"Might-have-been" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... so near causing a catastrophe was, I believe, infinitely more frightened than his might-have-been victims. He is a good-natured, stupid creature, and did not dare to descend the hill until some time after the excitement had subsided. The ludicrous expression of terror which his countenance wore when he came in to ...
— The Shirley Letters from California Mines in 1851-52 • Louise Amelia Knapp Smith Clappe
... for I have for many years attended to such experiments in various parts of Europe. "The Irish Quarterly" has taken up the subject with rather more zeal than judgment. I had hoped that a sound and temperate exposition of the facts might form an article in the "Might-have-been Review."' ...
— Lady Byron Vindicated • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... aspirants for Cairns' admiration had ranged themselves in his mind against the paragon, Beth Truba (with whom he had long comported himself with a rueful might-have-been manner, both pretty and pleasant). Beth had easily transcended. Whatever was great and desirable in woman was likely to wear a Beth Truba hall-mark for his observation. Now, that was changed, not that ...
— Fate Knocks at the Door - A Novel • Will Levington Comfort
... tender green And kindly Absinth, with its wimpling Sheen Of dusky half-lights, let me drown The haunting Pathos of the Might-Have-Been. ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... scented and slumbrous air, Strange thoughts are thronging; And a blind desire more fierce than fire Fills the soul with longing; Through the silence heavy and sweet Comes the panting breath Of a lover unseen from the Might-Have-Been, Whose ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... is no answer in this world to the Might-have-been; only silence and imagination, which, at ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile
... of the Queen, Is a dismal failure—is a Might-have-been. In a luckless moment he discovered men Rise to high position through a ready pen. Boanerges Blitzen argued therefore—"I, With the selfsame weapon, can attain as high." Only he did not possess when he made the trial, Wicked wit of ...
— Departmental Ditties and Barrack Room Ballads • Rudyard Kipling
... York in those days) would not have done me far more good of a certain kind than all the education I had till I left college in America. I am not here complaining, as most weak men do, as if they were specially victims to a wretched fate and a might-have-been-better. The vast majority of boys have not better homes or education, kinder parents, or advantages greater than mine were. But as I do not recall my boyhood's days or my youth till I left college with that joyousness ...
— Memoirs • Charles Godfrey Leland
... burning Might-have-been, No bitter after-taste, None to censure, none to screen, Nothing awry, nor anything misspent; Only content, content beyond content, Which hath ...
— Georgian Poetry 1916-17 • Various |
