"Might" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... them was keen, every one seeking as the first end in life to secure a seat on the coach for himself and to leave it to his child after him. By the rule of the coach a man could leave his seat to whom he wished, but on the other hand there were many accidents by which it might at any time be wholly lost. For all that they were so easy, the seats were very insecure, and at every sudden jolt of the coach persons were slipping out of them and falling to the ground, where they were instantly compelled to take hold ...
— Looking Backward - 2000-1887 • Edward Bellamy
... they walked forward he walked forward, when they halted he halted, when they slept he slept, when they awoke he awoke; nay, when they were weary he felt weariness. But for all the profit it brought him he might still have been sitting under the tree; for their eyes would not see him, and his talk to ...
— Fort Amity • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... it came to pass, fer weeks them miners might be found A-sneakin' round on Riley's ranch, an' snipin' at the ground; Till even Riley stops an' stares, an' presently allows: "Them boys appear to take a mighty interest in cows." An' night an' day they shadowed each auriferous bovine, An' panned the grass-roots on their trail, ...
— Rhymes of a Rolling Stone • Robert W. Service
... (for, although now sixteen years of age, he was too small to reach both arms at the same time), began lecturing Professor Smith for his non-attendance at an earlier hour, remarking that a different example to younger members was expected from him, and expressing a hope that it might not again be necessary to recur to the subject. Having finished his lecture, to the great amusement of the society, he requested the professor to resume his seat. The incident, as may well be imagined, long ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis
... Peter I., in sacrificing ten Russians for one Swede, thought that he was not sustaining merely an equal loss, but even gaining by so terrible a bargain. But what caused the greatest pain, was the idea that so sanguinary a conflict might ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur
... one so powerful, rich, witty and handsome, that she could not help having a good inclination for him. Her father perceived it, and told her that she was her own mistress as to the choice of a husband, and that she might declare her intentions. As the more wit we have, the greater difficulty we find to make a firm resolution upon such affairs, this made her desire her father, after having thanked him, to give her time ...
— The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault • Charles Perrault
... English, or European Coneys are here found, tho' but in one place that I ever knew of, which was in Trent-River, where they borough'd among the Rocks. I cannot believe, these are Natives of the Country, any otherwise than that they might come from aboard some Wreck; the Sea not being far off. I was told of several that were upon Bodies Island by Ronoak, which came from that Ship of Bodies; but I never saw any. However the Banks are no proper Abode of Safety, because of the many Minxes in those ...
— A New Voyage to Carolina • John Lawson
... study of the way in which crawfish right themselves when placed upon their backs on a smooth surface might furnish further evidence concerning the ability of the ...
— Harvard Psychological Studies, Volume 1 • Various
... CONSTRUCTIVE in his poetry. But if his great passion-capital, his keen spiritual susceptibility, and his great power of vigorous expression, had been brought into the service of constructive thought, he might have been a restorative power ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson
... and being assigned to duty at the naval rendezvous in New Orleans. When the Brooklyn entered the river he was lying at the point of death, but heard of his brother's approach, and expressed a hope that he might live long enough to see him again after so many years of separation. The wish was not to be fulfilled. Though ignorant of the danger, Captain Farragut hastened to the city, himself also looking forward with pleasure to the meeting; but he arrived only ...
— Admiral Farragut • A. T. Mahan
... poetic; or, if his particular character as simple poet has the upper hand, he leaves his species and becomes a common nature, in order to remain at any rate natural. The former of these two alternatives might represent the case of the principal poets of the sentimental kind in Roman antiquity and in modern times. Born at another period of the world, transplanted under another sky, these poets who stir us now by ideas, would have charmed us by individual truth and simple ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... and the empire. After some previous conversation, and a mutual oath of secrecy, the eunuch, who had not from his own feelings or experience imbibed any exalted notions of ministerial virtue, ventured to propose the death of Attila as an important service, by which Edecon might deserve a liberal share of the wealth and luxury which he admired. The ambassador of the Huns listened to the tempting offer; and professed, with apparent zeal, his ability, as well as readiness, to execute the bloody ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... machines somewhat nearer together. The motor-car gained in the open spaces, the taxicab caught up when it came to weaving its way in and out and dodging the trolleys. At the frequent moments when he appeared to be losing the car, Hambleton reflected that he had its number, which might lead to something. At the Waldorf the car slowed up, and the cab came within a few yards. Hambleton made up his mind at that instant that he had been mistaken in his supposition of trouble threatening the lady, and ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... or rather was forced to assent to, the Act of Secession, on the twentieth of May, 1861. In August the fortifications below Newbern were commenced, and continued for some months, and well garrisoned, till they were supposed capable of defending the town against any force that might be brought against it. General Burnside, however, attacked them on the fourteenth of March, 1862, and after a sharp battle the rebels fled, and he occupied the old place as a military conquest. All the wealthy and prominent citizens ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various
... in despotism and destruction then began between the two. They might be compared to the reapers in Homer, cutting down the corn in all directions. But the vassal had been long engaged in a process of innovation. In spite of the opposition of his Janissaries, he had accomplished his purpose of establishing regular regiments, clothed and disciplined after the ...
— Herzegovina - Or, Omer Pacha and the Christian Rebels • George Arbuthnot
... and came sprawling—on hands and knees—upon the ground, while the wheel rolled into the ditch. He was little hurt, although the accident might have been serious. ...
— Hiram The Young Farmer • Burbank L. Todd
... she gathered Graham in her little arms, drawing his long-tressed head towards her. The action, I remember, struck me as strangely rash; exciting the feeling one might experience on seeing an animal dangerous by nature, and but half-tamed by art, too heedlessly fondled. Not that I feared Graham would hurt, or very roughly check her; but I thought she ran risk of ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... Rash as I might be, I was not quite reckless enough yet to meet that plain question by an equally plain reply. I saw enough in his face to warn me to be careful with him before it ...
— The Law and the Lady • Wilkie Collins
... a few instances, of the cheerful-working-ness of great men, which might, indeed, be multiplied to any extent. All large healthy natures are cheerful as well as hopeful. Their example is also contagious and diffusive, brightening and cheering all who come within reach of their influence. ...
— Character • Samuel Smiles
... therefore stopped at an earlier hour than usual to cut some. Calling to mind the robbery practised on us shortly after we left the depot, my mind became uneasy as to Robert Harris's safety, since I thought it probable, from the sulky disposition of the natives who had visited us there, that he might have been attacked. Thus, when my apprehensions on our own account had partly ceased, my fears became excited with regard to ...
— Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia, Complete • Charles Sturt
... nor far off, which did not partake of the holy beauty of the morning, nor sing, nor be silent, nor stand still, nor move, with any other than a gliding sweetness and repose, or an under-tone which might have been the echo here on earth, of a better sphere. There was a tender sadness and wonder in the face of old Sylvester, when a voice came stealing in upon the silence. It did not in a single tone disturb the ...
— Chanticleer - A Thanksgiving Story of the Peabody Family • Cornelius Mathews
... commemorating the birthday of the nation, and then estimate what a strange sense of His own importance the Man must have had who said: 'That past is done with, and it is Me that you have to think of now.' If I might venture to take a very modern illustration without vulgarising a great thing, suppose that on the other side of the Atlantic somebody were to stand up and say, 'I abrogate the Fourth of July and Independence Day. Do not think about Washington and ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI • Alexander Maclaren
... surprisingly shrewd, yet withal charitable, in his judgments of men and their character, a qualification which enabled him to follow a laissez-faire policy until the proper time. Often his penetration and insight, in analyses of current problems and questions, which might be supposed not to interest so particularly a man of his years, surprised his young associates and gave evidence of the wonderful vitality, the spirit of youth, which lived ...
— The University of Michigan • Wilfred Shaw
... pleasure, no happiness, not even the love that seems the strongest force in our natures, is worth having at the expense of a stain on the white rose of honour. Had she been a few years older, Angelique might have failed to keep the word which was extorted from her as a child, but, being young, she kept it the more easily. What we have to do is to try to be young always in this matter, to be our natural selves ...
— The Red Book of Heroes • Leonora Blanche Lang
... And it shows men a sign of how sacred joys 390 Granted by God they may gain in trial— Hold beneath the heavens through his holy grace, And abide in rapture in the realms above. We have found that the faithful Father created Man and woman through his wondrous might. 395 At first in the fairest fields of his earth He set these sons on a soil unblemished, In a pleasant place, Paradise named, Since they lacked no delight as long as the pair Wisely heeded the Holy word 400 In their new home. There hatred came, The old foe's envy, who ...
— Old English Poems - Translated into the Original Meter Together with Short Selections from Old English Prose • Various
... you? Surely if he takes you out for the day he might at least see you safely home. I never heard of such proceedings in my life. The man might have been a positive blackguard. Had you any idea ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page
... better," insisted Betty. "Now we'll race in this fashion—team work to count. Amy and I in one team, you and Grace in the other, Mollie. Whichever member of the team gets to the bend first will win. You see," Betty explained, "one of a team might fall, or turn her ankle, or get tired, and then the other could keep on. It's ...
— The Outdoor Girls in a Winter Camp - Glorious Days on Skates and Ice Boats • Laura Lee Hope
... Finding that these yielded to exercise, he deemed it prudent to execute a purpose he had long cherished of ascending Mount Argeus, from the top of which, according to Strabo, the Black and Mediterranean Seas might both be discerned in a clear day. Outstripping his attendants, Mr. Gridley mounted with great agility till he reached an elevation within three or four hundred feet of the highest summit, when he was prevented from advancing farther by the steepness of the ascent. There, in ...
— History Of The Missions Of The American Board Of Commissioners For Foreign Missions To The Oriental Churches, Volume I. • Rufus Anderson
... dressing-table, Milly suddenly flung herself down on the bed and lay there a twisted heap of blue flannel, her face buried in the pillows, her whole body shaken by a paroxysm of sobs. Tims supposed that this might be a good thing for Milly; but for herself it created an awkward situation. Her soothing remarks fell flat, while to go away and leave her friend in this condition would seem brutal. She sat down to "wait till the clouds ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods
... up?" she begged, and grandmother, who always found it hard to deny her grandchildren anything, said she might. When evening came, Ethelwyn dressed in her best white frock, a little later than the hour when she usually went to bed, came down the staircase with grandmother, who was more stately and lovely ...
— What Two Children Did • Charlotte E. Chittenden
... scourged and tortured, that their bodies were not able to sustain their torments, till at length, and with difficulty, they had the favor to be slain. Those whom they caught in the day time were slain in the night, and then their bodies were carried out and thrown away, that there might be room for other prisoners; and the terror that was upon the people was so great, that no one had courage enough either to weep openly for the dead man that was related to him, or to bury him; but those that were shut up in their ...
— The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem • Flavius Josephus
... dangers and hair-breadth escapes. By this beauteous river we came to a place where rain and flood had worn the precipice into a steep declivity, shelving towards another precipice, and my horse, accustomed to it, took me down where an English donkey would scarcely have ventured. Beauty might be written upon everything in this dell. I never saw a fairer compound of rock, wood, and water. Above was flat and comparatively uninteresting country; then these precipices, with trees growing out wherever they could find a footing, arrayed in all the gorgeous colouring ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... he detailed to him the unfortunate situation of this youth, sprung from so illustrious a lineage, and yet cut off by a combination of unhappy circumstances from almost all those natural sources whence he might have expected support and countenance. And when Glastonbury, seeing that the Duke's heart was moved, added that all he required for him, Ferdinand, was a commission in the army, for which his parents were prepared ...
— Henrietta Temple - A Love Story • Benjamin Disraeli
... discharge his feudal services to the overlord of whom he held it, was now enabled by a process analogous to the modern sale of "tenant-right," to transfer both land and services to new holders. However small the estates thus created might be, the bulk were held directly of the Crown; and this class of lesser gentry and freeholders grew steadily from this time in ...
— History of the English People, Volume II (of 8) - The Charter, 1216-1307; The Parliament, 1307-1400 • John Richard Green
... portraits will now be exhibited; these might, with more propriety, be named, according to the happy phrase of Professor Huxley, "generic" portraits. The word generic presupposes a genus, that is to say, a collection of individuals who have much in common, and among whom medium characteristics ...
— Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development • Francis Galton
... had not connected the sentence of the American with himself; but now, quite vividly, he realized what it might mean to him if he failed before dawn to convince someone that he was not the American. Peter would not be awake at so early an hour, and if he had no better success with others than he was having with these soldiers, it was possible that ...
— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... at a slight slant so that he might look the better through his nose-nippers, was the very pattern of approval. "It's curious how one's always meeting with intelligence;" it seemed to say. Mrs. Dennant paused in the act of adding cream, and Shelton scrutinised her face; it was hare-like, and superior as ever. Thank goodness ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... clear. I know the people I live among don't know everything. I grant you all that. But Woman Free! Woman Free! Madame Mafflu wants to know what liberty—or what liberties—singular or plural; do you take me?—ha! ha! There might be questions asked. ...
— Woman on Her Own, False Gods & The Red Robe - Three Plays By Brieux • Eugene Brieux
... occasions on which he had certainly saved my life, when at the utmost peril; and I added, that whatever was the purpose of the restraint, now practised on me, as I was given to understand, by his authority, it could not certainly be with any view to ultimately injuring me. He might, I said, have mistaken me for some other person; and I gave him what account I could of my situation and education, to correct such an error. I supposed it next possible, that he might think me too weak for travelling, and not capable of taking care of myself; and I begged ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... Flaubert, of De Maupassant, of Dostoievsky, of Poe, and a score of others, though the organic system was more or less flawed, the work remains touched with that universal quality that gives artistic permanence even to perceptions born of the abnormal." Mr. Newman might have added other names to his list, those of Michael Angelo and Beethoven and Swinburne. Really, is any great genius quite sane according to philistine standards? The answer must be negative. The old enemy has merely changed ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker
... doctor saw no reason to doubt the truth of these narrations told in such measured and careful phrases, and was always pleased with the appearance of the family,—the intellectual husband, the pretty gay wife, and the amusing child; and no intuition gave him a hint, as might have been the case with a more delicate organization, of the peculiarity and bitterness of the ties which bound ...
— Jack - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet
... Christian coast? Ye have smoked the hives of the Laccadives as we burn the lice in a bunk, We tack not now to a Gallang prow or a plunging Pei-ho junk; I had no fear but the seas were clear as far as a sail might fare Till I met with a lime-washed Yankee brig that ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... and increasing fascination, and Baville, who had reported to the King the entire pacification and conversion of Languedoc, to his dismay found the whole province bursting with excitement, which a spark at any moment might fire into frenzy. And that spark was shortly afterwards supplied by the archpriest Chayla, director of ...
— The Huguenots in France • Samuel Smiles
... A searching investigation had to be made and enforced, and as it proceeded stout and sturdy utterances were not lacking on the part of the parishioners. To a spectator, though rude, they were amusing, and significant, foretelling what might be expected, and what was afterwards realised, on the advent of a new incumbent, if they ...
— The Life of Charlotte Bronte - Volume 1 • Elizabeth Gaskell
... hours that succeeded lingered like days of misery. So much depended on a variety of events, that every circumstance was noted by the seamen of the party, with an interest bordering on agony. A failure of the wind might compel the vessel to remain stationary, and then both brigantine and raft would be at the mercy of the uncertain currents of the ocean; a change of wind might cause a change of course, and render a meeting impossible; an increase of the breeze might ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... answer. A race might destroy a planet if it was useless. Earthmen had discovered useless planets, planets with poisonous atmospheres. Was Earth's ...
— No Hiding Place • Richard R. Smith
... page 21, or by the anemometer. It would be as well at the time to project the barometric readings in a curve even of a rough character, that the extent of fall after the mercury had passed its maximum might be readily discernible by the eye. A paper ruled in squares, the vertical lines representing the commencement of hours, and the horizontal tenths of an inch, would be quite sufficient for this purpose. The force ...
— The Hurricane Guide - Being An Attempt To Connect The Rotary Gale Or Revolving - Storm With Atmospheric Waves. • William Radcliff Birt
... refers to births per woman. This indicator shows the potential for population growth in the country. High rates will also place some limits on the labor force participation rates for women. Large numbers of children born to women indicate large family sizes that might limit the ability of the families to feed and ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... learn any new trade with great facility. They are, as a rule, exceedingly honest—perfect gentlemen in their manners, and the lowest labourer has an aplomb and ease of manner which many a person in a much higher rank in this country might envy. When in masses they are the quietest and most tractable workmen it is possible to have to deal with. The peasant and working man, the real bone and sinew of the country, are as fine a race as one might wish to meet with—not free from defects—what race is?—but possessed ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street
... damn foot gets well take letter H.J. Hobbs secon' 'sistant vice Pres'den' D. 'n' L.S. Rai'way New York, New York, dear Hobbs mark it pers'nal repline yours even date stock purchases goin' forward as rapidly's thought wise under circumstances it is held mos'ly 'n small lots an' too active a market might give rise t' silly notions ...
— Bunker Bean • Harry Leon Wilson
... in accordance with your orders, to ask his permission to pass through to General York; and, besides, I wished to ascertain where the Emperor Alexander had established his headquarters, that I might repair to them." ...
— NAPOLEON AND BLUCHER • L. Muhlbach
... chivalrously and well, by officers; and that men of science owe them and give them hearty thanks for their labours. But I should like, I confess, to see more done still. I should like to see every foreign station what one or two highly-educated officers might easily make it, an advanced post of physical science, in regular communication with our scientific societies at home, sending to them accurate and methodic details of the natural history of each district—details ...
— Scientific Essays and Lectures • Charles Kingsley
... Marcus, Charlie, and Frank for the other three disputants. There was some curiosity on the part of spectators to see how the boys would get along, and they were all eager to have Nat begin. All looked very pleasant, however, and well they might, for who could view this young parliament scene without a smiling face. Still, it was possible to trace an anxious feeling upon the countenances of the debaters, ...
— The Bobbin Boy - or, How Nat Got His learning • William M. Thayer
... and swimming pool, yes. Tell me, chick, might a humble constituent speak to the ...
— The Sturdy Oak - A Composite Novel of American Politics by Fourteen American Authors • Samuel Merwin, et al.
... constituents of the Prince of Wales's punch—"One bottle champagne, one bottle Burgundy, one bottle rum, ten lemons, two oranges, pound and a half of sugar." A process for preserving milk "for a long time" is also described. We read that on the 5th of November (1791) "there was a fog so thick that one might have spread it on bread. In order to write I had to light a candle as early as eleven o'clock." Here is a curious item—"In the month of June 1792 a chicken, 7s.; an Indian [a kind of bittern found in North America] 9s.; ...
— Haydn • J. Cuthbert Hadden
... why the government should buy this land, when it had millions of yes, more than the railroad companies desired, which, it might devote to this purpose? He answered, that the government had no such tract of land as this. It had nothing comparable to it for the purposes of the University: This was to be a school of mining, of engineering, of the working of metals, of chemistry, zoology, botany, manufactures, agriculture, ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 5. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... So I've shifted for myself ever since. Not that I've done so awful well. I'm slow, I am. I never was one o' those to sew with a hot needle and a scorching thread, but I do my stent right along. But, my! how I do rattle on! You might think I don't often go in good society. Well, I don't! So I must make the most of ...
— Patty's Social Season • Carolyn Wells
... half-moons, crescent moons, pierced for a cotton string. Small golden beasts and birds, poorly carved but golden. They traded freely; we gathered gold. And there was more and more, they said, at Veragua, wherever that might be, and south and east ...
— 1492 • Mary Johnston
... hesitated, looked a little confused, and admitted that he was not as well up in certain classes of knowledge as in others, but, by a desperate guess, pointed out a wooden building at the foot of the street, which any one might have seen could not be right, and which turned out to be an African Baptist meeting-house. But my friend had many capital points of character, and I owed much of the pleasure of ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... up in a retreat of Nature's making," said the Idiot, with a sigh. "Nature has set around me certain limitations which, while they are not material, might as well be so as far as my ability to soar above them is concerned—and it's well she has. If it were otherwise, my life would not be safe or bearable in this company. As it is, I am happy and not at all afraid of the effects your jealousy of ...
— The Idiot • John Kendrick Bangs
... seceded after all, some people say; for his action has divided Germany into two hostile camps, and the ancient strife, under varying battle-cries, has continued to our day. Those who think so might assert with equal right that the Christian revolt from Judaism was not necessary—why did not the apostles reform the venerable high-priesthood of Zion? They might assert that Hampden would have done better ...
— The German Classics Of The Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries, Volume 12 • Various
... that Rousseau, who would have had men return to a state of nature that they might be freed from shams and conventionalities, did not see that the sacrifice of reality to appearances was quite as bad for women. Mary Wollstonecraft, farther-sighted than he, discovered at once the flaw in his ...
— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... do you know what I've had? You have no way of knowing what's in me—what other thing I might have been? You know my heritage; you think that's left nothing? But I find myself here in America. I love those dependent on me. My wife—who's used to a certain manner of living; my children—who are to become part of the America of their time. I've never said this to ...
— Plays • Susan Glaspell
... friendly, with a great natural gift for association and co-operation, peacefully minded and profoundly religious; yet superstitious, and capable of rising at any moment en masse to the call of a great crusade or "holy war"; it might seem that they hold all Western Europe in the hollow of their hands. Indeed they constitute not only a hope and promise of deliverance to our modern world, but also a considerable danger. All depends on how we dispose ourselves towards them. Should the nations of Western Europe ...
— The Healing of Nations and the Hidden Sources of Their Strife • Edward Carpenter
... ten minutes or a quarter of an hour, till he thought her lunch ended, and that he might fairly take advantage of her invitation to start her on her way home. He went straight to The Three Tuns—a little tavern in a side street, scrupulously clean, but humble and inexpensive. On his way he had an occasional misgiving as to whether the place had been elegant enough for her; and as ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... generally eaten their draught-animals, burned portions of their buildings to keep life in their bodies, and reduced themselves to hopeless want. On my suggesting that the new commercial treaty with Germany might help matters, he thought that it would have but little effect, since only a small portion of the total product of Russian agriculture is consumed abroad. This led him to speak of some Americans and Englishmen who had visited ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White Volume II • Andrew Dickson White
... nature than I had given you credit for. CAPT. See, she comes. If your lordship would kindly reason with her and assure her officially that it is a standing rule at the Admiralty that love levels all ranks, her respect for an official utterance might induce her to look upon your offer in its proper light. SIR JOSEPH. It is not unlikely. I will adopt your suggestion. But soft, she is here. Let us ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan
... the meeting of the roads from Watford, King's Langley, and St. Albans, on the Grand Junction Canal. The nearest station is King's Langley (L.&N.W.R.), 11/4 mile N. There is a good modern inn and many pretty cottages, and folk in search of rest and quiet might journey farther and find less suitable retirement. The nearest church ...
— Hertfordshire • Herbert W Tompkins
... my researches corroborate this statement of Lady Burton's. Be the subject what it might, he was ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright
... disaster than he is to dwell morbidly upon thoughts of his own death. Left in the dark, he will get a certain comfort out of that darkness, at the same time that it clouds his mind and freezes his action. Disturbed by bad dreams about what might happen, he nonetheless will not plan an effective use of his own resources against that which is very likely to happen. Only when he is given a clear view of the horizon, and is made animated by the general ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense
... might be considered to betray, at this time, a continual malady of soul, was the indifference he showed toward the fair ladies of Milan, who, on their side, were full of enthusiasm about him, and with whom he refused to become acquainted, despite all their advances. ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli
... else, except along the boundaries. There you might put in a row of horn-beam and oak. They always look rather nice against a background of firs.—Only the stumps of the burnt trees ought ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... might we expect to find if order was nonexistent in the economic world? Surely that some things such as wool would be produced in quantities many times in excess of the demand for them, quite possibly five, ten, or twenty times in excess; while conversely the supplies of others such ...
— Supply and Demand • Hubert D. Henderson
... where to begin. Probably I shall not know where to leave off, either. That is my usual misfortune, to write a chapter at both ends. It is a fatal thing, like the doubly-consuming candle. Perhaps I might start with the sapience of Hector MacQuarrie, author of Tahiti Days. I am tempted to, because so many people think of W. Somerset Maugham as the author of The Moon and Sixpence. The day will come, however, when people ...
— When Winter Comes to Main Street • Grant Martin Overton
... at the thought. Many and many a time had I pictured to myself what it would be if he were set at liberty, and with what mingled joy and grief I should bid him good-bye; but it had never occurred to me as a possibility that he might be transferred ...
— Monsieur Maurice • Amelia B. Edwards
... that we can go and live there,—but if we were coaxed very hard, we might come and visit you ...
— Marjorie's Maytime • Carolyn Wells
... absolute setting- forth of facts which could scarcely be denied,—a man, who firmly grounded himself, made no attempt to force any one's belief, but who simply took a large view of the whole, and saw, as it were in a glance, what the world might become without faith in a Divine Cause and Principle of Creation. And once GRANT this Divine Cause and Principle to be actually existent, then all other divine and spiritual things become possible, no matter how IMPOSSIBLE they seem to dull ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... still operative, forbidding negroes to come within our lines at all. McClellan has issued a goodly number of orders and proclamations, but not one of them offers protection and freedom to such slaves of rebels as might see fit to claim them at his hands. His only order bearing upon their condition and prospects is that which expelled the Hutchinsons from his camp for the crime of ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... it "not decent"; he feared it would "be thought vain glory"; and, rather than appear singular, cheerfully remained a thief. One able merchant's countenance, and Pepys had dared to do an honest act! Had he found one brave spirit, properly recognised by society, he might have gone far as a disciple. Mrs. Turner, it is true, can fill him full of sordid scandal, and make him believe, against the testimony of his senses, that Pen's venison pasty stank like the devil; but, on the other hand, Sir William Coventry can raise him by a word into ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 3 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... freckled cheeks seemed to have sunk a little, and the pump-handle chin seemed to be defining itself, even to caricature. There was still a certain air of bravoure, of truculence, which attracted, and might still charm. He turned from the mirror, went up-stairs, and danced three or four times. He remained until the last, and followed by an increasing despair he muttered, as he ...
— Mike Fletcher - A Novel • George (George Augustus) Moore
... he was old, savory with antipodal spices, outlandishly garbed; and even his countenance had become like those Oriental faces amid which he had found unheard-of griefs and joys. In Venice, his birthplace, instead of a greeting that might ease his nostalgia, he encountered disbelief in his identity, and ridicule of his tales. He could not make them credulous of that delicious Cambulac where he had dwelt like a god: his tidings of unearthly felicities—free ...
— Sacrifice • Stephen French Whitman
... in that class-room, and it did me good, and not evil altogether. There I learned to reason with more patience than a school-girl may always care to suffer; and there I observed that the mysteries of time and eternity, whatever one might personally conclude about them, ...
— McClure's Magazine, March, 1896, Vol. VI., No. 4. • Various
... of them its own Author, and 'tis more than the generality of Chymists themselves can do: and if they be not of very known and familiar practise among them, unless the Authors wherein I found them had given me cause to believe, themselves had try'd them, I know not why I might not set them down, as a part of the Phaenomena of Colours which I present you; Many things unanimously enough deliver'd as matters of fact by (I know not how many Chymical Writers) being not to be rely'd on, upon the single Authority of such Authors: For Instance, as some Spagyrists deliver ...
— Experiments and Considerations Touching Colours (1664) • Robert Boyle
... to know it sooner or later, so you might as well know it now," he said in as steady a voice as he could command. "Do you remember that I wrote to you about sixty-four thousand dollars' worth of bonds that I had bought for dad in place of some securities that ...
— The Rover Boys in Business • Arthur M. Winfield
... a town in, in which there was a decent chance of covering over the nakedness of the land within a thousand years, they rejoiced to seize on it and warm their shivering imaginations in the idea of the possible snugness which their distant posterity might enjoy. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 42, April, 1861 • Various
... by the theory of evolution in this view of ethics? So far as I can discern, the ethical system of the Stoics, which is essentially intuitive, and reverences the categorical imperative as strongly as that of any later moralists, might have been just what it was if they had held any other theory; whether that of special creation, on the one side, or that of the eternal existence of the present order, on the other.[Note 16] To the Stoic, the ...
— Evolution and Ethics and Other Essays • Thomas H. Huxley
... another time, when Siddhartha left the forest together with Govinda, to beg for some food in the village for their brothers and teachers, Siddhartha began to speak and said: "What now, oh Govinda, might we be on the right path? Might we get closer to enlightenment? Might we get closer to salvation? Or do we perhaps live in a circle— we, who have thought we were ...
— Siddhartha • Herman Hesse
... know her. Indeed, if I remember, Justice is worse off than mortals respecting her parentage; for while there are many people who do not know who were their fathers, poets are uncertain who was Justice's mother:—some say Aurora, some say Themis. Now, if I might indulge at this moment in a bit of reverie, it would not be unreasonable to suppose that it is the classic disposition of Ireland, which is known to be a very ancient country, that tends to make the operations of Justice assimilate with the ...
— Handy Andy, Volume One - A Tale of Irish Life, in Two Volumes • Samuel Lover
... them at it during most of the forenoon of every pleasant day and if they performed their task carelessly, I made them do it over. I knew that the time was coming when many kinds of work would cease to be play to us all, and that we might as well face the fact first as last. After the morning duties were over, and the afternoon lessons learned, there was plenty of time for play, and the two little people ...
— Driven Back to Eden • E. P. Roe
... astonished and dismayed when he announced his determination. For once they ventured to remonstrate, setting forth the rashness of venturing his sacred person in the midst of a strange and barbarous people. They might as well have tried to turn a rusty weathercock with a broken-winded bellows. In the fiery heart of the iron-headed Peter sat enthroned the five kinds of courage described by Aristotle, and had the philosopher enumerated five hundred more, I verily believed he would have possessed them all. As ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... gentleman, who now resides in America in a publick character of considerable dignity, desired that his name might not be ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... into the barque's gig, in which they pulled alongside the cutter. Arrived there, they dropped overboard a heavy "killick" of rock which they had previously attached to the boat's painter, and thus anchored her in readiness for the Minerva's crew whenever they might choose to fetch her. To set the cutter's canvas was the work of a few minutes, and, this done, the anchor was quickly hove up and the little craft got under way. On their way out of the lagoon they tacked close under the Minerva's ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... "An' I might knock your teeth into your gullet if you butt in again. You can answer them questions later on. Now, boys, we're decent an' law-abidin', an' we got to handle this right an' regular. How far do you reckon we've ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London
... invited, large bodies of troops from the so-called seceding States." They "sent members to their Congress at Montgomery, and finally permitted the insurrectionary government to be transferred to their Capitol at Richmond." Mr. Lincoln concluded with an ominous sentence which might well have inspired Virginians with a sense of impending peril; "The people of Virginia have thus allowed his giant insurrection to make its nest within her borders, and this government has no choice ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... some have of cutting the Gordian knot of the difficulties of life; which having been done, possibly the very first thing made manifest to the spirit, after taking its mad leap into the dark may be—how very easily the said knot might have been UNTIED; nay, that it was on the very point of being untied, if the impatient spirit had stayed only ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... they have taken a step as irrevocable as suicide. And some logical minds would even go further, and have no law as between the members of a family, no rights, no private property within that limit. The family would be the social unit and the father its public representative, and though the law might intervene if he murdered or ill-used wife or children, or they him, it would do so in just the same spirit that it might prevent him from self-mutilation or attempted suicide, for the good of the ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells
... sins, when laid upon Christ, were yet personally ours, not his; so his righteousness, when put upon us, is yet personally his, not ours. What is it, then? Why, 'he was made to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... perfect, tempting were her lips— The bee or humming-bird that sips From scarlet blossoms in the South Beguiled might ...
— Daisy Dare, and Baby Power - Poems • Rosa Vertner Jeffrey
... details of the act. I imagined it would disgust her to talk about these things; but I now see I should have explained things to her. Before marrying I had come to the conclusion that the respect owed to one's wife was incompatible with any talk that might seem indecent, and also I had made a resolve not to subject her to what I thought then were dirty tricks, even to be naked and to have her naked. In fact, I was the victim of mock modesty; it was an artificial reaction from the life I had been living before marriage. Now it seems to me to be natural, ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... machines for raising water to extinguish fire was first introduced by Mr. Newsham of London, and is now applied to similar engines for washing wall-trees in gardens, and to all kinds of forcing pumps, and might be applied with advantage to lifting pumps where the water is brought from a great distance horizontally. Another kind of machine was invented by one Greyl, in which a vessel of water was every way dispersed by the ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin
... since you ask me I suppose I might as well. Gib, ever since me an' you first hooked up together, away back in the corner o' my head there's been lurkin' a suspicion that once before, a long time ago, you an' me have had some business dealin's, but for the life o' me I couldn't place ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... dignity amidst their sternness. He boasted, in no small degree, the attributes which Southey ascribes to the ancient Scandinavians, whom he terms "firm to inflict, and stubborn to endure." The whole formed a picture, of which the lights might have been given by Rembrandt, but the outline would have required the force and vigour ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... in a body. The biggest caught it, and found himself caught! The boy held on tenderly, while the fish in wild amazement darted from side to side, or sprang high into the air. Oliver was far too experienced a fisher not to know that the captive might be but slightly hooked, so he played it skilfully, casting a sidelong glance now and then at his busy comrades in the hope that they had not ...
— The Crew of the Water Wagtail • R.M. Ballantyne
... occurred to them that the census would be a good opportunity of advancing a step towards the desired end, and accordingly they telegraphed to the Commissioner of Jubbulpore before the enumeration, and petitioned the Chief Commissioner after it had been taken, to the effect that they might be recorded and classified only as Rathor and not as Teli; this method of obtaining recognition of their claims being, as remarked by Sir Bampfylde Fuller, a great deal cheaper than being weighed against gold. On the other hand, ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India—Volume I (of IV) • R.V. Russell
... shadows appear and vanish with the passing clouds, and the changing seasons mark their passage in changing colors. You cannot see the Grand Canyon in one view, as if it were a changeless spectacle from which a curtain might be lifted, but to see it you have to toil from month to month through its labyrinths. It is a region more difficult to traverse than the Alps or the Himalayas, but if strength and courage are sufficient for the task, by a year's toil a concept of sublimity can be obtained ...
— Canyons of the Colorado • J. W. Powell
... horse power in high pressure cylinder 398, in intermediate and low pressure cylinders together 790, total, 1,188; and temperature of hot well 100 deg. Fahr. Then with feed heating the same engine might work as follows: The feed might be heated to 220 deg. Fahr., and the percentage of steam from the first receiver required to heat it would be 12.2 per cent.; the indicated horse power in the high pressure cylinder would be as before 398, and ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 821, Sep. 26, 1891 • Various
... her most bewitching moods—even the old Highland word "fey" scarcely described her many brilliant variations from grave to gay, from gay to romantic, and from romantic to a kind of humorous-satiric vein which moved her to utter quick little witticisms which might have seemed barbed with too sharp a point were they not so quickly covered with a sweetness of manner which deprived them of all malice. She looked her best, too,—she had robed herself in a garment of pale shimmering blue which shone softly like the gleam of moonbeams through crystal—her wonderful ...
— The Secret Power • Marie Corelli
... height, died in Paris in 1858 aged ninety years. In childhood he had been a servant in the House of Orleans and afterward became their pensioner. During the Revolution he passed in and out of Paris as an infant in a nurse's arms, thus carrying dispatches memorized which might have proved dangerous to carry in any ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... father by the ship which had just arrived; it is not wonderful, therefore, that the group which surrounded Capt. Smith were very pale, eager, anxious-looking men. How much we were to learn in ten minutes time; what bitter tidings might be in store for us in ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... hostility of his preventive laws, together with a fresh obstacle in the shape of his new constructions; during three successive legislatures[2307] he provided against their future regeneration, against the permanent instincts and necessities which might one day resuscitate stable families, distinct provinces, and an orthodox church, against artistic, industrial, financial, charitable, and educational corporations, against every spontaneous and organized group, and against every collective, local, or special ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 5 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 1 (of 2)(Napoleon I.) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... state apartment." He stooped to undo the buckles of his shoes, and when Balby wished to assist him, he resisted. "No, no; you shall not loosen my shoes—you are too worthy for that. Madame Witte might think that I am a very assuming person—that I tyrannize over my brother. There, madame, the buckles are undone, and there lie my shoes, and now we are ready to ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... their breakfast was come in. The Cat ate hers, the Dog did penance for his; and if one might judge by the purring on the hearth-rug, the Cat, if not the happiest of the two, at least was ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude
... with Miss Avondale was folded forever. The romance he had evolved from his strange fortune had come to an end, not prosaically, as such romances are apt to do, but with a dramatic termination which, however, was equally fatal to his hopes. At any other time he might have projected the wildest hopes from the fancy that he and Miss Avondale were orphaned of a common benefactor; but it was plain that her interests were apart from his. And there was an indefinable something he did not understand, ...
— Trent's Trust and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... Jesus, a fanatic. He died at 33 when he might have lived to a good old age and done ...
— From the Bottom Up - The Life Story of Alexander Irvine • Alexander Irvine
... she felt that, despite discouragement, she had already dug a tiny, tiny hole in very hard ground, not for herself, but for a little seed which might perhaps ...
— Winnie Childs - The Shop Girl • C. N. Williamson
... convalesced, he grew impatient of the tenacious life which held him to earth. Slowly pacing up and down the corridors of the convent, he used to crave the prayers of the brothers whom he met, beseeching them to intercede with Heaven that he might be suffered to die. One day he said to the archbishop, "I fear that God has abandoned me, and I shall live." Only a little while before his death he wrote some verses, as Padre Giacomo's memorandum witnesses, "with a firm and ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells
... "we inform you." Churchill gives the present tense of this verb three forms, weet, wit, and wot; and there seems to have been some authority for them all: as, "He was, to weet, a little roguish page."—Thomson. "But little wotteth he the might of the means his folly despiseth."—Tupper's Book of Thoughts, p. 35. To wit, used alone, to indicate a thing spoken of, (as the French use their infinitive, savoir, a savoir, or the phrase, c'est a savoir,) is undoubtedly an elliptical expression: probably for, "I give you to ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... could but observe a dogged stupidity on the part of the venomous snake, who, had he but brought coils to his aid, might have simplified matters so easily. The little Heterodons, and even the Lacertines, often assist themselves with coils in managing their prey, though not themselves constrictors; but the venomous ones have not the slightest notion of helping themselves in ...
— A Book of Natural History - Young Folks' Library Volume XIV. • Various
... death, in a new relation to God. That is one outcome of the cross and of what followed; and as historians we have to explain it. We have also to explain how the disciples came to conceive of another Galilean—a carpenter whom they might have seen sawing and sweating in his shop, with whom they tramped the roads of Palestine, whom they saw done to death in ignominy and derision—sitting at the right hand of God. Taken by itself, we might call such a belief mere folly; but too much goes with it for ...
— The Jesus of History • T. R. Glover |
