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More "Frivolous" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... June's mother, her prejudices against such frivolous and worldly use of a church blown away, was pigeoning around with William Bentley. Likewise Mrs. Mann, the miller out of sight and out of mind, stepped lightly with Horace, the lawyer, the sober black bag doubled up and stored in the pocket of his ...
— Claim Number One • George W. (George Washington) Ogden
... an education sufficient, with the prospect of riches before them, to keep them out of the way of harm. They have not had, in addition to any religious instruction, that taste given them for sublime pursuits, which should make them despise those which were frivolous. Thus many of the corruptive opinions, fashions, and amusements of the world have charmed them. Giving way to these, they have been overcome. When overcome, they have run into excesses, and for these excesses they have been disowned. But surely, with a better ...
— A Portraiture of Quakerism, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Clarkson
... through the story in atmosphere, in the little touches that give a story nationality. When the excellent Gretchen has been civilised she spends a great deal of time in the kitchen, and soon knows all the duties of the complete housekeeper; while, when the frivolous Eugenie becomes Braut she cannot cook at all. But frivolous as she is, she recognises that marriage is unthinkable without cooking, and straightway sets to work to learn. Then, too, the Backfisch is the ideal ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... of youth, of any youth, not completely empty-headed, frivolous or superficial, or was this the result of a distinct inheritance of two very different and opposing personalities, of so different nationalities and with an addition of even tartar blood? I don't know. The fact remains that she was constantly ...
— Nelka - Mrs. Helen de Smirnoff Moukhanoff, 1878-1963, a Biographical Sketch • Michael Moukhanoff
... the baronet, who, he perceived, was extremely nice and scrupulous in the punctilios of honour; and said it was a pity that two gentlemen should forfeit each other's friendship, much less expose their lives, for such a frivolous cause. "My dear count," cried the Westphalian, "I am charmed to find your sentiments so conformable to my own. In an honourable cause, I despise all danger; my courage, thank Heaven! has been manifested in many public engagements as well as in private rencounters; but, ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... I noticed a mischievous smile on his lips; and then, obeying, I believe, some whim of his frivolous nature rather than the needs of the position itself, he rose abruptly, spun round on his heels and, with a bow, ...
— The Blonde Lady - Being a Record of the Duel of Wits between Arsne Lupin and the English Detective • Maurice Leblanc
... Jane, crisply. "Bathtubs and linoleum, indeed! Wring them out of your Board! I shall give you a Sleepy Hollow couch with bide-a-wee cushions, and deep, cuddly armchairs and a lamp or two with shades as mellow as autumn woods! And some perfectly frivolous pictures which aren't in the least inspiring or uplifting,—and every single girl's room shall have a pink pincushion!" Then at their blankness, she softened. "Oh, very well,—you shall have your tubs and your linoleum, if you'll ...
— Jane Journeys On • Ruth Comfort Mitchell
... heavy moustache, and a bronzed cheek—rather grave in his manner, but still perfectly good-natured, and when he smiled showing a most handsome set of regular teeth. Clara seemed less pleased (I thought) at his coming than the others, and took pleasure in tormenting him by a thousand pettish and frivolous ways, which I was sorry for, as I thought he did not like it; and used to look half chidingly at her from time to time, but without any effect, for she just went on as before, and generally ended by taking my arm and saying, "Come away, Harry; you always are ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... her as I, who had thought to hide my head for the disgrace of it! But the daring of this son of ours doth make me gay! I am ready to give thee a compliment on thy bringing up, which often I had feared was over frivolous. And now, he hath the Republic before him, where ...
— A Golden Book of Venice • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... sort of echoes my voice found. They were so discouraging to me, and to the frivolous minority of pleasure-seekers, that I recommended lowering the price of admission so as to suit the means of any decent people who were willing to leave off money-grubbing and tear themselves from the charms of mutual instruction for one evening at least. The proposition was indignantly ...
— A Rogue's Life • Wilkie Collins
... slightest notice of these "Knights of the Butchered Face," as he called them, with his usual careless and frivolous manner, went over to the Princess and immediately began to shower upon her in the most effusive manner compliment after compliment, which she received with laughter. She rather prided herself on shocking ...
— L. P. M. - The End of the Great War • J. Stewart Barney
... who include a parrot in the portrait of some fine frivolous lady do so to heighten their interpretation of character. We all betray our natures, by the creatures we instinctively gather about us. One might know that Jefferson at Monticello would select high-bred saddle horses as his companions; that Cardinal Richelieu would find no pet so soothing, ...
— The Old Coast Road - From Boston to Plymouth • Agnes Rothery
... the child the use of his natural liberty, which, for a time at least, secures him from the vices of the slave. Bring me those harsh masters, and those fathers who are the slaves of their children, bring them both with their frivolous objections, and before they boast of their own methods let them for once ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... To feel the west-wind cool refreshment yield, That comes soft creeping o'er the flowery field, And shadow'd waters; in whose bushy side The Mountain-Bees their fragrant treasure hide Murmuring; and sings the lonely Thrush conceal'd!— Then, Ceremony, in thy gilded halls, Where forc'd and frivolous the themes arise, With bow and smile unmeaning, O! how palls At thee, and thine, my sense!—how oft it sighs For leisure, wood-lanes, dells, and water-falls; And feels th' ...
— Original sonnets on various subjects; and odes paraphrased from Horace • Anna Seward
... held that disobedience of a temporary restraining order issued for the purpose of maintaining existing conditions, pending the determination of the court's jurisdiction, is punishable as criminal contempt where the issue is not frivolous but substantial. Secondly, the Court held that an order issued by a court with jurisdiction over the subject matter and person must be obeyed by the parties until it is reversed by orderly and proper proceedings, even though the statute under which the order is issued is unconstitutional. ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... observation; and I soon discovered that she would regard a stare as a tribute. Why was it that her face was so beautiful, yet so displeasing? Each feature analyzed seemed perfection, yet the general effect was a mocking, ill-kept promise. The truth was soon apparent. The expression was not evil, but frivolous, silly, unredeemed by any genuine womanly grace. She giggled and flirted through the sublime symphony, till in exasperation I went out into the promenade under the open sky. In less than an hour I had my story "A Face Illumined." ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... of Henry III. and the chessboard of Louis XIII. are merely ridiculous. We must excuse well-intentioned monarchs when they only indulge themselves with frivolous and childish trifles. It is something to be thankful for if we have not to apply to them the adage—Quic-quid delirant reges plectuntur Achivi—'When kings go mad ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... obliged at first to write some translations from the French Romances, he could not but feel that this kind of literature suited neither the aspirations nor the temperament of the people among whom he lived. Turning from these frivolous stories, he sought in the works of Vincent de Beauvais and Pierre Comestor a wiser and more serious inspiration. His ambition was to place within reach of laymen the scientific, philosophic and religious thought of his time, so that they might obtain the same chances of acquiring ...
— Belgium - From the Roman Invasion to the Present Day • Emile Cammaerts
... specially adapted for zenith observations, viz. a zenith sector. The observations were made in conjunction with a friend of his, an amateur astronomer named Molyneux, and they were made at Kew. Molyneux was shortly made First Lord of the Admiralty, or something important of that sort, and gave up frivolous pursuits. So Bradley observed alone. They observed the star accurately early in the month of December, and then intended to wait six months. But from curiosity Bradley observed it again only about a week later. To his surprise, he found that it had already changed its position. He recorded ...
— Pioneers of Science • Oliver Lodge
... presumptuous to attempt it. This is not only because he is a familiar subject, the triumphs and sorrows of whose career have been often portrayed, but also because he presents so many contradictions in his life and character,—lofty yet degraded, earnest yet frivolous, an impersonation of noble deeds and sentiments, and also of almost every frailty which Christianity and humanity alike condemn. No great man has been more extravagantly admired, and none more bitterly assailed; but generally he is regarded as a fallen star,—a man with splendid ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord
... college just to get the name of it and to kill time, but when they got through they didn't rub along well at home; called taking an interest in the house beneath them and the pair that liked society frivolous; so they took a flat (I mean apartment—a flat is when it's less than a hundred a month and only has one bathroom), and set up for bachelor girls. The younger pair did society for a while, and poor Mrs. Townley chaperoned ...
— People of the Whirlpool • Mabel Osgood Wright
... broad, silent Oscarina, who was suspicious of her frivolous mistress for a month, so that Juanita Haydock was able to crow, "There, smarty, I told you you'd run into the Domestic Problem!" But Oscarina adopted Carol as a daughter, and with her as faithful to the kitchen as Bea had been, there was ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis
... Psammeticus, king of Egypt, being driven to the marshy parts of his kingdom, sent to consult the oracle of Latona, which answered that he should be restored by brass men coming from the sea. At the time, this answer appeared to him entirely frivolous; but certain Ionian soldiers, being obliged, some years after, to retire to Egypt, and appearing on the shore with their weapons and armor, all of brass, those who perceived them ran immediately to inform ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Vol. I, Books I-VII • Publius Ovidius Naso
... the room in which I stood by Monsieur Carmaignac returned vaguely upon my mind, drowning in sudden shadows the gaiety of the more frivolous stories with which he had followed them. I looked round me on the room that lay in ominous gloom, with an almost disagreeable sensation. I took my pistols now with an undefined apprehension that they might ...
