"Reform" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... see, I object to the mania for reform and end by suggesting reforms myself. Well, one must be of one's own time, and there ...
— Musical Memories • Camille Saint-Saens
... catechumens that he did not believe what the Catechism teaches of Baptism and the Lord's Supper, etc. Thus Kurtz's Lutheranism, like that of Schmucker's, deteriorated as the years rolled on. Kurtz was a fiery advocate of "new measures," revivals, protracted meetings, Sabbath- and temperance-reform, etc., and an ardent champion of "American Lutheranism" and the Definite Platform. He violently opposed every effort at Lutheranizing and confessionalizing the General Synod. Through the Lutheran ...
— American Lutheranism - Volume 2: The United Lutheran Church (General Synod, General - Council, United Synod in the South) • Friedrich Bente
... guard myself against the supposition that so true a scholar is satisfied with the system of education which exists at the present time. Dr. Jacks looks for a reform of this system, but not from the present ...
— Painted Windows - Studies in Religious Personality • Harold Begbie
... be disturbed or further opposed. This made an opportunity for a union of all elements opposed to the reelection of Grant, leading Democrats having given assurance of support to a candidate to be nominated by what had come to be called the "Liberal Reform" party. That party held its convention in Cincinnati early in May, and named Horace Greeley as its candidate, a nomination which wrecked whatever chance the party had seemed to have. Grant was renominated by acclamation ...
— Ulysses S. Grant • Walter Allen
... never be resorted to; while Austrian protection was transferred from the Pope to the disaffected party in the Church, which consisted in a large proportion of the cardinals and of the inferior clergy who were afraid that, with the reform of abuses, they would lose their influence over the lower class of their flocks. The English diplomatic agents in Italy also firmly believed that Austria coupled with her support of the ultramontane malcontents the direct encouragement ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... much I could do to improve things generally in and about Europe, if only I had a free hand. I should not propose any great fundamental changes. These poor people have got used to their own ways; it would be unwise to reform them all at once. But there are many little odds and ends that I could do for them, so many of their mistakes I could correct for them. They do not know this. If they only knew there was a man living in their midst willing to take them in hand and arrange things for them, how ...
— Idle Ideas in 1905 • Jerome K. Jerome
... Let there be a reform of your church, an abolition of tithes, and let each sect maintain its ...
— The Olden Time Series, Vol. 6: Literary Curiosities - Gleanings Chiefly from Old Newspapers of Boston and Salem, Massachusetts • Henry M. Brooks
... were carried so far, that every one shut their doors against her, as they would have done against any one tainted with the plague; but neither hatred nor humiliation could reform a vice which custom and prejudice had so deeply rivetted in her heart. This glorious work of reformation was reserved for Angelica, her cousin, who was the only one left that would keep her company, and who lived in hopes that she should in the end be able ...
— The Looking-Glass for the Mind - or Intellectual Mirror • M. Berquin
... (Because the gracious Lord of Love was one with Him Who blessed the dying thief upon the cross), He held his way with no unfaltering steps, And gathered hope and light, and never missed To do a thing for the sake of good. And every day that glided through the world Saw some fine instance of his bright reform, And some assurance he would never fall Into the pits and traps of hell again. And thus it came to pass that Basil's name Grew sweet with men; and, when he died, his end ...
— The Poems of Henry Kendall • Henry Kendall
... Count Jean in the beginning of the 16th century left to his son Jean II the task of upholding the old ideals of the Gruyere house against the continually growing democracy in Switzerland, as well as against the advance of religious reform. Endowed with all his father's firmness, he possessed the chivalric ardor of his predecessors and a full share of their personal charm. The long and intimate relation of Gruyere and Savoy which had been interrupted ...
— The Counts of Gruyere • Mrs. Reginald de Koven
... the verge of the broken ground, awaiting the arrival of their general in chief to reform their array, and complete their preparations, ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 2 of 2) • Henry William Herbert
... make merry with his friends (Ibid, 29). What is all this but putting a premium upon immorality, and instructing people that the more they sin, the more joyous will be their welcome whenever they may choose to reform, and, like the prodigal, think to mend their broken ...
— The Freethinker's Text Book, Part II. - Christianity: Its Evidences, Its Origin, Its Morality, Its History • Annie Besant
... Gaufredi on his part acknowledged his illicit connection with her, denied all the rest, and maintained that it was the devil, by whom she was possessed, that had suggested to her all she had said. He owned that, having resolved to reform his life, Lucifer had appeared to him, and threatened him with many misfortunes; that in fact he had experienced several; that he had burnt the magic book in which he had placed the schedules of Mademoiselle ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet
... I understand it, Miles isn't guilty, but you would take advantage of the agitation to show the necessity for reform." ...
— A Hoosier Chronicle • Meredith Nicholson
... is difficult to believe that, which will make us wretched. But I will not sooth you by flattering and false hopes. We all know how fascinating the vice of gaming is, and how difficult it is, also, to conquer habits; the Chevalier might, perhaps, reform for a while, but he would soon relapse into dissipation—for I fear, not only the bonds of habit would be powerful, but that his morals are corrupted. And—why should I conceal from you, that play is not his only vice? he appears to have a ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... the Saviour of men. The world was full of evil. Society was corrupt. The state was bad. There were many giant wrongs crying out for the reformer. The apostles might have devoted themselves to the causes of social and political reform with splendid success. They might have bought only a gradual and purely friendly approach to the people whom they wished to influence, as we often do now, with some success, but the New Testament writings show that they believed ...
— Studies in the Life of the Christian • Henry T. Sell
... writing, and thundered from the editorial pulpit weekly. He gave the Crusher a policy. Castle Barfield was to be a borough at the next redistribution of seats. Its watchwords were 'Peace, Retrenchment, and Reform.' It was to uphold the traditions of Manchester in a curious blend with the philosophy, or the want of it, of Thomas Carlyle. It assailed the Vicar of All Saints' for the introduction of a surpliced choir, and it showed a bared arm and ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray
... say 'ouch!' the minute I find they prick me. Worse conditions have always been, and no doubt bad ones will survive for a time, and pass away as mankind outgrows them. I haven't the colossal conceit to suppose that I can reform the world—not even push it much faster toward the destination of good to which it is rolling. But I want to know—I want to understand, myself; then if there is anything for me to do I shall do it. It ...
— The Power and the Glory • Grace MacGowan Cooke
... stronghold. Carera, the honest and faithful, therefore proposes to become virtuous. He has, doubtless, of late experienced certain qualms of conscience respecting the trade he is at present engaged in, and he has made up his mind to abandon it. He has also resolved to reform his friend Giuseppe; and, in order that the reformation of that estimable person may be made thoroughly effectual, he has undertaken—for a consideration, most probably a share of the plunder—to point out to us, the captain-general's deputies, the various rocks, shoals, and other impediments ...
— The Rover's Secret - A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba • Harry Collingwood
... tax-gatherers; it yielded very little tribute to Constantinople beyond the supply of grain, and that by no means regularly. To remedy these abuses Justinian made a new law for the government of the province, with a view of bringing about a thorough reform. By this edict the districts of Menelaites and Mareotis, to the west of Alexandria, were separated from the rest of Egypt, and they were given to the prefect of Libya, whose seat of government was at Parotonium, because his province was too poor to pay the troops required to guard ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 11 (of 12) • S. Rappoport
... would have a dismal evening. And she was capable of such ferocious lonelinesses. He had driven away all her old friends. She would recall them now, he supposed. That would be a pity, for they were an odious gang. It would be his fault if she relapsed. It was his duty, in a way, to help her to reform. ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes
... the day as seditious, and their agitations as dangerous to the peace of the country; and Burns, though he did not become a member of the Society of the Friends of the People, was at one with them in their desire for reform. It was known also that he 'gat the Gazeteer,' and that was enough to mark him out as a disaffected person. No doubt he also talked imprudently; for it was not the nature of this man to keep his sentiments hidden in his heart, and to talk the language ...
— Robert Burns - Famous Scots Series • Gabriel Setoun
... give you two yeggs a chance to reform," concluded Mr. Gibney, addressing Tabu-Tabu. "If you show us where we can get a cargo of black coral and work hard and faithful helpin' us to get it aboard, it may help you to comb a few gray hairs. I'm goin' to take the ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... We marched before you Socialists were thought of. Who have put the bulk of the cottages of England in repair during the last half century, I should like to know—and built most of the new ones? The landlords of England! Who stands in the way of reform at the present moment? The small owner. And who are the small owners? Mainly ...
— The Mating of Lydia • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... not expect anything to come of it. Moral reform—and all that—is fine for election dope, but governments have no concern with it, these promises would not be ...
— Purple Springs • Nellie L. McClung
... saluted with some lines from the Bastard. She therefore left Bath with the utmost haste, to shelter herself in the crowds of London. Thus Savage had the satisfaction of finding, that tho' he could not reform, he could yet ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753),Vol. V. • Theophilus Cibber
... yours, but if I get hold of the banisters I shan't break any bones. Now, my dear lady, I leave you happy; your troubles are ended at last. I watched Burle closely, and I'll take my oath that he's guileless as a child. Dash it—after all, it was high time for Petticoat Burle to reform; he was ...
— Nana, The Miller's Daughter, Captain Burle, Death of Olivier Becaille • Emile Zola
... time there were comparatively few freemen remaining in all Italy, which swarmed with workhouses full of foreign-born slaves. These the rich men employed in cultivating their ground, of which they dispossessed the citizens. Caius Laelius, the intimate friend of Scipio, undertook to reform this abuse; but meeting with opposition from men of authority, and fearing a disturbance, he soon desisted, and received the name of the Wise or the Prudent, both which meanings belong to the Latin ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... it so understood by the king; but for some reason the suits against him were now dropped. Anselm's desire to visit Rome apparently arose from the general condition of things in the kingdom, from his inability to hold synods, to get important ecclesiastical offices filled, or to reform the evils of government and morals which prevailed under William. In other words, he found himself nominally primate of England and metropolitan of the great province of Canterbury, but in reality with neither power nor influence. Such a condition of things was intolerable to a man ...
— The History of England From the Norman Conquest - to the Death of John (1066-1216) • George Burton Adams
... I don't think I have seen a young English nobleman of all those whom I have looked upon that answered to the notion of "blood" so well as this young fellow did. I suppose if I made such a levelling confession as this in public, people would think I was looking towards being the labor-reform candidate for President. But I should go on and spoil my prospects by saying that I don't think the white-pine Yankee is the more generally prevailing growth, ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... yourself, Agnew. I have given you chance after chance to reform and change about. You get worse. You are a disgrace to humanity, to say nothing of Yale College. You struck at Badger to-day, ...
— Frank Merriwell's Reward • Burt L. Standish
... compelled to exercise its larger prerogative embodied in the power to tax. The right of the nation to do this had been asserted by the head of the Treasury under a Democratic administration some years before. Recognizing as he did the necessity of a reform in the system of banking, Secretary Guthrie in his report to Congress in 1855 declared that "if the States shall continue the charter and multiplication of banks with authority to issue and circulate notes as money, and fail to apply ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... be consistent, don't you? Leave all other mad and wicked people as well. Then you'll find it easier to reform ...
— A Voyage to Arcturus • David Lindsay
... her gratefully, but her cheeks were still unduly red when she answered, "I didn't know I was being so rude, and it must have sounded frightfully foolish when I answered 'yes' instead of 'no'; but I'll try to reform." ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield
... leopard may change his spots and the Ethiopian his skin, but this man—though resembling both outwardly, through his uncleanliness—never changes. His blunders, garrulity, and brainless labor, however, would transform Izaak Walton himself into a dragon of irritability. The effort to reform such a man would be heroic, indeed, but let those who enter upon such a task give their whole souls to it, and not attempt gardening at the same time—unless the garden is maintained for the sake of the man, and they, ...
— Success With Small Fruits • E. P. Roe
... the subject. The latter is said to have replied to the Pope's messenger: "Tell his Holiness that this is a small matter, and can easily be set straight. Let him look to setting the world in order: to reform a picture costs no great trouble." Later on, during the Pontificate of Pio V., a master named Girolamo da Fano continued the process begun by Daniele da Volterra. As a necessary consequence of this tribute to modesty, the scheme of Michelangelo's colouring and the ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds
... this complaint was laid in the time of Elizabeth, who, in order to reform the manners of the people, instituted a high commission in the year 1579. The commissioners were Henry Earl of Derby, Henry Earl of Huntingdon, William Lord Bishop of Chester, and others. At their sittings, which were held in Manchester, they issued orders ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... spent all her spare time with him at first, reading the Bible to him, and trying to convince him that it was not the thought of her, but God's mercy and love that had put it into his heart to repent, and desire to reform. He does not seem quite inclined to take that view of it, but he will come to it, sooner or later, for we have the sure promise that the Lord will finish the good work He has begun. We have hired a room for ...
— The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands • R.M. Ballantyne
... American city, the men who controlled it, the young editor who attempted to reform it, and the audacious girl who ...
— Little Miss Grouch - A Narrative Based on the Log of Alexander Forsyth Smith's - Maiden Transatlantic Voyage • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... Robbins. I have been a bad man, but it is not too late to reform. If you'll let me go I will leave Oreville to-night, and I will ...
— A Cousin's Conspiracy - A Boy's Struggle for an Inheritance • Horatio Alger
... dictator made serious attempts to reform the Roman state. He made it possible for freemen to become members of the Senate. He conferred the rights of citizenship upon distant communities as had been done in the early days of Roman history. He permitted "foreigners" to exercise influence upon the government. ...
— The Story of Mankind • Hendrik van Loon
... Horse Guards. Through the influence of his friends, he was made a cornet, and afterwards a captain, in the Fusileers; but this only gave him opportunity for continued dissipation. His principles were better than his conduct; and, haunted by conscience, he made an effort to reform himself by writing a devotional work called The Christian Hero; but there was such a contrast between his precepts and his life, that he was laughed at by the town. Between 1701 and 1704 he produced his three comedies. The Funeral, or Grief a la Mode; The Tender Husband, and The Lying Lover. ...
— English Literature, Considered as an Interpreter of English History - Designed as a Manual of Instruction • Henry Coppee
... I love equally—liberty and France. Well, then, as I believe in God, do I believe that both must perish in the throes of some convulsive catastrophe if all the life of the nation shall continue to be concentrated in the brain, and the great reform for which I call is not made: if a vast system of local franchise, if provincial institutions, largely independent and conformable to the modern spirit, are not soon established to yield fresh blood for our exhausted veins, and to fertilize our impoverished soil. Undoubtedly the work will ...
