"Symmetry" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... it might be said further that even if the bee-cells did conform to the laws of crystallization as in the case of snow, or Buffon's soap-bubbles, or boiled peas, they show also in their general symmetry, in their well-determined angle of inclination, etc., that there are many other laws not followed by inert matter ...
— A Book of Natural History - Young Folks' Library Volume XIV. • Various
... also two streams of water, pure as the finest crystal, which ran to the right and left of the tent within the distance of an hundred yards, and which, shaded by trees skirting either side of the lawn, completed the symmetry ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... were a need, to leap and bound. Verse was moulded by the feeling that inspired it; the melodies were like those of an Eolian harp, long-drawn or retracted as the wind swept or touched the strings. Symmetry was slighted; harmony was valued for its own sake and for its spiritual significance. Rich rhymes satisfied or surprised the ear, and the poet sometimes suffered through his curiosity as a virtuoso. By internal licences—the mobile cesura, ...
— A History of French Literature - Short Histories of the Literatures of the World: II. • Edward Dowden
... seems) the dwellings of the workmen and managers busy with the neighbouring Illahun pyramid.[6] But the settlement is very small, covering less than 20 acres; it is not in itself a real town and its plan has not the scheme or symmetry of a town-plan. For that we must turn to western Asia, ...
— Ancient Town-Planning • F. Haverfield
... as he prolongs his examination and inspection, the pyramids gain upon him, their impressiveness increases. By the vastness of their mass, by the impression of solidity and durability which they produce, partly also, perhaps, by the symmetry and harmony of their lines and their perfect simplicity and freedom from ornament, they convey to the beholder a sense of grandeur and majesty, they produce within him a feeling of astonishment ...
— Ancient Egypt • George Rawlinson
... who is possessed of blue curly locks, I will now play with thee. Possessed of eyes like the leaves of the autumn lotus, and fragrant also as the autumn lotus, equal in beauty unto her (Lakshmi) who delighteth in autumn lotuses, and unto Sree herself in symmetry and every grace she is such a woman as a man may desire for wife in respect of softness of heart, and wealth of beauty and of virtues. Possessed of every accomplishment and compassionate and sweet-speeched, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Part 2 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa
... straight-set eyes, with no hint of the slant often found among the Indians of the Amazon headwaters; and the cheek bones of all were fairly low. Their average stature was a little under six feet, and most of them had an athletic symmetry of physique. Their feet, McKay ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel
... alone; but the Hymenopteron nearly always fixes other domes against her first, to the number of five, six, or more. This shortens the labour by allowing her to use the same partition for two adjoining rooms. The original elegant symmetry is lost and the whole now forms a cluster which, at first sight, appears to be merely a clod of dry mud, sprinkled with tiny pebbles. But let us examine the shapeless mass more closely and we shall perceive the number of chambers composing the habitation with the funnelled ...
— The Wonders of Instinct • J. H. Fabre
... bed, which labor renders soft to them, and supply themselves with water-pot and lamp. Their drink is the clear fresh spring; their fare, bread, with onions as a relish. Every thing prospers in house and field. The house is no work of art, but an architect might learn symmetry from it. Care is taken of the field that it shall not be left disorderly, and waste or go to ruin through slovenliness or neglect; and, in return, grateful Ceres wards off damage from the produce, that the high-piled sheaves ...
— The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic • Arthur Gilman
... offer any useful criticism on what you have written about Darwin, because, although it does not quite please me, I cannot exactly say how I think it might be improved. My own way is to write and rewrite things, until by some sort of instinctive process they acquire the condensation and symmetry which satisfies me. And I really could not say how my original drafts are improved until they somehow ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 2 • Leonard Huxley
... I," said Madame Goesler. "One dash from a peccant oar would destroy the whole symmetry of my dress. Look. That green young lady ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... race, which the deluge of time has swept away, what, in that day, must have been their brilliant effect—unmutilated in their fair proportions—fresh in all their lineaments and hues? For their beauty was not limited to the symmetry of arch and column, nor their materials confined to the marbles of Pentelicus and Paros. Even the exterior of the temples glowed with the richest harmony of colours, and was decorated with the purest gold; an atmosphere peculiarly favourable both to the display and ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... state of factitious discontent which belongs to us amiable English. He was looking in vain for a lady equal in personal attraction to the idea he had formed of George Dolignan as a man, when suddenly there glided past him a most delightful vision—a lady whose beauty and symmetry took him by the eyes; another look: "It can't be! Yes, it is!" Miss Haythorn! (not that he knew her name), ...
— Stories by English Authors: England • Various
... and at some distance in front appeared the tall majestic keep, the lower rooms of which were in tolerable preservation, though the roof had fallen in to the second story, and the airy summit had lost its symmetry by the destruction of two entire sides. Short green turf covered the whole court, except where some mass of stone, more recently fallen than others, still stood out bare and gray; but a crop of brambles and nettles bristled up near the chapel, and ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various
... difference of dignity, for the high and low style in nature or in art. Michael Angelo's figures, we are told, are more than ordinarily grand; why, by the same rule, may not Raphael's be more than ordinarily beautiful, have more than ordinary softness, symmetry, and grace?—Character and expression are still less included in the present theory. All character is a departure from the common-place form; and Sir Joshua makes no scruple to declare that expression destroys ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... terms of symmetry. With a most amazing conceit they have decided upon the contours of their bodies as the standards of beauty. Therefore I am pleased to look at trees or at anything that grows, unhandicapped ...
— Fantazius Mallare - A Mysterious Oath • Ben Hecht
... which yields on reduction an aminobenzoic acid different from the starting-out acid. Therefore there must be another pair of hydrogen atoms, other than 2 and 6, which are symmetrical with respect to 1. The symmetry of the second pair was also established in 1878 by E. Wroblewsky ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 1 - "Chtelet" to "Chicago" • Various
... he was putting the finishing touches on a bandage that made up in bulk what it lacked in symmetry ...
— Abe and Mawruss - Being Further Adventures of Potash and Perlmutter • Montague Glass
... matters is fatal. They forget that a nose which varies slightly from the ideal line of beauty appropriate for noses, tending slightly towards becoming a hook or a snub, may still be of fair shape and not disagreeable to the eye, but if the excess be very great, all symmetry is lost, and the nose at last ceases to be a nose at all." This law of proportion holds good with regard to every ...
— The Cult of Incompetence • Emile Faguet
... that E mute can in no instance be assimilated to the accented E; but to suppress it entirely, is to break the symmetry of the verse, to put the measure out of time. It is unmistakable that the weakness of the vowel, or mute syllable, concerns the sound, not the duration. Let it die away gently; but for Heaven's sake, do not murder it! Voltaire wrote: "You reproach us with our E mute, as a sad, dull ...
— Delsarte System of Oratory • Various
... But Scott appeared, and effected a restoration of the balance in fiction. As Cervantes had introduced the democratic element into romances, so Scott replaced the aristocratic element, when it had disappeared, and only a prosaic, bourgeoisie fiction existed. He restored to romances the symmetry which we admire in "Don Quixote." The characteristic feature of Scott's historical romances, in the opinion of the great German critic, is the harmony between the ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... oval, and his skin dark but glowing; his hair, eyebrows, and long eyelashes black as jet; his gray eyes large and tender. He was dressed in black, with a white tie, and his clothes were well cut, and seemed superlatively so, owing to the importance and symmetry of the figure they covered. It was the new vicar, ...
— A Terrible Temptation - A Story of To-Day • Charles Reade
... (whom I have supposed an advocate for the lady, because I know that Lord M. has put thee upon using the interest he thinks thou hast in me, to persuade me to enter the pale; wilt thou not thyself) allow me to try if I cannot awaken the woman in her?—To try if she, with all that glowing symmetry of parts, and that full bloom of vernal graces, by which she attracts every eye, be really inflexible ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... literature becomes great. Failure at one end or the other will explain the failure of most of the work that seeks to be accounted literature. The literary value of a book cannot be determined by its style alone. It is possible to say nothing gracefully, even with dignity, symmetry, rhythm; but it is not possible to make literature without ideas. Abiding literature demands large ideas worthily expressed. Now, of course, "large" and "small" are not words that are usually applied ...
— The Greatest English Classic A Study of the King James Version of • Cleland Boyd McAfee
... the principles of arrangement, with brief comment on the periods of design which have most influenced printing. Treats of harmony, balance, proportion, and rhythm; motion; symmetry and variety; ornament, esthetic and symbolic. 37 illustrations; 46 review questions; ...
— Compound Words - Typographic Technical Series for Apprentices #36 • Frederick W. Hamilton
... of the Falls, beneath an aged pine, reclined a well- guarded, sorrowful, but haughty band. Their fine symmetry, noble height, and free carriage, were especially attractive. They were all young warriors, whose white paint presented emblems of peace: their plumes were from the beautiful white crane of the sunny forest, which designated the southern land ...
— Birch Bark Legends of Niagara • Owahyah
... little difficult to follow. Thus, one was of "Jackson's patent enema machines, as patronised by the nobility (either sex) when travelling"; another of "Mrs. Rodd's anatomical ladies' stays (which ensure the wearer a figure of astonishing symmetry";) and another of a "Brilliant burlesque ballad, 'Get along, Rosey,' sung with the most positive triumph every ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... of man's puny reason clothed with such authority that it dares to answer his heart, which knows nothing but that it bleeds? The terrible facts of the case may be read in two ways. With an inscrutable symmetry these facts may and do fit in with the universal theory of the power of the spirit-world to execute a curse from the grave. Look at that beggar in the street! How dare you ignore the theory of the sorrowing soul, the logic of ...
— Aylwin • Theodore Watts-Dunton
... painless development during childhood or adolescence of a number of tumours or irregular projections of bone, at the ends of the long bones, the vertebral border of the scapula, and the cristal border of the ilium. They exhibit a rough symmetry; they rarely attain any size; and they usually cease growing when the skeleton attains maturity—the conversion of cartilage into bone being then completed. While they originate from the ossifying junctions of the long bones, they tend, as the shaft increases in length, to project from the surface ...
— Manual of Surgery - Volume First: General Surgery. Sixth Edition. • Alexis Thomson and Alexander Miles
... long line on the library floor. They seemed to consist of little ridges of dirt on either side of a series of regular round spots, some of the spots very clear and distinct on the sides, others quite obscure in the centre. Now and then where you would expect to see one of the spots, just for the symmetry of the thing, it was missing. As I looked at the line of photographs on the floor I saw that they were a photograph of the track made by the tire of an automobile, and I suddenly recalled what ...
— The Silent Bullet • Arthur B. Reeve
... of the palace is the Banqueting-House of Inigo Jones, from which Charles I. passed to execution. Built in the dawn of the style of Wren, it is one of the most grandiose examples of that style, and is perfect alike in symmetry and proportion. That it has no entrance apparent at first sight is due to the fact that it was only intended as a portion of a larger building. In the same way we must remember that the appearance of two stories externally, while the whole is one room, is due to the Banqueting-House ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume I. - Great Britain and Ireland • Various
... indicated above. Waiving all discussion upon this interesting point, the fact is here faithfully chronicled that the Doctor stood up. Looking neither to the right nor to the left, but standing majestically in the middle of the room, and presenting in some of its characteristics the beauty and symmetry of an inverted L, the Doctor began, "S-h-o-o-g ——" whereupon the little schoolmaster burst into loud laughing. Solemnly warning him against the repetition of such conduct, the arbiter reminded him that such manifestations in the very ...
— Something of Men I Have Known - With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective • Adlai E. Stevenson
... setter page 90.), who is generally cautious in his statements, says that the greyhound within the last fifty years, that is before the commencement of the present century, "assumed a somewhat different character from that which he once possessed. He is now distinguished by a beautiful symmetry of form, of which he could not once boast, and he has even superior speed to that which he formerly exhibited. He is no longer used to struggle with deer, but contends with his fellows over a shorter and speedier course." An able writer (1/84. In the 'Encyclop. of Rural Sports' ...
— The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication - Volume I • Charles Darwin
... brunt of the weather, till it looked like some venerable tree trunk set down at the entrance of the alley, so riven it was with seams and cracks of all sorts and sizes. The house front, built of brick and stone, with no pretensions to symmetry, seemed to be bending beneath the weight of a worm-eaten roof covered with the curved pantiles in common use in the South of France. The decrepit casements were fitted with the heavy, unwieldy shutters necessary in that climate, ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... looked at her profile, at her drooping lashes, at her hands lying on her knees; and in his pagan head the idea began to hatch with difficulty that at the side of naked beauty, confident, and proud of Greek and Roman symmetry, there is another in the world, new, immensely pure, in which a ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... build, with a thin face and a finely shaped head. Her limbs were perfect in symmetry. As a girl, doubtless she had claim to a delicate beauty. She now showed the wear and tear of her mountain experience, coupled with an accumulation of heart-breaking trouble. She gave prodigally of all her gifts. She interpreted life and its arts to all discerning pupils, and ...
— The Shirley Letters from California Mines in 1851-52 • Louise Amelia Knapp Smith Clappe
... last piece of his art: it is connected with many things which I must bring before you when we enter on the study of architecture. That study we shall begin at the foot of the Baptistery of Florence, which, of all buildings known to me, unites the most perfect symmetry with the quaintest [Greek: poikilia]. Then, from the tomb of your own Edward the Confessor, to the farthest shrine of the opposite Arabian and Indian world, I must show you how the glittering and iridescent ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... regarded the stern. The other four—there were six in all—were lashed lengthwise along the sides,—two of them opposite each other on the larboard and starboard bows, while the other two respectively represented the "quarters." By this arrangement a certain symmetry was obtained; and when the structure was complete, it really looked like a craft intended for navigation, and by Ben Brace,—its chief architect,—it ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... expression of every passion by a greater or less suffusion of colour in the one, preferable to that eternal monotony, that immovable veil of black, which covers all the emotions of the other race? Add to these, flowing hair, a more elegant symmetry of form, their own judgment in favour of the whites, declared by their preference to them, as uniformly as is the preference of the oroonowtang for the black women over those of his own species? The circumstance of superiour beauty ...
