Free translatorFree translator
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Handmaiden   Listen
noun
Handmaiden, Handmaid  n.  
1.
A maid that waits at hand; a female servant or attendant.
2.
Something or someone serving in a subordinate position; as, theology should be the handmaiden of ethics.
Synonyms: handmaid, servant.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |





"Handmaiden" Quotes from Famous Books



... her handmaid and said, 'Bring me from my room the jewelled drinking horn.' And the handmaiden brought it and Grania filled it to the brim and said, 'Take it to Finn, and say that I would ...
— Celtic Tales - Told to the Children • Louey Chisholm

... ran through the assembly, as Black Claus related this fearful story. All eyes were turned upon the handmaiden of Satan. For a moment she had raised her head, horror-struck at this interpretation of the interview she had in Gottlob's chamber with the stranger—for a moment she seemed to have a desire to speak. But then, clasping ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 348 • Various

... lay all in a row, like nuns going to vespers. Spread out upon the table they would have made a donkey smile, even if he were being gutted alive; so lovely, so splendid, were those brave noble young piles. The good advocate, however, had prepared this view for no ass, for the little handmaiden look longingly at the golden heap, and muttered a prayer at the sight of them. Seeing which, the husband whispered in her ear his golden words, ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac

... called the handmaiden of Christianity, but may more appropriately be designated its loyal helpmeet. Whatever synagogue or other melodies may have first served to voice the sentiments kindled by the Gospel of Glad Tidings it was ...
— For Every Music Lover - A Series of Practical Essays on Music • Aubertine Woodward Moore

... human beings, the disparities of race and training far outweigh those of sex. The sedentary philosopher, turning from his demonstration of the hopeless inferiority of woman, finds with dismay that his Irish or negro handmaiden can lift a heavy coal-hod more easily than he. And while the dream is vanishing of the superiority of savage races on every other point, it still remains unquestionable that in every distinctive attribute of physical womanhood ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 56, June, 1862 • Various

... beady-eyed handmaiden returned to her mistress in the kitchen, and found that lady ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli

... that he was solely the god of the Ho-don in every sense, other than that other creatures were created by Jad-ben-Otho to serve some useful purpose for the benefit of the Ho-don race. And now to be told by the son of god that she stood no higher in divine esteem than the black handmaiden at her side was indeed a shock to her pride, her vanity, and her faith. But who could question the word of Dor-ul-Otho, especially when she had with her own eyes seen him in actual communion ...
— Tarzan the Terrible • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... thought those were most remarkable, and striking words. If people would think the subject out in a calm judicial, and fair spirit, they would see in it the fulfilment of what would not only promote the best interests of the British Empire, but would also be the handmaiden of civilization to others as well, because in it there was no idea of aggrandisement. He had recently made a most remarkable tour through this interesting country, and since he landed in Cape Town, on the 24th May, had seen a great deal of it. He had visited Kimberley, and gone down in a bucket ...
— A Winter Tour in South Africa • Frederick Young

... explained the handmaiden, with a note of triumph in her voice, "about that there cat. 'Ere's where I buried 'im, and 'ere's where there ain't no signs of 'is dead body. 'E's come back to 'aunt us, that's wot 'e 'as, and your uncle'll ...
— At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern • Myrtle Reed

... curse of cities,' he continued, 'and Flattery is its handmaiden. Vanity, flattery and Deceit are the three disgraces. I like a man to be what he is—out and out. If he's ashamed of himself it won't be long before his friends'll be ashamed of him. There's the trouble with this town. Many a ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller

... a mistake; the knowledge which is accumulated in books can never be anything but the handmaiden of living science, the science which is being constantly remodelled and corrected by living thought. A book is a wise man paralysed; the wise man is a book which ...
— The Cult of Incompetence • Emile Faguet

... order. Each of us, of course, was extremely anxious about the good appearance of the beloved object; and, though I was the one to glean compliments ashore, B- had the more intimate pride of feeling, resembling that of a devoted handmaiden. And that sort of faithful and proud devotion went so far as to make him go about flicking the dust off the varnished teak-wood rail of the little craft with a silk pocket-handkerchief—a present from Mrs. B-, ...
— The Mirror of the Sea • Joseph Conrad

... and parasitism—the evidences of a defective social organization. It still leaves room for religion, because it maintains ignorance and confusion by its structure and contradictions, and because religion is fostered as a handmaiden ...
— Communism and Christianism - Analyzed and Contrasted from the Marxian and Darwinian Points of View • William Montgomery Brown

... a family servant—an indoor domestic, and handmaiden to a white mistress. This in the days of youth—the halcyon days of her girlhood, in "Ole Varginny"—before she was transported west, sold to Ephraim Darke, and by him degraded to the lot of an ordinary outdoor slave. But her original owner taught ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid

... we could, with all my heart," answered Frank; "and here comes Mary with some more stout, who can tell us all about it." And so the handmaiden was questioned accordingly, who replied, in a tone of evident disappointment, "Lar bless ee, sir, there b'aint a bed to be had in the whole place; fay there b'aint, I can assure ee not, if ye'd offer pounds o' gold for 'un; for ever since Wheal Costly, just handy by here, has turned ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various

