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Conviction   Listen
noun
Conviction  n.  
1.
The act of convicting; the act of proving, finding, or adjudging, guilty of an offense. "The greater certainty of conviction and the greater certainty of punishment."
2.
(Law) A judgment of condemnation entered by a court having jurisdiction; the act or process of finding guilty, or the state of being found guilty of any crime by a legal tribunal. "Conviction may accrue two ways."
3.
The act of convincing of error, or of compelling the admission of a truth; confutation. "For all his tedious talk is but vain boast, Or subtle shifts conviction to evade."
4.
The state of being convinced or convicted; strong persuasion or belief; especially, the state of being convicted of sin, or by one's conscience. "To call good evil, and evil good, against the conviction of their own consciences." "And did you presently fall under the power of this conviction?"
Synonyms: Conviction; persuasion. Conviction respects soley matters of belief or faith; persuasion respects matters of belief or practice. Conviction respects our most important duties; persuasion is frequently applied to matters of indifference. Conviction is the result of the (operation of the) understanding; persuasion, of the will. Conviction is a necessity of the mind, persuasion an acquiescence of the inclination. Persuasion often induces men to act in opposition to their conviction of duty.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Conviction" Quotes from Famous Books



... and tuck the head under the wing and call it a meal. I had ever been what might be termed a sincere feeder. So, never associating the question of diet with the problem of attaining physical slightness, I swung back again into my old mode of life with the resigned conviction that since destiny had chosen me to be fat there was nothing for me to do in the premises excepting to go right on to the end of my mortal chapter being fat, fatter and perhaps fattest. I'd just make ...
— One Third Off • Irvin S. Cobb

... plodding along from the village with a sack thrown round his shoulders as an overcoat, and with a horn lantern in his hand. His legs were weary, but his mind was at ease, free from the presentiment of change. The sense of security more frequently springs from habit than from conviction, and for this reason it often subsists after such a change in the conditions as might have been expected to suggest alarm. The lapse of time during which a given event has not happened, is, in this logic of habit, constantly alleged as a reason why the event should never happen, even when the lapse ...
— Silas Marner - The Weaver of Raveloe • George Eliot

... belief in her privation—more mercilessly imposed, or more hopelessly felt, in the actual relation of the parties; over and beyond everything that, from more than three months back, of course, had fostered in the Princess a like conviction. These assumptions might certainly be baseless—inasmuch as there were hours and hours of Amerigo's time that there was no habit, no pretence of his accounting for; inasmuch too as Charlotte, inevitably, had had ...
— The Golden Bowl • Henry James

... her hand upon him, he became quite tractable. In this manner he continued for a long while, convincing all the Indians who saw him that he was possessed by a spirit, which nothing but the approach of Okoj could reduce. So deep was their conviction and her's, that she at last consented to become his wife, and never after was he troubled by a return ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 3 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones

... And, though it will be impossible for him to give positive testimony as to what lies beyond, he may yet mention that all his own course of study, training and experience, long, severe and dangerous as it has often been, leads him to the conviction that everything is really as stated, save some details purposely veiled. For causes which cannot be explained to the public, he himself may he unable or unwilling to use the secret he has gained access to. Still he is permitted by one to whom all his reverential affection and gratitude ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various

... Olive watched how, beneath the coarse, ill-formed hand, grew images of perfect beauty; how, within the body, almost repulsive in its ugliness, dwelt a brain which could produce the grandest ideal loveliness; and there dawned in the girl's spirit a stronger conviction than ever of the majesty of ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)

... volume the author gives but his own personal opinions upon the subjects discussed, and although the sentiments are expressed with an assurance born of conviction, yet he ...
— New and Original Theories of the Great Physical Forces • Henry Raymond Rogers

... superlative adjectives, not merely to guard against exaggeration but because the superlative degree lacks conviction. The statement that "This is the best collar ever made" is not believed, but to say that it is a "fine" collar or a "good" collar for it is five-ply, and so forth, rings true. It is a better selling talk and so the superlative is ...
— Business Correspondence • Anonymous

... conviction, that if you will take care of these memoirs, your descendants will read them with pleasure; and I here declare that I have been most particular as to the truth of all that ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 3 No 3, March 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... cited the incontestable proofs in my Hydrogeologie, and I have the conviction that one day all will be compelled to accept these ...
— Lamarck, the Founder of Evolution - His Life and Work • Alpheus Spring Packard

... was captured through the zeal, or treachery, of a Scot in Edward's service. In August, Wallace was despatched to London to stand a public trial for treason, sedition, sacrilege, and murder. He denied that he had ever become Edward's subject, but did not escape conviction. With his execution, the last stage of Edward's triumph in Scotland was accomplished. Though the full measure of Wallace's fame belongs to a later age rather than his own, yet it was a sure instinct that made the Scottish people celebrate him ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout

... world," she murmured under her breath. "I never met anyone like my father—so simple—so straightforward—so full of real feeling—so broad in his views. Talk of a sequestered life making a man narrower; there never was a man more open to real conviction than father. The fact is, no girl ever had better parents than I have; and the wonderful thing is that they give me leave to go, and take their blessing with me. It is wonderful—it is splendid. Agnes must be taught to do my present ...
— A Girl in Ten Thousand • L. T. Meade

... greatly outnumbering their own," exclaimed Giorgias, unwilling to believe the evidence of his own senses. But as the light more clearly revealed the tokens of flight and disaster in the far distance, where the smoke of ruin was rising into the calm morning air, conviction of the terrible truth forced itself on the general's mind, and, with mingled astonishment and dismay, he exclaimed, "Where are ...
— Hebrew Heroes - A Tale Founded on Jewish History • AKA A.L.O.E. A.L.O.E., Charlotte Maria Tucker

... waterfall," he exclaimed, with conviction. "I know the sound now." And he began to push vigorously through the bushes, in the direction of ...
— The House on the Borderland • William Hope Hodgson

... don't know enough to make it," stated Otie, with the conviction of a man who knew exactly what he was talking about. "It has all been left ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day

... imagine that it is my wish to degrade honest old Elias Ashmole, by the foregoing delineation of his weaknesses and follies. The ensuing entries, in the said Diary, will more than counterbalance any unfavourable effect produced by its precursors; and I give them with a full conviction that they will be greedily devoured by those who have been lucky enough to make good purchases of the entire libraries of deceased characters of eminence. In his 37th year, Ashmole "bought of Mr. Milbourn all his books and mathematical instruments;" ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin

... you, I waxed eloquent. I couldn't let John Starkweather, or any other man, get away with the conviction that a millionnaire is better than a farmer. "Moreover," I said, "think of the position of the millionnaire. He spends his time playing not with life, but with the symbols of life, whether cash or houses. ...
— Adventures In Contentment • David Grayson

