"Incompetent" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... half the force he sailed with from Spain the previous June, and of the three hundred men whom he led into Florida, only four lived to reach civilization - the rest perished. That is but one example of incompetent leadership. When Portola organized his expedition for the march from San Diego Bay to Monterey, many of his soldiers were ill from scurvy, and at one time on the march the sick list numbered nineteen men, including the governor ...
— The March of Portola • Zoeth S. Eldredge
... render, insisted on quitting the land; a great loss was incurred in an attempt to compel it to remain; then open rebellion broke out in the weakened state; and the reign, which had commenced under such fair auspices, terminated in calamity and confusion. Menephthah was quite incompetent to deal with the difficulties and complications wherewith he found himself surrounded; he hesitated, temporized, made concessions, retracted them, and finally conducted Egypt to a catastrophe from which she did not ...
— Ancient Egypt • George Rawlinson
... solid matter, viewed in other ways than as obstructing movement, has the same property of the extended belonging to the empty void. The inference is, that the limitation of our means of knowledge renders altogether incompetent the imagination of an end to either Time or Space. The greatest efforts of our combining faculty cannot exceed the elements presented to it, and these elements contain nothing that would set forth the situation of space ...
— Practical Essays • Alexander Bain
... arbitrary will of the Minister of lands, and though the Government promises to work the law reasonably, neither this nor any other of their declarations is regarded with confidence. It is asserted that the Government is flooding the country with incompetent settlers, who imagine that anyone can get a living out of the land; that the resumed properties have been purchased and cut up in such a way that a cry for a reduction of rents will soon become inevitable, and that the Cheap Money Scheme has created a class of debtors, who, in ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves
... because of the error of her incompetent heart, to take charge of this flotsam. That was so evident that she had given ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... even with the most perfect information, an unqualified, inexperienced, or unprepared military commander may not win except with extraordinary luck or an incompetent foe. And, we repeat that there are cases where NO military force may be able to succeed if the objectives are unobtainable. The match of the entrepreneurial individual with the potential of the technology base is key. Optimizing and integrating all elements into a total system is a certain ...
— Shock and Awe - Achieving Rapid Dominance • Harlan K. Ullman and James P. Wade
... with other people's money. In the matter of directing the destinies of this country towards a higher and better national existence, there is really nothing to choose between Republicanism and Democracy. Both are equally unwilling and incompetent, both, despite the prating of civil service snobs and snivellers are dominated by spoils, and the managers of both regard a campaign not as a battle for the betterment of America but as a battle for boodle. The McKinley administration ...
— Volume 10 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... some of the essentials of which it is constituted, that he has mastered, and is sufficiently familiar with them; but there are others, especially if his work is miscellaneous and comprehensive, to which he is glaringly incompetent. He must deny his nature, and become another man, if he would execute these parts, in a manner equal to that which their intrinsic value demands, or to the perfection he is able to give to his work in those places which are ...
— Thoughts on Man - His Nature, Productions and Discoveries, Interspersed with - Some Particulars Respecting the Author • William Godwin
... use he makes of his authority. The law fixes the age of majority, when the child is completely emancipated; and even during his nonage, takes him from the father and places him under guardians, in case the father is incompetent to fulfil or grossly abuses his trust. This is proper, because society contributes to the life of the child, and has a right as well as an interest in him. Society, again, must suffer if the child is allowed to grow up a worthless vagabond or a criminal; and has a right ...
— The American Republic: Its Constitution, Tendencies, and Destiny • A. O. Brownson
... often finds that the worse a thing is, the better it can be made by competent and careful study. To complete and adapt incompetent things to orderliness and beauty, to harmonise incongruous things into a perfect whole requires and exercises ability of a high order, and the consciousness of its possession is no small satisfaction. That it is constantly being done shows how much real cleverness is necessary to ordinary life—and ...
— Principles of Home Decoration - With Practical Examples • Candace Wheeler
... war of 1870 he was at the head of a brigade of infantry, of which the 106th regiment of the line, commanded by Colonel de Vineuil, formed part. Like so many other officers he proved himself incompetent, and after the capitulation he, alone among the generals, took advantage of the pretext of illness to sign an undertaking to the Germans not to take any further part in ...
— A Zola Dictionary • J. G. Patterson
... class of Monty Python characters, poss. with some influence from the 1960s claymation character] An act of minor but conspicuous stupidity, often in 'gumby maneuver' or 'pull a gumby'. 2. [NRL] /n./ A bureaucrat, or other technical incompetent who impedes the progress of real work. 3. /adj./ Relating to things typically associated with people in sense 2. (e.g. "Ran would be writing code, but Richard gave him gumby work that's due on Friday", or, "Dammit! ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... If it be nevertheless pretended that my information and knowledge of mankind, however extensive, and however painfully acquired, by constant domestic enquiry, and by foreign travel, is, natheless, incompetent to the task of recording the pleasant narratives of my Landlord, I will let these critics know, to their own eternal shame and confusion as well as to the abashment and discomfiture of all who shall rashly take up a song against me, that I am NOT the ...
— The Black Dwarf • Sir Walter Scott
... and looked dreamily across the sea. It was plain to the most incompetent observer that the statue represented one class of men—those who make their opportunities; while Gilbert, with his high and slightly receding forehead, his lazy eyes and good-natured mouth, was a fair type of that other class which may take advantage of opportunities ...
— The Isle of Unrest • Henry Seton Merriman
... dreadful have been the circumstances of this case, that when an offer was made subsequently, through the public press, to produce bank, official and mercantile evidence that the government functionary who preferred this frightful accusation was dishonest and incompetent, and that he had purloined public documents and destroyed them with a view to concealing his crimes, still this Premier dared not summon him to trial, although, times without number, he gave assurances, as did the then Inspector General, that the culprit ...
— Ridgeway - An Historical Romance of the Fenian Invasion of Canada • Scian Dubh
... weather one has the bird's need to whistle; and I, who am specially incompetent in this art, must content myself by chattering away to you on this bit of paper. All the way along I was thanking God that he had made me and the birds and everything just as they are and not otherwise; for although there was no sun, the air was so thrilled ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... to give a helping hand to those who were trying to advance our knowledge, ever willing to own to a mistake and give up even his most cherished ideas if truth required them at his hands. No conception can be more wantonly inexact. I grant that if a writer was sufficiently at once incompetent and obsequious Mr. Darwin was "ever ready," &c. So the Emperors of Austria wash a few poor people's feet on some one of the festivals of the Church, but it would not be safe to generalise from this yearly ceremony, and ...
— Luck or Cunning? • Samuel Butler
... had seen or had not seen, or whether even he had his faculty of hearing in present exercise, a glance at his face was incompetent ...
— Queechy, Volume II • Elizabeth Wetherell
... the next place, let us make the reflection, that the art of weaving clothes, which an incompetent person might fancy to have been sufficiently described, has been separated off from several others which are of the same family, but not from the ...
— Statesman • Plato
... government as to make it useful to all. It was never easier to administer the government than it is now. We are beset with none, or with few, of its original difficulties; and it is a time of great general prosperity and happiness. Shall we admit ourselves incompetent to carry on the government, so as to be satisfactory to the whole country? Shall we admit that there has so little descended to us of the wisdom and prudence of our fathers? If the government could be administered in Washington's time, when ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... army of a million of men rush forward upon danger and death. The word glory, well or ill understood, has always decided the destinies of the world. What is amply sufficient when the work of destruction is in hand, by what disastrous fatality does it become incompetent when the task is to produce and to create? Is it not true that great men have always sought and found their principal recompense in the very exercise of their high faculties? If society had wished to recompense Newton, it ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 347, September, 1844 • Various
... speak of, and which seemeth familiar with Plato, whereby the principles of sciences may be pretended to be invented, and so the middle propositions by derivation from the principles; their form of induction, I say, is utterly vicious and incompetent; wherein their error is the fouler, because it is the duty of art to perfect and exalt nature; but they contrariwise have wronged, abused, and traduced nature. For he that shall attentively observe how the mind doth gather this excellent ...
— The Advancement of Learning • Francis Bacon
... same. He has merely exchanged several excellent tones below for some very poor ones above. I repeat, one who aspires to be a lyric artist requires the best possible teacher to guide his first steps; he may consult an inferior or incompetent professor, when so firmly established in the right path that he cannot possibly be ...
— Style in Singing • W. E. Haslam
... those unessential qualities which minister to their pleasure, and of which alone they are aware. The cleverness of a man who can paint fruit that tempts urchins impresses them; but the artist who feels, and tries to express, the soul of fruit and flowers they take for an incompetent ...
— Pot-Boilers • Clive Bell
... peace is again manifested in this act, which, in providing for the military establishment of the Confederacy, fixed the number of enlisted men of all arms at nine thousand four hundred and twenty. Due care was taken to prevent the appointment of incompetent or unworthy persons to be officers of the army, and the right to promotion up to and including the grade of colonel was carefully guarded, and beyond this the professional character of the army was recognized as follows: "Appointments to the rank of brigadier-general, after ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis
... not saying that travel by automobile is not delightful elsewhere; certainly it is equally so in many places along the Rhine, in Northern Italy, and in England, where the chief drawback is the really incompetent catering of the English country hotel-keeper to the demands of the traveller who would dine off of something more attractive than a cut from a cold joint of ham, and eggs washed down with stodgy, ...
— The Automobilist Abroad • M. F. (Milburg Francisco) Mansfield
... of its wealth and its embellishments. Scarce anything is left but the walls and buildings, which are uninjured, the lives and the industry of the inhabitants. Sandarion is made Governor of the city and province, with, as it seems to me, a very incompetent force to support his authority. Yet the citizens are, as they have been since the day the contest was decided, perfectly peaceable—nay, I rather should say, stupid and lethargic. There appear to be on the part of Aurelian no apprehensions ...
— Zenobia - or, The Fall of Palmyra • William Ware
... incompetent," he murmured, brokenly, "and took away my commission. The colonel said I was a disgrace to ...
— Septimus • William J. Locke
... been made, and the revelation had burst upon Edward that it had been a ghastly failure. Hal had not come to realise that labour was turbulent and lazy and incompetent, needing a strong hand to rule it; on the contrary, he had become one of these turbulent ones himself! A champion of the lazy and incompetent, an agitator, a fomenter of class-prejudice, an enemy of his own friends, and of his brother's ...
— King Coal - A Novel • Upton Sinclair
... probable that Chesterfield was the more useful of the two. I am a bad player, I have not the high spirits or the conversational skill which each should contribute to the social game. And in almost any sport the incompetent confer a benefit by standing out: at least, that is the opinion which I hear the average player express. If I lived in the backwoods where any guest is welcome, it might be my duty to act differently. But my ways are cast in places where ...
— Apologia Diffidentis • W. Compton Leith
... silly, selfish, incompetent little beast," she whispered. "Bill ought to thump me, instead of being kind. I can't do anything, and I don't know much, and I'm a scarecrow for looks right now. And I started out to be a ...
— North of Fifty-Three • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... we start out by assuming that girls are poor at accounts, that they cannot understand machinery, that they are so generally inefficient as to be worth less wages than boys, any such widespread assumption will go a long way to produce the ignorant and incompetent and inefficient creatures it presupposes girls to be. But it will do more than this. Such poor standards alike of performance and of wages will not end with the unfortunate girls themselves. They will react upon parents, teachers, and the community which so largely consists of ...
— The Trade Union Woman • Alice Henry
... and her words, when she found them, were not lacking in either force or effectiveness. "No, there's no use trying on anything else, I have an appointment at Cambon's." Cambon was Dinard's hated and wholly incompetent rival; and until this illuminating instant Madame had never suspected that her particular Mrs. Pletheridge had ever entered the high white ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... trials until the arrival of Lord Loudon, the new commander-in-chief, from whom he expected vigor and improvement. Unfortunately he was destined to have only fresh disappointment from the new general, for Lord Loudon was merely one more incompetent man added to the existing confusion. He paid no heed to the South, matters continued to go badly in the North, and Virginia was left helpless. So Washington toiled on with much discouragement, and the disagreeable attacks upon him increased. That it should have ...
— George Washington, Vol. I • Henry Cabot Lodge
... qualified for the vulgar mind. The reader will of course understand the precise amount of seasoning which must be added to it before he adopts it as one of the axioms of his life. The speaker disclaims all responsibility for its abuse in incompetent hands.] ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... office, or better qualified to discharge it, he would have considered these visits complimentary and agreeable; but, holding the position of a handsomely-remunerated humbug, he resented them. This was quite according to rule, for the incompetent servant, by whomsoever employed, is always against his employer. Even those born governors, noble and right honourable creatures, who have been the most imbecile in high places, have uniformly shown themselves the most opposed (sometimes in belying ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... been placed under eternal obligation by Rickett, and yearly sends the little Ricketts a box of presents and toys. It is the same everywhere. The men who do not take the trouble to conceal from you their opinion that you are an incompetent ass, and the women who blacken your character and misunderstand your wife's amusements, will work themselves to the bone in your behalf if you fall sick or into ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling
... not add to yourself. This is where we make the mistake. We must not only enter by faith, but we must advance by faith each step of the way. At every new stage we shall find ourselves as incompetent and unequal for the pressure as before, and we must take the grace and the victory simply by faith. Is it courage? We shall find ourselves lacking in the needed courage; we must claim it by faith. ...
— Days of Heaven Upon Earth • Rev. A. B. Simpson
... organized activity in the scene about him filled him with resentment and despair. In the hills he ever felt his strength: they had presented in his whole lifetime few problems which he could not cope with, conquer; but here in that construction camp he felt weak, incompetent, saw full many a puzzling matter which he could not understand. He watched the scene with bitter but with almost hopeless eyes. These new forces working here at railroad building, working in the hills to rob him of the girl he loved, seemed pitilessly strong and terribly mysterious. He ...
— In Old Kentucky • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey
... actually to believe, at all events to act upon the faith, that men, no more able than themselves, are the best material for rulers. It is a kind of compromise between their modesty and self-love: not burthening them with the trials and responsibilities of positions for which they feel incompetent, but soothing their vanity by the contemplation of office-holders not at all their superiors. Below a certain (or uncertain) grade, therefore, political stations are usually filled by men of very moderate abilities: and their elevation is favored—indeed, often effected—by ...
— Western Characters - or Types of Border Life in the Western States • J. L. McConnel
... masculine profligacy will never turn back until there is a decided reformation in womanly costume. I am in full sympathy with the officer of the law who, at a levee in Philadelphia last winter, went up to a so-called lady, and because of her sparse and incompetent apparel, ordered her either to leave the house or habilitate herself immediately. It is high time that our good and sensible women make vehement protest against fashionable indecency, and if the women of the household do not realize the deplorable extremes of much of ...
— The Wedding Ring - A Series of Discourses for Husbands and Wives and Those - Contemplating Matrimony • T. De Witt Talmage
... rich man could have a French chef and an English butler, and as many strapping indoor men—some of them much better fitted for manual labor—as he liked, and find it a social glory; while a family of moderate means were obliged to pay high wages to crude incompetent women from the darkest backwaters of European life, just because ...
