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Homily   /hˈɑməli/   Listen
Homily

noun
(pl. homilies)
1.
A sermon on a moral or religious topic.  Synonym: preachment.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Homily" Quotes from Famous Books



... more moralists of a sanative type than it has. Our bad teeth have given us the best dentists in the world; our habit of defalcation hasn't resulted yet in any ethical compensation. Sewell, here, used to preach about such things, but I'll venture to say we shall have no homily on Northwick from him ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells

... for the love and help of this friend of Lassalle's early years. It was all in vain. Instead of a letter, Helen received from the Countess what she called "a scrawl," and Lassalle a long homily on his lack of judgment and foresight. Lassalle defended himself, and so the not too pleasing ...
— Immortal Memories • Clement Shorter

... "you have this day been found guilty of wilful murder. The jury have, upon the evidence given, passed that verdict upon you," he stopped. He had seemed on the point of saying something else, but was unable to do so. Perhaps, as is often the case, he was going to preach him a homily upon a wasted life, or upon a career cut off in the middle, destroyed by an act of brutal passion, but he did not do so. Perhaps there was something in Paul's face which forbade him. Perhaps he almost feared the ...
— The Day of Judgment • Joseph Hocking

... going to preach a homily on it. I see through you perfectly, Edward. You are getting tired of me, and you want to be rid of me. I tell you plainly that you are not going the right way to work about it. No woman, especially if she be in my—unfortunate position, can tamely ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard

... from his private purse fifty thousand rubles for the relief of the families of the victims of Bloody Sunday. On the 19th of January he received a deputation of carefully selected "loyal" working-men and delivered to them a characteristic homily, which infuriated the masses by its stupid perversion of the facts connected with the wanton massacre of Bloody Sunday. Then, at the end of the month, he proclaimed the appointment of a commission to "investigate the causes of labor unrest in ...
— Bolshevism - The Enemy of Political and Industrial Democracy • John Spargo

... train of pensive imagery into my fancy. Yet I then scarce conceived what it meant, or thought of it as a reckoning that concerned me. Not childhood alone, but the young man till thirty, never feels practically that he is mortal. He knows it indeed, and, if need were, he could preach a homily on the fragility of life; but he brings it not home to himself, any more than in a hot June we can appropriate to our imagination the freezing days of December. But now, shall I confess a truth?—I feel these audits but too powerfully. ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb

... Which homily brings me directly to a brace of the most finished little fiends that ever banged drum or tootled fife in the Band of a British Regiment. They ended their sinful career by open and flagrant mutiny and were shot for it. Their names were Jakin and Lew - Piggy Lew and they were ...
— This is "Part II" of Soldiers Three, we don't have "Part I" • Rudyard Kipling

... all such books and knowledge; let him hardly know that there was an ancient world, or that there are on the globe such regions and wonders as travellers have described; or that a reason and eloquence above the pitch of some plain homily ever illustrated and enforced religion. Let him keep clear of all such evil communications; and then, (since we were expressly making it a condition, that he can fairly spare the time for such reading from his common ...
— An Essay on the Evils of Popular Ignorance • John Foster

... was a little worried by the fear that her reputation as a chaperon would be damaged, and, sincerely believing that "no harm had been done," and that her homily would remove all danger from the future, she counselled as she thought wisely. Her heart was full of goodwill toward the girl, and she was desirous that nothing should prevent her from enjoying society in her interpretation of ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe

... gazing on the mild light, as the freest and most favoured man in all the spacious city; and in his ill-remembered prayer, and in the fragment of the childish hymn, with which he sung and crooned himself asleep, there breathed as true a spirit as ever studied homily expressed, or old cathedral ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens

... Sermons upon death I had heard many. Lectures by the score Upon life's vanities. But never words Of mortal preacher to my heart struck home With such convicting sense and suddenness As that plain-spoken homily, so brief, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 350, December 1844 • Various

... the dagger hilt again. But always her feet were still on the footstool of the throne, as if she knew—knew—knew that she stood on firm foundations. No sirkar ever doubted less than she, and the suggestions in King's little homily did not please her. She looked toward the table ...
— King—of the Khyber Rifles • Talbot Mundy

... Percival's face, had a smile hidden in their hazel depths—a smile which he could not understand, and which, therefore, made him angry. He rose and stood on the hearth-rug with his hands behind him, as he delivered his little homily for Kitty's benefit. ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant

... circumstances, and the absolute lack of freedom which conditioned their whole existence, he was struck with the resemblance between himself and them; and recalling how, with a similar sense of kinship, St. Francis had preached to the lower forms of life he too became imbued with the spirit of homily and prophecy, though it did not actually find ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman

... ready to crack the nut of the problem. One fine morning when the family was at breakfast—he had seen to it that all his sons-in- law and their wives were present—he announced that he was returning to his ancestral soil. In a neat little homily he explained that he had made ample provision for his family, and he laid down various maxims that he was sure, he said, would enable them to dwell together in peace and harmony. Also, he gave business advice to his sons-in-law, preached the virtues of temperate living ...
— The House of Pride • Jack London

... face once more with the Christ-spirit. But the blind desire of her dual personality is that pardon should wear the form of love. Parsifal, with every moment more firmly established in his strength and purpose, replies to her madness with a calm homily,—his theme, how from the springs of passion flow waters of thirst. Words of wisdom, eternal truths, drop from the so young lips of the fool. Kundry, who has listened in wonder, exclaims: "So it was my kiss which gave you universal vision! The full cup of my love then ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall

... whose likeness the images be made, and to whose names they be consecrated. And Clemens saith, That serpent the Devil uttereth these words by the mouth of certain men: We, to the honour of the invisible God, worship visible images.—(Third Part of the Homily on Peril of Idolatry: references in margin to Augustine Ps. 135; Lactantius l. 2. Inst.; Clem., L. S ad Jacob.) Here are the "Fathers" condemning as Pagan ...
— Clare Avery - A Story of the Spanish Armada • Emily Sarah Holt

... reviewed the sermon with some severity, and intimated—in the usual hypothetical case of the Church being "thrown open"—what kind of sermon he would have given them. After favoring them with some heads of that discourse, he remarked that he considered the subject of the day's homily, ill chosen; which was the less excusable, he added, when there were so many ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens

... memoirs of Archbishop Whately, tells a story of an eccentric Irish parson. This person, when preaching, was interrupted in his homily by two dogs, which began to fight in church. He descended the pulpit, and endeavoured to separate them. On returning to his place, the clergyman, who was rather an absent man, asked the clerk, "Where was I a while ago?"—"Wasn't yer Riverence appaising ...
— Heads and Tales • Various

... of the Apostles. 2. According to Chrysostom, First Homily on Acts, this book was not so abundantly read by the early Christians as the gospels. The explanation of this comparative neglect is found in the fact that it is occupied with the doings of the apostles, not ...
— Companion to the Bible • E. P. Barrows

... the brotherhood His homily had understood; He only knew that to one ear The meaning of his words ...
— Eighth Reader • James Baldwin

... into relenting; and, in fact, she listened with gravity and deep attention. But, on reviewing afterwards in conversation such passages as she happened to remember, she laughed at the finest parts, and shocked me by calling the mariner himself "an old quiz;" protesting that the latter part of his homily to the wedding guest clearly pointed him out as the very man meant by Providence for a stipendiary curate to the good Dr. Bailey in his over-crowded church. [Footnote: St. James', according to my present recollection.] With an albatross perched on his shoulder, and who might be introduced to ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey

... prayers morning and evening; — very elaborate compositions, which would have instructed the apostles themselves in many things they had never anticipated. But, unfortunately, Mrs. Elton must likewise read certain remarks, in the form of a homily, intended to impress the scripture which preceded it upon the minds of the listeners. Between the mortar of the homilist's faith, and the dull blows of the pestle of his arrogance, the fair form of truth was ground into the powder of pious small talk. This result was not pleasant either to Harry ...
— David Elginbrod • George MacDonald

... meanwhile had induced Day to cast a fount of Saxon types in metal. The first book in which these were used was Aelfric's 'Saxon Homily,' i.e. the Sermon of the Paschal Lamb, appointed by the Saxon bishop to be read at Easter before the Sacrament, an Epistle of Aelfric to Wulfsine, the Lord's Prayer, the Creed, and the Ten Commandments, all of which were included in the general title of A ...
— A Short History of English Printing, 1476-1898 • Henry R. Plomer

... other words. After this came the long prayer, which, in later times, became liturgical; and then the reading of the lesson for the day from "The Law," with its interpretation, when Hebrew had become a dead language. Then followed a reading from the Prophecies, and a homily or sermon based upon the passage read. In their synagogues the Jews worshipped much as we are ...
— The Right and Wrong Uses of the Bible • R. Heber Newton

... the blood of the unfortunate unarmed and helpless Germans that the fortunes of war have left stranded in England. He writes to the paper thoughtfully suggesting plans that have occurred to him for making their existence more miserable than it must be. He generally concludes his letter with a short homily directed against the Prussian Military Staff for their lack of the ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various

... the place, nor are we disposed, to read a homily upon the wisdom of legislative grants, or the moralities of moneyed speculations in stocks on the exchange or elsewhere. But it would seem that legislation upon this subject should be conducted with sufficient deliberation ...
— The Railroad Question - A historical and practical treatise on railroads, and - remedies for their abuses • William Larrabee

... was got ready for me, and such a bed as was more likely to pamper than to mortify the flesh. The day following his Grace sent for me quite as soon as I was ready to go to him. It was to give me a homily to transcribe. He made a point of having it copied with all possible accuracy. It was done to please him; for I omitted neither accent, nor comma, nor the minutest tittle of all he had marked down. His satisfaction at observing this was heightened by its being ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VII (of X)—Continental Europe I • Various

... just as plainly as to the men. He is always wanting to have them do something that is not pleasant, go to see some poor person, teach some ragged little urchins, give up some fashionable way of life, read some book on duty or some homily on fashionable sins. True, he is a very kind man, the kindest man in all the parish all admit. He never speaks an unpleasant word to any body; it is said he spends half his salary for the poor, and visits them ...
— Aims and Aids for Girls and Young Women • George Sumner Weaver

... to all advertising agencies that they would perhaps render a very substantial and timely service to the country if they would give it widespread repetition. And I hope that clergymen will not think the theme of it an unworthy or inappropriate subject of comment and homily from their pulpits. ...
— In Our First Year of the War - Messages and Addresses to the Congress and the People, - March 5, 1917 to January 6, 1918 • Woodrow Wilson

... on account of the fact that it has perplexed even thoughtful scholars to discover why society has come to regard it as a duty at all. [Footnote: The chapter on cleanliness by Epictetus is a homily, and not a philosophic argument. See, Discourses, Book IV, chapter xi.] That, if society does regard cleanliness as important, it should be the duty of the individual to keep himself and his house clean presents no problem. He has no right to make himself ...
— A Handbook of Ethical Theory • George Stuart Fullerton