... a tone of conviction. "Besides, I never offend any one, certainly not ladies. I never did such a ...
— An American Politician • F. Marion Crawford

... King of France, without effect. At last, in 1492, Columbus was introduced by Louis de Saint Angel to Queen Isabella of Spain. The friends who accompanied him pleaded his cause with so much force and conviction that he at length persuaded ...
— How to Succeed - or, Stepping-Stones to Fame and Fortune • Orison Swett Marden

... Mena of Egypt as far back as 5500 B.C. and Sargon at about 3800 B.C. has been abandoned by the majority of prominent archaeologists, the exceptions including Professor Flinders Petrie. Recent discoveries appear to support the new chronological system. "There is a growing conviction", writes Mr. Hawes, "that Cretan evidence, especially in the eastern part of the island, favours the minimum (Berlin) system of Egyptian chronology, according to which the Sixth (Egyptian) Dynasty began at c. 2540 B.C. and the Twelfth at c. 2000 B.C.[8] Petrie dates the beginning ...
— Myths of Babylonia and Assyria • Donald A. Mackenzie

... trace in the soil, burrowed in every direction. They had even attempted to find coal under strata which are usually below it, such as the Devonian red sandstone, but without result. James Starr had therefore abandoned the mine with the absolute conviction that it did not ...
— The Underground City • Jules Verne

... she has had with her many years, and whom she can entirely trust, had no idea that her mistress was expecting a visitor! I repeat—that no preparations for Mrs. Pargeter's arrival had been made at Marly-le-Roi. It is my belief—nay, my conviction—that Madame de Lera knows perfectly well where her friend ...
— The Uttermost Farthing • Marie Belloc Lowndes

... bear the burdens incident to their order and lose all their rights. This will explain the word Infamy, which is used a little below. Infamia among the Romans was not a punishment, but it was a consequence of conviction for certain offences; and this consequence was a civil disability; the person who became Infamis lost his vote, and was ineligible to the great public offices. He also sustained some disabilities in his ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume II • Aubrey Stewart & George Long

... exceedingly Orme's History of Hindostan, a lovely book in its way, in large quarto, with a quantity of maps, and written in a very lively and solid eighteenth century way, never picturesque except by accident and from a kind of conviction, and a fine sense of order. No historian I have ever read is so minute; yet he never gives you a word about the people; his interest is entirely limited in the concatenation of events, into which he goes with a lucid, almost superhuman, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... advance in the scale of being, and has its supreme success in man. Human society, the largest of all organic associations, requires that its units be knit together in certain common purposes and understandings, and the union can only be made effective by the ways of sympathy—by the instinctive conviction ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park

... l'abbe Goujet. Memoires de Litterature, t. 5. 4. It is very unjust in some moderns to charge him as conscious of so horrible a crime, which shocks human nature. Great persons are never to be condemned without proofs which amount to conviction. The silence of Orestes, and the historian Socrates, both his declared enemies, suffices to acquit him. 5. We have nothing further of the life of this father, until the year 428, when his zeal was first exerted in defence ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... The opening advice to violin students, the insistence on tune first and then on tone, the latter depending greatly for its excellence upon the correctness of the former, is not only worth saying, but is said well, and with conviction. Mr. Henley discriminates well between violinists: Joachim, the classic; Carrodus, the plain; Sarasate, the neat and elegant; and Wilhelmj, the fiery and bold.... The list of violin concertos, given in the last chapter but one of the book, seems a very complete one, and should ...
— Violin Making - 'The Strad' Library, No. IX. • Walter H. Mayson

... the results prove to him the correctness of the exercises. If the attitude of the student is right, then the satisfaction which he experiences in the practice of these exercises, in itself carries the conviction that he is doing the right thing, and he does not need to wait for results to prove it. The correct practice of exercises in occult training brings with it a satisfaction that is not merely satisfaction, but conviction—the conviction that I am doing something which shows me ...
— An Outline of Occult Science • Rudolf Steiner

... that chilling and invigorating plunge; but at last I was into my moccasins and shirt again. The Sagamore strode lightly to the lead; the Wyandotte started for the rear, but I shoved him next to the Mohican and in front of me, hating him suddenly, so abrupt and profound was my conviction that his stupidity was a studied treachery and not the consequences of a ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers

... roughly correct. It is so, or seems to us to be so, as a matter of course,—that the man is a fool, or reticent, or malicious; and, without giving a thought to our own phrenological capacity, we pass on with the conviction. No one ever considered that Mr Whittlestaff was a fool or malicious; but people did think that he was reticent and honest. The inner traits of his character were very difficult to be read. Even Mrs Baggett had hardly read them all correctly. He was shamefaced ...
— An Old Man's Love • Anthony Trollope

... spirits had gone suddenly down, and the visions of an hour ago showed stale and lifeless to his clouded eyes. After a day's ride and a poor dinner, the ten-mile walk had left him with aching limbs, and a growing conviction that despite his former aspirations, he was fast going to the devil along the tavern road. When at last he swung open the whitewashed gate before the inn, and threw the light of his lantern on the great oaks in the yard, the relief ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow

... to the penitent were the anger of the deity and the necessity of appeasing that anger. Beyond this conclusion the Babylonians and Assyrians did not go, but this reasoning also sufficed to bring the conviction home to him that his misfortunes were the result of some offence. The man afflicted was a sinner, and the corollary to this position was that misfortunes come in consequence of sin. Through the evils alone which overtook one, it became clear to an individual that he had sinned against ...
— The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria • Morris Jastrow

... Dutch Henry an' Black Jack seen him," agreed Waseche with conviction, "he's there. But, what in time do yo' want of him? If he was runnin' with wolves he's buildin' him up a pack. He's a bad actor. You take them renegade dogs, an' they're worse than wolves an' worse than dogs—an' they're smarter'n ...
— Connie Morgan in the Fur Country • James B. Hendryx

... speaking in her presence of the death of the Chevalier de Savoie, brother of the Comte de Soissons, and of the famous Prince Eugene, who died very young, very suddenly, very debauched; and full of benefices. The talk became religious. She listened some time, and then, with a profound look of conviction, said: "For my part, I am persuaded that God will think twice about damning a man of such high birth as that!" This caused a burst of laughter, but nothing could make her change her opinion. Her vanity was cruelly punished. She used to affect ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... aroused universal reprobation in Germany. Prince Buelow assumed the official responsibility, and tendered his resignation to the emperor, which was not accepted; but the chancellor's explanation in the Reichstag on the 10th of November showed how keenly he felt his position. He declared his conviction that the disastrous results of the interview would "induce the emperor in future to observe that strict reserve, even in private conversations, which is equally indispensable in the interest of a uniform policy and for the authority of the crown," adding that, in the contrary case, ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various

... in the same firm and temperate conduct, as expressed in the resolutions determined upon, at a meeting of the delegates for the county of Suffolk, on Tuesday the sixth instant; trusting that the effect of the united efforts of North America in their behalf, will carry such conviction to the British nation of the unwise, unjust, and ruinous policy of the present administration, as quickly to introduce ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 1 (of 5) • John Marshall

... better and fuller education of the children of the nation is motived partly by the growing conviction that the freedom, political, civil, and religious, which we as a nation enjoy, can only be maintained, furthered, and strengthened in so far as we have educated our children rightly to understand and rightly to use this freedom to which they are heirs. Democracy, ...
— The Children: Some Educational Problems • Alexander Darroch

... you nothing as to that. I have revelations touching the King my master, and those I will not tell you." Then she was stirred by a great emotion, and the tears sprang to her eyes and she spoke out as with strong conviction, saying: ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... other cases. The men who have really been the bold artists, the realistic artists, the uncompromising artists, are the men who have turned out, after all, to be writing "with a purpose." Suppose that any cool and cynical art-critic, any art-critic fully impressed with the conviction that artists were greatest when they were most purely artistic, suppose that a man who professed ably a humane aestheticism, as did Mr. Max Beerbohm, or a cruel aestheticism, as did Mr. W. E. Henley, had ...
— Heretics • Gilbert K. Chesterton

... that Gungadhura had thought it worth while to have the blotting paper from Samson's desk photographed in Paris by a special process. Adding two and two together now by the ancient elastic process, Gungadhura soon reached the stage of absolute conviction that Yasmini was in league with Samson to forestall him in getting control of the treasure of his ancestors; and Gungadhura was a dark, hot-blooded, volcanic-tempered man, who stayed not on the order of his anger but blew ...
— Guns of the Gods • Talbot Mundy

... temptation of undertaking, and are peculiarly fitted for despising the perils attendant upon consummating, the most enormous crimes. Murder, rapes, extensive schemes of plunder are the actions of persons belonging to this class; and death is the penalty of conviction. But the coarseness of organization, peculiar to men capable of committing acts wholly selfish, is usually found to be associated with a proportionate insensibility to fear or pain. Their sufferings communicate to those of the spectators, who may be liable to the ...
— A Defence of Poetry and Other Essays • Percy Bysshe Shelley

... case, all for want of a guide-post. Still, when one thinks of Kate's prosperous horoscope, that after so long a voyage, she only, out of the total crew, was thrown on the American shore, with one hundred and five pounds in her purse of clear gain on the voyage, a conviction arises that she could not guess wrongly. She might have tossed up, having coins in her pocket, heads or tails? but this kind of sortilege was then coming to be thought irreligious in Christendom, as a Jewish and a Heathen mode of questioning the dark future. She simply ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey

... opportunity of letting Miss Temple know that she thought that Henrietta was very unwell, and that she was quite convinced Henrietta was thinking of Ferdinand. Nay! she was not satisfied to confine these intimations to Miss Temple; she impressed her conviction of Henrietta's indisposition on Lord Montfort, and teased him with asking his opinion of ...
— Henrietta Temple - A Love Story • Benjamin Disraeli

... be proper to consider what must be required, in order to have a geological and mineral theory established upon scientific principles, or on such grounds as must give conviction to those who will examine the subject; for, unless we may clearly see that there are means for attaining that desirable end, few philosophers will be persuaded to ...
— Theory of the Earth, Volume 1 (of 4) • James Hutton

... Is your religious belief a sham or conviction? Do you sing on Sunday, "we shall know each other there," or do you make it a point to know and love your brother here, seven days ...
— Evening Round Up - More Good Stuff Like Pep • William Crosbie Hunter

... of the community to punish A for his sins without regard to B, and for my part, I shall leave no stone unturned till we have found Northwick, dead or alive; and if he is alive, I shall spare no effort to have him brought to trial, conviction and punishment." He shouted these words out, and thumped the breakfast table so that the spoons clattered in the cups, and Mrs. Hilary could hardly hear what Patrick was ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells

... of those ill-considered attempts of the Irish to escape from the colony, no further schemes of that nature had been planned; but, as a matter of common justice to them, it was much wished that regular accounts of the dates of their conviction, and their several terms of transportation, might be sent out. They had been informed, that a promise to this effect had been ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 2 • David Collins

... office typewriter. Miss Gale was pretty, of course— all typewriter girls are—and it was generally understood in the office that she belonged to a good family who had come down in the world. Her somewhat independent air deepened this conviction and kept the clerks at a distance. She was a sensible girl who realized that the typewriter paid better than the piano, and accordingly turned the expertness of her white fingers to the former instrument. Richard Denham sat down upon a park bench. "Why not?" he asked himself. There was no reason ...
— The Face And The Mask • Robert Barr

... two texts together, we have first the great conviction to which religion clings, that God being on our side all things are for ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... every class, would pour their best benedictions upon their heads, and look up lo them as the ministering angels of Providence. Too often, indeed, the supplies of benevolence are received with a coldness which is truly repulsive, and which bespeaks a secret conviction in the minds of the wretched, that they have a right to expect, and that the opulent are bound to bestow them; but these were Christian poor, and were influenced, we should hope, by a gratitude which ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. II • Francis Augustus Cox

... I said firmly, after a moment's pause, "it's too far-fetched, this explanation. A curse, you know, belongs to the ghost stories of early Victorian days." And only my positive conviction that there was something after all worth discovering, and that it most certainly was not this, prevented my suggesting that we terminate our visit forthwith, or as soon as we decently could. "This is not a haunted house, whatever it is," I concluded somewhat ...
— The Damned • Algernon Blackwood

... "Refrain from these men, and let them alone; for if this counsel or this work be of men, it will come to nought; but if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it, lest haply ye be found even to fight against God" (Acts 5:38,39). But why do you wonder at a work of conviction and conversion? Know you not that this is the judgment of God upon you, "ye despisers, to behold, and wonder, and perish?" (Acts 13:40,41). But why wonder, and think they are fools? Is the way of the just an abomination to you? See that passage, and be ashamed, "He that is upright in the way is ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... her a conviction grew that her old playmate must be classed with other men—man in the abstract—that indefinite and interesting term, hinting of pleasures to ...
— The Danger Mark • Robert W. Chambers

... is, That those Notions, or Ideas of Vertue, and consequent Rules of Action, which are usually given to such young Persons, do rarely carry along with them an entire conviction of their Truth and Reasonableness: Whence if these Instructions at any time happen strongly to cross the Inclinations of those to whom they are given, it will appear rational to question their Solidity: And when Principles ...
— Occasional Thoughts in Reference to a Vertuous or Christian life • Lady Damaris Masham

