"Devil" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of the Holy Warre, says that this Crusade was done by the instinct of the devil; and he adds a reason, which may provoke mirth now, but which was put forth by the worthy historian in all soberness and sincerity. He says, "the devil, being cloyed with the murdering of men, desired a cordial of children's blood to comfort his weak stomach;" as epicures, ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... cleansing the Augean stable of this world! Chivalrous child-Quixote, tilting at the Black Windmills, whose sails are whirled by burning blasts from Hell, and whose millstones grind the souls of Eve's lost daughters into the dust that makes the devil's daily bread—how should the Dop Doctor of Gueldersdorp dare to love her? But he did not cease to, for all the height of his self-knowledge and all the depth ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... bulkhead, and the like. The Chink's laying in his bunk, turned the other way. "Why don't you go aboard of him," says I. The Dutcher says nothing, but goes over to his own bunk and feels under the straw. When he comes back he's looking queer. "By God!" says he, "the devil has swiped my gun!"... Now if that's true there is going to be hell to pay in this vessel very quick I figure I'm still ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1915 - And the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... it," he said informally. "Waitin' a devil of a long time for you. I've gawt a message for you. He's ...
— His Own People • Booth Tarkington
... uttering the thought that had come uppermost in his mind without an instant's consideration. Perhaps instinctively he sought to rouse the devil that till then had been held in such rigid control. But the effect of his words was such as ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... might have expressed my comprehension of it at that time, if I had been called upon, I nevertheless did clearly comprehend in my own way, that it was another name for tyranny; and for a certain gloomy, arrogant, devil's humour, that was in them both. The creed, as I should state it now, was this. Mr. Murdstone was firm; nobody in his world was to be so firm as Mr. Murdstone; nobody else in his world was to be firm at all, for everybody was to be bent to his firmness. Miss Murdstone was an exception. ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... very joy! The thought that we might have to fight side by side annoyed me. Now, however, we shall be adversaries, and when we meet, the man who did not steal Ange Barthelmy will send her husband to the devil! And now, Herr Vice-palatine, I think it is time to say good night. It will be the first night in six years that ...
— The Nameless Castle • Maurus Jokai
... consolation was, that probably it was not true; so immediately after dinner we boarded the honest Sea-horseman who was reported to have brought the dismal intelligence. He turned out to be a very cheery intelligent fellow of about five-and-thirty, six feet high, with a dashing "devil-may-care" manner that completely imposed upon me. Charts were got out, and the whole state of the case laid before me in the clearest manner. Nothing could be more unpromising. The sloop had quitted the ice but eight-and-forty ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... Why, there isn't an ounce of live public spirit left among you, in spite of all the moonshine your man Benham talks about the healing virtues of tradition and the sacred taboo of your political Pharisees. There wasn't one of you that didn't hate like the devil to see me Governor of Virginia—and yet how many of you took the trouble to find out what I am made of, or to understand what I mean? Did you even take the trouble to go to the polls ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... Bernhard of Weimar, as if he purposed to join with those against whom he had so long fought. Bernhard received the message with deep astonishment, and exclaimed, moved by his belief that Wallenstein was in league with the devil,— ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris
... smile of such sweetness lightened his features, that a murmur of "Blessings on his comely face!" ran through the assembly; and Adam indulged in a gruff startled murmur of "'Tis the Prince, or the devil himself!" while his young master, comprehending the gesture of the Prince, and overborne by the lovely winning graces of the Princess, stepped forward, doffing his cap and bending his knee, and signing to Adam to follow ...
— The Prince and the Page • Charlotte M. Yonge
... it best for all concerned that he should flight his troublesome wings outside for a while. So he sent him off in a trading-ship, in the somewhat forlorn hope that a knowledge of the world would knock some of the devil out of him—a hope which, like many ...
— A Maid of the Silver Sea • John Oxenham
... any work. Little Black Fox is about again. Also he sees a heap too much of that white familiar of his, Nevil Steyne. By Jove, I wish we could fix something on that man and get the government to deport him. He's got a great sway over the chief. What the devil is his object?" Jimmy Parker's face ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... way. She storms at the Ministers for letting me go. I was told that at one dinner she became so violent that even Lord Holland, whose temper, whatever his wife may say, is much cooler than mine, could not command himself, and broke out: "Don't talk such nonsense, my Lady. What, the devil! Can we tell a gentleman who has a claim upon us that he must lose his only chance of getting an independence in order that he may come and talk to ...
— Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay • George Otto Trevelyan
... names in this advanced theology connected with Cartesian doctrines are Ludwig Meyer, the friend and editor of Spinoza, author of a work termed Philosophia scripturae interpres (1666); Balthasar Bekker, whose World Bewitched helped to discredit the superstitious fancies about the devil; and Spinoza, whose Tractatus theologico-politicus is in some respects the classical type of rational criticism up to the present day. Against this work and the Ethics of Spinoza the orthodox Cartesians (who were in the majority), no less than sceptical ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 2 - "Demijohn" to "Destructor" • Various
... evil spirit much dreaded by the Saxons. Zabulus and Diabolus (the Devil) seem to have ...
— Harold, Complete - The Last Of The Saxon Kings • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... he narrated one racy incident after another. With the pen in his hand (or, more probably, the typewriter under his fingers) his sense of epithet is precise; but in his conversational stories men were as mad "as Sam Hill," injuries hurt "like hell," and a knapsack was as heavy "as the devil." We all laughed; but he should have had more of ...
— Roving East and Roving West • E.V. Lucas
... wild, incoherent tales, when cornered at last by some cold-eyed officer in some town of France to which they had blundered? It was the coward's chance, and I for one can hardly bring myself to blame the poor devil I met one day in Rouen, stuttering out lies, to save his skin, or the two gunners, disguised in civil clothes, who begged from me near Amiens, or any of the half-starved stragglers who had "lost" their regiments ...
— The Soul of the War • Philip Gibbs
... on? I want to do right, as near as I can, but I had rather think of them dressed like our folks are to-day, than to think of them in a cyclone with leaves for wearing apparel. Say, it is wrong to fight, but don't you think if Adam had put on a pair of boxing gloves, when he found the devil was getting too fresh about the place, and knocked him out in a couple of rounds, and pasted him in the nose, and fired him out of the summer garden, that it would have been a big thing for ...
— The Grocery Man And Peck's Bad Boy - Peck's Bad Boy and His Pa, No. 2 - 1883 • George W. Peck
... hurled my fire Against the walls of holy Rome, But there the devil took him home! For at the storm my artist sire, Cellini, felled him, for the ire Of God his ...
— Memories of Canada and Scotland - Speeches and Verses • John Douglas Sutherland Campbell
... he repeated, 'why, yes, as much as I mean anything. Be off; you're keeping that poor devil in ...
— A Life's Morning • George Gissing
... delicious picture. A portrait of Columbus, said to be by the same master, is not like him, I am sure; for the physiognomy is vacant and disagreeable. Domenichino's large picture of the Angel shielding Innocence from a Demon pleases me, as all his pictures do—but not perfectly: the devil in the corner, with his fork, and hoofs, and horns, shocks my taste as a ludicrous and vulgar idea, far removed from poetry; but the figure of the angel stretching a shield over the infant, is charming. There are also two fine Claudes, two Holy Families, by Raffaelle, in his ...
— The Diary of an Ennuyee • Anna Brownell Jameson
... 266 feet above the sea level, and the latter part of the ascent had to be made on foot. I was at once taken before the commandant, who with a few other officers and a secretary sat prepared to investigate the peculiar circumstances which had brought a Fan Quei, or foreign devil, amongst them. The secretary knew English very indifferently—so indifferently that I am doubtful if he understood my story rightly. He asked me if I was acquainted with German, and gave me to understand that he knew more of that language ...
— Under the Dragon Flag - My Experiences in the Chino-Japanese War • James Allan
... eh? Well, will you be good enough to tell me what the devil is the meaning of all this two-faced, underhanded conduct on ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... were suffering dreadfully, and falling out by sections, when about eleven or twelve o'clock they caught sight of some water carriers with their mussacks full, so that they knew water could not be far off. All discipline was pitched to the devil in an instant, and the men rushed from the ranks for the water more like mad devils than anything else—nothing could stop them; the mounted officers galloped in amongst them, and threatened, but to no purpose; nothing short of cutting ...
— Campaign of the Indus • T.W.E. Holdsworth
... hero got off his line. There was a slight outburst of frightfulness between the stage-manager and a Voice named Bill that came from somewhere near the roof, the subject under discussion being where the devil Bill's "ambers" were at that particular juncture. Then things went on again until the moment arrived for ...
— Death At The Excelsior • P. G. Wodehouse
... poor woman was in Edward's reign condemned to be burnt for her religious opinions; the pious young monarch reasoned with the archbishop upon the impropriety of protestants resorting to the same cruel means they censured in papists, adding humanely, "What! would you have me send her quick to the devil in her error?" The prelate however was not to be softened, and the king signed the death warrant with eyes steeped in tears. There is however a shade in the greatest characters, and few characters, whether political or religious, ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... because they had nothing better to do. We went two or three times to a freethinking hall, where we were entertained with demonstrations of the immorality of the patriarchs and Jewish heroes, and arguments to prove that the personal existence of the devil was a myth, the audience breaking out into uproarious laughter at comical delineations of Noah and Jonah. One morning we found the place completely packed. A "celebrated Christian," as he was described to us, having heard of the hall, had volunteered to engage in debate on ...
— Mark Rutherford's Deliverance • Mark Rutherford
... his very dare-devil rashness, together with presents of wampum belts from his Indian parents, {97} saved his life for a second time, and a year of wild wanderings with Mohawk warriors finally brought him to Albany on the Hudson, where the Dutch would have ...
— Canada: the Empire of the North - Being the Romantic Story of the New Dominion's Growth from Colony to Kingdom • Agnes C. Laut
... ought to be bled, spring and fall, like our forefathers. Look here, mother, don't take my grumbling to heart. I tell you I'm just a little hipped from the weather. Let's send for dear old Knott and get him to drive out the devil with his lancet? No, no, seriously, I tell you what we will do. It'll be good for us both. I have arrived at a decision. We'll have Uncle ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... men. I would be disrated and go before the mast to-morrow, to be shown the way upward again by such a guide. You are in luck, men." When we had saluted, and he and the lady had waltzed away, I said, "You are a pretty follow, too, to talk of luck. You may go to the Devil!" ...
— The Perils of Certain English Prisoners • Charles Dickens
... a sense in which hunger sharpens a man's perceptions, and makes him see the truth in a clearer light—but starvation, the slow, gnawing starvation, when the reserve is gone, and every organ, every muscle, every nerve cries out for food—it is of the devil. The starving man is a brute, with no more moral sense than the gutter cat. His mind follows the ...
— Three Times and Out • Nellie L. McClung
... Chinatown. I tell you it was disgusting to run the gauntlet there, among those creatures.—I found the woman had been taken to the city hospital several days before and whether she was dead or alive the head she-devil of the place didn't seem to know ...
— Forty-one Thieves - A Tale of California • Angelo Hall
... Sangreal, he meeked him that he held him not a man worthy to be so nigh the Holy Vessel, for he had been so defouled in deadly sin by the space of many years; yet when he kneeled to drink of the well, there he saw great providence of the Sangreal. And for he had served so long the devil, he shall have vengeance four-and-twenty days long, for that he hath been the devil's servant four-and-twenty years. And then soon after he shall return unto Camelot out of this country, and he shall say a part of such ...
— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume II (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory
... the harassed woman, clasping her hands over her eyes; then suddenly she cried out: "What a devil you are to ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon
... still fumbling about the closet, with profane ejaculations, and finally emerged with something in his hand that I at first took for a small book. But he unblushingly put on the table that pasteboard volume sometimes called the Devil's Bible. "Come," he said, "where's the harm? Let us have a quiet game of Casino or California Jack, or something else. It is better ...
— That Mother-in-Law of Mine • Anonymous
... the cat, after washing her face, went mewing about, with her tail sweeing behind her like a ramrod; and a corbie, from the Duke's woods, tumbled down Jamie Elder's lum, when he had set the little still a-going—giving them a terrible fright, as they all took it first for the devil, and then for an exciseman—and fell with a great cloud of soot, and a loud skraigh, into the ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir
... favourite fiction with him, however (as if he were the most industrious character on earth), that YOU never work; and as he goes past your garden and sees you looking at your flowers, you will overhear him growl with a strong sense of contrast, 'YOU are a lucky hidle devil, YOU are!' ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... him again. "Come to 17 McBurney Place," she said, "some morning. Ask for Miss Ferris, and see what you think of the bust she's making of Mr. Blizzard." She smiled mischievously. "He's supposed to represent the devil just after ...
— The Penalty • Gouverneur Morris
... returned Thrush. "You take an absolutely worthless life; what do you do it for? It must be one of two motives: either you have a grudge against the fellow or his existence is a menace to you. Revenge or fear; he wants your money, or he's taken your wife! But what revenge can there be upon a poor devil without the price of a bed on his indescribable person? He hasn't anything to bless himself with, and he makes it a bit too hot for somebody who has, eh? So you whittle it down. And then perhaps by sheer luck you run your blade into ...
— The Camera Fiend • E.W. Hornung
... America—over-dressing. Clothes are peculiarly American—a sort of underhanded female revenge against the degenerate puritanism of the nation. I've seen them even at revival meetings clothed in the seven tailored sins and denouncing the devil with their bustles. Only they don't wear bustles any more. But what's an anachronism between friends? Why don't you paint pictures of real Americans?—men hunting for bargains in chastity and triumphantly marrying a waistline. ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht
... thing, then,' says Mr. Jack Dawson. 'Let's drive up to our hotel, put up the horses, have a devil and a glass of champagne, and we can be back easy in time for the race.' So away they went. Cyrus drove the girls and his wife in his dogcart, so we were there all ready to ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood
... rest, which built a rampart between him and yesterday. There was no agony in his awakening moments. But soon memory revived, and his face wore an expression more terrible than in the worst moments of yesterday. A pain different from yesterday's, a new devil had hurled itself upon him. He seized one piece of clothing after another and dressed as hastily and nervously as Vera had done as she prepared to go ...
