"Irresistible" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... whatever was beautiful in country life he carried with him to the town, with its green and radiant pictures still glowing on his heart, and its morning melodies still murmuring through his soul. And he could act out in deeds, what once he meditated in ideas. He was constantly called, by irresistible voices, to go out of himself, and out of his fixed and finite conceits and opinions, and mix with other souls; and transform his conceits to comprehensive conceptions, and enlarge ...
— Summerfield - or, Life on a Farm • Day Kellogg Lee
... have the kindness to read the enclosed, and look at the diagram. Six words will answer my question. It is not an important point, but there is to me an irresistible charm in trying to make out homologies. (602/1. In 1880 he wrote to Mr. Bentham: "It was very kind of you to write to me about the Orchideae, for it has pleased me to an extreme degree that I could have been of the least use to you about the ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin Volume II - Volume II (of II) • Charles Darwin
... Nature is a result of design or of chance. Variation and natural selection open no third alternative; they concern only the question, How the results, whether fortuitous or designed, may have been brought about. Organic Nature abounds with unmistakable and irresistible indications of design, and, being a connected and consistent system, this evidence carried the implication of design throughout the whole. On the other hand, chance carries no probabilities with ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. VI.,October, 1860.—No. XXXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... to say, the love of money is founded first on the intenseness of desire for given things; a youth will rob the till, now-a-days, for pantomime tickets and cigars; the "strength" of the currency being irresistible to him, in consequence of his desire for ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... at him with a sudden radiance. She had risen to her feet, and with a quick, graceful movement leaned over him. This new womanliness which he had found so irresistible was alight once more in her face. Her eyes sought his fondly, she touched his lips with hers. The perfume of her clothes, the touch of her hair upon his cheek, were like a drug. He had no ...
— A Lost Leader • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... mass and shadow; sometimes with a reaction of emotive force which gave even to sustained disappointment, even to the fulfilled demand of sacrifice, the nature of a satisfied energy, and spread over his young future, whatever it might be, the attraction of devoted service; sometimes with a sweet irresistible hopefulness that the very best of human possibilities might befall him—the blending of a complete personal love in one current with a larger duty; and sometimes again in a mood of rebellion (what human creature escapes it?) against things in general because they are ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... with the secrets of the heart: 'It is only the truly virtuous man,' he says in one place, 'who can love or who can hate others' (p. 30). In another place he expresses his belief in the irresistible charm of virtue: 'Virtue is not left to stand alone,' he says; 'he who practises it will have neighbours.' He bears witness to the hidden connection between intellectual and moral excellence: 'It is not easy,' he remarks, 'to ...
— Chips From A German Workshop - Volume I - Essays on the Science of Religion • Friedrich Max Mueller
... as though their bones would burst through their skins. They were mere skeletons, draped loosely in draggled hides, with blazing eyes and slavered fangs. But the hunger-madness made them terrifying, irresistible. There was no opposing them. The team-dogs were swept back against the cliff at the first onset. Buck was beset by three huskies, and in a trice his head and shoulders were ripped and slashed. The din was frightful. Billee was crying ...
— The Call of the Wild • Jack London
... should have been an unhappy and rebellious crew. But now the spell of adventure was upon us. Our savage guides moved silently and surely, and the forest was so mysterious and strange that I found its allurement all but irresistible. The slow, silent stream, on which now and then lights as faint and elusive as wisps of cloud played fitfully, reflected from I knew not where, had a fascination that I am sure the others felt as strongly as I. So we followed in silence ...
— The Mutineers • Charles Boardman Hawes
... He was sitting in a corner of the box, turning his attention neither to the play nor the audience; and, what was more, not striving to attract the attention of anyone. But from behind the shoulders of the young men in the front of the box, his hand, as if directed by an irresistible impulse, turned the opera-glass, from moment to moment, toward Malvina Darvid. He felt that he ought not to look so persistently at that woman with the gleaming star above her forehead, so he dropped his hand to raise it again and turn it in the same direction. As if imitating Kranitski, ...
— The Argonauts • Eliza Orzeszko (AKA Orzeszkowa)
... life; that on trial it did not realize my expectations; that if not a decided humbug, it was amazingly like one. With my health the buoyancy of my spirits departed. Hope and ambition no longer urged me with irresistible power to go forth and visit foreign lands, and traverse unknown seas like a knight errant of old in quest of adventures. While shivering with ague, and thinking of my wretched fare on board the schooner John, and my uncomfortable ...
— Jack in the Forecastle • John Sherburne Sleeper
... fine calm day, with light breeze, I was standing across the Goodwins, bound to the East Goodwin lightship, and we could hear the roar of the ripple on the Goodwins—not breakers, but ripple—at a distance of two miles. We were sucked into that ugly-looking ripple by an irresistible current, and after an anxious half-hour ...
— Heroes of the Goodwin Sands • Thomas Stanley Treanor
... natural manner, though still betrayed by her faltering voice and the paleness of her cheeks,—"you are quite right; Lord Evandale merits such usage from no one, least of all from her whom he has honoured with his regard. But if I have given way, for the last time, to a sudden and irresistible burst of feeling, it is my consolation, Lady Emily, that your brother knows the cause, that I have hid nothing from him, and that he at least is not apprehensive of finding in Edith Bellenden a wife undeserving of his affection. But still you are right, and I merit your censure ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... of love and flattery about this appeal which, backed as it was by a look of tenderness and beauty, made it irresistible; and the arrangements for the journey were made in strict accordance with ...
— Stories by English Authors: Orient • Various
... in five minutes afterward expires in convulsions. Part of the same bulb is converted into smoke, and ascends toward the sky; rain follows in a day or two. The inference is obvious. Were we as much harassed by droughts, the logic would be irresistible ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... of directly exploiting, of possibly quite enjoying, under cover of an evil duplicity, the felt element of curiosity with which they regarded her. Once she was conscious of the flitting wing of this last impression—the perception, irresistible, that she was something for their queer experience, just as they were something for hers—there was no limit to her conceived design of not letting them escape. She went and went, again, to-night, after her start was taken; ...
— The Golden Bowl • Henry James
... for about five minutes, and Hayes and old Harry Terry urged the rest of the remaining women to jump overboard and make for the shore, as the brig's decks were now awash, and every third or fourth sea swept along her, fore and aft, with irresistible force. One woman—a stout, powerfully-built native of Ocean Island—whose infant child was lashed to her naked back with bands of coir cinnet, rushed up to the captain, and crying, 'Kapeni, ka mate a mate '—('Captain, if I die, I die')—put her arms round his neck, ...
— Ridan The Devil And Other Stories - 1899 • Louis Becke
... No, for ten delicious days there was to be no such thing as hurry. Bob lay very still luxuriating in the thought. Then he glanced at Van, who was still immovable, his arm beneath his cheek. His friend's obliviousness to the world was irresistible. Bob raised himself carefully; caught up his pillow; took accurate aim; and ...
— The Story of Sugar • Sara Ware Bassett
... of these houses she was seized with an irresistible thirst. Mr. Parlin gave the reins to Mrs. Clifford, and stepped out of the carriage, then helped Dotty and ...
