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Modesty   /mˈɑdəsti/   Listen
Modesty

noun
1.
Freedom from vanity or conceit.  Synonym: modestness.
2.
Formality and propriety of manner.  Synonym: reserve.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Modesty" Quotes from Famous Books



... the same likewise, if we sought for them in any other of our Authors besides our British HOMER, Shakespeare. This Description of the Condition of Conspirators has a Pomp and Terror in it, that perfectly astonishes. Our excellent Mr. Addison, whose Modesty made him sometimes diffident in his own Genius, but whose exquisite Judgment always led him to the safest Guides, as we may see by those many fine Strokes in his Cato borrow'd from the Philippics of Cicero, has paraphrased this fine Description; but we are no longer to expect those terrible ...
— Preface to the Works of Shakespeare (1734) • Lewis Theobald

... line, a lady with him, and came to him. Clyde, too, was flushed with the strangeness of it all, and the joyous certainty that now for an evening, if only that, Nellie Lake was with him. The colonel looked at her and looked again, and she dropped her eyes in a pretty, serious modesty. ...
— Country Neighbors • Alice Brown

... of shyness and modesty suddenly fell around Faith. Even her head drooped. But Mr. Linden's lips touched the fair brow between those ...
— Say and Seal, Volume II • Susan Warner

... she had replied to the first questions with graceful modesty, fixing her wickedly guileless eyes upon the officials seated behind the presidential table, and on those other men in blue uniform, charged with accusing her or reading the documents of ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... this time, remarkable if becoming. It was all white, and cut wedge-shaped in front, very deep; but an undervest of crimson crossed the V in the midst and saved her modesty, and his. Her hair, which was long, was plaited in two plaits with seed-pearls, brought round her neck like a scarf and the two ends joined between her breasts, thus defining a great beauty of ...
— The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay • Maurice Hewlett

... painter's prerogative to warn even—love from that holy of holies. I often wonder what was behind the curtain. I realized from that moment that if you want to see a great artist's best work, you must override his modesty and secretiveness—and tear the screen ...
— Janet of the Dunes • Harriet T. Comstock

... the Government of the United States should make to Captain Ericsson "such suitable return for his services as will evince the gratitude of a great nation." Upon hearing this suggestion, Ericsson, with characteristic modesty, remarked,—"All the remuneration I desire for the Monitor I get out of the construction of it. It is all-sufficient." Nevertheless we think the suggestion well worthy of consideration. In the same spirit of manly independence, he discountenanced the movement set on foot among the merchants ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... instances of this kind, without producing the impression on the reader's mind that Charles was forward and captious in his inquiries. Certainly Mr. Upton had his own thoughts about him, but he never thought his manner inconsistent with modesty and respect ...
— Loss and Gain - The Story of a Convert • John Henry Newman

... the honest perseverance might have been; but the worst faults of boyhood have something exciting and even romantic about them—they would not be so alluring if they had not—while the homely virtues of honesty, frankness, modesty, and self-restraint appear too often as a dull and priggish abstention from the more daring and adventurous joys of eager living. If evil were always ugly and goodness were always beautiful at first sight, there ...
— Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories - Reprinted from The Hill of Trouble and The Isles of Sunset • Arthur Christopher Benson

... disease! Miserable, who has not at home where to be by himself Misfortunes that only hurt us by being known Mix railing, indiscretion, and fury in his disputations Moderation is a virtue that gives more work than suffering Modesty is a foolish virtue in an indigent person (Homer) More ado to interpret interpretations More books upon books than upon any other subject More brave men been lost in occasions of little moment More solicitous that men speak of us, than ...
— Quotes and Images From The Works of Michel De Montaigne • Michel De Montaigne

... modesty than they like to admit. She was stunned by my cold-blooded catalog of her body just long enough for me to make a quick lunge across her lap to the door ...
— Highways in Hiding • George Oliver Smith

... her person; her brilliancy was limited to her eyes, which commanded love. She claimed universal admiration." In regard to her character, all are unanimous. De Retz, who knew her well, speaks of her in these terms: "Madame de Montbazon was a very great beauty. Modesty was wanting in her air. Her jargon might, during a dull hour, have supplied the defects of her mind. She showed but little faith in gallantry, none in business. She loved her own pleasure alone, and ...
— Political Women (Vol. 1 of 2) • Sutherland Menzies

... intensest and possibly least appealing form it is exhibited by people who become awkwardly embarrassed in the presence of a stranger, however fluent and vivacious they may be with their friends. This type at its best may be described by the epithet of self-sufficient modesty. To be such a person may be said to be an achievement rather than a weakness. To be self-sufficient and modest at the same time means that one is going about one's business, that one is too absorbed in one's work to be continually and anxiously noting what sort of figure one ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman

... natives usually met with by the navigators had little idea of decency or modesty, the same was not true of the New Zealanders, and Cook gives a curious example of this fact. Although not so clean as the natives of Tahiti, whose climate is much warmer, and although they bathed less often, they took a pride in their persons, and showed a certain coquetry. For instance, ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne

... seemed to him that Gilbert was even more ideally fitted. The Club was founded by Dr. Johnson, the home of the best talk in the land, where Garrick and Goldsmith were at times shouted down by the great Lexicographer—a sign, said Chesterton, of his modesty and his essential democracy: Johnson was too democratic to reign as king of his company: he preferred to contend with them as an equal. The old formula still in use had informed my father "you have had the honour to be elected," but Wilfrid Ward felt ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward

... doublet by the grain; The monk beneath the hood can spy; Master from man can ascertain; I know the nun's veiled modesty; I know when sportsmen fables ply; Know fools who creams and dainties stow; Wine from the butt I certify; All things ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various

... let me believe that it is your modesty then. Jasper may be a fine boy, but he will do well if he grows up as ...
— Frank and Fearless - or The Fortunes of Jasper Kent • Horatio Alger Jr.

... dangerous; she related to her the insincerity, the faithlessness, and want of candour in men, and the domestic misfortunes that flow from engagements with them; on the other hand she made her sensible, what tranquillity attends the life of a virtuous woman, and what lustre modesty gives to a person who possesses birth and beauty; at the same time she informed her, how difficult it was to preserve this virtue, except by an extreme distrust of one's self, and by a constant attachment to the only thing which constitutes a woman's happiness, to love and ...
— The Princess of Cleves • Madame de La Fayette

... we had a glimpse of cells where fouler deeds were being done than modesty permits to mention, and which caused my companion to snatch me away in anger from this fatuous court into the princess' treasury (for we went where we list notwithstanding doors and locks). There we saw myriads ...
— The Visions of the Sleeping Bard • Ellis Wynne

... much, from him shall much be required. Now dare we say that the moral and religious standard of our people has risen as its economic prosperity has risen? The observance of Sunday rest, the Sunday mass, the reverence for marriage, the restraints of modesty—what ...
— The New York Times Current History: the European War, February, 1915 • Various

... uncle Toby, sighing again, "the story of the ensign and his wife, with a circumstance his modesty omitted; and particularly well that he, as well as she, upon some account or other (I forget what), was universally pitied by the whole regiment; but finish the story thou art upon." "Tis finished already," said the corporal, "for ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller

... an uncertain gesture, in which pride mingled with modesty; then, growing bolder, he smiled and said, "I knew her, the old sneak. Certainly, she'll spend the rest of her life looking in every ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse

... tells, with all due modesty, of his early days at Kelso—the respectable friends by whom he was surrounded—his acquiring the reputation of a clever youth, and running nigh being a good deal spoilt in consequence. At nineteen, he went to London, to enter the counting-house of a mercantile uncle, and during two years spent ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 441 - Volume 17, New Series, June 12, 1852 • Various

... and crafty modesty of her sex, Julia evaded this very pleasant shaft by saying: "How much you know, August! How do ...
— The End Of The World - A Love Story • Edward Eggleston

... this volume, is the history of his nation as written out by one of them who had already reached adult years, at the epoch of the first arrival of the Spaniards, in 1524. Unfortunately, his simple-hearted modesty led him to make few personal allusions, and we can glean little information about his own history. The writer first names himself, in the year 1582, where he speaks of "me, Francisco Ernantez Arana."[57-1] The ...
— The Annals of the Cakchiquels • Daniel G. Brinton

... we heard of Sir Philip Sidney's immortal act of chivalry as he lay on the field at Zutphen! But definite information has it otherwise. To learn of the prodigious industry of the youthful Mill, the perseverance of Darwin, the heroic struggle of Scott, the gentleness of Stevenson, the modesty of Browning, the lifelong consecration of Motley,—is not the leaven of inspiration made ...
— Stories of Authors, British and American • Edwin Watts Chubb

... the most impudent man of his time; so was CAESAR; so was LUTHER. Even now, when half the human race has grown impudent, we cannot but wonder at the impudence of that obscure monk. GALILEO, too, was a very impudent fellow until the well-bred 'Rev. and dear Sirs' of his time taught him modesty. And CROMWELL! what an Arch-Impudence was he! And NAPOLEON! he put Impudence itself to the blush. And have there been no Impudences among us? It cannot be denied that our Fourth-of-July-men made a very impudent declaration, to say the least of it. ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, May 1844 - Volume 23, Number 5 • Various

... people; the vulgar truth is that he enjoyed "treating" them. This was not because he was what is called purse-proud; handling money in public was on the contrary positively disagreeable to him; he had a sort of personal modesty about it, akin to what he would have felt about making a toilet before spectators. But just as it was a gratification to him to be handsomely dressed, just so it was a private satisfaction to him (he ...
— The American • Henry James

... Where Beethoven felt contempt for even the praise of those he knew were not great enough to understand him, MacDowell was merely uncomfortable; both because he hated insincere attentions and because his modesty would seldom allow him to believe that he deserved even honest congratulations.[Note: When in London in 1903, MacDowell was asked to give some recitals from his compositions, after the Philharmonic performance of his D minor Piano Concerto, but on seeing ...
— Edward MacDowell • John F. Porte

... to be a dash of vanity in the latter part of this remark, which surprised March not a little; for it seemed to him quite inconsistent with the stout hunter's wonted modesty of demeanour and speech. ...
— The Wild Man of the West - A Tale of the Rocky Mountains • R.M. Ballantyne

... to the parliament, giving an account of his successes in the war, he generally concludes with some expression of this strained evangelical modesty, and seems very much afraid lest Speaker Lenthall and other honourable members should attribute the victories he announces, in any measure to the army and the general who won them. He might be very sure, however, that, notwithstanding ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847 • Various

... was one of maidenly modesty; if Aunt Gouverneur had planned to bring the two people together at her table, Phillida wished it known that she was not a party to the plot. But Millard ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston

... into his arms ladies of high position but with an unconfessable past, anxious for novelties although exceedingly mature. This middle class woman who would advance so confidently toward him and then retreat with such capricious outbursts of modesty, was a new ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... step toward her and observed her more attentively. She did not lower her eyes at first. But she blushed. And never had he seen so pathetic a face, marked with such modesty and such dignity. He said to her, as on that first evening ...
— The Confessions of Arsene Lupin • Maurice Leblanc

... perils whose extent had been concealed from her. And, moreover, is it necessary for a girl to be any the less under the watchful eye of her mother, because she is mistress of her own actions? Are we to count as nothing the modesty and the fears which nature has made so powerful in the soul of a young girl, for the very purpose of preserving her from the misfortune of submitting to a man who does not love her? Again, what girl is there so thoughtless as not to discern, that ...
— The Physiology of Marriage, Part I. • Honore de Balzac

... address of Rev. HENRY WARD BEECHER was as follows: Ladies and Gentlemen:—It is but a little while ago that the question whether a woman might, with modesty and propriety, appear upon the public platform to speak her sentiments upon moral and philanthropic questions, agitated the whole community. Although I do not regard myself as excessively conservative, I remember very well when the appointment of women, by the Anti-Slavery Society of New ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... and Caunus may have originated in the disgust which the natives felt for their conquerors, and as a covert reproach to them for sanctioning alliances of so incestuous a nature. While Ovid enters into details in the story, which trench on the rules of modesty and decorum, the moral of the tale, aided by some of his precepts, is not uninstructive as a warning to youth to learn betimes how to regulate ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Copious Notes - and Explanations • Publius Ovidius Naso

... Maria said again. There was an odd inflection in her voice which her father did not understand. Her cheeks burned hot against his, but it was not due to the modesty of young girlhood, which flees even that which it secretly desires. Maria was reflecting upon her horrible deception, how every day and every minute of her life she was deceiving her father, but she dared not tell him. She ...
— By the Light of the Soul - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... fiftieth, if reached, is a period of extreme senility. Pure in race, ancient in history, and carefully studied, this race deserves some further attention here than can be extended to others with which I have to deal. The moral side of the Mincopies seems to be highly developed; the modesty of the young girls is most strict; ...
— A Philological Essay Concerning the Pygmies of the Ancients • Edward Tyson

... and the proud sense of freedom of the poet of Suessa—lies the reason why the refined Venusian, who in the Alexandrian age of Roman poetry revived the Lucilian satire, in spite of all his superiority in formal skill with true modesty yields to the earlier poet as "his better." The language is that of a man of thorough culture, Greek and Latin, who freely indulges his humour; a poet like Lucilius, who is alleged to have made two hundred hexameters before dinner and as many after it, is in far too great a hurry ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen

... head to foot, inclusive. The young person wore an ordinary wimple, but her gown was trimmed with fur, which was, in those days, almost a sign of superior rank or wealth. But what most struck Catherine was the candour and modesty of the face. She felt sure of sympathy from so good a countenance, and began ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade

... indispositions by which you are attacked, and which thus makes you share with the least of your ecclesiastics the task of administering the sacraments in places most remote from the principal settlements. I shall add nothing to this statement, which is entirely sincere, for fear of wounding your natural modesty, etc...." The prince himself is no less flattering: "My Lord Bishop of Petraea," writes Louis the Great, "I expected no less of your zeal for the exaltation of the faith, and of your affection for the furtherance of my service than the conduct ...
— The Makers of Canada: Bishop Laval • A. Leblond de Brumath

... this subject Cato delivered a speech in which he made out that the law ought to prevail, and finally he added these words: "Let the women, then, be adorned not with gold nor precious stones nor with any bright and transparent clothing, but with modesty, with love of husband, love of children, persuasion, moderation, with the established laws, with our arms, our victories, our trophies."—Lucius Valerius, a tribune, spoke in opposition to Cato, urging that the privilege of the old-time ornament be restored to the ...
— Dio's Rome, Volume 1 (of 6) • Cassius Dio

... that on the occasion of the capture of Huningen he thus characterized a certain M. de Montjoie, who was now serving in the Bavarian army after taking a German name, which I have forgotten. The Emperor added, however: "At least, he has had the modesty not to keep his French name." In general easy to conciliate on nearly all points, the Emperor was pitiless towards all those who bore arms against their country; and innumerable times I have heard him say that there was no greater crime ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant

... Modesty, in people of moderate ability, is merely honesty, but in people of great talent it is hypocrisy. Hence it is just as becoming in the latter to openly admit the regard they have for themselves, and not to conceal the fact that they are ...
— Essays of Schopenhauer • Arthur Schopenhauer

... told me was flowered beautiful with colours very lively. I thought they were. As to the rest of her toilet, I am at a loss for words. The overskirt was lute-string silk, I was told. The hoops were vast; the dress cut square, with a "modesty-fence" of stiff lace. A huge high cap "with wings is the last thing," cried the lady, turning round to be seen, and well pleased at my admiration. She was an immense and an amazing figure. I did wonder, ...
— Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker • S. Weir Mitchell

... like experience to make a man able to see every side," said the reformed one, with becoming modesty. ...
— The Black Creek Stopping-House • Nellie McClung

... less trouble about classification, if the system-mongers would consent to admit at the outset that no infallible system is possible, and would endeavor, amid all their other learning, to learn a little of the saving grace of modesty. A writer upon this subject has well observed that there is no man who can work out a scheme of classification that will satisfy permanently even himself. Much less should he expect that others, all having their favorite ideas ...
— A Book for All Readers • Ainsworth Rand Spofford

... leaving the house Zangwill remarked in a musing tone, "What fine humility, or rather modesty. I can't imagine any other man of Howells' eminence taking ...
— A Daughter of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland

... ask him what this wreck amounted to, that she should for the moment sink to nothing in comparison with it. But, at this instant, a small group of men and women joined them, and, catching sight of the faces of Sarah Ann Nanjulian and Modesty Prowse, her friends, she ...
— I Saw Three Ships and Other Winter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... allowing the two women that lived in her to be confounded with each other, in continuing to be, with Mademoiselle de Varandeuil, the virtuous, respectable girl she had been, in emerging from her orgies without carrying away the taste of them, in displaying, when she left her lover, a sort of old-maidish modesty, shocked by the scandalous courses of other maids. She never uttered a word or bore herself in a way to arouse a suspicion of her clandestine life; nothing about her conveyed a hint as to the way her nights were passed. When she placed her foot upon the door-mat outside Mademoiselle de Varandeuil's ...
— Germinie Lacerteux • Edmond and Jules de Goncourt

... yourself, Valerie!" he cried. "I found our family there; the most noble, the most gigantic persons in the world! Thy cousin Jambon, it is a giant, eight feet high, at the least. He denies it, he is the soul of modesty, but I have eyes, and I see. This man has the soul greater than his vast body; we have discussed life, death, in short, the Infinite, we three, Jambon and Jacques and I. He has a father—both have fathers! it is the course of nature. The father of D'Arthenay here is a prince, a diamond ...
— Rosin the Beau • Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards

... think otherwise. And as with regard to the subject of which I am writing, it may be said that "egotism is true modesty," I shall venture to say why I think so, even at the risk of wearying by a twice-told tale, for I shall have to go over well-worn ground, and I must of necessity tread more or less in the footprints of others. The reasons which satisfy me have ...
— The Contemporary Review, January 1883 - Vol 43, No. 1 • Various

... from being the author of sin, has been found hitherto to exceed all the power of philosophy. Happy, if she be thence sensible of her temerity, when she pries into these sublime mysteries; and leaving a scene so full of obscurities and perplexities, return, with suitable modesty, to her true and proper province, the examination of common life; where she will find difficulties enough to employ her enquiries, without launching into so boundless an ocean of doubt, uncertainty, ...
— An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding • David Hume et al

... a little at the thought of the women she had won him from. He talked to her now freely and openly, though always with that unassuming modesty which was so attractive. She knew what he had already had to combat. What a life of self-pleasing and gay-living lay open to him if he chose to take it. She knew that, if he chose it, though he might still win ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page

... my remarks are correct, I have no doubt they will show you the necessity of being silent, and to attend with activity, perseverance, and modesty, to the interests of ...
— Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made • James D. McCabe, Jr.

... Forces first laid Siege to that Town, the Priests, who were apprehensive of it, having been long since made sensible of the profound Regard to Chastity and Modesty of us Hereticks, by the ignominious Behaviour of certain Officers at Rota and Porta St. Maria, the Priests, I say, had taken care to send away privately all the Nuns to Majorca. But that the Heretick Invaders might have no Jealousy of it, the ...
— Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton • Daniel Defoe

... with growing wonder. "Why this sudden modesty?" he said with a smile. "I thought you prided yourself on your share in the ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton

... His calm, pure brow, the shape of his placid, but expressive face, his simple manners,—all revealed in him a laborious and resigned existence, that lofty personal dignity which is imposing to others, and the secret nobility of heart which can meet all events. His modesty inspired a sort of respect in those who knew him. Solitary in the midst of Paris, he knew the social world only by glimpses during the brief moments which he spent in his patron's ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac

... an extraordinary figure; we must study him, as well as his books. Fortunately we have his life story in his own words, written with the same lovable modesty and sincerity that marked all his work. Reading that story now, in Grace Abounding, we see two great influences at work in his life. One, from within, was his own vivid imagination, which saw visions, allegories, parables, revelations, ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long

... prelates of the older Church were eulogizing debauched princes like Louis XV, and using the unspeakably obscene casuistry of the Jesuit Sanchez in the education of the priesthood as to the relations of men to women, the modesty of the Church authorities was so shocked by Linnaeus's proofs of a sexual system in plants that for many years his writings were prohibited in the Papal States and in various other parts of Europe where ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White

... wicked plot against the peace, nay, as I infer from that club, against the very life, of an innocent creature? Behold what I suffer, and how unjustly!—I, of all animals, whose life,—the sad state I am now in constrains me against modesty to say it,—whose life is notoriously a pattern of all the virtues;—I, too, ungrateful biped, who have watched your flock through so many sleepless nights, lest some ill-disposed dog might do harm to the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, Issue 67, May, 1863 • Various

... a letter from [Huxley] with such tremendous praise of my book, that modesty (as I am trying to cultivate that difficult herb) prevents me sending it to you, which I should have liked to have done, as he is ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume II • Francis Darwin

... the joy and pride of her mother's heart, was her daughter Hannah. Well might she be proud of her! At sixteen, Hannah Wilson was, beyond a doubt, the prettiest girl in the village, and the best. Her chief characteristic was modesty. Her mind was like her person: modest, graceful, ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VI. • Various

... it has in him. But official red tape, and his early misfortune... prevent the giving of any higher official standing to even such a genius. Born and bred to such conditions, Muller understands them, and his natural modesty of disposition asks for no outward honours, asks for nothing but an income sufficient for his simple needs, and for aid and opportunity to occupy himself in the way he ...
— The Case of The Pocket Diary Found in the Snow • Grace Isabel Colbron and Augusta Groner

... retire. He refused to trust the faith of the Romans, unless Aetius and Jason, the sons of two great officers of state, were sent as hostages to his camp; but he offered to deliver, in exchange, several of the noblest youths of the Gothic nation. The modesty of Alaric was interpreted, by the ministers of Ravenna, as a sure evidence of his weakness and fear. They disdained either to negotiate a treaty or to assemble an army; and with a rash confidence, derived only from ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various

