"Extort" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the expense of each process being about 8 s. They had heard of opinions delivered in parliament, on the platform, and from the press by Protestant statesmen of the highest consideration, that it was a cruel oppression to extort in that manner from the majority of the tillers of the soil the tenth of its produce, in order to support the clergy of another church, who, in many cases, had no flocks, or only a few followers, who ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin
... noblemen or governors always reside with the Soldan to assist him with their councils and to carry his orders into execution. The Mameluke government is exceedingly oppressive to the merchants and even to the other Mahometan inhabitants of Damascus. When the Soldan thinks fit to extort a sum of money from any of the nobles or merchants, he gives two letters to the governor of the castle, in one of which is contained a list of such as he thinks proper to be invited into the castle, and in the other is set down what sum the Soldan is pleased to ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VII • Robert Kerr
... very clear about the position and duties of a chorus-girl, but it certainly had the air of being a last desperate resort. There sprang from that a vague hope that perhaps she might extort a capitulation from her father by a threat to seek that position, and then with overwhelming clearness it came to her that whatever happened she would never be able to tell her father about her debt. The completest capitulation ...
— Ann Veronica • H. G. Wells
... English, you shall be taken with ropes round your necks to Pekin, there to undergo the just punishment of your offence under the sentence of the mighty Emperor."] The Soubah, in endeavouring to extort the new treaty by force, and the Dingpun, who had his own revenge to gratify, exceeded their instructions in using violence towards Campbell, whom the Dewan ordered should be simply taken and confined; they were consequently disgraced, long before we were ...
— Himalayan Journals (Complete) • J. D. Hooker
... little paler. He knew well the horrible tortures which would, in such an instance, be inflicted to extort the names of those ...
— With Clive in India - Or, The Beginnings of an Empire • G. A. Henty
... Peter. First, that use will be made of this matter to extort much money from me, who am known to be rich, which is a sin best absolved by angels. Secondly, that if I make trouble about paying, other ...
— Fair Margaret • H. Rider Haggard
... of the affair. But the recollection of it comes back to me and haunts me persistently, and it is natural that I should apply to you. I have never spoken a word on the subject to my husband, and indeed it is best for our tranquillity that I should not attempt to extort a detailed confession from him. One circumstance which has induced me to speak to you is that on an occasion when I accompanied Madame Angelin to a house in the Rue de Miromesnil, I perceived you there with that girl, who had another child in her arms. So you have not lost sight of her, and you must ...
— Fruitfulness - Fecondite • Emile Zola
... When all the officers of the king posted in the provinces unite together and act with injustice, the king is then said to bring about a state of unmixed evil upon his kingdom. When the officers of the king extort wealth, by unjust means or acting from lust or avarice, from persons piteously soliciting mercy, a great destruction then is sure to overtake the king. A mighty tree, first starting into life, grows into large proportions. Numerous creatures then come and seek its shelter. When, however, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... I cannot bear it—and I am not worth it," he protested. "I ought never to have told you. I was a selfish brute to extort your sympathy by the miserable recital of my own misfortunes; I have ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... high-sounding a name) was, in every sense of the words, strictly necessary. Julia Wentworth had resided for years with her grandfather, a pragmatic old gentleman, to whom from pure affection she had long yielded an obedience which he would have had no right to extort, and which he was sometimes disposed to abuse. He had declared in the most ingenuous manner that she should never marry with his consent any man of less fortune than her own would be; and on his consent rested the prospect ...
— The Man Without a Country and Other Tales • Edward E. Hale
... called for an accounting for the trust funds which the complainant recognized were legally in the hands of Aguinaldo. It could be carried on only with great difficulty without his presence and without his account books. Meetings were held, and Artacho was denounced as attempting to extort blackmail, but he refused to yield, and Aguinaldo, rather than explain the inner workings of the Hongkong junta before a British court, prepared for flight. A summons was issued for his appearance before the supreme court of Hongkong on April 13, 1898, but he ...
— The Philippines: Past and Present (vol. 1 of 2) • Dean C. Worcester
... is love. The motive will determine the quality of the act. I may serve my family regardless of the sufferings I may cause to others. As for instance, I may accept an employment which enables me to extort money from people, I enrich myself thereby and then satisfy many unlawful demands of the family. Here I am neither serving the family nor the State. Or I may recognise that God has given me hands and feet only to work with for my sustenance and for that of those who may be dependent ...
— Third class in Indian railways • Mahatma Gandhi
... Motion, intended to extort a declaration from the House in favour of Free Trade, and describing the Corn Law Repeal as "a just, wise, and beneficial measure," was naturally distasteful to the Ministers. Their amour-propre was saved by Lord Palmerston's Amendment omitting the "odious epithets" and affirming ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria
... phenomena, the deceitful shows and appearances of things; to have resolved to reach and to grapple with the things themselves. It is the fable of Proteus over again. He will take a thousand shapes wherewith he will seek to elude and delude one who is determined to extort from him that true answer, which he is capable of yielding, but will only yield on compulsion. The true inquirer is deceived by none of these. He still holds him fast; binds him in strong chains; until he takes his proper shape at the last; and answers as a true seer, so far as answer ...
— On the Study of Words • Richard C Trench
... down all competition these combinations of capitalists and speculators are usually enabled to purchase the lands, including the improvements of the settlers, at the minimum price of the Government, and either turn them out of their homes or extort from them, according to their ability to pay, double or quadruple the amount paid for them to the Government. It is to the enterprise and perseverance of the hardy pioneers of the West, who penetrate the wilderness with their families, suffer the dangers, the privations, and hardships ...