— The Precipice • Ivan Goncharov
... painted this picture during the troubles of Italy ... when the devil was let loose for the space of three and a half years. Afterwards shall he be chained, and we shall see him trodden down ...
— Knights of Art - Stories of the Italian Painters • Amy Steedman
... his "Poor, poor fellow!" He was of a patriotic disposition; and he liked to praise his own tribe and country, in which he truly said there were "plenty of trees," and he abused all the other tribes: he stoutly declared that there was no Devil in his land. Jemmy was short, thick, and fat, but vain of his personal appearance; he used always to wear gloves, his hair was neatly cut, and he was distressed if his well-polished shoes were dirtied. He was fond of admiring himself in a looking glass; and a merry-faced little Indian boy from ...
— A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World - The Voyage Of The Beagle • Charles Darwin
... heavily. "I see. But you haven't been through what I've been through. What I've done, fighting that devil, has caused men to be deserted after being ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, August 1930 • Various
... far in this. I can't tell how or why, but it's so. Now, once more, as yesterday afternoon, for good or for bad, for long or for short, for the gods or for the devil, are you with me? There's time to turn back even yet, and I'll say no ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... about timber for posterity for? If you don't look alive, you'll go lean frying fat for posterity! Oh, rot, the thing makes me so tired I can't talk about it! Come down to my ranch. I want a thorough man! I want a man who can fight like the devil if he has to and handle that gang in the cow camp with branding irons! I want 'em run out, do you hear? They're blackguards! I want a man that's a man; and, for pay, you can name your own price. I'll want a partner as I grow older. And don't you do any fool rash ...
— The Freebooters of the Wilderness • Agnes C. Laut
... right honourable friend had learned to draw such a bill of indictment, and moreover to crowd it with all the technical epithets which disgraced our statute-book: such as false, malicious, wicked, by the instigation of the devil, and the like. He added, that having been taught by his right honourable friend that no revolt of a nation was caused without provocation, he could not help rejoicing at the success of a revolution resting upon the same basis with our own—the Rights of Man: no book ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... dear Tony?' He doated on her face. 'I don't blame you, I blame myself. These things should never be breathed. Once in the air, the devil has hold of them. Don't take it so much to heart. The thing's bad enough to bear as it is. Tears! Let me have the hand. I came, on my honour, with the most honest intention to submit to your orders: but if I see you ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... himself at liberty to let his genius have free untrammelled scope, as, for instance, in the celebrated battle between Christian and Apollyon. Arguing with himself that it was not possible for any man to overdo a fight with the devil, Adams made up his mind to "go well in" for that incident, and spent a whole evening over it, keeping his audience glaring and on the rack of expectation the whole time. Taking, perhaps, an unfair ...
— The Lonely Island - The Refuge of the Mutineers • R.M. Ballantyne
... the old days, after putting up the shop-windows for the night, Jurgen was passing the Cistercian Abbey, on his way home: and one of the monks had tripped over a stone in the roadway. He was cursing the devil who had placed ...
— Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell
... Leslie asked, lazily. And looking in whimsical penitence at Norma, she added, "I am a devil. But you were just as mean as you could be," she told him, widening her eyes and shaking ...
— The Beloved Woman • Kathleen Norris
... are the devil's own,' broke in the Brother still more violently. 'I've been a peasant, too. Up to eighteen I dug the earth; and later on, when I was at the Training College, I had to sweep, pare vegetables, do all the heavy work. It's not their toilsome labour I find fault with. On the contrary, ...
— Abbe Mouret's Transgression - La Faute De L'abbe Mouret • Emile Zola
... with a woman who has six toes! It would get about to a certainty, and then I should be ridiculous. Her income was only eighteen thousand francs; her fortune diminished in quantity as her toes increased. The devil take it; if we begin an outrageous sort of life, we may come on some ...
— The Magic Skin • Honore de Balzac
... "Devil take me! But I never could read. Here! Can any one of you read this?" And he turned to his men, but they one and ...
— Orrain - A Romance • S. Levett-Yeats
... struggled with that hideous insistent thought that if things should go ill with his brother at Arwenack, there would be great profit to himself; that these things he now enjoyed upon another's bounty he would then enjoy in his own right. A devil seemed to mock him with the whispered sneer that were Oliver to die his own grief would not be long-lived. Then in revolt against that voice of an egoism so loathsome that in his better moments it inspired even himself with horror, he bethought him of Oliver's ...
— The Sea-Hawk • Raphael Sabatini
... to figure the charge remaining in his blaster. There wouldn't be much. "Enough for a few more shots, maybe. Why the devil didn't I load ...
— Survival Tactics • Al Sevcik
... and the path became so rugged with jagged and irregularly piled rocks, that Cap could scarcely keep her horse upon his feet in climbing over them. And suddenly, when she least looked for it, the great natural curiosity—the Devil's ...
— Capitola the Madcap • Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... righteousness, it was too often followed by a breaking up of conventional standards and an emphasis on dogma at the expense of character, that operated badly. Latimer thought that the English Reformation had been followed by a wave of wickedness. Luther said that when the devil of the papacy had been driven out, seven other devils entered to take its place, and that at Wittenberg a man was considered quite a saint who could say that he had not broken the first commandment, but only the other nine. Much of this complaint must be set down to ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... the Retainer ventured smiling, "when I say that not only do I know the hiding-place of this homicide, but that I also am acquainted with the man who kidnapped and sold the girl; I likewise knew full well the poor devil and buyer, now deceased. But wait, and I'll tell your worship all, with full details. This person, who succumbed to the assault, was the son of a minor gentry. His name was Feng Yuean. His father and mother are both deceased, and he has likewise no brothers. He looked after ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... September 23, and arrived at our camp at Kill Devil Hill on Friday, the 25th. We found there provisions and tools, which had been shipped by freight several weeks in advance. The building, erected in 1901 and enlarged in 1902, was found to have been blown by a storm from its foundation posts a few months previously. While we were awaiting ...
— The Early History of the Airplane • Orville Wright
... shame, that's what it is," exclaimed King, "to put it all upon that poor girl! God, I'd give ten years of my life to lead her out of this devil's mess. She's too good ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... night—' Oh, Joan, can that be true? do you think he means really to-morrow?" then, running her eyes farther on, she continued: "Perhaps he does, for—listen, Joan—'You mustn't split on me to Adam, who's cock-a-hoop about giving you all a surprise, and there'd be the devil to pay if he found out I'd blown ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 26, August, 1880 - of Popular Literature and Science • Various
... her with astonishment. 'Good God!' thought I, 'can this be a woman? A pretty, soft-looking woman too—and a mere girl! What a heart she must have!' I felt equally tempted to tell her she was a devil, and that I would have nothing to do with such a horrible piece of business; but she looked so handsome, that somehow or another I yielded to the temptation, though it was not without a struggle; for ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... helplessly twitching knee, and ran one firm hand over him from thigh to ankle. Her touch had a mesmeric effect on his nerves when he could endure it, but nine times out of ten he struck it away. He did so now. "Go to the devil! How often have I told you not to paw me about? I wish you'd do as you're told. What do ...
— Nightfall • Anthony Pryde
... long-suffering house was a log hut, and the brave settlers defeated a band of hostile Indians, or occasionally were massacred by them; but in either case the Simpson house looked, to quote a Riverboro expression, "as if the devil had been having an auction ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... through the streets, without reserve, it would never have happened. I gave myself away: and there was someone ready to snatch what I gave. I gave myself away. It is my own fault. I should have been on my guard. I should be always on my guard: always, always. With God and the devil both, I should be on my guard. Godly or devilish, I should hold fast to my reserve and keep on the watch. And if I don't, I deserve what ...
— Aaron's Rod • D. H. Lawrence
... try to get in by either window; both were high and small; the best spot for an attack was the door. Unless he was hard pressed, he must not shoot; women were concerned, and the fort or Clark's might be stirred to unreasonable retaliation in their name; for example, there was that poor devil of a cow-puncher at Dodge who had been riddled simply for slapping his wife.... Obviously, the shack must be occupied without the shedding of blood. But what of his safety? "I'll jus' have t' chance it," he said, and hunted for something to use as ...
— The Plow-Woman • Eleanor Gates
... unexpected storm, And pelted with outrageous epithets, Turning beheld the Powers of the House On either side the hearth, indignant; her, Cooling her false cheek with a featherfan, Him glaring, by his own stale devil spurr'd, And, like a beast hard-ridden, breathing hard. 'Ungenerous, dishonorable, base, Presumptuous! trusted as he was with her, The sole succeeder to their wealth, their lands, The last remaining pillar of their house, The one transmitter ...
— Enoch Arden, &c. • Alfred Tennyson
... impression of the country. Those who would speak of the poet Robert Burns are expected to speak apologetically, and to point a moral from the story of a wasted life. For that has become a convention, and convention is always respectable. But after all is said and done, the devil's advocate makes a wretched biographer. It seems strange and unaccountable that men should dare to become apologists for one who has sung himself into the heart and conscience of his country, and taken the ear of the world. Yet there have been apologists even ...
— Robert Burns - Famous Scots Series • Gabriel Setoun
... in Santa Barbara, addressed to our missionary helper, Loo Quong: "It is now fifth month since I left you at Los Angeles. The time seems very long indeed. We hope dear God give you a great power to cast out the devil; and sowing the seed it bring forth fruit hundred fold into the only God. At beginning we came to the United States [i.e. I first came to the United States] about May, 1881. We did not know of Jesus Christ, because born in the heathen country and work here in the Chinese store. Then ...
— The American Missionary, October, 1890, Vol. XLIV., No. 10 • Various
... known as the "devil," a term that annoyed me not a little. I worked with Wood, the pressman, as a roller boy, and in the same room was a power press, the power being a stalwart negro who turned a crank. Wood and I used to race with the power press, and then I would fly the sheets,—that is, take them off, when ...
— Ox-Team Days on the Oregon Trail • Ezra Meeker
... shall turn soldier first, and rather depend upon the outside of his head than the lining. Why, what the devil, has not your poverty made you enemies enough? Must you needs shew your wit to ...
— Love for Love • William Congreve
... That was true enough. The nervous tension incidental to the use of his powers raised the devil with appetite. Nor could he be too lavish with his funds. ...
— The Sensitive Man • Poul William Anderson
... rose with a congregational sigh refreshed and relieved when the doxology, with its opening "Now to God the Father, God the Son," bowed out the tame, brief sermon. There was a hell in that religion of my mother's, a red-haired hell of curly flames that had once been very terrible; there was a devil, who was also ex officio the British King's enemy, and much denunciation of the wicked lusts of the flesh; we were expected to believe that most of our poor unhappy world was to atone for its muddle and trouble here by suffering exquisite torments for ever after, world without end, Amen. But ...
— In the Days of the Comet • H. G. Wells
... fife! How they have maddened mankind! And the deep bass boom of the cannon, chiming in in the chorus of battle, that trumpet and wild charging bugle,—how they set the military devil in a man, and make him into a soldier! Think of the human family falling upon one another at the inspiration of music! How must God feel at it, to see those harp-strings he meant should be waked to a love bordering on divine, strung and swept to ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... irresponsible, downwright lazy beggar. What he needs, as my Colonel used to profanely say, is 'a good old-fashioned Sergeant-Major to knock hell out of him'. And, believe me, Tony was a rattling fine soldier if his officer would regularly, systematically and effectively expel his own special devil from his system. ...
— To Him That Hath - A Novel Of The West Of Today • Ralph Connor
... man like Peter Birkin may pride himself upon his wealth, and receive honour during his lifetime, yet all the while have the devil grinning over ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky
... Peace Oration, which I only began in America; and to listening to the lady playing on the piano next door, and envying her. Our landlord has a piano in his room downstairs, I find, and he is not at home: now, that is a real temptation of the very devil. How I should like to pay half an hour's ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... first I saw some hope of holding the sheltered place—of beating the enemy off. I plunged into the thick of the fight, emptying my gun into the breast of a red devil, and bringing the butt down on the head of another. We pressed close up to the sides of the tower, and gained footholds on the ruins. Hand to hand we fought desperately, shooting and striking at the Indians and keeping ...
— The Cryptogram - A Story of Northwest Canada • William Murray Graydon
... May the devil take your father and mother." And Isshur would not even allow any one ...
— Jewish Children • Sholem Naumovich Rabinovich
... his sudden starts and bursts of feeling, of his low voice, of his fits of musing, that the aggregate impression is that of affectation and self-consciousness, rather than of a simple, passionate, and heroic nature. Mr. Gray does not seem to us at all like the rash, fiery, and dare-devil Scotchman of history. His conduct and conversation, as recounted in the fifth chapter of the novel, are unnatural and improbable; and we cannot wonder that the first lieutenant did not know what ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... shame and scorn be on ye all Who turn the good to evil, And steal the Bible, from the Lord, To give it to the Devil! ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... said he, "that I am hovering over the town—like the devil on two sticks—the first night after the armistice. I see innumerable sorrowing hearts behind shutters closed against the shouts in the streets. Hearts straining all through these years towards a victory that would ...
— Clerambault - The Story Of An Independent Spirit During The War • Rolland, Romain
... how delightful it would be to hear such songs as those after Cutcherry—what a distinguee girl she was—how she could speak French better than the Governor-General's lady herself—and what a sensation she would make at the Calcutta balls. "It's evident the poor devil's in love with me," thought he. "She is just as rich as most of the girls who come out to India. I might go farther, and fare worse, egad!" And in ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... to the House of Commons-to look on: and you will believe me when I tell you, that I really think the former the more serious occupation of the two; at least the performers are most in earnest. What men say to women, is at least as sincere as what they say to their country. If perjury can give the devil a right to the souls of men, he has titles by as many ways as my Lord Huntingdon is descended from ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... have liked very much to hear Mr. Pattison. It is said that Lord Thurlow and another lawyer were crossing Hounslow Heath in a post-chaise when a tremendous thunder-storm came on; that the other lawyer said that it reminded him of the battle in "Paradise Lost" between the devil and the angels, and that Thurlow roared, with a blasphemous oath, "Yes, and I wish the devil had won." Persons desirous of sustaining the religious reputation of the legal profession add that his companion jumped out of the chaise in the rain and ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... to turn away from the sight, and try to forget it. But Diamond began as usual to try to destroy the misery. The little boy was just as much one of God's messengers as if he had been an angel with a flaming sword, going out to fight the devil. The devil he had to fight just then was Misery. And the way he fought him was the very best. Like a wise soldier, he attacked him first in his weakest point—that was the baby; for Misery can never get such a hold of a baby as of a grown person. Diamond ...
— At the Back of the North Wind • George MacDonald
... beauties you worship. You've got a perfect harem in your head. I think I am living alone with you and when I look at you, the house is peopled with women that surround me, that fill everything and mock at me; all fair, like children of the devil all naked, like temptations. Let me alone, Mariano, don't come near me. I don't want to see you. ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... St. John; the poor listener, strange to say, can perceive clearly the Godhead of Christ, but is perplexed at His manhood; he wishes to get as firm a hold of it 'as if Christ came to meet him out of a wood.' His friend thereupon exhorts him to be humble, since this was only a doubt sent him by the Devil. Soon after it occurs to the penitent that he has not fulfilled a vow made in his youth to go on pilgrimage to the Impruneta; his friend promises to do it in his stead. Meantime the confessor—a monk, as was ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt
... to carry that particular heavy box, when we had to unload the canoe and take the baggage on our heads or shoulders at the many rapids we had encountered. They had never once missed an occasion to remonstrate and swear at the absurdity of having to sweat to carry "those blessed stones," or "the devil's own stones," as they ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... is many a better man when beginning to realize that he has made an ass of himself. Wells had been after him with a hot stick on discovering that the only authority for his accusations against Miss Wallen was "that devil's tool Elmendorf and a creature of his own coaching." Allison knew, moreover, that Forrest was back, commanding a company of his regiment, for his own associates were pouring into his ears their praises ...
— A Tame Surrender, A Story of The Chicago Strike • Charles King
... you. They square their shoulders vulgarly; they hold the reins in their hands as if they were driving, and they draw the reins to their waists in a coarse, absurd way. They tighten both these reins equally, and saw the poor devil's mouth with the curb and the snaffle at one time. Now you know, Mary, the snaffle is a mild bit, and the curb is a sharp one; so where is the sense of pulling away at the snaffle when you are tugging at the curb? Why, ...
— A Perilous Secret • Charles Reade
... more to be done about that. It simply existed; had sprung into being with her first penetrating question to him in the autumn light there at Weatherend. The real form it should have taken on the basis that stood out large was the form of their marrying. But the devil in this was that the very basis itself put marrying out of the question. His conviction, his apprehension, his obsession, in short, wasn't a privilege he could invite a woman to share; and that consequence of it was precisely what was the ...
— The Beast in the Jungle • Henry James
... charge thee, promptly wed, Or show the means I seek, then live and die Even as it pleases thee." The proud maid then Used every artifice to thwart his will, Was sick with fury, yea, was nigh to death! And when the Emperor would not bate a jot, Hark what this wild she-devil then devised.... ...
— Turandot, Princess of China - A Chinoiserie in Three Acts • Karl Gustav Vollmoeller
... something, I know not what, which makes success. When you spoke to me, in your slow, monotonous tones, when you fixed upon me your melancholy gaze, I should have been able to read in your eyes that you were only a fool. The devil take thee and thy gun, thy gun and thee; hollow head, head full of chimeras, true Pole, ...
— Samuel Brohl & Company • Victor Cherbuliez
... barbarian, assassin, deceiver, magician, and an enemy and destroyer of mankind. "Without doubt, child," added she, "he is a magician, and they are plagues to the world, and by their enchantments and sorceries have commerce with the devil. Bless God for preserving you from his wicked designs; for your death would have been inevitable, if you had not called upon Him, and implored His assistance." She said a great deal more against the magician's treachery; but finding that whilst she talked, Aladdin began ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown
... traduced by tongues which neither know our faculties nor our person. 'Tis but the rough road that virtue must go through. We must not allow any discouragements or censure to retard our aggressive work, remembering constantly that the Master was accused of having a devil, and that he cast out devils by the power of Beelzebub. Oh, what wrong ideas men have of the great work of saving souls. What prejudices, what indifference, what neglect, what lukewarmness have the true servants of Christ to ...
— Gathering Jewels - The Secret of a Beautiful Life: In Memoriam of Mr. & Mrs. James Knowles. Selected from Their Diaries. • James Knowles and Matilda Darroch Knowles
... tell us of his call, and these are practically identical in their statement except concerning his names. Matthew and Mark call him the Betrayer; Luke speaks of him as a Traitor, while John calls him a Devil. The next thing we learn concerning him is his rebuke of the woman who came to render her service to Jesus as a proof of her affection. In John the twelfth chapter, the fourth to the sixth verse, we read, "Then saith one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, which should betray him, Why ...
— And Judas Iscariot - Together with other evangelistic addresses • J. Wilbur Chapman
... incompatible also with politeness. Such as, should any one say "he was desired to present Mr. such-a-one's respects to you," to reply, "What the devil have I to do with his respects?"—"My Lord enquired after you lately, and asked how you did," to answer, "if he wishes to know, let him come and feel my pulse," and the like. A good deal of this often is affected; ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... flasks?—I can reduce your damned carcase to a pound of ashes with chemicals in half-an-hour! You've found out too much. But you've mistaken your man! Courtenay Ivor, say your prayers and commend your soul to the devil! You've driven me to bay, and ...
— Recalled to Life • Grant Allen
... the fjord, and the same kind of storm prevailed for several days while the king was lying there. Then the king applied to Bishop Sigurd, and asked him if he knew any counsel about it; and the bishop said he would try if God would give him power to conquer these arts of the Devil. ...
— Heimskringla - The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway • Snorri Sturluson
... octopus. I need say nothing of the gruesome, repulsive excellence of that famous scene; it will be enough to remind the reader that Gilliat is in pursuit of a crab when he is himself assaulted by the devil fish, and that this, in its way, is the last touch to the inner significance of the book; here, indeed, is the true position ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 3 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... spirit, too—the spirit of her nation; a masterful, conscientious, unscrupulous, unconquerable devil . . . that does a lot of good—incidentally . . . a lot of good . . . at times—and wouldn't stand any fuss from the best ghost out for such a little thing as our friend's shot. Don't look thunderstruck, you fellows. Help ...
— Tales of Unrest • Joseph Conrad
... "Nervy little devil," he acknowledged slowly to himself. "And maybe, after all, that would be the best thing for ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish
... better than juggling tricks. The French abbe, who had drank rather too much wine, challenged the whole tribe of ghosts, the English lord uttered blasphemies, and the musician made a cross to exorcise the devil. Some few of the company, amongst whom was the prince, contended that opinions respecting such matters ought to be kept to oneself. In the meantime the Russian officer discoursed with the ladies, and did not seem to pay attention to any part of conversation. In the heat of the ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... of fowls both wild and tame; some of the former we are yet unacquainted with: there is one of wonderful beauty, which I have seen in no other place except Peru: it has instead of a comb, a short horn upon its head, which is thick and round, and open at the top. The feitan favez, or devil's horse, looks at a distance like a man dressed in feathers; it walks with abundance of majesty, till it finds itself pursued, and then takes wing, and flies away. But amongst all their birds there is none more ...
— A Voyage to Abyssinia • Jerome Lobo
... It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that the ancient Lady of Calamities cried, "When Queen Nur al-Huda doeth such misdeed to her sister, what will she do to a stranger like myself, against whom she is incensed?" Then said she, "I conjure thee, O devil, by the Most Compassionate, the Bountiful-great, the High of Estate, of Dominion Elate who man and Jinn did create, and by the writing upon the seal of Solomon David-son (on both be the Peace!) speak to me and answer me;" Quoth Hasan, "I am no devil; ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 8 • Richard F. Burton
... turf; it is grey with marl, and patchy where scree of flint and chalk has run and found a lodgment. Ice-worn it may be, man-wrought it is not. No red-deer picks have been at work there, no bright-eyed, scrambling hordes have toiled their shifts or left traces through the centuries as at the Devil's Dyke. This noble arena is Nature's. Here I saw her people more than once. And the first sign I had of ...
— Lore of Proserpine • Maurice Hewlett
... beyond measure at Dulcibel's intimation that she and her party were instigated and tormented directly by the devil. And yet she could not, if she would, bear falser witness than she already had done against Rebecca Nurse and other women of equally good family and reputation. But at this appeal of the Magistrate, she flung her ...
— Dulcibel - A Tale of Old Salem • Henry Peterson
... her," the girl said. "She certainly attends to her own business, and that is more than I can say for my chief enemy, Carrie Wade. Alfred, that girl hates the ground I walk on, and yet she keeps coming to see me. She has me on her visiting list so she can devil me. She has no work to do at home, and so she comes over to nag me. She never has a beau or gets a thing to wear without trotting over to tell me about it or flaunt it in my face. She even makes fun ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben |
