"Dilemma" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... abstract is an illegitimate conception, a conception of what by its very nature is unknowable, because it involves the impossible conception of infinite past-time, he is logically bound by accepting one horn of the dilemma, to admit the conception of self-existence into the realm of the Knowable, or by choosing the other, to transfer his "Indestructibility," his "possibility of exact Science" into the realm of the Unknowable! In either event, we place an ultimate ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 19, June, 1891 • Various
... only an attempt to gain a little reputation for pluck, if in any way I could have accounted for the appearance and disappearance of the robbers. Yet to suppose—which seemed the only other horn to the dilemma—that the son and guests of the vice-president of the Missouri Western, and one of our own directors, would be concerned in train-robbery was to believe something equally improbable. Indeed, I should have put the whole thing down as a practical joke of Mr. Cullen's party, if it had not been ...
— The Great K. & A. Robbery • Paul Liechester Ford
... kill him was no remedy; for if I could not marry an undivorced woman, as little could she have married her husband's murderer." He hunched his shoulders and concluded, "The dilemma is not unusual." ...
— Lady Good-for-Nothing • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... follow them. Great thoughts require a great mind and pure beauties a profound sensibility. To attempt to give such things a wide currency is to be willing to denaturalise them in order to boast that they have been propagated. Culture is on the horns of this dilemma: if profound and noble it must remain rare, if common it must become mean. These alternatives can never be eluded until some purified and high-bred race succeeds the promiscuous bipeds ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... and therefore unfit to marry; or else you've done something which places you outside the tolerably generous boundaries of civilised society, and are therefore still more unfit to marry. You're on the horns of a dilemma.' ...
— The Beetle - A Mystery • Richard Marsh
... to be in a ridiculous dilemma. The Kappans were reported to have seized a Terran spaceship as it landed to trade. Naturally, the captain had squawked for help. He claimed he had crashed; his insurance company thought otherwise; the Kappans seemed to have some entirely different idea in mind. Mayne ...
— A Transmutation of Muddles • Horace Brown Fyfe
... was entirely out of proportion with the paw; and yet, if the former were larger or the latter smaller, surely they would not fit well in the places they were intended to ornament. What a provoking dilemma, to be sure—and at such a time, for, glancing suddenly up, she saw Iddilcar's dark, repulsive features bent upon her with a terrible intentness. All her former loathing surged back over her heart with tenfold force, sickening her with its ...
— The Lion's Brood • Duffield Osborne
... twofold difficulty? On the one hand you cannot mingle with the world without danger, and on the other hand it will not do for you to ignore its dangers which must be known in order to be avoided. This dilemma would be of no consequence to a frivolous and unreflecting soul, or to a vain and presumptuous mind, which, confiding in its own powers, believes that it has a good knowledge only of what it sees and experiences; and ...
— Serious Hours of a Young Lady • Charles Sainte-Foi
... would be in a dilemma, like that of another great general. He would have a knot before him which he could not untie. He must cut it with his sword. He must say to his followers, "Defend yourselves with your bayonets"; and this ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... not so awed by their dilemma that they couldn't have gay words. "You got into my heart, too, Bill—a great dealer smaller place than the window," she whispered. "The next thing—are Harold's snowshoes in ...
— The Snowshoe Trail • Edison Marshall
... this would be a hard question, for Leopold was deeply indoctrinated with the "little hatchet" principle. In a word, he could not tell a deliberate lie. He could not place himself in a situation where a falsehood would be necessary to extricate himself from a dilemma. Unhappily, like thousands of other scrupulous people, he could "strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel;" for it was just as much a lie to deceive his father by his silence as it was ...
— The Coming Wave - The Hidden Treasure of High Rock • Oliver Optic
... aware that this dilemma would not hold water very long, and was painfully impromptu; but it hit ...
— Where the Blue Begins • Christopher Morley
... other that they will not stand quietly by and see any one of their number favored by a gift of such importance; on the other hand, the presence of an American colony in Eastern Asia will be a thorn in the side of the great powers; we have, therefore, to choose which horn of the dilemma we shall accept. The final settlement of the matter will, no doubt, cause many new complications and material changes in the traditional policy ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 2, No. 23, June 9, 1898 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... of parenthood until he has fallen in love properly. Nobody who would permit an outsider's decision as to when he was properly in love would be worth thirty cents as a parent. There is the ultimate dilemma of the eugenist—the dilemma which destroys forever the dream of a control of parenthood from the point of view of merely ...
— The Glands Regulating Personality • Louis Berman, M.D.
... came to the exemption of seamen, Admiralty found itself on the horns of a dilemma. Both the Navy and the merchant service depended in a very large degree upon the seaman who knew the ropes—who could take his turn at the wheel, scud aloft without going through the lubber-hole, and act promptly and sailorly in emergency. To take wholesale ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson
... 305. The dilemma in which Diocletian is placed by the rash counsels of Galerius determines him to abdicate. He resigns the purple at Nicomedia, and persuades Maximian to follow his example on the same day at Milan. Constantius and Galerius take the title of augustus, and that of caesar is ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 03 • Various
... been an orthodox costume party which Mrs. Carroway had given, why, then he might have gone as a Roman senator or as a private chief or an Indian brave or a cavalier. In doublet or jack boots or war bonnet, in a toga, even, he might have mastered the dilemma and carried off a dubious situation. But to be adrift in an alien quarter of a great and heartless city round four o'clock in the morning, so picturesquely and so unseasonably garbed, and in imminent peril of detection, was a prospect calculated to fill one with the frenzied delirium of a nightmare ...
— The Life of the Party • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... the argument it looked like a dilemma. He should either send her "out" or not. If he pursued the former course, the advantages were six, the disadvantages half-a-dozen. If the latter, the advantages were twelve, the disadvantages a dozen, so that he found himself almost unequal to the ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera
... Here was a sad dilemma. I feared that what I was so confident I had secured would yet be frustrated. He had accustomed himself to show Mrs. Williams such a degree of humane attention, as frequently imposed some restraint upon him; and I knew that if she should be obstinate, he would not stir. ...
— The Ontario Readers: The High School Reader, 1886 • Ministry of Education
... from the same principles it should follow that the Deity ought to interfere where there is a worthy cause. Here however arises another dilemma, for if the Deity has really those attributes of power and justice, there would never have been occasion for such temperaneous interpositions. A particular providence must indeed prove one of these two principles, either that God was imperfect in his design, or that inert matter is ...
— Answer to Dr. Priestley's Letters to a Philosophical Unbeliever • Matthew Turner
... was opened, and that was pleasanter than all the rest. But he found that even twenty thousand would not be sufficient to accomplish all his plans. Yet, he was in no dilemma. Fairbanks, Frisbie and Fabens, had grown up into a mammoth business, and it would be as easy to make his thirty thousand, as to turn his hand over. Make it honestly too: and the money was all made, and he said now he had enough in all conscience, for ...
— Summerfield - or, Life on a Farm • Day Kellogg Lee
... the crystalline spheres was not more at variance with the correct motion of the stars and planets, than the moon theory of the tides. In their dilemma to account for the retrograde motions of the planets, they denominated them wanderers, stragglers, because they would not march with the "music of the spheres." In the moon theory of the tides the lunar satellite is made to pull and push at one and the same time, which ...
— Scientific American, Vol. 17, No. 26 December 28, 1867 • Various
... in sort of a fix," was the answer as Carter looked up at Carrick with a frank laugh. The dilemma was not causing him much alarm. "If they are," he continued, "we're dished unless we can get by them. I'll take a chance anyhow. We won't stop to investigate. Right through the woods as if the devil was after us," with which instructions he ...
— Trusia - A Princess of Krovitch • Davis Brinton
... a man who genuinely abhors violence confronts an almost insoluble dilemma. On the one hand he may be faced with the imminent triumph of some almost insufferable evil; on the other, he may feel that the only available means of opposing that evil is violence, which is ...
— Introduction to Non-Violence • Theodore Paullin
... daily losing credit, like the assignats. There is no other course to pursue, consequently, but to resort to the non-juror, who is the only one able to give valid absolutions. And it so happens that he not only refuses this, but he is said to be inimical to the whole new order of things.—In this dilemma the peasant falls back upon his usual resource, the strength of his arms; he seizes the priest by the throat, as formerly his lord, and extorts an acquittance for his sins as formerly for his feudal dues. At the very least he strives to constrain the non-jurors to swear, to close their separatist ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 2 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 1 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... one will, the other horn of the dilemma. That, too, one will find as ill a resting place as an upright thistle. Let the wages,—as with Mr. Bellamy,—all be equal. The managers then cannot vote themselves large emoluments if they try. But what about the purple citizens? Will they work, or will they lie round ...
— The Unsolved Riddle of Social Justice • Stephen Leacock
... But on the third day it was evident that the Koondooz fever had really made its appearance, and several of the guard and servants, to the number of twenty and upwards, were so much weakened as to be unable to proceed. In this dilemma we deemed it advisable not to remain any longer in the vicinity of the marshes, and resolved to proceed with such of our men as were still healthy, to survey the Dushti Suffaed Pass, already alluded to. We determined on leaving the sick and the greater portion of ...
— A Peep into Toorkisthhan • Rollo Burslem
... of her hand upon his arm, the fugitive contacts of her shoulder, seemed to him, just then, the most vivid and interesting things in life; the consciousness of her personality at his side was like a shaft of golden light penetrating the darkness of his dilemma. But as minutes passed and their flight was unchallenged, his mood grew dark with doubts and quick with distrust. Reviewing it all, he thought to detect something too damnably adventitious in the way she had nailed him, back there in the corridor of Troyon's. It was a bit too coincidental—"a bit ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance
... it is true, we find, and numerous ones; but the great whales are absent, and the fishes are not such as now live. Not one solitary species of fish now in existence is to be found there, and hence you are introduced again to the difficulty, to the dilemma, that either the creatures that were created then, which came into existence the sixth day, were not those which are found at present, or are not the direct and immediate predecessors of those which now exist; but in that case you ...
— Was Man Created? • Henry A. Mott
... superimposition, and mutual misattribution. But apart from pure consciousness these cannot be manifested or known, for it is pure consciousness alone that is self-luminous. Thus when we try to know the ajnana states in themselves as apart from the atman we fail in a dilemma, for knowledge means illusory superimposition or illusion, and when it is not knowledge they evidently cannot be known. Thus apart from its being a factor in our illusory experience no other kind of its existence is known to us. If ajnana had been a non-entity altogether it could never ...
— A History of Indian Philosophy, Vol. 1 • Surendranath Dasgupta
... with the same quiet smile upon his face, and he held up his hands toward either party as a man might do that wished to sunder and pacify quarrelling children. "Gently, friends, gently," he said; "there is a pleasant way to end this dilemma." Then he turned to me, and I never saw his face serener. "Friend Lappo," he said, "will you lend ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... of Zeno, of Elea, on natural philosophy, in which that philosopher followed the method of Parmenides. Zeno moreover had made an especial study of how to reduce any man to silence who questioned him, and how to enclose him between the horns of a dilemma, which is alluded to by Timon of Phlius in the ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume I (of 4) • Plutarch
... as I do of the man? Should I not be between the horns of a dilemma if I had to speak the honest truth, yet not hurt ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... charm; so much like a charm, indeed, that I should certainly have allowed my breakfast to cool had I been obliged to choose between that and my newspaper. The inventor of the apparatus had, however, provided against so painful a dilemma by a simple attachment to the trumpet, which held it securely in position upon the shoulders behind the head, while the hands were left free for knife and fork. Having slyly noted the manner in which my neighbors had effected the adjustments, I imitated their example with a careless ...
— With The Eyes Shut - 1898 • Edward Bellamy
... difficult. To retain her at Beaumanoir in face of the search which he knew would be made by the Governor and the indomitable La Corne St. Luc, was impossible. The quandary oppressed him. He saw no escape from the dilemma; but, to the credit of Bigot be it said, that not for a moment did he entertain a thought of doing injury to the hapless Caroline, or of taking advantage of her lonely condition to add to her distress, merely ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... if I were tempted to a fall and withstood it, that is to my credit. But if the law cuts me off it, and I am a criminal if I drink, it cuts me off a good part of my credit too—and I am against that." My friend has there put his finger upon a sharp little dilemma. If alcohol is a bad thing, then prohibition is a good thing. But if temperance is a good thing, then prohibition is a bad thing. You cannot be temperate in the use of alcohol if you have none. Nor is sobriety a virtue in you if you lock ...
— In a Green Shade - A Country Commentary • Maurice Hewlett
... stock of tea was exhausted, and we were unable to procure more. In this dilemma milk would have been an excellent substitute, or coffee, if we had possessed it; but we had neither the one nor the other, so we agreed to try the Yankee tea—hemlock sprigs boiled. This proved, to my taste, ...
— The Backwoods of Canada • Catharine Parr Traill
... has been torturing catgut, in sounds that would have insulted the dying agonies of a sow under the hands of a butcher, and thinks himself, on that very account, exceeding good company. In fact, I have been in a dilemma, either to get drunk, to forget these miseries; or to hang myself, to get rid of them: like a prudent man (a character congenial to my every thought, word, and deed), I of two evils have chosen the least, and am very drunk, ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... saw that these were indeed, as Jefferson Davis had said, "quack nostrums," and that the choice lay between permitting a secession accompanied with insulting menaces and some degree of actual violence, and maintaining the Union by coercion. In this dilemma great multitudes of Northern Democrats, whose consciences had never been in the least disturbed by the existence of slavery in the country or even by efforts to extend it, became "Union men" in the Northern sense of the word, which made it about equivalent ...
— Abraham Lincoln, Vol. I. • John T. Morse
... In this dilemma the officials hailed the appearance of the boys with unfeigned delight. But Jack was sorry to learn that it had been decided not to pay over thirty pistoles a month ...
