"Samson" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... with impunity. The influence of such attractions with me, I confess, is quite irresistible. Beauty is more potent than any other agent of human power, and he who is able to resist it must be a heartless Samson indeed. ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 1, August 1850 - of Literature, Science and Art. • Various
... was not long in coming. I thought as our friends think at home—that to prepare my childlike wonder-lovers to listen with favor to my grave message I only needed to charm the way to it with wonders, marvels, miracles. With full confidence I told the wonders performed by Samson, the strongest man that had ever lived—for so ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... separable in that all-pervading azure; only, the pensive air was transparently pure and soft, with a woman's look, and the robust and man-like sea heaved with long, strong, lingering swells, as Samson's chest ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... fallen nature of man, what a terrible hour for them! what frightful battles inside the poor heart! What superhuman efforts and strength would be required to come out a conqueror from that battle field, where a David, a Samson, have fallen, mortally wounded! ...
— The Priest, The Woman And The Confessional • Father Chiniquy
... everywhere, he knew everything, and he forgot nothing. What another must study, he learned at a glance; there were no difficulties for him. And he made things live before you when he told about them. He saw the world made; he saw Adam created; he saw Samson surge against the pillars and bring the temple down in ruins about him; he saw Caesar's death; he told of the daily life in heaven; he had seen the damned writhing in the red waves of hell; and he made us see all these things, and it was as if we were on the spot and looking at them with ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... air-men, Samson, captured a German Taube that he used for daily reconnaissance. Every day we watched him hover over the Turkish lines, circle clear of their bursting shrapnel, and return to our artillery with his report. One day we watched two hostile planes chase him back ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various
... entered this time. They did not trouble to tie the Mahatma, but they bound me as the Philistines did Samson, and then threw a silken bag over my head by way of blindfold. The bag would have been perfectly effective if I had not caught it in my teeth as they drew it over my shoulders. It did not take long to bite a hole in it, nor much ...
— Caves of Terror • Talbot Mundy
... vice president, prime minister, three deputy prime ministers, Cabinet Legislative branch: unicameral National Resistance Council Judicial branch: Court of Appeal, High Court Leaders: Chief of State: President Lt. Gen. Yoweri Kaguta MUSEVENI (since 29 January 1986); Vice President Samson Babi Mululu KISEKKA (since NA January 1991) Head of Government: Prime Minister George Cosmas ADYEBO (since NA January 1991) Political parties and leaders: only party - National Resistance Movement (NRM); note ...
— The 1992 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... ellipsis be that of the participle. The following examples may perhaps be resolved in this manner, though the expressions will lose much of their vivacity: "A horse! a horse! my kingdom for a horse!"—Shak. "And he said unto his father, My head! my head!"—2 Kings, iv, 19. "And Samson said, With the jaw-bone of an ass, heaps upon heaps, with the jaw of an ass, have I slain a thousand men."—Judges, xv, 16. "Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth."—Matt., ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... the best stone-wall builders, as the best wood-choppers, come from those solitary mountain towns; a tall, athletic, and hardy race, unerring with the axe as the Indian with the tomahawk; at stone-rolling, patient as Sisyphus, powerful as Samson. ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... scene, and with many cries of "white-fella," "womany," their men made it clear that we might take the whole lot with us if we so desired! This was hospitality, indeed; but underlying it, I fear, were treacherous designs, for the game of Samson and Delilah has been played with success more than once by the ...
— Spinifex and Sand - Five Years' Pioneering and Exploration in Western Australia • David W Carnegie
... more notable novels announced for immediate publication is The Man in the Platinum Mask by Samson Wolf (Black and Crosswell). By a curious and wholly undesigned coincidence the name of the hero is ATTILA, while a further touch of actuality is lent to the romance by the fact that the author's aunt's first husband fought in ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, October 21, 1914 • Various
... at this difficulty, only thirty of whom were Mormons, and only eight Mormons took part in the fight. I was an entire stranger to all who were engaged in the affray, except Stewart, but I had seen the sign, and, like Samson when loaning against the pillar, I felt the power of God nerve my arm for the fray. It helps a man a great deal in a fight to know that God is ...
— The Mormon Menace - The Confessions of John Doyle Lee, Danite • John Doyle Lee
... A Horse in a Hat Lerins Aqueduct of Frejus Lantern of Augustus Map of Massalia Musical Instruments from the Tomb of Julia Calpurnia's Monument An Arelaise. (From a Photograph.) Part of the Amphitheatre of Arles Back of a House at Arles A Boat with two rudders at Arles On a House at Arles Samson and the Lion, from the West door of the Cathedral of Arles On a House at Arles South Entrance to the Cloister, Arles Cathedral Church of Notre Dame de la Majeur, Arles Tower of the desecrated Church of S. ...
— In Troubadour-Land - A Ramble in Provence and Languedoc • S. Baring-Gould
... originally some mundane phenomenon of nature or some simple conflict of the savage life. The same thing is probably true of the adventures of the Babylonian hero Gilgamesh, who is sometimes considered to be the original of Heracles. Nothing is easier than to expound the story of Samson in the Old Testament as a series of solar and other phenomena,[1486] but the probability is that he embodies the vague recollections of early tribal adventures, and, notwithstanding his name (which means ...
— Introduction to the History of Religions - Handbooks on the History of Religions, Volume IV • Crawford Howell Toy
... "Therefore shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall cleave unto his wife," refers without any doubt to the early marriage under mother-right, when the husband left his own kindred and went to live with his wife and among her people. We find Samson visiting his Philistine wife, who remained with her kindred.[110] Even the obligation to blood vengeance rested apparently on the maternal kinsmen (Judges viii. 19). The Hebrew father did not inherit from his son, nor the grandfather from the grandson,[111] ...