... of the splendid spheres. Henrietta was closer to earth, for her features had been revealed; she was therefore the dearer, and the richer for him who loved her, being one of us, though an over-earthly one; and Carinthia gave her to Chillon, reserving for herself a handmaiden's place within ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... the tea quickly," she said, waving off the little handmaiden impatiently; and Martha, somewhat affronted and vaguely alarmed, ...
— Doctor Luttrell's First Patient • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... renounce the Quakers?" "Never, praise God, His son Jesus Christ, and Anne Hutchinson, His handmaiden—we live ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 9 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Reformers • Elbert Hubbard

... to Elizabeth's heart, such a gush to her eyes, that she hid her face on her knees and heard nothing of what her handmaid said for a long time after. If Clam talked, she had the talk all to herself; and when Elizabeth at last raised her head, her handmaiden was standing on the other side of the fireplace looking at her, and probably making up her mind that she wanted 'fixing' very much. There was no further discussion of the subject, however; for Miss Haye immediately ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner

... for God's sake!—you will break my arm," answered the terrified handmaiden. "I am sure I know no harm of Miss Mowbray; only, my lady spoke as if she was no better than she ought to be.—Lord, sir, there is some one listening at the door!"—and making a spring out of his grasp, she hastened back to the room in which the ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott

... maid it is!" chuckled Loki; "and how glad will Thrym be to see this Freia come! Bride Thor, I will go with you as your handmaiden, for I would fain see ...
— Myths That Every Child Should Know - A Selection Of The Classic Myths Of All Times For Young People • Various

... Handy, with a smile, "that handmaiden is a passion flower. 'Twould be an injustice to the more modest posy to designate her ...
— A Pirate of Parts • Richard Neville

... are her laws; as he changes, so must she. She has to do his foul work; as she had to do for King Henry, as she is doing it now for Queen Bess; and as she will always have to do, God help her, so long as she is wedded to the nation, instead of being free as the handmaiden and spouse of Christ alone. My faith would be lost, Mr. Norris, and my heart broken quite, if I were forced to think the Church of England to be the Church ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson

... the handmaiden of the Great Mother. May the sowing prosper and the reaping be good this year!" Ashe said finally, ignoring Lal, who still groveled on ...
— The Time Traders • Andre Norton

... man yielded to the advice of his wife, and bade the handmaiden go to his couch as a bride.[29] 2235 Her spirit exalted itself, when she had become pregnant with a man-child by Abraham; stiff-necked in scorn she began to despise her mistress, showed insolence, was overweening, and was unwilling to endure servitude but 2240 ...
— Genesis A - Translated from the Old English • Anonymous

... and other eminently pious members of his church. There, also, was the Reverend Mr. Clark, of Westbury, a young and zealous divine, who had ridden in haste to pray by the bedside of the expiring minister. There was the nurse, no hired handmaiden of death, but one whose calm affection had endured thus long in secrecy, in solitude, amid the chill of age, and would not perish, even at the dying hour. Who, but Elizabeth! And there lay the hoary head of good Father Hooper upon the death pillow, with the black veil still swathed about his ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne

... eatables and drinkables, and lastly to take a skin-bottle filled with good old wine. Then she changed her usual garb and donned the most sumptuous dress of all her gear; and, taking her Duenna and favourite handmaiden with a few of her women for comitive, she repaired to the quarters of the Youth, the King's son; and the time of her visit was the night-tide. Presently, reaching the Khan she said to her guardian, "Go thou ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton

... them with a gentle though firm, command. As we approached the sort of castle I have mentioned, the reason for Lylda's authoritative manner dawned upon me. She was, I soon learned, daughter of one of the most learned men of the nation and was—handmaiden, do you call ...
— The Girl in the Golden Atom • Raymond King Cummings

... The handmaiden at George Vavasor's lodgings announced "another gent," and then Mr Scruby entered the room in which were seated George, and Mr Grimes the publican from the "Handsome Man" on the Brompton Road. Mr Scruby was an attorney from Great Marlborough Street, ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope

... possess. The ancient aspiration of the Jewish law-giver: 'Would God that all the Lord's people were prophets, and that the Lord would put His Spirit upon them,' is fulfilled in the experience of Pentecost; and the handmaiden and the children, as well as the old men and the servants, receive of that universal gift. Therefore sacerdotal claims, special functions, privileged classes, are alien to the spirit of Christianity, and blasphemies against the inspiring God. If ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren

... and a second, and a third. And Owain called out to know whether the sigh he heard proceeded from a mortal; and he received answer that it did. "Who art thou?" said Owain. "Truly," said the voice, "I am Luned, the handmaiden of the Countess of the Fountain." "And what dost thou here?" said Owain. "I am imprisoned," said she, "on account of the knight who came from Arthur's Court, and married the Countess. And he stayed a short time with her, but he afterwards departed ...
— The Mabinogion • Lady Charlotte Guest

... were excelled in purity by her teeth, and by the colour of her skin, saving where the blush of pleasure and self-satisfaction had somewhat stained the neck with a shade of light crimson.—"Now, have done with these busy fingers, Janet," she said to her handmaiden, who was still officiously employed in bringing her hair and her dress into order—"have done, I say. I must see your father ere my lord arrives, and also Master Richard Varney, whom my lord has highly in his esteem—but I could tell that of ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott

... sky, fidgetted, grumbled, found nothing well done, and was never two minutes in the same mind. After donning the selected dress, she declared it a fright, tried two others, abused each roundly, dismissed her almost weeping handmaiden abruptly, and again put on the first. Sitting down to the mirror, she spent a full hour over the arrangement of her hair, looking attentively at her image, sometimes with the beginning of doubtful approval, often angrily, and, ...
— The Two Vanrevels • Booth Tarkington

... extreme gratification, she threw her arms round my neck and murmured pretty things. I was in no haste to stop her; and Nasiban, being a handmaiden of tact, turned to the big jewel-chest that stands in the corner of the white room and rummaged among the contents. The Muhammadan sat ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling

... as the handmaiden of protection. Our first duty is to see that the protection granted by the tariff in every case where it is needed is maintained, and that reciprocity be sought for so far as it can safely be done without injury to our home industries. ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Supplemental Volume: Theodore Roosevelt, Supplement • Theodore Roosevelt

... savage enemies of ours. It was in the very summer solstice of the year of violence; a time when he who took the sword was like to perish with the sword; and we thought of little save that Margery and her handmaiden were in deadliest peril, and that these Indians had five horses which we ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde

... she read, the young man sat upright in his chair, pulled the pipe from lips which had fallen open in astonishment, and fixed unblinking eyes of innocent blue upon the handmaiden. ...
— A Sheaf of Corn • Mary E. Mann

... about that we hunted the township for a handmaiden; and it also came about that our inquiring steps led us to the poor-house. A stout, not over-brilliant-looking girl, about twelve years of age, was to be had for her board and clothes, and such schooling ...
— Men, Women, and Ghosts • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps

... table, and in the hands of Mr. Timothy Green, hairdresser in ordinary to Williamsburgh, looked with unseeing eyes at her own fair reflection in the glass before her. Chloe, the black handmaiden who stood at the door, latch in hand, had time to grow tired of waiting before her mistress spoke. "You may tell Mr. Haward that I am at home, Chloe. ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston

... secretly now, and played as securely as a child might with a dog-rose of whose thorns he had been made aware. But of late, his haggard features, and the start with which he would wake into life when a guest haply plucked a flower from the bouquets on the table, or when the handmaiden came round to him with a dish of leguminous vegetables, could readily have been traced by a clairvoyant to associations connected with the ghastly belladonna and with the deadly bean of St. Ignatius the Martyr. For Mr. Arcubus ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... it to you. Do not question providence, and I am her handmaiden just now. Go along ...
— The Goose Girl • Harold MacGrath

... that his handmaiden should be blunt? Well, I know that there is no truth in what ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... hundred keeps the genuine article. All the rest keep a waitress or a 'second girl.' Sometimes the cook, waitress, butler, chambermaid, valet and housekeeper are all combined in one tough and versatile handmaiden." ...
— The House that Jill Built - after Jack's had proved a failure • E. C. Gardner

... lapwing, or peewit: The lapwing was at one time a handmaiden of the Virgin Mary, and stole her mistress's scissors, for which she was transformed into a bird, and condemned to wear a forked tail resembling scissors. Moreover, the lapwing was doomed forever and ever to fly from tussock to tussock, uttering over and over again the plaintive cry of "Tyvit! ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various

... think herself much honoured by the duty imposed upon her, but muttered between her teeth, 'Our fathers' herds did not feed so near together that I should do you this service.' A small donation, however, amply reconciled this ancient handmaiden to the supposed degradation; and, as Edward proceeded to the hall, she gave him her blessing in the Gaelic proverb, 'May the open hand be ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott

... be at home, but is probably taking tea at the Oaks or Roselands." And the old lady supped her tea and ate her waffles with a serene, happy face, now and then lighted up by a pleased smile which her attendant handmaiden was at a loss ...
— Elsie's Womanhood • Martha Finley

... previous letter he had told me that history. "Apropos of servants, I must tell you of a child-bearing handmaiden of some friends of ours, a thorough out and outer, who, by way of expiating her sins, caused herself, the other day, to be received into the bosom of the infallible church. She had two marchionesses ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster

... his presence. They hymned the adventures of the day that Dawn, her handmaiden, came speeding, silver-footed, perfume-bearing, fresh from ...
— Once Aboard The Lugger • Arthur Stuart-Menteth Hutchinson

... this is very pretty doings indeed!" began Mrs. Grubbling, meeting the little handmaiden at the parlor door. "So this is the way, is it, when my back is turned for a minute? That poor baby dumped down on the floor, to crawl up to the hot stove, or do any other horrid thing he likes, ...
— Faith Gartney's Girlhood • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney

... a girl, two or three years younger than he, and an old maid-of-all-work, of strangely mixed breed, crusty in temper and wonderfully sluttish in attire. [Endnote: 3] It might be partly owing to this handmaiden's characteristic lack of neatness (though primarily, no doubt, to the grim Doctor's antipathy to broom, brush, and dusting- cloths) that the house—at least in such portions of it as any casual visitor caught a glimpse of—was so overlaid with dust, ...
— Doctor Grimshawe's Secret - A Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... is the basest creature that ever was or ever shall be." And when he who had been vanquished hears that she wishes him to be killed, he says to him: "Don't believe her, for she hates me; but by that God who was at once Father and Son, and who chose for His mother her who was His daughter and handmaiden, I beg you to have mercy upon me!" "Ah, knight!" the maid exclaims, "pay no attention to what this traitor says! May God give thee all the joy and honour to which thou dost aspire, and may He give thee good success ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes

... Meanwhile she would say to Solita, "He shall not go to Broye, for in truth I need him;" and Solita would laugh happily, replying, "It is truth: he will not go to Broye," and thinking thereto silently, "but it is not the princess who will keep him, but even I, her poor handmaiden. For I have his promise never to depart from me." So much confidence had her mirror taught her, as it ever is ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason

... and asked Delilah, the handmaiden, to pass a plate of muffins to him. The dream had carried him away, and he thought for the moment that he was listening ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... Greek guest, Anna," Hadassah. "Bear to him some of this ripe, cooling fruit, and tell him of the triumphs of Judas. Though Lycidas be but a heathen," she added, as her handmaiden quitted the apartment to do her bidding, "he has a soul to admire, if he cannot emulate, the lofty deeds of ...
— Hebrew Heroes - A Tale Founded on Jewish History • AKA A.L.O.E. A.L.O.E., Charlotte Maria Tucker

... Joseph, you must sleep," said Mary. And when he slumbered peacefully she prayed in her heart: "I am a poor handmaiden of the Lord. The will of the ...
— I.N.R.I. - A prisoner's Story of the Cross • Peter Rosegger

... this out, and do a good turn, if I could, to Gwenny, who had done me many a good one, I begged my Lorna to say not a word of this matter to the handmaiden, until I had further searched it out. And to carry out this resolve, I went again to the place of business where they were grinding gold as freely as an ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore

... clusters along the base of the stone wall, and takes away the hardness of its outline; and in due time, as the upshot of these apparently aimless or sportive touches, we recognize that the beneficent Creator of all things, working through his handmaiden whom we call Nature, has deigned to mingle a charm of divine gracefulness even with so earthly an institution as a boundary fence. The clown who wrought at it little ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... in his stall, To serve him well upon; The first of them were Peter and Paul, The third of them was John. Mary, God's handmaiden, Bring us to thy ...
— In The Yule-Log Glow—Book 3 - Christmas Poems from 'round the World • Various

... things. And it is my work to arouse their dreams, to inspire their visions, to make them yearn for better living. I am trying to teach them to use and to love beautiful things, that they may be restless among ugly things. I think beauty only serves God as the handmaiden of discontent! And, father, way down deep in my heart—I know—I know surely that I must do this—that it is my reason for being—now that life has taken the greater joy of home from me. So," she concludes solemnly; "these people ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White

... remainder of the evening. The guests took their departure early. Sir Roger lingered behind the rest, and when alone with him the master of the house summoned Lucy. That handmaiden appeared, her eyes dancing with ...
— The Unseen Bridgegroom - or, Wedded For a Week • May Agnes Fleming

... America, in the region of Canada, where it became most flourishing, thanks chiefly to the solicitude and activity of the venerable servant of God, Francois de Montmorency Laval, first Bishop of Quebec, and of God's worthy handmaiden, Marguerite Bourgeoys." According to Cardinal Taschereau, it was Father Pijard who established the first Brotherhood of the Holy Family in 1650 in the Island of Montreal, but the real promoter of this cult was another Father of the Company of Jesus, Father Chaumonot, ...
— The Makers of Canada: Bishop Laval • A. Leblond de Brumath

... communication between the two rooms was closed. Another door in the smaller apartment opened to the passage, but this, she remembered, was habitually locked on the inside. It couldn't be Puckers, therefore, who thus disturbed her mistress's reflections, unless that handmaiden had come down the chimney, ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville

... magnify the Lord, And my spirit hath rejoiced in God, my Saviour. For He hath looked upon the low estate of His handmaiden; For behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed, For He that is mighty hath done to me great things; And holy is His name. And His mercy ...
— Debate On Woman Suffrage In The Senate Of The United States, - 2d Session, 49th Congress, December 8, 1886, And January 25, 1887 • Henry W. Blair, J.E. Brown, J.N. Dolph, G.G. Vest, Geo. F. Hoar.

... "Corn Rigs," and prolonged the pathetic notes of "Waly, waly" and the trembling wail of the "Flowers of the Forest" in the finest houses as in the humblest. Music, more properly so called, the art which has gradually made its way from being a modest handmaiden of poetry to full rivalship, if not a half-implied superiority, was already a scientific pursuit in England; and though the Italian opera aroused a violent opposition, and Tweedledum and Tweedledee called forth the gibes of the wits, there existed a vigorous English school of ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant

... reflection of our own; or, as in the spells of Hallowe'en, which we learned in childhood some unknown form may be seen peeping over our shoulder. In short, when I am in a ghost-seeing humour, I make my handmaiden draw the green curtains over the mirror, before I go into the room, so that she may have the first shock of the apparition, if there be any to be seen. But, to tell you the truth, this dislike to look into a mirror in particular times and places, ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott

... bringing him to a fit and proper state of subjection, the task became a labour of love for the energetic Susan. In spite of everything, however, he stuck to his guns, and the indignant Chrissie, who was in almost hourly communication with Metcalfe through the medium of her faithful handmaiden, ...
— Many Cargoes • W.W. Jacobs

... who was in it. As the road led nowhere but to Midbranch she was naturally desirous to know who was coming. She stepped into the hall, and, taking a small bell, rang it vigorously, and in a moment her youthful handmaiden, Peggy, appeared upon the scene. Peggy's habit of projecting her eyes into the far away could often be turned to practical account for her vision was, ...
— The Late Mrs. Null • Frank Richard Stockton

... aptly named! For, as 'mid brightest flowers The lovely Rose unquestioned reigns The Queen of Nature's bowers, So 'mid the daughters fair of Eve Art thou the peerless One! The chosen handmaid of the Lord! ...
— The Poetical Works of Mrs. Leprohon (Mrs. R.E. Mullins) • Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon

... thou, whose eye of contemplation Looks through the windows of the highest heavens, Resolve thy handmaid, where Earl Gloster lives: And whether he shall live, and 'scape the hate Of proud young ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various

... slid quietly down stairs. In the lower hall he, however, found an unexpected difficulty in opening the front door, and, after fumbling vainly at the lock for a moment, looked around for some help or instruction. But the Irish handmaid who had let him in was contemptuously oblivious of his needs, and ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte

... control; the faithful ministers of Christ resisted. Since the reign of Henry VIII., the Episcopal Church has acknowledged the reigning sovereign as supreme in her government. In this position the ruler can use the Church as an arm of his government, a handmaid in his administration, an instrument in carrying out his designs, an ally in supporting whatsoever may originate ...
— Sketches of the Covenanters • J. C. McFeeters

... nothing, for those to whom Christianity brings no revelation, for those who see no eternity in time, no infinity in life, for those to whom opportunity is but the handmaid of selfishness, to whom smallness is informed by no greatness, for whom the lowly is never lifted up by indwelling love to the heights of divine performance,—for them, indeed, each hurrying year may well be a King of Terrors. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... with human feelings love their country. Not the highborn or wealthy man alone, Who looks upon his children, each one led By its gay handmaid, from the high alcove, And hears them once a day: not only he Who hath forgotten, when his guest inquires The name of some far village all his own; Whose rivers bound the province, and whose hills Touch the last cloud upon the level sky: No; better men still better love ...
— Count Julian • Walter Savage Landor

... handmaid, freedom is its child, peace is its companion, safety walks in its steps, victory follows in its train; it is the brightest emanation from the Gospel; it is the attribute ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett

... certain cities and I travelled with great store of goods. But the daughter of my uncle (this gazelle) had learned gramarye and egromancy and clerkly craft[FN46] from her childhood; so she bewitched that son of mine to a calf, and my handmaid (his mother) to a heifer, and made them over to the herdsman's care. Now when I returned after a long time from my journey and asked for my son and his mother, she answered me, saying "Thy slave girl is dead, and thy son hath fled ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... angels, for I knew the room was full of them,—as for me, I only write here with a faltering heart, lest I should offend those prayers, for I know heaven is full of them, and I know that for every time my name arose to the throne of God on that beatified handmaid's hopes and cries, I have been forgiven ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 105, July 1866 • Various

... dispel the shadow that brooded over me with the same instinctive skill that some women will show with the trouble of a child. She made herself my glad and pretty slave and handmaid; she forced me at last to rejoice in her. Yet at the back of it all Marion remained, stupid and tearful and infinitely distressful, so that I was almost intolerably unhappy for her—for her and the dead body ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells

... persuaded Yerbury that if his advice had been taken there would have been no trouble. Whitlow discharged his man this winter, and took in his place a half-grown boy. Mrs. Whitlow sets a good example to her class by discharging one handmaid and making the other do double duty. Yet, so far as I can find, Whitlow is a richer man than he was three years ago. Kenny keeps his factory open, and gives the men three days' work in the week, and pays them in poor shoes, as much ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas

... to absorb, annex and exploit are still to that degree savages. Creation is still going on, and this earth is becoming better and more beautiful as men work in line with reason and allow science to become the handmaid ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 12 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Scientists • Elbert Hubbard

... have been proudly disregarded by the American aborigine, only in due time to meet the fate of my countrymen at the hands of Bridget the Celt,—what wonder that I gladly seize this opportunity to sing the praises of my German handmaid! Honor to thee, Lenchen, wherever thou goest! Heaven bless thee in thy walks abroad! whether with that tightly-booted cavalryman in thy Sunday gown and best, or in blue polka-dotted apron and bare head as thou trottest nimbly on mine errands,—errands which Bridget o'Flaherty would scorn ...
— The Twins of Table Mountain and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... done?" exclaimed the good man, "why have you not given a part to God's handmaid? Cut the fish in two pieces, and give her one, ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott

... the passage with a dignity and majesty of demeanor which impressed Miss Sherrard's neat handmaid considerably. The next instant she was ushered into the ...
— Wild Kitty • L. T. Meade

... the June honeymoon of the seasons, the strawberry shows itself among the bridal gifts, many of us exclaim for the hundredth time with Dr. Boteler, "Doubtless God could have made a better berry, but doubtless God never did." Nature, who is God's handmaid, does not attempt a rival berry. But by and by a little woolly knob, which looked and saw with wonder the strawberry reddening, and perceived the fragrance it diffused all around, begins to fill out, and grow soft and pulpy and sweet; ...
— Our Hundred Days in Europe • Oliver Wendell Holmes

... like the Greek, broke down in practice. 'Where the Middle Ages failed', says the Master of Balliol, continuing a passage already quoted, 'was in attempting ... to make politics the handmaid of religion, to give the Church the organization and form of a political State, that is, to turn religion from an indwelling spirit into an ecclesiastical machinery.' In other words, the mediaeval attempt broke down through neglecting the special ...
— Progress and History • Various

... way alter our original insistence that in our realm as preachers, unlike the scientist's realm of the theologians, thought is the handmaid, not the mistress. Our great plea, then, for doctrinal preaching is that by intellectual grappling with the final and speculative problems of religion we do not supersede but feed the emotional life and do not diminish but focus and steady it. It is that you and I may have reserves of feeling—indispensable ...
— Preaching and Paganism • Albert Parker Fitch

... behindhand in forwarding his version of events to the Egyptian court, and assuring the king of his unswerving fidelity. "Verily the king my lord knows," he says, "that the queen of the city of Sidon is the handmaid of the king my lord, who has given her into my hand, and that I have hearkened to the words of the king my lord that he would send to his servant, and my heart rejoiced and my head was exalted, and my eyes were enlightened, ...
— Patriarchal Palestine • Archibald Henry Sayce

... be but little to call for the great self-denials of Christian workers in the field and many Christian givers in the country at large. It is this thought that has ever been held up before it—the thought that the church and the school go together, and that the school is simply the handmaid of the church. We recognize the fact that in Congregationalism especially, out of all forms of religious belief, we cannot hope to make men earnest, effective Christians, caring for themselves, managing their own affairs independently, and having in them the heart ...
— American Missionary, Volume 43, No. 12, December, 1889 • Various

... ship, which was left behind. Astrid was one of the five women who went with this expedition; the other four were Gunhild, Thora, Sigrid, and Bertha. Gunhild and Sigrid were wives to two of Biarne's men. Thora was handmaiden to Gudrid; Bertha handmaid to Freydissa. Of all the women Bertha was the sweetest and most beautiful, and she was also very modest and good-tempered, which was a fortunate circumstance, because her mistress Freydissa had temper enough, as Biarne used to remark, for a dozen women. Biarne was fond of teasing ...
— The Norsemen in the West • R.M. Ballantyne

... them; the supremacy of the civil over the military authority; economy in the public expense, that labor may be lightly burdened; the honest payment of our debts, and sacred preservation of the public faith; encouragement of agriculture, and of commerce as its handmaid; the diffusion of information, and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the public reason; freedom of religion, freedom of the press, and freedom of person, under the protection of the habeas corpus, and trial by juries impartially selected. ...
— American Eloquence, Volume I. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1896) • Various

... to nought, or perchance I might repent it my life long. I would therefore now rather go to Stramehl, where I can pray and become strong in spirit, so that perchance I shall find favour in the sight of the angel of God, as Hagar the handmaid of Abraham in ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold

... have been guilty of the operation which may be described as cutting man up into parts: i.e., they have been inclined to treat him now as if he were all intellect, then as if he were all feeling; while to the will a kind of intermediate part has generally been allotted, as if it were the handmaid instead of the master of the other two. And there is still, in some quarters, a tendency to relegate the will and the feelings to an inferior plane, if indeed they be allowed any place at all. In other quarters, the onslaught is made on intellect. ...
— The Form of Perfect Living and Other Prose Treatises • Richard Rolle of Hampole

... of her upon that account, feeling pretty certain, perhaps, that the "affinity" between them was Platonic; but she had rather grudged the money with which he had so lavishly relieved the "perplexities" of "the handmaid." The amanuensis used to issue I O U's at Joanna's dictation, to be paid with enormous interest Hereafter, and Leonard Yorke was always ready to discount her paper. There was no one that subscribed more munificently than he did toward the famous "cradle," or looked more ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn

... lord, the taller. The other, please your grace, is her poor handmaid, Long since betrothed to me. But the maid's froward— Yet would your grace ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... a free maid, Heart against mine,— Take me, lord governor, Who am all thine! Thou that hast blessed me With a new light, Ah, is thy handmaid Fair in thy sight?' ...
— Miscellany of Poetry - 1919 • Various

... strict observance of which the undertaker will find the establishment unproductive and injurious to his interest. Purity cannot exist without cleanliness. Cleanliness in the human system will destroy an obstinate itch, of consequence, it is the active handmaid of health and comfort, and without ...
— The Practical Distiller • Samuel McHarry

... love but also to respect each other. I say "respect"; for if respect is gone, friendship has lost its brightest jewel. And this shows the mistake of those who imagine that friendship gives a privilege to licentiousness and sin. Nature has given us friendship as the handmaid of virtue, not as a partner in guilt: to the end that virtue, being powerless when isolated to reach the highest objects, might succeed in doing so in union and partnership with another. Those who ...
— Treatises on Friendship and Old Age • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... But her handmaid at the window sees a man riding in armour. He rides a grey horse, his face is pale and streaked with blood. She speaks to herself, and then to ...
— Gudrid the Fair - A Tale of the Discovery of America • Maurice Hewlett

... Virgin blest Hath laid her babe to rest: Time is our tedious song should here have ending; Heaven's youngest-teemed star[131] Hath fixed her polished car, Her sleeping Lord with handmaid lamp attending; And all about the courtly stable Bright-harnessed[132] angels sit, ...
— England's Antiphon • George MacDonald

... into that sublime canticle, the Magnificat: "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior, because He hath regarded the humility of his handmaid, for behold from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed."(247) On these words I shall pause to make ...
— The Faith of Our Fathers • James Cardinal Gibbons

... blest, Hath laid her Babe to rest. Time is our tedious Song should here have ending, Heav'ns youngest teemed Star, Hath fixt her polisht Car, Her sleeping Lord with Handmaid Lamp attending: And all about the Courtly Stable, Bright-harnest Angels sit in ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy

... With that she broke the silence once again, And gave the knight great thanks in little speech, She said she would his handmaid poor remain, So far as honor's laws received no breach. Her humble gestures made the residue plain, Dumb eloquence, persuading more than speech: Thus women know, and thus they use the guise, To enchant the valiant, and ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso

... Molly, do you say so?" says her handmaid, suddenly depressed. "Well, of course, miss, you—who are so much with London gentlemen—ought to know. And don't they mean what they say ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton

... raillery, they kicked him out of heaven for his sauciness of daring to reprove such as were beyond correction: and now in his banishment from heaven he finds but cold entertainment here on earth, nay, is denied all admittance into the court of princes, where notwithstanding my handmaid Flattery finds a most encouraging welcome: but this petulant monitor being thrust out of doors, the gods can now more freely rant and revel, and take their whole swinge ...
— In Praise of Folly - Illustrated with Many Curious Cuts • Desiderius Erasmus

... on the car of Time. And rule the spacious world from clime to clime: Thy handmaid arts shall every wild explore, Trace every wave, ...
— The Rivals of Acadia - An Old Story of the New World • Harriet Vaughan Cheney

... the Greeks "song" was an all-embracing term. It included the crooning of the nurse to the child... the half-sung chant of the mower or sailor... the formal ode sung by the poet. In all Greek lyrics, even in the choral odes, music was the handmaid of verse.... The poet himself composed the accompaniment. Euripides was censured because Iophon had assisted him in the musical setting of some of his dramas.' Here is pictured a type of Greek work which survives ...
— The Congo and Other Poems • Vachel Lindsay

... absurd until he commands a hearing, and then we worship him, because his prophecies have a wide circulation. If the artist is unsuccessful, we consider him a mere dilettante. Then, too, art suffers grievously from having been annexed by moralists, who talk about art as the handmaid of religion, and praise the artist if he provides incentives for conduct of a commercial type. It would be better for art if it were frankly snubbed rather than thus unctuously encouraged. We look upon it all as a matter of influence, for the one thing that we desire ...
— The Silent Isle • Arthur Christopher Benson

... alone, without thinking what somebody else was doing or ought to be doing. In short, she liked to have her out of the way for a while. Furthermore, it did not please her that Mr. Van Brunt and her little handmaid were, as she expressed it, "so thick." His first thought and his last thought, she said, she believed were for Ellen, whether she came in or went out; and Miss Fortune was accustomed to be chief, not only in her own ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner

... Duke of Hereward as the wronged husband who had slain my betrothed in a duel, all set me to thinking deeply, very deeply thinking. I did not express my thoughts unnecessarily. Silence is, with our order, a duty—the handmaid of devotion; but I set secret inquiries on foot, through agencies that our orders possess for finding out facts, and means that we can use, superior to those of the most accomplished detectives living. Through such agencies, and by such means, I learned not only external facts—which ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth

... Lethrenn, Ailill's horseboy, "if thou shouldst see him." Cuchulain came to the ford as he was. "What man is that yonder, O Fergus?" asked Medb.[c] And Medb, too, climbed on the men to get a look [W.2272.] at him.[7] [1]Then[1] Medb called upon [2]her handmaid for two woman-bands,[2] [3]fifty or twice fifty[3] of her women, to go speak with Cuchulain and to charge him to put a false beard on. The woman-troop went their way to Cuchulain and told him to put a false beard on [4]if he wished to ...
— The Ancient Irish Epic Tale Tain Bo Cualnge • Unknown

... with this design Mary the Virgin is found obedient, saying, 'Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it unto me according to ...
— The Lost Gospel and Its Contents - Or, The Author of "Supernatural Religion" Refuted by Himself • Michael F. Sadler

... Holy Maid spoke Over the high wall. The warriors rejoiced; To the gate of the fortress the folk then hastened, Wives with their husbands, in hordes and in bands, In crowds and in companies; they crushed and thronged 165 Towards the handmaid of God by hundreds and thousands, Old ones and young ones. All of the men In the goodly city were glad in their hearts At the joyous news that Judith was come Again to her home, and hastily then 170 With humble hearts the heroes received her. ...
— Old English Poems - Translated into the Original Meter Together with Short Selections from Old English Prose • Various

... that in the midst of such struggles, both political and religious, the minds of men could elevate themselves so far above their circumstances, as to look at any science or art in the light of its independent value. Poetry, at least, with a few exceptions, was only regarded as the handmaid of religion. We find many books of legends, biographies of the fathers and saints, both prose and rhyme, written partly by Romish, partly by Hussite writers. The doctrines of Huss did not, like those of Luther a century later, shake the belief ...
— Historical View of the Languages and Literature of the Slavic - Nations • Therese Albertine Louise von Jacob Robinson

... of the grape ran the juice of his veins. The Prophet had said, "O Faithful, drink not!" Abu Midjan drank till his heart was hot; Yea, he sang a song in praise of wine, He called it good names—a joy divine, The giver of might, the opener of eyes, Love's handmaid, the water of Paradise! Therefore Saad his chief spake words of blame, And set him in irons—a fettered flame; But he sings of the wine as he sits in his chains, For the blood of the grape runs ...
— Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Vol. 2 • George MacDonald

... nation which taught that the happiness of the race was forfeited through the fault of a Woman, and showed its thought of what sort of regard Man owed her, by making him accuse her on the first question to his God,—who gave her to the patriarch as a handmaid, and, by the Mosaical law, bound her to allegiance like a serf,—even they greeted, with solemn rapture, all great and holy women as heroines, prophetesses, judges in Israel; and, if they made Eve listen to the serpent, ...
— Woman in the Ninteenth Century - and Kindred Papers Relating to the Sphere, Condition - and Duties, of Woman. • Margaret Fuller Ossoli

... turning Socialists, and to those who think we are withholding just and desirable public aid and support, I say that government under the Republican Party will continue in the future to be so administered as to breed not mendicants, but men. Humanitarian legislation is going to be the handmaid ...
— Have faith in Massachusetts; 2d ed. - A Collection of Speeches and Messages • Calvin Coolidge

... queen-mother: "All that thou dost ask We will ordain. The gods reward thy love, Which hath such honor!" Comforting her so, To the king's daughter, young Sunanda, spake The Maharajni: "See, Sunanda, here Clad as a handmaid, but in form divine, One of thy years, gentle and true. Be friends; Take and give pleasure in glad company Each with the other, keeping happy hearts." So went Sunanda joyous to her house, Leading with loving hand the Princess in, The maidens ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson

... have dismissed, with the fee of an orange, the little orphan who serves me as a handmaid. I am sitting alone on the hearth. This morning, the village school opened. I had twenty scholars. But three of the number can read: none write or cipher. Several knit, and a few sew a little. They speak with the broadest accent of the district. At present, they and ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte

... on any chart, seas as yet unploughed by any keel. For this work of exploration Flinders nourished a passion as intense as that which inferior natures have had for love, avarice, or honours. It absorbed all his life and thought; and opportunity, becoming in his case the handmaid of capacity, ...
— Terre Napoleon - A history of French explorations and projects in Australia • Ernest Scott

... Tessa with her lantern in one hand and a wooden bowl of macaroni in the other, was kicking gently at the door of the outhouse; and Baldassarre, roused from sad reverie, doubted in the first moment whether he were awake as he opened the door and saw this surprising little handmaid, with delight in her wide eyes, breaking ...
— Romola • George Eliot

... trade was but the handmaid of frontier agriculture. The Westerners were a farmer folk who lived on the clearings their own hands had made in the great woods, and who owned the land they tilled. Towns were few and small. At the end of the century there were some four hundred thousand people in the West; ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Four - Louisiana and the Northwest, 1791-1807 • Theodore Roosevelt

... The little handmaid bubbled over with willing talk. Oh, yes, there was a meeting up Manx Road, and her Ladyship had gone with Lord Naseby, and Lady Madeleine, and Mr. Everard, the inspector, and, she thought, one or two besides. She expected the ladies back about ten, and they ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... only a time of trial, and the longer and harder the trial the greater our recompense in a better world. Whatever befalls us, our answer should be that of the Virgin Mary to the angel who announced the mystery of the Incarnation: 'Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... the king's finger, and the orient pearl unprizeable in his eye, the joy of the court in the comfort of the king, and the wealth of the kingdom in the fruit of her love. She is reason's honour in nature's grace, and wisdom's love in virtue's beauty. In sum, she is the handmaid of God, and the king's second self, and in his grace, the beauty of ...
— Character Writings of the 17th Century • Various

... MY aunt's handmaid, as I supposed she was from what she had said, put her rice in a little basket and walked out of the shop; telling me that I could follow her, if I wanted to know where Miss Trotwood lived. I needed no ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens

... Then my strange handmaid—who by the way is a droll, grumbling old soul, and orders me about as if she were still my nurse—dresses me and combs my hair, which will not yet awhile be rid of all its sand. And so, in due course, Molly emerges from her bower, ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle

... of the Regent, well known in the kingdom, saved her from suspicion, since she was supposed to be as impregnable as the Chateau de Peronne. At curfew, when everything was shut, both ears and eyes, and the castle silent, Madame de Beaujeu sent away her handmaid, and called for her squire. The squire came. Then the lady and the adventurer sat side by side upon a velvet couch, in the shadow of a lofty fireplace, and the curious Regent, with a tender voice, asked of Jacques "Are you ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac

... adapted to human discourse; that it is a fault much more often observed that the divines write too humanly, than that the humanists write not theologically enough. Philosophy, says St. Chrysostom, has long been banished the holy schools, as an handmaid altogether useless and thought unworthy to look, so much as in passing by the door, into the sanctuary of the holy treasures of the celestial doctrine; that the human way of speaking is of a much lower form and ought not to adopt for herself ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne

... colour, is natural affection, which, given us to procure our good, is sometime called Storge; and as every one is nearest to himself, so this handmaid of reason, allowable Self-love, as it is without harm, so are none without it: her place in the court of Perfection was to quicken minds in the pursuit of honour. Her device is a perpendicular level, upon a cube or square; the word, "se suo modulo"; alluding to that ...
— Cynthia's Revels • Ben Jonson

... only to the divine Author and Bestower of them. In submission, therefore, to God's will, without any further inquiries, she expresses her assent in these humble but powerful words: Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word. What faith and confidence does her answer express! What profound humility and perfect obedience! She was saluted mother of God, yet uses no word of dignity, but styles herself nothing more ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler



Words linked to "Handmaiden" :   subordinateness, subsidiarity, servant, housemaid, maid



Copyright © 2024 Free Translator.org