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More "Lenity" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... wounded, and returned to his lodgings; it was at first thought the wound was not mortal, but his pain increasing, he began to think of death. Some about him told him, That this was the fruit of his lenity, in sparing so many notorious offenders, and among the rest his own murderer; but he replied, "Your importunity shall not make me repent my clemency." Having settled his private affairs, he committed ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie
... severity of punishments, as was probably necessary in a corrupt state of society. After the decemviral laws fell into disuse, the Romans in the days of the republic passed from extreme rigor to great lenity, as is observable in the transition from the Puritan regime to our own times in the United States. Capital punishment for several centuries was exceedingly rare, and was frequently prevented by voluntary exile. Under the empire, ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume III • John Lord
... Mercutio slain! Away to heaven, respective lenity, And fire-ey'd fury be my conduct now! Now, Tybalt, take the 'villain' back again That late thou gay'st me;—for Mercutio's soul Is but a little way above our heads, Staying for thine to keep him company: Either thou, or I, or ...
— Emerson and Other Essays • John Jay Chapman
... sensible of the lenity shown them when their irons were taken off, but some of them appeared capable of the most desperate attempts, and even talked of seizing on the soldiers arms; they were, however, informed, that no mercy would be shown to any who were even seen near those ...
— An Historical Journal of the Transactions at Port Jackson and Norfolk Island • John Hunter
... thy intercession," said the Abbot, sternly; "the dignity to which the church has exalted me, never should have swelled my bosom more proudly in the time of the highest prosperity, than it doth at this crisis—I ask nothing of thee, but the assurance that my lenity to thee hath been the means of perverting no soul to Satan, that I have not given to the wolf any of the stray lambs whom the Great Shepherd of souls had intrusted ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... dirty Turk; not a landlord at all is half so hard to ourselves as those of our own religion: they'll show some lenity to a Protestant, and I don't blame them for that, but they trample those belonging to their own creed ...
— The Black Baronet; or, The Chronicles Of Ballytrain - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... to Charlemagne, he had tried the effect of forgiveness and lenity often in vain. Clemency was misinterpreted; it had been, and it would be, construed into conscious weakness. Under these circumstances, with a view, undoubtedly, to the final extinction of rebellions which involved infinite bloodshed on both sides, he permitted ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v2 • Thomas de Quincey
... Poems towards which I entreat the lenity of the Public. The Critic will doubtless find in them much to condemn; he may likewise possibly discover something to commend. Let him scan my faults with an indulgent eye, and in the work of that correction which I invite, let him remember he is holding the iron Mace of Criticism ...
— The Poetical Works of Henry Kirke White - With a Memoir by Sir Harris Nicolas • Henry Kirke White
... Let me not have it to say, now at this important crisis! that I have a sister, but not a friend in that sister. My reputation, dearer to me than life, (whatever you may imagine from the step I have taken,) is suffering. A little lenity will, even yet, in a great measure, restore it, and make that pass for a temporary misunderstanding only, which otherwise will be a stain as durable as life, upon a creature who has already been treated with great unkindness, to use no ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... ask for the continuance of the 'daily bread'!—'battle, murder and sudden death' lie behind doubtless. I repeat, and perhaps in so doing only give one more example of the instantaneous conversion of that indignation we bestow in another's case, into wonderful lenity when it becomes our own, ... that I only contemplate the possibility you make me recognize, with pity, and fear ... no anger at all; and imprecations of vengeance, for what? Observe, I only speak of cases possible; of sudden impotency of mind; that is ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett
... that the commons should appoint whomsoever they thought proper to conduct the inquiry. The office is intrusted to the consuls by the commons with the consent of the people at large, who, after having executed the task with the utmost moderation and lenity by punishing only a few, who there are sufficient grounds for believing put a period to their own lives, still could not succeed so as to prevent the people from feeling the utmost displeasure. "That constitutions, ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius
... Tyber had, or if the Nile had not, risen beyond its banks; if the earth had shaken, or if the temperate order of the seasons had been interrupted, the superstitious Pagans were convinced that the crimes and the impiety of the Christians, who were spared by the excessive lenity of the government, had at length provoked the divine justice. It was not among a licentious and exasperated populace, that the forms of legal proceedings could be observed; it was not in an amphitheatre, stained with the blood of wild beasts and gladiators, that the voice of ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... is reason for objection, when, after a strict cross-examination of witnesses, after the arguments of counsel, and the judge's charge, a verdict is found against the master, that the court should allow the practice of hearing appeals to its lenity, supported solely by evidence of the captain's good conduct when on shore, (especially where the case is one in which no evidence but that of sailors could have been brought against the accused), and then, on this ground, and on the invariable claims of the wife and family, be induced ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... friend the secretary will be directed to come to your house, and read before you the articles of impeachment; and then to signify the great lenity and favor of his majesty and council, whereby you are only condemned to the loss of your eyes, which his majesty doth not question you will gratefully and humbly submit to; and twenty of his majesty's surgeons will attend ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... the mild temper of Tullibardine: "Those who have gone home without a special licence on furlough, must be exemplarily punished, either in their persons or effects, or in both; for when our all depends, lenity would be folly." After urging the Marquis to send off the men to Blair by dozens, he adds, "If rewards and punishments do not, I know not what will. By the laws of God and man you have both in your power and your ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume III. • Mrs. Thomson
... different times, she had gained from him a full acquaintance with the predicament in which he would be placed by failing to appear on the day appointed, and the very small hope he could entertain of being treated with lenity. ...
— Chronicles of the Canongate • Sir Walter Scott
... of war a bloody but unavoidable prelude to the beneficent functions of peace. The conflict was not of our seeking. Be the consequences what they may, the Sikhs will have themselves to blame, should it so happen, for the illustration of the maxim, that "when lenity and cruelty play for a kingdom, the gentler gamester ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various
... by large parties to separate from the rest and form a colony. Both were defeated by the vigilance of Gates, who allowed the ringleaders to escape with a slight punishment. This lenity only emboldened the malcontents, and a third plot was formed to seize the stores and take entire possession of the islands. It was determined to make an example of one of the leaders named Payne; He was condemned to be hanged, but, on the ...
— Bay State Monthly, Vol. II. No. 5, February, 1885 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... he was, I gave fair grace, however, and plenty of openings for repentance. None of them would he embrace, and he thought scorn of my lenity. And I might have gone on with such weakness longer, if I had not heard that his coach-and-four was ordered for the ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore
... with Alexander Monypenny, proposed as trustee on the part of the Bank of Scotland, and found him decidedly in favour of the most moderate measures, and taking burthen on himself for the Bank of Scotland proceeding with such lenity as might enable me to have some time and opportunity to clear these affairs out. I repose trust in Mr. M. entirely. His father, old Colonel Monypenny, was my early friend, kind and hospitable to me when I was a mere boy. He had much of old Withers ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... was the conquest of Corsica, by the professed enemies of the freedom of mankind, in defiance of those who were formerly its professed defenders. We have had just claims upon the same powers—rights which ought to have been sacred to them as well as to us, as they had their origin in our lenity and generosity towards France and Spain in the day of their great humiliation. Such I call the ransom of Manilla, and the demand on France for the East India prisoners. But these powers put a just confidence ...
— Thoughts on the Present Discontents - and Speeches • Edmund Burke
... debates upon this impeachment, it must be confessed that his majesty gave many marks of his great lenity; often urging the services you had done him, and endeavouring to extenuate your crimes. The treasurer and admiral insisted that you should be put to the most painful and ignominious death, by setting fire to your house at night, and the general ...
— Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift
... the slave trade as with the Chinese at New Guinea. The sooner that this is effected the better; and to do it effectually we should have a large force at Labuan, ready to act with decision. Let it be remembered that, with people so crafty and so cruel as the Malays and descendants of the Arabs, lenity is misplaced, and is ascribed to cowardice. No half measures will succeed with them. Indeed, I have my doubts whether it will not be necessary to destroy almost every prahu in the archipelago, and compel the natives to remain on their ...
— Borneo and the Indian Archipelago - with drawings of costume and scenery • Frank S. Marryat
... Israel Perley. In this letter the inhabitants aver "that their greatest desire hath ever been to live in peace under good and wholesome laws," and they declare themselves "ready to attend to any conditions of lenity and oblivion that may ...
— Glimpses of the Past - History of the River St. John, A.D. 1604-1784 • W. O. Raymond
... submit to the laws a free pardon for the seditions and treasons heretofore by them committed; warning those who shall persist, after notice of this proclamation, in the present rebellion against the United States that they must expect no further lenity, but look to be rigorously dealt with according to their deserts; and declaring that the military forces now in Utah and hereafter to be sent there will not be withdrawn until the inhabitants of that Territory shall ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 4 (of 4) of Volume 5: James Buchanan • James D. Richardson
... judicially of a drop of blood. Lord Durham even took care that the eight prisoners should not be sent to a convict colony. The only criticism directed against his course in Canada was on the ground of its excessive lenity. Wolfred Nelson and Robert Bouchette had certainly suffered a milder fate {110} than that of Samuel Lount and Peter Matthews, who had been hanged in Upper Canada for rebellion. Yet when the news of Durham's action reached England, it was immediately attacked ...
— The 'Patriotes' of '37 - A Chronicle of the Lower Canada Rebellion • Alfred D. Decelles
... is said, at the lenity of the Parliament of Paris, summoned commissions chosen amongst the Parliaments of Rouen, Dijon, Toulouse, and Bordeaux, and made them reconsider the case. The provincial Parliaments decided as that ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume IV. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... Colonel Kirke was recalled and reprimanded, it was not because of his barbarities many of which transcend the possibilities of decent print—but because of a lenity which this venal gentleman began to display when he discovered that many of his victims were willing to pay ...
— The Historical Nights' Entertainment • Rafael Sabatini
... other cause is folly. But as far as appearances went, by the judicious sacrifice of one law you procured an acquiescence in all that remained. After this experience, nobody shall persuade me, when an whole people are concerned, that acts of lenity are not ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... him quickly but said nothing, whereat he was secretly annoyed. Why did she not express her wonder and delight at the Pope's lenity, as almost any other woman in her position would have done? Her outward appearance was that of child-like ultra- femininity,—how was it then that he felt as if she were mentally fencing with him, and that her intellectual sword-play threatened to ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... For arts like these at bounteous tables fed, When S——condemns a book he never read. Declaring with a coxcomb's native air, The 'moral's' shocking, though the 'rhymes' are fair. Ah! must he rise unpunish'd from the feast, Nor lash'd by vengeance into truth at least? Such lenity were more than Man's indeed! Those who condemn, should surely deign to read. Yet must I spare—nor thus my pen degrade, I quite forgot that scandal was his trade. For food and raiment thus the coxcomb rails, For those who fear his ...
