Biography & Autobiography Books

This account of the life of St. Ignatius, dictated by himself, is considered by the Bollandists the most valuable record of the great Founder of the Society of Jesus. The editors of the Stimmen Aus Maria Laach, the German review, as well as those of the English magazine, The Month, tell us that it, more than any other work, gives an insight into the spiritual life of St. Ignatius. Few works in... more...

CHAPTER I. I LEAVE MY FARM "Is it so small a thingTo have enjoyed the sun,To have lived light in spring?" It is eight o'clock of a sunny spring morning. I have been on the road for almost three hours. At five I left the town of Holt, before six I had crossed the railroad at a place called Martin's Landing, and an hour ago, at seven, I could see in the distance the spires of... more...

CHAPTER XXII ULM AND TRAFALGAR "Napoleon is the only man in Europe that knows the value of time."—Czartoryski. Before describing the Continental campaign which shattered the old European system to its base, it will be well to take a brief glance at the events which precipitated the war of the Third Coalition. Even at the time of Napoleon's rupture with England, his highhanded conduct... more...

INTRODUCTION [Lockhart, 1794-1854] "Nations yet to come will look back upon his history as to some grand and supernatural romance. The fiery energy of his youthful career, and the magnificent progress of his irresistible ambition, have invested his character with the mysterious grandeur of some heavenly appearance; and when all the lesser tumults and lesser men of our age shall have passed away... more...

I I am asked to jot down a few autobiographic odds and ends from such data of record and memory as I may retain. I have been something of a student of life; an observer of men and women and affairs; an appraiser of their character, their conduct, and, on occasion, of their motives. Thus, a kind of instinct, which bred a tendency and grew to a habit, has led me into many and diverse companies, the... more...

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Chapter I. Books may be written in all sorts of places. Verbal inspiration may enter the berth of a mariner on board a ship frozen fast in a river in the middle of a town; and since saints are supposed to look benignantly on humble believers, I indulge in the pleasant fancy that the shade of old Flaubert—who imagined himself to be (amongst other things) a descendant of Vikings—might have hovered... more...

CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION—PARENTAGE—LIFE IN SCOTLAND IN THE LAST CENTURY—EARLY EDUCATION—SCHOOL. The life of a woman entirely devoted to her family duties and to scientific pursuits affords little scope for a biography. There are in it neither stirring events nor brilliant deeds to record; and as my Mother was strongly averse to gossip, and to revelations of private life or of intimate... more...

EDITOR'S PREFACE If the volume now presented to the public were a mere work of ART, the history of its misfortune might be written in two very simple words—TOO LATE. The nature and character of slavery have been subjects of an almost endless variety of artistic representation; and after the brilliant achievements in that field, and while those achievements are yet fresh in the memory of the... more...

CHAPTER I PEDIGREE "Sir John Maundeville, Kt.," was his prototype, and Father Prout was his patron saint. The one introduced him to the study of British balladry, the other led him to the classic groves of Horace. "I am a Yankee by pedigree and education," wrote Eugene Field to Alice Morse Earle, the author of "The Sabbath in Puritan New England," and other books of the same... more...