— Monsieur de Camors, Complete • Octave Feuillet
... own mother. Well, sir, I did what I could for both the children; but the boy was consumptive, like his father, and sleeps at Pere-la-Chaise. The girl is here—you shall see her some day. Poor Fanny! if ever the devil will let me, I shall reform for her sake. Meanwhile, for her sake I must get grist for the mill. My story is concluded, for I need not tell you all of my pranks—of all the parts I have played in life. I have never been a murderer, or a burglar, or a highway robber, or what ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... girls who come up for their first communion, 11 out of 12 were given to masturbation.[298] The medical officer of a Prussian reformatory told Rohleder that nearly all the inmates over the age of puberty masturbated. Stanley Hall knew a reform school in America where masturbation was practiced without exception, and he who could practice it oftenest was regarded with hero-worship.[299] Ferriani, who has made an elaborate study of youthful criminality in Italy, states that even if all boys and girls among the general population ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... the onslaught upon the octopus, and I am happy to say that things are going as well as the most ardent muck-raker on the most active fifteen-cent reform magazine could wish. The suit has been put on the calendar for trial in Massachusetts, and in New York State the Superintendent of Insurance is causing more trouble than we ourselves could possibly have created. There haven't been any actual results ...
— White Ashes • Sidney R. Kennedy and Alden C. Noble
... but in the name of justice we are called upon to protest against the unseemly proceeding which persecutes those excellent young men and hesitates to attack this woman, who stands as a representative of what she regards a great reform, and in its advocacy shrinks not from any of the terrors the law may have in store for her. Mr. District Attorney, it is your duty to arrest Miss Anthony; to cross swords with an antagonist worthy of your steel. Your present action ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... it always would as soon think of being conceited of eating their dinner as of doing their duty. What honest boy would pride himself on not picking a pocket? A thief who was trying to reform ...
— Pearls of Thought • Maturin M. Ballou
... everlasting discontent of the artists, after attempts at reform, repeated a score of times and then abandoned, the authorities had just invested the exhibitors with the privilege of electing the members of the hanging committee; and this had quite upset the world of painters and sculptors, a perfect ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola
... billion welfare reform proposal was introduced with funding for 400,000 public service jobs welfare reform demonstration projects were launched in communities around the country the Vice President initiated a nationwide review of youth ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Jimmy Carter • Jimmy Carter
... still, in the close communion of home life, such a woman as Catherine Grant. She influences every one that comes within the pure atmosphere of her friendship, and as unconsciously to them as to herself. She never moralizes, or commands reform. There is no parade of her individual principle in any way, but she always acts rightly; and, if her opinion is called forth, it is given promptly and ...
— Godey's Lady's Book, Vol. 42, January, 1851 • Various
... been mentioned since, he read it assiduously every afternoon upon its arrival at Leith, feeling confident that Mr. Peter Pardriff (who had always in private conversation proclaimed himself emphatically for reform) would not eventually refuse—to a prophet—public recognition. One afternoon towards the end of that month of April, when the sun had made the last snow-drift into a pool, Mr. Crewe settled himself on his south porch and opened the State ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... The elections of 1895 and of 1898 resulted in decisive victories for the Liberals and Radicals, and in the Chamber the Government was confronted by an overwhelming majority comprising a Moderate Left, a Reform or Radical Left, and a group of Social Democrats. Even in the Landsthing the Government's hold was growing less substantial. Reedtz-Thott, none the less, clung to office until December, 1899, and after his retirement there followed ...
— The Governments of Europe • Frederic Austin Ogg
... and women are told and retold. It is the public's own fault if there is not a more general interest in, and a better knowledge of, the work of the notable characters of the century than ever before. This implies, also, a certain familiarity with the great movements of reform and philanthropy, and with the literature of the time. Some, however, who had a large share in the noblest work of this century, are less known, and less brought into notice, than we should expect. Among such is Mrs. L. M. Child. Her ...
— The New England Magazine Volume 1, No. 6, June, 1886, Bay State Monthly Volume 4, No. 6, June, 1886 • Various
... when our Saxon forefathers were in the lowest stage of barbarism, they were in a state of high civilization; and to-day, although scattered, they show a compact front, firmly knit in the bonds of brotherly love, a model for Christians. The great reform movement now agitating Judaism, as well as every other species of political and metaphysical thought, will eventually aid to consolidate all the races into ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley as a Philosopher and Reformer • Charles Sotheran
... Bullock the churchwarden, as boldly as at Hodge the plowman, and Scrub the hedger. As for Mr. Stirn, he had preached at him more often than at any one in the parish; but Stirn, though he had the sense to know it, never had the grace to reform. There was, too, in Parson Dale's sermons, something of that boldness of illustration which would have been scholarly if he had not made it familiar, and which is found in the discourses of our elder divines. Like them, ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 • Various
... weeks of restless exaltation followed. He read his Bible, studied Luther's catechism and pondered the ways and means of accomplishing a reform of his church, especially a reform inspired by pen and ink. But his New Year's Night, a small book published during this period, shows his still troublesome uncertainty, his constant wavering between the old gods and the Christ of the ...
— Hymns and Hymnwriters of Denmark • Jens Christian Aaberg
... make us doubt, that his contemporaries were not mistaken in considering him as a man of parts and vivacity. Unfortunately the ill humour which the sight of the Civil List caused evaporated in jests and invectives without producing any reform. ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... the hazard of going into battle with a many-headed commander. For a moment all was confusion, and the companies in attempting to form in the face of the impetuous attack were being broken, when Isaac Shelby rushed to the front and ordered each company a few steps to the rear, where they should reform, while he, with Lieutenant Moore, Robert Edmiston, and John Morrison, and a private named John Findlay,—in all five men,—should meet the onset of the savages. Instantly the six captains obeyed the command, recognizing in the volunteer of twenty-five their ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, August, 1885 • Various
... better way. Let us go forward with an historic reform for fairness, simplicity, and incentives for growth. I am asking Secretary Don Regan for a plan for action to simplify the entire tax code, so all taxpayers, big and small, are treated more fairly. And ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Ronald Reagan • Ronald Reagan
... their ignorance and enthusiasm when their program included at least twelve bills which they proposed to have enacted into law in one session.[62] Without any friends at court it was with considerable relief that they followed advice to put them all in the hands of an influential lobbyist. Reform bills were not in his line and the session was drawing to a close with nothing done when the Gordon sisters cast precedent and propriety to the winds, telegraphed to the Senator from their district for an audience, boarded a morning train for Baton Rouge and descended upon the Capitol. Article ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI • Various
... Ideas. Civil Service Reform. Perfecting of Party Organization in the Country. Jackson and the United States Bank. His Popularity. Revival of West Indian Trade. French Spoliation Claims. Paid. Our Gold and Silver Coinage. Gold Bill. Increased Circulation of ...
— History of the United States, Volume 3 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... to support the cease-fire agreement and peace process, protect UN facilities and people, support humanitarian activities, and assist in national security reform ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... of members of the new House of Commons never before elected to Parliament is 332. This has had no parallel since the first Parliament under the Reform Bill of 1832. The ultimate figures of the election are: Liberals, 334; Conservatives, 250; Parnellites, 86. The coalition of the last two has thus a majority of two. This, compared with the last Parliament, will leave the Liberals weaker by 17 votes, and the Conservatives ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 2, February 1886 • Various
... ken like a comet. They'll see me with never a stain; But will they reform me?—far from it. We pay for our pleasure with pain; But the dog will return to his vomit, the hog ...
