear to you to be a fool. ...
— A Selection from the Discourses of Epictetus With the Encheiridion • Epictetus
... by yourself in the black night, the slide shut, the top-coat buttoned, not a ray escaping, whether to conduct your footsteps or to make your glory public,—a mere pillar of darkness in the dark; and all the while, deep down in the privacy of your fool's heart, to know you had a bull's-eye at your belt, and to exult and ...
— Talks To Teachers On Psychology; And To Students On Some Of Life's Ideals • William James
... you fool!" shouted a furious voice; and at the same instant, with a rush and flutter, the Arab bounded over the prostrate camel and came down with his bare feet upon Anerley's chest. In a dream he seemed to be struggling frantically with someone upon the ground, ...
— The Green Flag • Arthur Conan Doyle
... completion of your duties—all but the last formation." He glanced at his wrist-watch. "Fall in the battery and call the roll. By that time, I will have organized my farewell speech to the men. Hope I can deliver it without making a fool of myself." ...
— The Pride of Palomar • Peter B. Kyne
... Better it is to die, better to starve, ...Rather than fool it so, Let the high office and the honour go To one that would do thus.—I am half through; The one part suffer'd, the other will ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... told everything. I showed him it was too crumbly. Then he was going to build it of copper ore—splendid yellow forty-per-cent. ore! There's fortunes upon fortunes of copper ore on our land! It scared me to death, the idea of this fool starting a smelting furnace in his house without knowing it, and getting his dull eyes opened. And then he was going to build it of iron ore! There's mountains of iron ore here, Nancy—whole mountains of it. I wouldn't take any chances. I just ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... with those possessing the qualities which they themselves want, so as to preserve the purity or equilibrium of the breed...It is trite to a proverb, that tall men marry little women...a man of genius marries a fool...and we are told that this is the result of the charm of contrast, or of qualities admired in others because we do not possess them. I do not so explain it. I imagine it is the effort of nature to preserve the typical ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume II • Francis Darwin
... of a place of distinction cannot save a fool from the reputation of folly, position in a sentence cannot redeem empty words from their truly insipid character. Indeed, as the imbecility of a shallow pate is made all the more apparent by a position of distinction, so is the utter unfitness of certain words for their ...
— English: Composition and Literature • W. F. (William Franklin) Webster
... I, annoyance in my tone, "this isn't as funny as it seems. Tying me up to this fool tradition may result in spoiling my plans for taking pictures in the Celebes. Of course the Dutch authorities know perfectly well that I haven't come here to start a revolution, but, on the other hand, they may not want a person whom the natives regard as a Messiah ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell
... "I don't see as there is anything else for you to do, except to find some woman fool enough to marry you, as Betsey did your father. There's ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 47, September, 1861 • Various
... Lord knows; but there's nothing else to tell you. I suppose Pen gave you a hint about it. I dropped something to her. I've been feeling bad about it, Persis, a good while, but I hain't had the heart to speak of it. I can't expect you to say you like it. I've been a fool, I'll allow, and I've been something worse, if you choose to say so; but that's all. I haven't hurt anybody but myself—and ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... a dire alternative. On the other hand, from the bond of marriage, as we know, he shrank with every instinct of his nature. Only a few weeks before, doubtless with his own possible fate in front of him, he had put these words in the mouth of Fernando in his Stella: "I would be a fool to allow myself to be shackled. That state [marriage] smothers all my powers; that state robs me of all my spirits, cramps my whole being. I must forth into the free world."[214] Goethe did eventually take the decision of Fernando, but not just yet. On March 25th he wrote to Herder: ...
— The Youth of Goethe • Peter Hume Brown
... is President Abe Lincoln is a fool Come here, see Jeff ride the gray horse And Abe Lincoln ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume II, Arkansas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... if there's a hole where I could look through," said Mr. Nestor to himself. "Of course I don't believe in spying on what another man is doing, and yet I'm too good a friend of Tom's to want to see him make a fool of himself. He ought to be in the army, or helping Uncle Sam in some way. And yet if he spends all his time on some foolish contraption, like a new kind of traction plow, what good is that? If I could get a glimpse of it, I might drop a ...
— Tom Swift and his War Tank - or, Doing his Bit for Uncle Sam • Victor Appleton
... "You fool!" said the Doctor, with a withering look. "Don't you see, it's life or death later. That—that thing will be as big as this house in half an hour. Don't you know that? As big as this house. We've got to kill ...
— The Girl in the Golden Atom • Raymond King Cummings
... more, 'Is incest not enough? And must there be adultery too? Grace after meat? Miscreant and Liar! 480 Thief! Blackguard! Scoundrel! Fool! hell-fire Is twenty times too ...
— Peter Bell the Third • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... one of them say to another, in a transport of indignation, "Ha-a-a, boy, s'pose I no be a Christian, I cuss you sol"—which was certainly drawing pretty hard upon the bridle. "Cuss," however, was a generic term for all manner of evil speaking; they would say, "He cuss me fool," or "He cuss me coward," as if the essence of propriety were in harsh and angry speech,—which I take to be good ethics. But certainly, if Uncle Toby could have recruited his army in Flanders from our ranks, their swearing would have ceased to ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... men readily confess, and other things they do not. No one then will confess that he is a fool or without understanding; but quite the contrary you will hear all men saying, I wish that I had fortune equal to my understanding. But men readily confess that they are timid, and they say: I am rather timid, I confess; but as to other respects you will not find me ...
— The Moral Economy • Ralph Barton Perry
... which we could hear, through the silence, excited undertones from the upper floors. The words were indistinct until Joe's heavy voice sent down to us an angry "No damn nonsense, I tell you. Allie's got to come, too. She's not such a fool as you ...
— The Deluge • David Graham Phillips
... Love makes a fool of the wise. Isak felt he must do something grand himself, and overdid it. "What I was going to say; you've no need to bother with hoeing potatoes. I'll do it myself the evening, when I ...
— Growth of the Soil • Knut Hamsun
... court were well known to Botticelli—from such a group he could have picked his model, if anywhere. Ruskin has linked this unknown wicked beauty with Machiavelli. But Machiavelli had a head that outmatched hers, and he would certainly have left her to the fool moths that fluttered around her candle. Machiavelli used women, and this woman has only one ambition, and that is to use men. She represents concrete selfishness—the mother-instinct swallowed up in pride, and conscience ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 6 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Artists • Elbert Hubbard
... be, was no fool, and even as Gard seemed a prey to nervous irritation, so Mahr appeared to experience a bitter pleasure in parrying his adversary's vicious thrusts and lunging at every opening in the other's arguments. Both men appeared to ease some inner turbulence, for they calmed down as the dinner progressed, ...
— Out of the Ashes • Ethel Watts Mumford
... taken place, he reasoned with me, pointed out to me that I had an opportunity of establishing myself for life, and proposed that I should purchase a part of a vessel, on condition that I was captain of her. I liked this idea very much, and being convinced that I had been making a fool of myself, I resolved to take his advice; but one thing only restrained me: I was still very young, not more than twenty years old; and although I could navigate at one time, I had latterly paid no attention. I told Sanders this, and he replied, that if I ...
— Masterman Ready • Captain Marryat
... any human creature; but poor Bathurst is dead!" Here a long pause and a few tears ensued.' Piozzi's Anec., p. 18. Another day he said to her:—'Dear Bathurst was a man to my very heart's content: he hated a fool, and he hated a rogue, and he hated a Whig; he was a very good hater.' Ib. p. 83. In his Meditations on Easter-Day, 1764, he records:—'After sermon I recommended Tetty in a prayer by herself; and my father, mother, brother, ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... cries. The man, if a burglar, had evidently a patient philosophical turn of mind, for he calmly waited till the damsel was exhausted, and when she at length peeped out to observe the effect of her heroic efforts at self-preservation he said quietly, "Nanny, lass, don't be a fool! It's me; open the door; I've gone ...
— The Iron Horse • R.M. Ballantyne
... cried in a spent voice, 'I have no money, for you did take all I had when you told us our lord Geraint was become a court fool.' ...
— King Arthur's Knights - The Tales Re-told for Boys & Girls • Henry Gilbert
... "What a fool I war! durned if I warn't!" said Dan, endeavoring unsuccessfully to find a place by which he ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... at an inconvenient distance from our base of supplies. If we have created permanent bases in time of peace the enemy will know their whereabouts as well as we do ourselves, and, unless he is a greater fool than it is safe to think he is, he will try to make us derive as little benefit from them as possible. He is likely to extend his operations to localities at a distance from the places to which, if we have the secondary ...
— Sea-Power and Other Studies • Admiral Sir Cyprian Bridge
... "There, I knew yer'd do it in some sech fool way! Now go in there and try it over again, every last one o' ye, 'n' if Larry can't come in on two legs he can stay ter ...
— The Bird's Christmas Carol • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... to return as soon as possible, and spend that night at Salerno. They had seen nothing of the driver since they left him, and they accounted for this on the ground that he was still maintaining himself in his gigantic sulk, and brooding over his wrongs; and they thought that if he chose to make a fool of himself, they would allow him to do so as long as it was agreeable ...
— Among the Brigands • James de Mille
... and don't make such a fool of yourself! It's only Pat,' said Al, with suppressed laughter, while Pat and I indulged in laughter that was far ...
— An Arrow in a Sunbeam - and Other Tales • Various
... against, and Heaven has heard me, I tell you, Sir, I am more fearful of it, I mean, of thinking of more lands, or livings, than sickly men are travelling o' Sundays, for being quell'd with Carriers; out upon't, caveat emptor, let the fool out-sweat it, that thinks he ...
— Wit Without Money - The Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher • Francis Beaumont
... had tossed away the whole Valley of the Mississippi, dropping it overboard as a little sand from a balloon, and Christendom in a pale agony of suspense was watching the turn of his eye; yet when a gibbering black fool here on the edge of civilization merely swings a pine-knot, the swinging of that pine-knot becomes to Joseph Frowenfeld, student of man, a matter of greater moment than the destination of the Boulogne Flotilla. For it now became for the moment the foremost necessity of his life to ...
— The Grandissimes • George Washington Cable
... Shylock. I love character parts. I don't see why you have to pick out these little tame scenes when we could have Lear and Edgar and the Fool on the heath, or Dick the Third or Macbeth. I'd play any of those for you. We used to have plays back home just amongst us girls, and I was always the leading heavy. We even tried putting on 'Faust' in the barn when the hay-lofts were empty, but ...
— Kit of Greenacre Farm • Izola Forrester
... I saw what an ass I had made of myself. Of course, the priest was perfectly right (I saw that before I got ten yards away, though I wouldn't acknowledge it for another five miles). I was a dirty tramp, and I talked like a brazen fool. (I remember thinking my 'openness' to him rather fine and manly!) Well, that ...
— None Other Gods • Robert Hugh Benson
... level. "Any woman who, to put any one at ease, will break a priceless Sevres cup is heroic," I said. His answer, though flippant, was pleasant: "Any man who would not smile across the table at a lovely woman is a fool." ...
— The Log-Cabin Lady, An Anonymous Autobiography • Unknown
... "Dolt! Fool!" he exclaimed. "Will you never learn how to hold your paddle? Will you never know the stroke? Will you tip us both into the water at such a time, when the messengers of the enemy are seeking to steal through? Do better with the paddle or ...
— The Lords of the Wild - A Story of the Old New York Border • Joseph A. Altsheler
... playing a good part in this Christian adventure, I think!' he broke out after a time. Saint-Pol squared his jaw. 'If I had caught you in your late sally, my friend,' Richard went on, 'I should have hanged you on a tree, knight or no knight. Why, fool, do you think your shameful brother worth so much treachery? With him before your eyes can you do no better? I hope so. Get you back, and tell King Philip this: He and I are vowed to honesty; but if he breaks faith again, I have that in me which shall break him. As for you, Bishop of ...
— The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay • Maurice Hewlett
... explain that there was a God. We answered, 'Dost thou think us so ignorant as not to know that? Go to the place whence thou camest!' Then, again, another preacher came, and began to teach us, and to say, 'You must not steal, nor lie, nor get drunk, and so forth.' We answered, 'Thou fool, dost thou think that we do not know that? Learn first thyself, and then teach the people to whom thou belongest to leave off these things. For who steal, or lie, or who are more drunken than thine own people?' ...
— History of the Moravian Church • J. E. Hutton
... grandmother Sottie (or Folly), who advises them to take up some trade. She introduces this progeny of her fools to the World, who takes them into his service. The World tries their skill, and is much displeased with their work. The Cobbler-fool pinches his feet by making the shoes too small; the Tailor-fool hangs his coat too loose or too tight about him; the Priest-fool says his masses either too short or too tedious. They all agree that the World does not know what he wants, and must be sick, and prevail upon him to ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... his tankard, "the fool who wanted us to be friends made us want to go on fighting. It is only natural that the fool who wanted us to fight should make ...
— The Ball and The Cross • G.K. Chesterton
... boys—they're starting a Mars colony too, you know. Barness is sure you're selling them info—" The man hiccupped again. "Barness is an ass, just like all the other Retreads running this place, but I'm not an ass, and you didn't fool me for ...
— Martyr • Alan Edward Nourse
... very notional and would never pull a load unless there was snow on the ground so after the spring thaws they had to white wash the logging roads to fool him. ...
— The Marvelous Exploits of Paul Bunyan • W.B. Laughead
... craft, looked long on sea and sky, and then turned and bade the mariners take in sail and be right heedful. And when Walter asked him what he looked for, and wherefore he spake not to him thereof, he said surlily: "Why should I tell thee what any fool can see without telling, to wit that ...
— The Wood Beyond the World • William Morris
... to rub and the collar to gall. "The girl who has married for money," writes a clergyman, "has not by that rash and immoral act blinded her eyes to other and nobler attractions. She may still love wisdom, though the man of her choice may be a fool; she will none the less desire gentle, chivalrous affection because he is purse-proud and haughty; she may sigh for manly beauty all the more because he is coarse and ugly; she will not be able to get rid of her own youth, and ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... that you stopped wearing it because you're so warm-blooded. A sensible woman soon begins to understand that affection can be expressed in porterhouse steaks as well as in American beauties. But when Charlie, on twenty-five a week, marries a fool, she pouts and says that he doesn't love her just the same because he takes her to the theatre now in the street-cars, instead of in a carriage, as he used to in those happy days before they were married. As a matter of fact, this doesn't ...
— Old Gorgon Graham - More Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son • George Horace Lorimer
... asked Edward a good deal surprised; and at the same time he wanted to give the besmeared book back again to the old man, saying with some irritation: "since you cannot trust me, or rather hold me to be such a fool, keep the treasure-casket yourself for our friend, and only give the master ...
— The Old Man of the Mountain, The Lovecharm and Pietro of Abano - Tales from the German of Tieck • Ludwig Tieck
... Sacraments, for which he received from the Pope the title of Defender of the Faith. The vituperative character of Luther's answer confirmed him in his hatred of the new doctrine. "When God," said the blunt Saxon reformer, "wants a fool, he turns a king ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... he answered. "For you've given me a Memory to carry till I can shake off the load—till I can get clear of McPherson's 'man-built hell.' It won't be long. So don't worry. Even now, my common sense tells me I've made a fool of myself. And I'm human enough to be more ashamed of being a fool than of being a knave. I had everything in my own hands. And I threw away the game because an attack of fright kept me from playing my winning cards. Last night I was afraid of a ghost. This morning I'm sane enough ...
— The Return of Peter Grimm - Novelised From the Play • David Belasco
... got some sort of a fool notion in his head that he don't want to make an exhibition of himself—that's what he said. I've got another man on the ranch now," he added, as though to change the subject, "that'll be mighty near as good as Phil ...
— When A Man's A Man • Harold Bell Wright
... come, Malcolm, I suppose you will join him? I am afraid I shall be fool enough to do so, even with my fifty years on my ...
