"Attain" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... part of man to attain to godliness were by the schoolmen said to deserve grace de ...
— The Church Handy Dictionary • Anonymous
... great eminence. That the titled and wealthy should advance to power and influence in a government peculiarly influenced by such recommendations, is not strange. Any son of a great English house, who has ambition, and a reasonable share of brains, may attain, with comparative ease, eminence in the state. An apt example is Lord Russell, who, with but little genius, with no oratorical force, and hardly more than medium capacity as a statesman, has become the leader of the predominant party, by dint of shrewdness, a persevering spirit, and ambition, ...
— Continental Monthly - Volume 1 - Issue 3 • Various
... of all eyes and a watchful dumbness settled down upon them like a pall. Frantically she tried to remember her instructions. But never had a light conversational manner seemed more difficult to attain. ...
— The Window-Gazer • Isabel Ecclestone Mackay
... then is she known, and who can tell us any tidings concerning her? Destruction and death assure us, that they have heard with their ears of her fame and renown. It is, then, in dying to all things, and in being truly lost to them, passing forward into God, and existing only in Him, that we attain to some knowledge of the true wisdom. Oh, how little are her ways known, and her dealings with her most chosen servants. Scarce do we discover anything thereof, but surprised at the dissimilitude betwixt the truth we ...
— The Autobiography of Madame Guyon • Jeanne Marie Bouvier de La Motte Guyon
... Mrs. Custance is not a woman, merely a psychological problem to me. She cares for only one person—herself, and that self she regards as a celestial body around which all other lesser bodies should revolve. To attain this necessary consummation she adopts a chameleon character, altering herself to suit all who approach her. To you she is sweet, and inclined to gush; to me, a woman whose interests are in the stern affairs of life; to another an artist—something ...
— Grey Town - An Australian Story • Gerald Baldwin
... you have but limited comprehension. I told you Villefort was ambitious, and to attain this ambition Villefort would sacrifice everything, even ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... dramatist exposing the pretensions of folly; but let her remember that those who thus excel, to all that Nature bestows and books can teach must add besides that consummate knowledge of the world to which a delicate woman has no fair avenues, and which, even if she could attain, she would never be supposed to have come honestly by.... Women possess in a high degree that delicacy and quickness of perception, and that nice discernment between the beautiful and defective which comes under the denomination ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VII • John Lord
... their laws and we half believe in something, whereas often the savage, not being troubled with religion, fears less, because he half believes in nothing. For very few inhabitants of this earth can attain either to complete belief or to its absolute opposite. They can seldom lay their hands upon their hearts, and say they /know/ that they will live for ever, or sleep for ever; there remains in the case of most honest men an element ...
— The Ancient Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... between Dollmann and Dollmann's daughter, the living and breathing symbols of the two polar passions he had sworn to harmonize, he kept an equilibrium which, though his aims were nominally mine, I could not attain to. For me the man was the central figure; if I had attention to spare it was on him that I bestowed it; groping disgustfully after his hidden springs of action, noting the evidences of great gifts squandered ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers
... in the same manner as the Bachelor Samson Carrasco, of fixing the weathercock La Giralda of Seville for weeks, months, or years, that is, for as long as the wind shall uniformly blow from one quarter. To this degree of popularity the author had the hardihood to aspire, while, in order to attain it, he assumed the daring resolution to keep himself in the view of the public by ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott
... That is the Precept; but he went no farther, leaving the Business of Committee Men, Ways and Means, &c. to the peculiar Turn of Thought, or Biass of Invention of every individual Money-Getter. Of all the Methods made use of to attain this great End, I believe it will be allow'd that he who gains his point the easiest way, is the wisest Person: For instance, I know there are Mines of Gold and Silver in Peru and Mexico; but when one considers at what a very inconvenient distance these are, and what Toils ...
— The Tricks of the Town: or, Ways and Means of getting Money • John Thomson
... taken. How can you tell where he may be, or whether it may not suit him to find his rest in your own cupboard, or under your own bed? And then, as escape without notice will of course be the felon's object, to attain that he will probably cut your throat, and the throat of everybody belonging to you. All which considerations give an interest to Princetown, and excite in the hearts of the Devonians of these parts a strong affection for the Dartmoor prison. Of those who visit Princetown ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... human hopes and aspirations are continually doomed to perish unfulfilled; and were it not that "Hope springs eternal in the human breast," all faith, all energy, all life, and all success would be at an end, as then we should know that most of our efforts are futile, whereas now we hope they may attain complete fruition. Yet, on the other hand, we learn that the fruit of dreamy hoping is waking blank despair. We were again in a region of scrubs as bad and as dense as those I hoped and thought, I had left ...
— Australia Twice Traversed, The Romance of Exploration • Ernest Giles
... only on the males, and attain their full size only when these have reached their seventh year. In the yearlings appear two knobs, about an inch in length; in two-year-olds, these knobs have become spikes a foot high; in the third year they begin to palmate, and antlers ...
— The Hunters' Feast - Conversations Around the Camp Fire • Mayne Reid
... depict grief, the abjectness of poverty, Lazarus's dunghill. That may be within the domain of art and philosophy; but, by representing poverty as so ugly, so base, and at times so vicious and criminal a thing, do they attain their end, and is the effect as salutary as they could wish? We do not dare to say. We may be told that by pointing out the abyss that yawns beneath the fragile crust of opulence, they terrify the wicked rich man, as, in the time ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... complexity, where there is unquestionably an evident correspondence. Therefore it is that a machine, although conforming to the prime condition of subjectivity in being a circumscribed system of matter in motion, nevertheless does not attain to subjectivity: the x does not rise to z because the internal processes of x are not sufficiently intricate, or their intricacy is not of the appropriate kind. From which it follows that although, as I have ...
— Mind and Motion and Monism • George John Romanes
... or of form. Seeing that all sleep, deposited together in the earth, why do men foolishly seek to treat each other injuriously? He who, after bearing this admonition, acts in conformity therewith from his birth onwards, shall attain the highest blessedness" (Ibid, xi. ...
— The Freethinker's Text Book, Part II. - Christianity: Its Evidences, Its Origin, Its Morality, Its History • Annie Besant
... it was not too late to join the armies of Napoleon's enemies. Schill might move into Bohemia, or to some point on the northern coast where he would be within reach of English vessels. But in any case quick and steady decision was necessary; and this Schill could not attain. Though brave even to recklessness, and gifted with qualities which made him the idol of the public, Schill lacked the disinterestedness and self-mastery which calm the judgment in time of trial. The sudden ruin of his hopes left him without a plan. He wasted ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... making those assistants, or advisers, feel that their interests were the same, that they were prepared to pay liberally for services strenuously rendered. By this system servants and sub-contractors worked for them with all the zeal of friends, and by this system the tenantry of Middleton will attain a degree of comfort and prosperity hitherto unknown, while the estate they occupy will be largely ...
— Rides on Railways • Samuel Sidney
... perception as was imagined in so intelligent a man, excited at first the surprise of Major Denham, but perhaps, just the same would a European have felt, under similar circumstances. Were a European to attain manhood without ever casting his eye upon the representation of a landscape on paper, would he immediately feel the particular beauties of it, the perspective and the distant objects of it? It is from our opportunities of contemplating works of art, even in the common walks of life, ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... never greater than in adversity, and whose favourite excitement was to aim at the impossible, had never been more resolved on a Dukedom than when the Reform Act deprived him of the twelve votes which he had accumulated to attain that object. While all his companions in discomfiture were bewailing their irretrievable overthrow, Lord Monmouth became almost a convert to the measure, which had furnished his devising and daring mind, palled with prosperity, and satiated with a life of success, with an object, and the ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli
... this digression, let me insist strongly once again on the fact that true progress will come only to those who seek to attain it. ...
— AE in the Irish Theosophist • George William Russell
... six and a half cents a head for inferior sheep, and seven and a half cents for the better quality, and a good hand shears from sixty to eighty in a day. It is not likely that sheep-raising will attain anything of the prominence which cattle-raising is likely to assume. The potato beetle "scare" is not of much account in the country of the potato beetle. The farmers seem much depressed by the magnitude and persistency of ...
— A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains • Isabella L. Bird
... with their position, or who are desirous of gaining the King's favour, or who wish to become famous among the people, or who are oppressed by the members of their own caste, or who want to injure their caste fellows, or who are spies of the King, or who have any other object to attain. ...
— The Kama Sutra of Vatsyayana - Translated From The Sanscrit In Seven Parts With Preface, - Introduction and Concluding Remarks • Vatsyayana
... will we come to thee, our Consuming Fire. And thou wilt not burn us more than we can bear. But thou wilt burn us. And although thou seem to slay us, yet will we trust in thee even for that which thou hast not spoken, if by any means at length we may attain unto the blessedness of those who have not seen ...
— Unspoken Sermons - Series I., II., and II. • George MacDonald
... first essay in settling, one of our sooty satyrs could do nothing for some minutes but fidget and skip; and with his eyes sparkling, and countenance beaming with ecstacy, exclaim, "Dam my eye, pambucan; dam my eye, pambucan!" such being the nearest point they can attain to the right pronunciation of their ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume 10, No. 271, Saturday, September 1, 1827. • Various
... To attain the skill in oratory which would enable the pupil to make a successful appearance in the Forum, he must have gone through an elaborate training in the art of rhetoric. Cicero does not tell us whether he himself ...
— Social life at Rome in the Age of Cicero • W. Warde Fowler
... that which the old man had promised him. He acquainted her with that which he had seen [in his sleep] and she fell to condoling with him and comforting him, saying, "Grieve not, O my son, for, an God the Most High have appointed thee aught of [good] fortune, thou wilt attain thereto without either travail or toil; but I would have thee be understanding and discreet and leave these things which have brought thee to poverty, O my son, and eschew singing-wenches and the commerce of youths ...
— Alaeddin and the Enchanted Lamp • John Payne
... produce a capital effect, and you can create a new type of stage bully; when you have gotten accustomed to this sort of thing, and no longer feel this burning indignation, you must feign it. Strike out in a path of your own, and you will be sure to attain success—far more so than if you attempt to follow in another's footsteps. Fracasse, as you represent him, loves and admires courage, and would fain be able to manifest it—he is angry with himself for being such an arrant coward. When free from danger, he dreams of nothing ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... hardy soldier, accustomed only to war in the open, will become a good cragsman in fewer weeks than it will take him years to learn to be so much as a fair woodsman; for it is beyond all comparison more difficult to attain proficiency in ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume One - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1769-1776 • Theodore Roosevelt
... need not be poetry. What rhythmical poetry is in essence, the critics have not yet agreed to say; but, roughly speaking, it may be described as the language of imagination and of passion, as opposed to verse which is the vehicle, merely, of fancy and of feeling. Many can attain to the latter; the former is open only to the few. The one is the natural expression of poetic genius; the other is that of the natures which can lay claim only to poetic sentiment. The one is exceptional; the other, luckily, is tolerably widespread. The writers of verse which is not ...
— By-ways in Book-land - Short Essays on Literary Subjects • William Davenport Adams
... these two or three notes, and deliver them if you like the addresses. I wrote them for you this morning. Farewell, my clerk has been waiting this hour to begin a d-d information.' And away walked Mr. Pleydell with great activity, diving through closes and ascending covered stairs in order to attain the High Street by an access which, compared to the common route, was what the Straits of Magellan are to the more open but ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... with desire, delirious from passion and rapturous exactions (exigencies), her maddening look exciting me in the highest degree will arouse all the strength I possess, and enable me to exhaust her so completely that she herself will attain the height of happiness; the greater the refinement and delicacy of my caresses the greater will be your happiness, the more languishing will your eyes become, the more will your pretty mouth unclose itself, the more will your tongue become agitated, ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous
... one of the most lucid and distinguished salubrists of the day. Everything that can assist a boy or girl quickly to attain to the status of honourable and decrepit old age is here carefully set forth. The author guarantees that if his instructions are carried out the conditions of centenarianism can be reached in ten years. "Lobster salad ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, June 17, 1914 • Various
... man, under such circumstances, reaching a very high standpoint, arriving at very lofty knowledge of the problems of fate and life, and at the same time finding a ban laid upon him, a tacit [Greek: anagke], not to reveal it to others, it being hinted to him that those who would attain to it at all must attain to it as he has himself attained, by finding out the ...
— Memoirs of Arthur Hamilton, B. A. Of Trinity College, Cambridge • Arthur Christopher Benson
... had gauged the pace of his own running, had arrived to receive it in his outstretched hands. He failed altogether in calculating the speed of the Tortoise. He suddenly forgot which way to push the tiller in order to attain the result he desired. A wild cry from Priscilla confused him more than ever. He was dimly aware of a sudden check in the motion of the boat. He saw Priscilla start up, and then the lady, who a moment before was standing in the sea, precipitated herself head ...
— Priscilla's Spies 1912 • George A. Birmingham
... thrusts, the troops labouring under the delusion that the trenches were filled with the liquids indicated. At all events they were not there during the rehearsals in spite of the hot weather. But if these diversions caused us to attain the boiling point of excitement, the arrival of General Byng on May 21st to witness a special stunt by the 7th almost burst the thermometer. A source of some interest was the presence of an American battalion consisting of raw troops of three weeks' New York training, to which the 127th ...
— The Seventh Manchesters - July 1916 to March 1919 • S. J. Wilson
... nevertheless, attained a certain majestic simplicity of style unlike any tiring else (not only in any writings of their own nation, their alleged sacred writings, and infinitely superior to any thing which their successors, Jews or Christians, though with the advantage of these models, could ever attain,) but, unlike any acknowledged human writings in the world, and possessing the singular property of being capable of ready transfusion, without the loss of a thought or a grace, into every language spoken by man: he must believe that these fabricators of fiction, ...
— Reason and Faith; Their Claims and Conflicts • Henry Rogers
... Was there ever a passage like this? The sympathy of the writer is wholly with the child, and the child's absolute indifference to his own sufferings. It might have been safely predicted that this man, should he ever attain to pathos, would be free from the facile, maudlin pathos ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson • Walter Raleigh
... certain point his task was easy. It is easy to say that a bad life, a rebellious temper, a selfish spirit are hopeless disqualifications for judging spiritual things; that we must take something for granted in learning any truths whatever; that men must act as moral creatures to attain insight into moral truths, to realise and grasp them as things, and not abstractions and words. But then came the questions—What is that moral training, which, in the case of the good heart, will be practically ...
— The Oxford Movement - Twelve Years, 1833-1845 • R.W. Church
... real happiness to me: it was that on which Prince Eugene, whose kindness to me I have never forgotten, was proclaimed viceroy of Italy. Truly, no one could be more worthy than he of a rank so elevated, if to attain it only nobility, generosity, courage, and skill in the art of governing, were needed; for never did prince more sincerely desire the prosperity of the people confided to his care. I have often observed how truly happy ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... much interested in your letter. Needless to say that I wish you the success that you are sure to attain. One word of advice. If I were you, while you are at Southampton, I should manage to be a good deal more at the hotel than you appear to be. You cannot have much opportunity for conversation on board the yacht, but at the hotel ...
— If Only etc. • Francis Clement Philips and Augustus Harris
... competition. The inefficiency of customary services and the high prices charged by selfish privilege were constant invitations to men to become competitors. Men strove to break over the barriers of custom and of prejudice. Their efforts to attain freedom to compete was the vital force of the time. The industrial history of the Middle Ages was largely the story of the struggle of the forces of competition against the ...
— Modern Economic Problems - Economics Vol. II • Frank Albert Fetter
... plaything—a thing to be cared for, taught, governed, disposed of, with the greatest affection and delight; but John's was a higher style of kindness, that entered into all her innermost feelings and wants; and his was a higher style of authority too, that reached where theirs could never attain; an authority Ellen always felt it utterly impossible to dispute; it was sure to be exerted on the side of what was right, and she could better have borne hard words from Mr. Lindsay than a glance of her brother's eye. Ellen made no ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner
... happily he will be out of that. Wilmarth and Eugene take the first, and the others are quite capable of managing the last. He has a secret pity for Wilmarth, and yet he knows he has been Eugene's worst enemy, that he would not have scrupled at any ruin to attain his end. That he is Marcia's husband he must always regret, and they have not yet ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... easily proved:—We may observe even in young children that they are full of spirit almost as soon as they are born, whereas some of them never seem to attain to the use of reason, and most of them ...
— The Republic • Plato
... boy's voice was tense and eager. He hurried forward, drawing his companion with him, and side by side they began the mounting of the stone steps—those steps, flanked by the row of houses, that rise one above the other, as if emulous to attain ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... of my gratitude, which, how great soever it is, will never attain the height of your eloquence and ...
— Madame Bovary • Gustave Flaubert
... good descent, he constituted himself the champion of hereditary privileges, and as such virtually threw down the gauntlet to his imperial master. Open rebellion, however, was not the plan which he proposed to himself by which to attain the object dearest to his heart—the re-embodiment of the Janissaries, and the establishment of the old order of things. To this end he consented, in 1823, to make a demonstration against the Greek rebels, but took very ...
— Herzegovina - Or, Omer Pacha and the Christian Rebels • George Arbuthnot
... revealed to our progressive souls, then how contemptibly insignificant will appear the learning of the wisest of earth's sages! how infinitesimal the wisdom of Solomon himself! For to such knowledge we must and shall attain; knowledge wisely barred from our attainment in this earthly existence, lest in our presumption we should rebel against God, and, like Lucifer of old, endeavor to make ourselves equal to Him who is the Author of our spiritual being. Yet in every soul is implanted a yearning for this forbidden ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 5, November, 1863 • Various
... the snow for the ripened grass whereby they must live throughout the winter. They were driven forth to the open range and left there, and the Double-Crank settled down to comparative quiet and what peace they might attain. Half the crew rolled their beds and rode elsewhere to spend the winter, returning, like the meadowlarks, with the first hint of soft skies ...
— The Long Shadow • B. M. Bower
... regions, from the number of antagonist species being greater. N.B. Humboldt, when in London, told me of some river (14/3. The Obi (see "Flora Antarctica," page 211, note). Hooker writes: "Some of the most conspicuous trees attain either of its banks, but do not cross them.") in N.E. Europe, on the opposite banks of which the flora was, on the same soil and ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin - Volume I (of II) • Charles Darwin
... expulsion of her king; France needs tranquillity to establish on solid foundations the throne of her young monarch. You need, as much as we do, that interior condition of repose which, thanks to the energy of our government, we are about to attain. ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... says the Mahabharata, "where women are treated with respect, the very gods are said to be filled with joy. Women deserve to be honoured. Serve ye them. Bend your will before them. By honouring women ye are sure to attain to the fruition of all things." And the rash teachers of our youth would have persuaded us that this generous lesson was first ...
— Essays • Alice Meynell
... against the Faith in Ireland: and it has completely failed. I know of no example in history of failure following upon such effort. It had behind it in combination the two most powerful of the evil passions of men, terror and greed. And so amazing is it that they did not attain their end, that perpetually as one reads one finds the authors of the dreadful business now at one period, now at another, assuming with certitude that their success is achieved. Then, after centuries, it is almost suddenly ...
— First and Last • H. Belloc
... many a bang, Hard crab-tree and old iron rang; While none that saw them cou'd divine To which side conquest would incline, 835 Until MAGNANO, who did envy That two should with so many men vie, By subtle stratagem of brain, Perform'd what force could ne'er attain; For he, by foul hap, having found 840 Where thistles grew on barren ground, In haste he drew his weapon out, And having cropp'd them from the root, He clapp'd them underneath the tail Of steed, with pricks as sharp as nail. 845 The angry ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... precepts are indications of what, on our journey to perfection, we are already fully able to avoid, and what we must labor to attain now, and what we ought by degrees to translate into instinctive and unconscious habits. But these precepts, far from constituting the whole of Christ's teaching and exhausting it, are simply stages on the way to ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy
... occasions at Congresses of the Archaeological Institute, the Cambrian Association, and other kindred bodies, by means of which he was enabled to maintain an intercourse with contemporary fellow-labourers in the archaeological field, and to attain that familiarity with different classes of antiquities which he turned to such account in the discussion and classification of the early remains ...
— Archaeological Essays, Vol. 1 • James Y. Simpson
... acknowledged to be far superior to the latter in its architectural details, and few, if any, Italian churches can be said to surpass it, either in general composition or external effect, although it must be admitted that everything having been sacrificed to attain the latter quality, S. Paul's taken as a whole, is neither worthy of its fine situation nor of ...
— Our Homeland Churches and How to Study Them • Sidney Heath
... finest exhibition plants. Pot them singly in 2-in. or 3-in. pots; stand them on coal ashes in a cold frame, and re-pot them in March or April in 6-in. pots, making the soil moderately firm. When they attain the height of 6 in. pinch off the extreme point of the shoot, which will induce the growth of side-shoots. Shift the plants from time to time into larger pots, until at the end of May they receive their final shift into 10-in. ...
— Gardening for the Million • Alfred Pink
... too ambitious of court favor, sacrificing his time in attendance on levees, his repose, his liberty, his virtue, and perhaps his friends, to attain it, I have said to myself, This man gives too ...
— From Boyhood to Manhood • William M. Thayer
... made the day less sacred to multitudes. With it will vanish that habit of periodic calm, which, even when it has become so largely void of conscious meaning, is, one may safely say, the best spiritual boon ever bestowed upon a people. The most difficult of all things to attain, the most difficult of all to preserve, the supreme benediction of the noblest mind, this calm was once breathed over the whole land as often as sounded the last stroke of weekly toil; on Saturday at even began the quiet and the solace. With the decline ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing
... that the nervous elements in the brain serving as connections between sensory regions—whether one conceive of them as centers (Flechsig), or as bundles of commisural fibers (Meynert, Wernicke)—are hardly outlined in the lower mammalia and attain only a mediocre development in the ...
— Essay on the Creative Imagination • Th. Ribot
... for art, draw instinctively, and get on almost without teaching; though never without toil. It is true, also, that of inferior talent for drawing there are many degrees: it will take one person a much longer time than another to attain the same results, and the results thus painfully attained are never quite so satisfactory as those got with greater ease when the faculties are naturally adapted to the study. But I have never yet, in the experiments I have made, ...
— The Elements of Drawing - In Three Letters to Beginners • John Ruskin
... keep alive the spirit of resistance and of hope, and prepare the time when the country shall make a general effort. Until that time comes, my son, resistance against the English power is vain. Even were it not so, you are too young to take part in such strife, but when you attain the age of manhood, if you should still wish to join the bands of Wallace—that is, if he be still able to make head against the English—I will not say nay. Here, my son, is your father's sword. Sandy ...
— In Freedom's Cause • G. A. Henty
... sleep, and preferred to spend his time in his shop, which was grown greatly, chatting with his customers, and bowing the ladies to their chariots. I need hardly say that this worthy man was on far better terms than his family with those personages whose society they strove so hard to attain. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... passed a telephone, to speak with Dudley Hamilt, Felicia found herself—happy, happy with the same haunting happiness with which she had long ago untangled the puzzle of the lost garden, happy with the aching happiness that longs to attain and ...
— Little Miss By-The-Day • Lucille Van Slyke
... himself for ever to a dubious renown, and depriving his country of the honest fame of having preserved through centuries, by mere oral transmission, a portion, at least, of the antique Irish literature. To the magnanimity of his own heroes he could not attain:— ...
— Early Bardic Literature, Ireland • Standish O'Grady
... now urged upon her, finally be convinced of her sins, and voluntarily bring the system of slavery to an end. I claim not that the predictions I present will be fulfilled. I only say, that if Abolitionists go on as they propose, such results are more probable than those they hope to attain. ...
— An Essay on Slavery and Abolitionism - With reference to the duty of American females • Catharine E. Beecher
... While each component atom breaks or twists; If, wandering past strange groups of shifting forms, Cells at their hidden marvels hard at work, Pale from much toil, or red from sudden storms, I might attain to where the Rulers lurk; If, pressing past the guards in those grey gates, The brain's most folded, intertwisted shell, I might attain to that which alters fates, The King, the supreme self, the Master Cell; ...
— Georgian Poetry 1916-17 - Edited by Sir Edward Howard Marsh • Various
... which mark so many of the Boer-Hollander enactments are again apparent here. The proposal is made to appear reasonable, but it is clearly impossible for a child to attain within the time named such proficiency in a foreign language as to be able to receive all instruction in it. The effect and the design are to place English-speaking children at a grave disadvantage compared with Dutch-speaking children; either they would have to devote a great deal more time ...
— The Transvaal from Within - A Private Record of Public Affairs • J. P. Fitzpatrick
... of life there is no law but the common sense, which is the union of those fragmentary perceptions of eternal law, which individual men [37] attain, in so far as their spirits are dry and pure. Of absolute knowledge human nature is not capable, but only the Divine. To the Eternal, therefore, alone all things are good and beautiful and just, because ...
— A Short History of Greek Philosophy • John Marshall
... forward. The experience gained on the other side is helping us here. At first it was the automobile factory that furnished the satisfactory motor. But now through the war the airplane factories have made enormous progress and helped the aviator to attain new marks in speed, reliability and endurance. While this war lasts every improvement in the airplane is utilized to make added destruction. Yet we can not doubt that after the war we will see further progress made in the airplane in ...
— An Aviator's Field Book - Being the field reports of Oswald Boelcke, from August 1, - 1914 to October 28, 1916 • Oswald Boelcke
... with hope long deferred, And with prayers that seem vain? Keep saying the word - And that which you strive for you yet shall attain. Keep praying. ...
— Poems of Experience • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... as foils to each other, are, however, peculiar to certain beds of the slaty coherents, which are both vast in elevation, and easy of destruction. In Wales and Scotland, the same groups of rocks possess far greater hardness, while they attain less elevation; and the result is a totally different aspect of scenery. The severity of the climate, and the comparative durableness of the rock, forbid the rich vegetation; but the exposed summits, though barren, are not subject to laws ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... Gay to write "The Shepherd's Week," to show that, if it be necessary to copy nature with minuteness, rural life must be exhibited such as grossness and ignorance have made it. So far the plan was reasonable; but the pastorals are introduced by a Proeme, written with such imitation as they could attain of obsolete language, and, by consequence, in a style that was never spoken nor written in any language or in any place. But the effect of reality and truth became conspicuous, even when the intention was to show them grovelling and degraded. These pastorals became popular, ...
— Lives of the Poets: Gay, Thomson, Young, and Others • Samuel Johnson
... remarkable for its qualities and superiority. This is due, we believe, to the fact that inventors, while showing arrangements that were often ingenious, have not always taken into account the end that the shutter is to subserve, and the qualities that it must possess in order to attain such end. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 430, March 29, 1884 • Various
... only forty feet above the level of the sea; here also the capping of lava is only between twelve and fifteen feet in thickness; on the other hand, at the north-east side of Porto Praya harbour, the calcareous stratum, as well as the rock on which it rests, attain a height above the average level: the inequality of level in these two cases is not, as I believe, owing to unequal elevation, but to original irregularities at the bottom of the sea. Of this fact, at Quail Island, ...
— Volcanic Islands • Charles Darwin
... about a hundred miles from the metropolis, there stands a sleepy little town, which possesses no special activity nor beauty to justify its existence. People live in it for reasons of their own. The people who do not live in it wonder for what reasons, but attain no better solution of the mystery than the statement that the air is very fine. "We have such bracing air!" says the resident, as proudly as if that said air were his special invention and property. Certain West-country doctors affect Norton-on-Sea for ...
— Flaming June • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... powers which European civilization exercised upon Russia, the Russians perceived its weak sides, which they studied by the light of the ideal which they promised themselves to attain in some indefinite future, a future which they nevertheless hoped ...
— Contemporary Russian Novelists • Serge Persky
... appointed; Him who asks you point out the way to; give to the needy Willingly; swear to forsake all evil habits of living, All kinds of theft and robbing, deceit and evil behavior. Thus can you make quite sure that you will attain ...
— Legends of the Middle Ages - Narrated with Special Reference to Literature and Art • H.A. Guerber
... line first. The fourth line contains measurements and indications. By complying with the indications and noting the measurements set down, we inevitably attain our object, on condition, be it understood, that we know where we are and whither we are going, in a word, that we are enlightened as to the real meaning of the Hollow Needle. This is what we may learn from the first three lines. The first is so conceived to revenge myself ...
— The Hollow Needle • Maurice Leblanc
... "If to attain Be to abide, then that may be." "Endless the way, followed with how much pain!" "The way ...
— Later Poems • Alice Meynell
... sake of argument imagine yourself very poor or very rich, since you would not enter wedlock in your present circumstances. Suppose you married your object of 'courteous service and respectful adoration;' which should you say you would attain ...
— Mr. Isaacs • F. Marion Crawford
... Proculus, that I should spend thus much time among mankind, and after founding a city of the greatest power and glory should return to heaven whence I came. Fare thee well; and tell the Romans that by courage and self-control they will attain to the highest pitch of human power. I will ever be for you the ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume I (of 4) • Plutarch
... they cannot declare publicly that they wish to be exempt from taxation. Their expressed principle is rather the rule that everybody shall be taxed in proportion to income; but, on the other hand, they attain, at least fairly well, the same result in disguised form by the distinction between ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... more good than harm by publishing the secret. But still I am not sure," he added, with one of his faint but significant smiles, "that I am not actuated by a wish to immortalize my name; for where is the mortal who would be indifferent to this object, if he thought he could attain it? Read the book at your ...
— A Voyage to the Moon • George Tucker
... the idea of attaining any object by prayer and supplication. The element of uncertainty will, in a great measure, be removed from the domain of the future, and man, gathering courage from a succession of victories over the obstructions of nature, will attain a serene grandeur unknown to the disciples of any superstition. The plans of mankind will no longer be interfered with by the finger of a supposed omnipotence, and no one will believe that nations or individuals are protected or destroyed by any deity whatever. Science, freed ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll, Volume I • Robert Green Ingersoll
... loyal, useful, honourable with true honour, in the sight of God and man. That is what we need to be. That is what we shall be at last, if we put ourselves into Christ's hand, and ask Him for the clean heart and the right spirit, which is His own spirit, the spirit of all goodness. And provided we attain, at last, to that—provided we attain, at last, to the truly heroic and divine life, which is the life of virtue, it will matter little to us by what wild and weary ways, or through what painful and humiliating processes, we have arrived thither. If God has ...
— All Saints' Day and Other Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... Peter has been now for nineteen centuries before the eyes of the world as a type of character which Christian men should emulate—a vision of life whose influence has touched millions with its inspiration. The price which had to be paid to attain this nobleness of character and this vastness of holy influence was ...
— Personal Friendships of Jesus • J. R. Miller
... to the better classes, and the rank is mostly hereditary. Certain ceremonies are considered necessary before the candidate can attain the actual dignity of a prelate. First of the ceremonies comes the navar, or six days' retreat in his own dwelling, followed by the ceremony of initiation; four more days in the fire temple with two priests who have previously gone through the Yasna prayers for six consecutive mornings. ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... be For us a hushed delight, a voiceless pain Serenely borne! Our lips must ne'er profane Our inmost feelings,—lest the sanctity Of Love be lessened in our hearts and we Nought higher than the common path attain! ...
— Sonnets • Nizam-ud-din-Ahmad, (Nawab Nizamat Jung Bahadur)
... downfall of Kid Mitchell—an event as yet unexpectedly delayed—there's money in it somewhere. Big money! I know it. And I mean to touch some of it. My unknown benefactor shall have my every assistance to attain his hellish purpose—hellish purpose, I believe, is the phrase proper to the complexion of this affair. Then, to use the words of the impulsive Hotspur, slightly altered to suit the occasion, I'll creep upon him while he lies asleep, and in his ear ...
— Copper Streak Trail • Eugene Manlove Rhodes
... mile opened the most lovely prospects. The trees in this part of France are uncommonly beautiful; and where there are any meadows, as along the banks of the rivers, they are adorned with the sweetest flowers, which here grow wild, and attain a more than garden-sweetness and brilliancy. The birds, moreover, were singing merrily, and all Nature seemed animate and gay. I felt truly happy, and Mademoiselle St. Sillery was in such life and spirits, that it was not without ...
— Travels through the South of France and the Interior of Provinces of Provence and Languedoc in the Years 1807 and 1808 • Lt-Col. Pinkney
... hope which it inspires; can there be conceived a more atrocious injury than to filch from its possessor this inestimable benefit to rob society of its charm, and solitude of its solace; not only to out-law life, but attain death, converting the very grave, the refuge of the sufferer, into the gate ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis
... ox hath therefore stretch'd his yoke in vain, The plowman lost his sweat; and the green corn Hath rotted ere his youth attain'd a beard; The fold stands empty in the drowned field, And crows are fatted with ...
— The Writings of John Burroughs • John Burroughs
... for somebody. How hard to keep out of such things, and yet one must if one is to achieve anything. Keep out of it, detached, observant, comfortable. Strange that in life comfort should be so difficult to attain! ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole
... early masters they added rule, order, proportion, draughtsmanship, and manner; not, indeed, in complete perfection, but with so near an approach to the truth that the masters of the third age, of whom we are henceforward to speak, were enabled, by means of their light, to aspire still higher and attain to that supreme perfection which we see in the most highly prized and most celebrated of our modern works. But to the end that the nature of the improvement brought about by the aforesaid craftsmen may be even ...
— Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Vol. 04 (of 10), Filippino Lippi to Domenico Puligo • Giorgio Vasari
... More poem than story, this beautiful idyl may be briefly described as mainly illustrative of the struggles of the transition period through which, as through a slough, all true artists must pass who have been led to reflect deeply upon the aims and ends of their calling before they attain that goal of settled purpose in which they see it to be best to work from their own heart simply, without regard for the spectres that would draw them apart into quagmires of moral aspiration. These ...
— Recollections of Dante Gabriel Rossetti - 1883 • T. Hall Caine
... Hearing your worth that way, ere you attain'd This reverend garment, joins you in commission With the right fortunate soldier the Marquis of ...
— The Duchess of Malfi • John Webster
... when I shap'd my course, To fly the danger of pursuing death, I left my friends, and all alone attain'd, In hope of succours, to this little town, Relying on your courtesies and truth. What foolish fear doth ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various
... every advantage in their favor, it is easy to understand why the British troops that attacked from Gommecourt to Thiepval failed to attain their objective. If the British bombardment had reached a high pitch of intensity on the morning of July 1, 1916, the German guns were no less active, and having the advantage of direct observation, their explosive shells soon obliterated ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... was a scholar—so reputed, and justly; but one of life's most important lessons had passed her by. She had never learned that to receive, one must give; to be loved, one must love; to attain, one must reach out. It never occurred to her to weigh her own shortcomings and throw them into the balance with those of her enemies. She spent no time in introspection, self examination. She set a high standard on her own virtues, and, like most ...
— Blue Bonnet in Boston - or, Boarding-School Days at Miss North's • Caroline E. Jacobs
... them both, discovering under all their outward peculiarities sterling worth and fitness of character. Thomas Gordon was surprisingly well read and could floor Eric any time in argument, once he became sufficiently warmed up to attain fluency of words. Eric hardly recognized him the first time he saw him thus animated. His bent form straightened, his sunken eyes flashed, his face flushed, his voice rang like a trumpet, and he poured out a flood of eloquence which ...
— Kilmeny of the Orchard • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... deal with the absurd and with the impossible, it cannot be anything rational, but a mere imitation of reality, in accordance with the Platonic theory—a fact of sensual pleasure. Aristotle does not, however, attain to so precise a definition as Plato, whose erroneous definition he does not succeed in supplanting. The truth is that he failed of his self-imposed task; he failed to discern the true nature of ...
— Aesthetic as Science of Expression and General Linguistic • Benedetto Croce
... with the savoir faire of social experience. Each felt and was stung by a realization of the other's points of advantage. Dorothy saw a perfection of well-groomed poise, such as she could hardly hope to attain, and Helen was impressed with her rival's grace and ...
— Hidden Gold • Wilder Anthony
... to swell the returns of pressed men the gangsman was supposed—we may even go so far as to say enjoined—to use no more violence than was absolutely necessary to attain his end. The question of force thus resolved itself into one of the degree of resistance he encountered. Needless to say, he did not always knock a man down before bidding him stand in the king's name. Recourse to measures so extreme was not always ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson
... but Leslie was of opinion that, although she showed all plain sail, up to her royals, she was scarcely doing three knots. This was all in their favour, for while the smoothening of the sea's surface enabled Leslie to attain a much more satisfactory rate of speed with the same moderate amount of exertion, the low rate of sailing of the on-coming vessel rendered it certain that, apart from accident, they would now assuredly be able to reach her. And by the time that this had become an undoubted fact, Leslie ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... impression upon the mind—the exquisite beauty of movement, of gesture and of grouping seen in the exercises; and the nearness of a great force, fundamental to the arts and expressing itself in the rhythm to which they attain. Jaques-Dalcroze has re-opened a door which has long been closed. He has rediscovered one of ...
— The Eurhythmics of Jaques-Dalcroze • Emile Jaques-Dalcroze
... written the year before his death, to one who asked this question, "What is the shortest and surest way for a young man to attain the true knowledge of the Christian religion?" he says, "Let him study the holy Scriptures, especially the New Testament: therein are contained the words of eternal life. It has God for its author; salvation for its ...
— The Book of Religions • John Hayward
... of fractures as to the success one may attain in approximating the parts of a broken bone, and in some cases of oblique fracture for instance, complete recovery is impossible, despite the most skillful and painstaking attention given. On the other hand, cases of simple transverse fractures make perfect recoveries in some ...
— Lameness of the Horse - Veterinary Practitioners' Series, No. 1 • John Victor Lacroix
... only parties warned by the fall and punishment of such an one as the prisoner I here refer to, are those in the same respectable position in life, because they are the only parties who have it in their power to commit the same crime. The punishment cannot warn those who are not in and cannot attain to the position which makes the crime possible, and who could not find the opportunity to commit it, even if they were paid to seek it; then why punish such men as this prisoner the more severely, because he was in ...
— Six Years in the Prisons of England • A Merchant - Anonymous
... have had your souls touched at the innermost, and have attempted to release yourselves in verse and have written trash—(and who know it)—be comforted. You shall have satisfaction at last, and you shall attain fame in some other fashion—perhaps in private theatricals or perhaps in journalism. You will be granted a prevision of complete success, and your hearts shall be filled—but you must not expect to find this mood on the Emilian ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc
... attention, and we shall eagerly seek for means of applying their experience to the education which we want to build up, in the direction of an ever fuller liberation of the individual. But how can we attain our end? Shall it not be by putting ourselves directly to the work favoring the foundation of new schools, which shall be ruled as much as possible by this spirit of liberty, which we forefeel will dominate the entire work ...
— Anarchism and Other Essays • Emma Goldman
... in the society of Mrs. Spence. Formerly she had not been prepared for appreciating Eleanor, but now she felt the beauties of that calm, self-reliant character, rich in a mode of happiness which it seemed impossible for herself ever to attain. Fortune had been Eleanor's friend. Disillusion had come to her only in the form of beneficent wisdom; no dolorous dead leaves rustled about her feet and clogged her walk. Happy even in the fact that she had never been a mother. She was a free woman; free in the love of her husband, ...
— The Emancipated • George Gissing
... that we could not attain to the feelings in the Confirmation poem in the Christian Year—Mr. Castleford's gift to me. Still, I believe that, though encumbered with such a drag as myself, ...
— Chantry House • Charlotte M. Yonge
... ease, of all the yielding and graceful lines into which the little black and white muslin frock fell so readily, of all that natural kinship between Laura and her hats, Laura and her gloves, which poor Polly fully perceived, knowing well and sadly that she herself could never attain to it. ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. I. • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... God of Truth that they lie awake weeping at night for joy at the thought that they will die and see Jerusalem the Golden—is doubtless, a pious and devout age; but not—at least as yet—an age in which natural theology is likely to attain a high, a healthy, ...
— Scientific Essays and Lectures • Charles Kingsley
... persons he may receive, and should court—he may profit by them. But, if he is a man fit for his place, he should retain that honour that will leave him scope, and inspire him with courage to act a manly part. A Christian pastor can never fulfil his office, and attain its highest ends, without being free to act among his people according to the light of his conscience and his best discretion. To have elders and deacons to rule over him, is to be a slave—is not to be a man. The responsibilities, cares, burdens, and labours of ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... classes, from the highest to the lowest,—for common freemen, mechanics, and citizens shared the honor of membership with knights and even princes,—bound together by a band of inviolable secrecy, and its edicts carried out so mysteriously and ruthlessly, could not but attain to a terrible power, and produce a remarkable effect upon the imagination of the people. "The prince or knight who easily escaped the judgment of the imperial court, and from behind his fortified walls defied even the emperor himself, trembled when in ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris
... this union, she seems not to have known the slightest thrill of joy or felt the least sensation of relief, although she was then not sixteen years old,—so entirely was her mind bent upon the crown of Russia. Partly to attain her end, and partly because it suited her intriguing, managing nature, she set herself immediately to the acquirement of the favor of the Empress on the one hand, and popularity on the other. The first she sought by an absolute submission ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... know her. Well, you do know her. At least, she says she knows you. Not all of us attain ...
— Little Miss Grouch - A Narrative Based on the Log of Alexander Forsyth Smith's - Maiden Transatlantic Voyage • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... he may not attain them in this life, but I think the very desire is a prophecy, and even promise, that we shall at some stage of our being possess what ...
— Two Festivals • Eliza Lee Follen
... long inability to attend to business. My brother Pierce was still in college and could be of no assistance to me. I had to master the business from the beginning, learning every detail before I could put it on the efficiency basis that I knew it must attain before I ...
— Molly Brown's Orchard Home • Nell Speed
... that a greater or less quantity of wealth abstained from is employed for a longer or shorter time; or, in other words, that laborers and capitalists undergo more or less sacrifice in exertion and abstinence, respectively, to attain a given result. This is the contribution to cost of production made by Mr. Cairnes, and briefly defined as follows: "In the case of labor, the cost of producing a given commodity will be represented by the number of average ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • John Stuart Mill
... the Chinese make no contribution to the welfare of the country; that they come here to remain several years, to attain a competence, and then ...
— Sociology and Modern Social Problems • Charles A. Ellwood
... imagination had fancied, a Biographia Flagitiosa, or The Lives of Eminent Scoundrels. This is also an imitation of the Historical Novel, though rather in the track of Eugene Aram and Jack Sheppard than of Waverley or Woodstock; but what would you have? To attain the picturesque—the chief object of our artist—he adopts the ready process of dark colours and a rough brush. Nature, even at the worst, is never gloomy enough for a Spagnoletto, and Judge Jeffries himself, ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... son was fitted for college at Dummer Academy, under the instruction of the well known 'Master Moody.' He early discovered an uncommon taste for the study of the languages, insomuch that his instructor predicted, while he was yet in his preparatory coarse, that he would attain to eminence in ...
— The History of Dartmouth College • Baxter Perry Smith
... withstand and baffle the fierce energy of passion and the all-corroding, all-dissolving scepticism of the intellect in religious inquiries? I have no intention at all of denying, that truth is the real object of our reason, and that, if it does not attain to truth, either the premiss or the process is in fault; but I am not speaking here of right reason, but of reason as it acts in fact and concretely in fallen man. I know that even the unaided reason, when correctly ...
— Apologia Pro Vita Sua • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... of its founders, they have become so accustomed to freedom and equality that they no longer value them, and begin to aim at pre-eminence; and it is chiefly those of ample fortune who fall into this error. So when they begin to lust for power and cannot attain it through themselves or their own good qualities, they ruin their estates, tempting and corrupting the people in every possible way. And hence when by their foolish thirst for reputation they have created among the masses an appetite for gifts and the habit ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... is a recognition of the existence of objects by a duller perception than the others, though all of the senses attain their perceptions by feeling, in the strict meaning of the word. We say things feel hard or soft, the varying density of the objects being the cause of the varying sensations they awaken. Smoothness and roughness are varying outlines of surface, existing as physical conformation; ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 122, December, 1867 • Various
... means that, I think," he said, "unless it be mediocre—then one is safe; one has scores of friends, and scarce a foe. Mediocrity succeeds wonderfully well nowadays—nobody hates it, because every one feels how easily they themselves can attain to it. Exceptional talent is aggressive—actual genius is offensive; people are insulted to have a thing held up for their admiration which is entirely out of their reach. They become like bears climbing a greased pole; they see a great name above them—a tempting sugary ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... being withdrawn from Virginia, and united to the force in South Carolina; because such an accession of strength would produce a movement from Winnsborough (where Cornwallis then lay,) and might separate the two divisions of the American army, and endanger their safety. To attain this object, (the separation of the two divisions of the American army,) Col. Tarleton was now detached from the main army of Lord Cornwallis, and was to be supported by his lordship, and Gen. Leslie as soon as he ...
— A Sketch of the Life of Brig. Gen. Francis Marion • William Dobein James
... the ascent is very gradual. The mountain begins to leave the plain in slopes scarcely perceptible, measuring from two to three degrees. These are continued by easy gradations mile after mile all the way to the truncated, crumbling summit, where they attain a steepness of twenty to twenty-five degrees. The grand simplicity of these lines is partially interrupted on the north subordinate cone that rises from the side of the main cone about three thousand feet from the summit. ...
— Steep Trails • John Muir
... the poetic fane, and can have no hope of advancing further, or of reaching its sanctuary. But it is to me a subject of peculiar satisfaction that your kind permission to have your name inscribed upon this page serves to attain a twofold end—one direct and personal, and relating to the present day; the other reflected and historical, and belonging to times long gone by. Of the first little need now be said, for the privilege is wholly mine, in making this dedication: ...
— The Poems of Goethe • Goethe
... men quite as strong willed as either and of quite other views. Before the first session had begun, Baldwin and the new French-Canadian leader, La Fontaine, had raised the issue and begun a new struggle in which their single-minded devotion and unflinching courage were to attain a ...
— The Canadian Dominion - A Chronicle of our Northern Neighbor • Oscar D. Skelton
... which have not been united to France, they, as well as other interests, political and commercial, may become the subject of a negotiation, which will present to the Directory the means of proving how much it desires to attain speedily to a happy pacification." That "the Directory is ready to receive, in this respect, any overtures that shall be just, reasonable, and compatible with the ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. V. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... some beyond the primary utilitarian stage of 'eating to live,' otherwise 'buying to read.' Three years, however, works miracles of refinement in any hunger that is at all capable of culture; and it was evident, when Narcissus did open his 'Gladstone,' that it had taken him by no means so long to attain that sublimation of taste which may be expressed as 'reading to buy.' Each volume had that air—of breeding, one might almost say—by which one can always know a genuine bouquin at a glance; an alluvial richness of bloom, ...
— The Book-Bills of Narcissus - An Account Rendered by Richard Le Gallienne • Le Gallienne, Richard
... half acres; a perennial spring in the midst of pine and oak woods, without any visible inlet or outlet except by the clouds and evaporation. The surrounding hills rise abruptly from the water to the height of forty to eighty feet, though on the southeast and east they attain to about one hundred and one hundred and fifty feet respectively, within a quarter and a third of a mile. They are exclusively woodland. All our Concord waters have two colors at least; one when viewed at a distance, and another, more proper, close at hand. The first depends more ...
— Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience • Henry David Thoreau
... danger, yet, notwithstanding there was no remedy, but we that were appointed to go away must of necessity do so. Howbeit, those that went in the first boat were safely set ashore, but of them which went in the second boat, of which number I myself was one, the seas wrought so high that we could not attain to the shore, and therefore we were constrained—through the cruel dealing of John Hampton, captain of the Minion, and John Sanders, boatswain of the Jesus, and Thomas Pollard, his mate—to leap out of the boat into the main sea, having more than a mile to shore, and, so to shift ...
— Voyager's Tales • Richard Hakluyt
... George Vavasors, the Calder Joneses, and the Botts are admitted. Dishonesty, ignorance, and vulgarity do not close the gate of that heaven against aspirants; and it is a consolation to the ambition of the poor to know that the ambition of the rich can attain that glory by the strength of its riches alone. But though England does not send thither none but her best men, the best of her Commoners do find their way there. It is the highest and most legitimate pride of an Englishman to have the letters M.P. written after his name. No selection ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... he continued unheedingly, "and will plunge myself into the midst of the big, busy, warm world, and will gain with one bound that social condition which it has taken the white man thousands of years to attain." ...
— Skookum Chuck Fables - Bits of History, Through the Microscope • Skookum Chuck (pseud for R.D. Cumming)
... perfection. She aims at what is necessary rather than at what is desirable. She is for the many as well as for the few. She is putting souls in the way of salvation, that they may then be in a condition, if they shall be called upon, to aspire to the heroic, and to attain the full proportions, as well as the rudiments, ...
— The Idea of a University Defined and Illustrated: In Nine - Discourses Delivered to the Catholics of Dublin • John Henry Newman
... and civilization held otherwise undisputed sway, the ideal of the perfect and healthy peasant did undoubtedly represent in some shape or form the conception that there was a dignity in simplicity and a dignity in labour. It was good for the ancient aristocrat, even if he could not attain to innocence and the wisdom of the earth, to believe that these things were the secrets of the priesthood of the poor. It was good for him to believe that even if heaven was not above him, heaven was below him. ...
— The Defendant • G.K. Chesterton
... in secret by his future friend by asking him to dine at Eldon's, and spent twelve francs at that restaurant. During the dinner Daniel admitted Lucien into the secret of his hopes and studies. Daniel d'Arthez would not allow that any writer could attain to a pre-eminent rank without a profound knowledge of metaphysics. He was engaged in ransacking the spoils of ancient and modern philosophy, and in the assimilation of it all; he would be like Moliere, ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... reconciliation. But Conde, on his side, was very little disposed thereto, for he had gone very far indeed to retrace his steps. Furious at having failed to reach the object which he had thought to attain, exasperated by the abandonment of his partisans, by the sarcasms of pamphleteers, he demanded securities and large indemnifications; and proposed such hard conditions that all accord with him became impossible. Thereupon he collected some troops around his standard, a tolerably large ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... the abiding faith that with our cooeperative efforts free government would attain to higher averages of intelligence and virtue; with an innate conviction, that the sequestration of rights in the homes of the republic makes them baneful nurseries of the monopolies, rings, and fraudulent practices that are threatening the national integrity; and that so long ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... kind chief. "But don't run any risks. A man like this Chester Hunt and a woman like this Dink person are often capable of any crime to attain ...
— Mary Louise and Josie O'Gorman • Emma Speed Sampson
... he said, "are pacifists in the broadest meaning of the word, but that does not mean that we may not sometimes have to use force to attain our object. We have a department which alone is concerned with the dealing of such matters. It is that department which has undertaken the forwarding and receipt of all communications between ourselves and our friends across ...
— The Devil's Paw • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... and determination—in other words, your power of self-control—alone can effect anything worthy in self-culture. To attain the power of self-control in a high degree is one of the greatest and most important aims we can set before us in life. I do not believe it can ever be attained in our own strength. To rightly control temper and speech and conduct requires help from the divine Spirit which is always around ...
— Letters to a Daughter and A Little Sermon to School Girls • Helen Ekin Starrett
... his estate, after the paying a few legacies, was left to his esteemed brother-in-law, Gabriel Le Noir, in trust for his only daughter, Clara Day, until the latter should attain the age of twenty-one, at which period she was to come into possession of the property. Then followed the distribution of the legacies. Among the rest the sum of a thousand dollars was left to his young friend Traverse Rocke, and another thousand to ...
— Capitola the Madcap • Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... that skirts the longer and more abiding streams for any use but that of fuel, must be a great drawback to settlement and cultivation. The coarse, short, hearty grass that carpets most of this region, and which is allowed to attain its full growth only in the valleys of the Chugwater and a few other streams which have their course mainly within or very near the Rocky Mountains, and which the Buffalo no longer visit, seems worthy at least of trial by the farmers and shepherds of our older States. Its ability to resist drouth ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I. February, 1862, No. II. - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... "infidelity." The point is not whether they are wicked; but, whether, from the point of view of scientific method, they are irrefragably true. If they are, they will be accepted in time, whether they are wicked, or not wicked. Nature, so far as we have been able to attain to any insight into her ways, recks little about consolation and makes for righteousness by very round-about paths. And, at any rate, whatever may be possible for other people, it is becoming less and less possible for the man who ...
— Collected Essays, Volume V - Science and Christian Tradition: Essays • T. H. Huxley |
