"Masterly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... spirit pervade the book, either described at some length or indicated by a masterly allusion. All kinds of girls are depicted, as all kinds of girls go to college—girls poor and rich, clever, dull, and commonplace, refined and unrefined, the unsubstantial and the dilettante, and those with genuine talent, and the life among them seems very real, for ...
— A Beautiful Alien • Julia Magruder
... little capital!" he cried aloud in despair. "Enough to support me until my Academy picture is finished." His Academy picture was a masterly study entitled, "Roll on, thou deep and dark blue ocean, roll," and he had been compelled to stop halfway across the Channel through sheer lack ...
— Happy Days • Alan Alexander Milne
... Duomo of Siena, it combines bas-reliefs and detached statues, carved capitals, and sculptured lions, in a maze of marvellous invention; but it has no rival in the architectonic effect of harmony, and the masterly feeling for balanced masses it displays. The five subjects chosen by Giovanni for his bas-reliefs are the "Nativity," the "Adoration of the Magi," the "Massacre of the Innocents," the "Crucifixion," and the "Last Judgment." In the ...
— Renaissance in Italy Vol. 3 - The Fine Arts • John Addington Symonds
... a Flemish copper-plate engraver, born at Antwerp; invited to France by Colbert, and patronised by Louis XIV.; executed in a masterly manner many ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... Ratisbon could have been her teacher? To whom did she owe this masterly training? As if by a miracle, he knew not whether from looking or listening, he found a combination of notes which he had long been seeking for the motet on which he was working. When he had registered it, and she sang a few passages from it, what an exquisite delight awaited him! But what should ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... exactly one-half of four guineas, the present cost of slacks. Please see attached affidavit from tailor. (By a masterly stroke I had actually induced the rascal to set out his iniquity in black ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, January 14, 1920 • Various
... Self-denial only, but even Paul, in our flesh, and with like passions with us, had the same experience and has left us the same record. 'I keep my body under': so our emasculated English version makes us read it. But the visual image in the masterly original Greek is not so mealy-mouthed. I box and buffet myself day and night, says Paul. I play the truculent tyrant over a lewd and lazy slave. I hit myself blinding blows on my tenderest part. I am ashamed to look at myself in the glass, for all under my ...
— Bunyan Characters - Third Series - The Holy War • Alexander Whyte
... and her Majesty's 13th Light Infantry, under Brigadier Sale. I ordered forward three troops of horse artillery, the camel battery, and one foot battery, to open upon the citadel and fortress, by throwing shrapnel shells, which was done in a masterly style under the direction of Brigadier Stephenson. My object in this was to make the enemy shew their strength in guns, and in other respects, which completely succeeded, and our shells must have done great ...
— Campaign of the Indus • T.W.E. Holdsworth
... foolishness of his worshipers. To the end of his life, neither society nor the critics ever forgave him, and did not even do justice to his genius. His espousal of the popular cause in Europe embittered the conservative element, and the freedom of speculation in such masterly works as 'Cain' brought upon him the anathemas of orthodox England. Henceforth in England his poetry was judged by his liberal and unorthodox opinions. This vituperation rose to its height when Byron dared to satirize George III., and ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... indeed, for under his masterly touch the instrument sang, laughed and wept, and whispered love-words at his will; now, one high string pleaded its passionate melody to a low and sighing accompaniment that never swelled to reach it; and now, the nineteen strings sounded together as a full orchestra, bursting in triumphant ...
— Stradella • F(rancis) Marion Crawford
... of their own reputations, have made much of what they chose to consider Rizal's historical errors. But history is not merely chronology, and his representation of its trend, disregarding details, was a masterly tracing of current evils to their remote causes. He may have erred in some of his minor statements; this will happen to anyone who writes much, but attempts to discredit Rizal on the score of historical inaccuracy ...
— Lineage, Life, and Labors of Jose Rizal, Philippine Patriot • Austin Craig
... the female heart better than any writer of our day, and in every fiction from her pen we trace the same masterly analysis and development of the motives and ...
— Country Walks of a Naturalist with His Children • W. Houghton
... Elgin began to turn into makeshift Methodists. The Doctor missed certain occupants of the gallery seats and felt the logic of circumstances. Here we must all yield, and the minister concealed his discomfiture in a masterly initiative. The matter came up again at a meeting of the church managers, brought up by Dr Drummond, who had the satisfaction of hearing that a thing put into the Doctor's hands was already half done. In a very few weeks ...
— The Imperialist • (a.k.a. Mrs. Everard Cotes) Sara Jeannette Duncan
... Continental pattern. Jefferson, she knew, had never cared for the girl nor taken the affair seriously. Some powerful influences must have been at work to make him surrender so easily. Here again she recognized the masterly hand of Ryder, Sr., and more than ever she was eager to meet this extraordinary man and measure her strength with his. Her mind, indeed, was too full of her father's troubles to grieve over her own however much she might ...
— The Lion and The Mouse - A Story Of American Life • Charles Klein
... He did not think any argument or inducement offered by Chase could change his mind on past dealings or his purpose of the present. But he believed by listening he might get some light on what had long puzzled him. The masterly effort Chase put forth to conquer his aroused passions gave Belding another idea of the character ...
— Desert Gold • Zane Grey
... which it embodies, though it at first existed rather as a nice poetic instinct than as a scientifically based thought, is at least as old as the times of Herder and Coleridge. In a passage quoted from the former writer by Dr. M'Cosh, in his very masterly work on typical forms, I find the profound German remarking of the strange resemblances which pervade all nature, and impart a general unity to its forms, that it would seem "as if on all our earth the form-abounding mother had proposed to herself but one type,—one proto-plasma,—according to ...
— The Testimony of the Rocks - or, Geology in Its Bearings on the Two Theologies, Natural and Revealed • Hugh Miller
... historical interest, which had been long sought after, should, when discovered, be suffered to remain unprinted; and Mr. Jardine, the accomplished editor of the Criminal Trials (the second volume of which, it will be remembered, is entirely devoted to a very masterly narrative of the Gunpowder Plot), has accordingly produced a very carefully prepared edition of the Tract in question; introduced by a preface, in which its historical importance is alone discussed, the object of the publication ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 81, May 17, 1851 • Various
... life, color and individuality, this story of true love cannot fail to attract and hold to its happy end the reader's eager attention. The word pictures are masterly; while the poise of narrative and description ...
— Miss Elliot's Girls • Mrs Mary Spring Corning
... subsequent remarks on the Miscellanies here selected. And, indeed, it is not fanciful to perceive in each book a somewhat different presentment of the author's genius; though in no one of the four is any one of his masterly qualities absent. There is tenderness even in Jonathan Wild; there are touches in Joseph Andrews of that irony of the Preacher, the last echo of which is heard amid the kindly resignation of the Journey to Lisbon, in the sentence, "Whereas envy of all things most exposes us to danger ...