— Byron's Poetical Works, Vol. 1 • Byron
... people will not deny the first request I have ever made to them, which is, that these men, whom I have displaced, may be pardoned. I will answer for them for the future, and assure you that their conduct shall be such as to give you cause to rejoice at your lenity." ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott
... To requite the lenity of the father they take up arms against the son; conquer, pursue, take, imprison, and at last put to death the anointed of God, and destroy the very being and nature of government, setting up a sordid impostor, who had neither title ...
— Political Pamphlets • George Saintsbury
... than entertainment, as this writer afforded his contemporaries. In the meantime, among judicious readers on both sides of the Atlantic, Stevenson stands, I think it may safely be said, as a true master of English prose; scarcely surpassed for the union of lenity and lucidity with suggestive pregnancy and poetic animation; for harmony of cadence and the well-knit structure of sentences; and for the art of imparting to words the vital quality of things, and making them convey the precise—sometimes, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Meanwhile a portion of the assailants took possession of the gunroom; seized the arms, and killed all who resisted. This vigorous assault soon carried the ship by a surrender at discretion. She proved to be a rich prize; and the prisoners were treated with lenity, which was not always the course adopted by the buccaneers when they were disappointed in the amount of their expected plunder. Many were the crews compelled to pay with their lives for the poverty of their cargoes. In the present case ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol III, Issue VI, June, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... man, what is the consequence?—that we shall have to account for his being wounded, and then, instead of judges, we shall immediately be placed in the position of culprits, and have to defend ourselves without witnesses. We therefore risk our lives from a misplaced lenity towards a wretch ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Captain Frederick Marryat
... himself up to despair, but now hope once more revived his spirits, and he availed himself of the indulgence granted him, by giving way to his old habits of debauchery. On being brought to Paris after six months' confinement, he flattered himself that he should experience the same lenity in the capital. The jailer of the Conciergerie, not knowing whether M. d'Orleans would leave that prison to ascend the throne or the scaffold, treated him with particular respect; and he himself was impressed with the idea that he would soon resume an ascendency in public affairs. But, on his ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... chiefs with one consent agreed in grateful commemoration of this treaty, that if any captive should hereafter be taken by them from Maysville, that captive should be treated with every possible degree of lenity. And it is worthy of record that such a captive was subsequently taken, and that the Indians with the most scrupulous fidelity fulfilled their pledge. Indeed, it is difficult for an impartial historian to deny, that these poor savages, ignorant and cruel as they were, often displayed a sense ...
— Daniel Boone - The Pioneer of Kentucky • John S. C. Abbott
... compassion, lenity, mercy, benevolence, love, excellence, virtue; beauty, loveliness, gracefulness, comeliness; refinement, elegance, courtliness, culture, polish; holiness, saintliness, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... possible means ought to be used to restore it to peace; and though her suspicions be perfectly groundless—though they be wild as the dreams of madmen—though they may present a mixture of the furious and the ridiculous, still the are to be treated with the greatest lenity and tenderness; and if, after all, you fail, the frailty is to be lamented as a misfortune, and not punished as a fault, seeing that it must have its foundation in a feeling towards you, which it would be the basest of ingratitude, ...
— The Wedding Guest • T.S. Arthur
... Palmyra surrendered. The emperor treated it with lenity, but a great treasure in gold, silver, silk, and precious stones fell into his hands, with all the animals and arms. Zenobia being brought into his presence, he sternly asked her how she had dared to take arms against the emperors of Rome. She answered, with respectful ...
— Historic Tales, vol 10 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... but it is not through these that his memory has survived him. He was domineering, arbitrary, intolerant of opposition, irascible, vehement in prejudice, often wayward, perverse, and jealous: a persecutor of those who crossed him; yet capable, by fits, of moderation, and a magnanimous lenity; and gifted with a rare charm—not always exerted—to win the attachment of men: versed in books, polished in courts and salons; without fear, incapable of repose, keen and broad of sight, clear in judgment, prompt in decision, fruitful in resources, unshaken when others despaired; ...
— France and England in North America, a Series of Historical Narratives, Part Third • Francis Parkman
... is an exemplification of the potent influence which party spirit exercises over those journals. In the latter, one or two of her works have been criticised with overwhelming power, and in a tone and spirit superlatively bitter. In the former, on the contrary, she is spoken of with studied lenity, although the Reviewer is obliged to confess that he is not one of her particular admirers, and seems to be perpetually restraining himself from indulging in the language of raillery and sarcasm. We need hardly add that the political principles which her Ladyship ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various
... appears that this fur-trader was one Boyer, of Rouen, who had been delivered from prison at Rochelle by Poutrincourt's lenity, where he had been incarcerated probably for the same offence. They did not succeed in capturing him at Canseau.—Vide His. Nou. France, par Lescarbot, Paris, ...
— Voyages of Samuel de Champlain, Vol. 2 • Samuel de Champlain
... fled from the laws of his country for twelve years, the Court was disposed to show no lenity. He was therefore sentenced to pay a fine of one shilling, and be imprisoned in ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... dissolved. But Crimes of Infirmity; such as are those which proceed from great provocation, from great fear, great need, or from ignorance whether the Fact be a great Crime, or not, there is place many times for Lenity, without prejudice to the Common-wealth; and Lenity when there is such place for it, is required by the Law of Nature. The Punishment of the Leaders, and teachers in a Commotion; not the poore seduced People, when they are punished, can profit the ...
— Leviathan • Thomas Hobbes
... killed, surrendered the ship when she could no longer be defended, was shot by sentence of a court-martial. This savage punishment was approved by the higher officers of the navy, who showed great lenity to men of their own rank. The contrast had angered the country, and the Articles of War had been amended precisely in order that there might be one ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... containing intercepted treasonable letters from the Popish lords in Scotland to the King of Spain and the Duke of Parma, and accompanied by the following letter in Elizabeth's own hand, in which she rates him for his fatuous lenity towards subjects who had joined hands with the enemies ...
— Andrew Melville - Famous Scots Series • William Morison
... in France; and I had marked, with indignation, the atrocious attempt to strip vice of its deformity, to dress crime in the garb of virtue, to decorate slavery with the symbols of freedom, and give to folly the attributes of wisdom. I had seen, with extreme concern, men, whom the lenity, mistaken lenity, I must call it, of our government had rescued from punishment, if not from ruin, busily engaged in this scandalous traffic, and, availing themselves of their extensive connections to diffuse, by an infinite variety of ...
— A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, • An English Lady
... fury of two powerful contending parties, concentrating their terrors, and perfecting their deep designs to crush each other before they entirely annihilate a fallen foe, bears no more resemblance to the wise lenity of a regular government towards the refractory subjects it has subdued, than the fearful stillness which is the precursor of a thunder-storm does to the serene tranquillity of a summer's day. No sooner were the Presbyterian republicans subdued by the fanatics, who had gained the entire command ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... in my riven breast, First against her, whom I esteemed so pure; Then 'gainst myself, whose foolish lenity Hath fashion'd her for treason. Man is soon Inur'd to slavery, and quickly learns Submission, when of freedom quite depriv'd. If she had fallen in the savage hands Of my rude sires, and had their holy rage Forborne to slay her, grateful for her life, She would have recogniz'd her ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... independence were less infringed than that of those who are accounted the freest members of society. I derived a sort of authority and dignity from the receipt and disbursement of money. The tenants and debtors of the lady were, in some respects, mine. It was, for the most part, on my justice and lenity that they depended for their treatment. My lady's household-establishment was large and opulent. Her servants were my inferiors and menials. My leisure was considerable, and my emoluments large enough to supply me with every valuable instrument of ...
— Edgar Huntley • Charles Brockden Brown
... of the great pacifications unexpected of man which happened this Friday; for in the forenone (betwene nine and ten) where the fellows were greatly in doubt of my heavy displeasure, by reason of their manifold misusing of themselves against me, I did with all lenity interteyn them, and shewed the most part of the things that I had browght to pass at London for the college good, and told Mr. Carter (going away) that I must speak with him alone. Robert Leigh and Charles Legh were by. Secondly, the great sute betwene Redishmer ...
— The Private Diary of Dr. John Dee - And the Catalog of His Library of Manuscripts • John Dee
... still most salutary, to consider the loss of office, and the public disapprobation, as punishments sufficient for errors in the administration not imputable to personal corruption. Nothing, we believe, has contributed more than this lenity to raise the character of public men. Ambition is of itself a game sufficiently hazardous and sufficiently deep to inflame the passions without adding property, life, and liberty to the stake. Where the play runs so desperately high as in the seventeenth ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... force; the upshot of which was, that my people got nothing but a few arrows fired at them by the lurking villagers, and I was abused for my squeamishness. Moreover, the villagers, emboldened by my lenity, vauntingly declared they would attack the camp by night, as they could only recognise in us such men as plunder their houses and steal their children. This caused a certain amount of alarm among my men, which induced ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... enemies from a hostile island. A number of captives were taken; and all under his command held his former orders in such reverence, that none, excepting two (and they had before shown refractory dispositions,) presumed to disobey his edict of mercy. But these men, in derision of his lenity, particularly to the female sex, selected a woman prisoner to be their victim; and slaying her, as they would have done a beast, they commenced their horrible repast upon her body. Laonce descried the scene at a distance just as they had prepared their hideous banquet, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 340, Supplementary Number (1828) • Various
... considerable time, often by open force, and often by soliciting to no purpose sometimes the commons, at other times the nobles; agreeing that they should depart with single garments and without arms. Then, as wishing to appear from the beginning to show lenity to all the inhabitants of Italy except the Romans, he proposed rewards and honours to those who might remain with him, and would be willing to serve with him. He retained none, however, by the hopes he held out; they all dispersed in different directions throughout the cities ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... contrived only to raise the fortunes of some favourites of the minister, and aggrandize the officers of state, by the miseries of the people, is a crime too enormous to require or admit any aggravation from rhetorick, and too dangerous to hope for any excuse from candour and lenity. ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 10. - Parlimentary Debates I. • Samuel Johnson
... inevitable to ourselves from the plan of ruling half the empire by a mercenary sword. We are taught to believe that a desire of domineering over our countrymen is love to our country, that those who hate civil war abet rebellion, and that the amiable and conciliatory virtues of lenity, moderation, and tenderness of the privileges of those who depend on this kingdom are a sort of ...