... are the dearest children in the world," said Margaret with conviction. "There is ...
— Fernley House • Laura E. Richards

... seems to think that Shakespeare has damaged English poetry. I wish he had! It is true he lifted Dryden above himself in "All for Love"; but it was Dryden who said of him, by instinctive conviction rather than judgment, that within his magic circle none dared tread but he. Is he to blame for the extravagances of modern diction, which are but the reaction of the brazen age against the degeneracy of art into artifice, that has ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. X (of X) - America - II, Index • Various

... and from some expressions which Binning uttered under strong excitement, and which were repeated to Principal Baillie,(27) it would appear that his loyalty was somewhat shaken by the passing of the public resolutions, after the battle of Dunbar if not before that time, by a conviction of the dissimulation of the king. He probably thought, with the framers of the western remonstrance,(28) in which he seems to have concurred, that they would not be justifiable in fighting for Charles, without some additional security being provided ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning

... unite with all who honor the birthday of its true citizen, and express the sincere wish that Miss Anthony in her sojourn in strange lands may find what she has in full measure here at home—a genuine appreciation of her true womanliness, her sturdy adherence to honest conviction and her heroic stand, against all opposition, for the higher education and enfranchisement of women. Wishing her Godspeed and a safe return, we, the undersigned, do not need to assure her that neither the triumphs nor the defeats of her future public life will change our estimation ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 2 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper

... presumptive; there was no proof whatever that he had committed the crime; and for his own part he stoutly denied it. But Antoine de Chaulieu entertained no doubt of his guilt, and his speech was certainly well calculated to carry that conviction into the bosom of others. It was of the highest importance to his own reputation that he should procure a verdict, and he confidently assured the afflicted and enraged family of the victim that their vengeance should be satisfied. Under these circumstances could anything ...
— International Weekly Miscellany Vol. I. No. 3, July 15, 1850 • Various

... and, by the liberty of the Press, you leave them at the mercy of every scribbler who can write or think. The wound inflicted may heal, but the scar will always remain. Were you, therefore, determined to decree the motion for this dangerous and impolitic liberty, I make this amendment, that conviction of having written a libel carries with it capital punishment, and that a label be fastened on the breast of the libeller, when carried to execution, with this inscription: 'A social murderer,' ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton

... l'inventer'? I feel, after reading these letters,—as ordinarily after seeing you, sweetest, or hearing from you,—that if marriage did not exist, I should infallibly invent it. I should say, no words, no feelings even, do justice to the whole conviction and religion of my soul—and though they may be suffered to represent some one minute's phase of it, yet, in their very fulness and passion they do injustice to the unrepresented, other minute's, depth and breadth of love ... which let my whole ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett

... energetically a Protestant. Apparently, her faith was founded in deep religious conviction. When Catharine of Medici advised her to follow her husband into the Catholic Church, ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott

... been said by some critics that whiskers are a disguise. I should be unwilling to commit myself to this belief; nor can I accept the contrary conviction that whiskers are a gift of Almighty Providence in which the Giver is so sensitively interested that to shave them off is to invite eternal punishment of a kind—and this, I think, destroys the theory—that would singe them off ...
— The Perfect Gentleman • Ralph Bergengren

... is born with the capacity to do something in a way impossible to another," said the inventor with conviction. "There are no two persons alike ...
— Suzanna Stirs the Fire • Emily Calvin Blake

... come hither with them voluntarily—has perhaps already arrived. Brussels, where two of her marmots rest, is one of her most frequent stations. That censorious Madame Kranich made a scene, but she had to yield to conviction." ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various

... it an easy task to associate his name with the robbery. His very father, after their last conference with the magistrate, doubted him; his friends, in the most sympathetic terms, expressed their conviction of his guilt, and the natural consequence resulting from this was, that he found himself expelled from his paternal roof, and absolutely put out of caste. The tide of ill-fame, in fact, set in so strongly against him, that Ellen, startled as she had been by his threat of taking to the highway, doubted ...
— The Dead Boxer - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton

... city ready to accept of any employment that may offer. "A thing of wood and wires by others played." Following the paste as the parrot, they stutter out anything in hopes of reward: obsequious parasites, says Erasmus, teach, say, write, admire, approve, contrary to their conviction, anything you please, not to benefit the people but to improve their own fortunes. They subscribe to any opinions and decisions contrary to the word of God, that they may not offend their patron, but retain the favour ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior

... intelligence of this handsome boy Pelayo. In the stirring events which immediately followed the Spanish evacuation, Datto Mandi remained neutral, his old antagonism to Alvarez being counterpoised by the conviction that a Zamboanga republic must end in a fiasco. He at once accepted the new situation under American dominion, and is headman of the Samal tribal ward of Magay, a suburb of Zamboanga. He told me in 1904 that he held under his control 9,600 persons, from 1,700 of whom he collected capitation tax ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman

... the unlucky, or rather the lucky, Chevalier, nothing human ever received a hotter shower of surmise and sarcasm. That he was "an impostor, a swindler, a spy," was the Earl's conviction, declared in the most public manner. The whole body of matrons looked round on their blooming innocents, as if they had been snatched from the jaws of a legion of wolves and thanked their own prudence which had not trusted ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXII. - June, 1843.,Vol. LIII. • Various

... wandering all the long way up the hill. Herr Oehmchen and Herr Leinhose were indefatigable. With them came not seldom the young widow with the heart-shaped face, in the wise conviction that the dangerous maiden could at worst take only one of her well-nourished boarders from her, and that it would pay her to keep on good terms ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various

... very lively. The old man never ceased talking. His good-humour, his optimism, his steady belief in a favourable and immediate solution overcame every resistance; and Philippe himself was glad to share a conviction that delighted him. ...
— The Frontier • Maurice LeBlanc

... escaped, so clear a solution of much that is enigmatical, even to those who reject Spiritualism, that the impulse to write weighs upon me with the pressure of a neglected duty. I cannot longer be silent, and, in the conviction that the truth of my statement will be evident enough to those most concerned in hearing it, without the authority of any name, (least of all, of one so little known as mine,) I now give my confession to the world. The names of the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, No. 38, December, 1860 • Various

... heavy-armed infantry. Thus Sparta had the advantage of strong allies. The motive at the bottom of this alliance was what Thucydides tells was the real cause of the Peloponnesian war,—the jealousy which the growth of Athens excited in other states. This feeling really involved a conviction of the need of maintaining in Greece that which in modern times is called a "balance of power." When Greece was no longer one, as in the best days of the wars with Persia, but was divided into two opposite camps, watchful ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher

... over to the town in which she was residing, and there had a long conversation with her upon this matter. When this was settled, her mind seemed to be more at ease. She died with a comfortable assurance that she was going to a better world, and with a bitter conviction that it would be hard to find one that would offer her a worse lot than being a poor relation ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 122, December, 1867 • Various

... should take them for a bribe, Resolved to mortify your pride, I'll here expose your weaker side. Your spirits kindle to a flame, Moved by the lightest touch of blame; And when a friend in kindness tries To show you where your error lies, Conviction does but more incense; Perverseness is your whole defence; Truth, judgment, wit, give place to spite, Regardless both of wrong and right; Your virtues all suspended wait, Till time has open'd reason's ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift

... characteristic of Mr. Bryan to shut his eyes to arguments and facts when he reaches the ecstacy of sentimental conviction. ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various

... of the day of peace great discontents in the army were developed. It prevailed equally among officers and private soldiers, and originated in the destitute condition of the troops at that time, and the conviction that the army would be disbanded without provision being made for the liquidation of the claims upon the government for the pay of arrearages, and the promised half-pay of the officers for a term of years after the conclusion of the war. The prospect was, indeed, ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing

... was prompted by the abiding conviction that Plautus as a dramatic artist has been from time immemorial misunderstood. In his progress through the ages he has been like a merry clown rollicking amongst people with a hearty invitation to laughter, and has been rewarded by commendation for his services to morality and ...
— The Dramatic Values in Plautus • Wilton Wallace Blancke

... wrong and punishing crime. He is without a peer in his profession. But he has also become the idol of some of the criminals. For if he discovers (as sometimes happens) that the criminal is a good sort after all, he is just as likely to warn his prey, once he has all proofs of the guilt and a conviction is certain. Possibly this is his way of taking the sting from his irresistible impulse to ferret out hidden mysteries. But it is rather inconvenient, and he has hurt himself by it—hurt himself badly. They were tired of his peculiarities ...
— The Case of the Golden Bullet • Grace Isabel Colbron, and Augusta Groner

... has eaten too much jam and feels that too much of a good thing is a truism is rather like the philosopher who, having studied everything, comes to the sad conviction that there is something wrong with the world. The child finds that large quantities of jam are a delusion; the philosopher discovers that the world is even more wrong ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Patrick Braybrooke

... not indicate all the guilt which God detects in the conscience, and which the awakened conscience detects in itself. It is a dreadful moment when a sinner is brought face to face with God, and charged with his guilt; it is then that the law performs its terrible yet merciful work of conviction. ...
— The Parables of Our Lord • William Arnot

... August, 1820, she realized for the first time the blessedness of full and free forgiveness. The Savior was precious to her soul, and holy duties were pleasant and delightful. She had passed from the deep waters of conviction, and gladly placed her feet on the Rock of Ages, where she stood immovable. Her joy knew no bounds. Liberated from sin, free from the dreadful weight of guilt and condemnation, pardoned by God and loved by Christ, she deemed no praises too exalted, no trials ...
— Daughters of the Cross: or Woman's Mission • Daniel C. Eddy

... A divine preparation of the nature, divine activities of the soul, precede all high uses of communication. Though Demosthenes or Phillips speak, it is the hearer's own spirit that convinces him. Conviction cannot be forced upon one from without. Hence the well-known futility of belligerent controversy. No possible logic will lead a man ahead of his own intelligence; neither will any take from him the persuasions which correspond to his mental condition. A good logical pose may sometimes serve ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... conviction that the boy had good stuff in him was deepened on the morrow, when, banishing books, I took him for a breather over hill and dale, through wood and underbrush, three miles out and three miles in. I told him stories ...
— Paradise Garden - The Satirical Narrative of a Great Experiment • George Gibbs

... arisen in relation to the exercise in that country of the judicial functions conferred upon our ministers and consuls. The indictment, trial, and conviction in the consular court at Yokohama of John Ross, a merchant seaman on board an American vessel, have made it necessary for the Government to institute a careful examination into the nature and methods ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Volume 8: Chester A. Arthur • James D. Richardson

... won't keep level, But rise beneath our feet or fail, A reeling ship's deck in a gale! God vanished long ago, iwis, A mere subjective synthesis; 140 A doll, stuffed out with hopes and fears, Too homely for us pretty dears, Who want one that conviction carries, Last make of London or of Paris. He gone, I felt a moment's spasm, But calmed myself, with Protoplasm, A finer name, and, what is more, As enigmatic as before; Greek, too, and sure to fill with ease Minds caught in the Symplegades 150 ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell

... and introduces us into the every-day life of Salt Lake City. That our families and our institutions are in peril from this monstrous and ridiculous evil it would not be easy for us to believe. Yet it is impossible to read this book without a conviction that the author could easily substantiate his facts by proofs, and that intelligent men and women have been and are still being led away into the heresy. The incidents of the story are, however, calculated to shock and repel the reader, who rises ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, October 1885 • Various

... and assuredly with no bias against Mr. Darwin's views, it is our clear conviction that, as the evidence stands, it is not absolutely proven that a group of animals having all the characters exhibited by species in nature, has ever been originated by selection, whether natural or ...
— Thomas Henry Huxley; A Sketch Of His Life And Work • P. Chalmers Mitchell

... all other means failed; indeed, it was simpler and more expeditious than the calling of many witnesses, the testing of evidence by cross-examination, and other surer but slower methods; and especially when conviction, not truth, was the end in view, torture was a ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... and one which should never be overlooked. One of his cases was in a man with a fractured leg in the Mercy Hospital at Pittsburg. The patient was in good health, but one day he became possessed of a cool, quiet, and perfectly clear impression that he was about to die. Struck with his conviction, Andrews examined his pulse and general condition minutely, and assured the patient there was not the slightest ground for apprehension. But he persisted, and was attacked by pneumonia three days later which brought him to the verge of the grave, although ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould

... To Tarling it was amazing that the man had maintained this show of bravado to the last, though in his heart he knew that the Crown had a very poor case against Milburgh if the charge of embezzlement and arson were proceeded with. It was on the murder alone that a conviction could be secured; and this Milburgh evidently realised, for he made no attempt in the remarkable statement which followed to do more than hint that he had been guilty of robbing the firm. He sat huddled up in his chair, his manacled hands clasped on the table before him, ...
— The Daffodil Mystery • Edgar Wallace

... with success. The dance of the eight tiny zanies was the best of the ballet. The Shakspearean pageant at the end might be (1) shortened, and (2) brightened by the characters throwing a little more conviction into their respective aspects—notably the ghost of Hamlet's father. However, as a popular tercentenary tribute to "our Shakspeare" the scheme is to be commended and was ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, January 3, 1917 • Various

... has successfully prevented the departure of a single military expedition or armed vessel from our shores in violation of our laws would seem to be a sufficient answer. But of this aspect of the Spanish note it is not necessary to speak further now. Firm in the conviction of a wholly performed obligation, due response to this charge has been made in ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... credit or influence; they are supported only by those whom they really represent, that is to say, those who elected them, a tenth of the population, and forming a sectarian minority. Again, in this minority there are a good many who are lukewarm; with most men the distance is great between conviction and action; the interval is filled up with acquired habits, indolence, fear and egoism. One's belief in the abstractions of the "Contrat-social" is of little account; no one readily bestirs oneself for an abstract end. Uncertainties beset one at the outset; the road one has to ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 4 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 3 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... Charles but what he seemed to blame her for it, and while she resented this strange form of attention, she had a compensating conviction that he was really paying tribute and she knew that the absence of his complaints would have left a blank. Fixing her with his pale eyes, he described the bitterness of life in his father's office, his mismanagement of clients, his father's sneers, his mother's sighs; his ...
— THE MISSES MALLETT • E. H. YOUNG

... it and be troubling herself about her boy, and fancying that she is never to see him again. For my part, I feel sure, however, that the youngsters will turn up somewhere or other; as it is my firm conviction, from experience, that a midshipman has as many lives as a cat, or, considering the immense trouble most youngsters take to expend themselves, there would be no superior ...
— The Three Lieutenants • W.H.G. Kingston

... nearer inspection of the two poles they proved to be stout spars about the thickness of a man's leg; and, from the appearance in each of a sort of sheave-hole, Lieutenant Mildmay declared his conviction that they were the masts of a small ship. They were very rotten, however, and, if Mildmay's surmise was indeed correct, the craft must have been under the ice for a very long time. The mere suggestion was enough to fully arouse their curiosity; ...
— The Log of the Flying Fish - A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure • Harry Collingwood

... his minion Stockbrigg, who still ruled the castle and its lord alike, sent word that he refused to see his sister; and the broken-hearted woman walked sadly away. To a letter in which she begged "to speak but a few moments to your Grace, and if I don't, to your own conviction, clear up my injured innocence, inflict what punishment you please upon me," ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall

... to describe the qualities of the refined sculpture which is executed in large quantities for private persons belonging to the upper classes, and for sepulchral and memorial purposes. But I could not now criticise that sculpture with any power of conviction to you, because I have not yet stated to you the principles of good sculpture in general. I will, however, in some points, tell you the facts ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin

... went up to her room, her heart was beating wildly. This sudden plunge into the unknown was blinding, even though she longed to make it. Having come to the edge of the precipice she feared the leap, in spite of the conviction that life-long ...
— Flower of the Dusk • Myrtle Reed

... of it to the older sisters, they answered cheerily, "Be patient, girlie, it takes a long time for such a hurt to heal," and turned their heads away lest she should read the growing conviction ...
— Heart of Gold • Ruth Alberta Brown

... Ghent at his mercy. What that was likely to be had been shown at Ypres. Now the young knights felt indeed that the cause was a righteous one, and that they could draw their swords for Ghent with the conviction that by so doing they were fighting to save its ...
— A March on London • G. A. Henty

... be safer?" said Caroline: "the arts of persuasion might be turned against us by others, but the power of conviction never could." ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. VII - Patronage • Maria Edgeworth

... Now an irresistible conviction came over her mind that Lord Bohun was thinking of Ferrers, and a desire on her part as strong to learn at length something ...
— Sketches • Benjamin Disraeli

... must also recognize the probability that the male portion of this majority would be composed of the milder and less energetic class of men, people with much brains and but little physical courage, ready to go to the stake for a conviction, but not ready to shoulder a musket or assault a redoubt. If under these circumstances the minority, composed exclusively of men, inferior if you will, to the majority in the purity of their motives, the breadth of their culture, and in capacity for drawing ...
— Reflections and Comments 1865-1895 • Edwin Lawrence Godkin

... great extent these defects characterise the Home Counties, and one might try to excuse them in various ways. In the North of England, and in Scotland throughout, you will be told to "go east," or "keep west" (as the Wordsworths were asked, were they "stepping westward?"), with a conviction that the direction will be sufficient for you as it plainly is for your guide. Now nobody can be said to know his countryside who does not know the airts; and the plain truth is that the Southern Englishman does not know his countryside ...
— In a Green Shade - A Country Commentary • Maurice Hewlett

... his sensations. He is not wholly undisturbed, for he is sometimes cold and hungry, and so on.[1] He claims, nevertheless, that he suffers less than the dogmatist, who is beset with two kinds of suffering, one from the feelings themselves, and also from the conviction that they are by nature an evil.[2] To the Sceptic nothing is in itself either an evil or a good, and so he thinks that "he escapes from difficulties easier."[3] For instance, he who considers riches a good in themselves, is unhappy in the loss ...
— Sextus Empiricus and Greek Scepticism • Mary Mills Patrick

... deferred his departure a whole week, and during that time he made me feel what severe punishment a good yet stern, a conscientious yet implacable man can inflict on one who has offended him. Without one overt act of hostility, one upbraiding word, he contrived to impress me momently with the conviction that I was put beyond the pale ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte

... and if they were willing to suffer persecution and death rather than desist from troubling the people with this testimony, it appears to me that reason will allow that this is, at least, some evidence of the truth of this astonishing fact; though this was not the evidence which carried conviction to so many thousands of the Jews as well as of the Gentiles. This we have before shown was the manifestation of the mighty power of God in the miraculous wonders which God wrought by ...
— A Series of Letters In Defence of Divine Revelation • Hosea Ballou

... times, "that we have a virtual representation; very well, let us have a virtual taxation too!" Here the wit is in the fidelity of the sequitur. When Columbus broke the egg, where was the wit? In the completeness of conviction ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... will produce no more conviction in an empty head than the most superficial declamation; as a feather and a guinea fall with equal velocity ...
— Pearls of Thought • Maturin M. Ballou

... I couldn't bear even to speak of it. Sell?—oh, Tabitha!" Then her voice changed from a piteous appeal to one of forced conviction. ...
— Across the Years • Eleanor H. Porter

... means of a former earth), to this changed state in which they have become perfect mineral bodies, and constitute a part of the present earth. For, as these changes are perfectly explained by the one theory, and absolutely inconsistent with the other, there arises from this a conviction that must be irresistible to a person who can give proper attention to a chain of reasoning from ...
— Theory of the Earth, Volume 1 (of 4) • James Hutton

... then he has something borne in upon him through the senses of sight, of hearing and understanding that appeals to him. Therefore, the impersonating medium is the most valuable medium you can present to inquirers." Another mediumistic writer has said: "This kind of mediumship carries conviction of the real presence of the so-called dead, and your aim should be to get into communication with the intelligent operator at the other end of the line, and elicit from him evidences of his identity and purpose. Table movements, ...
— Genuine Mediumship or The Invisible Powers • Bhakta Vishita

... carried away a single letter from the schools; but with them were also some who knew about Horace, Cicero, and the Roman Republic. There were many leaders who afterwards distinguished themselves in the king's armies; and there were numerous clever partisans who cherished a magnanimous conviction that it was of no consequence where they fought, so long as they did fight, since it was a disgrace to an honourable man to live without fighting. There were many who had come to the Setch for the sake ...
— Taras Bulba and Other Tales • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol

... address a train of them down at Emigrant Square. They are honest, peaceful people. You call them 'Copperheads,' I believe. But they are real, true, good men. We find them very truth-seeking, remarkably open to conviction. Many of them have stayed with us. Thus the Lord makes the wrath of man to praise Him. The Abolitionists—the same people who interfered with our institutions, and drove us out into the wilderness—interfered with the Southern institutions till they broke up the Union. But ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 78, April, 1864 • Various

... deepest moral problems of humanity, and that the key of those problems lies in the hands of the mothers of our race. They, and they alone, can unlock the door to a purer and a stronger life. This, in Ibsen's words, "is the mission that lies before them." And it is this strong conviction which makes me feel that, even with broken powers and shattered health, I cannot rest from my labors without, at any cost to myself, placing the knowledge and experience gained in those years of toil and sorrow at the disposal of the educated women of ...
— The Power of Womanhood, or Mothers and Sons - A Book For Parents, And Those In Loco Parentis • Ellice Hopkins

... said, "the conviction of individual immortality is so clear that, if I were not perfectly aware of the cause of their doubt or disbelief, I should wonder at intelligent persons questioning the fact. Like everything else taught by Christ, that we are immortal is a fact; and it is not ...
— A Strange Discovery • Charles Romyn Dake

... on account of the passage of the Home Rule Bill had become so strained that many people believed civil war to be inevitable. The conviction of the German Ambassador in London, as well as most German observers, was that Britain would not actually enter the war, when the test came. Upon her decision, it is now evident, depended the fate of Europe. With England out, the French army ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume I (of 8) - Introductions; Special Articles; Causes of War; Diplomatic and State Papers • Various

... a zigzag course to avoid the thirty or forty shell holes that our guns had made, and as he wormed himself forward the darkness of the night and the strange silence of the enemy batteries on that sector confirmed him more than ever in his conviction ...
— With Haig on the Somme • D. H. Parry

... arrived in due course, bringing with it that jolly time when everybody is excited, happy, and good-tempered; when the morning's work is a mere matter of form, and the boys slap their books together at the sound of the bell, with the joyful conviction that the whole length of the Christmas holidays lies ...
— The Triple Alliance • Harold Avery

... troubled countenance, stood beside her, looking round with an air of great perplexity. Louis, seating himself at Catharine's feet, surveyed the deep gloomy valley before them, and sighed heavily. The conviction had now forcibly struck him that they had mistaken the path altogether. The very aspect of the country was different; the growth of the trees, the flow of the stream, all indicated a change of soil and scene. ...
— Canadian Crusoes - A Tale of The Rice Lake Plains • Catharine Parr Traill

... asleep. Next he took wreaths of ivy from the vase before him, put them on the sleeping woman, and when he had finished looked at those present with a delighted and inquiring glance. He arrayed himself in ivy too, repeating, in a voice of deep conviction, "I am not a man ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz

... amend the constitution to permit another term, has struggled to assert his authority against his predecessor, who still leads their shared political party. MUTHARIKA's anti-corruption efforts have led to several high-level arrests and one prominent conviction. Increasing corruption, population growth, increasing pressure on agricultural lands, and the spread of HIV/AIDS pose major ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States

... some other purpose, but rather the presence or absence of a certain idea furnishes a reason for (our assuming) the existence of something. This is exemplified by the case of a person who, having set out for some other purpose, (nevertheless) forms the conviction of the existence of leaves, grass, and the like, which he sees lying on the road.—But, the purvapakshin may here object, the instance quoted by you is not strictly analogous. In the case of the wanderer, ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 1 • George Thibaut

... return there until he came back. Then she sat down and tried not to think. But she could not help thinking; so she submitted and tried to think the late catastrophe out. An idea that she had disjointed the whole framework of things by creating a false belief filled her imagination. The one conviction that she had brought out of her reading, observing, reflecting, and living was that the concealment of a truth, with its resultant false beliefs, must produce mischief, even though the beginning of that mischief might be as inconceivable as the end. She made no distinction ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw

... reading the above, when it dropped out of my coat pocket during one of our visits to the wood-shed, that Adam expressed the profound conviction that I was born to be hanged, but as I have already intimated, neither his sense of justice, nor his sense of ...
— The Autobiography of Methuselah • John Kendrick Bangs

... indifferently provided with materials for undertaking a siege and by far too weak in numbers to attempt to take the place by storm. Apprehensive of stratagem, he redoubled his vigilance; and he continued in this conviction until Wallenstein's house-steward, whom he discovered among the crowd, confirmed to him this intelligence. "The town is ours without a blow!" exclaimed he in astonishment to his officers, and immediately summoned it ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. III • Kuno Francke (Editor-in-Chief)

... Vice-President and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or ...
— History of the United States, Volume 6 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews

... right of selecting a tutor for the Duke of Gloucester, the son of the Princess Anne, without any consultation with the Princess herself; and finally the judges, with only two dissenting voices, expressed their conviction that the King was entitled to the prerogative which he claimed. The case does not, however, seem to have been regularly argued before them; there is no trace of their having been assisted in their deliberations by counsel on either side, and their extra-judicial ...
— The Constitutional History of England From 1760 to 1860 • Charles Duke Yonge

... distance we had to travel before we could gain a place of shelter for the winter, I trust it will be judged that we prosecuted the enterprise as far as was prudent, and abandoned it only under a well-founded conviction that a further advance would endanger the lives of the whole party, and prevent the knowledge of what had been done from reaching England. The active assistance I received from the officers, in contending with the fears of the men, demands ...
— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 2 • John Franklin

... of the greatest known rivers, each of which drained a vast range of territory. This narrative reveals the gradual dawning upon Columbus of the fact that he had discovered a hitherto unknown continental mass. In his letter to the sovereigns his conviction is settled and his efforts to adjust it with previous knowledge and the geographical traditions of the ages are most interesting. See Major, Select Letters of Columbus, pp. 134 et seqq. "Ptolemy," he says, on p. 136, "and the others who have written upon the ...
— The Northmen, Columbus and Cabot, 985-1503 • Various

... place was dismal and unendurable, the whole life and atmosphere indescribably depressing." He looked round with an instinct of caution, leaned forward earnestly, and dropped his voice. "Mr. Carrados, it is my absolute conviction that Creake is only waiting for a favourable opportunity to ...
— Four Max Carrados Detective Stories • Ernest Bramah

... other girls, twelve in all, from among the novices in the Pear Fragrance court, they egressed by the corner gate leading out of the covered passage. The matrons took soft bundles in their arms, as their strength was not equal to carrying boxes. And under the conviction that their old mistress would prefer plays of three or five acts, they had put ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... man of encyclopaedic learning, demonstrates more clearly perhaps than any other, how narrow and insufficient was this point of view, in what confusion worse confounded of contradictions it landed those who applied it. Says Saint Simon, with the profoundest conviction: "The future is made up of the last terms of a series, the first of which consist of the past. When one has thoroughly mastered the first terms of any series it is easy to put down their successors; thus from the past carefully observed one can easily deduce the future." This is so true ...
— Anarchism and Socialism • George Plechanoff

... The conviction of this sad yet natural fact came to Mrs Jo with a pang, for she felt how utterly hopeless such a longing was; since light and darkness were not farther apart than snow-white Bess and sin-stained Dan. No dream of such a thing disturbed the young girl, as her entire unconsciousness plainly showed. ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott

... began to read; but seeing at once that Sergeant Daw kept his keen eyes on her face, unflinchingly watching every flitting expression, I kept my eyes henceforth fixed on his. When Miss Trelawny had read her letter through, I had in my mind a conviction, which, however, I kept locked in my own heart. Amongst the suspicions in the mind of the Detective was one, rather perhaps potential than definite, of ...
— The Jewel of Seven Stars • Bram Stoker

... in letter of recent date for the particular physical aspects of my present environment, and though (as you so well know) it is my conviction that the physical fact is not and only the immaterial is, yet I shall gladly look about me—a thing I have not yet seen occasion to do—and describe to you the details ...
— The Night Horseman • Max Brand

... recognised expedition had reported it. For in the one case the man is known and trusted by his fellow-prospectors, while in the other there is not only the bushman's dislike of anything official to be overcome, but the curious conviction, which most of them possess, that any one in the position of a geologist, or other scientific calling, must necessarily be an ass! In the same way, if the country met with is useless, the fact soon becomes known amongst the prospectors, who avoid it accordingly—though ...
— Spinifex and Sand - Five Years' Pioneering and Exploration in Western Australia • David W Carnegie

... I will venture to take you for a short time from this place, and introduce you; depending on your innocence, or your repentance—on his conviction in your favour, or his mercy towards your guilt. Follow ...
— Lover's Vows • Mrs. Inchbald

... been some such conviction as this which led the late Master of Balliol to say that the longer he lived the less he prayed, but the more he thought. Precisely; it is not irreverence but a deepening reverence for the Divine powers within us, which shames us into trusting them when anything great is to be done. What ...
— Morality as a Religion - An exposition of some first principles • W. R. Washington Sullivan

... any other circumstance. "Listen to what I tell you, sir. If the Prussians dare to show their faces here, we will kick them home again. You hear me? we will kick them from here to Berlin." His bearing and manner were superb; the serene tranquillity of the child, the candid conviction of the innocent who knows nothing and fears nothing. "Parbleu! it is so, because it is so, and that's all there is ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola

... individual endeavours to the evanishment of the human race, or entail his own miserable condition on the endless generations proceeding from him. And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? that they are not to be violated but with his wrath? Indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that his justice cannot sleep for ever; that, considering numbers, nature, and natural means ...
— Clotel; or, The President's Daughter • William Wells Brown

... if I don't think I'm right after all," said the policeman, in a tone of conviction, as he again placed himself in ...
— The Masked Bridal • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

... animals might have since crossed it, which might mislead the hound. It would be cold at night, and much colder next morning. There were many chances that no relief might reach him from the camp. Impressed with this conviction, Basil began to feel serious alarm. Not despair, however—he was not the boy to despair. His mind only grew more alive to the necessity for action. He looked around to discover some means of escape. His gun lay not a hundred yards off. Could he only get hold of the piece, and return safely ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid

... woman," declared Miriam with deep conviction. "I may not have noticed it before, but better late than never. I move that we organize a writing school in the living-room for the purpose of squaring ourselves with ...
— Grace Harlowe's Golden Summer • Jessie Graham Flower

... late train, and Patty went up to her pretty bedroom, with her usual happy conviction that she was a very fortunate little girl and had the best father in ...
— Patty at Home • Carolyn Wells

... substituted the dangerous allurements of temporal prosperity and worldly honor. Idolaters were led to receive a part of the Christian faith, while they rejected other essential truths. They professed to accept Jesus as the Son of God, and to believe in His death and resurrection; but they had no conviction of sin, and felt no need of repentance or of a change of heart. With some concessions on their part, they proposed that Christians should make concessions, that all might unite on the ...
— The Great Controversy Between Christ and Satan • Ellen G. White

... vice itself assumes the aspect of virtue. Pardon what I have said, Madam. I do not desire to extenuate my guilt—far less to defend it; but I would show you, and such as you—who, happily, are exempted from trials like mine—how much misery has to do with crime. And I affirm to you, on my own conviction, that she who falls, because she has not strength granted her to struggle with affliction, may be reclaimed,—may repent, and be forgiven,—even as she, whose sins, 'though many, were ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth

... or ignorance or from motive of gain. I have deliberately resolved to do this virtuous deed. By this act, O Yudhishthira, two objects will be accomplished; one is a requital of the services rendered by the Brahmana and the other is the acquisition of high religious merit. It is my conviction that the Kshatriya who rendereth help unto a Brahmana in anything acquireth regions of bliss hereafter. So also a Kshatriya who saveth the life of a Kshatriya achieveth that great fame in this world as in the other. A Kshatriya rendering help unto a Vaisya also on this earth certainly acquires ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... unreliable; while the vision is always trustworthy. We are for ever changing the vision to suit the world as we find it, whereas we ought to be changing the world to bring it into conformity with the unchanging vision. The very essence of orthodoxy is a profound and reverent conviction of ideals that cannot be changed—ideals which were the first, and ...
— Among Famous Books • John Kelman

... about by the enforcement upon unwilling groups of a method which in their judgment is not adapted to their peculiar needs. In this as in all else, persuasion is an essential element in bringing about conviction. With the developments in industry what they are to-day there is sure to come a progressive evolution from autocratic single control, whether by capital, labor, or the state, to democratic cooeperative ...
— Modern American Prose Selections • Various



Words linked to "Conviction" :   article of faith, convict, final decision, belief, acquittal, final judgment, amateurism, strong belief, sentence, criminal law, robbery conviction, condemnation, judgment of conviction



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