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Abstemious   Listen
adjective
Abstemious  adj.  
1.
Abstaining from wine. (Orig. Latin sense.) "Under his special eye Abstemious I grew up and thrived amain."
2.
Sparing in diet; refraining from a free use of food and strong drinks; temperate; abstinent; sparing in the indulgence of the appetite or passions. "Instances of longevity are chiefly among the abstemious."
3.
Sparingly used; used with temperance or moderation; as, an abstemious diet.
4.
Marked by, or spent in, abstinence; as, an abstemious life. "One abstemious day."
5.
Promotive of abstemiousness. (R.) "Such is the virtue of the abstemious well."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Abstemious" Quotes from Famous Books



... orchard. At one of the central tables a very stumpy little priest sat in complete solitude, and applied himself to a pile of whitebait with the gravest sort of enjoyment. His daily living being very plain, he had a peculiar taste for sudden and isolated luxuries; he was an abstemious epicure. He did not lift his eyes from his plate, round which red pepper, lemons, brown bread and butter, etc., were rigidly ranked, until a tall shadow fell across the table, and his friend Flambeau sat down opposite. Flambeau ...
— The Wisdom of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton

... 1564, eleven years after the birth of Henry of Navarre, at the age of fifty-five. For several years he was so abstemious that he had eaten but one meal ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott

... boot or shoe, laced high, was also enjoined, and if these orders were disobeyed the culprit was condemned to walk bare-footed, until the Master, considering his humility said to him "enough." An oath of obedience and a promise to lead a moral and abstemious life was required of every Leper on admission. The Bishops of Rome from time to time issued Bulls, with regard to the ecclesiastical separation and rights of ...
— The Leper in England: with some account of English lazar-houses • Robert Charles Hope

... Madrid play-house as half-drunk and dancing lewdly, was the most abstemious and chastest of men, and neither smoked nor drank wine. His fame went on increasing, as did the number of his followers. He effected prodigies with the means at his command. His friends in France supplied him with two cannon, ...
— Romantic Spain - A Record of Personal Experiences (Vol. II) • John Augustus O'Shea

... attention to the decencies of his station. To the train of knights and noblemen, who had been accustomed to wait on him, succeeded a few companions selected from the most virtuous and learned of his clergy. His diet was abstemious; his charities were abundant; his time was divided into certain portions allotted to prayer and study and the episcopal functions. These he found it difficult to unite with those of the chancellor; and, therefore, as ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various

... Drugs are not forbidden, but they are not usually addicted to them. Tobacco is forbidden to the Jains, but both they and the Hindus smoke, and their women sometimes chew tobacco. The Bania while he is poor is very abstemious, and it is said that on a day when he has made no money he goes supperless to bed. But when he has accumulated wealth, he develops a fondness for ghi or preserved butter, which often causes him to become portly. Otherwise his food remains simple, and as a rule he confined himself until ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume II • R. V. Russell

... habits, we have, through his grandson, Patrick Henry Fontaine, some testimony which has the merit of placing the great man somewhat more familiarly before us. "He was," we are told, "very abstemious in his diet, and used no wine or alcoholic stimulants. Distressed and alarmed at the increase of drunkenness after the Revolutionary war, he did everything in his power to arrest the vice. He thought that the ...
— Patrick Henry • Moses Coit Tyler

... riser, and generally sat down to breakfast with a book on entomology in his hand. He ate and read, and read and ate—regarding no one, and speaking to no one. He was delicate and abstemious, and on gross feeders he often exercised the severity of his wit. Two meals a day were all he ventured on—he always avoided supper—the story of his having supped on raw pork-chops that he might dream his picture of the Nightmare, has no foundation. Indeed, the dreams he delighted to relate ...
— Anecdotes of Painters, Engravers, Sculptors and Architects, and Curiosities of Art, (Vol. 2 of 3) • Shearjashub Spooner

... father's books there are frequent references to delicious meals, wonderful dinners and more marvellous dishes, steaming bowls of punch, etc, which have led many to believe that he was a man very fond of the table. And yet I think no more abstemious man ever lived. ...
— My Father as I Recall Him • Mamie Dickens

... eyes full of expression. He never wore a beard, and in the latter part of his life his head was bald. His constitution was originally delicate, and he was twice attacked by epilepsy while transacting public business; but, by constant exercise and abstemious living, he had acquired strong and vigorous health, and could endure almost any amount of exertion. He took pains with his person, and was considered to be effeminate ...
— A Smaller History of Rome • William Smith and Eugene Lawrence

... was defective, and he had been addicted to wine. Once seated on the throne, the reformation of our Henry Fifth was not more thorough than was that of Dost Mahomed. He taught himself to read and write, studied the Koran, became scrupulously abstemious, assiduous in affairs, no longer truculent but courteous. He is said to have made a public acknowledgment of the errors of his previous life, and a firm profession of reformation; nor did his after ...
— The Afghan Wars 1839-42 and 1878-80 • Archibald Forbes

... the Spanish minister now showed no fear of the wines which came his way. Nor, for that matter, did the minister from Great Britain, nor the spouses of these twain. Mr. Burr, seated with their party, himself somewhat abstemious, none the less could not refrain from an interrogatory glance as he saw Merry halt a certain bottle or ...
— The Magnificent Adventure - Being the Story of the World's Greatest Exploration and - the Romance of a Very Gallant Gentleman • Emerson Hough

... handsome, with an expression of sweetness of temper, which was not fallacious; his manners were rather formal, but full of genuine kindness, especially when exercising the duties of hospitality. His general habits were not only temperate, but severely abstemious; but upon a festival occasion, there were few whom a moderate glass of wine exhilarated to such a lively degree. His religion, in which he was devoutly sincere, was Calvinism of the strictest kind, ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart

... that they were by the Ancients called Sana, by way of eminency, and so highly valu'd by the great [20]Augustus, that attributing his Recovery of a dangerous Sickness to them, 'tis reported, he erected a Statue, and built an Altar to this noble Plant. And that the most abstemious and excellent Emperor [21]Tacitus (spending almost nothing at his frugal Table in other Dainties) was yet so great a Friend to Lettuce, that he was us'd to say of his Prodigality, Somnum se ...
— Acetaria: A Discourse of Sallets • John Evelyn

... most, just enough for a single man to live on; in effect, most of the teachers were priests or monks, Benedictines, regular canons, Oratorians, the latter alone officiating in thirty colleges. Not subject to the expenses and necessities which a family imposes, they were abstemious through piety, or at least through discipline, habit, and respect for persons; frequently, the statutes of the school obliged them to live in common,[3160] which was much cheaper than living apart.—The ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 5 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 1 (of 2)(Napoleon I.) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... curiosity, dear boy,' he said persuasively, and slipped the brick into his bag; 'merely a memento of the past—ah, happy past, bright past! You will not take a touch of spirits? no? I find you very abstemious. Well,' he added, 'if you have really no curiosity to await ...
— The Dynamiter • Robert Louis Stevenson and Fanny van de Grift Stevenson

... the finer attributes of his class. His character was unimpeachable; he was abstemious, and unless his fiery temper was aroused by the sight of some supposed lack of seamanship on the part of his men or boys, or the idea of imposition on himself or his owner, he might have been considered religious, but never amiable. Parsimony was his besetting ...
— The Shellback's Progress - In the Nineteenth Century • Walter Runciman

... were extremely scrupulous in the care of their persons. They bathed twice by day and twice by night, and shaved the entire body every third day. Their inner clothing was linen, woollen garments being thought unclean; their diet was plain and even abstemious, in order that, as Plutarch says, "their bodies might sit light as ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers

... well-considered verdict wrapped up in tactful words to bear her company on the long journey. When she would be ordered on a longer journey by a mightier Authority, medical science forbore to specify; but in the higher interests of American music it was urgently pressed upon her that she be abstemious in diet, niggardly of work, careful about fatigue and excitement, and in general comport herself in such manner as to deprive the lease of life remaining to her of most of its savor and worth. She had told Ban that the physicians thought her ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... said, looking down demurely as he spoke into the glass of wine he had been toying with—Rupert was an abstemious man. "So, Adrian, you have been playing the chivalrous role of rescuer of distressed damsels—squire of dames and what not. The last one would have ascribed to you at least at this end of your life. Ha," throwing up his head with a mirthless laugh; "how little any of us would have ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle

... In a community where practical industry was the highest virtue, it was not strange, perhaps, that he was called "lazy" and "shiftless;" no one knew the long climbs and tireless vigils he had undergone in remote solitudes in quest of his favorites, or, knowing, forgave him for it. Abstemious, frugal, and patient as he was, even the crusts of his father's table were given him grudgingly. He often went hungry rather than ask the bread he had failed to earn. How his great frame was nurtured in those days he never knew; perhaps the giant mountains recognized some kin in him and fed ...
— Stories in Light and Shadow • Bret Harte

... oceans of money. Singing wrong words. Wore out his wife: now sings. But hard to tell. Only the two themselves. If he doesn't break down. Keep a trot for the avenue. His hands and feet sing too. Drink. Nerves overstrung. Must be abstemious to sing. Jenny Lind soup: stock, sage, raw eggs, half pint ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce

... A retired, abstemious, and austere life is essentially necessary for the pronunciation of Om, which promotes the love of rigid virtue and a contempt of impermanent sensuality. Siva says "He who is free from lust, anger, covetousness ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various

... the other, the small, dark, pinched, but fiery Prince Eugene. On the spotless white cloth was spread a frugal meal of bread, butter, cheese, and lettuce; a jug of milk, another of water, and a bottle of cowslip wine; for the habits of the family were more than usually frugal and abstemious. ...
— Love and Life • Charlotte M. Yonge

... recount the journey over the bare mountains with my new friend and benefactor. He was a strange gentleman, now jolly enough to make me shake with laughter and forget the sorrow of my parting, now moody for a night and a day; now he was all sweetness, now all fire; now he was abstemious, now self-indulgent and prodigal. He had a will like flint, and under it a soft heart. Cross his moods, and he hated you. I never thought to cross them, therefore he called me Davy, and his friendliness grew with our journey. His anger turned against rocks and rivers, ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... are some excellent cigars in that drawer—but I do not feel like smoking myself." Cedric spoke rather sulkily and with none of his accustomed amiability. "Shall I give you some whiskey and soda?" But Malcolm refused this refreshment—no man was more abstemious than he. ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... decided to exclude those establishments altogether from that important thoroughfare, which has since entirely regained its respectable reputation. The innovation was all the more unfortunate because of the extremely bad impression it made on the natives and Spaniards, who are remarkably abstemious. It must also have been the cause of a large percentage of the sickness of the American troops (wrongly attributed to climate), for it is well known that inebriety in the Philippines is the road to death. ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman

... food of many Indian tribes when on a journey. They carry it in a bag, or a hollow leathern girdle; and when they reach a brook or pond, they take a spoonful of the dry meal, and then one of water, to prevent its choking them. Three or four spoonfuls are sufficient for a meal for these hardy and abstemious people; and, with a few dried shellfish, or a morsel of deer's flesh, they will subsist on it ...
— The Pilgrims of New England - A Tale Of The Early American Settlers • Mrs. J. B. Webb

... given to reverie, and somewhat shy, he had a great fund of humor, drollery, and effervescent wit, which made his society much liked by all fortunate enough to be acquainted with him. He was a very abstemious man, and his tastes were of the simplest. His whole manner and speech were imbued with a high-bred courtesy, though he sometimes loved to run counter to the ordinary conventionalities of life. He could never ...
— Home Life of Great Authors • Hattie Tyng Griswold

... Frederick was abstemious. A glass of wine at dinner was his wildest excess. Three cigars a day he permitted himself, and these he smoked either on the broad veranda or in the smoking room. What else was a smoking room for? Cigarettes he detested. Yet his brother was ever rolling thin, brown-paper cigarettes and smoking ...
— The Turtles of Tasman • Jack London

... his head, being entirely unaccustomed to it, yet he could not resist drinking once again to the health of the ladies. The pedant and the tyrant drank like old topers, who can absorb any amount of liquor—be it wine, or something stronger—without becoming actually intoxicated. Matamore was very abstemious, both in eating and drinking, and could have lived like the impoverished Spanish hidalgo, who dines on three olives and sups on an air upon his mandoline. There was a reason for his extreme frugality; he feared that if he ate and drank like other people ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier

... the village was all against him. Had he been an abstemious man, there is no doubt but the village market-place would have been a square, or a triangle, an oval, a circle, or—well, some definite shape. As it was, it had no definite shape. It was not even irregular. It was nothing—just a space, with no apparent ...
— The One-Way Trail - A story of the cattle country • Ridgwell Cullum

... but mention an observation which I have often made, upon reading the lives of the philosophers, and comparing them with any series of kings or great men of the same number. If we consider these ancient sages, a great part of whose philosophy consisted in a temperate and abstemious course of life, one would think the life of a philosopher and the life of a man were of two different dates. For we find that the generality of these wise men were nearer an hundred than sixty years of age at the ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore

... invariably represent him as a man with a huge, protuberant stomach. The folly of this conception is sufficiently shown by the fact that many of the greatest of fortune-makers have, in their personal habits, been abstemious and even niggardly to a degree which has made them proverbial; and that, even in the case of those who value personal luxury, the maximum of self-indulgence which any single human organism can ...
— A Critical Examination of Socialism • William Hurrell Mallock

... it renders them instantly pale, by promoting the venous absorption; if the whole skin was moistened with warmish vinegar, would this promote venous absorption in the lungs by their sympathy with the skin? The very abstemious diet on milk and vegetables alone is frequently injurious. Flesh-meat once a day, with small wine and water, or small beer, is preferable. Half a grain of opium twice a day, or a grain, I believe to be of great use at the ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. II - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin

... be true; do not give dalliance Too much the rein: the strongest oaths are straw To th' fire i' the blood: be more abstemious, Or else ...
— The Tempest • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]

... thinking; Solely bent to laugh and stuff, And trample upon base Enough. Oh, right is thy instructive praise Of the wealth of Nature's ways! Right thy most unthrifty glee, And pious thy mince-piety! For, behold! great Nature's self Builds her no abstemious shelf, But provides (her love is such For all) her own great, good Too-Much,— Too much grass, and too much tree, Too much air, and land, and sea, Too much seed of fruit and flower, And fish, an unimagin'd ...
— In The Yule-Log Glow—Book 3 - Christmas Poems from 'round the World • Various

... the pork," Terence said, as seriously as O'Grady himself; "and it is unfortunate that you are such an abstemious man, or, as you say, its effects might ...
— With Moore At Corunna • G. A. Henty

... were not lost on the ladies, who increased the spirit of the dance. When this amusement had continued about three hours, the cuscasoe, meat, and vegetables were brought in, as a supper. The Moors ate plentifully; but the abstemious Arabs ate very little; the ladies partook of sweet cakes and dates; they very 142 seldom chew meat, but when they do, they think it gross to swallow it, they only press the juices from the meat, and throw away the substance. The manners ...
— An Account of Timbuctoo and Housa Territories in the Interior of Africa • Abd Salam Shabeeny

... demeanour. The other, his antithesis, was a short, rosy-cheeked, apoplectic-looking subject, with a laugh like a suffocating wheeze, and a paunch like an alderman; his quick, restless eye, and full nether lip denoting more of the bon vivant than the abstemious disciple of Aesculapius. A moment's glance satisfied me, that if I had only these to deal with, I was safe, for I saw that they were of that stamp of country practitioner, half-physician, half-apothecary, who ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Vol. 2 • Charles James Lever

... height, blue-eyed and golden-haired, he was the beau ideal cavalry leader—alert, active, ready, and responsive, with an eye to all details, a love for the picturesque in bearing and equipment, of great endurance, abstemious, healthy, and strong, and as much at home in the saddle and with the sabre as in his own little house in Monroe or by his blazing camp-fire. He married, in February, 1864, Elizabeth Bacon, a daughter of Judge Daniel S. ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 6 of 8 • Various

... been very bad since I left home, although I have been very careful not to drink much, remaining to the full as abstemious as usual, and have not eaten any great quantity, having no appetite. I suffered such an ecstasy of pain all night at Stratford that I was half dead yesterday, and was obliged last night to take a dose ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 1 (of 3), 1833-1856 • Charles Dickens

... stranger tumbles in and breaks his neck, on a dark night, it is ten chances to one that the jury of inquest return for a verdict, that "the deceased came to his death in consequence of intoxication," although he may be the most abstemious water-drinker that ever the sun shone upon. Such was, ten or eleven years ago, to my certain knowledge, ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames

... possess the books he needed, or command the time, if his appetite for luxuries was gratified. In his circumstances, the most marked self-denial was necessary, to gain his object. At the same time, he believed it would make him more healthy to be abstemious. There was not an iota of stinginess in ...
— The Printer Boy. - Or How Benjamin Franklin Made His Mark. An Example for Youth. • William M. Thayer

... character of Diogenes has never excited any general zeal of imitation, there are many who resemble him in his taste of wine; many who are frugal, though not abstemious; whose appetites, though too powerful for reason, are kept under restraint by avarice; and to whom all delicacies lose their flavour, when they cannot be obtained but at their ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson - Volume IV [The Rambler and The Adventurer] • Samuel Johnson

... roots of the lotus lily. A kind of beer brewed from rice is a usual drink; samshu is a spirit distilled from the same grain and at dinners is served hot in small bowls. Excellent native wines are made. The Chinese are, however, abstemious with regard to alcoholic liquors. Water is drunk hot by the very poor, as a substitute for tea. Tea is drunk before and after meals in cups without handle or saucer; the cups are always provided with a cover. Two substantial meals are taken during the day—luncheon and ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various

... time got completely intoxicated in order to celebrate the arrival of the foreigners, or perhaps rather that of the stock of brandy. As there are no Europeans settled at Behring's Straits, at least on the Asiatic side, we learn from the traffic in brandy that there are actually natives abstemious enough to be able to ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold

... the campaign, Cranston again used Devers's authority. "Differs said he had,—two or three times." But when Cranston wrote to Boynton, Boynton replied that young Brannan declared that he had been totally abstemious since the day after they reached the post. The day of their coming in, he arrived half frozen and all tired out, as he had been kept back on wagon guard, and he was offered liquor by Sergeant Haney himself, and drank several times, and was wretchedly ill all the next ...
— Under Fire • Charles King

... bright as ever. His dress was always a plain, gray uniform, with cavalry boots reaching to his knees, and a broad-brimmed gray felt hat. He seldom wore a weapon, and his only mark of rank was the stars on his collar. Though always abstemious in diet, he seemed able to bear any amount of fatigue, being capable of remaining in his saddle all day and at his desk ...
— Recollections and Letters of General Robert E. Lee • Captain Robert E. Lee, His Son

... do it just because I am not strong enough to resist the world and my fleshly desires. I must be in an absolutely pure environment and lead an abstemious life, only then will I remain good. I have tried it for three weeks. But then I fell ill and was nursed and petted by kind hands and then Satan again had ...
— The Bride of Dreams • Frederik van Eeden

... country, and I have not a doubt that he took an allowance of toddy occasionally of an evening which would have laid his feeble successors under the table. His last years, at least, poor fellow, were abstemious enough, when he sipped his barley-water, while the others passed the decanter. But what a high-souled chivalrous gentleman he was, with how fine a sense of honour, translating itself not into empty phrases, but into years of ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle

... you," I said, when I drew my head in again, "that you must not expect to regain your health and strength so completely as to be able to return to your old dissipations. You must make up your mind to lead a regular, quiet, abstemious life, avoiding all excitement. Nine months out of the twelve at least, if not the whole year, you must spend in the country for the sake of fresh air. A life in town would kill you in six months. But if you are careful of yourself you may ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton

... always judge the common life by what we see on convivial occasions," he made answer. "One may take wine freely with his friends and be as abstemious as an anchorite ...
— Danger - or Wounded in the House of a Friend • T. S. Arthur

... that book. How he surprises us from time to time. Came out well about 'bolting,' with regard to Butler the other day. Writes good verses, too,—not as good as mine, but good verses." ... Holmes was abstemious and never ceased talking. "Most men write too much. I would rather risk my future fame upon one lyric than upon ten volumes. But I have said 'Boston is the hub of the Universe;' ...
— Authors and Friends • Annie Fields

... been singularly abstemious. His brooding had caused him to forget or to neglect the appetite that mastered him. Toward evening he resumed his drinking, however, mainly for the purpose of restoring his courage, which had slumped terribly in ...
— The Rose in the Ring • George Barr McCutcheon

... liberally. He kept a demi-john of whiskey in his room at the tavern, and to its contents all the "afflicted" were welcome. It could not be said of him that he was the principal consumer, for, except under unusual circumstances, he was a fairly abstemious man. As he himself declared, he drank sparingly except when his "soul was tried." The fact that he had taken several copious draughts of the fiery Mononga-Durkee immediately upon his return was an indication that his soul was ...
— Viola Gwyn • George Barr McCutcheon

... his wealth there were but two things which the Roman noble could buy, political power and luxury; and in these directions his whole resources were expended. The elections, once pure, became matters of annual bargain between himself and his supporters. The once hardy, abstemious mode of living degenerated into grossness ...
— Caesar: A Sketch • James Anthony Froude

... which did not offer any variety, till we had nearly reached La Luc, 17 miles from Puget, whose situation and red sandy soil reminded us of a Herefordshire glen. The junction of two main roads has created a tolerable inn at this small place, which may with safety be recommended to persons on an abstemious regimen, ...
— Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone - Made During the Year 1819 • John Hughes

... gratified and restored. He played on the organ, and sang, or his wife sang for him. From his music he returned with fresh vigor to his books or his composition. At six he admitted the visits of his friends; he took his abstemious supper, of olives or some light thing, at eight; and at nine, having smoked a pipe and drank a glass of water, he retired. Yet in the midst of this clock-like regularity his labors were broken by frequent unfruitful seasons. Symmons says of him, that "he frequently composed ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various

... the other arts presupposes a diet as abstemious as any invalid's; eat and drink to your heart's content, and you make no ...
— Works, V3 • Lucian of Samosata

... the souls in purgatory. The Blessed Virgin entered the temple, at the age of three years, to perfect herself in that school of virtue; the daughters of the Congregation, in imitation of that act, consider themselves pupils of Mary during their novitiate. The Blessed Virgin was abstemious and mortified in her food, and in all the other necessaries of life; the Sisters should follow her example and mortify themselves in eating, drinking, sleeping, speaking, and clothing, using nothing but what is absolutely necessary, each one at the same time consulting her ...
— The Life of Venerable Sister Margaret Bourgeois • Anon.

... to him: What's the use of being good? You are the first woman of your station who has treated me as a human being; I do not say as an equal. You have given me back some of my self-respect. It throws my world upside down. It's a heady wine for an abstemious man. Don't you realize that you are a ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath

... admirable midnight resolution, while he struggled in exasperation to unfasten his collar, that he himself should begin to pay a due regard to his health—to restrict his indulgences; and he drew an agreeable picture of the consolation that Adams' friendship might afford to an abstemious man of middle age. "By Jove—confound this button—there, I've twisted it like the deuce—by Jove, it is refreshing to be thrown with a chap who is interested in something besides women and horses—who finds other objects—or subjects if you choose—suffice for his ...
— The Wheel of Life • Ellen Anderson Gholson Glasgow

... of the landing I could not see him very well, but there was something in his voice that surprised me. I knew he was of abstemious habit or I should have thought he had been drinking. I led the way into my sitting room and ...
— The Moon and Sixpence • W. Somerset Maugham

... present instance the doleful tragedy of George Barnwell. "The character of Barnwell, and several others," notes he in his journal, "were said to be well performed. There was music adapted and regularly conducted." A safe but abstemious criticism. ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving

... habits were irreproachable. In regard to the pleasures of the table he was temperate, almost abstemious. He was always religiously inclined and joined the Church before he died,—perhaps, however, out of loyalty to his wife, whom he adored, rather than from theological convictions. But whatever he deemed his duty, he made every sacrifice to perform. Although fond of power, he was easily accessible, ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XII • John Lord

... filled these places before? Did they remain vacant, or were there then disappointed applicants, as now? If my memory serves, there has been no time in the period that it covers when the supply of workers—abstemious male workers—was not in excess of the demand. That it has always been so is sufficiently attested by the universally ...
— The Shadow On The Dial, and Other Essays - 1909 • Ambrose Bierce

... bountifully supplied for his guests, he seldom partook of those preparations of the cook which specially please the appetite. He was very abstemious, and never indulged to excess in eating or drinking. His breakfast-hour was seven o'clock in summer, and eight in winter. He usually made a frugal meal of Indian cakes, honey, and tea or coffee, then mounted his horse and ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing

... this time finished her cordial—it was not the first she had taken that day; and, though a woman of strong brain, and cautious at least, if not abstemious, in her potations, it may nevertheless be supposed that her patience was not improved by ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott

... was an invalid, the King was abstemious, but the Elector was a mighty drinker. It was not his custom nor that of his councillors to go to bed. They were usually carried there. But it was the wish of Ferdinand to be conciliatory, and he bore himself as well as he could at the banquet. The Elector was also a mighty ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... foresto—ado. Absolute absoluta. Absolutely absolute. Absolution senkulpigo. Absolution (from sin) senpekigo. Absolve senkulpigi. Absolve (from sin) senpekigi. Absorb sorbi. Absorption sorbo. Abstain deteni sin. Abstemious sobrema. Abstinence deteno. Abstinent detenema. Abstract (abridgement) resumo. Abstract abstrakti. Abstracted abstrakta. Abstruse tre malklara. Absurd absurda. Absurdity absurdo. Abundance suficxego. Abuse trouzi. Abuse trouzo. Abyss profundegajxo. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes

... everything about him bespoke the gentleman; but neither in aspect nor manner of speech did he measure up to his real desire for political preferment. Yet he had many popular qualities which commended him to the rank and file of his party. He was a man of abstemious habits and boundless industry, whose courtesy and square dealing made him a favourite. Few errors of a political character could be charged to his account. He had favoured Clinton for President; he had supported Tompkins and the war ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander

... Cardan lived an abstemious life. He broke his fast on bread-and-water and a few grapes. He sometimes dined off bread, the yolk of an egg, and a little wine, and would take for supper a mess of beetroot and rice and a chicory salad. The catalogue of his favourite dishes seems to exhaust every known ...
— Jerome Cardan - A Biographical Study • William George Waters

... Roy and Dyan, was no scratch wayside meal, but an ambrosial affair:—salmon mayonnaise, ready mixed; glazed joints of chicken; strawberries and cream; lordly chocolate boxes; sparkling moselle—and syphons for the abstemious. ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver

... abduct, aberrant, aberration, abeyance, abhorrent, abject, abjure, aboriginal, abortive, abrade, abrasion, abrogate, absolution, abstemious, abstention, abstruse, accelerate, accentuate, acceptation, accessary, accession, accessory, acclamation, acclivity, accolade, accomplice, accost, acerbity, acetic, achromatic, acidulous, acme, acolyte, acoustics, acquiescence, ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor

... billiards, while Franco and Baldo smoked short pipes, and sipped whiskey and soda—but a half-pennyworth of whiskey, as Adrian noticed, to an intolerable deal of soda. Blood will tell, and theirs, in spite of everything, was abstemious Italian blood. ...
— The Lady Paramount • Henry Harland

... unstain'd by tears; Since vice the world subdued and waters drown'd, Auburn and Eden can no more be found. Hence good and evil mixed, but man has skill And power to part them, when he feels the will! Toil, care, and patience bless th' abstemious few, Fear, shame, and want the thoughtless herd pursue. Behold the Cot! where thrives th' industrious swain, Source of his pride, his pleasure, and his gain; Screen'd from the winter's wind, the sun's last ray Smiles on ...
— The Parish Register • George Crabbe

... Border clan, was a man of great physical and moral strength, of fearless independence, and of, in his son's opinion, "a natural faculty" equal to that of Burns; and Margaret Aitken was "a woman of the fairest descent, that of the pious, the just, and the wise." Frugal, abstemious, prudent, though not niggardly, James Carlyle was prosperous according to the times, the conditions of his trade, and the standard of Ecclesfechan. He was able, therefore, to give such of his sons (he had a family ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne

... and cannot be persuaded to partake of anything in the intervals. If it be not their hour for eating, they will refuse the choicest viands, and will sit at your table fasting, despite every temptation you can offer them. They are also very abstemious in their diet, and gluttony is the very rarest of vices. I do not believe there is another nation in Europe that eats so sparingly. In the morning they take a cup of coffee, generally without milk, sopping in it some light brioche. Later in the day they ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 31, May, 1860 • Various

... their parents, are not indulged in the liberty of choice or change. The first tutor into whose hands I was resigned appears to have been one of the best of the tribe: Dr. Waldegrave was a learned and pious man, of a mild disposition, strict morals, and abstemious life, who seldom mingled in the politics or the jollity of the college. But his knowledge of the world was confined to the university; his learning was of the last, rather than the present age; his temper was indolent; his faculties, which were not of the ...
— Memoirs of My Life and Writings • Edward Gibbon

... my detestation of Uncle Keith was somewhat unreasonable. I must own I had no grave reasons for my dislike. Uncle Keith had a good moral character; he was a steady church-goer, was painstaking and abstemious; never put himself in a passion, or, indeed, lost his temper for a minute; but how was a girl to tolerate a man who spent five minutes scraping his boots before he entered his own door, whatever the weather might be; who said, "Hir-rumph" (humph was ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII: No. 353, October 2, 1886. • Various

... acclivity, different groups, equally returning home from the public tables, passed them. Though the sacred festival had given excuse for prolonging the evening meal, and the wine-cup had been replenished beyond the abstemious wont, still each little knot of revellers passed, and dispersed in a sober and decorous quiet which perhaps no other eminent city in Greece could have exhibited; young and old equally grave and noiseless. For the Spartan youth, no fair Hetaerae then opened homes adorned with flowers, and gay with ...
— Pausanias, the Spartan - The Haunted and the Haunters, An Unfinished Historical Romance • Lord Lytton

... Martin gravely. 'I have no hesitation in telling you what I have already told the inspector. Mr. Manderson was, considering his position in life, a remarkably abstemious man. In my four years of service with him I never knew anything of an alcoholic nature pass his lips, except a glass or two of wine at dinner, very rarely a little at luncheon, and from time to time a whisky and ...
— Trent's Last Case - The Woman in Black • E.C. (Edmund Clerihew) Bentley

... was abstemious in her living, and in apparel void of all vain ornaments. I must needs say, that her mind had a noble prospect: her eye was to a better and more lasting inheritance, than can be found below. This ...
— The Book of Religions • John Hayward

... as I could have wished. Dr Johnson had said, 'I have done greater feats with my knife than this;' though he had eaten a very hearty dinner. My lord, who affects or believes he follows an abstemious system, seemed struck with Dr Johnson's manner of living. I had a particular satisfaction in being under the roof of Monboddo, my lord being my father's old friend, and having been always very good to me. We were cordial together. He asked Dr Johnson and me to ...
— The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D. • James Boswell

... whether it arises from the regular and abstemious habits they generally observe whilst working here, I cannot tell; but the notion I ...
— Impressions of America - During The Years 1833, 1834, and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Tyrone Power

... strange nature the violence and the coldness were equally genuine, both being a means to gratify some personal ambition, desire, or indolence. It is not an uncommon Irish type; self-important, upright, honourable, yet with a bent towards subtlety: abstemious in habit, but with freaks of violent self-indulgence; courteous and impulsive towards strangers, though cold to members of the household; naturally violent, and often assuming violence as an instrument of authority; selfish ...
— Emily Bront • A. Mary F. (Agnes Mary Frances) Robinson

... good housewifery as in those matters which are generally thought to transcend these humble occupations. Like Solomon's virtuous woman she "looked well after the ways of her household." Methodical, careful of minutes, simple in her tastes, abstemious, and therefore enjoying evenly good health in spite of her delicate constitution—this is the secret of her accomplishing so much. Yet all this foundation of exactness and diligence was so "rounded with ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss

... throne, calculated to do him honour, as he was guilty of the meanest flattery and servility to ingratiate himself with men in power. Yet, as a general, he was indefatigable in his duties, and of unquestionable valour; abstemious in his diet, and plain in his dress. On attaining to the imperial dignity he appears to have laid aside every vice except avarice. His elevation neither induced him to assume arrogant and lofty airs, nor ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith

... he consulted with the Brahmanas who had mastered the Vedas, and permitted Amba, the eldest daughter of the ruler of Kasi to do as she liked. But he bestowed with due rites the two other daughters, Ambika and Ambalika on his younger brother Vichitravirya. And though Vichitravirya was virtuous and abstemious, yet, proud of youth and beauty, he soon became lustful after his marriage. And both Ambika and Ambalika were of tall stature, and of the complexion of molten gold. And their heads were covered with black curly hair, and their finger-nails were high and red; their hips were ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)

... mean am I given to 'seein' things at night'?" Carroll asked. "I don't know how it will be after I have my seance with Mrs. Whoever-it-is I'm going to see, but when I'm reasonably abstemious I'm not given to ingrowing nerves. What do ...
— An American Suffragette • Isaac N. Stevens

... wants of his neighbor. When it was in his power he attended the ceremony of the salut at the parish church; and on festivals particularly solemnized by any community of the towns in which he resided, he usually assisted at the divine service in their churches. He was very abstemious in his diet; and considered systematic sensuality as the ultimate degradation of human nature. He never was heard to express so much disgust, as at conversations where, for a great length of time, the pleasures of the table, or the comparative excellence ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... of her precept and example that formed the man, and supplied him with his shield and buckler. His private life was spotless. His habits were regular and abstemious, and his practice in close conformity with the Episcopal church, of which he was a member. He invariably attended divine service on Sunday, and confined himself for the remainder of the day to a course of ...
— Oration on the Life and Character of Henry Winter Davis • John A. J. Creswell

... rested immediately on Miss Frost. She saw her line in the first year. She must defend the little Alvina, whom she loved as her own, and the nervous, petulant, heart-stricken woman, the mother, from the vagaries of James. Not that James had any vices. He did not drink or smoke, was abstemious and clean as an anchorite, and never lowered his fine tone. But still, the two unprotected ones must be sheltered from him. Miss Frost imperceptibly took into her hands the reins of the domestic government. Her rule was quiet, strong, and generous. She was not seeking her own way. ...
— The Lost Girl • D. H. Lawrence

... entering into conversation only when necessary, and then with modesty and good sense. He possessed a strong mind, improved by its own reflections and observations, not by books or travel. His dress was like his address— plain, regarding comfort and decency only. In his meals he was abstemious, eating generally of one dish, and drinking water mostly. He was sedulous and constant in his attention to the duties of his station, to which every other consideration yielded. Even the charms of the fair, like the luxuries of the table and the allurements of wealth, seemed to be ...
— The Life of Francis Marion • William Gilmore Simms

... a Hermit of pure disposition, abstemious and virtuous, had made his cell in one of the environs of Baghdad, and passed his morning and evening hours in the worship of the All-wise King, and by these means had shaken his skirt clear from the dust of worldly affairs. He had bowed his head ...
— The Talking Beasts • Various

... Mrs. D'Alton was able to go out again, and, as during her husband's stay at Orchard Beach she was particularly abstemious, she was able to associate with the ladies in the hotel, and made several acquaintances, who, seeing that she had the dress and manners of a lady, interchanged calls with her and invited her to visit them in Montreal. On her return to her home, however, these ladies received her but coldly, and ...
— The Mysteries of Montreal - Being Recollections of a Female Physician • Charlotte Fuhrer

... spade as they were with the lance and sword. They were inured to every kind of danger and difficulty, and not one of them was personally braver than the general who led them, or more skilful in riding a horse, or fording a river, or climbing a mountain. No one of them could be more abstemious. Luxury is not one of the peculiarities of successful generals in ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IV • John Lord

... taken so casually from tin cups near the summit of the Cascades, had been a part of the store of that great dreamer and most abstemious of men, James J. Hill, laid in for the use of that other great dreamer and idealist, Albert, when he was his guest. While we ...
— Tenting To-night - A Chronicle of Sport and Adventure in Glacier Park and the - Cascade Mountains • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... removed the soup with Nicolle's assistance. Faithful to her custom, Jacquotte herself always brought in every dish one after another, a plan which had its drawbacks, for it compelled gluttonous folk to over-eat themselves, and the more abstemious, having satisfied their hunger at an early stage, were obliged to leave the best ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac

... wife that night. "He'll skip out with one of the best saddle-horses some night, or else he'll go on a tearing drunk and send the whole outfit up in smoke. I don't understand the cuss. He looks like the usual hobo out of a job, but he's as abstemious as a New England deacon. 'Pears like he has ...
— They of the High Trails • Hamlin Garland

... honours with stately grace; and, on the rare occasions when he could be induced to dine out, his presence was sure to make the party a success. In early life he had been pestered by a delicate digestion, and had accustomed himself to a regimen of rigid simplicity; but, though the most abstemious of men, he knew and liked a good glass of wine, and in a small party would bring out of the treasures of his memory things new and old with a copiousness and a vivacity which fairly fascinated his hearers. His conversation had a certain ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell

... himself to his chamber. It was asserted, and believed, that about this time Nero made an attempt to poison him by the instrumentality of his freedman Cleonicus, which was only defeated by the confession of an accomplice or by the abstemious habits of the philosopher who now took nothing but bread and fruit, and never quenched his thirst except ...
— Seekers after God • Frederic William Farrar

... poor mate. Before he could be restrained, he leaped from the raft and sunk below the waves. The other two men sickened. First one, then the other died. The captain, though the oldest of all, kept his senses and his strength. He was a calm, even-tempered, abstemious man. Still, as he sat on the chest in the middle of the raft, of which he and I were the only occupants, he spoke encouragingly and hopefully to me. I listened, but could scarcely reply. I felt a sickness overcoming me. I thought death was approaching. ...
— Will Weatherhelm - The Yarn of an Old Sailor • W.H.G. Kingston

... self-comprehension, Roger Brevard knew that he would never, as he had hoped, leave Salem. He was an abstemious man, one of a family of long lives, and he would linger here, increasingly unimportant, for a great while, an old man in new epochs, isolated among strange people and prejudices. Whatever the cause—the small safety or an inward flaw—he had never been part of the corporate sweating ...
— Java Head • Joseph Hergesheimer

... was a most abstemious man; but I know what he never can resist, and that is cold raspberry tart and cream. There are plenty of raspberries ripe in the plantation—I will gather some, and I'll make the ...
— A Girl in Ten Thousand • L. T. Meade

... abused, by the Brethren honoured, by his intimate friends almost worshipped. According to many orthodox Lutherans he was an atheist; but the Brethren commonly called him "the Lord's disciple." He was abstemious in diet, cared little for wine, and drank chiefly tea and lemonade. He was broad and Catholic in his views, refused to speak of the Pope as Antichrist, and referred to members of the Church of Rome as "Brethren"; and, while he remained a Lutheran to the end, he had friends ...
— History of the Moravian Church • J. E. Hutton

... it occurred to him, "Would it not be cheaper for him to take board by the week in some boarding-house?" Reckoning up, he found that his hotel bill would be three dollars and a half a week, while his meals, even if he were quite abstemious, would make as much more; in all, seven dollars. Surely, he could be boarded somewhere ...
— Try and Trust • Horatio Alger

... Micky had not been very fortunate in a business way, and, as a natural consequence, his temper, never very amiable, was somewhat ruffled by the fact. He had had a very frugal breakfast,—not because he felt abstemious, but owing to the low state of his finances. He was walking along with one of his particular friends, a boy nicknamed Limpy Jim, so called from a slight peculiarity in his walk, when all at once he espied our friend Dick in his ...
— Ragged Dick - Or, Street Life in New York with the Boot-Blacks • Horatio Alger

... name a terror in the empire, just so soon as he found that he could accomplish his ends by milder means. His men were obliged to march light, very little baggage being allowed; his horses were most carefully looked after. He himself was by nature calm and cold, and his manner of life was frugal and abstemious. ...
— China and the Manchus • Herbert A. Giles

... other society and excitements, and led him to look back and to speak much of his short married life, and far beyond that, the days of his boyhood. L'Isle found himself convicted of contributing, with others, to mar the comfort and spoil the habits of the most abstemious and domestic old gentleman in the king's service. This was plainly a point on which it was not safe to contradict Lady Mabel, if he would keep in her good graces—so he ...
— The Actress in High Life - An Episode in Winter Quarters • Sue Petigru Bowen

... my own wine," he commented, "I can't withhold commendation. I sometimes think that only the very abstemious man can truly appreciate a good vintage. For him it is an undulled ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck

... and drinking he was, as far as I observed, abstemious rather than self-indulgent. I repeatedly breakfasted, dined, and supped in his company; and never knew him to partake of any thing stronger in drink than the light wines of France and Germany, and of these in great moderation. I have been with him early and late, unexpectedly as well as by appointment, ...
— Hortense, Makers of History Series • John S. C. Abbott

... the abode of Damian for nearly a month, when, strange as it may seem, his health, which had suffered much from his wounds, began gradually to improve, either benefited by the abstemious diet to which he was reduced, or that certainty, however melancholy, is an evil better endured by many constitutions than the feverish contrast betwixt passion and duty. But the term of his imprisonment seemed drawing ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott

... advantage that he could before. He suspected that this was owing to his eating too abundantly. He made the experiment, and the result convinced him that his apprehensions were well founded. He immediately adopted a system of regimen, to which, in some degree, he adhered through life. So abstemious was he during the greater part of the first year after his entrance into college, that it operated powerfully upon him, and he was supposed to be in bad health. He was in the habit of studying sixteen or eighteen hours of the twenty-four, until the period of examination arrived, when he ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis

... some red pepper. On his pronouncing it very good, I followed his example, and found it far more palatable than I had expected, and I doubt not very nutritious. I remembered having heard that it was dangerous, after a long fast, to eat much, and I therefore took but little. Oliver also was equally abstemious. Macco, however, laughed at my warning, and very soon finished off ...
— In the Eastern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston

... were attributed to his ignorance of the language, and it was not until he became the most expert compositor in the office that it was known that he had never, until he entered this office, been in a printing-office. He was so abstemious in his habits that those about the office wondered how he lived. He rarely left the composing-room, and, in his moments of rest from his work, was employed in studying the language, or reading some English author. A bit ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks

... or highest caste, who are the priests, scholars, lawyers, physicians, teachers, etc. This order is highly reverenced by the lower castes, and its members are dignified, abstemious, and sedate. Their highest ideal is to bring their desires and appetites under complete control. They exercise great influence in ...
— History of Education • Levi Seeley

... "Ah! very abstemious," murmured Father; "perhaps he is a vegetarian as well, sounds like it, and they are always the most difficult people ...
— The Tale of Lal - A Fantasy • Raymond Paton

... wise. It is disapproved by persons of foolish understanding who never follow it. With a pure heart I conduct myself according to it. My mind never swerves from this vow. I have not swerved from the practices of my order. I am abstemious in everything. I know the past and the present. Divested of fear and wrath and cupidity and errors of judgment, I follow this vow with a pure heart. There are no restrictions in respect of food and drink and other objects of enjoyment for one practising ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown

... prohibition party; and Gabriella had gathered from her mother's pious rambling that, like other sinners who have outlived temptation, he was devoting his middle years to a violent crusade against the moderate indulgences of the abstemious. But Charley, she felt, was out of the question. She would die before she would stoop to ask help of a man she had despised as heartily as she had once despised Charley. She must sink or swim by her ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow

... confined himself wholly to milk, vegetables, and water. This course, with active exercise, reduced him from the enormous weight of four hundred and forty-eight pounds, to one hundred and forty; and restored his health and the vigor of his mind. After a few years, he ventured to change his abstemious diet for one more rich and stimulating. But the effect was a recurrence of his former corpulence and ill health. A return to milk, water, and vegetables restored him again; and he continued in uninterrupted health ...
— Vegetable Diet: As Sanctioned by Medical Men, and by Experience in All Ages • William Andrus Alcott

... Coeur de Lion in this, that he was one of the most abstemious men in his army, and disciplined himself at least as rigidly as he did other people. And it was probably on this account that he did not fulfil Dame Idonea's predictions, but recovered favourably, and by the end of a fortnight was able, in ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge

... turned to the subject of age. "I attribute my many years," said Dr. Bigelow, "to the fact that I have been most abstemious. I have eaten sparingly, and have not used tobacco, and have taken ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers

... the due of others; and in those more numerous and certainly more unhappy countries, where the rule of the tyrant is substituted for the law of God, the unwearying flatterer, patient under blows and abstemious under high-feeding, will assuredly make his ...
— Mr. Isaacs • F. Marion Crawford

... now actually constructed in the garden. The butterflies were hovering over the belt of flowers which he had placed around his fountain, and the birds were singing overhead. Leonard Fairfield was resting from his day's work, to enjoy his abstemious dinner, beside the cool play of the sparkling waters, and, with the yet keener appetite of knowledge, he devoured his book as ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... prepared. The islanders are somewhat abstemious at this repast; reserving the more powerful efforts of their appetite to a later period of the day. For my own part, with the assistance of my valet, who, as I have before stated, always officiated as spoon on ...
— Typee - A Romance of the South Sea • Herman Melville

... habits of life the sachem was abstemious even to austerity, yet frank end popular in his manners, entering heartily into the rude amusements and athletic sports of his people. In the latter, such was his strength and activity of body, he rarely ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady

... season, the mother herself is extremely abstemious. At long intervals, she accepts, in my jars, a belated Locust, whom I have captured, for her benefit, in the sunnier nooks. In order to keep herself in condition, as when she is dug up in the course of my winter excavations, she must therefore sometimes break her fast and come ...
— The Life of the Spider • J. Henri Fabre

... clean, healthy body; 2. Good breathing capacity and some control over same; 3. A strong will such as can move body and mind; 4. Assiduous cultivation of the intellectual side; 5. Control over emotions; 6. A fearless mind; 7. Great determination; 8. and abstemious living ...
— The Doctrine and Practice of Yoga • A. P. Mukerji

... was under way, the Major got himself surrounded with some apollinaris and Scotch, and then settled back to enjoy himself. "Did you see the 'drunken kid' at the ferry?" he asked. "(That's what our abstemious district attorney terms my precious young heir-apparent.) You'll meet him at the Castle—the Havens are good to him. They know how it feels, I guess; when John was a youngster his piratical uncle had to camp in Jersey for ...
— The Metropolis • Upton Sinclair

... the darkness before he found the switch of the lamp; and as he bent over it she saw that his face was flushed, and that his eyes had an excited light which, in any one less abstemious, might almost have seemed like ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton

... few of us know our own fathers, and none of us our grandfathers. If our family tree record a line of abstemious forbears, and we mysteriously develop a partiality for neat rum and loose company, we hesitate whether to reproach ourselves for the vices of a previous existence or to disparage ...
— The Orchard of Tears • Sax Rohmer

... thou, all perfect Austen? Here Let one poor wreath adorn thy early bier, That scarce allowed thy modest youth to claim Its living portion of thy certain fame! Oh! Mrs. Bennet! Mrs. Norris too! While memory survives we'll dream of you. And Mr. Woodhouse, whose abstemious lip Must thin, but not too thin, his gruel sip. Miss Bates, our idol, though the village bore; And Mrs. Elton, ardent to explore. While the clear style flows on without pretence, With unstained purity, and unmatched sense: Or, if a sister e'er approached ...
— Memoir of Jane Austen • James Edward Austen-Leigh

... engaging sometimes in spite of a certain ungainliness of gesture, dress, and general behaviour that belongs to them, and which delighted Charles Keene, who was the reverse of ungainly, just as the oft-recurring tipsiness of his old gentlemen delighted him, though he was the most abstemious of men. I am now speaking of his middle-class people—those wonderful philistines of either sex; those elaborately capped and corpulent old ladies; those muttonchop-whiskered, middle-aged gentlemen with ...
— Social Pictorial Satire • George du Maurier

... talent, who often found a comfortable asylum under his roof. In his domestic economy he was frugal without being parsimonious. His hospitable board was ever ready for the reception of his friends; and, though he was himself abstemious in his diet, he seems to have been a lover of good wines, of which he received always the choicest varieties out of the Grand Duke's cellar. This peculiar taste, together with his attachment to a country life, rendered him ...
— The Martyrs of Science, or, The lives of Galileo, Tycho Brahe, and Kepler • David Brewster

... from anything. If, for example, I had found the dollar which some other careful fellow had lost, I could still get interest upon it. Or if I had inherited money from my father, it might happen that, so far from being abstemious and thrifty, I had been most extravagant, while the fellow who came to borrow had been very thrifty and abstemious, but still unable to provide for his family. Yet I should ...
— The Common Sense of Socialism - A Series of Letters Addressed to Jonathan Edwards, of Pittsburg • John Spargo

... returned, princes and members of the Roman nobility, and distinguished foreigners. At ten o'clock he takes a cup of broth brought by Centra. At two in the afternoon, or a little earlier, he dines, and he is most abstemious, although he has an excellent digestion. His private physician, Doctor Giuseppe Lapponi, has been heard to say that he himself eats more at one meal than the Holy Father eats in a week. Every day, unless ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 2 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford

... Friday[879], I waited on Johnson, as usual. I observed at breakfast that although it was a part of his abstemious discipline on this most solemn fast, to take no milk in his tea, yet when Mrs. Desmoulins inadvertently poured it in, he did not reject it. I talked of the strange indecision of mind, and imbecility in the common ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell

... singularly abundant for fifty cents, without wine. At one very neat French place he got a dinner at the same price with wine, but it was not so abundant; and March inquired in fruitless speculation why the table d'hote of the Italians, a notoriously frugal and abstemious people, should be usually more than you wanted at seventy-five cents and a dollar, and that of the French rather less at half a dollar. He could not see that the frequenters were greatly different at the different places; they were mostly Americans, of subdued manners and conjecturably ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... others—masons especially—frequently come from the provinces. They are not part of the fixed population; but are men who have left their wives and families to come up to the town and earn a sum of money. For this they work most energetically; living in the most abstemious manner, in order that they may not break into their hoard. They occupy furnished lodgings, flocking very much together. Thus the masons from the departments of la Creuse and la Haute Vienne occupy houses let out in furnished rooms exclusively to themselves, in the quarters ...
— A Tramp's Wallet - stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France • William Duthie

... night. The squaws had been busy for some hours in cooking the flesh in a variety of ways. We, of course, were invited, and sat down with the chief and some of his principal men. Though generally abstemious, it is extraordinary what an amount of food they consumed, washed down with whisky, of which they had shortly before obtained a supply ...
— Snow Shoes and Canoes - The Early Days of a Fur-Trader in the Hudson Bay Territory • William H. G. Kingston

... dinner table, if at all unusual, erred on the side of restraint rather than of extravagance; he gave indications of a certain curious personal refinement; and in the matter of wine he was almost incredibly abstemious. It was the first time that Jewdwine had come to close quarters with his disciple, and with some surprise he saw himself going through the experience without a shock. Either he had been mistaken ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair

... Cedars enough for the purpose were not to be found in Somersetshire. They were therefore collected in London, and sent down by land carriage. Relays of laborers were hired; and the work went on all night by torchlight. No man could be more abstemious than Pitt; yet the profusion of his kitchen was a wonder even to epicures. Several dinners were always dressing; for his appetite was capricious and fanciful; and at whatever moment he felt inclined to eat, he expected a meal to be instantly on the table. Other circumstances might be mentioned, ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... dearer to the heart of the khedive than statecraft. He rides well, drives well, rises early, and is of abstemious habits. Turkish is his mother tongue, but he talks Arabic with fluency and speaks English, French, ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 12 (of 12) • S. Rappoport

... and drank only water, which was placed by his side iced, with a single glass of wine at the close of the repast, which he drank on bending his head to Lionel, with a certain knightly grace, and the prefatory words of "Welcome here to a Haughton." Mr. Fairthorn was less abstemious; tasted of every dish, after examining it long through a pair of tortoise-shell spectacles, and drank leisurely through a bottle of port, holding up every glass to the light. Darrell talked with his usual cold but not uncourteous indifference. A ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... maid for the common decencies of my sex. I was sent to gaol, and was in hopes there, at least, this usage would have ended. But was told it was reported I was frequently drunk; that I attempted to make my escape; that I never attended the chapel. A more abstemious woman, my lords, I ...
— Trial of Mary Blandy • William Roughead

... their bread, not but that, should nature require anything more agreeable, many things might be easily supplied by the ground, and plants in great abundance, and of incomparable sweetness. Add to this, strength and health, as the consequence of this abstemious way of living. Now compare with this, those who sweat and belch, being crammed with eating, like fatted oxen: then will you perceive that they who pursue pleasure most, attain it least: and that the pleasure of eating lies not in ...
— The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero

... alcoholic drinks with the idea that they lead to a more fiery performance is a dangerous custom that has been the ruin of more than one pianist. The performer who would be at his best must live a very careful, almost abstemious life. Any unnatural excess is sure to mar his playing and lead to his downfall with the public. I have seen this done over and over again, and have watched alcohol tear down in a few years what had taken decades of hard practice and earnest study to ...
— Great Pianists on Piano Playing • James Francis Cooke

... Scott would outlive all his critics. I guess that's true. That fact of the business is you've got to be one of two ages to appreciate Scott. When you're eighteen you can read Ivanhoe, and you want to wait until you're ninety to read some of the rest. It takes a pretty well-regulated abstemious critic ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... was invented to secure a certain stoutness of heart and body in the members of the order, which otherwise might have lain open to too many timorous, merely abstemious, men and women. Many things had been suggested, swordplay and tests that verged on torture, climbing in giddy places and the like, before this was chosen. Partly, it is to ensure good training and sturdiness of body and mind, but partly, also, it is to draw their minds for a space from the ...
— A Modern Utopia • H. G. Wells

... London, and attended another of their interesting luncheons where their directors meet. My old friend Lord Strathcona presided. I could not help noting that after all the lapse of years since we first met at Hudson Bay House in Montreal, he still retained his abstemious habits. He was ninety-three, and still at his post as High Commissioner for a great people, as well as leading councillor of a dozen companies. His memory of Labrador and his days there, and his love for it, had not abated one whit. Hearing that the hospital steamer Strathcona needed ...
— A Labrador Doctor - The Autobiography of Wilfred Thomason Grenfell • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell

... interior we are allowed to doctor ourselves as we best can. What with the salubrity of the climate, and our abstemious fare, we are enabled, with the aid of a little Turlington balsam, and a dose of salts, perhaps, to overcome all our ailments. Most of us also use the lancet, and can even "spread a plaster, or give a glister," when necessary; but the Indians ...
— Notes of a Twenty-Five Years' Service in the Hudson's Bay Territory - Volume II. (of 2) • John M'lean

... you chappies call this sort of thing 'sitting,'" said Archie, pensively, as he conducted tentative experiments in osteopathy on his aching back. "I say, old thing, I could do with a restorative, if you have one handy. But, of course, you haven't, I suppose," he added, resignedly. Abstemious as a rule, there were moments when Archie found ...
— Indiscretions of Archie • P. G. Wodehouse

... appetites and passions; as, to glut a vengeful spirit with slaughter; we speak of glutting the market with a supply so excessive as to extinguish the demand. Much less than is needed to satisfy may suffice a frugal or abstemious person; less than a sufficiency may content one of a patient and submissive spirit. Compare ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald

... his place in the saddle. All this was now to be reformed. He taught himself to read and to write, accomplishments which he had before, if at all, scantily possessed. He studied the Koran, abandoned the use of strong liquors, became scrupulously abstemious, plain in his attire, assiduous in his attention to business, urbane and courteous to all.' In 1833, Shah Soojah, issuing from the British territory, made an abortive attempt to recover his kingdom; but Runjeet Singh, the ruler ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 425 - Volume 17, New Series, February 21, 1852 • Various

... Though habitually abstemious, Mr. Lavender was so very hungry that evening when he sat down to supper that he was unable to leave the lobster which Mrs. Petty had provided until it was reduced to mere integument. Since his principles prevented his lightening it with anything but ginger-beer ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... sweet beginning Omen'd their future bright condition. Offer all Asia to Septimius— Add Britain—put in competition With Acme—wretchedly abstemious They'd call him of your gifts, Ambition. The only province worth his winning Is Acme: Acme's faithful bosom Knows nought on earth but her Septimius. Ripe was the fruit, as fair the blossom Of this their mutual love, and glowing; And all admired its freshness growing. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 380, June, 1847 • Various

... "there are ten who say 'I am ill.'" The Bulgarians recognise bitterly that in their otherwise fine organisation there has been one flaw, the medical service. Among this nation of peasant proprietors—sturdy, abstemious, moral, living in the main on whole-meal bread and water—illness was so rare that the medical service was but little regarded. Up to Chatalja confidence in the rude health of the peasants was justified. They passed through cold, ...
— Bulgaria • Frank Fox

... every thing he purchased. His castle was filled with needy parasites and panderers to his pleasures, amongst whom he lavished rewards with an unsparing hand. But the ordinary round of sensual gratification ceased at last to afford him delight; he was observed to be more abstemious in the pleasures of the table, and to neglect the beauteous dancing girls who used formerly to occupy so much of his attention. He was sometimes gloomy and reserved, and there was an unnatural wildness in his eye which gave indications ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay



Words linked to "Abstemious" :   ascetical, spartan, nonindulgent, temperate, light, gluttonous



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