— Ballads of a Cheechako • Robert W. Service
... on a little farther, and came to a classical Scots word, like STOUR or DOUR or CLOUR, I should know precisely where I was - that is to say, that I was out of sight of land on those high seas of spelling reform in which so many strong swimmers have toiled vainly. To some the situation is exhilarating; as for me, I give one bubbling cry and sink. The compromise at which I have arrived is indefensible, and I have ...
— Underwoods • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of Dorothea's day-dreams. She, too, was going to be an "elder sister" and reform the home. In the flights of her imagination she saw herself making Betty and Nancy new frocks, mending Cyril's trousers, trimming her mother's hats, correcting her ...
— An Australian Lassie • Lilian Turner
... Shakespeare's contemporaries, although the duration of his life was but fifty-two years. Of these probably the most noteworthy was Gregory XIII (1572-1585), in whose reign occurred the fearful Massacre of St. Bartholomew, August 24, 1572, and the reform of the calendar from that known as the Julian to the new style named the Gregorian Calendar ...
— Shakespeare and Precious Stones • George Frederick Kunz
... learned some things that I could never have learned in college, 'cause at college you only learn things that have to be verified by actual experience in business. Pa says one year in the circus will be better for me than ten years in a reform school. But I learned something yesterday that made such an impression on me that I will not be able to sit down comfortably before ...
— Peck's Bad Boy at the Circus • George W. Peck
... the Goblin, "I will remain as long as you wish; my time is of no value; beside, if I can persuade you to reform and be a sober man, it will be worth ...
— Nick Baba's Last Drink and Other Sketches • George P. Goff
... a general holiday at the time in that city, and I lounged about the streets, looking at the crowds of people. The "Pembroke Social Reform League" was holding a mass meeting at the foot of Wellington's monument in St. George's Square to protest against the Government's building eight Dreadnaughts at a cost of 14,000,000 pounds. The crowd was all composed of working ...
— A Fantasy of Mediterranean Travel • S. G. Bayne
... from Everett clean on through Crabtree down to that very young Tucker Poteet. You are one of the women that feed and clothe and blush on men like you were borned a hundred years ago and nobody had told you they wasn't worth shucks. Are you a-going to reform?" ...
— Rose of Old Harpeth • Maria Thompson Daviess
... notable that his first public utterance, made before a local lyceum when a youth in his teens, was devoted to sentiments of social reform that foreshadowed his future work. When 'Looking Backward' was the sensation of the year, a newspaper charge brought against Mr. Bellamy was that he was "posing for notoriety." To those who know the retiring, modest, and almost diffident personality of the author, nothing could have been ...
— Looking Backward - 2000-1887 • Edward Bellamy
... for the old instead of the new has been the rock on which friendship between Briton and Boer has split. All ideas of reform have been met with suspicion—a kind of suspicion that, though now confined to the Boers, was very prevalent in Europe a hundred years ago. The present writer in extreme youth met here, in advanced England, a ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 1 (of 6) - From the Foundation of Cape Colony to the Boer Ultimatum - of 9th Oct. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... for the next seven years led the uneventful life of landed gentry of the times. The husband and wife were united in their efforts to improve the morals and general condition of their tenantry. Rightly believing that the beginning of all reform was to improve the physical condition, Howard spared no expense in rearing new cottages upon new and improved plans, held his tenants removable at will, and through their improved conditions ruled over them with an almost despotic sway, tempered ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 5 of 8 • Various
... felt himself, above all, a soldier. One of his earliest public utterances was a defense of the Prussian army against the sympathizers with the revolution of 1848. His first great political achievement was the carrying through, in the early sixties, of King William's army reform in the face of the most stubborn and virulent opposition of a parliamentary majority. Never, in the years following the formation of the Empire, did his speech in the German Parliament rise to a higher pathos than when he was asserting the military ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... order of release was made, President Lincoln remarking, with impressive solemnity, that he would expect the ladies to subdue the rebellious spirit of their husbands, and to that end he thought it would be well to reform their religion. "True patriotism," said he, "is better than ...
— Lincoln's Yarns and Stories • Alexander K. McClure
... is a reform of the administration of the army. Under the system previously existing, Chosroes found that the resources of the state were lavishly wasted, and the result was a military force inefficient and badly accoutred. No security was taken that ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 7. (of 7): The Sassanian or New Persian Empire • George Rawlinson
... both with vague noble meanings in them, which they knew so poorly how to carry out. They meant everything that was fine and great, these two young men, standing upon the threshold of their life, knowing little more than that they were fiercely opposed to each other, and meant to reform the world each in his own way; one by careful services and visitings of the poor, the other by the Liberation Society and overthrow of the State Church; both foolish, wrong and right, to the utmost bounds of human possibility. How different they felt themselves ...
— Phoebe, Junior • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... cause alleged, we may say that down nearly to the middle of the 15th century cosmographers, as a rule, made scarcely any attempt to reform their maps by any elaborate search for new matter, or by lights that might be collected from recent travellers. Their world was in its outline that handed down by the traditions of their craft, as sanctioned by some Father of the Church, such as Orosius or Isidore, ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... nowadays be called a "pragmatic" test to political affairs. Practice was the touchstone; a theory was useless unless you could prove that it had worked. It followed that he was not a democrat, opposed parliamentary reform, and held that the true remedy for corruption and venality was not to increase the size of the electorate, but to reduce it so as to obtain electors of greater weight and independence. For him a member of Parliament was a representative and not a delegate, and must act not on his elector's wishes ...
— English Literature: Modern - Home University Library Of Modern Knowledge • G. H. Mair
... absorptions—before tigers and monkeys especially. He didn't hear what went on around him. He did not appear to miss his lunch. You had to touch his shoulder to get his attention. The truant officer did this. It all led dismally to the Reform School from ...
— Son of Power • Will Levington Comfort and Zamin Ki Dost
... sound typifies the sorrow which a repentant man feels for his misconduct and his earnest determination to reform. ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various
... practical and real world,—she would begin to live now at sixty, such was his narrowness of youthful view; but the democratic sentiment is Hawthorne's. So, too, in his rhetorical impeachment of the past, though the passage is meant to summarize the point of view of reform, there is an emphasis such as ...
— Nathaniel Hawthorne • George E. Woodberry
... disposition, perhaps had met with fewer disappointments. At all events, he so wrought on Maggot's mind that he half induced him to deny his smuggling propensities for a time, and try legitimate work in the mines. Not that Joe Tonkin wanted to reform him by any means, but he was himself a little out of humour with his old profession, and sought to set his friend ...
— Deep Down, a Tale of the Cornish Mines • R.M. Ballantyne
... insisting that the "Seventh Division" was operating a thousand miles away—and all of us knowing about as much of the Sixth or Seventh Division's movements as Plato did of ping-pong! The need of Army reform was much felt and talked of. But there was behind this conflict of tongues a weary but firm determination to keep unfurled at all costs ...
— The Siege of Kimberley • T. Phelan
... teaching of the master, but because the "Giorgionesque" spirit was abroad, and the taste of the day required paintings like Giorgione's to satisfy it. But as no revolution can be effected without a struggle, and as there are invariably people opposed to any reform, whether in art or in anything else, we need not be surprised to find the academic faction, represented by the aged Giambellini and his pupils, resisting the progress of the Newer Art. In Giorgione's own lifetime, the exact measure of the opposition is not easy to gauge, but ...
— Giorgione • Herbert Cook
... least straw, "here's your chance to reform me. If you marry me I'll be a different person. I'd do anything for you. You know love is a great miracle worker. Won't you give me a chance to show you how nearly I can live up to ...
— Amanda - A Daughter of the Mennonites • Anna Balmer Myers
... began it in the monastery of the Incarnation, and finished it in the house of Dona Luisa de la Cerda, in Toledo, in the month of June, 1562. On the 24th of August, the feast of St. Bartholomew, in the same year, the Reform of the Carmelites began in the new monastery of St. ...
— The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus • Teresa of Avila
... undertook a revision of the Ordinances that had been passed by the Protector and his Council, and also of the Acts of the Barebones Parliament; and they proposed Bills of their own to supersede some of these,—especially a new Bill for the Ejection of Scandalous Ministers, and a new Bill for Reform of the Court of Chancery. But of all the incidental work undertaken by this Parliament none seems to have been undertaken with so much gusto as that which consisted in efforts for the suppression of Heresy and Blasphemy. Here was the natural outcome of the Presbyterianism ...
— The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 • David Masson
... bestow on a faithful or a wavering partisan. Young "honourables" and other needy scions of the governing classes have little ambition to undertake civic duties, while they are only onerous and expensive. Let the wedge be first applied. Let "reform" worm its way into the constitution of the Corporation, and then by degrees the whole edifice may gradually be subverted. Stipendiary magistracies and paid offices of any kind, if not too laborious, are always ...
— The Corporation of London: Its Rights and Privileges • William Ferneley Allen
... Baby Farm, 1913) assail with never-failing pungency the present governmental system in Bavaria; others (Morality, 1909, Lottie's Birthday, 1911) are directed with more general and less delicate ridicule against all sorts of common place morality and the excrescences of moral reform. Delicious are his stories of the little town, especially about the pranks that give expression to boyish impulses to incommode teachers, stern neighbors, and maiden aunts. These are told in the naively impudent language of the school-boy in Tales of Bad Boys (1904) and the continuation of ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... but rather lightened upon the subject, and reached the point by the flashings of the mind, which, like those of his eye, were felt, but could not be followed. Upon the whole, there was in this man something that would create, subvert, or reform; an understanding, a spirit, and an eloquence, to summon mankind to society, or to break the bonds of slavery asunder; something to rule the wilderness of free minds with unbounded authority; something that could establish, or overwhelm empire, and strike a blow in the world, that should resound ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... supernatural appearance in the palace of two mulberry-trees, which in a single night grew to such a size that they could hardly be spanned by two hands. The Emperor was terrified; whereupon a Minister said, "No prodigy is a match for virtue. Your Majesty's government is no doubt at fault, and some reform of conduct is necessary." Accordingly, the Emperor began to act more circumspectly; after which the mulberry-trees soon withered ...
— Religions of Ancient China • Herbert A. Giles
... and cultivated man; and upon telling him how earnestly his wife and himself had prayed for him, was rejoiced to learn that in that lonesome cell the Spirit of God had visited him, filled him with a sincere wish to reform the future and redeem the past. The missionary called again and again, and witnessed the strong determination of the young man to fight against his pernicious habit. He was soon employed again in a large house, became a regular attendant at the Lord's house, and began ...
— The Wonders of Prayer - A Record of Well Authenticated and Wonderful Answers to Prayer • Various
... of corruption. He closed it in the midst of the calamities produced by the French Revolution, when the nation was still strongly impressed with the horrors of anarchy. He changed, undoubtedly. In his youth he had brought in reform bills. In his manhood he brought in gagging bills. But the change, though lamentable, was, in our opinion, perfectly natural, and might have been perfectly honest. He changed with the great body of his countrymen. Mr Canning on the other hand, entered into public life when ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 2 (of 4) - Contributions To The Edinburgh Review • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... condition of gradual self-instruction, must he abjure the light, abdicate his reason, and abandon himself to fortune? Perfect health is better than convalescence: should the sick man, therefore, refuse to be cured? Reform, reform! cried, ages since, John the Baptist and Jesus Christ. Reform, reform! cried our fathers, fifty years ago; and for a long time to come we ...
— What is Property? - An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government • P. J. Proudhon
... are good reasons for criticism of these pages. But what has been done was done in the search for the truth, that the enthusiasm of reform may be linked with the reliability of knowledge in the efforts to better the future conditions of the city and ...
— The Negro at Work in New York City - A Study in Economic Progress • George Edmund Haynes
... participating in the nomination of a governor simply because, being in a minority, they were unrepresented in the Legislature? There was no good reason; and, although Van Buren well understood that such counties would return delegates generally favourable to Clinton, he was powerless to defeat the reform. The result was the beginning of nominating conventions, composed of delegates selected by the people, and the nomination of ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... immediately after the battle, the great patriot congratulated his countrymen on the courage which they had displayed, and at the same time pointed out the necessity of improving their discipline and military organization. One important reform should be made at once; the number of the generals, which had hitherto been fifteen, should be greatly reduced, and those appointed to the supreme command should be given absolute power, so that they might act with secrecy and despatch. Further, let the whole adult male population ...
— Stories From Thucydides • H. L. Havell
... reducing him gradually by a system of slow starvation: for myself, I confess, I am for knocking him on the head at once. Until this event, so long wished for by all the friends of Enlightenment and Progress, shall have happened, there will be no possibility of a Reform which will lessen the needless expense and shorten the unjustifiable delay which our present system of legal procedure occasions; a system which gives to the rich immeasurable advantages over poor litigants; and amounts in ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... office, to which Rabourdin had long aspired, was given to the incapable Baudoyer, who had been at the head of a bureau, through the influence of money and the Church. Disgusted, Rabourdin sent in his resignation. He had been responsible for a rather remarkable plan for executive and social reform, and this possibly contributed to his overthrow. During his career as a minister Rabourdin lived on rue Duphot. He had by his wife two children, Charles, born in 1815, and a daughter, born two years later. About 1830 Rabourdin paid ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe
... very strong attachment to her new husband and devoted herself to him from the time of her marriage with the most constant fidelity. She soon acquired a very great ascendency over him, and was the means of effecting a very considerable reform in his conduct and character. She was an ambitious and aspiring woman, and made many very efficient and successful efforts to promote the elevation and aggrandizement of her husband. She appeared, also, to take a great pride and pleasure in exercising over him, herself, a great personal ...
— Cleopatra • Jacob Abbott
... and Henry, now the boast of fame, And virtuous Alfred, a more sacred name, After a life of generous toils endured, The Gaul subdued, or property secured, Ambition humbled, mighty cities storm'd, Or laws establish'd, and the world reform'd; Closed their long glories with a sigh to find Th' unwilling ...
— Essays and Tales • Joseph Addison
... respectable Murgatroyd and the honest Milvain? I know them both and neither has the slightest appearance of being animated by you. And equally perplexing is your being mixed up with an American like that man Gidding in Peace Conferences and Social Reform Congresses and so forth. It's so—Carnegieish. There I'm surer because I've seen your name in reports of meetings and I've read your last two papers in the Fortnightly. I can't imagine you of all people, with your touch of reserve, launching into movements and rubbing shoulders with faddists. ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells
... backed up by the beginnings of their performance. Rizal witnessed this novel experience for his country with gratification, though he had seen too many disappointments to confide in the continuance of reform, and he remembered that the like liberal term of De la Torre had ended in the ...
— Lineage, Life, and Labors of Jose Rizal, Philippine Patriot • Austin Craig
... England—how Gladstone's denunciation of those atrocities aroused a wave of moral indignation and wrath which swept furiously from one end of Great Britain to the other, and even aroused the governments and peoples of the Continent of Europe. The Porte refusing to adopt satisfactory measures of reform, Russia declared war and her victorious army advanced to the very gates of Constantinople. The Treaty of San Stefano, which Russia then enforced upon Turkey, created a "Big Bulgaria" that extended from the Black Sea to the Albanian Mountains and from the Danube to the Aegean, leaving to Turkey, ...
— The Balkan Wars: 1912-1913 - Third Edition • Jacob Gould Schurman
... which he has trained to what seems to me perfection. For the last three hours that regiment alone bore the brunt of the battle, although assailed alternately by infantry and cavalry, and thus afforded time to reform the regiments that fought earlier in the afternoon and to give me hope that even were the enemy to overcome the resistance of his men, I could still be able to ...
— Won by the Sword - A Story of the Thirty Years' War • G.A. Henty
... more mischief than ever. Now when the king was riding through the country he came to the neighbourhood where Asmund was, and he sent out men-at-arms to seize him. The king then had him laid in irons, and kept him so for some time in hope he would reform; but no sooner did Asmund get rid of his chains than he absconded again, gathered together people and men-at-arms and betook himself to plunder, both abroad and at home. Thus he made great forays, killing and plundering all around. When the people ...
— Heimskringla - The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway • Snorri Sturluson
... deadly silence. He, who sold His conscience to preserve a worthless life, Even while he hugs himself on his escape, Trembles, as, doubly terrible, at length, Thy steps o'ertake him, and there is no time For parley, nor will bribes unclench thy grasp. Oft, too, dost thou reform thy victim, long Ere his last hour. And when the reveller, Mad in the chase of pleasure, stretches on, And strains each nerve, and clears the path of life Like wind, thou point'st him to the dreadful goal, And shak'st thy hour-glass in ...
— Poetical Works of William Cullen Bryant - Household Edition • William Cullen Bryant
... hell long before now—and you cannot make amends for the past by doing your duty for the future, inasmuch as your duty is only what you owe to your Maker, and you cannot do more than fulfil it: another must make amends for your past delinquencies. If you intend to reform, invoke God's blessing, His mercy, and His aid; not ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte
... representing, and combining distinct interests, classes, and opinions. In England, the House of Commons, as a representative body, is founded upon no uniform principle, either of numbers, or classes, or places; ... and in every system of reform which has found public favour in that country, many of these diversities have been embodied from choice, as important checks upon undue legislation, as facilitating the representation of different interests and different opinions, and as thus securing, by a well-balanced ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... and robberies by land were hatched within their walls; and it took centuries to reduce those pampered and arrogant ports to the safe and peaceful rank of ordinary English cities. The Revolution of 1688 did something, and the Reform Bill of 1832 did more to make Dover and her insolent sisters like the other free and equal cities of England; but to this day there are remnants of public shows and pageantries left in those old towns sufficient ...
— Bunyan Characters - Third Series - The Holy War • Alexander Whyte
... Prophet's "budget of reform," is correct as far as it goes: it embraced, however, many other matters, looking to the amelioration of savage life. Whatever may have been his original object, in the promulgation of his new code of ethics, there is enough, we think, in the character and conduct of this individual ...
— Life of Tecumseh, and of His Brother the Prophet - With a Historical Sketch of the Shawanoe Indians • Benjamin Drake
... politics, Mrs. Munger," said Putney. "Your readiness to sacrifice principle to expediency shows what a reform will be wrought when you ladies get the suffrage. ...
— Annie Kilburn - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... money with me, over two hundred dollars in clean greenbacks, as a commencement of restitution, an earnest of my reform. What do you think my father would say if he found them to-morrow morning on his pillow? Don't you think he would receive me with ...
— Major Frank • A. L. G. Bosboom-Toussaint
... is a house, which, sturdily and stubbornly, has remained what it was built for, a place of residence, despite the encroachments of commerce. But there are only four or five such. Until a few years ago this was a section of Clubland with the Reform, and the Knickerbocker, the latter at the Thirty-second Street corner, and the New York, just above the Thirty-fourth Street crossing. But the clubs, too, have moved on to the north, and the stretch of today is a riot without order or design, tailors, automats, art shops, opticians, railway ...
— Fifth Avenue • Arthur Bartlett Maurice
... to construct still more deadly and terrible engines of death. Industry is crippled, honest toil is robbed, and even beggary is taxed to defray the expenses of Christian murder. There must be some other way to reform this world. We have tried creed and dogma, and fable, and they have failed—and they have failed in all ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll - Latest • Robert Green Ingersoll
... of 1832 had been only a small step in the direction of popular government; but it opened the way for further reform. Almost immediately upon its granting, began what was known as the Chartist movement, an agitation kept up among the lower classes for a "charter" or more liberal constitution. This soon became associated with a demand ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 17 • Charles Francis Horne
... king the title of the only supreme "head" on earth of the church of England; as they had already invested him with all the real power belonging to it. In this memorable act, the parliament granted him power, or rather acknowledged his inherent power, "to visit, and repress, redress, reform, order, correct, restrain, or amend all errors, heresies, abuses, offences, contempts, and enormities, which fell under any spiritual authority or jurisdiction."[*] They also declared it treason to attempt, imagine, or speak evil against the king, queen, or his heirs; or to endeavor depriving ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. - From Henry VII. to Mary • David Hume
... these may be mentioned American Reform. In depth, in breadth, in vigor, in practical quality, this may challenge comparison with anything of a similar kind elsewhere. This is the direct outburst of a new life, arising and wrestling with the old forms, habitudes, institutions, with whatsoever is imported and traditional, on the one ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 12, October, 1858 • Various
... that may have been a source of amusement before now becomes irritating and exasperating. If the trait is a fundamental one, marriage should be even more searchingly questioned, although the wedding date may be only a few weeks off. Much has been written about the girl who marries a man to reform him; if the reformation is not completed during the engagement, the chances of ...
— The Good Housekeeping Marriage Book • Various
... he muttered as he closed the door behind her. "This is one of the penalties, I suppose, which I must pay for my privileges. I shall be called upon to reform the morals and manners, and look into the petty cares of every chuckle-headed boor and boor's brat for ten miles round. See why boys reject their mush, and why the girls dislike to listen to the exhortations of a mamma, who requires ...
— Charlemont • W. Gilmore Simms
... brought you to this condition? that's what I want to know," said the official earnestly. "And if you can explain that, you can have the place, provided you really want to reform." ...
— Snow on the Headlight - A Story of the Great Burlington Strike • Cy Warman
... was a reform of the Benedictine Order. The Order of Camaldoli which he founded was the second reform which had come out of the great brotherhood of S. Benedict; it was younger than the Cluniac but older than the Cistercian reform, and it was begun in 1012. In that year ...
— Ravenna, A Study • Edward Hutton
... upon my mind are these—failure to improve in the virtues, failure in discussion of what is learnt, inability to walk according to knowledge received as to what is right and just, inability also to reform what ...
— Chinese Literature • Anonymous
... is a picture of woman's ascendancy in the State, and the topsy-turvy consequences resulting from such a reversal of ordinary conditions. The women of Athens, under the leadership of the wise Praxagora, resolve to reform the constitution. To this end they don men's clothes, and taking seats in the Assembly on the Pnyx, command a majority of votes and carry a series of revolutionary proposals—that the government be vested in a committee of women, and further, that property and women be henceforth ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al
... times it has been made the organ of communication between the Deity and His creatures; and when, as I have seen, a dream produces upon a mind, to all appearance hopelessly reprobate and depraved, an effect so powerful and so lasting as to break down the inveterate habits, and to reform the life of an abandoned sinner, we see in the result, in the reformation of morals which appeared incorrigible, in the reclamation of a human soul which seemed to be irretrievably lost, something more than could be ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume I. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... of our older people, has a good memory. Most of the folks hereabouts had already forgotten that I was a candidate on Judge Stone's Reform and Anti-Monopoly ticket, for County Supervisor, in 1874, and that I was defeated with the rest. This was the only time I ever had anything to do with politics, more than to be a delegate to the county convention two or three times. I mention it here, because of the chance it gave ...
— Vandemark's Folly • Herbert Quick
... boisterously at village weddings. This is an abuse which, I sincerely hope, Civilization will never reform. Under cover of the noise, Fougas entered into conversation, or thought he did, with his left-hand neighbor. "Clementine!" he said to her. She raised her eyes, and ...
— The Man With The Broken Ear • Edmond About
... remark brings us to the first of the half-truths, which cause the complexity of the subject. The dramatists whose withers the well-intentioned and disastrous Collier wrung seem to have thought their best answer was to pose as people with a mission—certainly Congreve so posed—to reform the world with an exhibition of its follies. An amusing answer, no doubt, of which the absurdity is obvious! It does, however, contain a half-truth. The idea of The Way of the World's reforming adulterers—observe the quotation from Horace on the ...
— The Comedies of William Congreve - Volume 1 [of 2] • William Congreve
... you are quite right, Mr. Dinsmore," remarked Mrs. Allison. "I know we pamper our children's appetites entirely too much, as I have often said to their father; but he does not agree with me, and I have not sufficient firmness to carry out the reform by myself." ...
— Holidays at Roselands • Martha Finley
... public sentiment inscribes on the list of Executive duties, in characters too legible to be overlooked, the task of reform, which will require particularly the correction of those abuses that have brought the patronage of the Federal Government into conflict with the freedom of elections, and the counteraction of those causes which have disturbed the rightful course of appointment and have placed or continued ...
— U.S. Presidential Inaugural Addresses • Various
... not advise this," suggested the officer. "Depend upon it, if his present position is of no avail toward working change for the better—sending him to prison will harden, rather than reform him." ...
— The Iron Rule - or, Tyranny in the Household • T. S. Arthur
... the rectitude of Southern motives, that active sympathy, which can alone evoke effective assistance.... The best assurance you can give that the destinies of the negro race are safe in Southern hands is, not that the South will repent and reform, but that she has consistently and conscientiously been the friend ...
— Great Britain and the American Civil War • Ephraim Douglass Adams
... OF SWITZERLAND.—The materials for the account of it are scanty and disjointed. Since the reform of the Swiss universities during the present century, theological thought has chiefly taken the colour of the adjacent countries, Germany or France, in the respective universities where those languages are spoken. In the church of Geneva, about a quarter of a century ago, there seem to have been ...
— History of Free Thought in Reference to The Christian Religion • Adam Storey Farrar
... grand reform was made with regard to the administration of justice. The kings in those days seldom resided long in one place, and their courts followed their persons. This erratic justice must have been productive of infinite inconvenience to the litigants. It ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... as to the side of Rome, and also prone to attack the pure humanists who styled themselves Ciceronians, Erasmus was a humanist, an impassioned student of ancient letters, so that he has one foot in the Renaissance and one in reform, and withal possessed a very original brain, and ...
— Initiation into Literature • Emile Faguet
... in every region where the human race has not preserved a long consciousness of itself. The migration of the Toltecs, the most ancient historical event on the tableland of Mexico, dates only in the sixth century of our era. The introduction of a good system of intercalation, and the reform of the calendars, the indispensable basis of an accurate chronology, took place in the year 1091. These epochs, which to us appear so modern, fall on fabulous times, when we reflect on the history of our species between the banks of the Orinoco and the Amazon. We there see symbolic ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V2 • Alexander von Humboldt
... and the other to the Abbe Grimani, and I told them not to be anxious about me as I was in good hopes of soon being set at liberty, that they would find when I came out that my imprisonment had done me more good than harm, as there was no one in Venice who stood in need of reform ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... love-selfish husband had not Been so dear to her heart, or so close to her thought, As this weak, reckless sinner, who woke in her soul Its dominant wish—to reform ...
— Three Women • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... one of his masterly speeches on law reform, spoke with much truth, and in terms of severe censure, of the neglect with which public law has heretofore been treated in England, and the scanty contributions of English writers to it. And it is undoubtedly true, that, as the English language has no name by which to designate that branch ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 108, October, 1866 • Various
... designed to propagate their own private interests, and not his glory. He humbly besought His Majesty to make some gracious allowances for his vanities of youth, and to believe now he had so dearly bought discretion, at almost the price of His Majesty's eternal displeasure, that he would reform, and lead so good a life, so absolutely free from any appearance of ambition, that His Majesty should see he had not a more faithful subject than himself. In fine, he found himself, by this acknowledgement ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... always loved the saint as being the nearest possible approach to the perfection of God. Christ, through some divine instinct in him, seems to have always loved the sinner as being the nearest possible approach to the perfection of man. His primary desire was not to reform people, any more than his primary desire was to a relieve suffering. To turn an interesting thief into a tedious honest man was not his aim. He would have thought little of the Prisoners' Aid Society and other modern movements of the kind. The conversion ...
— Selected Prose of Oscar Wilde - with a Preface by Robert Ross • Oscar Wilde
... The lifting of the heart to God in praise or adoration is of greater value than the wealth of worlds. It is not enough to know much about the doctrine of the Bible, to be acquainted with this present reform, and to live a fair outward life; we must be filled with the Spirit. We must be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, whose leaf does not wither. Take plenty of time to gain heaven. Take time to be ...
— How to Live a Holy Life • C. E. Orr
... said, "you can't realize what you are saying. The stage has always been a hotbed of immorality from the very beginning of theatrical art, and nothing can reform it." ...
— The Philistines • Arlo Bates
... fast as the light of truth illumined his mind. This work he commenced in 1517, and continued from year to year till near the close of his life. In 1530, eleven years after, he began the work of reform, and sixteen before his death, he approved the Augsburg confession, as drawn up by Melancthon, although he told him in a letter during the diet, that he had yielded too much to the papists, as will be seen in the sequel. But Luther never signed any confession of faith; nor was a pledge to ...
— American Lutheranism Vindicated; or, Examination of the Lutheran Symbols, on Certain Disputed Topics • Samuel Simon Schmucker
... endeavoring with all her heart to reform a younger brother of her own, who was enough to have filled the hands of three or four red, white, and blue ribbon associations. He was a fine subject to work on, this young Harrison Lowder. Few young men have been so much reformed. He had ...
— Duffels • Edward Eggleston
... said this new party of self-styled Americans professed to have organized with a view to purify and reform the old political parties. A beautiful set, said he, to reform! The Order of Know Nothings was composed of the worst men in the Whig and Democratic parties. As a sample of these men, he pointed ...
— Americanism Contrasted with Foreignism, Romanism, and Bogus Democracy in the Light of Reason, History, and Scripture; • William Gannaway Brownlow
... expected had actually broken out. This rendered Lord Castlereagh, then Colonial Secretary, the more anxious to obtain the advice of a sensible, clear-headed man like Samuel Marsden, and he was encouraged to explain his views. First, he was anxious for whatever would tend to reform the convicts; and having observed that the most respectable of these were such as had married, or whose wives had come out to them, he begged that, for the future, the families of the married men might be sent out with them. This was refused; but his representation that the convicts ...
— Pioneers and Founders - or, Recent Workers in the Mission field • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... and end the war. To do that was nearly as important as it had been to win the victory. To be sure his troops were worn, but as compared with the shattered condition of the enemy, his army was ready for dress parade. So the enemy was allowed to cross the Potomac at leisure, reform, reorganize, and the war was needlessly prolonged. It was this neglect which, more than any other one thing, undermined the ...
— The Life of Abraham Lincoln • Henry Ketcham
... departments of the government. His attacks upon capital punishment and barbarous prison treatment resulted in laws which mitigated the former harsh conditions, and his criticism of the banking institutions in the crisis of 1843 led to considerable reform in that quarter. His bitter attacks on political and social conditions made many enemies. One evening, he was waylaid by several assailants and given a whipping. He was imprisoned, but he wrote in prison as well ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 6, 1921 • Various
... a few years of privileged intercourse and correspondence, which were the happiest years in Michael Angelo's life, it ended for this world when he stood mourning by her lifeless clay. 'I was born a rough model, and it was for thee to reform and re-make me,' the great painter had written humbly of ...
— The Old Masters and Their Pictures - For the Use of Schools and Learners in Art • Sarah Tytler
... twenty-four hours ago, when they had parted for ever. As he had entered the hall he had half wondered to himself if there could be anybody in the world that day happier than himself. Tall, well-connected, a vice-president of the Tariff Reform League, and engaged to the sweetest girl in England, he had been the envy of all. Little did he think that that very night he was to ...
— Happy Days • Alan Alexander Milne
... come from," he rejoined, "the sport of racing is pure, and only the most high-minded men take part in it. Their desire is not to make money, but merely to improve the breed of British horses. I grieve to find that here the case is otherwise. Reform the Sport, Sir; reform it, and make ...
— Punch Among the Planets • Various
... been thoroughly prepared for life, who can stand on her own feet if circumstances require it, or who brings with her as housewife the foundations of further self-development, instead of the pretentiousness of the half educated." In one of her many articles on the subject of school reform she points to three directions where reform is needed. What she says about the teaching of history is so characteristic of her views and of the modern movement in Germany, that I think the whole passage is ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... religious congregation founded in Italy (1524) by Gaetano de Tiene and Giovanni Pietro Caraffa, archbishop of Theato (the modern Chieti)—who afterward became pontiff of Rome, under the title of Paul IV. Their object was to reform the disorders that had crept into the Roman church, and restore the zeal, self-sacrifice, and charity of apostolic days. They would neither own property nor ask alms, but worked at various trades and were thus ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803, Volume II, 1521-1569 • Emma Helen Blair
... so much for the sake of the income he derived from them as because they afforded a livelihood to a large number of workmen. He had, therefore, ample means to leave to his son, should the latter accept his offer and reform his life, without the estates of Upmead. When he saw you, he told me his conscience was moved. He had, of course, a legal right to the estates, but he had purchased them for a sum not exceeding a fifth of their value, and he considered that in the twenty years he had held them he had drawn ...
— When London Burned • G. A. Henty
... they are inseparable since the work was begun. They always had a leaning to each other, and now I hear they pass their time between the steps of the Carlton and Reform Clubs." ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... to reform the world, which, through decay of faith, is much corrupted. For who is occupied in devotion today, who thinks of obeying the will of ...
— The Pharaoh and the Priest - An Historical Novel of Ancient Egypt • Boleslaw Prus
... everybody who knows. The more you mixed with the innermost ring in every polity or profession, the more often you met Sir Wilson Seymour. He was the one intelligent man on twenty unintelligent committees—on every sort of subject, from the reform of the Royal Academy to the project of bimetallism for Greater Britain. In the Arts especially he was omnipotent. He was so unique that nobody could quite decide whether he was a great aristocrat who had taken up Art, or a great artist whom the aristocrats had taken ...
— The Wisdom of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... dear sir, and you would remind me that the ceremonial rites should not be omitted. Ma foi, I beg your pardon, but as I have but one son, and it is the first time I have ever thought of marrying him, I am still serving my apprenticeship, you know; come, I will reform." And Morcerf with a forced smile arose, and, making a low bow to M. Danglars, said: "Baron, I have the honor of asking of you the hand of Mademoiselle Eugenie Danglars for my son, the Vicomte Albert ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... fury, suffered calumny, detraction, and abuse; they faced kings, high ecclesiastics, and all the rich and great ones of their day, incessantly and courageously reprimanding their injustice and demanding reform. Since the memorable day when Fray Antonio de Montesinos proclaimed himself "vox clamantis in deserto" before the astonished and incensed colonists of Hispaniola, the chorus of rebuke had swelled until it made itself heard, sparing none amongst the offenders against equity and humanity. The ...
— Bartholomew de Las Casas; his life, apostolate, and writings • Francis Augustus MacNutt
... that I belong to a society whose object is moral reform. Ask her if ever she heard from my mouth one word of gallantry, or if ...
— The Queen's Necklace • Alexandre Dumas pere
... hypocrisy, and injustice, and inclines the world to overlook, disregard, or even condone, what in them is considered small vices, eccentricities of genius, but which in a private person are magnified into mountains of viciousness, and call forth an army of well meaning but inconsistent people to reform them by ...
— Life, Letters, and Epicurean Philosophy of Ninon de L'Enclos, - the Celebrated Beauty of the Seventeenth Century • Robinson [and] Overton, ed. and translation.
... a trifle doubtful; granted; but what does the wife take by her remonstrance? Most probably a quarrel; possibly a good-natured peccavi for the sake of being let off the continuance of the sermon; perhaps a yawn; most certainly not reform. If the man is a man of free speech and broad humor by nature and liking, he will remain so to the end; and what the censorship of society leaves untouched, the interference of a wife ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous
... Twain in that city to-day. It vividly called attention to the neglect of the old North Street graveyard. The gruesome vision of the ancestors deserting with their coffins on their backs was even more humiliating than amusing, and inspired a movement for reform. It has been effective elsewhere since then, and may still be read with profit—or satisfaction—for in a note at the end the reader is assured that if the cemeteries of his town are kept in good order the dream is not leveled at his town at all, but "particularly ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine |
