"Purpose" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... new interests were concerned. She had asked questions, inquiring the names of things and their uses until she knew them intimately. The ropes and stays, from a mass of complex, meaningless cordage, had resolved themselves into individual units, each of which had its use and its purpose; the compass was no longer a mystery, and, during a lull in the drizzle, when the sun had come out on the fifth day, Harriet was permitted to take an observation with the sextant, the instrument with which mariners take sights to determine their ...
— The Meadow-Brook Girls by the Sea - Or The Loss of The Lonesome Bar • Janet Aldridge
... consisted of coal for smelting purposes, was a very dangerous one; so much so that Messrs. Nicholas, of Sunderland, from whose mines the coal is procured, have great difficulty in chartering vessels to carry it, and are therefore in the habit of building and using their own ships for the purpose. At Buenos Ayres we were told that, of every three ships carrying this cargo round to Valparaiso or Callao, one catches fire, though the danger is frequently discovered in time to prevent much damage to the vessel or ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey
... something to say, though if we had not beaten the river I think I should never have had courage enough," he said. "When you found me lying in the snow, you took me in; you nursed me back to life, gave me a purpose, and set me on ...
— The Greater Power • Harold Bindloss
... that serve the purpose, Ben? The cure should better the disease—the children must ...
— Master Skylark • John Bennett
... the field, to which you have listened, explains to you the necessity for the organization of a Bureau of Woman's Work. It was organized in April, 1883, for the purpose, as ...
— The American Missionary — Volume 38, No. 01, January, 1884 • Various
... rubber boots carefully, we knelt in the two inches of water, placed our chests across two wooden shell boxes we had brought for the purpose, ducked our heads, and waited. After a few moments overhead came the peculiar swift whistle of wings. We waited, rigid. When that whistle sounded very loud indeed, we jerked ourselves upright and looked up. Immediately above us, already towering frantically, was a flock ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White
... with his pride and obstinacy. They were scarcely acknowledged even to himself. He thought he could trample the suggestions of nature under foot, and he succeeded in so far as to suffer in silence, and to make no sign of yielding, nor of admitting the possibility of foregoing his resentful purpose. ...
— Miss Grantley's Girls - And the Stories She Told Them • Thomas Archer
... theory, propounded towards the middle of the sixteenth century by Nicholas Copernicus (1473-1543), a Prussian astronomer, the earth was dethroned from its central position and considered merely as one of a number of planetary bodies which revolve around the sun. As it is not a part of our purpose to follow in detail the history of the science, it seems advisable to begin by stating in a broad fashion the conception of the universe as accepted ...
— Astronomy of To-day - A Popular Introduction in Non-Technical Language • Cecil G. Dolmage
... the appointment of Colonel Humphreys as the agent to Algiers alluded to. He was then diplomatic agent of the United States at Lisbon. He came home for the special purpose of making arrangements for his negotiation, and returned to Lisbon deputed to purchase a peace of the Barbary powers. From Lisbon, Humphreys proceeded to Paris to confer with Mr. Monroe, and to solicit the mediation of the French government, leaving discretionary powers with Mr. Donaldson, ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing
... and dusty, the baskets were taken to Johannesburg and carefully examined: the ore was found to contain a considerable quantity of gold. The mine was bought, and not one scrap of gold was ever found in it. Mr. X—— had provided himself with cigarettes made for the purpose, which contained gold dust in lieu of tobacco, and the ashes which he had dropped were in reality the precious metal, the presence of which was to persuade the unfortunate Frenchman that he was buying a property of considerable value. He paid for it something like ...
— Cecil Rhodes - Man and Empire-Maker • Princess Catherine Radziwill
... what people's thine, And who thy God, the same shall both be mine. Where thou shalt die, there will I die likewise, And I'll be buried where thy body lies. The Lord do so to me, and more, if I Do leave thee, or forsake thee till I die. And when she saw the purpose of her heart, She left off to desire her to depart. So they two travelled along together To Bethlehem, and when they were come thither, Behold! the people were surprised, and cried, What, is this Naomi? But she replied, Oh! call ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... leisure to complete the work without assistance. On his requisition, therefore, Colonel Charles Faulkner, who had been United States Minister to France before the war, was attached to his staff for the purpose of collecting the reports of the subordinate commanders, and combining them in the proper form. The rough drafts were carefully gone over by the general. Every sentence was weighed; and everything that might possibly convey a wrong impression was at once rejected; evidence was called to clear ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... amalgamator, is promoting this end. Chinese porcelain has long been sent to Japan for decoration, the resemblance between the styles of the two countries, due primarily to race, being thus increased. American biscuit is sent to England for the like purpose; and we read with more surprise that the unfinished ware of Dresden seeks ornamentation in the same country, whence it is returned to be placed upon the market as true Meissen. A firm of New Yorkers, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December 1878 • Various
... confirm under the broad seal their petition for leave to worship as they chose, but he let it be understood that they were not to be molested in their new homes in any way.[120] And in this promise they finally decided to put their trust, feeling that "if afterwards there should be a purpose or desire to wrong them, though they had a seale as broad as ye house flore, it would not serve ye turn; for ther would be means a new found to recall ...
— Virginia under the Stuarts 1607-1688 • Thomas J. Wertenbaker
... now; the children had gone in—over the way she could see a family at dinner. Pointlessly, ridiculously, they rose and walked about the table; seen thus, all that they did appeared incongruous—it was as though they were being jiggled carelessly and to no purpose by invisible ...