— State of the Union Addresses of James Polk • James Polk
... it, Monsieur Joyeuse. But in order to get out of it with honor, we must have money, much money, must sacrifice two or three millions more; and we haven't them. That is why I am going to Tunis, to try and extort from the bey's rapacity a small portion of the great fortune which he so unjustly withholds. At this moment I have some chance of success, whereas a little ...
— The Nabob, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet
... whose signature the widow Morin tried to extort. She also attempted his assassination, and was condemned, January 11, 1812, on the evidence of a number of witnesses, among others that of Poiret, to twenty years of hard ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe
... an apportionment of goods and credit which the individual members of the rich nations, the owners of the surplus, would not make upon their own account. The edge of this issue should not be blunted. If the people and government of America were only concerned to let their individual citizens extort the highest prices they could get for their surplus in the best markets, they would let Central and Eastern Europe starve. If, however, they also take into account the social, political, and economic reactions of a starving Europe upon the future of a world in which they will have to live as members ...
— Morals of Economic Internationalism • John A. Hobson
... imprisoned in England, they returned to France, cursing the cause of their liberty, and exclaiming, "Vive l'Empereur!" Even in the deserts of Russia, neither threats of ill treatment, nor promises of assistance offered to the French prisoners at the moment when they were starving, could extort a single ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. I • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... Revolution combined to make kings and aristocracies wary of all organizations and associations of plain folk. And when we add to this the favor which the new employing class, the industrial masters, were able to extort from the governing class, because of their power over foreign trade and domestic finance, we can understand the compulsory laws at length declaring against ...
— The Armies of Labor - Volume 40 in The Chronicles Of America Series • Samuel P. Orth
... awaken a certain reverence, because though always present, they are inaccessible; but all natural objects make a kindred impression, when the mind is open to their influence. Nature never wears a mean appearance. Neither does the wisest man extort her secret, and lose his curiosity by finding out all her perfection. Nature never became a toy to a wise spirit. The flowers, the animals, the mountains, reflected the wisdom of his best hour, as much as they had delighted ...
— Nature • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... little good did that do him, when he could not fix the vision, talk with it face to face, and extort the fulfilment of ...
— Boyhood in Norway • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... to their own homes, we grant ... that no layman, of whatever condition or prominence he may be, whether he be a private person, prefect, or bailiff, shall disturb, molest, or presume otherwise in any way whatsoever to seek to extort anything from the aforesaid Masters and Scholars, in person, family or property, under pretext of toll, tallia [special form of feudal tax], tax, customs, or other such personal taxes, or other personal exaction of any kind, while they are either coming ...
— Readings in the History of Education - Mediaeval Universities • Arthur O. Norton
... brother, followed the fortunes of the Marquis of Exeter, and was 'a great sufferer for his inviolable fidelity to his noble master.' So firm was his devotion that even torture failed to extort from him a confession that the Marquis and 'the Lady Elizabeth' had been involved in Wyatt's conspiracy. His 'invincible resolution' asserted their innocence, even on the rack, and Queen Elizabeth later recognized this splendid loyalty by making him 'one of the clerks ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote
... himself for his outlay and for his trouble by collecting the tax in detail from the people. Of course, it was for the interest of the tax-gatherer, in such a case, after having paid the round sum to the government, to extort as much as possible from the people, since all that he obtained over and above the sum that he had paid was his profit on the transaction. Then, if the people complained to the government of his exactions, ...
— Genghis Khan, Makers of History Series • Jacob Abbott
... great trouble, and, out of consideration for them, he began to think of again leaving France. The dragoons were practising much cruelty on the Protestant population, being quartered in their houses, and at liberty to plunder and extort money to any extent. They were also incessantly on the look out for the assemblies, being often led by mounted priests and spies to places where they had been informed that meetings were about to be held. Their principal object, besides hanging the persons found attending, ...
— The Huguenots in France • Samuel Smiles
... never been. He had been brutally attacked, and had thought it best to say nothing on the subject. He would not allow his secret, such as it was, to be wormed out of him. Scarborough was endeavoring to extort from him that which he had resolved to conceal; and he determined at last that he would not become a puppet in his hands. "I don't see why you should care a straw about it," ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope
... one pass. I told him I knew better, that he had no such orders, that he was placed there to protect visitors, and not to prevent their entrance, and that I should pass. Finding me resolute (for I knew by experience his motive was merely to extort money), he softened in his tone, and wished me to wait until he could speak to the sergeant of the guard. To this I assented, and, while he was gone, a party of gentlemen approached also to the entrance. One of them, having ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Samuel F. B. Morse
... Royalist party will never assent to it, and without their aid the project has no chance. To obtain that aid, "the Prince" must secretly swear that after four years more he will turn France over to Henry V.; this promise only the last extreme of desperation could extort from him, and then to no purpose, since he could not fulfill it and the Legitimists could not trust him. And thus, alike by its own strength and by its enemies' divisions, the safety of ...
— Glances at Europe - In a Series of Letters from Great Britain, France, Italy, - Switzerland, &c. During the Summer of 1851. • Horace Greeley
... invaders whom the successes of the former soon after attracted, having totally subdued that country, built Milan, Verona, Brescia, and several other considerable towns, and governed with such tyrannic sway, especially over the nobility, whose riches they coveted and sought by every means to extort from them, that most of the principal families, joining under the conduct of Rhaetus[F], one of the most distinguished personages among them, retired with the best part of their effects and attendants among the ...
