«Iron hand in a velvet glove.»

«It was not... that she was unaware of the frayed and ragged edges of life. She would merely iron them out with a firm hand and neatly hem them down.»

«For ten years Caesar ruled with an iron hand. Then with a wooden foot, and finally with a piece of string.»

«Forasmuch as thou sawest that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it brake in pieces the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver, and the gold; the great God hath made known to the king what shall come to pass hereafter: and the dream is certain, and the interpretation thereof sure.»

«Let the high praises of God be in their mouth, and a two-edged sword in their hand; / To execute vengeance upon the heathen, and punishments upon the people; / To bind their kings with chains, and their nobles with fetters of iron; / To execute upon them the judgment written: this honour have all his saints. Praise ye the LORD.»

«Even three thousand talents of gold, of the gold of Ophir, and seven thousand talents of refined silver, to overlay the walls of the houses withal: / The gold for things of gold, and the silver for things of silver, and for all manner of work to be made by the hands of artificers. And who then is willing to consecrate his service this day unto the LORD? / Then the chief of the fathers and princes of the tribes of Israel and the captains of thousands and of hundreds, with the rulers of the king's work, offered willingly, / And gave for the service of the house of God of gold five thousand talents and ten thousand drams, and of silver ten thousand talents, and of brass eighteen thousand talents, and one hundred thousand talents of iron.»

«But the sons of Belial shall be all of them as thorns thrust away, because they cannot be taken with hands: / But the man that shall touch them must be fenced with iron and the staff of a spear; and they shall be utterly burned with fire in the same place.»

«Canst thou draw out leviathan with an hook? or his tongue with a cord which thou lettest down? / Canst thou put an hook into his nose? or bore his jaw through with a thorn? / Will he make many supplications unto thee? will he speak soft words unto thee? / Will he make a covenant with thee? wilt thou take him for a servant for ever? / Wilt thou play with him as with a bird? or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens? / Shall the companions make a banquet of him? shall they part him among the merchants? / Canst thou fill his skin with barbed irons? or his head with fish spears? / Lay thine hand upon him, remember the battle, do no more.»

«The bright old day now dawns again; the cry runs through the land, in England there shall be dear bread / in Ireland, sword and brand; and poverty, and ignorance, shall swell the rich and grand, so rally round the rulers with the gentle iron hand, of the fine old English Tory days; hail to the coming time!»

«The age demanded that we dance and jammed us into iron pants. And in the end the age was handed the sort of shit that it demanded.»