— Dotty Dimple Out West • Sophie May
... Plumed Knight which Mr. Ingersoll created to characterize Mr. Blaine is part of the latter's memory. At Chicago, four years later, when Garfield, dazed by the irresistible doubt of the convention, was on the point of refusing that in the acceptance of which he had no voluntary part, Ingersoll was the adviser who showed him that duty to Sherman required ...
— The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Volume VIII. - Interviews • Robert Green Ingersoll
... upon this noble creature, he became imbued with an irresistible desire to possess him. It is true he already had a horse, and as fine a one as ever wore saddle; but it was Basil's weakness to covet every fine horse he saw; and this one had inspired him with a most particular ...
— The Boy Hunters • Captain Mayne Reid
... discourse was read, but read in such a manner as to lose none of its effect. It occupied upwards of an hour. My irresistible impression as I listened was, There is a man of God! Truly a light shining in a dark place; for, as I returned to my lodgings, I found the coffee-houses, oyster-saloons, and theatres all open, just as on any other day, only more thronged with customers. ...
— American Scenes, and Christian Slavery - A Recent Tour of Four Thousand Miles in the United States • Ebenezer Davies
... man. Why had she embraced him? I was sure that she could be no wanton, nor indeed would any woman indulge for its own sake in such folly with a stranger who hung between life and death. What she had done was done because irresistible impulse, born of knowledge, or at least of memories, drove her on, though mayhap the knowledge was imperfect and the memories were undefined. Who save Ayesha could have known anything of Leo in the past? None who lived upon ...
— Ayesha - The Further History of She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed • H. Rider Haggard
... reinforcement, together with the addition of a body of sailors and marines from the fleet, our numbers amounted now to little short of 6000 men; a force which, in almost any other quarter of America, would have been irresistible. Of the numbers of the enemy, again, various reports were in circulation; some stating them at 20,000, others at 30,000; but I believe that I come nearer the truth when I suppose their whole force to have comprised 12,000 men of all arms. It is, at least, certain that they ...
— The Campaigns of the British Army at Washington and New Orleans 1814-1815 • G. R. Gleig
... fifteenth century. He had been brought up in the house of King John II., where he received as complete an education as could then be given him. After having made mathematics and navigation his special study—for at this time in Portugal there was an irresistible current which drew the whole country towards maritime expeditions and discoveries—Magellan early embraced a maritime career, and embarked in 1505 with Almeida, who was on his way to the Indies. He took part in the sacking of Quiloa, and in all the events of that campaign. The following ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part I. The Exploration of the World • Jules Verne
... impulse of an irresistible determination, the consequences of which she refused to anticipate, Yvonne, with the same automatic gestures, took a pneumatic-delivery envelope, slipped in the card, sealed it, directed it to "Horace ...
— The Confessions of Arsene Lupin • Maurice Leblanc
... his eager questions. He was never weary of admiring the huge machine which did with one smooth and regular movement the work of hundreds of strong men, obeying the slightest turn of a tiny wheel, yet capable of tearing the whole ship to pieces should its irresistible ...
— Harper's Young People, March 30, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... receiving those of the writer he said: "I want you to stay right by my battery with your regiment when it goes into action here, and if you will no rebel battalions can take it this time." There was a promise to comply with his request. On the following morning when the irresistible assault of the rebel army came, the Eleventh Ohio Battery was in position commanding the whole rebel line and the Fourth Minnesota Infantry in line flat upon the ground close in its rear. Lieutenant Neil was seated on his thoroughbred from twenty to forty ...
— A Battery at Close Quarters - A Paper Read before the Ohio Commandery of the Loyal Legion, - October 6, 1909 • Henry M. Neil
... in love with his wife as nine out of ten cavalry officers know how to love, and he seemed perfectly satisfied with the sentiment that he received in return for this sudden affection. A few successes with young belles, for whom an epaulette has an irresistible attraction, had inspired Baron de Bergenheim with a confidence in himself the simplicity of which excused the conceit. He persuaded himself that he pleased Clemence because ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... he wrote to Dr. Taylor:—'Your uneasiness at the misfortunes of your relations, I comprehend perhaps too well. It was an irresistible obtrusion of a disagreeable image, which you always wished away, but could not dismiss, an incessant persecution of a troublesome thought, neither to be pacified nor ejected. Such has of late been the state of my own mind. I had formerly great command of my attention, and what I did not like could ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell
... the sailors hurled themselves upon the crowd in a body. The surprise, added to the weight and force of the charge, was irresistible; the natives were sent flying like ninepins, and before the enemy quite understood what had happened, the whole party were safe in the house, and the ...
— In Times of Peril • G. A. Henty
... undergo the same evolution that his estimate of her business efficiency has undergone. He will judge her by what she is in her interior nature; and his sexual desires, now manifested distractedly in mere love of the female, will become concentrated in love of the one woman to whom his soul turns in irresistible sex-attraction, as unerringly as the needle turns to the pole to which ...
— Sex=The Unknown Quantity - The Spiritual Function of Sex • Ali Nomad
... and her round cheek was paled, either by the light or by the weariness that was expressed in her attitude: her lips were pressed poutingly together, and every now and then her eyelids half fell: she was a large image of a sweet sleepy child. Tito felt an irresistible desire to go up to her and get her pretty trusting looks and prattle: this creature who was without moral judgment that could condemn him, whose little loving ignorant soul made a world apart, where he might feel in freedom from ...
— Romola • George Eliot
... M. de Voltaire, "approached the place where I was standing motionless, in order to contemplate his person as much as I could while his eyes were turned from me; but on seeiug him move towards me, I found myself drawn by some irresistible power towards him; and, without knowing what I did, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... in on the charming harmonies of a slow waltz, which the orchestra was rendering at the moment.... There was an irresistible rush towards the boudoir, where two half-fainting women had collapsed on chairs, and the famous surgeon, Dr. Marvier, was doing his utmost to prevent the crowd from entering the room. The word went round that a tragedy had taken place—a ...
— Messengers of Evil - Being a Further Account of the Lures and Devices of Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... an account of the execution of Louis XVI; another reported the fight between the English thirty-six gun frigate Araminta and the French Niobe. The engagement had been desperate, the valiant Araminta having been fought, not alone against odds as to her enemy, but against the irresistible perils of a coast upon which the Admiralty charts gave cruelly imperfect information. To the Admiralty we owed the fact, the journal urged, that the Araminta was now at the bottom of the sea, and its young commander confined in a French fortress, his brave and distinguished ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... Hebrew poetry, however, spring from its internal force rather than from any external form. Indeed, the Hebrew poets soar far above all others in that energy of feeling, impetuous and irresistible, which penetrates, warms, and moves the very soul. They reveal their anxieties as well as their hopes; they paint with truth and love the actual condition of the human race, with its sorrows and consolations, its hopes and fears, its love and ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... countries, however, men seem at last to have been determined by irresistible reasons to give the preference, for this employment, to metals above every other commodity. Metals can not only be kept with as little loss as any other commodity, scarce any thing being less perishable than they are, but they can likewise, without any loss, be divided into any number ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... Margie waited upon me so prettily that I should have been tempted to try a sea porcupine unskinned if she had offered it, so irresistible was her chirping way of saying, "Oh, here's a perfectly lovely one! Do take him by his little black ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag, Vol. 5 - Jimmy's Cruise in the Pinafore, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... original a manner that it never failed to upset the gravity of the interrogator. When he raised his large, prominent, leaden-coloured eyes from the ground, and looked the inquirer steadily in the face, the effect was irresistible; the laugh would come—do ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... need hardly be said, Miss Melbury's view of the doctor as a merciless, unwavering, irresistible scientist was not quite in accordance with fact. The real Dr. Fitzpiers w as a man of too many hobbies to show likelihood of rising to any great eminence in the profession he had chosen, or even to acquire any wide practice ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... there that The Arraignment of Paris was acted. But Marlowe, like Kyd, laid his work before a larger, more unsophisticated audience, unrolling before its astonished gaze the full sweep of a five act play, crowded with warriors, headlong in its changes of fortune, and irresistible in its 'drum and trumpet' appeal to man's fighting instincts. From men of humble birth, in that age of adventure and romance, the victorious career of the Scythian shepherd won instant applause; with him they too seemed to rise; ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... irresistible. Granting only that the tubes are made in that simple and intelligible manner (and anybody can see for himself that they are), the sulphuretted hydrogen and the lactate of lead follow (down the osophagus) as a logical sequence. But the scientific horror seems to be profoundly unaware that these ...
