"Procrastination" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... for, like many other men who spend their lives in obscure literary research, he had a secret ambition to appear in print, which was checked by cold fits of diffidence, fear of criticism, and habits of indolence and procrastination. "But," thought he, "I may, like a second Teucer, discharge my shafts from behind the shield of my ally; and, admit that he should not prove to be a first-rate poet, I am in no shape answerable for his deficiencies, and the good notes ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... affairs of the Diet were neglected, either through the procrastination of the Emperor, or through the fault of the Protestant Estates, who had determined to make no provision for the common wants of the Empire till their own grievances were removed. These grievances related principally to the misgovernment ...
— The History of the Thirty Years' War • Friedrich Schiller, Translated by Rev. A. J. W. Morrison, M.A.
... father all last night—I don't sleep very well just now. I thought of the old days, a lifetime ago; and I said to myself that I would write him a letter. So I will, to-day. And in a month or two I shall see him. I'm a walking-copybook-line; procrastination—nothing but putting off pleasures and duties these last years; I don't know how it is. But certainly I will go over to Hawes when I'm in Yorkshire. And I'll write today, tell him ...
— The Crown of Life • George Gissing
... impression had gone out that the enemy were on us, and how the panic might have been prevented if information of the state of affairs had been given. There was danger. The host coming against us had, with characteristic procrastination, put off the attack till the morning. To prevent their approach to the city, every man and gun that could be spared were sent out ...
— Life and Work in Benares and Kumaon, 1839-1877 • James Kennedy
... in the saloon?" The points of the big moustaches twitched ironically. "I promise you there'll be no procrastination as—at ...
— A Breath of Prairie and other stories • Will Lillibridge
... procrastination and delay, the Rangoon Commissariat Department, under an energetic new official, decided to embark a collection of sixty elephants, which had long been awaiting transport from the neighbourhood of Rangoon, to India. Now a large sailing-ship had been ...
— The Road to Mandalay - A Tale of Burma • B. M. Croker
... is the conservative hand shown at present in opposition to every proposition for confiscation or punishing the rebels. After having hurried us by their cowardice and Southern toad-eating into this war; after urging it by their contemptible procrastination to its present tremendous proportions, they cry out 'humanity!' for the men who have murdered our relatives, and shake the Constitution for protection over estates which have been directly used to contribute to Southern war! While every mail from the South gives fresh instances ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various
... gentleman prophesied truly; from that moment he had no peace till he withdrew all semblance of dissent, and even of procrastination. ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade
... immediate conference, but that as soon as possible he would have pleasure in selecting a "felicitous day'' on which they could hold a "pleasant interview'';[49] and when the envoys, worn out by the never-ending procrastination, finally gave up in disgust and announced their intention of returning home, the typical Chinese official blandly replied, as the notorious Yeh did to United States Minister Marshall in January, 1854,—"I avail myself of the occasion to present ...
— An Inevitable Awakening • ARTHUR JUDSON BROWN
... as to their being in the right, there could be no doubt, and nothing but a kind motive could have induced them to take this trouble; so I yielded with a good grace, and thanked the cabinet council for their timely warning, though fearing that, in this land of procrastination, it would be difficult to procure another dress for the ...
— Mexico and its Religion • Robert A. Wilson
... stumbled upon Wolston and Ernest, who, in the exuberance of their joy, had also come out to meet the hunters. They were, however, a little behind; but that was nothing new. These two members of the colony had become quite remarkable for procrastination and absence of mind. When Wolston the mechanician, and Ernest the philosopher, travelled in company, it was rare that some pebble or plant, or question in physics, did not induce them to deviate from their route or tarry on their way. One day they both started for Rockhouse ...
— Willis the Pilot • Paul Adrien
... client, makes use of every technical artifice to secure delay, by claiming that there are flaws in the indictment, or by moving for commissions to take testimony in distant points of the country. The opportunities for legal procrastination are so numerous that in a complicated case the defence may often delay matters for over a year. This may be an important factor ...
— Courts and Criminals • Arthur Train
... came in, and was saluted by Katharine, with very evident dismay, as "Aunt Celia!" She was dismayed because she guessed why Aunt Celia had come. It was certainly in order to discuss the case of Cyril and the woman who was not his wife, and owing to her procrastination Mrs. Hilbery was quite unprepared. Who could be more unprepared? Here she was, suggesting that all three of them should go on a jaunt to Blackfriars to inspect the site of Shakespeare's theater, for the weather was hardly settled ...
— Night and Day • Virginia Woolf
... which, if lost, leaves me not innocent of her blood, and if saved, as I hope it may be, my sinful neglect is not the less. What a picture in them of the vanity of all under the sun; and in me of the evil of procrastination, for I meant to visit her. O my Saviour, is this the return I make for the millions of pardons which thou hast passed on my account; sparing even the rod, and blessing me with health, restored limbs, and mercy on mercy, comfort on comfort? I ...
— The Power of Faith - Exemplified In The Life And Writings Of The Late Mrs. Isabella Graham. • Isabella Graham
... and general human tendency to procrastination is shown in the progressive weakening of the various words in this group. Immediately primarily signifies without the intervention of anything as a medium, hence without the intervention of any, even the briefest, interval or lapse of time. ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... occupation permanent. Actions, it is said, speak louder than words, and while the diplomats on both sides were still engaged in an apparent endeavour to settle matters amicably, the action of those on the Russian side was characterised by systematic procrastination and delay which admitted of but one interpretation, namely, that Russia had no intention to quit Manchuria until she was compelled to do ...
— Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun - A Story of the Russo-Japanese War • Harry Collingwood
... books of our youth, "Procrastination is the thief of time." Now, Brian found the truth of this. He had been in town almost a week, but he had not yet been to see Calton. Each morning—or something very near it—he set out, determined to go direct to Chancery Lane, ...
— The Mystery of a Hansom Cab • Fergus Hume
... allowed them to expatiate on the perils of procrastination in the treatment of rare old canvases and pigments, and then, having formulated my plans, blandly inquired what the cost would be. It appears that Herr Schwartzmuller had examined the frescoes no longer than six months before in the interests of a New York gentleman ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... promised overnight, they found reasons in the morning for breaking their promises. Nothing was done on the 1st of May, and Lord Cochrane, tired of their excuses for procrastination, paid a brief visit to the authorities at Poros. The result was, that he thought of going without the Greek leaders. "I have seen the Government," he wrote to Sir Richard Church on the 2nd, "and prepared them for the worst, should things go on as they have ...
— The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald, Vol. II • Thomas Lord Cochrane
... eyes beamed with pleasure. He enjoyed the procrastination as much as she did. "But the month's only just begun! However! Yes, you shall have your way. I won't ...