... want an animated "No" To brush the surface, and to make it flow; But still remember, if you mean to please, To press your point with modesty and ...
— The World's Best Poetry — Volume 10 • Various

... Christians have found it very hard to exemplify in practice. These are modesty and civility. The Founder of the Christian religion appeared among a people accustomed to look for a Messiah, a special ambassador from heaven, with an authoritative message. They were intimately acquainted with every expression having reference to ...
— Over the Teacups • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... received the congratulations and commendations of the people in their vicinity with becoming modesty, and a little later moved on ...
— The Dare Boys of 1776 • Stephen Angus Cox

... ladies, and the Court, at the manners of this superb creature, who was proclaimed a lady of courtesy and beauty. The king first, then the queen, and afterwards every individual member of the company, complemented l'Ile Adam on having chosen such a wife. The modesty of the chatelaine did more than pride would have accomplished; for she was invited to court, and everywhere, so imperious was her great heart, so tyrannic her violent love for her husband. You may be sure that her charms, hidden ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac

... included the lower part of the vagina and rectum, the sphincter and, the fourchet, and perineum. Hemorrhage was profuse, and the wound caused excruciating pain. The subject fainted on the spot from hemorrhage and shock. Her modesty forbade her summoning medical aid for three days, during which time the wound was undergoing most primitive treatment. After suturing, cicatrization followed ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould

... ideal republic in the name of science, which, through modesty and euphemism, he called philosophy. Aristotle, a practical man, refuted the Platonic utopia in the name of the same philosophy. Thus the social war has continued since Plato and Aristotle. The modern socialists refer all things to science one ...
— The Philosophy of Misery • Joseph-Pierre Proudhon

... described her at seventeen, we see the slight girlish form of La Valliere making her reverence before royalty, owing her charm, as the court lady relates, more to a certain grace, modesty and tenderness in bearing and expression than to the dazzling whiteness and rosiness of her skin, the exquisite blueness of her eyes and the brilliancy of her blonde hair of the shade which the French ...
— In Chteau Land • Anne Hollingsworth Wharton

... or exciting any comment. It also implies that Jesus deliberately bewitched Judas in order to bring about his own betrayal. Later on John claims that Jesus said to Peter "If I will that John tarry til I come, what is that to thee?"; and John, with a rather obvious mock modesty, adds that he must not claim to be immortal, as the disciples concluded; for Christ did not use that expression, but merely remarked "If I will that he tarry till I come." No other evangelist claims personal intimacy with Christ, or even pretends to be his contemporary (there is no ground for identifying ...
— Preface to Androcles and the Lion - On the Prospects of Christianity • George Bernard Shaw

... world, though subject to infirmities; his acts are guided by the laws of propriety, and are marked by strict sincerity. Confucius admitted that he himself had failed to reach the level of the superior man. This admission may have been the result of his extraordinary humility and modesty. ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume I • John Lord

... head of vital and spiritual beauty, where purity and luxuriance, woman and mind, dwelt in harmony and joy. As she seemed ever to be ripening, so she seemed never to have been a child, but, with faculties and sense clear and unintimidated, she was never wanting in modesty, nor accused of want of self-possession. Judge Custis made her his reliance and pride; she never reproved his errors, nor treated them familiarly, but settled the household by a consent which all paid to her character alone. More than once she had appeared at the furnace mansion when the ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend

... called, for their conduct in this kingdom. This happy event will not, I am sure, be the less acceptable, from being principally brought about by part of the crews of his majesty's ships under my orders, under the command of Captain Troubridge. His merits speak for themselves. His own modesty, makes it my duty to state that, to him alone, is the chief merit due. The recommendation bestowed on the brave and excellent Captain Hallowell, will not escape their lordship's notice, any more than the exceeding good conduct of Captain Oswald, ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. II (of 2) • James Harrison

... who plainly and daily suffered for their creed, who stood to lose all the things most of us strive for, people who valued neither comfort, nor money, nor the world's good word. That they took help, and even sacrifice, as a matter of course, seemed in them mere modesty and sound good sense; tantamount to saying, 'I am not so silly or self-centred as to suppose you do this for me. You do it, of course, for the Cause. The Cause is yours—is all Women's. You serve humanity. Who am I that ...
— The Convert • Elizabeth Robins

... of thought, blooming youth succeeded this age, and she stood, blushing in maiden modesty, the gay young sister of other days; and his heart was filled with sadness as he gazed upon her stiff in the icy arms of death, and felt that she could no more return his affection. He was an aged man, and knew much of the sorrow and the trials of life; ...
— Withered Leaves from Memory's Garland • Abigail Stanley Hanna

... Book at the wrong End, with an Apology for the Author's inability to handle such weighty Points as they deserved; and indeed Tom, that single Confession was the only Thing that look'd like Truth or Modesty in the whole Performance. How could I be affronted by such miserable Efforts of Malice? and above all, if the natural elevation of my Mind, had not enabled me to look down on them with Disdain, the Dignity and usefulness of my Life, help'd me ...
— A Dialogue Between Dean Swift and Tho. Prior, Esq. • Anonymous

... and roof, and defy you to spoil any charm you think I have, if you will only not make me awkward or silly; and you may make me as self-conscious as Esther's St. Cecilia there, only she calls it modesty." ...
— Esther • Henry Adams

... exuberance of spirits, there were the greatest modesty and simplicity in the demeanour of these poor girls. When they proceeded in a more sober mood, we joined in the conversation, asking questions about their prospects at Ajaccio, and the schooling they had received. They had no friends at Ajaccio; but the “Mother of Mercy” would guide and ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester

... (in the limited sense which was of no use to her) an audience. She did not quite seem to know what she wanted of me. But she said she had understood at Stafford House that I had a theatre in which she could read; with a good deal of modesty and diffidence she at last got so far. Now, my little theatre turns my house out of window, costs fifty pounds to put up, and is only two months taken down; therefore, is quite out of the question. This Mrs. Dickens explained, and also my profound inability ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 2 (of 3), 1857-1870 • Charles Dickens

... twenty-three years old when her first book of poems was published; so we read in her letters, in which she entreats her father not to curtail ANY of the verses addressed to him; there is no reason, she says, except his EXTREME MODESTY why the verses should be suppressed,—she speaks not only with the fondness of a daughter but with the sensibility of a poet. Our young authoress is modest, although in print; she compares herself to Crabbe (as Jane Austen might have done), and feels 'what ...
— Our Village • Mary Russell Mitford

... Modesty might have directed her hasty action of enwrapping her shoulders, but it was scarcely likely, considering Miss Aldclyffe's temperament, that she had all her life been used to a maid, Cytherea's youth, and the elder ...
— Desperate Remedies • Thomas Hardy

... There were true modesty and manhood in the noble fellow, when he overheard a visitor in his employer's office relate the incident of the rescue, without suspecting that the hero stood before him, and never dropped the slightest intimation that ...
— Brave Tom - The Battle That Won • Edward S. Ellis

... to hold out against her wooing? I don't like to apply the word "wooing" to a young girl's conduct, but we all know that woman does her part in the great system of human mating when the persons most interested do the choosing; and it is right that she should. The modesty that prevents a woman from showing her preference is the result of a false philosophy, and flies in the face of nature. Her right to choose is as ...
— Yolanda: Maid of Burgundy • Charles Major

... to all that they said," and allowing them their natural wishes and ways, is touchingly expressed. And those who know Egypt will know that Bata still lives there—several Batas I have known myself. His sweetness of manner, his devotion, his untiringly earnest work, his modesty, his quietness, makes Bata to be one of the most charming friends. Bata I have met in many places, Bata I have loved as one of the flowers of human nature, and Bata I hope often to meet again in divers forms and varied ...
— Egyptian Tales, Second Series - Translated from the Papyri • W. M. Flinders Petrie

... not about men, as blaming them;" but when he adds, "or praising them," the injunction seems to me of doubtful value. Surely Marcus Aurelius more wisely advises that "when thou wishest to delight thyself, think of the virtues of those who live with thee; for instance, the activity of one, and the modesty of another, and the liberality of a third, and some other good quality of a fourth. For nothing delights so much as the examples of the virtues, when they are exhibited in the morals of those who live with us and present themselves in ...
— The Pleasures of Life • Sir John Lubbock

... Hater L20 and keep L10 towards a boy's keeping. Thence Mr. Coventry and I to the Attorney's chamber at the Temple, but not being there we parted, and I home, and there with great joy told T. Hater what I had done, with which the poor wretch was very glad, though his modesty would not suffer him to say much. So to the Coffee-house, and there all the house full of the ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... and women employed in the sweatshops, may be inferred from the fact that men and women to the number of twelve have been found sleeping together in one of these workrooms. The tenement-house factories are so crowded that no such thing as privacy or modesty, on the part of men or women, is possible; the usual water-closet is a wooden bucket upon every landing, which fills the air with ...
— White Slaves • Louis A Banks

... he had not handled his man skilfully. He remembered that even Socrates, for all the popular charm of his mock-modesty and his true geniality, had ceased after a while to be tolerable. Without such a manner to grace his method, Socrates would have had a very brief time indeed. The Duke recoiled from what he took to be another pitfall. He almost ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm

... details as to the ship's doctor's career, a first-page prominence. Mr. Fletcher himself had proved to be both generous and grateful. In assessing the value of his own life at 1,000 pounds, he had argued with good humour and good sense, he had erred on the side of modesty, and Robert Stonehouse, having weighed the argument gravely, had accepted its practical conclusion as just and reasonable. He had taken rooms, thereupon, if not actually in Harley Street, at least ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie

... hours, and created much sensation in the island, and every one agreed in praising Lord Byron's great knowledge of the Scriptures, joined to his moderation and modesty. Kennedy, however, a little irritated by the superiority granted to his adversary, did his best to dissipate the impression produced by it. He went so far as to reproach his friends for having allowed themselves to be blinded by the rank, the celebrity, and the prestige of Lord Byron. ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli

... home-like sat she there, her wings scarce moving. Now suddenly she stoops—I mean the maiden— Down to the spring, and lets her little feet Sink in its waters, while her colored skirt Covered with care what they did not conceal; And I within the shadow of the trees, Inly admired her graceful modesty. And as she sat and gazed into the brook, Plashing and sporting with her snow-white feet, She thought not of the olden times, when girls Pleased to behold their faces smiling back From the smooth water, used it as their mirror ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss

... severe temperance and purity, modesty and humility, a gracious temper and calmness of spirit; no true beauty without the signature of these graces in the very ...
— Pearls of Thought • Maturin M. Ballou

... shame, Frank," interrupted Vernon, "a very different kind of thing, though too often confounded with modesty. It's the latter—It's your ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various