— The Fiend's Delight • Dod Grile
... lively widow—she had married Colonel St. George at the age of eighteen, and the marriage only lasted two or three years, the Colonel dying of consumption—must have possessed personal and mental attractions irresistible to a cultivated young man of twenty-two. Had she been old and ugly, it is to be feared his business engagements would have prevented the youthful banker devoting much ...
— East Anglia - Personal Recollections and Historical Associations • J. Ewing Ritchie
... of Balaam should carry some conviction. I have grown to manhood and am now growing old with the growth of this system of government in my native land, have watched its advances, or what some would call its encroachments, gradual and irresistible as those of a glacier, have been an ear-witness to the forebodings of wise and good and timid men, and have lived to see those forebodings belied by the course of events, which is apt to show itself humorously careless of the reputation of prophets. I recollect hearing a sagacious old gentleman ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various
... Rosebrook interrupts, as a sagacious looking cat bounds on the table, much to the discomfiture of the Elder, who jumps up in a great fright,—"What irresistible natures we have; may heaven save us from the cravings ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... troops, which the presidency of Bombay had sent into Malabar and Canara, returned to Mysore, and by the end of the year 1768 recovered every inch of territory he had lost. Early in the year following Hyder Ali again poured down into the Carnatic; and so irresistible were his movements that the presidency of Madras proposed terms of peace. Hyder Ali could not hope to conquer the English, and he readily listened to the proposal; and a treaty was concluded, by which ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... had the bluest eyes the girls had ever seen. Her features were small and regular, and her skin as creamy as the petal of a magnolia. She stood regarding the astonished girls with a fascinating little smile that was irresistible. ...
— Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School - Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities • Jessie Graham Flower
... Her features were irregular, a trifle heavy perchance, with high cheek bones and massive square chin, with a cleft in the centre as though the Master Sculptor had said: 'This were too strong a face for a woman; I will give her a hint of tenderness to make her utterly irresistible,' and so He had planted a child's dimple in her chin and another near her lips when she smiled. Wilhelmine was over-tall, lithe of limb, and spare as a Greek runner; then suddenly, unexpectedly, full breasted—surprising, ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay
... the tide on the horizon, and to see again the sun in such a wide heaven that it seemed to have the world to itself, and to watch the changes in the sky as it sank, drawing with it the light. These great sands were dangerous at times, shifting in whirling and irresistible rushes of water, and changing the course of the channel, which was unaltered by the tide and which always lay out a gleaming artery from ...
— Women of the Country • Gertrude Bone
... unconsciously farther off than he intended to go. At last, having seen the Parsee carnival wind away in the distance, he was turning his steps towards the station, when he happened to espy the splendid pagoda on Malabar Hill, and was seized with an irresistible desire to see its interior. He was quite ignorant that it is forbidden to Christians to enter certain Indian temples, and that even the faithful must not go in without first leaving their shoes outside the door. ...
— Around the World in 80 Days • Jules Verne
... mind the inevitable downfall of the proud and arrogant favorite. She was the very opposite in nature of Madame de Montespan. Her self-possession, poise, skill and tact, virtue and piety made an irresistible appeal to the tired King. That her piety was scarcely more than a cloak is betrayed by many of her own utterances. "Nothing is more clever than irreproachable behavior," she said at one time to close friends. Her behavior ...
— The Story of Versailles • Francis Loring Payne
... time passed very pleasantly for Rodd and his uncle, for they took their stations on board the anchored schooner, firing at every crocodile that showed itself, the presence of the men at work upon the muddy exposed shore proving an irresistible attraction during the first part of the time. But so many had been sent writhing and lashing the water, to float down-stream, that at last they began to grow shy, and the sportsmen were enabled to direct some of their charges of small shot at specimens ...
— The Ocean Cat's Paw - The Story of a Strange Cruise • George Manville Fenn
... whimsical and imaginative tale of Hortense and the Cat. Antique furniture, literally stuffed with personality, hurries about in the dim moonlight in order to help Hortense through a thrillingly strange campaign against a sinister Cat and a villainous Grater. The book offers rare humor, irresistible alike to grown-ups ...
— The Cat in Grandfather's House • Carl Henry Grabo
... other debris assailed the flying-machine, and while sight was thus rendered almost useless for the time being, the aerostat began to sway and reel from side to side, shivering as though caught by an irresistible power, yet against which it battled as though instinct with life ...
— The Lost City • Joseph E. Badger, Jr.
... my own!' There was something in Mr. Gibson's voice when he spoke seriously, especially when he referred to any feeling of his own—he who so rarely betrayed what was passing in his heart—that was irresistible to most people: the change from joking and sarcasm ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... Southern people; but they view, as I do, this attempt to arrest the further spread of slavery as aggressive on the part of Congress, and discover an alarming state of the Northern mind upon this subject. This with an increasing popular strength may grow into proportions which shall be irresistible, and the South may be ultimately forced to do, what she never will voluntarily do—abolish at once the institution." It was urged by Mr. Holmes that the Constitution guaranteed slavery to the States, that its control and destiny was alone with the States, ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... been sufficient to enlist them in the scheme proposed by Ben-Hur; but when, besides, they were assured he was to rule the world, more mighty than Caesar, more magnificent than Solomon, and that the rule was to last forever, the appeal was irresistible, and they vowed themselves to the cause body and soul. They asked Ben-Hur his authority for the sayings, and he quoted the prophets, and told them of Balthasar in waiting over in Antioch; and they were satisfied, for it was the old much-loved legend of the Messiah, familiar to them almost ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... onwards again. He whom all supports were failing felt that he was himself a basis of support. Irresistible summons of duty! ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo
... Her colouring had all the delicacy which suggested the laying on by an artist's brush, and which no storm or sun seemed to have power to destroy. Her slight figure possessed all those perfect contours which are completely irresistible in early youth. Furthermore these things were supported to the utmost by the party frock she was wearing, and over which she had spent weeks of precious ...
— The Heart of Unaga • Ridgwell Cullum
... at the strength of this passion, of which Noel was disturbing the ashes. Perhaps, he felt it all the more keenly on account of those expressions which recalled his own youth. He understood how irresistible must have been the strength of such a love and he trembled to speculate ...