— The Room in the Dragon Volant • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... on the Council of Regency, what a formidable weapon it must place in the hands of Principal Souza and his partisans. In itself this was enough to trouble a man in O'Moy's position. But there was more. Lieutenant Butler happened to be his brother-in-law, own brother to O'Moy's lovely, frivolous wife. Irresponsibility ran strongly in that branch ...
— The Snare • Rafael Sabatini
... good sir," replied Wilton, who was, in general, not without that capability of putting down intrusion at a word, which, strangely enough, is sometimes a talent of the lowest and meanest order of frivolous intellects, but is almost always found in the firm and decided—"they are, indeed, if I may judge by what you and I ...
— The King's Highway • G. P. R. James
... modestly, "that the epoch of flimsy and frivolous prospectuses had gone by; we are entering upon an era of science; we need an academical tone,—a tone of authority, which imposes ...
— Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau • Honore de Balzac
... pursuance of his instructions, Almendras deprived the principal persons among these loyalists of their lands and Indians, and exacted heavy contributions from them towards defraying the expences of the war. He likewise affronted and used them ill on all occasions, and even on very frivolous pretences. One Don Gomez de Luna, a principal person among the loyalists of La Plata, happened one day to observe in conversation at his own house, that the emperor Don Carlos must assuredly at length recover ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 5 • Robert Kerr
... a beggar, here a fine lady, there a zealous poor papist, and here a Protestant, two or three together, come to see the shew. I was afeard of my pocket being picked very much.... Their musique very good indeed, but their service I confess too frivolous, that there can be no zeal go along with it, and I do find by them themselves that they do run over their beads with one hand, and point and play and talk and make signs with the other in the midst of their masse. But all things very rich and beautiful; and I see the papists have the wit, most ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... frivolous sperit of meddlin' thet brings me hyar askin' ye questions thet seems imp'dent an' nosy. Hit's a dire need of safeguardin' ther peace of our folks—aye, an' thar lives, ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... was no hard Matter to persuade all but the Princess. But though she opposed it, it was resolved on, and the Day appointed for Marriage, and the Portion demanded; demanded only, but never to be paid, the best Part of it being spent. However, she put them off from Day to Day, by a thousand frivolous Delays; and when she saw they would have Recourse to Force, and all that her Magnificence would be at an End, if the Law should prevail against her; and that without this Sister's Fortune, she could not long support her ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume V • Aphra Behn
... constitutional argument, in which he proved that a state had absolute control of the subject, and could fix the term of all its officers for life if it so preferred, and that congress had no right to interfere. Many other equally frivolous points were made against our admission, which were debated until the eleventh day of May, 1858, when the federal doors were opened and Minnesota became a state. The act admitting the state cut down the congressional representation to two. The three gentlemen who had been elected ...
— The History of Minnesota and Tales of the Frontier • Charles E. Flandrau
... How amusing for me to see you work at that!" Lucy rose and brought her the new novel. Mrs. Bazalgette took it and sat down to it, but she could not fix her attention long on it. Ladies whose hearts are in dress have no taste for books, however frivolous; can't sit them for above a second or two. Mrs. Bazalgette fidgeted and fidgeted, and at last rose and left the room, book in hand. "How unkind I am!" ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... former days. Let it be considered for how many ages a great part of the world appears not to have thought at all; how many more they have been busied in forming systems and conjectures, while reason has been lost in a labyrinth of words, and they never seem to have suspected on what frivolous ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... best part of it all," Mat broke in. "She added that Beverly isn't a deserter, he's just 'gone out.' Why don't you believe it all, serious or frivolous?" ...
— Vanguards of the Plains • Margaret McCarter
... scenery and man, a sense of poetic melody and luxuriance as yet utterly unknown. They chimed in with all my discontent, my melancholy, my thirst after any life of action and excitement, however frivolous, insane, or even worse. I forgot the Corsair's sinful trade in his free and daring life; rather, I honestly eliminated the bad element—in which, God knows, I took no delight—and kept the good one. However that might be, the innocent—guilty pleasure grew on me day by day. ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al
... fisherman, in the old gay, frivolous tone, which I heard now for the first time during this conversation; "I can make her tenfold and abundant reparation—ah, you don't know—I say you don't understand these people. It's a disagreeable subject; let it go! But I'm very rich, you know," ...
— Cape Cod Folks • Sarah P. McLean Greene
... short time; that she suffered a fatal relapse, and that she died a lingering and a painful death. Mr. Welwyn (who, in after years, had a habit of vaingloriously describing his marriage as "a love-match on both sides") was really fond of his wife in his own frivolous, feeble way, and suffered as acutely as such a man could suffer, during the latter days of her illness, and at the terrible time when the doctors, one and all, confessed that her life was a thing to be despaired of. He burst into irrepressible passions ...
— After Dark • Wilkie Collins
... the truth, when known, Though sad, has yet its charms. And if, at times, The truth discussing, my opinions should Unwelcome be, or not be understood, I shall not grieve, indeed, because in me The love of fame will be extinguished quite; Of fame, that idol frivolous and blind; More blind by far ...
— The Poems of Giacomo Leopardi • Giacomo Leopardi
... revealed in the light of the street door. And this Lily Cardew lived in state, bowed to by flunkeys in livery, dressed and undressed—his Scotch sense of decorum resented this—by serving women. This Lily Cardew would wear frivolous ball-gowns, such things as he saw in the shop windows, considered money only as a thing of exchange, and had traveled all over Europe a ...
— A Poor Wise Man • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... is only folly; Wanton love is too unholy; Greedy love is covetous; Idle love is frivolous; But the gracious love is it That doth prove ...
— Tudor and Stuart Love Songs • Various
... a frivolous sort of thing to send one nowadays," said Lennard, dropping the paper to the floor after reading the telegram aloud. "I have some interest in the beds at Whitstable, and my agents, who don't seem to know that there's a war going on, ...
— The World Peril of 1910 • George Griffith
... toward the lower gates while carrying on this frivolous conversation. A man had just entered and was coming toward them. Both recognised the tall figure in grey flannels. Deppingham's emotion was that of undisguised amazement; Genevra's that of confusion and embarrassment. She barely had ...
— The Man From Brodney's • George Barr McCutcheon
... so, or I should not have tried to make you my friend. I have been seeing life, as it is called. I wanted to discover what changes had taken place in the world during my absence—as if the world could ever change. I found it deceitful, vain, and frivolous as before. I have been buying experience. The whole remainder of my possessions lies stowed away in those two chests. The most valuable portions are a few new books for you and I to read and discuss; and this time I have not forgotten a suit of shore going clothes, in case ...
— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston
... did Zouaves and other casual fowl aid Septimus on his way. Madame Bolivard in particular took them both under her ample wing, to the girl's unspeakable comfort. A brav' femme, Madame Bolivard, who not only could cook, but could darn stockings and mend linen, which Emmy's frivolous fingers had never learned to accomplish. She could also prescribe miraculous tisanes for trivial ailments, could tell the cards, and could converse volubly on any subject under heaven; the less she knew about it, the more she had to say, ...
— Septimus • William J. Locke
... eschewed all ordinary society, restricting his intimacies to very grave and learned companions, and refusing to engage in conversation of any useless kind. It would seem as if his gifts for painting were condemned as frivolous; at all events, we do not learn that he continued to practise them. In addition to the discharge of his theological duties, his life was occupied partly in ministering medically to the wants of the poor, and partly with his researches in astronomy and mathematics. His equipment in the matter of ...
— Great Astronomers • R. S. Ball
... exasperating, I nevertheless claim great credit for having kept my temper with him. However, it turned out to be impossible for me to overcome his insular prejudice. He always supposed me to be a frivolous, volatile person, and so I was unable to prove myself of any value to him in his ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr
... an indispensable prerequisite to fit a minister of Christ to prosecute successfully the work of a missionary in evangelizing the world. Kindly expostulate with such Christians, physicians and ministers of the gospel on the propriety of their conduct, and they meet you with a multitude of the most frivolous excuses. ...
— A Dissertation on the Medical Properties and Injurious Effects of the Habitual Use of Tobacco • A. McAllister
... way," he admitted, "this is disappointing. You are right. I have never felt the call of those other things. When I was a young man, I was frivolous simply when I felt inclined to turn from the big things of life for purposes of relaxation. When an alliance was suggested to me, I was content to accept it, but thank heavens I have been Oriental enough to keep women in my life where they belong. I ...
— The Kingdom of the Blind • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... consent to them. Almost the whole power of appointment, of jurisdiction, and of taxation was put into the royal hands, some stipulations being made against the conferring of benefices on immoral priests and against the frivolous imposition of ecclesiastical punishments. What the pope gained was the abandonment of the assertion made at Bourges of the supremacy of a general council. The Concordat was greeted by a storm of protest in France. The Sorbonne refused ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... the prisoners, released the whole of them, 474 in number, under the promise that an equal number of British prisoners should be returned. This engagement was shamefully broken by the Americans, who raised a number of frivolous excuses, among others that prisoners taken by the British were ill treated—an accusation which excited the indignation of the prisoners themselves, some of whom wrote to members of Congress, stating that nothing could be kinder or more courteous than ...
— True to the Old Flag - A Tale of the American War of Independence • G. A. Henty
... thought itself frivolous, and submitted meekly to hearing itself decried as vain, fluttered through the Paris Exposition, jogging the futilities of St. Gaudens, Rodin, and Besnard, the world that thought itself serious, and showed other infallible marks of coming ...
— The Education of Henry Adams • Henry Adams
... rules in brainsick men, When for so slight and frivolous a cause Such factious emulations shall arise! Good cousins both, of York and Somerset, Quiet yourselves, I ...
— King Henry VI, First Part • William Shakespeare [Aldus edition]
... with the candour of near relations. "I couldn't forget if I tried. First thing when I wake in the morning I think of all the bothersome duties I have to do in the day, and the last thing at night I am thinking of them still. But you are so frivolous, Mollie!" ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... drawing-room; her face no longer expressed the idle good-nature which used to make it pleasant to contemplate, it was thinner, less wholesome in colour, rather acid about the lips. Her manner was hurried, she seemed to be living in a whirl of frivolous excitements. Her taste in dress had deteriorated; she wore a lot of jewellery of a common kind, and her ...
— Demos • George Gissing
... represented by a radish, or the embonpoint of Monsieur Picard by a pumpkin. Where will all this unwholesome stuff be scattered in a few days? Flown away and dispersed. Eccentric amateurs will tear their hair at the impossibility of obtaining for their collections these frivolous witnesses of troubled times. I will make a few notes so as to diminish their despair as ...
— Paris under the Commune • John Leighton
... those who scoff at the schoolboy, calling him frivolous and shallow: Yet it was the schoolboy who said "Faith is believing what you know ain't so." ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... which escaped him in correspondence, regarding the corruption of the Papal Curia, closed every avenue to office. Men of less mark obtained the purple. The meanest and poorest bishoprics were refused to Sarpi. He was thrice denounced, on frivolous charges, to the Inquisition; but on each occasion the indictment was dismissed without a hearing. The General of the Servites accused him of wearing cap and slippers uncanonical in cut, and of not reciting the Salve Regina. After ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds
... agitated without ceasing by the storms of our passions! It is here that true philosophy brings us to a safe port, by a sure and easy passage; not like that of the schools, which, raising us on its airy and deceitful wings, and causing us to hover on the clouds of frivolous dispute, let us fall without any light or instruction in the same place where she ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VIII (of X) - Continental Europe II. • Various
... individual capacity, in all the various pursuits of life. These deeper thoughts, these higher qualities, surprised him as they showed themselves, whenever occasion called them forth, under the light, gay, and frivolous exterior which she had at first seemed to present. Middleton often amused himself with surmises in what rank of life Alice could have been bred, being so free of all conventional rule, yet so nice and delicate in her perception of the true proprieties ...
— Sketches and Studies • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... scenes," chimed in Specht; "frivolous in the extreme, mere love-making and dueling—for which we know Wohlfart has always had a turn. Some fine morning we shall have him going out with pistols under his arm, and not returning ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... dancing-parties, of which she gave three or four a season, her husband would show himself below for a few moments for civility's sake, and then retire to a remote den on an upper floor, well shut out from the sounds of his wife's frivolous measures, but accessible to a few habitues of age and tastes approximating ...
— On the Stairs • Henry B. Fuller
... quite plainly magic at work. Mademoiselle next morning was a changed governess. Her cheeks were pink, her lips were red, her eyes were larger and brighter, and she had done her hair in an entirely new way, rather frivolous and ...
— The Enchanted Castle • E. Nesbit
... Similarly, in the building up of a university, a government department, a state, or a social order, consecutive and disciplined persistence in established ways is a requisite of progress. Without such continuous organization of efforts toward fixed goals, action becomes frivolous and fragmentary, a wind along a waste. The history of the English people has elicited the admiration of philosophers and historians because it has been such a gradual and deliberate movement, such a measured ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman
... other means than that of awakening their dormant minds. The voter who does not care enough about the election to go to the poll is the very man who, if he can vote without that small trouble, will give his vote to the first person who asks for it, or on the most trifling or frivolous inducement. A man who does not care whether he votes is not likely to care much which way he votes; and he who is in that state of mind has no moral right to vote at all; since, if he does so, a vote which is not the expression of a conviction, counts for as much, and goes as far ...
— Considerations on Representative Government • John Stuart Mill
... alone is the sovereign arbitrator of life and death; that he alone can give life to men, and restore it to them after he has taken it from them—the question that we here propose appears unseasonable and absolutely frivolous, since it ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet
... his ponderous tome, much marvelling in his mind how a person possessed of the lawyer's erudition could give his mind to these frivolous toys. But the Counsellor, indifferent to the high character for learning which he was trifling away, filled himself a large glass of Burgundy, and, after preluding a little with a voice somewhat the worse for the wear, gave ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... again: "But when the victims of man's cruelty are not birds or beasts but our own countrywomen, doomed by the hundred thousand to a life of unutterable shame and hopeless misery, then and then only the general average tone of young men becomes hard and brutally callous or frivolous with a kind of coarse frivolity not exhibited in relation to any other form of human suffering." At the present moment thousands of young people in our great cities possess no other knowledge of this grave social ...
— A New Conscience And An Ancient Evil • Jane Addams
... good and ill, unbridled in temper and tongue, reckless in insult and wit, Henry's delight was in the display of an empty and prodigal magnificence, his one notion of government was a dream of arbitrary power. But frivolous as the king's mood was, he clung with a weak man's obstinacy to a distinct line of policy; and this was the policy not of Hubert or Langton but of John. He cherished the hope of recovering his heritage across the sea. He believed in the absolute power of the Crown; and looked on the pledges ...
— History of the English People, Volume II (of 8) - The Charter, 1216-1307; The Parliament, 1307-1400 • John Richard Green
... what he had for dinner there, and forgets everything about Venice except his tea, his temporary absence from England is not exactly a disaster, and the Italians are glad to have him. Craddock of Balliol, who spoke before the man from London, was crushed for dealing with the subject in a frivolous manner, but I was not persuaded that a serious debate about English Tourists would make them any less humorous or plentiful. That debate did me good in one way, for I was so angry with this man of distinction that I wished I could have told him what I thought, and for three consecutive mornings ...
— Godfrey Marten, Undergraduate • Charles Turley
... "truly that idea never occurred to me! Take my advice, my dear Nelville, if you wish to do foolish things let them be such as will admit of reparation; but as for marriage, you must always consider propriety. I appear frivolous in your eyes, nevertheless I wager that in the conduct of life I shall be more reasonable than you." "I believe so too," answered Lord Nelville, and said not ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael
... lovely view, from the Eugen-Platz, of the city which lies below it. But after all, the Schloss-Garten and concerts to the contrary notwithstanding, there is an atmosphere about the law schools, museums, and collections of Stuttgart, which led frivolous pleasure-seekers like us to depart on the second ...
— Abroad with the Jimmies • Lilian Bell
... the Poles in language still more harsh; in his opinion they are vain in fortune, cringing in misfortune, capable of anything for the sake of money, spendthrifts, frivolous, without judgment, always ready to join or abandon a party without cause. No doubt there is much exaggeration in these statements; but that there is also much truth in them, is proved by the accounts of many writers, native and foreign, who cannot be accused of being prejudiced against Poland. ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... wrote the word "friend" he thought of Silin. He read the verses over to himself in an undertone, and was surprised at what had come from his pen. This scepticism, this indifference, this almost frivolous lack of faith—how did it all agree with his principles? How did it agree with what he had said at Markelov's? He thrust the copybook into the table drawer and went back to bed. But he did not fall asleep until dawn, when the larks had already begun ...
— Virgin Soil • Ivan S. Turgenev
... the sun seemed to penetrate to the very bottom. Dragon-flies and spiders skated merrily about, eluding the ever-watchful fishes lying in wait amid forests of lacy seaweeds and coral. Tall, stately palms, towering above their mates, scorned to seek their reflections in the clear depths, but frivolous bamboo and nipa-palms swayed gently out over the water, rustling and chattering with delight ...
— The Adventures of Piang the Moro Jungle Boy - A Book for Young and Old • Florence Partello Stuart
... her many, many thoughts there were few that were not sad. Her brother was her ideal of manly excellence and wisdom, and no exercise of charity on her part could make the bride that he had chosen seem other than weak, frivolous, vain. She shrank heartsick from the contemplation of the future, repeating rather in sorrow and wonder, than in anger, "How could he be so blind, so mad?" To her it was incomprehensible, that with his eyes open he could have placed ...
— Janet's Love and Service • Margaret M Robertson
... again commenced. The band gave place to the Piper, and he marched out to the tune of "The Cock o' the North," looking exactly like a great giant humming-bird, his plumage flashing in the sunlight, as he went buzzing around the deck. Harry Lauder and the doctor and two or three others of the frivolous young folk in the kilts went away off to where the minister could not see them and danced a Highland reel. The people who did not quite approve of public picnics gathered in a group by themselves, Miss Annabel Armstrong ...
— The End of the Rainbow • Marian Keith
... said Mr. Kennedy; "and as for petting, I do not understand it in reference to grown persons. Children may be petted, and dogs,—though that too is bad; but what you call petting for grown persons is I think frivolous and almost indecent." Phineas could not help thinking of Lord Chiltern's opinion that it would have been wise to have left Mr. Kennedy in the ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... of nature, by abridging or scanting those means, which books freely permitted are, both to the trial of virtue and the exercise of truth? It would be better done, to learn that the law must needs be frivolous, which goes to restrain things, uncertainly and yet equally working to good and to evil. And were I the chooser, a dream of well-doing should be preferred before many times as much the forcible ...
— Areopagitica - A Speech For The Liberty Of Unlicensed Printing To The - Parliament Of England • John Milton
... of the country was worse than the first. The mile-wide stockroute from Wilcannia to Hay was strewn with carcases of travelling sheep along the whole two hundred and fifty miles. On one part of the route, some frivolous person had stooked the dried mummies (they were lying so thick) in order that drovers and boundary men might have the pleasure of cantering on ahead to run the little mobs out of the way. And as human nature, thus sold, never grudges to others participation ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... justify her in appealing to them. A cruel, selfish, or licentious man is an abhorrent member of the community; but, after all, his actions are no worse in the long run than those of the woman who is content to be a parasite on others, who is cold, selfish, caring for nothing but frivolous pleasure and ignoble ease. The law of worthy effort, the law of service for a worthy end, without regard to whether it brings pleasure or pain, is the only right law of life, whether for man or for woman. The man must not be selfish; nor, ...
— Theodore Roosevelt - An Autobiography by Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt
... must not be misled by his exclusive references to poesia, as closer observation shows that he means thereby the whole mental activity of the poet-scholars. This it is whose enemies he so vigorously combats—the frivolous ignoramuses who have no soul for anything but debauchery; the sophistical theologian to whom Helicon, the Castalian fountain, and the grove of Apollo were foolishness; the greedy lawyers, to whom poetry was a superfluity, since no ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... his head. "I don't do frivolous things like that. But I heard Jim wheedling blue ribbon out of Norah this morning, and I don't fancy he has much use for it ordinarily. ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... course of the last century, at least will bear out one side of the contrast as I have drawn it. What could come, on the other hand, of the ideal systems of education which have fascinated the imagination of this age, could they ever take effect, and whether they would not produce a generation frivolous, narrow-minded, and resourceless, intellectually considered, is a fair subject for debate; but so far is certain, that the universities and scholastic establishments, to which I refer, and which did little more than bring together first boys and then youths in large numbers, ...
— English: Composition and Literature • W. F. (William Franklin) Webster
... constituencies to select Socialists as their candidates. No person, however, can obtain the support of the Fabian Society or escape its opposition, merely by calling himself a Socialist or Social-Democrat. As there is no Second Ballot in England, frivolous candidatures give great offence and discredit the party in whose name they are undertaken, because any third candidate who is not well supported will not only be beaten himself but may also involve in his defeat the better of the two candidates competing with ...
— The History of the Fabian Society • Edward R. Pease
... monastery, taking upon himself the vows of celibacy. It was here that his natural fervor and poetic enthusiasm conceived expression as a missionary. A longing to convert the uncivilized heathen succeeded his frivolous earthly passion, and a desire to explore and develop unknown fastnesses continually possessed him. In his flashing eye and sombre exterior was detected a singular commingling of the discreet Las Casas and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 72, October, 1863 • Various
... It's just the same with their jewels; they still have diamonds and pearls, in particular, which are very fine, but they are so wretchedly, so heavily mounted that they look frightful. And if you only knew how ignorant and frivolous these women are, despite all their conceit! Everything is on the surface with them, even religion: there's nothing beneath. I looked at them eating at the buffet. Oh! they at least have fine appetites. This evening some decorum was observed, there wasn't too much ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... worst, of taste, of aesthetics. In thus bringing down his repugnance to nakedness to so low a plane he had indeed rendered it generally acceptable, but at the same time he had deprived it of high sanction. His profound horror of nakedness was out of relation to the frivolous grounds on which ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... jovial tap-room, with Mr. Pickwick and his faithful Sancho Weller. I am sure that a man who, a hundred years hence should sit down to write the history of our time, would do wrong to put that great contemporary history of "Pickwick" aside as a frivolous work. It contains true character under false names; and, like "Roderick Random," an inferior work, and "Tom Jones" (one that is immeasurably superior), gives us a better idea of the state and ways of the people than one could gather from any ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... the last term of 1910, when he was in the Modern Upper V, he was described as "a very capable boy with great abilities." The next report, when he was in the Remove, complained of his "frivolous attitude" in the Physics classes, but "otherwise he has worked well and made good progress." In June, 1911, he passed the Senior School Examination with honours, winning distinction in English, French and Latin—a remarkable achievement for a boy who had only just turned ...
— War Letters of a Public-School Boy • Henry Paul Mainwaring Jones
... day withdrawn from frivolous pursuits would, if properly employed, enable a person of ordinary capacity, to go far toward ...
— The Girl Wanted • Nixon Waterman
... should know her own mind. Notwithstanding, Betty felt uneasy and uncomfortable. They had been hearing things not to Frederick Howard's credit in the village, and Edith had always been unlike the rest of their Sunrise Camp Fire girls. She was vainer and more frivolous and dreadfully tired of working in a millinery shop in Woodford. This much she had confided to Betty after coming to live in the Ashton house. And both Rose Dyer and Miss McMurtry were afraid that Edith might for this reason accept the ...
— The Camp Fire Girls in the Outside World • Margaret Vandercook
... idea of the Divinity that he should be clothed with that weak, vain passion of man, called glory: the being who had the faculty of producing such a system as it operated in nature, could hardly be supposed to have such a frivolous passion as we know this to be in our fellows: and as we can never reason but after what we do know, it would appear nothing can be more inconsistent than thus continually heaping together our own feeble, inconsistent views, and ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 2 • Baron D'Holbach
... everything in her favor. His praises increased Raoul's friendship twofold. Then came the question of gallantry and love affairs. Under this head, also, Bragelonne had much more to hear than to tell. He listened attentively and fancied that he discovered through three or four rather frivolous adventures, that the count, like himself, had a secret to hide in the depths of ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... New England for greater efforts of melody than are to be found in the simple ballads supposed to originate with the plantation negro, who, in addition to his other burdens, is thus chosen to assume the onerous one of Northern song, as being the only creature frivolous enough to indulge in vain carolling. If we can scarcely affirm that the Americans are yet a musical people, that they would be is an undeniable fact, and one constantly evinced in their lavish support of artists, from ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 1 January 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... He ventured to condemn the impetuosity of the baronet, who, he perceived, was extremely nice and scrupulous in the punctilios of honour; and said it was a pity that two gentlemen should forfeit each other's friendship, much less expose their lives, for such a frivolous cause. "My dear count," cried the Westphalian, "I am charmed to find your sentiments so conformable to my own. In an honourable cause, I despise all danger; my courage, thank Heaven! has been manifested in many public engagements as well as in private rencounters; but, to break ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... I'm such a frivolous person my husband never tells me his affairs or wishes. The rugs might be in rags and he would never ask me to replenish. I understand now so much more clearly than ever before why business men and women are prone ...
— The Gorgeous Girl • Nalbro Bartley
... Grave enough was that look to expel every frivolous feeling from the heart of Elsie,—at least, so long as she remained under its influence. It was something to trust another as Jacqueline intended now to trust her friend. It was a touching sight to see her seeking her old confidence, and appearing to rely on it, while she ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, Issue 35, September, 1860 • Various
... as on private-owned lines, amongst tram-car drivers and conductors, and even amongst city scavengers. Lightning strikes without any notice are of growing frequency. Some are short-lived, others very obstinate, dragging on for weeks and months. Some are grotesquely frivolous, others by no means lack justification or excuse. Intimidation often not unaccompanied by violent assaults on non-strikers is an ugly feature common to most of them. They sometimes lead to very serious riots and bloodshed. They have played ...
— India, Old and New • Sir Valentine Chirol
... the people under Lorenzo the Magnificent. The next year the people were induced to make a great bonfire, in the spacious square before the City Hall, of all the "vanities" which stood in the way of a godly life—frivolous and immoral books, pictures, jewels, ...
— An Introduction to the History of Western Europe • James Harvey Robinson
... hands; what you would have them be, they shall be, if you not only desire to have them so, but deserve to have them so; for they are but mirrors in which you will see yourselves imaged. If you are frivolous, they will be so also; if you have no understanding of the scope of their duty, they also will forget it; they will listen,—they can listen,—to no other interpretation of it than that uttered from your lips. ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... our brackets and diamond plates, and there's a sort of northwestward pull that follows the twist, which seriously annoys us. We mention this because we happened to cost a great deal of money, and we feel sure that the owner would not approve of our being treated in this frivolous way." ...
— McClure's Magazine, March, 1896, Vol. VI., No. 4. • Various
... something else; you might study law or diplomacy, or go into civil service. Nobody had docketed and pigeon-holed you, in fact. Take advantage of your social maiden fame to walk alone and grasp honors. Enjoy all pleasures gladly, even frivolous pleasures. I wish you luck, Lucien; I shall enjoy your success; you will be like a second self for me. Yes, in my own thoughts I shall live your life. You shall have the holiday life, in the glare of the world and among the swift working springs ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... concluded amidst profound silence. The relatives went forward first to take farewell of the corpse. Then followed the numerous guests, who had come to render the last homage to her who for so many years had been a participator in their frivolous amusements. After these followed the members of the Countess's household. The last of these was an old woman of the same age as the deceased. Two young women led her forward by the hand. She had not strength enough to bow down to the ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... astounded Claudia by the freest possible assumption, and by the most sweeping criticism of the established order of things as it affected women. The general conversation of the members seemed, however, no less frivolous, though much less restrained, than she had heard in ...
