Literary notes about ruminate (AI summary)
The term "ruminate" in literature carries a dual significance, functioning both as a literal reference to the act of cud-chewing among animals and as a metaphor for deep thought. In pastoral contexts, authors depict oxen or cattle engaged in natural ruminating behaviors ([1], [2], [3]), thereby evoking the calm, instinctual rhythms of nature. Conversely, many writers harness the word to illustrate characters engaging in profound introspection or wrestling with troubled thoughts, as seen when characters sit quietly to ponder life's challenges or their past experiences ([4], [5], [6]). This versatile usage allows the term to bridge the natural world with the realm of human contemplation, enriching the narrative by drawing parallels between a creature's physical act of digestion and the mental process of digesting ideas or memories ([7], [8]).
- They live entirely upon vegetable food, and all ruminate, or chew the cud.
— from Domestic Pleasures, or, the Happy Fire-side by Frances Bowyer Vaux - "This, that and the other horned animal, ox, sheep, goat, ruminate; therefore , all horned animals ruminate.
— from Logic, Inductive and Deductive by William Minto - RUMINANTS.—The group of quadrupeds which ruminate or chew the cud, such as oxen, sheep, and deer.
— from The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection by Charles Darwin - I had now got seated in my arm chair,—I am an infirm old man, and I live on a second floor,—when I began to ruminate on my project.
— from Memoirs of the Life of the Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan — Volume 01 by Thomas Moore - And to be the author of this highest degree of misery to a human being, was a thought on which he could not bear to ruminate a single moment.
— from History of Tom Jones, a Foundling by Henry Fielding - Satisfied with the shake of the hand, our hero turned abruptly away, and went off to ruminate by the sea-shore.
— from Under the Waves: Diving in Deep Waters by R. M. (Robert Michael) Ballantyne - I prithee, speak to me as to thy thinkings, As thou dost ruminate, and give thy worst of thoughts The worst of words.
— from The Complete Works of William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare - When we had done, he brought me a pudding, and having set it before me, seemed to ruminate, and to become absent in his mind for some moments.
— from David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
