"Merit" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... this song is the precision with which each character enters and joins the slowly increasing circle. But that is its only merit. It is wretched doggrel, and would make the play far too tedious. I was, however, interested by ...
— The Peace Egg and Other tales • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... other species. That means that he has corrected the earlier erroneous nomenclature of Natural History and has introduced a more correct classification. He has greatly simplified the work of the Creator of the world. Of that merit no one will deprive him, and it is a great merit. And those who believed that every species required its own act of creation, and had to be finished by the Creator separately (as was the established opinion in England, and still is in some places), cannot be ...
— The Silesian Horseherd - Questions of the Hour • Friedrich Max Mueller
... Mrs Jamieson," said Miss Pole, with just a sound of offended merit in her voice, "we, the ladies of Cranford, in my drawing-room assembled, can resolve upon something. I imagine we are none of us what may be called rich, though we all possess a genteel competency, sufficient for tastes that are elegant ...
— Cranford • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... Highland Brigade, in the place of the late General Wauchope. The "Scots" who were with us lined up and gave the General a thrilling welcome, whilst our fellows, who are not usually demonstrative, crowded around the railway line to get a look at the brilliant soldier who, by sheer merit, dauntless pluck, and iron resolution, forced his way from the ranks to the high place he holds. The Australians had expected to see a gaunt, prematurely aged man, war-worn and battle-broken, and were surprised to see a dashing, gallant-looking man, who might ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales
... protest against his propagandism of the new faith. Taking advantage of the protests, Ei-sai wrote a book entitled Ko-zen-go-koku-ron ('The Protection of the State by the Propagation of Zen'), and not only explained his own position, but exposed the ignorance[FN74] of the protestants. Thus at last his merit was appreciated by the Emperor Tsuchi-mikado (1199-1210), and he was promoted to So Jo, the highest rank in the Buddhist priesthood, together with the gift of a purple robe in 1206. Some time after this he went to the city of Kama-kura, the political centre, ...
— The Religion of the Samurai • Kaiten Nukariya
... Mary felt an inward weakness that she knew was occasioned by lack of food, and so accepted the offer of tea, in the hope that it might prove more palatable than the coffee. It had the merit of being hot, and not of decidedly offensive flavor; but it was little more in strength than sweetened water, whitened with milk. She drank off the cup, and then left the table, going, with her still wet feet and skirts ...
— All's for the Best • T. S. Arthur
... of Jockies (of the above description) has, I suppose, been long extinct in Scotland; but the old remembered beggar, even in my own time, like the Baccoch, or travelling cripple of Ireland, was expected to merit his quarters by something beyond an exposition of his distresses. He was often a talkative, facetious fellow, prompt at repartee, and not withheld from exercising his powers that way by any respect ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... important truth. The one has but the good faith of the minstrel, the other the high wisdom of the poet. In "The Fight of the Dragon," is expressed the moral of that humility which consists in self-conquest—even merit may lead to vain-glory—and, after vanquishing the fiercest enemies without, Man has still to contend with his worst foe,—the pride or disobedience of his own heart. "Every one," as a recent and acute, but somewhat over-refining critic has remarked, "has more ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXVIII. February, 1843. Vol. LIII. • Various
... American conflict than any of his ministerial colleagues. He was an occasional contributor to the reviews and his unsigned article in the Edinburgh, April, 1861, on "The Election of President Lincoln and its Consequences," was the first analysis of real merit in any ...
— Great Britain and the American Civil War • Ephraim Douglass Adams
... fair or the market; but she enables him to do all these without injury to his affairs at home; she is the guardian of his property; she preserves what would otherwise be lost to him. The barn and the granary, though they create nothing, have, in the bringing of food to our mouths, as much merit as the fields themselves. The wife does not, indeed, assist in the merchant's counting-house; she does not go upon the exchange; she does not even know what he is doing; but she keeps his house in order; she rears up his children; she provides a scene of suitable resort for ...
— Advice to Young Men • William Cobbett
... were both convinced that it was a great mistake that we were nothing but private soldiers, but felt that it would not be long before we were called to occupy high places. It seemed to stand to reason that true merit would find its reward. Then he knocked the ashes out of his pipe and said if I had a pack of cards we would go up in the judges stand and play seven-up to see whether I was his prisoner, or he was mine. I wanted to take a prisoner back to the regiment, ...
— How Private George W. Peck Put Down The Rebellion - or, The Funny Experiences of a Raw Recruit - 1887 • George W. Peck
... Lieutenant Richardson, as officers on whom her Majesty had been graciously pleased to bestow the Distinguished Service Order. The principal Native officers, whose gallantry had been so notable a feature of that grim day's work, received the coveted Order of Merit; Hira Singh and his brother being gazetted, though killed, that their widows might draw a larger pension. For England is rarely unmindful of her heroes; notwithstanding her superb dilatoriness in honouring ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver
... but no merit attaches to me. They were the precepts of Christianity that softened her heart, ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... on the work should be counted by the minute, almost as by the chronometers of psychological experiment. Justice is rigorous. On the paper handed in by the child the teacher writes the hour: handed in at 10.32, handed in at 11.5. If two papers are about equal in merit, so that it can hardly be said from the contents which is the better of the two, though both are superior to all the rest, a difficult case arises: it must be decided which is to be the first. It is a matter of great weight, because the prize is in question. When there is a doubt, the ...
— Spontaneous Activity in Education • Maria Montessori
... essential trouble of my life is its petty weaknesses. If I am to have that love, that sense of understanding fellowship, which is, I conceive, the peculiar magic and merit of this idea of a personal Saviour, then I need someone quite other than this image of virtue, this terrible and incomprehensible Galilean with his crown of thorns, his blood-stained hands and feet. I ...
— First and Last Things • H. G. Wells
... accepted and establish a name. On the other, I couldn't collect my royalties. The third was a failure. But none of these, or of any I have written, was up to the level of the play that Bagley dealt with. I admit that. It was my one work of first-class merit. I think my poor powers were affected by my experience with that play; but ...
— The Mystery of Murray Davenport - A Story of New York at the Present Day • Robert Neilson Stephens
... tightened vigorously by means of a stick inserted tourniquet fashion. This is believed to prevent the head, which is aching "fit to split," from actually bursting open, and is considered a cure of wondrous merit through many a countryside. Ludicrous as is the reason which is gravely assigned for its use, it does, in some cases, greatly relieve the pain, a fact which we were entirely at a loss to account for until our later knowledge showed us that the pain, instead of ...
— Preventable Diseases • Woods Hutchinson
... lift it is! It just shows what luck can do. Well, I don't care. I shouldn't care to be a painted accident—I shouldn't value it. I am prouder to have climbed up to where I am just by sheer natural merit than I would be to ride the very sun in the zenith and have to reflect that I was nothing but a poor little accident, and got shot up there out of somebody else's catapult. To me, merit is everything—in fact, the only ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc - Volume 1 (of 2) • Mark Twain
... figures enveloped in light. "Why do you look so sad?" they asked. "You are in that abode of departed spirits known as paradise, and should be happy." "I suppose I should be happy, were I here as you are, as the reward of merit," he replied. "But I am still in the flesh, and as such am subject to its cares." "You are about to have an experience," said another speaker. "This day your doubts will be at rest, for before another sunset you will know more of the woman you love." The ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds • J. J. Astor
... persistently claiming sixty-five thousand inhabitants are often heavier than the world suspects, and there were moments when Julia found the position so trying that she would have preferred to resign. She was a warm-hearted, appreciative girl, naturally unable to close her eyes to sterling merit wherever it appeared: and it was not without warrant that she complained of her relatives. The whole family, including the children, she said, regaled themselves with her private affairs as a substitute for ...
— Gentle Julia • Booth Tarkington
... the parlor should possess evident artistic merit. There should be no suggestion of amateurishness. Family attempts at drawing or painting, crayon portraits, etc., all photographs, with the exception of those intended as artistic studies, should be excluded from the walls. If good originals by capable artists are ...
— Practical Suggestions for Mother and Housewife • Marion Mills Miller
... that love or no love was a question of very little moment, and that the personal qualities of the man whom she chose for a husband mattered nothing to her, provided that his lands and houses and social status came up to her standard of merit. She had seen Mr. Smithson's houses and lands; and she was distinctly assured that he would in due course be raised to the peerage. She had, therefore, every reason to ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... Berlin. I have courage to defy the whole world for your sake—I will remain to prove that I am not ashamed of my love. The whole world shall know that the brave and handsome Kindar, the beloved of all women, is my lover. Ah, cousin, you merit this compensation at my hands; you defended my honor against the aspersions of my husband, and compelled ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... much of which runs on similar lines, is not founded on Cervantes. Southerne, in his comedy, The Disappointment; or, The Mother in Fashion (1684) and 'starch Johnny Crowne' in The Married Beau (1694), both comedies of no little wit and merit, are patently indebted to The Curious Impertinent. Cervantes had also been used three quarters of a century before by Nat Field in his Amends for Ladies (4to, 1618), where Sir John Loveall tries his wife in an ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume IV. • Aphra Behn
... period is portrayed for us by Fitzherbert, the first agricultural writer of any merit since Walter of Henley in the thirteenth century. He was one of the Justices of Common Pleas, and had been a farmer for forty years before he wrote his books on husbandry, and on surveying in 1523, so that he knew what he was writing about; 'there is nothing touching ...
— A Short History of English Agriculture • W. H. R. Curtler
... has the merit of being eminently simple and comprehensible in principle, and its essential positions may be stated in a very few words: all species have been produced by the development of varieties from common stocks by the ...
— Lay Sermons, Addresses and Reviews • Thomas Henry Huxley
... situation of our affairs, I have thought it would be wise to endeavor to gain a regular and acknowledged access in every court in Europe but most the Southern. The countries bordering on the Mediterranean I think will merit our earliest attention. They will be the important markets for our great commodities of fish, wheat, tobacco, ...
— The Bounty of the Chesapeake - Fishing in Colonial Virginia • James Wharton
... great surprise to him. Why, the product was quite an eye opener! A paper for general home use might not be such a bad thing in Burmingham. There was actually something in this March Hare worth while for grown-ups. If the following issues continued to be of the present order of merit, the Echo had nothing to blush for in fostering the scheme. As for that Paul Cameron, he was a boy worth watching. He would make his mark ...
— Paul and the Printing Press • Sara Ware Bassett
... was assailed. The young gentlemen when in the society of the young ladies generally join them in this unique use of snuff, as they are always sure to be invited and urged if they decline, and to merit their favor of course they must appear social. I believe, in credit to their taste, however, that they really prefer a good cigar, and think it more in keeping with their ideas of manhood and neatness. ...
— Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce • E. R. Billings
... circumstantial evidence: he was convicted, and ordered off to sea, to return a Nelson. For his conduct during the time he served her, Edward Forster certainly deserved well of his country, and had he been enabled to continue in his profession, would in all probability have risen by his merit to its highest grades; but having served his time as midshipman, he received a desperate wound in "cutting out," and shortly after obtained his promotion to the rank of lieutenant for his gallant conduct. His wound was of that severe description that he was obliged to quit the service, and, for ...
— Newton Forster - The Merchant Service • Captain Frederick Marryat
... action of the poem. How does the coloring harmonize with the artist's mood? Why is he weary? How does he think of his art: what merit has it? What does it lack? How does he explain this lack? What clew to it does his life afford? Is his art soulless because he has done wrong? Or, do the lack of soul in his painting, and the wrongdoing, and the infatuation ...
— Browning's Shorter Poems • Robert Browning
... don't suppose you can get anything on him till he gives you a chance," said Mr. Hagan grudgingly, "but what this man Tollman wants is results. He ain't paying out good money that he's hoarded for years, just to get merit reports. He didn't wring it out of the local widows and ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... the public mind been disturbed of late, that the sight, which a month before would have filled the streets with anxious or angry multitudes, now hardly seemed to merit a second glance, and the spectators hurried back to their couches, invoking the aid of the good Consul, who watched so well over the liberties and lives of Rome, or muttering curses on his head, according as they were well ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 2 of 2) • Henry William Herbert
... objected; "if it is exhibited with my name, and you say my name as the grower must appear, your father will hear of it and then he will know that you gave me a bulb—it cannot be exhibited. I do not care about a certificate of merit or whatever ...
— The Good Comrade • Una L. Silberrad
... young and have neither judgment nor experience, or you would never speak as you have done of these hated white men. You extol them as virtuous men, who injure no one. You say that they are valiant; are children of the Sun, and merit all our reverence and service. The vile chains which they have hung upon you, and the mean and dastardly spirit which you have acquired during the short period you have been their slaves, have caused ...
— Ferdinand De Soto, The Discoverer of the Mississippi - American Pioneers and Patriots • John S. C. Abbott
... Arrian or Raleigh may now be referred to by those who wish to know the real merit of Alexander as a general, and how far the commonplace assertions are true that his successes were the mere results of fortunate rashness and unreasoning pugnacity. Napoleon selected Alexander as one of the seven greatest ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 2 • Various
... branch of one of the noblest Neapolitan families, escaped from one of these castles before it capitulated. He was at the head of the marine, and was nearly seventy years of age, bearing a high character, both for professional and personal merit. He had accompanied the court to Sicily; but when the revolutionary government, or Parthenopean Republic, as it was called, issued an edict, ordering all absent Neapolitans to return on pain of confiscation of their property, he solicited and obtained permission of ...
— The Life of Horatio Lord Nelson • Robert Southey
... direction, they can lavish the wealth of their affections, the tenderness of their hearts, and the ardor of their charity, and find true joy and happiness in so doing, ample scope for woman's noblest ambition, and chances enough to acquire merit in the sight of heaven, and true glory, that will shine brighter and brighter forever. They thus are dear to God, dear to the Church, and dear to Christian society. They are to be envied, not pitied. It ...
— Public School Education • Michael Mueller
... over the qualities of Amadour, as pictured to him by the Countess of Aranda, and especially by the fair Florida, as well as by the young Count of Aranda, who was now beginning to grow up, and to esteem people of merit. When the marriage had been agreed upon by the kinsfolk, the Queen's majordomo sent for his brother, there being at that time a truce ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. II. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... old women, and your fussy charity-schools. Very well. That is all I do with my drawing, my lounging, my smoking, my reading. And I think, Minnie," added Fred, laughing, "I have the added grace of humility; for I am far from making a merit of my sort ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 18, April, 1859 - [Date last updated: August 7, 2005] • Various
... off—a rasee house. Close at hand, and peering over a paling, is a statue of our blest sovereign George II. How absurd these pompous images look, of defunct majesties, for whom no breathing soul cares a halfpenny! It is not so with the effigy of William III., who has done something to merit a statue. At this minute the Lord Mayor has William's effigy under a canvas, and is painting him of a bright green picked out with ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors - Vol. II Great Britain And Ireland, Part Two • Francis W. Halsey
... accounted righteous before God, only for the merit of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ by faith, and not for our own works or deservings: Wherefore, that we are justified by faith only is a most wholesome doctrine, and very full of comfort, as more largely is expressed in ...
— The Book of Common Prayer - and The Scottish Liturgy • Church of England
... curious, and also touching, to notice how often the errors of man are thus the shadows of truth. Were it not for the preceding shadows, indeed, the substance would never arrive; and therefore the Ptolemaics of the world are second, in value and in merit, only to ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... subaltern rattling his dice-box... At the sight of a public official rising from nowhere, even the soul of a bootblack will bound with emulation."—He has merely to push himself ahead and elbow his way to secure a ticket "in this immense lottery of popular luck, of preferment without merit, of success without talent, of apotheoses without virtues, of an infinity of places distributed by the people wholesale, and enjoyed by the people in detail."—Political charlatans flock thither from ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... Moore's famous story "Old Mistis," and many others of equal merit, with some of the poems which in fugitive form have found so many admirers. 12mo. 358 pages. Illustrated. Cloth extra. ...
— Dulcibel - A Tale of Old Salem • Henry Peterson
... upon the time-limit of six years as being wholly unacceptable. Redmond, on the other hand, while declaring that the Government had gone to "the extremest limits of concession," said that the proposals had one merit: they would "elicit beyond doubt or question by a free ballot the real opinion of the people of Ulster." This indicated his conviction that if Home Rule really came the majority in Ulster would ...
— John Redmond's Last Years • Stephen Gwynn
... that in the same year (A.D. 660), forty-seven men of Sushen were entertained at Court, and the inference is either that these were among the above "savages"—in which case Japan's treatment of her captured foes in ancient times would merit applause—or that the Sushen had previously established relations with Japan, and that Hirafu's campaign was merely ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... geranium in the glass yonder seemed to say with its dying breath, 'You have cared for neither of us as you ought to have cared; my scent and her goodness have been all one to you,—things to take or to leave. It was for no merit of yours that she was always planning something to make life smoother and brighter for you. What had you done to deserve it? How unselfish and generous and good she has been to you for years and years! What would have become of you without her? She ...
— The Stillwater Tragedy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... that he had scribbled a certain amount in years gone by, when he was at the 'Varsity: but not seriously. . . . An essay or two which he had been told showed distinct ability: a short story, of possible merit but questionable morality, which had been accepted on the spot by a not too particular periodical and had never been paid for—that was the extent of his scribbling. And yet—Margaret might be right. . . . One never knows till one tries: and Vane grinned ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile
... Benares offered him diamonds of great value. The Nabob of Oude pressed him to accept a large sum of money and a casket of costly jewels. Clive courteously, but peremptorily refused; and it should be observed that he made no merit of his refusal, and that the facts did not come to light till after his death. He kept an exact account of his salary, of his share of the profits accruing from the trade in salt, and of those presents which, according ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... be thoroughly trustworthy and brave men, as in a business of this sort our lives might depend upon their conduct. At last I secured two, one a Hottentot named Ventvoegel, or "windbird," and one a little Zulu named Khiva, who had the merit of speaking English perfectly. Ventvoegel I had known before; he was one of the most perfect "spoorers," that is, game trackers, I ever had to do with, and tough as whipcord. He never seemed to tire. But he had one failing, so common with his race, drink. ...
— King Solomon's Mines • H. Rider Haggard
... average, the stories are of good literary merit and plot. However, there is one thing that seems to be getting rather pushed into the background and that is the second part of your title, "Super-Science." If this is to be a Science Fiction magazine let ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, December 1930 • Various
... actually written in the book, "Dismissal—B. B." But she had learned that the words had not been written as yet. All is fair in love and war. She was not in the least angry with Tribbledale because of his little ruse. A lie told in such a cause was a merit. But not on that account need she be led away by it from her own most advantageous course. In spite of the little quarrel which had sprung up between herself and Crocker, Crocker, still belonging to Her Majesty's Civil Service, must be better than Tribbledale. But when she found that Tribbledale's ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope
... upon the arrangement, not understanding, she said, graciously, why they need deprive themselves of the society of such an agreeable and distinguished person. Madame Leon in no wise doubted but this favor was due to her merit alone, but Mademoiselle Marguerite, who was more discerning, saw that their hostess was really furious at the idea, but was compelled to submit to it by the imperious necessity of preventing Madame ...
— Baron Trigault's Vengeance - Volume 2 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau
... of Mr. Sinclair's books had been saved for the boys, and were stored in a little box in their room. The book Frank referred to was an old History of the Turks, and its gay cover was probably the best of it, since its contents were of no particular merit. ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1907 to 1908 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... on such occasion, Your dissenting voice Would have been, in mild persuasion, Raised against their choice; Man of peace, and man of merit, Pompous, wise, and grave, Ephraim! is it flesh or spirit You strive most to save? Vain is half this care and caution O'er the earthly shell, We can neither baffle nor shun Dark plumed Azrael. Onward! onward! still we wander, Nearer draws the ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... Orleans, doubtless, there were certain who were keen enough to perceive that the numerous and ingenious engines of war, gathered together by the magistrates, had been of great service; but folk generally prefer to ascribe results to miraculous causes, and the merit of their deliverance the people of Orleans attributed first to their Blessed Patrons, Saint Aignan and Saint Euverte, and after them to Jeanne, the Divine Maid, believing that there was no easier, simpler, or more natural explanation of the ...
— The Life of Joan of Arc, Vol. 1 and 2 (of 2) • Anatole France
... of the year frequent the theatre less for the purpose of seeing the play than the Pantomime, and at both theatres it was this evening their chief, and almost only, attraction; for the tragedy of Rowe, which is of very little merit, derived but trifling interest or effect from the performers who personated the prominent characters. Moreover the lessons of the pulpit have unfortunately but too slight an influence on those who attend them, and we are rather fearful the moral ...
— A History of Pantomime • R. J. Broadbent
... day of the present month, to shoot himself by subscription. His life being of no farther use to himself or his friends, he takes this method of endeavouring to turn his death to some account; and the novelty of the performance, he hopes, will merit the attention ...
— The Olden Time Series, Vol. 4: Quaint and Curious Advertisements • Henry M. Brooks
... vexation in the heart of the "Admiral of India" when the command of the new fleet was given to Pedro Cabral? History is silent. Anyhow, in the March of 1500 we find this "Gentleman of Great Merit" starting off with thirteen powerfully armed ships and some fifteen hundred men, among them the veteran explorer Bartholomew Diaz, a party of eight Franciscan friars to convert the Mohammedans, eight chaplains, skilled gunners, ...
— A Book of Discovery - The History of the World's Exploration, From the Earliest - Times to the Finding of the South Pole • Margaret Bertha (M. B.) Synge
... enterprise that we learn their full value and strength. Whether we glance back and compare his performance with the efforts of his predecessors, or look forward along the course which modern research is disclosing, we shall honour most in him not the rounded merit of finite accomplishment, but the creative power by which he inaugurated a line of discovery endless in variety and extension. Let us attempt thus to see his work in true perspective between the past from which it ...
— Evolution in Modern Thought • Ernst Haeckel
... these stories in the life of child-imagination can never be overestimated. Enchanting and valuable as they are, however, they should not blind us to the need for standard realistic stories of equal literary and poetic merit. ...
— All About Johnnie Jones • Carolyn Verhoeff
... ..."]. Some other critics have been neither more friendly than Sir Walter, nor more discriminating, in speaking of Jonathan Wild and Smollett's Count Fathom in the same breath, as if they were similar either in purpose or in merit. Fathom is a romantic picaresque novel, with a possibly edifying, but most unnatural reformation of the villainous hero at the last; Jonathan Wild is a pretty consistent picaresque satire, in which the hero ends where Fathom by all rights should have ended,—on the gallows. Fathom is the ...
— The History of the Life of the Late Mr. Jonathan Wild the Great • Henry Fielding
... very ill off, poor thing; but she had a great deal of merit, and worked hard; she taught my ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... evident, your Grace can have acted thus from no other motive but your pure regard to merit; from your entire love for learning; and from that accurate taste and discernment, which, by your studies, you have so early attained to in ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. II • Edited by Walter Scott
... much merit or ability an applicant for a position may possess, he can not afford to be careless of his personal appearance. Diamonds in the rough of infinitely greater value than the polished glass of some of those who get positions ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... crown, and made their private fortunes out of the nation's treasure! 'Tis a matter of years, ay, generations, to undo all the mischief that springs from such corruption; and when money, oftener than merit, gained admission to a command, no wonder that such scoundrels as Wade and Kirkby ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang
... kingdom of Naples. People call Ceprano a city; it is, however, in fact, only a large town of the Abruzzi, very ugly and very dirty, to which leads one of the worst and most romantic roads in Italy. Ceprano would scarcely merit the traveller's notice, but for many curiosities which it contains, worthy of particular attention. These curiosities are neither the charms of nature, for the scenery is without interest, nor ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various
... replied bluntly, "especially as I do not remember having done anything that should merit your evident dislike ...
— Weapons of Mystery • Joseph Hocking
... Another merit this supplement possessed, it was really humorous, and the humor was apparent, even to the people of that day, and that is more than the colored supplements of today ...
— Watch Yourself Go By • Al. G. Field
... Chase for the Chief Justiceship has always been regarded as an act of great magnanimity on Mr. Lincoln's part, as well as a clear perception of merit. It was doubtless all that, but the actions of the two men at this time certainly make out a case of striking coincidence. Such ...
— The Abolitionists - Together With Personal Memories Of The Struggle For Human Rights • John F. Hume
... John Russell was a man of letters, and it is a common opinion that a man cannot at the same time be successful both in meditation and in action.' If this surmise is correct, Lord John's fondness for printer's ink kept him out of Downing Street until he made by force his merit known as a champion of popular rights in the House of Commons. Literature often claimed his pen, for, besides many contributions in prose and verse to periodicals, to say nothing of writings which still remain ...
— Lord John Russell • Stuart J. Reid
... have many priceless possessions; they are able to confer upon each other various glittering orders of merit and distinction; but we doubt if any one of them has a dearer possession or a more genuine order of merit than this simple prayer of faith and gratitude offered at sunrise and at sunset on behalf of Your Majesty by the bedside of a little ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, March 15, 1916 • Various
... at Silva's side could have only one meaning—she had become his disciple, had accepted his faith, was ready to follow him. The thought turned me sick at heart, for her as well as for Swain, but for Swain most of all, for he had done nothing to merit such misfortune, while she, at least, had chosen her road and was following it with open eyes. Small wonder that I thought of her with anger and resentment, yes, and with a vague distrust, for, at the very back of my mind was the suspicion that she had been ...
— The Gloved Hand • Burton E. Stevenson
... Germany, only made matters worse. There was such a dread of the old oppressions coming back, that the peasants were ready to fight to the death against the return of the nobles. The army, where promotion used to go by rank instead of merit, were so glad of the change, that they were full of fresh spirit, and repulsed the army of Germans and emigrants all along the frontier. The city of Lyons, which had tried to resist the changes, was taken, and frightfully used by Collot d'Herbois, a member of the Committee ...
— History of France • Charlotte M. Yonge
... he)(285) nothing is so powerful to abolish profaneness, and to root out superstition out of men's hearts, as the exercise of divine worship, in preaching, praying and thanksgiving, chiefly then when the superstitious conceits of merit and necessity are most pregnant in the heads of people,—as doubtless they are when the set times of solemnities return,—for then it is meet to lance the aposteme when it is ripe." Ans. This is a very bad cure; and is not only to heal the ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie
... monument will have one great merit, regarded as a piece of art. It will be entirely an original,—such a piece of architecture as he himself would have delighted to describe, and the description of which he, and he only, could have sublimed into poetry. There is a chaste and ...
— Leading Articles on Various Subjects • Hugh Miller
... merit of these Poems and Ballads of Young Ireland, it strikes one key with their political quality. One exquisite ballad of "The Stolen Child," by W. B. Yeats, might have been sung in the moonlight on a sylvan lake by ...
— Ireland Under Coercion (2nd ed.) (2 of 2) (1888) • William Henry Hurlbert
... he had exchanged telegrams with the Czar and the Mikado concerning his bestowal of the Order of Merit on Generals Stoessel and Nogi, asking permission to bestow the Order and receiving expressions of consent. Another telegram went to the composer Leoncavallo in Naples, congratulating him on the success there of his "Roland von Berlin." In February, the Emperor opened an ...
— William of Germany • Stanley Shaw
... the Federal, State and Local Governments are the largest employers of labor in the United States, we urge (a) an actual merit system of appointment and promotion based on qualifications for the work to be performed, these qualifications to be determined in open competition, free from special privilege or preference of any kind and especially free from discrimination on the ground of ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume V • Ida Husted Harper
... in the presence of his people that he had appeared to two persons who had never seen him, and knew him only by reputation, and that he advised them to come to Hippo, to be there cured by the merit of the martyr St. Stephen:—they came ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet
... and more! Now do I walk in meadows of calm light; The love of God is over me; I faint Almost beneath its sweetness and wild joy. My whole heart's toil is how to merit it Even a little. ...
— Mr. Faust • Arthur Davison Ficke
... turned over these "Occasional Pieces," Leonard came to others in a different handwriting,—a woman's handwriting, small and fine and exquisitely formed. He had scarcely read six lines of these last, before his attention was irresistibly chained. They were of a different order of merit from poor Mark's; they bore the unmistakable stamp of genius. Like the poetry of women in general, they were devoted to personal feeling,—they were not the mirror of a world, but reflections of a solitary heart. Yet this is the kind of ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... plants of great merit. They are elegant when in flower, and will endure the open air. They should be trained to a south wall, or over a vase, or up a pillar. Any light loamy soil suits them, and they are easily increased by cuttings. Flower in July. Height, 10 ft. (See ...
— Gardening for the Million • Alfred Pink
... question, I know it is necessary to provide that others should not view my arguments through a different medium to myself. And I cannot state too distinctly, even if I incur more than one repetition, that the Collar of Esses was not a badge of knighthood nor a badge of personal merit; but it was a collar of livery; and the idea typified by livery was feudal dependence, or what we now call party. The earliest livery collar I have traced is the French order of cosses de geneste, or broomcods: and the term ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 51, October 19, 1850 • Various
... of his inches, took off his old hat and held it out the length of his arm. "Let the lady fear nothing, senor caballero of my soul. I engage the honour of a gentleman that she shall have every consideration at my hands which her virtues merit. No more"—he looked at the sullen beauty between him and the Englishman—"No more, for that would be idolatrous; and no less, for that would be injustice. Vaya, senor caballero, vaya V|d| con Dios." Manvers ...
— The Spanish Jade • Maurice Hewlett
... overlooked, I feel that, whatever errors I may fall into, I am justified in undertaking this task. My mistakes will be corrected by others with more knowledge than I can claim; and if my theory of mother-right has any merit, it will be established in more competent hands. The vast majority of investigators on these questions are men. I am driven to believe that sometimes they are mistaken in their interpretation of habits ...
— The Position of Woman in Primitive Society - A Study of the Matriarchy • C. Gasquoine Hartley
... could alter it: 115 But all the play, the insight and the stretch— Out of me, out of me! And wherefore out? Had you enjoined them on me, given me soul, We might have risen to Rafael, I and you! Nay, Love, you did give all I asked, I think— 120 More than I merit, yes, by many times. But had you—oh, with the same perfect brow, And perfect eyes, and more than perfect mouth, And the low voice my soul hears, as a bird The fowler's pipe, and follows to the snare— 125 Had you, with these the ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning
... in a dying voice. "I shudder to think of the judgment which awaits me. In this, my death agony, I see with frightful clearness. I dare not hope in God's mercy. I have done nothing to merit it. A dark veil is before ...
— The Amulet • Hendrik Conscience
... occasion. The two skippers sat in the private bar of the "Old Ship," in High Street, Wapping, solemnly sipping cold gin and smoking cigars, whose sole merit consisted in the fact that they had been smuggled. It is well known all along the waterside that this greatly improves ...
— Many Cargoes • W.W. Jacobs
... Gifts; The Dark Glass; True Woman; Without Her; Known in Vain; The Heart of the Night; The Landmark; Stillborn Love; Lost Days. But it would be difficult to formulate a critical opinion in support of the superiority of almost any of these' sonnets over the others,—so balanced is their merit, so equal their appeal to the imagination and heart. Indeed, it were scarcely rash to say that in the language (outside Shakspeare) there exists no single body of sonnets characterised by such sustained excellence of vision and presentment. ...
— Recollections of Dante Gabriel Rossetti - 1883 • T. Hall Caine
... others served as cooks assistants, mess attendants and in similar duties. Quite a number were full rated cooks. A few were water tenders, electricians and gunners' mates, each of which occupations entitled them to the aforesaid rank of petty officer. Among the petty officers some had by sheer merit attained the rank of chief petty officer, which is about equal to the rank of sergeant in ...
— History of the American Negro in the Great World War • W. Allison Sweeney
... made no public announcement of his speculation: that would have been to spoil the surprise. But he could not refrain from talking a good deal about the Company to his friends. He explained with zeal the merit of the scheme; it was dealing directly with the producers, the poor small-farmers who could never get fair treatment. He saw a great deal of Mr. Hilary, who was vastly interested in his East-End work. A severe winter had begun. ...
— Demos • George Gissing
... how the whirligig of time brings in his revenges! To pity Millet is a piece of arrogance; if life be hard for such resolute and pious spirits, it is harder still for us, had we the wit to understand it; but we may pity his unhappier rival, who, for no apparent merit, was raised to opulence and momentary fame, and, through no apparent fault was suffered step by step to sink again to nothing. No misfortune can exceed the bitterness of such back-foremost progress, even bravely supported as it was; but to ...
— Across The Plains • Robert Louis Stevenson
... her soul found utterance through the columns of the Christian Watchman in various prose and poetic effusions. These articles do not exhibit any extraordinary poetic merit. They hardly do credit to her real abilities. Bearing the marks of haste, these early productions never gave any peculiar pleasure to the authoress; but for deep feeling and pathos they are remarkable. They seem to be the outgushings of a soul stirred up with holy enthusiasm and flowing out ...
— Daughters of the Cross: or Woman's Mission • Daniel C. Eddy
... possibility of stone-falls has been admitted, we can turn to the ancient records, and assign to them the credit they merit, which was withheld for so many centuries. Perhaps the earliest of all these stone-falls which can be said to have much pretension to historical accuracy is that of the shower which Livy describes as having fallen, about the year 654 B.C., on the Alban Mount, ...
— The Story of the Heavens • Robert Stawell Ball
... done, on the vital spot—the rich humility of the whole thing, the fact that neither Flickerbridge in general nor Miss Wenham in particular, nor anything nor any one concerned, had a suspicion of their characters and their merit. Addie and he would have to come ...
— Some Short Stories • Henry James
... this picture profitably, we must consider separately the subject and the artistic qualities. These two elements in a work of art are often confused, but are in reality quite distinct. Very unpleasant subjects have sometimes been employed in pictures of great artistic merit, and again beautiful subjects have sometimes been treated very indifferently. When great art is united with a great subject, we have ideal perfection; but poor art and a poor subject together are ...
— Jean Francois Millet • Estelle M. Hurll
... have thou of thy merit, Kindly unassuming spirit! Careless of thy neighbourhood, Thou dost show thy pleasant face On the moor, and in the wood, In the lane—there's not a place, Howsoever mean it be, But 'tis good enough ...
— Language of Flowers • Kate Greenaway
... business was supplied by a cover sent anonymously to the writer during the course of these negotiations with no indication as to its origin. The documents which this envelope contained are so interesting that they merit attention at the hands of all students of history, explaining as they do the psychology of the Demands as well as throwing much light on the manner in which the world-war has been viewed ...
— The Fight For The Republic In China • B.L. Putnam Weale
... character of the contributors; it being held impossible that any editorial efforts can secure a uniform standard of goodness. Wherever the greatest power is found, it should be suffered to produce its natural effect. There are, indeed, critics who think that the merit of a book, like the strength of a chain, is that of its weakest part: but there are others who know that the parallel does not hold, and who will remember that the union of many writers must show exaggeration of the inequalities which almost ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume II (of II) • Augustus de Morgan
... first-class merit for gardens where there is plenty of room; amongst shrubs it will not only prove worthy of the situation, but, being a ceaseless bloomer, its tall and leafy stems decked with brilliant flowers may always be relied upon for cutting purposes; and let me add, as, perhaps, many have ...
— Hardy Perennials and Old Fashioned Flowers - Describing the Most Desirable Plants, for Borders, - Rockeries, and Shrubberies. • John Wood
... this through having no selfishness? Hereby he preserves self-interest intact. He is not self-displaying, and therefore he shines. He is not self-approving, and therefore he is distinguished. He is not self-praising, and therefore he has merit. He is not self-exalting, and therefore he stands high; and inasmuch as he does not strive, no one in all the world strives with him. That ancient saying, 'He that humbles himself shall be preserved entire'—oh, it is no vain utterance" (Ibid, pp. ...
— The Freethinker's Text Book, Part II. - Christianity: Its Evidences, Its Origin, Its Morality, Its History • Annie Besant
... done. Whatever might be the merit of the natural voices, it was evident there was spiritual melody ...
— The Annals of the Poor • Legh Richmond
... give to those that fish for parts, Long sleepless nights, and aching hearts, A little soul, a fawning spirit, With half a grain of plodding merit, Which is, as Heaven I hope will say, Giving what's not ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... nine satires, four being written during his sojourn abroad. In Satire Second, entitled, "Filaret and Evgeny," or "On the Envy and Pride of Cantankerous Nobles," he describes the arrogance of the nobility, and their pretensions to the highest posts, without any personal exertion or merit, solely on the merits of their ancestors; and here he appears as a zealous advocate of Peter the Great's "Table of Ranks," intended to put a stop to precisely this state of affairs, by making rank depend on personal services to ...
— A Survey of Russian Literature, with Selections • Isabel Florence Hapgood
... Jimmy's Nellie for hot plates; "Roast Vealer for Mac," and as Mac smiled and acknowledged the honour, Rosy was dismissed. "Boilee Ham" was allotted to the Dandy; and as Bertie's Nellie scampered away, Cheon announced other triumphs in turn and in order of merit, each of the company receiving a dish also in order of merit: Tam-o'-Shanter contenting himself with the gravy boat, while, from the beginning, the Quiet Stockman had been honoured ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn
... of Wolmar, until that eminent teacher was recalled to Germany. At Orleans he had been admitted a licentiate in law when scarcely twenty years old. At Paris he gave to the world a volume of Latin poetry of no mean merit, which secured the author great applause. The "Juvenilia" were neither more nor less pagan in tone than the rest of the amatory literature of the age framed on the model of the classics. That they were immoral seems never to have been suspected until Beza became a Protestant, and it ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird
... touching the said Wilson, said the young man had engaged with him at Birmingham about six months ago; but never would take his salary; that he had behaved so well in his private character, as to acquire the respect and good-will of all his acquaintance, and that the public owned his merit as an actor was altogether extraordinary. — After all, I fancy, he will turn out to be a run-away prentice from London. — The manager offered to bail him for any sum, provided he would give his word and honour that ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... extent, a different creature from the Englishman, the assumption is not likely to provoke dispute. No one will deny us the prominence of our cheek-bones, and our pride in the same. How far the difference extends, whether it involves merit or demerit, are questions not now sought to be settled. Nor is it important to discover how the difference arose; how far chiller climate and sourer soil, centuries of unequal yet not inglorious conflict, a separate ...
— Dreamthorp - A Book of Essays Written in the Country • Alexander Smith
... year of its labors much of its time was devoted to the examination and discussion of projects submitted for its consideration by engineers and practical builders, some of these projects having decided merit. Most of the methods proposed involved temporary structures, or the use of floating plant, in the navigable channels of the river. This was objectionable in view of the resulting obstruction to the enormous river traffic. After ...
— Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, Vol. LXVIII, Sept. 1910 • Charles W. Raymond
... Inheritance. It was finished on the 20th of January and published on the 23rd of November 1822. Werner is in parts Kruitzner cut up into loose blank verse, but it contains lines and passages of great and original merit. Alone of Byron's plays it took hold of the stage. Macready's "Werner" was ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... the wrapper) of Adventures in Marriage (SIMPKIN) lures us without any sense of difficult transition from the news of the day to the realms of romance. Fifteen stories are contained in this book, of rather unequal length and merit, nearly all of them dealing with a tense situation between husband and wife, several of them calculated to lift the hair, and one or two sufficiently ingenious in mechanism, I should think, to raise a curtain. The adventures are not all unhappy, and the author would seem on the whole to balance ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, May 5, 1920 • Various
... conversation, the First Lord said, "Captain O'Brien, I am always very ready to oblige Lord Privilege, and the more so as his recommendation is of an officer of your merit. In a day or two, if you call at the Admiralty, you will hear further." O'Brien wrote to us immediately, and we waited with impatience for his next letter: but, instead of the letter, he made his appearance on the ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat
... see it filled with a number of dried Imuran heads grinning horribly up at me! I turned away in disgust, when I saw the chief looking at me with a glance of triumph in his eye, just as a civilised person would have been pleased at exhibiting a collection of his orders of merit for gallantry in battle or sagacity in the council. They were trophies, I found, taken by the chief in his wars with neighbouring tribes. Probably it was the possession of these which had raised him to his position ...
— In the Eastern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... gipsies, and the use of the word 'band,' which was used by the poor girl, no doubt, to explain the appearance which she had caught a hurried glimpse of by the light of her match, were sufficient to put me upon an entirely wrong scent. I can only claim the merit that I instantly reconsidered my position when, however, it became clear to me that whatever danger threatened an occupant of the room could not come either from the window or the door. My attention was speedily drawn, as I have already remarked to you, to this ventilator, and to the ...
— The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... helping hand, the friendly word of cheer, the thought that others shared our losses and cheered our victories? If consideration for our feelings and thoughts did not exist on this earth we would never know the depths of the love of our friends. There would be no such thing as an earthly reward of merit. We know that no matter what happens to us in the battle of life there will be someone to cheer us on our way. We may be strong and thoroughly able to rely upon ourselves but there comes a time when we need friendship and sympathy. Society would crumble into ...
— Laugh and Live • Douglas Fairbanks
... the Five Powers the control of international relations and the direction in large measure of the foreign policies of all nations. It was based on the power to compel obedience, on the right of the powerful to rule. Its chief merit was its honest declaration of purpose, however wrong that purpose might appear to those who denied that the possession of superior might conferred special rights upon the possessor. It seemed to ...
— The Peace Negotiations • Robert Lansing
... had been transmitted even to the people themselves. Today we honor in this an undying merit of Frederick II., for this spirit of abnegation is still the secret of the greatness of the Prussian State, and the final and best guarantee of its permanence. The artfully constructed machine which the great King had set up with so much ...
— The German Classics Of The Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries, Volume 12 • Various
... do it?" burst forth Evelyn. "You know Miss Harlowe forbade it. Now she will think that I knew all about it. Just when I am trying to merit her confidence." ...
— Grace Harlowe's Problem • Jessie Graham Flower
... evident to every one, whether in the possession of an income no more than sufficient for a family's requirements, or of a large fortune, which puts financial adversity out of the question. We must always remember that it is a great merit in housekeeping to manage a little well. "He is a good waggoner," says Bishop Hall, "that can turn in a little room. To live well in abundance is the praise of the estate, not of the person. I will study more how to give a good account of my little, ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... patiently wrought out narrative of the most tragic event in American history. One merit of the book is its many illustrations, taken from original photographs and ...
— The Good Old Songs We Used to Sing, '61 to '65 • Osbourne H. Oldroyd
... laughed. "If you hint as much in public, it may come to a sudden end. You ought to know that promotion is now made on merit." ...
— Blake's Burden • Harold Bindloss
... yet not exactly of merit. It was an instrument of education in the hand of a father less indiscriminate than Solomon, who chose to interpret the text in a new way, and preferred to educate his child by encouraging him in pursuits which were harmless and wholesome, ...
— Little Rivers - A Book Of Essays In Profitable Idleness • Henry van Dyke
... added; sometimes brief, but occasionally so elaborate and extensive as to merit the ...
— Lessons in Music Form - A Manual of Analysis of All the Structural Factors and - Designs Employed in Musical Composition • Percy Goetschius
... committee present their cordial thanks to the said young ladies for so spirited a performance; look upon these resolutions to be sensible and polite; that they merit the honor, and are worthy the imitation of ...
— Sketches of Western North Carolina, Historical and Biographical • C. L. Hunter
... very cunningly chosen for us by Marc'antonio out of the small flotilla which my father had hired at Cape Corso for the assault. She was undecked, measured some eighteen feet over-all, and carried a fair-sized lateen sail; but her great merit for our purpose, lay in her looks. The inhabitants of Cape Corso (as the reader knows) have neither the patriotism nor the prejudices of their fellow-islanders; and this (however her owner had come by her) was a boat of Genoese ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine
... an inept person. He was blindly ignorant of naval affairs, coarse, obstinate, a placeman who owed his position to intrigue and favoritism. His only merit was that he tried to cut down expenditure, but in regard to the navy this policy was likely to be fatal. It is useless, said this guardian of France's marine, to try to rival Britain on the sea, and the wise thing to do is to save ...
— The Conquest of New France - A Chronicle of the Colonial Wars, Volume 10 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • George M. Wrong
... the green trees and green fields. I had, I confess, a feeling—grand as I had to appear—that I knew less than anybody else on board about affairs nautical; but modesty is the frequent companion of merit, and though I was very little, I might have ...
— Salt Water - The Sea Life and Adventures of Neil D'Arcy the Midshipman • W. H. G. Kingston
... years before Saint Thomas settled the Church dogma, a monk of Citeaux or some other abbey, a certain Alain of Lille, had written a Latin poem, as abstruse an allegory as the best, which had the merit of painting the scene of man's creation as far as concerned the mechanical process much as Thomas seems to have seen it. M. Haureau has printed an extract (vol. I, p. 352). Alain conceded to the weakness of human thought, that God was ...
— Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres • Henry Adams
... most men would be cussing. You acquire merit by not beating me. I believe that's done, in moments like this. If you'd like, I'll get out and crawl around in the mud, and play turtle ...
— Free Air • Sinclair Lewis
... are one and all Of the Old World," the Poet said, "Flowers gathered from a crumbling wall, Dead leaves that rustle as they fall; Let me present you in their stead Something of our New England earth, A tale which, though of no great worth, Has still this merit, that it yields A certain freshness of the fields, A sweetness ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... acquaintance with the taste of all sorts of new fruits while here, more than in our former journey; but this is to be explained by the proximity of the Botanical Gardens. I expected to revel in fruit all through the tropics, but, except at Tahiti, we have not done so at all. There is one great merit in tropical fruit, which is, that however hot the sun may be, when plucked from the tree it is always icy cold; if left for a few minutes, however, it becomes as hot as the surrounding atmosphere, and the ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey
... those fallen and failing elephants adorned with gold, the Earth looked beautiful there, as if strewn with broken mountains. With the fallen elephant-warriors of blazing resplendence and adorned with gems, the Earth looked beautiful as if strewn with planets of exhausted merit. Then elephants, with their temples, frontal globes, and trunks deeply pierced, fled in hundreds in that battle, afflicted with the shafts of Bhimasena. Some amongst them, huge as hills, afflicted with fear and vomiting blood, ran away, their limbs mangled with arrows, and looked ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... The merit of the original idea of a raking pot of tea evidently belongs to the washerwoman and the laundry-maid. But why should not we have LOW LIFE ABOVE STAIRS as well as HIGH ...
— Castle Rackrent • Maria Edgeworth
... merit," declared Dick, who felt that something was expected of him. In spite of himself, he found much to like in John Armitage. He particularly despised sham and pretense, and he had been won by the evident sincerity of Armitage's wish to appear ...
— The Port of Missing Men • Meredith Nicholson
... his features, fitted very ill with the Lieutenant's preconceptions on the subject of the proprietor of a hell; and the tone of his conversation seemed to mark him out for a man of position and merit. Brackenbury found he had an instinctive liking for his entertainer; and though he chid himself for the weakness, he was unable to resist a sort of friendly attraction for ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 4 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... printed in small, round letter; and the whole appearance is creditable to the publisher's taste. The American edition entirely eclipses the English in this regard. Though not advertised profusely, the merit of these Letters has already given them entrance and welcome into our most cultivated circles: but we bespeak for them a larger audience still; for they are books which our young men, our young women, our pastors, our whole thoughtful and aspiring community, ought ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 87, January, 1865 • Various
... is not only in their instinctive attachments and habits that they merit notice; the following anecdote proves that they are gifted with a sense of observation approaching to ...
— Love's Meinie - Three Lectures on Greek and English Birds • John Ruskin |
