"Proverb" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... class that pioneer the way towards the setting sun. But perhaps we are leaving the boy propped too long on his hoe. Let us take a more critical look at him. "Fine feathers don't make fine birds," observes the old proverb. Forgetting the dress, then, please study his face. A clear, deep-blue eye, delicately-arched eyebrows, regular features, mouth and chin indicating decision and native refinement, and a well-developed forehead. Ah, here may be a diamond ...
— The Cabin on the Prairie • C. H. (Charles Henry) Pearson
... familiar with publicans and sinners to a proverb. "Behold a gluttonous man and a wine-bibber; a friend of publicans and sinners." Matt. 11:19. The first part, concerning his gluttonous eating and drinking, to be sure, was a horrible slander; but for the other, nothing was ever spoken truer ...
— The Riches of Bunyan • Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin
... The Welsh proverb, that a man who sleeps on the top of Snowdon, must awake either a fool or a poet, refers as probably to the effect produced on the mind by the prodigious mountain panorama discernible from thence, as to any fancied influence of ...
— Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone - Made During the Year 1819 • John Hughes
... granting of a paper constitution, prefaced by some high-sounding declaration, of itself confers the power of self-government upon a people. This is never so. Nobody can "give" a people "self-government," any more than it is possible to "give" an individual "self-help." You know that the Arab proverb runs, "God helps those who help themselves." In the long run, the only permanent way by which an individual can be helped is to help him to help himself, and this is one of the things your University should inculcate. But it must be his ...
— African and European Addresses • Theodore Roosevelt
... with its corollary, hygiene, the care of the health. From ancient times psychology and physiology have been considered as equally associated and of prime importance. "A sound mind in a sound body" is an old Latin proverb. The need of every one to "know himself," both in mind and body, was taught by the earliest "Wise Men" of Greece. The Roman emperor Tiberius said that any one who had reached the age of thirty in ignorance of his physical constitution was a fool, a thought that has been modernized, with an unnecessary ...
— Practical Suggestions for Mother and Housewife • Marion Mills Miller
... in preserving it for God and the king by war, than to have it kept entire without war, to the profit of the devil and of his followers. He was also reported on another occasion to have reminded her of the Spanish proverb—that the head of one salmon is worth those of a hundred frogs. The hint, if it were really given, was certainly ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... left of man but a physical need for bedtime and a double nightcap; and even his pipe, if he be a smoker, will be savourless and disenchanted. It is the fate of such an one to take twice as much trouble as is needed to obtain happiness, and miss the happiness in the end; he is the man of the proverb, in short, who goes farther ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... passionate imitation, and of an imitation not always of the wisest or noblest kind. To Ascham it seemed like "the enchantment of Circe brought out of Italy to mar men's manners in England." "An Italianate Englishman," ran the harder proverb of Italy itself, "is an incarnate devil." The literary form which this imitation took seemed at any rate ridiculous. John Lyly, distinguished both as a dramatist and a poet, laid aside the tradition ...
— History of the English People, Volume V (of 8) - Puritan England, 1603-1660 • John Richard Green
... everybody and everything; his vehemence and vituperation were seasoned with a kind of wit, and he made himself, if not a power, at least an important factor in the House of Commons. Indeed, it passed into a kind of proverb at St. Stephen's that there were three parties in the State—the Ministry, the Opposition, and Lord George Gordon. Parliament had seen before, and has seen since, many a politician fighting thus like Hal o' the Wynd for his own hand, but no one so influential for a season or so pernicious ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume III (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy
... boat filled up there, he added, and some have got no further. But I've floated in and out so far. Oh well, 'The silver cup sinks, but the wooden bowl floats on', as the proverb says. There was a time when I had to drag out of the water here a man who was better than me in every way—that's when I really got ...
— Seven Icelandic Short Stories • Various
... how still and peaceful they are when their time comes to grub. 'The still sow sups the kail,' as we used to say in the north; the English turn the proverb differently, they say ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... and Joan, who have lived twenty years under our porch, when you were little boys? You thought they seemed to enjoy a rain so much that you would give them a shower. Poor Darby and his wife realized the proverb, 'It never rains but it pours.' A gentle, steady rain was agreeable enough; but you floated them out of house and home, and I do not think they ever resettled in ...
— Harper's Young People, June 29, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... foot). Don't repeat that hateful proverb! Nothing can make me more angry. I feel like crying when I hear it, too. Now see, I'm crying. ...
— The Atlantic Book of Modern Plays • Various
... from home was Eton, that great "prep" school of so many English boys. The fact that he attended there helped to give rise to the proverb that "Waterloo was won on the cricket fields of Eton"—but as a matter of record the boy was not interested in this sport. He preferred the fiddle to the racquet, as he had inherited his father's ...
— Boys' Book of Famous Soldiers • J. Walker McSpadden
... the horse or the ass, whose pedigree was kept as carefully as his own. His children were bondmen, like himself; even the freeman's children by a slave-mother inherited the mother's taint. 'Mine is the calf that is born of my cow,' ran the English proverb." In the same passage he points out that the number of the serfs was being continually augmented from various concurrent causes—war, crime, debt, and poverty all assisting to drive men into a condition of perpetual bondage.[16] Degradation of freemen into serfs remained ...
