"Attain" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Sabbath polish. The hat was the one he bought when he first set up as a Baal Habaas or respectable pillar of the synagogue; for even in the smallest Chevra the high hat comes next in sanctity to the Scroll of the Law, and he who does not wear it may never hope to attain to congregational dignities. The gloss on that hat was wonderful, considering it had been out unprotected in all winds and weathers. Not that Mr. Belcovitch did not possess an umbrella. He had two,—one ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... therefore, attempt to ridicule his companion, as some boys better brought up might have done, but was willing to follow his example in what something told him was right. Our young hero had taken an important step toward securing that genuine respectability which he was ambitious to attain. ...
— Ragged Dick - Or, Street Life in New York with the Boot-Blacks • Horatio Alger
... to attain this improved efficiency the most important practical aid is piecework. This has done much even in agriculture: the turnip-hoer by the acre earns more, while he does his work at his own time with more comfort to himself than the old day-labourer. What is more important, the men who ...
— Speculations from Political Economy • C. B. Clarke
... shall I hide your real praise, Or tell you what a nation says? 20 They in your infant bosom trace The virtues of your royal race; In the fair dawning of your mind Discern you generous, mild, and kind; They see you grieve to hear distress, And pant already to redress. Go on, the height of good attain, Nor let a nation hope in vain. For hence we justly may presage The virtues of a riper age. 30 True courage shall your bosom fire, And future actions own you sire. Cowards are cruel, but the brave ...
— The Poetical Works of Addison; Gay's Fables; and Somerville's Chase • Joseph Addison, John Gay, William Sommerville
... without help, it is necessary to charge very high prices to get any adequate return after the working expenses have been paid. In order to get high prices, the standard of work must be very high; and in order to attain a high enough standard of work, a very thorough training is necessary. It is desirable that any one hoping to make money at the craft should have at least a year's training in a workshop where good work is done, and after that, some time will be spent before quite satisfactory work can be ...
— Bookbinding, and the Care of Books - A handbook for Amateurs, Bookbinders & Librarians • Douglas Cockerell
... turn back to me, in order that I may guide you on your road, and that you may arrive more quickly at the goal which it has not been my lot to attain, pause, yet, for a moment, and look upon the past history of humanity. You will see that its fate has been ever to choose between the least of two evils, and ever to commit great faults in order to avoid others ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... more quiet. They recur alternately in periods of seven or eight weeks, while these again are also subject to a period of about eleven years—that is, the short recurring outbursts go on for some years, when they attain a maximum, from which they go on decreasing. I may say that we are now (August 1883) at, or very near, a maximum epoch. There is no doubt that this period has an intimate connection with our auroral displays; but I don't think that the influence sun-spots ...
— Men of Invention and Industry • Samuel Smiles
... and inopportune fog fell from the grey sky; however, at noon an exact observation could be taken. The vessel was in 65 degrees 20 minutes latitude by 54 degrees 22 minutes longitude. It was necessary to attain two degrees more in order to meet with ...
— The English at the North Pole - Part I of the Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... earlier forms that they involved very real sacrifices. The sacrifice was not always vicarious, and is not yet universally so. In India men pay with their own skins, torturing themselves hideously to attain holiness. In the west, saints amazed the world with their austerities and self-scourgings and confessions and vigils. But Luther delivered us from all that. His reformation was a triumph of imagination and a triumph ...
— Preface to Androcles and the Lion - On the Prospects of Christianity • George Bernard Shaw
... will be to discredit the policy and methods of this oligarchy and to hasten the break-up of the vast latifundia of the great magnates and the Church, and those other drastic land reforms without which Hungary cannot hope to attain her full economic value as the granary of central Europe. Hitherto the government of the day has secured a parliamentary majority by corrupting and terrorising the non-Magyar constituencies of the periphery and thus out-voting the ...
— The War and Democracy • R.W. Seton-Watson, J. Dover Wilson, Alfred E. Zimmern,
... as I was going by sea with the bones to the city of Polumbrum, where, pepper grows in great abundance, when the wind totally failed us. On this occasion, the idolaters began to pray to their gods for a favourable wind; but which they were unable to attain. Then the Saracens industriously made their invocations and adorations, to as little purpose. After this, I and my companion were ordered to pray to our God, and the commander of the ship said to me in the Armenian language, which the rest of the people on board did not understand, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... accuracy, and by hard training she will indeed gain steadily in speed and correctness, and after a year she will write rather quickly. Yet she will never succeed in reaching the ideal proficiency. In order to attain the highest point, she ought to have started with an entirely different method. She ought to have begun at once to use all her fingers, and, moreover, to use them without looking at the keyboard. If she had started with this difficult method ...
— Psychology and Social Sanity • Hugo Muensterberg
... who, in their hearts, really care no more for mankind than See-wise cared for the fish, lift their voices in shouts of a spurious humanity, in order to raise themselves to power, on the shoulders of an excited populace. Bloodshed, domestic violence, impracticable efforts to attain an impossible perfection, and all the evils of a civil conflict are forgotten or blindly attempted, in order to raise themselves in the arms of those they ...
— The Lake Gun • James Fenimore Cooper
... pursue, or suffer any qualms of conscience to interfere with their Colonial plans? No; as a measure of policy—as a means of security—they sought to conciliate the Indians, but not the less determined were they to attain their end. Who, then, among Englishmen, would have thought of blaming their fellow countrymen, when the object in view was the aggrandizement of the national power, and the furtherance of individual interests? While the Colonists continued tributary to England they could do no wrong; ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... life; that never for her would these costly tokens of respect be gathered. Yet, instead of this thought humbling her, instead of it teaching her the lesson that only by striving to do her duty in the lowly course set for her could she attain any measure of regard, it aroused in her once more, this time with an even fiercer intensity, her ardent desire to be as different from these good folk as possible. Miss Le Pettit had thought her different, had admired that difference, and to Miss Le Pettit, as supreme arbiter, her heart ...
— The White Riband - A Young Female's Folly • Fryniwyd Tennyson Jesse
... very biggest ichthyosaurian skeleton ever unearthed does not exceed twenty-five feet from snout to tail. Now, this is an extremely decent size for a reptile, as reptiles go; for the crocodile and alligator, the two biggest existing lizards, seldom attain an extreme length of sixteen feet. But there are other reptiles now living that easily beat the ichthyosaurus, such, for example, as the larger pythons or rock-snakes, which not infrequently reach to thirty feet, and measure round the waist as much as a London ...
— Falling in Love - With Other Essays on More Exact Branches of Science • Grant Allen
... direct. You, after long experience, have organized this school; you know best what is most needed to promote the highest interests of your students and maintain the superior standard of your institution. But your word has to be law to attain these conditions, and you insist upon implicit obedience to your rules and mandates. Are you autocratically exacting or 'assuming unwarrantable authority' by so doing in order to meet the responsibilities devolving upon you? As I said before, 'a leader must lead,' and a general must direct, ...
— Katherine's Sheaves • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... harmonious and vivid narrative of their own past history. And it is of inestimable value to any people to obtain such a narrative, which shall comprehend all epochs, be true to fact and, while resting on thorough research, yet be attractive to the reader; for only by this aid can the nation attain to a perfect self-consciousness, and feeling the pulsation of its life throughout the story, become fully acquainted with its own origin and growth and character. But we may doubt whether up to this time works ...
— A History of England Principally in the Seventeenth Century, Volume I (of 6) • Leopold von Ranke
... special property which is kept secret from the others, and from the uninitiated members in the tribe. In order to become a member of a society of that kind secrecy is required and long apprenticeship. The novice rises slowly from one degree of knowledge to another, and only few attain the higher positions. ...
— The Delight Makers • Adolf Bandelier
... very nature must develop slowly towards its ideals. It must expect at first to be much less certain and efficient in its action than is a highly centralized government. This inability on the part of popular government to attain its ideals is reflected also in its subordinate civic units; neither state nor city governments have yet solved the problem of efficient and economical administration, although it is a pleasure to note that some cities are making real progress in this direction. In ...
— Parent and Child Vol. III., Child Study and Training • Mosiah Hall
... cosmos, and we presented them in return with a basket of fruits and biscuit; and they gave us eight oxen and a goat, and a vast number of bladders full of milk, to serve as provision during our long journey. But by changing our oxen, we were enabled in ten days to attain the next station, and through the whole way we only found water in some ditches, dug on purpose, in the vallies, and in two small rivers. From leaving the province of Casaria, we traveled directly eastwards, having the sea of Azoph on our right hand, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... Religion; a good which all aspiring nations of antiquity made an attempt to attain; which some, the Indians and Persians, for example, really labored to achieve with admirable devotion of noble energies, but which this people alone clearly discerned from the beginning, and then pursued for ...
— The Right and Wrong Uses of the Bible • R. Heber Newton
... vessel built for him, the now-renowned Fram, especially intended to resist the pressure of the ice. Hitherto it had been the chief aim of Arctic explorations to avoid besetment, and to try and creep round the land shores. Dr. Nansen was convinced that he could best attain his ends by boldly disregarding these canons and trusting to the drift of the ice to carry him near to the Pole. He reckoned that the drift would take some three years, and provisioned the Fram for five. The results of his venturous ...
— The Story of Geographical Discovery - How the World Became Known • Joseph Jacobs
... the extremes of pleasure and of pain;—contented with his lot, and neither aiming at more than he possessed, nor fearful of being deprived of what he had. He, for a time, seemed in a condition such as all wise men would wish to attain, tho' so few take proper methods for that purpose, that those who we see in it, may be said to owe their felicity rather to chance, than to any right endeavours of ...
— Life's Progress Through The Passions - Or, The Adventures of Natura • Eliza Fowler Haywood
... that wherever elaborate construction and planting have been attempted they have failed from subsequent neglect to produce the effects expected from them, and that broad, quiet, pastoral and sylvan features are the only permanent and really valuable ones we can hope to attain in our great ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 1157, March 5, 1898 • Various
... resort to it. Would He not have resorted to it if He foresaw that His choice lay between eternal extinction and eternal fire, for the great majority of our race? Would the eternal joy to which He foresaw that a few of the race would attain, compensate for the eternal woe which He foresaw would be the fate of the great majority? A thousand times No. The fact that we, with our poor, limited powers, can see that there was a way of averting unutterable and everlasting woe ...
— Love's Final Victory • Horatio
... with inward satisfaction. "I shall, then, attain my ends," thought he. Aloud he said: "Your highness, I have but one wish and one request; if you are willing to fulfil this, then will there be nothing left on ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach
... truth, those persecutors who use the rack and the stake have much to say for themselves. They are convinced that their end is good; and it must be admitted that they employ means which are not unlikely to attain the end. Religious dissent has repeatedly been put down by sanguinary persecution. In that way the Albigenses were put down. In that way Protestantism was suppressed in Spain and Italy, so that it has never since reared its head. But I defy any body ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 4 (of 4) - Lord Macaulay's Speeches • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... 1908.—Long before the end of his elective term, President Roosevelt let it be known that he favored as his successor, William Howard Taft, of Ohio, his Secretary of War. To attain this end he used every shred of his powerful influence. When the Republican convention assembled, Mr. Taft easily won the nomination. Though the party platform was conservative in tone, he gave it a progressive tinge by ...
— History of the United States • Charles A. Beard and Mary R. Beard
... is in his glory here. Nowhere else does he develop such a variety of forms—nowhere attain such an infinity of sizes—nowhere emit so impressive a bray. It is the Bray of Naples. "It is like the thunder of the night when the cloud bursts o'er Cona, and a thousand ghosts shriek at once in ...
— The Dodge Club - or, Italy in 1859 • James De Mille
... have of the vulgar, with the content and happiness I conceive therein, is an ample recompense for all my endeavours in what part of knowledge soever. Wisdom is His most beauteous attribute; no man can attain unto it; yet Solomon pleased God when he desired it. He is wise because He knows all things; and He knows all things because He made them all; but His greatest knowledge is in comprehending that He made not—that is, Himself. The wisdom of God receives small honour from those heads ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books, Volume XIII. - Religion and Philosophy • Various
... priests encourage this infatuation, as those who embark leave their property to them. This is faith, but alas! sadly misdirected. It shows a yearning for something better,—to escape from cruel wars and practices and misgovernment, to attain peace and quiet and rest. It is certain that almost all who thus embark perish horribly at sea. A few may be thrown on coral islands,—probably to die,— certainly never ...
— The Cruise of the Mary Rose - Here and There in the Pacific • William H. G. Kingston
... thus denied adequate rest and suffered great losses, in no case did the enemy attain the slightest success, but was invariably thrown back ...
— 1914 • John French, Viscount of Ypres
... and Aristotle, he did not, apparently, take very seriously the contention that that government alone is good "which seeks to attain the permanent interests of the governed by evolving the character of its citizens." To put the matter brutally, politics, despite the lofty sentiments on the transparencies in torchlight processions, had only to do with the belly, not ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... sound strategical principle, had he attacked without necessity an army numerically so superior. For that the Swedish force amounted in all to not more than 18,000 men there is as much proof almost as it is possible to attain in such ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 11 • Various
... essays, extracted from the most celebrated authors; So that, blending PHILOSOPHY with POLITICKS, HISTORY, &c., the youth of both sexes will be improved and persons of all ranks agreeably and usefully entertained. And upon the whole we will labour to attain to all the exactness that so much variety will permit, and give as much variety as will consist with a reasonable exactness. And as this part of our project cannot be carried into execution without the correspondence of the INGENIOUS, we shall take all opportunities of ...
— The Father of British Canada: A Chronicle of Carleton • William Wood
... length of stigmatic horns at the moment when pollen is forced out of the indusium, compared to what they ultimately attain, makes me fancy that they are not then mature or ready, and if so, as in Lobelia, each flower must be fertilised by pollen ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin Volume II - Volume II (of II) • Charles Darwin
... miles, should endeavour to learn the force of the Yankees, and, as far as they could, their mode of attack. From that instant the corporal knew no more; for, after two hours' weary exertion, he reached the Fort, which, had it been but another mile distant, his strength had not held out for him to attain. ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... force ourselves to make the mournful effort to color the gloomy shrouds, veiling the skill we once loved, with the brilliant hues they would exact at our hands. We feel our loss too bitterly to attempt such an analysis. And what result would it be possible to attain with all our efforts! We could not hope to convey to those who have never heard him, any just conception of that fascination so ineffably poetic, that charm subtle and penetrating as the delicate perfume of the vervain or the ...
— Life of Chopin • Franz Liszt
... woman can enter heaven only as sealed to some devout member of the Mormon church "for time and eternity," and that the space around the earth is filled with spirits seeking some "tabernacles of clay" by means of which they may attain salvation. Through the teaching of this doctrine, which is accepted as explicitly by the membership of the Mormon church at large as is any doctrine by a Protestant denomination, the Mormon women believe that the ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... whole has no definite end that has absolute worth, then it has no worth except as the stages, the individual factors included in it, attain to something within themselves which is of increasing worth. If the movement achieves this, then it has worth, not otherwise. We may illustrate this question by asking ourselves concerning the existence and significance of suffering and of the evil and of the bad which are in the ...
— Edward Caldwell Moore - Outline of the History of Christian Thought Since Kant • Edward Moore
... youth completely naked with the exception of the blue girdle. Many, especially of the younger men, have besides so well-formed a body, that the sculptor who could accurately reproduce it in marble would at once attain a ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold
... solemn duty—the present system having signally failed—to call upon the Government, in the most imperative terms, to take such measures as will secure local supplies of food sufficient to keep the people alive, and to sacrifice any quantity of money that may be necessary to attain the object, declaring, as we do, that any neglect or delay in that matter will render the Government responsible for the safety of the people of Ireland, who must perish in ...
— The History of the Great Irish Famine of 1847 (3rd ed.) (1902) - With Notices Of Earlier Irish Famines • John O'Rourke
... General looked astonished. He had not yet fully measured little Jim's ambition that stopped at nothing. Hitherto it had been that pernicious ambition that desires, and at the same time, lazily refuses to put forth the exertion necessary to attain, or it had been that other scarcely less reprehensible ambition that exerts itself simply to outshine others, and Mrs. O'Callaghan had had good cause to be anxious about Jim. Tonight it was the right sort of ambition, backed ...
— The Widow O'Callaghan's Boys • Gulielma Zollinger
... been developed in so rude and ferocious a time. The estimation in which women were held among Eastern nations was little lower than their position among the Jews. Where polygamy exists, and where purchase-money is paid to the father of the bride, women never attain to high appreciation or respect. Beauty rather than virtue was the ideal of Greece. The women of that country, living in continual seclusion, deprived alike of opportunities for attaining culture or exerting influence, became narrowed in thought and intelligence, and passed ...
— A History of English Prose Fiction • Bayard Tuckerman
... not begin to do so now, but shall say what I think best. Against your character any words of mine would be weak enough, if I were to advise your keeping what you have got and not risking what is actually yours for advantages which are dubious in themselves, and which you may or may not attain. I will, therefore, content myself with showing that your ardour is out of season, and your ...
— The History of the Peloponnesian War • Thucydides
... soon as the growths are out of the earth the flowers begin to appear. The greatest height the plants attain rarely exceeds a foot; this commends it as a suitable border plant. Individually the flowers are not showy, but collectively they are pleasing and effective. When they first open they are a mixture of green, red, blue, and purple, the latter predominating. As they become older ...
— Hardy Perennials and Old Fashioned Flowers - Describing the Most Desirable Plants, for Borders, - Rockeries, and Shrubberies. • John Wood
... use and a sacrifice of distinctness. It is quite easy, of course, to think confusedly, even whilst employing the clearest type of language; though in such a case it is very hard to do so without being quickly brought to book. On the other hand, it is not feasible to attain to a high degree of clear thinking, when the only method of speech available is one that tends towards wordlessness—that is to say, is relatively deficient in verbal forms that preserve their identity in all contexts. Wordless thinking is not ...
— Anthropology • Robert Marett
... land, and won the western main, Now no fortress against him doth remain, No city walls are left for him to gain, Save Sarraguce, that sits on high mountain. Marsile its King, who feareth not God's name, Mahumet's man, he invokes Apollin's aid, Nor wards off ills that shall to him attain. AOI. ...
— The Song of Roland • Anonymous
... esteem. The Praetorians, who had not been consulted in his election, never looked upon him with favor, and Nerva was obliged to act with great caution. He stopped trials for high treason, pardoned political offenders, diminished taxes, recalled exiles, and strove by every honest art to attain popularity. But the Praetorians, becoming mutinous, not only put the murderers of Domitian to death, but forced the emperor to approve of their act publicly. This insult was deeply felt by Nerva, who now resolved to adopt a colleague, in order to increase ...
— A Smaller History of Rome • William Smith and Eugene Lawrence
... any other foreign State, and (12) Minor children, of naturalized citizens losing citizenship by such foreign residence, also lose their United States citizenship if they acquire the nationality of a foreign State; but not until they attain the age of 25 without having acquired permanent residence in the United States. 66 Stat. 163; Tit. ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... been subjected to many displacements, both flexures of the monoclinal type and faults. Some of these flexures attain a length of over 80 miles and a displacement of 3,000 feet, and the faults reach even a greater magnitude. There is also an abundance of volcanic rocks and extinct volcanoes, and while the principal eruptions ...
— The Cliff Ruins of Canyon de Chelly, Arizona • Cosmos Mindeleff
... sessile species from Massachusetts consist of five species. . .Of the genus Balanus, on the shores of Britain, we have ONE species (B. perforata Bruguiere), which you have not in the United States, in the same way as you exclusively have B. eburneus. All the above species attain a somewhat larger average size on the shores of the United States than on those of Britain, but the specimens from the glacial beds of Uddevalla, Scotland, and Canada, are larger even than those of the ...
— Louis Agassiz: His Life and Correspondence • Louis Agassiz
... vast new technological age-one that, despite its capacity for human destruction, has an equal capacity to make poverty and human misery obsolete. If our efforts are wisely directed—and if our unremitting efforts for dependable peace begin to attain some success—we can surely become participants in creating an age characterized by justice and rising levels of ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Dwight D. Eisenhower • Dwight D. Eisenhower
... young gentleman use the library as freely as you do, I am always tolerably confident that he will attain a high rank. We go on ...
— Up The Baltic - Young America in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark • Oliver Optic
... the proper heritage of man and woman, and whoso has missed it may attain wealth or ambition, may exhaust the earth—yet shall die without fully or ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... for his Glory, and my Soul's Good; and that he who is the true Light that never sets, the eternal Sun, that enlivens, nourishes and exhilarates all Things, would vouchsafe to enlighten my Soul, that I mayn't fall into Sin; but by his Guidance, may attain ...
— Colloquies of Erasmus, Volume I. • Erasmus
... get out of here," whispered Rob to Merritt, whose breast was decorated with the coveted bronze cross and red ribbon, which is the highest honor a scout can attain. ...
— The Boy Scouts of the Eagle Patrol • Howard Payson
... impression. He wants so competent a colleague removed from the political sphere. If his words and actions are of a piece, he will certainly work hard to attain this object. He is saying everywhere, 'Orange is a born ecclesiastic. Orange is a mystic. Orange is under the influence of Newman. Orange begins to see that marriage is not for him.' Such remarks don't help outside the Church. Really, competition ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes
... waves, in wars, she wonts to dwell, And will be found with peril and with pain; Nor can the man that moulds an idle cell Unto her happy mansion attain: Before her gate high God did Sweat ordain, And wakeful watches ever to abide; But easy is the way and passage plain To pleasure's palace: it may soon be spied, And day and night her doors to all ...
— English: Composition and Literature • W. F. (William Franklin) Webster
... years; and a greater age still might have been recorded of this specimen, but for the untoward treatment it sustained at the hands, or rather beak, of a tame raven. In all probability it may be safely assumed that, when the conditions of life are favorable, these creatures may attain a highly venerable age—regarding the lapse of time from a purely human and interested ...
— Young Folks' Library, Volume XI (of 20) - Wonders of Earth, Sea and Sky • Various
... the two principal seaports in Georgia, went 1,000 negroes, the chief occupation of whom was stevedoring. Savannah, another important seaport on the south Atlantic coast, with a population of about 70,000, saw the migration attain unusually large proportions, so as to cause almost a panic and to lead to ...
— Negro Migration during the War • Emmett J. Scott
... to see You haste away so soon; As yet the early-rising sun Has not attain'd his noon. Stay, stay, Until the hasting day Has run But to the even-song; And, having pray'd together, we Will go ...
— The Ontario Readers: The High School Reader, 1886 • Ministry of Education
... recognizable as a human being. All fear of making myself in a worse mess had vanished, and thus, freed from nervousness, I began to get quite daring. The Chief saw in me the making of a first-class pipe walker, and prophesied that I should be able to attain the speed of three miles an hour. I still fell off, however, enough not to get a swelled ...
— A Dweller in Mesopotamia - Being the Adventures of an Official Artist in the Garden of Eden • Donald Maxwell
... any being whatever, from the highest to the lowest, in any world. It tells me that I may live myriads of millions of ages, and that not in any of those ages, nor in any portion of any age, can I be free from apprehension as to the future, until I attain to a state of unconsciousness; and that in order to arrive at this consummation I must turn away from all that is pleasant, or lovely, or instructive, or elevating, or sublime. It tells me by voices ever repeated, like the ceaseless sound of the sea-wave on the shore, that ...
— Oriental Religions and Christianity • Frank F. Ellinwood
... once stop there. If there be classes above us of rational intelligences, clearer manifestations may belong to them. This may be one of the distinctions. And it may be one to which we ourselves hereafter shall attain. ...
— Evidences of Christianity • William Paley
... straight I again revolved The Law and Prophets, searching what was writ 260 Concerning the Messiah, to our scribes Known partly, and soon found of whom they spake I am—this chiefly, that my way must lie Through many a hard assay, even to the death, Ere I the promised kingdom can attain, Or work redemption for mankind, whose sins' Full weight must be transferred upon my head. Yet, neither thus disheartened or dismayed, The time prefixed I waited; when behold The Baptist (of whose birth ...
— Paradise Regained • John Milton
... believe in the former existence, attempt to justify the ills of man here, by assuming that a state of perfect happiness cannot be attained by man, except he has suffered a certain amount of pain; so that, in order to attain to perfect happiness, man must of necessity experience suffering—a theory founded on the much misunderstood axiom, that nothing can exist save by contrast. But supposing, for the sake of argument, that ...
— Byways of Ghost-Land • Elliott O'Donnell
... bring back plagues and epidemics? Have they prepared themselves to use my discovery only for the benefit of mankind? Or have they been precipitous? I shall have to apply myself to the devising of methods by which my discovery—made so that Humanity might attain hitherto undreamed-of-heights—I shall have to devise means by which it will be truly a ...
— Operation: Outer Space • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... in guns and marksmanship had any sinister propulsion back of it. His father and brothers had always been this way. Rifles were as important to pioneers as plows, and their skillful use was an achievement every frontiersman tried to attain. Friendly rivalry had always existed among the members of the Isbel family: even Ann Isbel was a good shot. But such proficiency in the use of firearms—and life in the open that was correlative with it—had not dominated them as it had Jean. Bill and Guy Isbel were born ...
— To the Last Man • Zane Grey
... satisfaction and expression of the individual is only to be found in his complete absorption, and that is only possible through love. Now a human being is both MAN and WOMAN: it is only when these two are united that the real human being exists; and thus it is only by love that man and woman attain to the full measure of humanity. But when nowadays we talk of a human being, such heartless blockheads are we that quite involuntarily we only think of man. It is only in the union of man and woman by love (sensuous and supersensuous) that the human being exists; and as the human being cannot ...
— The Perfect Wagnerite - A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring • George Bernard Shaw
... yet an artist, though, on the flute. The technique of the instrument has many depths which I had not thought of before, and I would not call myself a virtuoso within a year." He suffers agony because he does not attain a point in harmony which the audience did not notice. Writing of the temptation of flute soloists, he once said: "They have rarely been able to resist the fatal facility of the instrument, and have usually addressed themselves to winning the applause ...
— Sidney Lanier • Edwin Mims
... the Fieldmarshal, in writing these pages, was to attain to clearness of vision concerning his earthly lot, to bring the forces which were at work in his soul into harmony with those which govern the universe, to reconcile faith and knowledge, and to satisfy himself that life on this earth can only be regarded ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... rejection by the Senate remains in force they can not with propriety attempt to exercise such a power. In the present state of things, therefore, the corporation will be enabled effectually to accomplish the object it has been so long endeavoring to attain. Its exchange committees and its delegated powers to its president may hereafter be dispensed with without incurring the danger of exposing its proceedings to the public view. The sentinels which the law had placed at its board can no longer ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 2) of Volume 3: Andrew Jackson (Second Term) • James D. Richardson
... I live!—death cannot be A terror, then, to one from death set free' Living for Christ, rich blessings I attain, Yet, dying for Him, mine is greater gain Life for my Lord, is death to sin and strife, Yet death for Him is ...
— Poems of the Heart and Home • Mrs. J.C. Yule (Pamela S. Vining)
... the craftsman and his clients, and doubtless practically to have some desirable magic effect upon the realities of things. But (to return to the hypothesis of the aesthetic primacy of geometric and non-representative art) it is certain that although such early representations occasionally attain marvellous life-likeness and anatomical correctness, yet they do not at first show any corresponding care for symmetrical and rythmical arrangement. The bisons and wild boars, for instance, of the Altamira cave frescoes, do indeed display vigour and ...
— The Beautiful - An Introduction to Psychological Aesthetics • Vernon Lee
... and women who believe that the great question of world democracy includes government of the people, by the people and for the people in our country, are invited to attend our convention and counsel with us on ways and means to attain this object at the ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume V • Ida Husted Harper
... be possible to attain, in the study, to some such adumbration of an understanding, it were plainly unfair to expect it of officials in the hurry of events. Our two white officers have accordingly been no more perspicacious than was to be looked for, and I ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 17 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... days I have been taking out to walk my Cascaret, [Footnote: Francis Laur.] the little engineer of whom I told you. He has become very good looking, the ladies lift their lorgnons at him, and it depends only on him to attain the dignity of a negro "giraffier," but he loves, he is engaged, he has four years to wait, to work to make himself a position, and he has made a vow. You would tell him that he is stupid, I preach to him, on the contrary, my old ...
— The George Sand-Gustave Flaubert Letters • George Sand, Gustave Flaubert
... artist, the power of disentangling the central feature from the surrounding details, the power of subordinating accessories, of seeing which minister to the innermost impression, and which distract and blur. An artist who creates a great character need not necessarily even desire to attain the great qualities which he discerns; he sees them, as he sees the vertebrae of the mountain ridge under pasture and woodland, as he sees the structure of the tree under its mist of green; but to see beauty is not necessarily to desire it; for, as in the ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... would attain the priceless boon of peace, see to it that a humdrum bulb be planted in the brown flower-pot which ...
— The Hawk of Egypt • Joan Conquest
... insignificant in the eyes of the world, but none the less does responsibility devolve upon each one of us." "Zaccheus climbed a tree. We learn from this that we should all strive to climb to the loftiest that life can attain." Elizabeth put in an occasional remark, and Martha Ellen responded. This was one of the former's grown-up moments and she reveled in it. There was none of the family there to carry home the tale that Lizzie was putting on ...
— 'Lizbeth of the Dale • Marian Keith
... to be the last question—how are we to attain this wonderful gift, the secret of a ...
— The After-glow of a Great Reign - Four Addresses Delivered in St. Paul's Cathedral • A. F. Winnington Ingram
... only son of my own age. Her design, in relation to me, was that I should be educated with her child, and that an affection, in this way, might be excited in me towards my young master, which might render me, when we should attain to manhood, one of his most faithful and intelligent dependants. I enjoyed, equally with him, all the essential benefits of education. There were certain accomplishments, from which I was excluded, from the belief that they were unsuitable to my rank and station. ...
— Edgar Huntley • Charles Brockden Brown
... in fine, realised in the life of Jesus and sealed by his death, is no absurdity; it is for every thinking Christian the eternal life or the kingdom of God on earth, which Jesus wished to establish, and in part did establish. To become a citizen of this kingdom is the highest that man can attain, but it is not attained merely through baptism and confirmation; it must be ...
— The Silesian Horseherd - Questions of the Hour • Friedrich Max Mueller
... embitter all the most coveted possessions. There will ever be something to be achieved—some enemy to humble, some higher elevation to attain, some Mordecai in the gate, whose reverence withheld is more desirable than all the homage ...
— Notable Women of Olden Time • Anonymous
... to her and placing one on either side, there, while the shadows were lengthening in the beautiful garden, and the night came creeping silently on, she talked to them as a gentle mother would, of the great object and aim of this mortal life, and the high destiny which all may attain if they only so far desire it as to strive after it, and as the evening stole upon them, and the stars came quietly out in the mild heavens, she kissed them tenderly and left them to the sweet influences of the calm night, and of ...
— The Elm Tree Tales • F. Irene Burge Smith
... Western Canada are well composed, and have become a most formidable body of 80,000 men,[1] and are not to be classed with rude and undisciplined masses. In 1837, they rushed to the defence of their soil; and, so eager were they to attain a knowledge of the duties of a soldier, that, in the course of four months, many divisions were able to go through field-days with the regulars; and the embodied regiments, being clothed in scarlet, were always supposed by American visitors to be ...
— Canada and the Canadians, Vol. 2 • Richard Henry Bonnycastle
... as the owner of the boat, to defend the good qualities which have served us best," replied Nell, looking so brilliantly pretty, with her flushed cheeks and sparkling eyes, that I felt there might still be consolations in life for me, if only I could attain them. ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson
... quietly away, and continued writing, but another and another fell, and he could not help it. For Mr Percival was almost the only master whose goodwill he very strongly coveted, and whose approval he was most anxious to attain. ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar
... present only on the threshold of such a knowledge of that art as will enable us to use it eventually as the greatest of all humanising and educational agents. Music will prove a ladder to the loftier regions of thought; indeed I have long found for myself that I cannot attain to the highest range of my intellectual power except when hearing good music. All poets, and most writers of prose, will say that their thought is never so exalted, their sense of beauty and proportion never so just, as when they are listening either to the artificial music ...
— The Lost Stradivarius • John Meade Falkner
... sexual hygiene. But there is no room for compromise or combination here. A training in sexual hygiene has no meaning if it is not a training, for men and women alike, in personal and social responsibility, in the right to know and to discriminate, and in so doing to attain self-conquest. A generation thus trained to self-respect and to respect for others has no use for a web of official regulations to protect its feeble and cloistered virtues from possible visions of evil, and an army of police ...
— The Task of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... may require the elector to be of a certain age, to have had a fixed residence, to be of a sane mind, and unconvicted of crime, etc., because these are qualifications or conditions that all citizens, sooner or later, may attain; but to go beyond this, and say to one-half the citizens of the State, notwithstanding you possess all these qualifications you shall never vote, is of the very essence of despotism. It is a bill of attainder of the ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... with one of very finely Powder'd Crystal or Sand, we have taken pleasure to make the mixture pass through differing Colours, as we kept it more or less in the Fusion. For it was not usually till after a pretty long Decoction that the Mass attain'd to the Amethystin Colour. ...
— Experiments and Considerations Touching Colours (1664) • Robert Boyle
... was bitterly disappointed. The lesson was a hard one, but salutary. I took no more disinterested advice; I bought no more property. There are too many agents between a woman and the thing she aims at, for her ever to attain it without danger of discomfiture. The experience, as you may guess, put me in no amicable mood towards Mr. Seabrook. Just think of it! There were three years I had supported, by my labor, a large family of men, for that is what it amounted to. ...
— The New Penelope and Other Stories and Poems • Frances Fuller Victor
... personal and literary importance of hardly less moment. There comes an occasion, a period perhaps, in the life of every man when he touches his highest point, when he does his best, or even, under a sudden inspiration and excitement, something better than his best, and to which he can never again attain. At the moment it is often impossible to detect this point, but when the man and his career have passed into history, and we can survey it all spread out before us like a map, the pinnacle of success can easily be discovered. The reply to Hayne was ...
— Daniel Webster • Henry Cabot Lodge
... ten minutes it was almost a calm. I seized the moment to return home. Before I had got quite over, the gale rose from the southeast and threatened new destruction. It lasted great part of the night, but did not attain the violence of that from the north; yet it contributed to raise still higher the water, which was the principal instrument of devastation. The flood was about seven feet above the height of an ordinary high tide. This has been sufficient to inundate great part ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis
... was not expiated; she should shortly learn by what prayers and exercises she might attain once more to perfect purity before the Gods, of whom he purposed to ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... vex'd infant to her bosom clings, "When round her neck his eager arms he flings; "Breathes to her list'ning soul his melting sigh, "And lifts suffus'd with tears his asking eye! "Will she for all ambition can attain, "The charms of pleasure, or the lures of gain, "Betray strong Nature's feelings, will she prove "Cold to the claims of duty, and of love? "But should the mother from her yearning heart "Bid the soft image of her child depart; "When the vex'd infant to her bosom clings "When round ...
— Poems (1786), Volume I. • Helen Maria Williams
... you mimicked him!" cried the queen. "But why don't you make the Guises inform you of what is going on, so that when you attain your grand majority you may know how to reign yourself? I am your wife, and your honor is mine. Trust me! we will reign together, my darling; but it won't be a bed of roses for us until the day ...
— Catherine de' Medici • Honore de Balzac
... cares little for adaptability. He slogs through the world. But we! we are experts. Adaptability is what we depend on. We talk of our mastery of nature, which sounds very grand; but the fact is we respectfully adapt ourselves first, to her ways. "We attain no power over nature till we learn natural laws, and our lordship depends on the adroitness with which ...
— This Simian World • Clarence Day
... portrait of him, being a copy of the above, thus speaks: "He was one of the very first who to great legal knowledge, added a considerable share of polite literature. He arrived at the highest rank to which a lawyer could attain in his own country; and he has left to the world such literary productions, as will authorize his friends to place him, if not in the highest, yet much above the lowest, class of elegant and polite writers. He died in 1783, leaving to the world a proof, that an ...
— On the Portraits of English Authors on Gardening, • Samuel Felton
... 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, ...
— Capitola the Madcap • Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... Two centuries after the foundation of Rome, both Italy and Africa were strangers to this useful plant; it afterwards became naturalized in those countries, and at length arrived in Spain, France, &c. Olive trees sometimes attain ...
— A Catechism of Familiar Things; Their History, and the Events Which Led to Their Discovery • Benziger Brothers
... and to wear openly, and get yourself pointed at—laughed at! Again sounded the refrain of the hired bard of dress. "It is cut to give the wearer the appearance of perfect physical development. And the effect so produced so improves his form that he unconsciously strives to attain the appearance which the garment gives him; he expands his chest, draws in his waist ...
— Bunker Bean • Harry Leon Wilson
... which the people demands at the most solemn epochs. In 1848 the formula "From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs" was the one which went straight to the heart of the masses, and if they acclaimed the Republic and universal suffrage, it was because they hoped to attain to Communism through them. In 1871, also, when the people besieged in Paris desired to make a supreme effort to resist the invader, what was their demand?—That free rations should be served out to everyone. Let all articles ...
— The Place of Anarchism in Socialistic Evolution - An Address Delivered in Paris • Pierre Kropotkin
... believe and thus to limit his endless seeking, the proof would need to be irresistible. The God offered to us by the best and strongest proof has given us our reason to employ loyally and fully, that is to say, to try to attain, before all and in all things, that which appears to be the truth. Can He exact that we should accept, in spite of it, a belief of which the wisest and the most ardent do not, from the human point of view, deny the uncertainty? He proposes for our consideration a very doubtful story ...
— Death • Maurice Maeterlinck
... they understand whether a tire is well welded or not, and then pronounce upon its merits with great emphasis, but there their ambition rests satisfied. It is the same peculiarity among ourselves which leads us in other matters, such as book-making, to attain the excellence of fault-finding without the wit to indite a page. It was in vain I tried to indoctrinate the Bechuanas with the idea that criticism did not imply any superiority over the workman, or even equality ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... aim at or attain a high college rank, the rules of the Phi Beta Kappa Society, which confine the number of members to the first sixteen of each class, were stretched so as to include him,—a tribute to his recognized ability, and an evidence that a distinguished future was ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... 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 North Sea. Its operations ...
— The Devil's Paw • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... calculated to perplex and mislead from its very extent; not so an inquiry into the powers of government, and a classification of those powers. They are limited in extent, and, if we confine ourselves to English names and English necessities, we shall readily attain to an apprehension of the mode in which empires, nations, and political societies are bound together, at least in so far as such knowledge is required for the understanding of the nature of Imperial supremacy, and the mode in which Home Rule in Ireland is ...
— Handbook of Home Rule (1887) • W. E. Gladstone et al.
... tribulation, we attain'd at last to honour With no succour from my kindred, I upreared my house alone, And I see my cherish'd maiden, with admiring gazes on her, Glide amid the high and noble with a ...
— Eidolon - The Course of a Soul and Other Poems • Walter R. Cassels
... was an admirer of Cornelia's; a fact which was the occasion of much pleasant remark and easy witticism. More serious consequences were not likely to ensue, for such men as he seldom attain to be other than indirectly useful or mildly obnoxious to their fellow-creatures. But the strongest instincts he had were social; and it was touching to observe the earnestness with which they urged him to lumber the path of fashion and gay life. He ...
— Bressant • Julian Hawthorne
... among the cypress trees.—This nocturnal wanderer, my only companion in the "City of the Dead," dispelled my gloomy reflections at once, and inspired some vivid ideas relative to his appearance in such a place. Wishing to attain some means of elucidating the mystery, I concealed my person behind a tomb attached to that portion of the cemetery, well adapted to shield me from observation, and by the adoption of this judicious expedient, I succeeded in the accomplishment of my design; ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XVII. No. 473., Saturday, January 29, 1831 • Various
... obedience. She, and Zeke as well, knew the futility of fighting the old man's prejudices. But, with the optimism of youth, the lovers hoped for happiness. A little older, they might at least defy the hostile guardian. In the meantime, Zeke was determined to attain material prosperity during the ...
— Heart of the Blue Ridge • Waldron Baily
... &c. adj.; manhood, virility, maturity full age, ripe age; flower of age; prime of life, meridian of life, spring of life. man &c. 373; woman &c. 374; adult, no chicken. V. come of age, come to man's estate, come to years of discretion; attain majority, assume the toga virilis[Lat]; have cut one's eyeteeth, have sown one's mild oats. Adj. adolescent, pubescent, of age; of full age, of ripe age; out of one's teens, grown up, mature, full grown, in one's prime, middle-aged, manly, virile, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... fingers, yet smoking on the floor; Westcott, his clothes torn, his face bruised by blows, breathing heavily, went slowly backward, step by step, to the farther wall, conscious of nothing now but the savagely hostile faces of these new enemies. Lacy, staggering as though drunk, managed to attain his feet, hate, the desire for revenge, yielding him strength. This was his crowd, and his mind was ...
— The Strange Case of Cavendish • Randall Parrish
... more foolish, a little more ridiculous, than his own weak, ignorant, foolish, and, perhaps, ridiculous self. Not he; but the man who is always looking upwards to goodness, to good men, and to the all-good God: filling his soul with the sight of an excellence to which he thinks he can never attain; and saying, with David, 'All my delight is in the saints that dwell in the earth, and in those who ...
— Town and Country Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... But what mortal can attain shall be mine. Already thoughts that fled my agony come to me as gently as the alighting of birds. Truths open about me like the unfolding of roses yet warm with God's secret. Good-night. (Takes her hand) I am not the greatest ...
— Semiramis and Other Plays - Semiramis, Carlotta And The Poet • Olive Tilford Dargan
... passage about the ass; and, far from advising the predestined to be bled he would have changed the regimen of cucumbers and lettuces for one eminently substantial. He recommended the exercise of economy, in order to attain to the power of magic liberality in the moment of war, thus imitating the admirable example of the English government, which in time of peace has two hundred ships in commission, but whose shipwrights can, in time of need, furnish double that quantity when it is desirable ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... the whole effect of a pair of scissors to one blade and not to the other. His view leads to the apparent confusion of taking for the cause of value not our desire for a thing, but the sacrifice we must make to attain it. Bentham[330] said, for example, that Ricardo confused 'cost' with 'value.' The denial that utility must in some sense or other determine value perplexes an intelligible and consistent meaning. It is clearly true, upon his postulates, that ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume II (of 3) - James Mill • Leslie Stephen
... marriage, and this we can easily believe. Geoffrey was more than ten years her junior, and still a mere boy. She had but recently occupied the position of highest rank in the world to which a woman could attain. She was naturally of a proud and haughty spirit. We are told nothing of the arguments which induced her to consent; but in this case again the political advantage, the necessity of the marriage to the security of her succession, must have been ...
— The History of England From the Norman Conquest - to the Death of John (1066-1216) • George Burton Adams
... of the present improved invention is stated to be decided; but the public will shortly have an opportunity of judging for themselves, as several experimental journeys are projected. If it should attain its anticipated perfection, the contrivance will indeed be a proud triumph of human ingenuity, which, aided by its economy, will doubtless recommend it to universal patronage. Mr. Gurney has already secured ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, No. - 287, December 15, 1827 • Various
... passing through the barrier of broken stakes and spars. But her brave commander was no more. A shot from one of the batteries had struck and killed him, when on the very verge of gaining the highest honor that man could attain,—that of saving his native town from the ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 4 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... is profounder. There are men anaesthetic on the religious side, deficient in that category of sensibility. Just as a bloodless organism can never, in spite of all its goodwill, attain to the reckless "animal spirits" enjoyed by those of sanguine temperament; so the nature which is spiritually barren may admire and envy faith in others, but can never compass the enthusiasm and peace which those who are temperamentally qualified for ...
— The Varieties of Religious Experience • William James
... one sea, one river, and see all. An alchemist spends his fortunes to find out the philosopher's stone forsooth, cure all diseases, make men long-lived, victorious, fortunate, invisible, and beggars himself, misled by those seducing impostors (which he shall never attain) to make gold; an antiquary consumes his treasure and time to scrape up a company of old coins, statues, rules, edicts, manuscripts, &c., he must know what was done of old in Athens, Rome, what lodging, diet, houses they had, and have all the present news at first, though ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... mind. While its art is as studied and conscious as that of the Ciris, it has the directness and integrity of Homeric narrative. Yet Vergil has not forgotten the startling effects that Catullus would attain by compressing a long tale into a suggestive phrase, if only a memory of the tale could be assumed. The story of Priam's death on the citadel is told in all its tragic horror till the climax is reached. Then ...
— Vergil - A Biography • Tenney Frank
... said they to me, "by paying the extra price you may have it for your own grave, or for your family!" meaning that we should have a right to pile ourselves over the defunct Captain. I wonder how the English ever attain to any conception of a future existence, since they so overburden themselves with earth and mortality in their ideas of funerals. A drive with an undertaker, in a sable-plumed coach!—talking about graves!—and yet he ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... 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 ...
— Memoirs of Arthur Hamilton, B. A. Of Trinity College, Cambridge • Arthur Christopher Benson
... devotion in the tie between mother and son," a woman writes, "is added to the relation of husband and wife, the union of marriage is raised to the high and beautiful dignity it deserves, and can attain in this world. It comprehends sympathy, love, and perfect understanding, even of the faults and weaknesses of both sides." "The foundation of every true woman's love," another woman writes, "is a mother's tenderness. He whom she loves ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... mythical, past. There were legends of men with big bodies, fierce faces, and red hair, who had done big deeds, and conquered in dark and barbarous days, even Fate's self, as it had seemed. None could overthrow them, none could stand before their determination to attain that which they chose to claim. Students of heredity knew that there were curious instances of revival of type. There had been a certain Red Godwyn who had ruled his piece of England before the Conqueror came, and who had defied the interloper with such splendid arrogance and superhuman lack ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett |
