"Impulsive" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of animated nature as at present constituted, with powers and capacities well adapted for the full enjoyment of the augmented riches of the earth. And the end is not yet. "The present race, rude and impulsive as it is, is perhaps the best adapted to the present state of things in the world; but the external world goes through slow and gradual changes, which may leave it in time a much serener field of existence. There may then be occasion for ...
— A Theory of Creation: A Review of 'Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation' • Francis Bowen
... embarrassed by years of affliction, his wise counsel and deep sympathy helped me even more than money, badly as that was needed. When he was gone, I felt as if the only bright spot in my horizon, apart from my family, had faded into darkness. By nature he had a quick temper, and was very impulsive. By Christian culture he came to be a model in gentleness, patience and self-control. He was a wonderful example of how men, by faith, "out of weakness are made strong." As we stood around his bed of death, and his breathing indicated ...
— Autobiography of Frank G. Allen, Minister of the Gospel - and Selections from his Writings • Frank G. Allen
... the antecedents, ardent patriotism, and impulsive nature of Rutherford B. Hayes would enter the army in the war for the Union, was to be looked for as a thing of course. He had been in the habit of obeying every call of duty, and could not therefore disobey when duty called loudest. He regarded the war waged ...
— The Life, Public Services and Select Speeches of Rutherford B. Hayes • James Quay Howard
... you take them in the baggage-car?—such a barn of a place! Why weren't they brought here, where we could make them warm and care for them?" exclaimed Mrs. Rayner, in impulsive indignation. ...
— The Deserter • Charles King
... of the Mexican war. Down through incidents of, legislation, through history of government, even underlying cardinal maxims of political philosophy, it touched the very bedrock of primary human rights. Such a subject furnished material for the inborn gifts of the speaker, his intuitive logic, his impulsive patriotism, his pure and poetical conception ...
— Abraham Lincoln: A History V1 • John G. Nicolay and John Hay
... With the passionate and impulsive nature of a Greek fanatic, he burst forward through the crowd, towards the steps which led to the choir, and above which, in front of the altar, stood the corpse of Ammonius, enclosed in a coffin of glass, beneath a gorgeous canopy; and ...
— Hypatia - or, New Foes with an Old Face • Charles Kingsley
... great deal about Dr Muir as a preacher, and we went to hear him; but not being very certain of the church, we inquired at a gentleman's servant, dressed in splendid livery, very civilly, the way to Dr Muir's church. Instead of giving a civil reply, "Oh," he said, "Aberdeen awa'!" Thom, who was very impulsive, came across the side of the fellow's head with his umbrella, and laid him flat on his back in the middle of the street, with his heels in the air. I made no remark, Thom said as little, but walked on as if nothing had happened. We heard our friend calling after us he would have his revenge; ...
— Cattle and Cattle-breeders • William M'Combie
... the impulsive reply. "In my cave there back of that cypress; no one is allowed to enter but me; there I say my prayers, and my father says it is sacred to me alone. Good-bye, Henry," and she sped like a deer into the ...
— The Gentleman from Everywhere • James Henry Foss
... grave conceits toil'd Hero's spirits; For, though the light of her discoursive wits Perhaps might find some little hole to pass Through all these worldly cinctures, yet, alas! There was a heavenly flame encompass'd her,— Her goddess, in whose fane she did prefer Her virgin vows, from whose impulsive sight She knew the black shield of the darkest night Could not defend her, nor wit's subtlest art: This was the point pierc'd Hero to the heart; 290 Who, heavy to the death, with a deep sigh, And hand that languished, took a robe was nigh, ...
— The Works of Christopher Marlowe, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Christopher Marlowe
... respectful; when she saw him bend and whisper to the witching girl and hang delighted on her "low replies," her own confidence was shaken. What could he mean? Was it possible that instead of being merely impulsive and erring, he was deliberately wicked? No, no, never! Yet, what could be his intentions? Did he really wish to win Angelica's heart? Alas! whether he wished so or not, it was but too evident to all that he had gained her preference. ...
— The Missing Bride • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... officers floated down the lovely river, which we had ascended with hopes so buoyant; and from that day to this, the reasons for our recall have never been made public. It was commonly attributed to proslavery advisers, acting on the rather impulsive nature of Major-General Hunter, with a view to cut short the career of the colored troops, and stop their recruiting. But it may have been simply the scarcity of troops in the Department, and the renewed conviction at head-quarters that we were ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... without any real gifts for this science, as so few are who undertake it at charity bazaars, yet she told me not a few things that were significant: that my somewhat cold exterior and air of sternness were but a mask to shield a too-impulsive nature; that I possessed great firmness of character and was fond of Nature. She added peculiarly at the last "I see trouble ahead, but you are not to ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... had sworn to get even with Threewit. An added incentive to this course was the fact that he knew them both to be on very good terms with his chief enemy. Without doubt Chad would do his best to stimulate the insurgent leader to impulsive violence. ...
— Steve Yeager • William MacLeod Raine
... Hall. My opportunities of improving my acquaintance with her had not been so numerous as I could have desired, and I sincerely regretted it. She had produced a very favorable impression on me. Singularly inexperienced and impulsive—with an odd mixture of shyness and vivacity in her manner, and subject now and then to outbursts of vanity and petulance which she was divertingly incapable of concealing—I could detect, nevertheless, under the surface the signs which told of a true and ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... she answered, instinctively suppressing a sigh. She began to realize a little what a strange being she had married. With an impulsive need of protection she held him close, hiding her face in his neck. The reality of his arms ...
— The Nest Builder • Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
... often to the unscrupulous than to the strong. His wife's injustice cut Desmond to the quick. Impulsive renunciation sprang to his lips; and was only checked by the remembrance that he had given Honor ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver
... then, is presented to us in the beginning of the play as perfect, a model to young and old, of irreproachable virtue and of all wonderful qualities. In the course of the play, however, he shows himself very nimble-witted, credulous, and impulsive, quick to anger and quicker still to forgive; with thoughts all turned to sadness and to musing; a poet—ever in extremes; now hating his own rash errors to the point of demanding the heaviest punishment for them; now swearing that ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris
... earth, He took a few of His disciples with Him upon the mountain and there transfigured Himself. He clothed Himself in heavenly beauty and splendor; He arrayed Himself in His Godlike power. These men were so overjoyed at this manifestation of His glory and power, that old Peter, impulsive as he was, spoke out and said: 'Lord, it is good for us to be here, if it be Thy will, let us build here three tabernacles, one for Thee, one for Moses, and one for Elias.' The place was so glorious that they wanted ...
— Twenty-Five Years in the Black Belt • William James Edwards
... 1189.—Richard was accepted without dispute as the master of the whole of the Angevin dominions. He was a warrior, not a statesman. Impulsive in his generosity, he was also impulsive in his passions. Having determined to embark on the crusade, he came to England eager to raise money for its expenses. With this object he not only sold offices to those who wished to buy them, and the right ...
— A Student's History of England, v. 1 (of 3) - From the earliest times to the Death of King Edward VII • Samuel Rawson Gardiner
... Silverbel on the 22d of September, and was quickly conducted to Sibyl's room. She had not seen Sibyl for a couple of months. When last they had met, the child had been radiant with health and spirits. She was radiant still, but that quick impulsive life had been toned down to utter quiet. The lower part of the little body was paralyzed, the paralysis was creeping gradually up and up. It was but a question of time for the loving little heart to ...
— Daddy's Girl • L. T. Meade
... other hand, woman is by nature more impulsive than man; she reflects less than he; she has more abnegation, is naiver, and hence is governed by stronger passions, as revealed by the truly heroic self-sacrifice with which she protects her child, or cares for relatives, and nurses them in sickness. In the fury, however, this passionateness ...
— Woman under socialism • August Bebel
... showed much likeness to either in after life. Her genius was unquestioned even from her precocious babyhood, and she was the wonder and admiration of all the brilliant circle of her father's friends. Her temperament was most vehement and impulsive, and her vivacity a wonder even to the Parisians. She seemed to know everything by intuition, and made light of the hardest tasks which could be given her. The streams of her childish eloquence seemed ...
— Home Life of Great Authors • Hattie Tyng Griswold
... and the comments in silence, not knowing what to say. Had he been very impulsive, he would have come out instantly with his suspicions; but he had a habit of reflection, and was inclined to consider before acting or speaking. At this moment, however, his thoughts were confused, ...
— Harper's Young People, April 27, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... was of Adelaide that Florian thought: of the tall, impulsive, and yet timid, fair girl who was both shrewd and innocent, and of her tenderly colored loveliness, and of his abysmally unmerited felicity in having won her. Why, but what, he reflected, grimacing—what if he ...
— The Line of Love - Dizain des Mariages • James Branch Cabell
... beaten. Also he knew she was right and that he had been an impulsive fool—depressing convictions both. For a moment he stood nonplussed while Tara fingered a long chain he had given her, and absently studied a daisy-plant that had dared to invade the oldest, loveliest lawn in that part ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... that Rachel is perfect. She would be desperately uncomfortable as a friend if she were. Her failings are those belonging to a frank, impulsive, generous nature, which I myself find it easy to forgive. Her gravest fault is a witty tongue. That which many people would give years of their lives to possess is what she has shed the most tears ...
— The Love Affairs of an Old Maid • Lilian Bell
... the more conscious acts of control should be limited to acts which are so instinctive or impulsive that the one performing them has no means of foreseeing their outcome. If a person cannot foresee the consequences of his act, and is not capable of understanding what he is told about its outcome ...
— Democracy and Education • John Dewey
... opinion the judge was right. I do not think Penreath is insane, or even subject to fits of impulsive insanity. If you ask my opinion, I think he is still suffering from the effects of shell shock, and, like many other brave men who have been similarly affected, he endeavoured to conceal the fact. I have come to the ...
— The Shrieking Pit • Arthur J. Rees
... inequality of fortune amongst mankind, and instanced himself as a striking example of the fate of those men, who, according to all the rules of right, ought to be near the top, instead of at the foot of the ladder of fortune. "But," said he, springing to his feet with impulsive energy, "I have now the means at my command of rising superior to fate, or of inflicting incalculable ills upon the whole ...
— The Case of Summerfield • William Henry Rhodes
... of her children in an uneven, impulsive way. She would sometimes gather them passionately to her heart; she would sometimes forget them. The year before they had spent part of the summer with their grandmother Pontellier in Iberville. Feeling secure regarding ...
— The Awakening and Selected Short Stories • Kate Chopin
... was impulsive, even impetuous. Beneath his seeming cold exterior and admirable self-control—the discipline of the master artist—lay the moods and tenses of the musical temperament. He knew little or nothing outside of music and ...
— Marse Henry, Complete - An Autobiography • Henry Watterson
... which medical science is now pronouncing to be ineradicable and which they will transmit in some form or other to their children after them. We want a strong cord made up of every strand we can lay hold of, and one of these strands is doubtless self-preservation, though in impulsive youth I do not think it the strongest. But to give these warnings is manifestly the father's duty, and not the mother's; and I hope and believe that the number of fathers who are beginning to recognize their duty in this ...
— The Power of Womanhood, or Mothers and Sons - A Book For Parents, And Those In Loco Parentis • Ellice Hopkins
... avowal of readiness to bear anything, if only he was with Christ, is the genuine utterance of a warm impulsive heart, which took too little heed of Christ's solemn warning, and fancied that the tide of present feeling would always run as strong as now. Emotion fluctuates. Steadfast devotion is chary of mortgaging the future by ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... evokes a sort of deep compassionateness and affection, such as is evoked by an impulsive, headstrong, engaging child. One desires to have sheltered him, to have advised him, to have managed his affairs for him; one ends by forgiving him all, or nearly all. His character was essentially a noble one; he hated all oppression, injustice, arrogance, selfishness, coarseness, ...
— The Silent Isle • Arthur Christopher Benson
... and was gliding kitty-corner fashion, across the floor. Presently she and the stunning girl had saluted each other after the impulsive fashion of American girls, and were playing cat- in-the-cradle, to the amusement of those foreigners nearest. A nod, and I was threading ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath
... same family; after a time I learned that he had obtained employment in a distant village. The next tidings I heard of him was that he had been implicated in a petty robbery, and had run away. His impulsive disposition rendered him very easy of persuasion, for either good or evil; and he seldom paused to consider the consequences of any act. From what I could learn of the matter it seemed he had been ...
— Stories and Sketches • Harriet S. Caswell
... and formed school boy associations, his impulsive and rather reckless character brought him frequently into collision with his companions, and he gained a reputation which was by no means good. Every now and then some one would complain to Mr. Howland of his bad conduct, when he, taking all for granted, ...
— The Iron Rule - or, Tyranny in the Household • T. S. Arthur
... from the deck. Miko was near me! So he had dared to show himself here among us! But I realized that he could not be aware we knew he was the murderer. George Prince had been asleep, had not seen Miko with Anita. Miko, with impulsive rage, had shot the girl and escaped. No doubt now he was cursing himself for having done it. And he could very well assume that Anita had died without regaining consciousness to tell ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, March 1930 • Various
... bookseller, as may well be supposed, soon repaid him in full with many acknowledgments of his disinterestedness. This anecdote has been called in question, we know not on what grounds; we see nothing in it incompatible with the character of Goldsmith, who was very impulsive, and prone to acts of ...
— Oliver Goldsmith • Washington Irving
... friends, forget the vagaries of an impulsive but generous soul. To subdue my passions shall hereafter be my law. After conquering all the nations in the universe, it is ...
— The Man With The Broken Ear • Edmond About
... thing which places William at a disadvantage is his excessive frankness, which is, in him, almost a fault, for if he couched his utterances in courtly or diplomatic phrases, they would pass unchallenged, instead of being cited to ridicule him. His mistakes have largely resulted from his impulsive nature coupled with chauvinism, which is, perhaps, justifiable, or, at ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 1157, March 5, 1898 • Various
... Douglas made an impulsive movement, as though to reply; but he hesitated, and did not speak. Marian was not looking at him. She ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw
... hours' march from this same spot, on the very edge of the city, Andres Bonifacio and his literally sansculottic gangs of cutthroats were, almost with impunity, soiling the fair name of Freedom with murder and mutilation, rape and rapine, awakening the worst passions of an excitable, impulsive people, destroying that essential respect for law and order, which to restore would take a holocaust of fire and blood, with a generation of severe training. Unquestionably did Rizal demonstrate himself to be a seer and prophet when he applied to such a system the story ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... poses unsought, all groupings accidental, all action unaffected and unconscious. One meets Nature at every turn,—not braced up in prim forms, not conscious in manners, not made up into the fashionable or the proper, but impulsive, free, and simple. With the whole street looking on, they are as unconscious and natural as if they were where no eye could see them,—ay, and more natural, too, than it is possible for some people to be, even in the privacy ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 31, May, 1860 • Various
... well-bred. But besides what was pointed out to me, I noticed many other things which ought to be toned down in my nature and habits, if I meant to acquire what I heard called lady-like manners. I was at that time very vivacious, merry, and impulsive, and so long as I had lived in France this natural disposition had been looked upon as a happy one, and rather pleasant than otherwise; but I did not notice anything resembling it in our visitors, who were said to be real ladies, or lady-like. They looked to my French ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... beings, adopted with the enthusiasm of their years the Utopian doctrines of the Revolution, while the Marquis de St. Cyr and his family fought inch by inch for the retention of those privileges which had placed them socially above their fellow-men. Marguerite, impulsive, thoughtless, not calculating the purport of her words, still smarting under the terrible insult her brother had suffered at the Marquis' hands, happened to hear—amongst her own coterie—that the St. Cyrs were in treasonable correspondence ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... bearing of these remarks, let CD (Fig. 32) represent the section of a fault and EF that of the surface of the earth, and suppose the rock-mass A to slip slightly and suddenly downwards. Then the particles of A at the surface of the fault will, by impulsive friction, be drawn sharply upwards, and those of B correspondingly downwards; so that the earth-waves in the two rock-masses will start in opposite phases of vibration. Along the line of fault, every particle of rock, ...
— A Study of Recent Earthquakes • Charles Davison
... assertions. What wonder, therefore, that the thoughts of these people turned toward the possibility of diverting the treasures of the Transvaal into their own direction. Rhodes was brought into contact with the idea that it was necessary to subdue President Kruger. With a man of Rhodes' impulsive character to begin wishing for a thing was sufficient to make him resort to every means at his disposal to obtain it. The Boer War was the work of the Rhodesian party, and long before it broke out it was expected, spoken of, and ...
— Cecil Rhodes - Man and Empire-Maker • Princess Catherine Radziwill
... of its reality, he yet could not see it. The thing existed in his mind, not as a picture, but as a piece of irrefutable evidence. Larry had not meant to do it, of course. But it was murder, all the same. Men like Larry—weak, impulsive, sentimental, introspective creatures—did they ever mean what they did? This man, this Walenn, was, by all accounts, better dead than alive; no need to waste a thought on him! But, crime—the ugliness—Justice unsatisfied! Crime concealed—and his own share in the concealment! ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... might call prairie. He was a 'backwoodsman,'—liked the wild hunter's life better than sticking at home looking after sheep. He had the attractive characteristics of that kind of men, as well as their faults. He was frank, impulsive, generous, incapable of persevering work or of looking ahead, passionate. His descendants prefer cattle-ranching and gold-prospecting to keeping shops or sitting with their lungs squeezed against ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren
... are near enough, please make an analysis of her atmosphere, so that we can break out masks, if necessary." Hendricks, while young and rather too impulsive, was a good rough-and-ready scientist, as well as a courageous and dependable officer. "When Mr. Correy relieves you, please inform him that I am taking a watch below, should he need me." Hydrot was looming up in the television disk, and ...
— The Terror from the Depths • Sewell Peaslee Wright
... don't mind scar tissue on your toes," he murmured, bending his cheek in impulsive caress. He wished that he were nineteen again and could still dream. Twenty-seven seemed so aged and battered and cynical. And dreams can ...
— Master of the Moondog • Stanley Mullen
... one hand reached over and rested on his. The impulsive gesture brought warmth flooding ...
— The Sensitive Man • Poul William Anderson
... the edge of the flat-topped desk, leaned suddenly forward and gently tilted Miss Lee's face upward. There was nothing in the impulsive movement to offend; his face was ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott
... angusta domi" is almost always there; but away from his home, your literary man is often a prince and a millionaire. Or, if he be a man of domestic habits, if he spends little on tavern suppers, little on wine, little on cab hire, the probability is, that he is still impulsive and improvident, still little capable of self-denial; that he will buy a costly picture when his house-rent is unpaid; that he will give his wife a guitar when she wants a gown; and buy his children a rocking-horse when they are without ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... going to do about it?" Mabel demanded at last. "Believe me, old dear, he's got a bad eye. Now listen here," she said with impulsive generosity. "I've got a scheme. I'll draw enough ahead to send you back. I'll do it to-morrow, ...
— Love Stories • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... well-assured belief that the impulsive affection of her youth had become gradually tempered by lapse of years into a chaste and sisterly friendship, and that the pleasant memories which clustered about her heart and made her look back half regretfully upon those former days would be cherished only ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 5, May, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... likin' Bill; he allus played in the open an' when he kept score, he give you all the points you made without fussin' over 'em; but I didn't like the look o' that new outfit on his hip. He was too impulsive to carry a gun, an' he was too young. Take it when a man has had some experience in gun-fightin', he gets purty sober over the effect of it; but a young feller—well, who on earth knows what way a young feller is goin' to jump when he ...
— Happy Hawkins • Robert Alexander Wason
... an arm of succor, the artillery serves, 1st, to give impulsive force to the attacking columns; 2d, to assist in arresting, or at least in retarding, the offensive movements of an enemy; 3d, to protect the avenues of approach, and to defend obstacles that cover a position; and, 4th, to cover a ...
— Elements of Military Art and Science • Henry Wager Halleck
... easy to see that, in their manners and traits, they had a great resemblance to the Celts, before they were subdued and civilized, but were not so passionate, nor impulsive, nor thoughtless, nor reckless as they. Nor were they so much addicted to gluttony and drunkenness. They were more persevering, more earnest, more truthful, and more chaste. Nor were they so much enslaved by ...
— The Old Roman World • John Lord
... pendulum vibrates, and its hands move, not simply by reason of the situation and figure of its weight and wheels, but also because some intelligent person, by winding up the clock, has communicated an impulsive force to the weight and wheels. Waterworks perform all sorts of antics, not solely because the pipes are skilfully constructed and arranged with a view to such end, but because also an intelligent engineer has turned running water into the pipes. But the only intelligent agent to whom Descartes ...
— Old-Fashioned Ethics and Common-Sense Metaphysics - With Some of Their Applications • William Thomas Thornton
... the suppression of piracy in the Channel rewarded by an unjust imprisonment. He was now in the first vigour of manhood, with a mind exquisitely cultivated and familiar with the poetry and learning of his day, a nature singularly lofty and devout, a fearless and vehement temper. There was a hot impulsive element in his nature which showed itself in youth in his drawing sword on a neighbour who denounced him to his father, and which in later years gave its characteristic fire to his eloquence. But his intellect was as clear and cool as his temper was ardent. What he believed in was the ...
— History of the English People, Volume V (of 8) - Puritan England, 1603-1660 • John Richard Green
... behind the pencil-end he was chewing, but the officer maintained his solemn air, for which act of self-restraint he was undoubtedly grateful when in another minute she gave a quick impulsive shudder not altogether assumed, and vehemently added: "But I couldn't stand the sight; no, I couldn't! I'm an awful coward when it comes to things like that. Nothing in all the world would induce me to look at the woman or her room. But I should ...
— The Golden Slipper • Anna Katharine Green
... rule, all that can be taught and learned; and what is thus derived from others by docility and discipline, what is range, comes to have in him, and in his work, an equivalent weight with what is unique, impulsive, underivable. Raphael—Raphael, as you see him in the Blenheim Madonna, is a supreme example of such scholarship in the sphere of art. Born of a romantically ancient family, understood to be the descendant of Solon himself, Plato had been in early youth ...
— Plato and Platonism • Walter Horatio Pater
... her say so, knowing what I knew, but looked where she pointed. Her son sat opposite to us, next to the pretty Ellen Mayford. She had dropped the lids over her eyes and was smiling. He, with his face turned toward her, was whispering in his eager impulsive way, and tearing to pieces a slip of paper which he held in his hand. As the firelight fell on his face, I felt a chill come over me. The likeness was so fearful!—not to the father (that I had been long accustomed to), but to the son, to the half-brother—to the poor lost young soul I had ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley
... Lascelles would do anything for Philippe, deny himself anything almost. Asked if Monsieur Lascelles had not given some reason for his objection to Philippe's being nursed at his house when he came home the second time, she was embarrassed and distressed. She said Philippe was an impulsive boy, fancied himself in love with his brother's wife, and Armand saw something of this, and at last upbraided him, but very gently. There was no quarrel at all. Was there any one whom Monsieur Lascelles had been angered with on her account? She ...
— Waring's Peril • Charles King
... thought; it was not the first time that he had found this dangerous ally of sure and swift service in bringing him up or down to that level of his dreary, sodden guests, so necessary to his trade. Jeff had not the excuse of the inborn drunkard's taste. He was impulsive and extreme. At the end of the four weeks he came out on the porch one night as Bill drew up. "You must take me from this place to-night," he said, in a broken voice scarce like his own. "When we're on the road we can arrange matters, but ...
— Jeff Briggs's Love Story • Bret Harte
... gold. He was implored by General Sutter to keep the mill operatives in ignorance of his discovery, for fear they should desert their work. But how could such a secret be kept, especially by a man of generous and impulsive instincts? At any rate the news leaked out ...
— A Tramp Through the Bret Harte Country • Thomas Dykes Beasley
... this, a deep, significant, impulsive world had already interested me. Through my adventure with Gretchen and its consequences, I had early looked into the strange labyrinths by which civil society is undermined. Religion, morals, law, rank, connections, custom, all ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... for him," Paredes answered. "She's made most of her money on this side, you know. And she's as loyal and generous as she is impulsive. Undoubtedly she had the doctors do what they could for her father, and when she got track of Silas Blackburn through you, Bobby, she nursed in the warped brain that dominant idea with her own Latin desire ...
— The Abandoned Room • Wadsworth Camp
... soberly, as industrious peasants do. Married at twenty, he had loved but one woman in his life, and after her death, impulsive and gay as his nature was, he had never played nor trifled with another. He had borne a real sorrow faithfully in his heart, and it was not without misgiving nor without sadness that he yielded to his father-in-law; but that father had always governed the family wisely, ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... tribe threw up their arms three times. This was the inviolable sign of peace! Down fell the spears. Forward, with a heavy sigh of relief, and upward glance of gratitude, came the friends of peace. The impulsive natives rushed forth with tears and cries, as each saw in the other's rank a loved one of ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... precepts and commands, and by this articulating process become much more firmly entrenched. Then from the existence of miscellaneous maxims and prohibitions, taught by the elders and linked with whatever impulsive and haphazard punishments are customary, to the formulation of legal codes, with definite penalties attached to specific infringements, is an easy transition. With the invention of written language these laws could become still better fixed and more clearly known. The appointment of certain men ...
— Problems of Conduct • Durant Drake
... of abstract and ideal justice; while Cassius holds it both a wrong and a blunder to go about such a thing without making success his first care. This, accordingly, is what he works for, being reckless of all other considerations in his choice and use of means. Withal he is more impulsive and quick than Brutus, because less under the self-discipline of moral principle. His motives, too, are of a much more mixed and various quality, because his habits of thinking and acting have grown by the measures of experience; he studies to understand ...
— The New Hudson Shakespeare: Julius Caesar • William Shakespeare
... confidence, a terrible reaction of apprehension overcame her. Could it be that the angry look was for her, and that it could be justified by any word that she had ever spoken or any duty that she had neglected? With one hand lightly resting upon the table, her right foot thrown forward in impulsive readiness to spring into his extended arms, but her whole form drooping and shrinking with dismay, her face pale, and the smile which she had called upon it now faintly and painfully flickering in a deathlike manner about her whitened lips, as it glided ...
— Continental Monthly, Volume 5, Issue 4 • Various
... the door-knob, but she turned with an impulsive motion and went back to him. "I am so glad to see you," she said, giving him her hand again, and "Mammy," she called, "Mr. Northcope is an ...
— The Strength of Gideon and Other Stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... like twilight on a harsh landscape, softening it until it is tolerable. The complexity is too subtle, too varied; the values are changing utterly with each lesion of vitality; it has begun to appear that we can learn nothing from the past with which to face the future—so we cease to be impulsive, convincible men, interested in what is ethically true by fine margins, we substitute rules of conduct for ideas of integrity, we value safety above romance, we become, quite unconsciously, pragmatic. It is left to the few to be persistently concerned with the nuances of relationships—and ...
— The Beautiful and Damned • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... to an impulsive decision. We couldn't leave Jimmie to his fate. The men were ready to give up the fight if the thing could be put to them right. The time to strike was now, in the absence of Bothwell, while they were out of heart at ...
— The Pirate of Panama - A Tale of the Fight for Buried Treasure • William MacLeod Raine
... "insincerity." Well, perhaps some of the impulses of sincerity are better held in check; they are too closely allied to the humoring of our cherished prejudices. If "tact consists in knowing what not to say," etiquette consists in knowing what not to do in the direction of manifesting our impulsive likes and dislikes. ...
— Etiquette • Agnes H. Morton
... a little impulsive, dear, at times, although you seem so thoughtful," Lady Conyers continued. "Don't rush at any conclusion about these two men. Sometimes I have fancied that there is a great well of feeling behind Hugh's silence. And more than that—that there is something in ...
— The Kingdom of the Blind • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... solution would have denied the purpose of all his life. So he looked about him and discovered amongst his friends a man whose character he knew well, a man idealistic and foolish and romantic, like yourself, Ivan Andreievitch, only caring more for ideas, more impulsive and more reckless. He found this man and made him his friend. He played with him as a cat does with a mouse. He enjoyed life for about a year and then ...
— The Secret City • Hugh Walpole
... tall, sunburnt, soldierlike man of six or seven-and-thirty, powerfully built, and with that solidity of gesture and firmness of tread sometimes so marked with strong men. A mere glance at him showed he was a cold, silent, somewhat haughty man, not given to hasty resolves or in any way impulsive, and it is just possible that a long acquaintance with him would not have revealed a great deal more. He had served in a half-dozen regiments, and although all declared that Henry Lockwood was an honourable fellow, a good soldier, and thoroughly ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever
... natures, was frank and confiding. She was warm-hearted, impulsive, and quick to show gratitude. After the society of the Mowbrays, she found that of Little Dudleigh an inexpressible relief. What struck her most about him was his unvarying calmness. He must have some personal regard for her, she was sure, for on what other grounds would he come to see her so incessantly, ...
— The Living Link • James De Mille
... of evidence, or sentience, if you like, is combustible; we don't command the spark; it may be late in falling. And you argue in her favour. Consider her as a generous and impulsive girl, outwearied ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... to be calm, serene and collected. There are plenty who seem to be wild, impulsive creatures, driven on by sanguinary fury, while others disclose the vanity of the chorus girl, or a self- ...
— Youth and Egolatry • Pio Baroja
... at last, 'and answer me. Let me see that your morals are not yet utterly corrupt, and that you are still capable of listening to the voice of reason. Impulsive folly I can overlook, but stubborn obstinacy—never! My son...' there was a catch in his breath... 'Mihail Semyonitch has promised to marry you? Hasn't he? Answer ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... my dear, why? You are really too impulsive. Ezra has his faults, but what man has not? He has been a little wild in his youth, but he is settling down now into an excellent man of business. I assure you that, young as he is, there are few names more respected on 'Change. The way in which he managed the business of the firm in Africa was ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... her feet. Impulsive, loving and quick to act, she put her hands on Hester's shoulders and touched her lips warmly and affectionately. "But you have friends. I want to be one, Hester. You know I've always liked you and I'd love you if you'd give ...
— Hester's Counterpart - A Story of Boarding School Life • Jean K. Baird
... at the purser's office and helped himself to the register, finding the name of Romola Borria in full, impulsive handwriting, giving her address as Hong Kong, Victoria; and a long list of Dutch names, representing quite likely nothing more harmful than sugar and coffee men, with perhaps a sprinkling of ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... temperate in speech, and self-controlled. He is different, again, from the Frenchman of central France, who is almost purely Celtic. The meridional has a marked vein of the Italian in him, derived from the conquerors of ancient Gaul. He is impulsive, ardent, fiery in speech, hot-tempered, and ...
— Famous Affinities of History, Vol 1-4, Complete - The Romance of Devotion • Lyndon Orr
... was affectionate and impulsive, good-humored, with generous instincts and a quick temper; but she was also ambitious and exceptionally clever. She loved Greville warmly; but she took to heart the hard truths of his teachings, and they sank deep in a congenial soil. Under the ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... pale eyes. He wanted to cry—he—Bruce Burt! He fought the inclination furiously. It was too ridiculous—weak, sentimental, to be so sensitive to kindness. But he was so tired, so lonely, so disappointed. He touched Ma Snow's ginger-colored hair caressingly with his finger tips and the impulsive, boyish action made ...
— The Man from the Bitter Roots • Caroline Lockhart
... fell to the share of William Pitt, Earl of Chatham—may we not say that the community makes the brewer, and that if the brewer's stuff mars the community we have no business to howl at him. We are answerable for his living, and moving, and having his being—the few impulsive people who gird at him should rather turn in shame and try to make some impression on the huge, cringing, slavering crowd who make the plutocrat's ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman
... time, if you'll ask me. Not to-day," she said. And left rather precipitately. It hurt her, rather, to have Natalie, with an impulsive gesture, gather the flowers out of a great jar and insist on her carrying them home with her. It gave her a miserable sense of ...
— Dangerous Days • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... of his leg, contortions of his face, and the usual profanity. But when he returned to the party, he found them seated by a fire—for the air had grown strangely chill and the sky overcast—in apparently amicable conversation. Piney was actually talking in an impulsive, girlish fashion to the Duchess, who was listening with an interest and animation she had not shown for many days. The Innocent was holding forth, apparently with equal effect, to Mr. Oakhurst and Mother Shipton, who was actually relaxing into amiability. ...
— Short Stories Old and New • Selected and Edited by C. Alphonso Smith
... he will not be able to complete. Very likely there is not the remotest risk of any such shortage arising, but, in the excess of his anxiety, he buys too heavily, and at too high a price. His actions become impulsive rather than reasoned. It is true that in the perfectly balanced temperament action will follow on judgment so quickly that the two operations cannot be distinguished. Such decisions may appear to be precipitate ...
— Success (Second Edition) • Max Aitken Beaverbrook
... standing at the gate, and began his solitary walk back to Cacouna, he was almost as happy as she was. A kind of intoxication had swept away out of his very recollection the selfishness and policy of his habitual humour,—all that was youthful, generous, and impulsive in him had sprung suddenly to the surface, and so for the moment transformed him, that he was literally a different man to what he had ever been before. He pictured to himself the lovely bright face of the young girl as his daily companion—a Utopian vision of a small home where he was to be content ...
— A Canadian Heroine, Volume 1 - A Novel • Mrs. Harry Coghill
... step backward, then with an impulsive movement strode close up to him, his face unnaturally flushed and his eyes glittering with ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... distinguished for the strength of his conceptions, and for his resolute and persistent determination to apply himself only to great subjects, than for his skill in designing or for beauty in his colouring. His drawing is rarely good, his colouring frequently wretched. He was extremely impulsive and unequal; sometimes morose, sometimes sociable and urbane; jealous of his contemporaries, and yet capable of pronouncing a splendid ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various
... mood passed, and with his eyes on the star, his mouth settled into the lines of smiling patience which suffering brings to the brave. He had never been a coward and he was not one now. The years had taught him nothing if they had not taught him the wisdom most needed by his impulsive youth—that so long as there comes good to the meanest creature from fate's hardest blow, it is the part of a man to stand up and take it between the eyes. In the midst of his own despair, of the haunting memories of that bland period which was over for ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow
... out to the better end what is the good of it—where does it lead? Why should a man be tied to one woman when he has love enough for twenty? The pretty slender girl whom he chose as a partner in his impulsive youth may become a fat, coarse, red-faced female horror by the time he has attained to the full vigor of manhood—and yet, as long as she lives, the law insists that the full tide of passion shall flow always in one direction—always ...
— Vendetta - A Story of One Forgotten • Marie Corelli
... The Green Orchard (CASSELL), was too modern to have much acquaintance with the works of the late WILLIAM BLACK. Which was a pity, as a recollection of A Daughter of Heth might have withheld her from her impulsive marriage with Martin Wilderspin, or from feeling so much like a gold-fish out of water when he took her away from Paris to share a life that was a dreary contrast to all her previous experience. In any case I cannot hold her blameless for the resulting shipwreck. A bride who comes down late ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. CL, April 26, 1916 • Various
... Paris, was carried away by the French Revolution, and Muirhead suggests that the prime minister must have confounded father and son, but it seems unreasonable to suppose that he could have been so misled as to mistake the doings of the famous Watt in Birmingham for those of his impulsive son in France. ...
— James Watt • Andrew Carnegie
... continued to advance, the Nabob walking beside it, trying to open the accursed door which was stuck fast, and making signs to the engine-driver. The engine was not answering. "Stop, stop, there!" It did not stop. Losing patience, he jumped on to the velvet-covered step, and in that fiery, impulsive manner of his which had so delighted the old Bey, he cried, his woolly head at the door, ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... not a gallop. The Anura among the Amphibia are saltatory, but their leaps are usually single, or repeated only a few times, not sustained gallops. The exceptions among the Mammalia still more tend to prove the close correspondence between the 'impulsive' mode of progression and the dislocation of the male gonads. In the Monotremata there is no scrotum, the testes are in a position similar to that which obtains in Reptiles, and they are the only Mammals in which these organs are anterior to the kidneys. In locomotion they are sluggish, there is no ...
— Hormones and Heredity • J. T. Cunningham
... by nature the most impulsive woman I ever saw," he said, much amused, "and Eustaquia's lion is a kitten to the one that sleeps in you. You have cold deliberation enough, but it is manufactured, and the result of pretty hard work at that. Like all ...
— The Doomswoman - An Historical Romance of Old California • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... read a dozen times, and each time with tears and laughter as genuine and impulsive as at the ...
— Publisher's Advertising (1872) • Anonymous
... the years since what a real queen she was. Smiling, she extended her hand—but not to be touched. It was a little wave, a little imitation of my own impulsive outstretching to a friend; then her eyes went to the next person, and I was on my way, having been presented at court and done what "is not ...
— The Log-Cabin Lady, An Anonymous Autobiography • Unknown |
