Breast

“ Not thine the breast That deaf to nature's voice, ne'er owned the throbs Of kindred love:—nay more—like one entranced In bliss, thou look'st around, and smiles of rapture Play on thy cheek. DON MANUEL. How shall my lips declare The transports of my swelling heart? My brother Revels in glad surprise, and from his breast Instinct with strange new-felt emotions, pours The tide of joy; but mine—no hate came with me, Forgot the very spring of mutual strife! High o'er this earthly sphere, on rapture's wings, My spirit floats ”

“ Creeping slowly along the wall it reaches him at last—it falls upon his breast—it glances over his hard face, where sin has written her signature with a pen, as of iron—it looks into his stern eyes—that light arouses him, and while he returns the piercing gaze of the sunbeam, human feelings are aroused in his breast once more. ”

“ In sucking the hands also come awake. It is strange to notice the pictures by the old masters of the Madonna and Child. Sometimes the strange round belly of the Infant seems the predominant mystery-center, and sometimes from the tiny breast it is as if a delicate light glowed, the light of love. As if the breast should illumine the outer world in its seeking administering love. As if the breast of the Infant glimmered its light of discovery on the adoring Mother, and she bowed, submissive to the revelation. ”

“ As never mortal after thee shall sing!
These odorous buds, that on thy breast I lay,
Wake in thee tenderest sensibility,
The might of love, a fancy pure and bright—
More heavenly bright, than ever yet has burned
In mortal breast. ”

“ When breast to breast we clung, even I and she,—
A spirit when her spirit lookt thro' me,—
A god when all our life-breath met to fan
Our life-blood, till love's emulous ardours ran,
Fire within fire, desire in deity. ”

“ Your wattles drip down like a shawl to your breast
And the point of your mantilla drops across your nose, unpleasantly.
Or perhaps it is something unfinished
A bit of slag still adhering, after your firing in the furnace of creation.
Or perhaps there is something in your wattles of a bull’s dew-lap
Which slips down like a pendulum to balance the throbbing mass of a generous breast,
The over-drip of a great passion hanging in the balance. ”

“ And the infant glances, now turned upon the breast, now raised to meet our own! What dreams come to us as we watch the clinging nursling! All our powers, whether of mind or body, are at its service; for it we breathe and think, in it our longings are more than satisfied! ”

“ Is to my heart like manna,
Or balsam from the tree.
For, first, its tendrils feeding,
It gives them strength to cling;
And then, if pained or bleeding,
It soothes the wound or sting.
To thine, a fount of feeling
The warmest and the best,
’T is sweet to seem revealing
The secrets of my breast.
Of half its care and trouble,
My bosom, thus beguiled,
Feels every joy is double,
When on it thou hast smiled.
’T is dark and stormy weather—
Our first October day;
But we are here together,
Though thou art far away. ”

“ In reality, even closely examined, if it has less of charming whiteness, the breast of the new creatures is a true feminine breast; that globe which, swelling with love, and with the sweet necessity of giving suck, exhibits, in its gentle heavings, all the sighs of the heart beneath, and invites the child to nourishment and soft repose. All this is denied to the mother that swims and floats, but is enjoyed by her who rests. The fixity of the family, the constant tenderness, let us at once say, Society, all these commence from the moment that the child reposes on the maternal breast. ”

“ I have had few sensations in life that I would exchange for the warmth of her hand through the ragged glove, and the pathetic curve of the half-formed breast where the back of my wrist touched her body. ”

“ Her head is bowed upon her breast,
⁠And, oh, she's sairly failed the day.
Her breast is old, it will not rise,
⁠Her tearless sobs in anguish choke,
God put His finger on her eyes,
⁠And then it was her tears that spoke. ”

“ The warm glow falls on the old woman's face, neck, and breast—a face worn away to a skeleton, with shrivelled skin and sunken eyes, red and watery with smoke, dust, and working by lamplight—a long goître neck, wrinkled and sinewy—a hollow breast covered with faded, ragged shawls. ”

“ And bend its stalk, and fold its leaves,
From each approaching hand.
And thus there is a conscious nerve,
Within the human breast,
That from the rash or careless hand,
Shrinks, and retires—distrest. ”

“ There is in your breast a heart beating—an organ so wonderful in its sensitiveness, so perfect in its consciousness of good, that the least throb and thrill of pleasure that it feels is worth years and ages of mere sensual life enjoyment. ”

“ You must confidently lean on her breast, you must confidently blend yourself with her, you must let her touch you as your mother used to touch you when, a helpless babe, you lay in your cradle. Her hand went all over your body, from head to foot, with loving, soothing caress. Let the sun and the breezes touch your body in like fashion. ”

“ The breast is, in some measure, calmed and composed the moment we come into his presence. We are immediately put in mind of the light in which he will view our situation, and we begin to view it ourselves in the same light; for the effect of sympathy is instantaneous. ”

“ I already began to inspire the men with love: my breast began to take its right form; and such a breast! white, firm, and formed like that of Venus of Medici: my eyebrows were as black as jet; and as for my eyes, they darted flames, and eclipsed the lustre of the stars, as I was told by the poets of our part of the world. My maids, when they dressed and undressed me, used to fall into an ecstasy in viewing me before and behind: and all the men longed to be in their places. ”

“ To travel eastwards and breast the sun, to sail towards the watershed and breast the floods, to go north and breast the winter—fresh and warm are the energies of such bracing action; but more animating still is it to live so as to breast the stress of time. ”

“ They caught a glimpse of white limbs in the shadows, of bodies pressed breast to breast or even more amorously intertwined, with lips joined to lips and hands interlocked, and there were a dozen lovers standing motionless and making no sound at all. ”

“ All are aware that uneasy feelings, existing habitually in the breast, speedily exhibit their signature on the countenance, and that bitter thoughts or a bad temper spoil the human expression of its comeliness and grace. ”

“ That clear, bright eye is dim and lustreless, and that breast, where grew and flourished every quality which could adorn and dignify our nature, is cold as the clod that soon must cover it. A few hours have wrought a mighty change—a change for which a lingering illness had, indeed, in some degree, prepared us ”

“ We should fill our breast with the aspirations that impelled them, our imagination with the fears that restrained them, and feel those subtle forces which for generations had been developing intellect and moulding opinion. ”

“ The glittering projection on the breast was the jewelled haft of a dagger, the blade of which was thrust quite through the sternum or breastbone, showing that a most powerful blow had given the poor man, whoever he was, his quietus. ”

“ In every man’s breast there is more or less of that mysterious element which, under proper conditions of time and place, sees ghosts in shadows, and hears them in the faintest echo. These attributes (if the term be admissible) implanted in the breast of the child at its birth, though weeded with ever so careful a hand during the years of training, still retain some tendril hold, which no process of metaphysics can uproot, and which in the future years send out fruit-bearing branches that make and unmake human destiny. ”

“ Evidently that human breast was again admitting, or forcing itself to court, human hopes, human objects. Returning to the substances of life, their movement was seen in the shadows which, when they wrap us round at remoter distance, seem to lose their trouble as they gain their width. ”

“ However, the possession of a little daughter was more precious to her than she had expected, and the consciousness that the tiny doll which lay upon her breast, was flesh of her flesh and bone of her bone affected her agreeably and stirred her imagination. ”

“ The breast and the [Pg 190] haunches are in an inverse proportion in the two sexes. Man has the breast larger and wider than that of woman: woman has the haunches less circumscribed than those of man.
The upper part of the body is also less prominent, and the lower part more prominent, in woman than in man; and therefore, when they stand upright, or lie on the back, the breast is most prominent in the male, and the pubes in the female. The indication this affords of the fitness of woman for impregnation, gestation, and parturition, is obvious. ”

“ The important form of a gathered breast I will now describe: A severe gathered bosom is always ushered in with a shivering fit. Let this fact be impressed deeply upon my reader’s mind. This shivering is either accompanied or followed by sharp lancinating pains of the bosom. The breast now greatly enlarges, becomes hot, and is very painful. The milk in the affected bosom either lessens or entirely disappears. If the child be applied to the breast (which he ought not to be) , it gives the mother intense pain. She is now feverish and ill; she loses her strength and appetite, and is very thirsty. ”

“ And if you would like to learn something that is usually a secret, my breast is shaggy, and covered with hair, like the breasts of lions who among wild beasts are monarchs like me, and I have never in my life made it smooth, so ill-conditioned and shabby am I nor have I made any other part of my body smooth or soft. ”

“ Doubt not, but earnestly believe. "In every man's breast is to be found a lotus-blossom," says the pretty old Indian saying, and, watered by your prayers and your tears, be sure it will blossom into "the white flower of a blameless life." ”

“ But I don't believe you have any more cancer in your breast than I have. There is an obstruction and hardening of the glands, and that is about all."
"But Mrs. N—'s breast was just like mine, for Mrs. A—says so. She described the feeling Mrs. N—had, and mine is precisely like it."
"Mrs. A—neither felt the peculiar sensation in Mrs. N—'s breast nor in yours; and, therefore, cannot know that they are alike. She is an idle, croaking gossip, and I wish she would never cross our threshold. She always does harm." ”

“ I wait, with some impatience in my pulse, but no doubt in my breast. ”

“ That glorious breast, in which are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, is pierced with the lance of a soldier, to the end that thy heart might be cleansed from evil thoughts, and being cleansed might be sanctified, and being sanctified might be preserved. ”

“ Loving—if the answering breast
Seem not to be thus possessed,
Still in hoping have a care;
If it do, beware, beware!
But if in yourself you find it,
Above all things—mind it, mind it! ”

“ The firm belief of a definite, well-arranged connection of all earthly occurrences is deeply implanted within our breast. A well-defined law governs the varied hues of flowers, as offered us by the munificence of Nature, and it will, ere long, be revealed unto the eye of the student. ”

“ A. Because the breast is the seat of the heart, which is most hot; and therefore the paps grow there, to the end that the menses being conveyed thither as being near the heat of the heart, should the sooner be digested, perfected and converted with the matter and substance of the milk.
Q. Why are the paps below the breasts in beasts, and above the breast in women? A. Because woman goes upright, and has two legs only; and therefore if her paps were below her breasts, they would hinder her going; but beasts having four feet prevents that inconveniency. ”

“ I must confess no object ever disgusted me so much as the sight of her monstrous breast, which I cannot tell what to compare with, so as to give the curious reader an idea of its bulk, shape, and colour. It stood prominent six feet, and could not be less than sixteen in circumference. The nipple was about half the bigness of my head, and the hue both of that and the dug, so varied with spots, pimples, and freckles, that nothing could appear more nauseous: for I had a near sight of her, she sitting down, the more conveniently to give suck, and I standing on the table. ”

“ Under the breast it was joined to another child, but without
a head, and which had the spine of the back without motion, the rest
entire; for though it had one arm shorter than the other, it had been
broken by accident at their birth; they were joined breast to breast, and
as if a lesser child sought to throw its arms about the neck of one
something bigger. ”

“ 130 And hence one master passion in the breast, Like Aaron's serpent, swallows up the rest. ”

“ Gathered Breast.—A healthy woman with a well-developed breast and a good nipple, scarcely, if ever, has a gathered bosom; it is the delicate, the ill-developed breasted and worse-developed nippled lady who usually suffers from this painful complaint. And why? The evil can generally be traced to girlhood. If she be brought up luxuriously, her health and her breasts are sure to be weakened, and thus to suffer, more especially if the development of the bosoms and nipples has been arrested and interfered with by tight stays and corsets. ”

“ Look, how this ring encompasseth thy finger,
Even so thy breast encloseth my poor heart;
Wear both of them, for both of them are thine. ”

“ Once read thy own breast right,
And thou hast done with fears; ”

“ Her breast, with its badge of shame, was but the softer pillow for the head that needed one. ”

“ Such she often felt herself—struggling against terrific odds to maintain her courage; to say: “But this is what I see; this is what I see,” and so to clasp some miserable remnant of her vision to her breast, which a thousand forces did their best to pluck from her. ”