— The Truth About Woman • C. Gasquoine Hartley
... Further, Samson killed himself, as related in Judges 16, and yet he is numbered among the saints (Heb. 11). Therefore it is lawful for a man ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... cried the marquis, laughing delightedly. "You desire to show the world that there are still giants. What pleasure, what rapture, to go through the crowd of small persons, as myself, as D'Arthenay here, and exhibit the person of Samson, of Goliath!" ...
— Rosin the Beau • Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards
... distinct sign of the Nazarite, together with the unshorn locks, and the care with which he abstained from contact with death. In some cases, the vow of the Nazarite might be taken for a time, or, as in the case of Samson, Samuel, and John, it might be for life. But, whether for shorter or longer, the Nazarite held himself as peculiarly given up to the service of God, pliant to the least indication of his will, quick to catch the smallest whisper of his voice, ...
— John the Baptist • F. B. Meyer
... expeditions should scour the banks of the Mississippi from Helena to Vicksburg, until a healthier season permitted the resumption of more active hostilities. One such left Helena on the 14th of August, composed of the Benton, Mound City, and General Bragg, with the Ellett rams Monarch, Samson, and Lioness, and a land force under Colonel Woods. Lieutenant-Commander Phelps commanded the naval force. The expedition landed at several points, capturing a steamer with a quantity of ammunition and dispersing parties of ...
— The Gulf and Inland Waters - The Navy in the Civil War. Volume 3. • A. T. Mahan
... than to fall into their enemies' hands. How many myriads besides in all ages might I remember, qui sibi lethum Insontes pepperere manu, &c. [2766]Rhasis in the Maccabees is magnified for it, Samson's death approved. So did Saul and Jonas sin, and many worthy men and women, quorum memoria celebratur in Ecclesia, saith [2767]Leminchus, for killing themselves to save their chastity and honour, when Rome was taken, ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... mission we choose some one whom we think particularly fitted to fulfill the requirements and we must suppose that a Divine Being would use at least as much common sense, and not choose anyone to go his errand who was not fitted therefor. So when we read in the Bible that Samson was foreordained to be the slayer of the Philistines and that Jeremiah was predestined to be a prophet, it is but logical to suppose that they must have been particularly suited to such occupation. John the Baptist also, was born to be a herald of the coming ...
— The Rosicrucian Mysteries • Max Heindel
... slow temper. He hated to make an exhibition of himself, and much against his will he had been exhibited, as it were, to help the gaiety of the entertainment. Cotogni, the great sculptor, had suggested that Griggs should appear as Samson, asleep with his head on Delilah's knee, and bound by her with cords which he should seem to break as the Philistines rushed in. He had refused flatly, again and again, till all the noisy party caught the idea and ...
— Casa Braccio, Volumes 1 and 2 (of 2) • F. Marion Crawford
... the people were warming up, and becoming a little responsive, and "Billy" himself was getting excited. In reference to some remarks which had been made by a previous speaker about Samson, he said that he felt as happy and strong as Samson; then suddenly he put his arms round me, as I was standing gesticulating and making signs to the people to be still, and taking me up as he had done once before, he carried me down the schoolroom, crying ...
— From Death into Life - or, twenty years of my ministry • William Haslam
... be a completer contrast than between the polished and refined Roman paganism in Theodora, {27} the rustic paganism of "Bid the maids the youths provoke" in Hercules, the magician's or sorcerer's paganism of the blue furnace in "Chemosh no more," {28} or the Dagon choruses in Samson—to say nothing of a score of other examples that might be easily adduced? Yet who can doubt the sincerity and even fervour of either Milton's or Handel's religious convictions? The attitude assumed ...
— Alps and Sanctuaries of Piedmont and the Canton Ticino • Samuel Butler
... You'll find it too true. 25 Och! the hallabaloo! Och! och! how you'll wail, When the offal-fed vagrant Shall turn you as blue As the gas-light unfragrant, 30 That gushes in jets from beneath his own tail;— 'Till swift as the mail, He at last brings the cramps on, That will twist you like Samson. So without further blethring, 35 Dear mudlarks! my brethren! Of all scents and degrees, (Yourselves and your shes) Forswear all cabal, lads, Wakes, unions, and rows, 40 Hot dreams and cold salads, And don't pig in styes that would suffocate sows! Quit Cobbett's, O'Connell's and Beelzebub's ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... Samson, the grandfather of Theodoric, was a native of Salerno and served in the court of Earl Roger, the lord of that city Tall and dark, with black brows and long, thin face, he was distinguished by great ...
— Theodoric the Goth - Barbarian Champion of Civilisation • Thomas Hodgkin
... Place—that Charlotte was to preside in force; operations the quite awful appointed scale and style of which had at no moment loomed so large to Maggie's mind as one day when the dear Assinghams swam back into her ken besprinkled with sawdust and looking as pale as if they had seen Samson pull down the temple. They had seen at least what she was not seeing, rich dim things under the impression of which they had retired; she having eyes at present but for the clock by which she timed her husband, or for the glass—the image perhaps would be truer—in which ...
— The Golden Bowl • Henry James
... Moreover, there, is another curious commentary upon the value of his music, in the fact that Haendel took twelve measures well nigh bodily out of one of the choruses in Carissimi's "Jephthah," and incorporated them in "Hear Jacob's God" in his own "Samson." Mr. Hullah gives an excellent aria from this work, but it is too long for insertion here. The more important of Carissimi's innovations were in the direction of pleasing qualities in the accompaniments, and agreeable rhythms. He was teacher of several of the most important Italian ...
— A Popular History of the Art of Music - From the Earliest Times Until the Present • W. S. B. Mathews
... gave her a glance over her spectacles: "Seven—ten!" she repeated, "If it were your spirit, Fraeulein, you would be Samson himself; but your body—" She shook her head: "Na, when the master comes, ask him yourself. It is he who has talked with the Doctor, ...
— The Black Cross • Olive M. Briggs
... said, the thread of memory is touched by suggestion, and it vibrates back through half a century to some scene of terror stamped ineradicably upon the brain—or if not upon the brain, then where?—and, lo! the reflexes spring into action, and a maniac with Samson's strength takes the place of a docile invalid. Ah, who can answer the mystery of mysteries, and tell us what this consciousness is! Behind that gift of God rests the secret of life, and of death, and probably of ...
— A Strange Discovery • Charles Romyn Dake
... do not know of any islands, in the Black Sea. There is a peninsula attached to Russia, which contains the towns of Kafa, Aknetchet, Sevastopol, and Eupatoria: it lies between the Sea of Asof and the Gulf of Perecop. The principal gulfs are the Gulf of Baba, the Gulf of Samson, the Gulf of Varna, and the ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne
... tribes formed only a loose and weak confederacy without a common head. "In those days there was no king in Israel, every man did what was right in his own eyes." [10] The sole authority was that held by valiant chieftains and law-givers, such as Samson, Gideon, and Samuel, who served as judges between the tribes and often led them in successful attacks upon their foes. Among these were the warlike Philistines, who occupied the southwestern coast of Canaan. To resist the Philistines ...
— EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY • HUTTON WEBSTER
... a Samson," said Mark. "Consider if you or I had to pull a solid, eleven-stone man ...
— The Red Redmaynes • Eden Phillpotts
... position on the lounge. Through the steel-gray eyes in the brooding face his masterful spirit wrestled with hers. A lean-loined Samson, with broad, powerful shoulders and deep chest, he dominated his world ruthlessly. But this slim Irish girl with the young, lissom body held ...
— The Yukon Trail - A Tale of the North • William MacLeod Raine
... and thenceforth that and nothing else. And if, as Addison complains, you sometimes see a street-porter staggering under his load on spindle-shanks, and near at hand a tailor with the frame of a Samson handling a bit of cloth and small Whitechapel needle,—it cannot be considered that aptitude of Nature alone has been consulted here either!—The Great Man also, to what shall he be bound apprentice? Given your Hero, is he to become Conqueror, King, Philosopher, Poet? It is an inexplicably ...
— English Critical Essays - Nineteenth Century • Various
... that morning, first to Dick Blaine up at the gold mine, because he was a friend and needed good news of his wife; then across the bridge to Samson, straightening out the crumpled letter from Yasmini as he rode, and chuckling to himself at the thought of mystifying the commissioner. And it all worked out the way he hoped, even to the offer of a ...
— Guns of the Gods • Talbot Mundy
... and dreaded accordingly, and I was the dwarf's pet and plaything, and all-powerful with him. The hideous creature had a most hideous passion for me then, and I could wind him round my finger as easily as Delilah and Samson; and by his command and their universal consent, the mimicry of royalty was begun, and I was made mistress and sovereign head, even over the dwarf himself. It was a queer whim; but that crooked slug was always taking such odd notions into his head, which nobody there ...
— The Midnight Queen • May Agnes Fleming
... ever.... But in his countenance I saw a change: that looked desperate and brooding—that reminded me of some wronged and fettered wild beast or bird, dangerous to approach in his sullen woe. The caged eagle, whose gold-ringed eyes cruelty has extinguished, might look as looked that sightless Samson." ...
— The Three Brontes • May Sinclair
... the notes of its great plain-song to the sonorous lines, and "Duke Street," with superior melody and scarcely inferior grandeur, has given them wings; but the choice of many for music that articulates the life of the hymn would be the tune of "Samson," from Handel's Oratorio so named. It appears as No. ...
— The Story of the Hymns and Tunes • Theron Brown and Hezekiah Butterworth
... stone have been for ever broken and lost! What a rock of offence even his mere innocent existence, all unknown to himself till afterwards, has been! Swarms, said Christiana. Swarms of hornets armed, said Samson. And many of us understand what that bitter word means better than any commentator on Bunyan or on Milton can tell us. One of the holiest men the Church of England ever produced, and one of her best devotional writers, used to shut his door on the night of every first day of the week, ...
— Bunyan Characters (Second Series) • Alexander Whyte
... Model Railroad Club at MIT, one of the wellsprings of hacker culture. The 1959 "Dictionary of the TMRC Language" compiled by Peter Samson included several terms that became basics of the hackish vocabulary (see ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... John), at Siena, are ascribed to Quercia, and are in his manner; but when they were finished I do not know. They set forth six subjects from the story of Adam and Eve, with a compartment devoted to Hercules killing the Centaur Nessus, and another to Samson or Hercules and the Lion. The choice of subjects, affording scope for treatment of the nude, is characteristic; so is the energy of handling, though rude in detail. It may be worth while to notice here a similar series ...
— Renaissance in Italy Vol. 3 - The Fine Arts • John Addington Symonds
... but repetitions of older ones. Three times the writer of Judges tells of Samson that "the spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him," and then is added the pathetic sentence—"but he wist not that the Lord was departed from him." And between the two occurs the story of an act of disobedience. Twice the same thing is recorded of King Saul, ...
— Quiet Talks on Power • S.D. Gordon
... thereafter sold dry-goods and kept books at Dorman's store, should have become tainted with the infection of the times. But it is strange that she could have inoculated so sane a little man as Watts. Still, there were Delilah and Samson, and of course Samson was a much larger man than Watts, and Nellie McHurdie was considerably larger than Delilah; and you never can tell about those things, anyway. Also it must not be forgotten that Nellie McHurdie since her marriage had become Grand Preceptress in one lodge, Worthy Matron ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... might be unwilling to leave her home, and the presents which he carried went to Rebekah's mother and brother.[109] Laban says to Jacob, "These daughters are my daughters, and these children are my children;"[110] the obligation to blood-vengeance rests apparently on the maternal kindred;[111] Samson's Philistine wife remained among her people;[112] and the injunction in Gen. 2:24, "Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife," refers to the primitive Hebraic form of marriage.[113] Where the matriarchate prevails ...
— Sex and Society • William I. Thomas
... circumstance seemed to have the effect to precipitate the trade between the two cities. At least it grew rapidly from that day, our neighbors purchasing freely of our staple articles and sending us sugar and molasses in return. Thus, as in Samson's time, honey was gathered from the carcass of the dead lion. Ohio has become a very large consumer of our fish, and her influence is ...
— Old Mackinaw - The Fortress of the Lakes and its Surroundings • W. P. Strickland
... are, Tom! I think you're like Samson. If there came a lion roaring at me, I think you'd fight him, ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... my nose and whined for woe. All my thrill died away. I felt guilty, oddly ashamed of myself. I took a pessimistic view of life. What, thought I, are Joannas sent into the world for, save to play havoc with men's happiness? Maitre Francois Villon was quite right. Samson, Sardanapalus, David, Maitre Francois himself, all came to grief over Joannas. "Bien heureux qui rien n'y a." Happy is he who has nothing to ...
— The Beloved Vagabond • William J. Locke
... heading south by east. It soon became evident that the spout could not get by before the Slavonia reached it, and it was now too late to slow up—indeed, a collision was manifestly unavoidable from the start. Lorentzen had scarcely reached the bridge when the watery Philistine was upon the Samson. It just hit the steamer's bows on the starboard side, as depicted in the second cut. A rushing noise accompanied the column, and the water foamed in its wake. Immediately above was a great black cloud from which clouds less dark descended to form a funnel, ...
— The Jungle Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis
... What kind of mothers will this class of women make? It is said that a mother does more to mold the mind and heart of the child before it is born than can be done by any one from its birth up to twelve years. God sent an angel to the mother of Samson; told her "not to drink wine or strong drink" before the child was born. Why? God wishes here to teach that mothers can injure their children or entail on them vices ...
— The Use and Need of the Life of Carry A. Nation • Carry A. Nation
... told, but is worth repeating, how a pupil teacher was doing his level best to make the children remember Samson's mighty deeds with the jawbone of an ass, and, recapitulating, he asked, "What did Samson slay ten thousand Philistines with? Eh?" No reply came. Then, pointing to his jawbone, he asked, "What is this?" And at once the answer belched proudly from half-a-dozen throats in unison, "The ...
— Children's Rhymes, Children's Games, Children's Songs, Children's Stories - A Book for Bairns and Big Folk • Robert Ford
... indulgences had been committed to the Dominican friars, and was conducted by the infamous Tetzel. In Switzerland the traffic was put into the hands of the Franciscans, under the control of Samson, an Italian monk. Samson had already done good service to the church, having secured immense sums from Germany and Switzerland to fill the papal treasury. Now he traversed Switzerland, attracting ...
— The Great Controversy Between Christ and Satan • Ellen G. White
... with (say) six doses of our Stout Friend, and pour those doses consecutively on the fragments I have mentioned, at intervals of not less than five minutes. Quantities of little bubbles will rise at every pouring; collect the gas in those bubbles, and convey it into a closed chamber—and let Samson himself be in that closed chamber; our stout Friend will kill him in half an hour! Will kill him slowly, without his seeing anything, without his smelling anything, without his feeling anything but ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... Is one of Samson's foxes; he sets men together by the ears, more shamefully than pillories, and in a long vacation his sport is to go a fishing with the penal statutes. He cannot err before judgment, and then you see it, only writs of error are the tariers that keep his client undoing somewhat the longer. He ...
— Character Writings of the 17th Century • Various
... Paphos; many a vanquished victor sinks oppressed with wine and love on the breast of a Dalilah: this last comparison suggests itself to me from the immense quantity of hair worn by the Prussians, as if their strength, like that of Samson's, depended on their chevelure. There is a very pretty graceful girl who attends here and at the different restaurants and cafes with an assortment of bijouterie and other knick-knacks to sell. She is full of wit and repartee; but her answer ...
— After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819 • Major W. E Frye
... regarded from the stand-point of the personal religion which it originally expressed, or unless one means by so doing to define it as an expression of his own religion. He who defines "the myth of creation," or "the poetical story of Samson," as parts of the pre-Christian Judaic religion, exhibits a total loss of historical sense. The distinction between cognition and fancy does not exist among objects, but only in the intending experience; hence, for me to attach my own distinction to any individual case of belief, viewed apart from ...
— The Approach to Philosophy • Ralph Barton Perry
... the privy poisoning. *discontent I do vengeance and plein* correction, *full I dwell in the sign of the lion. Mine is the ruin of the highe halls, The falling of the towers and the walls Upon the miner or the carpenter: I slew Samson in shaking the pillar: Mine also be the maladies cold, The darke treasons, and the castes* old: *plots My looking is the father of pestilence. Now weep no more, I shall do diligence That Palamon, ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... jocund and gay of mood, He hath Cordres city at last subdued; Its shattered walls and turrets fell By catapult and mangonel; Not a heathen did there remain But confessed himself Christian or else was slain. The Emperor sits in an orchard wide, Roland and Olivier by his side: Samson the duke, and Anseis proud; Geoffrey of Anjou, whose arm was vowed The royal gonfalon to rear; Gereln, and his fellow in arms, Gerier: With them many a gallant lance, Full fifteen thousand of gentle France. The cavaliers sit upon carpets white Playing at tables for their delight; The ...
— Song and Legend From the Middle Ages • William D. McClintock and Porter Lander McClintock
... both be worthy of pity, and one of us would have ceased to exist before the other obtained her, for as long as I shall live Mdlle. Samson shall not be the ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... Raigne of King Iohn, conteining the death of Arthur Plantaginet, the landing of Lewes, and the poysning of King Iohn at Swinstead Abbey. As it was (sundry times) publikely acted by the Queenes Maiesties Players, in the honourable Citie of London. Imprinted at London for Samson Clarke, and are to be solde at his shop, on the backe-side of the Royall ...
— Catalogue of the Books Presented by Edward Capell to the Library of Trinity College in Cambridge • W. W. Greg
... like Samson blind,' said Mr. Lydiard; and Miss Denham, who had returned, begged her guardian to ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Like the despair of Samson awaking manacled and shaven, an occasional shriek would go up from some lone thinker, who perceived that the kingdoms of the world had lapsed into a single hand; and in the privy cabinet the governors drank to the dregs the cup of trembling. But their speech was bold, the matter ...
— The Lord of the Sea • M. P. Shiel
... consuming tragedy, or to a glorious unfolding of souls. Life is a composite of contradictions—a puzzle to the wisest of us: the lily lifting its graceful purity aloft may have its roots in a dunghill. Samson's dead lion putrefying by a roadside is ever and again being found to be a storehouse of wild honey. We are too accustomed to the ordinary and the obvious to consider that beauty or worth may, after bitter travail, grow out of that which ...
— Children of the Whirlwind • Leroy Scott
... saddle and draught, which I have particularly at my chateau of Pierrefonds, and which are called—Bayard, Roland, Charlemagne, Pepin, Dunois, La Hire, Ogier, Samson, Milo, Nimrod, Urganda, Armida, Flastrade, Dalilah, Rebecca, Yolande, Finette, Grisette, Lisette, ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... as essential, is lifted above its temporary and visible accidents. It is no longer associated with corruption, but rather with the sweet and wholesome freshness of life, being the way of its renewal. Sweeter than the honey which Samson found in the lion's carcass is this everlasting sweetness of Death; and it is a mystery deeper than the strong ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... descendants of Seth had not kept bad company and made friends of Cain's wicked race, the flood would never have swept them away. If Samson had not gone into bad company he would never have lost his strength, and have had to grind blindly and miserably at the mill. If Solomon had not kept bad company idolatry would never have ruined Jerusalem. ...
— The King's Cup-Bearer • Amy Catherine Walton
... 1857—sixteen years from its opening. He had also a night school and taught music, and these two features of his school he has revived since the war. This school contained from thirty-five to forty-five pupils. Rev. Dr. Samson, Mr. Seaton, and Mr. Coxe often visited his school and encouraged him in his excellent work. Thomas Tabbs used also to come into his school and give him aid and advice, as also did ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams
... commenced studying piano when only three years old. I believe it is mostly through his piano concertos and his symphonic poems that his name will live; for his operas have never attained popularity, with perhaps the one exception of "Samson and Delilah." His other operas are: "The Yellow Princess," "Proserpina," "Etienne Marcel," ...
— Critical & Historical Essays - Lectures delivered at Columbia University • Edward MacDowell
... to all rules of wrestling began to kick and trip, while his supporters stood ready to help, if need be, by breaking in with a regular free fight. This "foul play" roused the lion in Lincoln. He hated unfairness, and at once resented it. He suddenly put forth his Samson-like strength, grabbed the champion of the Clary Grove Boys by the throat, and, lifting him from the ground, held him at arm's length and shook him as a dog shakes a rat. Then he flung him to the ground, and, facing the amazed and yelling crowd, he cried: ...
— Heroes Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... long after the Conquest, were granted lands in Devonshire, and in one generation after another they have come forward to take a part in public affairs—often a Samson's share of toil. Sir John Fortescue fought at Agincourt, and was chosen Governor of Meaux by Henry V. Sir Edward Fortescue, when he had surrendered Salcombe Castle, had the consolation of knowing that this fort had been ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote
... in Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes, which, for calm, flowing, and immortal loveliness, are not surpassed in any poetry in ...
— One Hundred Best Books • John Cowper Powys
... Outflanking us by masses of infantry and swarms of cavalry—tearing us to tatters by the swift destruction from their immense and beautiful artillery—it fared with the Sikhs, before the stemless tide of British ardour, as with the Philistines before Samson— ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various
... John in the Lateran there are statues of Samson in marble, with a spear in his hand, and of Absalom the son of King David, and another of Constantinus the Great, who built Constantinople and after whom it was called. The last-named statue is of bronze, the horse being overlaid with gold[27]. Many other edifices are there, ...
— The Itinerary of Benjamin of Tudela • Benjamin of Tudela
... glory of a life passed wholly with her in that strong air, and among these rugged and lovely surroundings, at first with a whimpering sentiment, and then again with such a fiery joy that I seemed to grow in strength and stature, like a Samson. ...
— The Merry Men - and Other Tales and Fables • Robert Louis Stevenson
... window, while Kitty Maitland hovered in the background, scarcely less excited than themselves. He came. He stepped out of the fly, paid the cabman, and lounged up the path, lifting his head to nod in patronising fashion to his adorers. He was no Apollo of beauty, no Samson of strength, but just an ordinary-looking young man in an ordinary grey suit, with ordinary irregular features redeemed from plainness by an expression of quizzical good humour; yet each of the eight beholders gave a gasp of adoration as she beheld him. His mother's eyes swam with tears as she ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... again, and darkness reigned from end to end. Glanville, however, groped his way along the passage till he again reached Swithin's door, where he examined, by the light of a wax-match he had brought, the condition of the spider's thread. It was gone; somebody had carried it off bodily, as Samson carried off the pin and the web. In other words, a person had ...
— Two on a Tower • Thomas Hardy
... Milton," said Meldon, "because he was the most violent misogynist I ever heard of. Read what he says about Delilah in 'Samson Agonistes' and you'll see why I compare your remarks about Mrs. Lorimer to the sort of way ...
— The Simpkins Plot • George A. Birmingham
... herbs. Some statues, which had ornamented the garden in its days of splendour, were now thrown down from their pedestals and broken in pieces; and a large summer-house, having a heavy stone front, decorated with carving representing the life and actions of Samson, was in the same ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... a gay, careless, thoughtless fellow, spending all he got on musicians and dancers; but his mother loved him, and often, against the King's command, supplied him with money through a messenger named SAMSON. At length the incensed King swore he would tear out Samson's eyes; and Samson, thinking that his only hope of safety was in becoming a monk, became one, went on such errands no more, and kept his eyes ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens
... Gould's biggest persimmon; an' as t' Solomon, these fellows just lay Solomon out cold—regularly down th' old man an' sit on him. Why, for just that one front door of th' big house ahead of us I'd sell out all my shares in this treasure-hunt, an' be glad t' do it. But I guess I'd have to hire Samson—who was in that line of business—t' carry it off for me. It must ...
— The Aztec Treasure-House • Thomas Allibone Janvier
... answering, promising, the song, or perhaps hymn it might be called, went on through several stanzas, telling in dolorous cadences how our good "ol' Danel went up frum de den uf lions;" how "our good ol' 'Ligy went up on wheels uf fire;" how "our good ol' Samson went up wid de gates uf Gaza;" how "our good ol' Noah went up frum de mount uf Areat;" how "our good ol' Mary went up in robes uf whiteness," etc., all "safe to de promis' lan'," the comforting assurance over and over repeated that "by an' by we'll go an' see dem, safe in de promis' lan'." Long ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady
... mountains are Organ Mountains: the Alps and the Himalayas; the Appalachian Chain, the Ural, the Andes, the Green Hills and the White. All of them play anthems forever: The Messiah, and Samson, and Israel in Egypt, and Saul, and ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... assure you"—he smiled—"men have no difficulty in keeping important secrets, Samson notwithstanding. Glazzard would think himself for ever dishonoured. But in a week's time they will be gone; and I shouldn't wonder if they remain abroad for years. So brighten up, dearest dear, and leave Sam alone; he's ...
— Denzil Quarrier • George Gissing
... himself in Berners Street, London, and made furniture of an ornamental character in the style of his countrymen, reproducing the older designs of "Boule" and Marqueterie furniture. The present house of Mellier and Cie. are his successors, Mellier having been in his employ. The late Samson Wertheimer, then in Greek Street, Soho, was steadily making a reputation by the excellence of the metal mountings of his own design and workmanship, which he applied to caskets of French style. Furniture of a decorative character and of excellent quality was also made some ...
— Illustrated History of Furniture - From the Earliest to the Present Time • Frederick Litchfield
... smoke, Abe felt he had done the right thing in casting down every idol and putting away every mark of pride. Many and many a time in after years would he say to his wife, "Naa then, lass, where's th' shears? Thaa mun clip my locks agean. Samson gat clipt by his wife, and he were worth nought after, but thy shears mak's me strong." Then Sally would gently snip the ends of the curling fringe all around, while Abe, by way of encouraging her, would put in, "We mun shun th' appearance of evil, thaa knows; cut a bit more, ...
— Little Abe - Or, The Bishop of Berry Brow • F. Jewell
... interspersed with stage directions, many of which are impossible of scenic realization. Their whole purpose is to work upon the imagination of the listeners and thus open gate-ways for the music. Ever since its composition, Saint-Saens's "Samson and Delilah" has held a place in both theatre and concert-room. Liszt's "St. Elizabeth" has been found more effective when provided with pictorial accessories than without. The greater part of "Elijah" might be presented ...
— How to Listen to Music, 7th ed. - Hints and Suggestions to Untaught Lovers of the Art • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... marvelously disproportionate increase in their numbers, serve to awaken the colored race to self-consciousness and a sense of power. It is beginning to demand its rights and to be impatient of their resistance and suppression. The Samson of the past, bound, shorn and blinded, stands to-day with fetters broken, with locks grown long, and with eyes yet dim, but with the dimness of returning vision, as one who sees men as trees walking. ...
— American Missionary, Volume 43, No. 12, December, 1889 • Various
... of the Scriptures;[5] for his adversaries declared that the generation of bees from the carcase of a dead lion is affirmed, in the Book of Judges, to have been the origin of the famous riddle with which Samson perplexed the Philistines:— ...
— Discourses - Biological and Geological Essays • Thomas H. Huxley
... Wellington and Achilles and other fellows like that you can't expect any team-play. Each man is thinking about himself all the time. Hercules could walk right through 'em, and, when they begin to pose, it's mere child's play for him. The only chap that put up any game against us at all was Samson, and I tell you, now that his hair's grown again, he's a demon on the gridiron. But we divided up our force to meet that difficulty. Hercules put the rest of our eleven on to Samson, while he took care, personally, of all the other Hadesians. And you ...
— Olympian Nights • John Kendrick Bangs
... of ejectment! Pardon me! Be not angry, sir," pleaded Pothier supplicatingly, "I dare not knock at the door when they are at the devil's mass inside. The valets! I know them all! They would duck me in the brook, or drag me into the hall to make sport for the Philistines. And I am not much of a Samson, your Honor. I could not pull the Chateau down upon ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... now paying his devotions at another shrine. A Northern girl with her Northern gold is the next and natural step in his career, and he said to her pointblank that if the South again sought to regain her liberty, he would not help. He wasn't a Samson, but he was not long in being shorn by a Northern Delilah of what ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... military exploits were worthy of the highest admiration; while, in some instances, their private conduct calls forth only our surprise and regret. For examples of heroism and bravery, we can with confidence point to Gideon, to Samson, and to Jephthah; but there is not in their character anything besides that a father could recommend to the imitation of his son, or that a lover of order and pureness of living would wish to see adopted in modern society. We observe, in the greater number of them, uncommon ...
— Palestine or the Holy Land - From the Earliest Period to the Present Time • Michael Russell
... has not always profited by its martyrdoms. Samson, old and blind, toppled down the temple, and the Philistines that he slew at his death were more than they which he slew in his life. Not so Brann. His death was as tragic and pitiable as the charge of the Light Brigade, the sacrifice of men at the ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... is a poor blind Samson in our land, Shorn of his strength and bound with bonds of steel, Who may in some grim revel raise his hand, And shake the pillars ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers
... Serbia's woes we shared Each rise of sun or setting of the moon. So when the bugle blast had called us forth We went not like the surly brute of yore But, as the Spartan, proud to give the world The freedom that we never knew nor shared. These chains, O brothers mine, have weighed us down As Samson in the temple of the gods; Unloosen them and let us breathe the air That makes the goldenrod the flower of Christ. For we have been with thee in No Man's Land, Through lake of fire and down to Hell itself; And now we ask of thee our liberty, Our freedom in the land of ...
— The Book of American Negro Poetry • Edited by James Weldon Johnson
... vanished and grass and brown earth appeared, people had fought together, and there—Holy Virgin! What was this!—there lay his father's hammer. He knew it only too well; it was the smaller one, which to distinguish it from the two larger tools, Goliath and Samson, he called David-the boy had swung ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... is not the transcendental self known to a few rare souls, but is merely conscience, known to all. The biblical paintings have no secret meaning assigned to them. The inhabitants of Eden, the hero of the Deluge, the Hebrew patriarchs, Samson and Satan—all these are the familiar figures of the evangelical's Bible. "Eve Repentant" is the woman Eve, the mother of the race; "Jacob and Esau" are the brothers come to reconciliation; "Jonah" is the prophet denouncing the ...
— Watts (1817-1904) • William Loftus Hare
... the history of Samson, who "laid hold of the doors of the gate of the city, and the two posts, and plucked them up, bar and all, and put them on his shoulders and carried them up to the top of the mountain that is before Hebron." Ashkelon, on the coast, is connected with the history ...
— A Trip Abroad • Don Carlos Janes
... is free, and the inner man retaining the original uprightness of the image of God. You may know them by the stern sobriety of their countenances, and the contempt with which they regard the jests and pastimes of their miserable and degraded companions, who, like Samson, make sport for the keepers of their prison-house. These men are always feared as well as hated by their task-masters. Harry had never been whipped, and had always said that he would die rather than submit to it. He made no secret of his detestation of the overseer. While most of ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... Paul; "but if you wish not to insult me, and if you do not want to cause me to doubt the sincerity of your love, you won't call any prescription of the church of Christ foolish. The Scriptures tell us that we may lawfully and meritoriously abstain from many good and useful gifts of God—as Samson abstained from wine; St. John the Baptist from flesh and the luxury of apparel; St. Paul fasted and chastised his body; the Jews were commanded to abstain from the use of pork and other meats. Finally, our Savior promises ...
— The Cross and the Shamrock • Hugh Quigley
... syl.), "Samson, the Combatant," a sacred drama by Milton, showing Samson blinded and bound, but triumphant over his enemies, who sent for him to make sport by feats of strength on the feast of Dagon. Having amused the multitude for a time, he was allowed to rest awhile against the "grand stand," and, ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... Account of the Poem Games The King of Yellow Butterflies The Potatoes' Dance The Booker Washington Trilogy I. Simon Legree II. John Brown III. King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba How Samson Bore Away the ...
— Chinese Nightingale • Vachel Lindsay
... what had passed by the presence of the cardinal and the alteration in the king's countenance, M. de Treville felt himself something like Samson before the Philistines. ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... live without the working people is madness. You can no more live without them than they can live without you. You can no more deny the mutual dependence of employer and employee with safety to yourself than Samson of old could pull down the pillars of the temple without being himself ...
— Helen of the Old House • Harold Bell Wright
... did nothing of the kind. On the contrary, for some 30 years it did its best to ruin him, twice drove him to bankruptcy, badgered him till in 1737 he had a paralytic seizure which was as near as might be the death of him and, if he had died then, we should have no Israel, nor Messiah, nor Samson, nor any of his greatest oratorios. The British public only relented when he had become old and presently blind. Handel, by the way, is a rare instance of a man doing his greatest work subsequently to an attack of paralysis. ...
— The Note-Books of Samuel Butler • Samuel Butler
... clear steel-blue day. The firmaments of air and sea were hardly separable in that all-pervading azure; only, the pensive air was transparently pure and soft, with a woman's look, and the robust and man-like sea heaved with long, strong, lingering swells, as Samson's chest in his sleep. .. Hither, and thither, on high, glided the snow-white wings of small, unspeckled birds; these were the gentle thoughts of the feminine air; but to and fro in the deeps, far down in the bottomless ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... eternally. The Supreme Court of the United States was the stronghold in which the principle of tyrannical power, elsewhere only militant, was triumphant. Hamilton's funding system was a scheme to corrupt the country. Even the stately form of Washington rose before him in the shape of Samson shorn by the harlot England. Strange as it may seem, Jefferson persisted in his delusion to the end. A man in his position ought to have seen that in spite of the old connection with the British crown, the States ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, Issue 2, February, 1864 • Various
... [Footnote: So also Fr, rancon gives Eng. ransom. The French surname Rancon is probably aphetic for Laurancon.] by dissimilation of one n, and Hanson, son of Han (Chapter I), becomes Hansom. In Sansom we have Samson assimilated to Samson and then dissimilated. Dissimilation especially affects the sounds l, n, r. Bullivant is found earlier as bon enfaunt (Goodchild), just as a braggart Burgundian was called by Tudor dramatists a burgullian. Bellinger is for Barringer, an Old French name ...
— The Romance of Names • Ernest Weekley
... President Samson was a large, heavy man, more than six feet tall. Every member of his Cabinet was above the average in avoirdupois, and the heavyweight president of the Carnegie Institution, Professor Pludder, who had been specially invited, added by his presence to the air of ponderosity ...
— The Second Deluge • Garrett P. Serviss
... wonderful pupil, named Siegfried, a Samson among the inhabitants of the land. He was so strong that he could catch wild lions and hang them by the tail over the walls of the castle. Reginn persuaded this pupil to attack the serpent and to ...
— ZigZag Journeys in Northern Lands; - The Rhine to the Arctic • Hezekiah Butterworth
... and torture; and all this they do in despite of God. "But he sits above in heaven, and laugheth them to scorn." If, said Luther, God would be pleased to give me a little time and space, that I might expound a couple of small Psalms, I would bestir myself so boldly that, Samson-like, I would take all ...
— Selections from the Table Talk of Martin Luther • Martin Luther
... take any notice of the great painters of Italy, nor, indeed, of painting as an art; while every other page breathes his love and taste for music.... Adam bending over the sleeping Eve, in Paradise Lost, and Dalilah approaching Samson, in the Agonistes, are the only two proper ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... man, and the staff, Sir Victor, you would not be surprised," Lord Talbot said. "He stands some six feet four, and has shoulders that might rival Samson's. As to his quarterstaff, I marked it. It was of oak, and full two inches across; and a blow with it, from such arms, would crack an iron casque, to say ...
— Both Sides the Border - A Tale of Hotspur and Glendower • G. A. Henty
... in your sleeve," he said good-humoredly, "and yet I am but what I profess to be. In spirit I am a very Job, though nature hath fit to dress me as a Samson. I assure you, I am worse misfitted than is Master Yardstick yonder in those Falstaffian hose. But, good sir, will you not ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... I replied, "when I departed for the West I left all my wealth behind me." Verily, now I was proving myself the worthy scion of valiant men, who had laid aside hauberk, sword, and lance, taken up the Bible and stole, and thenceforth fought only with the weapon of Samson, ...
— Tales of Aztlan • George Hartmann
... men of all times have excited the admiration of their fellows and have always been objects of popular interest. The Bible celebrates the exploits of Samson of the tribe of Dan. During his youth he, single handed, strangled a lion; with the jaw-bone of an ass he is said to have killed 1000 Philistines and put the rest to flight. At another time during the night he transported from the village of Gaza enormous ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... of the riddle for the folk mind is well known, and before the spread of cards appears to have been one of the chief forms of gambling in which even life was staked, as in the case of Samson or the Sphinx. In the Folk-Tale it often occurs in the form of the Riddle-Bride-Wager, in which a princess is married to him that can guess some elaborate conundrum. The first two of Child's Ballads deal with similar riddles, and his notes are ...
— Europa's Fairy Book • Joseph Jacobs
... were afterwards placed in order to make them strong; St. Vouga passed from Hibernia to Cornwall on a rock whose fragments, preserved at Penmarch, will cure of fever such pilgrims as place these splinters on their heads. St. Samson entered the Bay of St. Michael's Mount in a granite vessel which will one day be called St. Samson's basin. It is because of these facts that when he saw the stone trough the holy Mael understood that the Lord intended him for the apostolate ...
— Penguin Island • Anatole France
... had bound the man with a piece o' bad rope, or that the strength o' Samson had been given to him, the Lascar could not tell, but he saw the Englishman snap the rope as if it had bin a bit o' pack-thread, and jump overboard. He swam for the junk where his little girl was. If he had possessed the strength of a dozen Samsons it would have ...
— Blown to Bits - or, The Lonely Man of Rakata • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... books of Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings, Chronicles, Ezra, etc., contain the history of the Hebrew nation for nearly a thousand years, and relate the prosperity and the disasters of the chosen people. Here are recorded the deeds of Joshua, of Samson, of Samuel, of David, and of Solomon, the building of the Temple, the division of the tribes into two kingdoms, the prodigies of Elijah and Elisha, the impieties of Ahab, the calamities of Jedekiah, the destruction of Jerusalem and of the ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... hear the curfew, Please go away and come some other day; Goliath tussels With Samson's muscles, Yet the muscles never fight ...
— The Sea Fairies • L. Frank Baum
... fortified. I rambled in the remains of the fortifications, like small hills and valleys covered with bright grass. I saw a quantity of fine mushrooms growing in them, and the tall yellow flowers known as Samson's rod. The reason of the fortification is this. The Hollanders were an industrious, frugal people, who made a fruitful country out of swamps and sand. Nymegen is in the border. It is the gate, as it were, to Holland, and the fortifications kept ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... case of female enlistment and protracted service in the patriot army, was that of Deborah Samson. The career of this woman shows that her motive in adopting and following the career of a soldier was a praiseworthy one. The whole country was aglow with patriotic fervor, and in no section did the flame burn ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler |
