"Break loose" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the fact that if the condition of the abode of spirits within the confines of Fairyland be still so (imperfect), how much the more so should be the nature of the affections which prevail in the dusty world; with the intent that from this time forth you should positively break loose from bondage, perceive and amend your former disposition, devote your attention to the works of Confucius and Mencius, and set your steady purpose upon the principles ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... Wildairs himself, while the tall stripling with them 'twas easy to give a name to, though she strode over the heather with her gun on her shoulder and as full a game-bag as if she had been a man—it being Mistress Clorinda, in corduroy and with her looped hair threatening to break loose and hanging in disorder about her glowing face. They were plainly in gay humour, though wearied, and talked and laughed ...
— His Grace of Osmonde • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... which rejected religion and law had a child born to them in the course of things, and determined that it should begin life free from the taint of superstition. It should not be christened, it should be named, in the Name of Reason. But they could not break loose from the idea of baptism. They poured a bottle of water on the shivering nape of the poor little neophyte, and its frail life went out in its first ...
— Castilian Days • John Hay
... festivities of the old Virginian gatherings, and crowns with its supreme merriment the pyramid of mirth. When it is danced properly,—to proper music, by the proper persons, and with proper ardor,—all the elements break loose. Mirth and music and bright eyes respectively shower, thunder and lighten. In the old days, it snowed too—for the powder fell in alabaster dust and foamy clouds, and crammed the ...
— The Youth of Jefferson - A Chronicle of College Scrapes at Williamsburg, in Virginia, A.D. 1764 • Anonymous
... joined the conference, crying: "O foolish men! What this babe says is true. He is the heart's heart of those white troops. For the sake of peace let them go both, for if he be taken, the regiment will break loose and gut the valley. Our villages are in the valley, and we shall not escape. That regiment are devils. They broke Khoda Yar's breast-bone with kicks when he tried to take the rifles; and if we touch this child they will fire and rape and ...
— The Short-story • William Patterson Atkinson
... however, they were still conscious in a vague way. Conscious enough, at all events, to go through a hell of agony when—second and last stage—every nerve in their bodies seemed of a sudden to be rasped with files, and every tiny particle of their flesh jerked and twitched as if to break loose ...
— The Raid on the Termites • Paul Ernst
... alone! I know where I'm going," snapped Hen, making a big effort to break loose from Dick's hold. The effort proved a disastrous one, for Hen tripped himself, slid along for a few feet and then sat down with a jarring bump on the ice. Dick Prescott all but shared ...
— The Grammar School Boys Snowbound - or, Dick & Co. at Winter Sports • H. Irving Hancock
... three streams of water, even if one was a small one, were beginning to tell. Gradually the flames amid the lumber on the barge began to die away. Once or twice it seemed as if the boat would break loose and go drifting down on the others, but grit told, and the boys ...
— The Young Firemen of Lakeville - or, Herbert Dare's Pluck • Frank V. Webster
... dwelling shall be of the riches of the earth and of the dew of heaven. You shall live by your sword and your descendants shall serve his descendants. But in time to come they shall break loose and shall shake off the yoke of your brother's ...
— The Wonder Book of Bible Stories • Compiled by Logan Marshall
... he cried. "Death the judge, the gaoler, the executioner! He has done justice on them for me, and they will not break loose from the house he has made for them to lie in and to sleep in for ever. And now, friend Death, I am master in their stead, and you must give me time to enjoy the mastership before you serve me likewise. Oh Vjera, the joy, ...
— A Cigarette-Maker's Romance • F. Marion Crawford
... was only human nature to dread a battle,—and I think it would be mere affectation to deny it, yet I also know that we common soldiers strongly felt that when fighting did break loose close at hand, or within the general scope of our operations, then we ought to be in it, with the others, and doing our part. That was what we were there for, and somehow a soldier didn't feel just right for fighting to be going on all round him, or in his vicinity, ...
— The Story of a Common Soldier of Army Life in the Civil War, 1861-1865 • Leander Stillwell
... jolly. I must break loose somewhere to-night. I can't wait till to-morrow. I was feeling splendid till Jane Foley went. Then the house began to get on my nerves, not to mention Susan Foley, with her supper at nine. Do all people in London fix their meals ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett
... the real elements in humanity; its true powers and natural characteristics; to see wherein we are hampered by the wrong ideas and inherited habits of earlier generations, and break loose from them—then we can safely and swiftly introduce a ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... criminal before this? Steel, and rock, and gutta percha, I think! Not mere flesh and blood and bone like other women's? Oh, why do I stay here? Why do I not go home? I have lost everything else; but I have still a home and country left! Oh, that I could break loose! Oh, that I could free myself! Oh, that I had the wings of a dove, for then I would fly away and be at rest!'" she exclaimed, breaking into the pathetic language of ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... than ten thousand, at several times, who mounted my body by the help of ladders. But a proclamation was soon issued, to forbid it upon pain of death. When the workmen found it was impossible for me to break loose they cut all the strings that bound me; whereupon I rose up, with as melancholy a disposition as ever I had in my life. But the noise and astonishment of the people, at seeing me rise and walk, are not to be expressed. The chains that held my ...
— The Children's Hour, v 5. Stories From Seven Old Favorites • Eva March Tappan
... with the priest, Job repaired one evening after sunset to the gloomy waters of the Youdic, dragging behind him a large black dog of the species most likely to excite distrust in the priestly mind. The priest showed considerable anxiety lest the animal should break loose. ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... measure green undulations, like motionless swells of the ocean; abundance of streams, followed through all their windings by lines of woods and scattered groves. But let him be as enthusiastic as he may, he will find enough to damp his ardor. His wagons will stick in the mud; his horses will break loose; harness will give way, and axle-trees prove unsound. His bed will be a soft one, consisting often of black mud, of the richest consistency. As for food, he must content himself with biscuit and salt provisions; for strange as it may seem, this tract of country produces very little game. As he advances, ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... when the whistle blows at night all you have is your little hall bedroom in a rooming house that smells of stale smoke and cabbage. There's no place to go except the streets—but you've just got to go somewhere, to break loose and have a little fun,—even though you're so tired you want to throw yourself on ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... volunteered. They had a slim chance, but some of them might break loose. They rode away, in the full open. The Indians could not fail ...
— Boys' Book of Frontier Fighters • Edwin L. Sabin
... that it was their own fault after all. You cannot imagine what a dreadful feeling it gives one to be climbing a slippery, rocky path, and know that a great heavy boy is pulling your horse backwards by the tail. Polly insisted that she heard her mule's tail break loose from its moorings, and on measuring it when she got back to camp she found it three ...
— A Summer in a Canyon: A California Story • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... this period, that from the middle of November to the beginning of March was the limit during which some success might be looked for. The temperature is more bearable then, storms are less frequent, the icebergs break loose from the mass, the ice wall has holes in it, and perpetual day reigns ...
— An Antarctic Mystery • Jules Verne
... year impends When, wearying of routine-resorts, The pleasure-hunter shall break loose, Ned, for our Pantheistic ports:— Marquesas and glenned isles that be Authentic Edens in a ...
— John Marr and Other Poems • Herman Melville
... from the path of truth, worse than nugatory. For what if Kitty should split?—so he elegantly expressed his fears—what if the girl, of whom he had heard nothing since the day of that deplorable scene, should break loose, and throw up the part which she had undertaken ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... have come to him the temptation to break loose from a people who deserved nothing of him, but cruelly entreated him, and who themselves were so manifestly doomed. Once at least ...
— Jeremiah • George Adam Smith
... Gjoll, which they sank very deep into the earth; afterwards, to make it still more secure, they fastened the end of the cord to a massive stone called Thviti, which they sank still deeper. The wolf made in vain the most violent efforts to break loose, and opening his tremendous jaws endeavoured to bite them. The gods seeing this, thrust a sword into his mouth, which pierced his under-jaw to the hilt, so that the point touched the palate. He then began to howl horribly, ...
— The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson; and the Younger Eddas of Snorre Sturleson • Saemund Sigfusson and Snorre Sturleson
... smoke and blowing it in spirals through his nostrils; "the old man won't tolerate anything more decent than a pipe, unless it happens to be a chew. Oh, I'm sick to death of the whole business," he burst out suddenly. "When I woke up this morning I had more than half a mind to break loose and go abroad to Maria. By the way, Wyndham's dead, you know; he died last fall ...
— The Deliverance; A Romance of the Virginia Tobacco Fields • Ellen Glasgow
... naturally much concerned about this, and a sharp divergence of opinion arose as to the means whereby the interests of Norwegian literature might be furthered, and the aims which it should have in view. One party urged that the literature should break loose from its traditional past, and aim at the cultivation of an exclusively national spirit. The other party declared such a course to be folly, contending that literature must be a product of gradual development rather than of set volition, and that, despite the shifting of the political kaleidoscope, ...
— Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson • William Morton Payne
... worth a cent, Fred, just grinned in his face, and kept on saying it was so, and we did find the boat adrift. Then, what d'ye think, he says that Bob Armstrong told him the paddle was all the while in the woodshed, so if the canoe did break loose, however in the world could it have been with the boat, 'less ...
— Fred Fenton on the Crew - or, The Young Oarsmen of Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... view of them, their astonishment was not diminished, on perceiving that the three horses were rearing and dancing over the ground, as if endeavouring to break loose from their fastenings! Each had been tied to a separate branch of the tree—their bridles being simply noosed over the twigs at the extremities of the branches; and allowing them to play to the full length of the rein. Consequently, the three horses were many yards apart from each other; ...
— Bruin - The Grand Bear Hunt • Mayne Reid
... and that's the whole of it. We gave three loud groans when we got the news in the bull-pen. And I cussed for ten minutes straight, without repeating myself once, when it so fell out that the members of the board rolled out our way the day the girl had to be sent for, and Jonesy couldn't break loose, and your Uncle was elected to take the buckboard and drive twenty miles to the railroad. I didn't mind the going out, but that twenty miles back with Jonesy's niece! Say, I foamed like a soda-water bottle when I got into the bull-pen and ...
— Red Saunders • Henry Wallace Phillips
... found an opportunity to break loose. I leaped and struck one of the men. But the others were too quickly on me. The kitchen table went over with ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, October, 1930 • Various
... if it was mighty good for the child, honey. You can't keep a boy tied to your apron-strings all the time. Archibald needs a father the same as other boys, and if he hasn't got one, he's either goin' to break loose or he's goin' to become a mollycoddle. You don't want to make a ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... that menagerie had to go and break loose, our Nora, she seems more set against my bear cub than ever. I saw she was goin' to make trouble first chance she got, and so I've been mighty careful to keep the cub from slippin' loose from his collar, like he used to. ...
— Chums of the Camp Fire • Lawrence J. Leslie
... They want us to succeed. If they dared they would rise in revolt to-morrow. They are doing all they can, without open resort to arms, to have us succeed. But they are a band of conspirators. They want us to succeed, because they want utterly to destroy the Federal Union. They want to break loose and form a Northwest Confederacy. They dare not tell their followers this, but it is what ...
— Raiding with Morgan • Byron A. Dunn
... Government of the Province, probably kept him from mingling freely among, or having much opportunity to meet, any leading men, outside of his Council and the party represented therein. Writing in the ensuing October, at the moment when he had made up his mind to break loose from those who had led him to the hasty appointment of the Special Court, there is significance in his language. "I have grieved to see that some, who should have done their Majesties, and the Province, better service, have ...
— Salem Witchcraft and Cotton Mather - A Reply • Charles W. Upham
... all you're a mind to, Giraffe," jeered Step-hen; "the rest of us want some sleep. Be sure and shoo him away if he does break loose, and try to wreck our cooking department. I'm going to hunt for a soft spot right now inside this tent. Don't anybody dare to wake me up before ...
— The Boy Scouts' First Camp Fire - or, Scouting with the Silver Fox Patrol • Herbert Carter
... most arduous and inspiring researches. Among the planets the widest variety in physical habitudes is seen to prevail, and each is recognised as a world apart, inviting inquiries which, to be effective, must necessarily be special and detailed. Even our own moon threatens to break loose from the trammels of calculation, and commits "errors" which sap the very foundations of the lunar theory, and suggest the formidable necessity for its complete revision. Nay, the steadfast earth has ...
— A Popular History of Astronomy During the Nineteenth Century - Fourth Edition • Agnes M. (Agnes Mary) Clerke
... the water hadn't yet decomposed. With a supreme effort, she had lifted her child above her head, and the poor little creature's arms were still twined around its mother's neck! The postures of the four seamen seemed ghastly to me, twisted from convulsive movements, as if making a last effort to break loose from the ropes that bound them to their ship. And the helmsman, standing alone, calmer, his face smooth and serious, his grizzled hair plastered to his brow, his hands clutching the wheel, seemed even yet to be guiding his wrecked ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne
... easy. The next man went out on a pop fly to third, which held Clink where he was. Following that came a safe hit which took the batter to first and allowed Clink to slide in with the first run. For the moment pandemonium seemed to break loose. The Roxley cohorts cheered wildly and sounded their horns and rattles. Brill, of course, had nothing ...
— The Rover Boys in Business • Arthur M. Winfield
... there any device, nor contrivance, for escaping these bitter torments. But now it is possible to escape them. Now, then, while it is possible, let us recover ourselves from our fall, let us not despair of restoration, if we break loose from our vices. Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners. "Oh, come, let us worship and bow down," let us weep before him. His word, calling us to repentance, lifts up its voice and cries aloud, "Come unto ...
— The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10) • Various
... happy! In Paris, of course, they are quite different—balloons have much too much flavour to be international—they are smaller and lighter in colour and gayer and more reckless—they always look as if they were out on a spree, just waiting to break loose from the long string by which they are tied, in a huge multi-coloured sunshade, to a stick. There is something very independent about French balloons—you feel you couldn't make a pet ...
— Balloons • Elizabeth Bibesco
... it were desirable, how impossible it is to escape from the past! we are ruled by the dead as truly in the fields of art as in the domain of morality and religion. The most radical innovator can no more break loose from tradition than a tree can run away from its roots. John Masefield takes us back to Chaucer; Vachel Lindsay is a reincarnation of the ancient minstrels; Edgar Lee Masters owes both the idea and the form of his masterpiece to Greek literature. ...
— The Advance of English Poetry in the Twentieth Century • William Lyon Phelps
... may be a big man in the East, but you're not big enough for the job you've tackled here. I've held my friends back as long as I can—longer than I thought I could—and when they break loose, this valley will be a little hell, perhaps a shambles. Men are going to be killed, and I have a feeling that you are going to be one of them. Against that time, once more, I warn you. Tell Jensen ...
— Hidden Gold • Wilder Anthony
... an effort to break loose, and as he did so a bobcat dropped from beneath his arm and fell, spitting and snarling, to the floor. Its fur was torn and matted, tufts were hanging loose, and the creature had a singularly disreputable and ferocious ...
— The Intriguers • Harold Bindloss
... was bound. They fixed a mighty chain to the fetter, and they passed the chain through a hole they bored through a great rock. The monstrous Wolf made terrible efforts to break loose, but the rock and the chain and the fetter held. Then seeing him secured, and to avenge the loss of Tyr's hand, the Gods took Tyr's sword and drove it to the hilt through his underjaw. Horribly the Wolf howled. Mightily the foam flowed down from ...
— The Children of Odin - The Book of Northern Myths • Padraic Colum
... telling you the truth. But that's no reason why you should break loose all at once. Please do as I tell you; go to the garden now and stop to dinner. I am not accustomed to ask a ...
— Demos • George Gissing
... a single instant, on the spot where he left her; but then all the feelings with which she had struggled during the whole of that painful conversation with her husband, seemed to break loose upon her at once, and over-power her. Her head grew giddy, a weary faintness seemed to come over her heart, and she ...
— The King's Highway • G. P. R. James
... useless," said Mr. Henderson. "We can only depend on the power of the ship herself. But do not be discouraged. We may escape. Come, Washington, start the engine again. By keeping it going constantly we can, perhaps, break loose from the grass. It ...
— Under the Ocean to the South Pole - The Strange Cruise of the Submarine Wonder • Roy Rockwood
... The bull continually bit his nose-rope through, and made several attempts to get away, the calf always going with him, leaving his mother: this made her frantic to get away too. The horses got frightened, and were snorting and jumping about, trying to break loose all night. The spot we were in was a hollow, between two high sandhills, and not a breath of air relieved us from the oppression of the atmosphere. Peter Nicholls and I were in a state of thirst and perspiration the whole ...
— Australia Twice Traversed, The Romance of Exploration • Ernest Giles
... the out-door life they led, had got into somewhat erratic ways. Miss Saville had done her best to teach the younger girls, as well as Tommy and Albert, but even they were apt to break loose and to rebel against her authority, as well as ...
— The Young Berringtons - The Boy Explorers • W.H.G. Kingston
... keyboard go flying, The change to the minor comes in like a groan. Without a cessation A chaste modulation Hastens adown to subdominant key, Where melody mellow-like Singing so 'cello-like Rises and falls in a wild ecstasy. Scarce is this finished When chords all diminished Break loose in a patter that comes down like rain, A pedal-point wonder Rivaling thunder. Now all is mad agitation again. Like laughter jolly Begins the finale; Again does the 'cello its tones seem to lend Diminuendo ad molto crescendo. Ah! Rubinstein only ...
— The Book of American Negro Poetry • Edited by James Weldon Johnson
... there was the sound of many feet running forward. The shooting and shouting redoubled in volume, and the restless animals tried to break loose. ...
— The Moving Picture Boys on the Coast • Victor Appleton
... horn, as some said, or a part of the tube of a trumpet, according to others, so as to kill him by the internal burning without making any outward mark of the fire on his person. Notwithstanding their efforts to stifle his cries, he struggled so desperately in his agony as partly to break loose from them, and thus made his shrieks ...
— Richard II - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... willed, by allowing it to be so, that the passions should unfold our reason, because he could see that present evil would produce future good. Could the helpless creature whom he called from nothing, break loose from his providence, and boldly learn to know good by practising evil without his permission? No. How could that energetic advocate for immortality argue so inconsistently? Had mankind remained for ever in the brutal state of nature, which ...
— A Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Title: Vindication of the Rights of Women • Mary Wollstonecraft [Godwin]
... his plans for handling the situation should the ladrones break loose upon the Gulf, and ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... befell me (fall from the horse) from which I soon wonderfully recovered, the Devil began to declare himself more openly mine enemy, to break loose and become outrageous. One night, when I least thought of it, something very monstrous and frightful presented itself. It seemed a kind face, which was seen by a glimmering blueish light. I don't know whether the flame itself composed ...
— The Autobiography of Madame Guyon • Jeanne Marie Bouvier de La Motte Guyon
... horse again, and went out in a hurry. Perhaps he thought that the horse would get impatient and break loose if he left it any longer, for he jumped into ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson
... strong craving to assert a greater manliness than the streets of cities would allow them to enjoy,—and all were moved by the same mainspring of action,—the overpowering spiritual demand within themselves which urged them to break loose from cowardly conventions and escape from Sham. He could not compete with younger men in taking up wild sport and "big game" hunting in far lands, in order to give free play to the natural savage temperament which lies untamed at the root of ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... the greater part of the warriors gathered there in the great square, "the king and I are about to confer together; therefore let no man move hand or foot, or utter a single word, for the air is full of terrible magic that only I can control; and if we are disturbed it may break loose, when—!" I concluded with an expressive gesture which was meant to convey all sorts of dreadful things; and I had the satisfaction of seeing Lomalindela's black skin turn a kind of slate colour, while his lips ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood
... could produce more wit and more valuable information than any man I ever heard talk. But he chewed hasheesh. He first took it out of curiosity to see whether the power said to be attached really existed. He took it. He got under the power of it. He tried to break loose. He put his hand in the cockatrice's den to see whether it would bite, and he found out to his own undoing. His friends gathered around and tried to save him, but he could not be saved. The father, a minister of the Gospel, prayed with him and counseled ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage
... the town folk catch him at any of his tricks, and Gawd help Hoover. A chap has no right comin' down and settin' up a business like that in a place like this full of nursemaids and children. People bring their innercent children down here to play on the sands, and any minit that place may break loose like a bum-shell. That's not marked down on the prospectices they publish with pictures done in blue and yaller, and lies about the air and water, and the salubriarity of the ...
— The Man Who Lost Himself • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... she was as nothing to Mrs Rufford. The Major would come in to lunch harassed and already spitting out oaths after an unsatisfactory morning's drilling of his stubborn men beneath a hot sun. And then Mrs Rufford would make some cutting remark and pandemonium would break loose. Once, when she had been about twelve, Nancy had tried to intervene between the pair of them. Her father had struck her full upon the forehead a blow so terrible that she had lain unconscious for three days. Nevertheless, Nancy seemed to prefer her father to her mother. She remembered rough kindnesses ...
— The Good Soldier • Ford Madox Ford
... since I took care that he was never left for one hour alone. No duenna could have clung to a Spanish princess more closely than I did to Leo. Yet I could see well that her passion was no whit abated; that it grew day by day, indeed, as the fire swells in the heart of a volcano, and that soon it must break loose and spread its ruin round. The omen of it was to be read in her words, her gestures, and her ...
— Ayesha - The Further History of She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed • H. Rider Haggard
... have to ring your telephone before the thread broke, say fourteen times. I should watch you from a convenient patch of woods. When you came home I would go to the nearest telephone and call your number. At the fourteenth ring, the clapper would break loose and strike a nail that discharges a blank cartridge that I had fastened with a small wooden block. The flare from the cartridge ignites the fuse I told you ...
— Death Points a Finger • Will Levinrew
... the true explanation; one that did not occur to the less experienced sealers. It is a danger, however, of no rare occurrence in the ice, and one that ever needs to be looked to. The bergs, when they first break loose from their native moorings, which is done by the agency of frosts, as well as by the action of the seasons in the warm months, are usually tabular, and of regular outlines; but this shape is soon lost by the action ...
— The Sea Lions - The Lost Sealers • James Fenimore Cooper
... grip on my collar, and I couldn't break loose, though I'll warrant his shins are tender yet, where I kicked him. He hauled me down to the fire, and he and three others who were there looked me over. The one that had caught me was a big mulatto—as ugly-looking a customer as I ever saw. And the others were no ...
— The Black Buccaneer • Stephen W. Meader
... campaigns, a most unusual thing for an Indian of that day. Being a man of means and influence, he was listened to with respect by the scattered white settlers in his vicinity. He would make a political speech through an interpreter, but would occasionally break loose in his broken English, and wind up with an invitation to drink in the following words: "Chentimen, you Pemicans (Republicans), come ...
— Indian Heroes and Great Chieftains • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... mad. It is true that if I cannot have the intellectual red that heralds the approach of Dawn, then I want the red light of Terror that ushers in the Night. My feelings have been clamouring for many years against my cowardly better judgment. I believe some day they will break loose and throw me, as from a catapult, even up against the stone wall of atrocity ...
— An Anarchist Woman • Hutchins Hapgood
... his moccasins. The missionary was something of an idealist, although he knew the weaknesses of human nature, but Thirlwell was practical. Somehow he had got entangled in the complications that sprang from Strange's supposititious discovery of the ore, but he did not want to break loose. Agatha Strange needed him; she had admitted that there was nobody else to whom she could look for help and advice. So far, he could find no clue to the web of mystery that surrounded the matter and had caught them both, ...
— The Lure of the North • Harold Bindloss
... it often break loose and go on a stampede that way?" asked Roy of the attendant who opened the door ...
— The Boy from the Ranch - Or Roy Bradner's City Experiences • Frank V. Webster
... fond and faithful creature as he is, from being the most docile and obedient of all animals, is made the most dangerous, if he become mad; so men acquire a frightful and not less monstrous power when they are in a state of moral insanity, and break loose from their social and religious obligations. Remember too how rapidly the plague of diseased opinions is communicated, and that if it once gain head, it is as difficult to be stopt as a ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 384, Saturday, August 8, 1829. • Various
... movements of the village repeated themselves like the play of a clock-work toy. Always the same figures on the same painted stand, marked with the same pattern of slanting roads and three-cornered grass-plots. Half-way through prayers the Morfe bus would break loose from High Row with a clatter, and the brakes would grind on the hill. An hour after tea-time it would come back with a mournful tapping and ...
— Mary Olivier: A Life • May Sinclair
... still for a moment, suddenly winded the lion and did what I feared they would do—began to 'skrek,' that is, to try and break loose from the trektow to which they were tied, to rush off madly into the wilderness. Lions know of this habit on the part of oxen, which are, I do believe, the most foolish animals under the sun, a sheep being a very Solomon compared to them; and it is by no means uncommon for a lion to get ...
— A Tale of Three Lions • H. Rider Haggard
... sorts. Anything may break loose if it's ill packed, and, as almost every sort of thing passes through the post, it would be difficult to describe 'em all. Here is a list, however, that may give you an idea of what kind of things the public sent through our mail-bags last year. A packet of pudding, ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne
... the bow toward Heaven 'stead o' Hell an' keep her p'inted straight an' it won't cost ye a penny. They's too much swearin' on this 'ere ship. Can't nobody be a Christian with his guts a-b'ilin'. His tongue'll break loose an' make his soul look like a waggin with a smashed wheel an' a bu'sted ex. A cook could do more good here ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller
... hardly more at rest when he left her and walked to his rooms. He carried the regret of a protector of England who had bungled his task and let the wards of his suspicion break loose. The fault was not his, but he would never escape the reproach. He had no taste for taking revenge on the young woman. It would not salve his pride to visit on her pretty head the thwarted punishments ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... is rather more dangerous than the great islands. It was not such ice as is usually found in bays or rivers and near shore; but such as breaks off from the islands, and may not improperly be called parings of the large pieces, or the rubbish or fragments which fall off when the great islands break loose from the ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 14 • Robert Kerr
... 'em, captain," he cried hoarsely. "By heaven, I warned 'em. 'Damn you,' I says, 'hell will break loose when the captain climbs aboard,' and it did, so help me. There was fifteen of 'em and now there's six, and the crew has 'em in the forecastle now, beating 'em, sir! And now, by ...
— The Unspeakable Gentleman • John P. Marquand
... of Springvale and that has injured reputation, brought lasting sorrow, even cost the life of many citizens. Sooner or later the man who does that meets his own crimes face to face, and their ugly powers break loose on him." ...
— The Price of the Prairie - A Story of Kansas • Margaret Hill McCarter
... lie down beyond them," Dias said. "There is no doubt the beasts will come from that side. If we posted ourselves behind them the mules might break loose and knock us over just as we ...
— The Treasure of the Incas • G. A. Henty
... If you want a bear, you should set your trap with the clog chained at one end, not around the middle: then it will trail through the woods and not break loose. But the best way is not to ...
— Days Off - And Other Digressions • Henry Van Dyke
... Dud Ardley upon whom we could doubtless depend. And Dr. Frank. Against us were Miko and his sister, and Coniston and Hahn. Of course, there were the members of the crew. But we were numerically the stronger when it came to true leadership. Unarmed and guarded now. But if we could break loose—recapture the ship.... ...
— Brigands of the Moon • Ray Cummings
... purpose and there was a little stream of peace flowing through his being—and also, mark, a stream of anger tumbling over rough places. He had read two letters addressed to Carmen by the man—Hugo Stolphe—who had left her to her fate; and there was a grim devouring thing in him which would break loose, if ever the man crossed his path. He would not go hunting him, but if he passed him or met him on the way—! Still he would go hunting—to find his Carmencita, his little Carmen, his Zoe whom he had ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... man gazed, the last stray was added to the milling, bleating bunch, and Chum was serenely trotting to and fro, driving back such of the sheep as sought to break loose from the huddle. Terrified and trembling, but mastered, the flock cowered motionless. The work ...
— His Dog • Albert Payson Terhune
... forms of the lower imagination, which are at first pursued by one who has freed himself from the power of the senses. He has got so far that his spirit acts freely, but is not initiated. He pursues illusions, from the power of which he must break loose. Odysseus has to accomplish the awful passage between Scylla and Charybdis. The Mystic, at the beginning of the path wavers between spirit and sensuousness. He cannot yet grasp the full value of spirit, yet sensuousness has already lost ...
— Christianity As A Mystical Fact - And The Mysteries of Antiquity • Rudolf Steiner
... as private souls that Ellis and Mitchell and Monier-Owen counted. Each by himself did good things; each, if he had the courage to break loose and go by himself, might do a great thing some day. Even George Wadham might do something if he could get away from Ellis and the rest. Edward ...
— The Tree of Heaven • May Sinclair
... must that is placed in the hands of a distinct and embodied class, who therefore bring to it the peculiar and hereditary prejudices of their order) has controlled his imagination to a reverence of former times, with an unjust contempt of his own. For no sooner does he break loose from this control, and begin to feel, as he contemplates the world for himself, how much there is surrounding him on all sides that gratifies his noblest desires, than there springs up in him an indignant sense of injustice, ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... embryonic dog, and had neither a skull nor a backbone. When he at last acquired these articles, he was for some time doubtful whether he was a bird or a fish. He had to compress untold centuries of development into nine months before he was human enough to break loose as an independent being. And even then he was still so incomplete that his parents might well have exclaimed 'Good Heavens! have you learnt nothing from our experience that you come into the world in this ridiculously elementary state? Why cant you talk and walk and paint ...
— Back to Methuselah • George Bernard Shaw
... reeled, but did not fall, and closed with Charnock, who could not get away because of the table. The latter felt his antagonist's strength, and there was no room for skill. When he tried to break loose his feet struck the upset bench, and the wall was close by. Breathing hard, they rocked to and fro in a furious grapple, striking when a hand could be loosed, and then fell apart, exhausted. Both were bleeding but determined, for deep-rooted dislike had ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss
... currently accepted terms are Classic and Romantic. So many shades of meaning have unfortunately been associated with the word Romantic that confusion of thought has arisen. It is also true that the so-called Romanticists, including poets and painters as well as musicians, in their endeavors to break loose from the formality of the Classic period, have indulged in many irritating idiosyncracies. We are beginning to see clearly that a too violent expression of individuality destroys a most vital factor in music—universality of ...
— Music: An Art and a Language • Walter Raymond Spalding
... and for an introductory address without a rival in Boston. Hillard was at heart as anti-slavery as Sumner, and his wife had even assisted fugitive slaves, but he was swathed in the bands of fashionable society, and he lacked the courage to break loose from them. He adhered to the Whigs and was relegated to private life. They parted without acrimony, and Sumner never failed to do his former friend a service ...
— Cambridge Sketches • Frank Preston Stearns
... one's skin; weather the storm &c (safe) 664; escape scot-free. elude &c, make off &c (avoid) 623; march off &c (go away) 293; give one the slip; slip through the hands, slip through the fingers; slip the collar, wriggle out of prison, break out, break loose, break loose from prison; break away, slip away, get away; find vent, find a hole to creep out of. disappear, vanish. Adj. escaping, escaped &c v.. stolen away, fled. Phr. the bird has ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... hung the old-fashioned oil-cloth sack on the handle of the brake behind, where Mr. Latham with keen anxiety, and Lydia with shame, watched it as it swayed back and forth with the motion of the car and threatened to break loose from its hand-straps and dash its bloated bulk to the ground. The old man called out to the conductor to be sure and stop in Scollay's Square, and the people, who had already stared uncomfortably at Lydia's bundles, all smiled. Her grandfather was going to repeat his direction as the ...
— The Lady of the Aroostook • W. D. Howells
... said gravely. "A tiger's cub, when tamed, is one of the prettiest of playthings, but when it once tastes blood it is as savage a beast as its mother was before it. Of course, I hope for the best, but if the Sepoys once break loose I would not answer for anything they might do. They have been pretty well spoilt, Major, till they have come to believe that it is they who conquered India and ...
— Rujub, the Juggler • G. A. Henty
... of war, Torpedo-boat No. 25. With her there, Lupin is welcome to break loose—if he wants to study the landscape at ...
— The Hollow Needle • Maurice Leblanc
... performance. Mr. Sponge, too, conscious that he was late, was more eager for his breakfast than anxious to be astonished; so, what with repressing the demands of the youngster, watching that the others did not break loose, and getting Jog and Mr. Sponge what they wanted, Mrs. Crowdey had her hands full. At last, having got them set a-going, she took a lump of sugar out of the basin, and showing it to the wonder, laid it beside her plate, whispering ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... the nursery was tremendous; the children, vaguely aware of the household demoralisation and excitement, took the opportunity to break loose on every occasion; and Kit-Ki, to her infinite boredom and disgust, was hunted from garret to cellar; and Drina, taking advantage, contrived to over-eat herself and sit up late, and was put to bed sick; and Eileen, ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers
... much music in the little house. Allison played the violin well; two or three others who played a little at stringed and wind instruments were discovered; and often the whole company would break loose into song until people on the street halted and walked back and forth in front of the house to listen to the wild, sweet harmonies ...
— Cloudy Jewel • Grace Livingston Hill
... had forgotten where they were. Now, again, the water seemed to break loose, so that both remembered their danger simultaneously and looked up. The mist parted for long enough to show them that where had only been the shepherd was now a crowd of men, with here and there a woman. ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... of the lions rose in sudden fury until the earth trembled to the hideous chorus. The horses shrilled their neighs of terror as they lay back upon their halter ropes in their mad endeavors to break loose. A trooper, braver than his fellows, leaped among the kicking, plunging, fear-maddened beasts in a futile attempt to quiet them. A lion, large, and fierce, and courageous, leaped almost to the boma, full in ...
— Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... fear the wolves will break loose and attack my Indians, which I would very much regret, for the Redmen are faithful fellows and we form a happy community. The Indians look upon me as Big Medicine because I can control these ...
— The Black Wolf Pack • Dan Beard
... won't need our services," Hartman remarked, putting down the paper he had been reading, when the train pulled into the central depot. "They wasted their time sending us here. Their plans have evidently prospered better than they expected. Hell will break loose any ...
— The Iron Heel • Jack London
... two I managed to appear at meals; for the human grub must eat till the butterfly is ready to break loose, and no one had time to come up two flights while it was possible for me to come down. Far be it from me to add another affliction or reproach to that enduring man, the steward; for, compared with his predecessor, he was a horn of plenty; but—I put it to ...
— Hospital Sketches • Louisa May Alcott
... and I will do your husband the justice to say that he understands his business. I had trouble to break loose." ...
— A Cousin's Conspiracy - A Boy's Struggle for an Inheritance • Horatio Alger
... puritans and mystics have labored to free us. Today the trend in conservative circles is back toward that bondage again. It is said that a horse after it has been led out of a burning building will sometimes by a strange obstinacy break loose from its rescuer and dash back into the building again to perish in the flame. By some such stubborn tendency toward error Fundamentalism in our day is moving back toward spiritual slavery. The observation of days and times is becoming more and more prominent among us. "Lent" ...
— The Pursuit of God • A. W. Tozer
... was happy when little Mike was tied in his chair, and a bar put in the doorway to keep him from crawling into the attractive water, if he should break loose; and when the door was bolted on the railroad side, he was allowed to gaze through the window at the engines smoking and thundering by all day, and fixing each blazing red eye on him at night—an entrancing spectacle to the child. And when the still younger Pat was tucked ...
— Connor Magan's Luck and Other Stories • M. T. W.
... must needs be when we are in the false position: we can have no glory though martyred. The youth felt it, even to the seeing of why it was; and he resolved, in justice to the dear girl, that he would break loose from his fetters, as we call our weakness. Behold, Rose met him descending the stairs, and, taking his hand, sang, unabashed, by the tell-tale colour coming over her face, a stave of a little Portuguese air that they had both been fond of in Portugal; and he, listening to it, ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... nature, but bearing about with him all his bravery and endurance, all his dash and spirit of adventure, all his fortitude and resolution to struggle against a certainty of doom which, sooner or later, must overtake him on that dread day, the 'twilight of the gods', when the wolf was to break loose, when the great snake that lay coiled round the world should lash himself into wrath, and the whole race of the Aesirs and their antagonists were to perish in ...
— Popular Tales from the Norse • Sir George Webbe Dasent
... loving, though the latter impulse in her I had always coldly checked. For though I could bear a great deal, any outburst of sham sentiment on her part sickened and filled me with such utter loathing that often when she was more than usually tender I dreaded lest my pent-up wrath should break loose and impel me to kill her swiftly and suddenly as one crushes the head of a poisonous adder—an all-too-merciful death for such as she. I preferred to woo her by gifts alone—and her hands were always ready to take whatever I or others chose to offer her. From a rare jewel ...
— Vendetta - A Story of One Forgotten • Marie Corelli
... Phoebe. "Oh, won't it be grand to stand still a minute after all this traipsin' around and around! Mr. Droop," she continued, "do you hear? You'd better be gettin' ready to take hold an' stop the Panchronicon, 'cause we're goin' to break loose ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... roaring blaze, and was preparing a meal, while the hungry dogs, smelling it, tried in vain to break loose and reach ...
— The Young Treasure Hunter - or, Fred Stanley's Trip to Alaska • Frank V. Webster
... for some time contemplating the possibility of retiring altogether from business. I had got enough of the world's goods, and was willing to make way for younger men. But I found it difficult to break loose from old associations. Like the retired tallow-chandler, I might wish to go back "on melting days." I had some correspondence with my old friend David Roberts, Royal Academician, on the subject. He wrote to me on the ...
— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth
... slowness of operation was a serious fault. Also, it was found that the brakes on coaches near the engine went on long before those more distant, so that during a quick stop there was a danger of the forward coaches being bumped by those behind. It goes without saying that any coaches which might break loose were uncontrollable. Mr. Westinghouse therefore patented his automatic brake, now so largely used all over the world. The brake ensures practically instantaneous and simultaneous action on all the vehicles of a train ...
— How it Works • Archibald Williams
... men singing in chorus. All was jollity and merriment there. But higher and higher arose the white cloud with the black spot in it. I cried out as loud as I could, but nobody heard me. I was too far away from them. The wind would soon break loose, the ice give away, and all upon it sink, without any chance of rescue. Hear me they could not, and for me to go to them was impossible. Was there nothing that I could do to bring them back to land? Then our ...
— The Sand-Hills of Jutland • Hans Christian Andersen |
