"Persuasive" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... remarked Lucinda; and then she was accosted again, by another gentleman. This time he was older and stouter, and somewhat tired in his aspect, but every whit as genially persuasive. ...
— The Shoulders of Atlas - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... so well furnish. The appearance and words of a spirit would excite us, and make us afraid; we could not feel and act as well, under such influences, as we can under the calm, dispassionate, convincing, and persuasive influences of the Bible. One of the most intelligent and cultivated of women, the wife of a missionary in Turkey, in her last sickness, having heard her husband read to her several times, from the Pilgrim's Progress, respecting the River of Death and the ...
— Catharine • Nehemiah Adams
... question him closely. Nobody save a churchman would have continued the discussion. But the Dean was a churchman, and also a Scot, and he returned to the attack, unabashed and unbaffled. "But surely, Mr. Ingledew," he said in a persuasive voice, "your people, whoever they are, must at least acknowledge ...
— The British Barbarians • Grant Allen
... in my most persuasive voice, for I could see the "no" on his face even before he began to ...
— Mary Marie • Eleanor H. Porter
... order that they might achieve success in winning him to their disgraceful love; for, had he been taken in that net, the chaste man would have remained ensnared. That trick, it is well known, is one of the most persuasive that the devil furnishes. For he makes war by the affection for the object, and with the vehement incentives of the appetite. But divine grace was very well fortified in the soul of the gospel minister. Consequently, the shots of ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXI, 1624 • Various
... likewise amuse myself with remarking the causes which produce it. When a Citizen hears an able Orator, he readily credits what is said;—he imagines every thing to be true, he believes and relishes the force of it; and, in short, the persuasive language of the Speaker wins his absolute, his hearty assent. You, who are possessed of a critical knowledge of the art, what more will you require? The listening multitude is charmed and captivated by the force of his Eloquence, and feels a pleasure which is not ...
— Cicero's Brutus or History of Famous Orators; also His Orator, or Accomplished Speaker. • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... unjust, but generally courteous in expression and independent in thought. Every day at noon the northern mails bring hither the word of all Europe to the awaking Spanish mind, and within that massive building the converging lines of the telegraph are whispering every hour their persuasive lessons of the ...
— Castilian Days • John Hay
... Miss Bussey, forgetful of their sufferings, were restoring Madame Painter to her senses; Painter was uncorking a bottle of champagne for Arthur Laing; Sir Roger Deane was talking in a low voice and persuasive tones to an imposing representative of the police. "What passed between them is unknown; possibly only words, possibly something else; at any rate, after a time, Deane smiled, the great man smiled responsively, ...
— Comedies of Courtship • Anthony Hope
... taken Vooda's measure accurately. He knew the Constable to have a persuasive tongue, to be honest, loyal, and discreet, and, above all, to possess that nameless and almost indescribable quality of imparting trustfulness in those with whom he ...
— Kafir Stories - Seven Short Stories • William Charles Scully
... be a regular little beauty with a touch here and there. I shan't let anyone see you till you are done, and then we'll burst upon them like Cinderella and her godmother going to the ball," said Belle in her persuasive tone. ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott
... feel disposed to lay bare his secret feelings before this persuasive superintendent and an absurdly conceited village constable. Love, to him, was an ideal, a blend of mortal passion and immortal fire. But the flame kindled on that secret altar had scorched and seared his soul in a wholly ...
— The Postmaster's Daughter • Louis Tracy
... surrounding men who cared for nothing but money-making, men who were not merely dishonest, but the very serpents of dishonesty, against whom pickpockets will "stick off" as angels of light; constantly under the softly persuasive influence of low morals and extravagant appreciation of cunning, he came by rapid degrees to think less and less of right and wrong. At first he called the doings of the place dishonest; then he called them sharp practice; then ...
— The Elect Lady • George MacDonald
... child. Your lips quiver! You have reason to understand. I know, I know you cannot think what to do. Let me think for you." His eyes were glowing and his face animated. He was using all his persuasive power, and her gaze was fixed upon him as though he had mesmerized her. She could not resist the flood-tide of his eloquence. She could only look on and seem to be gradually turning to stone—frozen ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... forgotten Livingstone and his methods. It is now the explosive bullet and the elephant gun. I intend to learn the language of the different native tribes I meet, and if a chief opposes me and will not allow me to pass through his territory, and if I find I cannot win him over to my side by persuasive talk, ...
— Revenge! • by Robert Barr
... Committee of Guardians, who shall place out children and young people with suitable persons, that they may (during a moderate time of apprenticeship or servitude) learn some trade or other business of subsistence. The committee may effect this partly by a persuasive influence on parents and the persons concerned, and partly by cooeperating with the laws, which are or may be enacted for this and similar purposes. In forming contracts of these occasions, the committee shall secure to the Society ...
— The Education Of The Negro Prior To 1861 • Carter Godwin Woodson
... Daphne. "I'm afraid that's your case too." She smiled, and the smile lit up a face full of delicate lines and wrinkles, which no effort had been made to disguise; a tired face, where the eyes spoke from caverns of shade, yet with the most appealing and persuasive beauty. ...
— Marriage a la mode • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... of argument Reud seems undecided, and observes that he can only judge the matter from well understanding the previous style and the context, and so, every now and then, requests him, with a most persuasive politeness, to begin again from the beginning. Of course, he gets no farther than the paving. After the baited author had re-read his page-and-a-half about six or seven times, the captain smiles upon him lovingly, and says in his most insinuating tones, "Just read it over again once ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... was left standing alone in the kitchen, did not like his position. He was a man not endowed with much persuasive gift of words, but he had a certain strength of his own. He had a will, and some firmness in pursuing the thing which he desired. He was industrious, patient, and honest with a sort of second-class honesty. He liked to earn what ...
