All 11 Uses of
perish
in
To the Lighthouse
- Who then could blame the leader of that forlorn party which after all has climbed high enough to see the waste of the years and the perishing of the stars, if before death stiffens his limbs beyond the power of movement he does a little consciously raise his numbed fingers to his brow, and square his shoulders, so that when the search party comes they will find him dead at his post, the fine figure of a soldier?†
Part 1
- …rejoice when the hero puts his armour off, and halts by the window and gazes at his wife and son, who, very distant at first, gradually come closer and closer, till lips and book and head are clearly before him, though still lovely and unfamiliar from the intensity of his isolation and the waste of ages and the perishing of the stars, and finally putting his pipe in his pocket and bending his magnificent head before her—who will blame him if he does homage to the beauty of the world?†
Part 1
- Whatever else may perish and disappear, what lies here is steadfast.†
Part 2 *
- Will you perish?†
Part 2
- And he shook his head at her, and strode on ("Alone" she heard him say, "Perished" she heard him say) and like everything else this strange morning the words became symbols, wrote themselves all over the grey-green walls.†
Part 3
- Perished.†
Part 3
- But the breeze bred in Mr. Ramsay too the same excitement, and, as old Macalister turned to fling his line overboard, he cried out aloud, "We perished," and then again, "each alone."†
Part 3
- Thinking this, she was murmuring to herself, "We perished, each alone," for her father's words broke and broke again in her mind, when her father, seeing her gazing so vaguely, began to tease her.†
Part 3
- For no one attracted her more; his hands were beautiful, and his feet, and his voice, and his words, and his haste, and his temper, and his oddity, and his passion, and his saying straight out before every one, we perish, each alone, and his remoteness.†
Part 3
- About here, she thought, dabbling her fingers in the water, a ship had sunk, and she murmured, dreamily half asleep, how we perished, each alone.†
Part 3
- He sat and looked at the island and he might be thinking, We perished, each alone, or he might be thinking, I have reached it.†
Part 3
Definition:
-
(perish) to die -- especially in an unnatural way
or:
to be destroyed or cease to existeditor's notes: You may encounter an informal expression, "Perish the thought." It means that the speaker hopes the thought will cease to exist and the thing it represents will never happen.