— The Empire Annual for Girls, 1911 • Various
... are so frivolous and fickle that they are as far removed from real defects as from ...
— Reflections - Or, Sentences and Moral Maxims • Francois Duc De La Rochefoucauld
... any rate—for Ignacz was a hard man and a stern father, and God only knew what he might not do if he was roused. Leopold did not want Klara hurt—not yet, at any rate—not until he was quite sure that she meant to play him altogether false. She was vain and frivolous, over-fond of dress and of queening it over the peasant girls of the village, but there was no real harm in her. She was immensely flattered by the young Count's attentions and over-ready to accept his presents ...
— A Bride of the Plains • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... virtue: and I have heard say, that when hints were given to him of the evident partiality which the Princess showed for the equerry, his answer was a stern command never more to be troubled on the subject. 'The Princess is light-minded,' he said; 'she was brought up at a frivolous Court; but her folly goes not beyond coquetry: crime is impossible; she has her birth, and my name, and her children, to defend her.' And he would ride off to his military inspections and be absent for weeks, or retire to his suite of apartments, and remain closeted ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Catherine when not yet seventeen years of age, a raw and immature boy, and he made his wife, Juliana of Coburg, intensely miserable. After a first separation in the year 1799, she went back permanently to her German home in 1801, the victim of a frivolous intrigue, in the guilt of which she was herself involved. An attempt made by Constantine in 1814 to win her back to his hearth and home broke down on her firm opposition. During the time of this tragic marriage Constantine's ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 7, Slice 2 - "Constantine Pavlovich" to "Convention" • Various
... little frivolous tune Which he felt to be pulsing with ecstasy, For he thought that success always followed desire, Such a ...
— A Dome of Many-Coloured Glass • Amy Lowell
... namely, that, the parts and organs of the old constitution of France were sound, and only needed moderate invigoration, is absolutely mistaken and untenable. There was not a single chamber in the old fabric that was not crumbling and tottering. The court was frivolous, vacillating, stone deaf and stone blind; the gentry were amiable, but distinctly bent to the very last on holding to their privileges, and they were wholly devoid both of the political experience that only comes of practical responsibility ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... Pastorals tis not so easy to give an account: For as to the end of Poetry in General: The Enemies of Poets run out into a large common place, and loudly tell us that Poetry is frivolous and unprofitable. Excellent men! that love profit perchance, but have no regard for Honesty and Goodness; who do not know that all excellent Arts sprang from ...
— De Carmine Pastorali (1684) • Rene Rapin
... special felicities of his own nature, to make the most, in no mean or vulgar sense, of the few years of life; few, indeed, for the attainment of anything like general perfection! With the brevity of that sum of years his mind is exceptionally impressed; and this purpose makes him no frivolous dilettante, but graver than other men: his scheme is not that of a trifler, but rather of one who gives a meaning of his own, yet a very real one, to those old words—Let us work while it is day! He has a strong apprehension, also, of the beauty of the visible things around him; their fading, momentary, ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume Two • Walter Horatio Pater
... our well-founded alarm, there were some moments in which we sought to amuse ourselves, or, to use a common expression, to kill time. Cards afforded us a source of recreation, and even this frivolous amusement served to develop the character of Bonaparte. In general he was not fond of cards; but if he did play, vingt-et-un was his favourite game, because it is more rapid than many others, and because, in short, ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... addressed the stranger in a manly, business-like way—a transition which, though it might seem a little abrupt, did not appear constrained, and, indeed, served to show that his recent levity was less the habit of a frivolous nature, than the frolic condescension of ...
— The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville
... traits almost absolutely opposite; the elder, Manuel, was of a frivolous, slothful, indolent disposition, and would neither study nor go to school. He was fond of romping about the fields and engaging in bold, dangerous escapades. The characteristic trait of Juan, the younger brother, was a morbid sentimentalism ...
— The Quest • Pio Baroja
... new world into which David's leap out of the baggage car had plunged him. He was picturesquely of the wild; his face was darkly bearded; his ivory-white teeth shining as he smiled a welcome; his tricoloured, Hudson's Bay coat of wool, with its frivolous red fringes, thrown open at the throat; the bushy tail of his fisher-skin cap hanging over a shoulder—and with these things his voice rattling forth, in French and half Indian, his joy that Father Roland ...
— The Courage of Marge O'Doone • James Oliver Curwood
... have left from the study of routes and hotels I spend on guide-books. Now I'm sure that if any one of the men I know were here, he could tell me all that is necessary as we walk along the streets. I don't say it in a frivolous or sentimental spirit in the least, but I do affirm that there is hardly any juncture in life where one isn't better off for having a man about. I should never dare divulge this to aunt Celia, for she doesn't think men very nice. She excludes them from ...
— A Cathedral Courtship • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... fingers, a haunting, tender, world-sorrow, full of questionings—a dark mystery of moonless, starlit nature—exhales itself in nocturnes, in impromptus, in preludes—in mere waltzes and mazourkas even! But waltzes and mazourkas such as the most frivolous would never dream of dancing to. A capricious, charming sorrow—not too deep for tears, if one be at all inclined to shed them—so delicate, so fresh, and yet so distinguished, so ethereally civilized and worldly and ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al
... the assumption of a reciprocal influence of terrestrial bodies could not be foreign, nor did this cease to correspond with a higher view of nature, until astrologers overstepped the limits of human knowledge with frivolous and mystical calculations. ...
— The Black Death, and The Dancing Mania • Justus Friedrich Karl Hecker
... said: "In view of the complete power of Congress over foreign commerce and its authority to prohibit the introduction of foreign articles recognized and enforced by many previous decisions of this court, the contentions are so devoid of merit as to cause them to be frivolous."[484] In Brolan v. United States[485] the Court again stressed the absolute nature of Congress's power over foreign commerce, saying: "In the argument reference is made to decisions of this court dealing with the subject of the power of Congress to regulate interstate ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... since, when all's said, you're too noble to stoop to the frivolous cant About crimes irresistible, virtues ...
— The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume IV • Elizabeth Barrett Browning
... doing my best,' pursued Mrs. Chittle, 'to cure her of her shyness. She is really afraid of people—and it's such a pity. She says that the things people talk about don't interest her; but all people are not frivolous—are they, Mr. Lord?' Horace hoped not; and presently out of mere good-nature he tried to converse with the young lady in a way that should neither alarm her shyness nor prove distasteful to her intelligence. But with very little success. From time to time the girl glanced ...
— In the Year of Jubilee • George Gissing
... banker, and for months she avoided his dangerous contribution. But always there came a black day when a desire to read the novel seized her, and she hurried home with it beneath her rokelay. This year the dashing banker's choice was a lady's novel called "I Love My Love with an A," and it was a frivolous tale, those being before the days of the new fiction, with its grand discovery that women have an equal right with men to grow beards. The hero had such a way with him and was so young (Miss Ailie could not stand them a day ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie
... would hold himself in hand that he was not as other men, and then gives thanks to God for this: But the conclusion was most vilely false, and therefore the praise for it could not but be foolish, vain, and frivolous. Whence I infer, that if to use such language in prayer is dangerous, then to affect the use thereof is yet more dangerous: Prayer must be made with humble hearts, and sensible words, and of that we ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... in human nature, which often gives a bigot a rake for a daughter, and makes a frivolous woman the mother of a narrow pietist; that rule of contraries, which, in all probability, is the "resultant" of the law of similarities, drew Victurnien to Paris by a desire to which he must sooner or later have yielded. Brought up as he had been in the old-fashioned provincial ...
— The Collection of Antiquities • Honore de Balzac
... public, and be tired to death with receiving frivolous complaints and petitions, and will not even have the satisfaction of doing justice; for, whether a cause be just or not, his ministers will take care that the decision shall be according to ...
— Hindoo Tales - Or, The Adventures of Ten Princes • Translated by P. W. Jacob
... as these mysteries were in the commencement, they afterwards lapsed into all the immoralities of pagan worship. But to give such a remote, and even such a noble, origin to the frivolous deism of modern Masonry is about as absurd as to say that men were at ...
— Alvira: the Heroine of Vesuvius • A. J. O'Reilly
... flowery field, And shadow'd waters; in whose bushy side The Mountain-Bees their fragrant treasure hide Murmuring; and sings the lonely Thrush conceal'd!— Then, Ceremony, in thy gilded halls, Where forc'd and frivolous the themes arise, With bow and smile unmeaning, O! how palls At thee, and thine, my sense!—how oft it sighs For leisure, wood-lanes, dells, and water-falls; And feels th' untemper'd ...
— Original sonnets on various subjects; and odes paraphrased from Horace • Anna Seward
... the frivolous interruption, and went on speaking to the girl, and now there was something pleasantly cajoling ...
— Within the Law - From the Play of Bayard Veiller • Marvin Dana
... transported across the continent. Their bulk was not in the least commensurable with their number, there were hundreds of them sometimes, for they were written on the thinnest tissue paper to be procured. There were no silly love missives among them nor frivolous correspondence of any kind; business letters only, that demanded the most rapid transit possible and warranted the immense expense attending their journey, found their way by the ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman
... not by mere danglers, but by men of suitable views and pretensions: but nothing to my mind can be more miserable than the situation of a poor girl, who, after spending not only the interest, but the solid capital of her small fortune in dress, and frivolous extravagance, fails in her matrimonial expectations (as many do merely from not beginning to speculate in time). She finds herself at five or six-and-thirty a burden to her friends, destitute of the means of rendering herself independent (for the girls I speak of ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... been his custom to speak so much. Tell me then, Pentuer, and record this: Is it proper that the heir to the throne should express his will before the army? Only a pharaoh may act thus, or a traitor, or a frivolous stripling, who with the same heedlessness will do hasty deeds or belch ...
— The Pharaoh and the Priest - An Historical Novel of Ancient Egypt • Boleslaw Prus
... melted and grew "beautifully less," until at last but one was left. This solitary individual, however, seemed to concentrate in his own person all the diligence, application, and punctuality of his frivolous fellows. At the conclusion of the last lecture of the course the professor approached him and praised him for these admirable qualities, and proceeded to inquire of him, "What is your name, my young friend?" No answer. "What country are you from?" Absolute silence. The matter was soon elucidated, ...
— Anecdotes & Incidents of the Deaf and Dumb • W. R. Roe
... guess what the fans are for; they are to put up as screens to shield the faces of the monks when they pass a woman, for they are not supposed ever to look at a woman, it is too frivolous! When the begging-bowls are full they generally contain a strange mixture, for everyone pours in anything he or she happens to have; there will certainly be rice, both cooked and raw, peas, perhaps fish, and this ...
— Round the Wonderful World • G. E. Mitton
... ruined its thousands. Thousands of the most beautiful women are destitute of common sense and common humanity. No gift from Heaven is so general and so widely abused by woman as the gift of Beauty. In about mine cases in ten it makes her silly, senseless, thoughtless, giddy, vain, proud, frivolous, selfish, low, and mean. I think I have seen more girls spoiled by Beauty than by any other one thing. "She is beautiful, and she knows it," is as much as to say she is spoiled. A beautiful girl is very likely to believe she was made to be looked at; and so she sets herself up for a ...
— Aims and Aids for Girls and Young Women • George Sumner Weaver
... which we should like to colonize with the surplus talent of the metropolis. That surplus talent comprises scores of men, waiting on Providence, feeding on foolish speculations, hanging on the skirts of some frivolous circle, doing nothing there, or worse than nothing, spoiling and wasting daily, who, planted out into a sphere of more favourable opportunities, are capable of being a blessing to a neighbourhood. However, it is not a case for violent measures. We do not propose that London ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19, Issue 547, May 19, 1832 • Various
... easiness of life can atone, and which show decadence and corruption in the nation just as much if they are produced by selfishness and coldness and ease-loving laziness among comparatively poor people as if they are produced by vicious or frivolous luxury in the rich. If the men of the nation are not anxious to work in many different ways, with all their might and strength, and ready and able to fight at need, and anxious to be fathers of families, and if ...
— The Woman Who Toils - Being the Experiences of Two Gentlewomen as Factory Girls • Mrs. John Van Vorst and Marie Van Vorst
... eye! How it spins! And you look at it, thinking: 'But whither, my friend, Do you hurry so quickly? On some hasty errand Of yours, or another's? Perhaps with a pass From the Tsar—Little Father, You carry a message 570 From him.' I was standing And bursting with laughter! Well, I am a drunken And frivolous peasant, The rats in my corn-loft Are starving from hunger, My hut is quite bare, Yet I call God to witness That I would not take Such an office upon me 580 For ten hundred roubles Unless I were certain That he was the last, That I bore with ...
— Who Can Be Happy And Free In Russia? • Nicholas Nekrassov
... eyes—sometimes tears were in them. I had had good reason to understand his soul, which is noble, grand, and generous to the core. I thought he might not like to be bound by benefits to a friend who was six years younger than himself, unless he could repay them. I was careless and frivolous, just as a young fellow is, and I knew I was certain to ruin myself at play, or get inveigled by some woman, and Paz and I might then be parted; and though I had every intention of always looking out for him, I knew I might sometime ...
— Paz - (La Fausse Maitresse) • Honore de Balzac
... sometimes a broad-leaved hat of yellow straw, with floating ribbon and a bunch of feathery grasses perched bewitchingly upon the brim. She had the dog Pluto with her always, and generally a volume of some new novel under her arm. I am ashamed to be obliged to confess that this young heiress was very frivolous, and liked reading novels better than improving her mind by the perusal of grave histories, or by the study of the natural sciences. She spent day after day in happy idleness—reading, sketching, playing, singing, talking, sometimes gaily ...
— Henry Dunbar - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... spirituous liquors should be kept under care of the nurses, that no drams in any case whatever should be dispensed to persons in common health, and that frivolous excuses of being unwell should not be admitted. Union ...
— The Communistic Societies of the United States • Charles Nordhoff
... that in flourishing Universities there will be gathered together a good number, who will be no dull spectators, but acute judges of these controversies and who will weigh for what they are worth the frivolous answers of our adversaries, I will gladly await this meeting-day, as one minded to lead forth against wooded hillocks [cf. Cicero in Catilinam ii. 11], covered with unarmed tramps, the nobility and strength of ...
— Ten Reasons Proposed to His Adversaries for Disputation in the Name • Edmund Campion
... the day. The author occasionally stoops to a pun, and, like that which Hood made in the hearing of Thackeray, the pun is not good. Indeed the novel, in its view of the decay of the Border, the ruined Laird, the frivolous foolish society of the Well, taking the place of sturdy William of Deloraine, and farmers like Scott's grandfather, makes a picture of decadence as melancholy as "Redgauntlet." "Not here, O Apollo, are haunts meet for thee!" Strangely enough, among the features of the time, ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... with one of these dieaway, attitudinizing, frivolous, married coquettes of the modern drawing-room, her heaven an opera box on the night of Meyerbeer's "Robert le Diable," the ten commandments an inconvenience, taking arsenic to improve the complexion, and her appearance a confused result of belladonna, ...
— The Wedding Ring - A Series of Discourses for Husbands and Wives and Those - Contemplating Matrimony • T. De Witt Talmage
... British preoccupations must largely fall away and he must be haunted by other and more dreadful specters. Paris was a nightmare, and every one there was morbid. A sense of impending catastrophe overhung the frivolous scene; the futility and smallness of man before the great events confronting him; the mingled significance and unreality of the decisions; levity, blindness, insolence, confused cries from without,—all the elements of ancient ...
— The Economic Consequences of the Peace • John Maynard Keynes
... treatment of a tribe of cruel savages! A nation of man-eaters,—forsooth, a nation! Why not apply the laws of nationality to every band of brigands who chances to have conquered an independent existence? Bah! The world is full of frivolous pretences,—drunk with the ...
— The Ocean Waifs - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea • Mayne Reid
... Women are becoming better educated and asserting their rights everywhere; they are now able to earn their living in many independent ways, and are in a position to break loose; the era of the subjection of women is over, and it is natural that many, particularly of the idle and frivolous, should turn ...
— Problems of Conduct • Durant Drake
... Napoleon, could feel in this way, it is easy to understand the severity with which those of the French who were devoted to the Emperor, regarded the conduct of his ungrateful wife. In the same way, Josephine, in spite of her occasionally frivolous conduct, has retained her popularity, because she was tender, kind, and devoted, even after she was divorced; while Marie Louise has been criticised, because after loving, or saying that she loved, the mighty Emperor, she deserted him when he was a prisoner. The contrast between her conduct ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand
... was connected someway with 'feminine obligations and woman's opportunity,'" Parker answered, ignoring the frivolous interruptions. ...
— The Ramblin' Kid • Earl Wayland Bowman
... meadows, and drank countless cups of strong English tea with blobs of yellow, frothing cream atop. Heavens, how we ate, and how we talked, and how tolerantly the warm, grey walls, ivy-hung and statue-niched, smiled through the long, opal English sunset at our frivolous and ephemeral chatter! They have listened to so much, those walls, and we shall perish and wax old as a garment, and still the tea and strawberries shall brew and bloom along the emerald turf, and infatuated youths shall cross their ...
— Margarita's Soul - The Romantic Recollections of a Man of Fifty • Ingraham Lovell
... with labor, not with ease. She does not seem to have had a good time with them, as Stevenson had with "Treasure Island," a story in other ways of comparative unimportance. And surely it is not frivolous to state that the most profound and serious of thoughts are communicated best when they are communicated with the ...
— A Manual of the Art of Fiction • Clayton Hamilton
... was, he bethought him that the knowledge might be of value, and it might help to float once more his shipwrecked fortunes. The haste with which Vallancey had proffered a frivolous explanation of Richard's words, the bustle with which upon the instant he swept Richard and Sir Rowland from the house to get to horse and ride out to Bridgwater were in themselves circumstances that went to heighten those suspicions of Sir Rowland's. But lacking all opportunity ...
— Mistress Wilding • Rafael Sabatini
... of his career; his useless patience dogging the footsteps of fortune, which presently took wings, his long tramps over the thorny brakes of Paris, his breathless chases as a petitioner, his attempts to win over fools; the schemes laid only to fail through the influence of some frivolous woman; the meetings with men of business who expected their capital to bring them places and a peerage, as well as large interest. Then the hopes rising in a towering wave only to break in foam on the shoal; ...
— Z. Marcas • Honore de Balzac
... that even if Denon had not been such a person as she describes him, "still, he suited me, I suited him. There was between us that sympathy, in spite of the disparity of years and talents, which, whether in trifles or essentials,—between the frivolous or the profound,—makes the true basis of those ties, so sweet to bind, so bitter to break!" It is well for Sir Charles Morgan's peace of mind, that he is acquainted, as he must be, with his wife's frivolity and egotism. How, indeed, he could have ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various
... Sunday? Now people are different; it depends, therefore, on who they are. Some are trifling and flighty, some are positively bad-principled, some are altogether good in their influence. So of the class of books called novels. Some are merely frivolous, some are absolutely noxious and dangerous, others again are written with a strong moral and religious purpose, and, being vivid and interesting, produce far more religious effect on the mind than dull treatises and sermons. The parables of Christ sufficiently ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... must endeavour to penetrate, if need be through the veil of legend. The old rationalists had made themselves ridiculous by their effort to explain everything in some natural way. Strauss and his followers often appeared frivolous, since, according to them, there was little left to be explained. If a portion of the narrative presented a difficulty, it was declared mythical. What was needed was such a discrimination between the legendary and historical elements ...
— Edward Caldwell Moore - Outline of the History of Christian Thought Since Kant • Edward Moore
... value of Machiavelli is just this lack of self-deception. You may think his morals devilish, but you cannot accuse him of quoting scripture. I certainly do not admire the end he serves: the extension of an autocrat's power is a frivolous perversion of government. His ideal happens, however, to be the aim of most foreign offices, politicians and "princes of finance." Machiavelli's morals are not one bit worse than the practices of the men who rule the world to-day. ...
— A Preface to Politics • Walter Lippmann
... break forth at intervals, and the cry of its hunger echo through the soul. Many of us do our best to silence it. But I, for my part, believe that, however you have crushed and hardened your souls by indifference, by ambition, by worldly cares, by frivolous or coarse pleasures, or by any of the thousand other ways in which you can do it—yet there is some response in your truest self to my poor words when I declare that a soul without God is an empty and an ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... Duke's grounds in the time between one bad epigram and another—that Dukes never allow the middle classes to encroach on their gardens so as to permit a doctor's lamp to be seen there—that no sister, however eccentric, could conduct a slightly frivolous love-scene with a brother going mad in the next room—that the Secretary disappears half-way through the play without explaining himself; and the conjuror disappears at the end, with almost ...
— G. K. Chesterton, A Critical Study • Julius West
... isn't it? You have been out all the afternoon; it's rather frivolous, isn't it, and a waste of precious time to be sauntering over the moor doing nothing? ...
— Dwell Deep - or Hilda Thorn's Life Story • Amy Le Feuvre
... fashionable and frivolous, and reprehensible in many ways, was not devoid of courage. And her conscience told her to give warning to her friends. This heroic decision was swiftly made. In making it, however, her cheeks ...
— The Pines of Lory • John Ames Mitchell
... one leads. I think I would soon grow very good, for there is no temptation to be anything else. One can't be very frivolous when there is no one to be frivolous with; nor can one backbite and be unkind, for there is no provocation. As for being vain and fond of the putting on of apparel, what is the good when one is the Best People if one wears ...
— Olivia in India • O. Douglas
... to burn me. But Minos to this chasm last of the ten, For that I practis'd alchemy on earth, Has doom'd me. Him no subterfuge eludes." Then to the bard I spake: "Was ever race Light as Sienna's? Sure not France herself Can show a tribe so frivolous and vain." The other leprous spirit heard my words, And thus return'd: "Be Stricca from this charge Exempted, he who knew so temp'rately To lay out fortune's gifts; and Niccolo Who first the spice's costly luxury Discover'd in that garden, where such seed Roots deepest ...
— The Divine Comedy • Dante
... to obtain information than to impart it. Perhaps he also wished to gain an insight into the characters of his companions before he allowed of any intimacy. Wherever he was, however he would allow of no light or frivolous conversation, and he did not hesitate to rebuke those who gave utterance to any profane or coarse expressions. Donald had heard him spoken of as an over religious man. That he was a strict one he had evidence, when ...
— Janet McLaren - The Faithful Nurse • W.H.G. Kingston
... clothes, their strong blacks and whites revealed in the light of the street door. And this Lily Cardew lived in state, bowed to by flunkeys in livery, dressed and undressed—his Scotch sense of decorum resented this—by serving women. This Lily Cardew would wear frivolous ball-gowns, such things as he saw in the shop windows, considered money only as a thing of exchange, and had traveled all over Europe a ...
— A Poor Wise Man • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... mirror which lay on her dressing table, she beheld herself for the first time in the glorious likeness of a queen, a new expression dawned on her features. It seemed as if a portion of her lord's pride were reflected there. The frivolous waiting-woman sank involuntarily on her knees, as her eyes, full of smiling admiration, met the radiant glance of Nitetis,—of the woman who was beloved by the most powerful ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... "Pamphilus, you must be married to-day: get ready; be off home." He seemed to me to say this: "Be off this instant, and go hang yourself." I was amazed; think you that I was able to utter a single word, or any excuse, even a frivolous, false, {or} lame one? I was speechless. But if any one were to ask me now what I would have done, if I had known this sooner, {why}, I would have done any thing rather than do this. But now, what course shall I first adopt? So many cares beset me, which rend ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence
... him on the same day in so many cities—offences which could not be excused upon the ground of any affronts which he might have received from the citizens of Antwerp—it might even now be possible to find a remedy for the past. He very bluntly told the envoy, however, that the frivolous excuses offered by the Duke caused more bitterness than if he had openly acknowledged his fault. It were better, he said, to express contrition, than to excuse himself by laying blame on those to whom no blame belonged, but who, on the contrary, had ever shown themselves ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... of Aquitaine, her successor, proved a penitential infliction second only in severity to the anathemas of the Church. Troops of vain and frivolous troubadours from her southern home, in all kinds of foreign and fantastic costumes, invaded the court at Paris and shocked the austere piety of the king. He perceived the corrupting influence on the simple manners of the Franks of their licentious songs, lascivious ...
— The Story of Paris • Thomas Okey
... liberal arts, to the degree that most of your countrymen do when they travel in Italy. If you love music, hear it; go to operas, concerts, and pay fiddlers to play to you, but I insist upon your neither piping nor fiddling yourself. It puts a gentleman in a very frivolous, contemptible light, brings him into a great deal of bad company, and takes up a great deal of time which ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IX. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... was their negation of interest in anything which seemed directly or indirectly a part of our everyday life that their sense of hearing—which had gradually come to understand its own futility when the tone of the conversation, at the dinner-table, became frivolous or merely mundane, without the two old ladies' being able to guide it back to the topic dear to themselves—would leave its receptive channels unemployed, so effectively that they were actually becoming atrophied. ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... concerned in these riots. One Bournois, a schoolmaster, who affirmed that king George had no right to the crown, was tried and scourged through the city, with such severity that in a few days he expired in the utmost torture. A frivolous incident served to increase the popular ferment. The shirts allowed to the first regiment of guards, commanded by the duke of Marlborough, were so coarse that the soldiers could hardly be persuaded to wear them. Some were thrown into the garden of the king's palace, and into that which ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... thought passed round the table, and was much admired. Only the frivolous Adele whispered to her obese admirer, 'It would take a good many angels to bear ...
— Norse Tales and Sketches • Alexander Lange Kielland
... Hazrloquacity, frivolous garrulity. Every craft in the East has a jargon of its own and the goldsmith (Zargar) is famed for speaking a language made unintelligible by the constant insertion of a letter or letters not belonging to the word. It is as if we rapidly pronounced ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... university, a government department, a state, or a social order, consecutive and disciplined persistence in established ways is a requisite of progress. Without such continuous organization of efforts toward fixed goals, action becomes frivolous and fragmentary, a wind along a waste. The history of the English people has elicited the admiration of philosophers and historians because it has been such a gradual and deliberate movement, such ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman
... circumstances. First, there was the grandfather, a fine, hale old man, who took his four meals a day, and doctored his little ailings with the wine of Bar or Thiaucourt. The grandmother, Catharine, had been pretty in her day, and a little frivolous; but she expiated by absolute deafness the crime of having listened too tenderly to gallants. M. Pierre Langevin, alias Pierrot, alias Big Peter, after having sought his fortune in America (a custom becoming quite general in the rural districts), had returned ...
— The Man With The Broken Ear • Edmond About
... here. We shall elsewhere have to contemplate the moralist, standing on the border of his mother's grave, and asking, with anxious agony, whether that dark bourn, once passed, terminated for ever the cares of maternity and love[a]. The frivolous and the proud, who think not, or acknowledge not, that there are secrets, in both matter and mind, of which their philosophy has not dreamed, may smile at what they may, in their derision, term such weak and idle inquiries. But on them, the most powerful minds that ever illuminated ...
— Dr. Johnson's Works: Life, Poems, and Tales, Volume 1 - The Works Of Samuel Johnson, Ll.D., In Nine Volumes • Samuel Johnson
... humanism with regard to the age. We must not be misled by his exclusive references to poesia, as closer observation shows that he means thereby the whole mental activity of the poet-scholars. This it is whose enemies he so vigorously combats—the frivolous ignoramuses who have no soul for anything but debauchery; the sophistical theologian to whom Helicon, the Castalian fountain, and the grove of Apollo were foolishness; the greedy lawyers, to whom poetry ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... above (A. 2), an oath is not good except for one who makes good use of it. Now two conditions are required for the good use of an oath. First, that one swear, not for frivolous, but for urgent reasons, and with discretion; and this requires judgment or discretion on the part of the person who swears. Secondly, as regards the point to be confirmed by oath, that it be neither false, nor ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... regret for the part they had played in breaking off his engagement with Mary Vernon. Having once convinced themselves that she was a frivolous girl, quite unsuited for the position of mistress of Penfold Hall, they had regarded it as an absolute duty to protect Herbert from the consequences of what they considered his infatuation. Consequently, for years they were in the habit of inviting for long visits ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty
... the S. S. Rowena, sleek-flanked, mounted fore and aft with a pair of black guns that lifted snouts slightly to the impeccable blue, slipped quietly, and without even a newspaper sailing-announcement into a frivolous midstream that kicked up little lace edged wavelets, undulating flounces of them. A blur of faces rose above deck-rails, faces that, looking back, receded finally. The last flag and the last kerchief became vapor. Against the ...
— Gaslight Sonatas • Fannie Hurst
... were formerly. The fashion of sending young men thither was even in some degree abated among that class who at the present day would be the most reluctant to omit it—the nobility. The useless and frivolous exercises required for the attainment of academic honors, and the relaxation of discipline, had by this time created a widespread and deeply felt contempt for the whole system of which they formed a part; and the indulgent but candid observer, who tries to dilute his censure with the truism that ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 9 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Reformers • Elbert Hubbard
... desire to keep his head and be reasonably calm. There had been a certain narrowness in the tragic separation of two happy children if the only reason for it had been that the mother of one was a pretty, frivolous, much gossiped about woman belonging to a rather too rapid set. And if it had been a reason then, how would it present itself now? What would happen to an untouched dream if argument and disapproval crashed into it? If his first intensely passionate ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... mankind had recognized. He perceived, too, the natural union of absolutism in the church with absolutism in the state, and came to the rescue of the great, unchanged, unchangeable, and ever-consistent advocates of despotism. The frivolous Choiseul, the extravagant Pompadour, and the debauched Sardanapalus of his age, did not perceive the truth which the King of Prussia recognized in his latter days. Nor would it have availed any thing, if they had been gifted with the clear insight of Frederic ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... dinner-services—everything. The ornaments of the walls of the rooms most particularly provoked her saucy remarks. From the oldest tapestry to the most modern printed paper; from the noblest family pictures to the most frivolous new copper-plate: one as well as the other had to suffer—one as well as the other had to be pulled in pieces by her satirical tongue, so that, indeed, one had to wonder how, for twenty miles ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. II • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... that woodland breath her better spirit was restored; somewhere in these wholesome shades seemed to still lurk what should have been her innocent and nymph-like youth, and to come out once more and greet her. Old songs she had forgotten, or whose music had failed in the discords of her frivolous life, sang themselves to her again in that sweet, grave silence; girlish dreams that she had foolishly been ashamed of, or had put away with her childish toys, stole back to her once more and became real in this tender ...
— A First Family of Tasajara • Bret Harte
... has been described as having three stages; the salon of 1730, still retaining some of the stately domesticity, elegance, dignity of the age of Lewis XIV.; that of 1780, grave, cold, dry, given to dissertation; and between the two, the salon of 1750, full of intellectual stir, brilliance, frivolous originality, glittering wastefulness.[214] Though this division of time must not be pressed too closely, it is certain that the era of Rousseau's advent in literature with his Discourses fell in with the climax of social unreality in the surface ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley
... sentimental into logical language, that the exercise of the intellect, as of all our other faculties, should have for its sole object the general good. Every other employment of it should be accounted not only idle and frivolous, but morally culpable. Being indebted wholly to Humanity for the cultivation to which we owe our mental powers, we are bound in return to consecrate them wholly to her service. Having made up his mind that this ought to be, there is with M. Comte but one ...
— Auguste Comte and Positivism • John-Stuart Mill
... This very tendency, in fact, brought one of the most promising of our earlier clubs to an untimely end. The young men in the club, twenty in number, had grown much irritated by the frivolity of the girls during their long debates, and had finally proposed that three of the most "frivolous" be expelled. Pending a final vote, the three culprits appealed to certain of their friends who were members of the Hull-House Men's Club, between whom and the debating young men the incident became the cause of a quarrel so bitter that at length it led to a shooting. ...
— Twenty Years At Hull House • Jane Addams
... and frivolous denunciation was made the pretext for throwing the owner of the money into prison, where he remained till September, when his friends, recollecting his danger, flew to the Committee and applied for his discharge. ...
— A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, • An English Lady
... century. Then Bogdan the Cossack, a wild warrior, not without his sins, but having deserved well of James Sobieski and the Poles, found that the neighbouring noble's steward had taken a fancy to his windmill and his farm upon the Dnieper. He was thrown into prison on a frivolous charge, and escaped to the Tatars, leaving his wife dishonoured, his house burnt, his infant lost in the flames, his eldest son scourged for protesting against the wrong. And he returned, at the head of an army of Tatars, Socinians, Greeks, or what not, to set free ...
— The Ancien Regime • Charles Kingsley
... the men of the faubourgs seemed to construe it. Such seemed to be the epitome of the French revolution; but it was not so. There was order amid disorder; two principles were at work; and the revolution—so frivolous in its details, so momentous in its results; exhibiting so much talent and energy, so much vanity and folly, so much honesty and treachery, such kind feelings and such malignant passions, such planting of trees and cutting of throats, such recommendations of order, such instances ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... nor am I out of it; Think'st thou that I, who saw the face of God, And tasted the eternal joys of heaven, Am not tormented with ten thousand hells In being depriv'd of everlasting bliss? O Faustus, leave these frivolous demands, Which strike a terror to my ...
— Among Famous Books • John Kelman
... as may well be supposed, was received by most of the anatomists of the period with distrust, and by all with surprise. Some of them undertook to refute it, but their objections turned principally on the silence of Galen, or consisted of the most frivolous cavils; the controversy, too, assumed the form of personal abuse even more speedily than is usually the case when authority is at issue with reason. To such opposition Harvey for some time did not think it necessary to reply; but some of his ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 5 of 8 • Various
... transport of frivolous egotism was suddenly checked, as she saw her sister, with her long dark tresses hanging dishevelled around her, kneeling in front of an image of the Madonna. Giving way to a feeling of reproach, she also knelt down and mingled her prayers with those of Gertrudis, while ...
— The Tiger Hunter • Mayne Reid
... repressing piracy, he encouraged it; and a fleet of one hundred and twenty prahus, with his tacit consent, actually put to sea. When a crew of English seamen were enslaved and carried to Bruni, under the most frivolous pretexts he refused to intercede with the Sultan for these unfortunate men. And so this strange friendship cooled. It was no slight proof either of his courage or his humanity to despatch at this very time, as Mr. Brooke did, his yacht to Bruni, to attempt something in behalf of his enslaved ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 110, December, 1866 - A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics • Various
... to him, "if you want to make me remember the rules of bezique, give me back my old friend Bignan, with whom I used to play cards every evening before the Five Academies solemnly escorted him to the cemetery; or else bring down to the frivolous level of human amusements the grave intelligence of Hamilcar, whom you see on that cushion, for he is the sole ...
— The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard • Anatole France
... she's sweet!" said Mrs. Crome; and then she kissed Beth, and Beth noticed that she had been eating onions, and for long afterwards she associated the smell with theatres, frivolous talk, and a fair-haired woman smiling fatuously on the brink ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... any or all of these classes. He saw no course for him to pursue but to follow his instructions to the letter. Consequently, when the civil authorities placed themselves in direct opposition to those of the military, by arresting and confining the men of the command on the most frivolous charges, and indicting their commanders for crime, such as unlawfully restraining persons of their liberty, &c., by enforcing proper military discipline, he ignored the right of the civil authorities to interfere ...
— The Black Phalanx - African American soldiers in the War of Independence, the - War of 1812, and the Civil War • Joseph T. Wilson
... enter in. This was what Rosamund had evidently made up her mind to do, was beginning to do. Dion compared her with many of the woman of London who have children and who, nevertheless, continue to lead haphazard, frivolous, utterly thoughtless lives, caring apparently little more for the moral welfare of their children than for the moral welfare of their Pekinese. Mrs. Clarke had a hatred of "things with wings growing out of their shoulders." Rosamund ...
— In the Wilderness • Robert Hichens
... at the Ursuline Convent in Montreal. It was my mother's dearest wish that I should take the vows of that order, but I fear I am far too frivolous for so serious a life. I love happy things too well, and the beautiful outside world of men and women. I ran away from the Sisters, and then my father and I voyaged to this country, where we might ...
— When Wilderness Was King - A Tale of the Illinois Country • Randall Parrish
... Yes, frivolous is just the word. (Putting her hand on his shoulder) Now it's possible to talk of a thing like this, Amadeus. Formerly you might have misunderstood such a remark—taking it for jealousy, or something like that.... But, really, I do hope you don't get mixed up in any more affairs of that kind. ...
— The Lonely Way—Intermezzo—Countess Mizzie - Three Plays • Arthur Schnitzler
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