— The Lost Girl • D. H. Lawrence
... it may be asked, by those who carry the proper spirit of jealousy into their historical reading, was Cicero always right in these angry comments upon Pompey's strategies? Might it not be, that where Cicero saw nothing but groundless procrastination, in reality the obstacle lay in some overwhelming advantage of Caesar's? That, where his reports to Atticus read the signs of the time into the mere panic of a Pompey, some more impartial report would see nothing to wonder at but the overcharged ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... friend says: "As to detail, the whole transaction was like a flash to those who saw the miserable ending. I was impelled to write without delay, by the thought that it would be in time for the 'Freeman,' and that any procrastination on my part, might jeopard others of these suffering people, who are living, as was this poor girl, in fancied security. Our consternation was inexpressible; our sorrow and indignation deepen daily, as the thought returns of the awful announcement with which we were awakened: ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... haste may be a crime, Procrastination's worse; Now—now is the accepted time To eviscerate your purse! So buy what finds you find to-day— That is the safest plan; And if you find you cannot pay, ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... The procrastination of which I am speaking was however productive of one advantage. It put off the evil day. She did not suspect the calamities that awaited her, till the close of the year. She gained an additional three months of comparative happiness. But she purchased it at a very ...
— Memoirs of the Author of a Vindication of the Rights of Woman • William Godwin
... temporising. That was perfectly true, but the period of temporisation was nearly over, and by mid-October Turkey had something like 800,000 men under arms, and for nine weeks Enver Pasha had had his signed treaty with Germany in his pocket. Possibly this diplomatic procrastination was useful to us, for it enabled us to bring troops from India in security, and send others to Egypt. But without doubt it was useful to the Turks, for it enabled them to mobilise their armies, and to strengthen enormously the defences of the Dardanelles. Then came the day when Germany ...
— Crescent and Iron Cross • E. F. Benson
... upon to face. He looked at Barbara. She had closed her eyes and made absolutely no sign. For some reason of her own she had elected that he should determine this vital point without the slightest assistance from her. And it must be determined at once; procrastination was impossible. For a moment he hesitated. On the one side was Barbara, on the other his conscience. After long doubts he had come to a certain conclusion which he quite understood to be inconvenient ...
— The Yellow God - An Idol of Africa • H. Rider Haggard
... to him," said one of the party; "he has postponed it. Ask Sheridan for Monday at seven, and you will have him next week on Tuesday at eight. 'Procrastination is the thief of time,' to him more than, I suppose, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various
... Procrastination was not one of Bell Cameron's faults, and for full half an hour before her mother and Juno came home, the stolen letter had been lying in the mail box where Bell herself deposited it, together with a few hurriedly written lines, ...
— Family Pride - Or, Purified by Suffering • Mary J. Holmes
... and for the retention of the old French custom of surveying the land along the river front in deep narrow strips, rather than according to the chessboard pattern taken over by Canada from the United States. Red tape, indifference, procrastination, rather than any illwill, delayed the redress of the grievances of the half-breeds. In despair they called Louis Riel back from his exile in Montana. With his arrival the agitation acquired a new and dangerous force. Claiming to be the prophet of a new religion, ...
— The Canadian Dominion - A Chronicle of our Northern Neighbor • Oscar D. Skelton
... they are, these memories of rare books which we have found and failed to secure! Two prominent instances of our bookman's folly stand out with bitter clearness, ever fresh in his memory as a reminder of the criminal stupidity of procrastination. One was an exceedingly scarce work by Lawrence Humphrey, entitled 'Optimates sive De Nobilitate eiusque Antiqua Origine,' printed in small octavo at Basle in 1560, which he once saw in a catalogue for five shillings. ...
— The Book-Hunter at Home • P. B. M. Allan
... polite man but not to the point of procrastination. He advanced to meet the puzzled American, smiling amiably and twirling his imposing ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... they forgot the bottles of curious liquors, and left them behind. They traveled in many lands, and had many strange adventures. They were virtuous young men, and lost no opportunity that fell in their way to make their livelihood. Their motto was in these words, namely, "Procrastination is the thief of time." And so, whenever they did come upon a man who was alone, they said, Behold, this person hath the wherewithal—let us go through him. And they went through him. At the end of five years they had waxed tired of travel and adventure, and longed to revisit their ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... absent; but when he came to her and spoke, there was something in his voice and manner which she would not own, even to herself, as being a contradiction to her faith, and yet which chilled her and made her seek a refuge in the haven of the cowardly—procrastination. ...
— Colonial Born - A tale of the Queensland bush • G. Firth Scott
... her nostalgia for the great world. She spoke now and then of visiting Japan and America and South Africa, somewhat to her mother's consternation; but no irresistible force drove her thither. She found contentment in procrastination. ...
— Septimus • William J. Locke
... intended to travel the next day, and inform him of the impossibility of my taking the journey. This led me to reflect further. The remark of the bailiff was just: delay was prejudicial. What had happened could not be kept secret, secrecy was in itself vicious, and to increase evil by procrastination was cowardly. Thus far roused, I presently conceived and determined on my plan. I saw no probability of avoiding a prison: but, being in this house, I was resolved first to see my friends. I had already sold my horses, and discharged my servant. Clarke, I knew, would reproach ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... not realize the difficulties that beset even a sagacious-headed daughter of song and dance in the matter of literary composition, and the temptation to postpone from day to day the grappling with them, until the original impulse has spent itself through sheer procrastination. It is all very well to say that a letter is an easy thing to write, when letter-writing is a daily habit and you have writing materials and table all comfortably to hand. But when, like Elodie, you would ...
— The Mountebank • William J. Locke
... making the necessary arrangements for the docking of the Thetis he at once found himself confronted with that adamantine procrastination which constitutes such a serious flaw in the Spanish character; manana (to-morrow) is the word that is most often in the Spaniard's mouth, and his invincible determination never to do to-day what can possibly be postponed until the ...
— The Cruise of the Thetis - A Tale of the Cuban Insurrection • Harry Collingwood
... are attentive and punctual in all their dealings; and may be relied upon as steadily as the English. The Parisian workpeople and smaller shopkeepers are more like (and unlike) Americans than I could have supposed possible. To the American indifference and carelessness, they add a procrastination and want of the least heed about keeping a promise or being exact, which is certainly not surpassed in Naples. They have the American semi-sentimental independence too, and none of the American vigour or purpose. If they ever get free trade ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... listen, but never suppose that the truths must become embodied in actual life. They will wait until the chief becomes a Christian, and if he believes, then they refuse to follow,—as was the case among the Bakwains. Procrastination seems as powerful an instrument ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie
... cannot act of themselves. But in the Netherlands more than elsewhere the forms, if not the reality, of freedom were preserved, and the sovereign was not absolute. Moreover, he governed from a distance, and, in addition to his constitutional caution and procrastination, correspondence was ...
— Lectures on Modern history • Baron John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton
... Stirling by the hand of his prince. His brother, Earl James, appears neither to have possessed the abilities nor the ambition of his ancestors. He drew, indeed, against his prince, the formidable sword of Douglas, but with a timid and hesitating hand. Procrastination ruined his cause; and he was deserted, at Abercorn, by the knight of Cadyow, chief of the Hamiltons, and by his most active adherents, after they had ineffectually exhorted him to commit [Sidenote: 1453] his fate to the ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish border (3rd ed) (1 of 3) • Walter Scott
... had he with Lord Ostermore in the library ere he departed. His lordship it was who reopened again the question, to repeat much of what he had said in the arbor on the previous day, and Mr. Caryll replied with much the same arguments in favor of procrastination that he ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini
... is, God is. He that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God. God is love. Therefore love. Without distinction, without calculation, without procrastination, love. Lavish it upon the poor, where it is very easy; especially upon the rich, who often need it most; most of all upon our equals, where it is very difficult, and for whom perhaps we each do least of all. ...
— The World's Great Sermons, Volume 10 (of 10) • Various
... disregard of the Government at home and the just sentiments, if they could have been ascertained, of the whole body of the people of this country. And this must be so as long as you have a Government like that of Calcutta. Procrastination is its ...
— Speeches on Questions of Public Policy, Volume 1 • John Bright
... Lord John Russell brought forward his third Reform Bill, which, substantially like the first, passed its second reading January 17, 1832, by the increased majority of one hundred and sixty-two. When considered in committee the old game of obstruction and procrastination was played by the opposition; but in spite of it, the bill finally passed the House on the ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume X • John Lord
... the cases which have come to my attention in the past many years, the stammerer or stutterer has been afflicted with a malady more difficult to cure than stammering, viz.: The Habit of Procrastination. ...
— Stammering, Its Cause and Cure • Benjamin Nathaniel Bogue
... Cal Harris was at least possessed of self-confidence and that procrastination was certainly not to be numbered among his failings. It came to her that his interests, for the present, were identical with her own. As half-owner in the Three Bar it would be as much to his advantage as to her own to build it up. Waddles's warped legs prevented his acting as foreman ...
— The Settling of the Sage • Hal G. Evarts
... considered the matter for two days and had come to no conclusion. His manner of considering anything was peculiar. He loved procrastination and coloured future events with such beautiful radiancy that, when they actually came, the shock of finding them only drab was so terrible that he avoided them altogether. He was, however, saved from any ...
— The Wooden Horse • Hugh Walpole
... discovered, my wife re-entered the Catholic Church. Soon afterward I heard that her father had extended his forgiveness, and that she had been welcomed back by her kinfolk in Ireland. Hearing nothing from her whatever, with the procrastination which was ever one of my great faults, I put off doing anything about the annulment of the marriage until the father of Quantrelle le Rouge wrote me that he had heard of her death as well as that of the child. But before my marriage to Mademoiselle ...
— Katrine • Elinor Macartney Lane
... your." In a letter written a year earlier (Oct. 18, 1596), replying to the special envoy sent by the king, they said: "Since the former envoys left us we have used every means in our power, as we promised we should do, to gain time and procrastination from one day to another. But how could we impose on so clever an enemy so skilled in every kind of cunning and cheating if we did not use much dissimulation, and especially if we did not pretend we were anxious for peace? We will keep firm and unshaken the promises which we made to ...
— The Crime Against Europe - A Possible Outcome of the War of 1914 • Roger Casement
... sees the economic foundation of the new slavery in the United States, which rose in the second decade of the nineteenth century. Manifestly the fatal procrastination in dealing with slavery in the eighteenth century received in the nineteenth century its terrible reward. The change in the attitude toward slavery was manifest in various ways. The South no longer excused slavery, but began ...
— The Negro • W.E.B. Du Bois
... exclaimed Napoleon, proudly. "The electress of Wurtemberg is a daughter of George the Third of England, a daughter of my mortal enemy; hence, she shall bow to me or feel my power and my wrath. The time for hesitation and procrastination is over. I want to have my friends at my side and my enemies opposite me. Let the German princes choose whether they will go with France against Austria, their common despot, or whether, like Austria, they wished to be conquered by France! We ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach
... conscientiously convinced that, all things considered, it was the promptest and most feasible process of re-establishing civil government in the insurrectionary States. Mr. Lincoln was especially anxious that neither the ruling power nor the conquered rebels should be needless procrastination become accustomed to military government—a form of administration which he regarded as very tempting, but very sure to undermine, and in time to destroy, the real spirit of independence and self-government. It was his belief, as he expressed it himself, that ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... slightest service to them. The end of it was that they all became extremely good friends, and the captain in particular became quite jocular in reference to mistakes in general and stealing in particular, until Tipps, pulling out his watch, declared that procrastination was the thief of time, and that as he happened to have business to transact with the police superintendent in reference to the very accident which had caused them all so much trouble, he ...
— The Iron Horse • R.M. Ballantyne
... Death of Nedham Almolk Lines to a Lover Verses to My Daughters Serenade to My Sleeping Mistress The Inconsistent The Capture of Jerusalem To a Lady An Epigram On a Little Man with a Very Large Beard Lamiat Alajem To Youth On Love A Remonstrance with a Drunkard Verses On Procrastination The Early Death of ...
— Oriental Literature - The Literature of Arabia • Anonymous
... reserve. He and she had many chats and the subjects of these chats were almost invariably two—her father and Nelson Howard. How could she reconcile the one with and to the other? Mr. Bangs' council was, of course, to wait and hope, but a council of procrastination is, to say the most, ...
— Galusha the Magnificent • Joseph C. Lincoln
... became the poor man's foe, Mix'd ashes in his cup of sorrow; Nor thought the pauper's "lot of woe," Perchance might be their own to-morrow. The Tories said they were his friend, That they abhorr'd procrastination; So give—till next July shall end— Exchequer bills and ventilation. Oh! the artful Tories dear, Oh! the dear and artful Tories; They alone perceive, 'tis clear, Taxes ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... remarkable for precipitancy than Eldon for procrastination, Sir John Leach, Vice-Chancellor, was said to have done more mischief by excessive haste in a single term than Eldon in his whole life wrought through extreme caution. The holders of this opinion delighted to repeat the poor ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson
... she managed to stave off the evil day until lunch was half over; but procrastination was not nearly as wholesale a thief of time as they wished ...
— The Harmsworth Magazine, v. 1, 1898-1899, No. 2 • Various
... regency wished the new king to make a speedy choice between the two crowns; and it was anticipated that he would abdicate the Portuguese crown in favour of his seven-year-old daughter, Maria da Gloria. The absolutists on the other hand hoped that the king might by procrastination avoid the separation ...
— The Political History of England - Vol XI - From Addington's Administration to the close of William - IV.'s Reign (1801-1837) • George Brodrick
... way through their complaints, petitions, and grievances with decision and despatch, he all the time in good humour with the people and they delighted with him, though he often rated them roundly when they stood before him perverse in litigation, helpless in procrastination, detected in cunning or convicted of falsehood. They saw into his character almost as soon ...
— A Book of Sibyls - Miss Barbauld, Miss Edgeworth, Mrs Opie, Miss Austen • Anne Thackeray (Mrs. Richmond Ritchie)
... if it were true. If, in consequence of the Sultan's procrastination, we were to arrive too late and the whole of the provinces of Hamadan and Kermanshan were to be lost—even then we should all be in the hands of Allah. Come, let us go to prayer and ...
— Halil the Pedlar - A Tale of Old Stambul • Mr Jkai
... physical, intellectual, and moral peculiarities which afterwards distinguished the man were plainly discernible; great muscular strength accompanied by much awkwardness and many infirmities; great quickness of parts, with a morbid propensity to sloth and procrastination; a kind and generous heart, with a gloomy and irritable temper. He had inherited from his ancestors a scrofulous taint, which it was beyond the power of medicine to remove. His parents were weak enough to believe that the royal touch was a specific ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 3. (of 4) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... jealously guarded his own opinions from the least question or discussion, and at every step he antagonized the easy-going people among whom he had come to work. He had no patience with their habits of procrastination, and he was continually offending their lazy good-nature and their pride. He treated the rich planters, who owned the land between the mines and the harbor over which the freight railroad must run, with as little consideration as he showed the regiment of soldiers which the Government ...
— Soldiers of Fortune • Richard Harding Davis
... punishment and shrink in the endurance of it; but I shall be indebted for part of my torment to the vigour of my understanding, which teaches me that my punishment is just. Why should I procrastinate my doom and strive to render my burden more light? It is but just that it should crush me. Its procrastination is impossible. The stroke is already felt. Even now I drink of the cup of retribution. A change of being cannot aggravate my woe. Till consciousness itself be extinct, the worm that ...
— Edgar Huntley • Charles Brockden Brown
... Quincey's guest, having spent most precious moments which he feels ought never to cease, signifies the necessity of his taking his departure. To take leave of this strange man, however, is not so easy a matter as one might rashly suppose. There is a genius of procrastination about him. Was he ever known to make his appearance at any dinner in season, or indeed at any entertainment? Yes, he did once, at the recital of a Greek tragedy on the Edinburgh stage; but that happened through a trick played on him by an acquaintance, who, to secure some ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. September, 1863, No. LXXI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... eastern Asia should be encouraged to expand westwards into the rich but sparsely populated regions lying north of Mongolia, rather than that they should be seeking to expand across the Pacific Ocean. As it was, Japan received scanty encouragement, and only received it after procrastination had been ...
— Experiences of a Dug-out, 1914-1918 • Charles Edward Callwell
... integration drive. This change in policy was substantive, but the traditionalists who feared the sudden intrusion of the services into local community affairs and the reformers who later charged McNamara with procrastination missed the point. More than a declaration of racial principles, the directive was a guideline for the progressive application of a series of administrative pressures. Endorsing the Gesell Committee's concept of command responsibility, McNamara enjoined the local commander to ...
— Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 • Morris J. MacGregor Jr.
... us by tradition and custom as a legacy. They are sufficiently real to be of practical use, and they are used. It is by them that we set a time—alas, that we should have the necessity of doing it—to discard some vice, some sin, some weakness. We use them in the interest of procrastination—that we may put off the parting day with something our conscience, or our taste, or both, disapprove. By them we appoint a time when we shall say to the divine spark within our breasts, you may flame out into our daily life. ...
— Observations of a Retired Veteran • Henry C. Tinsley
... to the importunacy of ministers, saying with stately ease: "We will speak of that, gentlemen, some other day," and so calmly turning from the subject in dispute—not solving it, but at least imposing delay as the penalty which ministers must pay for a difference of opinion. That policy of quiet procrastination no minister of his time would have dared to withstand without first making for it a certain time-allowance. So much at least would have been secured, not of right, but through the weight ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman
... night. To this method I owe the greatest part of my reading: for, from twenty to forty, I should certainly have read very little, if I had not been up while my acquaintances were in bed. Know the true value of time; snatch, seize, and enjoy every moment of it. No idleness, no laziness, no procrastination; never put off till to-morrow what you can do today. That was the rule of the famous and unfortunate Pensionary De Witt; who, by strictly following it, found time, not only to do the whole business of the republic, but to pass his evenings at assemblies and suppers, as if ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... ambiguousness and hesitation, and that he should once for all fix his mind, there being nothing more injurious than leisurely deliberation when a man has need of prompt decision and action. I told Mr. Windebank further, that the King's procrastination was simply putting the sceptre into the hands of the Puritans, was ruining the State, his children, and himself, and that a really wise prince not only provides for the safety of his kingdom during his own life-time, but orders things in such ...
— Studies from Court and Cloister • J.M. Stone
... Often he was excessively irritable and exasperating in words and manner, but no longer violent from bestial excess. He put off the project of going to a curative institution, with the true opium inertia and procrastination, and all efforts to lead him to definite action proved fruitless. His presence, however, and his quiet, haughty ways, with Roger's frequent visits, did much for a time to restrain the ill-disposed people around them, but the inevitable contact with so ...
— Without a Home • E. P. Roe
... letter to this day, the Minister has found it convenient to continue the system of delay mentioned in it. I have not been able to obtain anything more than excuses for procrastination, and these excuses are uniformly want of health, ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. VIII • Various
... learn right at the outset not to play with the spoon before you take the medicine. Putting off an easy thing makes it hard, and putting off a hard one makes it impossible. Procrastination is the longest word in the language, but there's only one letter between its ends when they occupy their proper places in ...
— Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son • George Horace Lorimer
... an event beyond his power to evade. He loved her and had promised to wed her. He was a man who might be weak, but had never explicitly behaved in a manner to make her tremble for such a situation as the present. Procrastination ceased to be possible. What now had happened must demand instant recognition of her rights, and that given, she assured herself the future held no terrors. Now he must marry her, or contradict his own record as a gentleman and a ...
— The Spinners • Eden Phillpotts
... night upon the ground which it was intended that they should occupy in line of battle. No disposition which could be made that evening was delayed; every precaution was taken to guard against a further procrastination of the attack. The men laid down to sleep in the order in which they were to rush upon ...
— History of Morgan's Cavalry • Basil W. Duke
... contented myself with thinking over my complacent feelings, and breathing forth solitary gratulations and thanksgivings, which I did in many a sweet and many a wild place, during my late Tour. In this shape, procrastination became irresistible to me; at last I said, I will write at home from my own fire-side, when I shall be at ease and in comfort. I have now been more than a fortnight at home, but the uneasiness in my chest has made me beat off the time when the pen was to be taken up. I do not know from what cause ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... no doubt that Si Kira bestowed a great blessing on the Dayaks when he gave them rice; but I am very sure that he saddled them with a dire affliction when he introduced to them the omen-birds; more procrastination, failure of expeditions, and exasperation of soul can be laid to the score of these birds than to anything else on earth. There is hardly an undertaking, however slight, that can be begun without first consulting these wretched birds. Yet it is ...
— Folk-lore in Borneo - A Sketch • William Henry Furness
... two weeks' notice of my intention to give up my work, I hastened to arrange my affairs, fearing that procrastination might allow some event to change my mind and thus alter the whole course of my life. Two weeks after giving notice to my employer, I started for Tuskegee. I bought a ticket to Atlanta, where I spent the night. The next morning I went to the station and asked for a ticket to Tuskegee. ...
— Tuskegee & Its People: Their Ideals and Achievements • Various
... of his lost authority. Beating back the crowd with his cane, he cleared a space around the gate into which but one of the travellers could enter at a time, while he professed himself not only ready but determined to proceed with his duty, without further procrastination. Baptiste, the patron, who beheld the precious moments wasting, and who, in the delay, foresaw a loss of wind, which, to one of his pursuits, was loss of money, now earnestly pressed the travellers to comply with the necessary forms, ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper
... preventive measures, if taken, are in no true sense offensive but defensive. Decadent conditions, such as we observe in Turkey—and not in Turkey alone—cannot be indefinitely prolonged by opportunist counsels or timid procrastination. A time comes in human affairs, as in physical ailments, when heroic measures must be used to save the life of a patient or the welfare of a community; and if that time is allowed to pass, as many now think that it was at the time of the Crimean war, the last state is worse than the first,—an ...
— The Interest of America in Sea Power, Present and Future • A. T. Mahan
... new giants every year and making them more powerful every hour. Publicity is the sustaining food of a powerful store and the only strengthening nourishment for a weak one. The retailer who delays his entry into advertising must pay the penalty of his procrastination by facing more giant competitors as each month ...
— The Clock that Had no Hands - And Nineteen Other Essays About Advertising • Herbert Kaufman
... that had started from my brow were chasing each other over my cheeks, and trickling down upon my breast. So prolonged was the suspense, I began to fancy that the Arapaho was designedly dallying with his aim, for the purpose of sporting with my fears. He may have had such motive for procrastination. I could have believed it. Distant though he was, I could mark his fiendish smile, as he repeatedly dropped the piece from his shoulder, and then returned it to the level. That he meant more than mere menace, however, was proved in the end. Having ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... 'Enough of this endless procrastination. What is wanted is not reasons for the deed, but the deed itself.' What ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... most part, been thought out for several years, and various portions of it reduced to writing. Though we have long cherished the design of preparing it for the press, yet other engagements, conspiring with a spirit of procrastination, have hitherto induced us to defer the execution of this design. Nor should we have prosecuted it, as we have done, during a large portion of our last summer vacation, and the leisure moments of the first two months of the present session of the University, but for the solicitation ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various
... failed to diminish his joy in the very fact of living, even less did they affect his powers of work. His father had declared that 'procrastination was his besetting sin,' and Mozart was certainly given to putting off the evil day as far as possible; but no one knew better than Leopold Mozart himself how tireless was Mozart's industry, or how boundless his powers of coping with a gigantic task which he had set his mind to accomplish. ...
— Story-Lives of Great Musicians • Francis Jameson Rowbotham
... could do was to procrastinate, he thought of the old Italian proverb, "Gain time, and you will pull through," and he determined to profit by the wisdom of it. Even procrastination would not be without difficulty. But something might be done in that way,- -some time might be gained. And then there was always that never- failing resource and consolation of those who, in the words of Horace, limit their ambition to adapting themselves ...
— A Siren • Thomas Adolphus Trollope
... he was married on June 11, 1844. "I ought to name that happy day," he declares, "as the commencement of my better life." It was at about this date, also, that he began and finished, not without delay and procrastination, his first novel. Curiously enough, he affirms that he did not doubt his own intellectual sufficiency to write a readable novel: "What I did doubt was my own industry, and the chances of a market." Never, surely, was self-distrust more unfounded. As for the first novel, he ...
— Confessions and Criticisms • Julian Hawthorne
... Our firmness is by the continual contemplation of misery, hourly impaired; every submission to our fear enlarges its dominion; we not only waste that time in which the evil we dread might have been suffered and surmounted, but even where procrastination produces no absolute increase of our difficulties, make them less superable to ourselves by habitual terrours. When evils cannot be avoided, it is wise to contract the interval of expectation; to meet the mischiefs which will ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson
... field, and bear away the prize himself. Pensee's observations with regard to Agnes had cleared away most, if not all, of his difficulties in that particular quarter. No one had ever accused him of cowardice. Whenever he took refuge in procrastination or deceit, it was never because he was afraid, but in order that nothing might interfere with the purpose he had in hand. The growing miseries of the situation which he saw, already in part, served only to augment the violence of his resolve. His vanity forbade him ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes
... quantum of intellectual power bestowed on me by nature or education was in any way connected with this habit of my feelings; or that it needed any other parents or fosterers than constitutional indolence, aggravated into languor by ill-health; the accumulating embarrassments of procrastination; the mental cowardice, which is the inseparable companion of procrastination, and which makes us anxious to think and converse on any thing rather than on what concerns ourselves; in fine, all those close vexations, whether chargeable on my faults or my fortunes, ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... see no great harm in this resolution except the procrastination that will result from it, and that will give us nothing but what we ...
— History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States • Wiliam H. Barnes
... night; the Year Was passing, and the clock's slow tick Boomed its sad message to my ear And made me pretty sick. "You have been slack," I told myself, "and weak; You have done foolishly, from wilful choice; Sloth and procrastination—" Here my voice Broke in ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, January 7, 1914 • Various
... was a time when his indignation against Lord Kitchener was almost uncontrollable. For Mr. Asquith he never entertained this violent feeling, but gradually lost patience with him, and only decided that he must go when procrastination appeared ...
— The Mirrors of Downing Street - Some Political Reflections by a Gentleman with a Duster • Harold Begbie
... girl's days, the indifference, comes from no longer being compelled to do certain tasks. "Get work, get work: be sure 'tis better than what you work to get." Do not delay the task that must be done. Procrastination is worse than the thief of time: it is the robber of our own character, our own growth and happiness. We need to work continually to be strong, mentally, physically, or spiritually, even; and the longer we put off exercise, the less competent we are. I cannot believe that ...
— Hold Up Your Heads, Girls! • Annie H. Ryder
... or soldier of known zeal and efficiency, had scruples of conscience against signing, the authorities, both civil and military, appear in many places to have exercised a discretion and winked at disobedience or procrastination.—The case of the Earl of Bridgewater may here be of some interest, on its own account, and as illustrating what went on generally. The Earl, known to us so long as "the Earl of Milton's Comus" had been living in retirement as an invalid during ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... enjoined the strictest secrecy, that no advantage might be given to James Harlowe, and which he had answered for as well on Mr. Harlowe's part as his own) I acknowledged nakedly and fairly the whole truth—to wit, 'That we were not yet married. I gave him hints of the causes of procrastination. Some of them owing to unhappy misunderstandings: but chiefly to the Lady's desire of previous reconciliation with her friends; and to a delicacy ...
— Clarissa, Volume 5 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... you please, with a similar analogy, "Who would not prefer the amputation of an arm to the periling of life by doubt and procrastination!" But I know not if I am right, and let ...
— The Sorrows of Young Werther • J.W. von Goethe
... for all that you require, if you only do not throw it away, nor let some quick-fingered thief like Procrastination steal away your treasure of Time," replied Mr. Learning with a smile. "Think of the pleasure which it will give your mother if she find each of you, on her return six months hence, comfortably settled in a well-furnished house of your own! If any ...
— The Crown of Success • Charlotte Maria Tucker
... day. As Africans are interminable speakers, they make excellent lawyers, and know how to spin out a case or involve it in a labyrinth of figures of speech. Mungo Park, who frequently heard these special pleaders, says that in the forensic qualifications of procrastination and cavil, and the arts of confounding and perplexing a cause, they are not easily surpassed by the ablest pleaders in Europe. The following may serve as an example of their talent:—An ass had got loose and broken into a field of corn, much of which it destroyed. ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal Vol. XVII. No. 418. New Series. - January 3, 1852. • William and Robert Chambers
... Indulge in procrastination, and in time you will come to this, that because a thing ought to be done, therefore ...
— Many Thoughts of Many Minds - A Treasury of Quotations from the Literature of Every Land and Every Age • Various
... stoops for popularity by courting the prejudices and flattering the arrogance, rather than commanding the respect, of the rabble; which seeks safety in a multitude of counsellors, and distracts itself by a variety of contradictory schemes and opinions; which mistakes procrastination for weariness—hurry for decision—parsimony for economy—bustle for business, and vaporing for valor; which is violent in council, sanguine in expectation, precipitate in action, and feeble in execution; which undertakes enterprises without ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... 'tis madness to defer; Next day the fatal precedent will plead. Procrastination is the thief of time. At thirty, man suspects himself a fool; Knows it at forty, and reforms his plan; At fifty chides his infamous delay, Pushes his prudent purpose to resolve, In all the magnanimity of thought Resolves, and re-resolves; then dies ...
— Practical English Composition: Book II. - For the Second Year of the High School • Edwin L. Miller
... situation might never have arisen if Servia had held out a hand after the murder of the Archduke. Servia had, however, shown no sign of sympathy or help, though some weeks had already elapsed since the murder; a time limit, said his Excellency, was essential, owing to the procrastination on Servia's part. ...
— The Evidence in the Case • James M. Beck
... rendered indispensable to his safety. He appeared weak in intellect, when he was only so from circumstances. An overwrought anxiety to be just made him hesitate about the mode of overcoming the abuses, until its procrastination had destroyed the object of his wishes. He had courage sufficient, as well as decision, where others were not menaced and the danger was confined to himself; but, where his family or his people were involved, he was utterly unfit to give direction. The want of self-sufficiency in his own faculties ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 7 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe
... compulsory measures; indeed, he could not await the hour when the order would be given to proceed against the heretics with fire and sword. He lamented, in bitter terms, the fact that the Emperor had not made use of stern measures as soon as he arrived in Germany. For now, said he, procrastination and the conciliatory demeanor of the Evangelicals, especially of Melanchthon and Brueck, had made it impossible to rouse the Emperor to such a degree as the exigency of the case demanded. (Plitt, 63.) Luther wrote: "For that shameless gab and bloodthirsty sophist, Doctor Eck, one of ...
— Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church • Friedrich Bente
... battle might end the war. When McClellan, instead of rushing to the front, entered his second phase—the one which he did not understand himself, which his enemies never understood—when he entered upon his long course of procrastination, the Jacobins, startled, dumfounded, casting about for reasons, could find in their unanalytical vision, but one. When Jove did not strike, it must be because Jove did not wish to strike. McClellan was delaying for a purpose. Almost instantaneous was the whisper, followed quickly ...
— Lincoln • Nathaniel Wright Stephenson
... silence towards you has been occasioned (if I have properly analyzed what has lately passed in my mind) by different reasons. During the Summer there was indolence and procrastination; since the opening of parliament the necessity of finishing my book, and at the same time of subduing America. I have been involved in a multitude of public, private, and literary business, such as I had never experienced in the whole course of my life. ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various
... Anything was welcomed by Metternich that seemed likely to avert, or even to postpone, a struggle with Napoleon for life or death. Bluecher correctly judged the march through Switzerland to be mere procrastination. He was himself permitted to take the straight road into France, though his movements were retarded in order to keep pace with the cautious steps of Schwarzenberg. On the last day of the year 1813 ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... that I declined to see him,' replied the surgeon; 'but I warn you, that if you persist in this extraordinary procrastination, and the individual dies, a ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... nation favorable to their designs. The nobility and gentry were in general displeased with the preference which Somerset seemed to have given to the people; and as they ascribed all the insults to which they had been lately exposed to his procrastination, and to the countenance shown to the multitude, they apprehended a renewal of the same disorders from his present affectation of popularity. He had erected a court of requests in his own house for the relief ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. - From Henry VII. to Mary • David Hume
... longer delay. The United States ought to do something toward the fulfillment of that pledge and the performance of that duty. There must be something very peculiar in the condition of our country that will justify a longer delay; a longer procrastination in the performance of this solemn pledge, this public policy—our ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... is about him, but it is also about the evils of procrastination. In short, it is ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, May 21, 1919. • Various
... the Ruthenians is, we claim, a necessity of the hour; its possibilities are beyond realization. Procrastination in this matter is nothing short of treason and will prove a disaster to the Ruthenians, and to the Church. Turning to the Knights of Columbus in Canada and pointing to the feverish and unceasing activities of other agents among this our people I ...
— Catholic Problems in Western Canada • George Thomas Daly
... no will of Lord Thomond's as yet; so his poor nephew will by his procrastination be the loser of a considerable estate; for he certainly intended to have made him his heir, and the attorney had left with him a will to be filled up. But we are never sure of doing anything but what we have but one minute for doing; what we think we may do any day, we put off ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... relieved by Frederick. The King hastened to defend Silesia, for which Soltikoff's procrastination allowed him ample opportunity. Daun had, it is true, succeeded in forming a junction with Laudon at Liegnitz, but their camps were separate, and the two generals were on bad terms. Frederick advanced close in their vicinity. An attempt made by Laudon, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various
... making. Why waste time with ultimatums? he argued to himself. He had never done so. Experience had taught him that the way to win a battle was to beat the other fellow to the draw; hence this diplomatic procrastination filled him with impatience. It seemed almost treasonable to one of ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach
... who well understood the value of a separate command, instead of joining, sent various apologies which the pressure of the times compelled Fergus to admit as current, though not without the internal resolution of being revenged on him for his procrastination, time and place convenient. However, as he could not amend the matter, he issued orders to Donald to descend into the Low Country, drive the soldiers from Tully-Veolan, and, paying all respect to the mansion of the Baron, to take his abode somewhere near it, for ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott
... "The mair reason he suld tell his secret, to us without procrastination. Harkye, prophet of ill!" he continued, as he strode forward. "The judgment of Heaven ye predicated for us, seems to have fallen on your ainsell, and to have laid you low, even afore our arm could touch you. Ye have gude ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 1 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... by calculation, Tattiana's love was quite sincere, A love which knew no limitation, Even as the love of children dear. She did not think "procrastination Enhances love in estimation And thus secures the prey we seek. His vanity first let us pique With hope and then perplexity, Excruciate the heart and late With jealous fire resuscitate, Lest jaded ...
— Eugene Oneguine [Onegin] - A Romance of Russian Life in Verse • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin
... of all his friends, not by death, but estrangement. He tries to account for the enmity of the world to him, a harmless and humane man, who wishes well to all created things, and "of his wondering finds no end." He upbraids himself with indolence, procrastination, neglect of his worldly concerns, and all other bad habits,—and then, with incredible inconsistency, vaunts loudly of his successful efforts in the cause of Literature, Philosophy, Morality, and Religion. Above all, he weeps and wails over the malignity of Reviewers, ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... amused with anecdotes of paupers dying with money sewed up in their clothes: appearance and assumed habits are still the handmaids to confidence; and so long as this system exists, the warfare of debtor and creditor will be continued. Procrastination will be found to be another furtherance of the system, inasmuch as it is too evident throughout life that men are more apt to take pleasure "by the forelock," than to calculate its consequence. In this manner, men of irregular habits anticipate and forestal every hour ...
— Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 276 - Volume 10, No. 276, October 6, 1827 • Various
... England. Her father, pleased to find that anything could interest her, was in the habit of reminding her of this desire, and suggesting that she should gratify it. But there was ever an excuse for procrastination. When the hour of exertion came, she would say, with a faint smile, 'Not to-day, dearest papa;' and then, arranging her shawl, as if even in this soft clime she shivered, composed herself upon that sofa which now ...
— Henrietta Temple - A Love Story • Benjamin Disraeli
... created the impression that Richmond's delegation, at the last moment, proposed to slaughter Douglas[561] as it did at Charleston, and the latter's friends, maddened and disheartened over what they called "New York's dishonest and cowardly procrastination," would gladly have prevented an adjournment. But the Empire State held the key to the situation. Without it Douglas could get nothing and in a hopeless sort of way his backers granted ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... sensible of these great truths.... But allowing that there can be no certainty, but mere chances, in our favor, I do insist upon it that these chances render it our duty to adopt the measure, as, by procrastination, our ruin is inevitable. Should it now be determined to wait the result of a previous formal negotiation with France, a whole year must pass over our heads before we can be acquainted with the result. In the mean ...
— Patrick Henry • Moses Coit Tyler
... yet undetermined in 1886. None of the original claimants survive, but they have left heirs and legatees, executors and assignees, who have perennially presented their cases, and who are now indulging in high hopes of success. Government, after more than fourscore years of unjustifiable procrastination, is at last having the claims adjudicated, and in time the heirs of the long-suffering holders will ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... was thus restrained by dread of the effect the disclosure would have upon him if my suspicions were correct, those very suspicions formed the strongest reason for acquainting him with her duplicity; and, although I was always too ready to put off the evil day so long as doubt supplied excuse for procrastination, I could not have let so much time slip by and nothing said but for my absorption ...
— Wilfrid Cumbermede • George MacDonald
... both Parliament and Convocation. The delays in the divorce suit disheartened Catherine's adherents. The Pope, wrote Chapuys, would lose his authority little by little, unless the case were decided at once;[831] every one, he said, cried out "au murdre" on Clement for his procrastination on the divorce, and for the speed with which he granted Cranmer's bulls.[832] There was a general impression that "he would betray the Emperor," and "many think that there is a secret agreement between Henry and the Pope".[833] That idea was sedulously fostered by ...
— Henry VIII. • A. F. Pollard
... any other questions which thou wouldst ask?" inquired the Jinnee, with grim indulgence; "or wilt thou encounter thy doom without further procrastination?" ...
— The Brass Bottle • F. Anstey
... the Assembly while the debate went on. Lights were now brought in,—the tallow candles of our colonial forefathers,—and placed upon the table round which the members sat. By this time Sir Edmund's impatience at their procrastination had deepened into anger, and he demanded the charter in so decided tones that the reluctant governor gave orders that it should be produced. The box containing it was brought into the chamber and laid upon the table, ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 1 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... slept at length in the arms of him who was to poniard her. Many were the conflicts I underwent before I could bring myself to strike the blow. My heart had become sore by the recent conflicts it had undergone, and I dreaded lest, by procrastination, some other should become her executioner. When her repose had continued for some time, I separated myself gently from her, that I might not disturb her sleep, and seizing suddenly my poniard, plunged it into her bosom. A painful and concentrated murmur, but without any convulsive movement, ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving
... out!" commanded Maitland. "Quick, you fool! The police are below; your freedom depends on your haste." Anisty's hands flew to his pockets, emptying their contents on the floor. Maitland's eyes sought in vain the shape of the canvas bag. But time was too precious. Another moment's procrastination and—— ...
— The Brass Bowl • Louis Joseph Vance
... extraordinary and daring valour, and I really believe that he found a keen joy in danger. He was full of a scheme for a night attack upon a position which Gourko had taken up in a height which the Russians called St Nicholas Crag, and he got leave, after a good deal of characteristic procrastination, to go into the forts, and thence to take a sketch of the country he desired to travel in the night-time. I was very eager to see things closer at hand than I had been able to do till then, and it was arranged that I should accompany Campbell on this sketching ...
— Recollections • David Christie Murray
... these glories, but although the inventions be greate, the first and last I meane, yet when I survei your storehouse, I see they are the smallest things and such as in comparison of manie others are of smal or no value. Onlie let this remember you, that it is possible by to much procrastination to be prevented in the honor of some of your rarest inventions and speculations. Let your Countrie and frinds injoye the comforts they would have in the true and greate honor you would purchase your ...
— Thomas Hariot • Henry Stevens
... the meaning of the words timidity and procrastination. His plans were instantly laid. The time fixed for the conflagration was midnight. He gave orders that the hall in which the conspirators were assembled should be surrounded exactly at eleven. Soon after, thinking that the hour had come, he sought the place alone and boldly entered ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 8 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... This fatal procrastination was perhaps not without excuse, in view of the critical situation of the Austrian monarchy during 1848. For months after the fall of Metternich Austria was practically without a central government. Vienna itself, where on the 14th of March the establishment of a National ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 1 - "Austria, Lower" to "Bacon" • Various
... in 1778 by demanding of the Rajah, in addition to his settled tribute, a large contribution towards the war expenses. The sum was paid, but similar requisitions in the following years were met with procrastination or evasion, and a demand that the Rajah should furnish a contingent of cavalry was not complied with. This conduct on the part of Cheyt Sing appeared to the Governor-General and his Council "to require early punishment, and, as his wealth was great and the Company's exigencies ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madam D'Arblay Volume 2 • Madame D'Arblay
... supremacy of wealth with Barabas, the Jew of Malta. Shakespeare, with his wider mind, presented many other phases of this new type of tragic theme. Macbeth is destroyed by vaulting ambition that o'erleaps itself; Hamlet is ruined by irresoluteness and contemplative procrastination. If Othello were not overtrustful, if Lear were not decadent in senility, they would not be doomed to die in the conflict that confronts them. They fall self-ruined, self-destroyed. This second type of tragedy is less lofty and religious than the first; but it is more ...
— The Theory of the Theatre • Clayton Hamilton
... for that sum, Tazewell would only accept of three hundred dollars. I may also state that when he retired from the bar, he had several thousand dollars on his books which could have been collected on application to the parties, but, whether from inadvertence or procrastination, or mere indisposition, he let ...
— Discourse of the Life and Character of the Hon. Littleton Waller Tazewell • Hugh Blair Grigsby
... Llewellyn, pushed him, as it were, along the track of what he had to put up with, you would have come upon the further fact that as a woman of business Miss Howe had no parallel for procrastination. Next season was imminent in his arrangements, as Christmas numbers are imminent to publishers at midsummer, and here she was shying at a contract as if they had months for consideration. It wasn't, either, as if she complained of anything in the ...
— Hilda - A Story of Calcutta • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... with shame; he could not escape from Debendra's banter and taunts. He consented to allow Debendra to make the acquaintance of his wife. Then fear arose lest Surja Mukhi should be displeased. A year passed in evasion and procrastination; when, seeing that this could be carried on no longer, he made an excuse that his house was in need of repair, and sent Kunda Nandini to Nagendra's house. When the repairs of the house were completed, Kunda Nandini returned home. A few days after, Debendra, with some of his friends, called ...
— The Poison Tree - A Tale of Hindu Life in Bengal • Bankim Chandra Chatterjee
... and, breathing heavily, he cursed his procrastination heartily to himself, threw discretion to the winds and hurried down to the Boyden box just as Gresham returned. His greeting to the other occupants was but perfunctory, and then he turned to Gresham with: "You haven't sold your property adjoining ...
— Five Thousand an Hour - How Johnny Gamble Won the Heiress • George Randolph Chester
... that comes of lack of opportunity, and the procrastination that comes of timidity, the spring was fast passing into summer. Hilbrough had taken Millard into partnership in an enterprise of his own—the reorganization of a bankrupt railway company in the interest of the bondholders. It was necessary to secure the co-operation of certain English holders ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston
... 60,000 men, with money corresponding, and no end of brilliant outlooks;—must keep back his offers, however, if he find the people indisposed. Which he did, to an extreme degree; nothing but vague talk, procrastination, hesitation on the part of Bruhl. This wretched little Bruhl has twelve tailors always sewing for him, and three hundred and sixty-five suits of clothes: so many suits, all pictured in a Book; a valet enters every morning, proposes a suit, which, after deliberation, with perhaps amendments, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XV. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... to find me still guilty of procrastination, and to hear me describing French manners, instead of the mode in which I addressed a youth whom I have accused myself of having, in a certain sense, misled, and kept in suspense. I can only answer that my intentions have ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... to herself of marrying if she chose. She also wished to keep Mary dependent upon her as long as she could. Hence, while she would not absolutely refuse to comply with Mary's proposition, she would not really accede to it, but kept the whole matter in suspense by endless procrastination, difficulties, ...
— Mary Queen of Scots, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... exquisite agony of suspense. In short, the brides-elect were obdurate. They insisted on waiting, even to the end of time, for the realization of their fondest, dearest hopes. Several heartbroken gentlemen, preferring anything to procrastination, threatened ...
— Anderson Crow, Detective • George Barr McCutcheon
... confessed the guilt becomes less."[53] If it is asked what other moral virtues are especially inculcated besides truth and purity the answer is that the acts commonly cited as self-evidently sins are murder, theft, and abortion; incidentally, gluttony, anger, and procrastination.[54] ...
— The Religions of India - Handbooks On The History Of Religions, Volume 1, Edited By Morris Jastrow • Edward Washburn Hopkins
... on his right flank at Aeca. Their leader, however, pursued a course different from that of his predecessors. Quintus Fabius was a man advanced in years, of a deliberation and firmness, which to not a few seemed procrastination and obstinacy. Zealous in his reverence for the good old times, for the political omnipotence of the senate, and for the command of the burgomasters, he looked to a methodical prosecution of the war as ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... so suspiciously long on the Oxus, or wherever "the youngest" may have placed him in his "nascent state" after the latter "saw his brothers all depart towards the setting sun." We find reasons to believe that the chief motive for alleging such a procrastination is the necessity to bring the race closer to the Christian era. To show the "brother" inactive and unconcerned, "with nothing but himself to ponder on," lest his antiquity and "fables of empty idolatry," and perhaps his traditions ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various
... came, and they would start at noon. Noon came, and they would start at night. But nothing is eternal in this world; not even the procrastination of an American skipper; and ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... returned to the house and took a cold shower-bath and ate his breakfast. Then he felt more like himself. He had a strong desire to return to his study and the lost manuscript, but, with the wilful and pleasing procrastination of one who knows that satisfaction is within his grasp, he put the temptation aside for the present, and spent the day riding over his estates with his steward. He also gave his business affairs a minute attention which delighted his servant. After dinner he smoked a cigar, then went into ...
— What Dreams May Come • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... the consecration, not to say the disbursement, should be made immediately, while the idea that our possession are from God is fresh in our minds, and before selfishness shall seize them as her own. Procrastination is often but giving heed to her treacherous voice, and ere we are aware, she carries us captive. As we receive our increase from the hand of God, like faithful stewards, we should set apart the portion belonging to others without delay. To indulge ourselves by holding them up before ...
— The Faithful Steward - Or, Systematic Beneficence an Essential of Christian Character • Sereno D. Clark
... and earnest will, there was a habit of putting off till to-morrow what should be done to-day, of which he was himself fully sensible, and which he speaks of in one of his letters, as that "fatal habit of delay and procrastination, for which ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... here, and we acquired the habit of living in a little world by ourselves,—a world which, as you have seen, was transformed into a sort of fairy-land by her love of beautiful things. After I lost her, it was my intention to send the children immediately to France to be educated. But procrastination is my besetting sin; and the idea of parting with them was so painful, that I have deferred and deferred it. The suffering I experience on their account is a just punishment for the wrong I did their mother. When I think how ...
— A Romance of the Republic • Lydia Maria Francis Child |