— Joseph Andrews Vol. 1 • Henry Fielding
... Owen Dugdale repeated the performance in almost as masterly a manner. The applause was, if anything, a shade more uproarous. Now the game went on evenly, with a goal apiece; but Keyport was out for scoring and would not be denied; so, in a hurry, they pushed the fighting down ...
— The Chums of Scranton High at Ice Hockey • Donald Ferguson
... for trouble between Turks and Germans, but we must not, I am afraid, build very high hopes on it, for Germany has dealt with the situation in a masterly manner. Jemal was already Minister of Marine as well as commander of the Syrian army, so the Emperor asked him to pay another visit to Berlin, and he has been visiting Krupp's works and German naval yards, and we shall find probably that in the future his activities will be marine ...
— Crescent and Iron Cross • E. F. Benson
... country. He was no holiday or dillettanti statesman. His industry was prodigious, and he seemed actually to love work. His toil in the memorable six months of 1835 was something absolutely prodigious; in 1842 and 1843 scarcely less so. His work was always done in a masterly and business-like style, which testified to the conscientious diligence he had bestowed upon it. His measures rarely had to be altered or modified in their passage through the House. In manners ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... very gradually, and should not be hastened, but should only keep pace with the new conceptions. Nevertheless, there should not be too tenacious a clinging to the old forms, which expressed lower conceptions, when the masterly thought of the day is forging out higher and purer ...
— The Etiquette of To-day • Edith B. Ordway
... on Saturday till Monday, having been at the Grove on Friday. George Villiers at the Grove showed me a Dublin paper with an attack on Stanley's proclamation, and also a character of Plunket drawn with great severity and by a masterly hand; it is supposed to be by Baron Smith, a judge who is very able, but fanciful and disaffected. He will never suffer any but policemen or soldiers to be hanged of those whom he tries. George Villiers came from Hatfield, where he had a conversation with the Duke of Wellington, ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. II • Charles C. F. Greville
... Pickwick was delivering himself of the sentiment just recorded, Mr. Weller and the fat boy, having by their joint endeavors cut out a slide, were exercising themselves thereupon, in a very masterly and brilliant manner. Sam Weller, in particular, was displaying that beautiful feat of fancy-sliding which is currently denominated "knocking at the cobbler's door," and which is achieved by skimming over the ice on one foot, and occasionally giving a postman's ...
— The Ontario Readers: The High School Reader, 1886 • Ministry of Education
... strength and influence of Choo had steadily grown, and in 1356 he made a daring and masterly move in the capture of the city of Nanking, which gave him control of some of the wealthiest provinces of the land. Here he showed the same moderation as before, preserving the citizens from plunder and outrage, ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 12 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... as an example and of the latter the Pras'astapada bha@sya, the Advaitasiddhi of Madhusudana Sarasvati or the Vedanta-paribha@sa of Dharmarajadhvarindra. The more remarkable of these treatises were of a masterly nature in which the writers represented the systems they adhered to in a highly forcible and logical manner by dint of their own great mental powers and genius. These also had their commentaries to explain ...
— A History of Indian Philosophy, Vol. 1 • Surendranath Dasgupta
... paid attentions to their daughter. With the former he appeared very likely to succeed, for the talent he displayed in the House, his apparently earnest zeal for the welfare of his country, her church and state, his masterly eloquence, and the interest he felt for Grahame, were all qualities attractive in the eyes of Mr. Hamilton; and though he did not yet invite him to his house, he never met him without evincing pleasure. With Mrs. Hamilton, Alphingham did not find ...
— The Mother's Recompense, Volume I. - A Sequel to Home Influence in Two Volumes. • Grace Aguilar
... nose swollen to twice its natural size, undertook a series of masterly retreats. It was then that Madame, at the keyhole, began to fear for her furniture, and considered interference. Chairs were overturned, the table went crashing. At last a foot-stool completed what Philip's fists had begun. Channing tripped over it, fell heavily for the ...
— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly
... character in the drama, the young priest, who in the fanaticism of his belief puts everything earthly far from him, as unclean, appeared, and in a few masterly, powerful lines, pronounced his vow, by which, for him, for time and eternity, all earthly bonds were loosed, and he was committed heart and soul to the service of his God. The oath was taken, the holy flame blazed and waved on the sacrificial ...
— The Northern Light • E. Werner
... us. Still the labor limae unsparingly employed by Terence, the rules of good writing laid down by Lucilius, and the labours of the great grammarians and orators at the close of the period, prepared the language for that rapid development which it at once assumed in the masterly hands ...
— A History of Roman Literature - From the Earliest Period to the Death of Marcus Aurelius • Charles Thomas Cruttwell
... science and Divines, but none of them could relieve her of this. Now I was present in the assembly; so I said to him, 'O King, I know a man called Sa'adu'llh the Babylonian, than whom there is not on the face of the earth one more masterly in these matters, and if thou see fit to send me to him, do so.' Said he, 'Go to him;' and quoth I, 'Bring me a piece of carnelian.' Accordingly he gave me a great piece of carnelian and an hundred ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 9 • Richard F. Burton
... the rapidity of his measures. He disposed of whole masses of troops at his pleasure, moved them here or there, brought them forward, or kept them out of sight, had them wholly at his disposition, when, where, and how he pleased, whether to occupy a position or to gain a battle. His diplomacy was as masterly as his military science. ...
— History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814 • F. A. M. Mignet
... not poetical. Accurate, vivid, life-like, it is. We cannot read it without a feeling of pleasure. We admire the genius of the writer; we wonder at the magnificence of the spectacle which, by a few masterly touches, he has raised up before us. But there is no more poetry in it than in his description of Herr Van Tassel's supper table, covered with all the luxuries of Dutch housewifery. It is true, there may ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, January 1844 - Volume 23, Number 1 • Various
... rebellion, but it was one of the grievances included by the habitants in their general bill of complaint. Hence, when Lord Durham came to Quebec to investigate the causes of colonial discontent, the system came in for its share of study. In his masterly Report on the Affairs of British North America he recognized that the old system had outlived its day of usefulness, and that its continuance was unwise. But Durham outlined no plan for its abolition. He believed that if the province were given a government responsible to the masses of its own people, ...
— The Seigneurs of Old Canada: - A Chronicle of New-World Feudalism • William Bennett Munro
... envious thoughts for the outlaws in their free life. Anything was better, to his mind, than oak-bark and ditch-water and the smell of half-tanned hides. Also he was ambitious to beat Robin at his own game. By dint of perseverance Arthur had once come very nigh to emulating that masterly feat of archery by which Robin had wrested the purse of gold and the Arab horse from him. Vastly elated at this promise of success, the tanner had flung down his trade and had marched off towards Barnesdale, armed with his bow and a ...
— Robin Hood • Paul Creswick
... Decision was stamped all over it; from the firm jaw to the steady eyes that met her own. Suddenly she began to tremble. It was not fear. Afterwards she knew it to have been pride—pride in his great masterly manfulness; in a judgment so sure of itself that it dallied not a moment in stating the terms upon which all future happiness might hang. For if Dave had misread Irene's heart he had deliberately closed the only door through which he might ...
— The Cow Puncher • Robert J. C. Stead
... sort of thing indicates so much. I see you have a masterly touch for so young an artist. I won't say anything hackneyed about so fair a one; for women are showing us nowadays that there are no regions of art closed against them. Well, it is a divine amusement, and ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon
... hands, and became so resolutely boyish and effusive in my delight at seeing her that anyone in the world but Bettie Hamlyn would have been quite touched. And my conversational gambit, I protest, was masterly, and would have made anybody else think, "Oh how candid is the egotism of this child!" and would have moved that person, metaphorically anyhow, to pat me ...
— The Cords of Vanity • James Branch Cabell et al
... aptitude Eskimos seem to show for art, and their fondness for poetry and music. King[255] says that "the art of carving is universally practised" by them, and he speaks of their models of men, animals, and utensils as "executed in a masterly style." Brinton indeed says they have a more artistic eye for picture-writing than any Indian race north of Mexico. They enliven their long winter nights with imaginative tales, music, and song. Their poets are held in high honor, and it is said they get their notion of the music of ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck
... sensational. The pictures are handsomely executed. A Sunday-school lesson each week by Rev. Dr. Strobridge. Its articles on scientific subjects are of the best, its short stories good, and, in fact, it is a masterly combination of useful ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls, Vol. XII, Jan. 3, 1891 • Various
... aloft, in his own domain, as an accumulator, his credit as a judge of testimony is nearly as high. The deciding test of his critical sagacity is the masterly treatment of the case against the Templars. They were condemned without mercy, by Church and State, by priest and jurist, and down to the present day cautious examiners of evidence, like Prutz and Lavocat, ...
— The History of Freedom • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... Moses as the foundation of sanitary science. The more we have learned about sanitation in the prophylaxis of disease and in the prevention of contagion in the modern time, the more have we come to appreciate highly the teachings of these old times on such subjects. Moses made a masterly exposition of the knowledge necessary to prevent contagious disease when he laid down the rules with regard to leprosy, first as to careful differentiation, then as to isolation, and finally as to disinfection after it had come ...
— Old-Time Makers of Medicine • James J. Walsh
... was not one of the men who can write only one sort of thing. The numerous little poems contained in the first volume of this series show his sympathetic knowledge of children, while his essays prove that he could handle serious subjects in a most masterly manner. The extract from Treasure Island which you have just been reading displays his skill in still another field—the writing ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester
... dulcimer the poet had heard in St. Petersburg from the famous Silbermann."(6) Through the whole book runs a humour not often found elsewhere in Mickiewicz; the reports of the debates in Jankiel's tavern and in Dobrzyn hamlet are masterly in their blending of kindly pleasantry with photographic fidelity to truth. The poet sees the ludicrous side of the Warden, the Chamberlain, the Seneschal, and the other Don Quixotes who fill his pages, ...
— Pan Tadeusz • Adam Mickiewicz
... joined the emperor of Barbary. The cause of his desertion was that Sebastian gave to Henri'quez the lady betrothed to Alonzo. Her name was Violante (4 syl.) The quarrel between Sebastian and Dorax is a masterly copy of the quarrel and reconciliation between Brutus and Cassius in Shakespeare's ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... This masterly discourse was read, but read in such a manner as to lose none of its effect. It occupied upwards of an hour. My irresistible impression as I listened was, There is a man of God! Truly a light shining in a dark place; for, as I returned to my lodgings, I found the coffee-houses, ...
— American Scenes, and Christian Slavery - A Recent Tour of Four Thousand Miles in the United States • Ebenezer Davies
... a brilliant and difficult etude of Herz in a masterly style. She had a great deal of strength ...
— A Nobleman's Nest • Ivan Turgenieff
... begun. The crowd is awaiting news. They talk at random, catching at the words which please them, or shaping utterances which express their wishes. Longing for victory, they imagine it won. In masterly fashion, Zweig shows how a vague rumour spreads in the hallucinated mind of the multitude, to attain in an instant a certainty surpassing that of truth. Details pass from mouth to mouth; precise figures of the false ...
— The Forerunners • Romain Rolland
... true; yet Pasta's acting in the opera was a grand performance; and I have myself seldom witnessed a more masterly effect produced by any actor in the world than I did a fortnight ago, at the Opera at Darmstadt, ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield
... [2] "This masterly argument on vitious intromission, after being prefaced and concluded with some sentences of my own," says Mr. Boswell, "and garnished with the usual formularies, was actually printed, and laid before the lords ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume V: Miscellaneous Pieces • Samuel Johnson
... under Domestication," the "Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex," and the "Expression of the Emotions in Men and Animals"—a series to which we may hope other volumes may in due time be added. We would rather, if space permitted, attempt an analysis of the less known, but not less masterly, subsidiary essays, upon the various arrangements for insuring cross-fertilization in flowers, for the climbing of plants, and the like. These, as we have heard, may before long be reprinted in a volume, and supplemented by some long-pending but still unfinished investigations upon the action ...
— Darwiniana - Essays and Reviews Pertaining to Darwinism • Asa Gray
... Dominic (which had already been treated in a masterly manner by Fra Guglielmo, in the "arca" at Bologna, and by Traini in his picture at Pisa), Fra Angelico has, in some scenes, given a fuller development, but with less dramatic sentiment; exactly the good and bad points which are more clearly shown in his other works. ...
— Fra Angelico • J. B. Supino
... must follow from the lack of it? I think that they must begin by acknowledging that the ancient art, the art of unconscious intelligence, as one should call it, which began without a date, at least so long ago as those strange and masterly scratchings on mammoth-bones and the like found but the other day in the drift— that this art of unconscious intelligence is all but dead; that what little of it is left lingers among half-civilised nations, and is growing coarser, feebler, less intelligent year by year; nay, it is mostly ...
— Hopes and Fears for Art • William Morris
... such a style, that, from the first moment of her touching the lute, the caliph perceived she did it with a masterly hand. Afterwards accompanying the lute with her voice, which was admirably fine, she sung and played with so much skill and sweetness, that the caliph was ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... into the daily life of some human being to whom it has been slowly and always painfully introduced. Or, to vary the metaphor, this new controversy is an inoculation performed by one who possesses a masterly acquaintance with the circulatory system of the spiritual anatomy, and is enabled thereby to describe with unerring accuracy the precise effects of the new ideal at every stage of its progress through the soul. You see before you the ...
— Morality as a Religion - An exposition of some first principles • W. R. Washington Sullivan
... shunned by all respectable society! And what a simple person that elderly gentleman was, who, abruptly starting, asked, in rather an authoritative voice, "And why should Lieutenant P . . . be shunned by respectable society?" and who after entering into what was said to be a masterly analysis of the entire evidence of the case, concluded by stating, "that having been accustomed to all kinds of evidence all his life, he had never known a case in which the accused had obtained a more complete and triumphant justification ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... dead, who has a masterly gift of noble and stirring eloquence, finds it in "a certain collocation of consonants." Why it is that a change of a single word, or even of a single syllable, for any other which is an absolute ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar
... This masterly suggestion seemed to Rainham both plausible and practical, and he proceeded to unfold the whole story of his first meeting with Kitty. When he reached the part of his narrative which brought out the girl's explanation that she was seeking to speak with a Mr. Crichton, Lightmark looked ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... perhaps equal the masterly ones of Frederick Schlegel, or those of the less powerful but not less rich mind of Augustus William Schlegel,"—those two wonderful brothers," as a modern litterateur has justly called them. Leigh ...
— The Young Lady's Mentor - A Guide to the Formation of Character. In a Series of Letters to Her Unknown Friends • A Lady
... the story been told with such masterly precision, or with such illuminating reference to the original sources of the time, as in this book.... The perspective and proportion are so perfect that the life of a whole era, analyzed searchingly and profoundly, passes before your eyes as ...
— The Enclosures in England - An Economic Reconstruction • Harriett Bradley
... in this Kind, must not dwell too long upon one Idea; As soon as the masterly Stroke is given, he must immediately pass on to another Idea.... For if, after the masterly Stroke is given, the Author shou'd, in a paraphrastical Manner, still insist upon the same Idea, the Work will immediately flag, the Character grow languid, and ...
— A Critical Essay on Characteristic-Writings - From his translation of The Moral Characters of Theophrastus (1725) • Henry Gally
... manhood in the Northwest, and bred on Webster's doctrine,—"the Union is paramount",—accepted for the second time the Republican nomination and platform, he summed up the issues of the war, as he had done before, in Webster's words. Lincoln, who had grown as masterly in his choice of words as he had become profound in his vision of issues, used in 1864 not the more familiar and rhetorical phrases of the reply to Hayne, but the briefer, more incisive form, "Liberty and Union", ...
— Webster's Seventh of March Speech, and the Secession Movement • Herbert Darling Foster
... poor; and yet he had lived for nearly thirty years as a rich man! What was his secret?—he had lived upon others. At all games of science, he played with a masterly skill; and in those wherein luck preponderates, there are always chances for a cool and systematic calculation. He had been, indeed, suspected of unfair play; but the charge had never cooled the eagerness with which he had been courted. With far better taste, and in far higher ...
— Godolphin, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... soul took precedence of her thoughts, and rushed on her with overwhelming force, like the winds let loose by the storm-god of old. Everything strange or sad in her past career lent its quota of color to the dark picture remorse, with cruel and masterly hand, delineated before her troubled spirit. The struggle, the agony she had learned to brave in the Duomo at Milan and the fortress of Messina, rose again with hydra fangs from the tomb of oblivion in which recent excitements had buried it. None but her guardian angel knew her soul was once ...
— Alvira: the Heroine of Vesuvius • A. J. O'Reilly
... collection of books, which he sold at auction. In 1757, Sam prevented the valuable collection of MSS. once belonging to Sir Julius Caesar from being destroyed; they had actually been sold to a cheesemonger as waste-paper for L10. He rescued the whole collection, and drew up a masterly catalogue of it, and when sold by auction the result was L356. For some years he was librarian to the Earl of Shelburne, afterwards first Marquis of Lansdowne. Sam's great talents at 'cataloguizing' were unrivalled: he ...
— The Book-Hunter in London - Historical and Other Studies of Collectors and Collecting • William Roberts
... and I myself was astounded at his execution. Up to this time I had not paid it the attention it deserved, and it inspired me with the greatest confidence in his future. I frequently had occasion to admire his masterly skill ...
— My Life, Volume II • Richard Wagner
... as well as the most truly representative of the writer's powers, let us try to guess its secret. In the first place, it is very short,—a single episode, succinctly and eloquently told. The descriptions of scenery and persons are masterly and memorable. The characters of these persons, their actions, and the circumstances of their lives, are as rugged, as grotesque, as terrible, and also as beautiful, as the scenery. Thus an artistic harmony is established,—the thing which is lacking in so much ...
— Confessions and Criticisms • Julian Hawthorne
... indifferent to public opinion, drove the grey pony through Dover in a masterly manner; sitting high and stiff like a state coachman, keeping a steady eye upon him wherever he went, and making a point of not letting him have his own way in any respect. When we came into the country road, she permitted him ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... separate closed-in little kitchen, built apart, wherein you may observe European-made saucepans, in addition to the ubiquitous skillet. Outside, all along the clean sandy streets, the inhabitants are seated. The Igalwa is truly great at sitting, the men pursuing a policy of masterly inactivity, broken occasionally by leisurely netting a fishing net, the end of the netting hitched up on to the roof thatch, and not held by a stirrup. The ladies are employed in the manufacture of articles pertaining to a higher culture—I allude, as Mr. Micawber would say, to bed-quilts ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... forgotten the considerable number of "students" who will buy Captain Burton's translation as the only literal one, needing it to help them in what has become necessary to many—a masterly knowledge of Egyptian Arabic. The so-called "Arabian Nights" are about the only written half-way house between the literary Arabic and the colloquial Arabic, both of which they need, and need introductions ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... ice might occur at any time. Some one asked Washington what he would do were Philadelphia to be taken. He answered, 'We will retreat beyond the Susquehanna River, and thence, if necessary, to the Alleghany Mountains.' Doubtless he was even then planning the masterly movements of his forces that presently drove the ...
— Elsie's Vacation and After Events • Martha Finley
... posture. It had the pinkish look of a wax doll, but lacked the doll's roundness of limb and approximation to correctness of form and justness of proportion. Mr. Gandhi explained every thing to us. He was delegate to the Chicago Fair Congress of Religions. It was lucidly done, in masterly English, but in time it faded from me, and now I have nothing left of that episode but an impression: a dim idea of a religious belief clothed in subtle intellectual forms, lofty and clean, barren of fleshly grossnesses; and with this another dim impression which connects that intellectual ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... considered himself more godly, wiser and better than my mother and I, and all his masterly eloquence only proved the contrary to me; and yet I saw that my mother was servile to him and adopted from him what he again had adopted from the large group of his equals and kindred spirits, and that all this took place without their realizing ...
— The Bride of Dreams • Frederik van Eeden
... attempt,—a bit of landscape, with two horses grazing and a man at work in the foreground. Quiet in tone, and half-concealed by the shaded casement, it was only by degrees, and to ward off the ennui of a listless half-hour, that I gradually became absorbed in its examination. There were some masterly lines, clever arrangement, a true feeling, and a peculiar delicacy of treatment, that implied the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, February, 1858 • Various
... exercise its invention after its own fashion, why should it not invent a new literature? Mr George Ade, the Shakespeare of Chicago, has already shown us what can be done with the new speech in his masterly 'Fables in Slang,' to read which is almost as good as a journey to the West; and there is no reason why he should ...
— American Sketches - 1908 • Charles Whibley
... military discipline might seem to be only good in itself, were it not for the fact that the Boers still retain their reputation for being good shots. Even the young men are not behind their fathers in the masterly manipulation of their rifles; in fact, while a large number of Englishmen are reputed to be born with silver spoons in their mouths, the birth-right of every ...
— The Boer in Peace and War • Arthur M. Mann
... writings alone[554], and that he had once an intention of giving an edition of Bacon, at least of his English works, and writing the Life of that great man. Had he executed this intention, there can be no doubt that he would have done it in a most masterly manner. Mallet's Life of Bacon has no inconsiderable merit as an acute and elegant dissertation relative to its subject; but Mallet's mind was not comprehensive enough to embrace the vast extent of Lord Verulam's genius and research. Dr. Warburton therefore observed, with witty justness, 'that ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell
... anywhere distinctly stated it. Chemistry, Biology, and Sociology, leaving Astronomy and Physics aside for the present, are not yet Positive Sciences, in any such sense as Mathematics. The lack of exact analysis is apparent in all of Comte's generalizations, otherwise magnificent and masterly as they undoubtedly are. In respect to the matter under consideration, it renders his Classification unavailing for determining with sufficient precision and exactitude the character of any intellectual domain. History, while ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol IV, Issue VI, December 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... to think how little notice she had taken of young Marvell, who turned out to be so much less negligible than his brilliant friend. She remembered thinking him rather shy, less accustomed to society; and though in his quiet deprecating way he had said one or two droll things he lacked Mr. Popple's masterly manner, his domineering yet caressing address. When Mr. Popple had fixed his black eyes on Undine, and murmured something "artistic" about the colour of her hair, she had thrilled to the depths of her being. Even now ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton
... They felt they were no longer at home as in the time of Camille; it seemed, so to say, that they were stealing every evening they passed seated at the dining-room table. It was in these desperate circumstances that the egotism of Michaud urged him to strike a masterly stroke by finding a husband for the widow ...
— Therese Raquin • Emile Zola
... the talented Spanish orator and statesman, in the fourth of a series of most erudite and interesting articles upon Christopher Columbus, in the Century Magazine for August, 1892, thus masterly refers ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various
... interest here. With those against Rueckert, however, the case is different. It is worth while noting that towards the distinguished scholar-poet Schlegel assumed a patronizing attitude. To Rueckert's masterly renderings from Sanskrit literature he referred slightingly as "Sanskritpoesiemetriknachahmungen" (ii. 235). But when he hailed the younger ...
— The Influence of India and Persia on the Poetry of Germany • Arthur F. J. Remy
... Washington had declared that if necessary he would raise a thousand men at his own expense and march them to Boston, Rodney exclaimed, "He'll do it, too!" When Boston was evacuated he said, "I knew it." When Washington, in the face of all sorts of difficulties, led his scattering forces in masterly retreat before the victorious British, Rodney was to say, "He's doing all that man can do." But this is getting ahead of the story, for young Allison is now on his way to the home of Richard Henry Lee, who later was to propose independence in the Continental Congress, when to ...
— Rodney, the Ranger - With Daniel Morgan on Trail and Battlefield • John V. Lane
... often find, that Persons the most accomplished in Ridicule are those who are very shrewd at hitting a Blot, without exerting any thing masterly in themselves. As there are many eminent Criticks who never writ a good Line, there are many admirable Buffoons that animadvert upon every single Defect in another, without ever discovering the least Beauty of their own. By this Means, these unlucky little Wits often gain Reputation in the Esteem ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... Hee mad confession of you, And gaue you such a Masterly report, For Art and exercise in your defence; And for your Rapier most especiall, That he cryed out, t'would be a sight indeed, If one could match you Sir. This report of his Did Hamlet so envenom with his Enuy, That he could nothing doe but wish ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... the picture of the model bank-clerk. Then he flung down his pen, slid from his stool with a satisfied sigh, and dusted his waistcoat. 'A commercial crisis,' he said, 'has passed. The job of work which Comrade Rossiter indicated for me has been completed with masterly skill. The period of anxiety is over. The bank ceases to totter. Are you busy, Comrade Jackson, or shall ...
— Psmith in the City • P. G. Wodehouse
... his Humour" (1598), in which Shakespeare acted, "The Poetaster" (1601), which vexed Dekker, the tragedy of "Sejanus" (1603), "The Silent Woman" (1609), a farcical comedy, Dryden's favourite play, and his most elaborate and masterly work, "The Alchemist" (1610); he wrote also thirty-five masques of singular richness and grace, in the production of which Inigo Jones provided the mechanism; but his best work was his lyrics, first of which stands "Drink to me only with thine eyes," ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... but men always spoke gently to Maisie. It was her air of trust and helplessness that did it, her tender trick of creating in each man the belief that she relied peculiarly on him for protection—all of which was totally at variance with the masterly efficiency with which she ran both ...
— The Kingdom Round the Corner - A Novel • Coningsby Dawson
... as head-quarters for exploring the neighbouring Vals and their romantic scenery, the works which it possesses of the ancient and famous Val Sesian school of painters and modellers are most interesting. At the head of them stands first and foremost Gaudenzio Ferrari, whose original and masterly productions ought to be far more widely known and studied than they as yet are; and some of the finest of them are to be found in the churches and Sacro Monte ...
— Ex Voto • Samuel Butler
... Walter's effort to make a virtue of his own masterly inactivity, and Miss Cassandra asked him if he had ever applied for a diplomatic mission, as we gaily entered the ...
— In Chteau Land • Anne Hollingsworth Wharton
... turn, Joe Hawkridge demanded to know the gossip of the Revenge. The storm had sobered Blackbeard, it seemed, and he had displayed the skill of a masterly seaman in bringing them safely through. In toiling for their own lives, the men had forgotten their brawls and plots and guzzling. And the great wind had blown the ship clear of Spanish fever. There were no new cases and the invalids were gaining ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... did he write most of it, but the least of what he wrote for it excels the best that was contributed to it by men so able as Jay and Madison. Every attempt that has been made to take from him any portion of the honor of this masterly work has failed, and it is now admitted that it can fairly be associated only with his name. "The total number of these essays," says Mr. John C. Hamilton, "by Hamilton's enumeration, approved by Madison, is seen ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various
... pleasantries, a few anecdotes, a few reminiscences. As well speak of spending an afternoon with Egypt or making an evening call upon Rome. Yet a volume of "In Memoriam" or "The Idylls of the King" enables one to overhear the richest and most masterly thoughts that occupied Tennyson through the best creative years in his career. So striking are the advantages books have over conversation that the brief biography of the Carpenter's Son makes us better acquainted ...
— A Man's Value to Society - Studies in Self Culture and Character • Newell Dwight Hillis
... provision beneath the great glass dome, as to whether it might be, that these English were on another start out of the dust in vigorous commercial enterprise, under leadership of one of their chance masterly minds-merchant, in this instance: and be debated within, whether Genius, occasionally developed in a surprising superior manner by these haphazard English, may not sometimes wrest the prize from Method; albeit we count for the long run, that Method has assurance ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... With a masterly review of these facts in her mind Lady Mallowe went on with a fluent and pleasant talk, through the medium of which she managed to convey a large number of things Miss Alicia was far from being clever enough to realize she was talking about. She lightly waved ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... unused, as though it had never been touched by human hand. At distant intervals in this studied bareness, costly little stools, marvelously inlaid, uphold some antique bronze monster or a vase of flowers; on the walls hang a few masterly sketches, vaguely tinted in Indian ink, drawn upon strips of gray paper most accurately cut but without the slightest attempt at a frame; this is all: not a seat, not a cushion, not a scrap of furniture. ...
— Madame Chrysantheme • Pierre Loti
... influenced by sentiment. It was always interesting to discuss a "case" with him. I do not mean that he discussed his cases with me, but I used to ask him how to deal with some intellectual or moral problem, and his insight seemed to me wonderfully shrewd, sensible, and clear. He had a masterly analysis, and a power of seeing alternatives and contingencies which always aroused my admiration. He was less interested in the personal element than in the psychological; and I used to feel that his strength lay in dealing ...
— Hugh - Memoirs of a Brother • Arthur Christopher Benson
... introduction to the history of the Company of the Staple is to be found in Mr Malden's aforesaid introduction to The Cely Papers, which also contains a masterly account of the political relations of England, France and Burgundy during the period. I have constantly relied upon Mr Malden's account of the working of the Staple system. Other useful short accounts of the wool trade and the Stapler's Company may be found ...
— Medieval People • Eileen Edna Power
... Timmie Lovejoy, the dramatic opportunity having come, would, with proper regard for his own importance, make the astounding revelation. It would be quite thrilling (he thought); moreover, it would be a masterly joke on his father, who took vast delight in ...
— Doctor Luke of the Labrador • Norman Duncan
... diction which the reviewers might very properly take occasion to amend even though such alterations could not be classified by a strict constructionist under either of the two heads "enrichment" and "flexibility." In the masterly Report of the Rev. Dr. T. W. Coit to the Joint Committee appointed by the Convention of 1841 to prepare a Standard Prayer Book,[10] a document of classical rank, there is more than one intimation of the hope that future reviewers would be given a larger liberty in this direction ...
— A Short History of the Book of Common Prayer • William Reed Huntington
... followed on the same side, of which Bekker's, published about a century later, was the most important. It is well reasoned, learned, and tedious to a masterly degree. But though the belief in witchcraft might be shaken, it still had the advantage of being on the whole orthodox and respectable. Wise men, as usual, insisted on regarding superstition as of one substance with faith, and objected to any scouring of the shield of ...
— Among My Books - First Series • James Russell Lowell
... and has the honour to report that in the debate of last night Viscount Palmerston defended the whole Foreign Policy of the Government in a speech of four hours and three quarters.[22] This speech was one of the most masterly ever delivered, going through the details of transactions in the various parts of the world, and appealing from time to time to great principles ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria
... reappearance. He ventured no remark, however. He could not say that the woman in the case was hardly worth troubling over, and, for the life of him, he could think of nothing else in the way of consolation. He discreetly cleared his throat a second time, and maintained a masterly silence. But the garrulous old man at his side needed no encouragement. He quickly resumed his discourse, with a certain unctuous enjoyment, distinctly inconsistent with his ...
— Heart of the Blue Ridge • Waldron Baily
... his palette with masterly care, Each tint on the surface he spread; The blue of her eyes, and the brown of her hair, The pearl and the white of her forehead so fair And her lips' and her cheeks' ...
— Translations of German Poetry in American Magazines 1741-1810 • Edward Ziegler Davis
... passed away most delightfully. Mr. Malderton, relieved from his apprehensions by the circumstance of Mr. Barton's falling into a profound sleep, was as affable and gracious as possible. Miss Teresa played the 'Fall of Paris,' as Mr. Sparkins declared, in a most masterly manner, and both of them, assisted by Mr. Frederick, tried over glees and trios without number; they having made the pleasing discovery that their voices harmonised beautifully. To be sure, they ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... Edward's ears, and chafed at the little heed paid by the pious Henry to his great work, stalked on, his head in the air. "Verily," mused the student, "King Edward may have been a cruel youth, and over hasty; it is horrible to think of Robert Hilyard's calamities! But men do say he hath an acute and masterly comprehension. Doubtless, he will perceive at a glance how much I can advantage his kingdom." With this, we grieve to say, selfish reflection—which, if the thought of his model could have slept ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... that Sir Philip Francis was not equal to the composition of those masterly letters; and it must be acknowledged that, though he made some very powerful and pointed speeches in the House of Commons, they wanted the penetration and the polish of Junius. But there are several letters by Sir Philip Francis in these volumes, which, though evidently ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 350, December 1844 • Various
... containing no ladies. Charlotte Cushman appeared as Meg Merrilies, Parodi and Dempster sang in concerts, Burton and Brougham convulsed their hearers with laughter, Booth gave evidence of the undiminished glow of his fiery genius by his masterly delineation of the "wayward and techy" Gloster, and Forrest ranted in Metamora, to the delight of his admirers. Colonel John W. Forney told a good story about a visit which he paid with Forrest to Henry Clay soon after the passage of the compromise measure. The Colonal unguardedly ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... known to be progressive, liberal and fair. In the early days of Reconstruction, the Democratic party in the State was sharply divided into two factions. One, the major faction, adopted what they termed a policy of "masterly inactivity," which meant that the white Democrats should take no part in the organization of a State government under the Reconstruction Acts of Congress, with a view of making the work of Reconstruction as odious, as objectionable and as ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 • Various
... Carl, having consolidated all the resources of Western Europe under his autocratic will, having crushed the Saracens and subdued the Saxons and Bavarians, resolved to make the Danube as well as the Rhine his own. The idea was stamped with genius, as all his ideas were, and the execution was masterly. The Frankish leudes, with their Saxon and Bavarian auxiliaries, routed the Avars in battle after battle, and drove them back beyond the Raab and the Theiss. The "eastern marches" became, and have remained to this day, the bulwark of Christendom. Carl's successors in Germany, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XVII. No. 101. May, 1876. • Various
... but through the influence of the investor's interests; while this, the form of the investment, will again 'determine' the proportion of the whole capital which shall be paid as wages to laborers."(166) In this excellent and masterly conception, the doctrine of a wages-fund is not open to the objections usually urged against it. Indeed, with the exception of Professor Fawcett, scarcely any economist believes in an absolutely fixed wages-fund. In this sense, then, and in ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • John Stuart Mill
... would unseat the end of the plank, but it was too far below him and then again he would be exposed to their volleys of stones, and if he was hurt he might not get back on his craft. Tod, who had resigned command in favor of his henchman after Archie's masterly defence in the last fight, stood behind him. Thermopylae was a narrow place, and so was the famous Bridge of Horatius. He and his faithful Tod would now make the fight of their lives. Both of these close shaves for immortality were closed books to Tod, but Archie knew every line of their records, ...
— The Tides of Barnegat • F. Hopkinson Smith
... his horses, now fatherly, now masterly, now with a professorial sarcasm: "Come on, Monkey, there's a good girl! Get out of that, you Fox! Dern you! You call that pulling? It's my notion of layin' off for the day." Even at its most urgent, his voice was soft, hushed by the great loneliness of this canon up which ...
— Hidden Creek • Katharine Newlin Burt
... said, to the energy and sagacity of the young district attorney. A murder had been so cunningly done that suspicion could fasten nowhere, until Byington laid his finger upon a man of so unspotted a name that no one else had had the mental courage to point to him. Through a long and masterly untangling of contradictions the state's counsel had so overwhelmingly proved him guilty that he had confessed without waiting for ...
— Bylow Hill • George Washington Cable
... state to maintain operations in the western Caribbean with a United States fleet based upon Puerto Rico and the adjacent islands. The same reasons prompted Bonaparte to seize Malta in his expedition against Egypt and India in 1798. In his masterly eyes, as in those of Nelson, it was essential to the communications between France, Egypt, and India. His scheme failed, not because Malta was less than invaluable, but for want of adequate naval strength, without which no ...
— Lessons of the war with Spain and other articles • Alfred T. Mahan
... of Americanists held last July at Nancy, France, M. Leon de Rosny delivered a masterly address on the Maya hieroglyphics. He critically analyzed the attempts at decypherment by Brasseur de Bourbourg and H. de Charency. The Bishop de Landa first discovered a clue to their meaning. He made out ...
— The Mayas, the Sources of Their History / Dr. Le Plongeon in Yucatan, His Account of Discoveries • Stephen Salisbury, Jr.
... homilies On the Epistle to the Ephesians (t. 11) were preached at Antioch; and though some passages might have received a higher polish from a second touch of the saint's masterly file, are a most useful and excellent work. From Hom. 3, p. 16, it {271} is clear that his predecessor Nectarius had not abolished canonical public penances, when he removed the public penitentiary; but that this ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... the Elder played a masterly game of croquet with Eldora, beating her with ease; then he wandered out to the barn and talked horses with the hired man, and finished by stripping off his coat and putting on one of Mrs. Buttles's aprons to ...
— Other Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... prophetic note in the line of her future expression; for it gave a graphic illustration of the art of teaching geography, to the consideration of which she had been led by Miss Crocker's logical, suggestive, and masterly presentation of the subject in the school course. Her ability and steadiness of working power, as well as singleness of aim, attracted the attention of Horace Mann, who was about forming the nucleus of Antioch College; and he succeeded in gaining her as ...
— The Seven Little Sisters Who Live on the Round Ball - That Floats in the Air • Jane Andrews
... interesting, but a really bad flaw in a subject cannot be treated out. Happily the man who has sense enough to treat a subject well will generally have sense enough to choose a good one, so that the case of a really repulsive subject treated in a masterly manner does not often arise. It is often said to have arisen, but in nine cases out of ten the treatment will be ...
— The Note-Books of Samuel Butler • Samuel Butler
... left at the post in a steeplechase. Old Mat didn't follow the race. Instead he watched the struggle between the lad and the young horse he was riding. Monkey gave a masterly exhibition of patience and tact; and Mat, then in his prime and always on the look-out for riding talent, watched it with grunts of pleasure. Monkey won the battle and went sailing after the field he could not hope to catch, cantering in long ...
— Boy Woodburn - A Story of the Sussex Downs • Alfred Ollivant
... dramatic expression. Lamartine elaborates a "History of the Restoration" from two reports,—the one monarchical, the other republican,—and, by making the facts picturesque and sentimental, wins countless readers. Comte elaborates a masterly analysis of the sciences, proclaims a fascinating theory of eras or stages in human development; but the positive philosophy, of which all this is but the introduction, to be applied to the individual ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... with his enchanted bow from those submissive strings, Guy leaned back on the sofa and listened, entranced, with a hopeless feeling of utter inability ever to approach the wizard-like and supreme execution of that masterly hand and those superhuman fingers. How he twisted and turned them as though his bones were india-rubber. His palms were all joints, and his eyes all ecstasy. He seemed able to do what he liked with his violin. He played on his instrument, indeed, as he played on Guy—with ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... hasty remarks without expressing a wish that one of your correspondents in particular would take up this subject, to handle which in a masterly manner, his position is a guaranty of his ability. I refer to the gentleman holding the office of ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 210, November 5, 1853 • Various
... an instant, his strong wrist mastered it. His companion and he had seen Michael's rapid stroke. "Bravo!" cried Alcide; "for a simple merchant, Mr. Korpanoff, you handle the hunter's knife in a most masterly fashion." ...
— Michael Strogoff - or, The Courier of the Czar • Jules Verne
... revealed a portrait by Raphael,—the portrait of a lady, young and beautiful, and glowing with a tender sentiment which recalled to my remembrance these heads by Allston, not alone in the sentiment, but in the masterly beauty of the painting. M. Kestner told us he supposed the picture to be a portrait of that niece of Cardinal Bibbiena to whom Raphael was betrothed. The picture had come into his possession by one of those wonderful chances which have preserved so many valuable works from destruction. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... joyousness of temper, and confidence in the future. The battle immediately commenced on the question of the authority of the papacy, which, at once intelligible and important, riveted universal attention." Eck, with great erudition and masterly logic, supported the claim of the pope, from the decrees of councils, the opinions of scholastics, and even from those celebrated words of Christ to Peter—"Thou art Peter, and on this rock will I build my church," &c. Luther took higher and bolder ground, denied the infallibility of ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... not only the characteristics necessary to make a living; but secondary ones, often of a purely aesthetic nature, which make much of what we call beauty. Between the two, all who live must be up to a certain grade, and those who become parents must be above it; a masterly ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... Japanese scenery and manners. Though rude, they are very characteristic, and often exhibit touches of great humour. He also possesses a large collection of coloured sketches of the plants of Japan, made by a Japanese lady, which are the most masterly things I have ever seen. Every stem, twig, and leaf is produced by single touches of the brush, the character and perspective of very complicated plants being admirably given, and the articulations of stem and leaves shown in a ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume I. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... all his stories. Dryden, Keats, and Tennyson have also been inspired by Boccaccio; while Lessing has made the Italian story-teller's allegory of "The Three Rings" the jeweled point on which turns his masterly play. "Nathan the Wise" (see Vol. XVII). Boccaccio, after filling many high posts at Florence, retired to Certaldo, where he ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol. I • Various
... the privilege of idling through this ancient quarter of New Orleans with the South's finest literary genius, the author of 'the Grandissimes.' In him the South has found a masterly delineator of its interior life and its history. In truth, I find by experience, that the untrained eye and vacant mind can inspect it, and learn of it, and judge of it, more clearly and profitably in his books than by personal ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... was terrible: in a masterly way he summed up the charges and the proof, as a general marshals his forces for battle, and the crowd, so clear were his words and so strong his statements, could see them all marching in unison, like the battalions and ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... fought well in the face of heavy odds; and that their officers had striven by every effort of manhood to hold them to their duty. General Garnett had exposed himself constantly, and was killed by a sharp-shooter at Carrock's Ford—over which he had brought the remnant of his army by a masterly retreat—while holding the stream at the head of a small squad. Pegram fought with gallantry and determination. He felt the position untenable and had remonstrated against holding it; yet the admirable disposition of his few troops, ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... Body of Christ,' is too theological for detailed discussion in these pages. The points in which the Roman Church has perverted and degraded the really Catholic sacramental doctrine are forcibly exposed, and the true nature of the sacrament is unfolded in a masterly and beautiful manner. ...
— Outspoken Essays • William Ralph Inge
... at furthest, a hair ribbon more or less matters very little. Moreover, it suddenly flashed upon Margery that here was a chance to make those few remaining hours more golden and at the same time gratify her soul with a trial at that masterly downward stroke of the flat hand. So before Eddie Grote had time to close his astonished mouth, she filled it with a mighty splash of water. Then, while Eddie choked and spluttered, too surprised to defend ...
— The Hickory Limb • Parker Fillmore
... d'Archeologie et d'Histoire of the Ecole Francaise de Rome for December 1895, but of the existence of which I had never heard until Father Ehrle shewed it to me. On reading it, I found that M. Fabre had completely anticipated me; he had done exactly what I had come to Rome to do, and in such a masterly fashion that I could not hope to improve upon his work. After some consideration I determined to verify his conclusions by carefully examining the locality, and to make a fresh ground-plan of it ...
— The Care of Books • John Willis Clark
... feet in height. The pavement is of white marble slightly veined with blue. The entire hall is bordered with a scroll of Sienna or yellow, centred with rosettes of puce-coloured marble, inlaid in the most masterly style of workmanship. The walls are of Scagliola, and the ceiling is supported by a succession of white marble pillars. From the hall are the avenues leading to the state apartments—drawing-rooms, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 13, No. 355., Saturday, February 7, 1829 • Various
... an unpleasant word to say, ladies," he said, at last, still controlling his feelings with a masterly effort. Then offerings a hand to the mother, he bowed respectfully and said "Good-by;" and to her, who now turned with evident feeling evinced in her lovely face at the idea of a long parting, he offered ...
— The Sea-Witch - or, The African Quadroon A Story of the Slave Coast • Maturin Murray
... is exceedingly interesting to the foreign student for its sidelights on folklore and family life; to the native scholar, who professes to smile at the subject-matter as beyond the pale of genuine literature, it is simply invaluable as an expression of the most masterly style of which ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various
... to regret even the calamitous times of his predecessor. John was distinguished by many virtues, particularly a scrupulous honor and fidelity: he was not deficient in personal courage: but as he wanted that masterly prudence and foresight, which his difficult situation required his kingdom was at the same time disturbed by intestine commotions, and oppressed ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume
... suggests that, if Clifford had not been so long in prison, his aesthetic zeal "might have eaten out or filed away his affections." This was what befell Harold Skimpole—himself "in prisons often"—at Coavinses! The Judge Pyncheon of the tale is also a masterly study of swaggering black-hearted respectability, and then, in addition to all the poetry of his style, and the charm of his haunted air, Hawthorne favours us with a brave conclusion of the good sort, the old sort. They come into money, they marry, they ...
— Adventures among Books • Andrew Lang
... profess to have been always satisfied with his conduct of the war, deeming it prompt, energetic, vigorous, masterly. I did not, and could not, so regard it. I believed then—I believe this hour,—that a Napoleon I., a Jackson, would have crushed secession out in a single short campaign—almost in a single victory. I believed that an advance to Richmond 100,000 strong might have been made by the end of June, ...
— Our American Holidays: Lincoln's Birthday • Various
... successively by the most experienced and distinguished generals of Europe,—the Duke of Alva, Don John of Austria (the conqueror of the Moors and the hero of the great naval fight of Lepanto), and the Duke of Parma; but the Prince of Orange coped ably with them all, and in the masterly service which he rendered his country, thus terribly assaulted, earned the title of ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers
... in, such inquiries. In the very heat of the controversy, Johnson was never accused of intentional deception. Dr. Douglas, in the year 1750, published a letter to the earl of Bath, entitled, Milton vindicated from the charge of plagiarism brought against him by Mr. Lauder. In this masterly letter, after exposing the gross impositions and forgeries of Lauder, he thus adverts to the author of the preface and postscript. "It is to be hoped, nay, it is expected, that the elegant and nervous writer, whose judicious sentiments, and inimitable ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume V: Miscellaneous Pieces • Samuel Johnson
... bargain was nothing short of masterly. The stranger—a fishmonger's runner—turned as he met us and trotted alongside, shaping his hands like a trumpet and bawling down his price. Marc'antonio, affecting a slight deafness, signalled to him ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine |
