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Active   /ˈæktɪv/   Listen
Active

adjective
1.
Tending to become more severe or wider in scope.
2.
Engaged in or ready for military or naval operations.  Synonyms: combat-ready, fighting.  "The platoon is combat-ready" , "Review the fighting forces"
3.
Disposed to take action or effectuate change.  "An active antagonism" , "He was active in drawing attention to their grievances"
4.
Taking part in an activity.  Synonym: participating.  "He was politically active" , "The participating organizations"
5.
Characterized by energetic activity.  "Active as a gazelle" , "An active man is a man of action"
6.
Exerting influence or producing a change or effect.
7.
Full of activity or engaged in continuous activity.  "An active bond market" , "An active account"
8.
In operation.  Synonym: alive.  "The tradition was still alive" , "An active tradition"
9.
(of the sun) characterized by an increased occurrence of sunspots and flares and radio emissions.
10.
Expressing that the subject of the sentence has the semantic function of actor:.
11.
(used of verbs (e.g. 'to run') and participial adjectives (e.g. 'running' in 'running water')) expressing action rather than a state of being.  Synonym: dynamic.
12.
(of e.g. volcanos) capable of erupting.
13.
(of e.g. volcanos) erupting or liable to erupt.
14.
Engaged in full-time work.  "Though past retirement age he is still active in his profession"



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"Active" Quotes from Famous Books



... our variegated existence, Lord Byron owed not only the great range of his influence as a poet, but those powers of fascination which he possessed as a man. This susceptibility, indeed, of immediate impressions, which in him was so active, lent a charm, of all others the most attractive, to his social intercourse, by giving to those who were, at the moment, present, such ascendant influence, that they alone for the time occupied all his thoughts and feelings, and brought whatever ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore

... tricks, and the violent exercise which he had to take put him into excellent training. Moreover, some cousins of the Bulls showed a very proper family spirit, and sent the eldest son, Larry, to help Mr. Atkins. So, what with Thomas being, so to speak, a new man, and Larry being very strong and active, and the shopboy coming out to lend a hand when required, the three between them began to turn the tables. They caught two or three of the marauders at last, and had them locked up; and I sincerely hope and trust that ...
— The Casual Ward - academic and other oddments • A. D. Godley

... big fellow brought out a coil of stout cord. Without much trouble he slipped a noose over one of Tom's wrists. Then began an active fight, the object of which, on the black man's part, was to make ...
— The Young Engineers on the Gulf - The Dread Mystery of the Million Dollar Breakwater • H. Irving Hancock

... your methods. You cannot expect to step up in front of a girl and stop her short as if she were a runaway horse. A horse doesn't like that sort of thing, and a girl doesn't like it. You must take more time about it. A runaway girl doesn't hurt anybody, and, if you are active enough, you can jump in behind and take the reins and stop her gradually without hurting her feelings, and then, most likely, you can drive her for all ...
— A Bicycle of Cathay • Frank R. Stockton

... Government is fitting up an expedition," he went on, "to go through the Straits of Magellan and down the east coast of Fuegia with a view of finding out something more exact in regard to the mineral and agricultural resources than has been known hitherto. I happen to have been in active correspondence for some time with the man who virtually set the thing going, and he has asked me to send him a botanist from here. Shall I offer the chance to your husband? He must go at once. It is already spring in that part of the world, and the summer at ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various

... philosophy of obedience and of the subjection of reason to authority was early taught him, and he sought to live from within, hearing only the divine law, as the worshipers of Cybele heard only the flutes. His twin brother Eustace was an active worldling, and soon he followed him to court as page to the Queen, but delighted more and more in wandering apart and building air castles. For a time he was entirely swayed, and his life directed, by a Jesuit Father, who taught him the crucifix and the ...
— Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene • G. Stanley Hall

... any evil whispers to Fanny! She, it is my belief, would have protected herself against any man's evil suggestions. But he, as the result showed, could not have intercepted the opportunities for such suggestions. Yet, why not? Was he not active? Was he not blooming? Blooming he was ...
— The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc • Thomas de Quincey

... difficulties. When a human creature resolves to dare and to do, no impediment, real or imaginary, is allowed to stand long in the way. An impulse pushes the soul forward, be it ever so reluctantly—the impulse is sometimes from heaven and sometimes from hell—but as long as it is active and peremptory, it is obeyed blindly and ...
— Innocent - Her Fancy and His Fact • Marie Corelli

... condemned by nature and fortune to an active and restless life, in two months after my return I again left my native country, and took shipping in the Downs, on the 20th day of June, 1702, in the Adventure, Captain John Nicholas, a Cornishman, commander, bound for Surat. We had a very prosperous gale till we arrived at ...
— The Children's Hour, v 5. Stories From Seven Old Favorites • Eva March Tappan

... and call for help, he will doubtless wake up some drowsy guardian of the law, but the help will be all against him. Instances have been related to me of robberies in which the police were the most active assailants, the robbers merely standing by for their share of the plunder. Should the unfortunate victim knock down a footpad or two in self-defense, it is good ground for an arrest, and both robbers ...
— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne

... such disqualifications by passing annual Acts of Indemnity. He laid stress on the loyalty which the Dissenters had shown during the Jacobite risings of 1715 and 1745, when the High Church party, which now resisted their just demands, had been 'hostile to the reigning family, and active in exciting tumults, insurrections, and rebellions.' The authority of Pitt and the eloquence of Burke were put forth in opposition to the repeal of the Test Acts, and the panic awakened by the French Revolution threw Parliament into a reactionary mood, which rendered reform in any direction ...
— Lord John Russell • Stuart J. Reid

... expression, some medium in which to register the degree and form of its activity. Such we recognize as the environment of life, the real objects among which it is placed; which it may change, or from which it may suffer change. Not only do we find our lives as unsolicited active powers, but find, as well, an arena prescribed for their exercise. That we shall act, and in a certain time and place, and with reference to certain other realities, this is the general condition of things that is encountered when each ...
— The Approach to Philosophy • Ralph Barton Perry

... How it could be a real contest she did not know; she felt sure that Lady Pickering did not love Gerald Digby, that she herself loved him she had not yet told herself, and that he loved neither of them was obvious. It seemed a mere struggle for supremacy, in which Lady Pickering's role was active and her own passive. For when she saw that Lady Pickering looked upon Gerald as a prey between them, that she seized, threatened and allured, she herself, full of a proud disdain, drew away, relinquished any hold, any faintest claim she had, handed Gerald over, as it were, to his pursuer; and ...
— Franklin Kane • Anne Douglas Sedgwick

... the day when there had always been "doings" second only to Christmas at Lindow. But she gathered up her courage like a woman. Hugh the elder was coming tonight from his dollar-a-year work in Washington, her man who had moved heaven and earth to get into active service, and who, when finally refused because of his forty-nine years and a defective eye, had left his great business as if it were a joke, and had put his whole time, and strength, and experience, and fortune at the service of the Government—as ...
— Joy in the Morning • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews

... [10] remember which upbore The bending body of my active sire; His seat beneath the honied sycamore Where [11] the bees hummed, and chair by winter fire; 220 When market-morning came, the neat attire With which, though bent on haste, myself I decked; Our watchful house-dog, that would tease and tire The ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth - Volume 1 of 8 • Edited by William Knight

... being thus gained, it seemed good to the friends of the maiden that the son of Numitorius and the brother of Icilius, young men both of them and active, should hasten with all speed to the camp, and bring Virginius thence as quickly as might be. So the two set out, and putting their horses to their full speed, carried tidings of the matter to the father. As for Appius, he sat awhile on the judgment-seat, waiting for other ...
— The Children's Hour, Volume 3 (of 10) • Various

... because he failed in attaining what his soul longed for—the removal of the Primatial chair from Canterbury to London. Anselm, not unreasonably, pronounced the attempt an audacious act of usurpation. Belmeis's health broke down. He was attacked with creeping paralysis, and sadly withdrew himself from active work, devoting himself to the foundation of the monastery of St. Osyth, in Essex. There, after lingering four years, he died, ...
— Old St. Paul's Cathedral • William Benham

... her of heartlessness, and of encouraging both his uncle and Just Trafford. She amusingly said, 'Perhaps she had, but it really didn't matter, did it?' For reply, Lawless said her interest in the whole family seemed active and impartial. He bade her not vex herself at all about him, and not to wait until he became Sir Duke Lawless, but to give preference to seniority and begin with the title at once; which he has reason since to believe ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... and the lids of these myriad urns—whereof a considerable hive will contain from sixty to eighty thousand—will break, and two large and earnest black eyes will appear, surmounted by antennae that already are groping at life, while active jaws are busily engaged in enlarging the opening from within. The nurses at once come running; they help the young bee to emerge from her prison, they clean her and brush her, and at the tip of their tongue present the first honey of the new life. But the bee, that has ...
— The Life of the Bee • Maurice Maeterlinck

... ardently to be of assistance to him; she had an acute sense of her responsibility and her duty. Yet, notwithstanding all that, her brain was perhaps chiefly occupied with herself and her own attitude towards existence. She became mentally and imaginatively active to an intense degree. She marvelled at existence as she had never marvelled before, and while seeming suddenly to understand it better she was far more than ever baffled by it. Was it credible that the accident of a lad losing control of a horse could have such huge and awful ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett

... were favorable for them to see much of active naval service, though as yet they could hardly more than guess ...
— Dave Darrin at Vera Cruz • H. Irving Hancock

... the trails passion-bent to escape pursuers, or passion-bent in his search, the constant action and toil and exhaustion made him sleep. But when in hiding, as time passed, gradually he required less rest and sleep, and his mind became more active. Little by little his phantoms gained hold on him, and at length, but for the saving power of his dreams, they would ...
— The Lone Star Ranger • Zane Grey

... times—came away from the grim presence of his commander with blasphemy on his bearded lips. The only human habitation within scores of miles of his line of march were Indian lodges, and both grass for the horses and game for the men had been fired off the face of the earth by those active foemen before the drenching wintry rain set in and chilled to the marrow the shelterless forms of starving ...
— Under Fire • Charles King

... Both of them were married, and each of them had only a son and a daughter. While Horatio had been remarkably successful in his pursuit of wealth in the metropolis, he had kept himself clean and honest, like so many of the wealthy men of the great city. When he retired from active business, he settled at Bonnydale ...
— Taken by the Enemy • Oliver Optic

... Dusk by dusk they drown our world in color, they smother our skies in glory. They are terrifying, sometimes, to the tenderfoot, giving him the feeling that his world is on fire. Poor old Struthers, during an especially active display, invariably gets out her Bible. Used to them as I am, I find they can still touch me with awe. They make me lonesome. They seem like the search-lights of God, showing up my human littlenesses of soul. They are Armadas of floating glory reminding me there are ...
— The Prairie Child • Arthur Stringer

... also before one or two of the most eminent conveyancers of the day, effectually commended to their best and earliest attention. He pledged himself to transmit their opinions, by the very first mail, to Mr. Parkinson; and both of those gentlemen immediately set about active preparations for defending the ejectment. The "eminent conveyancer" fixed upon by Messrs. Runnington and Parkinson was Mr. Tresayle, whose clerk, however, on looking into the papers, presently carried ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren

... A very active youngster of eight, with a long foil in his strong little hand, striking right and left regardless of consequences, and leaping from the ground when making a thrust at his opponent's heart, or savagely attempting to rival the hero of Chevy Chase ...
— Donald and Dorothy • Mary Mapes Dodge

... planning what they would do; instinctively, since the thought of Joan and the scene he had just left were too tender for much probing, his mind turned to that. As he stamped along he resolved, without thinking very deeply about it, that he would volunteer for active service, and speculated on the possibility of his ...
— To Love • Margaret Peterson

... and was about to go out, when the bell rang. A small, rather corpulent and very active gentleman pushed his way in. It was ...
— The Comedienne • Wladyslaw Reymont

... Where the government is representative, where there exists an intermediary degree of electors, society which elects them has essentially the right to determine the conditions of their eligibility. There is one right existing in our constitution, that of the active citizen, but the function of an elector is not a right. I repeat, society has the right to determine its conditions. Those who misunderstand the nature as they do the advantages of representative government, remind ...
— The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10) • Various

... I know not. It may have emanated in the fears of some active imagination on the chance and truthful word of a guard, flung in derision at some desperate man, or in a kindlier mood and in warning. The word was that we were to be inoculated with the germs of consumption. I understand that it appeared also in the papers at home. It seemed horrible beyond ...
— The Escape of a Princess Pat • George Pearson

... William D. Kelley entered the House at this session for the first time, and was destined to serve his State for a long series of years, with ability, fidelity, and usefulness. James K. Moorhead, John Covode, Edward McPherson, and John W. Killinger were active and influential members.*** ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine

... something ominous and uneasy. They scarcely ever spoke to one another, and it was Peter's object to avoid the house as often as possible, but in his father's silence now (Peter himself being older and intuitively sharper as to the reason of things) he saw active dislike, and even, at times, a suggested fear. Outwardly they—his father, his grandfather, his aunt, Mrs. Trussit—had changed not at all; his grandfather the same old creature of grey hairs and cushions and rugs, his father broad and square ...
— Fortitude • Hugh Walpole

... ceremoniously burnt its heart in order to prevent certain alleged visitations injurious to the public health and peace, and one may imagine the point of view of the same section in 1768. Ann's tongue was perniciously active, and within a few months Mercy discharged her, filling her place with a faithful and amiable ...
— The Shunned House • Howard Phillips Lovecraft

... paused here, but not so Grant. Without delay the whole army was put on an active footing and supplied with necessary food, clothing, and ammunition. Forage was brought in in large quantities, and the horses and mules put in the best possible condition, and heavy artillery was rushed forward. In the meantime, the arrival of General Sherman with reenforcements ...
— An Undivided Union • Oliver Optic

... to a transaction on which depended the most memorable events, not only of this long and active reign, but of the whole English and French history during more than a century; and it will therefore be necessary to give a particular account of the springs and causes ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume

... frost-bitten or dried, the substance of seeds must wither and then decay, the action of leaves must every night be reversed, vines and branches must be shaken by the winds, that the energies and the materials of new forms of life may be rendered active ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various

... one whose name was Othniel, the son of Kenaz, of the tribe of Judah, an active man and of great courage. He had an admonition from God not to overlook the Israelites in such a distress as they were now in, but to endeavor boldly to gain them their liberty; so when he had procured some to assist ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus

... sun or in any celestial object in which the spectroscope indicates the existence of incandescent hydrogen. The special act of the second day would appear to have consisted in the development of oxygen, or the calling it from a quiescent state into active operation. ...
— The Story of Creation as told by Theology and by Science • T. S. Ackland

... like? Well, just a little like the whitewashed crater of an active volcano. At any rate, it is the glorious companion piece to Kilauea in Hawaii. In these wonders of nature you behold the extremes, fire and ice, having it all their own way, and a world of adamant shall not prevail ...
— Over the Rocky Mountains to Alaska • Charles Warren Stoddard

... active and operative. It resembles good seed sown in the cultivated soil, which expands, and grows, and produces fruit. This holy vegetation exists in very different degrees of vigour, according to the diversities of Christian character, but it is apparent in all—the mark of true religion, the ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. II • Francis Augustus Cox

... "nor I. It so happens, though, that the gentleman whose name appears as president of our Mutual Funding Company is—well, hardly in active business life. It is necessary that he be represented here in some nominal capacity. The directors are now meeting in Room 19. I have authority to name a private secretary pro tem. Do ...
— Torchy, Private Sec. • Sewell Ford

... privilege a dozen years or more ago to have a small share in the active work of the Art Studies Association of Liverpool. This organisation, due to the zeal of the Director of Education, existed for the purpose of introducing the joys of Music to the children of the various elementary schools. Concerts of different types were given ...
— Spirit and Music • H. Ernest Hunt

... harmless-looking indian; the conductor dressed in the waiting-room, putting on a clean shirt and taking off his old one, at the same time talking to us about our baggage-checks. A fine horse, frisky and active, was loaded into the same baggage-freight car with our goods. The bells were rung as signals, and the station locked; the whole management—ticket-agent, conductor and baggagemen—then got upon the train and ...
— In Indian Mexico (1908) • Frederick Starr

... gentlemen and the peers, who were the heads of families at the period of Mary's accession, had never sympathised; and the tyranny of the Protestants while they were in power had converted a disapproval which time would have overcome, into active and determined indignation. The papacy was a mixed question; the Pilgrims of Grace in 1536, and the Cornish rebels in 1549, had demanded the restoration of the spiritual primacy to the See of St. Peter, and Henry himself, until Pole and Paul III. called on Europe to unite in a crusade against ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude

... he was before he entered the valley. Dying had robbed him of no human tenderness, no gentle grace of disposition, no charm of manner. As we watch him in his intercourse with his disciples, we recognize the familiar traits which belonged to his personality during the three years of his active ministry. ...
— Personal Friendships of Jesus • J. R. Miller

... preserving him from his lawless foes and his own inconvenient devotion to duty. A struggle for escape was not to be thought of, as the full measure of his deceitfulness would transpire in the event of failure, and the wedding drew nearer day by day, while his active brain was still casting about in vain for any means ...
— A Master Of Craft • W. W. Jacobs

... heart to everlasting life—all such texts we may, and shall, understand more and more, if we will bear in mind that everlasting life is the life of God and of Christ, a life of love; a life of perfect, active, self-sacrificing goodness, which is the one only true life for all rational beings, whether on ...
— The Good News of God • Charles Kingsley

... her of the fun they had been having with Brax, she met him with a cool tankard of "shandygaff," which he had learned to like in England among the horse-artillery fellows, and declared the very prince of drinks after active exercise in hot weather. He quaffed it eagerly, flung off his shako and kissed her gratefully, and burst all at once into laughing narration of the morning's work, but ...
— Waring's Peril • Charles King

... that John was shut up in prison. And the first thought which suggests itself is, that a magnificent career is cut short too soon. At the very outset of ripe and experienced manhood the whole thing ends in failure. John's day of active usefulness is over; at thirty years of age his work is done; and what permanent effect have all his labours left? The crowds that listened to his voice, awed into silence by Jordan's side, we hear of them ...
— Sermons Preached at Brighton - Third Series • Frederick W. Robertson

... her mother's idea of duty, knew the clear head, the steady will, the active intelligence holding her relentlessly to the task; the chafe and fret of seeing her husband constantly attempting against her judgment, and failing for lack of the help he scorned. Young as she was, she realized that the nervous breakdown of these later years was wholly due to that common misery ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman

... man looked troubled. "Well, Jack, it isn't so much that nobody's seen them. Nobody's seen any trace of them. There are land-prawns all around, but nobody's found a cracked shell. And six active, playful, inquisitive Fuzzies ought to be getting into things. They ought to be raiding food markets, and fruit stands, getting into places and ransacking. But there hasn't been a thing. The Company police have stopped looking for ...
— Little Fuzzy • Henry Beam Piper

... absolutely unable to digest the information it carried. Then with a rush understanding came to him, and he knew that Mike Stelton, the trusted foreman of the Bar T ranch, was really the leader of the rustlers, and was the most active of all of them in robbing old ...
— The Free Range • Francis William Sullivan

... stood at 37 degrees. The weather was not absolutely settled; at one moment it was clear, the next cloudy: but neither cold nor showers could have stopped the eager party. They could be followed easily by the compass; the needle was more active as they receded from the magnetic pole; it is true that it turned to the opposite direction and pointed to the south, while they were walking northward; but this did not in any way embarrass them. Besides, the doctor devised a simple method of staking out the way and thereby avoiding perpetual ...
— The Voyages and Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne

... within outwards; and it is often when the external world seems most sick and sorrowful, when selfishness and irresponsibility sit enthroned in the world's seats of government, that the power of truth is most active in the silent region of the soul, strengthening it in order that it may issue forth once again to impress man's unconquerable purpose of order, justice and freedom upon the recalcitrant material ...
— The Legacy of Greece • Various

... granular substance lining the cell wall (Fig. 1, pr.) is called "protoplasm," and with the nucleus constitutes the living part of the cell. If sufficiently magnified, the granules within the protoplasm will be seen to be in active streaming motion. This movement, which is very evident here, is not often so conspicuous, but still may often be detected ...
— Elements of Structural and Systematic Botany - For High Schools and Elementary College Courses • Douglas Houghton Campbell

... the creek a man, hardly reaching the middle size, lean and active-looking, narrow in the flanks, thin in the jaws, his knees well apart; with a keen bright eye in his head; his clothes looked as if they had belonged to ten different men; and his gait was heavy, and his face red, as if from a long hurried walk; but I said at once, ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley

... transshipment point for Southwest Asian opiates, hashish, and cannabis transiting the Balkan route and - to a far lesser extent - cocaine from South America destined for Western Europe; limited opium and growing cannabis production; ethnic Albanian narcotrafficking organizations active and rapidly expanding in Europe; vulnerable to money laundering associated with regional trafficking in narcotics, arms, ...
— The 2003 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency

... resemble those of her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools. The impulse given to parochial education by the latter is beyond all calculation; and the difference of ecclesiastical discipline in a diocese, where there are active archdeacons and where there are not, is a matter of well ...
— Narratives of Shipwrecks of the Royal Navy; between 1793 and 1849 • William O. S. Gilly

... response, but this time with closed eyes, for the Master of Arden had passed the point of active interest. ...
— Sunlight Patch • Credo Fitch Harris

... Should more active entertainment be demanded, the child will be set bold upright on one knee, and, suiting the action to the line, the ...
— Children's Rhymes, Children's Games, Children's Songs, Children's Stories - A Book for Bairns and Big Folk • Robert Ford

... the subject of this memoir. She was born in Bradford, Massachusetts, on the 22d of December, 1789. In a sketch which she has given of her life, between twelve and seventeen years of age, we find evidence of an active, ardent, and social disposition, gay and buoyant spirits, persevering industry, ...
— Lives of the Three Mrs. Judsons • Arabella W. Stuart

... superiority exists, not to that alone—but rather to the fact that in the United States the individual is constantly brought into interested contact with a greater variety of things and is admitted to active participation in the exercise of functions which in other countries are left to the care of a superior authority. I have frequently been struck by the remarkable expansion of the horizon effected by a few years of American life, in the minds of immigrants who had come from somewhat ...
— The Twentieth Century American - Being a Comparative Study of the Peoples of the Two Great - Anglo-Saxon Nations • H. Perry Robinson

... the most active physically. He was a miniature dynamo of a man, throbbing with a restless, inexhaustible tide of energy. Short and wiry, he stared truculently at the universe through wonderfully clear blue eyes, surrounded by a bumper crop of freckles and topped ...
— The Passing of Ku Sui • Anthony Gilmore

... been bestowed by Edward upon Lord Clifford, and the young Douglas, then but a lad, had sought refuge in France. After a while he had returned, and was living with Lamberton, Bishop of St. Andrews, who had been one of Wallace's most active supporters. ...
— In Freedom's Cause • G. A. Henty

... up his mail-phaeton, and thrown the ribbons to the active grooms at the horses' heads in the true coaching style, proceeded to descend from his throne, and had reached the ground ere he was aware of the presence of a stranger. Seeing him then, he made the sort of half-obeisance of a man that does not know whether he ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees

... many pueblos with abundant pottery and other evidences of active living is one of the mysteries of this prehistoric civilization. No doubt, with the failure of water-supplies and other changing physical conditions, occasionally communities sought better living in other localities, but it is ...
— The Book of the National Parks • Robert Sterling Yard

... boarding-house by aid of the remnant of the sovereign left for pocket-money. Next week saw him in debt. The third week saw him dinnerless. He knew the mistake his father had made, but it did not occur to him to take any active steps to remedy it Any lad of his years with a farthing's-worth of business faculty would have written home to explain his case, and would have gone into cheaper lodgings. Paul chose to do nothing, but to wander hungrily ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray

... first put his hand into his vest, and satisfied himself that the handle of a very sharp double edged poniard, which he always carried about him, was disposed conveniently for his grasp; for, as we have already noticed, he was, though now somewhat unwieldy, a powerful, athletic man, and prompt and active at the use of his weapon. Satisfied that this trusty instrument was in readiness, he next took from his bosom a scroll of parchment, inscribed with Greek characters, and marked with cabalistic signs, drew together ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott

... Hetty was active and slender, the man muscular, and both had been taught, not only to ride, but master the half-wild broncho by a superior daring and an equal agility, in a land where the horse is not infrequently roped and thrown before it is mounted. But Larry breathed hard as, with his arm about ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss

... to view the exercises of the Normal class, soon to be graduated. No courtesy was shown us by the master in charge, but we were tolerantly allowed to take seats. Here were young women about eighteen years of age, going through some of the more active exercises, in a large and well-fitted room, without a breath of outer air, in sleeves so close that their arms were partly raised with difficulty; so tightly laced about the waist that the blood rushed to their faces whenever they attempted the running ...
— In and Around Berlin • Minerva Brace Norton

... still more zealous and active than our enemy; believe me, your depression is really caused by his absence; we all miss the contact of that young heroic spirit; we are a ...
— White Lies • Charles Reade

... rose also and dispersed, but the light was not able to enliven the dull water nor give any hint of its apparently fathomless depth. Venerable mud-turtles crawled up and roosted upon the old logs in the stream, their backs glistening in the sun, the first inhabitants of the metropolis to begin the active business ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... commanded an English Company in Ireland in 1580; a favorite of Queen Elizabeth; obtained a charter to colonize Virginia in 1584, and sent out several expeditions, none of which founded permanent settlements; introduced tobacco into Europe, and the potato into Ireland; took an active part against the Armada in 1588; explored the Oronoko in 1595; charged with having plotted to place Arabella Stuart on the throne in 1603, and sent to the Tower, where he wrote his "History of the World"; sailed again for the Oronoko in 1616; and on his return, the expedition ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume III (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland I • Francis W. Halsey

... said that the best apples in the orchard are on the tree that has the most clubs under it. If this rule applies to people as well, then the Tappans were very good men. They were honest and prosperous in business; they were sincere and active Christians, giving liberally to all forms of benevolent effort, foreign and home missions, the Bible and Tract Societies, theological and college education, but their one great fault was they were abolitionists—a fault that ...
— The American Missionary—Volume 49, No. 02, February, 1895 • Various

... faint sound of a shot; then of another shot and another. After that, the radiant, baffling silence of daybreak on uninhabited wastes, when the very active glory of the spreading, intensifying light ought, one feels, to bring paeans of orchestral splendor. It set desperation in the hearts of the riders, which was communicated to weary ponies driven to a last effort of speed. And still no more shots. ...
— Over the Pass • Frederick Palmer

... they give place to Men who have Business or good Sense in their Faces, and come to the Coffee-house either to transact Affairs or enjoy Conversation. The Persons to whose Behaviour and Discourse I have most regard, are such as are between these two sorts of Men: Such as have not Spirits too Active to be happy and well pleased in a private Condition, nor Complexions too warm to make them neglect the Duties and Relations of Life. Of these sort of Men consist the worthier Part of Mankind; of these are all good Fathers, generous Brothers, sincere Friends, and faithful ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... deals with Christian workers, than how to say this needful truth and do that needful deed so as not to hurt the feelings of those whom he would help. The individual who feels slighted or insulted will probably give no active sign of his wound. He is too polite or too politic for that. He will merely close like a clam and cease to have further cordial feelings and relations with the person ...
— Evolution Of The Japanese, Social And Psychic • Sidney L. Gulick

... Bath-sheba and subsequently procuring the death of her husband, was really an hereditary propensity which had come down to him through his ancestors, and which, under more favorable circumstances, was more fully developed in his sons? The trait may have been kept dormant by the active and simple habits of his early years, but asserted itself in full force under the fostering influence of royal idleness and luxury. In accordance with the known laws of heredity, such a tendency would be the legitimate result of such ...
— Plain Facts for Old and Young • John Harvey Kellogg

... meeting together may stimulate the family to more devotion of heart to the service of their God; at home and abroad to mind their different callings, however varied; and to be active in helping others. It is proposed that this meeting should take place once a month at each house in rotation. I now have drawn some little outline of what I desire, and if any of you like to unite with me ...
— Elizabeth Fry • Mrs. E. R. Pitman

... the month of June, very soon after, Mr. Salmon had arrived at the Tower, and before Dymock, who was a woful procrastinator, had gone to demand the last payment, that Tamar, who was extraordinarily light and active, had undertaken to walk to the next village to procure some necessaries; she had three miles to go over the moor, nor could she go till after dinner. Her way lay by Shanty's shed; and Mrs. Margaret admonished her, if anything ...
— Shanty the Blacksmith; A Tale of Other Times • Mrs. Sherwood [AKA: Mrs. Mary Martha Sherwood]

... leaving a track anywhere. While the dogs are puzzling that out, he has plenty of time to plan more devices on his way to the big hill, with its brook, and old walls, and rail fences, and dry places under the pines, and twenty other helps to an active brain. ...
— Ways of Wood Folk • William J. Long

... long breath. If it had been so difficult for active boys, used to balancing, and doing all sorts of stunts, to cross on those treacherous little hummock paths, how in the wide world were they ever going to get a wounded man ...
— Boy Scouts on a Long Hike - Or, To the Rescue in the Black Water Swamps • Archibald Lee Fletcher

... naming the two Gulfs of Spencer and St. Vincent. The former he at one time thought would lead him through the continent into the Carpentarian Gulf. He reached Port Jackson in May, the year after he left England, and active preparations were soon afterwards commenced to prepare the ship for her long ...
— The History of Australian Exploration from 1788 to 1888 • Ernest Favenc

... you," I put in, with that cheerfulness her presence invariably inspires. "I have nothing pressing calling me home, and for once in my life I should like to take an active part in wedding festivities. It would make me ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green

... Lord. His prayers were tender and sincere; and his sermon on kindness—human kindness, spontaneous, for its own sake, not dictated by a creed—was a masterpiece of genuine eloquence. His face and figure were glorified in his effort. The story of his active sympathy with the injured horse had got about, and won the hearts of all. They came ready to love him, and—responding to the warm, magnetic influence—he blazed forth into the compelling eloquence that was native to his Celtic blood. ...
— The Preacher of Cedar Mountain - A Tale of the Open Country • Ernest Thompson Seton

... culmination of the two preceding centuries. An entire side of the richly endowed human nature to which we owe the high qualities of New England,—a nature which is often so easily disposed of as meagre, cold, narrow, and austere,—this side, long suppressed and thrown into shade by the more active front, found expression at last in these pages so curiously compounded of various elements, answering to those traits of the past which Hawthorne's genius revived. The sensuous substance of the early New England character had piously surrendered to the severe maxims ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop

... snuff-box was his, and that he had missed it on the previous day, the moment he had disengaged himself from the crowd before referred to. He had also remarked a young gentleman in the throng, particularly active in making his way about, and that young gentleman ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens

... consecrated doubt, you must remember that it was that sort of doubt which Goethe has called "the active scepticism, whose whole aim is to conquer itself;"[70] and not that other sort which is born of flippancy and ignorance, and whose aim is only to perpetuate itself, as an excuse for idleness and indifference. But it is impossible to define what is meant ...
— Lay Sermons, Addresses and Reviews • Thomas Henry Huxley

... simple, and while I sympathize with you, I must not disguise the truth," said the keen-eyed, lean-faced American. "Though Mr. Savine will partly recover from this attack, his career as an active man is closed. His heart may hold out a few years longer, if you follow my instructions, or it may at any time fail him—if he worries over anything, it certainly will. In any case, he will never be strong ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss

... other, that of all honest men. 2. In sending them to the seat of government, when the written law gave them a right to trial in the territory? The danger of their rescue, of their continuing their machinations, the tardiness and weakness of the law, apathy of the judges, active patronage of the whole tribe of lawyers, unknown disposition of the juries, an hourly expectation of the enemy, salvation of the city, and of the Union itself, which would have been convulsed to ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson

... "Jesu Maria!" she cried, and tried to raise herself, but could not. Ian, very near her, took a step farther in and, stooping, lifted her. But now the ravens chose to fall foul of him. The woman was presently gone, and her peasant fellows.... He was beating off a drunken Comus crew, with some of active ill-will. His dress was rich—he was not Roman, evidently—the surge had foamed and dragged across from the bonfire and the open place to the dark mouth of a poor street. Many a thing besides light-hearted gaieties happened ...
— Foes • Mary Johnston

... and the substitution of this modern artificial home for hollow trees illustrates the readiness with which it adapts itself to a change in surroundings. In perching, they cling to the side of the chimney, using the spine-pointed tails for a support. They are most active early in the morning and late in the afternoon, when one may hear their rolling twitter as they ...
— Birds Illustrated by Colour Photography, Vol II. No. 4, October, 1897 • Various

... purified religion may ultimately obtain under an improved and free constitution, it is better that a religious feeling of some sort should exist. The worst and most twisted crabstock, if alive, possesses an active principle, which allows of successful grafting; not so with a ...
— Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone - Made During the Year 1819 • John Hughes

... a minister, of the Sandemanian connection. I was settled in the active, wide-awake town of Naguadavick, on one of the finest water-powers in Maine. We used to call it a Western town in the heart of the civilization of New England. A charming place it was and is. A spirited, brave young parish had I; and it seemed as if we might have all "the joy of eventful ...
— The Best American Humorous Short Stories • Various

... crept to the window of her room; then the gladness of the day appeared so indifferent to her sorrow that she had raged hopelessly, helplessly, at the ill fortune which had over-ridden her. This paroxysm of rebellion had left her physically inert, but mentally active. She had surveyed her life calmly, dispassionately, when it seemed that she had been deprived by cruel circumstance of parents, social position, friends, money, love: everything which had been her due. She had been ...
— Sparrows - The Story of an Unprotected Girl • Horace W. C. Newte

... of the houses a rough fisherman is seated on a bench, his back against the house wall, mending his nets. At first sight he looks almost like an old man, for his hair is grey, though his body is still strong and active. His hands are twisted and bear the marks of cruel scars upon them, but his face is peaceful, though worn and rugged. He handles the nets lovingly, as if he were glad to feel them slipping through his fingers again. Evidently the nets have not been used for ...
— A Book of Quaker Saints • Lucy Violet Hodgkin

... two friends looked after him as he walked down the room with his light, active step, and graceful, gentlemanly figure—a youth who seemed born to be heir to all the splendors around him. Helen clasped her hands tightly together on her lap, and her lips moved. She did not speak, but the earl almost seemed to hear the great outcry of the mother's ...
— A Noble Life • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik

... independence of the Confederate States. They only asked audience to adjust, in a spirit of amity and peace, the new relations springing from a manifest and accomplished revolution in the Government of the late Federal Union. Your refusal to entertain these overtures for a peaceful solution, the active naval and military preparations of this Government, and a formal notice to the commanding General of the Confederate forces in the harbor of Charleston that the President intends to provision Fort Sumter by forcible means, if necessary, are viewed by the undersigned, ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis

... Barnes. We are speaking of a time before casinos were, and when the British youth were by no means so active in dancing practice as at this present period. Barnes resumed the reading of his county paper, but presently laid it down, with an execration so brisk and loud, that his mother gave a little outcry, and even his father looked up from his letters to ask the meaning of an oath ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray

... had had a busy and exciting day with her charge, who, active and restless, and playful, kept her on the alert and made her forget in part how lame she was. As she could not put her foot to the floor without great pain, and as she must move about, she adopted the expedient of placing her knee on a chair to the back of which ...
— Tracy Park • Mary Jane Holmes

... in divertisement, or constant in pastime; to make extravagance all our way, and sauce all our diet? Is not this plainly the life of a child that is ever busy, yet never hath anything to do? Or the life of that mimical brute which is always active in playing uncouth and unlucky tricks; which, could it speak, might surely pass well for a ...
— Sermons on Evil-Speaking • Isaac Barrow

... enthusiasm; "I have lost my health— the doctor thinks permanently. I've lost the strength that I used to be so proud of, and with it the hope of being able to make a living in any active line of life; and I've lost much more besides. But what I have found in my Saviour far more than makes up ...
— Jeff Benson, or the Young Coastguardsman • R.M. Ballantyne

... many sufficient to excite admiration. In the main hall outside, were assembled Hseh P'an, Chia Chen, Chia Lien, Chia Jung and several close relatives. But Lai Ta had invited as well a number of officials, still in active service, and numerous young men of wealthy families, to keep them company. Among that party figured one Liu Hsiang-lien, whom Hseh P'an had met on a previous occasion and kept ever since in constant remembrance. Having besides discovered that he had a passionate liking for theatricals, ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... ought to say it, but having begun I may as well finish. I was going to say that I could not understand how one so interested in men and so sensitive to humanity could be content to choose a profession which cuts him off from so much of active life." ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates

... dismay, at him)—"and Mr. Snap"—(This was the junior partner, having recently been promoted to be such after ten years' service in the office, as managing clerk: he was about thirty, particularly well dressed, slight, active, and with a face like a terrier—so hard, sharp, and wiry!) Of Mr. Gammon himself, I have already given the reader a slight notion. He appeared altogether a different style of person from both his partners. He was of most gentlemanly person and bearing—and ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren

... another in close file. One alighted on the breast and glided down instantly with devious vivacity, like a small insect running away; it left a narrow dark track on the white skin. He looked at it, looked at the tiny and active drops, looked at what he had done, with obscure satisfaction, with anger, with regret. This wasn't much like an act of justice. He had a desire to go up nearer to the man, to hear him speak, to hear him say something atrocious and wicked ...
— An Outcast of the Islands • Joseph Conrad

... the ants transport the beetles. Sitaris and Meloe are beetles which live "at the expense of bees of the genus Anthophora." The eggs are laid not in but near the bees' nest; in the early stage the larva is active and has the instinct to seize any hairy object near it, and in this way they are carried by the Anthophora to the nest. Dr. Sharp states that no such preliminary stage is known in the ant's-nest beetles. ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin Volume II - Volume II (of II) • Charles Darwin

... days, indeed, an active search was kept up. Every house was visited by the gendarmes but, as there was no reason for suspecting one person more than another, there was no absolute search made of the houses; which indeed, in so large a town as Bayonne, would have ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty

... Dumps he was scurrying towards me along a sequestered country lane. It was in the Dog Days. Dust lay thick on the road; the creature's legs were remarkably short though active, and his hair being long he swept up the dust in clouds as he ran. He was yelping, and I observed that one or two stones appeared to be racing with, or after, him. The voice of an angry man also seemed to chase him, but the owner of the ...
— My Doggie and I • R.M. Ballantyne

... long black hair, bearded chin, and beady eyes set under heavy eyebrows, gave a ferocity to his appearance which Ellerey did not find attractive. He looked like a man in whom the barbarian was still active, whose laws of right and wrong and honor were likely to be of his own fashioning—one in whom it would be dangerous to trust too implicitly. Yet he was a striking and a handsome figure, and his dress gave him distinction. ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner

... This is seen, for one thing, in the numerous exhibitions that have been held. Confining our attention to American exhibitions, I would remark that instead of, as in former years, having one big exhibition in Baltimore or Philadelphia or some other city, there are now active centers all over the country—there is a regularly established international salon in Los Angeles, and the well-known Pittsburgh Salon, and regularly established exhibitions in Portland and Toronto. There are groups of ...
— Pictorial Photography in America 1921 • Pictorial Photographers of America

... the third cutter, one of the four-oar boats. Bitts, the carpenter, who had been the only person on board except the boatswain, was in the waist busily at work upon the boat, and did not observe that anything unusual had transpired. Clyde had practised gymnastics a great deal, and was an active, agile fellow. Casting off the painter of the third cutter, he worked her astern, so as to avoid Peaks. Then, shipping a pair of oars, he pulled ...
— Up The Baltic - Young America in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark • Oliver Optic

... the next, which was Secretary William Cecil, for on the death of the old Marquis of Winchester he came up in his room: a person of a most subtle and active spirit. ...
— Travels in England and Fragmenta Regalia • Paul Hentzner and Sir Robert Naunton

... nothing," Mr. De Guenther went on, "which the poor lad had not. That was one trouble, I imagine. If he had not been highly intelligent he would not have studied so hard; if he had not been strong and active he might not have taken up athletic sports so whole-heartedly; and when I add that Allan possessed charm, money and social status you may see that what he did would have broken down most young fellows. ...
— The Rose Garden Husband • Margaret Widdemer

... to communicate with Galileo; and while they transmitted him a gold chain as a mark of their esteem, they at the same time assured him, that if his plan should prove successful it should not pass unrewarded. The commissioners entered into an active correspondence with Galileo, and had even appointed one of their number to communicate personally with him in Italy. Lest this, however, should excite the jealousy of the court of Rome, Galileo objected to the arrangement, so that the negociation was ...
— The Martyrs of Science, or, The lives of Galileo, Tycho Brahe, and Kepler • David Brewster

... I carried a union card of the "Painters, Paper Hangers and Decorators," and there came a time when every street car on the streets of New Haven carried at least two of my friends, for I became chaplain of the Trolleymen's Union, and took an active part in their work. ...
— From the Bottom Up - The Life Story of Alexander Irvine • Alexander Irvine

... cat-like eyes about, ruffled her feathers, and uttered a few soft 'to-whit to-whoos,' she murmured, 'I have it. Seldom do I require to deliberate so anxiously, but parental anguish has clouded my active brain; the recent combat, also, has exhausted my nervous system. I have the happy thought at last, though, and you shall be assisted. We will fly to the nest of an old friend, a celebrated kingfisher. He lives not far from here; he knows the ...
— Prince Lazybones and Other Stories • Mrs. W. J. Hays

... satellite—we might almost say, his confidant. The street was very crowded, insomuch that at one or two crossings they were obliged to stand a few minutes before venturing over,—not that the difficulty was great, many active men being seen to dodge among the carts, drays, vans, and busses with marvellous ease and safety, but the Captain was cautious. He was wont to say that he warn't used to sail in such crowded waters—there warn't ...
— Rivers of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne

... subsistence is perpetual existence. If, moreover, any thing were to be withdrawn entirely from the sun's influx through the atmospheres, it would instantly be dissipated; for the atmospheres, which are purer and purer, and are rendered active in power by the sun, hold all things in connection. Since, then, the perpetual existence of the universe, and of every thing pertaining to it, is from the sun, it is plain that the sun is the first ...
— Angelic Wisdom Concerning the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom • Emanuel Swedenborg

... is a robust little fellow whose chief beauty is his curls. He has the large head which usually shows an active temperament, and we fancy that he is somewhat masterful in his ways. We shall see the same boy again in the picture called ...
— Correggio - A Collection Of Fifteen Pictures And A Portrait Of The - Painter With Introduction And Interpretation • Estelle M. Hurll

... more than likely," retorted Chauvelin dryly; "though," he added with a contemptuous nod of the head directed at the huddled-up figure of his once brilliant enemy, "neither mind nor body seem to me to be in a sufficiently active state just now for hatching plot or intrigue; but even if—vaguely floating through his clouded mind—there has sprung some little scheme for evasion, I give you my word, citizen Heron, that you can thwart him ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy

... more at leisure, was a short, stout, active man, who, though sixty years of age and upwards, retained in his sinews and frame the elasticity of an earlier period. His countenance expressed self-confidence, and something like a contempt for those ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott

... pleasant, verdant squares, while beyond appeared the Chinese quarter, seemingly imported from the Celestial Empire in a toy-box. Sombreros and red shirts and plumed Indians were rarely to be seen; but there were silk hats and black coats everywhere worn by a multitude of nervously active, gentlemanly-looking men. Some of the streets—especially Montgomery Street, which is to San Francisco what Regent Street is to London, the Boulevard des Italiens to Paris, and Broadway to New York—were lined with splendid and spacious stores, which exposed in their windows the ...
— Around the World in 80 Days • Jules Verne

... But the other, which is the Female, is volatile, crude, cold, and moyst."(2b) EDWARD KELLY (1555-1595), who is valuable because he summarises authoritative opinion, says somewhat the same thing, though in clearer words: "The active elements... these are water and fire... may be called male, while the passive elements... earth and air... represent the female principle.... Only two elements, water and earth, are visible, and earth is called the hiding-place of fire, water the abode of air. In these ...
— Bygone Beliefs • H. Stanley Redgrove

... his Sexual Life of Woman), has dealt fully with this question, and reaches the conclusion that it is "extremely probable" that the active erotic participation of the woman in coitus is an important link in the chain of conditions producing conception. It acts, he remarks, in either or both of two ways, by causing reflex changes in the cervical secretions, and so facilitating the passage ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... although you took a kind of double first in the O.T.C., in the ordinary course of things you would have to have further training before you could go into active service as a private." ...
— All for a Scrap of Paper - A Romance of the Present War • Joseph Hocking

... genera or those less numerously represented. This fact he adduces in support of his opinion that varieties are incipient species, for he observes that the existence of the larger genera implies that the manufacturing of species has been active in the period immediately preceding our own, in which case we ought generally to find the same forces still in full activity, more especially as we have every reason to believe the process by which new species are produced is a slow one.* (* "Origin ...
— The Antiquity of Man • Charles Lyell

... have said over and over again in this inquiry, a woman's disinclination to acquire the intricate expertness that lies at the bottom of good housekeeping is due primarily to her active intelligence; it is difficult for her to concentrate her mind upon such stupid and meticulous enterprises. But whether difficult or easy, it is obviously important for the average woman to make some effort in that direction, ...
— In Defense of Women • H. L. Mencken

... the mind alone, but with the stored experiences of life, with the emotions that it has brought, with the attitudes toward men and things and ideas that it has given—in a word, with imagination. To read with imagination, you must be, in the first place, active; in the second place, sensitive, and, because you are sensitive, receptive. Instead, however, of being merely passively receptive of the stream of ideas and images and sensations flowing from the work you are reading, you must be alert to take all that it has to give, and ...
— Modern American Prose Selections • Various

... That's a Dutchman. Christian Jespersen was his name on the articles. He got in O'Sullivan's way when O'Sullivan went after the boots. That's what saved Andy. Andy was more active. Jespersen couldn't get out of his own way, much less out of O'Sullivan's. There's ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London

... after the bell had rung for "interval," the inquiry concluded, "go to your studies, and remain there till you hear from me—Noaks, go in like manner to the housekeeper's room.—Gull and Hawley, as you seem to have taken no active part in this last misdemeanour, you may go. As regards your previous misconduct, I shall speak to you on that subject when I have decided what is to ...
— The Triple Alliance • Harold Avery

... after. When he had got the other as it were on a balance, he suddenly sprang back to the ground, in such a direction that the impetus of his leap jerked the porcupine upon its back. Before the clumsy creature was able to turn over and 'clew' itself, the active weasel had pounced upon its belly, and buried his claws in the soft flesh, while, at the same time, his teeth were made ...
— The Desert Home - The Adventures of a Lost Family in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid

... ornaments of poetry and oratory, and of all rational analogy. While those who have connected great classes of ideas of causation, are furnished with the powers of producing effects. These are the men of active wisdom who lead armies to victory, and kingdoms to prosperity; or discover and improve the sciences which meliorate and adorn the ...
— The Temple of Nature; or, the Origin of Society - A Poem, with Philosophical Notes • Erasmus Darwin

... Cromwell could not cease In the inglorious arts of peace, But through adventurous war Urged his active star: ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy

... fit it up with warm winter accommodations. He reminded me of my dearest Fredy, when she brought me a decanter of barley-water and a bright tin saucepan, under her hoop. I Could not tell him that history in detail, but I rewarded his good-nature by hinting at the resemblance it bore, in its active zeal, to my sweet Mrs. Locke. . ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madam D'Arblay Volume 2 • Madame D'Arblay

... though he was no friend of the Church, he was not an active enemy, and believed that he was speaking the truth. The fight for free will would have to be fought in Ireland some day, and this fight was the most vital; but he agreed with her that other fights would have to be fought and won before the great fight could be arranged for. The ...
— The Untilled Field • George Moore

... disagreeables, they are infested with mosquitoes and endless varieties of loathsome insects; and the fish that are found around the coasts are not fit for food. So much for the country—now for the natives:—They are tall, robust, and active; the men wear scarcely any covering, and the women only a petticoat of matting. Both sexes stain their teeth black, and many of them tattoo their bodies. The Ladrone Islands were originally discovered by Magellan, who called them 'las Islas de las Ladrones' or the ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne

... kindness in Dr. Cambray's family, in which he felt himself at ease, and soon forgot that he was a stranger: his mind, however, was anxious about his situation, as he longed to get into active life. Every morning, when the post came in, he hoped there would be a letter for him with his commission; and he was every morning regularly surprised and disappointed, on finding that there was none. In the course of each ensuing day, however, he forgot his disappointment, and said ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth

... beings, but as independence is one of the strongest bonds of society, mankind were made dependent on each other for protection and security, as they thereby enjoy better opportunities of fulfilling the duties of reciprocal love and friendship. Thus was man formed for social and active life, the noblest part of the work of God; and he, who will so demean himself as not to be endeavoring to add to the common stock of knowledge and understanding, may be deemed a DRONE in the HIVE of nature, a useless member of ...
— The Mysteries of Free Masonry - Containing All the Degrees of the Order Conferred in a Master's Lodge • William Morgan

... a large sum of money to carry out his employer's plans. There were a hundred agents through the country, particulars of whom Poltavo now had in his possession. Innocent agents, and guilty agents; agents in high places and active agents in the servants' hall. Undoubtedly Gossip's Corner was ...
— The Secret House • Edgar Wallace

... in the stream was welling over with egotistic woes, far too many for the brief moment in which he would be closeted with the great one, who held the invisible keys of relief, who penetrated this mystery of human maladjustment. It was a busy, toiling, active, subdued place, where the tinkle of the telephone bell, the hum of electric annunciators, as one member of the staff signalled to another, vibrated in the tense atmosphere. Into this hive poured the suffering, mounting from the street, load ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... active it was at that moment. I struck out with my clenched fists, throwing all the power I possessed into my blows, and fortunately for me—a mere boy in the grasp of a heavily-built man—he was comparatively, powerless from loss of blood consequent upon his wounds, ...
— Blue Jackets - The Log of the Teaser • George Manville Fenn

... Murray was a man to be regarded in any company and under any circumstances, but when he stood up in his pulpit and faced his congregation he was truly superb. He was above the average height, of faultless form and bearing, athletic, active, and with a "spring in every muscle." He had coal-black hair and beard, and a flashing blue eye that held his people in utter subjection and put the fear of death upon evil-doers under the gallery. In every movement, tone, and glance there ...
— The Man From Glengarry - A Tale Of The Ottawa • Ralph Connor

... the absence of the familiar greeting, which had always been kind enough, if never enthusiastic; the general overturn and loss of the usual equilibrium in his little world. It was no blame to Theo if his feelings went little further than this. His father had been no active influence in his life. His love had been passive, expressing itself in few words, without sympathy in any of the young man's pursuits, or knowledge of them, or desire to know,—a dull affection because the boy belonged to him, ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant

... as if, in the agony of their talk, their countenances would go to pieces. For the stars, they darted about hither and thither, gathered into groups, dispersed, and formed new groups, and having no faces yet, but being a sort of celestial tadpoles, indicated by their motions alone that they took an active interest in the questions agitating their parents. Some of them kept darting up and down the ladder of rays, like phosphorescent ...
— Ranald Bannerman's Boyhood • George MacDonald

... told him that he seemed to her to be in a strange way—an even stranger way than his sad situation made natural. Had his disappointment gone to his head? He looked like a man who was going to be ill, and yet she had never seen him more restless and active. One day he would sit hanging his head and looking as if he were firmly resolved never to smile again; another he would indulge in laughter that was almost unseemly and make jokes that were bad even for him. If he ...
— The American • Henry James

... of a heart so forlorn as his to one so full of genuine sympathy as hers. She gave him an affectionate regard, because he needed so much love, and seemed to have received so little. With a ready tact, the result of ever-active and wholesome sensibility, she discerned what was good for him, and did it. Whatever was morbid in his mind and experience she ignored; and thereby kept their intercourse healthy, by the incautious, but, as it were, heaven-directed ...
— The House of the Seven Gables • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... too early for the milk carts. He worked on steadily and conscientiously, only stopping now and again to change a book, or to sip some of the poisonous stuff that kept him awake and made his brain so active, and on these occasions Field's breathing was always distinctly audible in the room. Outside, the storm continued to howl, but inside the house all was stillness. The shade of the reading lamp threw all the light upon the littered table, leaving the other end of the room in comparative ...
— The Empty House And Other Ghost Stories • Algernon Blackwood

... an active support to Napoleon Ney takes the leading part in most eyes; if it were only for his fate, which is too well known for much to be said here concerning it. In 1815 Ney was commanding in Franche-Comte, and was called up to Paris ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne

... was a farmer and grazier in Kintyre—a genuine Highlander. In person, though of rather low stature than otherwise, he was stout, athletic, and active; bold and fearless in disposition, warm in temper, friendly, and hospitable—this last to such a degree that his house was never without as many strangers and visitors of different descriptions, as nearly ...
— The Haunters & The Haunted - Ghost Stories And Tales Of The Supernatural • Various

... But these were trifles. It is not easy to describe the sense of relief and pleasure that I felt—after having been accustomed to the sleepy eyes and serpentine graces of Madame Fontaine—when I looked again at the lithe active figure and the bright well-opened gray eyes of ...
— Jezebel • Wilkie Collins

... the heartiest things I have seen of late is the letter of Rev. Dr. Dowling as he retires from active work in the ministry. He hands over his work to the younger brethren without sigh, or groan, or regret. He sees the sun is quite far down in the west, and he feels like hanging up his scythe in the first apple tree he comes to. Our opinion ...
— Around The Tea-Table • T. De Witt Talmage

... Heroism, active or passive, is the lesson taught by this romance, and we know that the author, in his life, illustrated both phases of the quality. His novels, which, when he was alive, the booksellers refused to publish, are now ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 54, April, 1862 • Various

... fitly appeal to the intelligent classes in all countries where its language is read. The proprietors of NATURE aim so to conduct it that it shall have a common claim upon all English-speaking peoples. Its articles are brief and condensed, and are thus suited to the circumstances of an active and busy people who have little time to read ...
— The Scientific Evidences of Organic Evolution • George John Romanes

... interesting to know which is the largest city in China—the largest river in Africa—but it is MORE important to know about the industrial life of your country—because when most of you go out into the world you will become active figures in the making, buying and ...
— Common Science • Carleton W. Washburne

... over and over. His master learnt him in books and to how to cuss. He learnt him how to trick the dogs and tap trees like a coon. At the end of the trail the dogs would turn on the huntsman. Uncle Frank was active when he was old. He was hired out to race other boys sometimes. He never wore glasses. He could see well when he was old. He told me he was raised out ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - Volume II. Arkansas Narratives. Part I • Work Projects Administration

... like children again themselves; and David and Joel were everywhere helping on the fun; in which excitement the other Harvard man and even Livingston Bayley were not ashamed to take a most active part, as Jasper, who had borrowed Santa Claus' attire for this occasion, now made his appearance with a most astonishing bow. And then the presents began to fly from the Tree, and Jack Loughead seemed to be all arms, for he was so tall he could reach down the hanging gifts from ...
— Five Little Peppers Grown Up • Margaret Sidney

... the royal cause; but it seems to have been suffered from that time forwards to fall into decay. All mouldering, however, and ruined as it is, its walls and towers may yet for many centuries bid defiance to wind and weather, unless active measures are ...
— Architectural Antiquities of Normandy • John Sell Cotman

... on Romans xi. 1-6, that this was altogether against her chance of being called, and that the better her disposition to perform good works, the more unlikely she was to be the subject of saving grace. Some of these severe critics were good people enough themselves, but they loved active work and stirring companionship, and would have found their real cross if they had been called to sit ...
— The Guardian Angel • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... latter had not been active, but had put the affairs in the hands of his capable son Tom, ably assisted by Ned Newton. The older man now spent most of his time ...
— Tom Swift and His Giant Telescope • Victor Appleton

... the physician, after feeling my pulse, "you certainly must, and you ought to be in bed this moment. Your pulse indicates a very high fever. What's more, you seem badly run down. I shall put you under active treatment at once; that is, if you'll ...
— A Day Of Fate • E. P. Roe

... an explanatory remark by Las Casas. It is misleading. The war in Naples growing out of the invasion of Italy by Charles VIII. of France, in which Ferdinand had taken an active part against the French, had been brought to a close so far as concerned France and Spain by a truce in March, 1497. The treaty of peace was ...
— The Northmen, Columbus and Cabot, 985-1503 • Various

... be regained. With the election of Jefferson, Madison entered upon another sphere of duty, which was politically a promotion, but where his influence, if it was so large, was not so evident as when an active leader of his party. It was at Mr. Jefferson's "pressing desire," Mr. Madison himself says, in a letter written many years afterward, that he took the office of secretary of state. In the same letter ...
— James Madison • Sydney Howard Gay



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