"Seemly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... his life for his land has been compassed at every turn of his service with elaborate ceremonial and observance, of which music is no small part, all carefully designed to support and uphold him. It is not seemly and it is not expedient that any portion of that ritual should be slurred ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... was guarded by men, and that faith had not been kept with her. Her saints, too, had told her "that it was great pity she had abjured to save her life." Still, she did not refuse to resume woman's dress. "Put me in a seemly and safe prison," she said; "I will be good, and do whatever ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... Sir, said they all, we bring you here this child the which we have nourished, and we pray you to make him a knight, for of a more worthier man's hand may he not receive the order of knighthood. Sir Launcelot beheld the young squire and saw him seemly and demure as a dove, with all manner of good features, that he weened of his age never to have seen so fair a man of form. Then said Sir Launcelot: Cometh this desire of himself? He and all they said yea. Then shall he, said Sir Launcelot, receive the high order of knighthood ...
— Chronicle and Romance (The Harvard Classics Series) • Jean Froissart, Thomas Malory, Raphael Holinshed
... the grove for years untold: Is there no reverence for a peace so old? Is there no seemly awe For bronze-engraven law, For dust beatified and saintly name? When they shall see the shrine Princes have held divine, Will they not bow ...
— Poems: New and Old • Henry Newbolt
... an honour] The modern editors all read, it is an honour. I have restored the genuine word ["hour"], which is more seemly from a girl to her mother. Your, fire, and such words as are vulgarly uttered in two syllables, are used as dissyllables by Shakespeare. [The first quarto reads honour; the folio hour. I have chosen the reading of the quarto. STEEVENS.] ...
— Notes to Shakespeare, Volume III: The Tragedies • Samuel Johnson
... again at Chelsea, a cheery, amiable younger Jane Welsh to nurse her: the tone of her Letters is still full of disconsolateness. I had to proceed hither, and have to stay here till this establishment can be abolished, and all the sad wrecks of it in some seemly manner swept away. It is above three weeks that I have been here; not till eight days ago could I so much as manage to command solitude, to be left altogether alone. I lead a strange life; full of sadness, of solemnity, ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, - 1834-1872, Vol. I • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson
... the four canoes darted under the middle arch of the old stone bridge, and then Ned took the lead, for it was not seemly that the pennant should be anywhere but in front while the club was on ...
— Canoe Boys and Campfires - Adventures on Winding Waters • William Murray Graydon
... the glass a minute, as she tied her bonnet-strings under her chin, and pinned her shawl. A night's vigil had not chased the bloom from her cheek, or the swimming lustre from her dark eyes. Content that her aspect should be seemly, she ran down the stairs, unfastened the bolts, and without hesitation closed the door behind her. At the same instant, a gentleman crossed the road. He asked whether Mrs. Ayrton lived in that house? Rhoda's vision danced across ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... The Sheriff knows the law. I wouldnt say for sure; but I think it would be more seemly to have a witness. Go and round one up, Strapper; and leave me here alone to wrestle ...
— The Shewing-up of Blanco Posnet • George Bernard Shaw
... 1. "As snow in summer and as rain in harvest, so honour is not seemly for a fool." It is as unseemly, prodigious, and destructive a thing, to give honours, promotions, and trust to a wicked man, as snow and much rain in harvest, a reproach and punishment more becomes him than honour, the reward of goodness (as ver. 3), a ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning
... was, that Emmanuel Himself made the feast. Mansoul did not feast her Deliverer; it was her Deliverer who feasted her. Mansoul, in good sooth, had nothing that she had not first and last received, and it was far more true and seemly and fit in every way that her Prince Himself should in His own way and at His own expense seal and celebrate the deliverance, the freedom, the life, the peace, and the joy of Mansoul. And, besides, what had Mansoul to set ...
— Bunyan Characters - Third Series - The Holy War • Alexander Whyte
... that was not wise in little Babette; but she was only nineteen! She did not reflect and still less did she think how her behaviour towards the young Englishman might be interpreted; for it was lighter and merrier than was seemly for the honourable and newly affianced daughter ...
— The Ice-Maiden: and Other Tales. • Hans Christian Andersen
... say it would have been more seemly to decline this proposal. I think perhaps I should have made a show of the indignation I really felt, and I am sure that Colonel MacAndrew at least would have thought well of me if I had been able to report my stout refusal to sit at the same table with a man of ...
— The Moon and Sixpence • W. Somerset Maugham
... grandmother's will. Her first business was to send for the best milliner in Oxford, a London Madam who had followed her court customers to the university town, and to order everything that was beautiful and seemly for a ...
— London Pride - Or When the World Was Younger • M. E. Braddon
... had meant to leave early, but it was as easy to stay as to go; besides, he felt the stirring of a curiosity to see what the closing hour of such an occasion might be like. Everything, thus far, had been most seemly, most decorous, full of a pleasant informality and a friendly, trustful goodwill; but the crucial point, he had read, always came about supper-time, after which the ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller
... picture of the old mill-dam. How naturally the wooded hill slopes back beyond the mill! And how, with the same old sleepy curves, the river winds on back. How green the trees—how very green! Ah, Singing Mouse, they do not mix that color now. And nowhere do wide bottom-lands wave and sing in such seemly grace, so decked with yellow flowers, with odd sweet william and the small wild rose. And nowhere now on earth, I know, is there any stream to murmur so sweetly and so comfortably, to say such words to any dreaming boy, to babble of a work ...
— The Singing Mouse Stories • Emerson Hough
... that Tatsu was allowed to remain. He could trust Tatsu's diplomacy and powers of resource to save his cherished possessions, and ultimately to restore a seemly order from the chaos, he was sure that Kitty and her decorators would create. On the whole, he succeeded in putting in about as stupid and empty a day as he had expected, perhaps because he had expected it, but late in the afternoon, as he was strolling up the Avenue in the direction ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... young woman a piece of goods that had been overlooked when her dress was sent home, Joel felt not unreasonably that he might have witnessed the transaction without offending the most rigid notions of what was seemly. ...
— Other People's Business - The Romantic Career of the Practical Miss Dale • Harriet L. Smith
... seem that this sudden love which you do me the honour to profess for me has destroyed your manners as well as your reason. But since you have assumed so high a dignity, it is not seemly that you should stand to hear what I have to say; sit down, for it looks as though standing were ...
— The Angel of the Revolution - A Tale of the Coming Terror • George Griffith
... will. But with the words which are their life and whereby they find admission into me, themselves seek in my affections a place of some estimation, and I can scarcely assign them one suitable. For at one time I seem to myself to give them more honour than is seemly, feeling our minds to be more holily and fervently raised unto a flame of devotion, by the holy words themselves when thus sung, than when not; and that the several affections of our spirit, by a sweet variety, have their own proper measures in the voice ...
— The Confessions of Saint Augustine • Saint Augustine
... Around the chapel was a great collection of black vehicles with sham-tailed mortuary horses; several of the families present must have left themselves bare in order to clothe a coffin in the way they deemed seemly. Emma and her sister had made their own funeral garments, and the former, in consenting for the sake of poor Jane to receive the aid which Mutimer offered, had insisted through Alice that there should be no expenditure beyond ...
— Demos • George Gissing
... leave all such to you," said Master Drury; "order whatever is seemly at this time. I know not what has come to ...
— Hayslope Grange - A Tale of the Civil War • Emma Leslie
... hand, if this being is not omnipotent, then He is a useless god, and there is no need for all the fears which religion breeds, no need for creed and worship. Every war, particularly this last one, is an indictment of God. "God's in His Heaven, all's right with the world," is seemly only to minds drugged with an ...
— The Necessity of Atheism • Dr. D.M. Brooks
... observe a seemly moderation in the use of Gangs, Conspiracies, Death-Rays, Ghosts, Hypnotism, Trap-Doors, Chinamen, Super-Criminals and Lunatics; and utterly and for ever to forswear Mysterious ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward
... left thee, gentle little frightened, fluttering thing, how little could I have thought that all alone, unaided, thou wouldst have kept that little head above water, and made thy son work out all these changes- -thy doing—and so I know they are good and seemly. I see thou hast made him clerkly, quick-witted, and yet a good knight. Ah! thou didst tell me oft that our lonely pride was not high nor worthy fame. Stine, ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge
... they dealt with the bedrooms, and made for each a set of long shelves and a dressing-table-cupboard—the latter a noble piece of furniture, which was merely a packing-case, smoothed, planed and fitted with shelves; the whole to be completed with a seemly petticoat when Tommy should be able to detach her mind from influenza patients. They made her, too, a little work-table, which was simply a wide, low shelf, at which she could write or sew—planned to catch a good light from her window, so that as she sat near ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... mediate a negotiation of the greatest importance, without furnishing him with certain, indubitable credentials of the truth and authenticity of his mission? And to consider further, whether it be just or seemly, to attribute to the Omniscient, Omnipotent Deity, a degree of weakness and folly, which was never yet imputed to any of his creatures? for unless men are hardy enough to pass so gross an affront upon ...
— The Grounds of Christianity Examined by Comparing The New Testament with the Old • George Bethune English
... also enumerates the Columbine among his "Coronary Herbs," as follows: "He beareth argent, a chevron sable between three Columbines slipped proper, by the name of Hall of Coventry. The Columbine is pleasing to the eye, as well in respect of the seemly (and not vulgar) shape as in regard of the azury colour thereof, and is holden to be very medicinable for the dissolving of imposthumations or ...
— The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare • Henry Nicholson Ellacombe
... experience and worth, was somewhat of a formalist and disciplinarian. "The proverb says, 'House goes mad when women gad;' and let his lordship's own man wait upon his master in his chamber—it is more seemly. ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... cloath'd him fine and brave, In Garments richly fair, The which did serve him many Years In seemly sort to wear. ...
— Parodies of Ballad Criticism (1711-1787) • William Wagstaffe
... 'Thou shall make holy rayments for Aaron and his sons, that are to minister unto me, that they may be for glory and beauty.'" In this light and flippant age there are men irreverent enough to smile at the habiliments which our judges wear in court, for the glory of God and the seemly embellishment of ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson
... that it was not seemly to charge of the mail-bag incline. He reached the pier as the steamer began to move off, and he followed her with ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... to walk up and down the room, stung beyond bearing—not that he had not heard it all before, but to get accustomed to such taunts is difficult, and it is still more difficult for a young and susceptible mind to contradict all that is seemly and becoming in nature, and to put forth its own statement in return. Reginald knew that his education had in reality cost his father very little, and that his father knew this. He was aware, too, much more distinctly ...
— Phoebe, Junior • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... ruins that surround me, one strip of wall remains standing, immovable upon its solid base: my passion for scientific truth. Is that enough, O! my busy insects, to enable me to add yet a few seemly pages to your history? Will my strength not cheat my good intentions? Why, indeed, did I forsake you ...
— The Wonders of Instinct • J. H. Fabre
... coupe to ourselves. This is quite opposed to my wishes, nor is it Sir Roger's doing, but Schmidt, the courier, knowing what is seemly on those occasions—what he has always done for all former freshly-wed couples whom he has escorted—secured it before we could prevent him. As for me, it would have amused me to see the people come in and out, to air ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... instance, jays, kingfishers, goldfinches—which are, taken absolutely, extremely brilliant in colouring. Yet they do not jar, are not obtrusive. So it was with her. Her dress was, perhaps, taken absolutely, indecorous. Upon her it looked at once seemly and beautiful. Upon Bessie Prawle it would have been glaring; but one had to dissect it before one could discover any fault with it upon its wearer. She was very pale, even to the lips, which were full and parted, as if she must breathe through ...
— Lore of Proserpine • Maurice Hewlett
... said in a grave and quiet voice that Marietta had never heard before. "But I am an old man, and I cannot help telling you that it is not seemly for a young girl to be alone at night with a young man, in the place where he lives. You will forgive me for saying so, because I have served your father ...
— Marietta - A Maid of Venice • F. Marion Crawford
... soon shall the people see your seemly face, and your body as it would have been but for me!' At that she led the wolf into a private chamber, and, drawing from her wallet a thread of red silk, she bound it round a ring she wore, which no witchcraft could prevail against. This ring she hung round the ...
— The Red Romance Book • Various
... delicate attention on your part. I am informed that stomachers are worn a thought less pointed than they were. I care not, you well know, for such vanities; but respect for the memory of your illustrious father renders me desirous to retain a seemly appearance to the world, and my women shall give you written instructions thereon to Madame Tourville; she lives in St. James's Street, and is the only person to be employed in these matters. She is a woman who has known misfortune, and appreciates the sorrowful and subdued ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... at me for a moment, but did not advance. "And further, let me suggest that we are in the presence of a lady, and it is not seemly for her to see the flash ...
— The Tory Maid • Herbert Baird Stimpson
... look upon you as a father. He also thanked your Majesty for the letter and for having sent it him by a messenger, although the letter was unnecessary; for even without it he would have known that your Majesty would be pleased by his success. In short, he could not have uttered better and more seemly words than those he used when he referred to you as his father and to himself as your son, which he ...
— Lucretia Borgia - According to Original Documents and Correspondence of Her Day • Ferdinand Gregorovius
... do I, Elizabeth, no more do I. I cannot think this lavish life is seemly. This table, now! Does thee note its profusion? More bread and honey and cheese and chicken pie than we can eat. Sheer waste— unless we can share it. If there was but some poor traveler in this inn whom we might bid ...
— Patriotic Plays and Pageants for Young People • Constance D'Arcy Mackay
... Ulm. It came on the table like unto a mountain of cream and eggs, spreading its extremities to the very confines of the dish; but, when touched by the magic-working spoon, it collapsed, and concentrated into a dish of moderate and seemly dimensions. In other words, this very soufflet—considered by some as the crux of refined cookery—was an exemplification of all the essential requisites of the culinary art: but without the cotelette, it would not ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Three • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... return—to take the holy communion in the parish church. Yesterday the parish had been alive with a pious hilarity. The great church had been crowded beyond the doors, the streets had been full of cheerily dressed habitants. There had, however, come a sudden chill to the seemly rejoicings—the little iron cross blessed by the Pope had been stolen from the ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... there has been no descent of heavenly grace, or where grace has not supervened to essay its recreation, or its moulding anew, should be; and there will also, I think, be divergent views as to a code of morals to be practised which shall comport with the exhibition of a reasonably seemly morality. I cannot, at least, concur in that definition of a moral character, upon which no operation of Divine grace has been expended, for its raising or its beautifying, which accepts that of the pagan Indian as its highest expression; and, distinctly, hesitate ...
— A Treatise on the Six-Nation Indians • James Bovell Mackenzie
... picture with inner satisfaction and is astonished if the victim, deeply offended, in turn takes up arms against him. His resemblance to Luther in this respect is very striking. Neither the king nor the reformer cared whether his behavior was dignified or seemly, for both of them, excited like men on the hunting field, entirely forgot the consequences in the joy of the fight. Both did themselves and their great causes serious injury in this way, and were honestly ...
— The German Classics Of The Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries, Volume 12 • Various
... are we bound in duty to lay hands upon them and deliver them again to their lord; for it is not seemly that one of his quality should suffer a so insolent and high-handed outrage from persons of their ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... Squires of low degree, Men known, and men unknown, Sick, Lame, and Blind, Post forward all, like Creatures of one kind, With first-fruit offerings crowd to bend the knee In France, before the new-born Majesty. 'Tis ever thus. Ye Men of prostrate mind! A seemly reverence may be paid to power; But that's a loyal virtue, never sown In haste, nor springing with a transient shower: When truth, when sense, when liberty were flown What hardship had it been to wait an hour? Shame on you, feeble Heads, ...
— Poems In Two Volumes, Vol. 1 • William Wordsworth
... Alas! I know not why, but infinite compunctions embitter in mature life the remembrances of budding joy and cover every beloved name. Every thing is beautiful seen from the point of the intellect, or as truth. But all is sour, if seen as experience. Details are melancholy; the plan is seemly and noble. In the actual world—the painful kingdom of time and place—dwell care, and canker, and fear. With thought, with the ideal, is immortal hilarity, the rose of joy. Round it all the Muses sing. But ...
— Essays, First Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... pride had entered, to open his heart to that sympathy and charity, which, as they are the characteristics of our mild and forbearing doctrines, should be the study of those who profess to follow their precepts. All that was seemly, and all that was usual, were done; but the purpose of the stubborn sectarian remained unchanged. His final decision is worthy of ...
— The Wept of Wish-Ton-Wish • James Fenimore Cooper
... are facing a barbarous or semi-civilized foe, who treacherously attacked them in a distant land, where our flag had been sent, in friendship with them, for the defense of our own shores. Was it creditable or seemly that it was lately left to a Bonaparte on our own soil to teach some American leaders that, at such a time, patriotic men at home do not discourage those soldiers or weaken the ...
— Problems of Expansion - As Considered In Papers and Addresses • Whitelaw Reid
... such talk is not seemly. What should a thing without a soul do in heaven where all ...
— A Little Girl in Old Philadelphia • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... "we say au revoir. I have come and it is not seemly that you remain here longer. You go to Germany to make ready for us and I write to your mother to-day. Ah!—the dear Lise! Her heart will rejoice! Where is your room, Franz, ...
— Tante • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... which noblest seemed, The purest of the dreams we dreamed, Have one by one all withered grown Like rotten leaves by Autumn strown— 'Tis fearful to anticipate Nought but of dinners a long row, To look on life as on a show, Eternally to imitate The seemly crowd, partaking nought Its passions ...
— Eugene Oneguine [Onegin] - A Romance of Russian Life in Verse • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin
... who could construe Latin, and the scholar rested from his labour; when there was introduced into his study, where a lamp burned continually before the bust of Plato, as other men burned lamps before their favourite saints, a young man fresh from a journey, "of feature and shape seemly and beauteous, of stature goodly and high, of flesh tender and soft, his visage lovely and fair, his colour white, intermingled with comely reds, his eyes grey, and quick of look, his teeth white and even, ...
— The Renaissance - Studies in Art and Poetry • Walter Pater
... is not seemly to leave your bed disarranged, to dress or undress before others, or to leave your chamber half-dressed, covered with a hood, or night-cap, or to remain standing in your room or at your desk with open gown. And although you have a servant to make ...
— George Washington's Rules of Civility - Traced to their Sources and Restored by Moncure D. Conway • Moncure D. Conway
... you can turn round now?" he asked; and, at once, the patient revolved, lying in a more convenient and seemly position. ...
— Two Knapsacks - A Novel of Canadian Summer Life • John Campbell
... Glanville,' said the Bishop warmly. 'I will think this over. Her motive in not replying I can quite understand: your motive in coming I can also understand and appreciate in a brother. If I feel convinced that it would be a seemly and expedient thing I will come ...
— Two on a Tower • Thomas Hardy
... words rang with sudden warmth. Dong-Yung trembled and crimsoned. It was not seemly that a man speak to a woman thus, even though that man was a husband and the woman his wife, not even though the words were said in an open court, where the eyes of the great wife might spy and listen. And yet Dong-Yung thrilled ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1919 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... the fears! And lo, the pride, grim greed, and wantonness— How great the slaughters in their train! and lo, Debaucheries and every breed of sloth! Therefore that man who subjugated these, And from the mind expelled, by words indeed, Not arms, O shall it not be seemly him To dignify by ranking with the gods?— And all the more since he was wont to give, Concerning the immortal gods themselves, Many pronouncements with a tongue divine, And to unfold by his pronouncements all ...
— Of The Nature of Things • [Titus Lucretius Carus] Lucretius
... the shoulders of the Mexican woman rose. She knew nothing. But the gesture was an unabridged philosophical system as to the resignation and the indifference that is seemly when one knows nothing. Jacqueline refrained from pinching her, and pursued the quest of her trunk even into ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... and perverse aims on the part of said negroes. They wanted nothing else than to deliver their children from bodily slavery, without striving for piety and Christian virtues. Nevertheless when it was seemly to do so, we have, to the best of our ability, taken much trouble in private and public catechizing. This has borne but little fruit among the elder people who have no faculty of comprehension; but there is some hope for the youth ...
— Narrative of New Netherland • J. F. Jameson, Editor
... secret springs of his life, the vain imaginations were revealed. I sometimes think that all the life of man sprawls abed, careless and unkempt, until it must needs clothe and wash itself and come forth seemly in act and speech for the encounter with one's fellow-men. I suspect that all things unspoken in our souls partake somewhat of the laxity of delirium and dementia. Certainly from those slimy, tormented lips above the bristling grey beard came nothing ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... turnout should be seemly. The gig-wheels, for instance, were not always washed during winter-time before a journey, the muddy roads rendering that labor useless; but they were washed to-day. The harness was blacked, and when the rather elderly white horse had been put in, and Winterborne was in ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... as an entirety will follow the rehabilitation of the entire physical body IN each member of Society. We have spoken already of Nakedness: its meaning and likely extent of adoption (Ch. XII). The idea that the head and the hands are the only seemly and presentable members of the organism, and that the other members are unworthy and indecent, is obviously as onesided and lopsided as that which honors certain classes in the commonwealth and despises others. Why should the head brag of its ascendancy and domination, and the heart be smothered ...
— Pagan & Christian Creeds - Their Origin and Meaning • Edward Carpenter
... into the body of the church, or shall be ready in some proper house, with their friends and neighbors." That the church is named first as the proper place shows that it is to be preferred for a marriage. It can be solemnized there in a more seemly and dignified way than elsewhere, and those coming to plight their vows may be more deeply impressed with the solemnity and ...
— The Worship of the Church - and The Beauty of Holiness • Jacob A. Regester
... on the stage. It would be an outrage, an insult to public opinion to reproduce this hospital scene in a theatre. I protest against it in the name of good taste, in the name of public morality, in the name of American decency. It is not seemly to drag that poor unfortunate child before an audience and shamelessly exploit her misery, merely because the shipwreck has placed her name ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann
... overtake and surpass that one and such-like relative prophesying, it is difficult to find any data from which to infer the absolute numerical limits of these various diffused cities. Or perhaps it is more seemly to admit that no such data have occurred to the writer. So far as London, St. Petersburg, and Berlin go, it seems fairly safe to assume that they will go well over twenty millions; and that New York, Philadelphia, and Chicago will probably, and Hankow almost certainly, reach forty millions. ...
— Anticipations - Of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon - Human life and Thought • Herbert George Wells
... seemly to see, Proved prudence peerless of price, Bright blossom of benignity, Of figure fairest, ...
— The White Rose of Langley - A Story of the Olden Time • Emily Sarah Holt
... government or business—for they talked more vehemently of these matters than of others, as men will, even beneath the very eyelids of the god. And so I could understand that this sacrifice was not the yearly celebrating of high mysteries, but the common piety of every day with which it is rather seemly than essential we should begin our labouring. There were, indeed, signs in the apparelling of the temple that more solemn festivals were sometimes held, as the delivery of oracles, the calculation of auspices and such like: that, at least, I took to be the intention of small recesses ...
— Earthwork Out Of Tuscany • Maurice Hewlett
... things come first, and never let them be allowed at all to the damage, or impairing, or obscuring of the simplicity and dignity of the great things; remembering always that the first function of a window is to have stately and seemly figures in beautiful glass, and not to arrest or distract the attention of the spectator with puzzles. Given the great themes adequately expressed, the little fancies may then cluster round them and will be ...
— Stained Glass Work - A text-book for students and workers in glass • C. W. Whall
... element into consideration, all seemly and modest requests we ought readily to comply with, not bashfully but heartily, whereas in injurious or unreasonable requests we ought ever to remember the conduct of Zeno, who, meeting a young man he knew walking very quietly ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... entertain any faction of the North Side set, nor even the set in its entirety. In each instance, I added that I could not debar from my tables even such members of the Bohemian set as conducted themselves in a seemly manner. It was a difficult situation, calling out all my tact, yet I faced it with a firmness which was later to react to my advantage in ways I did ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... not seem to relish royal society, for when he chanced to be caught with me among the members of the Royal House the flow of his brilliant conversations was checked like a spring in a drought, and he usually took his departure as soon as it was seemly. ...
— City of Endless Night • Milo Hastings
... as is seemly for a magistrate, was always dressed in black—a style which contributed to make him ridiculous in the eyes of those who were in the habit of judging everything from a superficial examination. Men who are jealous ...
— The Commission in Lunacy • Honore de Balzac
... honour, most noble and courteous King, to whom joy is a handmaid, and in whose heart all gracious things are rooted, I have brought together these Lays, and told my tales in seemly rhyme. Ere they speak for me, let me speak with my own mouth, and say, "Sire, I offer you these verses. If you are pleased to receive them, the fairer happiness will be mine, and the more lightly I shall go all the days of my life. Do not deem that I think more highly of myself than ...
— French Mediaeval Romances from the Lays of Marie de France • Marie de France
... wise and good, and, as Jupiter made him immortal, he was the teacher of many of the great Greek heroes. When Hercules was about eighteen, two maidens appeared to him—one in a simple white dress, grave, modest and seemly; the other scarcely clothed, but tricked out in ornaments, with a flushed face, and bold, roving eyes. The first told him that she was Virtue, and that, if he would follow her, she would lead him through many hard trials, but that ...
— Aunt Charlotte's Stories of Greek History • Charlotte M. Yonge
... you to go off with the likes of 'er," this referred to Fanny, "it hardly seems seemly to me, Miss. Not that Miss Bellairs ain't all right in her own way, but it is not your way. Mark my words, Miss, you will ...
— To Love • Margaret Peterson
... wherefore the perfection of that pleasant half-hour lying between the last sip of tea and the first step to meet the new day was seldom marred by the perusal of her morning budget. The apartment which she graced with her seemly presence was a choice one in the Mayfair Hotel, one which she had occupied for the past four or five years during her spring visit to London; a visit undertaken to keep alive a number of pleasant English friendships which had begun in ...
— The Cook's Decameron: A Study in Taste: - Containing Over Two Hundred Recipes For Italian Dishes • Mrs. W. G. Waters
... reminded of what has happened since that day. That festival could now have but one celebrant. Then, in another year of the War, in a mood of contrition and dismay, some people began to feel that on the day Peace arrived it would be seemly if she found them on their knees in church. Since that day, too, much has happened; and when Peace does come I suppose most of us will make reasonably certain the bird resembles a dove, and go to bed early—taking another look at the long-lost creature next morning, in the presence of a competent ...
— Waiting for Daylight • Henry Major Tomlinson
... is unclean, And into Swarga such shall enter not. The Krodhavasha's wrath destroys the fruits Of sacrifice, if dogs defile the fire. Bethink thee, Dharmaraj; quit now this beast! That which is seemly is not hard ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... matter which the Committee had neglected; and he says that he knows Fowler was buried there and left there for several years, near the railway tracks. The usual story says that Fowler was hanged to a telegraph pole in town. At any rate, he was hanged, and a very wise and seemly thing ...
— The Story of the Outlaw - A Study of the Western Desperado • Emerson Hough
... always an air of repressed pride about Jack when he listened to the thrilling accounts of his crimes told with dramatic inspiration to horrified audiences; a pride which is not seemly save for great worth and good deeds. Yet in spite of these grave faults of character Dubby accorded McMillan the recognition due his wonderful strength and keen intelligence; for Dubby, while intolerant of mere speed, was ever alert to find the sterner and more ...
— Baldy of Nome • Esther Birdsall Darling
... Thirteen were left with him, no more had he; In the Gaskhall their lodging have they ta'en. Fire got they soon, but meat then had they nane; Two sheep they took beside them of a fold, Ordain'd to sup into that seemly hold: Graithed[14] in haste some food for them to dight:[15] So heard they blow rude horns upon height. Two sent he forth to look what it might be; They 'bode right long, and no tidings heard he, But bousteous[16] noise so bryvely blowing fast; So other two into the ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... his virtue:" not by your own virtue, for it is not of power to resist such assaults as he speaketh of hereafter. "Put on, or apparel you with, the armour of God." Armour is an apparel to clothe a man, and maketh him seemly and comely; setteth forth his body, and maketh him strong and bold in battle. And therefore Saint Paul exhorteth generally his brethren to be armed; and as the assaults be strong, and not small, ...
— Sermons on the Card and Other Discourses • Hugh Latimer
... demanded what business had brought him there. She merely shrugged a little, hitched up her buckskin skirt and resumed her task of pounding corn between two stones at the door of the hut, appearing to take no interest in the quarrel that followed. For like a good squaw, she did not think it seemly to interfere ...
— The New Land - Stories of Jews Who Had a Part in the Making of Our Country • Elma Ehrlich Levinger
... canons of 1603 the churchwardens or questmen were to provide in every church a comely and decent pulpit, to be set in a convenient place within the same, and there to be seemly kept for the preaching of God's word. Carved pulpits set up between the years 1603 and 1640 are numerous, and the sides are more or less embellished with circular-arched panels, flat and shallow scroll-work, and other decorative detail in fashion at that period; and not a few ...
— The Principles of Gothic Ecclesiastical Architecture, Elucidated by Question and Answer, 4th ed. • Matthew Holbeche Bloxam
... lady gave him no peace till he did his duty. The General's womenfolk at the Bungalow were clamorous. It was not seemly. Something must be done, and since the action of Mr. Shepstone Oglethorpe on the occasion of the assault on the house had put him out of the question, and as the General flatly refused to have anything to do with the affair, it was obvious ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett
... night bonfires were lighted, rockets discharged, and windows lighted up. The Jacobites however contrived to discover or to invent abundant matter for scurrility and sarcasm. They complained bitterly, that the way from the hall to the western door of the Abbey had been lined by Dutch soldiers. Was it seemly that an English king should enter into the most solemn of engagements with the English nation behind a triple hedge of foreign swords and bayonets? Little affrays, such as, at every great pageant, almost inevitably take place between those who are eager to see the show and those whose business ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... behaved with such scant respect, Paul herded them into the Council Room. "Is it seemly," he rebuked them, "that the Prophets ...
— My Neighbors - Stories of the Welsh People • Caradoc Evans
... meet, suitable, seemly, condign, appertinent, conformable, consistent, apposite; decorous, conventional, formal, sedate, demure. Antonyms: ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... of the men were loading their firelocks; others found that they had forgot their ammunition, and ran back to get it; and Davie Cheyne was putting on his coat and arranging his garments in a seemly manner, and stuffing a night-cap into his pouch, he armed himself with a huge blunderbuss, which, with its ammunition ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... tragical business it was—to see that still warm and palpitating body pierced with a knife, to see the warm milk stream from the rent udder, and the ghastly naked red carcass appearing from within its seemly robe, which was made to hide it.' There is no joy of the hunter here! The words are as 'tragical' and tender as were those of the melancholy Jaques. That 'warm milk and rent udder' seems to make the stately creature half human. ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 2, August, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... swarming with men of sterling worth, all bent upon reforming the heaven and the earth; they come from far Savannah, they come from Texarkana, and points in Indiana, with loud yet seemly mirth. They're come from far Alaska, where show is heaped on snow; they've journeyed from Nebraska where commoners do grow; the famed, the wise, the witty, the timid, and the gritty have come from Kansas City and also Broken Bow. ...
— Rippling Rhymes • Walt Mason
... reserved their decision till next day; so that there might be decent and seemly pause for the purpose of looking up and pondering the legal precedents, as the legal fiction would have it; and on next day, they announced that they would send all the accused for trial to the next Commission at Green-street, to open on the 10th February, 1868. The several traversers, ...
— The Wearing of the Green • A.M. Sullivan
... off, and her own lovely hand, the whitest in the room, placed the stakes. You might see a red spot on her cheek-bone, and a strange glint in her deep eye; but she could not do anything that was not seemly. ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... spotted-leaved, variegated, and other abnormal "foliage" plants are less hardy and less reliable than the green-leaved or "natural" forms. They usually require more care, if they are kept in vigorous and seemly condition. Some marked exceptions to this are noted in the lists ...
— Manual of Gardening (Second Edition) • L. H. Bailey
... I shall be angry with thee!" cried Hester Prynne, who, however, inured to such behaviour on the elf-child's part at other seasons, was naturally anxious for a more seemly deportment now. "Leap across the brook, naughty child, and run hither! Else ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Suoi Tempe, has placed on record that this youthful Prince of the Church was "of mature judgment and wise beyond his years, and of such a bearing that it would have been difficult to have found anyone more attractive, more seemly in his morals, and very sensible." In Rome Giovanni gave himself up especially to the study of antiquities, and he became a great favourite with the many pious, learned, and distinguished men who were gathered round ...
— The Tragedies of the Medici • Edgcumbe Staley
... the idea of having her chaste and pure body defiled by his loathsome touch. Thus she preserved her sanctity to the last and displayed all the tokens of a chaste woman, like Hecuba, "taking care that she might fall in seemly wise." ...
— The Letters of the Younger Pliny - Title: The Letters of Pliny the Younger - - Series 1, Volume 1 • Pliny the Younger
... they heard a knight call loud that came after them, and he said, Knight, abide and yield my brachet that thou took from my lady. Sir Tor returned again, and beheld him how he was a seemly knight and well horsed, and well armed at all points; then Sir Tor dressed his shield, and took his spear in his hands, and the other came fiercely upon him, and smote both horse and man to the earth. Anon they arose lightly and drew their ...
— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume I (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory
... brother obeyed these contradictory commands in the way he judged most seemly—he removed the carcass of the half-sacked capon, and placed two goblets beside the stoup of Bourdeaux. At the same instant ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... place to ask the King these things?" he demanded, fiercely. "Was it dignified or seemly of you—you, ...
— The Traitors • E. Phillips (Edward Phillips) Oppenheim
... Kirby, "at nine o'clock this mornin' this place ceased to be Tom Belcher's sto', an' become a court of justice. Some things are seemly in a court, some ...
— Frank of Freedom Hill • Samuel A. Derieux
... all things created, the God of all grace, Of four prime materials, each good in its place. The work of His hands, when completed, He view'd, And saw and pronounc'd that 'twas seemly and good. ...
— Wild Wales - Its People, Language and Scenery • George Borrow
... King's part;—who sits very snuffy (says the privately ill-humored Busching) and does not sufficiently abhor grease on his fingers, or keep his nails quite clean. Occasionally laughs at the Clergy, too; and has little of the reverence seemly in an old King. The truth is, Doctor, he has had his sufferings from Human Stupidity; and was always fond of hitting objects on the raw. For the rest, as you may see, heartily an old Stoic, and takes matters in the rough; avoiding useless despondency above all; and intent to have a cheerful ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... on any arena of any amphitheatre anywhere inside our frontiers; fighting inside amphitheatres is proper and seemly. ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White
... to give her less than the larger sum. She thanked him with just so much effusiveness as was seemly in presence of the grief he might be supposed to feel, and left him. Philip went back into his sitting-room, cleared away the remains of his supper, and sat down to read Walsham's Surgery. He found it difficult. He felt ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham
... thus, think thus, act thus, says the French tradition, not for moral, still less for utilitarian, reasons, but for aesthetic. Stick to the rules, not because they are right or profitable, but because they are seemly—nay, beautiful. We are not telling you to be respectable, we are inviting you not to be a lout. We are offering you, free of charge, a trade mark that carries credit all the world over. "How French he (or she) is!" Many a foreigner ...
— Since Cezanne • Clive Bell
... was an irresistible thunderbolt upon their serried ranks. He presided over the army like a father, Guarding the commonweal lest any advantage to it should be stolen. Contracting a highly-born and seemly marriage connection, And securing thus again royal affinity,[551] And leaving his life as a splendid example, He lies a poor monk among bones! O sun, O earth, O final applauses! Well-nigh the whole Roman race laments him, As much of it as is not ignorant ...
— Byzantine Churches in Constantinople - Their History and Architecture • Alexander Van Millingen
... inquest among them for singers, and chose the most melodious to form a regimental choir, "the better to carry on the daily service of singing psalms;" insomuch that the New England camp was vocal with rustic harmony, sincere, if somewhat nasal. These seemly observances were not inconsistent with a certain amount of disorder among the more turbulent spirits, who, removed from the repressive influence of tight-laced village communities, sometimes indulged in conduct ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman
... most respects to sow therein good seed; To th' end when summer decks the meadows plain, He may have recompense of costs and pain. Or like the maid who careful is to keep The budding flower, that first begins to peep Out of the knop and waters it full oft, To make it seemly show the head aloft, That it may (when she draws it from the stocks) Adorn her gorget white and golden locks. So wise Merari all his study styl'd To fashion well the manners ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 19, No. 528, Saturday, January 7, 1832 • Various
... leaving the poor young thing nothing to say, no little pretence even to herself that she had guarded the proprieties, had comported herself circumspectly, leaving her with not even a little rag of a claim that she had conducted herself with seemly decorum, she sprang from him and began to cry. Whatever the cause, Mr. Middleton could not look upon feminine unhappiness with composure and here where he was himself responsible, he was indeed smitten with keen remorse and hastening to comfort her, gathered ...
— The Strange Adventures of Mr. Middleton • Wardon Allan Curtis
... handsome?" Ascanio answered: "Madonna Francesca, it is my master who has made me so handsome, and far more good to boot." In her petty spiteful way she took it very ill that Ascanio should speak so; and having no reputation for chastity, she contrived to caress the lad more perhaps than was quite seemly, which made me notice that he began to visit her more frequently than ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... as time—for the Macartneys belonged to the middle class, and were well on to the middle of life themselves—, but of stript, quivering and winged souls tiptoe within them, tiptoe for flight into diviner spaces than any seemly bodies can afford them. As you peruse you may find it difficult to believe that Macartney himself—James Adolphus, that remarkable solicitor—could have possessed a quivering, winged soul fit to be stript, and have hidden it so deep. ...
— Love and Lucy • Maurice Henry Hewlett
... repetition of the unlimited, anything, whatsoever (John xiv. 13, 14; xv. 7, 16; xvi. 23, 24), appear to us altogether too large to be taken literally, and they are qualified down to meet our human ideas of what appears seemly. It is because we separate them from that life of absolute and unlimited devotion to Christ's service to which they were given. God's covenant is ever: Give all and take all. He that is willing to be wholly branch, and nothing ...
— The Ministry of Intercession - A Plea for More Prayer • Andrew Murray
... young barbel[FN271] with a round head, as it were a milking-pail, which when he saw, his wits fled for joy and he said, "Glory be to God! What is this noble creature? Were yonder apes in the river, I had not brought up this fish." Quoth the seemly ape, "O Khalif, an thou give ear to my rede, 'twill bring thee good fortune"; and quoth the Fisherman, "May God damn him who would gainsay thee henceforth!" Thereupon the ape said, "O Khalif, take some grass and lay the fish thereon in the basket[FN272] and cover it with more grass and take also ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 8 • Richard F. Burton
... eternal spirit who can enrich with all utterance and knowledge, and sends out his Seraphim with the hallowed fire of his altar, to touch and purify the lips of whom he pleases: to this must be added industrious and select reading, steady observation, and insight into all seemly and generous arts and affairs. Although it nothing content me to have disclosed thus much beforehand; but that I trust hereby to make it manifest with what small willingness I endure to interrupt the pursuit of no less hopes ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... stocking gaiters, well patched and darned, came over his knee, while his doublet and hosen, or body-gear, were fastened together by the primitive attachment of wooden skewers—a contrivance now obsolete, being superseded by others more elegant and seemly. A woollen cap or bonnet, of unparalleled form and dimensions, was disposed upon his head, hiding the upper part of his face, and almost covering a pair of bushy grey eyebrows, that, in their turn, crouched over ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... that's fat and flabby do be wrinkled young, and that whitish yellowy hair she has does be soon turning the like of a handful of thin grass you'd see rotting, where the wet lies, at the north of a sty. (Turning to go out on right.) Ah, it's a better thing to have a simple, seemly face, the like of my face, for two-score years, or fifty itself, than to be setting fools mad a short while, and then to be turning a thing would drive off the ...
— The Well of the Saints • J. M. Synge
... banding yourselves with these men, not defiantly but firmly, not for selfish ends but for your country's good. In the meantime they have one bulwark; they have a General who is befriending them as I think never, after the fighting was over, has a General befriended his men before. Perhaps the seemly thing would be for us, their betters, to elect one of these young survivors of the carnage to be our Rector. He ought now to know a few things about war that are worth our hearing. If his theme were the Rector's favourite, diligence. I should be afraid of his advising a great many ...
— Courage • J. M. Barrie
... from Penzance to Leeds in those days was both very long and very expensive; the lovers had not much money to spend in unnecessary travelling, and, as Miss Branwell had neither father nor mother living, it appeared both a discreet and seemly arrangement that the marriage should take place from her uncle's house. There was no reason either why the engagement should be prolonged. They were past their first youth; they had means sufficient for their unambitious wants; the living of Hartshead ...
— The Life of Charlotte Bronte - Volume 1 • Elizabeth Gaskell
... where who can tell What elegance and grandeur wide expand,— The pride of Turkey and of Persia's land? Soft quilts on quilts; on carpets, carpets spread; And couches stretched around in seemly band; And endless pillows rise to prop the head: So that each spacious room was one ...
— Pink and White Tyranny - A Society Novel • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... "It air a seemly night for the men to fish," commented Myra when Tessibel had seated herself again. "I air always a hopin' that nothin' will happen ...
— Tess of the Storm Country • Grace Miller White
... sharp North Wind rushing from Thrace covered the flanks of Olympus, and nipped the spirits of thinly-clad men; then it was buried alive, clad in Pierian earth. Let a share of it be mingled for me; for it is not seemly to bear a tepid ...
— Select Epigrams from the Greek Anthology • J. W. Mackail
... the close of a night of debauch, the sentinels introduce Ellen and the minstrel Allan-bane—who are come in search of Douglas. Ellen awes the ruffian soldiery by her grace and liberality, and is at length conducted to a more seemly waiting place, until she may obtain audience with the King. While Allan-bane, in the cell of Sir Roderick, sings to the dying chieftain of the glorious battle which has just been waged by his clansmen ...
— Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... is the thought which is most operative in many minds, though it is veiled in more seemly phrases, and which darkens and injures all those on whom it lays hold. Need I spend time in showing you how, point by point, this picture is a picture of many among us? How many of you think of God when you are ill, and forget Him when you are well? How ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... states, and before the news of the action had reached Philadelphia. The zeal of the Federalists was so intense that they could wait no longer, and they hurried the event with a high-handed vigour that was not altogether seemly. The assembly was on the eve of breaking up, and a new election was to be held on the first Tuesday of November. The Antifederalists hoped to make a stirring campaign, and secure such a majority in the new legislature as to prevent the ...
— The Critical Period of American History • John Fiske
... a monotonous loud bawl, chanting, very much out of tune, a song, most of the verses of which he forgot before he had sung two lines, ever starting afresh ad nauseam, after the manner of drunken men. It was not a seemly spectacle, but it was the fashion of the day, and but for Eliott all might have ended with no worse effect than a bad headache next morning. But for Eliott—unfortunately. Nothing, apparently, would satisfy that ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... "is merely a cloak. And I find, Allan, that it is a garment that is only seemly when he who dons it wears it well. Yet this is no time for anger. Of what matter that this knight is ill bred. If there is any quarrel I shall seek it ...
— In the Court of King Arthur • Samuel Lowe
... indifference to appearance, but features misplaced, shallow mimicry of "effects" where their causes do not exist, transparent pretences of all kinds, forcing attention to the absence of the reality, otherwise perhaps unnoticed. The first step toward seemly building is to rectify the relation between the appearance and the uses of the building,—to give to each the weight that it really has with us, not what we fancy or are told it ought to have. Mr. Ruskin too often seems to imply ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 60, October 1862 • Various
... Olympus comes a cloud into heaven,[523] after a clear sky, when Jove stretches forth a whirlwind, thus was the clamour and rout of those [flying] from the ships. Nor did they repass [the trench] in seemly plight, but his fleet-footed steeds bore away Hector with his arms; and he deserted the Trojan people, whom against their will the deep trench detained. And many fleet car-drawing steeds left in the foss the chariots of their masters, ...
— The Iliad of Homer (1873) • Homer
... in the Vienna papers, to which the performance of the Preludes and the concert gave rise. As I had previously said to you, the doctrinaire Hanslick could not be favorable to me; his article is perfidious, but on the whole seemly. Moreover it would be an easy matter for me to reduce his arguments to nil, and I think he is sharp enough to know that. On a better opportunity this could also be shown to him, without having the appearance of correcting him. ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 1, "From Paris to Rome: - Years of Travel as a Virtuoso" • Franz Liszt; Letters assembled by La Mara and translated
... to-day, I wot, they let him go his way, Nor once looked up, as who should say: "It is a seemly man." For many lads went wooing aye Across the fields ...
— The Little Book of Modern Verse • Jessie B. Rittenhouse
... assure themselves of Vitelli; but, when he pressed that Florence should give him a condotta, Macchiavelli—following his instructions not to commit the Republic in any way—had answered "that his Excellency must not be considered as other lords, but as a new potentate in Italy, with whom it is more seemly to make an alliance or a friendship than to grant him a condotta; and, as alliances are maintained by arms, and that is the only power to compel their observance, the Signory could not perceive what security they would have when three-quarters or three-fifths of their arms would be in the duke's ...
— The Life of Cesare Borgia • Raphael Sabatini
... it was "sweet Moll," "my Heart's Life of Life," "my dearest cleaving Mischief;" here 'tis onlie "Wife," "Mistress Milton," or at most "deare or sweet Wife." This, I know, is masterfulle and seemly. ...
— Mary Powell & Deborah's Diary • Anne Manning
... is a dragon yonder," she whispered, with mischief adorable in her sparkling eyes; then slipped hastily beyond my reach, saying: "Oh, Euan! Forget not our vows, but let our conduct remain seemly still, ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers |
