"On the whole" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... art was keen. On the whole he kept pretty steadily to his work, spending a good six hours at his easel every day, very absorbed over the picture in hand. He was working up into large canvases the sketches he had made along the Maine coast, great, empty expanses of sea, sky, and sand-dune, full of wind and sun. ...
— Vandover and the Brute • Frank Norris
... of its foliage, this capital is, on the whole, the finest I know in Europe. The sculptor has put his whole strength into it. I trust that it will appear among the other Venetian casts lately taken for the Crystal Palace; but if not, I have myself cast all its figures, and two of its leaves, and I intend ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume II (of 3) • John Ruskin
... those who loved him then, and far more comfort afterward to believe—nay, to know for certain—that many a man, absorbed in the restless struggle of this busy world, prosperous citizen, husband and father, had, on the whole, led a far less happy life ...
— A Noble Life • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... though sometimes a little bit testy, and, on the whole, not without faults, was as good-natured an anchorite as ever said mass or brewed a contemplative bowl of punch. If he refused to go down to the Mills, he would not have been comfortable again that night, nor indeed for a week to come. So, with a sigh, he made up his mind, got quietly ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... of the last quatrain is also very effective. The poem, on the whole, however, is chiefly to be admired for the graceful insouciance of its metre, so well in accordance with the character of the sentiments, and especially for the ease of the general manner. This "ease," or naturalness, in a literary ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various
... Thus, on the whole, my school career was neither happy nor unhappy, nor did I distinguish myself in any way, nor (though I think I was rather liked than otherwise) make any great or lasting friendships; on the other hand. I did not in any way disgrace myself, nor make a single enemy ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al
... many farm children to get to high school who could not otherwise have attended and have enabled those living near them to more easily get back and forth from the village centers for all phases of community life. On the whole, however, they have probably carried more traffic between communities, and it seems strange that they have not more generally been able to find a profit in hauling produce from the farms to the ...
— The Farmer and His Community • Dwight Sanderson
... politeness toward the sisters and to the prescription labels that I wrote for them, I obtained fortunately a cutlet now and then and a pear picked in the hospital orchard. I was, then, on the whole, the least to be pitied of all the soldiers packed together, pell-mell, in the wards, but during the first days I could not succeed even in swallowing the meagre morning dole. It was inspection hour, and the doctor chose that moment to perform his operations. The second day ...
— Sac-Au-Dos - 1907 • Joris Karl Huysmans
... surprises awaited and greeted them. They found that the large room in front was a kind of drawing-room, in which rose-leaves, china-bowls, old engravings, a shining mahogany book-case, and a yellow-keyed piano atoned for the shortcomings of funeral horsehair and home-made carpets. They thought it on the whole a charming room, only to be eclipsed by the kitchen. For the kitchen, which was underneath the ground floor and nearly the entire size of the house, was therefore very spacious and comfortable, possessing three large pantries and an out-house or summer kitchen; besides, moreover, it was dark-raftered, ...
— Crowded Out! and Other Sketches • Susie F. Harrison
... intended. He had found the Ababdeh Arabs quiet amongst their mountains. If they were not disposed to acknowledge allegiance to Egypt, on the other hand they paid no tribute to Mahommed Achmet. The weather had been good, ibex and antelope plentiful. Durrance, on the whole, had reason to be content with his journey. And Calder sat and watched him, and disbelieved every word that he said. The other officers went about their duties; Calder remained behind, and waited until Durrance should finish. ...
— The Four Feathers • A. E. W. Mason
... which our bishop has been kept by his wife has not tended to exalt his character in the eyes of his daughters, who assume in addressing their father too much of that authority which is not properly belonging, at any rate, to them. They are, on the whole, fine engaging young ladies. They are tall and robust like their mother, whose high cheek-bones, and—we may say auburn hair they all inherit. They think somewhat too much of their grand-uncles, who have not hitherto returned the compliment ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... familiarity with composition than we should anticipate in a bad one. It is bold, rather sensational, involving a high-pressure murder and the somewhat connu father-in-difficulties with a daughter, but interesting, and on the whole likely enough—in New York, where any amount of anything may be supposed to take place at any time without in the slightest degree violating the conditions of probability. For his bete noir or grand villain, the Singular ...
— The Continental Monthly , Vol. 2 No. 5, November 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... there was little likelihood of success when he was between sixty and seventy years of age. This remark was received with general laughter, and shortly afterwards the Dewan made a judicious reply on the whole question, and said that, in his opinion, the interference of the Government was inadvisable, and that the question was one that ought to be settled by the people consulting privately on the subject. Then the Assembly turned to other matters, ...
— Gold, Sport, And Coffee Planting In Mysore • Robert H. Elliot
... "On the whole," he said to himself, "I will go to bed as I am. I may have occasion for a sudden start. It is best to ...
— The Erie Train Boy • Horatio Alger
... on. To Manchester, and to the cotton and silk industries of Lancashire generally, the tragedy of France meant on the whole a vast boom in trade. So many French rivals crippled—so much ground set free for English enterprise to capture—and, meanwhile, high profits for a certain number at least of Manchester and Macclesfield merchants, and brisk wages for the Lancashire operatives, especially for ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... or plunging us with precision to the depths. There were those at first who refused to entrust their lives to such frail hands, and there are still some who look concerned when they see a woman at the lever; but on the whole the elevator "girl" has gained the confidence of her public, and has gained it by skill, not by feminine wiles, for even men won't shoot into space with a woman at the helm whose sole equipment is charm. With need of less skill than the elevator operator, but more patience and tact in ...
— Mobilizing Woman-Power • Harriot Stanton Blatch
... explained. She grieved that her brother's suit should be discouraged, but could not persuade herself that Sylvia's decision was final. The idea of a match between those two was very pleasant to her. For Buckland she imagined it would be fraught with good results, and for Sylvia, on the whole, it might ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing
... the victory of Nelson over the French fleet in the battle of the Nile, the leading states of Europe had formed a new coalition against the French Republic. Early in 1779 the war began, and was waged in almost every part of Europe at the same time. The campaign was on the whole extremely disastrous to the French. They were driven out of Italy, and were barely able to keep the allies off the soil of France. The Tiberine and the Parthenopaean Republics ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers
... particular branch, have sometimes given to the world indifferent productions; while artists of moderate abilities have sometimes produced master-pieces far above their general standard. In a picture, which may, on the whole, merit the appellation of a chef d'oeuvre, are sometimes to be found beauties which render it superior, negligences which border on the indifferent, and defects which constitute the bad. Genius has its flights and deviations; ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... her fathers, she had shown sometimes an anxious disposition to practise the usual austerities of good Catholics. But neither doctor nor director had been able to indulge her in this respect, owing to the feebleness of her health. And on the whole she ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. I. • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... many Czech politicians foresaw that Austria's anti-Serbian policy in the Balkans and her increasing dependence on Germany must lead to war, yet on the whole the Czechs were not prepared for this contingency. The Reichsrat was closed when war broke out, and the Diet of Bohemia had been replaced by an Imperial Commission in 1913. War was declared by Austria ...
— Independent Bohemia • Vladimir Nosek
... French army to surrender arms and baggage and be treated as prisoners of war. Bismarck took no part in the discussion beyond giving the general his support, occasionally showing his teeth, like a big mastiff, inclined to be pacific on the whole, but quite ready to rend and tear should there be occasion for it. General de Wimpffen in reply protested with all the force he had at his command against these conditions, the most severe that ever were imposed on a vanquished army. He spoke of his personal ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... "And the Spirit of the Lord rests upon [Pg 211] Him," in chap. xi. 2; lxi. 1; Matt. iii. 16; John iii. 34. The three passages in Isaiah which speak of the communication of the Spirit to Christ are inseparably connected with one another, and, on the whole Old Testament territory, there is no passage exactly parallel to them. The Hiphel of [Hebrew: ica] must not be explained by "to announce," as some interpreters do; for in this signification it nowhere occurs; and ...
— Christology of the Old Testament: And a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions. Vol. 2 • Ernst Hengstenberg
... other enemies, we have multitudes of colonies which, if they had been kept on purpose to furnish food for the worms, could scarcely have answered a more valuable end in encouraging their increase. The simple truth is, that improved hives, without an improved system of management, have done on the whole more harm than good; in no country have they been so extensively used as in our own, and no where has the moth so completely gained the ascendency. Just so far as they have discouraged bee-keepers from the old plan of killing off all their weak swarms in the Fall, just so far have they ...
— Langstroth on the Hive and the Honey-Bee - A Bee Keeper's Manual • L. L. Langstroth
... disposed to give herself too much trouble, which made it possible for her ministers to wield more power over the country and its destinies. Nevertheless, the Queen had a will of her own, and made her influence felt, especially in Church matters. On the whole, however, Parliament and the Ministers gained in importance and influence during the reign. Marlborough, Harley, St. John, Rochester, Nottingham, were some of the leading ministers, and towards the end of the reign Sir Robert Walpole is first heard ...
— With Marlborough to Malplaquet • Herbert Strang and Richard Stead
... fireworks begin. Never mind; here by good luck we find seats where we can watch the throng passing and repassing. It is a great review of the people. On the whole, how respectable they are, how sober, how deadly dull! See how worn-out the poor girls are becoming, how they gape, what listless eyes most of them have! The stoop in the shoulders so universal among them merely means over-toil in the workroom. Not one in a thousand ...
— The House of Cobwebs and Other Stories • George Gissing
... the ashless tip of his cigar. "I have thought it over," he said, "and, on the whole, Delbridge, I am sure your name will help the bank's standing, and I hope you and Saunders will ...
— The Desired Woman • Will N. Harben
... where a full supply of coal was to be shipped, a gale was encountered, and much water came on board, resulting in damage to the stores. Some water leaked into the living quarters and, on the whole, several very uncomfortable days were spent. Such inconvenience at the outset undoubtedly did good, for many of the crew, evidently not prepared for emergency conditions, left at Cardiff. The scratch crew with which the 'Aurora'journeyed to Hobart composed for the most ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... lived at Oxford, and was often of our parties. She was a very ingenious poetess, and published a volume of poems; and, on the whole, was a most sensible, agreeable, and amiable woman. She was a sister to the Reverend River Jones, Chanter of Christ Church Cathedral at Oxford, and Johnson used to call her the Chantress. I have heard him often address her in this passage from ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... done well, Morgan," praised Marsh. "I believe on the whole that, while I have secured some valuable information, your work has really brought us the nearest to the ...
— The Sheridan Road Mystery • Paul Thorne
... But, on the whole, having stood by his rights as he had, and having the pleasant consciousness of being true to his own principles, he was disposed to feel a glow of commendation, and later in the evening as Helen's splendid picture looked ...
— The High Calling • Charles M. Sheldon
... SHAKSPEARE, we mean—SHAKSPEARE the sonnetteer. Both in the 'Revolt of Islam' and 'Tarquin and Lucrece,' blemishes resembling his own constantly occur. It will nevertheless be gratifying to his many ardent admirers to perceive that on the whole he has exhibited a more definite approach to what he is capable of accomplishing, and that in proportion as he has grown less vague and ethereal, less fond of personifying sounds and sentiments, so has he advanced toward ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, February 1844 - Volume 23, Number 2 • Various
... to see your wife crying when she writes—especially if you are conscious that, on the whole, your treatment of her has been reasonable and kind. It is not good, when you accidentally look over her shoulder, to see that she is writing to a man. Nor should she shake her fist at you when she leaves the room, under the impression that you are ...
— Where Angels Fear to Tread • E. M. Forster
... well on the whole. But no system is infallible. There must be occasional oversights, and you have been the victim of one. I mention this to disabuse your mind of the idea of any intentional neglect. Well, Mrs. Lovegrove, and so our good friends Mrs. Porcher and Miss Hart have gone—estimable women both ...
— The Far Horizon • Lucas Malet
... express them freely. She had but two closely intimate friends in the world, and by both of them this freedom of expression had now been fully permitted to her since she was a child. Miss Le Smyrger and her father were well accustomed to her ways, and on the whole well satisfied with them. The former was equally free and equally warm-tempered as herself, and as Mr. Woolsworthy was allowed by his daughter to be quite paramount on his own subject—for he had a subject—he did not object ...
— The Parson's Daughter of Oxney Colne • Anthony Trollope
... extinguishing the flame. This calumny becomes more dangerous at a period when the English detachments are wasting the south; when, under the protection of some frigates, corps of fifteen hundred men are repairing to Virginia, without our being able to get to them. On the whole continent, with the exception of the Islands of Newport, it is physically impossible that we should carry on an offensive war without ships, and even on those Islands the difficulty of transportation, the scarcity of provisions, and many other inconveniences, render all attempts too ...
— Memoirs, Correspondence and Manuscripts of General Lafayette • Lafayette
... these efforts of Mr. Choate and the wonderful way in which he could expose a current delusion, or what he thought was one, and produce an impression not only on his audience but on the whole community, when his speech was printed in the newspapers, was a kind of effort which necessarily required preparation. In all the many times I heard him, both at home and abroad, he never had a failure and sometimes made ...
— My Memories of Eighty Years • Chauncey M. Depew
... On the whole, however, it seems to me that we do not know enough of the essential personal tone of Erasmus Darwin's character to attempt more than a superficial comparison; and I am left with an impression that, in spite of many resemblances, the two men were of a different ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... judicial system. The High Court of this country has, in the absence of representation, been the sole guardian of our liberties. Although it has on the whole done its work ably, affairs are in a very unsatisfactory position. The judges have been underpaid, their salaries have never been secure, the most undignified treatment has been meted out to them, and the status and independence of the Bench have on more than one occasion ...
— The Transvaal from Within - A Private Record of Public Affairs • J. P. Fitzpatrick
... baskets of numerous young women, who hand them round, and press their customers to purchase. Police-officers superintend these resorts, to remove those who are violent and interfere with the amusements of others. On the whole, it is a very gay scene, and is resorted to by seamen of all nations, with a sprinkling of those who are not sailors, but who like amusement, and there are plenty of females who are ready to dance with them, ...
— Snarley-yow - or The Dog Fiend • Frederick Marryat
... a few damaged shins and broken heads since I came to this location," said Jonas, "but such accidents occur chiefly among the Canadian French, who seem on the whole to be ...
— Wrecked but not Ruined • R.M. Ballantyne
... Bunsen shrewdly remarks, "there is nothing like standing within the Bude-light of royalty to make one conspicuous, and sharpen perceptions and recollections." (II. p. 8.) Bunsen complained, no doubt, now and then, about excessive official work, yet he seemed on the whole reconciled to his position, and up to the year 1847 we hear of no attempts to escape from diplomatic bondage. In a letter to Mrs. ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller
... the English royal family, and a Protestant. All the Catholics in Scotland took her side. At length the Earl of Arran, who was the regent, changed to that side; and finally the government, being thus brought over, gave notice to King Henry VIII. that the plan must be given up, as they had concluded, on the whole, that Mary should not marry ...
— Mary Queen of Scots, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... (as far as I recollect) gilt scroll work; on the keys has been bestowed a great deal of labour and curious taste. Each of the sharps, or short keys, is composed of a number (perhaps thirty) of bits of pearl, &c., well wrought together. On the whole it is an object well worthy of the attention of ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 338, Saturday, November 1, 1828. • Various
... Lightfoot, who had Dr. Eales once again in her back rooms, keeping out of sight, while the good Dean was actually in prison for using the Prayer-book. Three soldiers were quartered upon her at the Wheatsheaf, and though, on the whole, they were more civil and much less riotous than some of her Cavalier lodgers had been, she was always in dread of their taking offence at the doctor and hauling him ...
— Under the Storm - Steadfast's Charge • Charlotte M. Yonge
... should perish. To the godless soul, immersed in material things, and blind to the light of God's wooing love, the transition to that other form of existence is likewise the transition to the field for the manifestation of the retributive energy of God's righteousness. Here and now His judgment on the whole slumbers. The consequences of our deeds are inherited, indeed, in many a merciful sorrow, in many a paternal chastisement, in many a partial exemplification of the wages of sin as death. But the harvest is not fully grown nor ripened yet; it is not reaped in all its extent; the bitter bread ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... these persons are able to see that we do not make assertions, and are unable to produce proof, like those fables that are told of the reputed sons of Jupiter. For with what reason should we believe of a crucified man that He is the first-born of the unbegotten God, and Himself will pass judgment on the whole human race, unless we found testimonies concerning Him published before He came and was born as a man, and unless we saw that things ...
— A Source Book for Ancient Church History • Joseph Cullen Ayer, Jr., Ph.D.
... handsomely fitted up. Elizabeth, after slightly surveying it, went to a window to enjoy its prospect. The hill, crowned with wood, which they had descended, receiving increased abruptness from the distance, was a beautiful object. Every disposition of the ground was good; and she looked on the whole scene, the river, the trees scattered on its banks and the winding of the valley, as far as she could trace it, with delight. As they passed into other rooms these objects were taking different positions; but from every window there were beauties to be seen. ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... barrier between man and the brute. Either we take the word "reason" in the wider sense, and then it is found in the higher mammals (ape, dog, elephant, horse) just as well as in most men; or else in the narrower sense, and then it is lacking in most men just as much as in the majority of animals. On the whole, we may still say of man's reason what Goethe's ...
— The Evolution of Man, V.2 • Ernst Haeckel
... own terms of employment with their employers. The local unions are obliged to pay their tithe into the greater treasury, to make stated reports, to appoint a certain roster of committees, and in certain small matters to conform to the requirements of the national union. On the whole, however, they are independent little democracies confederated, with others of their kind, by means ...
— The Armies of Labor - Volume 40 in The Chronicles Of America Series • Samuel P. Orth
... mere speculative insanities, we may be for a moment amused with the wild incoherencies of the patients; but when we reflect that out of these hideous misconceptions of the principle of evil arose the belief in witchcraft—that this was no dead faith, but one operating on the whole being of society, urging on the wisest and the mildest to deeds of murder, or cruelties scarcely less than murder—that the learned and the beautiful, young and old, male and female, were devoted ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... North it is usually sown in the early spring. This also is in a great majority of instances the best time for sowing. In many locations it may be sown with safety as soon as the winter snows have gone. On the whole, the earlier that it is sown in the spring the better, that the young plants may have all the benefit possible from the moisture, which is more abundant than later. But there are certain areas, as, for instance, in the northerly limits of ...
— Clovers and How to Grow Them • Thomas Shaw
... Sundays?—No; on all fete days, and throughout, I think you see the working man, with his wife, happier in the gardens or in the suburbs of a town, and on the whole in a happier state; there is less desire to get as much out of him for the money as they can; less of that desire to oppress him and to use him as a machine than there is in England. But, observe, I do not lean upon that ...
— On the Old Road, Vol. 2 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin
... ended in his determining that on the whole he had better curb his impatience until reaching Beaufort. At the postoffice he might get in touch with ...
— Motor Boat Boys Down the Coast - or Through Storm and Stress to Florida • Louis Arundel
... one-half and disposing of some bonds. That evening they drew checks and settled everything in full. Thereafter Elsie gave the orders, checked the accounts at the end of the month, and made out the checks for Mr. Middleton to sign. On the whole she did remarkably well and reduced the general expenses considerably. She made mistakes, but they were few; for her mind was of the type that takes to figures and details, and she was naturally methodical ...
— Elsie Marley, Honey • Joslyn Gray
... depended, no doubt, too much on occasion, as do so many motor-drivers. All the same, his stories always got home, and, strangely enough, this perpetual speeding-up of his mind never seemed to injure it or to wear it out. On the whole, his stories and his quotations were splendid, though I confess one dared not verify his dates and facts and quoted words, for fear of spoiling a real work of art. Strangely enough, he was nearly always accurate in the spirit if not in the letter. Some day I should ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey
... protection, still at Kenilworth, if she chose to make her wrongs public, the Countess might have Tressilian for her advocate, and the Queen for her judge; for so much Janet had learned in her short conference with Wayland. She was, therefore, on the whole, reconciled to her lady's proposal of going towards Kenilworth, and so expressed herself; recommending, however, to the Countess the utmost caution in making her ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... Garie, the gentleman who sat at the head of the table, to attract more than ordinary attention. He had the ease of manner usual with persons whose education and associations have been of a highly refined character, and his countenance, on the whole, was pleasing, and indicative of ...
— The Garies and Their Friends • Frank J. Webb
... Garry. "On the whole, it is better for us to play a lone hand in this game, without taking anyone into our confidence, except you, Miss Ruth, for without you we might have failed tonight, and Phil ...
— The Ranger Boys and the Border Smugglers • Claude A. Labelle
... watch!'' and the crew said that, ever since they had been on the coast, they had had "watch and watch'' while going from port to port; and, in fact, all things showed that, though strict discipline was kept, and the utmost was required of every man in the way of his duty, yet, on the whole, there was good usage on board. Each one knew that he must be a man, and show himself such when at his duty, yet all were satisfied with the treatment; and a contented crew, agreeing with one another, and finding no fault, was a contrast indeed with ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... spires of these evergreens with their note of deathless spring that mainly caught the eye on the whole landscape this dead winter day. Under the silvery-violet light of the sky they waited in beauty and in peace: the pale green of larch and spruce which seems always to go with the freshness of dripping Aprils; the dim blue-gray of pines which rather belongs to far-vaulted summer skies; ...
— Bride of the Mistletoe • James Lane Allen
... clothes,' was his reply. 'They were the best I could get. When I realized that I was alive, I was half naked; I was very weak and ill, too. I picked up these things,' and he glanced at his motley garments, 'where and how I could. On the whole, however, people were very kind to me. When I got to Bombay, my feeling was that ...
— "The Pomp of Yesterday" • Joseph Hocking
... at last, and it seems to me just a nice size, and on the whole very taking. I've put a touch or two more to the preface, and I'm sadly afraid there's a naughty note somewhere. I hope you won't find it, and that you will like the order the things ...
— Hortus Inclusus - Messages from the Wood to the Garden, Sent in Happy Days - to the Sister Ladies of the Thwaite, Coniston • John Ruskin
... see a similar state of things, a waiting crowd. A passive, content, strange mixed lot of humans. Some of them who have been well educated, but are now reaping the harvest that follows the sowing of wild oats. The submerged males are, on the whole, less repulsive than the women; dirt is less in evidence, and they exhibit a better standard of health. But many of them are harking back to nature, and remind us of the pictures we have seen ...
— London's Underworld • Thomas Holmes
... to be found blended, in various proportions, in these several treatises, and rendered the task of decision the more embarrassing. The committee were thus unable to select any one, two, or three, as on the whole preferable to the remainder of these four. They therefore awarded the premium, which the benevolent donor has increased to $400, to be divided equally among these four manuscripts;" one of which is here ...
— The Faithful Steward - Or, Systematic Beneficence an Essential of Christian Character • Sereno D. Clark
... A Development of Character, and a long Letter; a Chapter, on the whole, more important than ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... front rank of the nations of the world. Under him, as under President McKinley, progress has been remarkably rapid. In the uttermost parts of the world our Flag is respected as it was never respected before. Perhaps some few mistakes have been made, but on the whole our advancement has been justified, and is eminently satisfactory. The future is large with possibilities, and it remains for the generation I am addressing to rise up and embrace those opportunities and make ...
— American Boy's Life of Theodore Roosevelt • Edward Stratemeyer
... B.C.), though he could not free himself altogether from the primitive tendency to accept the marvellous as true because it is marvellous and without regard to its probability—in fact because of its improbability—yet on the whole showed a determination to investigate, and to see things for himself, and left in his writings an immense series of first-rate original observations. He had far more of the modern scientific spirit ...
— More Science From an Easy Chair • Sir E. Ray (Edwin Ray) Lankester
... came to him, swift and overwhelming. Once he had lived in this world and taken it as a matter of course. He had known these people, gone about with them; they had seemed friendly, obliging, a good sort of people on the whole. And now, what a change! They seemed no longer friendly! Was the change in them? Or was it Hal who had become cynical—so that he saw them in this terrifying new light, cold, and unconcerned as the stars about men who were ...
— King Coal - A Novel • Upton Sinclair
... commercial stand-point, the firm agreeing that not only have their employees done more, but better, work than ever before. One of the firm assured me that, while there were, of course, many discouraging things and occasionally an employee who showed little appreciation, on the whole there had been a steady improvement during their three years' experience in this factory, and under no circumstances would they be willing to go back to ...
— White Slaves • Louis A Banks
... on the whole, well written, and was popular enough in its day. The first edition, published in 1788, was followed by a second in 1791, and a third in 1796. To make it still more attractive, Mr. Johnson engaged Blake, whom he was then befriending, to illustrate ...
— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... feel daring. She looked up—suddenly—at the other boy—square. To be sure, she looked down quicker, that part being involuntary, as well as the blush that followed. The blush was disconcerting, but the sensation, on the whole, was pleasurable. ...
— Emmy Lou - Her Book and Heart • George Madden Martin
... exact account of my proceedings, if you like. First, I had a personal interview with Simpkins; and I may as well say at once that I was on the whole favourably impressed by him. I don't mean to say that he ought not to be killed, but merely that if left to myself I would not go out of my way to kill him. I next talked the matter over with Doyle and Dr. O'Donoghue. I found that they quite agreed with you; and the doctor is prepared ...
— The Simpkins Plot • George A. Birmingham
... on the whole operating for good or evil, are things inseparable from free government. This is a truth which, I believe, admits little dispute, having been established by the uniform experience of all ages. The part a good citizen ought to take in these divisions has been a ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. I. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... touched the quarter-deck. It is as the man and his wife say, and I'll not give them up, out here in blue water, for as much foam as lies on Jersey beach after an easterly blow. It will not be any of the family of Davis that will satisfy yonder wind-eater; but he will lay his hand on the whole family of the Montauk, leaving them the agreeable alternative of going back to Portsmouth in his pleasant society, or getting out here in mid-channel, and wading ashore as best they can. D—- me! If I believe, Leach, ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper
... thought, in those days, a good thing to give ships' companies the advantage of a hot and cold climate alternately. The cold was to drive away the yellow fever, and the heat to cure us of frostbites, to which we might be subjected at Halifax or up the Saint Lawrence. We preferred, on the whole, the West Indies, for, being constantly at sea, we had not much sickness on board. We took a good many of the enemy's merchant vessels, which struck without offering much resistance; but, though they assisted to fill our pockets, we gained little honour, or glory, or a chance of promotion. ...
— Ben Burton - Born and Bred at Sea • W. H. G. Kingston
... On the whole, however, court life did not have much charm for Lafayette. It was a part of the duty of the Marquis and Marchioness de Lafayette to take part in the plays and merrymakings that centered about a queen who loved amusement ...
— Lafayette • Martha Foote Crow
... of all this, no one will say, however much in matters of detail we may have erred in judgment, that Great Britain has failed to secure for herself, on the whole, a considerable number of miscellaneous commercial and political advantages from the facheuse situation arising out of an attitude on the part of the Chinese so hostile ...
— An Inevitable Awakening • ARTHUR JUDSON BROWN
... thirty-seven years of age when he came to the colonies as governor of New York on behalf of the Duke of York. He was a lawyer, and a man of energy and ability; and his career was on the whole successful, from the point of view of his employers and himself; his tenure of office in New York was eight years; he was governor of New England from 1686 to 1689, when he was seized and thrown in jail by the ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... or the waistcoat in some violent cases. Says they have some patients who do not generally wear clothes. Thinks confinement or restraint may be imposed as a punishment with some advantage, and, on the whole, thinks fear the most effectual principle by which to reduce the insane to orderly conduct. Instance: I observed a young woman chained by the arm to the wall in a small room with a large fire and several other ...
— Chapters in the History of the Insane in the British Isles • Daniel Hack Tuke
... 9. On the whole, Cyrus evidently used the greatest speed throughout the march, and made no delay, except where he halted in order to obtain a supply of provisions, or for some other necessary purpose; thinking that the quicker he went, the more unprepared he should find the king when he engaged ...
— The First Four Books of Xenophon's Anabasis • Xenophon
... was very much obliged to Jack for helping him with the trap, but he did not care to be on familiar terms with him. He was not the right sort of boy for a companion. On the whole he was sorry to have met him at ...
— Baby Pitcher's Trials - Little Pitcher Stories • Mrs. May
... miles of salt-bush plains and low monotonous scrub oppressed her when she wandered abroad. There was not one picturesque patch on the whole dreary run." ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris
... too much salt on top of the butter," I added—"all that, but on the whole we get only what we earn by the hard daily work of ploughing and planting ...
— Adventures In Friendship • David Grayson
... the North pole, the Mercator chart is worthless. How can you steer for the North pole when the meridians of your chart never come together at any pole? For the same reason, bearings of distant objects may be slightly off when laid down on this chart in a straight line. On the whole, however, the Mercator chart answers the mariner's needs so far as all practical purposes ...
— Lectures in Navigation • Ernest Gallaudet Draper
... On the whole the representation was well-balanced, with few weak spots in the acting for fault finding, even from a more captious gathering. In the costumes, it is true, the carping observer might have detected some flaws; notably in Adonis, a composite fashion plate, who ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... say that the lady was beautiful, and the little that she did say implied that you couldn't be beautiful if you looked like that. She was not beautiful (Thesiger had admitted it) in Vera's way, and on the whole he was glad to think that Vera didn't look like that; but there was, he had contended, a beauty absolute and above opinion, and the lady had it. That was all. Perhaps, now he came to think of it, he ought not to have drawn Vera's attention to her; for he knew what Vera ...
— The Return of the Prodigal • May Sinclair
... Suppose detection did come; suppose the cry of "Stop thief!" was raised. Who would quit watching a circus parade to join in a hunt for a marauder already vanished in a maze of outbuildings and alleyways? Still there were risks to be taken, and the rewards on the whole were small and uncertain. Before he reached his nineteenth year young Marr was the manager of a weighing pitch. Apparently he had but one associate in the enterprise; as a matter of fact he had four. In ...
— Sundry Accounts • Irvin S. Cobb
... also added a new stage character known as the Ghost. Seneca's elevation, to the dogmatic position of laws, of the unities of Time, Place and Action, rules by no means invariable among his older and greater masters, has been the subject of much debate, but, on the whole, the verdict has been hostile. According to these unities, the time represented in the play should not greatly exceed the time occupied in acting it, the scene of the action should not vary, and the plot should be concerned ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... with a front running clear across it in a general northwest line, several kilometres in from the point. The valley we had just left was Soghan-Dere, about seven miles from Sedd ul Bahr, and the plateau across which we were walking led, on the right, up to a ridge from which one could look down on the whole battle-field, or, to the left, straight down into the ...
— Antwerp to Gallipoli - A Year of the War on Many Fronts—and Behind Them • Arthur Ruhl
... and on the whole more pleasing, phase of the indigenous life, and also more like a phase of our own, showed itself the day of our visit to Conway, a little way from Llandudno. There, on our offering to see the ruins of the wonderful and beautiful old castle, we ...
— Seven English Cities • W. D. Howells
... But on the whole, the amount of exercise he took was insufficient for his bodily needs. Even the riding prescribed for him when he first broke down, became irksome, and was not continued very long, although his bodily machine was such as could only be ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 3 • Leonard Huxley
... it, she rather liked her own face, for she was not everlastingly trying to be some one else. It was a satisfactory face, on the whole, she thought, perfectly natural and frank, and healthy. No doubt it would have been nice to be as beautiful as a Madame de Villeneuve, or a Comtesse de Castiglione, but as that was quite impossible, it was easy to be satisfied with what she had in the way of looks and not to envy the insolent ...
— Fair Margaret - A Portrait • Francis Marion Crawford
... an excursion in the dinghy to the old place, but Emmeline refused to accompany him. He went chiefly to obtain bananas; for on the whole island there was but one clump of banana trees—that near the water source in the wood, where the old green skulls had been discovered, ...
— The Blue Lagoon - A Romance • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... briskly. "It is true you played a joke or two on me, but I flatter myself, on the whole, I paid you beforehand; and for the present the account ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 1 January 1848 • Various
... were the teachers of morality as well as of religion. Of their ethical teaching a valuable specimen is preserved in the Triads of the Welsh Bards, and from this we may gather that their views of moral rectitude were on the whole just, and that they held and inculcated many very noble and valuable principles of conduct. They were also the men of science and learning of their age and people. Whether they were acquainted with letters ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... don't believe in churches and parsons and all that," she said, "but I believe in God, and I don't believe He minds much about what you do as long as you keep your end up and help a lame dog over a stile when you can. And I think people on the whole are very nice, and I'm ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham
... that is in the enemies of God to destroy, provoke thee to make ready also, as I said a little before; go out to meet the armed men; 'David ran to meet Goliath'; rub up man,[5] put on thy harness, 'put on the whole armour of God, that thou mayest be ready,' as well as thy adversaries, as blessed Paul was here, 'I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand' (1 Sam 17:46-48). But because this will fall in fittest under the second ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... on the whole, pleased with her experiment in vicarious motherhood. Dick instinctively resented the fact that Nancy had taken Collier Pratt's daughter into her home and heart, but the child herself was a delight to him, and he spent hours romping with her and telling her stories, loading ...
— Outside Inn • Ethel M. Kelley
... to cross the border, eh? That northern intellect is strong. Able men the Scotch, a little too radical in politics, and a little too liberal, as it is called, in a matter of much greater consequence; but a superior people, on the whole. They will give you a warm reception, will the Scotch. Your name will insure that; and they are clannish; and another warm reception will, I assure you, await you here, when, returning, you again ...
— The Attache - or, Sam Slick in England, Complete • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... would find it out to be well done; but not vain of it, nor more profoundly vexed at its being found fault with, than a good saddler would be by some one's saying his last saddle was uneasy in the seat. Not, on the whole, much molested by critics, but generally understood by the men of sense, his neighbours and friends, and permitted to have his own way with the walls he had to paint, as being, on the whole, an authority about walls; receiving at the same time a good deal of daily encouragement ...
— Giotto and his works in Padua • John Ruskin
... On the whole it appears that St. Bernard's strictures are at least not without foundation in fact, in so far as they can be tested. But he can scarcely be acquitted of some measure of exaggeration in the rhetorical passages ...
— St. Bernard of Clairvaux's Life of St. Malachy of Armagh • H. J. Lawlor
... remembered that Anna was absent from school without leave one evening, and had returned alone with a young man who was unknown to the mistress. This incident was said, by some, to have completed her education rather within the usual time. Julia had herself thought her friend indiscreet, but on the whole, hardly treated—and they left the school together. This must have been St. Albans, and Anna stood fully exculpated in her eyes. The letter also announced the flattering fact, that Antonio had already left the country, ordering ...
— Tales for Fifteen: or, Imagination and Heart • James Fenimore Cooper
... We are on the whole more just than other nations. We founded ourselves upon justice, upon the doctrine that a naturally separated people had a right to their independence, that all men were politically equal and equal before the law, and that no government could be just that did ...
— The American Revolution and the Boer War, An Open Letter to Mr. Charles Francis Adams on His Pamphlet "The Confederacy and the Transvaal" • Sydney G. Fisher
... it went. We have few reliable statistics upon the subject, but on the whole, the Protestants tired of this game long before the Catholics, and the greater part of honest men and women who were burned and hanged and decapitated on account of their religious beliefs fell as victims of the very energetic but also ...
— The Story of Mankind • Hendrik van Loon
... themselves of some anecdote so appropriate that they have forgotten it. It has been supposed that the presence of women at our banquets has occasioned this fatal and inopportune desire to shine; and an argument has been founded on this circumstance in favour of their exclusion from an incident which, on the whole, has a tendency to impair that ideal which they should always study and cherish. It may be urged that if a woman eats she may destroy her spell; and that, if she will not eat, she destroys ...
— Tancred - Or, The New Crusade • Benjamin Disraeli
... failed of my object; but was on the whole more inclined than before to receive the doctrines of the Romish church; since the priest had promised to bring his evidence, on all points, from the word of God, that they (the papists) were walking in light and ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... of how Field came to hit upon this title, so appropriate to what appeared under it. The most ingenious of these was that evolved by John B. Livingstone in "An Appreciation" of Eugene Field, published in the Interior shortly after his death. In what, on the whole, is probably the best analysis of Field's genius and work extant, Mr. Livingstone ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... in ancient English history. Its survival, with many other illustrious names, is one of the strongest arguments in refutal of Professor Cortoran's theory; yet it opens no new doors to the past, and, on the whole, rather adds to ...
— The Lost Continent • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... that arose. He knew these men well from his long experience with them. Although the need for struggle against the tireless dynamics of the river was as insistent as ever; although it seemed certain that a moment's cessation of effort would permit the enemy an irretrievable gain, he called a halt on the whole work. ...
— The Riverman • Stewart Edward White
... not exactly expect you," she said, "but, on the whole, I am glad you came. Now sit down, both of you, and listen to me. What do you ...
— Mary-'Gusta • Joseph C. Lincoln
... peculiar bias was given to my own disposition in consequence of not being understood by the nurse and aunt who petted my brother, while they neglected me. Perhaps I was not a prepossessing child, but I had deeper qualities which might have been drawn out, though, on the whole, I do not regret what threw me early on my own resources. It has made me ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Matthew-in-the-Crescent—the church round the corner—but in no other kind of God whatever. They were not rich, and they were not poor; they went once a week—Fridays—to visit the poor of St. Matthew's, and found the poor of St. Matthew's on the whole unappreciative of their efforts, but that made their task the nobler. Their house was dark and musty, and filled with little articles left them by their grand-parents, their parents, and other defunct relations. They had no friendly feeling towards one another, but missed ...
— The Golden Scarecrow • Hugh Walpole
... famous story composed itself in the memory of Marius, with an expression changed in some ways from the original and on the whole graver. The petulant, boyish Cupid of Apuleius was become more like that "Lord, of terrible aspect," who stood at Dante's bedside and wept, or had at least grown to the manly earnestness of the Eros of Praxiteles. Set in ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume One • Walter Horatio Pater |
