"Handmaid" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and his wife—they would bring up their children without the ensnaring stimulant. Mr Oliphant showed his colours at once; and he preached as well as practised total abstinence, not in the place of the gospel, but as a handmaid to the gospel. And Mrs Barnes was the first ...
— Frank Oldfield - Lost and Found • T.P. Wilson
... which is begotten shall be called the Son of God. 36 And behold, Elisabeth thy kinswoman, she also hath conceived a son in her old age; and this is the sixth month with her that was called barren. 37 For no word from God shall be void of power. 38 And Mary said, Behold, the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word. And the angel departed ...
— The Gospel of Luke, An Exposition • Charles R. Erdman
... inscription Ursula et Undecimilla Virgines, which was incorrectly translated into 'Ursula and her Eleven Thousand Virgins.' Some later critic pointed out that a missing comma after Undecimilla, the name of a handmaid, made all the difference, assuming that two young ladies were a more reasonable and probable number than eleven thousand. But what legend ever cared for a comma, or reached a full stop? If you go to Cologne, the verger of the Church of St. ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... fell on me, shame burned upon my cheek, Swam earth and sky around me, my trembling limbs grew weak: "O Lord! support thy handmaid; and from her soul cast out The fear of man, which brings a snare, ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... in forwarding his version of events to the Egyptian court, and assuring the king of his unswerving fidelity. "Verily the king my lord knows," he says, "that the queen of the city of Sidon is the handmaid of the king my lord, who has given her into my hand, and that I have hearkened to the words of the king my lord that he would send to his servant, and my heart rejoiced and my head was exalted, and ...
— Patriarchal Palestine • Archibald Henry Sayce
... people claim With right to have thee back, I most of all, For most of all (else were I vile indeed) I mourn for thy misfortunes, seeing thee An aged outcast, wandering on and on, A beggar with one handmaid for thy stay. Ah! who had e'er imagined she could fall To such a depth of misery as this, To tend in penury thy stricken frame, A virgin ripe for wedlock, but unwed, A prey for any wanton ravisher? Seems it not cruel this reproach I cast On thee and on myself and all the ...
— The Oedipus Trilogy • Sophocles
... where lie his subtlest powers. Richard gave up his companions, servile or antagonistic: he relinquished the material world to young Ralph, and retired into himself, where he was growing to be lord of kingdoms where Beauty was his handmaid, and History his minister and Time his ancient harper, and sweet Romance his bride; where he walked in a realm vaster and more gorgeous than the great Orient, peopled with the heroes that have been. For there is no princely ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Corn-League agents; we have magistrates by scores angling for popularity as Repealers. But these have been private parties, insulated, disconnected, disowned. When we hear of Christianity prostituted to the service of Jacobinism—of divinity becoming the handmaid to insurrection—and of clergymen in masses offering themselves as promoters of anarchy, we go back in thought to that ominous organization of irreligion, which gave its most fearful aspects ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v2 • Thomas de Quincey
... clearness of judgment is apt to be the blessed handmaid of uncommon truth of character; the mind that knows not what it is to play tricks upon its neighbours is rewarded by a comparative freedom from self-deception. Guy could not sit down upon his estates and lead an insect ...
— Queechy • Susan Warner
... one of those who know that Art is the handmaid of God," he answered hotly. "I happen to believe in Jesus Christ, and I conceive that no picture is worthy to be called great or worthy of any Christian's painting unless it possess some qualities calculated ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts
... What Syrtis, what grasping Scylla, what vast Charybdis? O thou repayer with such guerdon for thy sweet life! If 'twas not thy heart's wish to yoke with me, through holding in horror the dread decrees of my stern sire, yet thou couldst have led me to thy home, where as thine handmaid I might have served thee with cheerful service, laving thy snowy feet with clear water, or spreading the purple coverlet o'er thy couch. Yet why, distraught with woe, do I vainly lament to the unknowing winds, which unfurnished with sense, ...
— The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus • Caius Valerius Catullus
... and had hopes and aspirations, who now, in his age, was come to serve the revels of a set of drunken sailors, in a disreputable tavern, where they danced with prostitutes. I don't know why, but from the first he drew my attention; and I left my handmaid to count her charms neglected, while I sat and watched him, speculating about him in a melancholy way, with ...
— Grey Roses • Henry Harland
... hangings and rickety furniture, had counted for anything, my dreams should certainly have been haunted. But, as a matter of fact, I never slept better. Possibly the lightness of the dinner (cooked by the small handmaid Lobelia) had something to do with it; possibly, too, the infectious somnolence of the two Admirals, who spoke but little during the meal, and nodded, without attempt at dissimulation, over the dessert. At any rate, shortly after nine o'clock—when Miss Wilhelmina brought ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... bestowed upon him, ever since he led him out of Mesopotamia, the gift of children. Accordingly Sarai, at God's command, brought to his bed one of her handmaidens, a woman of Egyptian descent, in order to obtain children by her; and when this handmaid was with child, she triumphed, and ventured to affront Sarai, as if the dominion were to come to a son to be born of her. But when Abram resigned her into the hand of Sarai, to punish her, she contrived ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... waiting"; she is too youthful as yet to have made history. She hails from a neighboring farm, and is a really satisfactory handmaid—ready, cheerful, and diligent; she entertains a thoroughly genuine respect for her superior officer, "Mistress Spence," in spite of the latter's somewhat severe notions as to the training of young servants. In appearance Elsie is much like ...
— Up in Ardmuirland • Michael Barrett
... Molly, do you say so?" says her handmaid, suddenly depressed. "Well, of course, miss, you—who are so much with London gentlemen—ought to know. And don't they mean what they say to ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... the humble handmaid of Mary, and the lamp of Repentigny will burn all the brighter trimmed by a daughter of her noble house," ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... whilst thou wast yet in the cradle; so call her no more sister from this day forth." Quoth Ni'amah, "If that be so, I will take her to wife." Then he went to his mother and told her of this, and she said to him, "O my son, she is thy handmaid." So he wedded and went in unto Naomi and loved her; and two[FN4] years passed over them whilst in this condition, nor was there in all Cufa a fairer girl than Naomi, or a sweeter or a more graceful. As she grew up she learnt the Koran and read works of science and excelled in music and playing ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 4 • Richard F. Burton
... these requisites whereof I bespake thee I may not visit him. Moreover set before me a dozen slave-girls unique in beauty and dight with the most magnificent dresses, that they wend with my mother to the royal palace; and let every handmaid be robed in raiment that befitteth Queen's wearing." The Slave replied, "To hear is to obey;" and, disappearing for an eye-twinkling, brought all he was bidden bring and led by hand a stallion whose rival ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... borne to prove the strength of her love, smilingly to win the wager from her lover. But so long as she remains obstinately in the dark, lifts not her veil, does not recognise her lover, and only knows the world dissociated from him, she serves as a handmaid here, where by right she might reign as a queen; she sways in doubt, and weeps in sorrow and dejection. She passes from starvation to starvation, from trouble to trouble, and from fear to fear. [Footnote: Daurbhikshat yati daurbhiksham ...
— Sadhana - The Realisation of Life • Rabindranath Tagore
... of Brilliant always puts me in good humour, so, of course, I can but answer, "That he is, Gertrude, and as good as he's handsome;" on which my voluble handmaid goes ...
— Kate Coventry - An Autobiography • G. J. Whyte-Melville
... service to tyranny, education is confined to a privileged class and denied to the people, property is sometimes pillaged and sometimes flattered, and even virtue is degraded by lowering its field and making subservience appear to be patience and loyalty, and religion is not unfrequently made the handmaid of oppression. Taxes fall heavily on the poor for the benefit of the rich, and the only check proceeds from the fear of rebellion. When, on the other hand, the majority extinguishes the minority, the evil effects ...
— An Autobiography • Catherine Helen Spence
... the Duke of Hereward as the wronged husband who had slain my betrothed in a duel, all set me to thinking deeply, very deeply thinking. I did not express my thoughts unnecessarily. Silence is, with our order, a duty—the handmaid of devotion; but I set secret inquiries on foot, through agencies that our orders possess for finding out facts, and means that we can use, superior to those of the most accomplished detectives living. Through such ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth
... pond where you can handle lupines and such other things as must be soaked in water. This exterior court yard should be strewn thick with straw and chaff, which, by being trampled under the feet of the cattle, becomes the handmaid of the farm by reason of the service it renders when it is hauled out. Every farm should have two manure pits, or one divided into two parts; into one division should be put the new manure from the barn, in the other the old manure which is ready for use on the ...
— Roman Farm Management - The Treatises Of Cato And Varro • Marcus Porcius Cato
... o'er every smiling land. Thy handmaid, Nature, meekly walks abroad, Scattering thy bounties with unsparing hand, While flowers and fruits spring up along her road. How can thy creatures their weak voices raise To tell thy deeds in their ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... have dismissed, with the fee of an orange, the little orphan who serves me as a handmaid. I am sitting alone on the hearth. This morning, the village school opened. I had twenty scholars. But three of the number can read: none write or cipher. Several knit, and a few sew a little. They speak with the broadest accent of the district. At present, ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... only to the divine Author and Bestower of them. In submission, therefore, to God's will, without any further inquiries, she expresses her assent in these humble but powerful words: Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word. What faith and confidence does her answer express! What profound humility and perfect obedience! She was saluted mother of God, yet uses no word of dignity, but styles herself nothing more ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... "It's that which Horace calls a handmaid, if you know how to use it; a mistress, if you do not—money! It is—success, the thing which wrecks more lives than cyclones, fires and floods! We were happy enough before this ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... anger was kindled against Rachel; and he said, Am I in God's stead, who hath withheld from thee the fruit of the womb? and she said, Behold my maid Bilhah, go in unto her; and she shall bear upon my knees that I may also have children by her. And she gave him Bilhah her handmaid to wife: and ...
— Woman under socialism • August Bebel
... the banks of deliverance, so would I at this season set up, as it were, in my poor journal, a like pillar of thanksgiving to the praise and honor of Him who hath so kindly cared for His unworthy handmaid. ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... by Nature? To be free, to be noble, to be modest (for what other living thing is capable of blushing, or of feeling the impression of shame?) and to subordinate pleasure to the ends for which Nature designed us, as a handmaid and a minister, in order to call forth our activity; in order to keep us constant to ...
— The Golden Sayings of Epictetus • Epictetus
... what else is it that we do, when we call off our minds from pleasure, that is to say, from our attention to the body, from the managing our domestic estate, which is a sort of handmaid and servant of the body, or from duties of a public nature, or from all other serious business whatever? What else is it, I say, that we do, but invite the soul to reflect on itself? oblige it to converse with itself, and, as far as possible, break off its acquaintance with the body? Now ...
— The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero
... in their days; rest in their slumbers; And cheerfulness, the handmaid of their toil; Nor yet too many, nor too few their numbers; Corruption could not make their hearts her soil The lust, which stings; the splendor which encumbers, With the free foresters divide no spoil. Serene, not sullen, were the solitudes Of this ...
— The First White Man of the West • Timothy Flint
... angry retort. She was afraid she had been undignified, but she wished for a moment that Clemantiny was there. Wicked as she feared it was, Miss Salome thought she could have enjoyed a tilt between her ancient handmaid and Mrs. Elwell. ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1902 to 1903 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... such, (which to chaste and sober maids cannot choose but avail much,) labour and exercise, strict diet, rigour and threats may more opportunely be used, and are able of themselves to qualify and divert an ill-disposed temperament. For seldom should you see an hired servant, a poor handmaid, though ancient, that is kept hard to her work, and bodily labour, a coarse country wench troubled in this kind, but noble virgins, nice gentlewomen, such as are solitary and idle, live at ease, lead a life out of action and employment, ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... The War-Thing, the Comrade, Father of honour And giver of kingship, The fame-smith, the song-master, Bringer of women On fire at his hands For the pride of fulfilment, Priest (saith the Lord) Of his marriage with victory. Ho! then, the Trumpet, Handmaid of heroes, Calling the peers To the place of espousal! Ho! then, the splendour And sheen of my ministry, Clothing the earth With a livery of lightnings! Ho! then, the music Of battles in onset And ruining armours, And God's gift returning ...
— The Song of the Sword - and Other Verses • W. E. Henley
... handmaid fair To draw her curled gold hair Through rings of gold that bear Her whole hair's weight; She hath no maids to stand Gold-clothed on either hand; In all that great green land None ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... immorality. If the astrologer, he maintains, believes in anything at all, he must worship not God, but the planets, from which all good and evil are derived. All other superstitions find a ready instrument in astrology, which serves as handmaid to geomancy, chiromancy, and magic of every kind. As to morality, he maintains that nothing can more foster evil than the opinion that heaven itself is the cause of it, in which case the faith in eternal happiness and punishment must also disappear. Pico even took the trouble to ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt
... the handmaid of the earth, I broider fair her glorious gown, And deck her on her days of mirth With many a garland ...
— Poems By The Way & Love Is Enough • William Morris
... To stoop and kiss the tender little thumb, That crost the trencher as she laid it down: But after all had eaten, then Geraint, For now the wine made summer in his veins, Let his eye rove in following, or rest On Enid at her lowly handmaid-work, Now here, now there, about the dusky hall; Then suddenly ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... rats that haunt our vault: Nor have you grumbled, reverend Dean, To keep our poultry sweet and clean; To sweep the mansion-house they dwell in, And cure the rank unsavoury smelling. Now enter as the dairy handmaid: Such charming butter [14] never man made. Let others with fanatic face Talk of their milk for babes of grace; From tubs their snuffling nonsense utter; Thy milk shall make us tubs of butter. The bishop with his foot ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... ship, which was left behind. Astrid was one of the five women who went with this expedition; the other four were Gunhild, Thora, Sigrid, and Bertha. Gunhild and Sigrid were wives to two of Biarne's men. Thora was handmaiden to Gudrid; Bertha handmaid to Freydissa. Of all the women Bertha was the sweetest and most beautiful, and she was also very modest and good-tempered, which was a fortunate circumstance, because her mistress Freydissa had temper enough, as Biarne used ...
— The Norsemen in the West • R.M. Ballantyne
... day.... Would you be better than the lady up yonder? She has pledged her soul to her husband and to her lover, and yet she yields it whole to her page. I am more than a page to you, more than a servant. In how many matters have I not been your little handmaid! Do not blush, nor be angry. Let me only say, that I am all about you, and already perhaps in you. Else, how could I know your thoughts, even those which you hide from yourself? Who am I, then? Your little soul, which speaks thus openly to the great one. We are inseparable. Do you know ...
— La Sorciere: The Witch of the Middle Ages • Jules Michelet
... need of it for themselves, nevertheless render cheerful obedience to this government, through love for the others who need it. A Christian himself may wield the sword when called upon to maintain peace among men and to punish wrong. This authority, which is God's handmaid, as St. Paul says, is as necessary and good as other worldly callings. God therefore instituted two regimens, or governments-the spiritual, which, through the Holy Ghost under Christ, makes Christians and pious people, and the worldly or temporal, which warns the non-Christians and the wicked ...
— Luther Examined and Reexamined - A Review of Catholic Criticism and a Plea for Revaluation • W. H. T. Dau
... thou not my kinswoman? Dost thou not receive at my hands honour, position, everything that places thee above the common herd of humanity? Were I not the Caesar, where wouldst thou be? Not in this palace surely, not the virtual queen of Rome, but, mayhap, a handmaid to another Caesar's wife, an attendant on his daughter.... Thou dost seem to ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... his profession to set up a false standard of excellence, than the cool and dispassionate Philosopher who proceeds deliberately from position to argument, and who employs Imagination only as the Handmaid of a superior faculty. Having gone thus far, like persons who have got into a track from which they cannot recede, we may venture to proceed a step farther; and affirm that the Lyric Poet is exposed to this hazard more ...
— An Essay on the Lyric Poetry of the Ancients • John Ogilvie
... are who, while to vulgar eyes they seem Of all my bounties largely to partake, Of me as of some rival's handmaid deem And court me but for gain's, power's, ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 3. (of 4) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... not be claimed, even as a sophistical subterfuge, that the motive which brought the African here was mercenary, and that, therefore, his coming here was not justifiable. Commerce is the handmaid of civilization, and if his coming was only incidentally right, yet that incident belongs to civilization, which is amenable to the moral code, and is also to be commended, with all its incidental, as well as more matured blessings. The institutions of civilization rescued these 4,000,000 of ...
— The Right of American Slavery • True Worthy Hoit
... Sovereigns there is none to whom I so much desire to commend myself as you. To me honour will ever be the sole test of advantage. Justice, like a handmaid, will wait upon my actions; and the power, which I have not myself bought from our virtuous Sovereign, I in my turn shall sell to no man. You have heard, noble Sirs, the panegyrics[714] passed upon me at my entrance ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)
... purpose of Evil is fulfilled; then Evil becomes the handmaid of Good; then we can feel and say with sincerity, Evil has smitten me friendly, for it has caused me to turn about and seek Good. Good, once found, is found to be stronger than Evil. In a few years Good has ...
— The Prodigal Returns • Lilian Staveley
... which I am about to tell thee. It happed that in the Court of the Emperor's Majesty, [Note 1] which at that time was Albright [Albert] the First, was a young noble, by name Rudolph, Count von der Wart. My mother was handmaid unto my Lady Gertrude his wife, and she spake right well of her mistress. A young gentle lady, said she, meek and soft of speech, loving and obedient unto her lord, and in especial shamefaced, shrinking from any public note ...
— The White Rose of Langley - A Story of the Olden Time • Emily Sarah Holt
... they were so white. Buskins of shell, all silver'd, used she, And branch'd with blushing coral to the knee; Where sparrows perch'd, of hollow pearl and gold, Such as the world would wonder to behold: Those with sweet water oft her handmaid fills, Which, as she went, would cherup through the bills. Some say, for her the fairest Cupid pin'd, And, looking in her face, was strooken blind. But this is true; so like was one the other, As he imagin'd Hero was his mother; And oftentimes into her bosom flew, About her ...
— Hero and Leander and Other Poems • Christopher Marlowe and George Chapman
... Christian workers in the field and many Christian givers in the country at large. It is this thought that has ever been held up before it—the thought that the church and the school go together, and that the school is simply the handmaid of the church. We recognize the fact that in Congregationalism especially, out of all forms of religious belief, we cannot hope to make men earnest, effective Christians, caring for themselves, managing their own affairs independently, and having in them the heart ...
— American Missionary, Volume 43, No. 12, December, 1889 • Various
... old men! beholding here—Night's birth— Madness, and me the handmaid of the gods, Iris: since to your town we come no plague— Wage war against the house of but one man From Zeus and from Alkmene sprung, they say. Now, till he made an end of bitter toils Fate kept him safe, nor did his father Zeus Let us ...
— Story of Orestes - A Condensation of the Trilogy • Richard G. Moulton
... cases. On the moral and prudential side it has led to such outrageous exaggerations as the well-known and oft-quoted proverb, "Speech is silver, but silence is golden." Articulate speech, the chiefest triumph and highest single accomplishment of the human species, the handmaid of thought and the instrument of progress, is actually rated below silence, the attribute of the clod and of the dumb brute, the easy refuge ...
— Preventable Diseases • Woods Hutchinson
... Abigail saw David, she hasted, and lighted off the ass, and fell before David on her face, and bowed herself to the ground, and fell at his feet, and said, Upon me, my lord, let this iniquity be: and let thine handmaid, I pray thee, speak in thine audience, and hear the words of thine handmaid. Let not my lord, I pray thee, regard this man of Belial, even Nabal: for as his name is, so is he; Nabal is his name, and folly is with him; but I, thine handmaid, saw not the young ...
— True Words for Brave Men • Charles Kingsley
... made them play wrong notes. An exception might perhaps be allowed in favour of dark purple, because of its association with mourning, but the glaring colour schemes now in vogue were to be deprecated as prejudicial to solemnity. It pained him to see music reduced to the menial position of the handmaid ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, January 28, 1914 • Various
... cheques, inspect and pay tradesmen's bills, and transact all my real business, whilst I myself pore over old books, walk about shires, discoursing with gypsies, under hedgerows, or with sober bards—in hedge ale-houses." I continued musing in this manner until the handmaid made her appearance with a tray, on which were covers and a decanter, which she placed before me. "What is that?" said ...
— Wild Wales - Its People, Language and Scenery • George Borrow
... the next day Lothario came to his house, where he was received by Camilla with a friendly and modest welcome; but she never suffered Lothario to see her alone, for she was always attended by her men and women servants, especially by a handmaid of hers, Leonela by name, to whom she was much attached (for they had been brought up together from childhood in her father's house), and whom she had kept with her after her marriage with Anselmo. The first three days Lothario did not speak ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... reaching even unto her lips, covering her eyes; and the saint stretched forth his hand, willing to remove the veil from her eyes; but the damsel humbly prevented him, saying, "I beseech thee, my father, let the veil remain, even as it is placed on the head of thine handmaid, that mine eyes may no longer behold the vanity of this world, but rather may, looking inward, contemplate the brightness of mine heavenly Spouse!" Therefore Patrick, rejoicing at the pious purpose of the damsel, let fall her veil; and as it was ...
— The Most Ancient Lives of Saint Patrick - Including the Life by Jocelin, Hitherto Unpublished in America, and His Extant Writings • Various
... Elisabeth, who had been barren; and by way of sufficient and final explanation added: "For with God nothing shall be impossible." With gentle submissiveness and humble acceptance, the pure young virgin replied: "Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage
... what is a handmaid, Or what is a queen? All must lie down together Where the turf is green, The foulest face hidden, The fairest not seen; Gone as if never ...
— Poems • Christina G. Rossetti
... Peter's,—which work, however, he did not live to see completed.] The mediaeval artists devoted themselves to painting instead of sculpture, for the reason that it best expresses the ideas and sentiments of Christianity. The art that would be the handmaid of the Church needed to be able to represent faith and hope, ecstasy and suffering,—none of which things can well be expressed by sculpture, which is essentially the art ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers
... religion is quite as much the handmaid of science as science can be said to be the handmaid of religion. She breathes far more household laws for her devotees, if she does not veil her "sacred fires" more modestly from the sight of men. She is certainly ...
— Life: Its True Genesis • R. W. Wright
... right—never mind about the moralities Give thanks that Christmas comes but once a year Good protections against temptations; but the surest is cowardice Goody-goody puerilities and dreary moralities Habit of assimilating incredibilities Human pride is not worth while Hunger is the handmaid of genius If the man doesn't believe as we do, we say he is a crank Inherited prejudices in favor of hoary ignorances It is easier to stay out than get out Man is the only animal that blushes—or needs to ...
— Quotes and Images From The Works of Mark Twain • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)
... and, as my Lord sees, I am come. And, if there is any grace or forgiveness of sins to spare, I beseech that I, thy poor handmaid, may be partaker thereof. ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... handmaid at the window sees a man riding in armour. He rides a grey horse, his face is pale and streaked with blood. She speaks to herself, and ...
— Gudrid the Fair - A Tale of the Discovery of America • Maurice Hewlett
... led back to the First and Final Cause. To the mediaeval thinker, science was fascinating as Philosophy's little sister: it was to Philosophy what Nature was to man. Nature had been to St. Francis a little lovely, dancing sister. Science had been to St. Thomas the handmaid of philosophy. The modern world thought these proportions fantastic. Huxley used Nature as a word for God. ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward
... second morning after this happy bridal, that the Lady Rowena was made acquainted by her handmaid Elgitha, that a damsel desired admission to her presence, and solicited that their parley might be without witness. Rowena wondered, hesitated, became curious, and ended by commanding the damsel to be admitted, and her attendants ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... dragons: and covered us with the shadow of death.' 4. On Monday, April 17, 1853 [his first budget speech], it was: 'O turn Thee then unto me, and have mercy upon me: give Thy strength unto Thy servant, and help the son of Thine handmaid.' Last Sunday [Crimean war budget] it was not from the Psalms for the day: 'Thou shalt prepare a table before me against them that trouble me; Thou hast anointed my head with oil and my ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley
... resentment when not fortified with food. Hugh went out of the pantry and settled himself gloomily upon a side verandah, uncertain which to anathematize, the flies that had broken in upon his slumbers, or the ones that evidently were studiously refraining from awakening his sister and her handmaid. ...
— In the Mist of the Mountains • Ethel Turner
... earth, which furnishes new incitements to the cultivation of land, which is the most powerful instrument in increasing the quantity of money in a state—could that, in fine, which is the faithful handmaid of labor and industry, in every shape, fail to augment that article, which is the prolific parent of far the greatest part of the objects upon which they are exerted? It is astonishing that so simple a truth should ever have had ...
— The Federalist Papers • Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison
... sat by the carriage window. But as the train drew near to Amberieu, the air brightened and the sunlight ministered to her beauty like a careful handmaid, touching her pale cheeks to a rosy warmth, giving a luster to her hair, and humaning her to a smile. Sylvia sat forward a little, as though to meet the sunlight, then she turned toward the carriage and saw her mother's eyes intently ...
— Running Water • A. E. W. Mason
... all unworthy, cross our arms, bow our heads; and accept the honours. Are you playing humble handmaid? What an old organ-tune that ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... admitted our visitor. She was the selfsame young lady of the covered head who had but a little while before stood by the peasant's side. "So you thought," said she, "that you could make a fool of me, did you? I am Quartilla's handmaid: Quartilla, whose rites you interrupted in the shrine. She has come to the inn, in person, and begs permission to speak with you. Don't be alarmed! She neither blames your mistake nor does she demand punishment; on the contrary, she wonders what god has brought ...
— The Satyricon, Complete • Petronius Arbiter
... rise. Just precepts thus from great examples giv'n, She drew from them what they deriv'd from Heav'n. The gen'rous Critic fann'd the Poet's fire, 100 And taught the world with reason to admire. Then Criticism the Muse's handmaid prov'd, To dress her charms, and make her more belov'd: But following wits from that intention stray'd, Who could not win the mistress, woo'd the maid; 105 Against the Poets their own arms they turn'd, Sure to hate ...
— The Rape of the Lock and Other Poems • Alexander Pope
... Great Steep's Garden is musked and fair: Araby-sweet is the spice on the air: Ah, softly tread, have gentle care, Love's handmaid has passed this way. Did the long miles fret or the red suns beat? Did the great stones tear at her little white feet? Did the storm winds harry with stinging sleet, Or the ...
— In the Great Steep's Garden • Elizabeth Madox Roberts
... prayers of the minister would dwell on the case, and thanks would be rendered to God for the great light and peace with which he had deigned to visit his young handmaid; and then would follow a prayer that when these sad tidings should reach a distant friend who had gone down to do business on the great waters, they might be sanctified to his spiritual and everlasting good. Then ...
— The Pearl of Orr's Island - A Story of the Coast of Maine • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... thus be self-explanatory to any person who had grasped the system, and would serve as an index or key to the things they represented. Language thus became a branch of philosophy as the men of the time conceived it, or at all events a useful handmaid. Thus arose the ...
— International Language - Past, Present and Future: With Specimens of Esperanto and Grammar • Walter J. Clark
... This celebrated handmaid was as lean as her mistress was stout. Her hair was magnificent in quality and quantity, but, alas! was of the unpopular tint called red; not auburn, or copper hued, or the famous Titian color, but a blazing, fiery red, which ...
— The Silent House • Fergus Hume
... exceptions, honorable as they are rare, they have done well for their day and generation; but with regard to the needs and policy of the Negroes of the present hour they are as innocent as babes. Men for the most part of excellent temper and good working capacity, they lack that which is the handmaid and often the indispensable auxiliary of knowledge and all effective work—judgment. Unconscious puppets often, they dance to unseen music, moved themselves ...
— Masterpieces of Negro Eloquence - The Best Speeches Delivered by the Negro from the days of - Slavery to the Present Time • Various
... marvellous crowd of twisted limbs in the story of the Brazen Serpent. In the composition of the Death of Holofernes Judith covers with a napkin the severed head, which is carried in a basket on the head of her handmaid; a most lovely group, said to have been taken from an intaglio representing a vintage scene, in which a nymph fills with grapes a basket supported on the ...
— Michael Angelo Buonarroti • Charles Holroyd
... life is for us only a time of trial, and the longer and harder the trial the greater our recompense in a better world. Whatever befalls us, our answer should be that of the Virgin Mary to the angel who announced the mystery of the Incarnation: 'Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... handmaid ere I was yours, lady. I bear in mind a solemn compact with the dead, which this marriage will violate. You are plighted by oath to another, if he should ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... stew-pans to this hour, but for the more scientific instructions of the renowned Mrs. Rundall, or of the still more scientific Dr. Kitchiner, who has verified the old adage, that the "Kitchen is the handmaid to Physic;" and if it be true that we are to regard a "good cook as in the nature of a good physician," then is Dr. Kitchiner the best physician that ever condescended ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 335 - Vol. 12, No. 335, October 11, 1828 • Various
... thy treacherous father and for thee; and full of sorrow my old age will be (for I see my fate in dreams), when the sons of the Swan shall carry me captive to the hollow vale of Eurotas, till I sail across the seas a slave, the handmaid of the pest of Greece. Yet shall I be avenged, when the golden-haired heroes sail against Troy, and sack the palaces of Ilium; then my son shall set me free from thraldom, and I shall hear the tale of Theseus' fame. Yet beyond that I see new sorrows; but I can bear them as I ...
— The Heroes • Charles Kingsley
... difference, and I am really only what I am in His Eyes. It is not because He wills me to be His interpreter among you, that He loves me more; rather, He makes me your little handmaid. It is for you, and not for myself, that He has bestowed upon me those charms and those ...
— The Story of a Soul (L'Histoire d'une Ame): The Autobiography of St. Therese of Lisieux • Therese Martin (of Lisieux)
... by the sun's flaming sword, to the west, trekking to evening lands. She trudges, schlepps, trains, drags, trascines her load. A tide westering, moondrawn, in her wake. Tides, myriadislanded, within her, blood not mine, oinopa ponton, a winedark sea. Behold the handmaid of the moon. In sleep the wet sign calls her hour, bids her rise. Bridebed, childbed, bed of death, ghostcandled. Omnis caro ad te veniet. He comes, pale vampire, through storm his eyes, his bat sails bloodying the sea, mouth to ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... debt. In any modern campaign the dollars are the shock troops. With a depleted treasury in the rear, no army can maintain itself in the field. A country loaded with debt is a country devoid of the first line of defense. Economy is the handmaid of preparedness. If we wish to be able to defend ourselves to the full extent of our power in the future, we shall discharge as soon as possible the financial burden of the last war. Otherwise we would face a crisis with a part of ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... between the new and the old London, and probably put a final close to the ravages of pestilence in our country. [189] At the same time one of the founders of the Society, Sir William Petty, created the science of political arithmetic, the humble but indispensable handmaid of political philosophy. No kingdom of nature was left unexplored. To that period belong the chemical discoveries of Boyle, and the earliest botanical researches of Sloane. It was then that Ray made a new classification of birds and fishes, and that the attention of Woodward was ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... sacrifice his son Isaac on the mountain,' was performed in the Church of St. Mary Magdalen in Florence, 1449. Another on the same subject, called 'Abraham and Sarah,' 'containing the good life of their son Isaac, and the bad conduct of Ishmael, the son of his handmaid, and how they were turned out of the house,' was printed in 1556; 'Abel e Caino,' and 'Samson,' 1554; 'The Prodigal Son,' 1565; and 'La Commedia Spirituale dell' Anima' ('The Spiritual Comedy of the Soul'), printed at Siena, without date, in which there ...
— The Standard Oratorios - Their Stories, Their Music, And Their Composers • George P. Upton
... Justice; it extinguishes revenge, it communicates a spirit of purity and uprightness to inferior magistrates; it makes the great good, by taking away impunity; it banishes fraud, obliquity, and solicitation, and teaches men that the law is their right. Truth is its handmaid, freedom is its child, peace is its companion; safety walks in its steps, victory follows in its train; it is the brightest emanation of the Gospel, it is the greatest attribute of God: it is that centre round ...
— Sydney Smith • George W. E. Russell
... lord's go-between?" she went on, not regarding this speech. "You are sent to bid me back into slavery again, and inform me that my lord's favor is graciously restored to his handmaid? He is weary of Covent Garden, is he, that he comes home and would ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... cried Blanchefleur, 'the guilt is mine, for had I not been in your Tower never would Fleur have sought to enter it. Moreover, it were shame that a king's son should die for me, who am but the daughter of his handmaid.' ...
— Fleur and Blanchefleur • Mrs. Leighton
... profounder philosophy is (I think) contained in the Teutonick's writings. And if there be any friendly medium which can possibly reconcile these ancient differences between the nobler wisdom which hath fixt her Palace in Holy Writ and her stubborn handmaid, Naturall Reason: this happy marriage of the Spirit and Soul, this wonderful consent of discords in one harmony, we owe in great ...
— Spiritual Reformers in the 16th & 17th Centuries • Rufus M. Jones
... of many Publique Schools, in one and the same Town or City. In which, the principal Schools were ordained for the three Professions, that is to say, of the Romane Religion, of the Romane Law, and of the Art of Medicine. And for the study of Philosophy it hath no otherwise place, then as a handmaid to the Romane Religion: And since the Authority of Aristotle is onely current there, that study is not properly Philosophy, (the nature whereof dependeth not on Authors,) but Aristotelity. And for Geometry, till of very late times it ...
— Leviathan • Thomas Hobbes
... the strawberry shows itself among the bridal gifts, many of us exclaim for the hundredth time with Dr. Boteler, "Doubtless God could have made a better berry, but doubtless God never did." Nature, who is God's handmaid, does not attempt a rival berry. But by and by a little woolly knob, which looked and saw with wonder the strawberry reddening, and perceived the fragrance it diffused all around, begins to fill out, ...
— Our Hundred Days in Europe • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... she would have been called a handmaid—answered, and dexterously piled the pillows and bolsters as rests for the back; after which they sat upon the side of the divan, while water was brought fresh from the lake, and their feet bathed and ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... poetical material for his poetical discourse on Liberty, but from Diderot, whether as editor or as writer, something better might have been expected than a clumsy reproduction of the reasoning by which men like Turretini had turned philosophy into the corrupted handmaid ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists (Vol 1 of 2) • John Morley
... iv. p. 53—57) be in jest or in earnest, when he supposes that Anagni still feels the weight of this curse, and that the cornfields, or vineyards, or olive-trees, are annually blasted by Nature, the obsequious handmaid of the popes.] ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon
... and are one after the other exposed and dismissed. Presently arrives Prometheus, who informs Epops of the desperate straits to which the gods are by this time reduced, and advises him to push his claims and demand the hand of Basileia (Dominion), the handmaid of Zeus. Next an embassy from the Olympians appears on the scene, consisting of Heracles, Posidon and a god from the savage regions of the Triballians. After some disputation, it is agreed that ...
— The Birds • Aristophanes
... three things the earth quakes, And under four it cannot stand. Under a slave when he seeks to reign, And under a fool when he is filled with meat; Under an odious woman when she gets a husband, And under a handmaid who is ...
— The Sceptics of the Old Testament: Job - Koheleth - Agur • Emile Joseph Dillon
... reaction consequent on his still weak physical condition threw him back upon himself and his memory. He had resolutely refused to think of Miss Sally; he had been able to withstand the suggestions of her in the presence of her handmaid—supposed to be potent in nursing and herb-lore—whom she had detached to wait upon him, and he had returned politely formal acknowledgments to her inquiries. He had determined to continue this personal avoidance ...
— Sally Dows and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... did appear Till I had got the name of Villars here: Now 'tis so full that when therein I look I see a cloud of glory fills my book. Here stand it still to dignify our Muse, Your sober handmaid, who doth wisely choose Your name to be a laureate wreath to her Who doth both love ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick
... maid, Heart against mine,— Take me, lord governor, Who am all thine! Thou that hast blessed me With a new light, Ah, is thy handmaid Fair in ...
— Miscellany of Poetry - 1919 • Various
... of Hadria's memorable lecture of a year ago, it was still the orthodox creed of the Society, that Circumstance is the handmaid of the Will; that one can demand of one's days "bread, kingdoms, stars, or sky," and that the Days will obediently produce the objects desired. If one has but the spirit that can soar high enough to really be resolved upon stars, or the ambition sufficiently vaulting ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... not the only department of training in which the recompense has been abundant. Ignorance is everywhere the usual handmaid of poverty, and there has been very careful effort to secure proper mental culture. With what success the education of these orphans has been looked after will sufficiently appear from the reports of the school inspector. From year to year these pupils have been ...
— George Muller of Bristol - His Witness to a Prayer-Hearing God • Arthur T. Pierson
... Meditation had by Mrs. Piety, and she was the daughter of the old Recorder. 'I am Thy servant,' said Mrs. Piety's son on occasion all his days—'I am Thy servant and the son of Thine handmaid.' And at that so dutiful acknowledgment of his a long procession of the servants of God pass up before our eyes with their sainted mothers leaning on the arms of their great sons. The Psalmist and his mother, the Baptist and his mother, our Lord and ...
— Bunyan Characters - Third Series - The Holy War • Alexander Whyte
... the noxious goblets which Luther has vomited on his pages, that out of the filthy hovel of his one breast he might breathe pestilence upon his readers. Listen patiently, and blush, and pardon me the recital. If the wife will not, or cannot, let the handmaid come (Serm. de matrimon.); seeing that commerce with a wife is as necessary to every man as food, drink, and sleep. Matrimony is much more excellent than virginity. Christ and Paul dissuaded men ...
— Ten Reasons Proposed to His Adversaries for Disputation in the Name • Edmund Campion
... will receive an inconceivable stimulus, from the recognition of its true significance as a re-humanization of nature, and from the perception of its scope and possibilities. Science will become, in truth, the handmaid of religion, in that it will be devoted to reporting the physical analogies of spiritual truths, and following them out in their subtler details. Hitherto, the progress of science has been slow, and subject to constant error and revision, because it would not accept the inevitable ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 19, June, 1891 • Various
... been jealous of her upon that account, feeling pretty certain, perhaps, that the "affinity" between them was Platonic; but she had rather grudged the money with which he had so lavishly relieved the "perplexities" of "the handmaid." The amanuensis used to issue I O U's at Joanna's dictation, to be paid with enormous interest Hereafter, and Leonard Yorke was always ready to discount her paper. There was no one that subscribed more munificently than he did toward the famous "cradle," or ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn
... would have no desire to return to the condition of his ancestors. In fact, the most hopeful symptom in the condition of the English peasant is his discontent. For, as skepticism is in one sense the handmaid of truth, discontent is the mother of progress. The man is comparatively of little use in the ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... handmaid, whatever her fingers be at, Will run like a puss when she hears a rat-tat: So Lucy ran up—and in two seconds more Had questioned the stranger and ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... them." The torture of an ingrowing toe-nail, which could be relieved in a few minutes, had incapacitated one poor father for years. Tuberculosis and rickets carried on their evil work unchecked. Preventable poverty was the efficient handmaid of these ...
— A Labrador Doctor - The Autobiography of Wilfred Thomason Grenfell • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... objectionable trees, known, I think, by the name of Malva, which made an inordinate show of cheap blossoms that they were continually shedding, and one or two dwarf oaks, with scaly leaves and a generally spiteful exterior, and you have what was not inaptly termed by our Milesian handmaid "the scrubbery." ...
— Urban Sketches • Bret Harte
... his prophecies have a wide circulation. If the artist is unsuccessful, we consider him a mere dilettante. Then, too, art suffers grievously from having been annexed by moralists, who talk about art as the handmaid of religion, and praise the artist if he provides incentives for conduct of a commercial type. It would be better for art if it were frankly snubbed rather than thus unctuously encouraged. We look upon it all as a matter of influence, ...
— The Silent Isle • Arthur Christopher Benson
... new thought to me, that I am unworthy to be thy servant—far more unworthy to be thy wife. In this great house of which thou didst make me queen, I have not acted as mistress, but only as lowly handmaid to thee. For these years of thy kindness, I thank thee. Gladly do I go to my father's house. There he tended me when I was but a child. Now I will stay with him till death enters the cottage door. To thee and to thy bride be joy. To her I willingly yield the place where I have been so happy. ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 3 (of 12) - Classic Tales And Old-Fashioned Stories • Various
... excellent good wits, where he lived for many years in much credit and reputation for his florid wit and ingenious vein in Poetry, which diffused itself in all the veins and sinews thereof; making it (according to its right use) an Handmaid to Theology. In his younger years he wrote two very ingenious and well-approved Comedies, viz. the City Match, and the Amorous War, both which, in my judgment, comparable to the best written ones of that time; Nor did ...
— The Lives of the Most Famous English Poets (1687) • William Winstanley
... design Mary the Virgin is found obedient, saying, 'Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it unto me according to ...
— The Lost Gospel and Its Contents - Or, The Author of "Supernatural Religion" Refuted by Himself • Michael F. Sadler
... (1849), which you will not find in his posthumous edition, but which "repay perusal." These minutiae of literary history become infinitely more important in the early editions of the great classical writers, and the book-collector may regard his taste as a kind of handmaid of critical science. The preservation of rare books, and the collection of materials for criticism, are the useful functions, then, of book-collecting. But it is not to be denied that the sentimental side ...
— The Library • Andrew Lang
... craven. But now she felt the completeness of a nature clothed in armour that rendered it impregnable. It was a strange thing that man should have the power to put the finishing touch to God's work, that religion should stoop to be a handmaid to faith in a human being, but she did not think it strange. Everything in life seemed to her to be in perfect accord because her heart was in ...
— The Garden Of Allah • Robert Hichens
... Hath laid her Babe to rest. Time is our tedious Song should here have ending, Heav'ns youngest teemed Star, Hath fixt her polisht Car, Her sleeping Lord with Handmaid Lamp attending: And all about the Courtly Stable, Bright-harnest Angels sit ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... and have been proudly disregarded by the American aborigine, only in due time to meet the fate of my countrymen at the hands of Bridget the Celt,—what wonder that I gladly seize this opportunity to sing the praises of my German handmaid! Honor to thee, Lenchen, wherever thou goest! Heaven bless thee in thy walks abroad! whether with that tightly-booted cavalryman in thy Sunday gown and best, or in blue polka-dotted apron and bare head as thou trottest nimbly on mine ...
— The Twins of Table Mountain and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... mahogany furniture, and our wall-papers and hangings and carpets, and on our richest apparel for holiday occasions and our simplest garments for daily wear. Even human Beauty, the Queen of all loveliness on earth, engages Flora as her handmaid at the toilet, in spite of the dictum of the poet of 'The Seasons,' that "Beauty when unadorned ...
— Flowers and Flower-Gardens • David Lester Richardson
... of wantonness. She is handmaid of the enchantress Acrasia, and sails about Idle Lake in a gondola. Seeing Sir Guyon, she ferries him across the lake to the floating island, where he is set upon by Cymoch'les. Phaedria interposes, and ferries Sir Guyon (the Knight Temperance) ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... minutes when he saw his rival approaching the front gate. With all that propensity for mischief that characterizes sailors on shore, he immediately formed, and proceeded to put in execution, a plan for the torment and vexation of his antagonist of the yard-stick. He promised the sable handmaid of his Mary a half dollar, if she would personate her mistress for a few minutes, which he imagined easily enough done in the dark, and instructing her "to behave prim and lady-like," went in quest of ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... allies of Napoleon by going to war. Should this dreaded alternative, however, come to pass, not only would British trade again miss the market, the loss of which had already caused widespread suffering, but, in common with it, British navigation, British shipping, the chief handmaid of commerce, would be exposed in a remote quarter, most difficult to guard, to the privateering activity of a people whose aptitude for such occupation had been demonstrated in the fight for independence and the old French wars. Half a ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 1 • Alfred Thayer Mahan |
