"Timorous" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... rounded off in the first scene of the fourth act when she begs the Elector to liberate Homburg. She could have borne the death of the Prince, but this timorous misrepresentation of himself ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various
... her. She is meek, and soft, and maiden-like; but she is Friedland's daughter, and does not shrink from what is unavoidable. There is often a rectitude, and quick inflexibility of resolution about Thekla, which contrasts beautifully with her inexperience and timorous acuteness of feeling: on discovering her father's treason, she herself decides that Max 'shall obey his ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle
... hour of dusk and mist and midges, Now the tired planes drone homeward through the haze, And distant wood-fires wink behind the ridges, And the first flare some timorous Hun betrays; Now no shell circulates, but all men brood Over their evening food; The bats flit warily and owl and rat With muffled cries their shadowy loves pursue, And pleasant, Corporal, it is to chat In this hushed moment with ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Nov. 14, 1917 • Various
... harsh, ill-sounding names of oppression and avarice. Oppression is often the CONSEQUENCE, but seldom or never the MEANS of riches; and though avarice will preserve a man from being necessitously poor, it generally makes him too timorous to be wealthy. ...
— Common Sense • Thomas Paine
... forth from her strown bed in terror, with beating heart, in such clear vision had she beheld the dream. Then she sat upon her bed, and long was silent, still beholding the two women, albeit with waking eyes; and at last the maiden raised her timorous voice ...
— Theocritus, Bion and Moschus rendered into English Prose • Andrew Lang
... property of this prayer of the heart is to give a strong faith. Mine was without limits, as was also my resignation to God, and my confidence in Him—my love of His will, and of the order of His providence over me. I was very timorous before, but now feared nothing. It is in such a case that one feels the efficacy of these words, "My yoke is easy, and my ...
— The Autobiography of Madame Guyon • Jeanne Marie Bouvier de La Motte Guyon
... sleeves; all of which I believe as a Delphian oracle, and am resolved to burn in that faith." "He," says Lodovico, in "May-Day,"—he "that holds religious and sacred thought of a woman, he that holds so reverend a respect to her that he will not touch her but with a kist hand and a timorous heart, he that adores her like his goddess, let him be sure she will shun him like her slave.... Whereas nature made" women "but half fools, we make 'em all fool: and this is our palpable flattery of them, where they had rather have plain dealing." In all Chapman's ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 122, December, 1867 • Various
... country rose, took the scattered castles, and put their defenders to the sword. Gustav bore the rising on his shoulders from first to last. He was everywhere, ordering and leading. His fiery eloquence won over the timorous; his irresistible advance swept every obstacle aside. In May he took Upsala; by midsummer he was besieging Stockholm itself. Most of the other cities were in his hands. The Hanse towns had found out ...
— Hero Tales of the Far North • Jacob A. Riis
... stray fighting couldn't be, but they'd pick it up first; and if a man would venture to give them a contrary answer, he was sure to get the crame of a good welting for his pains. The very landlord was timorous of them; for when they'd get behind in their rint, hard fortune to the bailiff, or proctor, or steward, he could find, that would have anything to say to them. And the more wise they; for maybe, a month would hardly pass ...
— The Ned M'Keown Stories - Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of - William Carleton, Volume Three • William Carleton
... their locks of gold The strange cold forest-fairies dance in glee; Sylphs over-timorous and over-bold Haunt the dark hollows where the dwarf may be, The wild red dwarf, the nixies' enemy; Then, 'mid their mirth, and laughter, and affright, The sudden goddess enters, tall and white, With one long sigh for summers passed away; The swift feet tear ...
— Essays in Little • Andrew Lang
... carnival pageant, or "Triumph," of the Medici. Great golden cars, richly decorated, and drawn by curious beasts; horses dressed in the skins of lions and tigers and elephants; shaggy buffaloes and timorous giraffes from the Medicean villa at Careggi; fantastic monsters made up of mingled men and boys and horses, with other surprising figures as riders; dragons and dwarfs, giants and genii; beautiful young girls and boys dressed ...
— Historic Boys - Their Endeavours, Their Achievements, and Their Times • Elbridge Streeter Brooks
... squire, he still acted in the capacity of minister to the caprice and vengeance of his mother, taking all opportunities of disturbing Julia's peace, slandering her reputation, and committing outrages against the tenants and domestics of her husband, who was a man of quiet and timorous disposition. ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... means of gratifying their insatiable rapacity. The state of society is a state of war between the sovereign and all the rest of its members. In every country alike the morality of the people is wholly neglected, and the one care of the government is to render them timorous and wretched. The common man desires no more than bread; he wins it by the sweat of his brow; joyfully would he eat it, if the injustice of the government did not make it bitter in his mouth. By the insanity of governments, those who ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists - Volume II. • John Morley
... and their governess looked timorous, and as if they knew not where to cast their eyes for shamefacedness; but not so Mistress Clorinda, who moved forward with a stately, swimming gait, her fine head in the air. As she stepped into the ...
— A Lady of Quality • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... hollow; though his tongue Dropped manna, and could make the worse appear The better reason, to perplex and dash Maturest counsels: for his thoughts were low— To vice industrious, but to nobler deeds Timorous and slothful. Yet he pleased the ear, And with persuasive accent thus began:— "I should be much for open war, O Peers, As not behind in hate, if what was urged Main reason to persuade immediate war Did not dissuade me most, and seem to cast Ominous conjecture on the whole success; When he who ...
— Paradise Lost • John Milton
... Greeks honoured thee, indeed, above [others] with a seat, with meat, and full cups; but now will they dishonour thee; for thou hast become like a woman. Away! timorous girl! since thou shalt never climb our towers, I giving way, nor bear away our women in thy ships; first shall I give ...
— The Iliad of Homer (1873) • Homer
... card-playing. There was among many of the lower classes an insolent revolt against an established order of things that had not brought them prosperity, and tradesmen had felt the pinch of hard times severely. The influx of British gold was hailed with delight, and some timorous souls that had longed for the larger liberty, yet feared the Colonies could never win independence, went over to the other ...
— A Little Girl in Old Philadelphia • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... question all answer that the black is more timorous than the white, but is in a corresponding degree more docile and obedient, hence more completely under the control of his commander, and much more influenced by ...
— The Black Phalanx - African American soldiers in the War of Independence, the - War of 1812, and the Civil War • Joseph T. Wilson
... as though night hesitated to awaken her countless myrmidons. With the lisping of invisible leaves the Great Master's music-book unfolded. That low, orchestral "F"—the dominant note of all nature's melodies—sounded in timorous unison—an experimental murmuring. Repeated in higher octaves, it swelled to shrill confidence, then a hundred, then myriad invisibles chanted to their beloved night or gossiped ...
— Overland Red - A Romance of the Moonstone Canon Trail • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... do you shun me, Chloe, like the fawn, That, fearful of the breezes and the wood, Has sought her timorous mother since the dawn And on the pathless mountain ...
— John Smith, U.S.A. • Eugene Field
... in delicate investigations. It is still legible. From poor dear Casimir! It is as well," he chuckled, "that I have educated him to patience. Poor Casimir and his correspondence—his infinitesimal, timorous, idiotic correspondence!" ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... were a trial, I fear my fond heart wants courage to bear; or is it a trick, a cold fit, only assum'd to try how much I love you? I have no arts, heaven knows, no guile or double meaning in my soul, 'tis all plain native simplicity, fearful and timorous as children in the night, trembling as doves pursu'd; born soft by nature, and made tender by love; what, oh! what will become of me then? Yet would I were confirm'd in all my fears: for as I am, my condition is more ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... further described to be of the size of a beeve, and to be likewise a fierce creature, contrary to what is observed of the goat or deer kind, which, unless they are irritated and highly provoked, are all of them of a shy and timorous nature. The only quadruped that we are acquainted with to which these marks will apply is the buffalo, well known in Egypt and in various parts of Western Asia. It may be so far reckoned of the goat kind, as the ...
— Palestine or the Holy Land - From the Earliest Period to the Present Time • Michael Russell
... us from him. Hence the Philosopher says (Rhet. ii, 8) that men pity such as are akin to them, and the like, because it makes them realize that the same may happen to themselves. This also explains why the old and the wise who consider that they may fall upon evil times, as also feeble and timorous persons, are more inclined to pity: whereas those who deem themselves happy, and so far powerful as to think themselves in no danger of suffering any hurt, are not so inclined ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... poor souls and timorous, Will ye draw nigh to gaze at us And see if we are fair indeed? For such as we shall be your meed, There, where our hearts would have you go. And where can the earth-dwellers show In any land such loveliness As that wherewith your eyes we ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... Mother, so near together in one thing, so far apart in another—alike in this, that both were singing. And in that choir—celestial and infernal—sang the jealous woman with grey cheeks and haggard eyes, and the timorous woman, and she of the fearless face, and the woman who could scale the stars for the creature she worshipped, and the woman who could lie down in the mud and let the world see her there, and the woman who had sold her soul for food, ...
— Flames • Robert Smythe Hichens
... that he did every thing for personal gain, and was willing to do and say any thing now for the same purpose. He was moreover a brave man! 'I hope,' says he, 'the public will consider that I have been a timorous man, or if you will, a coward from my youth, so that I cannot fight; my belly is so large that I cannot run; and I am so great a lover of eating and drinking that I cannot starve. When these things are considered, I hope they will ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, May 1844 - Volume 23, Number 5 • Various
... silent goodnight. As on the first day, I am harassed by the conflict of the desire to see you and the dread of touching a dream lest it perish. Ah, yes, you spoke truly. Miserable, miserable wretches that we are, our timorous souls are so afraid of any reality that they dare not think a sympathy which has taken possession of them capable of surviving an interview with the person who gave it birth. Yet, in spite of this fine casuistry, I simply must confess to you—no, no, nothing. ...
— La-bas • J. K. Huysmans
... you round on me in that way for, Thorpe—when I was here last?" He put the question with bravery enough, but at sight of the other's unresponsive face grew suddenly timorous aud explanatory. "No man was ever more astounded in the world than I was. To this day I'm as unable to account for it as a babe unborn. What conceivable thing had ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... worship of success. So it is now, but so it was not, in many circles of English society at least, during the continuance of the war. Almost up to the very fall of Richmond, to express a decisive adherence to the Northern cause was often to be singular and solitary in a roomful of company; the timorous adherent would be minded to keep silence, and the outspoken one would be prepared for a stare and an embarrassed pause to ensue upon his avowal. At the same time that all his sympathies and hopes were for the North, the writer entertained opinions which forbade him to condemn ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various
... trustless, timorous lease of human life Warns me to hedge in my diplomacy. The sooner, then, the safer! Ay, this eve, This very night, will I take steps to rid My morrows of the weird contingencies That vision round and ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... a public servant—for we may fairly regard in that light a man who wields so large a portion of our common estate. He was one of the most timid of men. He was even timorous. His timidity was constitutional and physical. He would take a great deal of trouble to avoid crossing a temporary bridge or scaffolding, though assured by an engineer that it was strong enough to bear ten elephants. Nor can it be said that he was morally brave. ...
— Captains of Industry - or, Men of Business Who Did Something Besides Making Money • James Parton
... start and fear to die! What timorous worms we mortals are! Death is the gate of endless joy, And yet we dread to ...
— Hymns for Christian Devotion - Especially Adapted to the Universalist Denomination • J.G. Adams
... waned on Stephen's face. Any allusion made to his father by a fellow or by a master put his calm to rout in a moment. He waited in timorous silence to hear what Heron might say next. Heron, however, nudged him expressively ...
— A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man • James Joyce
... month—it is enough to amaze, astonish, astound the compassionate bowels of all who hear it, nay, all who come to hear it in the course of time. Turn, O miserable, hard-hearted animal, turn, I say, those timorous owl's eyes upon these of mine that are compared to radiant stars, and thou wilt see them weeping trickling streams and rills, and tracing furrows, tracks, and paths over the fair fields of my cheeks. ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... falls, and spurns the plain. Great Hector sorrows for his servant kill'd, Yet unrevenged permits to press the field; Till, to supply his place and rule the car, Rose Archeptolemus, the fierce in war. And now had death and horror cover'd all;(193) Like timorous flocks the Trojans in their wall Inclosed had bled: but Jove with awful sound Roll'd the big thunder o'er the vast profound: Full in Tydides' face the lightning flew; The ground before him flamed with sulphur blue; The quivering steeds fell prostrate at the sight; And Nestor's ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... unlikely evening for the sportsman. The stillness was so complete that the faintest rustle could be heard at a great distance. Moreover, it was the sort of evening when Nature herself seems to be glancing over her shoulder with timorous restlessness. ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... observe? The world thou hast not seen, much less her glory, Empires, and monarchs, and their radiant courts— Best school of best experience, quickest in sight In all things that to greatest actions lead. The wisest, unexperienced, will be ever 240 Timorous, and loth, with novice modesty (As he who, seeking asses, found a kingdom) Irresolute, unhardy, unadventrous. But I will bring thee where thou soon shalt quit Those rudiments, and see before thine eyes ...
— Paradise Regained • John Milton
... Pearson asked with timorous joy, "but is that the American for saying you'll be good enough ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... lower berth and Father was believed to be asleep in the upper he slipped on his coat and trousers and kitten-footed out of the state-room to a dark corner of the deck. For, very secretly, Father was afraid of the water. He who had insouciantly reassured Mother had himself to choke down the timorous speculations of a shop-bound clerk. While the sun was fair on the water and there were obviously no leviathans nor anything like that bearing down upon them he was able to conceal his fear—even from himself. But now ...
— The Innocents - A Story for Lovers • Sinclair Lewis
... stature, more corpulent through his cloathes then in his body, yet fat enough, his cloathes ever being made large and easie, the Doublets quilted for steletto proofe, his Breeches in great pleites and full stuffed: Hee was naturally of a timorous disposition, which was the reason of his quilted Doublets: His eyes large, ever rowling after any stranger came in his presence, insomuch, as many for shame have left the roome, as being out of countenance: His Beard was very thin: His Tongue too large for his mouth, which ever made ...
— Characters from 17th Century Histories and Chronicles • Various
... naught but Ann's own shadow that her fear gave a voice and a touch to. Say naught to frighten Ann, father; she is the most timorous ...
— Giles Corey, Yeoman - A Play • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... into the forest where the enemy lay concealed. "Forward!" cried Germanicus, with a fine rhetorical inspiration, "Forward! and follow the Roman birds." It would be a very heavy spirit that did not give a leap at such a signal, and a very timorous one that continued to have any doubt of success. To appropriate the eagles as fellow-countrymen was to make imaginary allies of the forces of nature; the Roman Empire and its military fortunes, and along with these the prospects of those individual ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... teach morality by exposing vice in all its seductiveness. Over-sensitive and maudlin sympathy is as ridiculous as it is unhealthy; its tendency is principally to encourage and spoil. But a judicious, discreet and measured sympathy will lift up the fallen, strengthen the weak and help the timorous over many a difficulty. It will suggest, too, the means best calculated to insure freedom ...
— Explanation of Catholic Morals - A Concise, Reasoned, and Popular Exposition of Catholic Morals • John H. Stapleton
... that each individual under the English monarchy, was then as now, capable of attaining high rank and power—with one only exception, that of the function of chief magistrate; higher and nobler rank, than a bartering, timorous commonwealth could afford. And for this one exception, to what did it amount? The nature of riches and influence forcibly confined the list of candidates to a few of the wealthiest; and it was much to be feared, that the ill-humour and contention generated by this triennial ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... matter?' answered Miss Geddes, with an eager and timorous anxiety, which made me regret ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... it back into the sea. And then he cut the rope that fastened her, and he went away. The bully came down then out of the tree, and he brought the princess to where the king was, and he said, "I got a friend of mine to come and fight the serpent to-day, where I was a little timorous after being so long shut up underground, but I'll do ...
— The Celtic Twilight • W. B. Yeats
... knowledge, and who, in contradiction of Holy Scripture, assert, with Galileo Galilei, that this world is a ball which daily turns round. His company has not arrived, and never may arrive. Not on the timorous and doubting English Catholics, but on my own brave countrymen and the faithful Spaniards, must we rely for the accomplishment of the heaven-inspired thought of our ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams
... last of which were in such multitudes, that we cannot exaggerate in saying that at a single glance we saw three thousand of them before us. Of all the animals we had seen the antelope seems to possess the most wonderful fleetness: shy and timorous they generally repose only on the ridges, which command a view of all the approaches of an enemy: the acuteness of their sight distinguishes the most distant danger, the delicate sensibility of their smell defeats the precautions of concealment, and when alarmed their rapid career seems more ...
— History of the Expedition under the Command of Captains Lewis and Clark, Vol. I. • Meriwether Lewis and William Clark
... have been hard for Reuben to say just why he found the Perdu so attractive. He might have said it was the fishing; for sometimes, though not often, he would cast a timorous hook into its depths and tremble lest he should lure from the pallid waters some portentous and dreadful prey. He never captured, however, anything more terrifying than catfish; but these were clad ...
— Earth's Enigmas - A Volume of Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... The timorous, odorous violet must be sprouting on the damp ground yonder under the alders! And he went looking along the stream for those little purple flowers that bring dreams of love with their fragrance! He would make a bouquet to offer Leonora as she ...
— The Torrent - Entre Naranjos • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... insignificant episodes of his nightly career. Nor do I dare relate other adventures of a more intimate character, from which, as the writers of an earlier day would say in noble style, a pen the least timorous would ...
— Ten Tales • Francois Coppee
... any rate must venture,' said Christian to Timorous and Mistrust. 'Whatever you may do I must venture, even if the lions you speak of should pull me to pieces. I, for one, shall never go back. To go back is nothing but death; to go forward is fear of death and everlasting life beyond it. I will yet go forward.' So Mistrust and Timorous ran down ...
— Bunyan Characters - First Series • Alexander Whyte
... her, and once more his nearness sufficed to make the looming horror drop away. She could almost have smiled at her scruples of the night before: as she looked back on them they seemed to belong to the old ignorant timorous time when she had feared to look life in the face, and had been blind to the mysteries and contradictions of the human heart because her own had not been revealed to her. Darrow had said: "You were made to feel everything"; and to feel was surely ...
— The Reef • Edith Wharton
... independent beast, Unlick'd to form, in groans her hate express'd. Among the timorous kind the quaking Hare[94] Profess'd neutrality, but would not swear. Next her the buffoon Ape[95], as Atheists use, Mimick'd all sects, and had his own to choose: 40 Still when the Lion look'd, his knees he bent, And ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... Sly little, cowering, timorous beastie! Oh what a panic's in thy breastie! You need not start away so hasty, With bickering speed: I should be loth to run and chase thee I ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... p. 106: "He was as falsely accused by some of being unwilling to be alone, because he was afraid of spectres and apparitions, vain bugbears of fools, which he had chased away by the light of his Philosophy," and proceeds to argue that, perhaps, after all, Hobbes was afraid of the dark. "He was timorous to the last degree, and consequently he had reason to distrust his imagination when he was alone in a chamber in the night; for in spite of him the memory of what he had read and heard concerning apparitions would revive, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... created would really constitute a menace for us or not, this much would be certain—that the more timid and timorous among us would believe it to be a menace, and it would furnish an irresistible plea for a very greatly enlarged naval and military establishment. We too, in that case would probably be led to organize our nation on ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... whence the mariners fancied that it was the residence of Gegial. I determined to visit this wonderful place, and in my way thither saw fishes of one hundred and two hundred cubits long, that occasion more fear than hurt; for they are so timorous that they will fly upon the rattling of two sticks or boards. I saw likewise other fish, about a cubit in length, that had heads ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments • Anonymous
... though invisible presence? In the eye of a brute, we see only a part of the animal; it gives us little beyond the palpable outward; at most, it is but the focal point of its fierce, or gentle, affectionate, or timorous character,—the character of the species, But in man, neither gentleness nor fierceness can be more than as relative conditions,—the outward moods of his unseen spirit; while the spirit itself, that daily and hourly sends forth its good and evil, to take shape from the body, ...
— Lectures on Art • Washington Allston
... Waverley's mind, he resolved to go upon the open heath and search if, among the slain, he could discover the body of his friend, with the pious intention of procuring for him the last rites of sepulture. The timorous young man who accompanied him remonstrated upon the danger of the attempt, but Edward was determined. The followers of the camp had already stripped the dead of all they could carry away; but the ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... not often down-town; she had never seen an accident until this afternoon. She had come upon errands for her mother connected with a timorous refurbishment; and as she did these, in and out of the department stores, she had an insistent consciousness of the Sheridan Building. From the street, anywhere, it was almost always in sight, like some monstrous geometrical shadow, murk-colored and rising limitlessly into ...
— The Turmoil - A Novel • Booth Tarkington
... fancy should direct My trecherous tongue with that detested name To afflict thy unblemishd purity, Belisea. I do confes my error was an act Soe grosse and heathnish that its very sight Would have inforcd a Crocodile to weepe Drops as sincere as does the timorous heart When he ore heares the featherd ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Various
... and timorous souls, who in this terrible moment of our history, reproach themselves for having loved and served the cause of the weak. They see only one point in space, they believe that the people whom they have loved and served exist no longer, ...
— The George Sand-Gustave Flaubert Letters • George Sand, Gustave Flaubert
... we still found, from their cautious and timorous behaviour, that they were under some unaccountable apprehensions; and an uncommon degree of satisfaction was visible in their countenances, on the German's finding a person amongst us with whom he could converse. This was Mr Webber, who spoke that language perfectly well; ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 17 • Robert Kerr
... he must be dealt with by weapons and not by warnings; and in the end he must unwillingly surrender what he was too proud at first to yield uncompelled. Wermund, shaken by deep sighs, answered that it was too insolent to sting him with these taunts upon his years; for he had passed no timorous youth, nor shrunk from battle, that age should bring him to this extreme misery. It was equally unfitting to cast in his teeth the infirmity of his blindness: for it was common for a loss of this kind to accompany ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... say whether it would have been the more unworthy thing to pass such a bill or to pass none at all; but the last, being the most timorous course, had been adopted for ten successive years, as it has also been resorted to in the ten ...
— A Military Genius - Life of Anna Ella Carroll of Maryland • Sarah Ellen Blackwell
... carries with it some of the needful corrections, at least for a careful reader. For instance, Major Brooks's general summary is, that "the black is more timorous than the white, but is in a corresponding degree more docile and obedient, hence more completely under the control of his commander, and much more influenced by his example." But when we read on the previous ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 91, May, 1865 • Various
... behind him. There was a kind of narrow sheep-path, up which they marched in single file. Father first, Lucy next, with her gown prettily tucked-up; George and Fred following, with large fishing-baskets stuffed with edibles; Jacky next, light and active, but as yet quiescent; timorous Peter bringing up the rear. He, also, was laden, but not heavily. Mr Sudberry carried rod and basket, for he had been told that there were large trout in ...
— Freaks on the Fells - Three Months' Rustication • R.M. Ballantyne
... pictures, neither." In his workroom were piled, under a thick layer of dust or with faces turned to the wall, the canvases of his student years,—when, as the fashion of the day was, he limned scenes of gallantry, depicting with a sleek, timorous brush emptied quivers and birds put to flight, risky pastimes and reveries of bliss, high-kilted goose-girls and ...
— The Gods are Athirst • Anatole France
... that, riding so uncomfortably that the priest pointed out to her, after leaving Ballan, that she had better hold on to him; and immediately my lady put her plump arms around the waist of her cavalier, in a modest and timorous manner. ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 1 • Honore de Balzac
... as he is generally known, is a manly and very independent personage. As a rule his master is more afraid of him than he is of his master. Yet, according to the picture drawn of him by the Socialists, he is a timorous, cowardly, whining, pitiful creature who has to cringe to ...
— British Socialism - An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical Proposals • J. Ellis Barker
... sinks And the canons deepening in color Add mystery to silence Then the lone traveller lying out-stretched Beneath the silent pines on some high range Watches and listens in ecstasy of fear And timorous admiration. ...
— The Spirit of Sweetwater • Hamlin Garland
... At first the Commons could only take part in questions relating to taxation, but gradually they acquired the right to share in all matters that might come before Parliament.] The Commons were naturally at first a weak and timorous body, quite overawed by the great lords, but were destined eventually to grow into the controlling branch of the ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers
... made for a middle sort of beings, who, because they cannot be angels, ought to thwart their ambition, and not endeavour to become infernal spirits. It is too well exemplified in the present time, where the faults and errors of humanity, checked by the imperfect timorous virtues, have been overpowered by those who have stopped at no crime. It is a dreadful part of the example, that infernal malevolence has had pious apologists, who read their lectures on frailties in favour ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke
... many naval men who thought the venture dangerous in the extreme, and sought to dissuade Flinders from undertaking it. But his was no timorous nature—"a small craft, 'tis true," he said ...
— The Naval Pioneers of Australia • Louis Becke and Walter Jeffery
... fervid hectic eloquence that now seems so unnatural! One guesses there may be a place in the Pantheons or in Valhalla of the heroes for this poor not untawdry not unheroic Seneca. One sees in him a kind of Hamlet, hitting in timorous indecision on the likely possibility of converting his Claudius by a string of moral axioms and eloquence to a condition that should satisfy the Ghost and undo the something rotten in the state.... Yet the Gods must have been grateful to him for the work he did in holding ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... preferred to a considerable command, for dreaming that he killed him: without some previous waking thought and purpose of the kind, he could not, he supposed, have had that fancy in his sleep. So timorous was he, and so miserable a slave to his fears, yet very angry with Plato, because he would not allow him to be the ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... at the top, and commanding an extensive view of the adjoining country: from this tower the banner of the baron always waved, and its non-appearance excited some indignation in the breast of Nigel Bruce, for his warrior spirit had no sympathy with that timorous excuse, that did it wave at such a time it might excite the attention of the English, whereas did it elevate no symbol of defiance its ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar
... cautious of having anything to do with horses that are naturally shy; for horses that are excessively timorous will not only not allow the rider on their back to harm the enemy, but will often take him by surprize, and expose him to great danger. We must also learn whether the horse has anything of vice either toward other horses or toward men, and whether ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume I (of X) - Greece • Various
... valley as he had been up on the heights during his vision—of a world made better by his hand. In his darker moments he saw nothing but enmity and disloyalty about him—even, a little later, "usurpation" in the case of the timorous and circumspect ...
— The Mirrors of Washington • Anonymous
... experienced woman there too. Impossible to credit that the wistful little creature was thirty-seven! But she was! Indeed, it was very doubtful if she would ever see thirty-eight again. Once he had had the most romantic feelings about her. He could recall the slim flexibility of her waist, the timorous melting invitation of her eyes. And now ... Such ...
— The Regent • E. Arnold Bennett
... When the raids of the Bedouin obliged the Egyptian sovereign to cross the frontier into their territory, he would retire as soon as possible, without attempting any permanent conquest. After the expulsion of the Hyksos, Ahmosis seemed inclined to pursue a less timorous course. He made an advance on Sharuhana and pillaged it, and the booty he brought back ought to have encouraged him to attempt more important expeditions; but he never returned to this region, and it would seem that when his first enthusiasm ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... see if we could get rid of what we had kept for Ephraim. As there was no prospect of seeing him, we proposed to do the best we could with one of our neighbors, named Cornelius van Kleif, to whom my comrade had spoken, and who was inclined to trade. He entered into negotiations, but was a little timorous. We offered to let him examine the bills of the persons from whom we had bought the goods, and also of the freight and custom-house duties, and he should give us an advance of thirty per cent. on their ...
— Journal of Jasper Danckaerts, 1679-1680 • Jasper Danckaerts
... whites, without the aid of adventitious stimulants. When these are superadded, they become indeed, the most ruthless and infuriated enemy—"thirsting for blood," and causing it literally to flow, alike from the hearts of helpless infancy and hoary age—from the timorous breast of weak woman, and the undaunted bosom of the stout warrior. Leagued with Great Britain, the Indians were enabled more fully and effectually, to glut their vengeance on our citizens, and gratify their entailed resentment ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... The one quick timorous transient star; The waves outside where breakers are Huzza like a mad multitude. "Where the sun ups it, mist-imbued," I cry, "there reigns the star for me!" The wind outshrieks from points and peaks: "Here, westward, where ...
— Moments of Vision • Thomas Hardy
... think she CAN know,' pursued Clemency, 'how truly they forgive her; how they love her; what joy it would be to them, to see her once more. She may be timorous of going home. Perhaps if she sees me, it may give her new heart. Only tell me truly, Mr. ...
— The Battle of Life • Charles Dickens
... usually profess to give a quasi-logical explanation of the existence of evil, whereas of the general fact of evil in the world, the existence of the selfish, suffering, timorous finite consciousness, the mind-curers, so far as I am acquainted with them, profess to give no speculative explanation Evil is empirically there for them as it is for everybody, but the practical point of view predominates, and it would ill ...
— The Varieties of Religious Experience • William James
... crept between us. It came in from all our conceptions of life and public service; it was, we found, in the quality of our minds that physical love without children is a little weak, timorous, more than a little shameful. With imaginative people there very speedily comes a time when that realisation is inevitable. We hadn't thought of that before—it isn't natural to think of that before. We hadn't known. There ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells
... well within the range of his own, and our, intelligence. Mr. DEVERELL played the part with admirable restraint. And we could ill have spared the humours of Carter's man Jackson (Mr. WILL WEST), whose wide experience in matrimony, resulting in an attitude alternately timorous and prehensile towards female society in the servants' hall, was the source of many poignant generalisations. Miss EDITH EVANS, as a mother-in-law manquee, showed a touch of real artistry; and Mr. GEORGE CARR had no difficulty in getting fun ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, September 8th, 1920 • Various
... and rushed helter-skelter to the deep water for safety. On seeing the rapid disappearance of the Frogs, one of the Hares cried out to his companions: "Stay, my friends, do not do as you intended; for you now see that other creatures who yet live are more timorous ...
— Aesop's Fables - A New Revised Version From Original Sources • Aesop
... the lips of the inspired speaker fell upon the hearts of the Hebrews like the fresh dew of morning on the parched grass. The trusting hearers pressed around him and Miriam with shouts of joy, and the drooping courage of the timorous appeared to put forth new wings. Asarja, Michael, and their followers no longer murmured, nay, most of them had been infected by the general enthusiasm, and when a Hebrew mercenary stole out from the garrison of the store-house and disclosed what had been betrayed to his commander, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... her daughter to be the Lady Anna,—till she also should become a countess? Of the young man she had heard nothing but good, and it was impossible that she should have fear in that direction, even had she been timorous by nature. But she was bold and eager, hopeful in spite of all that she had suffered, full of ambition, and not prone to feminine scruples. She had been fighting all her life in order that she and her daughter might be acknowledged to be among the aristocrats of her country. ...
— Lady Anna • Anthony Trollope
... activities was widened until she came to feel responsible for the appearance of the entire schoolroom. Now in her womanhood she is a delight to her husband, her children, her guests, and her neighbors. Emergencies neither daunt her nor render her timorous, but, serene and masterful, she meets the new situation as a welcome novelty, and, with supreme amiability, accepts it as a friendly challenge to her resourcefulness. She needs not to apologize ...
— The Reconstructed School • Francis B. Pearson
... qualified them to fill such places with honor; and history proves that he did both qualify and employ them. Deborah was both a prophetess and a judge, and at one time was the chief ruler in Israel, even leading on the hosts of the living God; for timorous Barak would not go without her. Huldah, wife of Shallum, a prophetess who flourished in the reign of Josiah, was consulted by him on matters of vital importance to his kingdom, although both Jeremiah and Zephaniah were then alive. Josiah evidently ...
— Woman: Man's Equal • Thomas Webster
... in the evening, promising to visit them again in a year, but as I walked home I could not help reflecting how often these asylums, supposed to be devoted to chastity and prayer, contain in themselves the hidden germs of corruption. How many a timorous and trustful mother is persuaded that the child of her affection will escape the dangers of the world by taking refuge in the cloister. But behind these bolts and bars desires grow to a frenzied extreme; they crave in vain to ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... absorbed into the national character, as far as conversation is concerned. "They have not become woolly, nor do they wear horns, but the nobility are eternally bellowing forth the astounding deeds of their ancestors, whilst the muttonish middle classes bleat a timorous approval.... Such subjects constitute their fund of amusing small talk," &c. From the foregoing elegant description of conversation, he passes onwards to the subject of gentility, and describes a young honourable, ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... play trumps, Mrs. Wylie. What secret has the Jack of Hearts got hidden from us?" young Flandrau demanded, his hard eyes fastened to her timorous ones. ...
— Crooked Trails and Straight • William MacLeod Raine
... the work of negotiation went prosperously on. The minds of the Indians had been already prepared. In La Salle they saw their champion against the Iroquois, the standing terror of all this region. They gathered around his stronghold like the timorous peasantry of the middle ages around the rock-built castle of their feudal lord. From the wooden ramparts of St. Louis,—for so he named his fort,— high and inaccessible as an eagle's nest, a strange scene lay before ...
— France and England in North America, a Series of Historical Narratives, Part Third • Francis Parkman
... his hands, and shaking his head in a manner that would have excited the count's laughter, had not thoughts of a superior interest occupied him, and rendered him attentive to the least revelation of this timorous conscience. "Alas, excellency, the ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... resolved upon. But art thou sure that the hirelings of the priests haven't been told to kill thee? Nicodemus asked. Pilate's friendship for me is notorious, Joseph replied. I'm not afraid, Nicodemus, and it is well for me that I'm not, for assassination comes to the timorous. That is true, Nicodemus rejoined, our fears often bring about our destiny, but thou shouldst avoid returning by the valley; return by the eastern gate and on horseback. But that way, Joseph answered, is a lonely ...
— The Brook Kerith - A Syrian story • George Moore
... breasts are not so timorous, nor are our arms so weak, Nor are our veins so bloodless, that we our vow should break, To sell our freedom for the fear of Prince or Paladin,— At least we'll sell our birthright dear, no bloodless ...
— Mediaeval Tales • Various
... gipsy garb in which she had warned the Laird of Ellangowan on Ellangowan's height! In her shriveled hand it would seem she held the very sapling which for the last time she had plucked from the bonny woods which had so long waved above her bit shealing, until driven thence by the timorous and weak-minded laird. With this she again touched me, and in a half inviting, half ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848 • Various
... of doctrine, but giving impetus and force to the whole movement in Christ's kingdom, and sweeping along with him a host of weaker and dependent spirits. If we are not propagating faith in Christ, it is mainly because our our faith is meagre and timorous. If we are not producing Christians it is because we are not ourselves in the present experience of His mighty power. And while this is so, our conduct betrays the weakness of our faith, and we chill the kindling warmth in other souls instead of fanning it into flame, and all that ...
— How to become like Christ • Marcus Dods
... not that angling is an art: is it not an art to deceive a trout with an artificial fly? a trout that is more sharp-sighted than any hawk you have named, and more watchful and timorous than your high-mettled merlin is bold; and yet I doubt not to catch a brace or two to-morrow for a friend's breakfast. Doubt not, therefore, sir, but that angling is an art, and an art worth your learning. The question is rather, whether you be capable of learning it? for angling is somewhat ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume III (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland I • Francis W. Halsey
... considerable period. One evening a fortnight later I sauntered into the drawing-room, where my wife and four children were congregated round the family lamps, and drew attention to my appearance by a timorous cough. ...
— The Opinions of a Philosopher • Robert Grant
... little boy of five. From the moment when he caught the gleam of brass he knew that he had made the find of his life. But his nurse was a timorous, foolish thing. "You did ought to of left ...
— The Secret Places of the Heart • H. G. Wells
... by all nations during the prevalence of the black plague is without parallel and beyond description. In the eyes of the timorous, danger was the certain harbinger of death; many fell victims to fear on the first appearance of the distemper, and the most stout-hearted lost their confidence. The pious closed their accounts ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... was timorous at night when I couldn't help myself; and then she'd begin crying, as women will, saying as she knew you were dead, and that, any way, it was lonesome without you. So when I saw that it comforted her a bit to have someone to cook for, I encouraged the fellow. I told him he'd nothing to look for ...
— The Mermaid - A Love Tale • Lily Dougall
... all right," said Philip, smiling at his timorous, scrupulous women-kind. "We'll go as we are, and buy the best we can get. Monteriano is ...
— Where Angels Fear to Tread • E. M. Forster
... wicked uncle and the lost babes over again," declared Noel. "It also smacks of The Pilgrim's Progress. Old Bunyan would have made some good copy out of this. He'd have dubbed you Mistress Timorous ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... having cleverly dried her eyes, poured all their bright beauty upon him, and the heart of the youth was enlarged with a new, very sweet, and most timorous feeling. Then his dark eyes dropped, and he touched her gently, and ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... He had the timorous, or let us say, the imaginative temperament, which lends to adventure its very salt. He wished to have done dangerous or heroic things, if not to have to do them. He had so little to boast about; his brothers, and so many other fellows of his ...
— The Camera Fiend • E.W. Hornung
... sprightly and vigorous it was when the cardinal was with him, for he depended so much on everything he did, he that was at the utmost dilemma when he was absent, always timorous, jealous, ...
— Memoirs of a Cavalier • Daniel Defoe
... confused, terrifying noise of panting breaths and trampling feet. It came sweeping down the broad trail. There were grunting cries, also; and Grom understood at once that a herd of pig-tapirs—heavy-footed, timorous beasts, as tall as heifers—were sweeping down upon them in mad ...
— In the Morning of Time • Charles G. D. Roberts |