— Jack North's Treasure Hunt - Daring Adventures in South America • Roy Rockwood
... hope of reaching one of the beautiful persimmons hanging above him; but he failed each time, for a crab's legs are not made for climbing trees but only for running along the ground and over stones, both of which he can do most cleverly. In his dilemma he thought of his old playmate the monkey, who, he knew, could climb trees better than any one else in the world. He determined to ask the monkey to help him, and set out to ...
— Japanese Fairy Tales • Yei Theodora Ozaki
... educators find themselves facing an inevitable dilemma; first, to keep the young committed to their charge "unspotted from the world," and, second, to connect the young with the ruthless and materialistic world all about them in such wise that they ...
— The Spirit of Youth and the City Streets • Jane Addams
... great sensation in the business world. Madame Desvarennes's son-in-law was on the board. It was a good speculation, then? People consulted the mistress, who found herself somewhat in a dilemma; either she must disown her son-in-law, or speak well of the affair. Still she did not hesitate, for she was loyal and honest above all things. She declared the speculation was a poor one, and did all she could to prevent any of her friends ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet
... pondered on de Spain and his dilemma—and her own—the more she worried. When she went to bed, up-stairs in her little gable room, she thought sleep—never hard for her to woo—would relieve her of her anxiety for at least the night. But she waited in vain for sleep. She was continually asking herself whether ...
— Nan of Music Mountain • Frank H. Spearman
... terrible dilemma," said Tom; and added in a perplexity almost comical, "Drat the girl! Why did'nt she marry poor old Jim Stockbridge, or sleepy Hamlyn, or even your humble servant? Though, in all honour, I must confess that I never asked her, as those two others did. No! I'll ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley
... bachelor friend, Kinzie; there was a philosopher for you, and his philosophy was all the sweeter because it had never been embittered by marital experience. I had confidence in Kinzie, and I told him all about the dilemma I was in. He pitied me and condoled with me, for he was a sympathetic man, and he was, too, as consistent a bibliomaniac as I ever met with. "Be of good cheer," said he, "we shall find a way out of all this trouble." ...
— The Holy Cross and Other Tales • Eugene Field
... hate him as I do the Evil One. I could believe anything, however bad, about him; and yet what he does is good, always good, and he has shown himself a friend to you. Let us consider if there may not be some way out of this dreadful dilemma." ...
— Sister Carmen • M. Corvus
... crisis had come. He read in the face of his companion a set purpose, and he prepared to meet the dilemma squarely. ...
— The Boys of Bellwood School • Frank V. Webster
... daily grew more critical, the whole encampment was open to assault, and exposed to a constant and enfilading fire. In this dilemma lord Cornwallis resolved to decamp with the elite of his army, by crossing the river and leaving a small force to capitulate. The first division embarked and some had reached the opposite shore at ...
— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean
... for such comparisons are never made without arousing some measure of hatred against those who dispute our claim to the first place, were it only in our own estimation. Then we must be either blind or angry, a bad man or a fool; let us try to avoid this dilemma. Sooner or later these dangerous passions will appear, so you tell me, in spite of us. I do not deny it. There is a time and place for everything; I am only saying that we should not ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... through the famine which was trying them greatly at this time, because the sea off Sicily was in control of Sextus, and the Ionian Gulf was in the grasp of Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus, Caesar found himself in a considerable dilemma. For Domitius was one of the assassins, and, having escaped from the battle fought at Philippi, he had got together a small fleet, had made himself for a time master of the Gulf, and was doing the greatest damage to the cause of ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol. III • Cassius Dio
... awaited thee: and it was true. And I said: What if I had not come? And she said: Then it may be, thou wouldst have kept thy kingdom, and lost thy interview with me. That is all. It was not I, who had anything to do either with causing thy dilemma, or determining its conclusion. And I said: Beyond a doubt, the loss of any kingdom would be a trifle in comparison with thy affection: and yet the loss is certain, and the affection doubtful. For I showed thee very plainly which I chose, and my kingdom is gone. I have thrown ...
— The Substance of a Dream • F. W. Bain
... two horns to the dilemma: either Mr. Colbrith, or a man named Stuart Ford, will have to walk the official plank. Because Mr. Colbrith is your relative, I'm willing to be the victim. But you must say that it is what you wish. That is ...
— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde
... In this dilemma and strait an accident in the way of a "wind fall" (or I might more appropriately say, "bread fall") came to our regiment's relief. Jim George, a rather eccentric and "short-witted fellow," of Company C, while plundering around in some ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert
... independence altogether; and to make the House of Lords a mere tool in the hands of every cabinet would be well-nigh impossible and politically absurd."[165] Therein must be adjudged still to lie (p. 116) the essential dilemma ...
— The Governments of Europe • Frederic Austin Ogg
... and perhaps refuse the loan. Oh, what was he to do! He could hit upon no plan, and he couldn't muster confidence to turn in. The porter of the firm mercifully interposed to rescue Mr Brammel from his dilemma. That functionary had watched the stranger shuffling to and fro in great anxiety and doubt, and at length he deemed it proper to enquire whether the gentleman was looking for the doorway of the house of Messrs —— and ——, or not. Augustus, frightened, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXIX. January, 1844. Vol. LV. • Various
... pursuit, but fortunately Knox was close behind him. He doubled back towards Hopetown for supplies, leaving Knox to follow the trail. De Wet was now driven into the western corner of the rectangle where the Brak falls into the Orange, and where he found himself in a dilemma similar to that which in his first raid had cornered him between the Orange and the Caledon. The Brak was in spate, and he could not cross it to Prieska. All hope of joining Hertzog and of a successful raid into the Cape Colony was at an end; there was nothing to ...
— A Handbook of the Boer War • Gale and Polden, Limited
... tendency of which was to destroy the Union itself and with it all hope of realizing those blessings which we had anticipated from the glorious Revolution which had been so recently achieved. From this deplorable dilemma, or, rather, certain ruin, we were happily rescued by the adoption of ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Polk - Section 3 (of 3) of Volume 4: James Knox Polk • Compiled by James D. Richardson
... said at last. "I am eager for them to come out before those scoundrelly sepoys give the rajah warning; and I am longing for them to stay for a full three-quarters of an hour yet. What a dilemma. It ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn
... be more prudent now to ignore the fact that we are no longer—however much we may regret it—in a position of insignificance or isolation, political or geographical, in any way resembling the times of Jefferson, and that from the changed conditions may result to us a dilemma similar to that which confronted him and his supporters? Not only have we grown,—that is a detail,—but the face of the world is changed, economically and politically. The sea, now as always the great means ...
— The Interest of America in Sea Power, Present and Future • A. T. Mahan
... In this dilemma, I found it absolutely necessary to use every means for self-preservation; and having obtained the consent of the captain (who was not yet delirious) and the chief mate, I spoke to the only four men who were well, and represented to them, that going below ...
— An Historical Journal of the Transactions at Port Jackson and Norfolk Island • John Hunter
... to the doctor saint and sinner are alike, and the only immorality is not to follow orders. To do one's duty as a doctor, with one's sole aim the physical health of the patient, may mean to advise what runs counter to the present-day code of morals. This is the true "Doctor's Dilemma." In such cases discretion is the safest reaction, and discretion bids the physician say, "Call in some one else on that matter; I ...
— The Nervous Housewife • Abraham Myerson
... afraid to probe its wound or has it recognized the fact that evil is irremediable and things must be allowed to run their course? But there crops up here a question of legislation, for it is impossible to escape the material and social dilemma created by this balance of public virtue in the matter of marriage. It is not our business to solve this difficulty; but suppose for a moment that society in order to save a multitude of families, women and honest girls, found itself compelled ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... the sense of pain inflicted by the impertinent comments on your horse. Every imputed blemish is a distinct personality, and you reject the insinuated spavin, or the suggested splint, as imputations on your honour as a gentleman. In fact, you are pushed into the pleasant dilemma of either being ignorant as to the defects of your beast, or wilfully bent on an act of palpable dishonesty. When we remember that every confession a man makes of his unacquaintance with matters 'horsy' is, in English ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever
... post-kantian state of mind, I will ask your permission to leave the soul wholly out of the present discussion and to consider only the residual dilemma. Some day, indeed, souls may get their innings again in philosophy—I am quite ready to admit that possibility—they form a category of thought too natural to the human mind to expire without prolonged resistance. But if the belief in the soul ever does come to life after the ...
— A Pluralistic Universe - Hibbert Lectures at Manchester College on the - Present Situation in Philosophy • William James
... drawing-room, it would cease to be the place of intellectual culture. On the other hand she perceived that Miss Proctor's idea was to empty that drawing-room by securing Mr. Majendie for her own. Mrs. Eliott remained uncomfortably seated on her dilemma. ...
— The Helpmate • May Sinclair
... them. The Whigs represented the higher standards, the more definite organization, and the social inequalities of the older states, but when they attempted to make their ideas good, they were faced by a dilemma either horn of which was disastrous to their interests. They were compelled either to sacrifice their standards to the conditions of popular efficiency or the chance of success to the integrity of their standards. In point of fact they pursued precisely the ...
— The Promise Of American Life • Herbert David Croly
... the others do it," said Paul quickly, delighted at the possibility of a new way out of his dilemma, "and of course I shouldn't know if I ...
— Paul the Courageous • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... would come at his earliest convenience to my house. He was an Episcopal clergyman, by the way, and I considered that his testimony would uphold my fast-sinking character for veracity among my townspeople. I began to have an impression that this dilemma in which I found myself was a pretty serious one for a man of peaceable disposition and honest ...
— Men, Women, and Ghosts • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... weight seemed lifted from him. He had shifted his dilemma to the shoulders of his wife, and had no conception that in so doing he was guilty of an act of moral cowardice. Returning to the studio, he pulled out a clean canvas and began a vigorous drawing of two fauns chasing each other round a tree. Presently, as he drew, ...
— The Nest Builder • Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
... mostly square-rigged, and was therefore equally serviceable in all kinds of weather. It seems likely, therefore, that the Americans strove to bring on the conflict in smooth weather; while the British were determined to wait until a heavy sea should lessen the force of their foes. In this dilemma several ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... conclusion deduced from a piece of genial scandal as to a record having been seen in that Inn of a fine imposed upon him for beating a friar in Fleet-street. This story was early placed by Thynne on the horns of a sufficiently decisive dilemma: in the days of Chaucer's youth, lawyers had not yet been admitted into the Temple; and in the days of his maturity he is not very likely to have been found engaged in battery ...
— Chaucer • Adolphus William Ward
... of the favourite sandbanks in which this particular kind of human ostrich plunges its head is "Nature." "Nature does this," and "Nature does that," forgetting entirely the fact that "Nature" is a mere personification and means either chance-medley or a Creator, according to the old dilemma. There is a very curious example of this inability or unwillingness to admit—perhaps even to understand—the force of this argument exhibited by those to whom one would suppose that it would come home with overpowering force: I mean, of course, ...
— Science and Morals and Other Essays • Bertram Coghill Alan Windle
... and Lamartine looked at me. The same thought was in the minds of both of us. Curiously enough we felt a certain delicacy in letting Louis perceive our dilemma! ...
— The Lost Ambassador - The Search For The Missing Delora • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... felt and was very salutary," wrote Hamilton to a foreign correspondent. "At home, everything is in the main well; except as to the perverseness and capriciousness of one and the spirit and faction of many. The leading friends of the government are in a sad dilemma." ...
— The United States of America Part I • Ediwn Erle Sparks
... made any mistake. It was impossible that I could shrink from his Majesty in the distressing circumstances under which he was placed. I will not detain your Lordships longer with a detail of the circumstances which led to the dilemma in which we are now placed. But, my Lords, if you will only look back to the commencement of those transactions—if you look to the speech which his Majesty made from the throne to this and the other house of Parliament, in June 1831,—if you recollect that ...
— Maxims And Opinions Of Field-Marshal His Grace The Duke Of Wellington, Selected From His Writings And Speeches During A Public Life Of More Than Half A Century • Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington
... problem was the most difficult and delicate dilemma of his life—this divided loyalty: to balk Maggie and the two men behind her without revealing the truth about Maggie to Dick, to protect Dick without betraying Maggie. It certainly was a ...
— Children of the Whirlwind • Leroy Scott
... letter from Sir Walter, written in answer to mine of the 25th May,[14] sufficiently shows the extent of the dilemma he found himself thrown into. It is full of strange contradictions. He talks of "printing rather than publishing" a book which was publickly advertised and publickly sold. He assures me that he believed that it was Fountainhall's Life, and not his ...
— Publications of the Scottish History Society, Vol. 36 • Sir John Lauder
... men say, we are between the devil and the deep sea, Tars Tarkas," I replied, nor could I help but smile at our dilemma. ...
— The Gods of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... Sir Francis Varney, "you see the dilemma I am in. Your principals have both challenged me. I am ready to fight any one, or both of them, as the case may be. Distinctly understand that; because it is a notion of theirs that I will not do so, or that I shrink from them; but I am a stranger in this neighbourhood, ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... length, half an hour at least having elapsed. The captains who accompanied Cortes became impatient of delay, fearing that great numbers of the Mexicans might collect to the rescue of their sovereign, and that we should be oppressed under superior force. In this dilemma, De Leon exclaimed in his rough voice to Cortes: "Why, Sir, do you waste so many words? Tell him, that if he does not instantly yield himself our prisoner, we will plunge our swords into his body: Let us now assure our lives or perish." Montezuma was much struck with the manner in which De Leon expressed ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. IV. • Robert Kerr
... part of the nation, who were possessed of the ready money. London alone contributed to the amount of near ten thousand pounds. Archbishop Morton, the chancellor, instructed the commissioners to employ a dilemma, in which every one might be comprehended: if the persons applied to lived frugally, they were told that their parsimony must necessarily have enriched them; if their method of living were splendid and hospitable, they were concluded to be opulent ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. - From Henry VII. to Mary • David Hume
... But as you ask me I must tell you what I think. You are in a sort of dilemma between this girl ...
— An Eye for an Eye • Anthony Trollope
... priesthood, whose hands bestowed the grace of ordination, could not withdraw it . . . whether, at least, the schismatic did not forfeit it by the very act of schism . . . and instead of any real answer to that fearful spiritual dilemma, they set me down to folios of Nag's head controversies . . . and myths of an independent British Church, now represented, strangely enough, by those Saxons who, after its wicked refusal to communicate with them, exterminated it with fire ...
— Yeast: A Problem • Charles Kingsley
... I won't, Lily. You must choose. It's only in Miss Edgeworth's novels that one can do right, and have one's cake and sugar afterwards, as well (not that I consider the dilemma, to-night, ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... reached Italy. Here Latinus, the reigning king, received the exiles hospitably, and promised his daughter Lavin'ia in marriage to AEneas; but she had been already betrothed by her mother to prince Turnus, son of Daunus, king of Ru'tuli, and Turnus would not forego his claim. Latinus, in this dilemma, said the rivals must settle the dispute by an appeal to arms. Turnus being slain, AEneas married Lavinia, and ere long succeeded ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... mournfully in Spanish. Redell nodded and retired to his own office, where for an hour he sat with his head in his hands, searching his agile brain for a bright idea that would lead him out of his dilemma. Suddenly he leaped to his feet, tossed his hat to the ceiling and caught it again ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... Midshipman Darrin, squirming about between the horns of the dilemma, "you just think of whatever will please Laura ...
— Dave Darrin's Fourth Year at Annapolis • H. Irving Hancock
... beauty and yet wishing with all my heart that they had never come into my possession. I compared them with a list in the box, found none missing, and returning them to the little casket carefully corded and sealed the same, and sat for a long time racking my brains for some issue from the dilemma. I was awakened from my dreams by a servant who announced that dinner was served, and that his master awaited my coming to present me to his guests. While hastily dressing, I resolved at the first opportunity to confide frankly in Chigi and to take ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney
... pathetic to think of the mediaeval students poring over a single ill-translated sentence of Porphyry, endeavoring to extract from its clauses whole systems of logical science, and torturing their brains about puzzles more idle than the dilemma of Buridan's donkey, while all the time, at Constantinople and at Seville, in Greek and Arabic, Plato and Aristotle were alive, but sleeping, awaiting only the call of the Renaissance to bid them ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... time. The shopman, with tears in his eyes, came in a hurry to Rex, and informed him that all was lost. He did not want to confess, because he must implicate his friend Rex, but if he did not confess he would be given in charge. Flight was impossible, for neither had money. In this dilemma John Rex remembered Blicks's compliment, and burned to deserve it. If he must retreat, he would lay waste the enemy's country. His exodus should be like that of the Israelites—he would spoil the Egyptians. The shop-walker was allowed half ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke
... have taken revenge by giving thee such a delectable bride." I now fell at her feet, entreated her forgiveness, and expressed my repentance; upon which, smiling upon me, she said, "Be not uneasy, for as I have plunged thee into a dilemma, I will also relieve thee from it. Go to the aga of the leather-dressers, give him a sum of money, and desire him to call thee his son; then repair with him, attended by his followers and musicians, to the house of the chief ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 4 • Anon.
... in which even the greatest find it hard to maintain their dignity, and this was one. I looked at Maignan and La Trape, and they at me, and by the light of the lanthorn which the latter held I saw that they were smiling, doubtless at the dilemma in which we had innocently placed ourselves. But I found nothing to laugh at in the position; since the people outside might at any moment leave us where we were to fast until morning; and, after a moment's reflection, ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman
... undertook to object to the Church of Ipswich; and refused to proceed, if it was invited. Of course, the aggrieved brethren persisted in their right to name the Churches on their side. Knowing that they had the right so to do, and that public opinion would sustain them in it, Parris escaped the dilemma, by calling an ex parte Council; and the Churches invited to it were those of North Boston, Weymouth, Malden, and Rowley. The first was that of the Mathers. That Parris was right in relying upon the Rev. Samuel ...
— Salem Witchcraft and Cotton Mather - A Reply • Charles W. Upham
... perceive why Corporal Van Spitter was in a dilemma. With all the good-will in the world, with every anxiety to fulfil his duty, and to obey his superior officer, he was not a seaman, and did not know how to commence operations. He knew nothing about foddering a vessel's bottom, much less how ...
— Snarleyyow • Captain Frederick Marryat
... leave those hills but a prisoner or a corpse." From the shaking of his bridle, and the nervous quivering of his manly countenance, I saw how eagerly he would have received permission to bring the French general out of his dilemma. But he was a man of honour, and I was sure of him. In the midst of a thunder of cannon, which absolutely seemed to shake the ground under our feet, the firing suddenly ceased on the enemy's side. The cessation was followed on ours; there was an extraordinary silence over the field, and ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various
... Jacobinical, notwithstanding its abolition of the liberum veto and its extension of the prerogatives of the crown, and, taking advantage of the king's absence from Prussia, speedily regained possession of the country. What was Frederick William's policy in this dilemma? He was strongly advised to make peace with France, to throw himself at the head of the whole of his forces into Poland, and to set a limit to the insolence of the autocrat; but—he feared, should ...
— Germany from the Earliest Period Vol. 4 • Wolfgang Menzel, Trans. Mrs. George Horrocks
... of this futile interview upon Lady Harman was remarkable. She took to herself an absurd conviction that this inconclusiveness had been an achievement. Confronted by a dilemma, she had chosen neither horn and assumed an attitude of inoffensive defiance. Springs in England vary greatly in their character; some are easterly and quarrelsome, some are north-westerly and wetly disastrous, a bleak invasion ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... not only rejoiced that we were not the savages you supposed, (for then Joe and I must have perished in the flames somewhere,) on our own account, but for the sake of the only man who can possibly extricate us from this dilemma," ...
— Wild Western Scenes • John Beauchamp Jones
... liar. To be false and to be a liar are not one and the same thing, though they closely resemble each other, and if he told a lie it was only when hard pressed upon some promise or some business, and in spite of himself, so as to escape from a dilemma. ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... lack of genial helpfulness about George that it sometimes vexes me to notice. You would have thought he would have welcomed the chance of assisting two old friends out of a dilemma; ...
— Three Men on the Bummel • Jerome K. Jerome
... before, hoping, by continually looking at them, to be able eventually to understand their meaning, in which hope you may easily believe I was disappointed, though my desire to understand what they represented continued on the increase. In this dilemma I determined to apply again to the shopkeeper from whom I bought the tea. I found him in rather low spirits, his shirt-sleeves were soiled, and his hair was out of curl. On my inquiring how he got on, he informed ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... If, therefore, the will is evil also when it abides by erring reason, it seems that the will is always evil when in conjunction with erring reason: so that in such a case a man would be in a dilemma, and, of necessity, would sin: which is unreasonable. Therefore the will is good when it abides ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I-II (Pars Prima Secundae) - From the Complete American Edition • Saint Thomas Aquinas
... Carlyle's character. He had just completed, after infinite labor, one of the three volumes of his History, which he left exposed on his study table when he went to bed. Next morning he sought in vain for the manuscript, and had wellnigh concluded with Robert Hall, who was once in a similar dilemma, that the Devil had run away with it, when the servant-girl, on being questioned, confessed that she had burnt it to kindle the fire. Carlyle neither stamped nor raved, but sat down without a word ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... dilemma, and it is a puzzling one, I admit. No Negro who has given earnest thought to the situation of his people in America has failed, at some time in life, to find himself at these cross-roads; has failed to ask himself at some time: What, after all, ...
— The Conservation of Races - The American Negro Academy. Occasional Papers No. 2 • W. E. Burghardt Du Bois
... frame a word of protest to the colonel, suggesting in the mildest way that that particular bowl of apple toddy be not replenished—but the Lord of the Manor had silenced him with a withering glance before he had completed his sentence. In this dilemma he had again sought ...
— Kennedy Square • F. Hopkinson Smith
... frankly. Do you really love my sister? Would you wish to see her subjected to the alternative, either to become the wife of Don Carlos Alvarez, or else to be confined in a convent, perhaps be constrained or influenced to take the hateful veil? You alone can save her from this dreadful dilemma.' ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... was in truth a veritable hat, but having been informed by his superiors that it was no hat at all, he had ventured to come into their presence as he supposed with his head uncovered by that proscribed garment. But the dilemma was, as in his former position, decided against him; and no other alternative remained to him but to resume his full-brimmed beaver, and to comply literally with the enactments of the collegiate pandect."—pp. ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... He might be a manipulator of man, but he was not—he acknowledged to himself—always successful in his manipulation of women. If Selina had found Nan in the way, or if Nan had been jealous of Selina and Selina's babies, Sir John felt that he would have been placed on the horns of a dilemma. But this had not been the case. Nan was in the schoolroom when Lady Pynsent first arrived at Culverley, and the child had been treated with kindness and discretion. Nan repaid the kindness by an extravagant fondness for her little ...
— Name and Fame - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... indeed their stay was attended with some hazard, of which, it seems, he felt aware, inasmuch as he drove them forth without ceremony. Availing themselves of his suggestion they bolted the door on the outside, thus preventing any further mischief. Here was a perplexing and unforeseen dilemma; and how to dispose of the cavalier was a question of no slight importance. At present the only alternative was to convey him to his fellow-traveller, Chisenhall, who, comfortably established in his narrow loft, was quite unconscious of the events that were ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... honest conclusion that, unless JESUS CHRIST is what He claimed to be, divine, 'GOD manifest in the flesh,' 'the Son of the Father,' then He was simply an impostor. (He could not have been a self-deceived fanatic.) Now any man is free to accept the last horn of this dilemma, if he chooses. It is a free country. But if he takes that, we insist that he is logically bound to call Christianity a cheat, a delusion, a snare and a curse to humanity! He shall not ask us to swallow the monstrous ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... stood a couple of perches from the road. In this same clump stood two horses saddled and one harnessed to a sled. The latter was the chiefs horse, and of course the vehicle was intended for carrying away the prize. While the villains stood together, planning a way out of the dilemma, the jingle of sleigh-hells was heard upon the road ...
— The Four Canadian Highwaymen • Joseph Edmund Collins
... distracted ghost at the 'wealth of Ormus and of Ind,' displayed about me. Uncle Peter followed me with perfect patience; nay, I believe, with a delight that equalled my perplexity, for, every now and then when I looked round to him with a silent appeal for sympathy in the distressing dilemma into which he had thrown me, I found him rubbing his hands and spiritually chuckling over his victim. Nor would he volunteer the least assistance to save me from the dire consequences of too much ...
— Adela Cathcart - Volume II • George MacDonald
... in what a pitiable dilemma you are placing me! Your majesty wishes Prince Henry to engage himself as soon as possible, and I must now wish it to be as ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... In this dilemma he decided to do the one thing for which Nature intended him,—to become a writer of fiction,—and he held fast to this determination in the face of most discouraging obstacles. He composed a series of short stories,—echoes of his academic years,—which ...
— The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne • Frank Preston Stearns
... suffered from some sort of emotional block that left him continually on the horns of one dilemma or another. He was psychologically incapable of making a decision if he were faced with two or more possible ...
— In Case of Fire • Gordon Randall Garrett
... back to the Mistress and laid gently at her feet the baby robin he had found. His keen teeth had not so much as ruffled its pinfeather plumage. Having done his share toward settling the bird's dilemma, Laddie stood back and watched in grave interest while the Mistress lifted the fluttering infant and put it back in the nest whence it ...
— Further Adventures of Lad • Albert Payson Terhune
... with such pains, and to stammer out something or other about the high and unexpected felicity of being presented to the most powerful, the most celebrated, and the most sincerely beloved monarch in the world, when he relieved me at once from my dilemma. He addressed me in French, speaking very quick, but distinctly, to the ...
— Frederic Shoberl Narrative of the Most Remarkable Events Which Occurred In and Near Leipzig • Frederic Shoberl (1775-1853)
... alternative explanation of his intimacy with young Robespierre. Some of his injudicious admirers, in trying to disprove his complicity with the terrorists, impale themselves on this horn of the dilemma. In seeking to clear him from the charge of Terrorism, they stain him with the charge of truckling to the terrorists. They degrade him from the level of St. Just ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... mankind. They were the prime agents of the era. They put upon a fixed law a sanction so fearful that no one could dream of not conforming to it. No one will ever comprehend the arrested civilisations unless he sees the strict dilemma of early society. Either men had no law at all, and lived in confused tribes, hardly hanging together, or they had to obtain a fixed law by processes of incredible difficulty. Those who surmounted that difficulty soon destroyed all those that lay in their way who did not. And then ...
— Physics and Politics, or, Thoughts on the application of the principles of "natural selection" and "inheritance" to political society • Walter Bagehot
... contempt that contained more logic than a long argument from another man. In fact, the whole host of rhetorical figures seemed breaking out of his face. By a solitary glance of his eye he could look a man into a dilemma, and practise a sorites, or a homemade syllogism, by the various shiftings of his countenance, as clearly as if he had risen to the full flight of his former bombast. He had, in short, a prima facie disposition to controversy; his nose was set upon his face in a kind of firm ...
— Going To Maynooth - Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of - William Carleton, Volume Three • William Carleton
... Lucy did her best to lighten the atmosphere, being indeed most truly sorry for her poor friends and their dilemma. But her pleasant girlish talk seemed to float above an abyss of trouble and discomfort, which threatened constantly to swallow ...
— Eleanor • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... directions to despatch a sufficient quantity of provisions for the people on the rock; but after making two or three trips between the parties, Mr. Wilson, the master's assistant, returned in one of the canoes to say, that the natives refused to come again without being paid. In this dilemma, Captain Burgess went across himself, and by dint of persuasion and promises of payment, he at last induced some of the natives to go to the assistance of his people; and in the course of a few hours as many were ...
— Narratives of Shipwrecks of the Royal Navy; between 1793 and 1849 • William O. S. Gilly
... understand Irish history from the reign of Henry VIII. till the fall of James II.—nearly two hundred years—without constantly keeping in mind the dilemma of the chiefs and lords between the requirements of the English Court on the one hand and of the native clans on the other. Expected to obey and to administer conflicting laws, to personate two characters, to speak two languages, to uphold the old, yet to patronize the new ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... This dilemma, which applies in so simple a case, applies equally to any wide and sweeping system of Eugenist voting; for though it is true that the community can judge more dispassionately than a man can judge in his own case, this particular question of the choice of a wife is so full ...
— Eugenics and Other Evils • G. K. Chesterton
... leave of their parents at opposite ends of the same car developed. Tannersville is not a large town and those who were on the platform that morning when the New York express pulled in understood the dilemma and smiled over it. Steve and Tom were both rather relieved when the good-byes were over and the train was ...
— Left End Edwards • Ralph Henry Barbour
... to these words, at once became to a great extent aware of the object of her visit. Her husband had, however, in years gone by in his attempt to purchase some land, obtained considerably the support of Kou Erh, so that when she, on this occasion, saw goody Liu in such a dilemma, she could not make up her mind to refuse her wish. Being in the second place keen upon making a display of her own respectability, ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... perhaps, had not every man, without exception, who spoke of it given him the same advice Dave had given—to look out for Bluffy. To have to kill a man or be killed oneself is not the pleasantest introduction to one's new home; yet this appeared to Keith the dilemma in which he was placed, and as, if either had to die, he devoutly hoped it would not be himself, he stuck a pistol in his pocket and walked out the next morning with very much the same feeling he supposed ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... resumed, with all his courtly manner, upon close of the examination, "I am in hopes that you may assist me in a singular dilemma." ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 39, January, 1861 • Various
... it after a very original manner, under the disguise of awkwardness—as the clown shows off his agility in a pantomime. Nothing comes amiss to him. By the bye, he would have been the very lad for us in our present dilemma; not a horse in England could master Ben Kirby. But we are too far from him now—and perhaps it is as well that we are so. I believe the rogue has a kindness for me, in remembrance of certain apples and nuts, which ...
— Our Village • Mary Russell Mitford
... mistress did not see his indecision as she swept from the room, and "Marse Eddie" quickly relieved him of the embarrassing dilemma by picking up the carpet-bag and passing out of the ...
— The Dreamer - A Romantic Rendering of the Life-Story of Edgar Allan Poe • Mary Newton Stanard
... Si Kedge "threw up the sponge," as Bumpus put it, and knuckled down to the half grown tyrant. Perhaps he realized that in his half boozy condition he was in no shape to grapple with the dilemma by which he and his companion found themselves faced. What with their hands tied by the fact of their guns having been taken by Cale Martin, they were perfectly helpless. And two firearms held in the hands of a couple of determined ...
— The Boy Scouts in the Maine Woods - The New Test for the Silver Fox Patrol • Herbert Carter
... sleep. He sat at the window all afternoon, dismally trying to devise way of escape from the dilemma. He did not succeed. He had gone too far now to make a confession sound reasonably convincing; and he could not desert the girl to Dale. That was not to be thought of. And he was certain that if he admitted the deception, the ...
— Square Deal Sanderson • Charles Alden Seltzer
... they stopped, in fording a brook, to water old Prince, and were suddenly startled by the sound of thunder, Albert felt a little conscience-smitten that he had not traveled more diligently toward his destination. And when he drove on a quarter of a mile, he found himself in a most unpleasant dilemma, the two horns being two roads, concerning which those who directed him had neglected to give him any advice. Katy had been here before, and she was very sure that to the right hand was the road. There was now no time to turn back, for the storm was already upon them—one of those fearful ...
— The Mystery of Metropolisville • Edward Eggleston
... old man ruminated over this dilemma—"If I pay David's debts, he will be set at liberty, and once set at liberty, he need not share his fortune with me unless he chooses. He knows very well that I cheated him over the first partnership, and he will not care to try a second; so it is to my interest to keep him shut ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... was not asked to recant, but only to accept what he had always deemed the very essence of statesmanship, a compromise. His Republican allies promptly evinced their distrust. They fully expected him to join his former associates. From them he could expect no sympathy in such a dilemma.[662] His political ambitions, no doubt, added to his perplexity. They were bound up in the fate of the party, the integrity of which was now menaced by his revolt. On the other hand, he was fully conscious that his Illinois constituency approved of his opposition to Lecomptonism and ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson
... It takes as many to make two-thirds of fourteen as it does to make two-thirds of fifteen, and the bill had only nine friends. During the pendency of a call no business could be transacted, and a serious dilemma confronted the capital removers; but, nothing daunted, Mr. Balcombe made a long argument to prove that nine was two-thirds of fourteen. Mr. Brisbin, who was president of the council and a graduate of Yale, pronounced the motion lost, saying to the mover, who was ...
— The History of Minnesota and Tales of the Frontier • Charles E. Flandrau
... which were followed by request for return of the jewels. In the meantime the District Attorney was prosecuting condemnation proceedings in behalf of the United States which he showed no disposition to abandon. The President felt himself in a dilemma, whether if it was by statute the duty of the District Attorney to prosecute or not, the President could interfere and direct whether to proceed or not. The opinion was written by Taney, then Attorney-General; it is full of pertinent illustrations as to the necessity ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... beyond a name she has picked up at random and never, to my knowledge, repeated, save in her ravings. Should she recover, the test can be easily applied, and we can judge then, how to handle the dilemma." ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... by the worldly Lucio as "something ensky'd and sainted, and almost an immortal spirit," to two [178] sharp, shameful trials, and wring out of her a fiery, revealing eloquence. Thrown into the terrible dilemma of the piece, called upon to sacrifice that cloistral whiteness to sisterly affection, become in a moment the ground of strong, contending passions, she develops a new character and shows herself suddenly of kindred with those strangely ...
— Appreciations, with an Essay on Style • Walter Horatio Pater
... despot got into a dilemma, and then he did not know how to get out of it. A boy, now and then, would be roused into open and fierce remonstrance. I recollect S., afterward one of the mildest of preachers, starting up in his place, and pouring forth on ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... affirmative; for if we are to deny every proposition that can be stated in offensive terms by its opponents, we shall never be able to affirm anything at all. But the question reminds us that until the economic independence of women is achieved, we shall have to remain impaled on the other horn of the dilemma and maintain marriage as a slavery. And here let me ask the Government of the day (1910) a question with regard to the Labor Exchanges it has very wisely established throughout the country. What do these Exchanges do when a woman enters and states that her occupation is that of a ...
— Getting Married • George Bernard Shaw
... know, Mr. Cardemon," she said, thankful to encounter even him in her dilemma. "I must have walked a great deal ...
— The Common Law • Robert W. Chambers
... character, Japhet, but you will be in a dilemma: indeed, it appears to me, that your troubles are now commencing instead of ending, and that you would have been much happier where you were, than you will be by being again brought out into the world. Your prospect is not over cheerful. ...
— Japhet, In Search Of A Father • Frederick Marryat
... Nor did this dilemma seem likely to decrease when we spied in the far distant windings of the road, dotted over with the receding black groups of priests and their supporters, a moving object approaching in our direction bearing unmistakable resemblance to the gig and broad-backed horse, but with a female ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 28. July, 1873. • Various
... that he really cannot speak without reading. Alas, he is not speaking when he is reading, so his dilemma is painful—and not to himself alone. But no man has a right to assume that his memory is utterly bad until he has buckled down to memory culture—and failed. A weak memory is oftener an ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein
... currents, soon became widely separated, and were an easy prey for the hordes of Picaroons that swarmed in that region. In no way could the "Experiment" secure a position which would enable her to protect all the merchantmen. In this dilemma it was determined to disguise the war-vessel, in the hopes that the pirates, taking her for a merchantman, would attack her first. This was done; and, as luck would have it, the Picaroons ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 1 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... sprightly and vigorous it was when the cardinal was with him, for he depended so much on everything he did, he that was at the utmost dilemma when he was absent, always timorous, jealous, ...
— Memoirs of a Cavalier • Daniel Defoe
... probably depend upon the complete state of the still, I determined to use every effort for its recovery: but I was truly at a loss how to find it; for the waters of the river were extremely turbid. In this dilemma, the blacks would have been of the most essential service, but they were far behind us, so that we had to depend on our own exertions alone. I directed the whale-boat to be moored over the place where the accident ...
— Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia, Complete • Charles Sturt
... single attribute of a clergyman, unless he became so through the imposition of some bishop's hands, who had become a bishop through the imposition of other hands, and so on in a direct line to one of the apostles. Each had repeatedly hung the other on the horns of a dilemma, but neither seemed to be a whit the worse for the hanging; and so the war ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... In this dilemma, some person suggested to the magistrates that perhaps Argia really knew which was the eldest child, and that if so, by watching her, to see whether she washed and fed one, uniformly, before the other, or gave it ...
— Xerxes - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... again became a royal prince. On being asked in the revolutionary tribunal whether he had any defense to make, he replied, 'Rather die to-day than to-morrow: deliberate about it.'" His request was granted.—The Duc de Biron refused to escape, considering that, in such a dilemma, it was not worth while. "He passed his time in bed, drinking Bordeaux wine.... Before the tribunal, they asked his name and he replied, 'Cabbage, turnip, Biron, as you like, one is as good as the other.' 'How!' exclaimed the judges, 'you are insolent!' 'And you—you ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 4 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 3 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... she was aiming at the company which I sometimes kept, or the freedom of my diversions on the English Sabbath. I thought what trifles were these compared to the dilemma in which, possibly within a few ...
— Sacred And Profane Love • E. Arnold Bennett
... a momentary dilemma one day, when, at table with several officers, he ordered one of the waiters to "take away that marine there," pointing to an empty bottle. "Your majesty!" inquired a colonel of marines, "do you compare an empty bottle to a member of our branch of the ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... which must be performed before the more intellectual part of the work can be begun, has deterred, and continues to deter, men of excellent abilities from undertaking historical work. They are, in fact, confronted with a dilemma: either they must work on a supply of documents which is in all probability incomplete, or they must spend themselves in unlimited searches, often fruitless, the results of which seldom appear worth the time they have cost. It goes against the grain to spend a great part ...
— Introduction to the Study of History • Charles V. Langlois
... looking on, or hearing of Stonor's dilemma, would have said, 'Leave the girl alone to come to her senses.' But only a stupid man would himself have done it. Stonor caught her two hands in his, and drew ...
— The Convert • Elizabeth Robins
... image-worship, but the good sense of Charlemagne was superior to such idolatry. He openly expressed his disapproval, and even dictated a work against it—the Carolinian books. The pope was therefore placed in a singular dilemma, for not only had image-worship been restored at Constantinople, and the original cause of the dispute removed, but the new protector, Charlemagne, had himself embraced iconoclasm. However, it was not without reason that the pope at ...
— History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume I (of 2) - Revised Edition • John William Draper
... the same dilemma? I suppose, of course, you mean Dr Edward," cried Nettie, with a little flash of mischievous curiosity. "Why? He has nobody but himself. I should like to know why he can't marry—that is, if anybody would have him—when he pleases. Tell me; you know ...
— The Doctor's Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... dependent upon the eyes and nerves and brain does not even tend to show that there is not another chain of antecedents in which the eyes and nerves and brain as physical things are ignored. If we are to escape from the dilemma which seemed to arise out of the physiological causation of what we see when we say we see the sun, we must find, at least in theory, a way of stating causal laws for the physical world, in which the units are not material things, such as the ...
— Mysticism and Logic and Other Essays • Bertrand Russell
... the last girl to go downstairs, and there was nobody left on either landing to hear even the most frantic thumps. Flossie rushed to the electric bell, hoping to bring a servant to her assistance; but it was out of order, and would not ring. She was in a terrible dilemma: if she made too much noise one of the teachers, or even Miss Maitland herself, might come upstairs to see what was the matter; on the other hand, there she was locked up fast and secure, missing the ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... myself into notice as a candidate. Now; if I am not grossly deceived in myself, I should unfeignedly rejoice, in case the electors, by giving their votes in favour of some other person, would save me from the dreadful dilemma of being forced to accept or refuse. If that may not be, I am in the next place, earnestly desirous of searching out the truth, and of knowing whether there does not exist a probability that the government would be just as happily and effectually carried into execution ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 4 (of 5) • John Marshall
... food; if they really supposed the chaplain's moves were as deleterious as they represent, what does it show in regard to their judgment as fitting them for place and trust? or, if the other, what of their character as to truth and veracity? Let them take which horn of the dilemma they may choose. ...
— The Prison Chaplaincy, And Its Experiences • Hosea Quinby
... all seriousness and shadow. There was no room in his happy composition for aught of sorrow or sadness, and a quick and merry wit always extricated him from every embarrassing position or perplexing dilemma." ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... within, and Alonzo departs leaving Marcel wounded. Dormida fearing trouble drags Clarinda forth and meeting Alonzo in the street they throw themselves on his honourable protection. A complete stranger, in his dilemma he escorts them to the mansion of Ambrosio, and they chance on Cleonte's chamber. She has just had a visit from Silvio (under which name Roderigo passes), who is burning with passion for her but shrinks from his supposed sister. Cleonte offers the two ladies ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. I (of 6) • Aphra Behn |
