Liege man

“ I am baseborn, an impostor, an adventurer, the son of the peasant and the servant, the grandson of the butcher. I am no de Lincy nor Répentigny. My titles were false, my credit stolen, my position came to me by accident, and my defence was one long falsehood. De Léry was right. In him I wronged a man of honour, and my retribution is the judgment of God. ”

“ Man is his own curse, Lieberg; man is his own curse, and if, as we daily see, he brings two-thirds, at least, of the misery that exists upon his own head, by his own act, we may very well conclude, that the rest of the load also was purchased in times past by errors and disobedience of the same kind."
"By eating an apple in a garden," said Lieberg, with a sneer, turning on his heel to descend the mountain.
"By rebellion against God, in some shape!" replied Morley. ”

“ They laughed, boisterously.
“Nay, but you will have to join our merry company yonder, my worthy Roundhead,” said the elder of the two. “Short hair and a well-bred accent mark you out as a traitor. ’Tis idle to pretend that you are a Cavalier’s serving-man.”
“I make no pretence, sir,” said Gabriel, angrily. “I do but ask you, out of common humanity, to let a wounded man pass.” ”

“ If I thought that--"
"I can prove it," replied Lieberg. "You have mistaken your friends for your enemies, my good man. Listen to me for a very brief space of time, and you shall soon see that you have not only done me injustice, but yourself too. All the information that you possess, with regard to me and to my proceedings, has been derived from a youth whom you yourself know to be one of the most egregious liars in Europe, who has misrepresented my conduct to every one, even while I was acting for his own good. ”

“ Thus I set you at nought, scorning you, as well as hating you, feeling as much disgust as horror at your conduct. Let me tell you more, Count Lieberg, that, were there no other man on earth, I would regard you with the same contempt that I do now ”

“ A sense of foolhardiness enveloped me as I strode down from the plateau along the tree-bordered, vine-grown way. Would a truly well balanced person thus jeopardize his life? Most likely he would not. But a certain recklessness of spirit had come upon me, begotten of the Dryad's cruel absence, my long wait, and the abrupt aggressiveness of Buck. When a man's temperament becomes surcharged with a sentiment of this color, you may look for him to do things which had not even bordered his existence in saner moods. ”

“ But I am of opinion that upon an urgent necessity, or a great advantage, such a sort of a lie rather is no fault, or a very small one; unless it be that having once opened the way, there is danger of our growing into a habit of lying injuriously. Put the case that by a harmless lie a man might save the bodies and souls of his whole country; which would a pious man choose? ”

“ We are taught a simple moral,
Still we doubt the moral's truth.
When a boy they found, me rather
Loth to do as I was bid.
'I shall buy a birch," said father—
Broken vows! He never did.
Grown extravagant, when youthful,
In my tailor's debt I ran;
He appear'd about as truthful
In his talk as any man.
Let me tell you how he sold me:
"Look you, Mr What's-Your-Name,
I shall summons you," he told me—
But the summons never came!
Through the meadows, daisy-laden,
Once it was my lot to stray,
Talking to a lovely maiden
In a very loving way ”

“ They are before me night and day. If I had the courage I'd kill myself, but I have no more than a mouse. I'm a doomed man, Lije Callister, I feel it more and more, but being past redemption must go on sinning to the end. ”

“ He now comments bitterly on the malignity which has fastened this stigma on his name, merely because in the heat and flurry of debate, which left him not a moment to pick his words or arrange his sentences, he said something that he is sure no honest man who listened to his explanation could misconstrue into unfeeling frivolity. ”

“ TOPHAS: I will draw out their guts out of their bellies, and tear the flesh with my teeth, so mortal is my hate and so eager my unstaunched stomach.
EPITON: [Aside.] My master thinks himself the valiantest man in the world if he kill a wren, so warlike a thing he accounteth to take away life, though it be from a lark.
TOPHAS: Epiton, I find my thoughts to swell and my spirit to take wings, insomuch that I cannot continue within the compass of so slender combats.
FAVILLA: [Aside.] This passeth!
SCINTILLA: [Aside.] Why, is he not mad? ”

“ Yet on this apparently harmless principle has been built up the art of lying, in the Liguorian casuistry: He who lays his hand on a box or table, and swears “The man is not here,” speaks a material truth, and hence is judged innocent. ”

“ I was not then a Christian. Still, the act of lying was an offence before God, and no man should purchase his liberty at the price of a lie. He who saves his life at the cost of offending God, pays dearly for the purchase. I am thankful I have since learned this lesson, at the foot of the cross of Jesus Christ.
Not having our “land legs” on, we soon became excessively fatigued. When within two or three miles of the city, we concluded to stop all night at a tavern on the road.
The inmates looked somewhat surprised to see two sailor lads [108] inquiring for lodgings ”

“ Lycius," said he, "for uninvited guest
To force himself upon you, and infest
With an unbidden presence the bright throng
Of younger friends; yet must I do this wrong,
And you forgive me." Lycius blush'd and led
The old man through the inner doors broadspread ”

“ The moral of my book is that the working man who tries to get on, to desert his class and rise above it, enters into a lie, and leaves God's path for his own—with consequences.
"Second, I believe that a man might be as a tailor or a costermonger, every inch of him a saint, a scholar, and a gentleman, for I have seen some few such already. ”

“ He who lies to God daily, would hardly hesitate to lie to man, but that he lets “I dare, not wait upon I would,” and trembles, like the Chinese and the Kafir, not at commission of crime, but at the disgrace and punishment which must follow its discovery.
They stood up, did those three desperate men, in the low and narrow room; the owner of the wild domicile held the book in his hand, for there was a Bible in the chest. They opened the unholy compact with the words “I swear.” ”

“ Then, after a moment's pause, she continued more warmly:
“It is you people in society who get hold of some misquoted story, some ridiculous libel long ago crushed at the cost of the libeler it is you who do untold mischief! Only last summer I remember seeing in a paper the truest sentence that was ever written of my father, and it was this, 'Probably no one man has ever had to endure such gross personal insults, such widespread hostility, such perpetual calumny.' Why are you to judge him? ”

“ Man doth not yield him to the angels, nor unto death utterly, save only through the weakness of his feeble will."
Length of years and subsequent reflection have enabled me to trace, indeed, some remote connection between this passage in the English moralist and a portion of the character of Ligeia. An intensity in thought, action, or speech was possibly, in her, a result or at least an index of that gigantic volition which, during our long intercourse, failed to give other and more immediate evidence of its existence. ”

“ And Lycon laughed again.
“No!” said Aristeides, “a man who laughs in his sleep like a child is not wicked.... Who knows whether freedom has not made him a different and a better man? Certainly nothing dishonorable is known230 about him, and he is universally respected.... Perhaps his master has made up his loss long ago. Perhaps he has himself repaid the stolen money; he has slaves who work for him. ”

“ Carr's house, at Yelverly."
"That might do," said Harry Martin, in a thoughtful tone--"that would go a great way; but don't you think it would be a lie?"
"A lie!" exclaimed Lieberg, with his lip curling--"Are you fool enough to suppose, that a man of the world cares two straws about the mere empty shade of truth, when a great and important object is to be obtained? Where is the minister, the statesman, the patriot, who ever dreams of the abstract truth or falsehood of a particular proposition? ”

“ "look at me, now. Don't I sit before you, every way, just as much a man as you are? Look at my face,—look at my hands,—look at my body," and the young man drew himself up proudly; "why am I not a man, as much as anybody? ”

“ He is soon discovered, and as soon becomes the object of universal contempt and ridicule. Remember, then, as long as you live, that nothing but strict truth can carry you through the world, with either your conscience or your honor unwounded. It is not only your duty, but your interest; as a proof of which you may always observe, that the greatest fools are the greatest liars. For my own part, I judge of every man’s truth by his degree of understanding.
This letter will, I suppose, find you at Leipsig ”

“ But all this rigidity tended to a preservation of peace. The child who saw a man fined for lying, who beheld another set in the stocks for calling his neighbor ill names, or repeating scandalous assertions, grew up with a definite knowledge of the wickedness and danger of lying, and a wholesome regard for the proprieties of life. ”

“ I've got to live a lie to keep a man, who regards a lie as a mortal sin, happy in the belief that he has never tolerated a lie."
[Pg 33]
"My God, Conscience," Stuart broke out, "this is the New England conscience seeking martyrdom. Life runs forward, not back. Rivers don't climb hills." ”

“ Lloyd himself might be a worthy and honest man, and a sincere believer in the extravagances for which he demanded an equal credulity in others, do not honest men every day incur the penalty of ridicule if, from a defect of good sense, they make themselves ridiculous? ”

“ Earthly minds, like mud walls, resist the strongest batteries: and though, perhaps, sometimes the force of a clear argument may make some impression, yet they nevertheless stand firm, and keep out the enemy, truth, that would captivate or disturb them. Tell a man passionately in love, that he is jilted; bring a score of witnesses of the falsehood of his mistress, it is ten to one but three kind words of hers shall invalidate all their testimonies. ”

“ CHAPTER XXX. Slander Leaves a Slur For slander lives upon succession, Forever housed, where it once gets possession. Comedy of Errors. Not out of malice, but mere zeal, Because he was an infidel. Hudibras
“Blessed old London, how delightful it is to come back to it!” exclaimed Erica, as she and Tom drove home from Paddington on the afternoon of her return from Greyshot. “Tell the man not to go through the back streets, there's a good boy! Ah, he's doing it of his own accord! Why, the park trees are much browner than the Mountshire ones!” ”

“ But it is the glistening and softly spoken lie; the amiable fallacy; the patriotic lie of the historian, the provident lie of the politician, the zealous lie of the partizan, the merciful lie of the friend, and the careless lie of each man to himself, that cast that black mystery over humanity, through which any man who pierces, we thank as we would thank one who dug a well in a desert; ”

“ At times the whole world seems to be in conspiracy to importune you with emphatic trifles. Friend, client, child, sickness, fear, want, charity, all knock at once at thy closet door, and say,— `Come out unto us.' But keep thy state; come not into their confusion. The power men possess to annoy me, I give them by a weak curiosity. No man can come near me but through my act. ”

“ With all this bulk there's nothing lost in Og,
For every inch that is not fool is rogue:
A monstrous mass of foul corrupted matter,
As all the devils had spued to make the batter.
When wine has given him courage to blaspheme,
He curses God, but God before cursed him;
And if man could have reason, none has more,
That made his paunch so rich, and him so poor. ”

“ Should he succeed in re-entering, he will not enter alone, but will bring with him associates to fortify himself in the soul of which he has again got possession. Thus, the second destruction of that miserable soul shall be greater than the first. “And the last state of that man becomes worse than the first. ”

“ My weakness consists in not having a discriminating eye for the incidental—for the externals—no eye for the hod of the rag-picker or the fine linen of the next man. Next man—that’s it. I have met so many men,’ he pursued, with momentary sadness—‘met them too with a certain—certain—impact, let us say; like this fellow, for instance—and in each case all I could see was merely the human being. A confounded democratic quality of vision which may be better than total blindness, but has been of no advantage to me, I can assure you. Men expect one to take into account their fine linen. ”

“ We are but the veriest, sorriest slaves of our stomach. Reach not after morality and righteousness, my friends; watch vigilantly your stomach, and diet it with care and judgment. Then virtue and contentment will come and reign within your heart, unsought by any effort of your own; and you will be a good citizen, a loving husband, and a tender father—a noble, pious man. ”

“ I did not hate the author of my misfortunes—truth and justice acquit me of that; I rather pitied the hard destiny to which he seemed condemned. But I thought with unspeakable loathing of those errors, in consequence of which every man is fated to be, more or less, the tyrant or the slave. I was astonished at the folly of my species, that they did not rise up as one man, and shake off chains so ignominious, and misery so insupportable. ”