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A love for the gaming-table is the besetting sin of my family, and I had sworn to conquer it in myself, but you were too strong for me; so, whatever happens, do not blame me too much. And now give me a kiss as a guaranty of success.

"Now, to be frank with you," she said, "there's only one bond between Alice and me, and that is we do make a froth of the things in our drawers; and if we are both to struggle against our besetting infirmity, it will go hard with us; but there, it will be fun to see her struggling to be tidy and all to no purpose. I think I'll join on that account. I shall like to see her fighting her drawers.

No doubt this severe discipline was very useful to him at the time, in strengthening him against the besetting faults of his character; but it could not last long, without originating other errors.

At last they all three found themselves out of the crowd, near one of the arches, on a deserted spot where they were able to breathe for a moment. They now heard nothing but the distant canticle with its besetting refrain, and they only saw the reflection of the tapers, hovering like a luminous cloud in the neighbourhood of the Basilica.

To the second floor on which the window was situated, he ascended, much pre-occupied in mind by the uncertainties besetting the Roman Empire, and much regretting the death of the amiable Pertinax: who only last night had left the Imperial affairs in a state of great confusion, by falling a victim to the fury of the praetorian guards.

There is always the other voluntary flow to reckon with, the intense motion of independence and singleness of self, the pride of isolation, and the profound fulfillment through power. The very first thing of all to be recognized is the danger of idealism. It is the one besetting sin of the human race. It means the fall into automatism, mechanism, and nullity.

"I want to give myself to justice; but he has been ill, and he may be ill again, and he needs me." He told of the tailor's besetting weakness, of his struggles against it, of his fall a few days before, and the cause of it . . . told all to the man of silence. "You wish to give yourself to justice?" "I shall have no peace unless." There was something martyr-like in the man's attitude.

In an instant the damp surface of my block looked rough enough to strike matches on. But impatience is not my besetting sin, and I had endured these little catastrophes before. I waited for the block to dry before I brushed off the sand.

I hoped therefore, that, by placing her in the pew, I might at least liberate her for the moment from the besetting memorials of sorrow and calamity. But, as if in the very teeth of my purpose, one of the large columns which supported the roof of the chapel, had its basis and lower part of the shaft in this very pew.

"In other words, a one-man business." "That's the secret. There's nothing in this shop that I can't do, and don't do, every now and then, just to keep my hand in. I can put more pull into an ad. to-day than the next best man in the business. Modesty isn't my besetting sin, you see, Hal." "Why should it be? Every brick in this building would give the lie to it."