— The Widow Lerouge - The Lerouge Case • Emile Gaboriau
... mother's letter, and when he had read them both and slowly folded them up again and put them away, he was overcome with an irresistible feeling of home-sickness. For a long while he walked up and down his room, talking softly to himself, and then, under ...
— Immensee • Theodore W. Storm
... myself that I was a coward, and I set my teeth. I must lift his head from the water, and cover him up with my own coat while I fetched help. But when I stooped down a deadly faintness came over me. My fingers were palsied with horror. I had a sudden irresistible conviction I could not touch him. It was a sheer impossibility. There was something between us more potent than the dread of a dead man—something inimical between us two, the dead and the living. I staggered away and ran reeling to the road, plunging blindly ...
— The Betrayal • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... marry a woman to rule his life and make him trouble—it were easier to make love and then laugh and ride away. Luis was "muy s'prised" that Annie-Many-Ponies had ever believed that Ramon would marry her, beautiful though she was, charming though she was, altogether irresistible though she was—Luis became slightly incoherent here and lapsed into swift rolling Spanish words which ...
— The Heritage of the Sioux • B.M. Bower
... people harmonised for 4 and 5 voices; his method was adopted by the papal choir, which adorns it with many traditional graces, and in particular gives occasionally, says Baini, to the words of the multitude "the irresistible force of a most robust harmony". The abbate Alfieri has published a new edition ...
— The Ceremonies of the Holy-Week at Rome • Charles Michael Baggs
... explained that there were errands to be done, that her grandfather had taken the horse, and that Mr. Merrill's escort had been both opportune and convenient for these practical reasons. Claude was everywhere present, the center of attraction, the observed of all observers. He was irresistible, contagious, almost epidemic. Rose was now gay, now silent; now affectionate, now distant, now coquettish; in fine, everything that ...
— Homespun Tales • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... winning charm in his manner. Nature had endowed him liberally with virile fascination. My hard uncongenial life had rendered me weak. He was drawing me to him; he was irresistible. Yes; I would be his wife. I grew dizzy, and turned my head sharply backwards and took a long gasping breath, another and another, of that fresh cool air suggestive of the grand old sea and creak of cordage and bustle and strife of life. My old spirit revived, ...
— My Brilliant Career • Miles Franklin
... thought. As Mr. Washington well knew, the average person only thinks under constant prodding. Hence, the committees to do the prodding! It is so much easier to take one's problems from the textbooks than to dig them up in the shops or on the farm as to be practically irresistible unless one is being watched. Then, in the shops it requires a constant effort to work the theory in with the practice. If the instructors in the trades tended to become mere unthinking mechanics a vigilant committee was at hand to keep them true to their better lights. ...
— Booker T. Washington - Builder of a Civilization • Emmett J. Scott and Lyman Beecher Stowe
... like darkly lowering clouds Which Cronos' Son, when storm is rolling up, Herdeth together through the welkin wide. Swiftly the whole plain filled. Onward they streamed Like harvest-ravaging locusts drifting on In fashion of heavy-brooding rain-clouds o'er Wide plains of earth, an irresistible host Bringing wan famine on the sons of men; So in their might and multitude they went. The city streets were all too strait for them Marching: upsoared the ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus
... against precocious youths who gave themselves the airs of manhood before their time. "Does your mother know you're out?" was the provoking query addressed to young men of more than reasonable swagger, who smoked cigars in the streets, and wore false whiskers to look irresistible. We have seen many a conceited fellow who could not suffer a woman to pass him without staring her out of countenance, reduced at once into his natural insignificance by the mere utterance of this phrase. Apprentice lads and shopmen in their Sunday clothes ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... men-at-arms at his back, of whom no less than four hundred were knights. In addition his ships contained vast stores of provisions, a variety of war devices never before seen in Ireland, artizans for building bridges and making roads—a whole war train, in short. Such a display of force was felt to be irresistible. The chieftains one after the other came in and made their submission. Dermot McCarthy, lord of Desmond and Cork, was the first to do homage, followed by Donald O'Brien, Prince of Thomond; while another Donald, chieftain of Ossory, ...
— The Story Of Ireland • Emily Lawless
... you in regard to a matter that concerns my happiness; and, no matter what may be your decision, I am sure, from your kindness upon all occasions, that you will pardon my boldness. I can hardly imagine that the feeling—the irresistible feeling—I have entertained for Lenora from the first moment I saw her, has escaped your penetrating eye. I ought probably to have asked your consent long ago, before she obtained so complete a dominion over my heart; but ...
— The Poor Gentleman • Hendrik Conscience
... melancholy that he had seen the sun set for the last time on his student life, and reflecting on the possibilities of the future and perhaps on opportunities wasted in the past, the memory of that evening last June recurred strongly to his imagination, and he felt an irresistible impulse to play once more the "Areopagita." He unlocked the now familiar cupboard and took out the violin, and never had the exquisite gradations of colour in its varnish appeared to greater advantage than in the soft mellow light of the fading day. As ...
— The Lost Stradivarius • John Meade Falkner
... this account alone that this cause has my sympathy and appeals to me. It has, besides, the irresistible attraction of truth and justice, which no open and liberal mind can deny. If our action as legislators must be inspired by the eternal sources of right, if the laws passed here must comply with the ...
— The Woman and the Right to Vote • Rafael Palma
... nations, they will also allow us on our part to divert ourselves at the expense of their tragic writers, if with all their care they have now and then split upon the rock of which they were most in dread. Lessing has, with the most irresistible and victorious wit, pointed out the ludicrous nature of the very plans of Rodogune, Semiramis, Merope, and Zaire. But both in this respect and with regard to single laughable turns, a rich harvest might yet be gathered. [Footnote: A few examples of the latter ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel
... readily admit who recalls the wonderful stage pictures in Bella Donna, in which the role of good genius was sustained with such consummate skill and sympathy by Sir GEORGE ALEXANDER, whose smile is as irresistible as the sword of his ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, December 23, 1914 • Various
... plants of evil growth: their hour comes, and they wither and die, and leave the channels free. Life returns—in slow, soft ripples at first, but not the less in irresistible tide, and at last in pulses of mighty throb through every pipe. Death is the final failure of all sickness, the clearing away of the very soil in which the seed of the ill plant takes ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... in the mud, the men stood upright, to clear the way to freedom. But, as they parted the nearest branches, a number of arms were suddenly forced through the scrub; a number of hands gripped them with irresistible strength; and before they could realise what had happened they were rudely dragged up the ...
— The Fiery Totem - A Tale of Adventure in the Canadian North-West • Argyll Saxby
... alone; to make him independent of his own efforts in respect to safety, would be destroying one element necessary to his development—the sense of responsibility. What courage or conduct would be called for in a man sent to fight when armed with irresistible weapons and clothed in impenetrable armour? Hence the neophyte should endeavour, as far as possible, to fulfill every true canon of sanitary law as laid down by modern scientists. Pure air, pure water, pure food, gentle exercise, regular hours, pleasant occupations and surroundings, are ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various
... Seizing the moment favourable for the charge, Wellington called up Lord Ernest Somerset's brigade of heavy cavalry, consisting of the life-guards, the royal horse-guards, and the first dragoon-guards, and directed them to charge the already crippled cavalry of Napoleon. These regiments proved irresistible; horses and men fell on every hand; and the French cuirassiers, whose breastplates had glittered in so many battles and victories, were completely destroyed. When Lord Ernest Somerset's brigade returned from their charge, they brought with them about ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... bold antiphlogistic treatment, and has the luck to see a few patients of note get well under it. So of the remedies which have gone out of fashion and been superseded by others. It can hardly be doubted that they will come into vogue again, more or less extensively, under the influence of that irresistible demand for ...
— Medical Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... on in a flood of numbers: the defence, and half as much as the defence, and more again. The line swung down irresistible, with the massy weight of its club aimed at Paris. If the eastern forts at Toul and at Verdun and the resistance before Nancy had held back its handle, that resistance had but enabled it to pivot with the freer swing. Not only had there fallen back before its charge all ...
— A General Sketch of the European War - The First Phase • Hilaire Belloc
... as the King rushed on in climax after climax of heated words. Now he took one swift stride forward. From his quiet face had fallen every trace of impassiveness. When he spoke his voice trembled with the irresistible eloquence ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck
... (By the Special Correspondent of The Morning Roast.)—By intervening in Russia at once the Allies can destroy Bolshevism at a blow. Three days hence the Red hordes may be sweeping across Western Europe in an irresistible flood. At the present moment Trotsky has less than one thousand one hundred and thirty-five trustworthy troops all told, mostly Chinese, with a smattering of Army Service Corps. In a month's time he will have a million and a half of well-trained soldiers at his beck. Don't ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, April 30, 1919 • Various
... drop in at the 'Arcadian' to-night?" she said. "It's the dramatized version of 'Other Men's Shoes!' The temptation to make you see it was too irresistible—as ...
— The Masquerader • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... cramming their stomachs with the fruit. This is kept up, if the crop only lasts long enough until they have made themselves thoroughly sick by their hoggishness. But the craving for some sort of vegetable diet is irresistible, and with true Inuit improvidence they indulge it, careless of consequences. Fortunate for them is it that their summer, is a short one, and the parwong not abundant, or cholera might be added to the other dangers of Arctic residence. But the days of the buttercup and the ...
— Schwatka's Search • William H. Gilder
... vanish completely, when exposed to light alone. Employed in water, a thick glaze of gum-arabic or gamboge adds to its stability. As a landscape pigment, the colour is out of the general scale of nature; but in flower-painting its charms are almost irresistible. Nothing certainly can approach it as a colour for scarlet geraniums, but its beauty is almost as ...
— Field's Chromatography - or Treatise on Colours and Pigments as Used by Artists • George Field
... so clever, and know so much, that it is only just something should be hidden from their sight, and it is quite certain that they do not understand the irresistible and endless fascination of the country. They love to visit us in early autumn, and are vastly charmed with the honeysuckle in the hedges, and the corn turning yellow, and the rivers singing in the sunlight, and the purple on the ...
— Kate Carnegie and Those Ministers • Ian Maclaren
... very young, her form had all the roundness of womanhood; while her gay and sprightly manner indicated all the sans gene which only very young girls possess, and which, when tempered with perfect good taste, and accompanied by beauty and no small share of talent, forms an irresistible power of attraction. ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... approve of young men who began an acquaintance in this very familiar manner. She thought that there was a certain preliminary and more formal stage which ought to be got through with first, but Ste, Marie's grin was irresistible. In spite of herself, she found that ...
— Jason • Justus Miles Forman
... icy cold to my warm skin as I plunged deep into the heart of the great arching mass of water, which caught me just as I was rising to the surface and hurled me shoreward with irresistible force, rolling me over and over like a cork as it broke into a long line of hissing, pallid foam. But I knew exactly what to expect, and was fully prepared for it. I therefore allowed it to do with me just what it would, holding my breath and waiting until the ...
— Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun - A Story of the Russo-Japanese War • Harry Collingwood
... Carlyon. He found him superintending the throwing-up of earthworks. The most exposed part of the camp was to be abandoned. Derrick joined him in silence. Somehow this man's personality attracted him strongly. Though he had defied him, quarrelled with him, insulted him, the spell of his presence was irresistible. ...
— Rosa Mundi and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... found its fitting place in the Poet's life. It was no longer the overflow of an irresistible productive energy; it was the deliberate direction of that energy towards an appointed end. We hear something of his own feeling concerning this in a letter of August '65, again from Ste.-Marie, and called ...
— Life and Letters of Robert Browning • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... State Seminary of Learning and Military Academy,} "Alexandria, December 1, 1860. } "Dear Brother:—. . . The quiet which I thought the usual acquiescence of the people was merely the prelude to the storm of opinion that now seems irresistible. Politicians, by heating the prejudices of the people and running with the current, have succeeded in destroying the government. It cannot be stopped now, I fear. I was in Alexandria all day yesterday, and had a full and unreserved conversation with Dr. S. A. Smith, state ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... It remains to be shown in what manner this power, which regulates the laws, acts: its propensities and its passions remain to be pointed out, as well as the secret springs which retard, accelerate, or direct its irresistible course; and the effects of its unbounded authority, with the destiny which is probably ...
— American Institutions and Their Influence • Alexis de Tocqueville et al
... she almost leaned her head towards George's shoulder. She made a little, irresistible, nestling ...
— By the Light of the Soul - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... deciding, or however matters fell out, it certainly befell before very long that the terrible doctrine of cosmical development was supported by such powerful evidence, astronomical and terrestrial, as to appear wholly irresistible. Then, not only was the doctrine accepted by divines, but shown to be manifestly implied in the sacred narrative of the formation of the earth and heavens, sun, and moon, and stars; while upon those unfortunate students of science who had not changed front ...
— Myths and Marvels of Astronomy • Richard A. Proctor
... spiritual; that a life on the physical plane, devoted solely to selfishness, dwarfs and chokes the spiritual nature, and becomes a serious bar to unfoldment and progress on the spiritual plane of existence: Finally, that, like the pent up energies of some mighty volcano, the irresistible upward thrust of nature's unfoldment, ever producing and disclosing higher expressions of life, is to find its present outlet through these channels, by the wise use of methods in harmony with ...
— Solaris Farm - A Story of the Twentieth Century • Milan C. Edson
... primitive Communism. Her city populations may be as capable of Democracy as our own (it is, alas! not saying much); but the overwhelming mass of peasants to whom the Tsar is a personal God will for a long time to come make his bureaucracy irresistible. As against Russian civilization German and Austrian civilization is our civilization: there is no getting over that. A constitutional kingship of Poland and a sort of Caliphate of the Slavs in remapped southeastern Europe, with that access to warm sea water which ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various
... preceding, a young girl of fourteen years of age, who was used by her mother as an excuse for some of her extravagance, as she dressed her like herself, with all the fashionable novelties of which she submitted to the irresistible seduction. Au ...
— A Zola Dictionary • J. G. Patterson
... continue constant in his saying. And he commanded them to preach, 'and to testify, that it is he which was ordained of God to be the judge of quick and dead.' To testify, mark, that is, to be constant, irresistible, undaunted, in case it should be opposed and objected against. So here, let him testify to them, lest they come into this place ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... sealed for ever the allegiance of the youth to his self-chosen leader. He had prepared Sheridan, and through him Fox and Bouverie, for this change of front. The openness, the charm, the self-effacing patriotism of the Minister thenceforth drew him as by an irresistible magnet. The brilliance and joviality of Fox and Sheridan counted as nothing against the national impulse which the master now set in motion and the pupil was destined to carry to further lengths. There was a natural sympathy between these men both in ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... as the sea," he asserted, as they sat upon a bench of tepid iron. She did not demur. The weather had exhausted her patience; she was young and fond of the open air—the woods made an irresistible picture this day. The critic watched ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker
... it had not been dark more than two hours, when I felt an irresistible desire to sleep, and I have no doubt that I did slumber in this position, half in and half out of the water, for some time; for when I was roused up by losing my balance, I looked above and perceived that the sky was clear, and the stars ...
— Percival Keene • Frederick Marryat
... wouldn't shake, so he tried jumping out of the water and striking at the line with his tail. That wasn't any better, and next he rushed off up the stream as hard as he could go. But the line kept pulling him round to the left with gentle but irresistible force, and before he knew it he was back in the pool again. Wherever he went, and whatever he did, it was always pulling, pulling, pulling—not hard enough to tear the hook away, but just enough ...
— Forest Neighbors - Life Stories of Wild Animals • William Davenport Hulbert
... discovers (as sometimes happens) that the criminal is a good sort after all, he is just as likely to warn his prey, once he has all proofs of the guilt and a conviction is certain. Possibly this is his way of taking the sting from his irresistible impulse to ferret out hidden mysteries. But it is rather inconvenient, and he has hurt himself by it—hurt himself badly. They were tired of his peculiarities at the capital, and wanted to make his years an excuse to discharge him. I happened to get wind of it, and it was my weakness for ...
— The Case of the Golden Bullet • Grace Isabel Colbron, and Augusta Groner
... effect produced by poisons on animals is still more plain to see: its malignity extends to every part that it reaches, and all that it touches is vitiated; it burns and scorches all the inner parts with a strange, irresistible fire. ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... irrefragable evidence; evidence that no thinking man can possibly reject. Christ's teaching, the words that I have there as coming from his mouth are irresistible evidence of his fitness to teach. But you will permit me to use no such evidence. I must take it all, from the beginning of my career, before I can look into its intrinsic truth. And it must be all true ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... as if by an irresistible impulse, for he was then passing the residence of Dr. Dutton. Why he did so he could not satisfy himself, for he half expected to see Miss Nellie at the window, and he dreaded meeting her eyes; yet there was a strange fascination about the house, and with this sense of dread, strong ...
— Under Fire - A Tale of New England Village Life • Frank A. Munsey
... like magic from Grace's face. "Now what have you done, you funny girl?" she asked, her sad face breaking into smiles. Emma was irresistible. ...
— Grace Harlowe's Problem • Jessie Graham Flower
... and disgust was irresistible. We all laughed. "What a guignon I have," he said. "Mr. Raymond, I believe you ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence
... conceited, my dear!" said the Queen, her good-humor and confidence beginning to be restored as she watched the fair flushed face, and those queer attractive little gestures which made her daughter's charm so irresistible. ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman
... laughter. The singer smiled and kissed back. Somehow she conveyed the sense of a confidential feeling as if she were doing it for each separate person in the audience, and each person had an impulse to respond. It was irresistible, it was maddening, it swept ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... black-haired and black-eyed girl of about fourteen years of age, but upon whose infantile brow fell the shadow of some fearful woe. There was something awful in the despair "on that face so young" that bound the gazer in an irresistible and most painful spell. And Capitola remained standing before it transfixed, until the striking of the hall clock aroused her from her enchantment. Wondering who the young creature could have been, what had been her history and, above all, what had been the nature of that fearful woe that darkened ...
— Capitola the Madcap • Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... strengthen every day. I have been ill for the last fortnight; and possibly physical causes have contributed to shroud my mind in this thick darkness. Yet I can not believe that conviction so clear, conclusions so irresistible as those which weigh me down, are entirely the result of morbid physical action. In order to prove that they are not, and to have the means of judging hereafter of the rationalness of my present judgments, I will record the grounds of my despondency. As nearly as I can recollect, ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... with respect to our communications with the dead, namely, that it is natural that we should remain at home, in our own world, as long as we can, as long as we are not violently driven from it by a series of irresistible and incontrovertible proofs coming from the neighbouring abyss. The survival of a spirit is no more improbable than the prodigious faculties which we are obliged to attribute to the mediums if we deny them to ...
— The Unknown Guest • Maurice Maeterlinck
... and as he grew old some tendency to be stout, but with snowy hair and much personal dignity, he seems to have had an irresistible charm of manner toward those whom he wished ...
— The Emancipation of Massachusetts • Brooks Adams
... said one of the prisoners) of the enemy; we had shown that when N.C.O.'s became casualties, private soldiers were ready to assume command and become leaders, and, most important of all, the battle had proved to each individual soldier that if he went with his bayonet he was irresistible. ...
— The Fifth Leicestershire - A Record Of The 1/5th Battalion The Leicestershire Regiment, - T.F., During The War, 1914-1919. • J.D. Hills
... with their wives, taken from a lot of toy Noah's arks. As the carriage rolled between the two files, all the funny little women bobbed a simultaneous courtesy, and all the little old-fashioned men lifted their hats with the most irresistible gravity conceivable. "Fancy such a thing happening in the United States!" said Lynde. "If we were to meet such a crowd at home, half a dozen urchins would immediately fasten themselves to the hind axle, and some of the more playful spirits would probably favor ...
— The Queen of Sheba & My Cousin the Colonel • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... notwithstanding this strong and, as Mrs. Ludgate would have thought it, irresistible recommendation. "Now you must have it: it will become you a thousand times better than that you have on," cried Mrs. Ludgate, insisting the more the more Lucy withdrew; "and, besides, you must wear it for my sake. You won't? Then I take it very ill of you that you ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... might have suggested this profession to me at a later date. It is probable; but then I should have had no time for it. Would any workman, artisan, or tradesman give up a certainty, however slight it may be, to yield to a passion which would be surely regarded as a mania? Hence my irresistible penchant for the mysterious could only be followed at this precise period of ...
— The Lock and Key Library/Real Life #2 • Julian Hawthorne
... to teach them. So Linda realized that Mary Louise had been told about the trousseau. She knew, even lacking as she was in feminine sophistication, that there were two open roads to the heart of a woman. One is a wedding and the other is a baby. The lure of either is irresistible. ...
— Her Father's Daughter • Gene Stratton-Porter
... him and inspired by his presence, they wheeled as he dashed down their broken lines and, madly cheering, hurled themselves upon their pursuers. Completely surprised by this unexpected recovery, the Confederates faltered and the Union troops, gathering force as they charged, rolled them back with irresistible fury and finally swept them completely from the field. Indeed, Early's force was so badly shattered and scattered by this overwhelming defeat that it virtually abandoned the Valley and Sheridan continued his work of destruction almost unopposed, until the whole region was so barren that, ...
— On the Trail of Grant and Lee • Frederick Trevor Hill
... this course ends in suicide, but it only cost Gerfaut a portion of his slender patrimony; he bore this loss like a man who feels that he is strong enough to repair it. When his plans were once made, he followed them up with indefatigable perseverance, and became a striking example of the irresistible power of intelligence united to will-power. Reputation, for him, lay in the unknown depths of an arid and rocky soil; he was obliged, in order to reach it, to dig a sort of artesian well. Gerfaut accepted this heroic labor; he worked day and night for several years, his ...
— Gerfaut, Complete • Charles de Bernard
... education, the subjection of all to the same laws, the growing demands of commerce, and travelling together in railway-carriages. The attractions of the railway, notwithstanding its disregard of class distinctions, are irresistible. Thousands of pilgrims thus make their way to distant shrines, though by travelling in this easy fashion they lose the merit which suffering would bring. When railways were constructed, a proposal ...
— Life and Work in Benares and Kumaon, 1839-1877 • James Kennedy
... by another assembly which we have no right to choose, and which has this right of controul in itself unalienable. But the question still recurs, How came this right to be in the British parliament? Chronus says that "admitting that we are all one dominion, there is, and must be, a supreme, irresistible, absolute, uncontrouled authority, in which must reside the power of making and establishing laws," "and all others must conform to it, and be govern'd by it". But if we are all one dominion; or if I understand him, the members of one state, tho' so remotely situated, the kingdom from the Colonies, ...
— The Writings of Samuel Adams, volume II (1770 - 1773) - collected and edited by Harry Alonso Cushing • Samuel Adams
... corrupting influence at once; it accumulated force as time went on. The irresistible pull of that knowledge has brought me to the point where I know not whether it is heredity, or the knowledge of it, which presses upon me—which has driven me like a slave. At times I feel certain that the last message of Judge Colfax, rather ...
— The Blue Wall - A Story of Strangeness and Struggle • Richard Washburn Child
... much as said, "Beauty has been the gleam which the instinct of the race has followed in its upward development. Beauty has been the genius of Evolution." Thus science has lent its authority to philosophy. The idea is charming. In its power it is irresistible. It certainly dominates modern literary art, being the principal dynamic of Ibsen and Bernard ...
— A Tramp's Sketches • Stephen Graham
... wall of Trinity they will think of that gracious undergraduate who saw in the flower's sure recurrence a prophecy that he would abide for ever with the Benign Mother of his days—a prophecy that Faith, in her wisdom or her folly, suffered not to be fulfilled. Yes; autobiography is irresistible.—The ...
— Selected Prose of Oscar Wilde - with a Preface by Robert Ross • Oscar Wilde
... little sylph, resting on the tiniest of feet, with hands so charming that you would feel an almost irresistible desire to fold them caressingly within your own—the rich complexion of a brunette with the bloom of Hebe on her cheek—her hair like burnished jet—eyes large, lustrous and black—but (alas that there should be a but!) poor Ursula ...
— Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXII No. 4, April 1848 • Various
... he lives," said the lad, hesitating, and drawing a step forward as if held in that presence by some irresistible influence. ...
— The Old Homestead • Ann S. Stephens
... ancients represented as lightning, bearing down every opposer; this the power which has turned whole assemblies into astonishment, admiration, and awe; that is described by the torrent, the flame, and every other instance of irresistible impetuosity.—Goldsmith. ...
— Pearls of Thought • Maturin M. Ballou
... white and fanciful opera-cloaks; the gay rich dresses; the floating ribbons; the marvellous chevelures; the pearl-gray, the dove, and "tan" gloves, holding the jewelled fans and the beautiful bouquets—the smile, the sparkle, the grace, the superb and irresistible dandyism that we all know so well in the days of golden youth—they were all there, and the warm atmosphere was sweet with the thick odor of heliotrope, the very scent of ...
— From the Easy Chair, vol. 1 • George William Curtis
... Do not despise the stuff God put into you. Train and discipline it the best you can, and use it. And in using it you will be training it. The best training is in use. Brains and pains and prayer are an irresistible trinity. When the gray matter and the finger tips and the knees get into a combination ...
— Quiet Talks on Service • S. D. Gordon
... did was done in a hurry. Katy felt as if she were being driven about by a cyclone, as they rushed from one sight to another, filling up all the chinks between with shopping, which was irresistible where everything was so pretty and so wonderfully cheap. She herself purchased a tortoise-shell fan and chain for Rose Red, and had her monogram carved upon it; a coral locket for Elsie; some studs for Dorry; and for her father a small, beautiful vase of bronze, ...
— What Katy Did Next • Susan Coolidge
... peoples, somewhat modified, just as in the written laws of all Christian nations. Had crime not existed prior to this heavenly edict, there would have been little apparent reason for this ancient pronouncement through a Hebrew medium. The conclusion seems then to be irresistible—that mankind coveted, stole, lied, were disobedient to parents, were adulterers and murderers from the earliest times, and only ceased to be so, measurably, in proportion as the sanctions of law were strong or weak. The Christian religion and civilizations ...
— Twentieth Century Negro Literature - Or, A Cyclopedia of Thought on the Vital Topics Relating - to the American Negro • Various
... seemed to her that she must be alone for a time, to try to think out what was to happen; but now she saw that she had no need to think. Of the complex nervous and emotional reaction which had brought her flying home, she had, indeed, seemed to understand nothing except that it was irresistible; her mind was like a dark cloud, refusing to yield up its meanings. Nevertheless, there seemed to be no doubt as to ...
— V. V.'s Eyes • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... She hugged me close in her arms, and at the moment of spending involuntarily heaved up her bottom. This was the very moment I was with difficulty waiting for. I retired a little and plunged forward with irresistible force. I burst my way through every barrier, up to the very roots of my prick. The attack was as painful as unexpected. Miss Evelyn gave a shriek of agony and swooned away. I at once improved the opportunity, and thrusting in and out with the utmost vigour, broke down every ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous
... the light sledge. As the days pass, the Laps watch them more and more closely, well knowing what will happen sooner or later. And then at last, in the northern twilight, the great herd begins to move. The impulse is simultaneous, irresistible, their heads are all turned in one direction. They move slowly at first, biting still, here and there, at the bunches of rich moss. Presently the slow step becomes a trot, they crowd closely together while ...
— A Cigarette-Maker's Romance • F. Marion Crawford
... takes me to write this, Pornic's body was divided, in some unclear way or other; the men and women had dragged the fragments on to the platform and were preparing their normal meal. Gunga Dass cooked mine. The almost irresistible impulse to fly at the sand walls until I was wearied laid hold of me afresh, and I had to struggle against it with all my might. Gunga Dass was offensively jocular till I told him that if he addressed another ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... that she had been drawn into the circle of intense public interest which surrounded the red-headed stranger; she remembered on the other hand that her father would be furious if she exchanged two words with the man. And for that very reason she was intrigued. Donnegan, being forbidden fruit, was irresistible. So she let the smile come to her lips and eyes, and then ...
— Gunman's Reckoning • Max Brand
... Mr. Snowford; and practically all commercial activities had ceased on the instant. By fifteen-and-a-half all stores were closed, the Stock Exchange, the City offices, the West End establishments—all had as by irresistible impulse suspended business, and from within two hours after noon until nearly midnight, when the police had been adequately reinforced and enabled to deal with the situation, whole mobs and armies of men, screaming squadrons of women, troops of frantic youths, had paraded the streets, ...
— Lord of the World • Robert Hugh Benson
... irresistible. Still I held off. I was balancing between my wish to go and see Aunt Bretta at Southsea and the old lady and her niece at Plymouth, and trying to find my way back to my ship. I had an idea that the latter was the right thing to do. Still, unhappily, I had not always been accustomed to ...
— Will Weatherhelm - The Yarn of an Old Sailor • W.H.G. Kingston
... proposition, and the bargain was confirmed in writing. It was not long before he felt unwell, applied to his physician, and bitters were prescribed. He had scarcely begun to use them, when he found that his appetite for ardent spirits was returning with almost irresistible violence. He foresaw the evil that would probably ensue, threw away his bitters, and dashed his bottle to pieces. He drunk no more ardent spirits till the ten years had expired, when he called on the merchant, and informed him that the conditions ...
— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society
... apparent adversity comes, be not cast down by it, but make the best of it, and always look forward for better things, for conditions more prosperous. To hold yourself in this attitude of mind is to set into operation subtle, silent, and irresistible forces that sooner or later will actualize in material form that which is today merely an idea. But ideas have occult power, and ideas, when rightly planted and rightly tended, are the seeds that ...
— Thoughts I Met on the Highway • Ralph Waldo Trine
... forms, the mere mockeries of the understanding. The less definite, the less bodily the conception, the more vast, unformed, and unsubstantial, the nearer does it approach to some resemblance of that omnipresent, lasting, universal, irresistible principle, which every where, and at some time or other, exerts its power over all things. Death is a mighty abstraction, like Night, or Space, or Time. He is an ugly customer, who will not be invited to supper, or to sit for his picture. He is with us and about ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... he had to deal: the President of the Federation (the Emperor), who was King of Prussia, the Council, the Prussian Parliament, the German Parliament, and the Prussian Ministry. Now in the Council he presided, and also represented the will of Prussia, which was almost irresistible, for if the Constitution was to work well there must be harmony of intention between Prussia and the Federal Government; here therefore he could generally carry out his policy: but in the Prussian Ministry he ...
— Bismarck and the Foundation of the German Empire • James Wycliffe Headlam
... master was to be absent, and that, in consequence, the party having it under his entire control, could cut and slash without being interfered with, the value of the situation was greatly enhanced. It had also another irresistible attraction, the absence of the master would enable the overseer to engage in the customary picking and stealing operations, with ...
— The Garies and Their Friends • Frank J. Webb
... days. He held the reins listlessly over the horses, who moved slowly along, as though they were half asleep. Coach and horses and driver were so dead and alive, so Rip Van Winkle-like, that the temptation was almost irresistible to stir them up, to wake them out of their dream. To Teddy, with his native love of ...
— The Rushton Boys at Rally Hall - Or, Great Days in School and Out • Spencer Davenport
... The motive for this elevation, which was unfathomable then, is evident enough now. Prince Lichnowsky was known to be an Anglophile; everything English—English literature, English country life, English public men—had for him an irresistible charm; and his greatest ambition as a diplomat had been to maintain the most cordial relations between his own country and Great Britain. This was precisely the type of Ambassador that fitted into the Imperial ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume I • Burton J. Hendrick
... is something more than this life—agencies, subtler and more powerful mayhap than those our senses are commonly cognizant of. I say I have had experience of this truth, and of them. You laugh! and I suppose will laugh on, until that irresistible old gentleman-usher, DEATH, presents you to other realities face ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... my favorite waltz, Daisy," he said, as the music of the irresistible "Blue Danube" floated out to them. "Will you favor me ...
— Daisy Brooks - A Perilous Love • Laura Jean Libbey
... has fallen short of his child's trust and confidence knows that look. To Duncan its appeal was irresistible. He had his hand in his pocket, clutching the still considerable remains of what Kellogg had termed his grubstake, before he ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... squealed in delighted surprise. Lydia was carried away by one of her own childlike impulses of gayety, and burrowed bear-like, growling savagely, in the soft flesh. Ariadne doubled up, shrieking with laughter, the irresistible laughter of childhood. Lydia laughed in response, and the two were off for one of their rollicking frolics. They were like a couple of kittens together. Finally, "Come, dear; we must get our breakfasts," said Lydia, leading along the little girl, still flushed and ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... to a funeral, you know), it is utterly impossible to resist him; especially as he makes the strangest remarks the mind of man can conceive, without any intention of being funny, but rather meaning to be philosophical. I really cried with an irresistible sense of his comicality all the way; but when he was dressed out in a black cloak and a very long black hat-band by an undertaker (who, as he whispered me with tears in his eyes—for he had known H—— many years—was a "character, and he would like to sketch him"), I ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 3 (of 3), 1836-1870 • Charles Dickens
... human mind advances gradually from Polytheism to Monotheism, through the intermediate stage of the idea of Immutability or Destiny,—an idea suggested partly by the study of the invariable order of Nature, and partly by the irresistible domination of one great temporal power, such as the iron empire of Rome.[63] Historically, indeed, Monotheism is said to have spread in Europe through the Jews, who derived it from Egypt; but it ...
— Modern Atheism under its forms of Pantheism, Materialism, Secularism, Development, and Natural Laws • James Buchanan
... if it be the head-dress you assumed one day some months ago for my peculiar punishment, I pray you will not try its efficacy on the Spaniard; for it serves but to make you the more irresistible." ...
— Margaret Tudor - A Romance of Old St. Augustine • Annie T. Colcock
... on "sick certificate," and arrived in England in the early part of June 1855. The Crimean war was then at its height, and the military authorities were beating up for recruits in every corner of the land. This summons for war was irresistible. I was suffering a little from blindness, brought on probably by my late losses and impoverishment of blood.[31] Still I lost no time in volunteering my services to take part in this great national object, thinking it was a duty, as a soldier, I owed my country, and ...
— What Led To The Discovery of the Source Of The Nile • John Hanning Speke
... cannot tell a lie, so I must admit regretfully that you have guessed right. Indeed, Miss Vanrenen, I may go so far as to suggest, by letter, that before my father condemns me he should first meet you. Of course, I shall warn him that you are irresistible." ...
— Cynthia's Chauffeur • Louis Tracy
... or any of its members, and withal, as the favors conferred, came at times when the cause was peculiarly in need (the Committee oft-times being destitute of clothing or money), the idea that the Underground Rail Road was providentially favored, in this respect, was irresistible. ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... LeatherStocking, and that, consequently, they alone were responsible for the damages. This opinion soon gained ground, being most circulated by those who, by their own heedlessness, had caused the evil; and there was one irresistible burst of the common sentiment that an attempt should he made to punish the offenders. Richard was by no means deaf to this appeal, and by noon he set about in earnest to see the ...
— The Pioneers • James Fenimore Cooper
... are we bound, under the guidance of modern science? An irresistible current is drawing us on, and causing us to leave the morals of Philinthe in our rear. We are coming to those which Racine has engraven in immortal traits in the person of Mathan. When once conscience is put aside, all means are good in order to succeed; and the experience of the world ...
— The Heavenly Father - Lectures on Modern Atheism • Ernest Naville |
