"Inconstant" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... buried quick with 'em. But Customs of Countries change even Nature her self, and long Habit takes her place: The Women are taught, by the Lives of the Men, to live up to all their Vices, and are become almost as inconstant; and 'tis but Modesty that makes the difference, and, hardly, inclination; so deprav'd the nicest Appetites grow in time, by ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume V • Aphra Behn
... to its act, the illiberal man loves the man who is liberal, in so far as he expects from him something which he desires. The same applies to the man who is constant in his friendship as compared to one who is inconstant. For in either case friendship seems to be based on usefulness. We might also say that although not all men have these virtues in the complete habit, yet they have them according to certain seminal principles in the reason, in force of which principles the man who ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I-II (Pars Prima Secundae) - From the Complete American Edition • Saint Thomas Aquinas
... false witnesses, there would be little occasion for the exertions of eloquence and all that might seem requisite would be only to amuse the ear with the harmony of cadence. But if the orator has to deal with light, inconstant, prejudiced, and corrupt judges, and if many embarrassments must be removed in order to throw light upon truth, then artful stratagem must fight the battle, and set all its engines to work, for he who is beaten out of the straight road can ...
— The Training of a Public Speaker • Grenville Kleiser
... but thy feare that doth it so miscall. Cor. Ift bee no danger let me go with thee, And of thy safty a partaker bee, Alas why would'st thou leaue mee thus alone: 390 Thinkst thou I cannot follow thee by Land That thus haue followed thee ouer raging Seas, Or do I varie in inconstant hopes: O but thinke you my pleasure luckles is And I haue made thee more vnfortunate. Tis I, tis I, haue caus'd this ouerthrow, Tis my accursed starres that boade this ill, And those mis-fortunes ...
— The Tragedy Of Caesar's Revenge • Anonymous
... mind in creation is a fading coal, which some invisible influence, like an inconstant wind, awakens to transitory brightness; this power arises from within, like the color of a flower which fades and changes as it is developed, and the conscious portions of our nature are unprophetic either of its ...
— The Poet's Poet • Elizabeth Atkins
... have known, was far too inconstant. As the saying went, "He had a lass for ilka day in the week and twa for the Sabbath." It is more than likely that his long rumination at the well was the result of uncertainty as to whether it was the turn of Jeannie at the Craig or ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett
... inconstant character of the emanation tube there are many reasons for preferring its use to the use of the radium tube. Chief of these is the fact that we can keep the precious radium safely locked up in the laboratory and not exposed to the thousand-and-one risks of the hospital. ...
— The Birth-Time of the World and Other Scientific Essays • J. (John) Joly
... Thaddeus with a glowing countenance expressed his regret for having doubted his friend, and repeating the assurance of having been punctual to his promise of correspondence, even when he dreamed him inconstant, acknowledged that nothing but a premeditated scheme could have effected so ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... subclavian vessel is located. The form or position of the clavicle in the depressed condition of the shoulder, as seen in Plate 8, is invariable; whereas that of the trapezius and sterno-mastoid muscles is inconstant, these muscles being found to stand at unequal intervals from each other in several bodies. The space between the insertions of both these muscles is indefinite, and may vary in degrees of width from the whole length of the ...
— Surgical Anatomy • Joseph Maclise
... superior endurance and the ease with which they stood fatigue and exposure made amends for this. A white might outrun them for eight or ten miles; but on a long journey they could tire out any man, and any beast except a wolf. Like most barbarians they were fickle and inconstant, not to be relied on for pushing through a long campaign, and after a great victory apt to go off to their homes, because each man desired to secure his own plunder and tell his own tale of glory. They are often spoken of as undisciplined; but in reality ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume One - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1769-1776 • Theodore Roosevelt
... perfectly we understand the causes of present events, the more plainly are they seen to be the consequences of physical conditions, and therefore the results of law. To allude to one example out of many that might be considered, the winds, how proverbially inconstant, who can tell whence they come or whither they go! If any thing bears the fitful character of arbitrary volition, surely it is these. But we deceive ourselves in imagining that atmospheric events are fortuitous. Where shall a line be drawn between that eternal trade-wind, which, ...
— History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume I (of 2) - Revised Edition • John William Draper
... might perceive his eye in her eye lost, His ear to drink her sweet tongue's utterance; And changing passion, like inconstant clouds, That, rackt upon the carriage of the winds, Increase, and die, in his disturbed cheeks. Lo, when she blushed, even then did he look pale; As if her cheeks by some enchanted power Attracted had the cherry blood from his: {245a} Anon, with reverent ...
— A Study of Shakespeare • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... stern finger seawards, to where the bar is shown in charts, but where all we could make out was the flashing of inconstant white lines. ...
— Old Junk • H. M. Tomlinson
... attempting to reduce these various facts to any rule or law. The inconstant number of the additional digits—their irregular attachment to either the inner or outer margin of the hand—the gradation which can be traced from a mere loose rudiment of a single digit to a completely double hand—the occasional appearance ...
— The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, Volume II (of 2) • Charles Darwin
... pyrotechnic display in the heavens. An aurora flashed across the sky such as neither of them had ever seen before. The vault was aglow with waves of red, violet, and purple that danced and whirled, with fickle, inconstant flashes of gold and green and yellow bars. A radiant incandescence of great power lit the arch and flooded it with light that poured through the cathedral ...
— Man Size • William MacLeod Raine
... do not deserve that we should love them so ardently; they are all fickle and inconstant, believe me, ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... Spring; on his fickle wing Let the blossoms and buds be borne; He woos them amain with his treacherous rain, And he scatters them ere the morn. An inconstant elf, he knows not himself, Nor his own changing mind an hour, He'll smile in your face, and, with wry grimace, ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... how she could rely on his constancy, when the lover of Miss Segrim drew a mirror from his pocket (like Strephon in "Iolanthe"), and cried, "Behold that lovely figure, that shape, those eyes," with other compliments; "can the man who shall be in possession of these be inconstant?" Sophia was charmed by the "man in possession," but forced her features into a frown. Presently Thomas "caught her in his arms," and the rest was in accordance with what Mr. Trollope and the best authorities recommend. ...
— Lost Leaders • Andrew Lang
... Ambassadors of powers in friendship with them. Pau, not satisfied with this, wrote to the particular States of Holland. Grotius was informed of it, and seemed little concerned, because, he said, they knew little, were very inconstant, and took their resolutions ...
— The Life of the Truly Eminent and Learned Hugo Grotius • Jean Levesque de Burigny
... climb to overthrow them straight? Accurs'd thy wreak[116], thy wrath, thy bale, thy weal, That mak'st me sigh the sorrows that I feel! Untrodden paths my feet shall rather trace, Than wrest my succours from inconstant hands: Rebounding rocks shall rather ring my ruth, Than these Campanian piles, where terrors bide: And nature, that hath lift my throne so high, Shall witness Marius' triumphs, if he die. But she, that gave the lictor's ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various
... Dante tells how first he met Beatrice and loved her; but how he feigned that it was another lady he loved, making a defence of her and others still that his real passion might not be known; how Beatrice would not salute him, believing him false and inconstant with these ladies, her friends; how being at a banquet where she was, he was so visibly stricken with love that some of the ladies derided him; how Beatrice's father died, and how Dante himself fell ill; how Beatrice quitted the city, and soon after the world; ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various
... first meeting, her entire body, and glittering, curled along the ground. Her right hand was stretched high above her lovely head, holding between forefinger and thumb the ring with which the already inconstant ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 350, December 1844 • Various
... you should consider her so, until you have ocular or other positive evidence of her guilt. Meanwhile, let her not know your suspicions, but watch her narrowly; if she were frail before marriage, she needs but the opportunity to be inconstant afterwards. I have attended upon the lady several times, during slight illness, in my capacity as a physician, and I have had the opportunity to observe that she is of an uncommonly ardent and voluptuous temperament. Phrenology confirms ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn
... friend with effusion; "yes, over head and ears in love with him. And you are ashamed to confess the truth to me; and you are half ashamed to confess it even to yourself—as if you could deceive an old stager like me!" cried Charlotte, laughing. "Why, you dear inconstant thing, while I have felt myself the guiltiest and most selfish creature in the world for robbing you of Valentine, you have been quietly transferring your affections to this M. Gustave Lenoble—who is very ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon
... came to the palace whither the host conducted her, a very different effect was produced to what the kind host intended; for there, to her heart's sorrow, she beheld her lover, the inconstant Proteus, serenading the Lady Silvia with music, and addressing discourse of love and admiration to her. And Julia overheard Silvia from a window talk with Proteus, and reproach him for forsaking his own true lady, and for ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles Lamb and Mary Lamb
... merely the formality of lip service; if she be petulant to her friends, pert and disrespectful to her parents, overbearing to her inferiors; if pride, vanity, and affectation be her characteristics; if she be inconstant in her friendships; gaudy and slovenly, rather than neat and scrupulously clean, in attire and personal habits: then we counsel the gentleman to retire as speedily but as politely as possible from the pursuit of an object quite unworthy ...
— Routledge's Manual of Etiquette • George Routledge
... well enough," she said. "The girl was faithless, and tyrannous, and proud, and coquettish, and unworthy, and false, and inconstant. She was black as hell and dark as night in both her person and her living. You were ...
— The Certain Hour • James Branch Cabell
... contract in your light, their lids half close, modestly hiding the joy I feel at seeing you again, and my inscrutable countenance shows but the semblance of a thought painted there in fawn color and black.... Your crackling drowns the soft sound of my purr. Don't snap too much. Be merciful, O inconstant Fire! Don't sputter sparks on my fur. Allow me to adore you ...
— Barks and Purrs • Colette Willy, aka Colette
... agriculture, harvesting, gardening. And among all this variety of representations there was neither man nor boy to be seen—not so much as a little winged Cupid; so highly had the princess been incensed against her inconstant husband as not to show the least favor ...
— The Little Lame Prince - And: The Invisible Prince; Prince Cherry; The Prince With The Nose - The Frog-Prince; Clever Alice • Miss Mulock—Pseudonym of Maria Dinah Craik
... have violated a decree of the senate, by re-appointing their magistrates, you yourselves also wish it to be violated, lest ye should yield to the populace in rashness; as if to possess greater power in the state consisted in having more of inconstancy and irregularity; for it is certainly more inconstant and greater folly, to do away with one's own decrees and resolutions, than those of others. Imitate, conscript fathers, the inconsiderate multitude; and ye, who should be an example to others, transgress ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius
... landed in Elba, and informed him of the hatching of a plot by military malcontents, under the lead of Fouche, for the overthrow of Louis XVIII.[463] Napoleon at once despatched his informant to Naples, and ordered his brig, "L'Inconstant," to be painted like an English vessel. Most fortunately for him, Campbell on the 16th set sail for Tuscany—"for his health and on private affairs"—on the small war-vessel, "Partridge," to which the British Government had intrusted ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... fellows on reaching home found domestic trouble—a wife had proved inconstant and married another man. As the men had generally more wives than one, Livingstone comforted them by saying that they still ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie
... with no reasonable requisitions: for they said that they neither wanted Juba for their pay-master, nor were they afraid of Caesar if they had Cato to command them, but it was a dangerous thing to shut themselves up with the citizens of Utica, who were Phoenicians and an inconstant people; and if they should keep quiet now, they would set upon them and betray them, when Caesar came. If then any man wanted their aid in war and their presence, he must eject or kill all the people of Utica, and then invite them into a city free from enemies and ...
— Plutarch's Lives Volume III. • Plutarch
... passing dear, Whose force I am enforced to know and 'knowledge everywhere, This care of mine, though it be bred within my breast, Yet it is not so ripe as yet to breed me great unrest, So run I to and fro with hap luck as I find, Now fast, now loose: now hot, now cold: inconstant as the wind, I feel myself in love, yet not inflamed so, But causes move me now and then to let such fancies go, Which causes prevailing sets each thing else in doubt Much like the nail, that last came in, and drives the former out. Wherefore ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Robert Dodsley
... their mustaches. "The Emperor did nothing but play pranks on us," is the remark of one of them. During the mysterious trip from the island of Elba to France, on the 27th of February, on the open sea, the French brig of war, Le Zephyr, having encountered the brig L'Inconstant, on which Napoleon was concealed, and having asked the news of Napoleon from L'Inconstant, the Emperor, who still wore in his hat the white and amaranthine cockade sown with bees, which he had adopted at the isle of Elba, laughingly seized the speaking-trumpet, and answered for himself, "The ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... early stages of development the crystal will begin to cloud over, first becoming dull, then suffused with milky clouds, among which sparkle a large number of little specks of light like gold dust in the sunlight. The focus of the eyes is inconstant, the pupil rapidly expanding and contracting, the crystal at times disappearing entirely in a haze or film which seems to pass before the eyes. Then the haze will disappear, and the crystal will loom up into full view again, accompanied by a lapse of the seer into full consciousness. This ...