— The Beautiful and Damned • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... Considine to take you over to the Continent for a year or so; but we'll discuss all this in the evening. Now I must start on a canvass. Boyle expects to meet you at dinner to-day; he is coming from Athlone on purpose. Now, good-by!" ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... must know, dear Eliza, that this little cunt of yours is made for the express purpose of having a prick put into it; only, as mine is so large, and you are still so small and so young, I was afraid it would give you too much pain to do it sooner; but now, I think, I may get it in, if I ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous
... catastrophe, and all those poor creatures being killed—and it's most providential, of course, that—that—I was kept from going. But all that doesn't explain what share you had in it. You don't expect me to believe that you knew what was going to happen and kept me at home on purpose? The very idea is ridiculous. It was a coincidence, of course, though a most remarkable one, I must admit. A collision! Thank ...
— Austin and His Friends • Frederic H. Balfour
... which have ever since excited so much interest, and given rise to so much discussion as to their nature. The astronomer who has had the best opportunities for studying them is Mr. Percival Lowell, whose observatory at Flaggstaff, Arizona, is finely situated for the purpose, while he also has one of the best if not the largest of telescopes. There the canals are seen as fine dark lines; but, even then, they must be fifty miles in breadth, so that the word "canal" may be regarded as ...
— Side-lights on Astronomy and Kindred Fields of Popular Science • Simon Newcomb
... and never regarding anything as a trouble which could conduce to your pleasure. I confess I am surprised at my little niece Nell speaking in such a way of so good a man. If the Captain keeps you in suspense, depend upon it his purpose is to make you enjoy the treat he has in his mind ten times more than if you knew all about ...
— Bob Strong's Holidays - Adrift in the Channel • John Conroy Hutcheson
... heavenly means, if but in one solitary science—to lighten, if but in one solitary section, the condition of difficulty which had been designed for the strengthening and training of human faculties, is pro tanto to disturb—to cancel—to contradict a previous purpose of God, made known by silent indications from the beginning of the world. Wherefore did God give to man the powers for contending with scientific difficulties? Wherefore did he lay a secret train of continual occasions, that should rise, by intervals, ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... raised out of all proportion, for the purpose of giving a better idea of the scenes on board, than the limits of the sheet would otherwise have permitted. If the cabin on the deck of the Hudson River steamer were raised upon pillars about 15 or 20 feet high, it would convey a ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... should have thought that purpose quite negligible, seeing how valiantly the lady is already protected. But I have no objection," he added in an offhand tone, "as you seem to distrust the lasting power of bluff, to give you an extra safeguard. Indeed I think it just as well, all ...
— The Hunt Ball Mystery • Magnay, William
... emperor. He had promised his sister Constantia in marriage to that prince; but the celebration of the nuptials was deferred till after the conclusion of the war, and the interview of the two emperors at Milan, which was appointed for that purpose, appeared to cement the union of their families and interests. [78] In the midst of the public festivity they were suddenly obliged to take leave of each other. An inroad of the Franks summoned Constantine to the Rhime, and the hostile approach of the sovereign of Asia ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... I was very fond of dancing, and was invited privately to a negro shindy or dance, about twelve miles from home, and for this purpose I got Aunt Dinah to starch the collars for my two linen shirts, which were the first standing collars I had ever worn in my life; I had a good pair of trousers, and a jacket, but no necktie, nor no pocket handkerchief, so I stole aunt Dinah's checked apron, and tore ...
— Narrative of the Life of J.D. Green, a Runaway Slave, from Kentucky • Jacob D. Green
... at Shan Tung's frank confession of eavesdropping. A subtle significance began to attach itself more and more to the story his room was telling him. He knew that Shan Tung had left none of the marks of his presence out of bravado, but with a definite purpose. Keith's psychological mind was at all times acutely ready to seize upon possibilities, and just as his positiveness of Conniston's spiritual presence had inspired him to act his lie with Mary Josephine, so did the ...
— The River's End • James Oliver Curwood
... "For this purpose, we are temporarily abandoning some of the traditional trial procedures. We will call witnesses; statements of purported fact will be made under veridication as usual. We will also have a general discussion, in which all of you at these tables will be free to participate. ...
— Little Fuzzy • Henry Beam Piper
... to be much believed, And most pernicious purpose—seeming, seeming. I will proclaim thee, Angelo! look for't; Sign me a present pardon— Or, with an outstretch'd throat, I'll tell the world Aloud what man ...
— The Vale of Cedars • Grace Aguilar
... was very near my heart; few knew so well as I did all you suffered for and with her, for few have been over just the ground I have. But that is little to the purpose; what I was going to say is this,—'God never makes a mistake.' You know and feel it, I am sure, but when we are broken down with grief, we like to hear simple words, oft repeated. On this anniversary of my child's death, I feel drawn to you. It was a great blow to us because ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... well known that Yankees are born business men; everywhere that destiny takes them, from the glacial to the torrid zone, their instinct for business is usefully exercised. That is why simple visitors to Florida for the sole purpose of following the operations of the Gun Club allowed themselves to be involved in commercial operations as soon as they were installed in Tampa Town. The vessels freighted for the transport of the metal and the workmen had given unparalleled activity to the port. Soon other vessels of every ...
— The Moon-Voyage • Jules Verne
... sea: 12 nm in the north, 3 nm in the south; note - from the mouth of the Sarstoon River to Ranguana Cay, Belize's territorial sea is 3 nm; according to Belize's Maritime Areas Act, 1992, the purpose of this limitation is to provide a framework for the negotiation of a definitive agreement on territorial differences with Guatemala ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... and tales were well known to the past and even to the present generation. I revelled in them; they were the great enjoyment of my childhood and youth. Afterwards I grew rather less enthusiastic over his work. I did not care so much for the novels with a purpose which he had been writing of late as for his first, early works, which were so full of spontaneous poetry, and his latest publications I had not liked at all. Speaking generally, if I may venture to express my opinion on ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... . coward!" and Thelma's rich low voice caused Pierre to almost leap forward from the place where he stood concealed. "You,—you made me come here—you sent me that card—you dared to use the name of my betrothed husband, to gain your vile purpose! You have kept me locked in this room all these hours—and do you think you will not be punished? I will let the whole village know of your ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... with these matters, although I have made a vast number of observations, I shall not speak till I can more conveniently set them forth in a treatise apart, lest I should be held as wandering too wide of my present purpose, which is the use and motion of the heart, and be charged with speaking of things beside the question, and rather complicating and quitting than illustrating it. And now returning to my immediate subject, I go on with what yet ...
— The Harvard Classics Volume 38 - Scientific Papers (Physiology, Medicine, Surgery, Geology) • Various
... into a committee, for the purpose of considering the amount of supply to be granted. The King wanted fourteen hundred thousand pounds: but the ministers saw that it would be vain to ask for so large a sum. The Chancellor of the Exchequer ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... Its purpose is to acquaint parents with the most vital problems of child life and character and to suggest some methods of solving these problems. The work is not offered as a complete course in this great subject; it is intended rather to open up ...
— Parent and Child Vol. III., Child Study and Training • Mosiah Hall
... flower gardens and parks, and the forest of more than seven thousand acres is the finest in England. It is one of the royal preserves where the king occasionally goes hunting, but it really serves more the purpose of a great public park. There are many splendid drives through the forest open to everybody, the main one leading straight away from the castle gates for about four miles and terminating at an equestrian statue of George the Third, of ...
— British Highways And Byways From A Motor Car - Being A Record Of A Five Thousand Mile Tour In England, - Wales And Scotland • Thomas D. Murphy
... backgrounds of endless variation. To copy its lovely lines, to caress with a creative hand those curves of beauty instinct, as I then felt, with soul, became my one overmastering desire,—a desire which soon deepened into purpose. The boy of fifteen would attempt the impossible. I procured my clay and then awaited my opportunity. It came, as I have ...
— Dark Hollow • Anna Katharine Green
... lodging, and delivered it to a servant of mine, and went his way, so that I know not what he is. The effect of his letter is, that for because he taketh it to be the part of every good Christian man to further your godly purpose and Catholic doings, he hath thought good to advertise me that those fugitives of England say to their friends here that they have intelligence of great importance in England with some of the chiefest on the realm, which shall appear on ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude
... laughing; "just see what I've got to mend, and I came out here on purpose to get it done, so I could come over to your house. You see I oughtn't to be glad to see you at all, but I ...
— Gypsy Breynton • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... soon invested. The six pounder with which Greene had furnished Marion, was mounted on a battery raised in the quarter which he occupied, for the purpose of raking the northern face of the enemy's parapet. McPherson was in the possession of a wall-piece, but he had not been able to adapt it for use before the investment took place. It does not seem to have been even used during the siege. ...
— The Life of Francis Marion • William Gilmore Simms
... suggestion I cannot state until I have made a preamble. Like hundreds of thousands of others, I have worked in other fields, striving to organize the mass of mankind into movements for the purpose of ameliorating its own wretchedness and misery. Difficult as this is to accomplish, it is still more difficult to persuade the human into any organised effort to alleviate the ill conditions ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London
... beauty!" said the driver, his attention for a moment diverted from the question of right of way. His companion, a smallish man in striped trousers and fawn-colored overcoat, sprang lightly out of the trap, with the double purpose of clearing the road and amusing himself with Liz. The saucy smile with which she met him turned into a frown, however, as he began brutally kicking the knees of the oxen to make ...
— Earth's Enigmas - A Volume of Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... Then to exact our revenge for all we have endured at the hands of society by making it in some measure the slave to minister to our needs and our desires. I positively tremble, my brother, when I think of the little mischief one man can work; but with money and ingenuity, combined with devotion to purpose, we may succeed in accomplishing ...
— In the Roaring Fifties • Edward Dyson
... has recently sprung into being as a result of the introduction of Women Clerks into the Board of Trade and the National Health Insurance Service, the Federation of Civil Service Women Clerks having been formed for the purpose of working for the larger interests of the women in the various clerical departments of the Civil Service. The general policy of the Federation will be to afford a ready means of communication between various sections of the Service for the purpose of taking ...
— Women Workers in Seven Professions • Edith J. Morley
... himself alone with the dry, harsh old man, who looked at him with contempt from beneath his heavy overhanging eyelids, he stated that he was an honourable man who had become one of the disciples of Jesus of Nazareth with the sole purpose of exposing the impostor, and handing Him over to the ...
