Customs do not concern themselves with right or wrong or reason. But they have to be obeyed; one reasons all around them until he is tired, but he must not transgress them, it is sternly forbidden.
Some children like to make castles out of their rice pudding, or faces with raisins for eyes. It is forbidden -- so sternly that, when they grow up, they take a horrid revenge by dying meringues pale blue or baking birthday cakes in the form of horseshoes or lyres or whatnot.
In criticism I will be bold, and as sternly, absolutely just with friend and foe. From this purpose nothing shall turn me.
I'm not a feminist,' some women say sternly as they march off to work where equal opportunity legislation protects them. . . Women who say they are not feminists and act like individuals with basic human rights have just got their terminology wrong.
I do not often follow my characters off on tangents or change my story on a whim. I have an outline which I follow quite sternly. . . for a good long while. Then it turns out in some way to be insurmountably wrong and I am forced to re-think every component. Usually at this point I throw hundreds of pages away.
Drowning yourself won't help, she told herself sternly. Now, drowning Will, on the other hand.
Don’t be a hero,” I told him sternly. “Protect yourself.
I learned a lot from Arthur Rimbaud. People talk about how he wanted to be a seer and do that through the derangement of the senses. What they forget was that he also advocated, sternly and austerely, that one must be able to go through all that - and then articulate it.
Duty - that which sternly impels us in the direction of profit, along the line of desire.
Stern duties need not speak sternly. He who stood firm before the thunder worshipped the still small voice.
I ought to break your neck!" Clayton interrupted. Too late, Whitney realized that she shouldn't have been standing all this time on her "injured" knee. "Allow me to congratulate you on a fine day's work, Madam," he said sternly. "In less than twelve hours, you've brought Whitticomb to your side and Cuthbert to your feet.
William 'Big Bill' Rockefeller, who sold cancer 'cures' from a medicine wagon, taught him to leap into his arms from a tall chair. One time his father held his arms out to catch him but pulled them away as little John jumped. The fallen son was told sternly, 'Remember, never trust anyone completely, not even me. '
The status quo was rote memorization and recitation in classrooms thronged with passive children who were sternly disciplined when they expressed individual needs.
Oh dear," said Sarah anxiously, "I do wish he wouldn't do these silly things. " I'm sure we all wish that, Sarah," said Marcia sternly. "But unfortunately he has progressed rather further than the silly stage. Evil-minded-scheming stage is more what I would call it.