— The Dust Flower • Basil King
... county; indeed in respect of moral tone and religious atmosphere it was perhaps the best. Meanwhile the work of cramming the children for the yearly diocesan examination must have fallen into arrears; for the school, which under my friend's incompetent predecessor had always been classed as "Excellent," sank to the level of "Good" in the year after he left, and in the following year to the level of "Fair." Any one who has any acquaintance with the reports of the Diocesan ...
— What Is and What Might Be - A Study of Education in General and Elementary Education in Particular • Edmond Holmes
... addition to turning over quartermaster and other property, kept him hard at work night and day, so the superintendence of all things pertaining to the house and camp outfit fell to my lot. The soldiers were most willing and most incompetent, and it kept me busy telling them what to do. The mess-chest, and Faye's camp bedding are always in readiness for ordinary occasions, but for a camp of several months in this climate, where it can be really hot one day and freezing cold the next, it was necessary to add many more ...
— Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888 • Frances M.A. Roe
... mind. Lacking the heart or ear, we cannot interpret the musician or the lover justly, and are even likely to consider him weak-minded or absurd. The mystic finds that most of us accord to his experiences an equally incompetent treatment. ...
— The Varieties of Religious Experience • William James
... 1: Christ as God and not as man was able to carry out all He wished, since as man He was not omnipotent, as stated above (Q. 13, A. 1). Nevertheless being both God and man, He wished to offer prayers to the Father, not as though He were incompetent, but for our instruction. First, that He might show Himself to be from the Father; hence He says (John 11:42): "Because of the people who stand about I have said it" (i.e. the words of the prayer) "that they may believe that Thou hast sent Me." Hence Hilary says (De Trin. ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... taken away from him, but his friend, Barry Ussher, believing that restraint would make Tyrrell mad indeed, so intimidates a hesitating physician that Mrs. Tyrrell fails in her most natural plan to save herself and her child from ruin by having her husband declared incompetent, and, if necessary, restrained. With his friend's assistance Tyrrell has won his fight against his wife. Obstinacy in the treatment of some tenants that his debts have driven him to evict rouses such hatred ...
— Irish Plays and Playwrights • Cornelius Weygandt
... laterally by encroachment upon their neighbors, which is a common effect of local excitement, must be slow to make any impression upon the superjacent bone of the cranium. Cranioscopy, moreover, is incompetent to indicate the development of small regions or portions of a convolution; it gives but a rude survey of development. Being thus incapable of minuteness, accuracy and certainty, it cannot be considered a proper and sufficient basis for cerebral science. ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, January 1888 - Volume 1, Number 12 • Various
... was crazy," agreed the seamen. It was as though the gaiety, the spring of gladness, within the little man had been dried up; there was left only the incompetent and despised Dago. He faced the routine of his toil now with no smile of preoccupation for a sweeter vision; he shuffled about decks, futile as ever, with the dreariness ...
— Those Who Smiled - And Eleven Other Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... been declared hors de combat? Stewart says that Reid made it good by means of direct observation; but the claim is too ridiculous to be listened to for a single instant. We have also shown that reasoning is incompetent to make out and support the analysis; and therefore our conclusion is, that it falls to the ground as a thing altogether impracticable as well as false, and that the attempt to re-establish it ought never, on any account, to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various
... his determination to suppress plundering. The same day he visited all the guards; changed their position; dismissed some of the officers, whom he found totally incompetent; gave new instructions. On the same day, also, he commenced a register of the names and characters of all who resided near and below his guards. Distinguished by secret marks the whig, the timid whig, the tory, ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis
... had said yes to Mr. Fyshe's invitation with alacrity, and had taken a look through the list of his more incompetent professors ...
— Arcadian Adventures with the Idle Rich • Stephen Leacock
... biggest and most barefaced scheme that under these conditions can receive any attention whatsoever from the department, and even then its force is hopelessly inadequate and incompetent for the work in hand, work requiring the highest-class ...
— Stories from Everybody's Magazine • 1910 issues of Everybody's Magazine
... haggard and dusty faces, at their excoriated ankles, and his eyes closed in pain. All they felt he felt. What their homes were to them, these fellaheen, dragged forth to defend their country, to go into the desert and waste their lives under leaders tyrannous, cruel, and incompetent, his old open life, his innocence, his integrity, his truthfulness and character, were to him. By an impulsive act, by a rash blow, he had asserted his humanity; but he had killed his fellow-man in anger. He knew that as that fatal blow had been delivered, there was no thought of punishment—it ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... His duties, so far as I was able to learn, were to put stamps on envelopes, and he was provided with a damp sponge to prevent any injury which might happen to his tongue through licking the stamps. At the end of a year he was dismissed as hopelessly incompetent. He came back to me, beautifully dressed, with a small despatch-box full of tradesmen's bills, and a grievance against the government. It was plain to me after that experiment that Godfrey could never earn his own living. I did ...
— The Red Hand of Ulster • George A. Birmingham
... incompetent man; you let that poor girl go on from bad to worse—for some vile end ...
— Heart and Science - A Story of the Present Time • Wilkie Collins
... sovereign's will; and his choice fell upon a certain handsome Manuel Godoy, a member of the bodyguard of the king, with whom the vapid Marie was madly in love, and whom she had recommended for the position. The king, all unsuspecting, followed this advice, and Godoy, who was wholly incompetent, went from one mistake to another, to the utter detriment of Spanish interests. The queen's relations with her husband's chief of state were well known to all save Charles himself, and, on one occasion at least, Napoleon, ...
— Women of the Romance Countries • John R. Effinger
... love—tremendous proof of the vigour of that immortal article, for they were in the graceful uniform under which English Charity delights to hide herself—and they were overgrown, and their legs (his legs at least, for I am modestly incompetent to speak of hers) were as much in the wrong as mere passive weakness of character can render legs. O it was a leaden churchyard, but no doubt a golden ground to those young persons! I first saw them on a Saturday evening, ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... a man should not undertake to be a clergyman, unless he possesses certain qualifications of mind and character which evidently qualify him for that profession. But he does not see why he has not the right to become a wearisome professor or an incompetent physician, if he chooses to enter upon such a career. Is a man not free to take up what profession he pleases? He must take the risk, of course; but if he fails, ...
— An Introduction to Philosophy • George Stuart Fullerton
... public schools assign picture-study work in each grade, recommending the study of certain pictures by well-known masters. As Supervisor of Drawing I found that the children enjoyed this work but that the teachers felt incompetent to conduct the lessons as they lacked time to look up the subject and to gather adequate material. Recourse to a great many books was necessary and often while much information could usually be found about the artist, very little was ...
— Stories Pictures Tell - Book Four • Flora L. Carpenter
... Presidents' messages, and Congress for the last dozen years, lest we endanger the safety of the Union. The true danger to popular forms of government begins when public opinion ceases because the people are incompetent or unwilling to think. In a democracy it is the duty of every citizen to think; but unless the thinking result in a definite opinion, and the opinion lead to considerate action, they are nothing. If the people are assumed to be incapable of forming a judgment for themselves, the men whose position ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell
... asserting his occasional danger—by no means a constant danger—of forming in his mind images of men that were more significant than it was possible for the men themselves to be. John Pope was perhaps his worst instance. An incompetent general, he was capable of things still less excusable. Just after McClellan had so tragically failed in the Seven Days, when Lincoln was at the front, Pope was busy with the Committee, assuring them virtually that the war had been ...
— Lincoln • Nathaniel Wright Stephenson
... meal in company with Mr. Palford, and attended by the large, serious man who wore no livery and three tall footmen who did, was of a size and stateliness which made him feel homesick for Mrs. Bowse's dining-room, with its two hurried, incompetent, and often-changed waitresses and its prevailing friendly custom of pushing things across the table to save time. Meals were quickly disposed of at Mrs. Bowse's. Everybody was due up-town or down-town, and regarded food as an unavoidable, ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... passes every Sunday at home in the little cottage occupied by his father, who, however, has ceased to be a farmer, having been promoted to the post of superintendent of the factory, formerly occupied by Mr. Davis. For the first twelve months the post was filled by a new man, who proved to be incompetent, and then was offered to Captain Rushton, whose excellent executive talents were well known. He soon made himself familiar with his duties, and the post is likely to be his as long as he cares to ...
— Brave and Bold • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... sound orthodoxy and deep learning, but his exquisite skill in playing at bowls, and his facetious conversation over a pipe and tankard of October. For these latter accomplishments, the Doctor had the honour to be recorded by old Century White amongst the roll of lewd, incompetent, profligate clergymen of the Church of England, whom he denounced to God and man, on account chiefly of the heinous sin of playing at games of skill and chance, and of occasionally joining in the social ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... indicate that mortality assessments on the average will be sufficiently burdensome to seriously threaten the permanence of the institution. Where disaster has been visited upon assessment companies, the cause has been easily traceable to incompetent or dishonest conduct of the business, and utter disregard of the foundation principles of all insurance. It has in no instance been fairly chargeable to defects in the system. With the record before us of our best assessment ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 5 • Various
... good of going to the War Office? They're all corrupt and incompetent there. If I had my way, I'd make a clean sweep of them. Talking of red-tape, I'll just give you an instance. Now, this is a fact. It was told me by the brother-in-law of the uncle of the ...
— The Hero • William Somerset Maugham
... several belligerent nations of Europe are showing that it can be done, that the sabotage of business enterprise can be put aside by sufficiently heroic measures. And they are also showing that they are all aware, and have always been aware, that the conduct of industry on business principles is incompetent to bring the largest practicable output of goods and services; incompetent to such a degree, indeed, as not to be tolerable in a season of desperate need, when the nation requires the full use of its productive forces, equipment and man-power, ...
— An Inquiry Into The Nature Of Peace And The Terms Of Its Perpetuation • Thorstein Veblen
... leaving a steam reserve amply fitted to control home waters. The gentlemen from the West had at last been constrained to acknowledge that a college for the training of diplomats was as necessary as law schools are for the training of barristers; consequently we were no longer represented abroad by incompetent patriots. The nation was prosperous; Chicago, for a moment paralyzed after a second great fire, had risen from its ruins, white and imperial, and more beautiful than the white city which had been built for its plaything in 1893. Everywhere good architecture was replacing bad, and ...
— The King In Yellow • Robert W. Chambers
... not in a position to do so, Miss Van Teyl," Joyce replied. "The trouble probably is that Governor Roughton has been considered incompetent as so many of these disasters have taken place unhindered ...
— The Pawns Count • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... I found that the substitute was hopelessly incompetent and stupid. When Annie came to say "good-bye" to me, I told her about the new girl. She broke down and wept. "Ay sorry Ay try to go," she sobbed. "Ay tell my sister dere iss nobody what can take care of ...
— Threads of Grey and Gold • Myrtle Reed
... period, the fees which he charged in 1185 suits, and in the preparation of many legal papers out of court, and still have been seriously addicted to laziness. Indeed, if so much legal business could have been transacted within three years and a half, by a lawyer who, besides being young and incompetent, was also extremely lazy, and greatly preferred to go off to the woods and hunt for deer while his clients were left to hunt in vain for him, it becomes an interesting question just how much legal business we ought to expect to ...
— Patrick Henry • Moses Coit Tyler
... genius: they had forgotten to ask him for a key to articles which, so far from understanding, they with some confusion vainly strove even to decipher. The government was obliged (May 1752) to appeal to Diderot and D'Alembert to resume a work for which their enemies had thus proved themselves incompetent. Yet, by one of the meannesses of decaying authority, the decree of three months before was left suspended ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists (Vol 1 of 2) • John Morley
... advocate of the subject animal creation, finished their argument in the light of fuller knowledge. Much also do I wonder which of them was proved to be right, a difficult matter whereon I feel quite incompetent to express ...
— The Mahatma and the Hare • H. Rider Haggard
... his lonesome, Mr. President. His income was immense. But he cut into it something terrible. His brothers in the East began to row at the way he poured it out. When he began to draw in advance they were goin' to have him declared incompetent. Even his brothers say he's cracked. Recently they've drawn in on him. Won't let ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... capable of feeling interest in the comparison of slighter with sublimer things, and the detection in minor works of the same style, here revealed by fitful hints in casual phrases, as that which animates and distinguishes even a work so insufficient and incompetent as Webster's "tragecomoedy" of "The Devil's Law-case." The noble and impressive extracts from this most incoherent and chaotic of all plays which must be familiar to all students of Charles Lamb are but patches of imperial purple sewn on with the roughest of needles to a garment ...
— The Age of Shakespeare • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... who have come into long and deadly collision with its spirit and power in Kansas and upon the western border of Missouri. Even Northern and Eastern Abolitionists, better versed perhaps in the theory of the subject, would prove very incompetent if matched in practical hostility with slaveholding opinion and might—slaveholding vindictiveness, cunning, treachery, and recklessness of every consideration, human or divine, but the gaining of their one end, the retention of their hold over ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol V. Issue III. March, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... Andra, goaded to desperation by his absolute lack of success and the facetious remarks which were rendering his guides weak and incompetent, resolved to give up the hopeless struggle. He shoved aside his supporting comrades fiercely, and came down upon the ice with a crash that seemed as if he had decided to end his tortures Samson-like and die with his tormentors. But ...
— Duncan Polite - The Watchman of Glenoro • Marian Keith
... Incompetent my song to raise To its just height thy praise, Great Mill! That by thy motion proper (No thanks to wind, or sail, or working rill) Grinding that stubborn corn, the Human will, Turn'st out men's consciences, That were begrimed before, as clean and sweet As flower from purest ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb
... no fact; it is rather the baseless fancy of incompetent observers, to some extent acquiesced in, or at least not contradicted, by the proud Castilian, who cares not at all about the opinions of other nationalities, and who never takes the trouble to enlighten ignorance of the kind. True, there was an exhibition of something like popular indignation ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street
... making their arrangements and canvassing their supporters so as to control the votes of the College at that future Conclave. Therefore Francesco Piccolomini, Cardinal of Siena (nephew of Pius II), a feeble octogenarian, tormented by an ulcer, which, in conjunction with an incompetent physician, was to cut his life even shorter than they hoped, was placed upon the throne of St. Peter, and assumed with the Pontificate the name ...
— The Life of Cesare Borgia • Raphael Sabatini
... know that the wild animals and birds now living upon the earth are here solely because they have had sufficient sense to devise ways and means by which to survive. The ignorant, the incompetent, the slothful and the unlucky ones have passed from earth and joined ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... month. And I don't like your invalids to be smoking such strong tobacco. It makes you sneeze when you come in. It would be better, too, if there weren't so many of them. If there are a large number, it will instantly be ascribed to bad supervision or incompetent medical treatment. ...
— The Inspector-General • Nicolay Gogol
... been generally supposed that St. Cecilia with a cold in her head would be incompetent to "Nix my Dolly;" and this erroneous and popular prejudice is continually made the excuse for vocal inability during the winter months. Now the effect which we have before described upon the articulation of the catarrhed would be, in our opinion, so far from displeasing, that we feel ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... causes underlying breakdowns in family morale. The ratio of desertions has been observed to decrease rather than to increase in "hard times";[8] moreover, it is a matter of common observation that not all slovenly and incompetent wives are deserted, and that many married couples in all walks of life whose sex relationships are unsatisfactory, nevertheless maintain the fabric of family life and support and bring up their children with an average ...
— Broken Homes - A Study of Family Desertion and its Social Treatment • Joanna C. Colcord
... text, but also the subsequent experience of the United States and other countries where they relate to the views expressed by the authors. The most authentic text has been used; the antiquated and often absurd punctuation—largely due to incompetent early printers—has been rationalized; and an introduction, abundant cross-references, and a full index materially increase the value of this edition for both students and lawyers. Matter of obsolete ...
— The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of Citizens • Georg Jellinek
... what we have seen of medical facts, as they are represented by incompetent persons, we are disposed to attribute little value to all statements of wonderful cures, coming from those who have never been accustomed to watch the caprices of disease, and have not cooled down their young enthusiasm by the habit of tranquil ...
— Medical Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... tiresome or laborious to undergo. Work well and conscientiously done must attract attention; there is a great deal of lolling and idleness among the many thoughtless and indifferent persons who drift on to the stage as the last refuge of the negligent or incompetent. ...
— [19th Century Actor] Autobiographies • George Iles
... of them one pound a month as pocket-money. The allowance was amply sufficient for the old man; it scarce appears how Miss Hazeltine contrived to dress upon it; but she did, and, what is more, she never complained. She was, indeed, sincerely attached to her incompetent guardian. He had never been unkind; his age spoke for him loudly; there was something appealing in his whole-souled quest of knowledge and innocent delight in the smallest mark of admiration; and, though the lawyer had warned her she was being sacrificed, Julia had refused to add ...
— The Wrong Box • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... charter did not isolate the judicial office. Under the theocracy the policy of the clergy had been to suppress the study of law in order to concentrate their own power; hence no training was thought necessary for the magistrate, no politician was considered incompetent to fill the judgment-seat because of ignorance of his duty, and the office-hunter, having got his place by influence, was deemed at liberty to use it as a point of vantage, from whence to prosecute his chosen career. For example, the first chief justice was ...
— The Emancipation of Massachusetts • Brooks Adams
... you; and, if it should be necessary, I will, without hesitation, avail myself of your kind offer. I feel the deficiency of my education most sensibly in respect to my daughter. I find myself incompetent to take the direction of her ...
— Godey's Lady's Book, Vol. 42, January, 1851 • Various
... can be practical and is actually so, as the consciousness of the moral law proves, then it is still only one and the same reason which, whether in a theoretical or a practical point of view, judges according to a priori principles; and then it is clear that although it is in the first point of view incompetent to establish certain propositions positively, which, however, do not contradict it, then, as soon as these propositions are inseparably attached to the practical interest of pure reason, it must accept them, though it be as something offered to it from a foreign source, something that ...
— The Critique of Practical Reason • Immanuel Kant
... handle to his enemies by the profusion of his own household, his appropriations of clerical lands and even of the fabric of consecrated buildings to his own use; and finally his conduct of foreign affairs had been so incompetent that while the Emperor declined an English alliance, the position of Boulogne—which remained quite inefficiently garrisoned—was becoming critical, and a French squadron, ostensibly in pursuit of English ...
— England Under the Tudors • Arthur D. Innes
... perplexities which had loomed before him in the morning were closing around him now in grim earnest! The worst he had feared had happened, and more than the worst. It was now proved beyond all doubt that he was utterly incompetent. Would it not be sheer madness in him to attempt this impossible task a ...
— The Willoughby Captains • Talbot Baines Reed
... national security to be a natural gift rather than a product of the will. Such communities further fail from the lack of civic aptitude, as was said above, which means that they deliberately elect to leave the mass of citizens incompetent and irresponsible for generations, so that, when any more strain is upon them, they look at once for some men other than themselves to relieve them, and are incapable of corporate action upon their ...
— First and Last • H. Belloc
... creative activities, to flourish under any system which requires that the artist shall prove his competence to some body of authorities before he is allowed to follow his impulse. Any really great artist is almost sure to be thought incompetent by those among his seniors who would be generally regarded as best qualified to form an opinion. And the mere fact of having to produce work which will please older men is hostile to a free spirit and to bold innovation. Apart from this difficulty, ...
— Proposed Roads To Freedom • Bertrand Russell
... is all very well in its way, and a climate of incomprehension may suit orators and metaphysicians admirably; but it will not do for politics. The party or people that fails to make its programme understood is politically incompetent, and Ireland is assuredly safe from any such imputation. She has her spiritual secrets, buried deep in what we may call the subliminal consciousness of the race, and to the disclosure of these secrets we may look with confidence for the ...
— The Open Secret of Ireland • T. M. Kettle
... tried to lead them to the consideration of more humanising truths, for the purpose of preparing the way for the inculcation of the great mysteries of our holy religion: but the greater portion of my hearers were incompetent to understand what I seemed so desirous of teaching, and my making them comprehend the principles of Christianity appeared to be ...
— The Little Savage • Captain Marryat
... as MAIRE DU PALAIS to the incompetent Otto, and using the love-sick Princess for a tool and mouthpiece, he pursues a policy of arbitrary power and territorial aggrandisement. He has called out the whole capable male population of the state to military service; he has ...
— Prince Otto • Robert Louis Stevenson
... in the struggle with danger, slander, suspicion, expulsion, and even worse consequences of enmity, ye have at last to play your last card as protectors of truth upon earth—as though "the Truth" were such an innocent and incompetent creature as to require protectors! and you of all people, ye knights of the sorrowful countenance, Messrs Loafers and Cobweb-spinners of the spirit! Finally, ye know sufficiently well that it cannot be of any consequence if YE just carry your point; ye know that hitherto no ...
— Beyond Good and Evil • Friedrich Nietzsche
... perfect way than to any other standpoint; or the name is used to attest that the world alone {180} exists, and that monism knows of but one existence,—namely, that of the world; while the contrary view of the world—that of theism, which in a manner wholly incompetent, and historically wholly unjustified, is called dualism—supposes two existences, God and the world. But then this name does not correctly represent either itself or theism. It does not correctly represent itself: for the so-called monism does not, indeed, suppose that that ...
— The Theories of Darwin and Their Relation to Philosophy, Religion, and Morality • Rudolf Schmid
... the most dangerous of all the errors of mankind. A false leader in religion may be more fatal than an incompetent general of an army, therefore ministers of the gospel and teachers have the greatest task imposed on them of any of God's creation. When once one's religion runs mad, barbarity assumes the support of conscience and feels its approval in the consummation of the most heinous crimes. The Pilgrims ...
— The Witch of Salem - or Credulity Run Mad • John R. Musick
... sarcastically, "are, as far as I can see, usually sealed before our long-suffering, incompetent ...
— The Old Man in the Corner • Baroness Orczy
... east gallery. Teddy had been exhausting the science of prognostication as to the probabilities of a price of twenty-four cents for the autumn clip, and had then subsided into an anesthetic cloud of Havana smoke. Only as incompetent a judge as a woman would have failed to note long ago that at least a third of his salary must have gone up in the fumes ...
— Whirligigs • O. Henry
... curtly signed himself, in spite of all Louis's wit on Rolands and Olivers—and yet those soft satirical speeches did more than all direct attacks to shake his confidence in his own magnanimity; more especially because Fitzjocelyn always declared himself incompetent to judge, and never failed to uphold that he was so far right, that his ministry must stand ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. II) • Charlotte M. Yonge
... lasted all the afternoon. Patty grew very tired of the unaccustomed work, and was glad when Miss Bender noticed it, and told her to run out into the garden with Bertha. Bertha was not allowed to touch the quilt with her incompetent fingers, but Elise sewed away, thoroughly enjoying it all, and with no desire to avail herself of Miss Bender's permission to stop and rest. Patty and Bertha wandered through the old-fashioned garden, in great delight. The paths were ...
— Patty's Summer Days • Carolyn Wells
... valve, declared in his desperation, that "either she or he should go." At length the machinery was set in motion, on which, as Jonathan Foster described to the author "she flew all to pieces, and it was the biggest wonder i' the world that we were not all blewn up." The incompetent and useless engine was declared to be a failure; it was shortly after dismounted and sold; and Mr. Blackett's praiseworthy efforts thus ...
— Lives of the Engineers - The Locomotive. George and Robert Stephenson • Samuel Smiles
... warriors of Fleet Street set about explaining why the defeat was sustained and why it should never have happened. In due course these carpet tacticians proved to their own satisfaction that Colonel Stevenor was incompetent for the service on which he had been dispatched. But the reek of printing-ink never was good ...
— From One Generation to Another • Henry Seton Merriman
... endeavour to slay Jarasandha and rescue the kings kept by him for a cruel purpose, there is no higher act which we could employ ourselves in. If, however, we do not undertake the task, the world will always think us incompetent. We have certainly the competence, O king! Why should you, therefore, regard us as incompetent? Those that have become Munis desirous of achieving tranquillity of souls, obtain yellow robes with ease. So if we vanquish the foe, the imperial dignity will easily be ours. We ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Part 2 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa
... Hazel reached the top of the chapel that the congregation observed Foxy, a small red figure, trotting willingly in Hazel's wake—a loving though incompetent bridesmaid. ...
— Gone to Earth • Mary Webb
... So incompetent has the generality of historians been for the province they have undertaken, that it is almost a question, whether, if the dead of past ages could revive, they would be able to reconnoitre the events of their own times, as transmitted to us by ignorance and ...
— Historic Doubts on the Life and Reign of King Richard the Third • Horace Walpole
... this, but never another 'best seller' like Marmion or The Lady of the Lake. Our popular poets had to express themselves in other ways. Then Borrow, although his verse has been underrated by those who have not seen it at its best, or who are incompetent to appraise poetry, was not very effective here, notwithstanding that the stories in verse in Romantic Ballads are all entirely interesting. This fact is most in evidence in a case where a real poet, not of the greatest, ...
— George Borrow and His Circle - Wherein May Be Found Many Hitherto Unpublished Letters Of - Borrow And His Friends • Clement King Shorter
... respects they were on a level with the best—and had he no wish to make good men of them? Nay, he must have wished it. But virtue, as I suspect, could not be taught. And that you may not suppose the incompetent teachers to be only the meaner sort of Athenians and few in number, remember again that Thucydides had two sons, Melesias and Stephanus, whom, besides giving them a good education in other things, ...
— Meno • Plato
... them, or any of them. This doubt has gained strength by the circumstances which have unfolded themselves in the prosecution of the enterprise, which have marked it as a mere private, unauthorized adventure. Projected and commenced with an incompetent force, reliance seems to have been placed on what might be drawn, in defiance of our laws, from within our limits; and of late, as their resources have failed, it has assumed a more marked character of unfriendliness to us, the island being made a channel for the illicit introduction ...
— State of the Union Addresses of James Monroe • James Monroe
... which will certainly be attempted are—Better training of the Staff, especially in the thinking out and writing of orders; weeding out of incompetent amateurs from among our officers; better pay for the men; careful preparation in time of peace of a picked Imperial force of mounted infantry from all parts of the Empire. But greater changes, urgently as they are demanded by the national interest, ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Vol. 2 • Stephen Gwynn
... the princes. "In matters of conscience the majority has no power." The deputies declared: "It is to the decree of 1526 that we are indebted for the peace that the empire enjoys: its abolition would fill Germany with troubles and divisions. The Diet is incompetent to do more than preserve religious liberty until the council meets."(291) To protect liberty of conscience is the duty of the state, and this is the limit of its authority in matters of religion. Every secular government that attempts to regulate or enforce religious observances by civil ...
— The Great Controversy Between Christ and Satan • Ellen G. White
... anything she had ever tried, if only there was work all the year round; for she couldn't afford to sit idle through the long summer months—well, I should say not!—with eight small brothers and sisters at home, and a rather incompetent father, and sixteen dollars a month rent! The experiences of a score of shops, and the motley crew of people she had worked with in these busy years, Bessie in her careless, simple narrative had the power ...
— The Long Day - The Story of a New York Working Girl As Told by Herself • Dorothy Richardson
... the manner in which its atoms are aggregated. I take it," he says, "to be demonstrable that it is utterly impossible to prove that anything whatever may not be the effect of a material and necessary cause, and that human logic is equally incompetent to prove that any act is really spontaneous. A really spontaneous act is one, which, by the assumption, has no cause; and the attempt to prove such a negative as this, is on the face of the matter absurd. And while it is thus a philosophical ...
— What is Darwinism? • Charles Hodge
... at once appointed surgeon in ordinary to the King. When Metz was besieged by the Spanish army, under Charles V., the garrison suffered heavy loss, and the number of wounded was very great. The surgeons were few and incompetent, and probably slew more by their bad treatment than the Spaniards did by the sword. The Duke of Guise, who commanded the garrison, wrote to the King imploring him to send Pare to his help. The courageous surgeon at once set out, and, after braving many dangers (to use his own words, ...
— Self Help • Samuel Smiles
... forth his melody, and to the gross ear it seems a mere tinkle of inanity. That is simply because the crowd who worship at the shrine of the Sminthean Apollo have been accustomed by an old-fashioned and ridiculously incompetent priesthood to look for an instant and mechanical relation between sound and sense. I would not exaggerate, sire; but the kind of poetry lately cultivated, not only at Delphi, but in ...
— Hypolympia - Or, The Gods in the Island, an Ironic Fantasy • Edmund Gosse
... be led by them, and who will act with iron firmness when the time for such action comes—should be assigned to such a difficult post as Peking. In the fifth place, the strange idea, which refuses to be eradicated, that the Chinese showed themselves in this Peking seige once and for all incompetent to carry to fruition any military plan, may be somewhat corrected by the plain and convincing terms in which the eye-witness describes the manner in which they stayed their hand whenever it could have slain, and the silent struggle which the Moderates of Chinese ...
— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale
... Candahar had been consistently repudiated. The intention on our part announced was to separate it from Cabul, and to place it under the independent rule of a Barakzai prince. Such a prince had actually been appointed in Shere Ali Khan, and although that incompetent Sirdar was wise enough to abdicate a position for which he was not strong enough, this action did not relieve us from our pledges against annexation. Nevertheless many distinguished men whose opinions were abstractly entitled to weight, ...
— The Afghan Wars 1839-42 and 1878-80 • Archibald Forbes
... matters are allowed to drift their own way. It is useless to conceal the fact that the Cabinet is not solid. Its members are working at cross purposes, the ministers lack energy, and, in fact, are absolutely incompetent, and simply trust to chance to get ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 2, No. 24, June 16, 1898 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... thy movements! inscrutable thy operations! An atom of thy creation, wildered in the mazes of ignorance and woe, would bow to thy decrees. Surrounded with impenetrable gloom, unable to scrutinize the past, incompetent to explore the future——fain would he say, THY WILL BE DONE! And Oh, that it might be consistent with that HIGH WILL to call this atom from a dungeon of wretchedness, to worlds of light and glory, where his ...
— Alonzo and Melissa - The Unfeeling Father • Daniel Jackson, Jr.
... untried child goes, whether to join the assembly of its elders who have borne the heat of the day—fire-purified martyrs, and torment-sifted confessors—what know we? We promise heaven methinks too cheaply, and assign large revenues to minors, incompetent to manage them. Epitaphs run upon this topic of consolation, till the very frequency induces a cheapness. Tickets for admission into Paradise are sculptured out at a penny a letter, twopence a syllable, &c. It is all a mystery; and the more I try to express my meaning (having ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Vol. 6) - Letters 1821-1842 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... very able hands. Nevertheless, it is surely a paradox that the English people should know so little about foreign affairs as to be absolutely incapable of any control in questions that affect their life or death. Democracy, though it is supposed to be incompetent to manage foreign relations, could hardly have made a worse mess of it than the highly-trained Chancelleries. When the new Europe arises out of the ashes of the old, it is not very hazardous to prophesy that diplomacy, with its secret methods, ...
— Armageddon—And After • W. L. Courtney
... out. Strassburg, the city which gave birth to the Marseillaise, had been a centre of Jacobin activities. Metternich remembered that his pleasant social life had been sadly interrupted, that a lot of incompetent citizens had suddenly been called forth to perform tasks for which they were not fit, that the mob had celebrated the dawn of the new liberty by the murder of perfectly innocent persons. He had failed to see ...
— The Story of Mankind • Hendrik van Loon
... blooming matrons, spreading out in their pride, like the anxious clucking hen, over their numerous encircling offspring, who have borne them with a mother's throes, watched over them with a mother's anxious mind, and reared them with a mother's ardent love, are considered to be wholly incompetent, in the opinion of these dessicated and barren branches of ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... enough at college. Innumerable devices have been tried with considerable ingenuity to remedy this evil, and the best possible intentions by the professors and other public-spirited persons who are sincerely grieved to see so many incompetent, half-qualified men in almost every corner ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... legislators back on Earth has been getting heavier and heavier. Jupiter Equilateral won the greatest fight in its history when they limited U.N. jurisdiction to Mars, and kept us out of the Belt. And now they hope to convince the lawmakers that we're incompetent to administer the Martian colonies and keep peace out here. If they succeed, we'll be called home in nothing flat; we've had to fight just ...
— Gold in the Sky • Alan Edward Nourse
... away one artist: the poor creature was utterly incompetent to depict the sublime, graceful, and pathetic personages and events with which this history will most assuredly abound, and I doubt whether even the designer engaged in his place can make such a portrait of Miss Ethel Newcome as shall satisfy her friends ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Dumanoir's incompetent selfishness left the centre and rear to be crushed by equal numbers and far superior fighting power. But it was no easy victory. Outmatched as they were, Frenchmen and Spaniards fought with desperate courage and heroic determination. Trafalgar is remembered ...
— Famous Sea Fights - From Salamis to Tsu-Shima • John Richard Hale
... kill Grouse. At least I can't. I sometimes suspect there are others of the population equally incompetent, and perhaps still less interested in battues; though the Twelfth figures in everybody's calendar like a Church festival, and the newspapers devote leaders to it, and the comic papers have pictures, and sometimes even jokes about it, and you would think ...
— Without Prejudice • Israel Zangwill
... she sometimes avoids the trouble of trying to keep house with incompetent employees by living in hotels, or non-housekeeping apartments; but for the housewife who does not possess the financial means to indulge herself thus, or who still prefers home life with all its trials to hotel life, the only alternative is to submit to pay high wages for very poor work or ...
— Wanted, a Young Woman to Do Housework • C. Helene Barker
... ample fund will be provided, (5) partly out of the pockets of those who are only too glad to escape cavalry service (in other words, those on whom the service devolves prefer to pay a sum of money down and be quit of the duty), (6) and from wealthy men who are physically incompetent; and I do not see why orphans possessed of large estates should not contribute. (7) Another belief I hold is that amongst our resident aliens (8) there are some who will show a laudable ambition if incorporated with the cavalry. I argue from the fact, apparent to myself, that amongst this class ...
— The Cavalry General • Xenophon
... rule is, to form all plans and arrangements in consistency with the means at command, and the character of those around. A woman who has a heedless husband, and young children, and incompetent domestics, ought not to make such plans as one may properly form who will not, in so many directions, meet embarrassment. She must aim at just as much as she can probably attain, and no more; and thus ...
— The American Woman's Home • Catherine E. Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe
... coming—could still mount his horse and cast his 'eye over his acres.' The progress of decline, in his case, was not of that humiliating kind, by which the faculties of the intellect are clouded, and the muscles of the body made feeble and incompetent. He spoke thoughtfully of the great concerns of life, of death, and of the future; declared himself a Christian, a humble believer in all the vital truths of religion. As of the future he entertained no doubt, so ...
— The Life of Francis Marion • William Gilmore Simms
... on the charity of the friends of Poland in London. 1848 gave Bern once more a career. He went to Vienna, and when the people were in the ascendant, in October, he held a command. But the Viennese could not trust the Pole. Incompetent men were placed over him. Vienna fell before the artillery of Windischgratz and Jellachich in November. Slaughter, terror, violation reigned. Never will the Viennese forget the red cloaks of the Croats. The educated youth of Vienna were shot in clusters. ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various
... birds may easily take his choice from amongst twenty different sorts. There is, however, so little difference in the various members of the family, either as regards hardiness, laying, or hatching, that the most incompetent fancier or breeder may indulge his taste without danger of making a bad bargain. In connection with their value for table, light-coloured ducks are always of milder flavour than those that are dark-coloured, the white Aylesbury's being general favourites. Ducks reared exclusively on vegetable diet ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... originating in the army of the Danube. The rebellion was successful, and the Emperor Maurice was murdered, together with his sons. Maurice had been unsuccessful in war, unpopular with the army, and his financial measures had been oppressive. Phocas was utterly incompetent as a ruler, licentious and sanguinary as a man. His reign was a period of ...
— A Source Book for Ancient Church History • Joseph Cullen Ayer, Jr., Ph.D.
... beforehand that he cannot make a true poem out of something which to us was merely alluring or dull or revolting? The question whether, having done so, he ought to publish his poem; whether the thing in the poet's work will not be still confused by the incompetent Puritan or the incompetent sensualist with the thing in his mind, does not touch this point; it is a further question, one of ethics, not of art. No doubt the upholders of 'Art for art's sake' will generally be in favour of the courageous course, of refusing to sacrifice the better or stronger ...
— Poetry for Poetry's Sake - An Inaugural Lecture Delivered on June 5, 1901 • A. C. Bradley
... who holds three important situations under the Russian Government, and who is far advanced in years, has neither time, inclination, or eyesight for the task, and I am apprehensive that my strength and powers unassisted are incompetent to it' (praised be the Lord, they were not!), 'therefore I should be glad to return home. Moreover the compositors say that they are unaccustomed to compose in an unknown tongue from such scribbled ...
— Letters of George Borrow - to the British and Foreign Bible Society • George Borrow
... subjoined, the petitioner desires that it may please you, inasmuch as the foregoing facts sufficiently prove the insanity and incompetency of the Marquis d'Espard herein described with his titles and residence, to order that, to the end that he may be declared incompetent by law, this petition and the documents in evidence may be laid before the King's public prosecutor; and that you will charge one of the judges of this Court to make his report to you on any day you may be pleased to name, and ...
— The Commission in Lunacy • Honore de Balzac
... all. It rested with Maggie to go or stay. If she was incompetent I wasn't bound to keep her just because she'd had a baby. At that rate I should have been completely in ...
— Life and Death of Harriett Frean • May Sinclair
... beneath his blows, but peace followed; and though he was termed "the Portuguese Mars," his justice became traditional, and his sagacity was shown in the permanence of the settlements he made, even under the incompetent ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 5 of 8 • Various
... of nature applied to nations, as in the instance of receiving distressed ships with humanity. By various conventional compacts, the Law of Nations became positive; thus flags of truce are respected, and prisoners are not put to death. One independent state is declared incompetent to prescribe to another, so long as that state is innoxious to its neighbours. The Law of Nations consists of those principles and regulations, founded in reason and general convenience, by which the mutual intercourse between ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... like a man; but Brown found out, a day or two before the struggle came, that he could not bring himself to stand against his friend. Jones, he said, he knew was incompetent, but Robinson ought to get it; so he, for one, would not stand ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... be no success, unless the execution be entrusted to Generals of competent judgement. That the British Army swarms with those who are incompetent—is too plain from successive proofs in the transactions at Buenos Ayres, at Cintra, and in the result of the Board of Inquiry.—Nor must we see a General appointed to command—and required, at the same time, to ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... planet to be nothing but a howling wilderness, inhabited by us poor savages and wild beasts, shall take formal possession of it, in the name of his most gracious and philosophic excellency, the Man in the Moon. Finding however that their numbers are incompetent to hold it in complete subjection, on account of the ferocious barbarity of its inhabitants, they shall take our worthy President, the King of England, the Emperor of Hayti, the mighty Bonaparte, and the great King of Bantam, and, returning to their native planet, shall ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... sons, the new king was timid and incompetent; Cyrus was remarkably shrewd and able, and was filled with a consuming ambition. He wanted the Persian throne and knew the best means of obtaining it. He was well aware of the military ability of the Greeks. It was ...
— Historic Tales, vol 10 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... upon the first stages of old age. And what a lonely old age hers was likely to be! Her husband was dead; her only near relative, brother Jedediah, was—well, he might be dead also, poor helpless, dreamy incompetent. He might have died in the Klondike, providing he ever reached that far-off country, which was unlikely. He would have been but an additional burden upon her had he lived and remained at home, but he would have been company for her at least. Emily was a ...
— Thankful's Inheritance • Joseph C. Lincoln
... in flannel bandages, and so to confine them to splints in order to restrain them. Next, do not become over-anxious because the child grows stupid and ceases to talk; intelligence and the power of speech will certainly come back again. And, lastly, do not be impatient and think your medical adviser incompetent because the disorder lasts so long. An average duration of seventy days implies that while sometimes it ceases sooner, in others it lasts much longer than the two weary months of watching and waiting with which in any case you must lay ...
— The Mother's Manual of Children's Diseases • Charles West, M.D.
... began to scatter. There was need, therefore, to follow Lygia more from a distance, and more carefully, so as not to rouse attention. Chilo fell to complaining of wounds, of pains in his legs, and dropped more and more to the rear. Vinicius did not oppose this, judging that the cowardly and incompetent Greek would not be needed. He would even have permitted him to depart, had he wished; but the worthy sage was detained by circumspection. Curiosity pressed him evidently, since he continued behind, and at moments even approached ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... also hold Newport News on the Peninsula. There are rumors of a fight at Philippi. One Col. Potterfield was surprised. If this be so, there is no excuse for him. I think the President will make short work of incompetent commanders. Now a blunder is ...
— A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital • John Beauchamp Jones
... the present Legislature will go down in history as the most incompetent body of lawmakers that ever sat in the ...
— The Hindered Hand - or, The Reign of the Repressionist • Sutton E. Griggs
... April, describes the opposition to the institution of which it is the organ, as directed by "envy, malice, and uncharitableness," and intimates that it is occasioned by the inability or unwillingness of the committee to purchase the trashy productions of incompetent painters constantly offered to them. We submit to the gentlemen connected with the Art-Union, that they should not suffer the hirelings they may sometimes employ upon the Bulletin, thus to refer to such artists and such men as Durand, Wier, Kellogg, Elliott, and many others, who have ventured ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... Mesopotamian. chieftain, called Tayer or Thair, made an attack upon Otesiphon, took the city by storm, and captured a sister or aunt of the Persian monarch. The nobles, who, during Sapor's minority, guided the helm of the State, were quite incompetent to make head against these numerous enemies. For sixteen years the marauding bands had the advantage, and Persia found herself continually weaker, more impoverished, and less able to recover herself. The young prince is said to have shown extraordinary discretion and intelligence. He diligently ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 7. (of 7): The Sassanian or New Persian Empire • George Rawlinson
... superficialness, tho marked excellence is at times attained by amateurs. A connoisseur is supposed to be so thoroughly informed regarding any art or work as to be able to criticize or select intelligently and authoritatively; there are many incompetent critics, but there can not, in the true sense, be an incompetent connoisseur. The amateur practises to some extent that in regard to which he may not be well informed; the connoisseur is well ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... as a bad link in an otherwise good chain renders the whole useless. Omitting the other portions of the correspondence, the following letter from Major-general D'Aguilar, dated Hong-Kong, August 21, 1847, to Major-general Smelt, reveals sufficiently the incompetent arrangements for British ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... bloods, as the Mexican peons and Mongol-Slavs of a portion of the southeastern Europe, that, so far as recorded history is concerned, are either static or retrogressive. There are family units, poverty-stricken and incompetent, in Naples, Canton, East Side New York; or opulent and aggressive in West Side New York, in Birmingham, Westphalia, Pittsburgh, that are no more subject to the cultural and character-creating influences of education and environment—beyond a certain ...
— Towards the Great Peace • Ralph Adams Cram
... few lines from Berlioz. Schuberth, whom I commissioned before I left to send the dedication copy of the 'Faust' score to Berlioz, has again in his incompetent good nature forgotten it, and perhaps even from motives of economy has not had the dedication plate engraved at all! Forgive me, dear friend, if I trouble you once more with this affair, and beg you to put an execution on Schuberth in order to force a copy with the dedication ...
— Among the Great Masters of Music - Scenes in the Lives of Famous Musicians • Walter Rowlands
... life had Clover felt so small and incompetent and so very, very young as when the train with Car Forty-seven attached vanished from sight, and left her on the platform of the Denver station with her two companions. There they stood, Phil on one side tired ...
— Clover • Susan Coolidge
... with which varicosity occurs in the lower limbs of athletes and of those whose occupation involves repeated and violent muscular efforts. There is reason to believe, moreover, that a sudden strain may, by rupturing the valves and so rendering them incompetent, induce varicosity independently of any congenital defect. Prolonged standing or walking, by allowing gravity to act on the column of blood in the veins of the lower limbs, is also an important determining factor in ...
— Manual of Surgery - Volume First: General Surgery. Sixth Edition. • Alexis Thomson and Alexander Miles
... opposition, and one after consultation with the Belize Advisory Council-this council serves as an independent body to advise the governor general with respect to difficult decisions such as granting pardons, commutations, stays of execution, the removal of justices of appeal who appear to be incompetent, etc.) and the National Assembly (29 seats; members are elected by direct popular vote to serve five-year terms) elections: National Assembly-last held 30 June 1993 (next to be held no later than September 1998) election results: ...
— The 1998 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... Mediterranean to the Indus, was composed of various nations which enjoyed a semi-independence. Under incompetent rulers, she saw portion after portion of her dominions fall from her. Thus arose Pergamus, Pontus, ...
— History of Rome from the Earliest times down to 476 AD • Robert F. Pennell
... common profession of so many of his kind—that was only another offence in the eyes of politicians like Mr. Keir Hardie. When the class war came, he would naturally he found shooting down the workmen; but for any other war, an ignorant popinjay!—incompetent even at his own trade, and no match whatever for the ...
— The War on All Fronts: England's Effort - Letters to an American Friend • Mrs. Humphry Ward |