— A Book of English Prose - Part II, Arranged for Secondary and High Schools • Percy Lubbock
... and other persons in need, and of his generous fidelity to his friends. They did not, indeed, revere him as a model of virtue, but of the occasional lapses of his bachelor life from correct moral standards, which seemed to be well known and freely talked about, they spoke with affectionate lenity of judgment. ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol 31, No 2, June 1908 • Various
... vicissitudes and shiftings of Ministerial measures, instead of convicting their authors of inconstancy and want of system, would be taken as an occasion of charging us with a predetermined discontent, which nothing could satisfy; whilst we accused every measure of vigor as cruel, and every proposal of lenity as weak and irresolute. The public, he said, would not have patience to see us play the game out with our adversaries; we must produce our hand. It would be expected that those who for many years had been active in such affairs should show that they had formed ...
— Burke's Speech on Conciliation with America • Edmund Burke
... also, might tend to corroborate the opinion, that the service of the state, in legal matters, is attended with much difficulty and embarrassment. It will, however, be seen upon examination of the facts of the case, that the difficulty which then arose, proceeded solely from the lenity and indulgence shown to the prisoners by the crown. On New-Year's day 1840, John Frost and others, were brought to trial, on a charge of high treason, before a special commission at Monmouth. The proceedings were interrupted by an objection taken by the prisoners' counsel, that ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXIX. January, 1844. Vol. LV. • Various
... commanded all who were in that city to sacrifice to the idols. This order was nobly refused by seven of his own soldiers, viz. Maximianus, Martianus, Joannes, Malchus, Dionysius, Seraion, and Constantinus. The emperor wishing to win these soldiers to renounce their faith by his entreaties and lenity, gave them a considerable respite till he returned from an expedition. During the emperor's absence, they escaped, and hid themselves in a cavern; which the emperor being informed of at his return, the mouth of the cave was closed up, and they ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... zoological, and ethnological considerations render it almost certain, that if these two races ever had a common origin, it could only have been at a period far more remote than any which has yet been assigned to the antiquity of the human race. And even if their lenity could be proved, it would in no way affect my argument for the close affinity of the Papuan and Polynesian races, and the radical distinctness of both from ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume II. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... occasions of needful profit and healthful pastime have permitted) that these little books which I here put into thy hands, might stand instead of many bigger books—yet have I carried myself towards thee in such fanciful guise of careless disport, that right sore am I ashamed now to intreat thy lenity seriously—in beseeching thee to believe it of me, that in the story of my father and his christian-names—I have no thoughts of treading upon Francis the First—nor in the affair of the nose—upon Francis ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... in the sarcastic spirit of a Mephistopheles, this, too, was considered as part of his functions. He was the Ter'roe Fil'ius [Footnote: Terroe Filius, son of the earth; that is, a human being.] of the day; and lenity would have been considered, not as an act of discretion, but as ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... times and upon such conditions as should seem proper. But others, in agreement with the President, insisted that if no State could lawfully secede, it followed that no State could lawfully be deprived of statehood. These persons reinforced their legal argument with the sentimental one that lenity was the best policy. As General Grant afterward put it: "The people who had been in rebellion must necessarily come back into the Union, and be incorporated as an integral part of the nation. Naturally the nearer they were placed to an equality with the people who had not ...
— Abraham Lincoln, Vol. II • John T. Morse
... their success, the Indians marched directly back with their prisoners to Chillicothe. The extreme suffering of the prisoners, during this march, inspired the savages with pity, and induced them to exercise an unusual lenity towards their captives. In March, Boone was carried to Detroit, where the Indians refused to liberate him, though an hundred pounds were offered for his ransom, and from which place he accompanied them back to Chillicothe in the latter part of April. In the first ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... so powerfully did each prevent the other from exceeding its proper bounds. He knew how to conciliate the most enterprising spirit with the coolest moderation; the most obstinate perseverance with the easiest flexibility; the most severe justice with the greatest lenity; the greatest rigour in command with the greatest affability of deportment; the highest capacity and inclination for science, with the most shining: talents for action. His civil and his military virtues are almost equally the objects of our admiration, excepting only, that the ...
— The Illustrated London Reading Book • Various
... God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and he himself who is our everlasting high-priest, the Son of God, even Jesus Christ, build you up in faith and in truth, and in all meekness and lenity; in patience and long- suffering, in ...
— The Forbidden Gospels and Epistles, Complete • Archbishop Wake
... divided the infant Commonwealth. But to these proposals he turned a deaf ear. Enough of blood, he said, had been spilled—it was time that the nation should have repose under a firmly-established government, of strength sufficient to protect property, and of lenity enough to encourage the return of tranquillity. This, he thought, could only be accomplished by means of Cromwell, and the greater part of England was of the same opinion. It is true, that, in thus submitting to the domination ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott
... she is more beautiful than any other young lady of your acquaintance, and, polished by your example, may do honour to your taste as well as your prudence. Under these circumstances, you will, I am quite sure, look with lenity on her girlish errors, and not love her the less because her foolish fancy persuades her that she is in ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... was a case which came clearly within that code. Then the forms of justice should have been carefully observed; the accused should have been heard in his defence; the spirit of the law should have been the guide of the judges, with a leaning in favour of lenity and mercy; the passions ought not to have been suffered to interfere, where the minds of the court should have been regulated by justice and wisdom; and finally, the judges should have proceeded deliberately, avoiding every thing like haste in their decision. Such is the law of ...
— A Sketch of the Life of Brig. Gen. Francis Marion • William Dobein James
... was passed in great quiet after 1660: Charles II, according to Clarendon, with a wise and humorous lenity, not thinking it 'necessary to inquire after a man so long forgotten.' His letters reveal a man of affectionate and honest disposition; he uses the Puritan phraseology of the day without leaving a sense of nausea in the reader's mind. At Hursley he was ...
— The Visions of England - Lyrics on leading men and events in English History • Francis T. Palgrave
... decency to be violated. We must make a stand against vice. We must teach libertines that the English people appreciate the importance of domestic ties. Accordingly some unfortunate man, in no respect more depraved than hundreds whose offenses have been treated with lenity, is singled out as an expiatory sacrifice. If he has children, they are to be taken from him. If he has a profession, he is to be driven from it. He is cut by the higher orders, and hissed by the lower. He is, in truth, ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli
... befallen them for it; so that they would have made the people (who, as it was, were in the most terrible distraction imaginable), I say, they would have made them stark mad: whereas the magistrates found it proper on several occasions to treat them with lenity and compassion, and not with violence and terror, such as dragging the sick out of their houses, or obliging them to remove themselves, ...
— History of the Plague in London • Daniel Defoe
... with great courtesy, to dissipate their terror, assuring them that their fears were altogether groundless, and that they would find a generous enemy in the commodore, who was no less remarkable for his lenity and humanity, than for courage and resolution. The prisoners who were first sent on board the Centurion, informed us, that the prize was called Neustra Lenora del Monte Carmelo, and her commander Don Manuel Zamorra. Her cargo consisted chiefly of sugar, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... "would you commit two persons to Bridewell for a twig?" "Yes," said the lawyer, "and with great lenity too; for if we had called it a young tree, they would have been both hanged." "Harkee," says the justice, taking aside the squire; "I should not have been so severe on this occasion, but Lady Booby desires to get them out of the parish; so lawyer Scout will give the constable ...
— Joseph Andrews, Vol. 2 • Henry Fielding
... gentleman's contented and pacified people! I deeply sympathize with the right hon. gentleman. His policy produces strange and portentous results. A policy of concession, of confiscation, of truckling to ecclesiastical arrogance, to popular passions and ignorant prejudices, of lenity to Fenian revolutionists, has at length brought us to this, that the outrages of Galway and Tipperary, no longer restricted to those charming counties, no longer restrained to even Her Majesty's judges, are to reach the interior of this House and the august person of its Speaker. (Cheers.) Sir, ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell
... severe laws being enacted under King James than those which had been carried by the late queen. There was no ground for such an apprehension, since King James was really anxious to treat his Roman Catholic subjects with great lenity. Sir Everard also requested that his wife and children might not suffer on his account. His last request was that he might be put to death by being beheaded, and not as ...
— Guy Fawkes - or A Complete History Of The Gunpowder Treason, A.D. 1605 • Thomas Lathbury
... Tiller, has troubled your reason. What I offer, was offered because I would not drive an unfortunate and remarkable man, like him we have, to extremities, and—there may be other motives, but do not mistake my lenity. Should force become necessary to put your vessel into our hands, the law may view your offences with a still harsher eye. Deeds which the lenity of our system now considers as venial, may easily turn ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... come down through history shining with a halo of gentle lenity, for their tithingman was ordered to bear a short, small stick only, and he was "Desired to use it with clemency." However, if any boy proved "incoridgable," he could be "presented" before the elders; and perhaps he ...
— Sabbath in Puritan New England • Alice Morse Earle
... I confide in, and shall have regard to your opinions. When the articles of war were read, we found their crime did not touch life, but they were to suffer corporal punishment. Whilst Mr Cummins was laying open the nature of their guilt, and the ill consequence of lenity in the circumstances we were in, I proposed a way next to death, which was, if judged proper by Captain P——n and Captain C——p, to carry 'em off to an island where the ship parted, there being muscles, limpetts, and clams in abundance, and no want of ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 17 • Robert Kerr
... my child,' replied my father, 'I shall certainly show them lenity, but I wish first to hear your story, and then I shall know how to proceed. So, Sir Robert, if you will please to detain these people till to-morrow, I shall ...
— Forgotten Tales of Long Ago • E. V. Lucas
... of King Henry touching religion shall be put in force. No Sacramentary shall be admitted to any benefice; all married priests shall be deprived, but more lenity shall be shown to them whose wives be dead (to wit, I take it, they shall not be divorced from their dead wives). If they shall part by consent, and shall promise to commit the crime of matrimony ...
— Robin Tremain - A Story of the Marian Persecution • Emily Sarah Holt
... feebleness of his moral resistance and the nature of his environment, that instead of being an athlete, armed for a glorious strife, he had learned to drift where he should have steered, to float with the current instead of nobly breasting the tide. He conducted his plantation with as much lenity as it was possible to infuse into a system darkened with the ...
— Iola Leroy - Shadows Uplifted • Frances E.W. Harper
... himself secure in consequence of the lenity of Henley, he hates him as sincerely as if he were pursuing him to the gallows. The loss of the three thousand guineas is one great motive; and another is that he felt he was out-braved by Henley, whom he could not terrify, but who on the ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... his tone might have been more unqualified, and marvelled again at the curious lenity of judgment he had always shown of late towards Mr. Wendover. And all his judgments of himself and others were generally so quick, ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... alleged that it ought to be applied for replacing the horses which were killed during the expedition. These disputes ran so high, that our captain ordered both Godoy and De Grado into irons, intending to send them to Mexico. Godoy obtained his liberty by concessions; and in return for this lenity entered into cabals with De Grado for misrepresenting the conduct of Marin to Cortes. On this occasion I was solicited to write to Cortes in exculpation of De Grado, as they said that Cortes would believe ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. IV. • Robert Kerr
... been the issue of the Indian consultation. Such, however, was not the result of the council. It was decreed that they should be killed with as little noise as possible; their scalps taken as trophies, and that their daughters should remain captives as before. The lenity of this sentence may be traced to two causes. The daring hardihood, the fearless intrepidity of the adventure, inspired them with unqualified admiration for their captives. Innumerable instances have since been recorded, where the most inveterate enemies ...
— The First White Man of the West • Timothy Flint
... lavished on her reflections of her imperfections, which, though not apparent to any one but herself, she verily believed were uncommonly great, as she beheld them with very scrutinizing and rigid eyes, while she looked on those of others with the greatest lenity. But of all the means she used to preserve her humility, she was the most assiduous in praying to him who made her ...
— A Description of Millenium Hall • Sarah Scott
... procure work. It is only a set of political enthusiasts, to be found amongst the students, whose wild republican schemes have dazzled others and induced the different outbreaks which have occurred since the event of the three days, and having been treated with lenity in the first instance, unprecedented in the annals of every other government, they were emboldened ...
— How to Enjoy Paris in 1842 • F. Herve
... nothing transitory worth their Concern; and having their Thoughts always employ'd on Meditations of a future Happiness, neglected every thing on Earth but their Duty; and for this Reason, they often became a Prey to Knaves, who slipp'd no Opportunity of spoiling them, knowing their Lenity such, that, if detected, they should not be prosecuted. I have been assured, that a Priest being told, such a Farmer had stole away a great many Tithe Sheafs, the good Divine answer'd, If he's poor, it's no ...
— A Voyage to Cacklogallinia - With a Description of the Religion, Policy, Customs and Manners of That Country • Captain Samuel Brunt
... siege was pushed to such extremities, and the famine became so cruel, that bread was made of human bones ground to powder. That Henry did not then master the capital, where two hundred thousand men were maddened with want, was owing to his own lenity. He declared that he had rather lose Paris, than gain possession of it by the death of so many persons. He gave a free passage through his lines to all who were not soldiers, and allowed his own troops to send in refreshments to their friends. By this paternal kindness he lost the fruit of his labors ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 1 of 8 • Various
... think of, young man," said the elder, calmly, and without evincing even the slightest irritation in his manner. "If you be a Frenchman born, the lenity of our government accords you the privilege of a prisoner of war. If you be only French by adoption, and a uniform, a harsher destiny ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... "particularly careful not to take above five-and- twenty ounces of laudanum." To this moderation and temperate use of the article I may ascribe it, I suppose, that as yet, at least (i.e. in 1812), I am ignorant and unsuspicious of the avenging terrors which opium has in store for those who abuse its lenity. At the same time, it must not be forgotten that hitherto I have been only a dilettante eater of opium; eight years' practice even, with a single precaution of allowing sufficient intervals between every indulgence, has not been sufficient to ...
— Confessions of an English Opium-Eater • Thomas De Quincey
... country, where they assemble privately for worship. These are well known; and detachments are sent out every Sunday to intercept them; but the officer has always private directions to take another route. Whether this indulgence comes from the wisdom and lenity of the government, or is purchased with money of the commanding officer, I cannot determine: but certain it is, the laws of France punish capitally every protestant minister convicted of having performed the ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett
... of Romney had struck such terror into the hearts of the inhabitants, who knew there was no army that could advance to their assistance, that they surrendered at the Conqueror's approach. To them William behaved with lenity and kindness. His severity at Romney and his lenity at Dover had their effect. There being no central authority, no army in the field, each town and district was left to shift for itself; and assuredly none of them unaided could hope to offer prolonged resistance to the Normans. As, after eight ...
— Wulf the Saxon - A Story of the Norman Conquest • G. A. Henty
... peacefulness, charity, lenity, patience, self-control, forbearance, long-suffering, peace, self-restraint. gentleness, ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... pen. That any man who insults the common order of society, and denies the being of God, is essentially mad we never doubted. But for the madness, that retains enough of rationality to be wilfully mischievous, we can have no more lenity than for the appetites of a wild beast. The poetry of the work is contemptible—a mere collection of bloated words heaped on each other without order, harmony, or meaning; the refuse of a schoolboy's common-place book, full of the vulgarisms ...
— Early Reviews of English Poets • John Louis Haney
... went peaceably to range himself under his respective standard. 3. Thus going forth to oppose the enemy, he, after concluding a truce for a year, returned with his army, and, in six months, laid down the dictatorship, with the reputation of having exercised it with blameless lenity. ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... Campo Formio, Bernadotte was sent as an Ambassador to the Court of Vienna, accompanied by a numerous escort of Jacobin propagators. Having procured the liberty of Austrian patriots, whose lives, forfeit to the law, the lenity of the Cabinet of Vienna had spared, he thought that he might attempt anything; and, therefore, on the anniversary day of the fete for the levy en masse of the inhabitants of the capital, he insulted the feelings of the loyal, and excited ...
— Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, Complete - Being Secret Letters from a Gentleman at Paris to a Nobleman in London • Lewis Goldsmith
... from South Wales. Eloquent's bearing, both during the contest and afterwards, was acknowledged to be modest and "suitable." If he was lacking in geniality and address, he was, at all events, neither bumptious nor servile. His lenity towards the youths who had done their best to break up his meeting and wreck his committee rooms had leaked out, and gained for him, if not friends, at least toleration among several leading Conservatives who ...
— The Ffolliots of Redmarley • L. Allen Harker
... Lucca, for having conspired against him. Although he had been found guilty, his life was spared, and as Pagolo thought the forgiveness mutual, he reposed confidence in him. Jacopo, more mindful of the danger he had incurred than of the lenity exercised toward him, on his arrival in Florence secretly instigated the citizens to hostilities; and these instigations, added to other hopes, induced the Signory to call the Council together, at which 498 citizens assembled, before whom the principal men of ...
— History Of Florence And Of The Affairs Of Italy - From The Earliest Times To The Death Of Lorenzo The Magnificent • Niccolo Machiavelli
... confession in it. It was like the reverence which the criminal makes to the judge, when he at once owns his guilt and implores mercy—which is at the same time an impudent and embarrassed attempt at defence or extenuation, a confession of a fault, and an entreaty for lenity. ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... of blood and treasure, make issue with the savages, and forever close the question by the complete conquest and reduction of all the hostile or dangerous tribes. But no assumption could be farther from the facts of the case than that the effect of lenity has been to increase the sum of Indian outrage. There is no scintilla of evidence to show that any savage tribe has been incited by the forbearance of the government to increased depredations. On the contrary, the history ...
— The Indian Question (1874) • Francis A. Walker
... matter, I beg of you," he said more gently. "Do I understand that something hath gone amiss for which you are entreating lenity?" ...
— Peggy Owen and Liberty • Lucy Foster Madison
... this fray, Mr. and Mrs. Tetterby both precipitated themselves with great ardour, as if such ground were the only ground on which they could now agree; and having, with no visible remains of their late soft- heartedness, laid about them without any lenity, and done much execution, ...
— The Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargin • Charles Dickens
... original resolution. Conference after conference was held. Compromise after compromise was suggested. From the imperfect reports which have come down to us it appears that every argument in favour of lenity was forcibly urged by Burnet. But the Commons were firm: time pressed: the unsettled state of the law caused inconvenience in every department of the public service; and the peers very reluctantly gave ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... observed that he assumed and exercised to the utmost the discretionary power, which, while the law had no free course in the Highlands, was conceived to belong to the military parties who were called in to support it. He acted, for example, with great and suspicious lenity to those freebooters who made restitution on his summons, and offered personal submission to himself, while he rigorously pursued, apprehended, and sacrificed to justice, all such interlopers as dared to despise his admonitions or commands. On the other hand, if any officers of justice, ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott
... has always advocated lenity of measures towards them. He wants to get them into a state in which the moral influence of the North can act upon them beneficially, and to get such a state of things that there will be a party at the ...
— The Life of Harriet Beecher Stowe • Charles Edward Stowe
... victory; and the Kentish troops, despairing of success in their stratagem, fell upon such of his retainers as had already landed, and took 150 of them prisoners. These were tried, sentenced, and executed by order of the king, who was determined to show no lenity to the rebels. Perkin being an eye-witness of the capture of his people, immediately weighed ...
— Celebrated Claimants from Perkin Warbeck to Arthur Orton • Anonymous
... minds of the people so much as to excite apprehensions, that they would proceed to retaliation, which, if once commenced, might be carried to extremities; to prevent which, the Congress issued an address exhorting to forbearance and a further trial by examples of generosity and lenity, to recall their enemies to the practice of humanity amidst the calamities of war. In consequence of which, neither the Congress, nor any of the States apart, have ever exercised or authorised the exercise ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. I • Various
... art and caution will have a right to the same lenity as was used by the Lacedemonians; who did not punish theft, but the want ...
— Seven Discourses on Art • Joshua Reynolds
... respectable, which left the senate its majesty, and some of its power. He restored vigour and spirit to the laws; he made new and good ones for the reformation of manners; he enforced their execution; he governed the empire with lenity, justice, and glory; he humbled the pride of the Parthians; he broke the fierceness of the barbarous nations; he gave to his country, exhausted and languishing with the great loss of blood which she had sustained in the course of so many civil ...
— Dialogues of the Dead • Lord Lyttelton
... I disposed to inquire into the reason of the comparative lenity, on the other hand, with which some pieces were treated, which, to indifferent judges, seemed at least as much deserving of condemnation as some of those which met with it. I am willing to put, a favorable ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, Issue 67, May, 1863 • Various
... sacred volume. But he bade the Inca take courage and confide in him, for the Spaniards were a generous race, warring only against those who made war on them, and showing grace to all who submitted! 33— Atahuallpa may have thought the massacre of that day an indifferent commentary on this vaunted lenity. ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... implore your lenity: your examination will be alike unbiassed by partiality and prejudice;-no refractory murmuring will follow your censure, no private interest will be gratified by ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney
... almost as completely as that of Varus on a former occasion, and in nearly the same country. The distressing tidings filled his soul with rage and a bitter thirst for revenge. He had done his utmost to win over the Saxons by lenity and kindness, but this course now seemed to him useless, if not worse than useless. He determined to adopt opposite measures and try the effect of cruelty and severe retribution. Calling together his forces until he had a great army under his command, he marched into Saxony torch and sword in ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris
... treat the city with lenity, withheld any attack upon public monuments in which the insurgents had taken up positions. This morning they carried the Place de la Concorde. The Ministry of Finances, the Hotel of the Conseil d'Etat, the ...
— The Insurrection in Paris • An Englishman: Davy
... known still to carry on political intrigues, which most other persons had considered as desperate. It was also possible that he, as well as others, might get his pardon, as government showed every year more lenity towards the remnant of the Jacobites, and then he might claim the custody of your person, as your legal guardian. Either of these events she considered as the direct road ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... issue with the savages, and forever close the question by the complete conquest and reduction of all the hostile or dangerous tribes. But no assumption could be farther from the facts of the case than that the effect of lenity has been to increase the sum of Indian outrage. There is no scintilla of evidence to show that any savage tribe has been incited by the forbearance of the government to increased depredations. On the ...
— The Indian Question (1874) • Francis A. Walker
... tone might have been more unqualified, and marvelled again at the curious lenity of judgment he had always shown of late towards Mr. Wendover. And all his judgments of himself and others were generally ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... to say, now at this important crisis! that I have a sister, but not a friend in that sister. My reputation, dearer to me than life, (whatever you may imagine from the step I have taken,) is suffering. A little lenity will, even yet, in a great measure, restore it, and make that pass for a temporary misunderstanding only, which otherwise will be a stain as durable as life, upon a creature who has already been treated with great unkindness, to use ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... causing a /table d'hote/ to be established for these young men at his brother's house. This brother, a tall, good-looking, blunt, unceremonious, and somewhat coarse, man, had, it was said, been a fencing-master; and, notwithstanding the too great lenity of his brother, the noble boarders were often treated harshly and roughly: hence the people thought they must again take the part of these young folks, and pulled about the good reputation of the excellent Gellert to such a degree, that, in order not to be mistaken about ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... powers confided to him with caution, but he did exercise them; and by doing so, acquired considerable supplies. Congress appeared as much dissatisfied with the lenity of the Commander-in-chief, as the people were with his rigour, in consequence of which the subject was taken into consideration, his forbearance disapproved, and instructions given for the rigorous exertions in future of the powers with which he was invested. In reply to the letter communicating ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 2 (of 5) • John Marshall
... into the sea, which was done to show them that we did contemn their sorcery. These people are very simple in all their conversation, but marvellous thievish, especially for iron, which they have in great account. They began through our lenity to show their vile nature; they began to cut our cables; they cut away the Moonlight's boat from her stern; they cut our cloth where it lay to air, though we did carefully look unto it, they stole ...
— Voyages in Search of the North-West Passage • Richard Hakluyt
... law is as nice as a new-laid egg. Bullum and Boatum mentioned both ebb and flood, to avoid quibbling; but, it being proved that they were carried away neither by the tide of flood nor by the tide of ebb, but exactly upon the top of high water, they were nonsuited; but, such was the lenity of the court, that, upon their paying all costs they were allowed to begin again de novo. ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... to sacrifice to the idols. This order was nobly refused by seven of his own soldiers, viz. Maximianus, Martianus, Joannes, Malchus, Dionysius, Seraion, and Constantinus. The emperor wishing to win these soldiers to renounce their faith by his entreaties and lenity, gave them a considerable respite till he returned from an expedition. During the emperor's absence, they escaped, and hid themselves in a cavern; which the emperor being informed of at his return, the mouth of the cave was closed up, and ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... connexions. Pickle d—d him for his pusillanimity; and the exempt hearing a lady bemoan herself so piteously, expressed his mortification at being the instrument of giving her such pain, and endeavoured to console them by representing the lenity of the French government, and the singular generosity of the prince, by whose ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... at full length with Alexander Monypenny, proposed as trustee on the part of the Bank of Scotland, and found him decidedly in favour of the most moderate measures, and taking burthen on himself for the Bank of Scotland proceeding with such lenity as might enable me to have some time and opportunity to clear these affairs out. I repose trust in Mr. M. entirely. His father, old Colonel Monypenny, was my early friend, kind and hospitable to me when I was a mere boy. He had much of old Withers ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... the minister was neither sanguinary nor revengeful: his favourite maxim was rather to appease the minds of the discontented by lenity, than to have recourse to violent measures; to be content with losing nothing by the war, without being at the expense of gaining any advantage from the enemy; to suffer his character to be very severely handled, provided he could ...
— The Memoirs of Count Grammont, Complete • Anthony Hamilton
... not subject to regular inspection, and that it was scarcely possible to bring them to justice for their treatment of those committed to their charge. It was argued, that it is impossible to depend upon the lenity of men who have such powers over their fellow-creatures, and that these officers must be supposed more than human if they did not occasionally abuse their authority. Of their having actually done so, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 454 - Volume 18, New Series, September 11, 1852 • Various
... needless to point out the advantages of its concession. It would preserve the life and self-respect of him who is needy through misfortune, and supply an infallible means of detection of his criminal imitator, who could then be dealt with as he deserves, widiout the lenity that finds justification in doubt and compassion. It would diminish crime, for an empty stomach has no morals. With a wage rate lower than the commercial, it would disturb no private industries by luring away their workmen, ...
— The Shadow On The Dial, and Other Essays - 1909 • Ambrose Bierce
... Madam," said Mark, upon returning to the hall, "you can hardly expect any special lenity from me. The will allowed you an annuity of one thousand dollars while you remained single; since you are married your interest ceases, but you shall receive two hundred a year. The house, however, belongs to my wife. Your husband there has a home to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various
... with cloth for purchases, and strict orders not to use force; the upshot of which was, that my people got nothing but a few arrows fired at them by the lurking villagers, and I was abused for my squeamishness. Moreover, the villagers, emboldened by my lenity, vauntingly declared they would attack the camp by night, as they could only recognise in us such men as plunder their houses and steal their children. This caused a certain amount of alarm among my men, which induced ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... triumphing conqueror. Burton considered Gelele, despite his butcherings and vapourings, as, on the whole, quite a phoenix for an African. Indeed, some months after his mission, in conversations with Froude, the historian, he became even warm when speaking of the lenity, benevolence and enlightenment of this excellent king. Froude naturally enquired why, if the king was so benevolent, he did not alter the murderous "Customs." Burton looked up with astonishment. "Alter the Customs!" he said, "Would ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright
... his desire to avoid giving pain to the boy. If it then turns out that the individual is ordinarily a well-disposed boy, all is right, and if he proves to be habitually disobedient and troublesome, the lenity and forbearance exercised at first will facilitate the effect aimed at by subsequent measures. Avoid, then, for the few first days, all open collision with any of your pupils, that you may have opportunity for minute and ...
— The Teacher • Jacob Abbott
... Jonathan, with more vivacity than he usually exhibited, with a lenity to which he had heretofore in his lifetime been a stranger—being warmed into such a spirit, doubtless, by the generous wines of which he had partaken—"indeed, friend, if I could but see thy face it would doubtless ...
— The Ruby of Kishmoor • Howard Pyle
... in rebellion against the United States, and offering all those who should submit to the laws a full pardon for their past seditions and treasons. At the same time I assured those who should persist in rebellion against the United States that they must expect no further lenity, but look to be rigorously dealt with according to their deserts. The instructions to these agents, as well as a copy of the proclamation and their reports, are herewith submitted. It will be seen by their report of the 3d of July last that they have fully confirmed the opinion expressed by General ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... Impatient of any delay or division of empire, he attempted, more than once, to shorten the small remainder of his father's days, and endeavored, but without success, to excite a mutiny among the troops. [15] The old emperor had often censured the misguided lenity of Marcus, who, by a single act of justice, might have saved the Romans from the tyranny of his worthless son. Placed in the same situation, he experienced how easily the rigor of a judge dissolves away in the tenderness of a parent. He deliberated, he threatened, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... forgotten, the duke never having put it in force during his whole reign. This was a law dooming any man to the punishment of death who should live with a woman that was not his wife; and this law, through the lenity of the duke, being utterly disregarded, the holy institution of marriage became neglected, and complaints were every day made to the duke by the parents of the young ladies in Vienna that their daughters had been seduced from their ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... know your lenity and affection, dear aunt," returned Lucie; "but I was most unwilling to involve you in my difficulties, and expose you to my uncle's displeasure; in time, all would have been known to you; I should have taken no important step without your ...
— The Rivals of Acadia - An Old Story of the New World • Harriet Vaughan Cheney
... friend when he is in trouble?" Yes, when you are convinced that he deserves to be in trouble; throw him all the harder and the further because he is your friend. In addition to his particular offense against society he has disgraced you. If there are to be lenity and charity let them go to the criminal who has foreborne to involve you in his shame. It were a pretty state of affairs if an undetected scamp, fearing exposure, could make you a co-defendant by so easy a precaution as securing your acquaintance and regard. Don't throw the first stone, ...
— The Shadow On The Dial, and Other Essays - 1909 • Ambrose Bierce
... lie under such manifest Obligations to attack publick Immorality, wherever it is found, and by whatsoever Patrons of Power, Dignity, and Interest it is shelter'd and supported, thar, as I have suggested, it is not easy to imagine whence their Lenity and Tenderness for the Theatre can proceed. But if the true Reason of it, whatever it is, and which is so hard to be accounted for, were remov'd, and our Divines would interest themselves with Zeal in the Cause of Vertue, in respect to our Dramatick ...
— Essay upon Wit • Sir Richard Blackmore
... the laws of his country for twelve years, the Court was disposed to show no lenity. He was therefore sentenced to pay a fine of one shilling, and be ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... learned, beautiful, and an agreeable writer, but governed the East for five years with discretion and success. Aurelian was amazed at her warlike preparations upon the fall of Palmyra, and treated her beautiful city with lenity; but the Palmyrenians having rebelled, the city was taken by storm, and its people put to death. The ruins of Palmyra are still among the most remarkable ...
