Vulgar words in Past and Present - Thomas Carlyle's Collected Works, Vol. XIII. (Page 1)

This book at a glance

ass x 2
bastard x 2
blockhead x 20
jackass x 1
            

Page 1

~   ~   ~   Sentence 224   ~   ~   ~

The Heaviest, sinking through complex fluctuating media and vortices, has its deflexions, its obstructions, nay at times its resiliences, its reboundings; whereupon some blockhead shall be heard jubilating, "See, your Heaviest ascends!"

~   ~   ~   Sentence 405   ~   ~   ~

Not easily again shall a Corn-Law argue ten years for itself; and still talk and argue, when impartial persons have to say with a sigh that, for so long back, they have heard no 'argument' advanced for it but such as might make the angels and almost the very jackasses weep!-- Wholly a blessed time: when jargon might abate, and here and there some genuine speech begin.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 1,165   ~   ~   ~

These were absurd superstitious blockheads of Monks; and we are enlightened Tenpound Franchisers, without taxes on knowledge!

~   ~   ~   Sentence 1,173   ~   ~   ~

Those superstitious blockheads of the Twelfth Century had no telescopes, but they had still an eye; not ballot-boxes; only reverence for Worth, abhorrence of Unworth.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 1,221   ~   ~   ~

For the mischief that one blockhead, that every blockhead does, in a world so feracious, teeming with endless results as ours, no ciphering will sum up.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 1,225   ~   ~   ~

Surely a just citizen _is_ admonished by God and his own Soul, by all silent and articulate voices of this Universe, to do what in _him_ lies towards relief of this poor blockhead-quack, and of a world that groans under him.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 1,230   ~   ~   ~

This poor blockhead too is born, for uses: why, elevating him to mastership, will you make a conflagration, a parish-curse or world-curse of him?

~   ~   ~   Sentence 1,293   ~   ~   ~

How pay them at the public cost;--how, above all, by _setting fire_ to the public, as we said; clapping 'conflagrations' on the public, which the services of blockheads, _non-idonei_, intrinsically are!

~   ~   ~   Sentence 1,682   ~   ~   ~

Stupid blockheads, to reverence their St. Edmund's dead Body in this manner?

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,114   ~   ~   ~

* * * * * Of a truth, if man were not a poor hungry dastard, and even much of a blockhead withal, he would cease criticising his victuals to such extent; and criticise himself rather, what he does with his victuals!

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,156   ~   ~   ~

The Fates sing of thee that thou shalt many times be thought an ass and a dull ox, and shalt with a godlike indifference believe it.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,178   ~   ~   ~

Fate's prophecy is fulfilled; you call the man an ox and an ass.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,195   ~   ~   ~

And greatly do I respect the solid character,--a blockhead, thou wilt say; yes, but a well-conditioned blockhead, and the best-conditioned,--who esteems all 'Customs once solemnly acknowledged' to be ultimate, divine, and the rule for a man to walk by, nothing doubting, not inquiring farther.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,601   ~   ~   ~

Did William the Norman Bastard, or any of his Taillefers, _Ironcutters_, manage so?

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,872   ~   ~   ~

Sweep away thy constitutional, sentimental and other cobwebberies; look eye to eye, if thou still have any eye, in the face of this big burly William Bastard: thou wilt see a fellow of most flashing discernment, of most strong lion-heart;--in whom, as it were, within a frame of oak and iron, the gods have planted the soul of 'a man of genius'!

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,924   ~   ~   ~

Thou entire blockhead!

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,994   ~   ~   ~

I say, these Paragraphs, and low or loud votings of thy poor fellow-blockheads of mankind, will never guide thee in any enterprise at all.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 3,714   ~   ~   ~

Quashee, it must be owned, is hitherto a kind of blockhead.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 3,825   ~   ~   ~

Strange enough: a many-counselled Ulysses is set in motion by a scoundrel-blockhead; plays tunes, like a barrel-organ, at the scoundrel-blockhead's touch,--has to snatch, namely, his sceptre-cudgel, and weal the crooked back with bumps and thumps!

~   ~   ~   Sentence 3,916   ~   ~   ~

Thou fool, with _thy_ empty Godhoods, Apotheoses _edgegilt_; the Crown of Thorns made into a poor jewel-room crown, fit for the head of blockheads; the bearing of the Cross changed to a riding in the Long-Acre Gig!

~   ~   ~   Sentence 4,206   ~   ~   ~

Danger of blockheads.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 4,631   ~   ~   ~

Blockheads, danger of, 111.

Page 1