— The Crushed Flower and Other Stories • Leonid Andreyev
... aunt's kindness crossed me—the sum it was to her—the pleasure she had a right to expect that I—not the old impostor —should take in eating her cake—the cursed ingratitude by which, under the colour of a Christian virtue, I had frustrated her cherished purpose. I sobbed, wept, and took it to heart so grievously, that I think I never suffered the like—and I was right. It was a piece of unfeeling hypocrisy, and proved a lesson to me ever after. The cake has long been masticated, consigned to dunghill with the ashes ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Vol. 6) - Letters 1821-1842 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... He trembled all over with rage, and his friend expected to see an immediate outbreak; but, as if recollecting himself, he suddenly stammered out something about the necessity of changing his boots, and limped off accordingly for that purpose. He was not gone more than five minutes, but in that time had contrived not only to supply his pedal deficiency, but also to take a drink by way of calming himself; and after the drink he took a turn with Miss Friskin, and ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... the Prior; a lively, genteel man, of good address; who, with Pere Tendre, the Frenchman, shewed us an infinite quantity of jewels, vessels of gold and silver, garments, &c. which have been presented by Kings, Queens, and Emperors, to the convent, for the purpose of arraying this miraculous image. I begin to suspect that you will think I am become half a Catholic;—indeed, I begin to think so myself; and if ever I publicly renounce that faith which I now hold, it shall be done in a pilgrimage ...
— A Year's Journey through France and Part of Spain, 1777 - Volume 1 (of 2) • Philip Thicknesse
... Governor was undoubtedly intended in favor of the people—The necessity and importance of a legislative in being, and of its having the opportunity of exerting itself upon all proper occasions, must be obvious to a man of common discernment. Its grand object is the REDRESS OF GRIEVANCES: And for this purpose it is adjudg'd that parliaments ought to be held frequently—The people may be aggriev'd for the want of having a good law made, as well as repealing a bad one: So they may be, by the mal conduct of the executive in its manner of administring justice ...
— The Writings of Samuel Adams, volume II (1770 - 1773) - collected and edited by Harry Alonso Cushing • Samuel Adams
... there was a piece of black-and-gold lacquer; a set of painted panels; a Persian rug, swept by the tails of two haughty peacocks; some cloud-gray Chinese porcelains; a set of Du Barry vases; a crystal-and-enamel box, designed probably for some sacred purpose, but contributed by Pete as an excellent receptacle for chocolates at her bedside. "The Boy with the Sword" for the dining-room, Ver Meer's "Women at the Window," the small Bonnington, and then, since Mathilde wanted ...
— The Happiest Time of Their Lives • Alice Duer Miller
... world.[1] To him was offered the honor of forming from the clay, a model of the figure of him whose name, "John Christopher Frederick," had been written by his father in the Bible. The bust was cast in bronze, and part of the metal used for this purpose was the old church bell, whose tones had died away from the memory of those at home and elsewhere. The metal, glowing with heat, flowed into the mould, and formed the head and bust of the statue which was unveiled ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... could have known for what a purpose this description would serve when he wrote it," thought the young barrister, "surely his hand would have fallen paralyzed by horror, and powerless to shape one syllable of ...
— Lady Audley's Secret • Mary Elizabeth Braddon
... thine, for ever thine, Nor shall my purpose move; Thy hand hath loos'd my bonds of pain, And bound me with ...
— The Psalms of David - Imitated in the Language of The New Testament - And Applied to The Christian State and Worship • Isaac Watts
... had beheld and understood the purpose of the manoeuvre. He made straight for the head of the fallen tree, got on the stranger's tracks and cautiously followed them, keeping far enough behind to be ...
— Old Man Savarin and Other Stories • Edward William Thomson
... professional auspices is that the ghost won't charge you anything. Of course, if any lady or gentleman—especially lady—wishes to contribute to any charitable object, after a satisfactory interview with the ghost, a hat will be found at the hall-door for the purpose, and Mrs. Westangle will choose the object: I have put in a special plea for my own firm, at a season when the real-estate business is not at its best." By this time Bushwick had his audience laughing, perhaps the more easily because ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... this, we are trying to form a little colony out yonder, then we'll be able to hold our own against all the reeving Indians that ever strode a horse. Ah! boys, this Silver Land has a mighty future before it! We have just to settle down a bit and work with a will and a steady purpose, then we'll fear competition neither with Australia nor the ...
— Our Home in the Silver West - A Story of Struggle and Adventure • Gordon Stables
... the enemy's lines to communicate by telephone or signal. These observers have been found in haystacks, barns, and other buildings well in advance of the German lines. Balloons of the so-called sausage pattern remain up in the air for long periods for the purpose of discovering targets, and until our aviators made their influence felt by chasing all hostile aeroplanes on sight the latter were continually hovering over our troops in order to register their positions and to note where the headquarters, ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol 1, Issue 4, January 23, 1915 • Various
... I was told," she said. "But it was added that M. de La Tour d'Azyr had gone to the theatre expressly for the purpose of breaking finally with La Binet. Do you know ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... question yet presented to them, and the author has no doubt that with full information upon the subject they will find the proper solution of the railroad problem. The masses have an honest purpose and a keen sense of right and wrong. With them a question is not settled until it ...
— The Railroad Question - A historical and practical treatise on railroads, and - remedies for their abuses • William Larrabee
... unity and peace is wanting, there is much precious time spent to no purpose. How many days are spent, and how many fruitless journeys made to no profit, where the people are not in peace? how often have many redeemed time (even in seed-time and harvest) when they could scarce afford it, to go to church, and, by reason of their divisions, come ...