— Account of the Romansh Language - In a Letter to Sir John Pringle, Bart. P. R. S. • Joseph Planta, Esq. F. R. S.
... Ocumpaugh has, that the child had somehow found her way to the water and was drowned. But if all this is true we shall have to face a worse evil. A conspiracy against such a tender little being as that! A conspiracy, and for what? Not to extort money, or why these blundering efforts to ...
— The Millionaire Baby • Anna Katharine Green
... to seek out his old mother, to extort money from her; that was beyond a doubt. But would he of necessity recognise the wife of twenty-three years ago in the very middle-aged person Aunt M'riar saw in the half of a looking-glass that Mr. Bartlett's careful myrmidons had not broken? Would she recognise him? Need either see ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... torture of "picketings;" to say nothing of houses burned, and farms laid waste—things which were done daily, and under military orders; the purpose avowed being either vengeance for some known act of insurrection, or the determination to extort confessions. Too often, however, as may well be supposed, in such utter disorganization of society, private malice, either personal or on account of old family feuds, was the true principle at work. And many were thus driven, by mere frenzy of just indignation, or, perhaps, by mere ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... and they were so dutiful as to vote this supply before they received any satisfaction in the business of monopolies, which they justly considered as of the utmost importance to the interest and happiness of the nation. Had they attempted to extort that concession by keeping the supply in suspense, so haughty was the queen's disposition, that this appearance of constraint and jealousy had been sufficient to have produced a denial of all their requests, and ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... anxious hours when Hanno's father and brothers visited the Hydra to induce her captain to make money out of the captive sculptor, and either sell him at a high price or extort a large ransom from him; but Bias had overheard how resolutely Ledscha opposed these proposals, and represented to old Satabus of what priceless importance Myrtilus might become to them if either should be captured ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... the public toward the newspaper is peculiar. The public would appear to believe that anything it can coax, wheedle, or extort from the newspaper is fair salvage from the necessary expenditures ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 19, June, 1891 • Various
... earthly princes violently extort many things from their subjects: and this seems to savor of robbery. Now it would seem a grievous matter to say that they sin in acting thus, for in that case nearly every prince would be damned. Therefore in some cases ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... tramp is a much-abused person, and I have no doubt that he often deserves what is said of him, but, in spite of that, his life is often so hard that he might extort at the least a little sympathy—and something to eat. All Americans are too ready to confound two distinct classes of tramps—those who take the road to look for work, and those (the larger number, I confess) who look for work and pray to heaven that they may never find it. In this preponderance ...
— A Tramp's Notebook • Morley Roberts
... visited almost every English gaol, and in nearly all of them he found frightful abuses which had been noticed half-a-century before, but which had been left unredressed by Parliament. Gaolers who bought their places were paid by fees, and suffered to extort what they could. Even when acquitted, men were dragged back to their cells for want of funds to discharge the sums they owed to their keepers. Debtors and felons were huddled together in the prisons which Howard found crowded by the legislation ...
— History of the English People, Volume VIII (of 8) - Modern England, 1760-1815 • John Richard Green
... compounded of habitual respect for the person, and conventional submission to his station; the young master must, therefore, effect a change in his footman's manner of thinking and speaking by violent means; he must extort that tribute of respect which he has neglected so long, and to which, consequently, his right is disputed.[35] He is sensible, that his superiority is merely that of situation, and he, therefore, exerts his dormant prerogatives with ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... woman of infamous character, who by some means was implicated in the conspiracy, deserves to be mentioned as an instance of female fortitude. She was condemned to the torture, but the united force of racks, stripes and fire, could not extort a word from her. The next day she was conducted in a chair to be tortured afresh, (for her limbs were so mangled and disjointed, that she could not stand,) she hung herself with her girdle to the top of the chair, ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... misapprehension, and if modesty merely had been the obstacle, such questions would not have been wanting; but we considered, that, if the disclosure were productive of pain or disgrace, it was inhuman to extort it. ...
— Wieland; or The Transformation - An American Tale • Charles Brockden Brown
... benefit from the money which you have earned by your many years of conscientious industry. To me there is no other spectacle in the world so humiliating as that of people laying themselves out to extort money from others. Do tear yourself away from the sponges. You and Miss Eva ought to have a quiet winter in a congenial climate. I hope you will go to Florida, and, after doing Jacksonville and St. Augustine, why not rent a little furnished cottage and keep house for the winter? Along in February ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... was not the work. It was not the suffering of the world. It was the pain in their own hearts, and the awful chasm that his holy vows had put between them. They stood so only an instant. He was trembling in the extort to master himself, and in a second she felt the hot blood rising to her face. Her woman's wit was the first to break the hopeless situation. She turned, and hailed a passing car. "I cannot walk any farther. ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... had scarcely a penny. She traded on her beauty and the lovely clothes with which some trusting milliner must have supplied her, to pick up rich or influential friends, from whom she was certain to extort money in some way or another. And it was Mrs. Maitland-Fox's advice that Miss Beverly should be warned to beware ...
— The Castle Of The Shadows • Alice Muriel Williamson
... Broadhurst. 'Don't you see that he believes it as firmly as you and I do? Why should you force his lordship to pay a compliment contrary to his better judgment, or to extort a smile from him under false pretences? I am sure he sees that you, ladies, and I trust he perceives that I, do not think the worse of ...
— The Absentee • Maria Edgeworth
... into making love to her, and used Voles to extort eight thousand pounds from him on account ...
— The Man Who Lost Himself • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... were called into vigorous exercise. Even the Protestants, for their own sakes, were often obliged to connive at the evasion of laws so extremely severe, and which introduced much difficulty in their dealings with Catholics; but, when any Protestant wished to be revenged upon a Catholic, or to extort money from him, he found in these laws a ready instrument for his purpose. By an additional Act, in 1726, it was ordained that a Roman Catholic priest, marrying a Protestant to a Catholic, should suffer death; and in order that ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... as his instructions went, his mission was successful, and, by a happy accident, he was able at Tunis and Tripoli to extort further from the rulers a promise that thereafter captives should be treated as in civilized countries; in other words, that they should no longer be reduced to slavery. Algiers refused this concession; and the admiral ...
— Types of Naval Officers - Drawn from the History of the British Navy • A. T. Mahan
... Fu is aware I have been liberated?" said Mrs. Forbes. "It's rather odd, is it not, that nothing has been heard from him or his gang if I was to be held a prisoner in order to extort terms?" ...
— Number Seventeen • Louis Tracy
... which had grown up between the mother and son, hastened to insinuate to Marie de Medicis that Louis had expressed his gratification at her refusal, and to assure her that should she suffer the Prince to extort her consent to such an act of wilful revolt against the royal command she would ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe
... inextricably mingled resentment at the private wrong which Harold had done him, and a resolve to exact vengeance on the man whom he regarded as untrue to his oath. The difficulties in the way of his enterprise were indeed enormous. He could reckon on no support within England itself. At home he had to extort the consent of his own reluctant baronage; to gather a motley host from every quarter of France and to keep it together for months; to create a fleet, to cut down the very trees, to build, to launch, to man the vessels; and to ...
— History of the English People, Volume I (of 8) - Early England, 449-1071; Foreign Kings, 1071-1204; The Charter, 1204-1216 • John Richard Green
... I waited for him to come down, but instead of doing so, in a second or two he turned round, clambered deliberately up the cliff and vanished. I supposed it was only a ruse to extort offers of more money, and waited for half an hour, but he did not appear again. This was rather embarrassing, for he carried off my knapsack. The choice of action lay between chasing him and going on to Breuil, risking the loss of my knapsack. ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume VI • Various
... air—prints, muslins, kaleidoscopes, (they have just introduced them[2]) trinkets, and especially watch chains and strings of beads, spread in gay colours upon the ground—the undulations of the chaussee—and a bright blue sky above the green trees—all these things irresistibly rivet the attention and extort the admiration of a stranger. You may have your boots cleaned, and your breakfast prepared, upon these same boulevards. ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Two • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... and also a stupendous hiding-place. All the treasures of the kings, increasing from century to century, all the gold of France, all that they extort from the people, all that they snatch from the clergy, all the booty gathered on the battle-fields of Europe lie heaped up in the royal cave. Old Merovingian gold sous, glittering crown-pieces, doubloons, ducats, florins, guineas; and the precious stones and the diamonds; and all the ...
— The Hollow Needle • Maurice Leblanc
... opposed In dubious battle on the plains of Heaven, And shook his throne. What though the field be lost? All is not lost—the unconquerable will, And study of revenge, immortal hate, And courage never to submit or yield: And what is else not to be overcome? That glory never shall his wrath or might Extort from me. To bow and sue for grace With suppliant knee, and deify his power Who, from the terror of this arm, so late Doubted his empire—that were low indeed; That were an ignominy and shame beneath ...
— Paradise Lost • John Milton
... things move with all things from their prime? Who shall expound the mystery of the lyre? In far retreats of elemental mind Obscurely comes and goes The imperative breath of song, that as the wind Is trackless, and oblivious whence it blows. Demand of lilies wherefore they are white, Extort her crimson secret from the rose, But ask not of the Muse that she disclose The meaning of the riddle of her might: Somewhat of all things sealed and recondite, Save the enigma of herself, she knows. The master could not tell, with all his lore, Wherefore ...
— The Poems of William Watson • William Watson
... monsters nor men-eaters[71]. Nevertheless, all the swaggering Arabs and Arab camel-drivers are here very quiet and civil amongst their masters, the Touaricks. I frequently bully them now about their past boasting and present cowardice. Two of the Arabs who had attempted to extort a present from me I met at Haj Ibrahim's house. I lectured them roundly, telling them I would report them to the Pasha, for they were greater banditti than the Touaricks. This had a salutary effect. I was not troubled afterwards ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... tragically sad, but calm and resolute. The spots of red had faded out of her cheeks. There was no fever in her manner. Miss Van Tuyn's wonder grew as she looked at her former friend, who now dominated her, and began to extort from her a strange and unwilling admiration, which recalled to her the admiration of that past time when she had first met Alick Craven in ...
— December Love • Robert Hichens
... seem a tempting opportunity for revenge; but suppose that the colonial resistance collapsed before effective aid could arrive? Suppose the colonists merely used the threat of French intervention to extort terms from England and then made common cause against the foreigner? These obvious considerations made the French statesmen hesitate. Aid was indeed given to the colonial rebels, especially in the very valuable ...
— A History of the United States • Cecil Chesterton
... though really guiltless of any fault, will rather comply with their demands than have their names connected with a scandal. Such persons think that the wretch will not dare to charge them with the offence, or endeavor to extort money a second time, and do not regret the first outlay. They ought never to yield, whether innocent or guilty, for the wretches are sure to make repeated demands upon those who are weak enough to comply with them. The law makes it a crime for any one to endeavor ...
— The Secrets Of The Great City • Edward Winslow Martin
... follow, by some worldly respect, Acts xix. 26; 1 Tim. vi. 5. Now, as for those in our church who contend for the ceremonies, many of them are led by such argumenta inartificialia, as wealth, preferment, &c., and if conscience be at all looked to by them, yet they only throw and extort an assent and allowance from it, when worldly respects have made them to propend and incline to an anterior liking of the ceremonies. We do not judge them when we say so, but by their fruits we know them. ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie
... complicated by business disputes, which were carried into the courts, where Fisk was all powerful. The matter went from bad to worse, until at length Stokes and Mrs. Mansfield instituted a libel suit against Fisk, which was commonly regarded in the city as simply an attempt on their part to extort money from him. The suit dragged its slow way through the court in which it was instituted, and every day diminished the chances of the ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... the language; so the native teacher drew up a petition, and Mrs. Judson herself presented it to the Viceroy. He received it kindly, and at once gave orders that Mr. Hough was not to be troubled further. They afterwards found out that the thing had been arranged by the minor officials, in order to extort money from ...
— Excellent Women • Various
... occasions spoken to slaves as the gangs were on their way back to the prison, and had told them to be prepared to take part in a plan that was on foot for their rescue from slavery. The torture had not been, as was then the usual custom, applied to extort information; partly because his story was probable, still more because the grand master and council did not wish that more publicity should be given to the affair, and were glad that it should be allowed to drop without any further trial of the delinquents. ...
— A Knight of the White Cross • G.A. Henty
... Caiaphas might put Jesus on His oath, and extort from His own lips the charge on which to condemn Him; but he was evidently reluctant to do it, and only availed himself of this process as a last resource. It was well known to this astute and cunning priest ...
— Love to the Uttermost - Expositions of John XIII.-XXI. • F. B. Meyer
... took sides with England, in order to establish a claim upon her for concessions advantageous to France in some other quarter. With these views, Vergennes secretly aimed at delaying the negotiations; for as long as hostilities were kept up, he might hope to extort from his American allies a recognition of the Spanish claims and a renouncement of the fisheries, simply by threatening to send them no further assistance in men or money. In order to retard the proceedings, he refused to take any steps whatever until the ...
— The Critical Period of American History • John Fiske
... But upon examination this spirit proved to be nothing more than a poor Bedlam beggar who had crept into this deserted hovel for shelter, and with his talk about devils frighted the fool, one of those poor lunatics who are either mad, or feign to be so, the better to extort charity from the compassionate country people, who go about the country calling themselves poor Tom and poor Turlygood, saying, "Who gives anything to poor Tom?" sticking pins and nails and sprigs of rosemary into their arms to make them bleed; and with horrible actions, ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... the instigations of the clergy, who thought they had an equal right for revenge in this point, prevailed so far upon the civil magistrates, as to procure an order, that Natura should himself undergo the same tortures his soldiers had done, thereby to extort that confession from him they could no otherwise procure:—this, notwithstanding, they had the lenity to inform him of, the day before that which was prefixed for the execution, thinking perhaps, that the menace of what he was condemned to endure, would be sufficient: ...
— Life's Progress Through The Passions - Or, The Adventures of Natura • Eliza Fowler Haywood
... advisers were men of sagacity and talent. It is true they did not fully appreciate the weakness of the king, or the strength of his enemies; but they saw his distress, and tried to remove it. They, very naturally in such an age, recommended violent courses—to grant new monopolies, to extort fines, to exercise all his feudal privileges, to pawn the crown jewels, even, in order to raise money; for money, at all events, he must have. They advised him to arrest turbulent and incendiary members of the Commons, to prorogue ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... the trend of Rasputin's evil thoughts. By the written confession he would, through his princely friend, be able to extort ...
— The Minister of Evil - The Secret History of Rasputin's Betrayal of Russia • William Le Queux
... destroy him. And so with Storri; he would hide until he could command that old-time manner of unclouded ease. He would stifle every surmise, deny every rumor if rumor blew about, of the blow he had received. A few days, and Storri would be himself again. As for immediate money, Storri would extort that from Mr. Harley, who, in his dull-head ignorance or worse, had been the author of his losses. Who first spoke of Northern Consolidated? Who suggested the "bear" raid? Was it not Mr. Harley? The affair had been his; the loss should be ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... with that strange flush of joy upon it, that spoke more eloquently to the father's heart than any words could have done), to induce that gentleman to allow Harry to remain where he was all day; likewise to extort a promise that he might come to see the lady whenever and as often as she chose to trouble herself with the care of him: and this being nicely arranged, Harry's papa went his way and they went theirs. And Harry did that day what is seldom done in this world of disappointment—more ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... observations, is negligible. What Christian said was known only to Rinka, the eldest of the fox terriers, who had a habit of sitting in the chair at which Christian, knelt to say her prayers, and would then, with her bland and balmy smile, extort confidences denied to any ...
— Mount Music • E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross
... I, "the enigma seems still in as bad a condition as ever. How is it possible to extort a meaning from all this jargon about 'devil's seats,' 'death's-head,' and ...
— Short Stories Old and New • Selected and Edited by C. Alphonso Smith
... military and naval expeditions to kill, burn, and destroy tribes and villages for knocking an Englishman on the head are so common a part of our Imperial routine that the last dozen of them has not called forth as much pity as can be counted on by any lady criminal. The judicial use of torture to extort confession is supposed to be a relic of darker ages; but whilst these pages are being written an English judge has sentenced a forger to twenty years penal servitude with an open declaration that the sentence will be carried out in full unless ...
— Revolutionist's Handbook and Pocket Companion • George Bernard Shaw
... himself. Surprised at this magnanimity, the Viceroy—who is described in Don Quixote as "the homicide of all human kind"[74]—sent for him, and found him as good as his word. No threats of torture or death could extort from him a syllable which could implicate any one of his fellow-captives. His undaunted manner evidently overawed the Viceroy, for instead of chastizing he purchased Cervantes from his master for ...
— The Story of the Barbary Corsairs • Stanley Lane-Poole
... elsewhere in Italy, claimed the Apostolic primacy. It was in the midst of these troubles and trials of the Church that the powerful Kings of England, who were also sovereigns of a great part of France, contrived to extort from the embarrassed pontiffs concessions which, however gratifying to royal pride, were abhorrent to the more Catholic spirit of the Irish people. A constant struggle was maintained during the entire period of the captivity of the Popes ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... to exact, to extort. 'The church is pilled and polled by its own flocks.'—South, Ser. 11. ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... and, to their shame, have nothing but shame left to lose; and I, like him, should pass over those who are openly and obstinately ungrateful, and would demand repayment only from those who were likely to give it me, not from those from whom I should have to extort it by force. ...
— L. Annaeus Seneca On Benefits • Seneca
... honest Citizens, could in no wise perswade him to leave his extort power, no nor yet to cause any temperance of his tongue, but the more they went about with gentle words to tell him his faults, the more would he fret and likewise fume, swearing all the oathes under God, that he little regarded the presence ...
— The Golden Asse • Lucius Apuleius
... beneath their thick lids that I doubt if my face concealed the least thought from her. "But there, there," she added very suavely, stooping her head a little, "don't trouble to answer me. I never extort an answer. Boys are queer fish. Brains might perhaps have suggested his washing his hands before luncheon; but—not my choice, Smithers. God forbid! And now, perhaps, you would like to go into the garden again. I cannot actually see from here, but I should not be surprised ...
— The Best British Short Stories of 1922 • Edward J. O'Brien and John Cournos, editors
... waiting-women: take them, and extort By any kind of torment the truth from them. —Our present business is, I take it, this: That I should win the wife of Pamphilus To return home; which so I but effect, I sha'n't regret the same of having done What others of my ...
— The Comedies of Terence • Publius Terentius Afer
... stood Isaac Zahn, who was flirting with the bar-maid. But the regal dispenser of liquors responded to the young clerk's sallies with merely the brief politeness which she was paid to show towards all the customers of the inn. He could extort no marked encouragement, in spite of every familiarity ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace
... Christians then was. A rescript of Hadrian to Minucius Fundanus, the Proconsul of Asia, which stands at the end of Justin's first Apology,[B] instructs the governor that innocent people must not be troubled, and false accusers must not be allowed to extort money from them; the charges against the Christians must be made in due form, and no attention must be paid to popular clamors; when Christians were regularly prosecuted and convicted of illegal acts, they must be punished according to their deserts; and false accusers also must be punished. ...
— Thoughts of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus • Marcus Aurelius Antoninus
... 1262, Koursk in 1284, Kolomna in 1318, and Tver in 1327. But the oppression was greater when the dukes of Moscow farmed this tax, not only from their own subjects, but also from neighboring dukedoms. They were absolutely pitiless in collecting from the poor people as much as they could extort, and this was the disgraceful foundation of their wealth and power. The poll-tax, thereafter, was always a favorite source of ...
— The Story of Russia • R. Van Bergen
... government of Ireland, with all the opportunities thence arising to oppress the opposite party in Ireland and to worry England herself. It was all very well to urge that the tactics which the Nationalists had pursued when their object was to extort Home Rule would be dropped, because superfluous, when Home Rule had been granted; or to point out that an Irish Parliament would probably contain different men from those who had been sent to Westminster as Mr. Parnell's nominees. The internal condition ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 13 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Lovers • Elbert Hubbard
... never got the letters, although I used every means that occurred to me. I even suggested that he should entrust them to me so that I might try to extort money by their means from Lady Eileen Meredith. He would have none of it. I changed my ground and arranged to accompany him on what was to be the final decisive interview with Grell on his ...
— The Grell Mystery • Frank Froest
... and all the other sweet and sacred things which belong to the silent life of the spirit in God, unless, side by side with these, there is the doing of the common deeds which the world is actually able to appraise in such a fashion as to extort, even from them, the confession, 'We find no occasion ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... Lord Bristol, a vain and half-crazy prelate, advocated the admission of catholics to the franchise, and tried to excite the volunteers, who were then no longer exclusively protestant, and were recruited from the rabble, to extort reform from parliament by force. He attended parliament with an escort of volunteers and in regal state, and appeared in a purple coat and volunteer cap fiercely cocked. His seditious behaviour, the claim made for the catholics, ...
— The Political History of England - Vol. X. • William Hunt
... 'But let me not extort anything from your pity. I have just seen a second volume, published by him evidently in careless despair. I have desired my bookseller to send you a copy: and allow me to solicit your especial attention to the fragment of a poem entitled Hyperion, the composition of which was checked ...
— Adonais • Shelley
... simple. The Government have refused to the workman the right to extort unearned increment out of the country in its dire necessity. The workman may not strike or cease work or even change employment without the permission of the State. Assuredly the State has the right ...
— The World in Chains - Some Aspects of War and Trade • John Mavrogordato
... there under the warden; and these being very poor men, having neither land nor any trade to live by, nor any certain wages of the said warden, and being also greedy of gain, did live by bribing and extortion. That they did most shamefully extort and exact from the prisoners, raising new customs, fines, and payments, for their own advantage. That they cruelly used them, shutting them up in close prisons when they found fault with their wicked dealings; not suffering them to come and go as they ought to do; with other abominable misdemeanours, ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 2 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... utterly at variance upon most subjects, were upon this agreed: They would not submit to the tax. They had read the Magna Charta, they knew that the Stamp Act violated its most vital principle. This tax had been framed to extort money from men who had no representation in Parliament, ...
— The Evolution of an Empire • Mary Parmele
... crueller forms of punishment had been legally abolished, they continued to be used in many parts. Having been joint judge at Chinese trials at which, in spite of my protests, prisoners were hung up by their thumbs and made to kneel on chains in order to extort confession (without which no accused person could be punished), I can testify that the true meaning of the "proper end of punishments" had no more entered into the Chinese mind at the close of the monarchical regime than ...
— Myths and Legends of China • E. T. C. Werner
... victualled for a long voyage. The crews of the Lachesis and Atropos and with them their captains, Wolverstone and Yberville, renounced the intention. After all, there would be a deal of treasure still hidden in Cartagena. They would remain behind to extort it whilst fitting their ships for sea. Let Blood and Hagthorpe and those who sailed with them ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini
... of the East nor of the West but rather international in its universality, yet India is specially fitted to make great contributions. {FN8-5} The burning Indian imagination, which can extort new order out of a mass of apparently contradictory facts, is held in check by the habit of concentration. This restraint confers the power to hold the mind to the pursuit of ...
— Autobiography of a YOGI • Paramhansa Yogananda
... merit and excellence be which can extort this from us, freelivers, like yourself, and all of your just resentments against the rest of her family, and offered our assistance to execute your vengeance on them? But we cannot think it reasonable that you should punish an innocent creature, who loves you so ...
— Clarissa, Volume 4 (of 9) - History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... insensible to the passion she inspires. Her strength is in her virtues alone. Her sympathies are clearly mine!' These conclusions emboldened me. I haunted your house nightly with music. Sheltered beneath your trees, I poured forth the most plaintive strains which I could extort from my flute. Passion increased the effect of art. I strove at no regular tunes; I played as the mood prompted; and felt myself, not unfrequently, weeping over my ...
— Confession • W. Gilmore Simms
... taken and sacked, Alphage, the Archbishop, being made prisoner, and carried away by the Danish fleet to Greenwich. Finding it impossible to extort a ransom, they brutally murdered him (19th May, 1012), in one of their drunken moods, pelting him in their open court or "husting" with bones and skulls of oxen.(43) The worthy prelate's corpse was allowed to be removed to London ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume I • Reginald R. Sharpe
... not ask you about your father to extort this confession; I pray God give you repentance for it, and forgive you that and all your other sins; but I asked you, because I see that, though you have not much learning, yet you are not so ignorant as some are in things that are good; that you have known more ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808) • Daniel Defoe
... before the first of January, would not be likely to stop to quibble at paying the five thousand dollars or so that Grady, who, as the business agent of his union was simply in masquerade, would like to extort. ...
— Calumet "K" • Samuel Merwin and Henry Kitchell Webster
... be his own, and assured the judge he had put twenty sequins into it. Upon which the judge called me before him; "Come, young man," said he, "confess the truth. Was it you that took the gentleman's purse from him? Do not wait for the torture to extort confession." Then with downcast eyes, thinking that if I denied the fact, they, having found the purse upon me, would convict me of a lie, to avoid a double punishment I looked up and confessed my guilt. I had no ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... regular and symmetrical detail offers a suspicion of mere mechanism, yet it is no less evident that after longer study the charms of this exquisite structure tell with a lasting power. Too subtle to extort admiration at first, it bewitches a student of architecture who notes the scholarly reticence of its detail, the masterly way in which, as a rule, the construction is legitimately ornamented and the decoration made an integral part of ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Salisbury - A Description of its Fabric and a Brief History of the See of Sarum • Gleeson White
... revealed the extent of the carnage with which the plains were heaped for miles, the successful allies saw also and respected the resolute attitude of their antagonist. Neither were any measures taken to blockade him in his camp, and so to extort by famine that submission which it was too plainly perilous to enforce with the sword. Attila was allowed to march back the remnants of his army without molestation, and even ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... doubtless also imaginary) follows, kind but timid, to advise submission; then appears Io, victim of Zeus' love and Hera's jealousy, to whom Prometheus prophesies her future wanderings and his own fate; lastly Hermes, insolent messenger of the gods, who tries in vain to extort Prometheus' secret knowledge of the future. Oceanus, the well-meaning palavering old mentor, and Hermes, the blustering and futile jack-in-office, gods though they be, are vigorous, audacious and very human character-sketches; the soft entrance of the consoling nymphs is unspeakably beautiful; ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... did so, but with so unmistakable an air of cunning and triumph that Eric was both astonished and dismayed. Could the miscreant have any further plot against him? At first he fancied that Billy might attempt to extort money by a threat of telling Dr Rowlands; but this supposition he banished as unlikely, since it might expose Billy himself ...
— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar
... that in consideration for his nomination he should, if elected, permit no temperance legislation during his term. It was the brewing interests of Indiana, not the distillers, that sought on the eve of election, after his nomination in spite of their opposition, to extort a like promise as the price of ...
— Government By The Brewers? • Adolph Keitel
... confession to a priest—auricular confession—being at that time formally established. This, so far as domestic life was concerned, gave omnipresence and omniscience to the Inquisition. Not a man was safe. In the hands of the priest, who, at the confessional, could extract or extort from them their most secret thoughts, his wife and his servants were turned into spies. Summoned before the dread tribunal, he was simply informed that he lay under strong suspicions of heresy. ...
— History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science • John William Draper
... suppose, Lucy, that she cared in the slightest which was her son; her main object, of course, was to extort money. Edgar does not say anything at all about that; and of course at first she would try and make out that she was ready to sacrifice herself for him, and would scarcely say that she expected him to make her a handsome allowance when he came into the property, but I have no doubt that ...
— The Dash for Khartoum - A Tale of Nile Expedition • George Alfred Henty
... of one of Napoleon's generals, and had already opened negotiations with a view of carrying these intentions into effect. The father, unable to resist the daughter's tears, joined with her in endeavouring to extort from Madame V. a reluctant consent; but the latter remained inflexible. After all other arguments had been exhausted in vain, Monsieur M., her daughter and even her husband threw themselves on their knees before her in tears, and ...
— The Letter-Bag of Lady Elizabeth Spencer-Stanhope v. I. • A. M. W. Stirling (compiler)
... get from a European in a sulky frame of mind. Hajjee Ali has very kindly offered to take Marie down to Cairo and start her off to Alexandria, whence Ross's people can send her home. If she wants to stay in Alexandria and get placed by the nuns who piously exhorted her to extort ninety francs a month from me, so much the better for me. Ali refuses to take a penny from me for her journey—besides bringing me potatoes and all sorts of things: and if I remonstrate he says he and all his family and all they have is mine, in consequence ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon
... determined advocate of this odious traffic the exact image of himself in the garb and harness of a slave, dragged and whipped about like a beast: place this image also before him, and paint it as that of one without a ray of hope to cheer him; and you would extort from him the reluctant confession, that he would not endure for an hour the misery, to which he condemned his fellow-man for life. How dared he then to use this selfish plea of interest against the voice of the generous sympathies of his nature? But even upon this narrow ground the advocates for ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (1808) • Thomas Clarkson
... life, and about her marriage with me. Her popularity being on the wane in London, as she was now growing old-, and had to make way for younger actresses, Whyte proposed that they should proceed to the colonies and extort money from me, and he had come to me for that purpose. The villain told me all this in the coolest manner, and I, knowing he held the secret of my life, was unable to resent it. I refused to see Rosanna, but told Whyte I would agree to his terms, which were, first, ...
— The Mystery of a Hansom Cab • Fergus Hume
... grossly outraged any human and civilized taste. The treatment of the Templars, although it was no doubt good statecraft to abolish the order, was a scandalous outrage. In the face of Christendom torture was used to extort the evidence which was wanted to destroy the order, without regard to truth and justice.[1651] The crusades were extravagant and fantastic, and were attended by incidents of shameful excess, gross ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner
... more respects than one, for princes love not to see their subjects approach them with an air conscious of deserving, and thereby seeming desirous to extort, acknowledgment and recompense for their services; and Louis, the most jealous monarch that ever lived, was peculiarly averse and inaccessible to any one who seemed either to presume upon service rendered or to pry into ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... walking near the chapel, had just seen his worthy old friend, the priest, most barbarously murdered there. Sir Maurice Beevor had set Gaussen upon him; his reverence was coming with the papers concerning Norman's birth, which Beevor wanted in order to extort money from the countess. Gaussen was, however, obliged to run before he got the papers; and the clergyman had time, before he died, to tell Norman the story, and give him the documents, with which Norman sped off to the castle to have ...
— Memoirs of Mr. Charles J. Yellowplush - The Yellowplush Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Procedure, and the institutions which they regulate, are somewhat grim presents for one people to make to another, and are little calculated to excite affection; but they are eminently well calculated to protect peaceable men and to beat down wrongdoers, to extort respect and to enforce obedience.' The code was re-enacted in 1882 under the care of Mr. Whitley Stokes. It was then extended to the High Courts, which had been previously omitted, and alterations were made both in arrangement and in substance. Of these alterations Fitzjames says that ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... incarnation of motiveless malignity, presents itself to the imagination. The once imposing and solemn rite of exorcism has become obsolete in the Church. Men are no longer, in any quarter of the world, racked or pressed under planks to extort a confession of diabolical alliance. The heretic now laughs to scorn the solemn farce of the Church which, in the name of the All-Merciful, formally delivers him over to Satan. And for the sake of abused and ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier |
