"Incapacitate" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Mademoiselle de Villefort has been a faithful companion to M. Noirtier, which she cannot be when she becomes the Baroness d'Epinay. My father's melancholy state prevents our speaking to him on any subjects, which the weakness of his mind would incapacitate him from understanding, and I am perfectly convinced that at the present time, although, he knows that his granddaughter is going to be married, M. Noirtier has even forgotten the name of his intended ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... did the people of Upper Canada begin to show an appreciation of his talents, than the Upper Canadian oligarchy saw in him a formidable rival to be got rid of by any means. A special Act was passed to incapacitate Mr. Bidwell from holding a seat in the Assembly. He was to be considered an alien and to be treated as an alien as the Act directed. Mr. Barnabas Bidwell was expelled. The spirit of opposition to a bad government was not, however, lessened by such a course of action. New champions ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger
... about $50,000 "in cash, lands, etc." (a pretty good sum for the refugee from Ohio to amass so soon), but got little practical assistance from them, "for sometimes they were afraid to act on account of the mob, and sometimes they were so drunk as to incapacitate them for business." In one of his letters to the church he thus speaks of some of his recent allies," This poor man [W. W. Phelps] who professes to be much of a prophet, has no other dumb ass to ride but David Whitmer, ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... possible that she might have occasion at some time to make use of. This Locusta she now determined to consult. She accordingly went to her, and asked her if she did not know of any poison which would immediately take effect upon the brain and mind, so as to incapacitate the patient at once from all mental action, while yet it should be gradual and slow in its operations on the vital functions of the body. Locusta answered in the affirmative. Such characters were always prepared to furnish any species of medicaments that ...
— Nero - Makers of History Series • Jacob Abbott
... in the previous year, Ballantyne had been disabled from attending to business by his wife's illness (which ended in her death), Scott had written in his diary, "It is his (Ballantyne's) nature to indulge apprehensions of the worst which incapacitate him for labour. I cannot help regarding this amiable weakness of the mind with something too nearly allied to contempt," and assuredly he was guilty of no such weakness himself. Not only did he row much harder against the stream of fortune than he had ever ...
— Sir Walter Scott - (English Men of Letters Series) • Richard H. Hutton
... years of my life were spent in the East, and my experience there only confirms me the more. I have known many drunkards among literary men, and the stimulants they took never helped their work; and it was only because they were men of exceptionally strong brain that their excesses did not incapacitate them. There are many excesses of this kind that are equally misunderstood by those who indulge in them, and by temperance writers. There are, in fact, many men of enormous power, who can smoke and drink ...
— Study and Stimulants • A. Arthur Reade
... they were powerless to relieve, can imagine the anguish that Mrs. Boardman endured in seeing her husband so near his end in that miserable place, destitute of the little comforts so needful in sickness. But with heroic determination she repressed her own sorrow, lest it might incapacitate her for assisting him while rallying his expiring energies for one more effort in his Master's cause. The poor worn body, though, was found unequal to the task assigned it by the zealous spirit, and he was forced to admit that ...
— Woman: Man's Equal • Thomas Webster
... than play the savage antic just suggested; because, a moment's reflection would show him that to use his horns to a greater length, were to frighten the young runaway out of his wits, and thereby incapacitate him from being made to see and feel the error of his way. Though, I must confess that, for my own part, I should not be willing to trust the savage fellow a single horn's length until I had subjected him to a certain old-fashioned test—I would first take care ...
— The Red Moccasins - A Story • Morrison Heady
... sorry for now, although I should certainly be sorry if he did come. A happy state of contradiction, not confined either to that particular movement or no-movement, inasmuch as I was gratified by his sending me the poem you saw, and yet read it with such extreme pain as to incapacitate me from judging of it. Such stuff ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1 of 2) • Frederic G. Kenyon
... bravado of a neighbour whom he had eased of a score of cattle. He merely brought in the doings of the Justice-Ayr at Jedburgh, to screen his fits of laziness; those states of the mind common to rievers, thieves, writers, and poets, and generally all people who live upon their wits, which at times incapacitate them for using sword or pen for their honest livelihood. But all Margaret's arguments and Will's courage were on one occasion overturned, by the riever's apprehension for stealing a cow, belonging to a farmer at Stobbs, of the name of Grant. He was carried ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume 2 - Historical, Traditional, and Imaginative • Alexander Leighton
... bread. He had no right to call upon others to bear the burden of his needs. His brother; a steady hard-headed mechanic, who was doing well in the Midlands and had just married, spoke to him with uncompromising common sense; if he chose to incapacitate himself, he must not look to his relatives to support him. Silently Gilbert acquiesced; silently he went back to the factory, and, when he came home of nights, sat with eyes gazing blankly before him. His mother lived with him, she and his sister; the latter ...
— Thyrza • George Gissing
... subject to proof. Does virtue go by default where there is no opportunity to be otherwise than virtuous? The very first pipe of port, or aum of Rhenish, or bale of silk, which comes rolling along may wrestle with my morality and so wrench and twist it as to incapacitate it for ordinary usage for months, or may even permanently disable it. And must not I, venturing to regard myself as a truthful historian, frankly admit a sense allied to disappointment when the white blazing beaches are destitute of the most trivial ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... on "The Part I'd Like to Play in High School;" a study of "My Best Friend," and finally an essay on "The Work of My Early School Days," which shows the pupil's likes and dislikes. In addition to this, the teacher notes any physical defects—eyesight, hearing, and the like—which might incapacitate the pupil for particular vocations. This data, together with reports from all departments on neatness, sincerity, ambition and other qualities is ...
— The New Education - A Review of Progressive Educational Movements of the Day (1915) • Scott Nearing
... subject, believe that likely. She knew exactly his business relations with his employers; that there was a fixed time for his return to England, which nothing except the very strongest necessity could alter. Even in the chance of his health breaking, so as to incapacitate him for work, he should, he always said, have to go to the hills, rather than take the voyage home prematurely. And in that case he certainly would have informed his friends of his movements. There was nothing erratic, or careless, or eccentric about Robert ...
— Mistress and Maid • Dinah Craik (aka: Miss Mulock)
... writer.... A fixed limit of twenty years would greatly aid the discipline of its subjects. And what is of more importance so far as the public are concerned, it would, in most cases, avail to practically incapacitate or effectually deter the persons who pass through it from any repetition of their crime. The mere natural operation of age, decay, and disease would tend towards this result; and not only so, but it would, in a considerable proportion of cases, render the limit of ...
— A Plea for the Criminal • James Leslie Allan Kayll
... afternoon: our morning service is over. I am sorry to say I find both Mr. and Mrs. Scott quite unwell, the former with one of those constitutional headaches from which he has suffered so much for many years. They incapacitate him for conversation or any mental exertion, and I am a great loser by it, as well as grieved for his ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... am sorry to be obliged to put you off; but since I came in from hunting I have been attacked with influenza, which will incapacitate me from the enjoyment of society at least for two or three days. I therefore think the kindest thing I can do is to write to put you off; and, in the hopes of seeing both you and my lord at ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... attorneys to whom he was bound, were ready enough to release him; since, though well satisfied with his conduct and attention to their concerns, they perceived him to be troubled with a deafness which would incapacitate him for the practice of the law. The means of supporting him at the University were accordingly supplied by the liberality of the friends whom he had gained; and after passing a twelvemonth with the Rev. Mr. Grainger, of Winteringham in Lincolnshire, to prepare himself, ...
— Lives of the English Poets - From Johnson to Kirke White, Designed as a Continuation of - Johnson's Lives • Henry Francis Cary
... for relieving me." Truth is, I have never regarded the employment of literary time as thrown away. The discipline of the mind, induced by composition, is something, and it is surprising what may be done by a person who carefully "redeems" all his time. It does not, in the least, incapacitate him for business. It rather quickens ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... pleased the Lord to incapacitate me altogether for active service, but instead of this, He has still allowed me, in some small measure, to help by my judgment in some church matters, to write some letters in His service, to speak now and then a word to believers for the furtherance of their faith, and to confess His name repeatedly ...
— A Narrative of some of the Lord's Dealings with George Mueller - Written by Himself. Second Part • George Mueller
... which resulted from its use. Supposing now that I made a few scratches on my arm and rubbed some of this stuff into them, who would be the wiser? The inflammation which would follow would not be sufficient to incapacitate me, and nobody can see through a man's coat sleeve; even if the limb should become swollen or helpless I could pretend that I had strained it. Whatever I had preached to prove my point and forward my ambition, ...
— Doctor Therne • H. Rider Haggard
... joint, and under these conditions both sides are sometimes affected, and the accident is not attended with the usual pain and disability either at the time or after reduction. The facility and frequency with which dislocation recurs render the limb comparatively useless, and may seriously incapacitate the patient. We have had cases under observation in which dislocation resulted from the hyper-abduction of the arm in swimming, from throwing the arms above the head in dancing and in gymnastic exercises, and even in "doing" ...
— Manual of Surgery Volume Second: Extremities—Head—Neck. Sixth Edition. • Alexander Miles
... hear no contempt of penmen, unless a depraved use of the pen shall have so cramped them as to incapacitate them for the sword and for the council chamber. If Alexander was the Great, what was Aristoteles who made him so, and taught him every art and science he knew, except three—those of drinking, of blaspheming, and of murdering ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor
... marriage, of either party, which shall incapacitate him from contributing his or her share to the ...
— Reno - A Book of Short Stories and Information • Lilyan Stratton
... bell rang, and the attendants flew, not to arms, but to their trays, to bring up supper, when a second uproar announced that it was ready. The new comers woke at the sound; and I presently discovered that it took a very bad wound to incapacitate the defenders of the faith for the consumption of their rations; the amount that some of them sequestered was amazing; but when I suggested the probability of a famine hereafter, to the matron, that motherly lady cried out: ...
— Hospital Sketches • Louisa May Alcott
... repented. She was of a sudden terribly afraid. Remembering too late the high heels of her slippers, she discounted the certainty of a turned ankle—which would hurt frightfully even if it failed to incapacitate her totally. For the life of her she could not release her grasp, though all ready the drag of her weight was beginning to cause most perceptible aches in the ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance
... conscious of the prejudices, which really incapacitate them, from forming impartial and true judgments on systems alien to their own habits of thought. And philosophers who may pride themselves on their freedom from prejudice, may yet fail to understand; whole classes of psychological phenomena which are the result of religious ...
— Scarabs • Isaac Myer
... exception to its perfect religious indifference were excluded from public office, were excluded, not on the ground of their religious belief, but because their opinions were deemed to be degrading to mankind and therefore to incapacitate those who held them from governing in a noble temper. But they were subject to no punishment, because the people of Utopia were "persuaded that it is not in a man's power to believe what he list." The religion which a man held he might propagate by argument, ...
— History of the English People, Volume III (of 8) - The Parliament, 1399-1461; The Monarchy 1461-1540 • John Richard Green
... just proportion. And by means of this one carried too far, a man throughout his life is subject to much more uneasiness than belongs to his share; and in particular instances, it may be in such a degree as to incapacitate him from assisting the very person who is the object of it. But as there are some who upon principle set up for suppressing this affection itself as weakness, there is also I know not what of fashion on this side; and, by some ...
— Human Nature - and Other Sermons • Joseph Butler
... opinion that this article of dress by keeping the parts too warm, affording them a constant support, and allowing the muscles but little freedom of motion, may, at least, relax and cause them to become flaccid, if it do not totally incapacitate them for the ...
— Aphrodisiacs and Anti-aphrodisiacs: Three Essays on the Powers of Reproduction • John Davenport
... delightful parlors where the guests dropped into pleasant conversational groups as by magic, and contrast them mentally with those other chilly apartments where a sort of mental frost seems to settle over one's faculties and incapacitate them for use. Much of this may be avoided by a judicious arrangement of chairs and couches, just where people drop naturally into easy groups, or, for the time ...
— Social Life - or, The Manners and Customs of Polite Society • Maud C. Cooke
... the most annoying symptoms and sometimes is very persistent. It may incapacitate the patient for the ordinary duties of life. After laying down awhile and being quiet, the headache may be relieved, but recurs on ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce
... Khan had the power, if he had chosen to exert it, to restrain those tribes. Once more the living mass of men and animals was put in motion. The frost had so crippled the hands and feet of the strongest men, as to prostrate their powers and to incapacitate them ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXVIII. February, 1843. Vol. LIII. • Various |