— Travels in the United States of America • William Priest
... was a symmetry and elegance, as well as strength and agility, in the person of Jacob Hall, which was much admired by the ladies, who regarded him as a due composition of Hercules and Adonis. The open-hearted Duchess of Cleveland was said ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... several countries, attended, teased, and kissed. Both physically and mentally, she was very fine-wrought. Her bones were small; her body and limbs were slender, but beautifully fashioned. She was supple and vigorous. Grace is a product of brain as well as an effect of bodily symmetry: Grace had the quality on both counts. She answered to one's conception of Mahomet's houris, assuming that the conception is not of a fat person. Her head was small, but well proportioned,—compact ...
— The Golden Fleece • Julian Hawthorne
... balanced mind, it is the hair and complexion, and, above all, those remarkable eyes,—deep-searching, seen and seeing from afar,—that reveal the passions of the father in their heights and depths of power. The form is taller than either that of the elder Booth or Kean, lithe, and disposed in symmetry; with broad shoulders, slender hips, and comely tapering limbs, all supple, and knit together with harmonious grace. We have mentioned personal fitness as a chief badge of the actor's peerage, and it is of one of the born nobility that we have ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 103, May, 1866 • Various
... the rest of the earl's household. Despairing of success, he was preparing to change his station, when he heard a sound among the dry leaves, and the next moment a beautiful young creature passed the bush behind which he was concealed. The fine symmetry of her profile assured him that she must be the daughter of Lady Tinemouth. She stooped to gather a china-aster. Knowing that no time should be lost, Pembroke gently emerged from his recess, but not in so quiet a manner as to escape the ear of Lady Albina, who instantly looking round, screamed, ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... mean depriving families and friends of sorely needed money, and the direct and indirect consequences are sometimes small and sometimes very great. These can be readily imagined. If instead of fines a prison sentence is given, a sort of decimal system has been worked out by chance or laziness or symmetry of figures; certainly it has been done wholly regardless of science, for there is no chance to apply science when it comes to degrading men and taking away a portion of their lives. Generally ten days is the shortest. From this the court ...
— Crime: Its Cause and Treatment • Clarence Darrow
... mistakes they added wilder though less important confusions or inventions of their own. The result of all this, by the tenth century A.D., was a geography, based not on knowledge, but on ideas of symmetry. It was a scheme fit for ...
— Prince Henry the Navigator, the Hero of Portugal and of Modern Discovery, 1394-1460 A.D. • C. Raymond Beazley
... the accepted meaning of beauty may be if it was not there under my eyes. Flawless as palest amber ivory and rose, the smooth-flowing contours melted into exquisite symmetry; lashes like darkest velvet rested on the pure curve of the cheeks; the closed lids, the mouth still faintly stained with color, the delicate nose, the full, childish lips, sensitive, sweet, resting softly upon each other—if these were not all ...
— The Tracer of Lost Persons • Robert W. Chambers
... saloon. "This house," says Mr. Walpole, "the idea of which is borrowed from a well-known villa of Palladio, and is a model of taste, though not without faults, some of which are occasioned by too strict adherence to rules and symmetry. Such are too many corresponding doors in spaces so contracted; chimneys between windows, and, which is worse, windows between chimneys; and vestibules however beautiful, yet little secured from the damps of this climate. The ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, - Issue 269, August 18, 1827 • Various
... favourable, it grows harmoniously in all directions,—upward, outward, and all around. In other words, it is growing as a whole, growing, as it ought to grow, through every fibre of its being, and yet maintaining a perfect symmetry of form and the harmony of true proportion ...
— What Is and What Might Be - A Study of Education in General and Elementary Education in Particular • Edmond Holmes
... of balance, and a profusion of ornament in the way of scrolls, garlands, shells, the acanthus, anthemion, etc. The moldings were wide and sometimes a torus of laurel leaves was used, but in spite of the great amount of ornament lavished on everything, there is the feeling of balance and symmetry and strength that ...
— Furnishing the Home of Good Taste • Lucy Abbot Throop
... its ponderings, was led to contradict. For the notion of a huge mechanism like the celestial sphere, spinning round the terraqueous globe as its pivot looked unreasonable. To explain it in any way on mathematical principles needed a most complicated array of cycles and epicycles. Symmetry and simplicity were wanting in the theory. A priori objections started up against it. If the senses pointed to the earth as a centre, reason pointed to a centre elsewhere. Copernicus studied the ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 3 of 8 • Various
... lives. The institutions of policy, the goods of fortune, the gifts of Providence, are handed down to us, and from us, in the same course and order. Our political system is placed in a just correspondence and symmetry with the order of the world, and with the mode of existence decreed to a permanent body composed of transitory parts; wherein, by the disposition of a stupendous wisdom, moulding together the great mysterious incorporation of the human race, the whole, at one time, is never old, or middle-aged, ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke
... at dinner opposite an old lady who had the remains of striking beauty. I remember how much she interested me. Her hair was false, her teeth were false, her complexion was shrivelled, her form had lost the round symmetry of earlier years, and was angular and stiff; yet how cheerful and lively she was! She had gone far down-hill physically; but either she did not feel her decadence, or she had grown quite reconciled to it. Her daughter, a blooming matron, was ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd
... imitation windows in similar circular spaces on the south front of the Palace—imitations which are frankly hideous. The spaces would look far better if filled with plain brick or stone. Perhaps some of these spaces being occupied with practical windows, it was thought necessary for the sake of symmetry to make the rest appear such to the casual glance. Around the Fountain Court—along the north cloister of which the public way passes to the gardens—are entrances to various apartments allotted to private residents. On the east side flights of steps go ...
— Hampton Court • Walter Jerrold
... it is not too much to say that nothing could be added to render more perfect the illusion. The whole pose—her aspect, the contour of her head, the exquisite turn of the stately throat, the faultless symmetry of shoulder and arms—everything is in keeping with the realization of the most perfect, most beautiful, and most illusive figure that has ever been witnessed on the stage. Miss Anderson indeed is liberally endowed with physical charms, so fascinating that we can understand an ...
— Mary Anderson • J. M. Farrar
... well mounted. They were out upon an expedition against the Pawnee[15] Loups, and they behaved to us with the greatest kindness and hospitality. The chief knew Gabriel, and invited us to go in company with them to their place of encampment. The chief was a tall, fine fellow, and with beautiful symmetry of figure. He spoke Spanish well, and the conversation was carried on in that tongue until the evening, when I addressed him in Shoshone, which beautiful dialect is common to the Comanches, Apaches, and Arrapahoes, and related to him the circumstances ...
— Monsieur Violet • Frederick Marryat
... scarcely observed this boy at all. But when the pause came, I noticed him. I noticed him for many reasons. He was tall for his age, slender, and of extremely delicate make, but with limbs of a symmetry and beauty that reminded one of a fine antique statue. His face, too, was extremely beautiful; and there was something in his large, thoughtful, melancholy eyes, that it was impossible ever to look upon ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various
... her a child. He found her a beautiful woman. What transformation is so magical, so charming, as this? To see the uncertain lines of-youth rounded into firmness and symmetry, to discover the half-ripe, merry, changing face of the girl matured into perfect loveliness, and looking at you with calm, clear, serious eyes, not forgetting the past, but fully conscious of the changed present—this is to behold a ...
