"Recreant" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... And the Lord said unto me in the days of Josiah, the king,(175) Hast thou seen what recreant Israel did to Me(176) going up every high hill and under each rustling tree, and there playing the harlot. 7. And I said, After she has done all these things can she return to Me?—and she did not return. 8. And her treacherous sister Judah saw, yes ...
— Jeremiah • George Adam Smith
... carried him away from the actual brink of the precipice. "But how about the dragon," said she, "or rather about the dragon's brother, at whom you were bound to go and tilt on my behalf? Have you tilted, or are you a recreant knight?" ...
— The Claverings • Anthony Trollope
... long ago. As to this Chute, he seems to me perhaps to have been a kind of tool of the lover, who employed him probably to settle his forgery business, and also to take care of the unhappy woman whom he had ruined and deserted. He wrote these few letters to keep the recreant lover informed about her fate. In the midst of these there is the last despairing farewell of the unhappy creature herself. All these the conscience-stricken lover has carefully preserved. In addition to these, no doubt for the sake of easing his conscience, ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... him by the delights of her garden; the songs and dances of her maidens; her sweetest caresses. He turns from her with loathing, he curses her. At last Kirke's love turns to fierce hatred; she changes her garden into a desert; she calls upon Helios to come and slay her recreant lover. The sun god appears indeed, but says Zeus has forbidden him to injure Odysseus. In mad {410} frenzy Kirke tears his bow and arrow from Helios; she will kill her false lover herself; but her heart ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley
... advised it because of its possible effect on the Legal Tender Law. Yet this foolish and dirty charge has found extensive credit. I read it once in the London Times. It was, however, in a communication written by a degenerate and recreant American who was engaged in reviling his own country. It was also referred to by Mr. Bryan in his book on the United States. I sent him a copy of a pamphlet I prepared on the subject, and received from him a letter expressing his satisfaction that the story was without foundation. ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar
... lay a horse-pistol. As the fingers approached it, their trembling increased. Twice they hesitated, craven flesh rebelling against a recreant will. They shook so frightfully upon encountering the butt that it seemed as if to grasp it were beyond their power. Once they had seized it, however, the trembling left them and ...
— Anthony Lyveden • Dornford Yates
... and incomplete account as a guest at Ludlow Street Jail I ought, in justice to my family, to say, perhaps, that I came down this morning to see a friend of mine who is here because he refuses to pay alimony to his recreant and morbidly sociable wife. He says he is quite content to stay here, so long as his wife is on the outside. He is writing a small ready-reference book on his side of the great problem, "Is ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VIII (of X) • Various
... fought in field, and victories have had. Give me a fee: the right to smite Rollanz! I'll slay him clean with my good trenchant lance, If Mahumet will be my sure warrant; Spain I'll set free, deliver all her land From Pass of Aspre even unto Durestant. Charles will grow faint, and recreant the Franks; There'll be no war while you're a living man." Marsilie gives the ...
— The Song of Roland • Anonymous
... as the present volume completes the history of the Boat Club, that my young readers will wish to know something of the subsequent fortunes of the prominent characters of the association. It gives me pleasure to say that not one of them has been recreant to his opportunities, or abandoned his high standard of character; that the moral, mental, and physical discipline of the organization has proved salutary in the highest degree. The members of the boat clubs ...
— All Aboard; or, Life on the Lake - A Sequel to "The Boat Club" • Oliver Optic
... night and weakness by day, of desperate efforts on the part of the son, and of bitter reproaches on the part of the father. But the worst of it was, that the latter grew gradually colder towards the boy, only addressed him rarely, as though he had been a recreant son, of whom there was nothing any longer to be expected, and almost avoided meeting his glance. And Giulio perceived this and suffered from it, and when his father's back was turned, he threw him a furtive kiss, stretching forth his face with a sentiment ...
— Cuore (Heart) - An Italian Schoolboy's Journal • Edmondo De Amicis
... man changed and softened. Into it came a smile of high and spiritual beauty, of nobility and unworldliness, of tenderness most touching. All that was most winning in the character of the man was embodied in the look which he fixed upon his recreant disciple, a look pleading and wistful, yet full of dignity and strength. He leaned forward, laying the tips of his thin fingers almost caressingly on ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates
... thee, or by him who made The world! thy heart-blood dyes my blade.— Thy threats, thy mercy I despise, Let recreant yield, ...
— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio
... said that in these recreant days we cannot expect to find the majesty of St. Paul beneath the cassock of a curate. If we look to our clergymen to be more than men, we shall probably teach ourselves to think that they are less, and can hardly hope to raise the character of the pastor by denying to him the ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... Sirrah could not be seen, but the faithful animal had heard his master lament their absence in words which set him at once on the alert, and without more ado he had silently gone off in quest of the recreant flock. In vain Hogg and his assistant spent the whole night in searching for their lost charge; and they were on their way home to inform their master of their loss, when they discovered a lot of lambs at the bottom of a deep ravine, and the indefatigable Sirrah standing in front of ...
— Stories of Animal Sagacity • W.H.G. Kingston
... sounds naturally led him to expect that some accident had occurred, especially as some of the yells indicated that somebody had come to grief. This caused him a very laborious run, and he arrived thoroughly blown, and with a natural desire to kick the recreant villager who bad ...
— Eight Years' Wandering in Ceylon • Samuel White Baker
... very destructive on the trout streams; if a summer camper spare them, it is because of his interest in the young, and especially because of the mother bird's devotion. When the recreant drake is met with, however, he goes promptly onto the bill of fare, with ...
— Ways of Wood Folk • William J. Long
... engages a maid without such credentials is regarded as recreant to her order. In England, too, the former mistress is held partly responsible for the mischief done, if she turn loose upon other households a ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland
... shell-fish on the shore, did not break the spirit of the Highlanders. Many bands held out in arms, and Lochgarry was only prevented by the Prince's command from laying an ambush for Cumberland. The Campbells and the Macleods under their recreant chief, the Whig Macdonalds under Sir Alexander of Sleat, ravaged the lands of the Jacobite clansmen; but the spies of Albemarle, who now commanded in Scotland, reported the Macleans, the Grants of Glenmoriston, ...
— A Short History of Scotland • Andrew Lang
... petition was not an ebullition of vindictiveness. It had a practical purpose. On the scaffold he could say nothing for Cobham; Cobham might say much for him. It was possible that, when nothing more was to be gained by falsehoods, his recreant friend would clear his fame once for all. Then he quitted the hall, accompanying Sir Benjamin Tichborne, the High Sheriff, to the prison, according to Sir Thomas Overbury, 'with admirable erection, yet in such sort ...
— Sir Walter Ralegh - A Biography • William Stebbing
... flame; a glow of light held at arm's length by the recreant follower of Destiny illuminating a tableau which shall end the ignominious chronicle—a maid with unkissed, curling, contemptuous lips slowly lifting the lamp chimney and allowing the wick to ignite; then waving a scornful and abjuring hand toward the staircase—the unhappy Tansey, erstwhile ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... Roland," Blancandrin spake, "Who every race would recreant make. And on all possessions of men would seize; But in whom doth he trust for feats like these?" "The Franks! the Franks!" Count Ganelon cried; "They love him, and never desert his side; For he lavisheth gifts that ...
— The Harvard Classics, Volume 49, Epic and Saga - With Introductions And Notes • Various
... go forward, I say; I've nothing more to say to you." And, drawing over the slide of the scuttle, he disappeared. Upon the very point of following him down, the attention of the exasperated seamen was called off to a party who had just then taken the recreant Bungs in hand. Amid a shower of kicks and cuffs, the traitor was borne along to the forecastle, where—I forbear to relate ...
— Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville
... pretty superior smile of a young empress pardoning a recreant subject, and suffered him to draw her again, but with more gentleness, into his embrace. She put up her lips to meet his—I looked on like a man in a dream! I saw them cling together—each kiss they exchanged was a fresh ...
— Vendetta - A Story of One Forgotten • Marie Corelli
... groom's former acquaintances, received an invite to the bridal feast, and appeared in red morocco shoes and a cap whose ruffles were the astonishment of the entire assembly. Mary Madeline's squealing baby detained her at home, and perhaps, also, she did not care to see her former lover, recreant and unfaithful though he had been to her, take the solemn vow ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... design to trespass upon the time of the Conference at this stage of the debate. But statements have been made upon this floor to-day which I cannot permit for a single hour to remain unanswered. I should be recreant to my conscience, and especially to my State, if I did not answer ...
— A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention • Lucius Eugene Chittenden
... wilderness, and guarded it from the savage foe. The old government, so endeared to the people, and defended against kingly assault with the truest courage, was swept away by arbitrary power, and in its place a new one established, under the presidency of Joseph Dudley, and he a recreant son of the colony. It was the inauguration of this government which had taken place on the day before Captain Bowden and Dr. Clarke encountered John Wiswell, Jr., on their ride to Cambridge. There ceremonies of the inauguration ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Vol. 1, Issue 1. - A Massachusetts Magazine of Literature, History, - Biography, And State Progress • Various
... and, to the dismay of both recreant lads, Dr. Alec walked out of the room to offer his services to ...
— Eight Cousins • Louisa M. Alcott
... great speeches made on that evening. Mr. Gresham delivered an oration of which men said that it would be known in England as long as there were any words remaining of English eloquence. In it he taunted Mr. Turnbull with being a recreant to the people, of whom he called himself so often the champion. But Mr. Turnbull was not in the least moved. Mr. Gresham knew well enough that Mr. Turnbull was not to be moved by any words;—but the words were not the less telling to the House and to the country. Men, who ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... innate love, These to my wish must recreant prove; Nor whilst an impulse here remain, Can ever hope the soul to gain; For memory scanning all the past, Relaxes her firm bonds at last, And gives to candor all the grace The heart ...
— A Nonsense Anthology • Collected by Carolyn Wells
... meet Rosamund Barry! Thank you, Carus. And I may add that I have seen little of you since Friday; not that I had noticed your absence, but meeting you on your favorite promenade reminded me how recreant are men. Heigho! and alas! You may hand me to my chair before you leave me to go ogling Broad Street ...
— The Reckoning • Robert W. Chambers
... to the little cottage, the poor old tidy bonnet drooping lower than it was wont. Meadows came back to dinner; he had a mutton-chop in his study, for it was a busy day. While thus employed there came almost bursting into the room a man struck with remorse—Jefferies, the recreant postmaster. ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... left cheek, seizes a dropped carbine and thrusts it into Burleigh's shaking hands. "Up with you, man!" he cries. "It's your scalp you're fighting for. Here, take a drink of this," and his filled canteen is glued to Burleigh's ashen lips. A long pull, a gasp, and hardly knowing what he does, the recreant officer kneels at the nearmost rock, aims at a painted savage leaping to the aid of a fallen brother, and the chance shot, for a marvel, finds its mark, and with a howl the ...
— A Wounded Name • Charles King
... escape when pursued so closely by numbers. On the contrary, all his energies were aroused in order to meet his expected fate, with a calmness that should do credit to his colour and his manhood; one equally removed from recreant alarm, ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper
... breast. "Why stay'st thou, Turnus? Wherefore this delay? Fierce arms, not swiftness, must decide the day. Shift as thou wilt, and every shape assume; Exhaust thy courage and thy craft, and pray For wings to soar with, or in earth's dark womb Sink low thy recreant head, and hide ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil - Translated into English Verse by E. Fairfax Taylor • Virgil
... years he married Margaret Aitken—a serving-woman. She bore nine children. Thomas was the eldest and the only one who proved recreant to the religious faith ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 1 of 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Good Men and Great • Elbert Hubbard
... Sir, when I heard the gentleman lay down principles which place the murderers of Alton side by side with Otis and Hancock, with Quincy and Adams, I thought those pictured lips [pointing to the portraits in the hall] would have broken into voice to rebuke the recreant American—the slanderer ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 7 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Orators • Elbert Hubbard
... turn recreant at the last cast? You must along to countenance my undertaking: we ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden
... Master's favorites, for the last fifty years or so, should be arranged, with certificate from each Squire of his satisfaction, to such and such a point, with the portrait of Lightfoot, or Lucifer, or Will o' the Wisp; and due notification, for perhaps a recreant and degenerate future, of the virtues and perfections at this time sought and secured in the English horse. Would not such a chamber of chivalry have, in its kind, a quite indisputable authority and historical value, not to be shaken by any future ...