— A Smaller History of Rome • William Smith and Eugene Lawrence
... disposed to inquire into the reason of the comparative lenity, on the other hand, with which some pieces were treated, which, to indifferent judges, seemed at least as much deserving of condemnation as some of those which met with it. I am willing to put, a favorable construction ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, Issue 67, May, 1863 • Various
... is called "The Diaboliad."(138) This hero is Lord Ernham. Lord Hertford and Lord Beauchamp are the chief persons whom he loads with his invectives. Lord Lyttleton (and) his cousin Mr. Ascough are also treated with not much lenity; Lord Pembroke with great familiarity, as well as C. Fox; and Fitzpatrick, although painted in colours bad enough at present, is represented as one whom in time the Devil will lose for his disciple. I am only attacked upon that trite and very foolish ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... indecent for his sollicitor to mary a woman who had suffered public punishment for adultery, and who was confined by his command—but where is the tyrant to be found in this paper? Or, what prince ever spoke of such a scandal, and what is stronger, of such contempt of his authority, with so much lenity and temper? He enjoins his chancellor to dissuade the sollicitor from the match—but should he persist—a tyrant would have ordered the sollicitor to prison too—but Richard —Richard, if his servant will not be dissuaded, allows the match; and in the mean time commits Jane—to whose custody?—Her ...
— Historic Doubts on the Life and Reign of King Richard the Third • Horace Walpole
... he enter'd the Town, with a good deal of seeming Lenity, put a stop to the Ravages of the Sailors; and ordered Proclamation to be made throughout the Place, that all the Inhabitants should immediately bring in their best Effects into the great Church for their better Security. This was by the mistaken Populace, as readily ...
— Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton • Daniel Defoe
... past, he said, by dividing of words and other their own additions, had brought in many errours detestable unto the Church of Christ." "He axed a boon of the Queen's Highness, that, like as she had beforetime extended her mercy particularly and privately, [and] so through her lenity and gentleness much conspiracy and open rebellion was grown ... she would now be merciful to the body of the commonwealth and conservation thereof, which could not be unless the rotten and hurtful members thereof were cut off and consumed."—Chronicle ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude
... signed in their behalf by Israel Perley. In this letter the inhabitants aver "that their greatest desire hath ever been to live in peace under good and wholesome laws," and they declare themselves "ready to attend to any conditions of lenity and oblivion that may be ...
— Glimpses of the Past - History of the River St. John, A.D. 1604-1784 • W. O. Raymond
... several debates upon this impeachment, it must be confessed that his majesty gave many marks of his great lenity, often urging the services you had done him, and endeavoring to extenuate your crimes. The treasurer and admiral insisted that you should be put to the most painful and ignominious death, by setting fire on your house at night; and the general ...
— Gulliver's Travels - Into Several Remote Regions of the World • Jonathan Swift
... indication of his troubled conscience, which fancies some atonement for his own sin in stern repression of that of others; for consciousness of evil may sometimes sting into harshness as well as soften to lenity, and sinful man is a sterner judge than the righteous God. The answer of Nathan is a perfect example of the Divine way of convincing of sin. There is first the plain charge pressed home on the individual conscience, ...
— The Life of David - As Reflected in His Psalms • Alexander Maclaren
... opinions. They are intimately connected with the memory of Laud, first as Bishop of London, and then as Archbishop of Canterbury, whose letters show that the severities in question were to him and Strafford (to use Hallam's expression) "the feebleness of excessive lenity." To the last Charles was not despotic enough to please Laud, who complains petulantly in his Diary of a prince "who knew not how to be, or ...
— Books Condemned to be Burnt • James Anson Farrer
... a colonial surgeon, dismissed on a charge of culpable negligence. His neighbors, believing the penalty unjust, remonstrated in his favor, and Franklin complied with their request. This Mr. Montagu severely condemned, as fatal to the dignity of government, and ascribed the lenity of Sir John to the influence of Lady Franklin. He then announced to the governor, in a formal manner, that thenceforth he should confine his own services to the routine of his office, and that a cordial co-operation might be expected no longer. The ...
— The History of Tasmania, Volume I (of 2) • John West
... swimmers, I was very glad that I knew to whom I might apply. Having thus dismissed these honest fellows from their fears, I was infinitely gratified by the murmur of satisfaction which instantly ran through the ship's company; and was afterwards amply rewarded for my lenity, there being no service during all the toils and dangers of the voyage which they did not perform with a zeal and alacrity that were much to their honour and my advantage, as an ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... of Campo Formio, Bernadotte was sent as an Ambassador to the Court of Vienna, accompanied by a numerous escort of Jacobin propagators. Having procured the liberty of Austrian patriots, whose lives, forfeit to the law, the lenity of the Cabinet of Vienna had spared, he thought that he might attempt anything; and, therefore, on the anniversary day of the fete for the levy en masse of the inhabitants of the capital, he insulted the feelings of the loyal, and excited the discontented to rebellion, by placing over ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... over those journals. In the latter, one or two of her works have been criticised with overwhelming power, and in a tone and spirit superlatively bitter. In the former, on the contrary, she is spoken of with studied lenity, although the Reviewer is obliged to confess that he is not one of her particular admirers, and seems to be perpetually restraining himself from indulging in the language of raillery and sarcasm. We need hardly add that the political principles which her Ladyship professes ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various
... towards deserters which was not consonant with the mild temper of Tullibardine: "Those who have gone home without a special licence on furlough, must be exemplarily punished, either in their persons or effects, or in both; for when our all depends, lenity would be folly." After urging the Marquis to send off the men to Blair by dozens, he adds, "If rewards and punishments do not, I know not what will. By the laws of God and man you have both in your power and your person:" thus alluding to the ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume III. • Mrs. Thomson
... were not distinguishable by any striking habits of character from other nuns, and were generally not very different in their appearance when in their usual dress, and engaged in their customary occupations. It was evident, that they were treated with much kindness and lenity by the Superior and the old nuns; and this I discovered was done in order to render them as well contented and happy in their situation as possible. I should have attributed the motives for this partiality to their wishing that they might not influence others ...
— Awful Disclosures - Containing, Also, Many Incidents Never before Published • Maria Monk
... army, was accused of popery, and Swift wrote to Lord Carteret that the charge was generally believed to be false: "The father is the most universally beloved of any man I ever knew in his station.... You cannot do any personal thing more acceptable to the people of Ireland than in inclining towards lenity to Mr. Proby and his family." Proby was probably a near relative of Sir Thomas Proby, Bart., M.P., of Elton, Hunts, at whose death in 1689 the baronetcy expired. Mrs. Proby seems to have been a ...
— The Journal to Stella • Jonathan Swift
... assailants took possession of the gunroom; seized the arms, and killed all who resisted. This vigorous assault soon carried the ship by a surrender at discretion. She proved to be a rich prize; and the prisoners were treated with lenity, which was not always the course adopted by the buccaneers when they were disappointed in the amount of their expected plunder. Many were the crews compelled to pay with their lives for the poverty of their cargoes. In the present case Le Grande retained for his own service such of the common ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol III, Issue VI, June, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... I hope. I think thou shouldst be glad to have the justification of her memory left to one, who, at the same time, thou mayest be assured, will treat thee, and thy actions, with all the lenity the case will admit. ...
— Clarissa, Volume 7 • Samuel Richardson
... that they would proceed to retaliation, which, if once commenced, might be carried to extremities; to prevent which, the Congress issued an address exhorting to forbearance and a further trial by examples of generosity and lenity, to recall their enemies to the practice of humanity amidst the calamities of war. In consequence of which, neither the Congress, nor any of the States apart, have ever exercised or authorised the exercise of the right ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. I • Various
... a Majesty in your Countenance, such Lenity in your Eyes, gravity in your speech, as that for your gracefull presence that may be truly affirm'd of you what was once appli'd to a great Prince resembling you, Jam firmitas, Jam proceritas corporis, jam honor Capitis & dignitas oris, ad hoc aetatis indeflexa maturitas, nonne longe lateque ...
— An Apologie for the Royal Party (1659); and A Panegyric to Charles the Second (1661) • John Evelyn
... policy, has suddenly made himself the hero and the darling of the moment by declaring that some foreign state has insulted England, and that the time has come when the sword must be drawn to defend the nation's honor. Then "away to heaven, respective lenity" indeed! The appeal acts like a charm to call out the passion and to silence the reason of vast masses of the population in all ranks and conditions. Even among the working-classes and the poor—who, one might imagine, have all to lose and nothing to gain by war—it is by ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume II (of 4) • Justin McCarthy
... appears that the Romanists were apprehensive of more severe laws being enacted under King James than those which had been carried by the late queen. There was no ground for such an apprehension, since King James was really anxious to treat his Roman Catholic subjects with great lenity. Sir Everard also requested that his wife and children might not suffer on his account. His last request was that he might be put to death by being beheaded, and not ...
— Guy Fawkes - or A Complete History Of The Gunpowder Treason, A.D. 1605 • Thomas Lathbury
... leniency, mildness, peacefulness, charity, lenity, patience, self-control, forbearance, long-suffering, ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... increased the severity of punishments, as probably necessary in a corrupt state of society. After the decemviral laws fell into disuse, the Romans, in the days of the republic, passed from extreme rigor to great lenity, as is observable in the transition from the Puritan regime to our times in the United States. Capital punishment for several centuries was exceedingly rare, and this was prevented by voluntary exile. Under the empire, public ...
— The Old Roman World • John Lord
... of Colonel Boone over the Indian mind, that the chiefs with one consent agreed in grateful commemoration of this treaty, that if any captive should hereafter be taken by them from Maysville, that captive should be treated with every possible degree of lenity. And it is worthy of record that such a captive was subsequently taken, and that the Indians with the most scrupulous fidelity fulfilled their pledge. Indeed, it is difficult for an impartial historian to deny, that these poor savages, ...
— Daniel Boone - The Pioneer of Kentucky • John S. C. Abbott
... as to give no offence to John Russell, a lower tone than would be naturally expected from us by our friends, who will, and can, know nothing of our reasons for foregoing the advantage which seems to be in our power, and for treating our opponents with such extraordinary and unaccountable lenity and forbearance. This is asking a great deal.' I owned that it was; but I urged that the paramount importance of winning over the Whig leader, and a part of the Whig party, to a decided opposition to the movement, and the prospect it held out of separating the Whigs from the Radicals, ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... spend the night here. I've been able to secure this much lenity for you, but it's for one night only. Tomorrow you go with the other prisoners in the stables. Your door will be locked, but even if you should succeed in forcing it don't try to escape. The halls swarm with sentinels, and you would be shot instantly. ...
— The Forest of Swords - A Story of Paris and the Marne • Joseph A. Altsheler
... his cheek inflamed, while he called out, "Up! up, neighbour! No time now to mope in the chimney-corner! Where is your buff-coat and broadsword, man? Take the true side once in your life, and mend past mistakes. The King is all lenity, man—all royal nature and mercy. I ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... of two powerful contending parties, concentrating their terrors, and perfecting their deep designs to crush each other before they entirely annihilate a fallen foe, bears no more resemblance to the wise lenity of a regular government towards the refractory subjects it has subdued, than the fearful stillness which is the precursor of a thunder-storm does to the serene tranquillity of a summer's day. No sooner were the Presbyterian republicans ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... Harold, and had fallen at Senlac; and that the terrible fate of Romney had struck such terror into the hearts of the inhabitants, who knew there was no army that could advance to their assistance, that they surrendered at the Conqueror's approach. To them William behaved with lenity and kindness. His severity at Romney and his lenity at Dover had their effect. There being no central authority, no army in the field, each town and district was left to shift for itself; and assuredly none of them unaided could hope to offer prolonged resistance to the ...
— Wulf the Saxon - A Story of the Norman Conquest • G. A. Henty
... by a back-door. The regent told his attendants that he was wounded, and returned to his lodgings; it was at first thought the wound was not mortal, but his pain increasing, he began to think of death. Some about him told him, That this was the fruit of his lenity, in sparing so many notorious offenders, and among the rest his own murderer; but he replied, "Your importunity shall not make me repent my clemency." Having settled his private affairs, he committed the care of the young king to the nobles there present, ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie
... disorder in the punishment of offenders; and wish to be governed, not by temper but by reason, in the manner of treating them. We are sensible that our cause has suffered by the two following errors: first, by ill-judged lenity to traitorous persons in some cases; and, secondly, by only a passionate treatment of them in others. For the future we disown both, and wish to be steady in our proceedings, and serious in ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... are Mr. Hallam's, not Mr. Froude's—we can deduce not tyranny, but lenity, good sense, and the frank withdrawal from a wrong position as soon as the unwillingness of the people proved it to be ...
— Froude's History of England • Charles Kingsley
... lost their hopes, and our friends, I hope, are recovered from their fears. To fancy that our government can be subverted by the rabble, whom its lenity has pampered into impudence, is to fear that a city may be drowned by the overflowing of its kennels. The distemper which cowardice or malice thought either decay of the vitals, or resolution of the nerves, appears, at last, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 6 - Reviews, Political Tracts, and Lives of Eminent Persons • Samuel Johnson
... pronounce too harshly on the conduct of others, seeing that we ourselves may stand in much need of lenity of judgment. There might have existed motives for the action of him whom you designate as an assassin, quite as powerful as those which led to YOUR interference, and quite as easily ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... forth to oppose the enemy, he, after concluding a truce for a year, returned with his army, and, in six months, laid down the dictatorship, with the reputation of having exercised it with blameless lenity. ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... or if the Nile had not, risen beyond its banks; if the earth had shaken, or if the temperate order of the seasons had been interrupted, the superstitious Pagans were convinced that the crimes and the impiety of the Christians, who were spared by the excessive lenity of the government, had at length provoked the divine justice. It was not among a licentious and exasperated populace, that the forms of legal proceedings could be observed; it was not in an amphitheatre, stained with the blood of wild beasts and gladiators, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... prisoner. The paper was a bail writ, demanding the body of the accused. The officer serving had been kind enough to allow Marston his parole of honour until the next morning. He granted this in accordance with Marston's request, that by the lenity he might see Daddy ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... Charles, and the rest, it is enacted thus: That in regard King Henry giues consent, Of meere compassion, and of lenity, To ease your Countrie of distressefull Warre, And suffer you to breath in fruitfull peace, You shall become true Liegemen to his Crowne. And Charles, vpon condition thou wilt sweare To pay him tribute, and submit thy selfe, Thou shalt be plac'd ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... must teach libertines that the English people appreciate the importance of domestic ties. Accordingly, some unfortunate man, in no respect more depraved than hundreds whose offences have been treated with lenity, is singled out as an expiatory sacrifice. If he has children, they are to be taken from him. If he has a profession, he is to be driven from it. He is cut by the higher orders, and hissed by the lower. He is, ...
— Venetia • Benjamin Disraeli
... instead of convicting their authors of inconstancy and want of system, would be taken as an occasion of charging us with a predetermined discontent, which nothing could satisfy; whilst we accused every measure of vigor as cruel, and every proposal of lenity as weak and irresolute. The public, he said, would not have patience to see us play the game out with our adversaries; we must produce our hand. It would be expected that those who for many years had been active in such affairs should show that they ...
— Burke's Speech on Conciliation with America • Edmund Burke
... happiness of life, by preserving the mind from perturbation, and arming it against the assaults of calumny and malice. A wise man, who puts himself under the government of reason, will be able to receive an injury with calmnese, and to treat the person who committed it with lenity; for he will rank injuries among the casual events of life, and will prudently reflect that he can no more stop the natural current of human passions, than he can curb the stormy winds. Refractory servants in a family should be chastised, and disorderly members of a state ...
— Ancient and Modern Celebrated Freethinkers - Reprinted From an English Work, Entitled "Half-Hours With - The Freethinkers." • Charles Bradlaugh, A. Collins, and J. Watts
... effect; when the well-disposed in those counties are unable by their influence and example to reclaim the wicked from their fury, and are compelled to associate in their own defence; when the proffered lenity has been perversely misinterpreted into an apprehension that the citizens will march with reluctance; when the opportunity of examining the serious consequences of a treasonable opposition has been employed in propagating principles of anarchy, endeavoring through emissaries to alienate the friends ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing
... waters, because the Most High is no respecter of persons, nor does the Most Holy desire the death of sinners, who offered Himself to die for them, but desires to heal the contrite in heart, to raise the fallen, and to correct the perverse in the spirit of lenity. For which most salutary purpose our kindly Mother Church has planted you freely, and having planted has watered you with favours, and having watered you has established you with privileges, that ye may be co-workers with pastors and curates in procuring the salvation ...
— The Philobiblon of Richard de Bury • Richard de Bury
... out of Rome, and the Monarchy it selfe dissolved. But Crimes of Infirmity; such as are those which proceed from great provocation, from great fear, great need, or from ignorance whether the Fact be a great Crime, or not, there is place many times for Lenity, without prejudice to the Common-wealth; and Lenity when there is such place for it, is required by the Law of Nature. The Punishment of the Leaders, and teachers in a Commotion; not the poore seduced ...
— Leviathan • Thomas Hobbes
... This impolitic lenity, too frequent in those times, was probably the result of a secret combination among the barons, who never could endure to see the total ruin of one of their own order: but it encouraged Fawkes de Breaute, a man whom King John had raised from a low origin, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume
... that have been stealing from o'r estate and gett drink out of ye cellar for them; saucy and impudent, as when we have taken her to task for her wickedness she has gone away to complain of cruell usage. I can truly say we have used this base creature w'th a great deal of kindness and lenity. She w'd frequently take her mistresses capps and stockins, hankerchers etc., to dresse herselfe and away without leave among her companions. I may have said some time or other when she has been in fault that she was fitt to live nowhere but in Virginia, and ...
— Customs and Fashions in Old New England • Alice Morse Earle
... language as he passed by the window of her prison; they knew, also, that she was adjudged to suffer death, and had been preserved only by an involuntary banishment into the wilderness. The new outrage by which she had provoked her fate seemed to render further lenity impossible, and a gentleman in military dress, with a stout man of inferior rank, drew toward the door of the meetinghouse and awaited her approach. Scarcely did her feet press the floor, however, when an unexpected scene occurred. In that ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... clearly that we ought to quarrel originally with Queen Elizabeth's tyranny for most of the errors of Charles the First. As long as he is Willing to sacrifice some royal head, I would not much dispute with him which it should be. I incline every day to lenity, as I see more and more that it is being very partial to think worse of some men than of others. If I was a king myself, I dare say I should cease to love a republic. My Lady Rochford desired me t'other day to give ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... punished among us as a crime, it ought at least to be treated with the same lenity as other crimes; the offender ought not to languish at the will of him whom he has offended, but to be allowed some appeal to the justice of his country. There can be no reason why any debtor should be imprisoned, but that he may be compelled to payment; ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson
... shedding the blood of their brethren on account of religious differences. But justly apprehensive that so extraordinary a declaration of opinion from such a person might not of itself suffice to establish in the minds of the English that character of lenity and moderation which he found it his interest to acquire, he determined to add some few deeds ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... can do, is to improve it, if it happens in our day; if not, let us transmit to our descendants, together with our slaves, a pity for their unhappy lot, and an abhorrence for slavery. If we cannot reduce this wished for reformation to practice, let us treat the unhappy victims with lenity. It is the furthest advance we can make towards justice. It is a debt we owe to the purity of our religion, to show that it is at variance with that ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 • Various
... rather our wish to prevent evils in future than to enter into a severe retrospection of the past, and, where facts are doubtful, or attended with alleviating circumstances, to proceed with lenity, rather than to prosecute with rigor,—yet some of the cases are so flagrantly corrupt, and others attended with circumstances so oppressive to the inhabitants, that it would be unjust to suffer the delinquents to go unpunished. The principal facts[56] ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VIII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... for removing an officer from his command" (he writes to Chancellor Livingston on the 12th of March, 1778) "where his misconduct rather appears to result from want of capacity than from any real intention of doing wrong...." Livingston had written complaining of Putnam's "imprudent lenity to the disaffected, and too great intercourse with the enemy"—or, in other words, that he had not persecuted the people Livingston disliked, and had shown generosity to the foe when in distress. Yet he felt compelled to add: "For my own part, I respect ...
— "Old Put" The Patriot • Frederick A. Ober
... grace, n. compassion, lenity, mercy, benevolence, love, excellence, virtue; beauty, loveliness, gracefulness, comeliness; refinement, elegance, courtliness, culture, polish; ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... years, be it a "finality," or only a phase of progress towards a more perfect state, is the grand historical fact of modern times, and Paine's name is intimately connected with it. One is always ready to look with lenity on the partiality of a biographer,—whether he urge the claims of his hero to a niche in the Valhalla of great men, or act as the Advocatus Diaboli ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various
... to allow the garrisons to march out with the honours of war on condition of not serving against them for a year. A better example of shirking present problems at the cost of enhanced difficulties in the future cannot be imagined. By this improvident lenity the Allies enabled the regicides to hurl fully 25,000 trained troops against the royalists of the West and deal them terrible blows. In September and October the Republicans gained considerable successes, especially at Cholet. Soon the Vendean War became little more than a guerilla ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... misfortunes. This lay in the increased bitterness of the struggle, and in those more strenuous measures which the British commanders felt themselves entitled and compelled to adopt. Nothing could exceed the lenity of Lord Roberts's early proclamations in the Free State. But, as the months went on and the struggle still continued, the war assumed a harsher aspect. Every farmhouse represented a possible fort, and a probable depot for the enemy. The extreme ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle
... hands from the English Queen containing intercepted treasonable letters from the Popish lords in Scotland to the King of Spain and the Duke of Parma, and accompanied by the following letter in Elizabeth's own hand, in which she rates him for his fatuous lenity towards subjects who had joined hands with the enemies of ...
— Andrew Melville - Famous Scots Series • William Morison
... those in fault, and that is the only dread they have of John, for they know he is not authorized to beat them. You mention in your letter that you do not wish your negroes treated with severity. I have ever thought my fault on the side of lenity; if they were treated severe as many are, I should not be their overseer on any consideration." In the same letter Cain mentioned that the pork made on the place the preceding year had yielded eleven monthly allowances to the negroes at the rate of 1050 pounds ...
— American Negro Slavery - A Survey of the Supply, Employment and Control of Negro Labor as Determined by the Plantation Regime • Ulrich Bonnell Phillips
... we cherished the feeling till it led us to commit this wicked action; but that feeling has all passed away. You never injured us, and I know not what spirit of evil tempted us to injure you as we have done. We feel thankful to our teacher for the lenity he has shown us, and I hope our future conduct will bear witness that we appreciate his kindness, and, if you can forgive us and be friends again, I hope you will find that we are ...
— Walter Harland - Or, Memories of the Past • Harriet S. Caswell
... indeed, revere him as a model of virtue, but of the occasional lapses of his bachelor life from correct moral standards, which seemed to be well known and freely talked about, they spoke with affectionate lenity of judgment. ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol 31, No 2, June 1908 • Various
... some difficulty in treating with perfect seriousness a line of reasoning which, proceeding from the quarter whence it comes, holds up for our admiration the wisdom or lenity of Turkish rule in Crete, and extols the supreme justice of the system upon which rests the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, which implies that the arts of government may be learnt from the Russian administration of Finland, and ...
— England's Case Against Home Rule • Albert Venn Dicey
... name. Macdonald acted with great moderation. He upbraided Hugh, both with disloyalty and ingratitude; but told the rest, that he considered them as men deluded and misinformed. Hugh was sworn to fidelity, and dismissed with his companions; but he was not generous enough to be reclaimed by lenity; and finding no longer any countenance among the gentlemen, endeavoured to execute the same design by meaner hands. In this practice he was detected, taken to Macdonald's castle, and imprisoned in the dungeon. When he was hungry, they let down a plentiful meal of salted meat; and when, after ...
— A Journey to the Western Isles of Scotland • Samuel Johnson
... an asylum in Brittany. This is supposed to have happened in 1047; but the anger of the offended duke was short-lived; for the very next year, there is an account of William's restoring to Neel the lordship of St. Sauveur, "in consideration of the services he had rendered him." The same lenity, however, was not shewn with regard to Neel's lordship of Nehou; for this was permanently alienated, and was granted to the family of Riviers, or Redvers, who, some years afterwards, became powerful in England, where they had a grant ...
— Architectural Antiquities of Normandy • John Sell Cotman
... deliver them into Christian bondage. He set them at liberty, and permitted them to repair to Granada—"a proof," says the pious Agapida, "that his conversion was not entirely consummated, but that there were still some lingerings of the infidel in his heart." His lenity was far from procuring him indulgence in the opinions of his countrymen; on the contrary, the inhabitants of Granada, when they learnt from the liberated garrison the stratagem by which Roma had been captured, cursed ...
— Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada • Washington Irving
... A.D., in the seventh year of the Emperor Nero. Here the centurion handed Paul over to the prefect of the praetorian guards, by whom he was subjected to a merely nominal custody, although, according to Roman custom, he was chained to a soldier. But he was treated with great lenity, was allowed to have lodgings, to receive his friends freely, and to hold Christian meetings in his own house; and no one molested him. For two years Paul remained at Rome, a fettered prisoner it ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume II • John Lord
... happy fortune, Master Tiller, has troubled your reason. What I offer, was offered because I would not drive an unfortunate and remarkable man, like him we have, to extremities, and—there may be other motives, but do not mistake my lenity. Should force become necessary to put your vessel into our hands, the law may view your offences with a still harsher eye. Deeds which the lenity of our system now considers as venial, may ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... same way of thinking as Hogarth. Writing of a speech made at the Oxford Commemoration of 1754 by the Jacobite Dr. King (see post, Feb. 1755), he said:—'There cannot be a greater instance of the lenity of the government he abuses than his pestilent harangues so publicly made with impunity furnishes (sic) all his readers with.'—Rich. Corresp. ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... they have power, Let them have cushions by you; if none, awake Your dang'rous lenity; if you are learned, Be not as commmon fools; if you are not, Then vail your ...
— Notes to Shakespeare, Volume III: The Tragedies • Samuel Johnson
... destruction. Here, men rampant against the Minister as having strained the laws, in what regarded Ireland, for the sake of a vigour altogether unnecessary; there, men threatening impeachment—as for a lenity in the same case altogether intolerable! To the right, "how durst you diminish the army in Ireland, leaving that country, up to March 1843, with a force lower by 2400 rank and file shall the lowest that the Whigs had maintained?" ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various
... hereditary reverence had annexed to that island: it became once more a place of consideration by the return of the Druids. Here Agricola observed a conduct very different from that of his predecessor, Paulinus: the island, when he had reduced it, was treated with great lenity. Agricola was a man of humanity and virtue: he pitied the condition and respected the prejudices of the conquered. This behavior facilitated the progress of his arms, insomuch that in less than two campaigns all the British nations ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... as he was, I gave fair grace, however, and plenty of openings for repentance. None of them would he embrace, and he thought scorn of my lenity. And I might have gone on with such weakness longer, if I had not heard that his coach-and-four was ordered for ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore
... whom we have before noticed as being partial to a drowsy life, now put in his word, and gave his affirmation as to the lenity of the police. His beat as he called it, was between the foot of Ludgate Hill and Blackfriars Bridge, "and neither the man who formerly looked about for the people there, nor his predecessor, ever once interrupted ...
— Sinks of London Laid Open • Unknown
... you for Chief Justice Robinson's address at the trial of the prisoners. It is good. My own views are in favour of lenity to these prisoners. Punishments for political offences can never be beneficial, when they are inflicted in opposition to public sentiment and sympathy. In such a case it will defeat the object it is intended to accomplish. It matters not whether ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... to use every means necessary to that end. Relentless rigor is the only measure adequate to the occasion. It is the weakness of civilization that it hesitates to be cruelly kind. The mistake of the military authorities in regard to the New York riot, was lenity. The prompt and vigorous bombardment, in the beginning of the rising, of a block of the houses in which the rioters were safely ensconced, while covertly firing on the soldiers and policemen, would have done more to quell the mob than all ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No 3, September 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... surrendered. The emperor treated it with lenity, but a great treasure in gold, silver, silk, and precious stones fell into his hands, with all the animals and arms. Zenobia being brought into his presence, he sternly asked her how she had dared to take arms against the emperors of Rome. She answered, with ...
— Historic Tales, vol 10 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... with pity toward the poor, untutored savage who had thus really been grateful, and no doubt had done all in his power for her good. She recalled many instances where she believed that he was the cause of the lenity upon the part of the captors, and where it seemed that some one had shown an interest in her welfare. She informed him that she believed he had done her all the good that was in his power, and expressed her heartfelt thanks for it. The ...
— The Ranger - or The Fugitives of the Border • Edward S. Ellis
... very great torment night and day. The statute of 1562 includes 'fond and fantastic prophecies' (a very common sort of political offences in that age) in the category of forbidden arts. With unaccustomed lenity it punished a first ...
— The Superstitions of Witchcraft • Howard Williams
... into the royal presence he limited his commission to a serious admonition, that, upon such occasions, his majesty should always shut the windows.—The king is said to have recompensed this unexpected lenity after the Restoration. He probably remembered the joke, though he ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3) • Walter Scott
... merely in order to avenge defeats and vindicate a military superiority which the immensely greater forces of Britain made self-evident? A great country is strong enough to be magnanimous, and shows her greatness better by justice and lenity than by a sanguinary revenge. These moral arguments, which affect different minds differently, were reinforced by a strong ground of policy. The Boers of the Orange Free State had sympathised warmly with their kinsfolk in the Transvaal, and were with difficulty kept from crossing ...
— Impressions of South Africa • James Bryce
... kept out of view in the proceedings of the government, which deals with the whole matter as if the tenants were nothing but martyrs to hard bargains, and the landlords their task-masters, of greater or less lenity, they are extensively circulated in the "infected districts," and are held to be very sound doctrines by a large number of the "bone and sinew of the land." Of course the reasoning is varied a little, to suit circumstances, and to make it meet the facts. But of this school is a great deal, ...
— The Redskins; or, Indian and Injin, Volume 1. - Being the Conclusion of the Littlepage Manuscripts • James Fenimore Cooper
... her. When she first came I was at some pains to prevent her seeing much of her aunt; but I have relaxed, as I believe I may depend on her observing the rules I have laid down for their discourse. But do not imagine that with all this lenity I have for a moment given up my plan of her marriage. No; I am unalterably fixed on this point, though I have not yet quite decided on the manner of bringing it about. I should not chuse to have the business brought on here, and canvassed by the wise heads of Mr. and Mrs. Vernon; and I ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... prudence and humanity, I was not sorry that the measures I had recommended were rejected. For, though the contemptuous behaviour of the natives, and their subsequent opposition to our necessary operations on shore, arising, I have no doubt, from a misconstruction of our lenity, compelled us at last to have recourse to violence in our own defence; yet I am not so sure that the circumstances of the case would, in the opinion of the world, have justified the use of force on our part in the first instance. ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... of Masters," and "Of the Duty of Parents," are valuable upon many accounts: inasmuch as they afford curious anecdotes of the system of academic and domestic education then pursued, and are accompanied with his own sagacious and candid reflections. Peacham was an Aschamite in respect to lenity of discipline; as the following extracts, from the foregoing work, (edit. 1661) will unequivocally prove. Peacham first observes upon the different modes of education: "But we see on the contrary, out ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... to proscribe no set of persons whatever,' says Chesterfield, 'and determined to be governed by none. Had the Papists made any attempt to put themselves above the law, I should have taken good care to have quelled them again. It was said my lenity to the Papists had wrought no alteration either in their religious or their political sentiments. I did not expect that it would: but surely that was no reason ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 1 • Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton
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