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Tenderness   /tˈɛndərnəs/   Listen
Tenderness

noun
1.
A tendency to express warm and affectionate feeling.
2.
A pain that is felt (as when the area is touched).  Synonyms: rawness, soreness.  "After taking a cold, rawness of the larynx and trachea come on"
3.
Warm compassionate feelings.  Synonym: tenderheartedness.
4.
A positive feeling of liking.  Synonyms: affection, affectionateness, fondness, heart, philia, warmheartedness, warmness.  "The child won everyone's heart" , "The warmness of his welcome made us feel right at home"
5.
A feeling of concern for the welfare of someone (especially someone defenseless).  Synonym: softheartedness.



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"Tenderness" Quotes from Famous Books



... engraving and painting of the hieroglyphics were resumed with success, and carried out with a minuteness and accuracy that provokes the admiration of the beholder. Bas-reliefs of extreme beauty and elaboration characterize the period. There rests upon some of them "a gentle and almost feminine tenderness, which has impressed upon the imitations of living creatures the stamp of an incredible delicacy both of conception and execution." Statues and statuettes of merit were at the same time produced in abundance. The ...
— Ancient Egypt • George Rawlinson

... smote him. And he felt that he had shown more tenderness for this lady than the occasion called for, or than his duty warranted. He had called her "dear;" he had kissed her hand; he had asked her if she loved him! And this in the face of all his late protestations ...
— Cruel As The Grave • Mrs. Emma D. E. N. Southworth

... former times at Casgar, on the extreme boundaries of Tartary, a tailor who had a pretty wife, whom he affectionately loved, and by whom he was beloved with reciprocal tenderness. One day while he was at work, a little hunch-back seated himself at the shop door and began to sing, and play upon a tabor. The tailor was pleased with his performance, and resolved to take him to his house to entertain his wife: "This little fellow," ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 2 • Anon.

... with the added reverence of a disciple for his Teacher.—You shall find these intense feelings sometimes in children of his stamp; though truly children of the stamp of Tiberius are rare enough; for with all his tenderness, his over-sensitiveness and timidity, put him to some task, whisper to him Duty!—and the little Tiberius is another child altogether: unflinching, silent, determined, pertinacious, ready to die rather than give in before the thing is most ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris

... him with the greatest tenderness, but she saw with despair that their little fund was rapidly decreasing and that there was no other prospect of support. But Caroline Beaufort possessed a mind of an uncommon mould, and her courage rose to support her in her adversity. She procured plain work; ...
— Frankenstein - or The Modern Prometheus • Mary Wollstonecraft (Godwin) Shelley

... nymph! why fear Such tenderness as mine? Great Dian, why, 940 Why didst thou hear her prayer? O that I Were rippling round her dainty fairness now, Circling about her waist, and striving how To entice her to a dive! then stealing in Between her luscious lips and eyelids thin. O that her shining hair was in the sun, And I distilling ...
— Endymion - A Poetic Romance • John Keats

... Gray white and Marjorie's mischievous face all quick remorse and tenderness. Together they went swiftly up the walk and out to the stile where Gray's horse and buggy were hitched, and without a word Marjorie, bareheaded as she was, climbed into the buggy and they ...
— The Heart Of The Hills • John Fox, Jr.

... aware of some subtler feeling than mere desire to bring the Mistress one more gift. His great heart had ever gone out in loving tenderness toward everything helpless and little. He adored children. The roughest of them could take unpardonable liberties with him. He would let them maul and mistreat him to their heart's content; and he reveled in such usage; although to humans other than the Mistress and the Master, he ...
— Further Adventures of Lad • Albert Payson Terhune

... unquestionably a strong vein of tenderness running through the stoical character of the Duke, and if we were more intimately acquainted with his private life we should probably see many traces of it. Such traces exist as it is. We have Mme de Sevigne's account of his reception of the news of the Passage of ...
— Three French Moralists and The Gallantry of France • Edmund Gosse

... and, as it were, go back upon Himself after this fashion? He passed judgment upon men and their ways with the utmost freedom and confidence; some, such as the Pharisees, He condemned with a severity which almost startles us; towards others, such as she "that was a sinner," He was all love and tenderness. Yet never does He speak as one who fears lest either in His tenderness or His severity He has gone too far. His path is always clear; He enters upon it without doubt; He looks ...
— The Teaching of Jesus • George Jackson

... physician at "The Hospital for Women and Children," on Codman Avenue, in Boston. Both the students of medicine and the patients became devotedly attached to her; they were fascinated by this remarkable union of tenderness, firmness and skill. The secret was in part told by what she said in one of her lectures in the training-school for nurses connected with the woman's hospital: "I wish you, of all my instructions, especially to remember this. Where ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various

... feels so petty!—One feels such—emptiness!—' You mimic horror, let fall your lifted hand, And smile at me; with brooding tenderness . . . Alone on darkened waters I fall and rise; Slow waves above me break, faint ...
— The House of Dust - A Symphony • Conrad Aiken

... bring the morrow when he was to come; but even this delusive promise failed; the present was all; and Cousin Honor herself was only not daddy, though she nursed him, and rocked him in her arms, and fondled him, and told stories or sung his lullaby with nightly tenderness, till the last sobs had quivered into the smooth ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge

... and electrical atmosphere, we seem at times to breathe lightning: let me point to those spots where clouded day-light and the eclipsed sun still attest their existence. For a specimen of true benevolence and homely fidelity, look at the character of Nelly Dean; for an example of constancy and tenderness, remark that of Edgar Linton. (Some people will think these qualities do not shine so well incarnate in a man as they would do in a woman, but Ellis Bell could never be brought to comprehend this notion: nothing moved her more than any insinuation that the faithfulness ...
— Charlotte Bronte's Notes on the pseudonyms used • Charlotte Bronte

... sudden, severe pain, often accompanied by faintness and nausea, swelling, tenderness, and heat of the injured parts. The sprained joint can be only moved with pain and difficulty. The swelling is due not so much to leaking of blood from broken blood vessels as to filling up of the joint with fluid caused by the inflammation, ...
— The Home Medical Library, Volume I (of VI) • Various

... without anything lovely. There was a woman on the platform seeing him off. At first sight, with her one eye blind and the whole cast of her features strongly plebeian, and even vicious, she seemed as unpleasant as the man; but there was something beautifully soft, a sort of light of tenderness, as on some Dutch Madonna, that came over her face when she looked at the man. They talked for a while together through the window; the man seemed to have been asking money. "Ye ken the last time," she said, "I gave ye two shillin's for your ludgin', and ye said——" it died off ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... affection for Verona and certain things in Verona. Italians must forgive us English this little streak of impertinent proprietorship in the beautiful things of their abundant land. It is quite open to them to revenge themselves by professing a tenderness for Liverpool or Leeds. It was, for instance, with a peculiar and personal indignation that I saw where an Austrian air bomb had killed five-and-thirty people in the Piazza Erbe. Somehow in that jolly old place, ...
— War and the Future • H. G. Wells

... knows that though he has skill, he has a hard heart, and fingers that are like iron. He that handleth a wound, had need have fingers like feathers or down; to be sure the patient wisheth they were! Tenderness is a thing of great worth to such; and such men are much inquired after by such; yea, their tenderness is an invitation to such to seek after them. And the thing is true in spirituals (Isa 42:3). Wherefore ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... the Peace Treaty with Germany as "impracticable," Sir DONALD MACLEAN revealed himself as a diligent student of a recent notorious book. Most of his observations—excepting, perhaps, the statement that he had "no sentimental tenderness for the Germans"—were marked with the brand of KEYNES, and his assertion that the utmost Germany could pay was two thousand millions came bodily from that eminent statistician. To the same inspiration was possibly due the unhappy suggestion that our chief ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, February 18th, 1920 • Various

... society, which might become too civil without them; but your coarse cynic is not pleasant. Mr. Copperhead's eye was as effectual in quenching emotion of any but the coarsest kind as water is against fire. People might be angry in his presence—it was the only passion he comprehended; but tenderness, sympathy, sorrow, all the more generous sentiments, fled and concealed themselves when this large, rich, costly man came by. People who were brought much in contact with him became ashamed of having any feelings at all; his eye upon them seemed to convict them of humbug. ...
— Phoebe, Junior • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant

... saying, "This is the head of a woman of the town, or a ———; but, whatever other title the lady may have, we are not entitled here to take notice of it." Nothing can be more delicate than this suppression: it displays a tenderness and liberality to the frailty of female nature, which does as much credit to his feelings as to ...
— A Lecture On Heads • Geo. Alex. Stevens

... delight, made him sit in his own old chair, got him a cup of tea, and waited upon him with the tenderness of a woman. While he drank his tea, Malcolm recounted his last adventure in connection with the ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald

... are my only child. Every peso (dollar) that I earn and save is for you one of these days. I have much money, but I crave more, and it is all for you, chiquita. It is my wish to see you, one of these days, a very queen of wealth, as you are already a queen of goodness and tenderness. Since you must handle the great fortune that I am building for you I have concluded to override the customs of our people for generations. In other words, I am going to begin to train you, ...
— The Young Engineers in Mexico • H. Irving Hancock

... said, taking her in his arms to wipe away the tears that were freely coursing down her cheeks, and caress her with exceeding tenderness. ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley

... fled with a sad heart and tearful eyes; and when, after her marriage, every prayer for pardon was rejected by the cardinal, Giulietta wept as if such sorrow had not been foreseen. Her uncle felt her flight most bitterly. He had watched his favourite niece, if not with tenderness of look and tone, yet with deep tenderness of heart. When her elder sisters married and left his roof, he missed them not: but now it was a sweet music that had suddenly ceased, a soft light that had vanished. The only flower that, during his severe existence, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 573, October 27, 1832 • Various

... camping or canoeing trip, experience from singing a rather cheap and frayed repertory is obviously for sentimental rather than for aesthetic satisfaction. Similarly, we may cherish the mementos of a lost friend or child, not for their intrinsic worth, but for the tenderness of the memories they arouse. The situation is delicately described in Eugene ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman

... in our public nurseries is very large. I impute it to moral influences, since the chief cause of death is low vitality, marked nervous depression and want of animal spirits, such as the total absence of personal tenderness and sympathy must produce in children. It is popularly ascribed to the over-cultivation of the race, as plants and animals highly civilised—that is, greatly modified and bred to an artificial excellence by human ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg

... with infinite tenderness, even as a mother might speak to a well-loved son, "Allan, come now and let me dress your wound. That's the first thing to do. Come, ...
— Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England

... The tenderness of this scene, its grace and delicacy, are quite idyllic, and worthy of the best ages of the pastoral drama. The ring is at length restored to Dushyanta, having been found by a fisherman in the belly of a carp. On its being restored to the ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson

... to give me the nickname Tamino." Then the mother rejoin'd:—"You're wrong, dear Hermann, to harbour Angry feelings against the children, for they are but children. Minnie's an excellent girl, and has a tenderness for you; Lately she ask'd how you were. Indeed, I ...
— The Poems of Goethe • Goethe

... California cottage under the shadow of the blue mountains, with the lilacs and marigolds in the yard. And colored by her new great love, and by the solemn fears of this endless night, Rachael found a tenderness in her heart for all those shadowy figures that had played a part ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris

... was a tall young fellow, but slender, with an honest, good-humoured face. Without being handsome, there was something attractive about him—an alertness, a vigour in the well-knit limbs, a candour and kindliness in the expression of the open face, a tenderness, moreover, in the blue eyes as they rested on Roseen—which would seem to account for the fact that these former ...
— North, South and Over the Sea • M.E. Francis (Mrs. Francis Blundell)

... There was a note of fatherly tenderness in the way this utter stranger called me David. It reminded me of Reb Sender. I wanted to say something to express my gratitude, but I felt a ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan

... and rank; you saw every class of the community give up its members, and send them armed into the field to protect the public and private tranquility of Ireland; it is impossible for any man to turn back to that period, without reviving those sentiments of tenderness and gratitude which then beat in the public bosom; to recollect amidst what applause, what tears, what prayers, what benedictions, they walked forth amongst spectators, agitated by the mingled sensations of terror and of ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous

... does my blood thrill at your fancied touch— Stop and leap up at your ideal caress? Ah, God! to feel that dear warm mouth on mine In lingering tenderness! ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various

... but to-day had woken very early, had got up and gone out and walked through the grey mist, turning his own particular trouble over and over in his mind. To-day Annie had faded back from him again; that tenderness that he had felt for her last night seemed to have vanished, and he was aware only of a savage longing to shake himself free of his burden. He had visions this morning of going up to London and ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole

... when her tenderness flared into startling outbursts of bleak, cutting anger, giving way in the end to floods of hysterical tears. A couple of such tempests formed part of Keith's ...
— The Soul of a Child • Edwin Bjorkman

... deserted innocent, trace the resemblance of the wretched Caroline,-should its face bear the marks of its birth, and revive in thy memory the image of its mother, wilt thou not, Belmont, wilt thou not therefore renounce it?-Oh, babe of my fondest affection! for whom already I experience all the tenderness of maternal pity! look not like thy unfortunate mother,-lest the parent, whom the hand of death may spare, shall be snatched from thee by the more cruel ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney

... of the corner of her eye, and without taking a bit of open notice, slipped off and lavished hospitality and tenderness on ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade

... letter from Amicus was from an unknown correspondent. It breathes a tenderness of spirit worthy of Johnson himself. But he practised the lesson which it inculcates;—a harder ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson

... as my hand fell it touched Constance's hand, which was cool and fresh as a flower. Mine was moist and hot. I never was more at a loss for words. I took her hand in mine and held it. So we stood, hand in hand, like children, looking out over that lovely English valley. My heart was all abrim with tenderness; but I had no words. I had been a good deal moved by the curious instance of telepathic sympathy or understanding which had brought me from my bed that morning ...
— The Message • Alec John Dawson

... ourselves of the secure and classical method of cremation? Especially if we had benefited by worldly goods or money left to us by the so deservedly lamented! For we are self-deceiving hypocrites—few of us are really sorry for the dead—few of us remember them with any real tenderness or affection. And yet God knows! they may need more ...
— Vendetta - A Story of One Forgotten • Marie Corelli

... [6809]numero, pondere, et mensura, the Lord will not quench the smoking flax, or break the bruised reed, Tentat (saith Austin) non ut obruat, sed ut coronet he suffers thee to be tempted for thy good. And as a mother doth handle her child sick and weak, not reject it, but with all tenderness observe and keep it, so doth God by us, not forsake us in our miseries, or relinquish us for our imperfections, but with all pity and compassion support and receive us; whom he loves, he loves to the end. ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior

... animalism, chasing the leeriness of the contented man's conceit, turned her to softness if not to cheerfulness. She adored Fritz like that. His open-mouthed, gaping yawn moved something in her to tenderness. She would have liked to kiss him while he was yawning and to pass her hands over his short hair, which was like a mat and grew as strongly as the hair which he shaved every morning from ...
— The Woman With The Fan • Robert Hichens

... little suspecting that his protege had become his accuser and was preparing to become his executioner, received him with more tenderness than ever, and lodged him, as heretofore, in his palace. Under the shadow of this hospitable roof, Ali skilfully prepared the consummation of the crime which was for ever to draw him out of obscurity. He went every morning to pay his court to the ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - ALI PACHA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... diminished, rather than abruptly broken off. In the case of quickly impulsive, passionate feeling, the speech is likely to be much varied in pitch, broken by frequent abrupt stops, and decisive inflections. In the case of the expression of tenderness or pathos, there is a lingering tone, with the quality and inflection of plaintiveness, qualified, in public speech, by such dignity and strength as is fitting. In all cases the quality of voice is of course the main thing, and this, not being technical or mechanical, ...
— Public Speaking • Irvah Lester Winter

... about me, they both looked with new signs of wonder. He stroked my right hand, seeming to admire the softness and colour; but he squeezed it so hard between his hoof and his pastern, that I was forced to roar; after which they both touched me with all possible tenderness. They were under great perplexity about my shoes and stockings, which they felt very often, neighing to each other, and using various gestures, not unlike those of a philosopher, when he would attempt to solve some new and ...
— Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift

... out towards him. It was because Christ was a perfect man, as well as the infinite God, that such a feeling dwelt in His breast. For, there has never been an uncommonly fair and excellent human character, in which tenderness and affinity for childhood has not been a quality, and a quality, too, that was no small part of the fairness and excellence. The best definition that has yet been given of genius itself is, that it is the carrying of the feelings of childhood onward into the thoughts ...
— Sermons to the Natural Man • William G.T. Shedd

... a goose. Bob said he didn't believe there ever was such a goose cooked. Its tenderness and flavor, size and cheapness, were the themes of universal admiration. Eked out by the apple-sauce and mashed potatoes, it was a sufficient dinner for the whole family; indeed, as Mrs. Cratchit said with great delight (surveying one small atom of a bone on the dish), ...
— Christmas - Its Origin, Celebration and Significance as Related in Prose and Verse • Various

... fret, stamp, and throw dust on herself. Then Laddie came, fresh from a tubbing, starched linen, dressed in his new riding suit, and wearing top hat and gauntlets. He looked the very handsomest I ever had seen him; and at the same time, he seemed trembling with tenderness, and bursting with power. Goodness sake! I bet the Princess took one good look and "came down" like Davy Crockett's coon. Mother was on his arm and she walked clear ...
— Laddie • Gene Stratton Porter

... writers a little more cautious in their mode of expression, but the spirit of the articles remained unchanged. These energetic intolerant leaders of public opinion were novi homines not personally connected with the social strata in which moderate views and retrograde tenderness had begun to prevail. Mostly sons of priests or of petty officials, they belonged to a recently created literary proletariat composed of young men with boundless aspirations and meagre national resources, who earned a precarious subsistence by journalism or by giving lessons ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace

... only served to render the succeeding paleness more obvious, passed across the brow of the mother. She stooped, and imprinted a kiss on the forehead of the impatient boy, who scarcely waited to receive this act of tenderness, ere he hurried to place himself in the ...
— The Wept of Wish-Ton-Wish • James Fenimore Cooper

... it ought to last. Then suddenly, and without the slightest apparent cause, she began to manifest symptoms of restlessness, anxiety, and preoccupation, which she vainly strove to conceal beneath an assumption of increased tenderness obviously costing her a very great effort. Her uneasiness was so unmistakable that at length, finding she did not take me into her confidence, or seek my assistance in any way, I questioned her about it, and was shocked and grieved ...
— The Rover's Secret - A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba • Harry Collingwood

... hoarse with anger. A sob came from his tired companion and Crosby turned to her, his heart full of tenderness and— shame, perhaps. Tears were streaming down her cheeks and ...
— The Day of the Dog • George Barr McCutcheon

... the eyes of her lover were fixed upon her with that fond expression she so well understood, and which found a ready response in her youthful heart. Now that heart was almost bursting with its agony of grief; but William was beside her, whispered words of tenderness and hope were murmured in her ear, and how could she break the spell? how could she speak of the gathering storm? The commands of a stern father were upon her, and she knew his indomitable spirit would never swerve one inch ...
— Withered Leaves from Memory's Garland • Abigail Stanley Hanna

... last Act may be noticed here. A Chandala or executioner leads a criminal to the place of execution. The latter bears a stake (Sula) on his shoulder, and is followed by his wife and son who use no expressions suggestive of tenderness but only of sacrifice—a stern sense of duty. At the impending execution of her husband, she neither faints nor becomes disconsolate but simply weeps and talks of ...
— Tales from the Hindu Dramatists • R. N. Dutta

... her father's face. That face was as pale as death: but cold, stern, and impassible. Laura Dunbar shivered as she looked at it. She had been a spoiled child; a pampered, idolized beauty; and had never heard anything but words of love and tenderness. Her lips quivered, and the tears came into ...
— Henry Dunbar - A Novel • M. E. Braddon

... 3: Tears are caused not only through sorrow, but also through a certain tenderness of the affections, especially when one considers something that gives joy mixed with pain. Thus men are wont to shed tears through a sentiment of piety, when they recover their children or dear friends, whom they thought to have lost. In this way ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas

... artist. As an interpreter of Chopin she had no rival among women, and only one man was her equal. She had fire, tenderness, passion, strength; she had beyond all these, soul, which is worth more in true expression than the most marvelous technique. She had chosen Chopin for his brilliance, as some will chose Turner in preference to Corot: riots of color, barbaric and tingling. She was as ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath

... delights of an accepted lover. What visions of future happiness those two weeks of close companionship opened to my eyes! The refinement and natural dignity of the woman made her caresses of exquisite daintiness and tenderness. Spontaneously and absolutely without a suggestion of affectation her love was poured out generously to the man who had won her heart, and each evening it seemed as if my affection had increased a ...
— The Romance and Tragedy • William Ingraham Russell

... none more enjoy, or are more fitted by nature or temper, for all the ornamental displays of society; a Castle ball was always a glittering exhilaration of lustre and beauty. But I had seen all this before. To-night they mingled with the tenderness which the perusal of Clotilde's letter had shed over all my feelings. As the dance moved before my eye, as the music echoed round me, as I glanced on the walls, filled with the memories of all the gallant and the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 57, No. 356, June, 1845 • Various