— Linda Tressel • Anthony Trollope
... bind all these qualities together in the imagination of the young and clothe the conception with every attribute of beauty that fancy can devise, how can we forego the precious opportunities that lie to our hand in the persuasive witchery of art? The power that may be exercised in the formation of character by the presentment of ideal types is as yet very imperfectly utilized. Love is par excellence the theme of the artist, and young people will soon find this out for themselves; but there is a wide difference in ...
— Sex-education - A series of lectures concerning knowledge of sex in its - relation to human life • Maurice Alpheus Bigelow
... setting aside the consideration of the end, have defined rhetoric to be "The power of inventing whatever is persuasive in a discourse." This definition is equally as faulty as that just mentioned, and is likewise defective in another respect, as including only invention, which, separate from elocution, ...
— The Training of a Public Speaker • Grenville Kleiser
... the company which did not understand the language in question. As I had the happiness of sitting opposite to her, I feasted my eyes much more than my palate which she tempted in vain with the most delicious bits carved by her fair hand, and recommended by her persuasive tongue; but all my other appetites were swallowed up in immensity of my love, which I fed by gazing incessantly on the delightful object. Dinner was scarcely ended, when the squire became very drowsy, and after several dreadful ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... see beyond my toes, Though I accept my pedigree, Yet where, pray tell me, is the key That should unlock a private door To the Great Mystery, such no more? Each offers his, but one nor all Are much persuasive with the wall 230 That rises now as long ago, Between I wonder and I know, Nor will vouchsafe a pin-hole peep At the veiled Isis in its keep. Where is no door, I but produce My key to find it of no use. Yet better ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... "Three is lucky," Friedrich may have thought: and there has no precaution, of drum-music, of secrecy or persuasive finesse, been neglected on Lacy. But Lacy has ears that hear the grass grow: our elaborately accurate triple-pincers, closing simultaneously on Bischofswerda, after eighteen miles of sweep, find Lacy flown again; nothing ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... of an over or false estimate of ourselves. Let us be thankful, and not angry, that we must accept it as our touchstone. Our stamp has so often been impressed upon base metal, that we cannot expect it to be taken on trust, but we may be sure that true gold will be equally persuasive the world over. Real manhood and honest achievement are nowhere provincial, but enter the select society of all time on an ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various
... to drop on to the lawn, a shapeless, solemn mass of feathers. At the back of the hills a little rim of gold, no wider than a wedding ring, announced the rising of the moon. He felt a touch upon his sleeve, a very sweet, persuasive voice in his ear. Nora had left Miller in the background and was ...
— Nobody's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... victory); she must assist at the ordering of gowns, at the selections, and while Madame's patrons were fitted, young Mrs. Fowler must be prepared to assume graceful attitudes in the background and to offer her suggestions with a persuasive air. Suggestions, even futile ones, offered in a charming voice from a distinguished figure in black satin had borne ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... Protestant land, free from prelacy and superstition, the boy seemed reconciled to his fate. Major Oakshott spoke more kindly than usual to him, being free from fresh irritation at his misdemeanours; but even thus there was a contrast with the gentler, more persuasive tones of the diplomatist, and no doubt this tended to increase Peregrine's willingness to be ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge
... tell me you have more persuasive ways of making me talk. You can use force but it'll take time. Your time is valuable or you wouldn't have hustled me over here as fast as you did. So let's not waste your time. You tell ...
— The Observers • G. L. Vandenburg
... to defend his own. Thus armed, it was rarely in the power of his adversaries, mighty as they were, to beat him from the field. His eloquence, occasionally rapid, electric, vehement, was always chaste, winning, and persuasive, not awing into acquiescence, but arguing into conviction. His understanding was bold and comprehensive: nothing seemed too remote for its reach, or too large for its grasp. Unallured by dissipation, and unswayed by pleasure, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, - Issue 269, August 18, 1827 • Various
... Always remember that the service on which we are engaged has no soul and a very long arm." Then dropping into the persuasive and servile tone of the maitre d'hotel: "I propose, Mr. Rebener, that you allow me to send you up a nice little lunch, some melon, say, a salmon mayonnaise or a filet du sole au vin blanc and a noisette d'agneau and a nice little sweet, and you ...
— L. P. M. - The End of the Great War • J. Stewart Barney
... to make his apology, and fall back from the head of the table to some lower seat, which his modesty would have preferred, when he was suddenly seized upon by the Lady Penelope Penfeather, who, detaining him in the most elegant and persuasive manner possible, insisted that they should be introduced to each other by Mr. Mowbray, and that Mr. Cargill should sit beside her at table.—She had heard so much of his learning—so much of his excellent character—desired ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... to that fisherman's hut, just to see what it was like," Mollie said. "You know the old woman was always teasing us to come in and have some milk. She may have been more persuasive this time, though Betty couldn't ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Ocean View - Or, The Box That Was Found in the Sand • Laura Lee Hope
... many years. The convention recommended that such meetings of delegates be annually convened; that annual or periodical discourses or orations be delivered in public on slavery and the means of its abolition, in order that, "by the frequent application of the force of reason and the persuasive power of eloquence, slaveholders and their abettors may be awakened to a sense of their injustice, and be startled with horror at the ...
— Anti-Slavery Opinions before the Year 1800 - Read before the Cincinnati Literary Club, November 16, 1872 • William Frederick Poole
... of a woman's heart which could not be bartered. And yet might there not be an element of selfishness in this—might not its sacrifice be a family duty? Mrs. Mavick having found this weak spot in her daughter's armor, played upon it with all her sweet persuasive skill and ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... follows the close of a great world war. At such times, they always are. In the words of Mr. Kahn,—"They possess the fervor of the prophet allied often to the plausibility and cunning of the demagogue. They have the enviable and persuasive cocksureness which goes with lack of responsibility and of practical experience. They pour the vials of scorn and contempt upon those benighted ones who still tie their boat to the old moorings of the teachings ...
— Socialism and American ideals • William Starr Myers
... in which they could succeed in influencing that hopping stage manager to promise to sell them a duplicate set of the pictures when they were ready for showing to the public. Alec knew that they were rented out, and sometimes sold outright. If Hugh now, with his persuasive tongue, could only exact such a promise from the gentleman in charge, would it not be a splendid achievement to incidentally have the picture included in the programme to be run at the town hall for some local benefit; and then hear the shouts ...
— The Boy Scouts with the Motion Picture Players • Robert Shaler
... his young mistress, when she had told him of all that lay within his grasp, and had added a gentle and persuasive modicum of moral suasion,—"now that you are going out into the world to make a way, it may be a name, for yourself, you must choose what that name shall be. You remember," soothingly, for this was ...
— Uncle Rutherford's Nieces - A Story for Girls • Joanna H. Mathews
... ranger strode after the amazed burgher, blocking his way; the thrifty had taken alarm, but the rangers herded them back with persuasive playfulness, while the little Weasel made the rounds, talking cheerfully all the time, and Mount, great fists dangling, minced round and round, with a huge simper on his countenance, as though shyly aware ...
— The Reckoning • Robert W. Chambers
... LEE possessed many of the attributes of the orator, a gift inherited from his grandfather, Light-Horse Harry Lee. He was graceful in delivery, persuasive in manner, ...
— Memorial Addresses on the Life and Character of William H. F. Lee (A Representative from Virginia) • Various
... never seemed to be at a loss, in public or private, for a criticism, or for an answer to the criticisms of others. If his power of adapting his own mind to the minds of those whom he had to convince had been equal to the skill and swiftness with which he accumulated a mass of matter persuasive to those who looked at things in his own way, no one would have exercised so complete a control over the political opinion of his time. But his mind had not this power of adaptation. It moved on its own lines—peculiar ...
— William Ewart Gladstone • James Bryce
... the less, he is resolved to give up his place at Christmas. Johannes and Trinette are both beside themselves; the reports about the prospective son-in-law are conflicting and doubtful. But Elsie is so wild, and the cotton-dealer so persuasive, that the parents finally give reluctant consent to the marriage. Elsie constantly accuses Freneli of flirting with her husband, who is not insensible to Freneli's beauty and charm; she resolves to leave Slough Farm also, since Elsie is ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various
... business? he shall stand before kings, he shall not stand before mean men." And because this is a Divine law, it prevails in higher spheres also. If a Christian uses, in the service of his heavenly Master, the gifts he possesses, faith in God, knowledge of truth, power in prayer, persuasive speech—his five talents will become ten, or his two will gain other two. "To him that hath, to him shall be given, and he shall ...
— Men of the Bible; Some Lesser-Known Characters • George Milligan, J. G. Greenhough, Alfred Rowland, Walter F.
... you are a most persuasive cock," observed Mr. Jorrocks interrupting the Yorkshireman, "and would conwince the devil himself that black is white, but you'll never make me believe the Newmarket folks are honest, and as to the fine hair ...
— Jorrocks' Jaunts and Jollities • Robert Smith Surtees
... presentation of the doctrine will be faulty and cold and lifeless, or weak and vacillating, or harsh and sharp and severe. With the experience, the preaching of the doctrine will be with great joy and assurance, and will be strong and searching, but at the same time warm and persuasive and tender. ...
— When the Holy Ghost is Come • Col. S. L. Brengle
... secretaries at one time, dictating to them in different languages, of which he is said to have spoken seven. What his penetrating mind had slowly matured acquired in his lips both force and grace, and truth, set forth by his persuasive eloquence, irresistibly carried away all hearers. He was tempted by none of the passions which make slaves of most men. His integrity was incorruptible. With shrewd penetration he saw through the ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... to commit burglary by deputy. I said to Holt, "Show us this agreeable little crib, young man." Holt was game—then Marjorie chipped in—she wanted to go and see it too. I said, "You'll be sorry if you do,"—that settled it! After that she'd have gone if she'd died,—I never did have a persuasive way with women. So off we toddled, Marjorie, Holt, and I, in a growler,—spotted the crib in less than no time,—invited ourselves in by the kitchen window —house seemed empty. Presently Holt became hypnotised ...
— The Beetle - A Mystery • Richard Marsh
... by his persuasive words and strong personal influence—when the object was the financial benefit of the Church—Bishop Strachan rallied around him many of the leading members of the Church of England in Upper Canada who aided him in his plans for endowing ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... and who now declared that under the specious name of "Federation" Liberty had been betrayed. The defence was conducted in a publication called The Federalist largely by two men afterwards to be associated with fiercely contending parties, Alexander Hamilton and James Madison. But more persuasive than any arguments that the ablest advocate could use were the iron necessities of the situation. The Union was an accomplished fact. For any State, and especially for a small State—and it was the small States that hesitated ...
— A History of the United States • Cecil Chesterton
... he replied in the accented but dignified tones of a superior who painfully finds himself in the hands of one considered inferior. "I have never seen him fight. He is persuasive—yes. ...
— "And they thought we wouldn't fight" • Floyd Gibbons
... become persuasive, such as might have been used to a child, and the girl wondered what further cruelty it masked. She had not ...
— The Night Riders - A Romance of Early Montana • Ridgwell Cullum
... said that the chauffeur knew by instinct what I liked best to eat, and he must have had a very persuasive way with the waiter. There was creme d'orge, in a big cup; there were sweetbreads, and there was lemon meringue. Nothing ever tasted better since my "birthday feasts" as a child, when I was allowed to ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... them. They kept on proffering persuasive little notes of interrogative sound, and possibly they advanced their claim to be heard because they had their day's work ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... shopman not long ago tried to sell me a pair of marching-boots, "for use"—as he explained, lest their name should have misled me—"on the march." Had he said "for use after the war" he might have been more persuasive. When I told him that marching-boots were no good to me, it was manifestly difficult for him to conceal his opinion that, if so, I had no business to flaunt the garb of Thomas Atkins. When I added that if he could offer me a pair of running-shoes I might entertain the proposition, his look ...
— Observations of an Orderly - Some Glimpses of Life and Work in an English War Hospital • Ward Muir
... rubbing it between my hands, immersing it in water, passing it quickly from one hand to the other, and using all other persuasive attempts to solve it into lather. Useless; it was un-lather-able, and hearing the gong sound for dinner, I gave it up ...
— Continental Monthly - Volume 1 - Issue 3 • Various
... oracular; never persuasive or plausible. It is "Lo—here" and then again "Lo—there!" and we are either with him or not with him. There are no half ...
— Suspended Judgments - Essays on Books and Sensations • John Cowper Powys
... public good will. Pressure to rectitude by government investigation is distinctly an American institution. It is not an intervention of public interest that is usually welcomed. In the plan of this Conference, this general repugnance to investigation is depended upon as a persuasive influence to the parties of the conflict to get together and settle their own quarrels. They are given the alternative of investigation or collective bargain under persuasive circumstances. In order to increase the moral pressures surrounding the investigation, either one of the parties to the ...
— Herbert Hoover - The Man and His Work • Vernon Kellogg
... places, then, and in all seasons, Flowers expand their light and soul-like wings, Teaching us, by most persuasive reasons, How akin they are to ...
— A Walk from London to John O'Groat's • Elihu Burritt
... rendered. Some judges write treatises instead of decisions or in addition to decisions. Whatever goes beyond that which is required to show that the judgment is the legal conclusion from the ascertained facts is styled in law language obiter dictum. It may be interesting and even persuasive, but it is not an ...
— The American Judiciary • Simeon E. Baldwin, LLD
... to get a team from with which to continue our journey. This is a hard country on horses at best, and at this time of the year particularly so; few will let their teams go out at any price, but Mrs. O'Shaughnessy had hopes, and she is so persuasive that I felt no one could resist her. There was a drummer at breakfast who kept "cussing" the country. He had tried to get a conveyance and had failed; so the cold, the snow, the people, and everything ...
— Letters of a Woman Homesteader • Elinore Pruitt Stewart
... appreciating you, that I would not delay any longer the pleasure of making you a personal avowal of my past sentiments, and of those with which you now inspire me." The tone in which madame de Flaracourt uttered these words was so gracious and so persuasive, that I could not resist the pleasure of embracing her. She returned my kiss with the same eagerness, and would not listen to my thanks. "All is explained between us," she continued, "let us forget the ...
— "Written by Herself" • Baron Etienne Leon Lamothe-Langon
... point that never bloodless fell When spear bit harness in the battle din, For Aphrodite spake, and like a spell Wrought her sweet voice persuasive, till within His heart there lived no memory of sin, No thirst for vengeance more, but all grew plain, And wrath was molten in desire to win The golden heart of ...
— Helen of Troy • Andrew Lang
... her to the bathroom, he insisted, with unusual gentleness, that he be left to apply the arnica to the alleged injuries himself. He was so persuasive that she yielded, and descended to the library, where she found her husband once more at home ...
— Penrod and Sam • Booth Tarkington
... to do so," answered the Abbe, shrugging his shoulders. He spoke very bad English throughout the consultation. "But the stars, too, may be very persuasive with King Charles. To be plain, he will probably consult ...
— The Touchstone of Fortune • Charles Major
... made a movement as if he were inclined to follow, but any such intention was frustrated by Lagardere, who shut the door after the boy and stood with his back towards it. "Stay where you are, gentlemen," he said, and there was something so persuasive in the way in which he said it that the gentlemen stayed where they were. Then Lagardere, as if he had almost forgotten their presence, slowly walking down the room till he paused in the middle, opened the letter and began to read it. As he seemed absorbed ...
— The Duke's Motto - A Melodrama • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... as stay with a quiet gesture the scattering beasts. The whips would cap him, and the Master with his field find themselves in company of an equal. For his ease of manner never left him, nor that persuasive smile which made you think that the sun was come out. He had none of the airs of mystagogue, but talked to men, as he did to beasts, in the speech which was habitual to them. The lagging fox understood him when, grinning his fear and fatigue, he drew himself painfully through the furze. So did the ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett
... acted or declared their opinions behind the shield of his promises. He repeated what Alexander had already been told, that the Regency would, in fact, be nothing but Bonaparte in disguise. However, Dessolles acknowledged that such was the effect of Marshal Macdonald's powerful and persuasive eloquence that Alexander seemed to waver; and, unwilling to give the Marshals a positive refusal, he had recourse to a subterfuge, by which he would be enabled to execute the design he had irrevocably formed without seeming to take on himself alone the responsibility ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... prospects more than the betrayal of our intercourse with the Bishop to the Emperor. Samuel in that respect could not for a long time be trusted; as a deadly enmity existed between himself and the Bishop. It required all the persuasive powers of Mr. Rassam to bring on a good understanding between the two; he, however, managed the affair so skilfully that he not only succeeded, but after mutual explanations, they became affectionate friends. ...
— A Narrative of Captivity in Abyssinia - With Some Account of the Late Emperor Theodore, - His Country and People • Henry Blanc
... occasion) would not so soon have embraced a foreign authority, instead of the commanders she had been inured to, had not the general of these strangers been of a kind gentle nature, one who worked rather by fair means than force; of a persuasive address in all applications to others, and no less courteous, and open to all addresses of others to him; and above all bent and determined on justice. But the story of his actions will ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... fancied success, he in 1750 ventured to collect them into a pamphlet, entitled An Essay on Milton's Use and Imitation of the Moderns in his Paradise Lost. To this pamphlet Johnson wrote a Preface[679], in full persuasion of Lauder's honesty, and a Postscript recommending, in the most persuasive terms[680], a subscription for the relief of a grand-daughter of Milton, of ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... words made Iron feel much braver; and they were spoken in tones so sweet and persuasive that he was almost minded to obey without another word. But he asked, 25 "Why should I leave these places where I have rested so long? What will become of me after I have made friends ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell
... masterpiece of cunning from a man in a corner, which suggests with so persuasive an air that he has ruled his actions up to the very moment when he faces you, and had almost preconceived the present occasion, rather won Lady Charlotte; or it seemed to, or the scene had been too ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... had frequently seen an old woman—Barbara Trond by name—who gained her livelihood by the sale of wax tapers, little leaden ornaments of the Virgin and saints, and other Papistical trickeries. She managed also to gain many a coin by the persuasive powers of her tongue, which she wagged with considerable effect on all occasions. When she pleased, nothing could be more smooth and oily; but when angered, that tongue could utter oaths and abuse with ...
— The Golden Grasshopper - A story of the days of Sir Thomas Gresham • W.H.G. Kingston
... the premises, I took occasion to invite her up to my own room, with a view of seeing whether my mattress of pebbles and iron-filings could be supplemented by another of shavings or straw, or some material less provocative of bodily injuries. She was most sympathetic, persuasive, logical, and after the manner of her kind proved to me conclusively that the trouble lay with the too-saft occupant of the bed, not with the bed itself, and gave me statistics with regard to the latter which established ...
— Penelope's Progress - Being Such Extracts from the Commonplace Book of Penelope Hamilton As Relate to Her Experiences in Scotland • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin
... the small figure that chance had deposited so unexpectedly upon his hearth, a most forlorn and drooping small figure, with downcast and averted head, then with that sudden smile that made his young face so brightly persuasive he dropped beside her ...
— The Innocent Adventuress • Mary Hastings Bradley
... refined and educated man under such conditions. They also made him prolific. He shrank from the restraints and humiliations to which the poor and shabbily dressed private tutor is exposed—revealed to us with a persuasive terseness in the pages of The Unclassed, New Grub Street, Ryecroft, and the story of Topham's Chance. Writing fiction in a garret for a sum sufficient to keep body and soul together for the six months following payment was at any rate better than ...
— The House of Cobwebs and Other Stories • George Gissing
... remained persuasive, but to an ear attuned to shades, there was a note of menace underlying its softness—"you know there was ...
— The Moon Rock • Arthur J. Rees
... voice to a gentle persuasive whisper: "Don't do it, ole man—come now—be reasonable. If we stay here in the woods, Triggers'll think we're at home. Dad will think we're in school. They'll never know no better. It's wrong, but we'll have plenty o' time to make it right—we've got six months mo' ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore
... to be remembered is, that the constant design of both these orators in all their speeches, was to drive some one particular point, either the condemnation or acquittal of an accused person, a persuasive to war, the enforcing of a law, and the like; which was determined upon the spot, according as the orators on either side prevailed. And here it was often found of absolute necessity to inflame or cool the passions of the audience, especially ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. III.: Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Vol. I. • Jonathan Swift
... he stopped at the seventeenth round, and it was a good, plain, matter-of-fact reason, too, and one that easily commends itself to us by the eloquent, persuasive flavor of probability there is ...
— The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories • Mark Twain
... marm," said George, in a persuasive voice, and pushing the brandy bottle towards her, "where's the need for you to go to the workhus or to chokey either—you with a rich husband as is bound by law to support you as becomes a lady? And, marm, mind another thing, a husband as hev ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard
... "Persuasive in a good or bad sense—probably the latter. At any rate, it was sufficient to lure him ...
— The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood • Arthur Griffiths
... scene may be easily imagined; dust flying, gowns torn, heads broken, well-fed faces in the hot September weather steaming with anger and exertion, and every voice in loudest outcry. At length the clamour was partially subdued, and the bishop, beautifully equal to the emergency, arose bland and persuasive. ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude
... cloths; further, if they bought their hoes then, they would have to carry them all the way to the Lake and back. The Kirangozi acknowledged the fairness of this harangue, and soon gave way; but it was not until much more arguing, and the adoption of other persuasive means, that the rest were ...
— What Led To The Discovery of the Source Of The Nile • John Hanning Speke
... gather the full message and enthusiasm of the essay. It will probably seem to you not to "hang together." Still, it will leave bright bits of ideas in your mind. Third: After a week's interval read the essay again. On a second perusal it will appear more persuasive to you. ...
— LITERARY TASTE • ARNOLD BENNETT
... thoughtful persons are sometimes tempted to suppose that the mass of mankind do not sufficiently know what their duty is; that they need teaching, else they would be obedient. And others fancy that if the doctrines of the Gospel were set before them in a forcible or persuasive manner, this would serve as a means of rousing them to an habitual sense of their true state. But ignorance is not the true cause why men will ...
— Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VII (of 8) • John Henry Newman
... accustomed to being ignored. She bore her crown of beauty with added brilliance and grace because of the passing years, and was fully aware of her power to sway the will of those about her, and move the hearts of men with her irresistible charm and perfect splendor, alike persuasive, compelling and all-powerful. ...
— Reno - A Book of Short Stories and Information • Lilyan Stratton
... possible, to a committee in a few minutes; and I have often thought his clients never understood their own cases until he had explained them. It was wonderful how he could make a committee (sometimes composed of by no means the highest specimens of mankind) understand a case; and his persuasive power with those ...
— Memoirs of James Robert Hope-Scott, Volume 2 • Robert Ornsby
... the grandson's, was one of faintly amused condescension. There was a difference, however. The grandson's unlined young face had nothing to offer except this condescension; the grandfather's had other things to say. It was a handsome, worldly old face, conscious of its importance, but persuasive rather than arrogant, and not without tokens of sufferings withstood. The Major's short white hair was parted in the middle, like his grandson's, and in all he stood as briskly equipped to the ...
— The Magnificent Ambersons • Booth Tarkington
... well-grounded convictions before you can hope to convince and influence other men. Duty, necessity, magnanimity, innate conviction, and sincere interest in the welfare of others,—these beget true fervor and are essential to passionate and persuasive speaking. ...
— Model Speeches for Practise • Grenville Kleiser
... and libels, he was ignored. I have seen one of his sermons which is very insipid, and which bears sufficient resemblance to the predications of the quakers; assuredly there is to be found there no trace of that persuasive eloquence with which later he carried the parliaments away. The reason is that in fact he was much more suited to public affairs than to the Church. It was above all in his tone and in his air that his eloquence consisted; a gesture of that hand that had ...
— Voltaire's Philosophical Dictionary • Voltaire
... speaking suddenly with a murmuring, yet so sharp a confidence; a confidence that in broad daylight, or in complete solitude, might have seemed impossible. All sorts of things must steal out in that persuasive, that ...
— A Fountain Sealed • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... also have his redeeming qualities. This man had redeeming qualities. I cannot positively say that he was either handsome or ugly, young or old, well or ill dressed. But I can speak with certainty to the personal attractions which recommended him to notice. For instance, the tone of his voice was persuasive. (Did you ever read a story, written by one of us, in which we failed to dwell on our hero's voice?) Then, again, his hair was reasonably long. (Are you acquainted with any woman who can endure a man with ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... slender means and those of his parents at home were by no means sufficient for the purpose, and yet he felt that he had no chance in his defence if he were to face the judges of the military court, and Roth himself, whose persuasive powers of language he knew so well. He would be unable, with his very insufficient command of language, to enlighten the court in an impressive manner as to intimate details. Somehow, therefore, the money must ...
— A Little Garrison - A Realistic Novel of German Army Life of To-day • Fritz von der Kyrburg
... halted, under the persuasive influence of that loaded revolver, till we dismounted once more in the early dawn upon the ...
— Miss Cayley's Adventures • Grant Allen
... long time. Our journalist was now eloquent, now persuasive: he heaped argument on argument, he appealed to his self-respect, to duty! When at last he saw that the young corporal hesitated, that a faint gleam of hope appeared, that a vague desire for rehabilitation was born in him, he stopped short and ...
— A Nest of Spies • Pierre Souvestre
... which are consistent with what I say, and by making them your guide you will with pleasure abstain from things which have such persuasive power to lead us and overpower us. But if to the persuasive power of these things, we also devise such a philosophy as this which helps to push us on towards them and strengthens us to this end, what will be the consequence? In a piece of toreutic ...
— A Selection from the Discourses of Epictetus With the Encheiridion • Epictetus
... case, by the brutal encroachments of Napoleon. Austria, unaided by Prussia, could scarcely dream of success.[4] But England, at that time fearful of Napoleon's landing on her coast, lavished her all-persuasive gold. ...
— Germany from the Earliest Period Vol. 4 • Wolfgang Menzel, Trans. Mrs. George Horrocks
... you will no doubt remember"—he crossed his fat hands again comfortably—"it was these precise researches on a then little-known poison that first brought Sebastian prominently before the public. What was the consequence?" His smooth, persuasive voice flowed on as if I were a concentrated jury. "The Admiral grew rapidly worse, and insisted upon calling in a second opinion. No doubt he didn't like the aconitine when it came to the pinch—for it DOES pinch, I can tell ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... these curious works. So far as the Gaonic period is concerned, the characteristics of these thousands of letters are lucidity of thought and terseness of expression. The Gaonim never waste a word. They are rarely over-bearing in manner, but mostly use a tone which is persuasive rather than disciplinary. The Gaonim were, in this real sense, therefore, princes of letter-writing. Moreover, though their Letters deal almost entirely with contemporary affairs, they now constitute as fresh and vivid reading as when ...
— Chapters on Jewish Literature • Israel Abrahams
... cigar and talked. As he grew more sure of himself and the affairs that absorbed him, he also became more smooth and persuasive in the matter of words. He talked for a time of the necessity of certain men's surviving and growing constantly stronger and stronger in the industrial world. "It's necessary for the good of the community," he ...
— Poor White • Sherwood Anderson
... glance met hers, a look of inquiry flashed from her eyes to his, accompanied by an expression persuasive, almost appealing. But the only reply was an ominous flash from the dark eyes, as, with a gesture of proud disdain, he folded his arms and again faced his interlocutor, while, with eyes gleaming with revenge ...
— That Mainwaring Affair • Maynard Barbour
... herself, the future of the human race is assured by our example. No sweep of overwhelming armies, no ponderous treatises on the rights of man, no hymns to liberty, though set to martial music and resounding with the full diapason of a million human throats, can exert so persuasive an influence as does the spectacle of a great republic, occupying a quarter of the civilized globe, and governed quietly and sagely by ...
— Memoir of John Lothrop Motley, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... while his friend, the sportsman, never let him out of his sight—afraid, no doubt, that the doctor might take his departure, without saying a word to anybody. On this subject, he regaled him with the most persuasive arguments, which, however, did NOT persuade Samuel Ferguson, and wasted his breath in pathetic entreaties, by which the latter seemed to be but slightly moved. In fine, Dick felt that the doctor ...
— Five Weeks in a Balloon • Jules Verne
... fine spirits. This light marching order, as the phrase is, involves a weight of some thirty pounds, musket included. At ten o'clock, having advanced some seven miles, our regiment was halted in a grove just out of the village of Kinston, for a noon-rest. By the persuasive force of greenbacks the villagers and outlying farmers were induced to unearth a goodly supply of bread, butter and eggs, hidden relentlessly doubtless from the holders of confederate shinplasters during the late sojourn of King Jeff's hungry ...
— Our campaign around Gettysburg • John Lockwood
... her heart a burden of responsibility for its existence, I hold my dear that a nation as well as an individual should have a conscience, and on this liquor question there is room for woman's conscience not merely as a persuasive influence but as ...
— Sowing and Reaping • Frances Ellen Watkins Harper
... readers have heard Mrs. Besant in the sweet persuasive vein, and felt pleased if rather muddled. For their sakes, and not for our own satisfaction, we shall criticise her little volume on Death—and After? just issued as No. III. of a series of Theosophical Manuals. When we have done they will know more about Theosophy than if ...
— Flowers of Freethought - (Second Series) • George W. Foote
... possessor, the power of doing mischief to dependents. To confound these two, is the standing fallacy of ambiguity brought against those who seek to purify the electoral system from corruption and intimidation. Persuasive influence, acting through the conscience of the voter, and carrying his heart and mind with it, is beneficial—therefore (it is pretended) coercive influence, which compels him to forget that he is a moral agent, or to act in opposition to his moral convictions, ...
— A System Of Logic, Ratiocinative And Inductive • John Stuart Mill
... the Traveling Salesman's most persuasive voice. "You don't want to go and get mixed up in any sensational nonsense and have your picture stuck in the ...
— The Indiscreet Letter • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... "Were hanged" quoth 'a! How sillily he pronounced it, and with lips wide apart! How can this youth ever learn an acquittal from a trial or a legal summons, or persuasive refutation? And yet Hyperbolus learned this at ...
— The Clouds • Aristophanes
... in returning to his flagship in Callao Roads. Thence, however, on the 7th of August, he wrote a letter to San Martin, couched in terms as temperate and persuasive as he could bring himself to use. "My dear General," he there said, "I address you for the last time under your late designation, being aware that the liberty I may take as a friend might not be deemed decorous to you under the title ...
— The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald, G.C.B., Admiral of the Red, Rear-Admiral of the Fleet, Etc., Etc. • Thomas Cochrane, Earl of Dundonald
... would seem, must long remain the last remedy, but might it not be force resting on a pivot and striking with effect wherever international crime seeks to disturb the peace of the nations? The mere knowledge of such a united determination would at least be a powerful persuasive. That may be only a dream. The immediate fact is that the doctrine of Will to Power must first be crushed, represented as it is to-day by Germany and her dupes. But men who have been through the ...
— On the King's Service - Inward Glimpses of Men at Arms • Innes Logan
... Doubtless he expects me. What a persuasive thing love is, to be sure! Because he loves me, he argues that the Crown Princess, the wife and mother, will rush to meet him, fall into ...
— Secret Memoirs: The Story of Louise, Crown Princess • Henry W. Fischer
... heroine came to touch upon the situation of the dying man, she became the most truly persuasive; for then she was the most truly zealous and natural. The beauty of the language was preserved, but it was sustained by the simple power of love; and her words were warmed by a holy zeal, that approached ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... The false prophet invented it to tempt his followers to force his lying creed, by might of arms and in mad contempt of death, on nation after nation. Our Lord, the Word made flesh, came down on earth to win hearts and souls by the persuasive power of the living truth, one and eternal, which emanates from Him as light proceeds from the sun; this Mohammed, on the contrary, is a sword made flesh! For me, then, there is no choice but to submit to superior strength; but I can still hate and loathe their ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... persuasive messages and arguments, and both Clover and Elsie wrote him a long letter on the subject. On the very eve of the departure came a second telegram. Telegrams were not every-day things in the High Valley, the nearest "wire" being at the Ute Hotel five miles ...
— In the High Valley - Being the fifth and last volume of the Katy Did series • Susan Coolidge
... waterfall was still, and the rushing torrent tarried in its bed; the elves forgot their hidden treasures, and joined in silent dance around him; and the strom-karls and the musicians of the wood vainly tried to imitate him. And he was as fair of speech as he was skilful in song. His words were so persuasive that he had been known to call the fishes from the sea, to move great lifeless rocks, and, what is harder, the hearts of kings. He understood the voice of the birds, and the whispering of the breeze, the murmur of the waves, and the roar of the waterfalls. He knew the length and breadth of the earth, ...
— The Story of Siegfried • James Baldwin
... moral philosophy, Mr. Ferrier, was a famous metaphysician and scholar. His lectures on "The History of Greek Philosophy" were an admirable introduction to the subject, afterwards pursued, in the original authorities, at Oxford. Mr. Ferrier was an exponent of other men's ideas so fair and persuasive that, in each new school, we thought we had discovered the secret. We were physicists with Thales and that pre-Socratic "company of gallant gentlemen" for whom Sydney Smith confessed his lack of ...
— Adventures among Books • Andrew Lang
... and persuasive and all patience as he strove to make the colt take the leap. The urge of voice and rein was of the mildest; but the animal balked the take-off each time, and the hot thoroughbredness in its veins ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London
... emissary—for he ought to be so known—shortly after suggested to the Provisional Government that he was 'broke,' and wished to represent the Seventh Congressional District of Kentucky, that is, the Louisville District: 'For,' said he, in his persuasive, confidential tones, 'that is the only way I know of for a man without money to ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I, No. V, May, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... to the soft sound of the sea as Thomas Lie's boat rolled lazily from side to side and the water murmured gently under the gentle stroke. Then came voices again just by my shoulder. I did not move. I knew the tones that spoke, the persuasive commanding tones hard to resist, apt to compel. Slowly I turned myself round; the speakers must be within eight or ten feet of me, but I could not see them. Still they came nearer. Then I heard the sound of a sob, and at it sprang to rigidity, ...
— Simon Dale • Anthony Hope
... lesser beasts, but of those who have a human appearance with the spirit of a sheep or of some other abominable beast. I say then: "Thought that once fed my grieving heart"—thought, that is, of the inner life—"was sweet" (sweet, insomuch as it is persuasive, that is, pleasing, or beautiful, gentle, delightful); this thought often sped away to the feet of the Father of those Spirits to whom I speak, that is, God; that is to say, that I in thought contemplated the realm ...
— The Banquet (Il Convito) • Dante Alighieri
... house of commons before the close of the eighteenth century, but were thrown out in the house of lords. The same fate befell a bill for a temporary suspension of the slave trade, which passed the commons in 1804 under the spell of Wilberforce's persuasive eloquence; but Pitt's government caused a royal proclamation to be issued, which at least checked the spread of the nefarious traffic in the newly conquered colonies. A larger measure failed to pass the house of commons in 1805, but in 1806 Fox and Grenville succeeded in ...
— The Political History of England - Vol XI - From Addington's Administration to the close of William - IV.'s Reign (1801-1837) • George Brodrick
... o' goin' to-night," continued the young hunter in a persuasive tone. "Come along wi' me; an' you can ride down to Holt's in the mornin'. You'll then find him more reezonable to deal wi'. I can't offer you no great show o' entertainment; but thar's a piece o' deer-meat in the house, an' I reckon ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... touch stop there. It even began to make its quietly persuasive way among the finer spirits of the South from the very day on which the Second Inaugural closed with words which were the noblest consummation of the prophecy made in the First. This was the prophecy: "The mystic chords of memory, stretching ...
— Captains of the Civil War - A Chronicle of the Blue and the Gray, Volume 31, The - Chronicles Of America Series • William Wood
... to the lecture room of this hall and listened to an address entitled: "The Divinity of Christ," by one of Satan's ablest advocates a professor with ecclesiastical titles. His gestures were unique and his style altogether persuasive. ...
— Mr. World and Miss Church-Member • W. S. Harris
... the instinctive feelings of the heart be an inspiration of God? May not God come near to the heart of man and awaken a mysterious presentiment of an invisible Presence, and an instinctive longing to come nearer to Him? May he not draw men towards himself by sweet, persuasive influences, and raise man to a conscious fellowship? Is not God indeed the great ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker
... It was the first that had come from him since she had left Poona, although, as he said in it, he had obtained her new address from the Goanese clerk in the Munster Hotel office on the day of her flight, thanks to the persuasive powers of a ...
— The Jungle Girl • Gordon Casserly
... ask after anybody but me, when I came here this morning on purpose to talk the whole day to you. Now, dear little Fleda," said Miss Constance, executing an impatient little persuasive caper round her, "won't you go out and order dinner? for I'm raging. Your woman did give me something, but I found the want of you had taken away all my appetite; and now the delight of seeing you has exhausted me, and I feel that nature ...
— Queechy, Volume II • Elizabeth Wetherell
... they had taken seats, and were awaiting, without much impatience, the return of the ferryman. The compassion of the silly child was excited by the severe accident which the stranger described as the origin of his fractures and contusions; nor need I tell you that the persuasive voice and deportment of Don John are calculated to make even a more experienced one than this pretty Ulrica forget his unseemly aspect and ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... in another way. Madame Elisabeth's comments upon the state of France, her mild and persuasive eloquence, and the, ease and simplicity with which she talked to him, yet without sacrificing her dignity in the slightest degree, appeared to him unique, and his heart, which was doubtless inclined to right ...
— Memoirs Of The Court Of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Complete • Madame Campan
... every point of novel-composition, though with special regard to epigrammatic phrase. But the whole is inorganic somehow, and more than somehow unreal; without (save in the cases mentioned) attaining that obviously unreal but persuasive phantasmagoria which some great writers of fiction have managed to put in existence and motion. How far this is due to the fact that most of the novels are political is a question rather to be hinted than to be discussed. But the present writer has ...
— The English Novel • George Saintsbury
... his road has met Hindrance so great, that he through fear has turn'd. Now much I dread lest he past help have stray'd, And I be ris'n too late for his relief, From what in heaven of him I heard. Speed now, And by thy eloquent persuasive tongue, And by all means for his deliverance meet, Assist him. So to me will comfort spring. I who now bid thee on this errand forth Am Beatrice; from a place ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri |
