"Contriver" Quotes from Famous Books
... affirmer aider almoner annoyer arbiter assenter asserter bailer caster censer (vessel) concocter condenser conferrer conjurer consulter continuer contradicter contriver convener conveyer corrupter covenanter debater defender deliberater deserter desolater deviser discontinuer disturber entreater exalter exasperater exciter executer (except in law) expecter frequenter granter idolater imposer impugner ... — Division of Words • Frederick W. Hamilton
... type. He was a fanatical and devoted believer in the Mahdi and a loyal follower of the Khalifa. For many years he had served on the northern frontier of the Dervish Empire, and his name was well known to the Egyptian Government as the contriver of the most daring and the most brutal raids. His cruelty to the wretched inhabitants of the border villages had excluded him from all hope of mercy should he ever fall into the hands of the enemy. His crafty ... — The River War • Winston S. Churchill
... know you for a cunning contriver—an upsetter of calculations—but no Turk. Nevertheless, as I understand it, we go against Ali Higg, who calls himself the Lion of Petra. Sheikh Ali Higg has amassed a heap of plunder—hundreds of camels—merchandise taken from the caravans; that should be ours for the lifting. That ... — The Lion of Petra • Talbot Mundy
... I have here related it, I freely give him leave to do as I did, and go up to the Moon for a Demonstration; and if upon his return he does not give ample Testimony to the Case in every part of it, as here related, I am content to pass for the Contriver of it my self, and be punish'd as the Law shall ... — The Consolidator • Daniel Defoe
... The infinite wise Contriver of us, and all things about us, hath fitted our senses, faculties, and organs, to the conveniences of life, and the business we have to do here. We are able, by our senses, to know and distinguish things: and to examine them so far as to apply them to our uses, and several ways to accommodate ... — An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, Volume I. - MDCXC, Based on the 2nd Edition, Books I. and II. (of 4) • John Locke
... all that while!" said Matilda; and then she stopped. If not, then the moving of Mrs. Staples, and all the delight of the supper to be prepared for her, and the pleasure of seeing her pleasure, must be for others; not for the little planner and contriver of the whole. For a minute Matilda felt as if she could not give it up; this rare and exquisite joy; such a chance might not come again in a very long while. She wanted to see how the stove would work; she wanted to hear the kettle sing, and to set the table with the ... — Trading • Susan Warner
... Sheridan's(246) beginning a negotiation without him. I have figured him, if it be true, saying to him, at his arrival, as Hecate does to the Witches in Macbeth, "Saucy and (over) bold, how did you dare to trade and traffic, &c., and I, the mistress of your charms, the close contriver of all harms, was never called to bear my part," &c. I will not (go) on to the rest of the passage,(247) for fear of offending. I hope that I shall not have offended you by anything which I have said; if I do not, you shall hear ... — George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... then Lord Treasurer, for he was a person of most excellent abilities; and, indeed, the Queen began to need and seek out men of both guards, and so I conclude to rank this {54} great instrument amongst the TOGATI, for he had not to do with the sword, more than as the great paymaster and contriver of the war which shortly followed, wherein he accomplished much, through his theoretical knowledge at home and his intelligence abroad, by unlocking of the counsels of ... — Travels in England and Fragmenta Regalia • Paul Hentzner and Sir Robert Naunton
... artist; a shaper with the pencil or the chisel, a planner, a contriver capable of turning his hand to almost any work of eye and hand. It would not have been strange if he thought he could do everything, having gifts which were capable of various application,—and being an American citizen. But though he was a good draughtsman, and had made ... — The Guardian Angel • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... most indefatigable contriver, inventor, and organizer of industry. One of his inventions was a double-bottomed ship, to sail against wind and tide. He published treatises on dyeing, on naval philosophy, on woollen cloth manufacture, on political arithmetic, and many other subjects. He founded iron works, opened lead mines, ... — Self Help • Samuel Smiles
... Dexterous contriver, he undoubtedly is. Lady Cowry has it from Sir Meeson Corby, who had it from the poor dowager, that Lord Fleetwood has installed the man in his house and sits at the opposite end of his table; fished ... — The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... cost him and his son to calculate its dimensions, and fix it in its place. The dial had been serenely numbering the hours through the busy years that had elapsed since that humble dwelling had been his home; during which the Killingworth locomotive had become a great working power, and its contriver had established the railway system, which was now rapidly becoming extended in all parts of ... — Lives of the Engineers - The Locomotive. George and Robert Stephenson • Samuel Smiles
... concerning the printing and publishing their Books and Pamphlets, and to examine also what they know concerning the Libel [the Libel against the Peers of which George Jeffrey had dispersed copies], who was the author, printer, and contriver of it; and the Gentleman-Usher shall attach the parties, and bring them before the Judges; and the Stationers are to be present at their examinations, ... — The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... the public mind had been adroitly fanned into flame by the evil genius of Lord Shaftesbury. Eachard states that if he was not the original contriver of this disturbance, "he was at least the grand refiner and improver of all the materials. And so much he seemed to acknowledge to a nobleman of his acquaintance, when he said, 'I will not say who started the game, but I am sure I had the full ... — Royalty Restored - or, London under Charles II. • J. Fitzgerald Molloy
... with experiments upon mind, or experiments for producing effects through the medium of voluntary acts of the human mind, so that the contriver must take into consideration the laws of mind in forming his plans. To illustrate this by rather a childish case: I once knew a boy who was employed by his father to remove all the loose small stones, which, from the peculiar nature of the ground, had accumulated in the road before the house. ... — The Teacher - Or, Moral Influences Employed in the Instruction and - Government of the Young • Jacob Abbott
... There were times when Leibnitzes with their heads buried in monstrous wigs could compose Theodicies, and when stall-fed officials of an established church could prove by the valves in the heart and the round ligament of the hip-joint the existence of a "Moral and Intelligent Contriver of the World." But those times are past; and we of the nineteenth century, with our evolutionary theories and our mechanical philosophies, already know nature too impartially and too well to worship unreservedly any God of whose character she ... — The Will to Believe - and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy • William James
... I know some that have been familiarly acquainted with it. This is a little trick wrought by some pitiful contriver, ... — The Comedies of William Congreve - Volume 1 [of 2] • William Congreve
... he, "You the leader of the robbers, You the plotter of this mischief, The contriver of this outrage, I will keep you, I will hold you, As a hostage for your people, As a pledge ... — The Song Of Hiawatha • Henry W. Longfellow
... horror of Mayor Bailly and his Municipals, word comes that Berthier has also been arrested; that he is on his way hither from Compiegne. Berthier, Intendant (say, Tax-levier) of Paris; sycophant and tyrant; forestaller of Corn; contriver of Camps against the people;—accused of many things: is he not Foulon's son-in-law; and, in that one point, guilty of all? In these hours too, when Sansculottism has its blood up! The shuddering Municipals send one of their number to escort him, with mounted ... — The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... to give his words any other meaning than that which he himself intends them to express," (Ib., p. 19,) either writes so badly as to make any ordinary false syntax appear trivial, or actually conceives man to be the inventor of one of his own faculties. Nay, docs he not make man the contriver of that "natural language" which he possesses "in common with the brutes?" a language "The meaning of which," he says, "all the different animals perfectly understand?"—See his Gram., p. 16. And if this notion again be true, ... — The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... household, and Jean Kennedy, a stiff Scotswoman, whose hard outlines did not do justice to her tenderness and fidelity, and with her was a tall, active, keen-faced stripling, looked on with special suspicion by the English, as Willie Douglas, the contriver of the Queen's flight from Lochleven. Two secretaries, French and Scottish, were shrewdly suspected of being priests, and there were besides, a physician, surgeon, apothecary, with perfumers, cooks, pantlers, scullions, lacqueys, to the number of thirty, besides their wives and attendants, ... — Unknown to History - A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland • Charlotte M. Yonge
... to a part of the rock which was seldom guarded, and showed them where to place their ladders. He had been in the service of the Lord Fleming, the governor, but on account of contumelious usage had quitted it, and had been the contriver ... — Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt
... praised by Homer, not the encomiums passed on Cyrus, or Agesilaus, or Aristides, or Themistocles, or Philip, or Alexander; but read the praises of our own fellow-countrymen, of the heroes of your own family. You will not find any one praised on the ground of having been a cunning contriver, or procurer, of pleasure. The eulogies on their monuments signify no such thing; like this one which is at one of our gates, "In whose favour many nations unanimously agree that he was the noblest man of the nation." Do we think that many nations judged of ... — The Academic Questions • M. T. Cicero
... was a notable contriver of such carriages. He had several, of different styles, and probably the most remarkable of his experiments was the making of one with a divided boiler, to relieve the fears which were common then amongst people to ... — Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... Prince may do; for it is very natural, and I cannot disapprove of it, that a soul inflamed by a noble passion should become exasperated by jealousy, and that frequent doubts should cross his mind: but what surprises me, Don Lopez, is to hear that you keep alive his suspicions; that you are the contriver of them; that he is sad only because you wish it, jealous only because he looks at everything with your eyes. I repeat it, Don Lopez, I do not wonder that a man who is greatly in love becomes suspicious. But, that a man who is not in love should have ... — Don Garcia of Navarre • Moliere
... seat, and from what I had seen I supposed the navvy was now dead. If that were the case it would be time for me to go; but I knew that so long as a man trusts himself to the current of Circumstance, reaching out for and rejecting nothing that comes his way, no harm can overtake him. It is the contriver, the schemer, who is caught by the Law, and never the philosopher. I knew that when the play was played, Destiny herself would move me on from the corpse; and I felt ... — The Day's Work, Volume 1 • Rudyard Kipling
... laid before his Sovereign. As Eugene de Beauharnais interested himself so much for the individuals involved in this affair as both to implore Bonaparte's pardon and the Cardinal's interference for them, many were inclined to believe that he was in the secret, if not the contriver of this unfortunate joke. This supposition gained credit when, after all his endeavours to save them proved vain, he sent them seventy-two livres L 3,000—to Rochefort, that they might, on their arrival at Cayenne, be able ... — Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, Complete - Being Secret Letters from a Gentleman at Paris to a Nobleman in London • Lewis Goldsmith
... remorseless insistence on every mean detail which announces the "rag-and-feather hero-sham." Everything except his wit and eloquence is sham and shabby in this Club-and-Country-house villain, who violates more signally than any figure in poetic literature the canon that the contriver of the tragic harms must not be totally despicable. A thief, as Schiller said, can qualify for a tragic hero only by adding to his theft the more heroic crime of murder; but Browning's Elder Man compromises even the professional perfidies of a Don Juan with shady dealings at ... — Robert Browning • C. H. Herford
... a thousand frauds. His friend undone by sharpers and false dice; and Stukely sole contriver, and possessor ... — The Gamester (1753) • Edward Moore
... the English official classes, of English diplomacy, of the English Government with its hesitations, its insincerities, its double-faced schemes. Sir Evelyn Baring, he almost came to think at moments, was the prime mover, the sole contriver, of ... — Eminent Victorians • Lytton Strachey
... matter setting hard and dry.'" Many other examples of similar expressions are quoted by the Duke, who maintains that no explanation of these "contrivances" has been or can be given, except on the supposition of a personal contriver, specially arranging the details of each case, although causing them to be produced by the ordinary ... — Contributions to the Theory of Natural Selection - A Series of Essays • Alfred Russel Wallace
... remarkable expedition of New Englanders—which had "a lawyer for contriver, a merchant for general, and farmers, fishermen, and mechanics for soldiers"—set off to capture Louisburg from the French, they sailed proudly away under a flag whereon was written in Latin, "Never despair, for Christ is our leader." It was on this same expedition that a new ... — The Little Book of the Flag • Eva March Tappan
... honour to be acquainted with this gentleman while I was at Leipsic. It pleased him exceedingly to have been the contriver of so fine a structure as the Conclusions of Leipsic, and he was glad to be entertained on that subject. I had the relation from his own mouth, when, but very modestly, he told me he thought 'twas an inspiration darted on a sudden into his thoughts, when the Duke of Saxony ... — Memoirs of a Cavalier • Daniel Defoe
... advantage of shelter with the fresh elasticity of out-door air. I am not going to give here a treatise on ventilation, but merely to say, in general terms, that the first object of a house-builder or contriver should be to make a healthy house, and the first requisite of a healthy house is ... — The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... gross a pretence to pass at any time, and especially in this age, where we all know one another so well. Yet, whoever proposeth any scheme which may prove to be a public benefit, I shall not quarrel if it prove likewise very beneficial to the contriver. It is certain, that next to the want of silver, our greatest distress in point of coin is the want of small change, which may be some poor relief for the defect of the former, since the Crown will not please to ... — The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... the open air. Now the first problem in housebuilding is to combine the advantage of shelter with the fresh elasticity of outdoor air. I am not going to give here a treatise on ventilation, but merely to say, in general terms, that the first object of a house builder or contriver should be to make a healthy house; and the first requisite of a healthy house is a pure, ... — Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... women are so impertinent, so full of reproaches, that I know not how to do any thing but curse them. And then, truly, they are for helping me out with some of their trite and vulgar artifices. Sally, particularly, who pretends to be a mighty contriver, has just now, in an insolent manner, told me, on my rejecting her proffered aids, that I had no mind to conquer; and that I was so wicked as to intend to marry, though I would not own ... — Clarissa, Volume 4 (of 9) - History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... often so full, that "as many went back for want of room as had entered;" and that meanly as these "drolls" might be thought of in later times, they were acted by the best comedians "then and now in being." Especially he applauds the actor, author, and contriver of the majority of the farces—"the incomparable Robert Cox." Isaac Disraeli gives him credit for preserving alive, as it were by stealth, the suppressed spirit of the drama. That he was a very natural actor, or what would now be called "realistic," may be judged from the story ... — A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... was threatening by his reforming actions to deprive him of his pension? It was not an impossible theory. And others branched out of it. It was already evident to Brent that Simon Crood, big man though he was in the affairs of the borough, was a schemer and a contriver of mole's work: supposing that he and his gang had employed Krevin Crood as their emissary? That, too, was possible. Underground work! There was underground ... — In the Mayor's Parlour • J. S. (Joseph Smith) Fletcher
... the assembly were twisted, and the eyes of all turned upon me with a frightful squint; not an individual present but squinted, - the genteel Pepa, the good-humoured Chicharona, the Casdami, etc. etc. The Gypsy fellow, the contriver of the jest, squinted worst of ... — The Zincali - An Account of the Gypsies of Spain • George Borrow
... is dead—was in the plot, and his lackey Pontou, and Martin the clerk; but the contriver ... — Helmet of Navarre • Bertha Runkle
... which followed Caesar's funeral, Cicero had remained in Rome. His timidity seemed to have forsaken him, and he had striven, with an energy which recalled his brightest days, to set the Constitution again upon its feet. Antony charged him in the Senate with having been the contriver of Caesar's death. He replied with invectives fierce and scurrilous as those which he had heaped upon Catiline and Clodius. A time had been when he had affected to look on Antony as his preserver. Now there ... — Caesar: A Sketch • James Anthony Froude
... his grace for King George's "Paternal Goodness" in directing that the prisoner should be prosecuted at "His Majesty's Expence," stating that no endeavour would be wanting on their part to render that prosecution successful, and praying that, in order to bring to justice "the Wicked Contriver and Instigator of this Villainous Scheme," His Majesty might be pleased to offer by proclamation a reward for Cranstoun's apprehension. The signatories included the Mayor and Rector of Henley, divers county magnates, and also ... — Trial of Mary Blandy • William Roughead
... which the umbrella firm strove to keep their hands respectable and contented, and were highly pleased with all, most especially with Mr. Dutton, who, though his name did not come prominently forward, had been the prime mover and contriver of all these things, and might have been a wealthier man if he had not undertaken expenses which he could not charge upon ... — Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the Dead Soul was drunk, heartily and shamelessly drunk; Granger, the contriver of his condition, sat facing him, impatiently waiting to see whether that was true which the Indians said, that, when drink had subdued his body, his soul returned for ... — Murder Point - A Tale of Keewatin • Coningsby Dawson
... same degree that the weight of water is lighter than the weight of the earth. Here he ordered vapors, here too, the clouds to take their station; the thunder, too, to terrify the minds of mortals, and with the lightnings, the winds that bring on cold. The Contriver of the World did not allow these indiscriminately to take possession of the sky. Even now, (although they each of them govern their own blasts in a distinct tract) they are with great difficulty prevented from rending the world asunder, so great is the discord of the brothers.[18] Eurus ... — The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Vol. I, Books I-VII • Publius Ovidius Naso
... maker of the foregoing will, and contriver of such a grand scheme of charity? The answer to this inquiry will be the most interesting part of this narrative. John McDonogh was born in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1779. The only incidents of his youth that are known are, that he was ... — The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 2, August, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... susceptible to pain; but this may have been a necessary condition of its susceptibility to pleasure; a supposition which avails nothing on the theory of an omnipotent Creator, but is an extremely probable one in the case of a Contriver working under the limitation of inexorable laws and indestructible properties ... — Problems of Immanence - Studies Critical and Constructive • J. Warschauer
... towards him. The less you make him, the less he shall be able to harm you and yours. And if her Majesty's favour fail him, he will again decline to a common person. For after revenges fear them not; for your own father, that was esteemed to be the contriver of Norfolk's ruin, yet his son followeth your father's son and loveth him. Humours of men succeed not, but grow by occasions and accidents of time and power. Somerset made no revenge on the Duke of Northumberland's heirs. Northumberland, that now is, thinks ... — Sir Walter Ralegh - A Biography • William Stebbing
... marriage (1613) of the Lady Elizabeth, daughter of King James I., with Prince Frederick, the unfortunate Elector-Palatine, the Temple and Gray's Inn men gave a masque, of which Sir Francis Bacon was the chief contriver. The masque came to Whitehall by water from Winchester Place, in Southwark; three peals of ordnance greeting them as they embarked with torches and lamps, as they passed the Temple Garden, and as they landed. This short trip cost L300. ... — Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... "could entertain such inhuman ideas, and in so familiar a manner, as to appear wholly unmoved at all the scenes of blood and desolation which I had painted as the common effects of those destructive machines; whereof," he said, "some evil genius, enemy to mankind, must have been the first contriver. As for himself, he protested, that although few things delighted him so much as new discoveries in art or in nature, yet he would rather lose half his kingdom, than be privy to such a secret; which he commanded me, as I valued any life, never ... — Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift
... as she is first presented to us, that aim is for the time apparently concentrated in improved cottage accommodation for the poor; even here there is no thought of displaying the skill of the design and contriver: there is thought alone of the object she seeks—ameliorating the condition of those ... — The Ethics of George Eliot's Works • John Crombie Brown
... contriver of the passage indignantly, "her Grace might sleep there herself and take no harm. There is not even the whisker of ... — By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson
... Soho—now to be seen at the Museum in South Kensington—in like manner to be compared with the last improved pumping-engine made yesterday, even the great James Watt might be made out to have been a very poor contriver. It would be much fairer to compare Koenig's steam-printing machine with the hand-press newspaper printing machine which it superseded. Though there were steam engines before Watt, and steamboats before ... — Men of Invention and Industry • Samuel Smiles
... flood went pouring into the moat around its feet, until it mantled to the brim, turning the weeds into a cold shadowy pavement of green for a foil to its pellucid depth. She understood all the secrets of the aqueous catapult, at which its contriver had little more than hinted on that memorable night when he disclosed so much, and believed she could arrange it for action without assistance. At the same time her new responsibilities required but a portion of her leisure, and lady Margaret ... — St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... lawns and stately woods had been laid out together with great skill, and where the whole had been so artfully combined, and so judiciously adapted to the slopes of the hills, and the inequalities of the ground, as to produce a most striking effect, and to do honour to the invention of the contriver. Thus (an event not unlike what we had already seen) we were forced upon the most desirable and salutary measures by accidents, which at first sight we considered as the greatest of misfortunes; for had we not been driven by the contrary winds and currents to the northward ... — A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... dogmas of theology, philosophy holds itself free to criticize; they are for it problems. The teleological arguments of the older theologians have had to be left behind. "We are fearfully and wonderfully made," no doubt, but not perfectly, and the arguments in favour of an intelligent contriver (cf. The Bridgewater Treatises) which showed the greatest plausibility, were made meaningless by Darwin's work. Further, Evoluton knows no break. We cannot believe in the doctrines of the "fall" or in "original sin," for Evolution means a progress from lower to higher forms. ... — Bergson and His Philosophy • J. Alexander Gunn
... that all his habit of command and arts of pleasing were here thrown away. In the eyes of all, except Secundra Dass, he figured as a common gull and designated victim; going unconsciously to death; yet he could not but suppose himself the contriver and the leader of the expedition; he could scarce help but so conduct himself; and at the least hint of authority or condescension, his deceivers would be laughing in their sleeves. I was so used to see and to ... — The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition, Vol. XII (of 25) - The Master of Ballantrae • Robert Louis Stevenson
... it will apply to the mechanism of animal and vegetable bodies only, if it is used to show that they too must have had a contriver who has a hand, or something tantamount to one; who does act; who, being a contriver, has what all other contrivers must have, if they are to be called contrivers—a body which can suffer more or less pain or chagrin if the contrivance is unsuccessful. ... — Evolution, Old & New - Or, the Theories of Buffon, Dr. Erasmus Darwin and Lamarck, - as compared with that of Charles Darwin • Samuel Butler
... he is to be delivered up by his master to the injured person. If the master suspect collusion between the slave and the injured person, he may bring the matter to trial: and if he fail he shall pay three times the injury; or if he obtain a conviction, the contriver of the conspiracy shall be liable to an action for kidnapping. He who wounds another unintentionally shall only pay for the actual ... — Laws • Plato
... convey a just idea of this performance, which altogether reflected great credit on its contriver, as also on the abilities of each individual dog. We must conclude that the firing from the embrasures, and some other parts of the mechanique, were effected by human agency; but the actions of the dogs were clearly their own, and showed what could be effected ... — Anecdotes of Dogs • Edward Jesse
... "Where now dwells he, who ever dwells within my mind? You two went forth, the horse a third, but now two only have returned! My heart is utterly o'erborne with grief, filled with anxious thoughts, it cannot rest. And you, deceitful man! Untrustworthy and false associate! evil contriver! plainly revealed a traitor, a smile lurks underneath thy tears! Escorting him in going; returning now with wails! Not one at heart—but in league against him—openly constituted a friend and well-wisher, ... — Sacred Books of the East • Various
... Aceda Khan died, who was the contriver of this discord, and Adel Khan descended the gaut mountains with a powerful army to reduce the rebels, recovering possession of the Concan in a few days. But as Adel Khan was still fearful of Meale Khan, he offered ... — A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VI - Early English Voyages Of Discovery To America • Robert Kerr
... recognizing great merit in each other, coupled with a power of mutual assistance, they agreed to act in concert. Sir Francis was as cautious and timid as Sir Giles was daring and inflexible: the one being the best contriver of a scheme, and the other the fittest to carry it out. Sir Francis trembled at his own devices and their possible consequences: Sir Giles adopted his schemes, if promising, and laughed at the difficulties ... — The Star-Chamber, Volume 1 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... outward parts, and particularly those that distinguish it from all other animals, with their peculiar aptitudes for the state of being in which providence has placed them, it would be one of the best services their studies could do mankind, and not a little redound to the glory of the All-wise Contriver. ... — The Coverley Papers • Various
... took possession of Holmby. The king was ultimately taken to London, tried, and executed in Whitehall. At Ashby St. Leger, near Daventry, in Northamptonshire, is the gate-house of the ancient manor of the Catesbys, of whom Robert Catesby was the contriver of the Gunpowder Plot. The thirteen conspirators who framed the plot met in a room over the gateway which the villagers call the "Plot-room," and here Guy Fawkes was equipped for his task, which so alarmed the kingdom that ... — England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook
... to God, she turns about, and bespeaks her: 'In the name of God, mother, why do you trouble me?' 'Peace,' says the spectrum; 'I will do thee no hurt.' 'What will you have of me?' says the daughter," &c.[86] Dunton, the narrator and probably the contriver of the story, proceeds to inform us at length of a commission which the wife of Mr. Leckie receives from the ghost to deliver to Atherton, Bishop of Waterford, a guilty and unfortunate man, who afterwards died by the hands of the executioner; but that part of the subject is too disagreeable ... — Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... regarded as not unlikely to have done some of them on purpose. Whereupon, the genesis of the eye ceases to be a mystery. All the appearances of contrivance that have resulted from the operation find their obvious and complete explanation in the assumption of a contriver, and all such hazy films as that of variability producing variation cease to be capable of serving as excuses for wilful blindness. And why should not the power in question be so credited? Here is Mr. Darwin's solitary reason why. He doubts whether the inference implied ... — Old-Fashioned Ethics and Common-Sense Metaphysics - With Some of Their Applications • William Thomas Thornton
... king of Moab thought would itself have affected it. Their crime and punishment are related in Deuteronomy {21} and Numbers. {22} And from the relation repeated in Numbers, {23} it appears, that Balaam was the contriver of the whole matter. It is also ascribed to him in the Revelation, {24} where he is said to have taught Balak to cast a stumbling-block before ... — Human Nature - and Other Sermons • Joseph Butler
... in which the contriver was at once the author and performer, have been admirably revived by Mathews and others; and in another line, by the lamented Albert Smith. The Westminster justices, furious and alarmed, opposed the daring performance, on which Foote changed the name of ... — The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton |