"Be-all" Quotes from Famous Books
... scenes, it sounded throaty, a squeezed-out, constrained tone, but later, when Manrico's display pieces came it rang out full and vibrant as a trumpet. It developed at once that he was a singer of the sideshow kind, with whom the be-all and end-all of his part and art lay in the high tones. So little of a musician was he that, being enthusiastically recalled after the "Di quella pira," he was unable to keep the key of C major in his head in ... — Chapters of Opera • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... Russian sportsman, he forms a class by himself, and is a very original person indeed, unless taught the delights of the chase by an Englishman. In his eyes the be-all and end-all of a true sportsman is to purchase the orthodox equipment of a green-trimmed coat, Tyrolese hat, and long boots, and to pay his subscription to a shooting club. He rarely discharges a gun; the rascally ... — Russia - As Seen and Described by Famous Writers • Various
... will the sun definitely refuse to set on the roast beef of old England. May it be soon. Some day, mayhap, I shall gather my great-great-grandsons round my knee, and tell them—as one tells tales of Faery—that I can remember the time when Work was considered the be-all and the end-all of a school career. Perchance, when my great-great-grandson John (called John after the famous Jones of that name) has brought home the prize for English Essay on 'Rugby v. Association', ... — Tales of St. Austin's • P. G. Wodehouse
... have boggled towards the same end through centuries of crass political experiment. Confucius, following his ancient models, ignored metaphysics altogether: jumped the life to come, and made his be-all and his end-all here:—in what was necessary, in deeds and thought and speech, to make individual, social, and political life staid, sincere, orderly, quiet, decent, and happy. He died a broken- hearted failure; than whom perhaps no man except the Lord Buddha ... — The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... in the writing of books is tempted to make such writing the be-all and end-all of his existence—to grow his literature out of his history, experience, or observation, as the gardener grows out of soils brought from a distance the plants which he intends to exhibit. The cup of life foams fiercely over into first ... — Dreamthorp - A Book of Essays Written in the Country • Alexander Smith |