— An Exhortation to Peace and Unity • Attributed (incorrectly) to John Bunyan
... fixed upon the purpose of their journey; he thought of it day and night, and naturally interpreted his dreams with reference to it. One time, in his dream, he saw himself walking along a road beside which was a gigantic ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier
... hair was faded, and looked dry; her blue silk blouses and modest lace collars and high black shoes and sailor hats were as literal and uncharming as a schoolroom desk; but her eyes determined her appearance, revealed her as a personage and a force, indicated her faith in the goodness and purpose of everything. They were blue, and they were never still; they expressed amusement, pity, enthusiasm. If she had been seen in sleep, with the wrinkles beside her eyes stilled and the creased lids hiding the radiant irises, she would ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis
... execution was as easy as it was perfect; and Michael Angelo is reported to have said to Raphael, of the insignificant little personage Andrea then was: that he would bring the sweat to his (Raphael's) brow, if urged on in like manner by popes and kings. But he lacked strength and loftiness of purpose; and as Mr. Browning depicts him, is painfully conscious of these deficiencies. He feels that even an ill-drawn picture of Raphael's—and he has such a one before him—has qualities of strength and inspiration ...
— A Handbook to the Works of Browning (6th ed.) • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... can ever make pay in this world. Well, will you be so kind as to give me a little insight into the state of your affairs? A poor enough state they appear to be in, if this parson writes truly—only parsons are accustomed to draw the long bow, for the purpose of ferreting money out of people's pockets. Well, my dear, have you ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan
... I said, on purpose to vex Master Cockram, because he eyed us so heavily, and squinted to unluckily, "we have long been looking for you at our Plover's Barrows farm. You remember how you used to love hunting for eggs in the morning, and hiding up in the tallat with Lizzie, ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... makes a pretty episode of the battle. I haven't seen it—if it's possible to look on it: but I hear it is flexible, of a vulgar appearance in repose, Jove's lightning at one time, the thong of AEacus at another. Observe Dartrey marching off to the Station, for the purpose of laying his miraculous weapon across the shoulders of a son of Mars, who had offended. But we have his name, my dear Victor! His name, Simeon?—Worrell; a Major Worrell: his offence being probably, that he obtained military instruction in the Service, and left ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... I was endeavouring to save a drowning wretch, I have been, not accidentally, but premeditatedly, and of set purpose, drawn in after him.'—What say you ...
— Clarissa, Volume 7 • Samuel Richardson
... curtly rhymed (without any very great impressiveness) by Schiller. Browning has shown elsewhere that he can tell a simple anecdote simply, but he has here seized upon the tale of the glove, not for the purpose of telling over again what Leigh Hunt had so charmingly and sufficiently told, but in order to present the old story in a new light, to show how the lady might have been right and the knight wrong, in spite of King Francis's verdict and the look of things. The tale, which is very wittily told, and ...
— An Introduction to the Study of Browning • Arthur Symons
... Jentham,' thought Mr Cargrim, recalling Miss Whichello's nervous hesitation. 'I wonder what she knows about him. The man is a mystery, and is in Beorminster for no good purpose. Miss Whichello and the bishop both know that purpose, I'm certain. Well! well! two secrets are better than one, and if I gain a knowledge of them both, I may inhabit Heathcroft Rectory sooner ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume
... a great battle and not a massacre. With reference to the real reason for this fight I may say that the talk among the Indians was that they were going to compel us to stay on the reservation and take away from us our country. Our purpose was to move north and go as far north as possible away from the tribes. Our object was not to fight the Crows or any other tribe, but we learned that the soldiers were getting after us to try to compel us to go back on the reservation, ...
— The Vanishing Race • Dr. Joseph Kossuth Dixon
... present motley ministry could only command majorities of the narrowest kind; and sometimes during this session they were even left in a minority. Wearying and worrying debates, and all to little or no purpose, became the order of the day. Sheridan on one occasion, indeed, suggested that ministerial members, distributed in parties of twenty, should go home to rest in the midst of debate, and then come back to rest after they had slept and breakfasted. ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... should be two-fold—on the one hand the theoretical study of the action of Universal Law, and on the other the practical fitting of ourselves to make use of it; and if the present volume should assist any reader in this two-fold quest, it will have answered its purpose. ...
— The Dore Lectures on Mental Science • Thomas Troward
... were staying at the same hotel, and they walked back to it together. They had only just made each other's acquaintance, and were feeling the attraction which there is in a common object pursued by the most dissimilar means. They were both humanitarians, Mr. Price by choice and of set purpose, Mr. St. John of necessity—seeing that he was a good man, but unconsciously, the consequence being much confusion of mind on the subject, and a wide difference between his words and his deeds. He preached, for instance, the degrading doctrine that we ought to be miserable ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... why that is?" Guy answered, with an innocent smile. "I do it on purpose. Cyril writes sloping forward, the ordinary way, so I slope backward just to prevent confusion. And I form all my letters as unlike his as I can, though if I follow my own bent they turn out the same; his way is more natural to me, in fact, than the way I write myself. But I must do something to ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... moment deny that there may be, and occasionally is, a magnificent force of will and persistency of purpose in efforts at self-improvement on the part of perfectly irreligious men. But, if by the occasional success of such effort, a man conquers one form of evil, that does not deliver him from evil. You have the usurping dominion deep in your nature, and what does it matter in ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... Wise. The aims of the wise are in part defined in the remarkable preface to the book of Proverbs, which was intended primarily to describe the purpose of the collection of proverbs which embodies their teachings. Four distinct classes commanded their attention: (1) The ignorant, those who were unacquainted with the moral, religious, and practical heritage received from ...
— The Makers and Teachers of Judaism • Charles Foster Kent
... resistance or resentment. But the sneer of jocularity was not the worst. Steele, whose imprudence of generosity, or vanity of profusion, kept him always incurably necessitous, upon some pressing exigence, in an evil hour, borrowed a hundred pounds of his friend probably without much purpose of repayment; but Addison, who seems to have had other notions of a hundred pounds, grew impatient of delay, and reclaimed his loan by an execution. Steele felt with great sensibility the obduracy of his creditor, but with emotions of sorrow rather ...
— Lives of the Poets: Addison, Savage, and Swift • Samuel Johnson
... an outlying village. The circumstances of the bereavement were unusually distressing; and the survivor, new to the peasants and the country, sorely needed help, being alone with the remains. With some difficulty, but with the strong influence of a purpose at once gentle, disinterested, and determined, my friend—Mr. Kindheart—obtained access to the mourner, and undertook ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... very deep hold on his affections, for we find that in 1504 he gave up his Perugian establishment for the purpose of returning to Florence, and on arriving there took a lodging in the Pinti suburb. At Florence Perugino was justly esteemed as one of the great master-craftsmen of the city, and as such was invariably consulted—as in the great meeting held (January of 1491) to consider the new facade ...
— Perugino • Selwyn Brinton
... led the Volscians to Rome, encamps under its walls, and the Romans, in their peril and terror, send to him a deputation to move him from his vengeful purpose, the deputies,—the foremost citizens of Rome and the relations and former friends of Coriolanus,—having "declared their business in a very modest and humble manner," he is described by Plutarch as stern ...
— Essays AEsthetical • George Calvert
... eight months it raged, and when it ceased at length, Tenoctitlan, and with it many other beautiful and populous towns, were blackened ruins, the most of the Aztecs were dead by sword and famine, and their nation was crushed for ever. Of all the details of this war I do not purpose to write, for were I to do so, there would be no end to this book, and I have my own tale to tell. These, therefore, I leave to the maker of histories. Let it be enough to say that the plan of Cortes was to destroy all her vassal and allied cities and peoples before he grappled ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard
... abruptly stopped his reasoning, seeing that it was prompted by a defence of Mr. Mardale. He made his escape from his hosts as soon as he decently could and retired to his room. He sat down in his room and thought, and he thought to some purpose. He blew out his candle, and stole down the stairs into the hall. He had met no one. From the hall he went to the library-door and opened it—ever so gently. The room was quite dark. Sir Charles ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... that God did not wish him to remain at Jerusalem, he began to consider what he should do. The plan he approved and adopted was to enter upon a course of study in order to be better fitted to save souls. For this purpose he determined to go to Barcelona, and setting out from Venice ...
— The Autobiography of St. Ignatius • Saint Ignatius Loyola
... well-trained troops had failed, and the Army of the Loire had been repulsed at Orleans, Gambetta with his Provisional Government moved to Bordeaux. Thither came Thiers, returned from his roving embassy,—a mission of peace whose purpose had been defeated by the warlike ...
— France in the Nineteenth Century • Elizabeth Latimer
... is here, O man! Hath hope been smitten in its early dawn? Have clouds o'ercast thy purpose, truth, or plan? Have faith, and ...
— Voices for the Speechless • Abraham Firth
... thoughts on the subject—the child equally perplexed with the parent; and after an interval passed in conjecturing, all to no purpose, Halberger is about to turn and ride home again, when it occurs to him he had better find out in what direction the Indians ...
— Gaspar the Gaucho - A Story of the Gran Chaco • Mayne Reid
... did a hair trunk, or a pair of spurs, or last week's Miscellany, go astray—or even were his mistress's spectacles mislaid—Alec could put his hand upon each and every item in so short a space of time that the loser was convinced the old man had hidden them on purpose, to enjoy their refinding. Moorlands without old Alec would hive been a wheel without ...
— Kennedy Square • F. Hopkinson Smith
... back, seemed to his simple auditors born of knowledge. They at all events listened to him, which they had not done to the soldiers, and plied him with anxious queries, which he in turn referred to the mounted men and then translated their sulky answers. This was done to such good purpose that before long the wiser of the Palatines were agreed to return to their homes up the Valley, and the others had ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... by the shrouds as he looked up once more, to see that the Norseman was intent upon something in the distance, resting the large telescope he had taken up on the ring or rail of iron raised above the top of the cask, just at a convenient height for the purpose, and in perfect ignorance of the presence of visitors. Steve smiled as he climbed higher, and paused once more as he reached the stout cross-bars which they had placed that day when ...
— Steve Young • George Manville Fenn
... My purpose here is to speculate a little upon what the herb Moly can be, how it can be found and used. Hermes, the messenger of the Gods, is always ready to pull it up for anyone who really requires it. And just because ...
— Escape and Other Essays • Arthur Christopher Benson
... that he took a second look, saw that there was really no snake, and nothing to frighten him. "Hum! I believe you did that on purpose, just ...
— The Story of a Stuffed Elephant • Laura Lee Hope
... his conclave an altered man. "I have heard tidings,—no matter what," he cried,—"that have changed my purpose. On the 10th we are destined to the guillotine. I revoke my counsel for delay. Robespierre comes to the Convention to-morrow; THERE we must confront and crush him. From the Mountain shall frown against him the grim shade of Danton,—from the Plain shall rise, ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... were sky high. While treating our situation seriously he found in every phase of it some new sense of humor, whereas the professor looked on with grim purpose. Gates occupied rather a neutral ground, I think, perhaps alternately leaning one way and the other. But I was gripped by a single idea, a deep and growing love for this fugitive girl to whom I had never spoken, who I did not know, but had sworn ...
— Wings of the Wind • Credo Harris
... nearly twelve per cent. per annum. Their Vice-president (Mr. Breckenridge), their Finance Minister (Mr. Cobb), their Secretary of War (Mr. Floyd), their Secretary of the Interior (Mr. Thompson), are now in the traitor army. Even the President (Mr. Buchanan), with an evident purpose of aiding the South to dissolve the Union, had announced in his messages the absurd political paradox, that a State has no right to secede, but that the Government has no right to prevent its secession. It was a conspiracy of traitors, ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. IV. October, 1863, No. IV. - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... of 1881 guaranteed freedom of commerce; nevertheless, from 1882 onwards "the triumvirate who ruled the country," says Mr. FitzPatrick (The Transvaal from Within), "granted numbers of concessions, ostensibly for the purpose of opening up industries. The real reasons are generally considered to have been personal." In 1884, Article XIV. renewed the guarantee of freedom of commerce; the Volksraad itself one day passed a resolution condemning monopolies ...
— Boer Politics • Yves Guyot
... a Wood one day with an axe in his hand, and begged all the Trees to give him a small branch which he wanted for a particular purpose. The Trees were good-natured and gave him one of their branches. What did the Man do but fix it into the axe head, and soon set to work cutting down tree after tree. Then the Trees saw how foolish they had been in giving their enemy the ...
— Aesop's Fables • Aesop
... holy zeal inspires, He rakes hot embers, and renews the fires; His country gods and Vesta then adores With cakes and incense, and their aid implores. Next, for his friends and royal host he sent, Reveal'd his vision, and the gods' intent, With his own purpose. All, without delay, The will of Jove, and his desires obey. They list with women each degenerate name, Who dares not hazard life for future fame. These they cashier: the brave remaining few, Oars, banks, and cables, half consum'd, ...
— The Aeneid • Virgil
... be EXPLAINED the nature of colours, sounds, tastes, smells, and ALL OTHER IDEAS WE HAVE, if we had but faculties acute enough to perceive the severally modified extensions and motions of these minute bodies, which produce those several sensations in us. But my present purpose being only to inquire into the knowledge the mind has of things, by those ideas and appearances which God has fitted it to receive from them, and how the mind comes by that knowledge; rather than into their causes ...
— An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, Volume I. - MDCXC, Based on the 2nd Edition, Books I. and II. (of 4) • John Locke
... to tell all the points of interest grouped around that hill; for the present purpose, enough that its feet are planted in the veritable orthodox Hell of the moderns—the Hell of brimstone and fire—in the old nomenclature Gehenna; and that now, as in the days of Christ, its bluff face opposite the ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... away, soon. That was the sentence that gripped Flavia. Go, without seeing her, without pursuing the purpose he had shown her in the fountain arbor? It seemed so impossible that the thrill that shook her was not of fear, but of startled expectancy. Yet she answered Corrie with scarcely a pause, ...
— From the Car Behind • Eleanor M. Ingram
... what he had done at that corral. The corral seemed the center of a fight between Ward and the men. She dreamed that he came to her, and that she must hide him away and save him. But though she took him to Minervy's cave, which was secret enough for her purpose, yet she could not feel that he was safe, even there. There ...
— The Ranch at the Wolverine • B. M. Bower
... maintains that The Dream "has no autobiographical value.... A dream it was, as false as dreams usually are." The character of the poet, as well as the poem itself, suggests another criticism. Byron suffered or enjoyed vivid dreams, and, as poets will, shaped his dreams, consciously and of set purpose, to the furtherance of his art, but nothing concerning himself interested him or awoke the slumbering chord which was not based on actual fact. If the meeting on the "cape crowned with a peculiar diadem," and ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron
... parsley on purpose for Tousin Charlotte, only 'twas to be a secret," she confided to Esther as she was being put to bed that night, "to help her, like you said. She could have some to use, and I was going to sell most of it and give the money ...
— The Carroll Girls • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... walls of an ancient Tudor castle, now crumbling into the sea; and then across the narrow causeway that leads on to Portland. On our right rose the Chesil Bank, that mysterious mole of orange shingle, which the sea, for some strange purpose of its own, has piled up, century after century, for eighteen miles along the western coast. And then the grim front of Portland Island itself loomed out above us. The road ran up steeply among the bluffs, through line upon line of grey-slated houses; to the left, at the top ...
— The Thread of Gold • Arthur Christopher Benson
... I nor Mark Rivers can help those two people we love. Don't cry, Leila; or cry if it will help you. When you marry, be sure to ask, 'what are your politics, Jeremiah?'" His diversion answered his purpose. ...
— Westways • S. Weir Mitchell
... regained the equanimity which he had sat down on the fallen tree to recover—arose, and returned to his apartment in the palace for the double purpose of feeding and meditation. Being a robust man, he did not feel much the worse for the events of the morning, and attacked a rib of roast beef with gusto. Hearing, with great surprise, that his late antagonist was no other than Bladud, ...
— The Hot Swamp • R.M. Ballantyne
... strong right hand clasped her listless fingers and the warmth of his heart came bounding into her veins as if by magic. He did not speak to her, but she knew that he was claiming her then for all time; she knew that nothing could stand in the way of his purpose. The sobs grew less despairing, her understanding of things less vague and uncertain. A few moments before she had felt that she was no kin to the world; now there was a new appreciation of love and its greatness in ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon
... much more, or if we at all are hesitant about our possession of the light, and the certitudes and the joys that are in it, then good-bye to our missionary zeal. We shall soon begin to ask the question, 'To what purpose is this waste?'—though the lips that first asked it, by the bye, did not much recommend it—and shall consider that money and resources and precious lives are too precious to be thrown away thus. But if we rightly appreciate ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... included in a State of the Union Message, with which I am not dealing today. They are important to us and to our prosperity. But I am reserving them for treatment in separate communications because of my purpose today of speaking only about matters bearing directly upon ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... and distracted me; everything I saw made a fresh impression on me. Flies and tiny mosquitoes stick fast to the paper and disturb me. I blow at them to get rid of them—blow harder and harder; to no purpose, the little pests throw themselves on their backs, make themselves heavy, and fight against me until their slender legs bend. They are not to be moved from the spot; they find something to hook on to, set their heels against a comma or an unevenness in ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun
... identify it, just as his eyes seized and tried to understand the forms and faces of the swarming pavements. He felt his weakness as never before and it made him sullen and irritable. He acknowledged also the folly of thrusting himself into such a world, and had it not been for a certain tenacity of purpose which was beyond his will, he would have returned with his companions at the end of their ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland
... his purpose was to start there and then, and he called Ming Yen in, to come and pack up his books. Ming Yen walked in and put the books away. "Master," he went on to suggest, in an exultant manner, "there's no need for you ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... and tripped away to her window, while he threw himself down on the couch and took up a newspaper, more as a screen to his face, however, than for the purpose of reading; for he lay there closely watching his little daughter, as she sat in the rich glow of the sunset, with her sweet, grave little face bending ...
— Elsie Dinsmore • Martha Finley
... varieties. For when he was clumsy with the pole, Pedro only swore softly in Spanish, but when he brought up a worthless grass sponge, the big oar was lifted, and the boy might have been knocked overboard but for the iron claw which he held high, while a purpose gleamed in his eye which made Pedro peaceful. But Dick felt that Pedro was half right and he set to work studying sponges until he knew them almost as well as his teacher. His strength and skill with the sponge hook were less than the Spaniard's, ...
— Dick in the Everglades • A. W. Dimock
... understanding that it is not to be used by him for any purpose whatsoever and that we are taking a strictly neutral position on it, even inclining to the view that it does not necessarily indicate that Gibson and Cummings are in a conspiracy," the publisher replied. "I can ...
— Spring Street - A Story of Los Angeles • James H. Richardson
... to carry out a mere reckless and palpably useless feat for the purpose of show. His well-balanced genius of caution and accurate judgment was the guiding instinct in his terrific thrusts which mauled the enemy out of action at the Nile, St. Vincent, Copenhagen, and Trafalgar, and enthralled the ...
— Drake, Nelson and Napoleon • Walter Runciman
... the droll interest of it. "You ARE all indeed wonderful. I should awfully disappoint you. I do take my stand on my sufficiency. But I know, I confess," she went on, "strange people. I don't know how it happens; I don't do it on purpose; it seems to be my doom—as if I were always one of their habits: it's wonderful! I dare say moreover," she pursued with an interested gravity, "that I do, that we all do here, run too much to mere eye. But how can it be helped? We're all looking at each other—and in the light of Paris ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... required, not merely a nod and a smile, but as wholesome an action of the lungs withal, as a long-winded Parliamentary speech. Sometimes, passengers on foot, or horseback, plodded on a little way beside the cart, for the express purpose of having a chat; and then there was a great deal to be said, ...
— The Cricket on the Hearth • Charles Dickens
... purpose to render the highest service, to advance the welfare of men, is best reached by training men and women for leadership. The demand for educated and influential Christian leadership is greater than the supply. In 1890 there were about 15,000,000 ...
— Colleges in America • John Marshall Barker
... thus encounter the scoundrel on his own ground was not pleasant; but what else could be done? He decided, after some reflection, as he could not just then leave the place, to send the superintendent of the mill to Mr. Joslin for the purpose of investigating the account, and all the circumstances connected with the business. He prepared a strong letter to Joslin, in which he spoke with great severity of the course ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... finely-formed, handsome young man, of twenty years of age, and he had made an arrangement with a captain of a ship here to supply him with a certain number of hogs. Accordingly, accompanied by a party of his friends, he started into the interior for the purpose of collecting them. In making his selection, he not only proceeded to drive off some of his own, but actually laid claim to, and began marching away with, some belonging to his neighbours. The right owners remonstrated with him in vain. He, being an insolent, over-bearing young ...
— A Narrative of a Nine Months' Residence in New Zealand in 1827 • Augustus Earle
... carries Milkau from the Old World to the New is an ideal of human brotherhood, high purpose and dissatisfaction with the old, degenerate world. In the State of Espirito Santo, where the German colonists are dominant, he plans a simple life that shall drink inspiration in the youth of a new, virgin continent. He ...
— Brazilian Tales • Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis
... bouquet; and a hundred other nonsensicalities, among which the rudest and simplest are not the least effective. A resounding thump on the back with a harlequin's sword, or a rattling blow with a bladder half full of dried pease or corn, answers a very good purpose. There was a good deal of absurdity one day in a figure in a crinoline petticoat, riding on an ass and almost filling the Corso with the circumference of crinoline from side to side. Some figures are dressed in old-fashioned garbs, perhaps of the last century, or, even more ridiculous, of thirty ...
— Hawthorne and His Circle • Julian Hawthorne |