— The Lost Word - A Christmas Legend of Long Ago • Henry Van Dyke
... fellow-workers in the scheme; and they had a sympathetic sister-in-law disengaged. Fate therefore seemed to designate her for Coleridge and with the personal attraction which she no doubt exerted over him there may well have mingled a dash of that mysterious passion for symmetry which prompts a man to "complete the set." After all, too, it must be remembered that, though Mrs. Coleridge did not permanently retain her hold upon her husband's affections, she got considerably the better ...
— English Men of Letters: Coleridge • H. D. Traill
... in all, as a friend, as a gentleman, as a Christian, as a citizen, I never knew a man so thoroughly delightful as Dr. Heugh. Others had more of this or more of that, but there was a symmetry, a compactness, a sweetness, a true delightfulness about him I can remember in no one else. No man, with so much temptation to be heady and high-minded, sarcastic, and managing, from his overflowing ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown
... that, when completed, his House was lacking in Symmetry and Utility, and in a Hundred ways it was Unsatisfactory, and for each Defect there was a Neighbor who said, "Had you asked Me, I would have Warned you against ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume II. (of X.) • Various
... and tobogganing in winter, they never lacked for fun. Frank was expert in all these sports. Some of the boys might excel him at one or another of them, but not one of his companions could beat him in an all-round contest. This was due in part to the strength and symmetry of his frame, and in part to that spirit of thoroughness which characterized all he undertook. There was nothing half-way about him. He put his whole soul into everything that interested him, and, so far as play was concerned, at fifteen years of age he ...
— The Young Woodsman - Life in the Forests of Canada • J. McDonald Oxley
... lines of least resistance, wherefore many a fine tree or fruit is rare to us, because shy or difficult of growth, or perhaps unsymmetrical. The fine Rhode Island Greening apple is unpopular because the young tree is crooked, while the leather-skinned and punk-fleshed Ben Davis is a model of symmetry and rapidity of growth. Our glorious tulip tree of the woods, because of its relative difficulty in transplanting, has had to be insisted upon from the nurserymen by those who know its superb beauty. For the same reason this small charming maple, with the large, soft, comfortable leaves ...
— Getting Acquainted with the Trees • J. Horace McFarland
... accomplished musician play Beethoven, Bach, or Chopin in his—the commonplace one's—drawing-room, and who says in agony, "Very fine! Very deep! Very profound—profound indeed, sir! Full of breadth and symmetry and that sort of thing! Now do you think we might vary that noble masterpiece with a waltz?" Can we blame the poor fellow? Wagner represents a noise to him, and the awful scorn and despair of the first movement in ...
— Side Lights • James Runciman
... corresponds singularly with the portrait of him in the preface to the Royal and Noble Authors. He has a sort of tippet of ermine doubled about his neck, which seems calculated to disguise some want of symmetry thereabouts. I have given two prints(51) of this drawing, which is on large folio paper, that it may lead to a discovery of the original, if ...
— Historic Doubts on the Life and Reign of King Richard the Third • Horace Walpole
... certain affluence was noticeable in garden plots, and with Louis XV an even more notable symmetry was apparent in the disposition of the general outlines. By this time, the garden in France had become a frame which set off the architectural charms of the dwelling rather than remaining a mere accessory, but it was only with the replacing of the castle-fortress by the more domesticated ...
— Royal Palaces and Parks of France • Milburg Francisco Mansfield
... jetty hair, curled loosely on his head, Fell down upon his shoulders glistening white, The rounded symmetry of breast and limb, And the rich color of his sensuous lips Almost belied the down upon his cheek. No uncouth garments hid his perfect form, Nor marred its grace, but, naked like the gods, The ruddy sunlight bathed him in ...
— A Williams Anthology - A Collection of the Verse and Prose of Williams College, 1798-1910 • Compiled by Edwin Partridge Lehman and Julian Park
... masculine sentiments. "All our ARTS are employed to gain and keep the heart of man:"—and what is the inference?—if her person, and was there ever a person, though formed with Medicisan symmetry, that was not slighted? be neglected, she will make herself amends by endeavouring to please other men. Noble morality! But thus is the understanding of the whole sex affronted, and their virtue deprived of the common basis of virtue. A woman must know, that her person cannot be as pleasing ...
— A Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Title: Vindication of the Rights of Women • Mary Wollstonecraft [Godwin]
... necks, straight noses, short, curled lips, firm chins, deep chests, light flanks, large muscles, small joints, were finer than anything we ever see. It may well be questioned whether the human shape will ever present itself again in a race of such perfect symmetry. But the life of the youthful Greek was local, not planetary, like that of the young American. He had a string of legends, in place of our Gospels. He had no printed books, no newspaper, no steam caravans, no forks, no soap, none of the thousand cheap conveniences ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... looking her best, a woman is a dangerous animal; but throw her in contact with another of her sex who is but poorly clad, socially beneath her, and in training her inferior, and you may behold all the grace, all the symmetry of the cobra as it unwinds its beautiful, sinuous body before the ...
— Sally Bishop - A Romance • E. Temple Thurston
... a vivacious, early developed child had impressed itself upon Wolf's mind. Now he stood before a maiden in the full bloom of her charms, whose superb symmetry of figure surprised and stirred him to the depths of ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... phases of philosophy come from some want of normal brain-action. Following out the Darwinian theory,—supported as it seems to be by the facts,—one must believe that the human race as a whole is improving in bodily development; that the results of what we call civilization are, increase of symmetry in the growth of the human body, diminution of disease, greater perfection in the power of the senses, in short, a gradual progress toward a healthy body. Now, a healthy body brings with it a healthy mind. The two cannot be separated. Whatever brings the ...
— Bay State Monthly, Vol. I, No. 3, March, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... never corpulent, and, with the exception of the very old, they are seldom poor. During the period of a man's prime he is usually muscled to an excellent symmetry. His neck, never long, is well formed and strong and supports the head in erect position. His shoulders are broad, even, and full muscled, and with seeming ease carry transportation baskets laden with 75 to 100 pounds. His arms are smoothly developed and are ...
— The Bontoc Igorot • Albert Ernest Jenks
... testimony given by the Creator to its goodness? The word, even among us, refers the judgment to the eyes, incapable of raising itself to the idea that the senses have already received. But if beauty in bodies results from symmetry of parts and the harmonious appearance of colors how, in a simple and homogeneous essence like light, can this idea of beauty be preserved? Would not the symmetry in light be less shown in its parts than in the pleasure and delight at the sight ...
— The World's Great Sermons, Volume I - Basil to Calvin • Various
... him, she alone—her confidence in him, her high opinion of him, and—her love. Yes, her love. He looked upon her as she walked beside him, entrancing beyond words in her rich, warm beauty, a perfect dream of grace and symmetry. Even the hot sunlight seemed to linger, as with a kiss, upon the dark, brilliant loveliness of her eyes, on the soft curve of ...
— The Sign of the Spider • Bertram Mitford
... what right have these men to set up the idea of "utility" as the only standard to which the Creator must conform? How came they to know that God is a mere "utilitarian;" or, if they do not believe in God, that nature is a miserable "Benthamite?" Why may not the idea of beauty, of symmetry, of order, be a standard for the universe, as much as the idea of utility, or mere subordination to some practical end? May not conformity to one grand and comprehensive plan, sweeping over all nature, be ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker
... laughing with all the glee of a child; darting the piece of sugar about incessantly from place to place. Every moment, her head and neck assumed some new and lovely turn—every moment her figure naturally fell into the position which showed its pliant symmetry best. The last-left glow of the evening atmosphere was shining on her—the farewell pause of daylight over the kindred ...
— Basil • Wilkie Collins
... indicated opinion. His father was in everlasting torment—having been not only unbaptised, but godless and a scoffer. With a quickening sense of the majesty of that Spirit infinitely good, a new apprehension of His plan's symmetry, he read the words meant to explain, to comfort him, silently indicated one day by the ...
— The Seeker • Harry Leon Wilson
... crossed with parallel streets in the English fashion. Nothing could be more simple, nothing less attractive. As the town grows, they lengthen the streets as we lengthen the trousers of a growing child, and thus the original symmetry is undisturbed. ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne
... Spanish alchemist by Hippolyte Schinner, an autograph of Lord Byron to Lady Caroline Lamb, framed in carved ebony, while, hanging opposite as a species of pendant, was a letter from Napoleon to Josephine. All these things were placed about without the slightest symmetry, but with almost imperceptible art. On the chimney-piece, of exquisitely carved oak, there was nothing except a strange, evidently Florentine, ivory statuette attributed to Michael Angelo, representing ...
— A Daughter of Eve • Honore de Balzac
... was the most beautiful brunette in the world; her eyes were large, lively, and sparkling; her looks sweet and modest; her nose was of a just proportion and without a fault; her mouth small, her lips of a vermilion red, and charmingly agreeable symmetry; in a word, all the features of her face were perfectly regular. It is not therefore surprising that Aladdin, who had never seen, and was a stranger to, so many charms, was dazzled. With all these perfections the Princess ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... looped up to enable her to walk with more freedom. She was accompanied by two female attendants, and about her sported a little hound decorated with bells, probably the small Italian hound of exquisite symmetry which was a parlor favorite and pet among the fashionable dames of ancient times. James closes his description by a burst ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving
... also called the three-thorned acacia, because the thorns consist of one long spine with two shorter ones projecting out of it, like little branches, near its base. This is said to display much of the elegance of the tropical acacia in the minute division and symmetry of its compound leaves. These are of a light and brilliant green and lie flat upon the branches, giving them a fan-like appearance such as ...
— Among the Trees at Elmridge • Ella Rodman Church
... than a being of earth;—it was the wife of Halloway. Her long fair hair was wild and streaming—her feet, and legs, and arms were naked—and one solitary and scanty garment displayed rather than concealed the symmetry of her delicate person. She flew to the fatal bridge, threw herself on the body of her bleeding husband, and imprinting her warm kisses on his bloody lips, for a moment or two presented the image of one whose reason has fled for ever. Suddenly she started from the earth; her face, her hands, ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson
... compound you are, Clara," I said, "and what perfect symmetry nature has given to you, ...
— The Harvest of Years • Martha Lewis Beckwith Ewell
... was a disciple of Leibnitz; great as a teacher rather than an inventor, who invested the system of his master slightly modified, with the precision of form which raised it to rivalry with the perfect symmetry of Spinoza's system. Adopting his master's two great canons of truth, the law of contradiction as regulative of thoughts, and the law of the sufficient reason as regulative of things,(664) he attempted in his theoretic philosophy to work out a ...
— History of Free Thought in Reference to The Christian Religion • Adam Storey Farrar
... special creation of his literary art, becomes in his hands, and by his masterly conduct of it, like a single living person; so comprehensive a sense does he bring to bear upon it of the slowly- developing physiognomy of the thing—its organic structure, its symmetry and expression—combining all the various, disparate subjects of The Republic, for example, into a manageable whole, so entirely that, looking back, one fancies this long dialogue of at least three hundred pages might ...
— Plato and Platonism • Walter Horatio Pater
... in the richest examples, of a human figure, half emergent out of a cup of leafage, as, for instance, in the small archway of the Campo San Zaccaria: while the crockets, as being at the side of the arch, and not so strictly connected with its balance and symmetry, appear to consider themselves at greater liberty even than the finials, and fling themselves, hither and thither, in the wildest contortions. Fig. 4. in Plate I, is the outline of one, carved in stone, from the later Gothic of St. Mark's; fig. 3. a crocket ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume III (of 3) • John Ruskin
... empires. You may find that hotel rising among the red blooms of the warm spring woods of Nebraska, or whitened with Canadian snows near the eternal noise of Niagara. And before touching on this solid and simple pattern itself, I may remark that the same system of symmetry runs through all the details of the interior. As one hotel is like another hotel, so one hotel floor is like another hotel floor. If the passage outside your bedroom door, or hallway as it is called, contains, let us say, a small table with a green vase and a stuffed flamingo, ...
— What I Saw in America • G. K. Chesterton
... feet gazing out into the world indifferent to spectators, indifferent even to the common sentiment of gracefulness. Her left hand clasped his right, and she supported herself on the floor with the other hand leaning away from him, to the destruction of conventional symmetry in the picture. None but a woman of consummate breeding dared have done as she did. It was not Southern suppleness that saved her from the charge of harsh audacity, but something of the kind of genius in her mood which has hurried the greater poets of ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... unbidden growths of nature do with a carefully clipped hedge; and to the spirit the contrast was about the same. The hedge is the more studiedly and obviously beautiful, but, ah! there is a kind of beauty and satisfaction in trees that one would not care to lose. There are symmetry and proportion in the sonnet, but to me there is something I would not exchange for them in the wild swing and balance of many free and unrhymed passages in Shakespeare; like the one, for instance, ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... although he made some degree of progress in classical attainments, and even in philosophy and mathematics, thus proving that natural ability was not wanting, he was far more successful in attaining mere accomplishments, which add a powerful charm to comeliness and symmetry than in mastering more solid studies. He became an adept in fencing, in riding, in drawing, and also in music; and acquired the distinctive and comprehensive designation, of being "a ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume III. • Mrs. Thomson
... fair arm, of loveliest symmetry, Supports the fairer brow in thought reclining, While gleams with diamond fires thy poniard nigh In quick ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848 • Various
... of one or two hundred houses arranged without symmetry, or rather grouped together in complete defiance of it. These houses are constructed (as I have before said) of posts driven in the ground, covered with long dry grass, and walled with matting; the thatched roof gives them ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to the Northwest Coast of America in the years 1811, 1812, 1813, and 1814 or the First American Settlement on the Pacific • Gabriel Franchere
... series of questions (unfortunately not yet answered) contained in the 'Notes and Queries.' This island is entirely surrounded by the ocean, which here contains a large amount of saline substance, crystallizing in cubes remarkable for their symmetry, and frequently displays on its surface, during calm weather, the rainbow tints of the celebrated South Sea bubbles. The summers are oppressively hot, and the winters very probably cold; but this fact cannot be ascertained precisely, ...
— Little Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor - Volume I • Various
... of the spheres; for those well-ordered motions and regular paces, though they give no sound unto the ear, yet to the understanding they strike a note most full of harmony. Whatsoever is harmonically composed, delights in harmony, which makes me much distrust the symmetry of those heads which declaim against all church music. For myself, not only from my obedience, but my particular genius, I do embrace it: for even that vulgar and tavern music, which makes one man merry, another mad, strikes in me ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... exhibits, we may infer that the civilized man has also a more complex or heterogeneous nervous system than the uncivilized man: and, indeed, the fact is in part visible in the increased ratio which his cerebrum bears to the subjacent ganglia, as well as in the wider departure from symmetry in its convolutions. If further elucidation be needed, we may find it in every nursery. The infant European has sundry marked points of resemblance to the lower human races; as in the flatness of the alae of the nose, the depression of its bridge, the divergence and forward ...
— Essays: Scientific, Political, & Speculative, Vol. I • Herbert Spencer
... a seat of honour next to Soranho, and my two friends were close by. On looking round the hall, and scanning the features of the different individuals present, I was much impressed by the fact that the same regularity, beauty, and symmetry was apparent in all; not one face could be termed "plain," or gave any impression of self-indulgence or sensuality; whilst the soft glowing light in their eyes produced a most indescribable and charming effect upon the ...
— To Mars via The Moon - An Astronomical Story • Mark Wicks
... Tithonus Symmetry and Incident The Plaid The Flower Unstable Equilibrium Victorian Caricature The Point ...
— Essays • Alice Meynell
... suddenly and silently that it seemed as if he had taken instant shape in the moonlight—appeared a gigantic moose, standing in the meadow, his head held high, his nostrils sniffing arrogant inquiry. The broadly-palmated antlers crowning his mighty head were of a spread and symmetry such as Jabe had ...
— The House in the Water - A Book of Animal Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... Symmetry of form is a rare and exquisite gift, but there are other conditions quite as indispensable to beauty. Let a woman possess but a very moderate share of personal charms, if her countenance is expressive of intellect and kind feelings, her figure buoyant with health, and her attire distinguished ...
— The Jewish Manual • Judith Cohen Montefiore
... cathedrals are to be seen to-day in their completely perfected forms. To what extent would not the glories of Reims, of Amiens, of Beauvais, or of Rouen, be enhanced, were it possible for us to even imagine their splendour, were they possessed of the symmetry and well-favoured situation of the Dom at Cologne? And so it is that we can but feel regret when we mentally note the lack of nave at Beauvais, of spires at Bourges, and, yet again, regret even with more pain the monstrousness of the cast-iron fleche which has been added to the central tower at ...
— The Cathedrals of Northern France • Francis Miltoun
... regular in form that they were puzzling. About fifty feet across and ten in altitude, they looked artificial in their symmetry—like great saucers set on the ocean floor bottom side up. They took on a dirty black hue as our light struck them, and glowed with a faint phosphorescence as they stretched away ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science September 1930 • Various
... those whom he wished to benefit; on the contrary, he exaggerates the passivity and plasticity of men and circumstances, and dreams that his model legislator, who apparently is to initiate the new society, will be able to repress all anti-social feelings. He aims at order and symmetry, oblivious that human nature does not easily and rapidly bend to such treatment. It is his inability to discover the true mode of investigation that accounts for much of Rousseau's sophistry. His truisms and verbal propositions, his dogmatic assertions and unreal demonstrations, ...
— The Rise of the Democracy • Joseph Clayton
... in point, particularly Biblical incidents, such as the Expulsion from Paradise, wherein appear undraped figures. Here are seen to advantage the generic form, the typical beauty, the harmony of line, the symmetry, which distinguish the Classic from the Gothic. Furthermore, Overbeck from first to last eschewed the dress actually worn in the Holy Land, and deliberately draped Christ and the Apostles as Greek sages and Roman senators. I believe in so doing he was on the ...
— Overbeck • J. Beavington Atkinson
... in Ireland received a present of a beautiful black setter puppy, from an unknown hand. He bred and cherished him, and the memory of Black York is still fresh in his country; not only for his perfect symmetry, his silky, raven black hair, but for his gentle, submissive disposition. He was a nervous dog when young, for even a loud word alarmed him, which, combined with his mysterious arrival, and an involuntary affection, induced his master to transfer ...
— Anecdotes of the Habits and Instinct of Animals • R. Lee
... gone back to his village. The other, with one of the Frenchmen, went towards the smoke, and found a camp of Indians, whom the journal calls Les Beaux Hommes, and who were probably Crows, or Apsaroka, a tribe remarkable for stature and symmetry, who long claimed that region as their own. They treated the visitors well, and sent for the other Frenchmen to come to their lodges, where they were received with great rejoicing. The remaining Mandan, however, became frightened,—for the Beaux Hommes ...
— A Half-Century of Conflict, Volume II • Francis Parkman
... who have not seen Eliza Hadwin, cannot conceive what effect this entreaty was adapted to produce in me. She has surely the sweetest voice, the most speaking features, and most delicate symmetry, that ever woman possessed. Her guileless simplicity and tenderness made her more enchanting. To be the object of devotion to a heart so fervent and pure was, surely, no common privilege. Thus did she tender me herself; and ...
— Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 • Charles Brockden Brown
... you. You have to choose between the intact body which is stationary and the broken and projected bodies which are in movement. That is why we destroy or suppress symmetry in the figure and in design. Because symmetry is perfect balance which is immobility. If I wanted to present perfect rest I should do it by an ...
— The Tree of Heaven • May Sinclair
... are so fine that he may be said to be a model of symmetry in ornithology. On each wing he has a bright yellow spot, and his rump, belly and half the tail are of the same colour. All the rest of the body is black. His beak is the colour of sulphur, but it fades in death, and requires the same operation as the bill ...
— Wanderings In South America • Charles Waterton
... until it became mingled with the architecture propagated from Rome, as the Christian community which worshipped within the buildings became absorbed in the hierarchy. The Oratory of Galerus, in Kerry, is a piece of solid, well-conditioned masonry, built after a plan of no mean symmetry and proportion, yet with scarcely a feature in common with the early Christian churches of the rest of Europe. Like the ruder specimens, it struggles for as much solidity and spaciousness as it can obtain in stonework without the help of the arch, and it makes a good deal out of the old Egyptian ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... obvious, however, that if we give up the principle in one case,—if we do not admit that the variations of the primeval dog were intentionally guided in order that the greyhound, for instance, that perfect image of symmetry and vigor, might be formed,—no shadow of reason can be assigned for the belief that variations similar in nature and the result of the same general laws which have been the groundwork through natural selection of the formation of the most perfectly adapted ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIV • John Lord
... six, the second of eleven, and the third of thirty-six. The height, comprehending the aqueduct on the top, amounts to 174 feet three inches: the length between the two mountains, which it unites, extends to 723. The order of architecture is the Tuscan, but the symmetry of it is inconceivable. By scooping the bases of the pilasters, of the second tire of arches, they had made a passage for foot-travellers: but though the antients far excelled us in beauty, they certainly fell short of the moderns in point of conveniency. The citizens of Avignon ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett
... house all symmetry within, The worshippers all white and clean; How lustrous is the scene, and rare! It must be so—'The Lord ...
— Religion in Earnest - A Memorial of Mrs. Mary Lyth, of York • John Lyth
... ardent female suffragist deems it to be. Not only will it not do any of the things which she imagines it is going to do, but it will leave the world exactly where it is. Still—the concession of votes to women is desirable from the point of view of symmetry of classification; and it will soothe the ruffled feelings of quite a number ...
— The Unexpurgated Case Against Woman Suffrage • Almroth E. Wright
... Greek in its readiness, its symmetry, and its point! But it was not the intellectual merit of the answer that pleased the Master. Cleverness is cheap. It is the faith he praises, [Footnote 5: Far more precious than any show of the intellect, even ...
— Miracles of Our Lord • George MacDonald
... Ch'ien-lung of the present dynasty. This was done in compliance with a memorial from the president of one of the Boards, who said he was moved by a dream to make the request. We may suppose that his real motives were a wish to do Justice to the merits of Tsze-zo, and to restore the symmetry of the tablets in the 'Hall of the Great and Complete One,' which had been disturbed by the introduction of the tablet of Chu Hsi in the preceding reign. 28. Kung-hsi Ch'ih, styled Tsze-hwa (公西赤, 字子華), a native of Lu, younger than Confucius ...
— THE CHINESE CLASSICS (PROLEGOMENA) Unicode Version • James Legge
... hints on some Errors in Reasoning. This addition may interfere with the symmetry of the book; but if it is found of use, the utility will be ample compensation. In reading literature, pupils are continually meeting instances of false reasoning, which, if passed over without comment, do harm, and, if commented upon, require some little basis of knowledge in the pupil to enable ...
— How to Write Clearly - Rules and Exercises on English Composition • Edwin A. Abbott
... slippery stones on the beach; and, on perceiving one of the boats aground, several of them stript and jumped into the water to push her off. This gave us an opportunity of observing their remarkable symmetry and firmness of limb; yet, as their long hair was allowed to flow about their neck and shoulders, their appearance was truly savage. During this visit we saw no women; but the children came round us without shewing any ...
— Account of a Voyage of Discovery - to the West Coast of Corea, and the Great Loo-Choo Island • Captain Basil Hall
... great Murphy came— Common to fools and wits, the rage of fame. What though the sons of Nonsense hail him Sire, Auditor, Author, Manager, and Squire, 560 His restless soul's ambition stops not there; To make his triumphs perfect, dub him Player. In person tall, a figure form'd to please, If symmetry could charm deprived of ease; When motionless he stands, we all approve; What pity 'tis the thing was made to move. His voice, in one dull, deep, unvaried sound, Seems to break forth from caverns under ground; From hollow chest the low sepulchral note Unwilling heaves, and struggles in his ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill
... music—evidently one of the singers for La Muette de Portici at the theatre to-night. I turned back as I went away: the white Christ stood out in strong relief on his brown cross against the blue sky, and the four kneeling angels and lanterns grouped themselves about the foot with a symmetry that was almost laughable; the musician read on at his music, and counted time with his hand ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... and of look, the smooth And swimming majesty of step and tread, The symmetry of form and feature, set The soul afloat, even like delicious ...
— The Woman Beautiful - or, The Art of Beauty Culture • Helen Follett Stevans
... simple it is! How broad! How large! How grand in design! A strip of coast, a range of mountains, a plain, a second range, a second strip of coast! That is all! Contrast the complexity of Europe, its lack of symmetry, its variety, irregularity, disorder and caprice! The geography of the two continents already foreshadows the differences in their civilizations. On the one hand simplicity and size; on the other a hole-and-corner variety; there immense ...
— A Modern Symposium • G. Lowes Dickinson
... natural arrangement observed in flowers, leaves, etc. Of these different arrangements it is curious to note that the bilateral is more characteristic of the higher forms of nature and the radiating of the lower. The leading principles of ornament—symmetry, proportion, rhythm, contrast, unity, variety, repose, etc.—are all exemplified in natural forms. The latter have also suggested many of the most important architectural forms. The Gothic cathedral, with its clustered columns branching and forming ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 598, June 18, 1887 • Various
... land into right-angled sections, and the planting of the trees in straight lines, is so contrived as to favour the future supervision of the labourers much more than from any strict attention to mere symmetry. The distance of the trees from each other ought to be regulated by the quality of the soil, and the degrees of heat and shade they are to enjoy. The ranges from north to south are usually four yards apart, and those from east to west not more than three; but the lower ...
— The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom • P. L. Simmonds
... day before the blackboard and smearing figures on it with honey, I was struck with the thought, "Why is symmetry so agreeable to the eye? What is symmetry? Of course it is an innate sense," I continued; "yet what is its basis? Perhaps everything in life is symmetry? But no. On the contrary, this is life"—and I drew an oblong figure on the board—"and after life the soul passes to eternity"—here I drew ...
— Boyhood • Leo Tolstoy
... savages, speedily followed by others, amounting in all to twelve, besides their chief, who was in the advance, crossed the threshold, and, without uttering a word, either of anger or salutation, squatted themselves upon the floor. They were stout, athletic warriors, the perfect symmetry of whose persons could not be concealed even by the hideous war-paint with which they were thickly streaked—inspiring anything but confidence in the honesty or friendliness of their intentions. The head of each was ...
— Hardscrabble - The Fall of Chicago: A Tale of Indian Warfare • John Richardson
... least and lowliest, in the effusive warmth Of colours mingling with a random blaze, Doth Beauty dwell. Then higher in the line And variation of determined shape, 450 Where Truth's eternal measures mark the bound Of circle, cube, or sphere. The third ascent Unites this varied symmetry of parts With colour's bland allurement; as the pearl Shines in the concave of its azure bed, And painted shells indent their speckled wreath. Then more attractive rise the blooming forms Through which the breath of Nature has infused Her genial ...
— Poetical Works of Akenside - [Edited by George Gilfillan] • Mark Akenside
... succeeded perfectly. I was then a very active man, and I walked so fast that I left the Duchesse every day when our promenade ended bathed in a copious perspiration; which, aided by the medicine and sparing regime, soon restored her figure to its former symmetry. ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner
... of serious and fruitful thought. Especially valuable and helpful have we found his obiter dicta on the arts of painting, sculpture, and architecture; for example, when he says of the Tuscan palaces that "in their large dependence on pure symmetry for beauty of effect, [they] reproduce more than other modern styles the simple nobleness of Greek architecture." And we would note also what he says of the Albani Antinoues. It must be a nimble wit that can keep pace with Mr. James's logic in his aesthetic criticism. It is apt to spring airily over ...
— The Function Of The Poet And Other Essays • James Russell Lowell
... chairs, the question was set at rest the instant he was seen standing: he must have measured at least six feet two inches, though the extreme breadth of his chest and shoulders, and the graceful setting-on of his finely formed head, together with the perfect symmetry and proportion of his limbs, prevented his appearing too tall. He went through the ceremony of introduction with the greatest ease and self-possession; and though he infused rather more courtesy into his manner towards Mrs. Mildman than he had taken the trouble to bestow on us, his behaviour ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... not. Proceeding on the assumption that she had not, he lifted his eyes and searched the air. Was it possible that the book, though thrown from the window, had never reached the ground? The branches of an old and stalwart maple, now almost divested of leaves, extended in rough symmetry above him, and one big limb, reaching out toward the house, came close to Laura's windows. Triumph shown again from the shrewd countenance of the sleuth: Laura must have slid the ledger along a wire into a hollow branch. However, no wire was to be seen—and ...
— The Flirt • Booth Tarkington
... David Helmsley, sitting apart in the shadow, could not take his eyes off the gypsy's face and figure,—a kind of fascination impelled him to watch with strained attention the dark shape, moulded with such herculean symmetry, which seemed to command and subdue the very air that ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... deserve some consideration. It might have been anticipated, that deviations from the law of symmetry would not have been inherited. But Anderson[23] states that a rabbit produced in a litter a young animal having only one ear; and from this animal a breed was formed which steadily produced one-eared rabbits. He also mentions a bitch, with a single leg deficient, and she produced ...
— The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, Volume II (of 2) • Charles Darwin
... thus constructed according to the events are of unequal duration. We must not be troubled by this want of symmetry; a period ought not to be a fixed number of years, but the time occupied by a distinct phase of evolution. Now, evolution is not a regular movement; sometimes a long series of years passes without notable change, then come moments of rapid transformation. ...
— Introduction to the Study of History • Charles V. Langlois
... girl of fourteen. It often happens that fruits borne on the same stem are different in color and taste; so these two sisters were different in personal appearance and character. Nature seems to have presided in a special manner over the moulding of Aloysia's exquisite frame. The symmetry of her person, hand and foot of charming delicacy, azure eye and rosy cheek, garlanded with nature's golden tresses, and the sweet expression of innocence in her features, would suggest her at once as a model for one of Raphael's Madonnas. Her disposition, too, comported with ...
— Alvira: the Heroine of Vesuvius • A. J. O'Reilly
... would seem that citizens of Chinese extraction were no longer ashamed of their race. There was little uniformity of fashion apparent in the forms of clothing worn. The more shapely men displayed their symmetry in trunk hose, and here were puffs and slashes, and there a cloak and there a robe. The fashions of the days of Leo the Tenth were perhaps the prevailing influence, but the aesthetic conceptions ...
— The Sleeper Awakes - A Revised Edition of When the Sleeper Wakes • H.G. Wells
... both, and the details are largely filled out in the anthropoid apes, the convolutions being all present and the pattern of arrangement the same. The brain of the orang may be said to be like that of man in all respects except size and the greater symmetry of its convolutions, which are less complicated with minor convolutions than in man. In truth, the difference between the brains of man and the orang is almost insignificant as compared with the difference between those of the orang ...
— Man And His Ancestor - A Study In Evolution • Charles Morris
... whole it is one of the most magnificent in the world. It shows best from certain points of view—from the north, for instance, or from the network of narrow streets to the south. It may be contended that the central tower is not quite lofty enough compared with the two western towers for perfect symmetry of outline; that, seen from certain aspects, it is rather square and box-like in appearance; that from no point of view are the western towers satisfactory. But the minster produces its great effect by its enormous bulk and dignity, its vast length, the ...
— The Cathedral Church of York - Bell's Cathedrals: A Description of Its Fabric and A Brief - History of the Archi-Episcopal See • A. Clutton-Brock
... the gracefullest things That are borne thro' the light air by feet or by wings, Not a single new grace to that form could they teach, Which combines in itself the perfection of each; While, rapid or slow, as her fairy feet fall, The mute music of symmetry modulates all. ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... the uncertain hand she held out, and looked at her. The slim Rilla of four years ago had rounded out into symmetry. He had left a school girl, and he found a woman—a woman with wonderful eyes and a dented lip, and rose-bloom cheek—a woman altogether beautiful and desirable—the woman of ...
— Rilla of Ingleside • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... of a work in which the entire poetic, artistic, scientific, and social culture of the Greeks should be painted as one grand and harmonious whole, as a true work of nature, prevaded by the most wondrous symmetry and proportion of the parts, and traced through its connected development in the same spirit which Winkelmann has executed in the part which he attempted. An attempt has indeed been made in a popular work, which is in everybody's hands, I mean the Travels of the Younger ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... not even his dagger, which on other occasions he is never without. The only article of great value was his rosary, composed of large pearls (the produce of his fishery at Bahrein), of the most beautiful water and symmetry, and this he kept constantly ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier
... acquired. It is but opening the Eye, and the Scene enters. The Colours paint themselves on the Fancy, with very little Attention of Thought or Application of Mind in the Beholder. We are struck, we know not how, with the Symmetry of any thing we see, and immediately assent to the Beauty of an Object, without enquiring into the particular Causes and Occasions ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... their small, new drawing-room, where it was impossible to sit down anywhere without disturbing its symmetry, neatness, and order; so it was quite comprehensible and not strange that Berg, having generously offered to disturb the symmetry of an armchair or of the sofa for his dear guest, but being apparently painfully undecided on the matter himself, eventually left the visitor ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... encroachments; and lest that fabrick of power should be destroyed, which has been erected at such expense and with such labour; at which one generation has toiled after another, and of which the wisdom of the most experienced and penetrating statesmen have been employed to perfect its symmetry, and the industry of the most virtuous patriots ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson
... chosen; that the structure of the sentences should be correct and clear; and that, in the case of poetry, the laws of versification should be observed. These elements contribute to excellence of form. In addition to these external elements there should be unity of thought, symmetry of presentation, truth of statement, and sincerity and self-restraint in sentiment. These elements give substantial worth to the matter or content of literature. Besides all this there is a grace or elegance or force, proceeding from the personality ...
— Elementary Guide to Literary Criticism • F. V. N. Painter
... this beautiful relic, one is led almost instinctively to believe that it was used as a plummet, for the purpose of determining the perpendicular to the horizon [for building purposes?]; . . . when we consider its symmetry of form, the contrast of colors brought out by the process of grinding and polishing, and the delicate drilling of the hole through a material (syenite) so liable to fracture, we are free to say it affords an exhibition of the lapidary's ...
— Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel • Ignatius Donnelly
... capacious to a fault, and was only tolerated on account of the double row of pearls it contained. In person Caesar was short, and we should say square, had not all the angles and curves of his figure bid defiance to anything like mathematical symmetry. His arms were long and muscular, and terminated by two bony hands, that exhibited on one side a coloring of blackish gray, and on the other, a faded pink. But it was in his legs that nature had indulged her most capricious humor. There ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... Archie in the parlor, the symmetry of his face somewhat marred by the patch of plaster on his ...
— Teddy: Her Book - A Story of Sweet Sixteen • Anna Chapin Ray
... me as I write, a fragment, formerly clear rock-crystal, so completely fused that between crossed Nicols it behaves as if an amorphous body, save in the very center where a speck of flashing color reveals the remains of molecular symmetry. Bubbles have ...
— Scientific American Supplement, Vol. XXI., No. 531, March 6, 1886 • Various
... nest is usually some low bank by the roadside, near a wood. In a slight excavation, with a partially concealed entrance, the exquisite structure is placed. Horse and cow hair are plentifully used, imparting to the interior of the nest great symmetry and firmness ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... kept in vigour by constant exercise. His legs were somewhat bent, but not in a manner which could be said to approach to deformity, on the contrary, which seemed to correspond to the strength of his frame, though it injured in some degree its symmetry. ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... Benoit, the jolly French-Canadian cook. "Good for my healt. He's tak off my front porsch here." And the cook patted affectionately the little round paunch that marred the symmetry ...
— Corporal Cameron • Ralph Connor |