— The Customs of Old England • F. J. Snell
... was only used in extreme danger, and was hence peculiarly termed iera or sacra, whence the proverb sacram anchoram solvere, as flying to the ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... all knew what was about to happen. "When a man's mind is made up," says the old Irish proverb, "his feet must ...
— Hugh - Memoirs of a Brother • Arthur Christopher Benson
... the unconscious authority of his words he was easily master of them all; but though he had the voice of Mars and a head like Olympian Zeus he must needs abase his proud spirit to the demands of the occasion, for the jealousy of mortal man is a proverb. Where the punchers that he hired for thirty dollars a month were decked out in shaps and handkerchiefs he sat in his shirt-sleeves and overalls, with only his high-heeled boots and the enormous black sombrero which he always wore, to mark him for their ...
— Hidden Water • Dane Coolidge
... fourth Earl of Salisbury (a descendant of Lord Burghley's younger son), who succeeded to the title in 1683, and died in 1694. He was mixed up in the troubles of the time, and was, says Macaulay, 'foolish to a proverb,' and the 'prey of gamesters.' John Cecil, Earl of Exeter, from 1678 to 1700, who was descended from Lord Burghley's elder son, was himself a book collector, and therefore not likely to part with the library of his ...
— English Book Collectors • William Younger Fletcher
... same thing in the same way. Scores of those who suffer from the depredations of this class of offenders, complain to me every day; but I can neither afford them redress, nor hold out any hope of it from any of the Oude authorities. It is a proverb, "that those who are sentenced to six years' imprisonment in Oude, are released in six months, and those who are sentenced to six months, are released in six years." Great numbers are released every ...
— A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II • William Sleeman
... buried beneath the precautions of cold demeanor, and then she is charming. She does not seek success, but she obtains it. We find that for which we do not seek: that saying is so often true that some day it will be turned into a proverb. It is, in fact, the moral of this adventure, which I should not allow myself to tell if it were not echoing at the present moment through ...
— Study of a Woman • Honore de Balzac
... plain-spoken than the two Italian adaptations. The religious postulate on which it rests, namely Deism, will be discussed later on in its wider significance for this period. The same idea is repeated, though in a clumsy caricature, in the famous proverb of the 'three who have deceived the world, that is, Moses, Christ, and Mohammed.' If the Emperor Frederick II, in whom this saying is said to have originated, really thought so, he probably expressed ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt
... ace quoth Bolton" is an old proverb of unknown origin. Ray tells us that a Collection of Proverbs having been presented to Queen Elizabeth, with an assurance that it contained all the proverbs in the English language. "Bate me an ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 55, November 16, 1850 • Various
... she addressed her, Bice—that is to say, according to English pronunciation, Beeshee (you would probably call it Beetchee if you learned to speak Italian in England, but the Contessa had the Tuscan tongue in a Roman mouth, according to the proverb), which, as everybody knows, is the contraction of Beatrice. She was called Miss Beachey in the household, a name which was received—by the servants at least—as a quite proper and natural name; a great deal more sensible than Forno-Populo. Her position, however, in the little party ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... That homely proverb, used on so many occasions in England, viz. "That what is bred in the bone will not go out of the flesh," was never more verified than in the story of my Life. Any one would think that after thirty-five years' affliction, and a variety of unhappy circumstances, which ...
— The Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe
... modest distance, as regards the glory of the achievements related, each peasant told what he had done himself; two or three probably made out their little history together, and told of each other's valour: that homely and somewhat vulgar Scotch proverb, "you scratch my back, and I'll scratch yours," was certainly unknown to them, but nevertheless they fully recognized the wise principle of mutual ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope
... to take the advice of another. Let me practise this towards you as well as preach it to you, and I'll lay a wager you will approve on't. But I am chiefly of your opinion that contentment (which the Spanish proverb says is the best paint) gives the lustre to all one's enjoyment, puts a beauty upon things which without it would have none, increases it extremely where 'tis already in some degree, and without it, all that we call happiness besides loses its property. What is contentment, must be left ...
— The Love Letters of Dorothy Osborne to Sir William Temple, 1652-54 • Edward Abbott Parry
... characteristic of the Prince. It was one of the chief sources of his greatness. At that period, perhaps at any period, he would have been incapable of such brilliant and dashing exploits as had made the name of Egmont so famous. It had even become a proverb, "the counsel of Orange, the execution of Egmont," yet we shall have occasion to see how far this physical promptness which had been so felicitous upon the battle-field was likely to avail the hero of St. Quentin in the great political ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... the remark and I turned laughingly to Bennett and said: Nonsense; he can't harm any one, and there is an old proverb about the impossibility of drowning those who are born for ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... these times ought to put no faith in the bulletins, despatches, notes, and proclamations which have emanated from Bonaparte, or passed through his hands. For my part, I believe that the proverb, "As great a liar as a bulletin," has as much truth in it as the axiom, two ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... the Senator from Illinois Be the world's proverb of successful shame, Dazzling all State house flies that steal and steal, Who, when the sad State spares ...
