"Pontifex" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... extensive practice as a bridge-builder led his friend Southey to designate him "Pontifex Maximus." Besides the numerous bridges erected by him in the West of England, we have found him furnishing designs for about twelve hundred in the Highlands, of various dimensions, some of stone and ...
— The Life of Thomas Telford by Smiles • Samuel Smiles
... the Gospel, si pontifex evangelium admitteret." A. Osiander remarked: "That is, if the devil would become an apostle." In the Jena edition of Luther's works Melanchthon's phrase is commented upon as follows: "And yet the ...
— Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church • Friedrich Bente
... Allesley and went to Shrewsbury under the Rev. B. H. Kennedy. Many of the recollections of his school life at Shrewsbury are reproduced for the school life of Ernest Pontifex at Roughborough in The Way of All Flesh, Dr. ...
— The Humour of Homer and Other Essays • Samuel Butler
... control elections ordinarily elected Venality of the people Caesar borrows money to bribe the people Elected Quaestor Gains a seat in the Senate Second marriage, with a cousin of Pompey Caesar made Pontifex Maximus; elected Praetor Sent to Spain; military services in Spain Elected Consul; his reforms; Leges Juliae Opposition of the Aristocracy Assigned to the province of Gaul His victories over the Gauls and Germans Character of the races he subdued ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IV • John Lord
... referred the affair from themselves to the people, and ordained that to whichsoever of them the dedication should be granted by order of the people, he should preside over the markets, establish a company of merchants, and perform the functions of a pontifex maximus. The people gave the dedication of the temple to M. Laetorius, the centurion of the first legion, that it might plainly appear to have been done not so much out of respect to a person on whom an honour above his rank had been conferred, as to affront the consuls. ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius
... armed with bayonets,—from the sophomores, who were infuriated by the fact that the head of the intended victim, a skull furnished from medical sources, was crowned by a mortar-board, the sophomore class insignia. A formal trial followed, presided over by a Pontifex Maximus, in which a Judex, an Advocatus Pro, and an Advocatus Con participated, with the foregone result that the culprit was sentenced to be hanged, shot, and burned; a decree carried out on a gallows and bonfire previously prepared in spite of ...
— The University of Michigan • Wilfred Shaw
... said, "but there will be only one alternative. Unless you agree to obey me I shall go at once to the Pontifex and offer ...
— The Unwilling Vestal • Edward Lucas White
... social and political ethics. As far as I experienced, the European radical press more strictly observes that rule of political ethics than the American press is wont to do. And the press, bad or good, is the high pontifex of our times; more than any other social agency whatever, the press ought, at least, to be manly, elevated, indomitable, vigilant and straight-forward. I mean ...
— Diary from November 12, 1862, to October 18, 1863 • Adam Gurowski
... Roman Emperor was called Pontifex Maximus, because he presided over civil and ecclesiastical affairs; which, is the first beast that persecuted the Christians that separated from the Established religion, which they call the holy religion of their forefathers; ...
— The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut • M. Louise Greene, Ph. D.
... the equals of the patrician families in dignity, as they were in riches and in importance. They gradually forced the patricians to open to them all the offices, beginning with the consulship, and ending with the great pontifical office (Pontifex Maximus). The first plebeian consul was named in 366 B.C., the first plebeian pontifex maximus in 302 B.C.[119] Patricians and plebeians then coalesced and henceforth formed but ...
— History Of Ancient Civilization • Charles Seignobos
... resuscitation of the old national religion, in which the people believed, whether he himself did or not. Religion in Rome was largely an affair of the state; the leaders of the public religion were great state officials. Augustus was made pontifex maximus, and it was only one step farther to elevate the chief magistrate to the rank of a god. The good sense of the time generally forbade the bestowment of this honor during the imperator's lifetime, but an apotheosis was in accord with the veneration paid to ...
— Introduction to the History of Religions - Handbooks on the History of Religions, Volume IV • Crawford Howell Toy
... mysteries was alleged to have been committed in December of that year, and before he could go to the province allotted to him as quaestor in Sicily he had to stand a trial for sacrilege. Such an offence—penetrating in disguise into the house of the Pontifex Maximus, when his wife was engaged in the secret rites of the Bona Dea—would place him under a curse, and not only prevent his entering upon his quaestorship, but would disfranchise and politically ruin him. Clodius would seem not to have been a person ...
— The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1 - The Whole Extant Correspodence in Chronological Order • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... phrase, no gossamer-like slightness of theme, which did not rest upon the unseen structure of artistic sincerity. That was why in rare solemn moments he believed that his poetry would live, live beyond his own lifetime and his age, even, perhaps, as long as the Pontifex Maximus and the Vestal Virgin should ascend to the Capitol in public processional. He had said laughingly of his published metrical letters that they might please Rome for a day, travel on to the provinces, and finally become exercise-books ...
— Roads from Rome • Anne C. E. Allinson
... ceremony of the consecration of the High Priest of Cybele, which many learned men have mistaken for the consecration of the Roman Pontifex Maximus; which dignity, from the very earliest infancy of the Roman Empire, was always annexed to ...
— A Year's Journey through France and Part of Spain, Volume II (of 2) • Philip Thicknesse
... tabbies in the village. Oh, he was the beau-ideal of a vieux garcon. We recommend all school-assistants to learn the guitar and grow fat—if they can; and then, perhaps, they may prosper, like Mr Sigismund Pontifex. He contrived to elope with a maiden lady, of good property, just ten years older than himself: the sweet, innocent, indiscreet ones went off by stealth one morning before daylight, in a chaise-and-four, and returned a week after, Mr and ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... not mean necessarily eminent ecclesiastics; several famous ecclesiastics with whom circumstances have brought me into contact have not been priestly persons at all; they have been vigorous, wise, energetic, statesmanlike men, such as I suppose the Pontifex Maximus at Rome might have been, with a kind of formal, almost hereditary, priesthood. And, on the other hand, I have known more than one layman of distinctly priestly character, priestly after the order of Melchizedek, who had not, I suppose, received any religious consecration for his ...
— From a College Window • Arthur Christopher Benson
... have contributed to its making. From the historical point of view it is a religious and social method that developed with the later development of the world empire of Rome and as the expression of its moral and spiritual side. Its head was, and so far as its main body is concerned still is, the pontifex maximus of the Roman world empire, an official who was performing sacrifices centuries before Christ was born. It is easy to assert that the Empire was converted to Christianity and submitted to its terrestrial ...
— First and Last Things • H. G. Wells
... into his kingdom at the head of a Roman army had not the tribunes of the people, fearing any addition to Pompey's great power, had recourse to their usual state-engine, the Sibylline books; and the pontifex, at their bidding, publicly declared that it was written in those sacred pages that the King of Egypt should have the friendship of Rome, but should not be helped ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 10 (of 12) • S. Rappoport
... Greeks invented a system of numerals second only to that now in use, the Romans counted to the end of their days with the clumsy apparatus which we still call by their name; the Greeks made a capital and scientific calendar, the Romans began their month when the Pontifex Maximus happened to spy out the new moon. Throughout Latin literature, this is the perpetual puzzle:—Why are we free and they slaves, we praetors and they barbers? why do the stupid people always win and the clever people always lose? I need not say that in real ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various
... jumping with his own desires, caused Tom much sly mirth. For might it not be counted among the satisfactory results of his deposition of heavy baggage at Radley's that, for the first time in his life, he was at liberty to regard even his father, Thomas Pontifex Verity, Archdeacon of Harchester and Rector of Canton Magna, in a true perspective? And he laughed again, though this time softly, indulgently, able in the plenitude of youthful superiority to extend a kindly tolerance towards the foibles and ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... tide began to turn. The earliest recorded instance of a priest holding a high political office is in the year B.C. 242 when the Flamen Martialis or special priest of Mars was chosen Consul; but when the gentleman in question started to go to the war, he was forbidden by the Pontifex Maximus. In B.C. 200 the Flamen Dialis, or special priest of Juppiter, was allowed to be made aedile, but his brother had to be especially authorised to take the oath of office in his stead, since the priest of Juppiter, the god of oaths, was himself not ...
— The Religion of Numa - And Other Essays on the Religion of Ancient Rome • Jesse Benedict Carter
... continued, the triumvirate agreed to come to an accommodation with Pompey: the principal terms were, that the latter should retain possession of Sicily, Sardinia,. &c.; and that he should moreover receive Peloponnesus; that he might endeavour to obtain the consulate; that the dignity of Pontifex Maximus should be granted him; that he should be paid 70,000 great sesterces out of his father's confiscated estate; and that such of his companions as chose should be allowed to return. On his part, he promised, that he would no longer interrupt the Roman trade ...
— Robert Kerr's General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 • William Stevenson
... interest to the classical student. To the right of it are the remains of the Regia or Royal Palace, the official residence of the early kings of Rome, and afterwards, during the whole period of the Republic, of the Pontifex Maximus, as the real head of the State as well as the Church. Numa Pompilius resided here in the hope that, by occupying neutral ground, he might conciliate the Latins of the Palatine and the Sabines of the Capitoline Hills. It was also the ...
— Roman Mosaics - Or, Studies in Rome and Its Neighbourhood • Hugh Macmillan
... Pontifex, however, we do not care to respond to the challenge at all. The experiment is faked and proves nothing. It is mere humbug to declare that a man has been thrown into the waters of life to sink or swim, when there is an anxious but cool-headed ...
— Aspects of Literature • J. Middleton Murry
... long as with his Vestals mute Rome's Pontifex shall climb The Capitol, my fame shall shoot Fresh buds through ...
— Horace • Theodore Martin
... the open. But leave was constantly being applied for, and as constantly granted; and perhaps every boy, at some time or other, cast wistful glances at the black buoy bobbing a mile out at sea, and wondered when he, like Pontifex and Mansfield, and other of the Sixth, should be able to wear the image of it on his belt, and call himself a ...
— Follow My leader - The Boys of Templeton • Talbot Baines Reed
... These included a Lar, or ancestral family divinity, in each house. There were Vestal virgins to guard the most sacred places. There was a college of pontiffs to regulate worship and perform the higher ceremonies, which were complicated and minute. The pontiffs were presided over by one called Pontifex Maximus,—a title shrewdly assumed by Caesar to gain control of the popular worship, and still surviving in the title of the Pope of Rome with his college of cardinals. There were augurs and haruspices ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume I • John Lord
... Publicus, Publius, Puer. P.C. Pactum conventum, Patres conscripti, Pecunia constituta, Ponendum curavit, Post consulatum, Potestate censoria. P.F. Pia fidelis, Pius felix, Promissa fides, Publii filius. P.M. Piae memoriae, Pius minus, Pontifex maximus. P.P. Pater patratus, Pater patriae, Pecunia publica, Praepositus, Primipilus, Propraetor. PR. Praeses, Praetor, Pridie, Princeps. P.R. Permissu reipublicae, Populus Romanus. P.R.C. Post Romam conditam. PR.PR. Praefectus praetorii, Propraetor. P.S. Pecunia sua, Plebiscitum, ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... the Prime Minister who, under the feeble King Cloche, governed the kingdom, respected popular beliefs, as all great statesmen respect them. Caesar was Pontifex Maximus, and Napoleon had himself crowned by the Pope. Monsieur de La Rochecoupee admitted the power of the fairies. He was by no means sceptical, by no means incredulous. He did not suggest that the prediction of the seven ...
— The Story Of The Duchess Of Cicogne And Of Monsieur De Boulingrin - 1920 • Anatole France
... massacre was in B.C. 87-86; the Sullan in 82-81. (7) The head of Antonius was struck off and brought to Marius at supper. He was the grandfather of the triumvir. (8) Scaevola, it would appear, was put to death after Marius the elder died, by the younger Marius. He was Pontifex Maximus, and slain by the altar of Vesta. (9) B.C. 86, Marius and Cinna were Consuls. Marius died seventeen days afterwards, in the seventieth year of his age. (10) The Battle of Sacriportus was fought between Marius the younger and the Sullan army in B.C. ...
— Pharsalia; Dramatic Episodes of the Civil Wars • Lucan
... thereon. Samuel Butler, that brilliant writer who has not even yet come into his own, sums up in his novel The Way of All Flesh (and it may incidentally be remarked, in himself) most of the characteristics of the day. Many a parsonage home like that of the Rev. Theobald Pontifex existed in those days, and more than one Ernest Pontifex emerged from them. Now in this book Butler states that "the year 1858 was the last of a term during which the peace of the Church of England was singularly unbroken," ...
— Science and Morals and Other Essays • Bertram Coghill Alan Windle
... people, and the original character of the gods of Latium was modified after the new mythology. Notwithstanding this, however, the worship of the Romans retained its political and practical character. The priests (sacerdotes) Flamines, Salii, Feciales, the Pontifices with the Pontifex Maximus at their head, the Augurs, were likewise officers of the state, and did not form a hierarchy apart from the ...
— A Comparative View of Religions • Johannes Henricus Scholten
... interests of the State, now being undermined. Appius Claudius, his father-in-law, who had been both consul and censor; Publius Mucius Scaevola, the great lawyer and founder of scientific jurisprudence; his brother, Publius Crassus Mucianus; the Pontifex Maximus; Quintus Metellus, the conqueror of Macedonia—all men of the highest rank and universally respected, entered ...
— Ancient States and Empires • John Lord
... scarlet hangings, bearing the arms of Pius IX. and suspended at the corners of the nave and transept, were two Latin inscriptions, of similar purport, of one of which I give a translation: 'O Germana, raised to-day to celestial honors by Pius IX. Pontifex Maximus, since thou knowest that Pius has wept over thy nation wandering from God, and has exultingly rejoiced at its reconciling itself with God little by little, he prays thee intimately united with God, do thou, for thou ...
— Life in the Grey Nunnery at Montreal • Sarah J Richardson
... Colonna, the Protonotary, that Pope Sixtus the Fourth destroyed the last remains of the Sublician Bridge, at the foot of the Aventine. So, at least, tradition says. From that bridge the Roman pontiffs had taken their title, 'Pontifex,' a bridge-maker, because it was one of their chief duties to keep it in repair, when it was the only means of crossing the Tiber, and the safety of the city might depend upon it at any time; and for many centuries ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 2 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... which gave Ireland to Henry II. Adrian had great friendship for John: "Fatebatur etiam," John wrote somewhat conceitedly, "publice et secreto quod me prae omnibus mortalibus diligebat.... Et quum Romanus pontifex esset, me in propria mensa gaudebat habere convivum, et eundem scyphum et discum sibi et mihi volebat, et faciebat, me renitente, esse communem" ("Metalogicus," in the "Opera Omnia," ed. Giles, vol. v. p. 205). ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... hence his works display all the best qualities which are fostered by a military education—frankness, simplicity, and brevity. His earliest literary triumph was as an orator, and, according to Quintilian, he was a worthy rival of Cicero. When he obtained the office of Pontifex Maximus, he diligently examined the history and nature of the Roman belief in augury, and published his investigations. When his career as a military commander began, whatever leisure his duties permitted him to enjoy he devoted to the composition ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... habitae in seminario Sancti Sulpitii, 1867 (Par l'abbe Icard), I., 138. "Sancti canones passim memorant distinctionem duplicis potestatis qua utitur sanctus pontifex: unam appelant ordinariam, aliam absolutam, vel plenitudinem potestatis... . Pontifex potestate ordinaria utitur, quando juris positivi dispositionem retinet.... Potestatem extraordinariam exserit, quando jus humanum non servat, ut si jus ipsum auferat, si 1egibus conciliorum deroget, ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 6 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 2 (of 2) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... hot, cold, moist and dry, is he here struggling (by union of like with like, which is Method) to build a firm Bridge for British travellers. Never perhaps since our first Bridge-builders, Sin and Death, built that stupendous Arch from Hell-gate to the Earth, did any Pontifex, or Pontiff, undertake such a task as the present Editor. For in this Arch too, leading, as we humbly presume, far otherwards than that grand primeval one, the materials are to be fished-up from the weltering deep, and down from the simmering air, here one mass, there another, and cunningly cemented, ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle
... story The Way of All Flesh will probably recall his description of the Simeonites (chap. xlvii), who still flourished at Cambridge when Ernest Pontifex was up at Emmanuel. Ernest went down in 1858; so did Butler. Throughout the book the spiritual and intellectual life and development of Ernest are ...
— Samuel Butler's Cambridge Pieces • Samuel Butler
... potentissime domine rex, domine mi supreme humillima commendatione premissa, salutem et felicitatem. Superioribus diebus Pontifex secreto, veluti rem quam magni faceret, mihi proposuit conditionem hujusmodi; concedi posse vestrae majestati, ut duas uxores habeat; cui dixi nolle me provinciam suscipere ea de re scribendi, ob eam causam quod ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude
... absurd extravagances of poets and augurs, and through the growth of critical thought, this unbelief went on increasing from the days of Anaxagoras, when it was death to call the sun a ball of fire, to the days of Catiline, when Julius Casar could be chosen Pontifex Maximus, almost before the Senate had ceased to reverberate his voice openly asserting that death was the utter end of man. Plutarch dilates upon the wide skepticism of the Greeks as to the infernal world, at the close of his essay on the maxim, "Live concealed." The portentous ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... the report calls it "a stage without a theatre." In the performances of the next day and in those of June 2 and 3, which took place on the Capitol and the Palatine, the following order was observed in the ceremonial pageant; first came Augustus as Emperor and Pontifex Maximus, next the Consuls, the Senate, the Quindecemviri and other colleges of priests, then followed the Vestal Virgins, and a group of one hundred and ten matrons (as many as there were years in the saeculum) selected ...
— Pagan and Christian Rome • Rodolfo Lanciani
... disgraceful treaty with Numantia repudiated by home in 139 B.C. P. Africanum: i.e. the younger, who supported the ballot bill of Cassius, but seems to have done nothing else for the democrats. Fratres: Lamb. viros, but cf. Brut. 98. P. Scaevolam: the pontifex, consul in the year Tib. Gracchus was killed, when he refused to use violence against the tribunes. The only connection these brothers had with the schemes of Gracchus seems to be that they were consulted by him as lawyers, about the legal effect the bills would have. Ut ...
— Academica • Marcus Tullius Cicero |
