United States or United States Minor Outlying Islands ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
From Molière to Oscar Wilde we had a line of comedic playwrights who, if they had nothing fundamentally positive to say, were at least in revolt against falsehood and imposture, and were not only, as they claimed, 'chastening morals by ridicule, but, in Johnson's phrase, clearing our minds of cant, and thereby shewing an uneasiness in the presence of error which is the surest symptom of intellectual vitality.
"I believe," he said, "that to avenge a father of the imposture of which he was the victim during his life, is to render homage to his memory. Yes, madame, I read the whole of that correspondence, and with an interest which you will readily understand.
Set down that name in the warrant if you are determined to be bubbled by that fellow there and made to look foolish afterwards with my Lord Carteret." Mr. Templeton sat back in his chair, frowning; but more from utter bewilderment now than anger. "Perhaps," said Mr. Caryll, "if I were to explain, it would help you to see the imposture that is being practiced upon you.
Rogers, a private tutor, with whom he was reading passages of Virgil and Cicero, remarked, "It makes me uncomfortable, my lord, to see you sitting them in such pain as I know you must be suffering." "Never mind, Mr. Rogers." said the child, "you shall not see any signs of it in me." The other illustrates his precocious delight in detecting imposture.
This was to make God the ruler, through instruments chosen by Himself theoretically a perfect arrangement, but in practice open to the gravest perils. It not merely paved the way to imposture, but invited it; and the most dangerous imposture is that which imposes on the impostor himself.
This imposture, in course of time, produced its effect, Many, it is true, laughed at his impudent assumptions, but on the other hand, hundreds were strongly impressed with a belief in the mysterious and rhapsodical predictions which he was in the habit of uttering.
The score on which he hesitated was whether the thing should be done, not whether it could; our appeals were not to brace a failing courage, but cajole a sturdy sense of honor which found the imposture distasteful so soon as it seemed to serve a personal end. To serve the king he had played the king in old days, but he did not love to play the king when the profit of it was to be his own.
Well, while they war talkin', Bill turns in the way he was sleepin' into an aisier imposture; and as soon as he stopped snorin' ould Tim Donovan's courage riz agin, and says he: 'I'll go to the kitchen, says he, 'an' light a rish, says he. An' with that away wid him, an' the wife kep' workin' the beads all the time, an' before he kem back Bill was snorin' as loud as ever.
His Majesty, on sight of this and of the fatal impression which so great an imposture had produced in some ultramarine Provinces, and what must without difficulty be the consequence among the rest, thought proper to order that, by means of a circular to all the chiefs and corporations beyond seas, this atrocious falsehood should be disbelieved; and now he has deigned to command me to make it known to the Government of the United States that it is false as far as General O. Donojú published beyond his instructions, by pointing out to it that he never could have been furnished with other instructions than those conformable to constitutional principles.
He urged his daughter to do this by saying that, if the pretended king was really an impostor, the imposture ought to be made known, and that she, being of noble birth, ought to have the courage and energy to assist in discovering it. To this Phædyma replied that she would do as her father desired, though she knew that she hazarded her life in the attempt.
Word Of The Day