— General William Booth enters into Heaven and other Poems • Vachel Lindsay
... was one of those men who always do the opposite of what is expected of them and of what they expect of themselves. It is not that they are not warned—a man who is warned is worth two men, says the proverb. They profess never to be the dupe of anything, and that they steer their ship with unerring hand towards a definite point. But they reckon without themselves, for they do not know themselves. In one of those moments of forgetfulness ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland
... many instances, in the Japanese history, of Samurais who were really starved to death in spite of their having a hundred pieces of gold carefully preserved to meet the expenses at the time of an emergency; hence the proverb: "The falcon would not feed on the ear of corn, even if he should starve." Similarly, we know of no case of Zen monks, ancient and modern, who got rich by any ignoble means. They would rather face poverty with gladness of heart. Fu-gai, one of the most distinguished ...
— The Religion of the Samurai • Kaiten Nukariya
... progressive revelation admits them all; and this is already contained in the words of our SAVIOUR, 'Moses because of the hardness of your hearts;' or even in the Old Testament, 'Henceforth there shall be no more this proverb in the house of Israel?'" (O if Catholic writers were to expound Holy Scripture with the license of these gentlemen!... That the scheme of Revelation has been progressive, is a Theological truism. What that has to do with the question in hand, I see not.)—"For what is ...
— Inspiration and Interpretation - Seven Sermons Preached Before the University of Oxford • John Burgon
... worst enemy I had among them all—one who has been after me like a hungry wolf after a caribou all these years. I knew there was trouble coming, and I came home and made ready for it. I guessed I'd fight through it all right on my own, my luck was a proverb in the States about '76. I never doubted that it would ...
— The Valley of Fear • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... situations in time. Our friend—your husband—has many of the English idiosyncrasies. He has all the narrow-minded notions of honor which obtain in that country. Added to this, I suspect him of possessing a truly Slavonic fire which he keeps under. 'A smouldering fire—' You know, madame, our French proverb. He is not the man to take a rational and broad-minded view of your little transaction with M. Vassili; more especially, perhaps, as it banished his friend Stepan Lanovitch—the owner of this house, by the way. His reception of ...
— The Sowers • Henry Seton Merriman
... surrounded the mother had fallen upon the daughter. One felt the influences that had rained upon Nancy ever since she had come into the world, One could not look at her, nor talk with her, without feeling that her mother—like a vine in the blood, as the old proverb says—was breathing, growing, budding, blossoming in her ...
— Mother Carey's Chickens • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... exquisite joy it was to work for it. Yes, mio amico, work is the greatest intoxication, the greatest blessing, the greatest solace we can know. Therefore work, work, work. But of all things, my good musical friends in America, remember the old German proverb: ...
— Great Pianists on Piano Playing • James Francis Cooke
... compositions to questionable stories, from laughter to tears, from Blind-man's-buff to Lotto. Some of the proverbs were quite ingenious and required elaborate preparations; for example, at one place Mme. de Lauzun dances with M. de Belgunce, in the simplest kind of a costume, which represented the proverb: Bonne renommee vaut mieux que ceinture doree [A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches]. Mme. de Marigny danced with M. de Saint-Julien as a negro, passing her handkerchief over her face in ...
— Women of Modern France - Woman In All Ages And In All Countries • Hugo P. Thieme
... like a person recovered from a fever who finds mere health a condition of joy. She went back to her music, to her neglected books, with a singing heart. And in accordance with the curious ways of Providence, noted in the proverb relating the different fates of him who hath and him who hath not, there was at once added to her pleasure in the old elements of her life the very elements she had longed for unavailingly. Seeing her friendly and shining of face, ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... el-Azhar had promised him that a "child of God" would lead him. If he waited and trusted and just let things take their course, all things would come right. Haste comes of the devil—a true Eastern proverb, a warning far too little regarded by the Western children of speed. But his conscience rebuked him. Had he verily been one of those who do deeds of real kindness? Was he worthy to drink of the cup tempered with camphor? Had his deed been sincerely inspired by disinterested love towards his ...
— There was a King in Egypt • Norma Lorimer
... mother. Bugrov came, unpacked his presents, and after saying a few words, departed. And those few words he said not to Liza but to Groholsky . . . . With Liza he was silent and Groholsky's mind was at rest; but there is a Russian proverb which he would have done well to remember: "Don't fear the dog that barks, but fear the dog that's quiet. . . ." A fiendish proverb, but in practical life ...
— Love and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... has had a narrow escape of being drowned. All the wits, of course, appeal to the proverb, and deny the possibility of his concluding his career by water. Still, his escape was extraordinary. He had taken a boat at Palace Yard to cross to Lambeth. As he was standing up in the boat, immediately on his getting in, the waterman awkwardly ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various
... makest a voyage to the stars, go thou blindfolded; and carry not a sword, but the sandals of thy youth. —Egyptian Proverb. ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... the word of the Lord to the Jews in a like case: "What means this proverb which you take up, saying, The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge? It is not so, O house of Israel. The son shall not die for the iniquity of his father, nor the father for the iniquity of the son. The soul that sinneth, ...
— Sermons on National Subjects • Charles Kingsley
... proverb says that Providence protects children and idiots. This is really true. I know it because I have tested it. It did not protect George through the most of his campaign, but it saved him in his last inning, and the veracity of the ...
— Chapters from My Autobiography • Mark Twain
... mature life, wields enormous influence over the family, males included, and is a kind of private Empress Dowager. A man knows, says the proverb, but a woman knows better. As a widow in early life, her lot is not quite so pleasant. It is not thought desirable for widows to remarry; but if she remains single, she becomes "a rudderless boat;" round which gathers much calumny. Many young women ...
— The Civilization Of China • Herbert A. Giles
... of most of ours too. Johnson liked satisfying food, such as a leg of pork, or veal pie well stuffed, with plum pie and sugar, and he devoured enormous quantities of fruit, especially peaches. His inordinate love of tea has almost passed into a proverb,—he has actually been credited with twenty-five cups at a sitting, and he would keep Mrs. Thrale brewing it for him till four o'clock in the morning. The following impromptu, spoken to Miss Reynolds, points its ...
— Stories of Authors, British and American • Edwin Watts Chubb
... estimate the power which emanated from the pulpits of Dr. McElroy, or Dr. DeWitt, or Dr. Spring, or Dr. Krebs? Their work will go on in New York though their churches be demolished. Large-hearted men were these pulpit apostles, apart from the clerical obligations of their denominations. No proverb in the world is so abused as the one which declares that the children of ministers never turn out well. They hold the highest places in the nation. Grover Cleveland was the son of a Presbyterian clergyman, Governor Pattison of Pennsylvania, Governor Taylor of Tennessee, were sons of Methodist ...
— T. De Witt Talmage - As I Knew Him • T. De Witt Talmage
... Deuteros plous] is a proverb," says the Scholiast on the Phaedo, "used of those who do anything safely and cautiously inasmuch as they who have miscarried in their first voyage, set about then: preparations for the second cautiously," and he ...
— Ethics • Aristotle
... really pretty, and has something so unspeakably refined, that a young gentleman might well be attracted by her. With my brother it is not all quite right in this respect; but, candidly speaking, I am in great fear on your account, Mr. Thostrup. Still waters—you know the proverb? I might have spared you the trouble. The letter which I received a few evenings ago informed me of her departure. Mamma has taken her with her. It seemed to her a sin to leave that sweet, innocent girl in a public-house. The host and ...
— O. T. - A Danish Romance • Hans Christian Andersen
... which gave Hetty some misgivings as to the success of her experiment. However, she knew that Nan could be trusted to repeat to the other servants all that she had said, and that it would lose nothing in the recital; and, as for the future, one of Hetty's first principles of action was an old proverb which her grandfather had explained to her when ...
— Hetty's Strange History • Anonymous
... to gather some of the flowers—who does not want to gather Roses? We want some fully opened blossoms and many of the dainty buds. But the straggling stems of the Rose soon teach us the truth of the proverb: "No Rose without a Thorn." The stems are thickly covered with thorns; these are not only sharp, but hooked as well, and we do not get our bunch of roses ...
— Wildflowers of the Farm • Arthur Owens Cooke
... will strengthen our wills. For when God comes into a heart, He restores the due subordination which has been broken into discord and anarchy by sin. He dismounts the servant riding on horseback, and carrying the horse to the devil, according to the proverb, and gives the reins into the right hands. Now, if the gift of God's Spirit, working through the Word of God, and the principles and the motives therein unfolded, and therefrom deducible, be the great means by ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... went before. And Michael seemed gigantical, The Arch-fiend but a dwarf; And at the towers of Erebus Our striplings flung the scoff. But the elders with foreboding Mourned the days forever o'er, And re called the forest proverb, The Iroquois' old saw: Grief to every graybeard When young ...
— Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War • Herman Melville
... fifty or more boys were trooping out of school. I carefully scanned the throng. The old proverb has it that it is a wise child who knows its own father; but it is not so difficult for a father to know his own children. The moment I put my eyes on Sarah's son, I knew him; he was the very image of me; I could have ...
— Seven Wives and Seven Prisons • L.A. Abbott
... breakfast I didn't make a very hearty meal. After that the weather began to get bad, and continued getting bad for a long time. Then for some days, as sure as I went down below for a meal I did violence to the sentiment of the old proverb "wilful waste makes woeful want." However, in a few days I recovered sufficiently to withstand the noxious influences of the saloon long enough to satisfy my hunger. We had bad weather, more or less the whole way across to Belle Isle; not a gale exactly, except once on ...
— Canada for Gentlemen • James Seton Cockburn
... flotation," the Master curtly retorted. "If we make land, we make it, that's all, sir." He relapsed into silence. Leclair muttered, in Arabic—his words audible only to himself—an ancient Islamic proverb: "Allah knows best, and time will show!" Then, after a moment's pause, the single ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England
... never heard of him. Thus it will be with Bloomfield and Blackett—their names two years after their death will be found neither on the rolls of Curriers' Hall nor of Parnassus. Who would think that anybody would be such a blockhead as to sin against an express proverb, 'Ne sutor ultra crepidam'? ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Letters and Journals, Vol. 1 • Lord Byron, Edited by Rowland E. Prothero
... advantages of defensive and offensive war and to decline or give battle according to circumstances, and in the latter case to fight under the ramparts of their camp just as under the walls of a fortress—the Roman, says a Roman proverb, conquers by sitting still. ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... fifteen years, then," he said, laughing. "I should have a choice of professions by that time at any rate. You know the proverb that 'At forty every man is either a fool or a physician.'" She looked at him with a smile. "Yes," he said, "I realize the alternative." She laughed a little, but did ...
— David Harum - A Story of American Life • Edward Noyes Westcott
... would seem, in the slightest action that a man attempts in this Great World's Fair of Conventionality, whose every sideshow is hedged around with the red-tape of the Law. Witness even that delusive proverb—there is honour amongst thieves. So is there an unwritten canon in literature and the making of books, that a Romance must end with a phrase to convey another illusion—namely, the happiness ...
— Sally Bishop - A Romance • E. Temple Thurston
... fair in war and saying so, gave but half the proverb, which adds, all's fair in love as well, and maiden, nymph of the woodland, so rapidly does a man learn that which he has never been taught, I proclaim with confidence that I ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr
... "The Brig of Don, near the 'auld town' of Aberdeen, with its one arch and its black deep salmon stream, is in my memory as yesterday. I still remember, though perhaps I may misquote the awful proverb which made me pause to cross it, and yet lean over it with a childish delight, being an only son, at least by the mother's side. The saying, as recollected by me, was this, but I have never heard or seen it since I was ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I. (of VI.) - With his Letters and Journals. • Thomas Moore
... require a high temperature to boil you, Hilda," said Prudence with a laugh, for Hilda's good-nature had passed into proverb. ...
— The Gentle Art of Cooking Wives • Elizabeth Strong Worthington
... an Italian proverb—"Tutto il mondo e paese"—which means, in its broadest sense, "All the world is ruled by the same passion and qualities." In the old days it needed a Dickens, and, later, a Neil Lyons to discover the qualities ...
— Mud and Khaki - Sketches from Flanders and France • Vernon Bartlett
... as that plain, moral, respectable man. I am convinced of sin; I am converted; I have the right frames, and the right feelings, and the right experiences.' Oh, of all the cunning snares of the devil, that I think is the cunningest. Well says the old proverb—'The devil is old, and therefore he ...
— The Good News of God • Charles Kingsley
... said to him: "I did not know you before, Geronimo. I hope it may be in my power to prove to you how much your generosity ennobles you and elevates you in my esteem; but although your confidence in the amulet rests on so laudable a sentiment, I would not rely too much upon it. You know the proverb says: 'Help yourself, and Heaven will ...
— The Amulet • Hendrik Conscience
... also engrossed the moody Vanslyperken, which was how he should behave relative to the widow Vandersloosh. Should he call or should he not? he cared nothing for her, and provided he could succeed with the Portsmouth lady, he would pitch her to the devil; but still he remembered the old proverb, "You should never throw away dirty water before you are sure of clean." After some cogitation he determined upon still pressing his suit, and hoped at the same time that the widow would not admit him into her presence. ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... devilish hurry to be quit of your shekels," laughed the Irishman O'Sullivan, who sat across the table from me. "Isn't there a proverb, Mr. Montagu, about a—a careless gentleman and his money going different ways, begad? Don't keep him waiting any longer than ...
— A Daughter of Raasay - A Tale of the '45 • William MacLeod Raine
... country, and you assign various reasons for disliking it; among others, you imagine the atmosphere too moist and heavy; I agree with you in that opinion, all the black clouds in the sky are continually pressing upon you, for as the proverb says, Like draws to like. Believe me, I have sometimes taken you at a distance, for the pillar of smoke which used to accompany the Israelites out of Egypt; it would be impossible to tell how many things I have taken you for at different times; sometimes I have taken you for the witches' cauldron ...
— Boswell's Correspondence with the Honourable Andrew Erskine, and His Journal of a Tour to Corsica • James Boswell
... De Guiche seemed very unwilling to take his departure for the purpose of dressing himself. Monsieur, singing, laughing, and admiring himself, passed away the time until the dinner-hour, in a frame of mind that justified the proverb ...
— Ten Years Later • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... stations as they rise, are pressed upon more and more severely by objective things, by relations and claims from without, so that they become the more perplexed the lower the degree of their individual intelligence. This so far as regards War is the chief foundation of the truth of the French proverb:— ...
— On War • Carl von Clausewitz
... say, if your religion's Roman, And you at Rome would do as Romans do, According to the proverb,—although no man, If foreign, is obliged to fast; and you, If Protestant, or sickly, or a woman, Would rather dine in sin on a ragout— Dine and be d—d! I don't mean to be coarse, But that's the ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron
... expressed, the little fancies may then cluster round them and will be carried lightly, as the victor wears his wreath; while, on the other hand, if these be lacking no amount of symbolism or attribute will supply their place. "Cucullus non facit monachum," as the old proverb says—"It is not the hood that makes the monk," but the ascetic face you depict within it. Indeed, rather beware of trusting even to the ordinary, well-recognised symbols in common use, and being misled by them to think ...
— Stained Glass Work - A text-book for students and workers in glass • C. W. Whall
... there met him by chance a train of mules loaded with parsley; which his soldiers conceived to be an ominous occurrence or ill-boding token, because this is the herb with which we not unfrequently adorn the sepulchres of the dead; and there is a proverb derived from the custom, used of one who is dangerously sick, that he has need of nothing but parsley. So, to ease their minds, and free them from any superstitious thoughts or forebodings of evil, Timoleon ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... person of whom you speak, your own good sense must direct you. I never pretend to advise, being an implicit believer in the old proverb. This present frost is detestable. It is the first I have felt for these three years, though I longed for one in the oriental summer, when no such thing is to be had, unless I had gone to the top ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. II - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... trace its course. The richness and beauty of these Links of Forth appeared the more surprising to the boys from the contrast which the scene presented to the dreary wastes of moss and heather which they had seen in the Highlands. There is an old Scotch proverb that refers to ...
— Rollo in Scotland • Jacob Abbott
... Eusthenes towards the Norman ladies, and even savour faintly, as from afar, the bouquet of that Vin blanc d'Anjou which Pantagruel bought in some old hostelry beside the Eau de Robec. "Mouton de Rouen," says the old proverb, "qui a toujours la patte levee," and her sons were ever ready from the earliest years to go their ways, "gaaignant," through all the trade-routes of Europe, where French and Spanish wines were to be ...
— The Story of Rouen • Sir Theodore Andrea Cook
... scant forty and looking a neglected fifty, short-sighted, stoop-shouldered and absent-minded to a proverb, he cast a last fond look at the parcel containing his translation of the Bacchic epic and climbed the stairs to his bachelor bedroom, took off his shabby garments, and stretched himself out in the illiterate sleep of a ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... to anything so undignified as seasickness, let me tell you that," retorted Xanthippe. "Furthermore, the proverb is not as the lady has quoted it. 'People who live in glass houses should not throw stones' is the ...
— The Pursuit of the House-Boat • John Kendrick Bangs
... time when it is a year of domestic dissension and repentance. And it is a very true proverb, 'Marry in haste and repent at leisure.' No! If at the end of the year the young people continue of the same mind, and no ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... extravagances. It would be sad to have spent my life in saving, only to fatten the Jesuits or those sisters who cannot speak Castilian. I do not wish my money to share the fate of that of the sacristans in the proverb. For this reason, to the annoyance I feel at my struggles with this inimical Chapter, I must add the distress I feel at my daughter's feeble character. Probably she will be hunted; some rake will laugh at me and possess ...
— The Shadow of the Cathedral • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... dedicated to Athene, and being respected at Athens, it had greatly multiplied. Hence the proverb, 'taking owls to Athens,' similar to our English 'taking coals ...
— The Birds • Aristophanes
... one; and amid the general felicitation that ensued the successful proverb-guessers were made room for in the magic circle, and Horace had a chance of exchanging "How ...
— Reginald Cruden - A Tale of City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... all his faults, was never mean. "Don't spoil the ship for a ha'po'rth of tar," was a favourite motto of his. She had ever thought it a proverb both pleasant and wise. She was not an extravagant woman, but she also liked to have things well done, and had no sympathy with cheese-paring ways. The house was well and handsomely furnished, she and the children had plenty of dress, their table was an excellent one, all of them indulging ...
— Mrs. Day's Daughters • Mary E. Mann
... of the low characters is different: the Reeve, the Miller, and the Cook are several men, and distinguished from each other as much as the mincing Lady- Prioress and the broad-speaking, gap-toothed Wife of Bath. . . . It is sufficient to say, according to the proverb, that here is God's plenty. We have our forefathers and great-grand-dames all before us, as they were in Chaucer's days. Their general characters are still remaining in mankind, and even in England, though they are called by other ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall
... started to answer, but checked himself. Never before had he appreciated to the full the depth and truth of the proverb relating to the frying-pan and the fire. To clear himself, he must mention his suspicions of Jimmy, and also his reasons for those suspicions. And to do that would mean revealing his past. It ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse
... helmet to the circular neck of the breast-plate. Previously, however, a woollen night-cap was drawn over the poor man's head, well down on his ears, and Rooney looked—as indeed he afterwards admitted that he felt—as if he were going to be hanged. He thought, however, of the proverb, that a man who is born to be drowned never can be hanged, and somehow ...
— Under the Waves - Diving in Deep Waters • R M Ballantyne
... and just like the children; Both of them bent upon living according as suiteth their pleasure, While we others must never do aught but flatter and praise them. Once for all time holds good the ancients' trustworthy proverb: 'Whoever goes not forward comes backward.' So must it ...
— Hermann and Dorothea • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... I do retract it. I here emphatically record that first thoughts are not always best thoughts, and that it is my sober second judgment that Mr. Uncannon has done us more good than he has the parish at North Bizzy. We gave him to them grudgingly. But it has been a case in which the proverb applies: It is more blessed to give than to receive. For Mr. Uncannon's flirtation has probably given us Maurice ...
— Laicus - The experiences of a Layman in a Country Parish • Lyman Abbott
... of his ear. "What an undaunted young pedestrian! Four leagues a day are no such trifle when you have to begin again next morning. 'Slow and steady wins the race,' says an old proverb, which I intend to carry out to the letter; for forced marches would soon injure our health, and then good-bye to the success of our expedition. As to walking until night, it is perfectly impossible, except when one is certain to meet with an inn. Under these large ...
— Adventures of a Young Naturalist • Lucien Biart
... themselves how to define man, so as to distinguish him from other animals. Burke says, "Man is an animal that cooks its victuals." "Then," says Johnson, "the proverb is just, 'there is reason in roasting eggs.'" Dr. Adam Smith has hit this case; "Man," says he, "is an animal that makes bargains; no other animal does this—one dog does not change a ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 10, No. 277, October 13, 1827 • Various
... in love and war,'" exulted the Skeptic, somewhat breathlessly. It seemed to be a favourite maxim with him. I recalled his having excused himself for eluding Dahlia by that same well-worn proverb. "No—don't run! Have ...
— A Court of Inquiry • Grace S. Richmond
... been torn to pieces in the struggle. Grettir's fame spread far abroad for this deed, and none was deemed his equal for boldness and prowess. Yet Glam's curse began already to work, for Grettir dared not go out after nightfall, for then he seemed to see all kinds of horrors. It became a proverb in the land that Glam gives Glam-sight to those who see things otherwise than as they are, which we now ...
— The Book of Romance • Various
... callers;—were shut even to some who find but few doors closed against them;—were shut occasionally to those whom she most specially wished to see within them. She knew how to allure by denying, and to make the gift rich by delaying it. We are told by the Latin proverb that he who gives quickly gives twice; but I say that she who gives quickly seldom gives more than half. When in the early spring the Duke of Omnium first knocked at Madame Max Goesler's door, he was informed that she ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... the jury,—you know the old saying—'He that pleads his own cause has a fool for his client.' We cannot say that the proverb has held good in this case. The defendant has proved himself no fool. Never in my life have I listened to the pleadings of an opponent with deeper anxiety. Nature and the awful chances of life have made the defendant in this case more than eloquent. For a moment I actually trembled for ...
— Stories of Comedy • Various
... onward as through life we go, Amid the pomp, and glare, and show, We oft some proverb misconstrue And mutter boldly, "'Tis not true." But in their calm, majestic way, We hear the tongues of wise men say: "You go way back And ...
— Poems for Pale People - A Volume of Verse • Edwin C. Ranck
... into my mind Concerning a proverb of old, Plain dealing's a jewel most rare, And more precious than silver or gold: And therefore with patience give ear, And listen to what here is penned, These verses were written on purpose The honest man's cause to defend. For this I will make it appear, And prove by experience ...
— Ancient Poems, Ballads and Songs of England • Robert Bell
... Favraud, for my maitre d'hotel. Your mind is too much engrossed by the bubbles of politics, you would spoil all my materials, and realize the old proverb that 'the devil sends cooks.' But go to work like a good fellow, and carve the dish before you; by that time the soup will be removed. I have a fine fish, however, in reserve (let me announce this at once), for my end of ...
— Miriam Monfort - A Novel • Catherine A. Warfield
... thought of the old proverb, and the alternative the plough presents to those who would thrive by it; Fleda thought of Mr. Didenhover; Mrs. Rossitur would fain have suggested that such an important person must be well paid; but ...
— Queechy, Volume I • Elizabeth Wetherell
... Bruyn. They are likewise taken notice of by [682]Thevenot, and Herbert. In respect to the grottos I am persuaded, that they were temples, and not tombs. Nothing was more common among the Persians than to have their temples formed out of rocks. Mithras e [683]Petra was in a manner a proverb. Porphyry assures us, that the Deity had always a rock or cavern for his temple: that people, in all places, where the name of Mithras was known, paid their worship at a [684]cavern. Justin Martyr speaks to the same [685]purpose: ...
— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume I. • Jacob Bryant
... he had found old Pierre and had followed him to a bath-room, the water that washed the stains from brow and wrist seemed also to purify the stain that is popularly supposed to resist earthly ablutions. A clean body and a clean conscience is not a proverb, but there are, perhaps, worse ...
— Lorraine - A romance • Robert W. Chambers
... Gloucester, who was really buried at St. Alban's. On May Day the watermen used to come to St. Paul's in order to sprinkle water and strew herbs upon this tomb—I know not why. Those who were out of work and went dinnerless were said to dine with Duke Humphrey: and there was a proverb—'Trash and trumpery is the way to Duke Humphrey.' Trumpery being used in its original meaning—tromperie—deceit. Among other tombs there were those of the Saxon Kings Sebbi and Ethelred. The first of ...
— The History of London • Walter Besant
... that exists upon earth has its ethereal counterpart.'' Christ said: "As a man thinketh so is he.'' A Hindu proverb says: "Man is a creature of reflection; he becomes that upon which he reflects.'' A modern metaphysicist says: "Our thoughts are real substance and leave their images upon our personality, they fill our aura with beauty or ugliness according to our intents and purposes ...
— 10,000 Dreams Interpreted • Gustavus Hindman Miller
... action to blatant braggadocio. That the Pacific Ocean may become, in truth, the Peaceful Ocean, and never resound to the clash of American arms, is the devout wish of one who believes—implicitly—with Moltke in the old proverb, Si vis pacem, para bellum—If you wish for ...
— Banzai! • Ferdinand Heinrich Grautoff
... rain, be sure it will soon clear up and remain clear for some time. The spider, it is said, changes her web every twenty-four hours, and the part of the day she chooses to do this is always significant. If it occurs a little before sunset, the night will be fine and clear. Hence the old French proverb: "Araignee du ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, October, 1880 • Various
... my head on his arm, and he went on: "By and by, the Southdowns will be changed up here, and the Shropshires will go down to the orchard. I like to keep one flock under my fruit trees. You know there is an old proverb, 'The sheep has a golden hoof.' They save me the trouble of ploughing. I haven't ploughed my orchard for ten years, and don't expect to plough it for ten years more. Then your Aunt Hattie's hens are so obliging that they keep me from the worry of finding ticks at shearing time. ...
— Beautiful Joe - An Autobiography of a Dog • by Marshall Saunders
... you had better delay your visit to the bazaar until you have done your business with Mr. Arithmetic. Our mother's proverb, you know, is, 'Duty first, and pleasure afterwards.' The sky is dark, the weather uncertain; we may be stopped from going altogether if we do ...
— The Crown of Success • Charlotte Maria Tucker
... higher power than all that which was around would not overlook me or any other fellows on that day. At one time, not very long before the moment of attack, I felt to its intensest depth the truth of the proverb, "Carpe diem." What was time? I had another twenty minutes in which to live in comparative safety. What was the difference between twenty minutes and twenty years? Really and truly what was the difference? I was living ...
— Attack - An Infantry Subaltern's Impression of July 1st, 1916 • Edward G. D. Liveing
... may happen? When I was a kid in the circus—you have heard, of course, that I spent my childhood in a travelling circus"—how simply he brought this out!—"the fat woman, we called her 'the fat lady' in those days, had a favourite proverb: 'When the skies fall we shall catch larks'. I reckon when the skies fall the people ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... the water mill, through all the livelong day, As the clicking of the wheels wears hour by hour away; How languidly the autumn wind does stir the withered leaves As in the fields the reapers sing, while binding up their sheaves! A solemn proverb strikes my mind, and as a spell is cast, "The mill will never grind again with water that ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... andreiotera de panta ta en taei Europaei, polymorphotata de ta en taei libyaei; kai legetai de tis paroimia, hoti aei pherei ti libyae kainon;] i.e. That generally the Beasts are wilder in Asia, stronger in Europe, and of greater variety of shapes in Africa; for as the Proverb saith, Africa always produces something new. Pliny[B] indeed ascribes it to the Heat of the Climate, Animalium, Hominumque effigies monstriferas, circa extremitates ejus gigni, minime mirum, artifici ad formanda Corpora, ...
— A Philological Essay Concerning the Pygmies of the Ancients • Edward Tyson
... in the refrain is true and beautiful, and the very euphony of its words helps to enforce its meaning and make the song pleasant and suggestive for young and old. It has passed into popular quotation, and become almost a proverb. ...
— The Story of the Hymns and Tunes • Theron Brown and Hezekiah Butterworth
... tolerably large library. All these objects I kept in view, to be executed as convenience should serve; and although I knew many years should elapse before they could be attained, I was of a disposition to comfort myself with the Spanish proverb, 'Time and I ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 571 - Volume 20, No. 571—Supplementary Number • Various
... is no paradox to say that "Utopia," which has by a conspiracy of accidents become a proverb for undisciplined fancifulness in social and political matters, is in reality a very unimaginative work. In that, next to the accident of its priority, lies the secret of its continuing interest. In some respects it is like one of those precious and ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells
... sociable and friendly game now and then, just to pass the time away a little agreeably. By this means he may readily mark down his man, and the game once in view, he should not appear too eager in the pursuit of it, but take good care, as the proverb says, to give a sprat, in order to catch a herring. This should be done by allowing some temporary success, before he make ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan |
