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At this point therefore let us begin our narrative, without
adding any more to what has already been said; for it would be
foolish to lengthen the preface while cutting short the history
itself.
Author: Bible
Source: II Maccabees (ch. II, v. 32)
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A schoolboy's tale, the wonder of an hour!
Author: Lord Byron (George Gordon Noel Byron)
Source: Childe Harold (canto II, st. 2)
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A story, in which native humour reigns,
Is often useful, always entertains;
A graver fact, enlisted on your side,
May furnish illustration, well applied;
But sedentary weavers of long tales
Give me the fidgets, and my patience fails.
Author: William Cowper
Source: Conversation (l. 203)
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In this spacious isle I think there is not one
But he hath heard some talk of Hood and Little John,
Of Tuck, the merry friar, which many a sermon made
In praise of Robin Hood, his outlaws, and their trade.
Author: Michael Drayton
Source: Polyolbion
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This story will never go down.
Author: Henry Fielding
Source: Tumble-Down Dick (air I)
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In vain would I seek to discover
Why sad and mournful am I,
My thoughts without ceasing brood over
A tale of the time gone by.
[Ger., Ich weiss nicht was soll es bedeuten,
Dass ich so traurig bin:
Ein marchen aus alten Zeiten
Das kommt mir nicht aus dem Sinn.]
Author: Heinrich Heine
Source: Die Lorelei, (E.A. Bowring's translation)
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When thou dost tell another's jest, therein
Omit the oaths, which true wit cannot need;
Pick out of tales the mirth, but not the sin.
Author: George Herbert
Source: Temple--Church Porch (st. 11)
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Soft as some song divine, thy story flows.
Author: Homer ("Smyrns of Chios")
Source: The Odyssey (bk. XI, l. 458), (Pope's translation)
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I hate
To tell again a tale once fully told.
Author: Homer ("Smyrns of Chios")
Source: The Odyssey (bk. XII, l. 566), (Bryant's translation)
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And what so tedious as a twice-told tale.
Author: Homer ("Smyrns of Chios")
Source: The Odyssey (bk. XII, last line), (Pope's translation)
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Why do you laugh? Change but the name, and the story s told of
yourself.
[Lat., Quid rides?]
Mutato nomine de te fabula narratur.]
Author: Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus)
Source: Satires (I, 1, 69)
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But that's another story.
Author: Rudyard Kipling
Source: Mulvaney--Soldiers Three
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An' all us other children, when the supper things is done,
We set around the kitchen fire an' has the mostest fun
A-list'nin' to the witch tales 'at Annie tells about
An' the gobble-uns 'at gits you
Ef you
Don't
Watch
Out!
Author: James Whitcomb Riley
Source: Little Orphant Annie
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I cannot tell how the truth may be;
I say the tale as 'twas said to me.
Author: Sir Walter Scott
Source: The Lay of the Last Minstrel (canto II, st. 22)
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But that I am forbid
To tell the secrets of my prison house,
I could a tale unfold whose lightest word
Would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood,
Make thy two eyes like stars start from their spheres,
Thy knotted and combined locks to part,
And each particular hair to stand on end
Like quills upon the fretful porpentine.
Author: William Shakespeare
Source: Hamlet Prince of Denmark (Ghost at I, v)
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His eye begets occasion for his wit;
For every object that the one doth catch
The other turns to a mirth-moving jest,
Which his fair tongue, conceit's expositor,
Delivers in such apt and gracious words,
That aged ears play truant at his tales,
And younger hearings are quite ravished,
So sweet and voluble is his discourse.
Author: William Shakespeare
Source: Love's Labor's Lost (Rosaline at II, i)
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Out of their saddles into the dirt--and thereby hangs a tale.
Author: William Shakespeare
Source: The Taming of the Shrew (Grumio at IV, i)
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For seldom shall she hear a tale
So said, so tender, yet so true.
Author: William Shenstone
Source: Jemmy Dawson (st. 20)
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With a tale forsooth he cometh unto you, with a tale which
holdeth children from play, and old men from the chimney corner.
Author: Sir Philip Sidney (Sydney)
Source: The Defense of Poesy
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In after-dinner talk,
Across the walnuts and the wine.
Author: Lord Alfred Tennyson
Source: The Miller's Daughter
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A tale in everything.
Author: William Wordsworth
Source: Simon Lee
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