— On the Old Road, Vol. 2 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin
... she belongs to the gentry, yet no fighting Irishman could match her temper when roused, and the Billingsgate which passes through the dumb-waiter between our Mary and the tradespeople is enough to turn the colour of the walls. Yet though I have seen her pull a recreant grocery boy in by his hair, literally by his hair, tradesmen, one and all, adore her, and do errands for her which ought to earn their discharge, and they bring her the pick of the market to avoid having anything less choice thrown in their faces when they ...
— At Home with the Jardines • Lilian Bell
... perhaps, who has been more generally respected by his party for earnestness and sincerity. On the present occasion there was a fierceness, almost a ferocity, in his very countenance, to the fire of which friends and enemies were equally anxious to add fuel,—the friends in order that so might these recreant Tories be more thoroughly annihilated, and the enemies, that their enemy's indiscretion might act back upon himself to his confusion. For, indeed, it never could be denied that as a Prime Minister Mr. Gresham could be ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... purpose never apparent in their short married life, rising from their common tomb and hastening to that other tomb at the end of the alley, and falling at the feet of the one to whom in life he had been recreant in love, she ...
— Balcony Stories • Grace E. King
... but when he made up his mind to leave the army, I fancied it was no better than being a recreant knight, and I begged and prayed him to go out with Sir Philip Cameron, and as near as I dared told him it was for my sake. But he went on all the same, and then I was quite sure he did not care, and saw what a goose I had made ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge
... could not doubt her sincerity. But with the injustice of a passionate, jealous love she did not so much blame her recreant lover. Some charm, some art, must have been used, perhaps by a third person, and the girl be guiltless. And if she could send her away and ...
— A Little Girl in Old Detroit • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... viciousness of that "I wish it had rained!" I wonder if that man beats his wife, or if he just converses with her as he does with a recreant ...
— As Seen By Me • Lilian Bell
... the flock, they bribed the son, To sell the priest and rob the sire; Their dogs were taught alike to run Upon the scent of wolf and friar. Among the poor, Or on the moor, Were hid the pious and the true— While traitor knave, And recreant slave, Had riches, rank, and retinue; And, exiled in those penal days, Our ...
— Thomas Davis, Selections from his Prose and Poetry • Thomas Davis
... it is the duty of the whole people to never intrust to any hands but their own, that thing is the preservation and perpetuity of their own liberties and institutions. And if they shall think as I do, that the extension of slavery endangers them more than any or all other causes, how recreant to themselves if they submit The question, and with it the fate of their country, to a mere handful of men bent only on seif-interest. If this question of slavery extension were an insignificant one, one having ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... Victory, Whereto we're bound? Alack! or we must lose The Country, our dear nurse; or else thy Person, Our comfort in the Country. We must find An eminent calamity, though we had Our wish, which side shou'd win. For either thou Must, as a foreign Recreant, be led With manacles thorough our streets; or else Triumphantly tread on thy Country's ruin, And bear the palm, for having bravely shed Thy wife and children's blood. For myself, son, I purpose not to wait on Fortune, 'till These wars determine: if I can't persuade thee Rather to shew a ...
— Eighteenth Century Essays on Shakespeare • D. Nichol Smith
... even together. But the sword of the knight smote King Arthur's sword in two pieces, wherefore he was heavy. Then said the knight unto Arthur, Thou art in my daunger whether me list to save thee or slay thee, and but thou yield thee as overcome and recreant, thou shalt die. As for death, said King Arthur, welcome be it when it cometh, but to yield me unto thee as recreant I had liefer die than to be so shamed. And therewithal the king leapt unto Pellinore, and took ...
— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume I (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory
... been looking everywhere for you. Come with me, and don't sit starving here," said Tom, with a scornful look from her empty plate to that of her recreant escort, which was ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott
... or by Him who made The world, thy heart's blood dyes my blade!"— "Thy threats, thy mercy, I defy! 405 Let recreant yield, who fears to die." —Like adder darting from his coil, Like wolf that dashes through the toil, Like mountain-cat who guards her young, Full at Fitz-James's throat he sprung; 410 Received, but recked not of a wound, And locked his arms his foeman ...
— Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... I went on to inquire whether he felt himself equal to the delicate duty of hanging about the yard of the Black Swan, and watching the doors of exit from that hotel, with a view to following my recreant nephew wherever he might go, even if considerably beyond the limits of Ullerton. I saw that the lad's intelligence was likely to be equal to this transaction, unless there should arise any difficult or complicated position by reason of the suspicion ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon
... life continues to burn," she added, "I wish to direct my thoughts to Heaven, and prepare for that change that is before me. Death, Alfred, will soon claim me for his bride; he, at least, will not prove recreant ...
— Withered Leaves from Memory's Garland • Abigail Stanley Hanna
... recreant to his sorrow, A traitress to his woe." From her place the Marchioness rises, The minstrel ...
— Poems • William D. Howells
... boy was safe in bed—clean, full-stomached, and sleepily content the sisters talked it over. The Reverend John Hapgood, in his will, had cut off his recreant son with the proverbial shilling, so, by law, there was little coming to Ralph. This, however, the sisters overlooked in ...
— Across the Years • Eleanor H. Porter
... 'mid the cannons' thunder, Whistling shot and bursting bomb, When my brothers fall around me, Should my heart grow cold and numb?' But the drum Answered, 'Come! Better there in death united, than in life a recreant,—Come!'" —BRET HARTE. ...
— Deeds that Won the Empire - Historic Battle Scenes • W. H. Fitchett
... said, I could almost have concluded that the object of the Double was to drive away from Lucy this last and almost earliest friend. At times, I could scarcely bear to own it, but I myself felt inclined to turn recreant; and I would accuse Lucy of being too patient—too resigned. One after another, she won the little children of Coldholme. (Mrs. Clarke and she had resolved to stay there, for was it not as good a place as any other to such as they? and ...
— Curious, if True - Strange Tales • Elizabeth Gaskell
... Constitution which reads, "shall approve of all laws," is mandatory and leaves the Executive without discretion. The committee took the whole matter very seriously, believing that great principles were at stake. "As representatives of the people," they declared, "we conceive that we should be recreant to their rights and true interests, if we should acquiesce in the 'veto power' as used by the Executive . . . . We believe the people should be heard through those who represent them and are responsible ...
— History of the Constitutions of Iowa • Benjamin F. Shambaugh
... 'Thou recreant and coward!' said Beaumains. 'Did not any of those knights that thou hast hung cry to thee for mercy? What pity and what mercy didst thou give them? And thou deservest none from me, ...
— King Arthur's Knights - The Tales Re-told for Boys & Girls • Henry Gilbert
... acknowledge yourselves a couple of recreant knights: Sir Timorous is mine: I have won him in fair field ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. II • Edited by Walter Scott
... though scarcely with steerage way. The three others remained in contact with their heads to the southward. While this melee was in progress, the French flagship "Bucentaure" surrendered, at five minutes past two; but, before hauling down the flag, Villeneuve made a signal to his recreant van,—"The ships that are not engaged, take positions which will bring them most rapidly under fire." Thus summoned, the ten vessels which constituted the van began to go about, as they should have done before; and, although retarded by the slack wind, ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. II. (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... indeed, that the Catholic Church spares no pains and stops at no sacrifice in order to induce mankind to embrace her faith. Otherwise she would be recreant to her sacred mission. But she scorns to exercise any undue influence in her efforts to ...
— The Faith of Our Fathers • James Cardinal Gibbons
... build somewhere over the horizon; for the sake of the civilization that was to be planted, of the nation that must arise, of the manhood and womanhood of to-morrow—she would be brave. Deep in her heart she swore she would be brave, even while a recreant tear stole forth unbidden and froze into a little pearl ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead
... and not the other? Why, sir, if the people of Pennsylvania could sustain a distinction so odious, the very shades of their ancestors would rise from the battlefields of the Revolution, from Paoli and Germantown, and call their children bondmen of Carolina, vassals and recreant slaves! I speak not now of the whiskey insurrection, when, at the order of Washington, the militia of Virginia and of other States moved against the people of Western Pennsylvania, under the command of the Governor of Virginia and Carolina, and the nation approved the deed; but ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3 No 2, February 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... shuddering to the awful mystery of being; strange and terrible words have been spoken—words never to be forgotten—"phenomenon," and "thing-in-itself"; not knowing what these words mean, you are ignorant and recreant to the truth; knowing what they mean, you tug no more at the veil. Also we have learned that time and change are our portion, "the plastic dance of circumstance"; we talk no more of immortality. We have turned our hopes to the new birth of time, to the ...
— The Journal of Arthur Stirling - "The Valley of the Shadow" • Upton Sinclair
... doctrine there had been Followed by "wigs upon the green." None there refused the offered glass, Or dared to let the bottle pass For, casus belli this was strong, Unless with a good roaring song The recreant could in his defence Atone for such most strange offence. Sometimes, nay oft, upon the street Antagonistic friends would meet By chance, or by some other charm, To try each other's strength of arm, And without legal process settle Disputes, like men of taste ...
— Recollections of Bytown and Its Old Inhabitants • William Pittman Lett
... King in sore despite; "A murrain seize that traitrous knight, For that he lies!" he cried— "A base, unchristian paynim he, Else, by my beard, he would not be A recreant to his bride! ...
— John Smith, U.S.A. • Eugene Field
... from the recreant spouse to her husband in the Castle St. Louis, no home life nor welcoming domestic fireside threw a charm over his exile. The glamour with which affection can glorify even the rudest surroundings was denied him in his long life ...
— Famous Firesides of French Canada • Mary Wilson Alloway
... Lady Seton.—Go, worthless recreant, and in thickest fight Blot out thy guilty purpose: know thy life Depends on this day's daring; and its deeds And wounds alone, won in the onset's ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume XXIV. • Revised by Alexander Leighton
... again, the two men were disputing in a whisper, the one of them in violent agitation and terror, and the other upbraiding him, and urging him on to some desperate act. At length I heard the young man in the Highland garb say indignantly, 'Hush, recreant! It is God's work which you are commissioned to execute, and it must be done. But, if you positively decline it, I will do it myself, and do you beware of ...
— The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner • James Hogg
... the recreant, the apostate, the only seceder of our family from the just cause, who speaks thus?" said the old woman lifting her head ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various
... objected, such an institution as this has never existed. Every political or social aristocracy in history has been mixed and adulterated with bad characters and recreant representatives. There never has been and never will be a perfect aristocracy. Quite true; neither has there ever been a perfect democracy, or a perfect monarchy for that matter. As men we work with imperfections, but we live by faith, and ...
— Towards the Great Peace • Ralph Adams Cram
... short while before I came back, I plucked it from his breast with my own hands." It boots not to ask if the lady was sorrow-stricken to receive such tidings of her best beloved. But after a while she said:—"'Twas the deed of a disloyal and recreant knight; for if I, unconstrained by him, made him lord of my love, and thereby did you wrong, 'twas I, not he, should have borne the penalty. But God forbid that fare of such high excellence as the heart of a knight so true and courteous as Sieur ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio
... else, due possibly to the lady's wonderful eyes, of which he had thought much. Yet it was not her simplicity that affected him solely; on the contrary, it was her apparent intelligent reading of the character of her recreant lover—and of his own! Of all the Colonel's previous "light" or "serious" loves, none had ever before flattered him in that way. And it was this, combined with the respect which he had held for their professional relations, that precluded his ...
— Openings in the Old Trail • Bret Harte
... "Or if there be any who entertain such thoughts, we will make them outcasts among us, and the finger of scorn will be pointed at them as recreant to their ...
— Fort Lafayette or, Love and Secession • Benjamin Wood
... He was in the saddle quickly, loping Patches to the crest of a hill near by in hopes of getting a view of the recreant pony. He got a glimpse of it, far back on the plains near some timber, and he was about to shout the news to Ruth, who was watching him intently, when he thought better of the notion and ...
— The Range Boss • Charles Alden Seltzer
... Amongst our recreant Shaykhs I must not include Furayj bin Raf'a el-Huwayt, a man of whom any tribe might be proud, and a living proof that the Bedawi may still be a true gentleman. A short figure, meagre of course, as becomes the ...
— The Land of Midian, Vol. 1 • Richard Burton
... opposition which, without inconsistency, he cannot fail to offer? As prosecuting attorney for the Darringtons he would be recreant to his client, if he consented to release ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... falsehood, by giving up the object of her evening wandering. But a bright gleam of sunshine darted through the trees—the stream foamed and leapt towards it—the waterfall sparkled beneath—the arrowy fern glittered like gold, and Netta's heart forgot her duty, and thought of her recreant lover. Her repentance must come in gloom, her ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... knights we'll hack, and so thou shouldest not alter the article of thy gentry. The punishment of a recreant or undeserving knight, was to hack off his spurs: the meaning therefore is; it is not worth the while of a gentlewoman to be made a knight, for we'll degrade all these knights in a little time, by the usual form of hacking off their spurs, and thou, if thou art knighted, shalt be ...
— Johnson's Notes to Shakespeare Vol. I Comedies • Samuel Johnson
... the hall had disappeared; for I had hoped to meet with the stately elbow-chair of carved oak, in which the country Squire of former days was wont to sway the scepter of empire over his rural domains; and in which might be presumed the redoubted Sir Thomas sat enthroned in awful state, when the recreant Shakespeare was brought before him. As I like to deck out pictures for my entertainment, I pleased myself with the idea that this very hall had been the scene of the unlucky bard's examination on the morning ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume I. - Great Britain and Ireland • Various
... yellow-brown like cigarette tobacco; low, straight brows and lashes of the same light shade; a clever, impudent nose and a wide, laughing mouth; a pointed, prominent chin with a cleft in it. Now, can you imagine this as the description of a nineteen-year-old girl's recreant parent, a ruined bankrupt returning to a house deserted ...
— The Lightning Conductor Discovers America • C. N. (Charles Norris) Williamson and A. M. (Alice Muriel)
... boil along the throbbing veins.— Albion, displeas'd, her own lov'd Spring surveys Passing, with volant step, o'er russet plains; Sees her to Summer's fierce embraces speed, Pale, and unrobed.—Faithless! thou well may'st hide Close in his sultry breast thy recreant head, That did'st, neglecting thy distinguish'd Isle, In Winter's icy arms so long abide, While Britain vainly languish'd for ...
— Original sonnets on various subjects; and odes paraphrased from Horace • Anna Seward
... nor her Government, but against Colonial mis-government.... We remonstrated; we were derided.... We were goaded on to madness, and were compelled to show that we had the spirit of resistance to repel injuries, or to be deemed a captive, degraded and recreant people. We took up arms, not to attack others, but to defend ourselves."—Letter to Lord Durham from Dr. Wolfred Nelson and others, confined at Montreal, June ...
— The Story of the Upper Canada Rebellion, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent
... work you will doubtless be criticised by a class of your own people who think you are lowering your own dignity, but the South has suffered too much already from that kind of false pride to let it longer keep her recreant to the ...
— Masterpieces of Negro Eloquence - The Best Speeches Delivered by the Negro from the days of - Slavery to the Present Time • Various
... battle for the maintenance of slavery. While the master was away fighting to forge the fetters upon the slave, he left his wife and children with no protectors save the Negroes themselves. And yet during those years of trust and peril, no Negro proved recreant to his trust and no white man returned to a home that ...
— The Red Record - Tabulated Statistics and Alleged Causes of Lynching in the United States • Ida B. Wells-Barnett
... wholly his; that his mind rebels; that another girds him and carries him whither he would not. It came now to Herrick, with the authority of a revelation. There was no escape possible. The open door was closed in his recreant face. He must go back into the world and amongst men without illusion. He must stagger on to the end with the pack of his responsibility and his disgrace, until a cold, a blow, a merciful chance ball, or the more merciful hangman, should dismiss him from his infamy. There were men who could commit ...
— The Ebb-Tide - A Trio And Quartette • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... to Heaven—hot as that crimson haze By which the prostrate Caravan is awed[109] In the red Desert when the wind's abroad. "Oh, Swords of God!" the panting CALIPH calls,— "Thrones for the living—Heaven for him who falls!"— "On, brave avengers, on," MOKANNA cries, "And EBLIS blast the recreant slave that flies!" Now comes the brunt, the crisis of the day— They clash—they strive—the CALIPH'S troops give way! MOKANNA'S self plucks the black Banner down, And now the Orient World's Imperial crown Is just within his grasp—when, hark, that shout! Some hand hath checkt the flying Moslem's ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... and watchfulness. Aun' Jinkey smoked and dozed in her chair, listening to every sound, but no "squinch-owl" renewed her fears. The family at the mansion were too perturbed to sleep much, for all knew that the morrow must bring decisive events. The three soldiers sent after the recreant trooper returned from a bootless chase and were allowed to rest, but Whately saw to it that there was a vigilant watch kept by relief of guards on the part of the others. He was not very greatly encouraged ...
— Miss Lou • E. P. Roe
... her knife. 'Those hands, that have protected a Roman life, shall never grasp a Roman sword, shall never pollute again by their touch a Gothic weapon! I remembered, as I watched you in the darkness, how the women of my race once punished their recreant warriors when they fled to them from a defeat. So have I punished you! The arm that served not the cause of sister and sister's children—of king and king's nation—shall serve no other! I am half avenged of the murders at Aquileia, now that I am ...
— Antonina • Wilkie Collins
... child was declared immune to the bacteria of ignorance, illiteracy, stupidity and other prevalent social complaints. If the virus did not take the schoolmaster ostentatiously washed his hands of the recreant. ...
— The New Education - A Review of Progressive Educational Movements of the Day (1915) • Scott Nearing
... Virginia retired to the dressing-room, absorbed in woeful recollection of the resolute No they had been compelled to reiterate, in response to the most eloquent and, saving for a single instance, admirable man, their cousin, the representative of 'the blood,' supplicating them. A recreant thankfulness coiled within her bosom at the thought, that Dorothea, true to her office of speaker, had tasked herself with the cruel utterance and repetition of the word. Victor's wonderful eyes, his ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... therefore, though allowing that, from disappointment or disgust, he might have been led to withdraw all personal participation in such a cause, in no case would he have shown himself a recreant to its principles; and though too proud to have ever descended, like Egalite, into the ranks of the people, he would have been far too consistent to pass, like Alfieri, into those of ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... are flown thy wits? Go plait rush-baskets, lop the olive-boughs To feed thy lambkins—'twere the shrewder part. Chase not the recreant, milk the willing ewe: The world hath ...
— Theocritus • Theocritus
... examples to guide and to animate, it will be pleaded, there would be no cause for apprehension; he could not falter, he could not be misled. But ours is, notwithstanding its manifold excellences, a degenerate age; and recreant knights are among us far outnumbering the true. A false Gloriana in these days imposes worthless services, which they who perform them, in their blindness, know not to be such; and which are recompensed by rewards as worthless, yet eagerly grasped ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... prelates and lay lords, who, by virtue of their nobility, were exempt from taxation. The collection of the taxes was enforced with unrelenting severity. On one occasion, in the reign of Louis XIV., the troops sent out against the recreant peasants made more than 3,000 prisoners, of whom 400 were condemned to the galleys for life, and a number so large that the government did not dare to disclose it, were hung on trees or broken on the wheel.—Moreau de Jonnes, Etat Economique ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... Thou runaway, thou coward, art thou fled? Speake in some bush: Where dost thou hide thy head? Rob. Thou coward, art thou bragging to the stars, Telling the bushes that thou look'st for wars, And wilt not come? Come recreant, come thou childe, Ile whip thee with a rod. He is defil'd That drawes a ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... my last words, thou recreant boy; Sweyn will send for thee early in the morning before the assembled host; it will be the day of St. Brice; and even were he not now mad with rage, there would be no mercy for a Christian on that day. Thou ...
— Alfgar the Dane or the Second Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... emoluments of a saddler. There were seven children in the family, and never a servant crossed the threshold. One daughter survived Immanuel, and in her eighty-fourth year she expressed regrets that her brother had proved so recreant to the teachings of his parents as practically to alienate him from all his relatives. One brother became a Lutheran minister and lived out an honored career; the others vanish and fade away into the ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great Philosophers, Volume 8 • Elbert Hubbard
... friend. In his train rode all those knights who had drawn together to that town for the great tournament. Not a knight of them all but plighted faith to follow where he led, and to hold himself recreant and shamed if ...
— French Mediaeval Romances from the Lays of Marie de France • Marie de France
... been exposed, Lancelot bore her off to Joyeuse Garde, where he swore he would defend her even against the king. Arthur, whose mind, in the mean while, had been poisoned by officious courtiers, besieged his recreant wife and knight; but although repeatedly challenged, the loyal Lancelot ever refused to bear arms directly ...
— Legends of the Middle Ages - Narrated with Special Reference to Literature and Art • H.A. Guerber
... in the midst of this, a distracting love for you seems to unnerve and torment me. I beg you to wait until those days may come when I can show you all the devotion I yearn now to give you, but must not, for every moment that voice may reach me from beyond the grave, and I would be recreant to the most sacred obligations, and deep responsibilities that seem now to shape themselves before me, to our common humanity, if I forfeited an instant of inattention. I beg you to remember all this and wait, wait, until the depthless power of my love for ...
— The Certainty of a Future Life in Mars • L. P. Gratacap
... a low-lying marshy coast, La Salle had sailed four hundred miles beyond the mouth of the river he sought. Unaware of his mistake, he determined to land and build a temporary fort; but the frigate Aimable, laden with stores, was wrecked upon a reef; Beaujeu, the recreant commander of the Joly, deserted his leader and made sail for France, and presently La Salle was left with only the little frigate Belle. Soon afterwards this vessel also sank beneath the stormy waters of ...
— Old Quebec - The Fortress of New France • Sir Gilbert Parker and Claude Glennon Bryan
... portrait is, if possible, even more scandalously caricatured, I fail or quail in spirit at the upcome! Where canst thou show me the least symptom of the recreant temper, with which thou hast invested me (as I trust) merely to set off the solid and impassible dignity of thine own stupid indifference? If you ever saw me tremble, be assured that my flesh, like that of the old Spanish general, only quaked at the dangers into which my spirit ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... too strong for an honest man in your position to resist,—whether successfully or not is beyond the question. The officer who is intimidated by threats, or by his own fears, is recreant to his duty, and no better than the mob which threatens him. But you will have no such test, Mr. Wemyss! I shall see to it myself ...
— The Marrow of Tradition • Charles W. Chesnutt
... it is decreed that all such if they give not freely, of themselves be rated according to the Jurisdiction order for the Ministers Maintaynance." The delinquents were ordered to bring their "rate" to the Deacon's house at once. A presuming young man ventured to suggest that the recreant members who would not pay in the face of the whole congregation would hardly rush to the Deacon's door to give in their "rate." He was severely ordered to keep silence in the company of wiser and elder people; but time proved his simply ...
— Sabbath in Puritan New England • Alice Morse Earle
... with them. My honor requires it, and forbids me to stay at our house with Ulrich von Hohenberg, for whose sake my father called me publicly to-day a recreant daughter of the Tyrol, and threatened to disown me forever. I must prove to all the world that I am a loyal daughter of the Tyrol; and I feel, Elza, that it will do me good to contribute my mite to the deliverance of the fatherland. I am not gentle and patient enough to sit quietly at home ...
— Andreas Hofer • Lousia Muhlbach
... gentleman lay down the principles which place the murderers of Lovejoy at Alton side by side with Otis and Hancock, with Quincy and Adams," said Wendell Phillips, pointing to their portraits on the walls. "I thought those pictured lips would have broken into voice to rebuke the recreant American, the slanderer of the dead. For the sentiments that he has uttered, on soil consecrated by the prayers of the Puritans and the blood of patriots. the earth should have yawned and swallowed ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... shriveled and meaningless tradition. Oh! for the quick-pulsing, warm-beating, mighty human heart of the man of Galilee! Oh! for his uplifted hand, armed with a whip of scorpions, to depopulate the temples of the world, and lash his recreant preachers into devotion to the cause of his poor ...
— Caesar's Column • Ignatius Donnelly
... political career. Except for his work as one of the early leaders of the liberal movement in Germany, it has perished, and his name has been almost forgotten. As a lover, his story stands out forever as a warning to the timid and the recreant. Let men do what they will; but there is just one thing which no man is permitted to do with safety in the sight of woman—and that is to play ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr
... you say so, Mistress Thankful," said Washington quietly; "for 'twould have been natural for you to have sought an interview with your recreant lover in yonder camp, though the attempt would ...
— Thankful Blossom • Bret Harte
... good time, if you do not turn recreant," answered the fairy, with a significant smile. "But away, away, my prince. Mount and away. Follow the course of the river, and once more, never turn aside let what will be before you, remembering that ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 1 January 1848 • Various
... shortcoming of theirs upon which to thrust the blame of their helplessness. "Criminal helplessness," he called it, mutteringly. He tried to define the idea—or the idea tried to define itself—that they had somehow been recreant to their social caste, by getting down into the condition and estate of what one may call the alien poor. Carondelet street had in some way specially vexed him to-day, and now here was this. It was bad enough, he thought, for men to slip into riches through dark back ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... lies that says so; Yet now I know thee, I do lie that say it, For if she be a villain like thyself, A perjur'd traitor, recreant, miscreant, Dog—a dog, a dog, ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. IX • Various
... recurrent appears The ancestral crime. When the dark hour comes that the gods have decreed And the Fury burns with wrathful fires, A demon unholy, with ire unabated, Lies like black night on the halls of the fated; And the recreant Son plunges guiltily on To perfect ...
— Lectures Delivered in America in 1874 • Charles Kingsley
... this monstrous Nought had come to his kingdom and was opening a yawning mouth and toothless jaws to swallow its all down into the throat that it has not got—you, and me, and your young officer, with this splendid, recreant city and the sky and the earth. Wait, only wait! The glorious image of Serapis still stands radiant, but the cross casts an ominous shadow that has already darkened the light over half the earth! Our gods are an abomination ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... particulars, the deathbed conversion of two New England women; and to the minister's unspeakable grief and horror, the messenger who brought the letter told him that the boy himself had turned Catholic. "I have heard the news," he wrote to his recreant son, "with the most distressing, afflicting, sorrowful spirit. Oh, I pity you, I mourn over you day and night. Oh, I pity your weakness that, through the craftiness of man, you are turned from the simplicity ...
— A Half Century of Conflict - Volume I - France and England in North America • Francis Parkman
... a majority of three, recreant Liberals again helping to defeat the just claim of a man whom they disliked; and Bradlaugh did not take his seat until the new Parliament in 1886 admitted, without a division, the right which the ...
— Fifteen Chapters of Autobiography • George William Erskine Russell
... dark, and proceeded to set her house in order. She made the children go to bed when they were not sleepy and get up when they were. There was no beauty-sleep in that household, not even forty winks; and did any member prove recreant and require a douse of cold water, not only did he get the douse but he also heard quoted for a year and a day that remark concerning the sluggard, "A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep: so shall thy poverty come as one that traveleth, and ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 2 of 14 - Little Journeys To the Homes of Famous Women • Elbert Hubbard
... entered the room, and announced to the astonished members of the council the alarming tidings that one of their own body, and, until that day, an active participator in their discussions, had proved a Judas, and was now, with a band of his recreant neighbors, on his way to the British camp. The news fell like a thunder-clap on the council, producing, at first, a sensation not often witnessed in so grave an assemblage. But no formal comments were offered; and, after the commotion had subsided, ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... farther on. Fortunately Mr. Stevenson was up to the wiles of the native, and he at once scented the favourite device for two to take the travelling allowance, and then, by some amicable arrangement, for only one to go. So messengers were sent in haste to look up the recreant, who finally joined us with cheerful face at the West Gate, which we reached by a rough ...
— A Wayfarer in China - Impressions of a trip across West China and Mongolia • Elizabeth Kendall
... a recreant Genoese who taught them metal work and had once lived at the court of Cambaluc. The man had glimmerings of honesty, and tried hard to dissuade Aimery from the journey. "It is a matter of years," he told him, ...
— The Path of the King • John Buchan
... Archduke John, into whose hands he first fell. But where he is no one exactly knows. The news has created an immense excitement in the kingdom, and all are resolved to sacrifice any of their treasures which may be demanded in order to satisfy the ransom which the recreant emperor has placed upon the king. Shame is it indeed that a Christian sovereign should hold another in captivity. Still more, when that other was returning through his dominions as a Crusader coming from the Holy Land, when his person should be safe, ...
— The Boy Knight • G.A. Henty
... foreman came crunching savagely along, his heavy boots resounding upon the hard floor, the hickory club in his hand occasionally striking against the wall as though he imagined himself already belaboring the recreant Swanson. About him, causing his figure to appear gigantic, his shadow grotesque, the yellow gleam of the light shone in spectral coloring. Winston set his teeth determinedly, and noiselessly cocked his revolver. The man was already almost upon him, a black, shapeless bulk, like some unreal ...
— Beth Norvell - A Romance of the West • Randall Parrish
... before me. I would not make this "Reformation of the nineteenth century" a withered and blasted trunk, scattered by the lightnings of heaven, because it took part with the rich and powerful against the poor and oppressed, and because we have been recreant to those maxims of free discussion which we have so ostentatiously heralded to the world as our ...
— Personal Recollections of Pardee Butler • Pardee Butler
... girlish shapes in these colors, seen newly lighted at a doorway from a passing carriage, gave as they pressed eagerly forward a supreme effect of that sentiment in English dress which I hope I am not recreant in liking. Occasionally, also, there was a scarf, lightly escaping, lightly caught, which, with an endearing sash, renewed for a fleeting moment a bygone age of Sensibility, as we find it recorded in many a graceful page, on many a ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... avenge his death, for wife and children's sake preferred to foil inquiry rather than confront the truth and challenge it. He might not have meant to go so far, at first beginning with it; but, starting once, might be driven on by grievous loss, and bitter sense of recreant friends, and the bleak despair of a homeless world before him. And serving as the scape-goat thus, he might have received from the real culprit a pledge for ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore
... was thirty-five leagues from Nombre de Dios and forty-five from Panama. It had been surprised the year before Drake came there (1572) by 150 Spanish troops under "a gallant gentleman," who had been guided thither by a recreant Maroon. He attacked a little before the dawn, and cut down many women and children, but failed to prevent the escape of nearly all the men. In a little while they rallied, and attacked the Spaniards with great fury, killing their guide and four-fifths of their company. The wretched ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... do what he me biddeth; that shall be to-morrow, before our men, that fight we shall by ourselves, and fall the worst of us! And whether (which) of us that goeth aback, and this fight will forsake, be he in each land proclaimed for a recreant! Then may men sing of one such king, that his brag (or threat) hath ...
— Brut • Layamon
... hymn, written in 1840, "Nearer my God to Thee," he discussed as a boy his religious difficulties, and in proposing his own doubts drew forth her latent scepticism as to the orthodox beliefs. "It was in answering Robert Browning;" she wrote, "that my mind refused to bring forward argument, turned recreant, and sided with the enemy." Something of this period of Browning's Sturm und Drang can be divined through the ideas ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden
... to the door, called him with an imperative voice, and brought the recreant back to his duty of calling. Then she turned to the two girls, and said ...
— Polly of Pebbly Pit • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... while in such condition; nor to the faithful in the Church, whose voice and actions are weakened or neutralized by majorities. This important and hazardous task throughout the ages has not been committed to a Church, that is recreant at any point; nor to individuals, that are true at every point; but to a distinctive body of earnest, faithful, and fearless believers. For this purpose the Lord has divided, and sub-divided, His people time ...
— Sketches of the Covenanters • J. C. McFeeters
... directly from their midst, owing both his present and future position to their suffrages, more closely identified with them in interest, and partaking more nearly of their modes of thought, and who from the shortness of his term might easily be displaced if he should prove recreant to his trust, thus having every inducement to correctly represent the sentiments and protect the rights of his constituents, might act as a check upon that other house, which, further removed in every respect from the people, elected more in accordance with, ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... a recreant, and witness such a spirit! Hundreds of warriors have I witnessed in their blood, but never a firmer ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... by the late Judge John Pearson shortly before his death. In the February term, 1850, of the Circuit Court of Vermilion County, Illinois, a case was being tried in which a young lady had brought suit for $10,000 against a recreant lover who had married another girl. The amount sued for was thought to be an enormous sum in those days, and the ablest talent to be found was brought into requisition by both sides. Richard Thompson ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... gentlemen of the South for using this threat of rending God's creation from foundation to turret. They have tried it fifty times, and fifty times they have found weak and recreant tremblers in the North who have been affected by it, and who have retreated ...
— The Man in Gray • Thomas Dixon
... meant no harm, cousin; I but put in a good word for the poor ladies at Whitehall. I fear that you are but a recreant wooer." ...
— Prisoners of Hope - A Tale of Colonial Virginia • Mary Johnston
... gloves, that is certain and sad," Mlle. de Montluc replied, as if the loss of the wager were all her care. "I am punished for my vanity, mesdames et messieurs. I undertook to produce my recreant squire and I have failed. Alas!" And she put up her white hands before her face with a pretty imitation of despair, save that her eyes sparkled from between ...
— Helmet of Navarre • Bertha Runkle
... confided to her a part of her history, she had never alluded to it or intimated a desire to hear more; but she thought much about it, revolving in her mind various expedients for finding and bringing back to his allegiance the recreant lover. ...
— Bad Hugh • Mary Jane Holmes
... in the plains of Tigris I upraised the sacred standard of our chosen race, and called them from their bondage; how, despairing of his recreant fathers, and inspired by human power alone, I vainly claimed the mighty office for his sacred blood alone reserved. God of my fathers, grant that future service, the humble service of a contrite soul, may in the coming ...
— Alroy - The Prince Of The Captivity • Benjamin Disraeli
... fought with swords with many great strokes and much blood-shed on both sides. Finally by a mighty blow from his enemy,—a passing big man of might,—Arthur's sword was smitten in two pieces, and he was called upon to yield himself as overcome and recreant, or die. ...
— Stories of King Arthur and His Knights - Retold from Malory's "Morte dArthur" • U. Waldo Cutler
... dreading what might come from the disclosures he had just made. He had reason to distrust the tactics such men might employ. His relief arising from the show-down was tinged with regret; he was still sorry for the innocent losers in Egypt. To employ two escaped convicts and a recreant prison guard in his efforts to prevail on Britt and secure the rights due an innocent man promised to ...
— When Egypt Went Broke • Holman Day
... your arms; your reputation has suffered from it. Every one used to say not long ago that in all the world there was known no better or more gallant knight. Now they all go about making game of you—old and young, little and great—calling you a recreant. Do you suppose it does not give me pain to hear you thus spoken of with scorn? It grieves me when I hear it said, and yet it grieves me more that they put the blame for it on me. Yes, I am blamed for it, I regret to say, and they all assert it is because I have so ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes
... or should the friends of Viscellinus [Footnote: Spurius Cassius Viscellinus, the author of the earliest agrarian law, passed, but never carried into execution. He was condemned to death,—probably a victim to the rancorous opposition of the patrician order, of which he was regarded as a recreant member by virtue of his advocacy of the rights or just claims of the plebs. Cicero in early life was by no means so hostile to the principle underlying the agrarian laws, and to the memory of the Gracchi, as he was after he had reached the highest offices ...
— De Amicitia, Scipio's Dream • Marcus Tullius Ciceronis
... timidity of Mr. Buchanan. He has himself reported the language he used: "I am sorry for it," said he; "you are President, it is for you to order. You have the right to order and I will consider your orders when made. But I would be recreant to you if I did not tell you that this policy of garrisoning the forts will lead to certain conflicts; it is the inauguration of civil war, and the beginning of the effusion of blood. If it is a question of property, why not put an ordnance sergeant into ...
— Abraham Lincoln, A History, Volume 2 • John George Nicolay and John Hay
... turpi remedio fatentur se uti; recordatione pristinarum voluptatum se recreant, et adversante natura, pollinctam ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior |
