Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

He is not infected with the wilful provincialism of Lamb nor with the spirit of John Bullishness which seriously proclaims in its rivals “equally a want of books and men.”

From Hazlitt on English Literature An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature by Zeitlin, Jacob

Cranks were still vainly trying to prove to the blunt John Bullishness of the Prime Minister that the Daylight Saving Bill was not a piece of mere freak legislation.

From The Pretty Lady by Bennett, Arnold

A kind of John Bullishness may also be noted, especially in derogatory references to France, which, true or untrue, are out of taste and keeping.

From Alfred Tennyson by Lang, Andrew

The entire range of French literature, old as well as new, he seems to have ignored altogether—I should imagine out of pure John Bullishness.

From Essays in English Literature, 1780-1860 by Saintsbury, George