... to thank you for your homily; and, to make a sober application of it, you may have some laudable design yourself ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden

... built up that sublime and imperishable monument against auricular confession, St. John Chrysostom had raised his eloquent voice against it, in his homily on the 50th Psalm, where, speaking in the name of the Church, he said: "We do not request you to go to confess your sins to any of your ...
— The Priest, The Woman And The Confessional • Father Chiniquy

... the Book of Judith "is put into English in our manner as an example to you men, that you should defend your country with weapons against an invading army"—the word which he uses, "here," always meaning in old English the army of the Danes. AElfric also wrote "a homily on Judith to teach the English the virtues of resistance ...
— Our Catholic Heritage in English Literature of Pre-Conquest Days • Emily Hickey

... good and amusing instance is given in Fig. 62, which is copied from a carved corner-post of an old house in Lower Brook Street, Ipswich. It depicts the old popular legend of the Fox and Geese, the latter attracted toward Reynard by his apparent innocence and sanctity, as he reads a homily from a lectern, and meeting the reward of their foolish trustfulness, in the fattest of their number being carried off by the crafty fox. Both incidents are, as usual with these ancient designers, represented side by side on different angles ...
— Rambles of an Archaeologist Among Old Books and in Old Places • Frederick William Fairholt

... sensations, or rather sentiments, are more inextricably made up of pleasure and sadness than that with which we contemplate (as is not infrequent in some old gallery of Europe) a portrait which deeply interests or powerfully attracts us, and whose history is irrevocably lost. A better homily on the evanescence of human love and fame can scarcely be imagined: a face alive with moral personality and human charms, such as win and warm our stranger eyes, yet the name, subject, artist, owner, all lost in oblivion! To pause before an interesting ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, February, 1858 • Various

... without knowing that it was the dreadful winter of New England which was rattling the doors and frosting the panes,—in their language the whole year told its history of life and growth and beauty from that simple desk. There was always at least one good sermon,—this floral homily. There was at least one good prayer,—that brief space when all were silent, after the manner of the Friends ...
— The Professor at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes (Sr.)

... she said, laying down the law with her mite of a forefinger; and, to make her words more impressive, giving him an occasional tap on the nose. He listened dutifully, as if he were the sole transgressor; but interrupted the homily now and then by lapping the hand of his little mistress with his tiny red tongue, as a token of the perfect understanding ...
— Apples, Ripe and Rosy, Sir • Mary Catherine Crowley

... the prison house, now perfecting a brilliant scheme, now captured through recklessness or drink. Once when a mistake at Manchester sent him to the Hulks, he owned his failure was the fruit of brandy, and after his wont delivered (from the dock) a little homily upon the benefit ...
— A Book of Scoundrels • Charles Whibley

... life, he acknowledged that the extraordinary individual, who was, in substance if not in name, seated on the throne of the Plantagenets, had been the boon companion and ungodly associate of many of his youthful hours. Then would follow a long, wholesome, extemporaneous homily on the idleness of setting the affections on the things of life, and a half-suppressed, but still intelligible commendation of the wiser course which had led him to raise his own tabernacle in the wilderness, instead of weakening the chances of eternal glory ...
— The Wept of Wish-Ton-Wish • James Fenimore Cooper

... so, Fred. To be sure, how a man does forget himself in abstract speculations; but let us have a little more, I've not concluded my homily." ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever

... are, and Miss Lushington, no doubt, quite safe; for she is under the holy guidance of Pope Eustace the First, who has, of course, been delivering to her an edifying homily on the wickedness of the heathens of yore, who, as tradition tells us, in this very place let loose the wild beastises on poor St. Paul!—Oh, no! by the bye, I believe I am wrong, and betraying my want of clergy, and that it was not at all St. Paul, nor was it here. ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot

... of the scene that was loosely described as "The Other Side," the play abounded in amateurisms. For one thing there was too much sermonising. It began with an obtrusive homily on the part of an inspector of police, who went out of his way to admonish Julia about the danger of associating with "The Daisy." Another instance was that of the bank-messenger, a person of ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, September 22, 1920 • Various

... wished to say a word 'on the eve of the great change which my dear young friend—little Gertie, we used to call her—is about to make.' And so he talked to them both. It was an affectionate little homily, and went on ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... earth; so also was the walls; the best of our houses were of like curiosity.... Yet we had daily Common Prayer morning and evening; every Sunday two sermons; and every three months a holy Communion till our Minister died: but our Prayers daily with an Homily on Sundays wee continued two or three years ...
— Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday

... and vigorous and full of images; indifferent to scholastic commonplaces, the ideas soared, hovering gently in the serene heights of a kindly philosophy. This time, I listened with pleasure; I even felt stirred. Here was no official homily: it was full of impassioned zeal, of words that carried you with them, uttered by an honest man accomplished in the art of speaking, an orator in the true sense of the word. In all my school experience, I had never had ...
— The Life of the Fly - With Which are Interspersed Some Chapters of Autobiography • J. Henri Fabre

... would be at any time," added the old lady to herself, after a second thoughtful investigation of Miss Landale's countenance, which had assumed an expression of mulishness in addition to an increase of dolefulness during this homily. ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle

... Timotheus?" The son answered correctly. "What is sin?" was appropriately solved, and "What is the reason annexed to the fifth commandment?" Then came, "What is repentance unto life," and on the answer to this Mr. Pilgrim preached a brief homily. "With grief and hatred of his sin, turns from it, with full purpose of, and endeavour after, new obedience. Is ...
— Two Knapsacks - A Novel of Canadian Summer Life • John Campbell

... Chupin listened to this homily with a half-cringing, half-impudent air; when it was finished he lifted his head, ...
— The Honor of the Name • Emile Gaboriau

... the scolding," she declared afterwards, when Miss Frazer had administered a due homily on the danger of practical jokes. "I only wish I could have seen their faces when the rat plumped on to them. They needn't talk of screaming at nothing, and if they ever begin to tease us about anything again—well, we'll ...
— The Manor House School • Angela Brazil

... chacun a son metier; yet here I am betrayed into a homily where I only contemplated a jest. The truth is, my allusion to this topic at all arose from the vivid recollection I still have of the great fun I derived from this canvassing of my companions in support of their opinions ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power

... that suggested a long homily. The shipmaster was degraded from his old position of the merchant's friend, confidential agent, and often brother-merchant. He was to become a mere conductor, to take the ship from port to port. No longer identified with the honor and success of a great and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various

... Oh, better than lands and vast estates, or titles high and long The spirit of those whose deeds are fit to consecrate in Song! When Regulus to Carthage went, and went back to keep his word, His great action preached a homily which all mankind has heard. It gave to the sacred cause of truth an impulse which still lives, And left the world the moral which a grand example gives. Here, within a nutshell's compass, the high argument appears Which the man who dies for duty in his dying moment cheers, And 'tis thus the Human ...
— A Wreath of Virginia Bay Leaves • James Barron Hope

... her brother's homily with a half-smile lurking about the puckered corners of her eyes and mouth, and putting her finger in the button-hole of his coat, drew him closer to her, as they sat together ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson

... too. I shall not try to form a surmise as to the real nature of the suspense. Their very goodness must have made it very anxious. The girl's hands were lying in her lap; her head was lowered as if in deep thought; and the other went on delivering a sort of homily. Ingratitude was condemned in it, the sinfulness of pride was pointed out—together with the proverbial fact that it "goes before a fall." There were also some sound remarks as to the danger of nonsensical notions and the disadvantages ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad

... Hardouin discharged the accused, improving the occasion with a homily which, considering the ordeal that Mme Boursier had had to endure through so many months, and that might have been considered punishment enough, may be quoted merely as a fine specimen of salting ...
— She Stands Accused • Victor MacClure

... N. dissertation, treatise, essay; thesis, theme; monograph, tract, tractate^, tractation^; discourse, memoir, disquisition, lecture, sermon, homily, pandect^; excursus. commentary, review, critique, criticism, article; leader, leading article; editorial; running commentary. investigation &c (inquiry) 461; study &c (consideration) 451; discussion &c (reasoning) 476; exposition ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... with a silent prayer that the play may not come by a natural death in time for my homily to serve as a funeral appreciation) I hasten to conclude, hoping that it will find, him in the pink (as they say) of a blushful remorse; and, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, May 10, 1916 • Various

... such interest, that the preacher could but make the most of it. After the nuptial benediction had been pronounced, he straightway launched forth into a homily of such graciousness and force, that but few of us missed being forcibly wrought upon, while Mrs. Rose was stirred apparently to the depths of her being. On the day succeeding the marriage, our light-hearted Benedict ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I., No. IV., April, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... was in march to London: but hearing that the King had left, she altered her course, and went to Oxford. There tarried we one day, and went to our duties in the Church of Saint Martin [Note 1], where an homily was preachen by my Lord of Hereford [Note 2]. And a strange homily it was, wherein Eva our mother stood for the Queen, and I suppose Adam for the King, and Sir Hugh Le Despenser (save the mark!) was the serpent. I stood it out, but I will not say I goxide [gaped] not. The next day went the Queen ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt

... whirl of alarm. Before this crazy exaltation, her very desire to pursue her purpose vanished. For Julian's manner even more than his words contributed to her fears. In spite of his homily, emotion was dominant in his expression, swaying his body, burning on his face and lighting his eyes with a fire of changing colours. And every note in his voice was struck within the ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason

... Chillingfoot's boarders. To save a wholesale expulsion of the school from the town, I was forced to acknowledge myself as both the inventor and perpetrator of the deed. Chillingfoot was entirely in the power of the Vicar, so he was forced to read me a long homily in public—which he balanced by an affectionate leave-taking in private—and to expel me solemnly from the school. I never saw my old master again, for he died not many years afterwards; but I hear that ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle

... said, was the hole of an old gray badger, who was doubtless snugly housed in this bad weather. Sometimes he saw him at the entrance of his hole, like a hermit at the door of his cell, telling his beads, or reading a homily. He had a great respect for the venerable anchorite, and would not suffer him to be disturbed. He was a kind of successor to Thomas the Rhymer, and perhaps might be Thomas himself returned from fairy land, but ...
— Abbotsford and Newstead Abbey • Washington Irving

... going to quarrel with you any more, Rash. I've made a vow to that effect and I'm going to keep it. But if I'm to keep it on my side you mustn't badger me on yours. It doesn't do me any good, and it does yourself a lot of harm." Having delivered this homily she took a tone of brisk cheerfulness. "Now, you said over the phone that you were coming to tell ...
— The Dust Flower • Basil King

... bears anyhow, but embrace this opportunity to declare ourself firmly and unalterably opposed to the whole business. We plant our ample feet squarely upon the platform of non-intervention, so far as affects the social economy and individual idiosyncrasies of bears. But if the Tribune man expects a homily upon the sin of feeding oneself in courses to wild animals, he is informed that we waste no words upon the senseless wretch who is given to that species of iniquity. We ...
— The Fiend's Delight • Dod Grile

... said Father Lucien. "We have had a foretaste to cheer us while winter lasts. The sun is moving north, and up here, it always thrills me to watch the light drive back the dark. One could make a homily on that." ...
— The Lure of the North • Harold Bindloss

... were emblazoned in chalk, to hold up for the inspection of the classes; and so he left him for the remainder of the afternoon, every now and again pausing in his vicinity to deliver some incomprehensible sentiment or a sarcastic homily. This performance affected all the scholars, but it excited Gable so much that the little old man could do nothing but sit and stare at Dick with round eyes and open mouth, and mutter 'Oh, crickie!' in a frightened way. The little dark-eyed girl ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson

... shall sleep in dull suppression sundry comments on a certain Rhenish law, whereof my author's mind had at one time studiously cogitated a grave and wholesome homily. For our censor of the press, one strait-laced Mr. Better Judgment, has, "with his abhorred shears," clipped off the more eloquent and spirited portion of a trenchant argument concerning—the revealed doctrine ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper

... good sentence for a homily, Though not for this occasion. Prithee keep it To plead thy Sovereign's ...
— The Works of Lord Byron - Poetry, Volume V. • Lord Byron

... good-night, none of them supposing slumber to be anywhere one of the warlike arts, a paradoxical thing you must battle for and can only win at last when utterly beaten. Hard by their inn, close enough for a priestly homily to have been audible, stood a church campanile, wherein hung a Bell, not ostensibly communicating with the demons of the pit; in daylight rather a merry comrade. But at night, when the children of nerves lay stretched, he threw off the mask. As soon as they had fairly nestled, he smote ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... which homily leads up to the Holidays. I hope that you will enjoy them. Nancy is having no end of a gay time, and knows how really good a time she is having, I do believe. She is the rarest combination of old woman ...
— The Letters of Franklin K. Lane • Franklin K. Lane

... myself as the discourse proceeded, that the minister was a good speaker. I could not possibly say to myself that he expressed an understanding of the general mind and character of his audience. There was a supposititious working-man introduced into the homily, to make supposititious objections to our Christian religion and be reasoned down, who was not only a very disagreeable person, but remarkably unlike life—very much more unlike it than anything I had seen in the pantomime. The native independence of character this ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens

... Built o'er the Indian's grave, the city, here, To all the pomp of civic pride is giv'n, While o'er the spot there falls no tribute-tear, Not e'en his kindred drop—the dew of Heav'n. How touching was the chieftain's homily! That none would mourn for him when he should die; Soon shall the race of their last man be run— Then who will mourn for them? Alas! ...
— The Emigrant - or Reflections While Descending the Ohio • Frederick William Thomas

... to Kendrick as he listened with interest to Old Nat's homily upon the caprices of the eternal feminine—that this high-spirited motherless girl and her father were very close to each other and, paradoxically, that he knew nothing of her present masquerade as a stenographer in Ferguson's office. For masquerade it evidently ...
— Every Man for Himself • Hopkins Moorhouse

... word—had made but a meteoric appearance in her future sister-in-law's cottage—a hasty greeting, a brief peck on Ilona's two cheeks, and one on Aladar's bristly face, then the inevitable homily; and as soon as Ilona paused in the latter, in order to draw breath, Elsa gave her another peck, by way of farewell, explained hastily that her mother was waiting for her, and fled incontinently from the rigid atmosphere of the ...
— A Bride of the Plains • Baroness Emmuska Orczy

... little homily—much better than any clergyman could have given—and it ended with touching allusions to Pluffles' Mamma and Papa, and the wisdom of ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling

... a Man's Single [Footnote: This brilliant novel should be seriously studied by every young journalist. It contains more useful advice to the outside contributor than all the manuals of journalism ever written.] the following homily is delivered by a journalist of experience to a naive and ...
— Journalism for Women - A Practical Guide • E.A. Bennett

... the Third are the pillars of the house; and the Third, though (with the exception of the episode of the Archbishop, and that eternal sentence governing the relations of author and critic that "the homily which has the misfortune not to be approved" by the one is the very best ever produced by the other) not so well known, is perhaps even better than anything in the First. But the later part has, of course, not quite so much freshness; and nobody need want anything better than the successive scenes, ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury

... on with a homily upon education generally, and upon the way in which young people should go through the embryonic stages with their money as much as with their limbs, beginning life in a much lower social position than that in which their parents were, and a lot more, which he has since published; ...
— The Way of All Flesh • Samuel Butler

... which our guest inspired did not rob his infernal homily of its effect. It was not a new or strange thing which he presented to our minds. There was an awful subtlety in the train of his suggestions. All that he had said had floated through my own mind before, without order, indeed, or shew of logic. From my own rebellious heart the same evil thoughts ...
— J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 4 • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

... first strong pulses of spiritual life by discouraging doubts. Remind such, if you will, that now, as with the disciples of old, the moments on the Mount of Transfiguration are few, and the days of work and self-denial on the lowly plain many. But do not fail to close your homily with the assurance that the work and self-denial are of earth, while the illumined mount is the ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe

... exhortation till the party had reached Stirling, had not his attention been attracted by a pedlar who had joined the march from a cross-road, and who sighed or groaned with great regularity at all fitting pauses of his homily. ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott

... a laugh of derision. "No more of your homily, reverend oracle," said the sergeant; "I have an excellent recipe for short sermons here; utter another word and you shall have it!" The troopers laughed again, and the sergeant, as he spoke, held his pistol in the face ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume 2 - Historical, Traditional, and Imaginative • Alexander Leighton

... fails to be on time. If you can remind him that he was late for dinner on Wednesday, missed the letter-carrier twice last month, and delayed attending to an errand Monday until all the shops were closed, you have him where he can understand your point. Mary will listen respectfully enough to a homily on being considerate, but it will have little effect upon her compared to bringing before her a picture of some of her actions: how, instead of coming right home from school the day you were not feeling well, and helping you with some of your tasks, ...
— Your Child: Today and Tomorrow • Sidonie Matzner Gruenberg

... Professor Ray Lankester mixes grave and gay in a little homily, edged by personal experience, on the virtues ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 3 • Leonard Huxley

... half, "Faultes escaped in the printyng," which appear to have been corrected in all the subsequent editions, and are as they stand in the subsequent and modern editions, I presume, up to the present time. But the principal proof arises from a cancelled leaf in the Homily, "Of Common Prayer and Sacraments," as it stands in the Oxford edition of 1822, p. 329-331. The passage in question, as it there stands, and stands likewise in another edition of 1563, which I have, begins within three ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 67, February 8, 1851 • Various

... change their opinion in after life. But the study of grammar is not so enticing that it may be disparaged in the hearing of the young, without injury. What would be the natural effect of the following sentence, which I quote from a late well-written religious homily? "The pedagogue and his dunce may exercise their wits correctly enough, in the way of grammatical analysis, on some splendid argument, or burst of eloquence, or thrilling descant, or poetic rapture, to the strain and soul of which not a fibre in their nature would yield ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown

... service is not to be found in the prayer-book Germans take to church, but I have both read it and listened to it. The vows made are much the same as here; but in Germany great importance is attached to the homily or marriage sermon. This is often long and heavy. I have heard the pastor preach to the young couple for nearly half an hour about their duties, and especially about the wife's duty of submission and obedience. His victims were kept standing ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick

... Who is said to have lived without meat, on the smell of a rose. 48. "Essentiae rationalis immortalis." 49. St. Augustine, De Civ. Dei, lib. x., cc. 9, 19, 32. 50. That which includes everything is opposed to nullity. 51. An inversion of the parts of an antithesis. 52. St. Augustine—"Homily on Genesis." 53. Sir T. Browne wrote a dialogue between two twins in the womb respecting the world into which they were going! 54. Refinement. 55. Constitution another form of temperament. 56. The Jewish computation for fifty years. 57. Saturn ...
— Religio Medici, Hydriotaphia, and the Letter to a Friend • Sir Thomas Browne

... passed his arm round D'Artagnan's neck and clasped him in a close embrace, while with the other hand he pressed his hand. "An excellent homily," he ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas

... never let a fellow's good things go purely as good things; she probed and questioned and spoiled the whole effect. He was quite sure that when he began to speak he had meant something, but what it was escaped him for the moment. He had been urged to the homily by the fact that at a neighboring table he had caught sight of a stout young Briton, with a red face, who reminded him of the Honorable Frederick Threepwood. He mentioned ...
— Something New • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse

... old-fashioned. Here his strong personality obtrudes itself too often, and he is inclined to forget that he is a novelist and not a preacher. I could imagine him throwing off a fine comminatory sermon from the text, "Cursed be he who does not admire the genius of Mr. COMPTON MACKENZIE." This homily is drawn from me with reluctance, because in the main I am a strong believer in Mr. MAIS, and (with his connivance) have every intention of retaining that attitude. With all its faults Rebellion remains ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Sept. 26, 1917 • Various

... scene," said the priest, who was no other than Joseph Ribas. "In earnest, I was quite affected by it myself, and I came near weeping at my own sublime homily. Confess, Stephano, that a consecrated priest could not have better gone ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach

... captive packers, who sat near her lord, armed with a willow wand, watchful of intruding wasps, sand-flies, and even the more ostentatious advances of a rotund and clerical-looking humble-bee, with his monotonous homily. Content, dumb, submissive, vacant, at such times, Wachita, debarred her husband's confidences through the native customs and his own indifferent taciturnity, satisfied herself by gazing at him with the wondering but ineffectual sympathy of a faithful dog. Unfortunately ...
— A Drift from Redwood Camp • Bret Harte

... as academic. Her brother William and her revered master Dr. Hickes were among the antiquarians whom Swift had casually insulted, and she herself had published an elaborate edition of An English-Saxon Homily on the Birthday of St. Gregory (1709) and was at work on an Anglo-Saxon homilarium. Moreover she had a particular affection for her field of study, because it had enabled her to surmount the obstacles to learning which had been put in her path as ...
— An Apology For The Study of Northern Antiquities • Elizabeth Elstob

... assertions of the proneness of women to evil in general, and to sorcery in particular, by the respectable names and authority of St. Chrysostom, Augustin, Dionysius Areopagiticus, Hilary, &c. &c.[42] The Golden-mouthed is adduced as especially hostile in his judgment of the sex; and his 'Homily on Herodias' takes its proper place with the satires of Aristophanes and Juvenal, of ...
— The Superstitions of Witchcraft • Howard Williams

... wise, loving guidance of a young girl's life barque from the reefs of adventure. It was homily and force. The result was, that the girl escaped from school before six weeks ...
— A Woman of the World - Her Counsel to Other People's Sons and Daughters • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... Jerry Mitchell received this homily in silence. It disposed definitely of the lurking doubt in his mind as to the possibility of this man really being Jimmy Crocker. Though outwardly convinced by the other's denial, he had not been able to rid himself till now ...
— Piccadilly Jim • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse

... The crux of the ever difficult problem,—the precise division of responsibility between society and the wretch whom it spews out of its mouth,—is brought clearly into view, but without any attempt at an exact solution. The tale is not a homily, but an object-lesson designed to show how things go. It is too slight an affair to be worthy of extended comment, but it shows Schiller becoming interested in the psychological analysis of conduct. Moral ...
— The Life and Works of Friedrich Schiller • Calvin Thomas

... at work. It was Friday. Dick had chosen the day and the hour because he knew that it was his father's custom to sit up far into the night, preparing his Sunday sermon. Sunday morning's discourse was prepared on Friday evening; the evening homily on Saturday. ...
— The Scarlet Feather • Houghton Townley

... humble myself to the full, seizing the opportunity to read me a long homily on Christian forbearance, in which, I fervently believed at the time, he was almost ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson

... himself as one of the company of pilgrims, instead of a tale bringing him into competition with the creatures of his own invention, after his mocking ballad has served its turn, nothing more ambitious than a version of a popular discourse—half narrative, half homily—in prose. But a question of far greater difficulty and moment arises with regard to the other prose piece included among the "Canterbury Tales." Of these the so-called "Parson's Tale" is the last in order of succession. Is it to ...
— Chaucer • Adolphus William Ward

... him lived, but the most of him died"—can the heartache of the situation be conveyed more achingly? Or were it better that the young man, some of him alive but most of him dead, should come out before the curtain and deliver a homily to the weeping audience? ...
— Revolution and Other Essays • Jack London

... was like the dropping of a weight to which our shoulders had become so accustomed that we hardly realized it till it was gone. Instead of pompous and futile absurdity—as in the existing exhortation, and homily—beautiful and fitting quotation from the unused treasures of the Bible. Instead of the brutal speech, the crudely physical outlook of an earlier day, the just reticence and nobler perceptions of our own, combined with perfectly plain and tender statement as to the founding of the home and the family. ...
— The Case of Richard Meynell • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... common street-boyhood could hinder the duty he owed to his master of protecting his property and insuring his comfort, and that he must sooner tell tales of his friend than have the painter wronged. To this homily the bandy-legged boy listened with his red cheeks artificially distended, and occasional murmurs of "Crikey!" but he took service on these terms, and did Jan no discredit. He was incorruptibly honest, and when from time to time the street ...
— Jan of the Windmill • Juliana Horatia Ewing

... much fitness in this poet essaying a homily for the groom's benefit, for he had been the young man's tutor some years before. When the first Earl—a man of most fascinating manners—placed his son in the tutor's charge, he said, "Make him, if you can, like yourself and I shall be satisfied." Johnson ...
— Some Old Time Beauties - After Portraits by the English Masters, with Embellishment and Comment • Thomson Willing

... passages appear to be taken from the same homily of Valentinus. The pneumatics are naturally immortal, but have assumed mortality to overcome it. Death is the work of the imperfect Demiurge. The concluding portion, which is very obscure, does not fit well into the ...
— A Source Book for Ancient Church History • Joseph Cullen Ayer, Jr., Ph.D.

... showed such deep conviction that Marie understood at once the secret of the homily, the influence of the clergy over the rural masses, and the tremendous effect of the scene which ...
— The Chouans • Honore de Balzac

... most difficult of the three. Yet here, too, your words are barren, if they come not supported by the example of your life. A simple homily from a holy man, even though it were halting, lame, and ungrammatical, will carry more weight than the most learned and eloquent discourse preached by a worldly priest. I know nothing more significant in all ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan

... no preachers—preceded and followed by a psalm. But all was easy to-day to a man who had such cause for exultation; his voice boomed heartily out; his face radiated his pleasure; and he delivered his homily when the time came, with excellent emphasis and power—all from the ...
— Come Rack! Come Rope! • Robert Hugh Benson

... forms of things, so must we study antiquity in order to understand the present time [2].' In the hall of the ancestral temple, there was a metal statue of a man with three clasps upon his mouth, and his back covered over with an enjoyable homily on the duty of keeping a watch upon the lips. Confucius turned to his disciples and said, 'Observe it, my children. These words are true, and commend themselves to our feelings [3].' About music ...
— THE CHINESE CLASSICS (PROLEGOMENA) • James Legge

... week. His uncle wrote back that he could do nothing. It was not fair to ask him to sell out when everything was at its worst, and the little he had he felt that his duty to himself made it necessary for him to keep in case of illness. He ended the letter with a little homily. He had warned Philip time after time, and Philip had never paid any attention to him; he could not honestly say he was surprised; he had long expected that this would be the end of Philip's extravagance and want of balance. Philip grew hot and cold ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham

... time," said his Highness, "for me to appeal to your better nature. I shall do so in a rather loud voice, for I have prepared a most virtuous homily that I am unwilling the Grand Duchess should miss. You will at its conclusion be overcome with an appropriate remorse, and will obligingly burst into tears, and throw yourself at my feet—pray remember that the left is the gouty one,—and be forgiven. You will then be restored to favor, while ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell

... varied persons, is not as likely to exhibit that independence and vigor of action which is characteristic of the man who stands solely upon honor, with nothing to appease save his own idea of right. But I forgot. The grandson of Captain Hawes needs no such homily. The Aimes family is a hard lot, sir, but a gentleman can at all times stand in smiling conquest above a tough. Scott Aimes, a burly scoundrel, and, therefore, the pet of his father, at one time threatened to chastize my son Chydister, who is now off at college. And I said ...
— The Jucklins - A Novel • Opie Read

... due course, and was a somewhat lengthy meal. Then the ladies retired to the stately apartment they had been in before, and the mother read a homily to her daughters, which was listened to with dutiful attention. But Kate's bright eyes were often bent upon the casement of one window, the curtain of which she had drawn back with her own hand before sitting down; and as the moon rose brighter and brighter ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green

... Articles and Homilies, which were derived from Geneva. The Calvinistic members of the Church, on the other hand, have always maintained that her deliberate judgment on such points is much more likely to be found in an Article or a Homily than in an ejaculation of penitence or a hymn of thanksgiving. It does not appear that, in the debates on the Comprehension Bill, a single High Churchman raised his voice against the clause which relieved ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... proceed unto the communion, if any communicants be to receive the Eucharist; if not, we read the Decalogue, Epistle, and Gospel, with the Nicene Creed (of some in derision called the "dry communion"), and then proceed unto an homily or sermon, which hath a psalm before and after it, and finally unto the baptism of such infants as on every Sabbath day (if occasion so require) are brought unto the churches; and thus is the forenoon bestowed. In the afternoon likewise we meet again, ...
— Chronicle and Romance (The Harvard Classics Series) • Jean Froissart, Thomas Malory, Raphael Holinshed

... expounding the Bible in this way to the Jewish public at Alexandria, there arose a new form of religious literature, the sermon, and a new form of commentary, the homiletical. The words "homiletical" and "homily" suggest what they originally connoted; they are derived from the Greek word [Greek: homilia], "an assembly," and a homily was a discourse delivered to an assembly. The Meturgeman of Palestine and Babylon, who expounded the ...
— Philo-Judaeus of Alexandria • Norman Bentwich

... This homily, besides being preached in a tone of calm determination, which left no room to hope for any abatement, had exhausted another minute or two of the time already so precious. The merchant hurriedly counted out the ten dollars, which Amos deliberately inspected, ...
— Tales for Young and Old • Various

... prophets. As Judaism, except in Jerusalem, had, properly speaking, no clergy, the first comer stood up, gave the lessons of the day (parasha and haphtara), and added thereto a midrash, or entirely personal commentary, in which he expressed his own ideas.[5] This was the origin of the "homily," the finished model of which we find in the small treatises of Philo. The audience had the right of making objections and putting questions to the reader; so that the meeting soon degenerated into a kind of free assembly. It had a president,[6] "elders,"[7] a hazzan, i.e., a recognized ...
— The Life of Jesus • Ernest Renan

... 7th) we had a small assembly of thirty-two persons. A plan had been laid for apprehending us, which was put in execution. We had time to sing a hymn, read a chapter, and a homily; but whilst singing the second hymn, the noise of the soldiers was so great in approaching our house of prayer, that we were obliged to cease singing. Wishing, however, to continue our meeting, an officer of the police said, "In the name of the law, leave ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox

... this short homily, as he stood before her in Mary's little parlor, just ere the wedding service began. Maggie listened to him with a touching gratitude and humility. In her eyes David was something more than a brother. He had laid his hand upon the altar and ...
— A Daughter of Fife • Amelia Edith Barr

... one irrelevant or absurd remark in my homily, I'll eat the hat through which you say ...
— Simon the Jester • William J. Locke

... himself and all parties, Pen never read that homily which Doctor Portman addressed to him, until many weeks after the epistle had been composed; and day after day, the widow waited for her son's reply to the charges against him; her own illness increasing ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray

... while an important part of the early Christmas ritual there was the celebration of Mass over a "manger" in which the consecrated Host was laid, as once the body of the Holy Child in the crib at Bethlehem.{42} Further, an eastern homily of the late fourth century suggests that the preacher had before his eyes a representation of the Nativity. Such material representations, Usener conjectures, may have arisen from the devotions of the faithful at the supposed actual birthplace at Bethlehem, which would naturally be adorned ...
— Christmas in Ritual and Tradition, Christian and Pagan • Clement A. Miles

... thought, or emotion in some act or attitude that shall be remarkably striking to the mind's eye.' His essay on Victor Hugo shows how keenly conscious he was that narrative romance can catch and embody emotions and effects that are for ever out of the reach of the drama proper, and of the essay or homily, just as they are out of the reach of sculpture and painting. Now, it is precisely in these effects that the chief excellence of romance resides; it was the discovery of a world of these effects, insusceptible of treatment by the drama, neglected entirely by the character-novel, ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson • Walter Raleigh

... tongues—she look'd a lecture, Each eye a sermon, and her brow a homily, An all-in-all sufficient self-director, Like the lamented late Sir Samuel Romilly, The Law's expounder, and the State's corrector, Whose suicide was almost an anomaly— One sad example more, that 'All is vanity' (The jury brought their verdict ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron



Words linked to "Homily" :   homiletic, preaching, discourse, sermon, homiletical



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