... shone redly, and the range of ice stood in a kind of gold atmosphere which gave an extraordinary richness to the shadowings of its rocks and peaks, and a particular fullness of mellow whiteness to its lustrous parts, softening the dazzle into an airy tenderness of brightness, so that the whole mass shone out with the blandness visible in a glorious star. But its main beauty lay in those features by which I knew it to be ice—I mean in a vast surprising variety of forms, such as steeples, towers, columns, pyramids, ruins ...
— The Frozen Pirate • W. Clark Russell

... near his end, seeing his lady weeping by his bedside, he gave her a look of great tenderness, and said, "My dear, weep not for me, I am not afraid to die; for, thank God, I can lay my hand on my heart and say, that since I came to man's estate, I have never intentionally done wrong ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems

... the fair little butterfly of a thing had always her flowers to hang over: the little sweets of existence, the hats and frocks and ribbons which she loved, and then have gone away and left her? A great pity for the bride came over him, and then a flood of yearning tenderness for the other girl, greater than he ...
— The Debtor - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... commanding voice and intense eyes: still, I liked her at once. Mr. Floyd had begged me to be kind to her, and it seemed easy for me to cherish and protect her: she appeared to need being taken care of with both strength and tenderness, for it was such a fragile little hand I held, and, with all its beauty, such a wan little face ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, August, 1878 • Various

... with all the tenderness of one speaking to little children, explained it all to them—how he had himself carried Captain Tom off the battle-field of Franklin; how he had cared for him since—even to the present time; how Ephraim would ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore

... consideration alone would not have stayed him in spite of the curious pride of race and family which he had become sensible of of late, it was evident that his daughter must suffer too. She had done no wrong, and Alton, who thought of her with a great tenderness, dare not contemplate all that the ...
— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss

... the forlorn little things to the best of her ability, but it was past midnight before the last weary, sobbing baby was fairly asleep, while all night long one or another would start up terrified from some frightful dream, to be soothed into quiet by the patient motherly tenderness of their wakeful protector. ...
— Twilight Stories • Various

... form, voice, and manner belonged to the period of transition from girlhood. Her face was perfectly oval, her complexion more pale than fair. The nose was faultless; the lips, slightly parted, were full and ripe, giving to the lines of the mouth warmth, tenderness, and trust; the eyes were blue and large, and shaded by drooping lids and long lashes; and, in harmony with all, a flood of golden hair, in the style permitted to Jewish brides, fell unconfined down her back to the pillion on which she sat. The throat ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace

... avoid saying anything which could hurt wounded souls. I know how much grief, how much suppressed tenderness, are hidden, in thousands of women, beneath the armour of a dogged enthusiasm. They stiffen their sinews for fear of falling. They walk, they talk, they laugh, with an open wound in the side through ...
— The Forerunners • Romain Rolland

... the particular Parts of her Character, it is necessary to Preface, that she is the only Child of a decrepid Father, whose Life is bound up in hers. This Gentleman has used Fidelia from her Cradle with all the Tenderness imaginable, and has view'd her growing Perfections with the Partiality of a Parent, that soon thought her accomplished above the Children of all other Men, but never thought she was come to the utmost Improvement of which she her self was capable. This Fondness has had very happy Effects ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... on account of the fact that a pair of cloth slippers, embroidered by the hands of some affectionate girl or doting woman, was a token which was not too unusual to carry inconvenient significance. It might mean much or little, much tenderness or affection, or a work of idleness tinctured ...
— The Development of Embroidery in America • Candace Wheeler

... another through her heart and over her face: dismay, shame, pride, tenderness. "You don't believe," she said, hoarsely, ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... difficulties and disgraces which a more selfish man would have avoided. The pawning of the clothes, charged upon him as a crime by the grinding bookseller, and apparently admitted by him as one of "the meannesses which poverty unavoidably brings with it," resulted, as we have shown, from a tenderness of heart and generosity of hand in which another man would have gloried; but these were such natural elements with him that he was unconscious of their merit. It is a pity that wealth does not oftener bring such "meannesses" ...
— Oliver Goldsmith • Washington Irving

... rigidity of actual death those clutching hands held their tenacious grip, but the aroused soldiers wrenched the interlaced fingers apart with every tenderness possible in such emergency, shocked at noting the expression of intense agony stamped upon the man's face when thus exposed to view. The whole terrible story was engraven there—how he had toiled, agonized, suffered, before finally yielding ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish

... have been severer than the sages?—since the pious Fenelon taught that true virgin delicacy was almost as incompatible with learning as with vice; and Dr. Channing complained, in his "Essay on Exclusion and Denunciation," of "women forgetting the tenderness of their sex," ...
— Women and the Alphabet • Thomas Wentworth Higginson

... nothing like so large as those that must be allowed for in every book. And a friendship of old gentlemen who have got rid of many illusions, survived their ambition, and blushes, and passion for euphony, and surface harmonies, and tenderness for their accidental literary stores, but have kept all their curiosity and awe touching the problems of man and fate and the Cause of causes,—a friendship of old gentlemen of this fortune is looking more ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol II. • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson

... deserted the raft. They looked back, feeling in their hearts a mite of tenderness for the wet planks. Later, they wriggled up the side of the vessel and climbed over ...
— Men, Women, and Boats • Stephen Crane

... actions to the state of polygamy in which the uncatechized Indians live. Polygamy no doubt diminishes the domestic happiness and internal union of families; but this practice, sanctioned by Ismaelism, does not prevent the people of the east from loving their children with tenderness. Among the Indians of the Orinoco, the father returns home only to eat, or to sleep in his hammock; he lavishes no caresses on his infants, or on his wives, whose office it is to serve him. Parental affection ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V2 • Alexander von Humboldt

... the spirit of a dead woman stands between us. I didn't love her when she was alive. But if I hadn't married her and brought her to France she'd be living now. She died through me—and for me. I think of her with immense tenderness and—a kind of loyalty; a fierce loyalty. I ...
— Everyman's Land • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... in order to follow that instinct? Are we not compelling women to choose between inflicting injury upon themselves, their children and the community, and undergoing an abhorrent operation which kills the tenderness and delicacy of womanhood, even as it may ...
— Woman and the New Race • Margaret Sanger

... soften'd: The one has to do with Personages, all gentle and tender; the Subject of the other is Fury and Bravery. I would therefore have, methinks, a Sprinkling of Love thro' all my Pastorals; and 'twill give the Writer an Opportunity of showing the Tenderness, and the Simplicity of his Characters in the finest Manner: Yet must it be so diversify'd and broken, by other Incidents interfering, as not to cloy and nauseate the Reader, with the Repetition of ...
— A Full Enquiry into the Nature of the Pastoral (1717) • Thomas Purney

... impostnre was problematic. But if he was a true prince, the duchess could only forfeit credit for herself, not for him: nor would her preparing the way for her nephew, by first playing off and feeling the ground by a counterfeit, be an imputation on her, but rather a proof of her wisdom and tenderness. Impostors are easily detected; as Simnel was. All Henry's art and power could never verify the cheat of Perkin; and if the latter was astonishingly adroit, the king was ridiculously clumsy. 6. Perkin himself confessed ...
— Historic Doubts on the Life and Reign of King Richard the Third • Horace Walpole

... Alps look down with most benignant aspect upon this plain. They seem quite proud of it, and nurse it with the care and tenderness of a parent. Noble rivers not a few—the Ticino, the Adige, and streams and torrents without number—do they send down, to keep its beauty ever fresh. These streams cross and re-cross its green bosom in all directions, forming by their interlacings ...
— Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber - Or The Influence of Romanism on Trade, Justice, and Knowledge • James Aitken Wylie

... what you've come to tell me, Sophy dear," she said, directly. "I've seen it for some time. And I'm glad as glad—glad with all my heart, Sophy." Her voice was tenderness itself, her eyes melted. But the hand on my hand was cold. "I love you a great deal, Sophy," she whispered. "More than anybody else ...
— A Woman Named Smith • Marie Conway Oemler

... gentle children they were, and with tenderness did Eva care for the little ones who were their father's joy and the ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various

... crowed and exchanged nods and knowing winks. They enjoyed the peddler's talk, and felt an indulgent tenderness for his slow and feeble intellect. He on his part enjoyed no less to assume a simple and shallow nature. A twinkle lurked under his bushy brows while he "smoked the gonies." They laughed and he smiled ...
— A Son of Hagar - A Romance of Our Time • Sir Hall Caine

... the tree Lawrence Newt conversed with Hope in a tone of earnest and respectful tenderness that touched her heart. She could not understand the winning kindliness of his manner, nor could she resist it. He spoke of her home with an accuracy ...
— Trumps • George William Curtis

... Dolly crossing the room with the child in her arms. It was only for an instant, and yet he noted the unspeakable tenderness which pervaded her attitude and movement. He was reminded of a picture of a Madonna he had seen in a gallery in New York. The crying of the child had ceased; there was scarcely any sound in the cabin, for Dolly's tread was as ...
— The Desired Woman • Will N. Harben

... finds a modern parallel. The story centers round the coming of love to the young people on the staff of a newspaper—and it is one of the prettiest, sweetest and quaintest of old fashioned love stories, * * * a rare book, exquisite in spirit and conception, full of delicate fancy, of tenderness, of delightful humor ...
— Janet of the Dunes • Harriet T. Comstock

... was either himself deceived or tried to deceive others in a harmless way. As an instance of this, he remembered declaring that he could "produce variously coloured polyanthuses and primroses by watering them with certain coloured fluids," though he knew all the time it was untrue. His feeling of tenderness towards all animals and insects is revealed in the fact that he could not remember—except on one occasion—ever taking more than one egg out of a bird's nest; and though a keen angler, as soon as he heard that he could kill the worms with salt and water he never ...
— Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Marchant

... has only its beginning here, leaders in society, and yet you wanted the nobility of that love which the Bible claims is the fruit of the spirit, we should have to say, we have 'labored in vain, and spent our strength for naught.' I wish I could see among you that tenderness of spirit that would shrink as sensitively from hurting another, as it does from being hurt yourselves. I am looking anxiously for it in this new year. I am looking hopefully for it; you will not disappoint ...
— Miss Ashton's New Pupil - A School Girl's Story • Mrs. S. S. Robbins

... such endearments upon the old man, already in his dotage, that he lost his principles and all self-control, and made himself very ridiculous by assuming the airs of a young lover. Henry had the imprudence to join in the mockery with which the court regarded his tenderness. This was an indignity which an old man could never forget. Instigated by his beautiful seducer, he became entirely unmindful of those principles of honor which had embellished his life, and in revenge invited a Roman Catholic general ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott

... quiet. For the "Laddie," as he had called Freddy since the tiny boy had been placed six years ago in his special care, was the idol of the good man's heart. He had washed and dressed and tended him in those early years with almost a woman's tenderness, and was watching with jealous anxiety as Laddie turned from childish ways into paths beyond his care. Dan Dolan was Brother Bart's especial fear—Dan Dolan, who belonged to the rough outside world ...
— Killykinick • Mary T. Waggaman

... Tall she was, and of imperial mien. Diamonds glistened in the coils of her raven hair. Her face was beautiful, her smiling lips and deep, soft eyes, full of sympathy and tenderness, seemed incapable of any stern expression of anger. A woman born to rule, born to lead, but not the woman ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner

... with an expression of simple and friendly sympathy. The tears came to her eyes, and she turned her face away. She for the first time had a sense of loss, a moving memory of her father's goodness to her, of an element of tenderness that had passed out of her life forever. And she felt abjectly ashamed—ashamed of her relief at the lifting of the burden of his long struggle against death, ashamed of her miserable wranglings with Martha and Billy's wife, ashamed of her forgetfulness of her father in the ...
— The Conflict • David Graham Phillips

... near Lymington, Hampshire, England. Her first work, "Ellen Fitzarthur," a poem, was published in 1820; and for more than twenty years her writings were published anonymously. In 1839 she was married to Mr. Southey, and survived him over ten years. Her poetry is graceful in expression, and full of tenderness, though somewhat melancholy. The following extract first appeared in 1822 in a collection entitled, "The ...
— McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey

... her, caressing her with infinite tenderness. Of all men in the world he was surely the happiest to have known this sweet and womanly Arithelli, the Arithelli that no one else had ever seen. He kissed the heavy, closed lids and stroked back ...
— The Hippodrome • Rachel Hayward

... only the outward stretch of her arm, only the extension of her hand, palm up, but it was as if her whole nature expanded toward him in tenderness. ...
— Trailin'! • Max Brand

... score, every possible means ought to be used to restore it to peace; and though her suspicions be perfectly groundless; though they be wild as the dreams of madmen; though they may present a mixture of the furious and the ridiculous, still they are to be treated with the greatest lenity and tenderness; and if, after all, you fail, the frailty is to be lamented as a misfortune, and not punished as a fault, seeing that it must have its foundation in a feeling towards you, which it would be the basest of ingratitude, and the most ferocious ...
— Advice to Young Men • William Cobbett

... no fashionable milliner to turn a yard of linen into one of those ugly caps, which are beautiful banners of Christian charity and womanly tenderness to the sick and suffering. The monster cap was made in an hour, and Miss Somerset put it on, and a thick veil, and then she no longer thought it necessary to sit out ...
— A Terrible Temptation - A Story of To-Day • Charles Reade

... other arguments to endeavour to make Aladdin change his mind; but he persisted in importuning his mother to execute his resolution, and she, out of tenderness, complied ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown

... slightly aquiline, his eyebrows were a trifle rugged, and his hair was brushed straight back from a high forehead. His face was that of a man who had seen rough service and enjoyed it keenly—a face full of fire and resolution with some subtle suggestion of tenderness. ...
— Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches • Joel Chandler Harris

... two, and then returned again to my father's. These journeys cemented a firm and intimate friendship between the prince my cousin and myself. The last time I saw him, he received me with greater demonstrations of tenderness than he had done at any time before; and resolving one day to give me a treat, he made great preparations for that purpose. We continued a long time at table, and after we had both supped; "Cousin," said he, "you will hardly be able to guess how I have been employed since your last departure from ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 1 • Anon.

... has got so far ahead of me that I hesitate to say much about a difficult morphological question—all the more, as old men like myself should be on their guard against over-much tenderness for their own speculations. And I am conscious of a great tenderness for those contained in my ancient memoir on the "Morphology of the Cephalous Mollusca." Certainly I am entirely disposed to agree with you that the ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 3 • Leonard Huxley

... to tell about the dogs they had possessed; they had regarded their dogs as useful servants and nothing more as long as they lived, and when dead they were forgotten. But Caleb had a feeling for his dogs which made it impossible for him to forget them or to recall them without that tenderness which accompanies the thought of vanished human friends. In a lesser degree he had something of this feeling for all animals, down even to the most minute and unconsidered. I recall here one of his anecdotes of a very small creature—a shrew, or ...
— A Shepherd's Life • W. H. Hudson

... tears issue from the same source, we are told, and the Gettysburg speech revealed a depth and a quality of tenderness that men had not, before, been able to recognize or appreciate. The absence of a sense of humor betokens shallowness in that it reveals an inability to feel deeply. People who feel deeply often laugh in order to forestall ...
— The Vitalized School • Francis B. Pearson

... my day had two poles, between which it vibrated. The little house in the rue Montparnasse was one, the rock of Guernsey the other. We spoke with awe of ‘Father Hugo’ and mentioned ‘Uncle Beuve’ with tenderness. The Goncourt brothers accepted Sainte-Beuve’s judgment on their work as the verdict of a ‘Supreme Court.’ Not a poet or author of that day but climbed with a beating heart the narrow staircase that led to the great writer’s library. ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory

... beauty. Don Roberto Windham, home again, after long months of wandering and hardship, stood beside the chair in which Senora Windham rested against a pillow. She had mended much since his return, and her eyes as she looked up at him held the same flashing, fiery tenderness which in the long ago had caused her to renounce Castilian traditions and become the bride of an Americano. At her feet upon a low stool sat her daughter, Inez, and Windham, as he looked down, was a little startled at her ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman

... Longfellow seems to have developed to its utmost the Latin element in our poetical diction, and to have found in words of a kindred stock the best interpretation of the Italian, while Mr. Norton instinctively chooses for the rendering of Dante's tenderness and simplicity a diction almost as purely Saxon as that of the Bible. This gives the prose of "The New Life" with all its proper archaic quality; and those who read the following sonnet can well believe that it is not unjust to the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various

... Next, next—my lord! You know you told me that the lady loved you, Had loved you with incautious tenderness. That if the young man, her betrothd husband, 50 Return'd, yourself, and she, and an unborn babe, Must perish. Now, my lord! ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... the Kingdom of Heaven: the Buddha teaches that birth, sickness and death are necessary conditions of existence and that disease, which like everything else has its origin in Karma, can be destroyed only when the cause is destroyed[398]. Nor do we find ascribed to him that love of children and tenderness towards the weak and erring which are beautiful features in the portrait of Christ[399]. He had no prejudices: he turned robust villains like Angulimala, the brigand, into saints and dined with prostitutes but one cannot associate him with simple friendly intercourse. When he accepted ...
— Hinduism and Buddhism, Vol I. (of 3) - An Historical Sketch • Charles Eliot

... others, Sir Francis Burdett made a personal attack on the Duke, in which he said that his administration showed how correct was his estimate of his own powers when he said he would be mad to think of being prime minister. That illustrious individual, he said, had been treated with much tenderness, because he had conferred the greatest benefits on his country; but if his services had been great his recompense had been great also. Mr. Brougham, also, made a most personal attack on the Duke on the ...
— Maxims And Opinions Of Field-Marshal His Grace The Duke Of Wellington, Selected From His Writings And Speeches During A Public Life Of More Than Half A Century • Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington

... on John almost as a physical pleasure, and also that his hands seemed nervous with delight as he unfolded the jewelled embroideries, and smoothed out the fine linen of the under vestments; and his voice, too, seemed to gain a sharp tenderness and emotive force, as he told how these were the gold vestments worn by the bishop, and only on certain great feast-days, and that these were the white vestments worn on days especially commemorative ...
— A Mere Accident • George Moore

... check Katie for feeling so keenly. She encouraged her; for she knew that a hard, indifferent child, who can see suffering and not care or be distressed over it, would make a hard woman; and she wanted her Katie to be full of love and tenderness for all, and especially ...
— Catherine Booth - A Sketch • Colonel Mildred Duff

... age" (what that age is, I cannot tell), think themselves privileged to giggle at the expense of their elder sister. Now, though there may be a degree of peevishness (and it is not to be wondered at) amongst the sisterhood, yet with them you will find the most sensitive tenderness of heart, a delicacy that quivers, like the aspen leaf, at a breath, and a kindliness of soul that a mother might envy—or rather, for envy, shall I not write imitate? But ah! if their history were told, what a chronicle would ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume VI • Various

... not plumb yet, little girl!" Henley was unconscious of the vast tenderness of his tone. "Don't cry; be the brave little trick you've ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben

... his new tenderness fleeing, frightened, into the inner recesses of his being. "I beg your pardon, I didn't know—Don't! I ...
— The Claim Jumpers • Stewart Edward White

... breaking over his face. She rose and answered his smile, and laid her hand in his. They looked in each other's eyes; and Lawrence Newt saw in Hope Wayne's the beauty of a girl that long ago, as a boy, he had loved; and in his own, Hope felt that tenderness which had ...
— Trumps • George William Curtis

... thirty-seventh Psalm, two verses are placed close together, the one speaking of the power and greatness of God, the other of His tenderness and ...
— Twilight And Dawn • Caroline Pridham

... imps of Fontainebleau, as of all beloved spots, are very long of life, and memory is piously unwilling to forget their orphanage. If anywhere about that wood you meet my airy bantling, greet him with tenderness. He was a pleasant lad, though now abandoned. And when it comes to your own turn to quit the forest, may you leave behind you such another; no Antony or Werther, let us hope, no tearful whipster, but, as becomes this not uncheerful and most active age ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... Why, there was a big pink affair, lined with silk, with bits of ribbon and lace all over it, which nearly drove me out of my head, for I would have defied mortal man to pack it so that it shouldn't muss. I had a funny little feeling of tenderness for everything, which made fussing over it all a pleasure, even while I felt all the time that I was doing a sneak act and had really no right to touch her belongings. I didn't find anything incriminating, and the posse reported the same result with the other baggage. If the letters were still in ...
— The Great K. & A. Robbery • Paul Liechester Ford

... holes and untied his feet and left him to scramble out best way he can. It'll take him longer'n it took me. Having the use of your hands helps quite a lot. And the use of your mouth to cuss a little. But he'll make it in an hour or two—I'm afraid." He looked at Bud, a half-shamed tenderness in his eyes. "It sure was hard to leave him like I did. It was like walking on your toes past a rattler curled up asleep somewhere, afraid you might spoil his nap. Only Pop wasn't asleep." He sat up and reached his hand for a cup of coffee which Eddie was ...
— Cow-Country • B. M. Bower

... in his connections with women. He made no secret of his lawless amours; and to his own wife, on her expostulating with him on his aberrations in this respect, he replied—that "wife" was a designation of rank and official dignity, not of tenderness and affection, or implying any claim of love on either side; upon which distinction he begged that she would mind her own affairs, and leave him to pursue such as he might himself be involved in by ...
— The Caesars • Thomas de Quincey



Words linked to "Tenderness" :   regard, concern, protectiveness, lovingness, soft spot, pain, compassionateness, respect, warmth, compassion, hurting, fond regard, fondness, tender, feeling, chafe, attachment, softheartedness, affectionateness, chafing



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