— How to Read the Crystal - or, Crystal and Seer • Sepharial
... [Sidenote: The king giuen to sensuall lust and couetousnesse.] After Lanfrankes death, the king began greatlie to forget himselfe in all his dealings, insomuch that he kept many concubines, and waxed verie cruell and inconstant in all his dooings, so that he became an heauie burthen vnto his people. For he was so much addicted to gather goods, that he considered not what perteined to the maiestie of a king, insomuch that nothing tending to his gaine, and the satisfieng of his appetite, was esteemed of him vnlawfull, sith ...
— Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland (2 of 6): England (2 of 12) - William Rufus • Raphael Holinshed
... time the relative popularity of painters shifts strangely, but no matter what inconstant fashion may dictate, or what may be the cult of the hour, certain paintings never lose their prestige, but annually attract as many pilgrims as Lourdes ...
— Great Pictures, As Seen and Described by Famous Writers • Esther Singleton
... trouvais que de tous les sens, l'oeil etait le plus superficiel; l'oreille, le plus orgueilleux; l'odorat, le plus voluptueux; le gout, le plus superstitieux et le plus inconstant; le toucher, le plus profond ...
— The World I Live In • Helen Keller
... said too much—having betrayed yourself. Margaret, for God's sake, tell me 'tis not so! Tell me my fears are wrong! Assure me I have not lost you—no, no, I won't even ask you. 'Tis not possible. I won't believe it of you—that you could be inconstant! Forgive me, dear—your strange manner has so upset me—but forgive me, I beg, and let me take you in my arms." He had risen to ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens
... pretty as her sister, though in another style, began by awakening my curiosity—a weakness which usually renders the profligate man inconstant. If all women were to have the same features, the same disposition, and the same manners, men would not only never be inconstant, but would never be in love. Under that state of things one would choose a wife by instinct and keep to her till death, but our world would then be under a ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... that the types of tubercle bacilli are very inconstant, and that under suitable conditions they readily change both in morphology and in virulence. A similar conclusion was reached by other investigators in working with the avian and porcine types of tubercle bacilli several years ago, ...
— Special Report on Diseases of Cattle • U.S. Department of Agriculture
... * * I know well that impatience will sometimes put on the pretence of something much better, and that we shall never run to good purpose unless we "run with patience." Unhappily, a slow gradual progress is sadly opposed to my inconstant nature, and after one of the many interruptions it meets with, how prone am I to wish for some flying leap to make up for the past! It seems so hard a thing to get transformed, and therefore—strange inconsistency indeed—one would be translated. But truly it might be said, "Ye know not ...
— A Brief Memoir with Portions of the Diary, Letters, and Other Remains, - of Eliza Southall, Late of Birmingham, England • Eliza Southall
... scene was certainly impressive; but the road was in that part very securely walled in; the mule went steadily forward; and I was astonished to perceive the paleness of terror in the face of my companion. The voice of that wild river was inconstant, now sinking lower as if in weariness, now doubling its hoarse tones; momentary freshets seemed to swell its volume, sweeping down the gorge, raving and booming against the barrier walls; and I observed it was at each of ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XXI • Robert Louis Stevenson
... wind mad (pazzo) or furious, the sea treacherous, the waters insidious; a stone is obstinate, if we cannot easily move it, and we inveigh against all kinds of material obstacles as if they could hear us. We call the season inconstant or deceitful, the sun melancholy and unwilling to shine, and we say that the sky threatens snow. We say that some plants are consumed by heat, that some soils are indomitable, that well cultivated ground is no longer wild, that in a good season the whole landscape ...
— Myth and Science - An Essay • Tito Vignoli
... with thy jealousies, Fancies too weak for boys, too green and idle For girls of nine, O! think what they have done, And then run mad indeed, stark mad; for all Thy by-gone fooleries were but spices of it. That thou betray'dst Polixenes, 'twas nothing; That did but show thee, of a fool, inconstant And damnable ingrateful; nor was't much Thou would'st have poison'd good Camillo's honour, To have him kill a king; poor trespasses, More monstrous standing by; whereof I reckon The casting forth to crows thy baby daughter To be or none or little; though a devil Would have shed water ...
— Books and Characters - French and English • Lytton Strachey
... Boys, prisoners of the Kaiser, were bred up in a confiscated state, as sons of a mere private gentleman; nothing visibly ahead of them, at one time, but an obscure and extremely limited destiny of that kind;—though now again, on French favor, and the turn of Fortune's inconstant wheel, they are mounting very high. Bavaria came all back to the old Elector of Bavaria; even Marlborough's "Principality of MINDELHEIM" came. [At the Peace of Baden (corollary to UTRECHT), 1714. Elector had been "banned" (GEACHTET, solemnly drummed out), 1706; nothing but French ...
— History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 7 • Thomas Carlyle
... sunset, for fear of the spirit that dwelt unquietly within. The tradition was always current in people's mouths; and three centuries after, a young man of the neighbourhood, who had been jilted and mocked by an inconstant mistress, determined to bear his ills no longer, so he rushed to the Puits, and took the fatal leap. The result was not what he anticipated: he did not, it is true, jump into a courtly assembly of knights ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXVI. October, 1843. Vol. LIV. • Various
... to study how to behave and how to pick out subjects of conversation, as if he were courting the most inconstant of women. It is for him that a philosopher has ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... Madness and Folly, Alone I lie, Toss, tumble, and cry, What a happy Creature is Polly! Was e'er such a Wretch as I! With rage I redden like Scarlet, That my dear inconstant Varlet, Stark blind to my Charms, Is lost in the Arms Of that Jilt, that inveigling Harlot! Stark blind to my Charms, Is lost in the Arms Of that Jilt, that inveigling Harlot! This, ...
— The Beggar's Opera - to which is prefixed the Musick to each Song • John Gay
... philosopher and saint-like character of a sacerdotal vicaro of any church or creed, feeling full well that the so-called divine teacher and pupil know just as much about the "hereafter" as I do—and that's nothing! Put not thy faith in wind, variable and inconstant. ...
— Shakspere, Personal Recollections • John A. Joyce
... maximum average use of 80, and instances such as the hotels, small office buildings, etc., where the service will not exceed 60 of the contract H. P. hours. In order, however, that the electric light company shall derive the greatest benefit from this inconstant service, the installation and wiring should be the best, and only the most approved and ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 664, September 22,1888 • Various
... perhaps, she hath conceived this magnificent scheme for my sake. Alas, cruel is the deed that the innocent princess of Vidarbha intends to do, having been deceived by my sinful and low self of little sense. It is seen in the world that the nature of woman is inconstant. My offence also hath been great; perhaps she is acting so, because she hath no longer any love for me owing to my separation from her. Indeed, that girl of slender waist, afflicted with grief on my account and with despair, will not certainly do anything of the kind, when especially, she ...
— Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa Bk. 3 Pt. 1 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa
... the air: his talk was rhodomontade. He took no thought for the morrow: he treated the Court as if the King were already a prisoner in his hands: he built on the favour of the multitude, as if that favour were not proverbially inconstant. The signs of the coming reaction were discerned by men of far less sagacity than his, and scared from his side men more consistent than he had ever pretended to be. But on him they were lost. The counsel of ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... profound humility; and in gladness it enters into itself, that the heart may not fall into vain glee. It is strong and persevering, because it has put to death its own will, which made it weak and inconstant. All times are the right time for it; all places the right place. If it is in a season of penance, this is a time of gladness and consolation to it, using penance as a means; and if, by necessity or obedience, penance has to be abandoned, it rejoices; ...
— Letters of Catherine Benincasa • Catherine Benincasa
... shall be quite au desespoir, shoot myself and Go out of the world with eclat, and my History will furnish materials for a pretty little Romance which shall be entitled and denominated the loves of Lord B. and the cruel and Inconstant Sigismunda Cunegunda Bridgetina, etc., etc., ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Letters and Journals, Vol. 1 • Lord Byron, Edited by Rowland E. Prothero
... Iseria by his cruel uncle and shipped to Ceylon. Shipwrecked, he becomes the slave of a savage Incas, whose renegade Italian queen falls in love with him. But neither her blandishments nor the terrible effects of her displeasure can make him inconstant to Iseria. After suffering incredible hardships, he returns to see Iseria once more before entering a monastery, but she, loyal even to the semblance of the man, refuses to allow ...
— The Life and Romances of Mrs. Eliza Haywood • George Frisbie Whicher
... unhappiness; misfortune. {uns[ae]lic} ({-ec}), aj. unhappy, cursed. {unschulde}, sf. innocence. {unschuldigen}, wv. proclaim one's innocence. {unsegel[i]ch}, aj. unspeakable. {unsenfte}, aj. painful, hard. {unser}, pr. our, 7, 67. {unst[ae]te}, aj. inconstant, fickle. {unst[ae]te}, sf. inconstancy, fickleness. {untriuwe}, sf. faithlessness, deceit. {untr[oe]sten}, wv. dishearten, discourage. {untr[o]st}, sm. despondency, discouragement. {untugent}, sf. lack of good training. {unversunnen}, pp. unconscious. ...
— A Middle High German Primer - Third Edition • Joseph Wright
... July, 1838, from his sacred niche in Palace street, and was subsequently triumphantly replaced by the grateful citizens,—rejuvenated, repainted, revarnished, with the best materials Halifax could furnish, the "General" having been brought there by the youngsters of the "Inconstant" frigate, Captain Pring, from Quebec. It would appear the roystering middies, having sacrificed copiously to the rosy god, after rising from a masonic dinner in the Albion Hotel, in Palace street, had noticed the "General" by the pale moonlight, looking ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... descended to our time under two different aspects. The Nixa of the Germans is one of those fascinating and lovely fays whom the ancients termed Naiads; and unless her pride is insulted or her jealousy awakened by an inconstant lover, her temper is generally mild and her actions beneficent. The Old Nick known in England is an equally genuine descendant of the northern sea-god, and possesses a larger portion of his powers and terrors The British sailor, who fears ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... At any rate he wooed and won. Nanca begged the young foreigner to divorce her, which he did. The Seminole divorce custom is lenient when the marriage is childless. The artist, I fancy, was merely a wild, reckless, inconstant sort of chap who did not regard the simple Seminole marriage tie as binding. After the birth of his daughter, a tiny little elf whom Nanca has named "Red-winged Blackbird," he tried to run away, and ...
— Diane of the Green Van • Leona Dalrymple
... described in the words he himself uses of a book by one of his opponents, as calculated "to gain a short, contemptible, and soon-fading reward, not to stir the constancy and solid firmness of any wise man ... but to catch the worthless approbation of an inconstant, irrational, and image-doting rabble." ...
— Milton • Mark Pattison
... she had confided to me her anxieties, "but I find it hard to keep up the deception that I am heart-whole and fancy-free, and yet indifferent to Count Hendrick's attentions. Indeed, my father openly upbraids me with being fickle, inconstant, unmaidenly, and I know not what besides, until I am driven to my wit's end to keep the peace between us. Yet I doubt not, if he knew the truth, he would marry me willy-nilly to Count ...
— Adventures in Southern Seas - A Tale of the Sixteenth Century • George Forbes
... the long-expected flying squadron arrived, and took up positions ahead of us. The following ships comprised it—"Inconstant" (flag), "Bacchante," ...
— In Eastern Seas - The Commission of H.M.S. 'Iron Duke,' flag-ship in China, 1878-83 • J. J. Smith
... well proportioned and delicately organized; at the same time they lack vigor, are slow and indolent, possess vivid imaginations, are vain and inconstant, though hospitable to strangers, and ardent ...
— Porto Rico - Its History, Products and Possibilities... • Arthur D. Hall
... accord, do not immediately pronounce anything upon their friendship, though they should affirm it with an oath, though they should declare, "For us to live apart in a thing impossible!" For the heart of a bad man is faithless, unprincipled, inconstant: now overpowered by one impression, now by another. Ask not the usual questions, Were they born of the same parents, reared together, and under the same tutor; but ask this only, in what they place their real interest—whether in outward things or in the Will. If in outward things, call them ...
— The Golden Sayings of Epictetus • Epictetus
... flood. Faith in that promise preserved both me and mine: So will it all them which follow the same line. Not only this gift thou hast given me, sweet Lord, But with it also thine everlasting covenant Of trust forever, thy rainbow bearing record, Never more to drown the world by flood inconstant; Alack! I cannot to thee give praise condign, Yet will I sing here with ...
— Everyman and Other Old Religious Plays, with an Introduction • Anonymous
... people of Rome; he advances gravely towards them, and thus does he speak: "I, who never yet feared anything that was human, have, amongst such as were divine, always had, a dread of fortune as faithless and inconstant; and, for the very reason that in this war she had been as a favourable gale in all my affairs, I still expected some change and reflux of things. In one day I passed the Ionian Sea, and reached Corcyra from Brundisium; thence in five more I sacrificed ...
— Wisdom and Destiny • Maurice Maeterlinck
... only praise those whom they love. If they sought its own praise, they were as much mistaken as Ixion when he embraced a cloud instead of Juno; for there is nothing so fleeting, so changeable, and so inconstant as popular applause; it is but a pompous shadow, and hath no manner of solidity and duration in it. But a wise man, if he design to engage in business and matters of state, will so far aim at fame and popularity as that he may be better enabled to benefit others; for it is a difficult and ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch
... direct the grand phenomena of the Trades. Indeed, the most extensive observation serves only to link the whole into one harmonious chain or series of explanations, exhibiting the uniformity as well as the exquisite adaptability of Nature, even in those departments called "inconstant," where she is ...
— The Lieutenant and Commander - Being Autobigraphical Sketches of His Own Career, from - Fragments of Voyages and Travels • Basil Hall
... sweet to submit to love's rule, If one could find faithful love, But, alas! oh cruel rule! No faithful shepherdess is to be seen, And that inconstant sex, much too unworthy, ...
— The Middle Class Gentleman - (Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme) • Moliere
... possessed of great natural ability, and for a time was regarded as the most eminent physician and astrologer among his contemporaries. But his mind was of a peculiar cast, and his temper most inconstant. He had, says Peter Bayle, in his "Historical Dictionary," a decided love of paradox, and of the marvellous, an infantine credulity, a superstition scarce conceivable, an insupportable vanity, and a boasting that knew no limits. His works, though ...
— Primitive Psycho-Therapy and Quackery • Robert Means Lawrence
... she could do what she pleased with him, even to passing her hand over his back and taking him by the tail, holding him in her hands, or putting him in her apron—caresses of a kind that parrots do not usually permit. Nothing astonished him or offended him. He proved very inconstant toward her, and now, while better disposed toward the other girl, he is furious against this one. A third miss has come to capture his affection; and when he has been left asleep, or resting in ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 841, February 13, 1892 • Various
... the destruction of poor Mrs. Middleton, when, by accident, he met with Miss Hamilton. From this moment ended all his resentment against Mrs. Middleton, and all his attachment to Miss Warmestre: no longer was he inconstant: no longer were his wishes fluctuating: this object fixed them all; and, of all his former habits, none remained, ...
— The Memoirs of Count Grammont, Complete • Anthony Hamilton
... (which his father—sentimental as he—read with him), poetry, and gushing biographies; although a little later he became, with impartial facility, equally delighted with the sturdy Plutarch. His nature was passionate and inconstant, his sensibilities morbidly acute, and his imagination lively. He hated all rules, precedents, and authority. He was lazy, listless, deceitful, and had a great craving for novelties and excitement,—as he himself says, "feeling everything and ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord
... opinion of the sex at large, I fear, Mr. Verty," she said; "some of them are very inconstant; you ...
— The Last of the Foresters • John Esten Cooke
... India, Dyaus became subordinate to Indra. Thus the primitive Heaven personified recedes, and his place is taken by a more individualised god. But generally Mother Earth remains a constant quantity. Earth was nearer man and was more unchanging than the inconstant sky, while as the producer of the fruits of the earth, she was regarded as the source of all things, and frequently remained as an important divinity when a crowd of other divinities became prominent. This ...
— The Religion of the Ancient Celts • J. A. MacCulloch
... reading words or in listening to them, we get the sound and the meaning and their "impressions" (emotions), but the images which float across the mind, if there are any, are often too vague or too inconstant to be of much relevance to the experience. They are, moreover, highly individual in nature, differing in kind and clearness from person to person. The recent researches into imageless thinking are a striking confirmation of Burke's observation. It is now pretty clearly established that ...
— The Principles Of Aesthetics • Dewitt H. Parker
... initials of Napoleon. Meantime the Allied Princes appointed military governors of Paris, were visible daily at processions and festivals, and received, night after night, in the theatres, the tumultuous applause of the most inconstant of peoples. ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... inconstant, cruel, I cannot excuse myself. But, O Silvestre, in the name of the love you once bore me, have pity on us! Reform, abjure your evil courses! Do not, I implore you, condemn my husband to this abyss of depravity, do not wreck my married life!" Now I understood what had ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... fortune presented to him, that it seemed as if he had foreseen or desired them. He knew how to put a good gloss upon his failings, and oftentimes verily believed he was really the man which he affected to be only in appearance. He was a man of bright parts, but no conduct, being violent and inconstant in his intrigues of love as well as those of politics, and so indiscreet as to boast of his successful amours with certain ladies whom he ought not to have named. He affected pomp and splendour, though his profession demanded simplicity and humility. He was continually ...
— The Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz, Complete • Jean Francois Paul de Gondi, Cardinal de Retz
... Comedies, has he praised himself upon the stage; but, having been slandered by his enemies amongst the volatile Athenians, accused of scoffing at his country and of insulting the people, to-day he wishes to reply and regain for himself the inconstant Athenians. He maintains that he has done much that is good for you; if you no longer allow yourselves to be too much hoodwinked by strangers or seduced by flattery, if in politics you are no longer the ninnies you once were, it is thanks to him. Formerly, when delegates from other cities ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al
... with the wind (irresolute) 605; oscillate &c. 314; vibrate between, two extremes, oscillate between, two extremes; alternate; have as man phases as the moon. Adj. changeable, changeful; changing &c. 140; mutable, variable, checkered, ever changing; protean, proteiform|; versatile. unstaid[obs3], inconstant; unsteady, unstable, unfixed, unsettled; fluctuating &c. v.; restless; agitated &c. 315; erratic, fickle; irresolute &c. 605; capricious &c. 608; touch and go; inconsonant, fitful, spasmodic; vibratory; vagrant, wayward; desultory; afloat; alternating; alterable, plastic, mobile; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... perhaps even a blind country gentleman was preferable to a lachrymose pianist. Chopin must have heard of the attachment in 1831. Her name almost disappears from his correspondence. Time as well as other nails drove from his memory her image. If she was fickle, he was inconstant, and so let us waste no pity on this episode, over which lakes of tears have been shed and rivers of ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 • Rupert Hughes
... and sat upon her case. They were sitting on it now, up-stairs with Brodrick in his study. She knew infallibly what their judgment would be. Just as she had seemed to them so long a creature of uncertain health, she must seem now inconstant, insincere, the incarnation of heartlessness, egotism and caprice. She said to herself that it was all very well for Nina to talk. This insight was a curse. It was terrible to know what people were thinking, to feel what they were feeling. And they were ...
— The Creators - A Comedy • May Sinclair
... it is to be feared that she was not always able to maintain the attitude of contemptuous composure. So, at least, we may suspect from the evidence of that Frenchman who met "le bon et agreable Tristram," and his wife, at Montpellier, and who, characteristically sympathizing with the inconstant husband, declared that his wife's incessant pursuit of him made him pass "d'assez mauvais moments," which he bore "with the patience of an angel." But, on the whole, Mrs. Sterne's conduct seems by her husband's own admissions to have ...
— Sterne • H.D. Traill
... power of tyranny vested in chiefs; political and religious persecutions; hence human servility; but society may flourish without servility; its corporate actions would then have statistical constancy; nations who are guided by successive orators, etc., must be inconstant; the romantic side of servility; free ...
— Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development • Francis Galton
... if at night Ye wake to feel your beauty going. It was a web of frail delight, Inconstant as ...
— The Little Book of Modern Verse • Jessie B. Rittenhouse
... her child as the sun in the heavens, a changeless and ever radiant star, whither the inconstant little creature, so ready with its tears and its daughter, so light, so passionate, so stormy, may come to calm and to fortify itself with heat and light. A mother represents goodness, providence, law, nay, divinity itself, under the only ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IX. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... will do no harm, for nobody will follow my advice. But the last word is of more concern. Marriage is a step so grave and decisive that it attracts light-headed, variable men by its very awfulness. They have been so tried among the inconstant squalls and currents, so often sailed for islands in the air or lain becalmed with burning heart, that they will risk all for solid ground below their feet. Desperate pilots, they run their sea-sick, weary bark upon the dashing rocks. It seems as if marriage were the royal road through life, ...
— Virginibus Puerisque • Robert Louis Stevenson
... strength and his sight; the rapid progress of a dropsy admonished him of his end, and he sunk into the grave on Nov. 10, 1770, in the sixty-fourth year of his age. A family tradition insinuates that Mr. William Law had drawn his pupil in the light and inconstant character of Flatus, who is ever confident, and ever disappointed in the chace of happiness. But these constitutional failing were happily compensated by the virtues of the head and heart, by the warmest sentiments of honour and humanity. His graceful person, ...
— Memoirs of My Life and Writings • Edward Gibbon
... the peculiar situation of Japan and the anomalous form of its Government, the action of that empire in performing treaty stipulations is inconstant and capricious. Nevertheless, good progress has been effected by the Western powers, moving with enlightened concert. Our own pecuniary claims have been allowed or put in course of settlement, and the inland sea has been reopened to commerce. There is reason also to believe that ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... from north to south for the space of forty leagues in that territory, which contains also a multitude of veins which have not been explored. In all these minerals abound, but the irregular and inconstant labor of some of the mines does not permit us to consider ...
— Mexico and its Religion • Robert A. Wilson
... thirst, I would desert you—think not but I would!— And seek another as I sought you first. But you are mobile as the veering air, And all your charms more changeful than the tide, Wherefore to be inconstant is no care: I have but to continue at your side. So wanton, light and false, my love, are you, I am most faithless when I ...
— A Few Figs from Thistles • Edna St. Vincent Millay
... most menial tasks, compared with whom the sporting priest of Beira is at least pleasantly independent; and there are the luxurious hermit, the dissipated village priest who never prayed the hours, the inconstant monk who had been carrier and carpenter and now wishes to be unfrocked in order to join more freely in dance and pilgrimage, the mad friar Frei Martinho persecuted by dogs and Lisbon gamins, the ambitious preacher who glosses over men's sins. If the priests fared well ...
— Four Plays of Gil Vicente • Gil Vicente
... down to the year of his death, which occurred on May 32, 1885; but it is most important as a defence of his political career from 1848 onwards. It does not, however, tell us how changeable his opinions had actually been. His inconstant attachments are thus summed up by Dr. Brandes: "He warmly supports the candidacy of Louis Napoleon for the post of President of the Republic ... lends him his support when he occupies that post, and is even favourable to the idea of an empire, until the feeling that he is despised as a politician ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol X • Various
... fleeting and inconstant, we find that the power of prophecy did not remain with a prophet for long, nor manifest itself frequently, but was very rare; manifesting itself only in a few men, and in them ...
— A Theologico-Political Treatise [Part I] • Benedict de Spinoza
... minute is to me? More than that, time is not constant even in the same individual. How many hours are shorter to you than others? How many days have been almost interminable? No, instead of being constant, there is nothing more inconstant ...
— The Girl in the Golden Atom • Raymond King Cummings
... in uncertainty, and do not consider, in the first place, that the greatest part of the world live so: how many worthy men have wholly abandoned their own certainties, and yet daily do it, to the winds, to trust to the inconstant favour of princes and of fortune? Caesar ran above a million of gold, more than he was worth, in debt to become Caesar; and how many merchants have begun their traffic by the sale of their farms, which they ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... and admiration so much as the "northern lights." We know that the magnetic and electric forces of the earth time after time envelop practically the whole globe in a mantle of light, but this mysterious phenomenon is still unexplained. Usually the aurora is inconstant. It flashes out suddenly, quivers for a moment in the sky, and then grows pale and vanishes. Most lasting are the bow-shaped northern lights, which sometimes stretch their milk-white arches high above the horizon. It may be that only one half of the arch is visible, rising like a pillar of light ...
— From Pole to Pole - A Book for Young People • Sven Anders Hedin
... dreams, Which are the children of an idle brain, Begot of nothing but vain fantasy; Which is as thin of substance as the air, And more inconstant than the wind, who wooes Even now the frozen bosom of the north, And, being anger'd, puffs away from thence, Turning his ...
— Romeo and Juliet • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... inconstant to Elizabeth, Betty, and Bess, I am never inconstant to love. But I will not defend myself. No, if it would do any good to confess, I own my fault, and will say that I hate myself for it; but I must add, that though I wish it, I cannot be otherwise than what I ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various
... between her and Mary as to the manner in which he should be received. Mary on a previous occasion had given him an answer, and really did believe that that would be sufficient. He was, according to her thinking, a light, inconstant man, who would hardly give himself the labour necessary for perseverance in any suit. Patience at once began to ask him after his brother and the doings at the Priory. He had been so intimate at ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... ye powers that sway eternal seats, And guide this massy substance of the earth, If you retain desert of holiness, As your supreme estates instruct our thoughts, Be not inconstant, careless of your fame, Bear not the burden of your enemies' joys, Triumphing in his fall whom you advanc'd; But, as his birth, life, health, and majesty Were strangely blest and governed by heaven, So honour, heaven, (till heaven dissolved ...
— Tamburlaine the Great, Part II. • Christopher Marlowe
... gifts a woman can possess, and whose childhood, it is certain, will be rich in all those joys which a sad mother refused to the Eugenie of these pages. If Frenchmen are accused of bring frivolous and inconstant, I, you see, am Italian in my faithfulness and attachments. How often, as I write the name of Eugenie, have my thoughts carried me back to the cool stuccoed drawing-room and little garden of the ...
— Women in the Life of Balzac • Juanita Helm Floyd
... of her loves were barren. She embraced them each in turn with an ardour that resulted in the production of an offspring—a song, a picture, a poem, or book on some most serious subject, and all worthy of note. But she was inconstant, and these children of her thought or fancy were generally isolated efforts that marked the culminating point of her devotion, and lessened her interest if they ...
— Ideala • Sarah Grand
... gathering fast, Loud roars the wild inconstant blast, Yon murky cloud is foul with rain, I see it driving o'er the plain; The hunter now has left the moor, The scatter'd coveys meet secure, While here I wander, prest with care, Along ...
— Robert Burns - How To Know Him • William Allan Neilson
... navy in a century. This circumstance alone would have insured the confirmation of his rank by the Admiralty, even had he not also eminently distinguished himself; but it was for him one of those periods when inconstant fortune seems bent upon lavishing her favors. He was near the head of the British column, as the hostile fleets passed in opposite directions, exchanging broadsides. As his ship cleared the French rear, a neighboring ...
— Types of Naval Officers - Drawn from the History of the British Navy • A. T. Mahan
... more, lady, sigh no more Be not inconstant ever, One foot on sea, and one on shore, You can ...
— A Fairy Tale in Two Acts Taken from Shakespeare (1763) • William Shakespeare
... these questions, the young man began to weep bitterly. "How inconstant is fortune!" cried he; "she takes pleasure to pull down those she has raised. Where are they who enjoy quietly the happiness which they hold of her, and whose day ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown
... inconstant outline of the Corbiere, as we were hurried swiftly past it, was a subject of surprise and admiration. When first seen through the haze of morning, it resembled a huge elephant supporting an embattled tower; a little after, it assumed the similitude of a gigantic warrior ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 395, Saturday, October 24, 1829. • Various
... (says story) I lov'd you, For which you call me most inconstant now; Pardon me, madam, you mistake the man; For I am not the same that I was then; No flesh is now the same't was ...
— English literary criticism • Various
... just requisite; but the other Metals have not such fixt bodies, for their pores are open, and far extenuated, therefore the Tincture Spirit can the more abundantly pass thorough and possess them. But because the bodies of the other Metals are inconstant, the Tincture cannot remain with those inconstant bodies, but must depart. And whereas the Tincture of Gold is found in none more plentiful than in Mars and Venus, as Man and Wife, their bodies therefore are destroyed, and the tinging ...
— Of Natural and Supernatural Things • Basilius Valentinus
... forged so far ahead as to lie directly on the weather-beam of the stranger, but too near to enable her to fall-off in the least, without imminent danger that the vessels would come foul. The wind was inconstant, sometimes blowing in puffs, while at moments there was a perfect lull. As the ship felt the former, her tall masts bent gracefully towards the slaver, as if to make the parting salute; but, relieved from the momentary pressure of the inconstant ...
— The Red Rover • James Fenimore Cooper
... after all, the problem of human growth. ... The one constant and inconstant quantity with which man must deal is man—changing, inert, impulsive, limited, sympathetic, selfish, aspiring man. His institutions, whether social or political, must come out of his wants and out of his capacities. Luther Burbank has not yet made grapes to grow on thorns or ...
— Community Civics and Rural Life • Arthur W. Dunn
... things and principles of things as inconstant modes or fashions has more and more become the tendency of modern thought. Let us begin with that which is without—our physical life. Fix upon it in one of its more exquisite intervals, the moment, for instance, of ...
— The Renaissance - Studies in Art and Poetry • Walter Pater
... represented, that she had released Vivian from all promises, all engagements; that, at parting, she had professed to leave him perfectly at liberty: that it would, therefore, be as indelicate as imprudent to make such an attempt to reclaim his inconstant heart. She had told him, that she desired to have proof of the steadiness, both of his character and of his attachment, before she could consent to marry him. From this decision she could not, she ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. V - Tales of a Fashionable Life • Maria Edgeworth
... danger that he would be betrayed. The Irish had many faults—we may not refuse them credit for their virtues. However treacherous they were to their enemies, however inconstant in their engagements, uncertain, untrue in ordinary obligations, they were without rivals in the world in their passionate attachments among themselves; and of all the chiefs who fell from Fitzgerald's banner, and hastened with submission to the English deputy, there was perhaps not one who, ...
— History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth. Vol. II. • James Anthony Froude
... which the inexpert will not believe. And here a Question presents it self at hand; How the Spirit of Copper can make other imperfect Metals perfect, and make them ripe, whereas in its own Body it is imperfect and inconstant? For Answer, I say as I have often said, that this Spirit cannot possess or inhabit a permanent Body in Copper; for when the habitation is burnt by Fire, the Spirit goes away with it, and must with impatience ...
— Of Natural and Supernatural Things • Basilius Valentinus
... we were happy on that morning?—it would be just about this time of year, two years ago. And what a change in you since then! Heigho! And yet men say that woman is inconstant!" ...
— The Strolling Saint • Raphael Sabatini
... terrible mistake there, Lady Mary," said Sylla, in accents of mock anguish. "Mr. Cottrell is one of the most dangerous and inconstant of his sex. He made most desperate love last year to me in Suffolk, whispers pretty speeches into my ear the whole of this evening, and then turns me over—consigns me, I believe, is the proper term—to Mr. Beauchamp as if I were ...
— Belles and Ringers • Hawley Smart
... diverse creatures and return or rebirth. All that I say is proper and correct, like to what a person who is endued with intelligence and who has seen his soul, would say on this topic of previous births.[23] That person who looks upon pleasure and pain as inconstant, which, indeed, is the correct view, who regards the body as an unholy conglomeration, and destruction as ordained in action, and who remembers that what little of pleasure there is, is really all pain, will succeed in crossing this terrible ocean of worldly migration that is so difficult ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... over for good and all; you can have no hopes of getting her for a mistress; and she is too proud, too inconstant, too affected and too witty, and too handsome for ...
— The Comedies of William Congreve - Volume 1 [of 2] • William Congreve
... at her lover, "Sir," said she, "you overwhelm me with amazement and anxiety! you are imposed upon, if you have received any such letter. You are deceived, if you thought Aurelia Darnel could be so insensible, ungrateful, and—inconstant." ...
— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett
... compelled to look cheerful and gay, at least, I am. To fall frowning will never do. I had no fall. My gallant Leboo made my heart leap with love of him, though mill-stones were tied to it. I may be vexed when I begin, but I soon ride out a bad temper. And he is mine! I am certainly inconstant to Charles, for I think of Leboo fifty times more. Besides, there is no engagement as yet between Charles and me. I have first to be approved worthy by Mr. and Miss Pollingray: two pairs of eyes and ears, over which I see a solemnly downy owl sitting, conning their reports of me. It is ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... But she must not melt too quickly. She will not; she will do nothing but what is exquisitely proper. How I do love this child! I dote upon her very image. It is the very thing that I have always been wanting. The women call me inconstant. I have never been constant. But they will not listen to us without we feign feelings, and then they upbraid us for not being influenced by them. I have sighed, I have sought, I have wept, for what I now have found. What would she give ...
— The Young Duke • Benjamin Disraeli
... Spanish literature,—complained of his pen having caught up a hair, and forthwith begins, with more eloquence than common sense, an affectionate expostulation with that useful implement, upbraiding it with being the quill of a goose,—a bird inconstant by nature, as frequenting the three elements of water, earth, and air, indifferently, and being, of course, 'to one thing constant never.' Now I protest to thee, gentle reader, that I entirely dissent from Francisco de Ubeda in this matter, and hold it ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott
... presenteth nought but shows Whereon the stars in secret influence comment; When I perceive that men as plants increase, Cheered and checked even by the self-same sky, Vaunt in their youthful sap, at height decrease, And wear their brave state out of memory; Then the conceit of this inconstant stay Sets you most rich in youth before my sight, Where wasteful Time debateth with decay To change your day of youth to sullied night, And all in war with Time for love of you, As he takes from ...
— Shakespeare's Sonnets • William Shakespeare
... lady lasted not long; for, as we have before observed, he was the most inconstant of all human race. Mrs. Trent's passion was not however of that kind which leads to any very deep resentment of such fickleness. Her passion, indeed, was principally founded upon interest; so that foundation ...
— Amelia (Complete) • Henry Fielding
... fond Unthriftyhead, Lewd Losse of Time, and Sorrow seeming dead, Inconstant Chaunge, and false Disloyalty, Consuming Riotise, and guilty Dread Of heavenly vengeaunce; faint Infirmity, Vile Poverty, and ...
— Stones of Venice [introductions] • John Ruskin
... disposition, with a weak understanding, headstrong, a gadder, who would be constantly changing his situations and inclinations, sleeping every night in a new place, and every day forming some new intimacy. Young men may be lively and handsome, but they are inconstant in their attachments. Look not thou for fidelity from those who, with the eyes of the nightingale, are every instant singing upon a different rose-bush. But old men pass their time in wisdom and good manners, not in the ignorance and frivolity of youth. Seek one ...
— Flowers from a Persian Garden and Other Papers • W. A. Clouston
... in her and those were their reflections; two lodestars set above her that by turns brightened and drew her gaze; two lodestones set within her that claimed her banners as claim the moon and earth the inconstant sea; one of head, one of heart; one of choice, one of dower; one of will, one ...
— This Freedom • A. S. M. Hutchinson
... banished from the Courte, the Abbot and his counsall begynnis to lay befoir the inconstant Governour, the dangeris that mycht ensew the alteratioun and change of religioun; the power of the King of France; the commoditie that mycht come to him and his house, by reatenyng the ancient league with France; and the great danger that he brought upoun ...
— The Works of John Knox, Vol. 1 (of 6) • John Knox
... really there is so much sweetness, so much innocence, such tender melancholy in this countenance, that, if I were a man, I should inevitably be in love with it, and in love for ever! Such beauty, if it were in nature, would certainly fix the most inconstant ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... a vulture rapacious, in falsehood a fox, Inconstant as waves, and unfeeling as rocks, As a tiger ferocious, perverse as a hog, In mischief an ape, ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange |
