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Civilize   /sˈɪvəlˌaɪz/   Listen
Civilize

verb
(past & past part. civilized; pres. part. civilizing)
1.
Teach or refine to be discriminative in taste or judgment.  Synonyms: civilise, cultivate, educate, school, train.  "Train your tastebuds" , "She is well schooled in poetry"
2.
Raise from a barbaric to a civilized state.  Synonym: civilise.






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"Civilize" Quotes from Famous Books



... the action of the state with its cruel methods of punishment, behind the general moral standard of the age, such as prisons, galleys, gibbets, and guillotines, tends rather to brutalize the people than to civilize them, and consequently rather to increase than diminish the ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy

... is confirmed by the experience of the Jesuits, in their interesting efforts to civilize the Indians of Paraguay. The real difficulty was the improvidence of the people; their inability to think for the future; and the necessity accordingly of the most unremitting and minute superintendence on the part of their instructors. ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • John Stuart Mill

... the freshest bud of Feeling's soil, Such was this rude rhyme—rhyme is of the rude, But such inspired the Norseman's solitude, Who came and conquer'd; such, wherever rise Lands which no foes destroy or civilize, Exist; and what can our accomplish'd art Of verse do more than ...
— On the Old Road, Vol. 2 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin

... reproach on a high-minded people like the French; and he was still more grieved to find that America was not free from blame; but he still trusted that all nations would unite in their endeavours to civilize the inhabitants of Africa. He concluded by moving an address to the prince regent, to renew his exertions for the attainment of this noble object, which was agreed to unanimously, as was a similar one in the lords, on the motion ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... provided for his own security, he applied himself to polish and civilize his subjects, who, having been accustomed to live in the country and in villages, almost without laws and without polity, had contracted the disposition and manners of savages. To this end he commanded them to build a city, marking out himself the place and circumference ...
— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin

... cattle were multiplied; the area of meadow land and every kind of out-turn increased. I had nothing to fear after that. I could continue my efforts to improve this, as yet, untilled corner of the earth; and to civilize those who dwelt in it, whose ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac

... recognizing all native rights, and letting it be distinctly understood that we govern for the native races, not the white men, that we are determined to civilize and raise to a higher level of humanity those whom we govern, that our aim will be to do all to defend them and save them from extermination by just humanitarian laws—not the laws of the British nation—but the laws suited for them. It will not take long for the natives to ...
— Adventures in New Guinea • James Chalmers

... respects, pay a visit &c (sociability) 892; dance attendance on &c (servility) 886; pay attentions to; do homage to &c (respect) 928. prostrate oneself &c (worship) 990. give one's duty to, send one's duty to, &c n.. render polite &c adj.; polish, civilize, humanize. Adj. courteous, polite, civil, mannerly, urbane; well-behaved, well- mannered, well-bred, well-brought up; good-mannered, polished, civilized, cultivated; refined &c (taste) 850; gentlemanlike &c (fashion) 852 [Obs.]; gallant; on one's ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... of all that defileth—all that sensualizes her men and enfeebles their self-mastery, all that renders the heart of her women too craven to encounter the burdens of being the mothers of a mighty race, flowing out into all the lands to civilize and Christianize, and "bear the ...
— The Power of Womanhood, or Mothers and Sons - A Book For Parents, And Those In Loco Parentis • Ellice Hopkins

... of his views and the magnanimity of his spirit. Instead of ravaging the newly-found countries, like many of his cotemporary discoverers, who were intent only on immediate gain, he regarded them with the eyes of a legislator; he sought to colonize and cultivate them, to civilize the natives, to build cities, introduce the useful arts, subject everything to the control of law, order, and religion, and thus to found regular and prosperous empires. That he failed in this was the fault of the dissolute rabble which it was his ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey

... New Zealand, the land of beautiful mountain and sea, with its even temperate climate, and its natives whom English enthusiasm hoped not only to govern, but to civilize and assimilate, was in the minds of all to whom the colonies seemed to offer chances of social reconstruction beyond any that were possible in a crowded and decadent Europe. "Land of Hope," I find it often called in these old letters. ...
— A Writer's Recollections (In Two Volumes), Volume I • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... resemblance to those useful utensils. The prairies were frequent & some peculiarly attractive. On Wabasa's we saw a Sioux village—and a farmer's establishment—he being sent there by the U. S. to civilize the Indians. This morning we passed another village called Red Wings but saw very few of the inhabitants. The corn field was very ... [illegible] and there were in it elevated frames where the boys are kept to scare away the blackbirds. I saw smoke near ...
— Old Fort Snelling - 1819-1858 • Marcus L. Hansen

... heart and kindling eye, the cool breeze whistling through his long fair curls, he is a symbol, though he knows it not, of brave young England longing to wing its way out of its island prison, to discover and to traffic, to colonize and to civilize, until no wind can sweep the earth which does not bear the echoes of an English voice. Patience, young Amyas! Thou too shalt forth, and westward ho, beyond thy wildest dreams; and see brave sights, and do brave deeds, which no man has since the ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley

... freedom of action been permitted to her, she would have given a decisive tone to the forthcoming civilization of Europe. As will be seen in the following pages, that great destiny did not await her. From her eccentric position at Alexandria she could not civilize Europe. In her old age, the power of Europe, concentrated in the Roman empire, overthrew her. There are very few histories of the past of more interest to modern times, and none, unfortunately, more misunderstood, than this Greek age of Reason manifested at ...
— History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume I (of 2) - Revised Edition • John William Draper

... express doubts about the Immaculate Conception than you are to ask the lady whom you take down to dinner how old she is. Now that is, as I have said, an intelligent and rational church for people to have. As the Irish civilize themselves—you observe them diligently engaged in the process down below there—and the social roughness of their church becomes softened and ameliorated, Americans will inevitably be attracted toward it. In the end, it will ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic

... any better, do you?" said she, pleasantly, to Hamlyn. "We shall civilize him in time, though. Then I believe he'll be nicer than you, Charlie. I ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. 6, No. 5, April, 1896 • Various

... only jes' begin to dig. Ah's ashamed to say how long ah been here" (just why was not evident, unless she fancied she should long ago have made her fortune and left). "Is you a American? Well, de Americans sure have done one thing. Dey mak' dis country civilize. Why, chil', befo' dey come we have all de time here revolutions. Ah couldn't count to how many revolutions we had, an' ebery time dey steal all what we have. Dey even steal mah clothes. Ah sure glad fo' one ...
— Zone Policeman 88 - A Close Range Study of the Panama Canal and its Workers • Harry A. Franck

... race who have long excited interest in mine; so much, that in the year 1801, I had written a letter upon the subject to the society for bettering the condition, and increasing the comforts of the poor; but I thought on further reflection, that any attempts to civilize a race of beings so degraded, and held in so much contempt, would be considered so very visionary, that I gave up the idea and did not send it. A greater lapse of time, farther observation, and the suggestions of your correspondents, induce me to trouble you with the few following remarks; ...
— A Historical Survey of the Customs, Habits, & Present State of the Gypsies • John Hoyland

... larger scale in society and among nations and peoples. Civilization is brought about through self-activity and cooperation. It were better for the Filipinos to civilize themselves as much as possible than that we impose civilization upon them. It is better that Mexico bring peace into her own household, than that we take the leadership and enforce order among her people. When the Irish captain said to his soldiers, "If ...
— Rural Life and the Rural School • Joseph Kennedy

... to be a white race and nearer of kin to Europeans than Asiatics. The Japanese have pushed them northward and are now trying to civilize them. They are a dirty, hairy race, but when they are brought under civilizing influences they adapt themselves to their environment and make very good servants. Still, they are on about the lowest ...
— The War Terror • Arthur B. Reeve

... ideals wait. They submitted to conditions because they were afraid that if they did not man would take to the woods and become again a wild barbarian. They were flattered by the fact that men liked them as they were, and they failed to realize that their power to civilize ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various

... earth when he comes if the most potent instrument God has given to man is abandoned to those who know not Christ? Why should we who reckon it a part of the glory of the Church in the past that she labored to civilize barbarians, to emancipate slaves, to elevate woman, to preserve the classical writings, to foster music, painting, sculpture, architecture, poetry, and eloquence, think it no part of her mission now to encourage scientific ...
— Education and the Higher Life • J. L. Spalding

... wilderness and solitary place shall rejoice, the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose." I look forward to that glorious era when that vast continent shall be fully populated with civilized and religious people; when heavenly wisdom and virtue, and all that can civilize, adorn, and bless the children of men, shall cover that part of the globe as ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various

... was saying as Lydia entered. "That's a very good expression, gentlemen, and one that I can tell you a lot about. We have been told that if we want to civilize our neighbors we must do it mainly by the example of our own lives, by each becoming a living illustration of the highest culture we know. But what I ask is, how is anybody to know that you're an illustration of culture. You can't ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw

... may be taken to civilize the poorer sort of our natives, in all those parts of this kingdom where the Irish abound; by introducing among them our language and customs; for want of which they live in the utmost ignorance, barbarity and poverty; giving themselves wholly up to idleness, nastiness, and thievery, to ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. VI; The Drapier's Letters • Jonathan Swift

... xviii Period I. Britain before Written History began II. The Geography of England in Relation to its History III. Roman Britain; A Civilization which did not civilize IV. The Coming of the Saxons[1]; the Coming of the Normans V. The Norman Sovereigns[1] VI. The Angevins, or Plantagenets; Rise of the English Nation[1] VII. The Self-Destruction of Feudalism VIII. Absolutism ...
— The Leading Facts of English History • D.H. Montgomery

... the boy too long with the old woman. I hear his lessons for a quarter of an hour a day, and he is a clever child enough; but his pronunciation and habits are an absolute distress, and he is not happy anywhere but in the housekeeper's room. I try to civilize him, but as yet I cannot worry poor Owen. You can't think how comfortable we are together, Phoebe, when we are alone. Since his sister went we have got on so much better. He was shy before her; but I must ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge

... and insurmountable objections against the scheme. We are an unlettered people, brought up in ignorance, not one in a hundred can read or write, not one in a thousand has a liberal education; is there any fitness for such to be sent into a far country, among heathens, to convert or civilize them, when they themselves are neither civilized or christianized? See the great bulk of the poor, ignorant Africans in this country, exposed to every temptation before them: all for the want of their morals being ...
— Walker's Appeal, with a Brief Sketch of His Life - And Also Garnet's Address to the Slaves of the United States of America • David Walker and Henry Highland Garnet

... beauty," he answered, counting these on his fingers as though they were points in law; "but give her a man's education, and what have ye done? Simply made a dangerous contrivance of her to get her own way. I tell ye, Jock," he said in conclusion, "ye can't civilize women. They are ...
— Nancy Stair - A Novel • Elinor Macartney Lane

... ago, that had made her smile so indulgently when Stanley came back from the conference. She had said at once that they must have Felix to stay, and for her part she would be only too glad to do anything she could for those poor children of Tod's, even to asking them to Becket, and trying to civilize them a little. . . . "But as for that woman, there'll be nothing to be done with her, I can assure you. And I expect Tod is completely under ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... will not attempt to account. I leave in the hands of ethnologists to determine whether we are to seek the cause in minute variations of climate or in other circumstances, physical or historical. This I can say, that great pains were formerly taken to civilize the natives of Sydney, gardens were given them, and numerous attempts made to inculcate habits of order, and communicate a knowledge of European arts; but no advantageous results ensued, and it was at length deemed impossible not only to improve them, but even to prevent ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1. • J Lort Stokes

... the daughters of the Brazilian Portuguese who had been sent over for their education. By a wise and humane decree, issued in 1765, the Indians, and a large portion of Brazil, were declared free. Expedients were adopted to civilize them, and privileges were granted to the Portuguese who should contract marriage among them. Of course those great objects were not achieved without encountering serious difficulties. The pride of the idle aristocracy, the sleepless intriguing of the Jesuits, the ignorant enthusiasm of the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various

... torpid with the cold,—it is sad to turn from an outward scene of so little comfort and find the same sullen influences brooding within the precincts of my study. Where is that brilliant guest, that quick and subtle spirit, whom Prometheus lured from heaven to civilize mankind and cheer them in their wintry desolation; that comfortable inmate, whose smile, during eight months of the year, was our sufficient consolation for summer's lingering advance and early flight? Alas! blindly inhospitable, grudging the food ...
— Fire Worship (From "Mosses From An Old Manse") • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... any given tribe in India just as easily as the time-table on the new railway in Egypt. No wonder that he could tell you in a breath the percentage of orphans, deserted minors, children of vicious parents, in his own State, and the amount per capita required to civilize and Christianize them. As he talked of this matter his eyes became suffused with tears. The great Home for these helpless wards of the State he described at length, from its situation on a high table-land of the Alleghanies and the dimensions ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, October, 1877, Vol. XX. No. 118 • Various

... Eliot's attempt to civilize the Massachusetts Indians was, that in 1663 the General Court granted to the town of Dedham eight thousand acres of wilderness, as compensation for the territory taken by the apostle for his settlement at Natick. After an examination of various localities, Dedham selected a ...
— The New England Magazine Volume 1, No. 3, March, 1886 - Bay State Monthly Volume 4, No. 3, March, 1886 • Various

... now allowed him, Charlemagne employed in endeavoring to educate and civilize his people. He made a tour through his dominions, spreading local and general improvement, reforming laws, advancing knowledge, and building churches and monasteries, Christianity being one of the chief means to which he trusted for the attainment ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 1 of 8 • Various

... fortikajxo. Citation citajxo. Cite citi. Citizen urbano. Citron citrono. City urbo. Civic urba. Civil civila. Civil (polite) gxentila. Civilian nemilita. Civility gxentileco. Civilization civilizacio. Civilize civilizi. Claim pretendo. Claimant pretendanto. Clamber suprenrampi. Clammy glua. Clamour bruego. Clan gento. Clandestine sekreta. Clank resoni. Clap manfrapi. Clarify klarigi. Clarion milita trumpeto. Clarionet klarneto. Clasp (buckle) buko. Clasp ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes

... land by right of discovery, but, although maintaining the feeble settlement at St. Augustine, did next to nothing after this to explore or civilize this portion of America. The nation that had sent out Columbus was not destined to be permanently the great power of the New World. The hap of first landing upon the Antilles, and also the warm climate and the peaceable ...
— History of the United States, Vol. I (of VI) • E. Benjamin Andrews

... stories begin), long, long ago, when the gods came down from heaven to subdue the earth for the mikados, and civilize the country, there were a great many earthquakes, and nothing to stop them. The world continually rocked, and men's houses and lives were ...
— Japanese Fairy World - Stories from the Wonder-Lore of Japan • William Elliot Griffis

... replied. "Improve human nature, and then you will improve the conditions in which it lives. Improve the rich as well as the poor. Teach 'em to be human beings, not machines, to one another—that's Gideon's idea, you know,—humanize—Christianize, if you like it better—civilize. It's a pretty hopeless problem—the individual case—charity is all rotten from root to branch. If you could see the harm that's been done by mistaken charity! Why, look at my friend, Mrs. Page, now. She tried to work it out that ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow

... post was designed to afford protection to settlers against depredations by hostile Indians. Soon after the arrival of the troops the Captain began to cast eyes of favor on a comely young Indian woman, the wife of a Pit River brave. The Captain had been sent to civilize the Indians, and was not long in taking the woman under his protection. The arrangement was agreeable to the woman, who preferred the favor of the white chief to that of ...
— Reminiscences of a Pioneer • Colonel William Thompson

... in history is the expansion of Europe since the sixteenth century. Not resting content with discovering the rest of the world, the European nations with sublime confidence pressed on to divide the new continents among them, to conquer, Christianize, and civilize the natives, and to send out millions of new emigrants to establish beyond the seas a New England, a New France, a New Spain, and a New Netherland. The Spaniards in Spain to-day are far outnumbered by the Spanish-speaking people in Argentina, Chili, Peru, Venezuela, Colombia, ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes

... safety rescued Ireland to him owes; And treacherous Scotland, to no interest true, Yet blest that fate which did his arms dispose Her land to civilize, as ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden

... favors the numerically stronger side; that is, unless the less numerous party is armed with quick firing guns, dumdum bullet, and other harmless weapons that Europeans think it criminal to employ against one another, but cheerfully use to Christianize and civilize ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 3, 1918 • Various

... just returned to London after a lot of Indian Ocean, Pacific, China Seas—a regular dose of the East—six years or so, and I was loafing about, hindering you fellows in your work and invading your homes, just as though I had got a heavenly mission to civilize you. It was very fine for a time, but after a bit I did get tired of resting. Then I began to look for a ship—I should think the hardest work on earth. But the ships wouldn't even look at me. And I got tired of ...
— Heart of Darkness • Joseph Conrad

... rum and cotton have brought more honor than those made in groceries and dry goods. Odd snobbery of trade! But in that broad, middle ground of the country, its great dorsal column, the merchant found his field, after the War, to develop and civilize. The character of those pioneers in trade, men from Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine, was such as to make them leaders. They were brave and unselfish, faithful, and trusting of the future. With ...
— Together • Robert Herrick (1868-1938)

... And drink by stealth A cup or two to noble Barkley's health, I'll take my pipe and try The Phrygian melody; Which he that hears, Lets through his ears A madness to distemper all the brain: Then I another pipe will take And Done music make, To civilize with ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 3 (of 4) • Various

... be so confident, my dear Glaucon, I said; I am much more certain that they ought to be, and that true education, whatever that may be, will have the greatest tendency to civilize and humanize them in their relations to one another, and to those who are ...
— The Republic • Plato

... that were taken here Lieut. Jackson sent to Fort Yuma and placed under guard, as Gen. Crook had made up his mind to capture all the Apaches he could and try in that way to civilize them, but he made a total failure in regard to this ...
— Thirty-One Years on the Plains and In the Mountains • William F. Drannan

... were designed for different sections of the country and different classes of people—to remove the dangerous element would make a strong appeal to the slaveholder and the South, for it was believed that the free black contaminated and ruined the slave; to civilize and Christianize Africa would appeal to churchmen and religious bodies, and this argument could be used in the North. To return to Africa people who could contribute to her betterment; indeed, to return ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 • Various

... development of European history with simple realism and without ideals. The only weak link in her chain-mail is the belief in the civilizing mission of France. If there is no progress why have a mission to civilize? ...
— Europe—Whither Bound? - Being Letters of Travel from the Capitals of Europe in the Year 1921 • Stephen Graham

... with absolutely nothing but the clothing they wore. By the exercise of their ingenuity they succeed in fashioning clothing, tools and weapons and not only do they train nature's forces to work for them but they subdue and finally civilize neighboring savage tribes. The books contain two thousand items of interest that every boy ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Adventures on Strange Islands • Roger Thompson Finlay

... with the Swedish men walking on one side of the cart with their rifles, keeping a good lookout for buffaloes and red Indians and grizzly bears, as men landing in a new country which they were to civilize. More sailing for there was the ferry to cross to old Boston. Much waiting, for there was a broken-down coal-wagon in Salutation Alley. Long conference between Nora and Mike, in which he did all the talking and she all the listening, ...
— The Brick Moon, et. al. • Edward Everett Hale

... Strange stories have flitted here and there of wonders yet to be seen. The country swarms with savages, living in much the same state as they were when the Spaniards invaded the country. They have never been conquered, and, in the rugged fastnesses of their land, bid defiance to all attempts to civilize them. From all we can learn, there are numerous groups of ruins scattered here and there—but of their nature we are, as ...
— The Prehistoric World - Vanished Races • E. A. Allen

... plans, he proposed to destroy the race of men then living, and to replace it with some new order of creatures. Prometheus alone heard this scheme with indignation. Not only did he plead for the life of man and save it, but ever after he spent his giant efforts to civilize the race, and to endow it with a wit ...
— Old Greek Folk Stories Told Anew • Josephine Preston Peabody

... nation has in extending and strengthening the authority of reason and justice among the people around them, it will be useful to acquire what knowledge you can of the state of morality, religion, and information among them; as it may better enable those who may endeavour to civilize and instruct them, to adapt their measures to the existing notions and practices of those on whom ...
— History of the Expedition under the Command of Captains Lewis and Clark, Vol. I. • Meriwether Lewis and William Clark

... like to civilize the churches, so that they will be able to do good deeds without building bad creeds. In other words, take out the superstitious and the miraculous, and leave the ...
— The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Volume VIII. - Interviews • Robert Green Ingersoll

... the name of the United States of America! It is to add a thirty-ninth State to the glorious Union! It is to colonize the lunar regions, to cultivate them, to people them, to transport to them some of our wonders of art, science, and industry! It is to civilize the Selenites, unless they are more civilized already than we are ourselves! It is to make them all good Republicans, if they are not ...
— All Around the Moon • Jules Verne

... that Arnold was in charge of Rugby, he got the ill-will of his directors by declaring that he did not intend to curtail the powers of the Sixth Form—he proposed to civilize it. To try out the new master, the Sixth Form, proud in their prowess, sent him word that if he interfered with them in any way, they would first "bust up the school," and then resign in a body. Moreover, they gave it out that if any pupil complained ...
— Little Journeys To The Homes Of Great Teachers • Elbert Hubbard

... the best western civilization had thus far attained was probably about all men of the future could look forward to so far as happiness was concerned. These views, however, were no longer tenable if our arts, philosophies and scientific attainments fail to civilize and refine us. Clearly, modern man's conception of ethical progress was as deficient in certain respects as that of the great historic civilizations. The secret of right living had not yet been discovered. History proved this, and unless the trend of modern ...
— When Dreams Come True • Ritter Brown

... galley police when he was a kid, and he got civilized and learned to talk English. He was a cannibal in them days, but the chaplain aboard showed him how foolish it was to do such things, and finally Tabu-Tabu got religion and asked as a special favour to be allowed to return to Kandavu to civilize his people. As a result of Tabu-Tabu's efforts, he tells me the king has concluded that when he eats a white man he's flyin' in the face of his own interests, and most generally a gunboat comes along in a ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne

... unnoticed, the spiteful brute approached the Sultan, and offered the greatest indignity in his power to the pantaloons of the sensitive monarch. Imagine the indignation which occurred, and the designs of the wily British Ambassador to civilize the Turkish Sultan would have been wholly frustrated had not the chief gardien of the Sultan's wardrobe fortunately brought with him a full fresh suit for his master, in ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 2, August, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... friends of ours at a little place called Upchurch, on a branch line from Oxford. The people were well-to-do—Goodall their name—and went in for philanthropy. Mrs. Goodall always had a lot of Upchurch girls about her, educated and not; her idea was to civilize one class by means of the other, and to give a new spirit to both. My cousin Mary was staying at the house whilst I was there. She had more reasonable views than Mrs. Goodall, but took a great interest in what ...
— The Odd Women • George Gissing

... Christian and Bahaite heroism generated by a persecuting fanaticism, we may well wish that it might be called forth otherwise. Heroic was the imprisonment and death of Captain Conolly (in Bukhara), but heroic also are the lives of many who have spent long years in unhealthy climates, to civilize and moralize those who need ...
— The Reconciliation of Races and Religions • Thomas Kelly Cheyne

... had a man like Cavanagh for sheriff, we'd have the murderers in two days. He knows who the butchers are, and I'd like his help; but he's nailed down here, and there's no hope of his getting away. A few men like him could civilize this cursed country." ...
— Cavanaugh: Forest Ranger - A Romance of the Mountain West • Hamlin Garland

... have borne hard upon the Indians, born and brought up in untasked freedom, but it was never cruel nor sanguinary. He inflicted no wanton massacres nor vindictive punishments; his desire was to cherish and civilize the Indians, and to render them useful subjects; not to oppress, and persecute, and destroy them. When he beheld the desolation that had swept them from the land during his suspension from authority, he could not restrain the strong expression of ...
— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving

... was made to convert and civilize these savages, but it was not long before the English colonists were at war with the Pequots, the most dreaded of the tribes in southern New England. This contest(1636-1638) was mainly carried on for the colonists by the settlers of Connecticut. It resulted ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 12 • Editor-In-Chief Rossiter Johnson

... missions were to win over the savage hordes at once to Heaven and to France. Peaceful, benign, beneficent, were the weapons of this conquest. France aimed to subdue, not by the sword, but by the cross; not to overwhelm and crush the nations she invaded, but to convert, civilize, and ...
— Pioneers Of France In The New World • Francis Parkman, Jr.

... savagery to free civilization. The Dutch system attempts to supply this missing link, and to bring the people on by gradual steps to that higher civilization, which we (the English) try to force upon them at once. Our system has always failed. We demoralize and we extirpate, but we never really civilize. Whether the Dutch system can permanently succeed is but doubtful, since it may not be possible to compress the work of ten centuries into one; but at all events it takes nature as a guide, ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume I. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace

... state that to the primaeval civilization of America must be assigned a great and indefinite antiquity, leaving however no palpable monuments; but sending colonies to civilize China and Japan! is not this preposterous? where are the proofs either from traditions, languages, monuments or ...
— The Ancient Monuments of North and South America, 2nd ed. • C. S. Rafinesque

... intolerable as he had believed. He had seen little of Alban and that little had not been to the young man's disadvantage. If the youth were not all that report had painted him, if the amenities of the house should civilize him and kindness win his favor, then even he might be an advocate for those to whom he owed such favors. This new phase set Gessner thinking more hopefully than at any time since the beginning of it. He rose from his bed and turning on the lamps began to recall ...
— Aladdin of London - or Lodestar • Sir Max Pemberton

... of my disappointment, I decided that it was in vain to attempt to improve and civilize such people as the Irish. I did not recollect, perhaps at that time I did not know, that even in the days of the great Queen Elizabeth, "the greatest part of the buildings in the cities and good towns of England consisted only of timber, cast ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. IV • Maria Edgeworth

... spread a plain, encircled by the chestnut-covered Appennines. A dark ravine was on one side, spanned by an aqueduct, whose tall arches were rooted in the dell below, and attested that man had once deigned to bestow labour and thought here, to adorn and civilize nature. Savage, ungrateful nature, which in wild sport defaced his remains, protruding her easily renewed, and fragile growth of wild flowers and parasite plants around his eternal edifices. I sat on a fragment of rock, and ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley

... about frauds being perpetrated by the Democrats in the elections on the frontier. For instance, it was asserted that, at Pembina and the Indian agencies, one pair of pantaloons would suffice to civilize several hundred Indians, as, by putting them on, and thus adopting the customs and habits of civilization, they would be entitled to vote. There never was much truth about these rumors, and being on the border, and having charge of an Indian agency, where hundreds of men were ...
— The History of Minnesota and Tales of the Frontier • Charles E. Flandrau

... by no means easy. On Mindanao, one of the larger islands in the group, lived the Moros. So cruel and fierce were they that during all the years Spain held the Islands she had never attempted to civilize them. To Pershing was given the task of going back into the mountains and capturing these Moros. To him was assigned the most stubborn ...
— Modern Americans - A Biographical School Reader for the Upper Grades • Chester Sanford

... heritage of St. Amand. For the third time, she endeavoured to bring charity, art and culture into a world of violence and barbarism. After civilizing the Pagan Celts in the third century and the Pagan Franks in the seventh, she had now to civilize the Christians of the tenth century, and this was not destined ...
— Belgium - From the Roman Invasion to the Present Day • Emile Cammaerts

... theocracy.] As the means the missionaries called in to their aid, in order to reduce and civilize the Indians, were preaching and other spiritual labors, and, although scattered about and acting separately, they were still subject to the authority of their prelates, who, like so many chiefs, directed the grand work of conversion, the government primitively established in these colonies ...
— The Former Philippines thru Foreign Eyes • Fedor Jagor; Tomas de Comyn; Chas. Wilkes; Rudolf Virchow.

... better his own condition. Every animal that man has taken from its native haunts and domesticated, he has efficiently improved. He has even produced more marvelous results by the application of the same principles to the vegetable kingdom. In his haste to civilize himself, however, he has failed to apply the principles that are essential to self-preservation. It is regrettable, also, to know that, while the government has spent many thousands of dollars in sending out literature to the farmers, instructing them how to ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Volume I. (of IV.) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague, M.D.

... selection! Well, the first is hard to get now. The grizzly is closer to extinction than the elk or the buffalo, for the buffalo breed in domestic life, and the grizzly—well, he hasn't domesticated yet. He's the one savage—he and the gray wolf—that would never civilize. And ...
— The Young Alaskans on the Missouri • Emerson Hough

... national destiny until Puritanism has been crushed. Let us not elevate this nauseating nonsense into importance by attempting a reply. Such men must be left to follow out their inevitable instincts. They are not worth the trouble necessary to civilize them. Mr. Rarey succeeded in taming a zebra from the London Zooelogical Gardens; but a single lesson could not permanently reclaim the beast, and it soon relapsed into its native and normal ferocity. One experiment sufficed to show ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., April, 1863, No. LXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics. • Various

... called the Congo State, because of a magnificent river, the Congo, which flows through it. It was the Great Powers of Europe who made him ruler, and they made him promise that he would abolish slavery, allow all nations to trade freely there, and do all he could to civilize the natives. But after some time ugly stories began to reach Europe about what was being done by King Leopold's servants in that distant part of the world. The Congo is a country full of rich products, and it was said that the King was breaking his promises: that he was making heaps ...
— Peeps At Many Lands: Belgium • George W. T. Omond

... how invisible thy dominion! Who can restrain thee and forbid thy further progress? Kings are but as infants in thy hands, and emperors, despotic in all else, are bound to obey thee! Thou civilizest, hast civilized, and wilt civilize. Civilization is thy mission, and man's welfare thine appointed charge. The nation that most warmly fosters thee shall ever be the greatest in the earth; and without thee no nation shall endure for a day. Thou art our Alpha and our ...
— The Struggles of Brown, Jones, and Robinson - By One of the Firm • Anthony Trollope

... object should be pursued upon a regular and persevering system, and while the Missionary needs the active co-operation of the resident Officer in his arduous engagement with the Indians; no idle prejudice should ever prevent his endeavours to civilize and fix them in the cultivation of the soil where it ...
— The Substance of a Journal During a Residence at the Red River Colony, British North America • John West

... no case for democracy. Progress, in such a case, is not wholly impossible, but it must depend on the number of those who do care for the things that are of social value, who advance knowledge or "civilize life through the discoveries of art," or form a narrow but effective public opinion in support of liberty and order. We may go further. Whatever the form of government progress always does in fact depend on those who so think and live, and on the degree in which these common interests envelop ...
— Liberalism • L. T. Hobhouse

... coal, drinking hot water, and spitting fire, shall seem, but falsely, threatening to come on the platform. Ah! Claude!" he cried to the youngest of the group, "now shall you behold what I have told you—that vast am-azement of civilize-ation anni-high-lating space and also time at the tune of twenty miles the hour!" He wheeled upon the planter—"Sir, do ...
— Bonaventure - A Prose Pastoral of Acadian Louisiana • George Washington Cable

... and their characters have been traduced by bigoted and interested writers. The colonist often treated them like beasts of the forest, and the author has endeavored to justify him in his outrages. The former found it easier to exterminate than to civilize, the latter to vilify than to discriminate. The appellations of "savage" and "pagan" were deemed sufficient to sanction the hostilities of both; and thus the poor wanderers of the forest were persecuted and defamed, not because they were guilty, but ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes

... he rode alone in the Campagna, covering great distances on his stanch Irish mare, Biddy. She was the handsomest horse in Rome; her master was the handsomest man. He looked like some old Roman consul going out to govern and civilize. Peasants whom he passed touched their hats to him automatically. His face in repose ...
— IT and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris

... industrial and commercial development and incidentally for Christian work. The change no doubt has contributed vastly to the wealth of the world and to progress, but it has been fatal to the native populations. The Spanish policy aimed to preserve and civilize the native races, not to establish a new home for Spaniards, and the colonial legislation provided elaborate safeguards for the protection of the Indians. Many of these were a mere dead letter but the preservation and civilization ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803 • Emma Helen Blair

... Can this double emigration civilize Africa and more than re-people the South? Yes; and I regard the difficulties presented here, in Congress, or the country, as little worth. God intends both emigrations. And, without miracle, he will accomplish both. Difficulties! There are no difficulties. Half a million emigrate to our shores, ...
— Slavery Ordained of God • Rev. Fred. A. Ross, D.D.

... He means well, and if we only had him for a while out West, where I came from, we might make something sensible out of him yet. But, when a man will live so far away from the Rocky Mountains as away over here, what can be expected? We can't civilize the whole ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 9, May 28, 1870 • Various

... equally silly game, from morning to night, is pitiful. And then their yelling and laughter are more like wild beasts or demons than human beings. These people seem to me the lowest, meanest, most treacherous, and hardened of the human race. I do not wonder that it is so difficult to civilize or Christianize them." ...
— The Cabin on the Prairie • C. H. (Charles Henry) Pearson

... the city of Liverpool, in which it was lately proved that crime—and especially the crime of uneducated boys and girls—had cost, in the last few years, the city many times more than it would cost to educate, civilize, and depauperize the whole rising generation of that city, and had been a tax upon the capital and industry of Liverpool, so enormous that they would have submitted to it from no Government on earth; and yet they had been blindly ...
— Sermons for the Times • Charles Kingsley

... and execution are a dark and bloody mystery to all save the cook that created them! No, we sat calmly down—it was in old Dijon, which is so easy to spell and so impossible to pronounce except when you civilize it and call it Demijohn—and poured out rich Burgundian wines and munched calmly through a long table d'hote bill of fare, snail patties, delicious fruits and all, then paid the trifle it cost and stepped happily aboard the train again, without once cursing the railroad company. ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... the policy or intention of the Government of Spain to found Missions in the New World solely for the benefit of the natives. Philanthropic motives doubtless influenced the rulers to a certain degree; but to civilize barbarous peoples and convert them to the Catholic faith meant not only the rescue of savages from future perdition, but the enlargement of the borders of the Church, the preparation for future colonization, and, consequently, the extension of ...
— The Old Franciscan Missions Of California • George Wharton James

... formation, made use of as an engine to conquer, unify and civilize all the tribes. In one sense, this conquest of men having lower forms of faith, by believers in the Kami no Michi, or Way of the Gods, was analogous to the Aryan conquest of India and the Dravidians. However this may be, the energy and valor displayed in these early ages formed ...
— The Religions of Japan - From the Dawn of History to the Era of Meiji • William Elliot Griffis

... cheerfully acquiesced. "Eva Gonorowsky alone would civilize a whole tribe of savages. Will you ...
— Little Citizens • Myra Kelly

... the first respectable-looking man from the street, and prove to him that literary study tends, as Bacon requires, "to civilize the life of man"; prove to him that, as Montesquieu requires, it "increases the excellence of our nature, and makes an understanding being yet more understanding," and the man—type though he may be of the modern ...
— Platform Monologues • T. G. Tucker

... unbroken.' It is the highest form of love,—the only firm rock of friendship. It leaves no room for suspicion,—no place for argument—no cause for contradiction. It is the true meaning of the wedding-ring. Apart from marriage altogether, it is the only principle that can finally civilize and elevate man. So long as we doubt God and mistrust our fellows, so long must corruption sway business, and wars move nations. The man who gives us cause to suspect his honesty,—the man who forces ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli

... frequently arise in the use of not—but only, to understand which we must attend to the force of the whole expression. 'He did not pretend to extirpate French music, but only to cultivate and civilize it.' Here the not is obviously misplaced. 'He pretended, ...
— The Verbalist • Thomas Embly Osmun, (AKA Alfred Ayres)

... the very spot where I am writing, is evidence in abundance of the facts here stated. Every effort to civilize and make the nomadic Indian a cultivator of the earth—here has been tried, and within my memory. Missionary establishments were here, schools, churches, fields, implements, example and its blessings, all without effect. Nothing now remains to tell of these ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks

... give those Names promiscuously to All that, having studied Human Nature, have endeavour'd to civilize Men, and render them more and more tractable, either for the Ease of Governours and Magistrates, or else for the Temporal Happiness of Society in general. I think of all Inventions of this Sort, the same which told ...
— An Enquiry into the Origin of Honour, and the Usefulness of Christianity in War • Bernard Mandeville

... question how far a country may be civilized, and in how short a time, without actual conquest? Civilization has progressed in Central Africa with the spread of Islamism. When it reaches the point of Mahometan civilization it will stop. The question with us is, "Whether we shall civilize the Mohammedans, and so work on Central Africa, or reconquer their conquests?" There appears very little chance of civilizing Africa without arms and conquest. Bornou, Soudan, and its numerous cities, Timbuctoo and Jinnee, formerly all governed by the Kohlan—‮كحلان‬, or "blacks," ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson

... the dual nature of the solution and its relative importance to both races is clearly indicated by Voltaire, the great French savant: "It is more meritorious and more difficult to wean men from their prejudices than to civilize the barbarian." ...
— Twentieth Century Negro Literature - Or, A Cyclopedia of Thought on the Vital Topics Relating - to the American Negro • Various

... it, but I want ter tell yer thet because of yer the flowers is brighter, the birds sing sweeter, the sunshine is clearer, the sky more smilin', and I cud get down and crawl on the ground yo' has walked over, that bad do I worship yer. And if yo' cud stay and marry me and civilize me, I'd try to brush up and be a decenter man than I ever war; leastways, I'd clar ev'ry rock ...
— The Wedge of Gold • C. C. Goodwin

... calling and profession that she cares to enter; accord her all she asks, not grudgingly but cheerfully; but do not force upon her "rights" she does not want, duties she would shun, and which that beneficent God, who gave her to us to civilize and humanize us, destined for our own ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann

... seldom been so impressed by any one as by this Kaffir, who, born in absolute barbarism, had acquired culture both deep and wide, and then returned to try and civilize his people. At the time I met him Mr. Soga was hard at work translating, for the benefit of the Natives, the Bible and "Pilgrim's Progress." The Kaffir language is eminently suited to the former; good ...
— Reminiscences of a South African Pioneer • W. C. Scully

... busy," said the man, "and I reckon, after all, you can't civilize a wolf. I'm afraid I've been wasting ...
— The Call of the Cumberlands • Charles Neville Buck

... the curious things in this connection is the similarity—the practical sameness—of the arguments used to justify the Philippine occupation and those once used to justify American slaveholding. We are now working to civilize and Christianize the Filipinos, and were then civilizing and Christianizing the negroes with ...
— The Abolitionists - Together With Personal Memories Of The Struggle For Human Rights • John F. Hume

... above quoted, of the endeavors of Osiris to civilize the world, who would not imagine to be perusing the traditions of the deeds of the culture heroes Kukulean[TN-28] and Quetzalcoatl of the Mayas and of the Aztecs? Osiris was particularly worshiped at Philo, where the history of ...
— Vestiges of the Mayas • Augustus Le Plongeon

... very weak of a consumption. The same year two other of the maids were shipped off to the Bermudas, after being long a charge to the company, in the hope that they might there get husbands, "that after they were converted and had children, they might be sent to their country and kindred to civilize them." One of them was there married. The attempt to educate them in England was not very successful, and a proposal to bring over Indian boys obtained this comment from ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... Like any other gentleman. When jests grew dull he showed his wit, And many a lounger hit with it. When he had fully stored his mind— As Orpheus once for human kind,— So he away would homewards steal, To civilize the monkey weal. ...
— Fables of John Gay - (Somewhat Altered) • John Gay

... have taken it into their heads that they will humanize and civilize the world; but Jonathan marches with more zeal in this direction, and wishes to go much farther than John Bull; he has no fear of wounding his dignity by putting his two hands to the pie, like a true workman. The two brothers desire to become rich ...
— Celebrated Women Travellers of the Nineteenth Century • W. H. Davenport Adams

... that most worthy gentleman's great and generous concern for both the present and future interest of these nations, and his earnest desire and endeavors, so well known, to civilize them first, and make them more capable of instruction in the ways of religion and civil government, and his hearty wishes that something might be done to forward such good purposes, prevailed with the author, however indifferently qualified for such a work, to set about the following essay ...
— Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe • Thaddeus Mason Harris

... she set a hand on the low stone wall of the garden and was over and lost among the trees. "Leila, Leila," cried Mrs. Ann, "I told you to finish—" It was useless. "Everything goes wrong to-day," she murmured. "Well, school will civilize that young barbarian, and she must have longer skirts." This was a sore subject and ...
— Westways • S. Weir Mitchell

... the missionaries employed to reduce and civilize the Indians, were their preaching and other spiritual instruments, and as, although they were scattered and working separately, they were at the same time subject to the authority of their superiors—who as chiefs, directed the great work of the conversion—the government primitively established ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 (Vol 28 of 55) • Various

... "'Twill civilize thim stiff," said Mr. Dooley. "An' it may not be a bad thing f'r th' r-rest iv th' wurruld. Perhaps contack with th' Chinee ...
— Mr. Dooley's Philosophy • Finley Peter Dunne

... folly), "Hum! nebber want him again - Him civilize all of us, golly! CALAMITY suck him brain!" The people, however, were pained when They saw him aboard his ship, But none of them wept for their FREDDY, except ...
— Fifty Bab Ballads • William S. Gilbert

... civilize one willing barbarian, what must it have been to compel millions to put on the garment of respectability which they hated! Never before was there such a complete social reorganization, so entire a change in the daily habits of a whole people; and so violently effected. It required a soul ...
— A Short History of Russia • Mary Platt Parmele

... any other gentleman. In visits, too, his parts and wit, When jests grew dull, were sure to hit. Proud with applause, he thought his mind In every courtly art refined; Like Orpheus, burned with public zeal To civilize the monkey weal: So watched occasion, broke his chain, And sought his native woods again. The hairy sylvans round him press Astonished at his strut and dress. Some praise his sleeve, and others gloat Upon his rich embroidered coat; His ...
— The Talking Beasts • Various



Words linked to "Civilize" :   fine-tune, polish, educate, civilization, modify, sophisticate, refine, down, alter, change, civilise



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