"Virtue" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... lost. But the sacrifices Austria was compelled, to make were great. The territories ceded to France were immediately united into a new general government, under the collective denomination of the Illyrian Provinces. Napoleon thus became master of both sides of the Adriatic, by virtue of his twofold title of Emperor of France and King of Italy. Austria, whose external commerce thus received a check, had no longer any direct communication with the sea. The loss of Fiume, Trieste, and the sea-coast appeared so vast a sacrifice ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... reasoning suited to the scientific requirements of the times, he introduces the student to an enlarged view of Religion, ascends with him to the heavenly source from which it emanated, and leads him, through the paths of virtue and love, to the comprehension and admiration of the objects contemplated by it. In short, he teaches—if I am permitted the expression—the ...
— A Guide for the Religious Instruction of Jewish Youth • Isaac Samuele Reggio
... see In falsehood thy belief o'erwhelm'd, if well Thou listen to the arguments, which I Shall bring to face it. The eighth sphere displays Numberless lights, the which in kind and size May be remark'd of different aspects; If rare or dense of that were cause alone, One single virtue then would be in all, Alike distributed, or more, or less. Different virtues needs must be the fruits Of formal principles, and these, save one, Will by thy reasoning be destroy'd. Beside, If rarity were of that dusk the cause, ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... first posts, a certain income was required (besides merit and noble birth.) By which means, poverty might exclude persons of the most exalted merit, which he considers as a great evil in a government. For then, says he, as virtue is wholly disregarded, and money is all-powerful, because all things are attained by it, the admiration and desire of riches seize and corrupt the whole community. Add to this, that when magistrates and judges are obliged to pay large ...
— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin
... And plunge thy head beneath the bubbling spring, where it bursts forth most abundantly, and at once purge thy body, at once thy crime." The king placed himself beneath the waters prescribed; the golden virtue tinged the river, and departed from the human body into the stream. And even now, the fields, receiving the ore of this ancient vein {of gold}, are hard, growing of pallid colour, from their clods imbibing ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Copious Notes - and Explanations • Publius Ovidius Naso
... "By virtue of this my signature, I make over my soul to the holder of this, after its natural separation ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... custom to do so when I eat plums,' she said, with quite an aggravating air of complacent virtue; 'my mother, good creature, brought me up in excellent habits, and with her dying breath bade me never be wasteful. Now these stones will grow into trees, the fruit of which, even if I do not live to see the day, will afford a meal to ...
— Tales Of The Punjab • Flora Annie Steel
... the eulogist of sincerity. He delighted to trace its influence on the happiness of mankind; and proved that nothing but the universal practice of this virtue was necessary to the perfection of human society. His doctrine was splendid and beautiful. To detect its imperfections was no easy task; to lay the foundations of virtue in utility, and to limit, by that ...
— Memoirs of Carwin the Biloquist - (A Fragment) • Charles Brockden Brown
... thus impaired. Familiarized to the horrid scenes of savage cruelty, it can no longer boast of the noble and generous principles which dignify a soldier. No longer sympathize with the dignity of the royal banner, nor feel the pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war that makes ambition virtue. What makes ambition virtue? the sense of honour. But is this sense of honour consistent with the spirit of plunder, or the practice of murder? Can it flow from mercenary motives? or can it ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 2 (of 5) • John Marshall
... the Missouri Province of the Society of Jesus, in virtue of faculties granted to him by Very Rev. L. MARTIN, General of the same Society, hereby permits the publication of a book entitled "Moral Principles and Medical Practice," by Rev. CHARLES COPPENS, S.J., the same having been approved by the censors appointed ...
— Moral Principles and Medical Practice - The Basis of Medical Jurisprudence • Charles Coppens
... retained the pristine vigour and fire of a chivalrous and noble age. What was personal and peculiar to Charles Gordon had to be evolved by circumstance and the important occurrences with which it was his lot to be associated throughout his military and public career, but his soldierly talent and virtue must be mainly assigned to the traditions and practice of ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume I • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... degrees of perfection. There is no other name for him, but one hears it rarely; yet the shining virtue of democratization is that it has produced a kind of tacit agreement with Chaucer's Parson that 'to have pride in the gentrie of the bodie is right gret folie; for oft-time the gentrie of the bodie benimeth the gentrie ...
— The Perfect Gentleman • Ralph Bergengren
... and occupied the open country as I told you, they stormed a tower belonging to some of the islanders who refused to surrender, and they cut off the heads of all the garrison except eight; on these eight they found it impossible to inflict any wound! Now this was by virtue of certain stones which they had in their arms inserted between the skin and the flesh, with such skill as not to show at all externally. And the charm and virtue of these stones was such that those who wore them ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... was a large, five-sided work with bastions, strong by virtue of its position, and important as commanding the passage of the Hudson in connection with Fort Lee (first named Constitution), opposite, on the summit of the Palisades on the Jersey side. Much labor had been expended upon it, and it was generally regarded as impregnable. ...
— The Campaign of 1776 around New York and Brooklyn • Henry P. Johnston
... he was in the toils. Though it emphasized the elegant proportions of his figure, it sat uncomfortably upon him. His vanity was not equal to his sense of guilt. The uniform was a livery of dishonor. He could not distort it into a virtue, try as he would. He lacked that cunning artifice which a man of the world possesses, that of winning over to the right ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... across the dewy cornfields and through the wild-plum thicket to play the fiddle for Lena Hanson, whose name was a reproach through all the Divide country, where the women are usually too plain and too busy and too tired to depart from the ways of virtue. On such occasions Lena, attired in a pink wrapper and silk stockings and tiny pink slippers, would sing to him, accompanying herself on a battered guitar. It gave him a delicious sense of freedom and experience to be with a woman ...
— The Troll Garden and Selected Stories • Willa Cather
... of the hungry, hard-bitten band owned a solitary lucifer; but was afraid that the damp had deprived it of all virtue. ...
— VC — A Chronicle of Castle Barfield and of the Crimea • David Christie Murray
... mortal stage What mournful scenes arise: What ruin waits on kingly rage; How often virtue dwells with woe; How many griefs from knowledge ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... doubt but that you are right, Malachi," said Alfred, after a pause. "Well, we must make a virtue of a necessity, and give ...
— The Settlers in Canada • Frederick Marryat
... the course of conversation, Touch'd upon honesty: 'No virtue better,' Says Dick, quite lost in sweet self-admiration, 'I'm sure I'm honest;—ay—beyond the letter: You know the field I rent; beneath the ground My plough stuck in the middle of a furrow And there a pot of golden coins I found! ...
— My Life as an Author • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... Patience, however, is a virtue which is sure to meet with a reward. The point which Saunders failed to prove by argument, was pretty well proved to every one (though not admitted) by the agency of John Frost. That remarkably bitter individual nestled round the ...
— The World of Ice • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... the laughter rippled from her throat she gave a gesture of impatience. There were times when self-depreciation ceased to be a virtue. She remembered a confidence Blister had ...
— The Fighting Edge • William MacLeod Raine
... were fond of the lettuces of Smyrna, which appeared on their tables at the close of the repast. In this respect the Romans, at first, imitated the Greeks, but later came to serve lettuce with eggs as a first course and to excite the appetite. The ancient physicians valued lettuce for its narcotic virtue, and, on account of this property, Galen, the celebrated Greek physician, called it "the ...
— Salads, Sandwiches and Chafing-Dish Dainties - With Fifty Illustrations of Original Dishes • Janet McKenzie Hill
... its simplest terms, then, the necessary conclusion is that the violet glass acts purely as a shade for decreasing the intensity of the solar light. And in the simple fact that it does so serve as a shade lies the sole virtue (if any there be) of the glass. In 1856, Dr. Daubeny made experiments on the germination of seeds, and in his report is this suggestive sentence: "In a south aspect, indeed, light which had passed through the ammonia sulphate of copper (blue solution), and even ...
— Scientific American, Volume XXXVI., No. 8, February 24, 1877 • Various
... heroic be reduced to deshabille? That we cannot so well afford. We can give up William Tell's apple as easily as we can the one in Genesis, but Winkelreid's "sheaf of Austrian spears" is an essential argument against original sin, being an altogether original act of virtue.] ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... exposition took great care not to accept for exhibition any articles which had mere virtue of novelty, without practical value, or any articles not produced in large volume. The idea of the Government in employing such discrimination was to so plan the exhibition that it would leave some lasting effects after the exposition upon ...
— Final Report of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission • Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission
... and the German idea of world government. It is not an accident, as Baron von Huegel remarks in his book on The German Soul, that the chief colonizing nation of the world should be a nation without a national army. We have depended enormously in the past on the initiative and virtue of the individual adventurer; if our adventurers were to fail us, which is not likely, or if the State were to supersede them, and attempt to do their work, which is not conceivable, our political power and influence ...
— England and the War • Walter Raleigh
... dull, callous, rooted impudence, Which, dead to shame and every nicer sense, Ne'er blushed, unless, when spreading Vice's snares, He stumbled on some virtue unawares.—CHURCHILL. ...
— The Lost Trail - I • Edward S. Ellis
... seen you a sickly child; I have been anxious—who would not? I have seen you grow in health and strength, and every virtue." ...
— A Perilous Secret • Charles Reade
... can imagine only one plausible objection, which is, that the treaties would not be observed. It is readily admitted that if the only guaranty for the faithful observance of these treaties consisted in the virtue and integrity of those who signed them, the confidence to be reposed in them would be faint indeed. Happily, however, we have a far stronger guaranty in national interest and in public opinion. * ...
— A Visit To The United States In 1841 • Joseph Sturge
... more, the priests of the Galilean God poured over trees and stones a charmed water, and pronounced magic words, and set up crosses where roads met in the forest; for the Galilean, my son, is learned in the art of incantations. Better than Saturn, better than Jupiter, he knows the virtue of formularies and mystic signs. Thus the poor rustic Divinities could no more find refuge in their sacred woods. The company of long-haired, goat-footed Satyrs, that beat of yore their mother earth with sounding hoof, was but a cloud of pale, ...
— The Well of Saint Clare • Anatole France
... saw one too ambitious of court favor, sacrificing his time, his repose, his liberty, his virtue, and perhaps his friends, to attain it, I have said to myself, This man gives too much ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... reflection. Happy am I now, and proud, that I had the virtue to stifle it. For myself, escape by flight might not have been so problematical. A steed stood near that could have carried me beyond all danger. It only needed to fling myself into the saddle, and ply the spur. Even without that impulsion, my Arab would, and could, have carried me clear of the ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... and plot To bring about my ruin. Hence! avaunt! Or else in pity tell me what you want. I cannot live, and yet I would not die! My hopes are blighted! Where, oh whither shall I fly? 'Tis past! I'll cease to daily with vain sophistry, And try the virtue of a ...
— The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands • R.M. Ballantyne
... sacrifice for it. To enjoy it, though but for a brief season, she ought not to refuse to bear the hardest, most terrible things, and, if what was now her secret became rumoured among the people, to accept humiliation, shame, and scorn. Let the respectable women of Ratisbon, in their pride of virtue, maliciously cast stones at her; they could not look down upon her, for, as the object of the most illustrious sovereign's love, she was ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... hosts, especially in Minna, he found once more the arrogant spirit with which he had come into such violent contact in the old days, though he had almost forgotten it since,—the arrogance of weakness as much as of virtue,—honesty without charity, pluming itself on its virtue, and despising the weaknesses which it could not understand, a worship of the conventional, and a shocked disdain of "irregular" higher things. Minna was calmly and sententiously confident that she was always right. There ...
— Jean-Christophe Journey's End • Romain Rolland
... justification of power wielded from above. And was it good enough? Was it quite good enough? Like so many other thinkers, Felix hesitated to reply. If only merit and the goods of this world could be finally divorced! If the reward of virtue were just men's love and an unconscious self-respect! If only 'to have nothing' were the highest honour! And yet, to do away with this beside him and put in its place—What? No kiss-me-quick change had a chance of producing anything better. To ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... himself, the redoubted robber Sheikh about whom we had been laughing and crying "Wolf!" all day. Never was seen such a skurry! "March!" was the instant order given. When Victoire heard who it was and the message, you should have seen how she changed countenance; trembling for her virtue in the ferocious clutches of a Gosh. "Un verre d'eau pour l'amour de Dieu!" gasped she, and was ready to faint on her saddle. "Ne buvez plus, Victoire!" screamed a little fellow of our party. "Push on, push on!" cried one and ...
— Notes on a Journey from Cornhill to Grand Cairo • William Makepeace Thackeray
... of the arrival of the manager, Mr. Hand's rather mysterious but friendly temper underwent a change for the worse. He not only continued silent, which might easily be counted a virtue, but he became almost sulky, which could only be called a crime. There was no bantering with Sallie in the kitchen, scarcely a friendly smile for Agatha herself. Mr. Hand was ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... as wise as the social animals; as the ant and the bee, who have risen, if not to the virtue of all-embracing charity, at least to the virtues of self-sacrifice and patriotism: then he will rise towards a higher sphere; towards that kingdom of God of which it is written—"He that dwelleth in love, dwelleth in ...
— Westminster Sermons - with a Preface • Charles Kingsley
... fascinating power over most who approached her. She often visited the countess, where she attracted much admiration from the fashionable guests who were ever assembled in her saloons. The dissolute courtiers were lavish in their attentions to the highly-endowed child. Established principles of virtue alone saved her from ruin. Misfortune and sorrow had rendered her precocious beyond her years. It was her only and her earnest desire to take the veil, and join the sisters in the convent. But money was needed for that purpose, and she ...
— Louis XIV., Makers of History Series • John S. C. Abbott
... must almost die, that is, come to London, to plaguy London; a place full of danger, and vanity, and vice, though the Court be gone. And such it will be, till your return redeem it: Not that, the greatest virtue in the World, which is you, can be such a Marshal, as to defeat, or disperse all the vice of this place; but as higher bodies remove, or contract themselves, when better come, so at your return we shall have one door open to innocence. Yet, Madam, you are not such an Ireland, as produceth neither ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury
... no moralist, no man writing for a sensitive and strictly virtuous public, could further interest himself in this man. So I dismissed him at once from my mind, and returned to the literary contemplation of virtue that was clearly and positively defined, and of Sin, that invariably commenced with a capital letter. That this man, in his awful condition, hovering on the verge of eternity, should allow himself to be attracted by—but it ...
— Drift from Two Shores • Bret Harte
... his talents, born to rule, And train'd in virtue's honest school! What clemency his temper sways! How uncorrupt are all his ways! Beneath his conduct and command Rapine shall cease to waste the land; What blessings must attend the nation Under this ...
— Favourite Fables in Prose and Verse • Various
... of virtue have the power To make me at an instant true and false: True to distressed beauty and rare chastity; False to King John, that holds the sight of thee Dearer than England or earth's empery. Go, happy soul, ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VIII (4th edition) • Various
... Word of God; or that the bodies of men shall not rise again after they are dead; or that there is no Day of Judgment after death:—All such maintaining and publishing of such Error or Errors, with obstinacy therein, shall, by virtue hereof, be adjudged Felony: And all such persons [here is explained the process by which they are to be accused and brought to trial].. and in case the indictment be found and the party upon his trial shall not abjure the said Error, and defence and maintenance of the same, he SHALL SUFFER ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... known by his brotherly face, Thrice blessed such sign of a heavenly grace: You would think from his aspect of meekness and shame, That his anger was stirred at the thought of his fame. Oh rare virtue and beautiful, natural trait, Which never will change by the change of estate! When clad in his armor and prepared for the fray, The army rejoiceth and winneth ...
— The Women of the Arabs • Henry Harris Jessup
... Central Asia would have upon Afghanistan and India. He explained that by the occupation of Bokhara Russia would gain a pretext for interfering in Afghan politics, and 'that if Russia once assumes a position which, in virtue either of an imposing military force on the Oxus, or of a dominant political influence in Afghanistan, entitles her, in Native estimation, to challenge our Asiatic supremacy, the disquieting effect will ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts
... announcement, telling the assembled Pinkies that by virtue of her high office as Queen of Sky Island she would leave Rosalie the Witch to rule over the Pink Country while she returned to the Earth with her friends. As Rosalie was greatly loved and respected, the people joyfully accepted her as their Queen, and Trot ordered ...
— Sky Island - Being the further exciting adventures of Trot and Cap'n - Bill after their visit to the sea fairies • L. Frank Baum
... difference between gentle and simple. There is not the extreme division of labour that produces the contempt of the lord for the villain. The nobles have not yet discovered for themselves any form of occupation or mode of thought in virtue of which they are widely severed from the commons, nor have they invented any such ideal of life or conventional system of conduct as involves an ignorance or depreciation of the common pursuits of those below them. They have no such elaborate theory ...
— Epic and Romance - Essays on Medieval Literature • W. P. Ker
... whispering humbleness?" Not so! There comes a season when the stress Of insolent and exacting tyranny Makes the most patient turn. Autocracy, Without the despot's vaunted virtue, pride, Shows small indeed. Can Power lay aside Its swaggering port, and low petition make (Driven by those Treasury thirsts which never slake) For help from those it harries? PHARAOH's scourge Was the taskmaster's weapon, ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, May 16, 1891 • Various
... have devoted themselves to the contemplation of nature, and who have lived in it, and in the soul alone, being citizens of heaven and of the world, and very acceptable to the Father and Creator of the universe because of their virtue; it has procured them His love as their most appropriate reward, which far surpasses all the gifts of fortune, and conducts them to the very summit and ...
— Castles and Cave Dwellings of Europe • Sabine Baring-Gould
... only envy me and supplicate the gods that one day it will be given to them to show that they too are loyal to their friends, that they too will never yield to their foes while life is in them, unless some god strike them down; that they too would never sacrifice virtue and fair renown for all the wealth you proffer and all the treasure of Syria and Assyria to boot. Such is the nature, believe me, of some who are ...
— Cyropaedia - The Education Of Cyrus • Xenophon
... Already Mr. Leonard, being furnished with ample funds, had ordered bats and balls, bases, and all manner of necessary adjuncts that go with a well-organized baseball team. Meanwhile, they must make a virtue of necessity, and do the best they could with the stock ...
— The Chums of Scranton High - Hugh Morgan's Uphill Fight • Donald Ferguson
... shadow of tenderness upon the whole expression of her face when the lids dropped—to say all this is to convey nothing; simply because their expression formed the wonder, strangeness, and beauty of them, and there is no virtue in ink, at all events in my ink, to communicate it. I do not exaggerate when I assure you that the surprise of the beauty of her eyes when they came to mine and rested upon me, steadfast in their stare as a picture, was a sort of shock in its way, comparable in a physical ...
— The Honour of the Flag • W. Clark Russell
... weakness you expose and blame, Of every prating fop the common theme; Yet from this weakness you suppose is due Sublimer virtue than your Cato knew. From whence is this unjust distinction shown? Are we not formed with passions like your own? Nature with equal fire our souls endued: Our minds as lofty, and as warm our blood. O'er the wide world your wishes you pursue, The change ...
— Lady Mary Wortley Montague - Her Life and Letters (1689-1762) • Lewis Melville
... virtuous life, he would settle down and raise children and vegetables; but if he found it inconvenient and disagreeable, so much the worse for those who made it so. Like many other persons, he was not principled against virtue, provided virtue were a better investment than its opposite; but he knew that there might be contingencies in which the property would be better without its incumbrances, and he contemplated this conceivable problem in the light of ...
— Elsie Venner • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... L'Histoire,' [11:2] that a Frenchman named Maigrot, Bishop of Conon, who knew not a word of Chinese, was deputed by the then Pope to go and pass judgment on the opinions of certain Chinese philosophers; he treated Confucius as Atheist, because that sage had said, 'the sky has given me virtue, and man can ...
— Superstition Unveiled • Charles Southwell
... you, that the honor, the virtue of my mother can be suspected. And my first minister has not yet done justice ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... General Hayne tells us in his proclamation, to execute the laws against insurgents not sustained by any law of the State? No; this act was passed at the very time when Pennsylvania was proceeding, by virtue of a law of the State, to execute, by an armed force, the mandate of the State in opposition to the mandate of the Federal authorities; and the officer of Pennsylvania, acting under the mandate of the Governor and a positive law of the State, was condemned for executing a law ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3 No 2, February 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... which of the party had spoken, but she was conscious of the fact that by virtue of the strange witchcraft which became hers on such nights she held them all spell-bound. ...
— Tales of Chinatown • Sax Rohmer
... One virtue of Uncle Jabez's, which shines as brightly in his rather gloomy character as a candle in the dark, is that he always pays his debts. If he considers he owes anybody anything he is not satisfied until he pays it. Therefore, ...
— Ruth Fielding at the War Front - or, The Hunt for the Lost Soldier • Alice B. Emerson
... whole matter; and how much nobler it is than a shallow religion which in like manner is ever straining after acts of righteousness, and forgets that in order to be right there must be prior surrender to God. Get a man to yield himself up to God and no fear about the righteousness. Virtue, goodness, purity, righteousness, all these synonyms express very noble things; but deep down below them all lies the New Testament idea of holiness, consecration of myself to God, which is the parent of ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) • Alexander Maclaren
... was, indeed, the identical person who had sent the hundred-pound note to Miss Matthews, when in the prison. He had reason to believe, likewise, as well by the letter as by other circumstances, that James had hitherto been an unsuccessful lover; for the lady, though she had forfeited all title to virtue, had not yet so far forfeited all pretensions to delicacy as to be, like the dirt in the street, indifferently common to all. She distributed her favours only to those she liked, in which number that gentleman had not the ...
— Amelia (Complete) • Henry Fielding
... you had knowne the virtue of the Ring, Or halfe her worthinesse that gave the Ring, Or your owne honour to contains the Ring, You would not then have parted with ...
— Shakespeare and Precious Stones • George Frederick Kunz
... mental torture, the jealous husband sees his wife violate every rule and principle and vow of virtue. He sees her reveling in the arms and embrace of him that he despises, committing trespass upon the one ...
— Tyranny of God • Joseph Lewis
... in tom. ii. p. 47. Gregory of Tours exhibits a very different picture. Perhaps it would not be easy, within the same historical space, to find more vice and less virtue. We are continually shocked by the union of ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon
... how enthusiastic Burr was," said Clover, evening the cards preparatory to slipping them into their holder on the side of the table. "He's always so enthusiastic and he's always so sick. In his place I should feel that, if a buoyant nature is a virtue, I didn't get ...
— The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary • Anne Warner
... fish," as his neighbors (whenever, by coming ashore, he had such treasures) contemptuously called him, was endowed from his birth with a peculiar skin, and by exercise had improved it. Its virtue was excessive thickness—such as a writer should pray for—protected also by powerful hairiness—largely admired by those with whom it ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... word that has passed between you and this detested villain, is known to me. Shadows on the wall have caught your whispers, and brought them to my ear; the sight of the persecuted child has turned vice itself, and given it the courage and almost the attributes of virtue. Murder has been done, to which you were morally if not ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... think, be fairly drawn from the whole of the story—that all Willoughby's difficulties have arisen from the first offence against virtue, in his behaviour to Eliza Williams. That crime has been the origin of every lesser one, and of all his ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... virtue of my self-imposed duty as chronicler of the deeds of Dr. Fu Manchu—the greatest and most evil genius whom the later centuries have produced, the man who dreamt of a universal Yellow Empire—I should have acquired a certain facility in describing bizarre happenings. But I confess that ...
— The Devil Doctor • Sax Rohmer
... adapted for all the world, and if practically acted upon would every where produce the same pure and upright character in the people. Vice and wickedness were the hateful effect of aristocratic pride, kingly lusts, or sacerdotal delusion; the human heart was naturally innocent, and bent only upon virtue; when the debasing influence of these corrupters of men was removed, it would universally resume its natural direction. Hence the maxim of Robespierre—"Le peuple est toujours bon, le magistrat toujours corruptible." Hence the readiness ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 360, October 1845 • Various
... and beneficence which he has displayed in his works of creation and providence, I cheerfully devote to the service of my fellow mortals, and particularly of the younger and unexperienced part of them. The most valuable service I can render them is to conduct them into the paths of virtue and discretion. For this purpose, having been gifted with the faculty of distinguishing those animals which are now animated by the souls of such human beings as formerly degraded themselves to a level with ...
— Vice in its Proper Shape • Anonymous
... "The Greater Joy;" "The Voice of the Heart." How the hero, by virtue of a self-evolved, infallible system, speedily climbs to the top of his profession in New York; how he saves the woman he loves from a fate worse than death, and then, to save his honor, discards the system that made his success, forms a vividly ...
— The Pirate of Panama - A Tale of the Fight for Buried Treasure • William MacLeod Raine
... happy disposition," he pursued, abiding by his former phrase as if there were some lingering virtue of self-defence in it. "I knew it would be, and am glad it is. However, on this travel of mine (in which I mean to pass the rest of my days, having abandoned all thought of a fixed home), I stopped, as you have heard from your father, at the Junction ...
— Mugby Junction • Charles Dickens
... pangs were never To mother giv'n in vain. Rise, new-born! Rise and sever Tyranny's clanking chain. Rise, Virtue! Rise forever! The New-Year comes amain! O! Give him welcome ever! Can ...
— The Poets and Poetry of Cecil County, Maryland • Various
... of the second campaign my plans were postponed. However, the measures I had been obliged to take could not remain secret. Some refractory conscripts, some deserters, appeared armed, at different places; they had to be maintained, and without an order ad hoc, but by virtue of general instructions, one of my officers possessed himself of the public funds for the purpose.... The guilty ones are ... myself, for whom I ask nothing, not from pride, for the haughtiest spirit need not feel humiliated at receiving grace from one who has granted it to kings, but from honour. ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre
... may be easily undermined and destroyed by the flattery or the ridicule, the reproach or the banter of some subtle or even of some thoughtless companion. To those who may read these pages, and who may at any time be tempted to seduce others from paths of virtue, or to break over solemn resolutions which they may have formed as to an upright and commendable course of life, let the injunction of old Zachary, the Mohegan sachem, not come in vain. "Never tempt any one ...
— Mrs Whittelsey's Magazine for Mothers and Daughters - Volume 3 • Various
... the great and mysterious book of life. He saw vice prosperous in externals, and from this sight his conclusion was drawn. "Vice," said he, "is not an obstacle to success; and if so, it is at least a pleasanter road to it than your narrow and thorny ways of virtue." But there are certain vices which require the mask of virtue, and Crauford thought it easier to wear the mask than to school his soul to the reality. So to the villain he added the hypocrite. He found the ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... distribution can be referred to the tendency of the half savage mind to confuse persons and things, and from seeming likeness of the inanimate to the animate, to endue the lifeless object with the virtue and power of the living object. This mental outlook is better understood in practice than in theory. A Melanesian native may come across a large stone, lying upon the top of a number of smaller stones. It suggests to him a sow with ...
— Stonehenge - Today and Yesterday • Frank Stevens
... the guests had arrived. His mother presented him, using proudly her formula for such meetings, "Our son." Somehow it always made him feel like an inanimate object of virtue—as if she had said "our Rembrandt," or, "our ...
— Youth Challenges • Clarence B Kelland
... a sketch of him. Let my readers then remember that he was a sincere and zealous Christian, of high Church of England and monarchical principles, which he would not tamely suffer to be questioned; steady and inflexible in maintaining the obligations of piety and virtue, both from a regard to the order of society, and from a veneration for the Great Source of all order; correct, nay stern in his taste; hard to please, and easily offended, impetuous and irritable in his temper, but of a most ...
— The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D. • James Boswell
... virtue. They have that sort of thing in France, and they say it gives a great support to ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever
... first chapter of the "Seven Gables," to a grant of lands in Waldo County, Maine, owned by the Pyncheon family. In the "American Note-Books" there is an entry, dated August 12, 1837, which speaks of the Revolutionary general, Knox, and his land-grant in Waldo County, by virtue of which the owner had hoped to establish an estate on the English plan, with a tenantry to make it profitable for him. An incident of much greater importance in the story is the supposed murder of one of the Pyncheons by his nephew, to whom we are ...
— The House of the Seven Gables • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... and neglected. I know that Sunday-school books tell you to love your mother; but if the only maternal caresses you could remember were administered by means of a wet pair of woollen drawers or the edge of a hot flat-iron, you would find filial piety a virtue somewhat abstract. Verily do earwigs care more for their progeny than did my mother. She sold me body and soul ...
— The Beloved Vagabond • William J. Locke
... with his arms folded across his massive chest. As he drew closer to the giant Phil wondered after all whether he might not have injured his cause by thus setting the balance of the camp against the man who had been leader all these years, by virtue of his brute ...
— Chums in Dixie - or The Strange Cruise of a Motorboat • St. George Rathborne
... indeed, my dear," I replied. And I replied with unshakable conviction. She was a woman who once having come under the domination of an idea would obey it blindly, ruthlessly, marching straight onwards, looking neither to right nor left. The very virtue that had made her overcruel to him in the past would have made her overkind to him in the future. Unwittingly she had used a phrase startlingly true. She would have worn herself to death in her determination to please. Incidentally ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke
... traitor and was brought to death. In the other is a pebble of the same weight. Come, my niece, take you these boxes and give them to your kinsmen, to each the box you will. The jewel that is called the Star of Hassan is magical, and has virtue, so they say. Let it choose, therefore, which of these knights is ripe for death, and let him perish in whose ...
— The Brethren • H. Rider Haggard
... change be observed when the magnet is excited? Absolutely none; and still profound and complex changes have occurred. First of all, the particles of water have been rendered diamagnetically polar; and secondly, in virtue of the structure impressed upon it by the magnetic whirl of its molecules, the liquid twists a ray of light in a fashion perfectly determinate both as to quantity ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... to," said Noah Ezekiel. "He is due to get away with about half a million. But what do we care?" Noah shook his head solemnly. "As my dad used to say, 'Virtue is its own reward.' That ought to comfort you, Brother Rogeen, when you are working out that $78,000 of debts at forty ...
— The Desert Fiddler • William H. Hamby
... Greville who will be debased, and not my uncle, Percy. The world might think him humbled to plead to such a man, but they would think falsely; he is raised above the cringing crowd, who from false pride would condemn the child of virtue to misery and death, because they would not bear with the vices of the parent. Were Mary, were Mrs. Greville in any point otherwise than they are, I would not thus plead, for there would be no necessity. She could not be so dear to Herbert. I do not ask my uncle to humble himself; I ask him ...
— The Mother's Recompense, Volume II. - A Sequel to Home Influence in Two Volumes • Grace Aguilar
... pushing on some four or five poor devils, who have been wedged up to honours, in this manner, ever since they were captains. I am glad they do not talk of promoting me, for I should hardly know how to refuse such a grace. There is great virtue in parchment, with all ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... tomahawks. "You are a liar," said one of the surviving Winnebagoes to him, after the action, "for you told us that the white people were dead or crazy, when they were all in their senses and fought like the devil." The Prophet appeared dejected, and sought to excuse himself on the plea that the virtue of his composition had been lost by a circumstance of which he had no knowledge until after the battle was over. His sacred character, however, was so far forfeited, that the Indians actually bound him with cords, and threatened to put him to death. After leaving the Prophet's ...
— Life of Tecumseh, and of His Brother the Prophet - With a Historical Sketch of the Shawanoe Indians • Benjamin Drake
... you sent that shameless Brent girl away, too," she announced, with the calm attitude of one whose own virtue ...
— Kindred of the Dust • Peter B. Kyne
... says: "As I have already urged, the practice of that which is ethically best—what we call goodness or virtue—involves a course of conduct which in all respects is opposed to that which leads to success in the cosmic struggle for existence. In place of ruthless self-assertion, it demands self-restraint; in place of thrusting aside or treading down all competitors, ...
— Reincarnation • Swami Abhedananda
... would have been for me to have purloined a book and its signature, but I am proud to say that I resisted, and my collection of autographs is to this day devoid of anything from Richard Wagner, showing that virtue is not always its own reward, since I regret having ...
— The Sunny Side of Diplomatic Life, 1875-1912 • Lillie DeHegermann-Lindencrone
... a never-failing source of satisfaction to me. My dreams glory in having discovered so much hidden virtue here, at my door; and I am surprised at the new pleasures which I ...
— The Choice of Life • Georgette Leblanc
... bedchambers and dressing-rooms. Built in the time of Louis XIV. the mansion retained an aspect of noble grandeur, subordinated to the epicurean tastes of the triumphant bourgeoisie, which for a century now had reigned by virtue ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... done as I done?" That was to be the wind-up, and it had rung in his mind like a trumpet call, bold yet irresistible—"Duke you may be, but if also a man, act as a man, and see fair play." Now, however, the prime virtue of it seemed to be lessened: it was all muddled, unstimulating, and flat ...
— The Devil's Garden • W. B. Maxwell
... has greatly favored the Jesuits, who have opened a school for his clergy and the sons of some citizens. Their labors are chiefly among the Visayan natives and the Chinese, and meet much success. The writer relates some instances of especial virtue and piety among these converts; there, as in missions elsewhere, the women are distinguished in those respects. No less important are the labors of the Jesuits among the Spaniards of Cebu, among whom they exercise great influence, even the bishop depending upon their advice; ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, - Volume XIII., 1604-1605 • Ed. by Blair and Robertson
... demand on them for gold, and, to complete the climax of this country's degradation and disgrace, an act of national bankruptcy was declared on the twenty-seventh day of February; an order in council being issued on that day, by virtue of which the Bank of England stopped payment in cash. From that fatal hour, swindling, the most barefaced swindling, has become legalized! On the eleventh of March, the King, for the first time, refused to receive the petition of the Common Hall of the City ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 1 • Henry Hunt
... best to entertain us, and lectured us unceasingly upon his virtue and his wisdom, dwelling greatly on the propriety and good policy of always speaking the truth. This spectacle of veracity became intolerable after a while, and I was goaded to say: "Oh then, if you never tell lies, you expect to go to Paradise." "Not at all," answered Antonino ...
— Italian Journeys • William Dean Howells
... worthy of a feverish poet," said she, laughing rather compassionately, and taking out the flower. "I scorn to owe anything to magic. Here, Mr. Hollingsworth, you may keep the spell while it has any virtue in it; but I cannot promise you not to appear with a new one to-morrow. It is the one relic of my more brilliant, my ...
— The Blithedale Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... with a mind suited to my present calamities; prepared alike for favors and for anger; to welcome your gracious reconciliation, and to deprecate your wrath. Take my own countrymen for witnesses of the services I have done for Persia, and make use of this occasion to show the world your virtue, rather than to satisfy your indignation. If you save me, you will save your suppliant; if otherwise, will destroy an enemy of the Greeks." He talked also of divine admonitions, such as the vision which he saw at Nicogenes's house, and the direction given him ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... the day from them and am preserved alive, I will set all the kings of the Jann under thy feet and thou shalt become queen of the world." But she shook her head and shed tears; and he said, "Weep not, for I swear by the virtue of the mighty inscription borne on the seal-ring of Solomon, thou shalt never again see the land of men; no, never! Say me, can any one part with his life? Give ear, then, to my words; else will I slay thee." So she was silent. And forthright he sent for his daughter, whose name was Jamrah,[FN245] ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... Mogg? O Muse! the man declare, How excellent his worth, his parts how rare. A younger son, he learnt in Oxford's halls The spheral harmonies of billiard-balls, Drank, hunted, drove, and hid from Virtue's frown His venial follies in Decorum's gown. Too wise to doubt on insufficient cause, He signed old Cranmer's lore without a pause; And knew that logic's cunning rules are taught To guard our creed, and not invigorate thought,— As those bronze steeds at Venice, kept for pride, Adorn ...
— The Life of John Sterling • Thomas Carlyle
... very narrow limitations. This is why women remain children all their lives, for they always see only what is near at hand, cling to the present, take the appearance of a thing for reality, and prefer trifling matters to the most important. It is by virtue of man's reasoning powers that he does not live in the present only, like the brute, but observes and ponders over the past and future; and from this spring discretion, care, and that anxiety which we so frequently notice in people. The advantages, as well as the disadvantages, that this ...
— Essays of Schopenhauer • Arthur Schopenhauer
... sufficient to drink out of the bony drum of the hyoidal bone of the araguato. This animal having so extraordinary a volume of voice, it is supposed that its larynx must necessarily impart to the water poured into it the virtue of curing affections of the lungs. Such is the science of the vulgar, which sometimes resembles that of ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V2 • Alexander von Humboldt
... general attitude toward the world and society at this time, Vittoria had adopted as her device a small Cupid within the circlet of a twisted snake, and under it was the significant motto: Quem peperit virtus prudentia servet amorem [Discretion shall guard the love which virtue inspired]. The soldier-husband came for a hasty visit to Ischia whenever distances and the varying fortunes of war made it possible; but his stays were brief, and he always wore in his wife's eyes that romantic ...
— Women of the Romance Countries • John R. Effinger
... Century Dictionary, is—"The fulfilment or discharge of a set duty or requirement, exercise of a faculty or office, or power of acting, faculty,—that power of acting in a specific way which appertains to a thing by virtue of its special constitution; that mode of action or operation which is proper to any organ, faculty, office structure, etc. (This is the most usual signification ...
— The Psychology of Management - The Function of the Mind in Determining, Teaching and - Installing Methods of Least Waste • L. M. Gilbreth
... architect, sculptor, or painter in glass, did rise here above his usual level. He knew it when he did it, and probably he attributed it, as we do, to the Virgin; for these works of his were hardly fifty years old when the rest of the old church was burned; and already the artist felt the virtue gone out of him. He could not do so well in 1200 as he did in 1150; and the Virgin was ...
— Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres • Henry Adams
... of Savage (Works, viii. 183) Johnson wrote of the keeper of the Bristol gaol:—'Virtue is undoubtedly most laudable in that state which makes it most difficult; and therefore the humanity of a gaoler certainly deserves this publick attestation; and the man whose heart has not been hardened by such an employment may be justly proposed as a pattern of benevolence. If an inscription ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 3 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... these hospitable people, and meanwhile not to mistake for over-familiarity that which is intended as honor to a guest. I was fortunate in my travels in the islands, and saw nothing to shake one's faith in native virtue. ...
— Sailing Alone Around The World • Joshua Slocum
... a young man With my bones full of marrow, Oh, if I were a bold young man Straight as an arrow, I'd store up no virtue For Heaven's distant plain, I'd live at ease as I did please And ...
— Country Sentiment • Robert Graves
... fine clearness and lustre, while the heavy lines of his mouth, only partly concealed by a short, thick black beard, plainly betokened that the monarch's tendencies were by no means toward the strict and narrow paths of virtue. ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... life for one's country as the Lombard boy did, is a great virtue; but you must not neglect the lesser virtues, my son. This morning as you walked in front of me, when we were returning from school, you passed near a poor woman who was holding between her knees a thin, pale child, ...
— Cuore (Heart) - An Italian Schoolboy's Journal • Edmondo De Amicis |