— Bonnie Prince Charlie - A Tale of Fontenoy and Culloden • G. A. Henty
... goatee bobbing, his lean body coming upright smoothly. "Quite right, Captain. Nor does it forbid me to let you and your men spend the sixteen months on the moon—where I command—in irons. Why don't you ask Sam what happened before you make a complete fool of yourself, Captain Muller?" ...
— Let'em Breathe Space • Lester del Rey
... knew how to live. Captain Vane was handsome and fascinating, and a hero from having lost his estates, and there were a full hundred reasons why he should be attractive to a woman. He believed Andrew Henry was no sort of rival beside him. Of course Primrose would—what a fool he had been to ...
— A Little Girl in Old Philadelphia • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... Wesley Sinton soothingly. "Nothing, honey. That was just one of them fool things a man says, when he is trying his best to be wise. You see, she loved him mightily, and they'd been married only a year, and what she was loving was what she thought he was. She hadn't really got acquainted with the man yet. If it ...
— A Girl Of The Limberlost • Gene Stratton Porter
... before I picked up the book again. You call me a fool for continuing it? A fool? I tell you, even a story of horror is more comfort than a room of grotesque shadows and silence. Even a printed page is better ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science February 1930 • Various
... "I were a fool," answered Roland, "so to do. Not so; but I will deal these heathen some mighty blows with Durendal, my sword. They have been ill-advised to venture into these passes. I swear that they are condemned to death, ...
— Myths and Legends of All Nations • Various
... an avowed type, below true Shakespearean plays like Measure for Measure. I cannot help that. Popular dramas and operas may have overwhelming merits as enchanting make-believes; but a poet's sincerest vision of the world must always take precedence of his prettiest fool's paradise. ...
— The Perfect Wagnerite - A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring • George Bernard Shaw
... his stupor; the captives of life to whom death sings his insistent, luring songs; the half-idiotic peasant boy who tries to stammer out his declaration of love to the superb village belle; the wretched fool who weeps in the falling snowy night. He is those who have never before spoken in musical art, and now arise, and are about us and ...
— Musical Portraits - Interpretations of Twenty Modern Composers • Paul Rosenfeld
... it had been left when he fell asleep, and spoke of Madam Esmond in curt, disrespectful terms, such as soldiers were in the habit of using in those days, and asking, again, what was the name of the old fool about whom Dinwiddie had been talking? He then broke into expressions of contempt and wrath against the gentry, ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Think'st thou that, fool-like, I shall let thee go, And act the mock-magnanimous with thee? Thy father is become a villain to me; I hold thee for his son, and nothing more: Nor to no purpose shalt thou have been given Into my power. Think not that I will honor That ancient ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. III • Kuno Francke (Editor-in-Chief)
... a blank. Though she doubts everything else, she will keep the one atom of faith in love and the truth that is love and life in her heart. When something shrieks within her, she feels that all her anguish is for nothing and that she is a fool. She is exasperated that people call her peculiar, but confesses that she loves admiration; she can fascinate and charm company if she tries; imagines an admiration for Messalina. She most desires to cultivate badness when there is lead in the sky. "I would live about ...
— Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene • G. Stanley Hall
... I take," flung back the other as he swung buoyantly across the room. "But YOU don't need to take it. If you want, you can get out now at the top market price. I feel it in my bones I'm going to win; but if you don't feel it, you'd be a fool to ...
— Ridgway of Montana - (Story of To-Day, in Which the Hero Is Also the Villain) • William MacLeod Raine
... humanity, declared (as a phrenologist of that day) that he was born to be a scamp, and a very bad one. A great general may save his country at Zurich, and take commissions from purveyors. A great musician may conceive the sublimest music and commit a forgery. A woman of true feeling may be a fool. In short, a devote may have a sublime soul and yet be unable to recognize the tones of a noble soul beside her. The caprices produced by physical infirmities are equally to be met with in ...
— The Jealousies of a Country Town • Honore de Balzac
... command in behalf of the Huguenots. Soubise appears to have valued him highly as one of those reckless youths that court rather than shun personal peril, while he shared the common impression that the lad was little better than a fool. True, for years—ever since the tumult of Amboise, where his kinsman, La Renaudie and another relative had been killed—Merey had been constantly boasting to all whom he met that he would kill the Duke of Guise; but those who heard him "made no more account of his words than if he had ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... is entirely without any scientific value for the explanation of the future. Elsewhere he says that 'history robbed of the exposition of its causes and laws is a profitless thing, though it may allure a fool.' And all through his history the same point is put forward ...
— Miscellanies • Oscar Wilde
... good act of James was the translation of our English Bible, known as King James's Version, a work which, for the exercise of learning, scholarship, and a zealous religious faith, has not been surpassed in any age. Take him all in all, James was a bigot, a tyrant, a conceited fool. He professed to be the most ardent devotee of piety, and at the same time issued a proclamation that all lawful recreations, such as dancing, archery, leaping, May-games, etc., might be used after divine service, on Sundays. An advocate ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Vol. 1, Issue 1. - A Massachusetts Magazine of Literature, History, - Biography, And State Progress • Various
... Scripio relinquished the suggestion of "dodges" in despair. He was, as usual, brimful of projects, making money by the thousand, and bearing or bulling, as the case might be, with genuine American enthusiasm. I believe he thought me a fool for remaining so easily contented, and very soon manifested no further symptom of his consciousness of my existence than by transmitting me regularly a copy of the Railway Gazette, with some mysterious pencil-markings at the ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various
... fool. I saw that we could do nothing against such weapons, but must use all our wits if ...
— The Lord of Death and the Queen of Life • Homer Eon Flint
... "Don't be a fool," called the Major. "If you show yourself they'll have you, as sure as eggs are eggs." But my anxiety to obtain pictures of the bursting shells was too much for me. I set to to make a handle of wood. Looking round, I spotted an old tree-trunk, ...
— How I Filmed the War - A Record of the Extraordinary Experiences of the Man Who - Filmed the Great Somme Battles, etc. • Lieut. Geoffrey H. Malins
... likewise, they will be glad to keep you away! Don't you see that they cut off competition? They would not be whispering around to Republicans to come in and share the profits with them. But if they are not sincere, and are merely trying to fool Republicans out of their votes, they will grow very anxious about your pecuniary prospects; they are afraid you are going to get broken up and ruined; they do not care about Democratic votes, oh, no, no, no! You must judge which class those belong to whom you meet: I leave it to you to determine ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... sacred things; nothing is sacred because it is mysterious; reverence does not dwell apart from reason. Faith does not reach its perfection in the fool; it shines most glorious where wisdom dwells. There still are the superstitious souls who confound darkness with divinity; who cry aloud against the light of knowledge. But they can no more stay the discovery of truth than the bats can ...
— Levels of Living - Essays on Everyday Ideals • Henry Frederick Cope
... therefore be new to most readers—Lamb writes very much in the manner in which Shakspeare's fools and jesters—in some respects the wisest and thoughtfullest characters in his works—talk. If his words be "light as air," they vent "truths deep as the centre." If the Fool in "Lear" had written letters to his friends and acquaintances, I think they would have marvellously resembled this epistle to Patmore; and if, in saying this, I compliment the Fool, I hope I do not derogate from the genius of Elia. Jaques, it will be remembered, after ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... first, she reflected patriotically, "One German the less in Paris!" That of the second elicited the matter-of-fact comment, "It was bound to happen; he had no moderation." A third admirer, who died in a hospital, was dismissed as "a fool who, in spite of all, still respects women." But, in ruining her lovers, she had ruined her own health. In 1865 she was compelled to enter a private asylum. There she is described as "dark in complexion, with dark expressive eyes, very pale, and of a nervous ...
— A Book of Remarkable Criminals • H. B. Irving
... been saying that he was a fool to let me marry off the place; that he hates Mr. Shelby and all his tribe, because they are proud, and hold their heads up above him, and that I've got proud notions from you; and he says he won't let me come here any more, and that I shall take ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... Sir Morgan Blunder! a Sot, an ill-bred senseless Fool; almost too great a Fool ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume IV. • Aphra Behn
... "Why, you fool! I noticed that order for metal-foil wrappers, assumed it was some sub-secretary's mistake, and ...
— Bread Overhead • Fritz Reuter Leiber |