... born in Virginia; a man of fine character, lacking none of the sterner stuff of the soldier, but blended with modesty and gentleness; universally popular in the army, which he joined in 1840 and continued in till his death, rising to be general of a division through gallantry in the Indian frontier wars and in the Civil War, ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... agreed, and sent to Camillus to desire him to take the command; but he answered that he would not until they that were in the Capitol should legally appoint him. When this answer was returned, they admired the modesty and tempter of Camillus; but they could not tell how to find a messenger to carry the intelligence to the Capitol, or rather, indeed, it seemed altogether impossible for any one to get to the citadel whilst the enemy was in full possession of the city. But among ...
— The Boys' and Girls' Plutarch - Being Parts of The "Lives" of Plutarch • Plutarch

... silent for some time, for though she was quick-witted enough, a woman's natural modesty and her own frankness, prevented her from guessing at my artifice. I, too, astonished at my success in making her believe ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... necessary, without making a study of their subtilties, for the most insecure attitude of mind for girls is to think they know, in these difficult questions, and the best safeguard both of their faith and good sense is intellectual modesty. Without making acquaintance in detail with the phenomena of spiritualism and kindred arts or sciences, it is needful to know in a plain and general way why they are forbidden by the Church, and also to know how those who have lost their balance and peace of mind ...
— The Education of Catholic Girls • Janet Erskine Stuart

... glances they exchanged, he was amazed at La Zambinella's continued reserve toward him. She had begun, it is true, by touching his foot with hers and stimulating his passion with the mischievous pleasure of a woman who is free and in love; but she had suddenly enveloped herself in maidenly modesty, after she had heard Sarrasine relate an incident which illustrated the extreme violence of his temper. When the supper became a debauch, the guests began to sing, inspired by the Peralta and the ...
— Sarrasine • Honore de Balzac

... fashionable bankruptcies spring from this polluted source. The stars of this order rise and fall in estimation, become fixed planets or meteors of the most enchanting brilliancy, in proportion not to the grace of modesty, or the fascination of personal beauty, but to the notoriety and number of their amours, and the peerless dignity of their ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle

... where modesty resides Is found the priceless treasure of Pure Truth. If pride within you secretly abides That, forced by the elixir's charm, The Sooth You needs must speak—be wholly pure in thought, Despising not the teachings wise, of old; When ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... own spiritual image; their unqualified straightforwardness, their transparent simplicity of mind and heart, their fearlessness, their complacent rusticity, their childish notions of the uses of wealth, their personal modesty and communal vanity, their happy oblivion to world standards, their extravagance of speech, their political bigotry, their magisterial down-rightness, their inflammability, and their fine self-reliance. They saw these ...
— Gideon's Band - A Tale of the Mississippi • George W. Cable

... inquiry of eighty-six physicians, of much the same nationalities, that only one had himself been sexually abstinent before marriage. There seem to be no similar statistics for the English-speaking countries, where there exists a greater modesty—though not perhaps notably less need for it—in the making of such confessions. But if we turn to the allied profession which is strongly on the side of sexual abstinence, we find that among theological students, as has been shown in the United States, while prostitution may be infrequent, ...
— Little Essays of Love and Virtue • Havelock Ellis

... elate, Defies all bowlers' concentrated spite. That hero is myself, I need not state. 'Tis sweet to see their captain's growing ire And his relief when I at last retire; 'Tis sweet to run pavilionwards and say, "Yes, somehow I was seeing them to-day"— Thus modesty demands that I retort To murmured compliments upon my play. Cricket in sooth is ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, May 14, 1919 • Various

... Mr. Badger's modesty," said Mr. Jarndyce, "I would take leave to correct him and say three ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens

... man is insane is, I suppose, going too far; but to say that he does not know the value or the meaning of the words he uses, to say that he is driven by an extraordinary and brainless prejudice, is certainly the modesty of truth. ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 1 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris

... due to myself to say, that the manner in which the Autobiography is subordinated to the general subject in the present volume, and also the manner in which it is veiled by the title, are concessions to the modesty of her who had the best right to decide in what fashion I should profit by her goodness, and are very far from ...
— A Practical Illustration of Woman's Right to Labor - A Letter from Marie E. Zakrzewska, M.D. Late of Berlin, Prussia • Marie E. Zakrzewska

... followers, that they were docile, artless, generous, but inclined to ease; that they were well-formed, grave, and far from possessing the vivacity of the natives of the south of Europe. They expressed themselves with a certain modesty and respect, and were hospitable to the last degree. Reading between the lines of the records of history, it is manifest that after their own rules and estimates, their lives were chaste and proper, though it was admissible for kings to have several wives. Moreover, though living in ...
— Due South or Cuba Past and Present • Maturin M. Ballou

... modesty!" Mrs. Hseh replied smiling. "It's all a dread lest I shouldn't be able to observe the order ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... eyes upon him there was something in the gentle dignity and purity of her look that held him back, abashed, and curiously afraid. She made him feel the power of her sex,—a power invincible when strengthened by modesty and reserve,—and the easy licence which modern women, particularly those of a degraded aristocracy, permit to men in both conversation and behaviour nowadays, would have found no opportunity of being exercised in her presence. So, though his impulse ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli

... contrary to her wish and will—she wished not to long for him, not to call him back, not to love him! Angrily she roused herself and sought to recall the burning gaze with which Soelver had wounded her modesty. So with a vexed and hard stroke of the oars she pushed the boat ...
— Sleep Walking and Moon Walking - A Medico-Literary Study • Isidor Isaak Sadger

... steel succeeded then, And stubborn as the metal were the men. Truth, Modesty, and Shame the world forsook; Fraud, Avarice, and Force their places took. Then sails were spread to every wind that blew; Raw were the sailors, and the depths were new: Trees rudely hollowed did the waves sustain, Ere ships in triumph plough'd ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson

... determined in her heart upon making the conquest of this big beau, I don't think, ladies, we have any right to blame her; for though the task of husband-hunting is generally, and with becoming modesty, entrusted by young persons to their mammas, recollect that Miss Sharp had no kind parent to arrange these delicate matters for her, and that if she did not get a husband for herself, there was no one else in the wide world who would take the trouble off her hands. What causes young people to "come ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray

... replied, somewhat severely, "you may not know that I have a scientific reputation which, putting aside all modesty, I may say is an enviable one. You used a word last night to which I must interpose serious objection. You more than hinted that I hid—superstitions. Let me inform you, Larry O'Keefe, that I am solely ...
— The Moon Pool • A. Merritt

... modesty than you used to be, I perceive, young lady. I'll be pleased to pass on your message. The chief is a conscientious fellow, and feels his responsibility so much that it will doubtless be a relief to him to ...
— More About Peggy • Mrs G. de Horne Vaizey

... lumbering body and diminutive brain, was whole worlds superior to inorganic nature. That the marvellous thing called human personality should outlast the decay of what is so much inferior to itself, is therefore not only not inconceivable, but in itself not even improbable. It is a strange sort of modesty—to say the least of it—which would make us think ourselves of less account in the scale of existence or the sight of God than unconscious matter in its cruder and lower stages. One might as sensibly ...
— Problems of Immanence - Studies Critical and Constructive • J. Warschauer

... childlike gladness to be made acquainted with it, which those only can have, who dare look at their own hearts—and that with a steadiness which religion only has the power of reconciling with sincere humility;—without this, and the modesty produced by it, I am deeply convinced that no man, however wide his erudition, however patient his antiquarian researches, can possibly understand, or be worthy of understanding, ...
— Literary Remains, Vol. 2 • Coleridge

... nearly had me, though," I hastily intervened to spare my own modesty. "And It did ...
— The Thing from the Lake • Eleanor M. Ingram

... things which are called beautiful by the vulgar, for example, material things and works of art. That which is really beautiful has no need of anything; not more than law, not more than truth, not more than benevolence or modesty. Which of these things is beautiful because it is praised, or spoiled by being blamed? Is such a thing as an emerald made worse than it was, if it is not praised? or gold, ivory, purple, a lyre, a little ...
— The Thoughts Of The Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus • Marcus Aurelius

... the scheme is the perfection of decoration, with the subject well subdued, yet so subtly placed that notwithstanding its modesty, the eye promptly seeks it. The castle in the distance, the motive holding aloft the sign of the Zodiac, are seen even before the splendid columns and ...
— The Tapestry Book • Helen Churchill Candee

... desired her father that he would not be so liberal in his offers, for that no man should ever be allowed that freedom, except him who should be her lawful husband. The Emperor was not less delighted by her resolute modesty than he had before been by the loveliness of her person, and calling to him Guido, one of his barons, gave her to him in marriage, at the ...
— The Divine Comedy • Dante

... and this completely conquered and captivated the boys. He had one characteristic which made all his schoolfellows from the bottom class to the top want to mock at him, not from malice but because it amused them. This characteristic was a wild fanatical modesty and chastity. He could not bear to hear certain words and certain conversations about women. There are "certain" words and conversations unhappily impossible to eradicate in schools. Boys pure in ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... great themes, his own mind had gained their dignity. Accustomed to the company of dead statesmen and heroes, his own ideas had risen to a higher standard. The flattery of society had added a new grace to his natural modesty. He was now a citizen of the world by his reputation; the past was his province, in which he was recognized as a master; the idol's pedestal was ready for him, but he betrayed no desire to show himself ...
— Memoir of John Lothrop Motley, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... fully characteristic of Milton whose genius lay rather in strength than in tenderness. Yet perhaps we love Lycidas all the more for giving us our almost solitary glimpse of a Milton in whom the affections are more than the will, and sorrow not sublimated into resolution. Its modesty, too, is astonishing. He had already written the Nativity Ode, Comus and Allegro and Penseroso, and yet he fancies himself still unripe for poetry and is only forced by the "bitter constraint" of the death of his friend to pluck the berries ...
— Milton • John Bailey

... was induced to write his book has been mentioned. The expressions of modesty Saxo uses, saying that he was "the least" of Absalon's "followers", and that "all the rest refused the task", are not to be taken to the letter. A man of his parts would hardly be either the least in rank, or the last to be solicited. The words, however, enable ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")

... and brought with him one or two of his companions, who had been, by the way, present in the affair of the empty money-boxes; and though he never fancied that there was any danger in meeting his brother-in-law, for he had no idea that he had been seen on the night of the attack, with a natural modesty, which did him really credit, he kept out of the young bridegroom's sight as much as he could, and showed no desire to be presented to him. At supper, however, as he was sneaking modestly down to a ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray

... seen a good many handsome people, but there was a modesty, grace, and dignity, and an expression of deep latent sentiment in that woman's countenance, that, combined with her straight nymph-like figure, and the sort of chastity that characterized her whole person ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble

... moment that one realises that, one also realises that there is no prima facie impossibility that God should so reveal Himself—for indeed it seems an idea which no human mind would dare to originate, except in a kind of insane delusion; and the teaching of Christ, His utter modesty and meekness, His perfect sanity and clear-sightedness, make it evident to me that we may put out of court the possibility that He was under the influence of a delusion. He, it seems to me, took all the old vague ideas of sacrifice and consummated them; He showed ...
— Beside Still Waters • Arthur Christopher Benson



Words linked to "Modesty" :   reserve, modest, immodesty, propriety, properness, Grundyism, prudishness, modestness, primness, demureness, prudery, immodest, correctitude, decency



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