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Function   Listen
noun
Function  n.  
1.
The act of executing or performing any duty, office, or calling; performance. "In the function of his public calling."
2.
(Physiol.) The appropriate action of any special organ or part of an animal or vegetable organism; as, the function of the heart or the limbs; the function of leaves, sap, roots, etc.; life is the sum of the functions of the various organs and parts of the body.
3.
The natural or assigned action of any power or faculty, as of the soul, or of the intellect; the exertion of an energy of some determinate kind. "As the mind opens, and its functions spread."
4.
The course of action which peculiarly pertains to any public officer in church or state; the activity appropriate to any business or profession. "Tradesmen... going about their functions." "The malady which made him incapable of performing his regal functions."
5.
(Math.) A quantity so connected with another quantity, that if any alteration be made in the latter there will be a consequent alteration in the former. Each quantity is said to be a function of the other. Thus, the circumference of a circle is a function of the diameter. If x be a symbol to which different numerical values can be assigned, such expressions as x^(2), 3^(x), Log. x, and Sin. x, are all functions of x.
6.
(Eccl.) A religious ceremony, esp. one particularly impressive and elaborate. "Every solemn 'function' performed with the requirements of the liturgy."
7.
A public or social ceremony or gathering; a festivity or entertainment, esp. one somewhat formal. "This function, which is our chief social event."
Algebraic function, a quantity whose connection with the variable is expressed by an equation that involves only the algebraic operations of addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, raising to a given power, and extracting a given root; opposed to transcendental function.
Arbitrary function. See under Arbitrary.
Calculus of functions. See under Calculus.
Carnot's function (Thermo-dynamics), a relation between the amount of heat given off by a source of heat, and the work which can be done by it. It is approximately equal to the mechanical equivalent of the thermal unit divided by the number expressing the temperature in degrees of the air thermometer, reckoned from its zero of expansion.
Circular functions. See Inverse trigonometrical functions (below). Continuous function, a quantity that has no interruption in the continuity of its real values, as the variable changes between any specified limits.
Discontinuous function. See under Discontinuous.
Elliptic functions, a large and important class of functions, so called because one of the forms expresses the relation of the arc of an ellipse to the straight lines connected therewith.
Explicit function, a quantity directly expressed in terms of the independently varying quantity; thus, in the equations y = 6x^(2), y = 10 -x^(3), the quantity y is an explicit function of x.
Implicit function, a quantity whose relation to the variable is expressed indirectly by an equation; thus, y in the equation x^(2) + y^(2) = 100 is an implicit function of x.
Inverse trigonometrical functions, or Circular functions, the lengths of arcs relative to the sines, tangents, etc. Thus, AB is the arc whose sine is BD, and (if the length of BD is x) is written sin ^(-1)x, and so of the other lines. See Trigonometrical function (below). Other transcendental functions are the exponential functions, the elliptic functions, the gamma functions, the theta functions, etc.
One-valued function, a quantity that has one, and only one, value for each value of the variable. Transcendental functions, a quantity whose connection with the variable cannot be expressed by algebraic operations; thus, y in the equation y = 10^(x) is a transcendental function of x. See Algebraic function (above). Trigonometrical function, a quantity whose relation to the variable is the same as that of a certain straight line drawn in a circle whose radius is unity, to the length of a corresponding are of the circle. Let AB be an arc in a circle, whose radius OA is unity let AC be a quadrant, and let OC, DB, and AF be drawnpependicular to OA, and EB and CG parallel to OA, and let OB be produced to G and F. E Then BD is the sine of the arc AB; OD or EB is the cosine, AF is the tangent, CG is the cotangent, OF is the secant OG is the cosecant, AD is the versed sine, and CE is the coversed sine of the are AB. If the length of AB be represented by x (OA being unity) then the lengths of Functions. these lines (OA being unity) are the trigonometrical functions of x, and are written sin x, cos x, tan x (or tang x), cot x, sec x, cosec x, versin x, coversin x. These quantities are also considered as functions of the angle BOA.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Function" Quotes from Famous Books



... belief in a future life. If man was truly descended from the lower creation, it seemed obvious to infer that as had been his origin, so also would be his destiny—the destiny of the beasts that perish. The Kraft und Stoff school of physicists proclaimed aloud that consciousness was only a function of the brain, and would come to a stop together with the mechanism which produced it; as Haeckel expressed it, "The various functions of the soul are bound up with certain special parts of the brain, and cannot be exercised unless these are in a normal condition; if the areas are destroyed their ...
— Problems of Immanence - Studies Critical and Constructive • J. Warschauer

... Prussian guarantee to respect Belgian neutrality would be torn up at the outbreak of war, then three great fortresses—Liege, Namur, and Antwerp—would hold up the enemy's advance in this quarter, and perform the function of delay which the obsolete armament of the north-eastern French frontier could not perform. We shall see, when we come to the conflicting theories of warfare held by the various belligerents, what a grievous ...
— A General Sketch of the European War - The First Phase • Hilaire Belloc

... and shocking women, you, Mrs. Chapman, and myself as (the traveler of twenty years ago). Not only newspapers, but pamphlets of such denunciation are circulated, I'm told. I'm afraid now I, and even Mrs. Chapman, must lose our fame, and all the railing will be engrossed by you. My little function is to keep English people tolerably right, by means of a London daily paper, while the danger of misinformation and misreading from the "Times" continues. I can't conceive how such a paper as the "Times" can fail to be better informed than it ...
— The Life of Harriet Beecher Stowe • Charles Edward Stowe

... effects of too little, if persevered in and continued, especially if some of these effects are attributed to causes which have no real existence, are deadly and dangerous, for they bring on an insidious deterioration both of function and structure which leads by several avenues, often miscalled ...
— The Healthy Life, Vol. V, Nos. 24-28 - The Independent Health Magazine • Various

... usurped judicial power, arraigning magistrates for their conduct in office, &c. The functions of the Comitia Centuriata were, as we have, seen, also legislative. They elected to the higher magistracies and exercised jurisdiction in capital cases, a function which grew out of the Roman citizen's right to appeal. Each century had one vote; and as by the Servian arrangement the first class, though containing fewest voters, had nevertheless, owing to its highest ...
— The Gracchi Marius and Sulla - Epochs Of Ancient History • A.H. Beesley

... has shewn ("British Medical Journal," January 7th, 1922) from observations of the lining of the womb in animals and in women that "the weight of evidence goes to prove that its function is more likely to be absorbent than excretive, and that as such it plays an important part in ...
— Conception Control and Its Effects on the Individual and the Nation • Florence E. Barrett

... made secure his progress. A few months after the death of the promoter of this model town, a court decision made it obligatory upon the company to divest itself of the management of the town as involving a function beyond its corporate powers. The parks, flowers, and fountains of this far-famed industrial centre were dismantled, with scarcely a ...
— Democracy and Social Ethics • Jane Addams

... not only of what the latter is, and how it has become what it is, but of what it ought to be, and what it is tending to become, I cannot but think that the real force of the analogy is totally opposed to the negative view of State function. ...
— Critiques and Addresses • Thomas Henry Huxley

... them one by one. "I only wish to God that my country were with you, too, in this thing," he said when he had performed this function. ...
— The Sky Pilot in No Man's Land • Ralph Connor

... doing, and how are you getting on? How is your wife? And the children?' His friend answered with his quiet smile. All were doing well, thank God. The little girl was just going to be weaned. The boy continued to fulfil his function of looking lovely, and was waiting impatiently for old Rehu's centenary. As for himself, he was hard at work. He had two pictures in the Salon this year, not badly hung, and not badly sold. On the other hand ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet

... fix Hellas in his mind's eye as the counterpart of Christendom. Let it be understood, then, that all that preceded Hellenism in the ancient world was but the vestibule of its magnificent temple, and that the sole function of the Roman Empire, which came afterwards, was to tide the world over from Hellenic realities to the more sublime realities of Christianity. The mighty deeds of Egyptian conquerors, the imperial splendors of Persian dynasties,—these were but miniature gems that gilded the corridors ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 65, March, 1863 • Various

... we got? Why, the simplest matter conceivable. The forces inside our atom—itself, mind you, the function ...
— Defenders of Democracy • The Militia of Mercy

... "affections"—he too, alas! at times—was for ever trying to be, to assert ITSELF, to maintain its isolated and petty self, by a kind of practical lie in things; although through every incident of its hypothetic existence it had protested that its proper function was to die. Surely! those transient affections marred the freedom, the truth, the beatific calm, of the absolute selfishness, which could not, if it would, pass beyond the circumference of itself; ...
— Imaginary Portraits • Walter Pater

... of which Fig. 57 illustrates a specimen, comprising 8 warp-threads and 32 picks in a repeat, the rib contains 4 picks. Of the 8 warp-threads, 3 float over and 3 under the rib, while the 2 others bind taffeta, which latter function is executed by 2 other threads in ...
— Theory Of Silk Weaving • Arnold Wolfensberger

... at Mrs. Sturtevant's and was the great affair of the year. It was called, to distinguish it from the others, "The Annual Meeting," and upon that occasion the husbands and men friends of the members were invited and the function was in the evening. Margaret had wished to have the club at her own house, before the affair of Martha Wallingford, but the annual occasions were regulated by the letters of the alphabet and it was incontrovertibly the turn of the letter ...
— The Butterfly House • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... check revealed one fact. The machines, when trained on the Jovian worlds, refused to function. Anywhere else in space, however, they ...
— Empire • Clifford Donald Simak

... In gardening, almost the only thing which costs unduly is for us to try to give our house some other house's garden. One's private garden should never be quite so far removed from a state of nature as his house is. Its leading function should be to delight its house's inmates (and intimates) in things of nature so refined as to inspire and satisfy their happiest moods. Therefore no garden should cost, nor look as if it cost, an outlay of money, time or toil that cramps the house's own ability to minister to the ...
— The Amateur Garden • George W. Cable

... Her function is to consider the general health, physical capacity and character of each applicant. As regards those under 16 years of age, she could obtain useful advice as to health from the Certifying Surgeon ...
— Women and War Work • Helen Fraser

... I said, in a cold tone. "Of course it matters not to me, because I can be kept in school untill I am thirty, and never come out or have a good time, and no one will care. But when you are an old woman and have not employed your natural function of having children to suport you in Age, don't say I did ...
— Bab: A Sub-Deb • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... with a series in some degree representing their function in surviving belief. The comparison of these with dream books, still sold and used, and with a more extensive collection of superstitions, retained in this and other continents, would no doubt offer curious results. At present attention may be called only to one remarkable trait, namely: ...
— Current Superstitions - Collected from the Oral Tradition of English Speaking Folk • Various

... forgiven." He thus assured her of the pardon previously granted, but still more he vindicated her in the eyes of the guests and assured them of the new life upon which the woman already had entered. They marveled as they heard him pronouncing pardon. That is a divine function; but the ideal Man whose sympathy Luke records was likewise the Son of God. Last of all, Jesus turned to the woman with the final word of blessing: "Thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace." This is a clear statement of the fact ...
— The Gospel of Luke, An Exposition • Charles R. Erdman

... enlarge the sphere of her sex, but it was by taking it and making it, rather than by talking about it. "Your might must be your right," she says in a chapter on The Rights of Women, in "Means and Ends." Voting did not seem to her a function suited to women: "I cannot believe it was ever intended that women should lead armies, harangue in halls of legislation, bustle up to ballot-boxes, or sit on judicial tribunals." The gentle Lucy Stone would not have considered this ...
— Daughters of the Puritans - A Group of Brief Biographies • Seth Curtis Beach

... well-ordered home, where husband and wife are united by mutual love and respect, we see that the man's function is to enter into the larger world and to provide the wife with all that is needed for the maintenance and comfort of the home, while the function of the woman is to be the distributor of what her husband provides, in doing which she follows her own discretion; and a sensible man, knowing ...
— The Hidden Power - And Other Papers upon Mental Science • Thomas Troward

... of the form. As I am persuaded that all intelligent and honest musicians will be of this opinion, I should like to add to it some assurance on the next performance of your Ratcliff in Germany. It should be done at once at Weimar were I in active function at the theater as in the preceding years (from 1848 to '59); but since my retirement I am not any longer in a position to take definite steps, and must confine myself to recommendations—more ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated

... met a disaster of this sort with the dignity and the manliness of my friend, and I am further confident that the recital of his suffering here given will not have been useless in the great debate now engaged as to the function ...
— On Nothing & Kindred Subjects • Hilaire Belloc

... naturally occurring soft fibrous mineral commonly used in fireproofing materials and considered to be highly carcinogenic in particulate form. biodiversity - also biological diversity; the relative number of species, diverse in form and function, at the genetic, organism, community, and ecosystem level; loss of biodiversity reduces an ecosystem's ability to recover from natural or man-induced disruption. bio-indicators - a plant or animal species whose presence, abundance, and ...
— The 2005 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency

... States have hardly been touched upon; but in less than a hundred years individual greed has done its work, and the people are bankrupt. They have been legislated out of everything, and the one function of our government, as at present conducted, is to see that this legislation is enforced. Yes, it is beyond the reach of contradiction that this government, that was founded in the interests of All, has degenerated into a ...
— Confiscation, An Outline • William Greenwood

... to the good convalescent how dear his preservation was to him, the King released him from his function for the rest of the year, and begged him to watch over his health, the most important of his duties and ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... baptising just to come and see us?" It occurred to her that from his point of view two stray disciples such as herself and Halsey could be of little importance compared with his appearance at the solemn function. ...
— The Mormon Prophet • Lily Dougall

... encouragement to inventors, the first Federal Patent Act, passed by Congress on the 10th of April. Every State had its own separate patent laws or regulations, as an inheritance from colonial days, but the Fathers of the Constitution had wisely provided that this function of government should be exercised by the nation.* The Patent Act, however, was for a time unpopular, and some States granted monopolies, particularly of transportation, until they were forbidden to do so by ...
— The Age of Invention - A Chronicle of Mechanical Conquest, Book, 37 in The - Chronicles of America Series • Holland Thompson

... postponed. In every social function of the foreign colony, Kalman's singing was a feature. The boy loved to sing and was ever ready to respond to any request for a song. So when the cry for a song rose once more, Kalman was ready ...
— The Foreigner • Ralph Connor

... there is nothing more to be said, so far as concerns his title to renown. The creative achievement is far more precious and important than any possible criticism of it. This does not mean that in dealing with such a poet the critic is in duty bound to abdicate his lower function and to let his scruples melt away in the warm water of a friendly partisanship; it means only that he will be best occupied, speaking generally, in a conscientious attempt to see the man as he was, to "experience the savor of him", and to understand the national temperament ...
— The Life and Works of Friedrich Schiller • Calvin Thomas

... a large amount of capital, a specialized and rather rare capacity for organization and a considerable knowledge of a wide sphere of industry. Indeed, the undertaking of new business enterprises has itself become to no small extent the function of organizations rather than of individuals. Further the personal cooperation between employer and the best men among his wage earners which was in the past the ordinary method of business education is not often practised now. Industry is not a good education for the skilled and able wage earners. ...
— The Settlement of Wage Disputes • Herbert Feis

... small almond-shaped body called the ovary. Each ovary is similar in shape and size to an almond, measuring about one and a half inches in length, three-fourths of an inch in width and one-half an inch in thickness. The function or work of the ovaries is to produce, develop and mature the ova (eggs) and to discharge them when fully formed so they may enter the tubes and so find their way to the womb. In every ovary there are several hundred little ovules or eggs in various stages of development. At irregular ...
— Herself - Talks with Women Concerning Themselves • E. B. Lowry

... it, she rejoiced that Lise's child would not be born into a world that had seemed—so falsely—fair and sweet, and in reality was black and detestable. Her acceptance of the act—for Lise—was a function of the hatred consuming her, a hatred which, growing in bigness, had made Ditmar merely the personification of that world. From time to time her hands clenched, her brow furrowed, powerful waves of heat ran through her, the craving for action became so intense ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... library that evening after dinner she opened fire. The small function at the Girls' Friendly had been a success; but she wished to do something more for Merchester—"where we ought to be a real influence for good—living as we do so close ...
— Brother Copas • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... controverted the accepted views as to the operation and meaning of those described above. He distinguishes in certain tribes of New South Wales kinship organisations running across the phratries; these are of two kinds, according to the author, but they do not seem to differ in function. They are termed by Mr Mathews "blood" and "shade" divisions, and are held by him to be the names of the really exogamous groups. The subject ...
— Kinship Organisations and Group Marriage in Australia • Northcote W. Thomas

... was, of course, not one of the civic officers chosen by this liberal franchise. He was elected by the chapter of St. Lambert, subject to papal and imperial ratification for the two spheres of his jurisdiction. But in the exercise of his function there were many restrictions to his free administration, which papal and imperial sanction together ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam

... great avenues which branch out from beneath the vast Dome of the Exhibition-building. We have not in Australia any sense of the historical prestige which attaches itself to a royal opening of the British Parliament. There the stately function is magnificent in its setting and pregnant in its associations, but it is in scarcely any sense of the word ...
— A Source Book Of Australian History • Compiled by Gwendolen H. Swinburne

... pleasure-loving young man of twenty-one, who had never in his life done any thing to merit the especial esteem of any one. Maria Theresa was an amiable and pretty girl, who never dreamed that she had any other function than to indulge in luxuries at the expense of others. Millions were to be impoverished that she and her husband might pass through life reveling in luxury and charioted in splendor. One can not contemplate such a state of things without being agitated ...
— Louis XIV., Makers of History Series • John S. C. Abbott

... to himself approvingly, "that there's no sense in being peevish. A swell funeral must be written up like any other society function." ...
— The Law-Breakers and Other Stories • Robert Grant

... story of the rise, glory, division and fall of the Jewish monarchy. The people desired a king and the king sought to rule by his own will rather than the will of God. We note God's desire to make this nation a "Holy Nation" and its sin and failure. The function of the prophets was to declare the sin of the nation, to set the right way before it and seek to lead it back to God, but the nation would not heed the voices of the prophets, hence the fall of the monarchy. The coming of the perfect king and kingdom under the Messiah is prophesied. The work ...
— Studies in the Life of the Christian • Henry T. Sell

... in essential points of structure or of function from those of the previously described species. Bits of meat or a little saliva placed on the glands of the exterior tentacles caused well-marked movement in 3 m., and particles of glass acted in 4 m. The tentacles with the latter ...
— Insectivorous Plants • Charles Darwin

... (episcopos) meaning an "Overseer." It is the title now given to the highest Order in the Christian Ministry, to which appertains the function of ordination. Of this Order were Titus and Timothy, the one being Bishop of Crete, the other Bishop of Ephesus. In the English Church a Bishop must not be less than 30 years old, a Priest 24, and a Deacon 23, unless dispensed by a faculty from the ...
— The Church Handy Dictionary • Anonymous

... course of action, unless, indeed, the Indian consent were first obtained.[41] The Indian troops, however and wherever raised under the provisions of those treaties, were expected by Pike to constitute, primarily, a home guard and nothing more. If by chance it should happen that, in performing their function as a home guard, they should have to cross their own boundary in order to expel or to punish an intruder, well and good; but their intrinsic character as something resembling a police patrol could not be deemed thereby affected. Moreover, ...
— The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War • Annie Heloise Abel

... that her father is a terribly useful man. That if he should fail to function, then the disposal of garbage would become an individual problem and that the mamas of kids whose fathers are not garbage men would be obliged to say to their husbands—"Ed, dear, don't forget to take the garbage bucket to the ...
— Vignettes of San Francisco • Almira Bailey

... to Aphrodite Urania. This deity is to be carefully distinguished from the Cyprian or Pandemic Aphrodite: she is different, not only in attribute and function, but even in personality and origin. She is the daughter of Heaven (Uranus) and Light; her influence is heavenly: she is heavenly or spiritual love, as distinct from earthly or carnal love. If the ...
— Adonais • Shelley

... never be as though he had learnt it not." That, however, is not my own conclusion. It is with the workings of the soul as with those of the body; want of exercise of the organ leads to inability of function, here bodily, there spiritual, so that we can neither do the things that we should nor abstain from the things we should not. And that is why fathers keep their sons, however temperate they may be, out of the reach of wicked men, considering that ...
— The Memorabilia - Recollections of Socrates • Xenophon

... did it seem odd that a plain Englishman should be invited to perform the function of best man at the wedding of the daughter of the President of the United States of America at the White House. The matter was never even noticed either in the press or in conversation. The only citizen to whom I suggested the anomaly ...
— A Labrador Doctor - The Autobiography of Wilfred Thomason Grenfell • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell

... sensations like those produced by flakes of falling snow coming between him and the objects he was looking at. Mr. Bowman, one of our most excellent oculists, was then consulted. Mr. Bowman wrote to me as follows: "Such symptoms as exist point rather to disturbed retinal function than to any brain-mischief. It is, however, quite likely that what you fear for the brain may have had its counterpart in the nerve-structures of the eye, and as he is short-sighted, this ...
— Memoir of John Lothrop Motley, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... was a popular function in San Jose, which still retained all the characteristics of a Mexican pueblo, and there was not a night without the strumming of guitars and the lively stepping of the dancers in some public hall. Murieta went to one of ...
— When the West Was Young • Frederick R. Bechdolt

... Ethel regarded her marriage rather as a religious rite than a social function, she objected to its details becoming in any sense public, and her desires were to be regarded. Yet everyone may imagine the white loveliness of the bride, the joy of the bridegroom, the calm happiness of the family breakfast, and the leisurely, ...
— The Man Between • Amelia E. Barr

... the building forces be strengthened, stimulated, and made more harmonious and divine? Yes, through mind. The mind surely but unconsciously pervades every physical tissue with its vital influence, and is present in every function; throbbing in the heart, breathing in the lungs, and weaving its own quality into nutrition, assimilation, sensation, ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 23, October, 1891 • Various

... and reared. To this animal nature belongs the natural appetites, passions, faculties and senses. This nature is not sufficient in itself, and its realisation cannot be accomplished until it is brought into complete subordination to the higher or spiritual nature. The function of this spiritual nature is to subordinate the animal nature by harmonising and controlling it, and it finds its partial realisation in the institutions of family, church and state; and its ultimate realisation in the heavenly ...
— A Plea for the Criminal • James Leslie Allan Kayll

... general invitation to the wedding on the board outside the store next day, and great was the satisfaction which the announcement produced. If everyone was invited, then no one felt left out in the cold; and immediately there ensued a great bustle of preparation for the function, which certainly would be the event of the year to the ...
— A Countess from Canada - A Story of Life in the Backwoods • Bessie Marchant

... of action, and this leads us along back to the first moment of the germ, and forward to the resolution of the living frame into its lifeless elements. In this way Anatomy, or rather that branch of it which we call Histology, has become inseparably blended with the study of function. The connection between the science of life and that of intimate structure on the one hand, and composition on the other, is illustrated in the titles of two recent works of remarkable excellence,—"the Physiological ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... would hardly be inferior to the most perfect columns of Greece." The one fault—a grave one to a critical eye—is the meaningless and inappropriate block inserted between the capital and the horizontal beam which it is the function of the column to support. The type of column used in the side aisles of the hall at Karnak is illustrated by Fig. 10, taken from another temple. It is much less admirable, the contraction of the capital toward the top producing an ...
— A History Of Greek Art • F. B. Tarbell

... understanding properly so called, as its measure and criterion. He says: "That therefore to rely upon the understanding, misinformed as it is by depraved affections, as our adequate instructor in matters of religion, is most highly irrational." Nevertheless, "the understanding has a great function in religion and is a medium to the affections, and may ...
— The Grand Old Man • Richard B. Cook

... winding its way along near the bottom, with its barbels extended, and you will at once realise that fishes can feel, this function being very useful to those kinds which search for their food in the mud at ...
— The Log of the Sun - A Chronicle of Nature's Year • William Beebe

... matter is a more difficult question, but here again I don't go with you. The position of the writers of "Essays and Reviews" is, that certain parts of the Old Testament have done their intended function in the education of the world as it was; but that mankind, like the individual man, is designed by the Almighty to have an infancy and a maturity, and that as it advances, the machinery of its education must advance too. For example: inasmuch as ever since there ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 2 (of 3), 1857-1870 • Charles Dickens

... been shot at, would not take fright at the noise. Sometimes they came upon great masses of snakes, intertwined and coiled like worms; in these cases Cortlandt brought his gun into play, raking them with duck-shot to his heart's content. "As the function of these reptiles," he explained, "is to form a soil on which higher life may grow, we may as well help along their metamorphosis by artificial means." They were impressed by the tremendous cannon-like reports of their firearms, which they perceived ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds • J. J. Astor

... be true in England and false everywhere else? Is it not true in Ireland? Has it not hitherto been true in the colonies? Why should you presume, that, in any country, a body duly constituted for any function will neglect to perform its duty, and abdicate its trust? Such a presumption would go against all government in all modes. But, in truth, this dread of penury of supply from a free assembly has no foundation ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... my pulse, and took his leave, declaring that his function was at an end, and that the rest ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... function so well known, and so often described, that it would be superfluous to enter in detail into its various happenings. In their first year Darsie and Hannah had taken little part in the festivities, but upon their second anniversary ...
— A College Girl • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... was Jack who made the discovery, Tom's attention being in part taken up with the requirements necessary to his function as pilot. ...
— Air Service Boys Flying for Victory - or, Bombing the Last German Stronghold • Charles Amory Beach

... Terror that dominated the country, the organization of the loggers began daily to gather strength. The Chamber of Commerce began to growl menacingly, the Employers' Association to threaten and the lumber trust papers to incite open violence. And the American Legion began to function as a "cats paw" for the men behind ...
— The Centralia Conspiracy • Ralph Chaplin

... discriminatory because there are flagrant instances of its not holding the scales evenly between correspondents and newspapers. I call it unchivalrous because it has been known to elide eulogies of enemy decency and enemy valour. I call it destructive because its function is to destroy; it has no constructive function whatever. I call it in effect anti-British and pro-German because its tendency—one means, of course, its unconscious tendency—often is to elevate the German name for veracity and for courage above ...
— The Better Germany in War Time - Being some Facts towards Fellowship • Harold Picton

... task; practically impossible with any large degree of efficiency in view of the almost insurmountable obstacles to be contended with. But step by step the imperfect machinery was set up, and it began to function in the home camps. Then the overseas work was introduced by the first troops going to France, and ...
— The Americanization of Edward Bok - The Autobiography of a Dutch Boy Fifty Years After • Edward William Bok

... men—the race of women—men had voyaged in from some other world in space women had done the like from their world ... to this world, alien to both of them. And here a monstrous thing had brought them together like an interlocking fungus—their sex-union ... a function that monstrously held together two different species of animals that should not even ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp

... senses returned. He heard squeakings. At first they were faint as the exhausted nerve ends in his ears only began to regain their function. He began to regain the sense of touch, though ...
— Operation Terror • William Fitzgerald Jenkins

... in each division a sanitary section composed of one officer and 25 men, whose function it is to keep an eye on the sanitation of the divisional area, report failure on the part of units to observe the established sanitary regulations, see that the incinerators are operated, have new sources of drinking water tested, look after ...
— On the Fringe of the Great Fight • George G. Nasmith

... illustration of the difference between the function of a judge and a jury. The jury pass on the facts, the judge on the law. When the judge dismisses the case, he is saying that the facts may be so and what happened may be truly stated, but even then it does not make any ...
— The Man in Court • Frederic DeWitt Wells

... obscure and thorny passages in the sciences which you will perhaps have found fatiguing, at which the mind strives to raise itself, by an effort, beyond itself, and which repel us quite as much by their, at any rate apparent, uselessness as by their difficulty. The function of kings consists principally in leaving good sense to act, which always acts naturally without any trouble. All that is most necessary in this kind of work is at the same time agreeable; for it is, in a word, my son, ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume V. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... this function of holding fast, roots have a power of grasp quite different from that of branches. It is not a grasp, or clutch by contraction, as that of a bird's claw, or of the small branches we call 'tendrils' in climbing plants. It is a dead, clumsy, but inevitable grasp, by swelling, after contortion. ...
— Proserpina, Volume 1 - Studies Of Wayside Flowers • John Ruskin

... the result of a curious irregularity of equipment. Taking for granted, as he did, the absolute integrity of the Scriptures, and applying to them his trained scientific spirit, he contrived to stifle, with a deplorable success, alike the function of the imagination, the sense of moral justice, and his own deep and instinctive tenderness ...
— Father and Son • Edmund Gosse

... shrine the townspeople whose turn it was to attend the annual function had assembled in ceremonial costumes. One man wore his hair tied up in the fashion of the old prints. The plaintive strains of old instruments made the strange appeal of all folk music. A decorous procession was headed ...
— The Foundations of Japan • J.W. Robertson Scott

... nine Muses. Clio's function was to preside over history—which she did with great dignity, many of the prominent citizens of Athens occupying seats on the platform, the meetings being addressed by Messrs. Xenophon, Herodotus and ...
— The Devil's Dictionary • Ambrose Bierce

... a chosen few, the beautiful Mrs. Mortimer and her delightful husband were seldom missing. They were prominent members of that sort of family party which made the "Monday Pops" for years a social as well as an artistic function. And their small, but exquisite house in Berkeley Square, now inherited by their daughter, was famous for its "winter evenings," at which might be met the creme de la creme of the intellectual and artistic worlds, and at which no vulgarian, however rich and prominent, ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens

... tribune re-eligible. The personnel of the commission was, therefore, a guarantee of its good faith. Its energy was on a level with its earnestness. The task of annexing and distributing the domain land was strenuously undertaken, and other officials, on whom fell the purely routine function of enforcing the new limit of occupation, seem to have been equally faithful to their work. Even the consul Popillius, one of the presidents of the commission that tried the Gracchan rioters, has left a record of his activity in the ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge

... "has no other function than to allow the medium's sensitiveness to distinguish a definite force from among the ...
— The Unknown Guest • Maurice Maeterlinck

... modification of this. Religion is very important in a girls' public school: it is the surest guarantee for mothers and husbands. We must train up believers, not reasoners. The weakness of women's brains, the unsteadiness of their ideas, their function in the social order, their need of constant resignation and of a kind of indulgent and easy charity—all can only be attained by religion." They were to learn a little geography and history, but no foreign language; above all, ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose

... of a bird is not necessary for flight. A pigeon can fly perfectly with this appendage cut short off; it probably performs an important function in steering, for it is to be remarked, that most birds that have either to pursue or evade pursuit are amply ...
— A History of Aeronautics • E. Charles Vivian

... colleges no longer promote the researches of science, or direct professional study. Here and there college walls may shelter an occasional student, but not in larger proportions than may be found in private life. Elementary teaching of youths under twenty is now the only function performed by the university, and almost the only object of college endowments. Colleges were homes for the life-study of the highest and most abstruse parts of knowledge. They have become boarding schools in which the elements of the learned ...
— Lay Sermons, Addresses and Reviews • Thomas Henry Huxley

... fully occupied in serving tea," breaks in Aunty. "Besides, we shall try to give this affair the appearance, at least, of a genuine social function. I imagine that the presence of such persons as Mr. Wiggins will make the task sufficiently difficult. ...
— Torchy, Private Sec. • Sewell Ford

... lazaret of bile, But very rarely executes its function, For the first passion stays there such a while, That all the rest creep in and form a junction, Like knots of vipers on a dunghill's soil—[168] Rage, fear, hate, jealousy, revenge, compunction— So that all mischiefs spring up from this entrail, Like ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron

... either exemplary or deserving of sympathetic contemplation. Animal painting investigates the laws of greater and less nobility of character in organic form, as comparative anatomy examines those of greater and less development in organic structure; and the function of animal painting is to bring into notice the minor and unthought of conditions of power or beauty, as that of physiology is to ascertain the minor ...
— Lectures on Landscape - Delivered at Oxford in Lent Term, 1871 • John Ruskin

... of this conclusion, I was led to consider whether we might not reasonably consider the true source of the latent element of light to reside, not in the solar orb, but in space itself; and that the grand function and duty of the sun was to act as an agent for bringing forth into vivid existence its due portion of the illuminating or luciferous element, which element I suppose to be diffused throughout the boundless regions of space, and which in that ...
— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth

... and climatic conditions are such that the roadway at times becomes unstable because of underground water rising to a level not far below the road surface, the ground water level is lowered by means of tile underdrains. The function of the tile drains in such cases is precisely the same as when employed in land drainage; to ...
— American Rural Highways • T. R. Agg

... brief personal chat flattered her immensely by forgetting that she was deaf. He also found time to express his gratification that she had approved his idea of a temperance camp. In the election that followed the incumbent Directors were unanimously re-elected, whereupon, having performed their sole function as stockholders, they adjourned and immediately reconvened as Directors. In marked contrast to the last, this meeting of the Directors was characterized by the utmost harmony—only L. W. seemed ill at ease. He had avoided Mary since the day she came back, and even yet ...
— Rimrock Jones • Dane Coolidge

... a very philosophic man, of general learning, great sanctity of life, and the most exact good breeding. He has the misfortune to be of a very weak constitution, and consequently cannot accept of such cares and business as preferments in his function would oblige him to: he is therefore among divines what a chamber-counsellor[32] is among lawyers. The probity of his mind, and the integrity of his life, create him followers, as being eloquent or loud ...
— The De Coverley Papers - From 'The Spectator' • Joseph Addison and Others

... magic casements—surely is the office of our artists in every sort: thus, for them to say all that there is to say about anything is to show the casement stuck fast, as it were, and themselves battering somewhat desperately to open it. Saying the things "about" is the other people's function. It is as if we suddenly saw a princess come out upon her castle-walls, and hymned that fair emergence, which to herself ...
— Browning's Heroines • Ethel Colburn Mayne

... while the brain and nerves keep the parts working in harmony and also provide for the proper relation of the whole creature to its environment. So rigidly are these organs specialized in structure and in function that they cannot replace one another, any more than the drive wheels of the locomotive could replace the smokestack, or the boiler be interchanged with either of these. All of the organs are thus fitted or adjusted to a particular place ...
— The Doctrine of Evolution - Its Basis and Its Scope • Henry Edward Crampton

... elevator companies, or anything that seemed to help the country, while the people who were doing the most for the country, the settlers' wives, were left to live or die as seemed best to them. Woman's most sacred function is to bring children into the world, and if all goes well, why, God bless her!—but when things go wrong—God help her! No one else was concerned at all. But, as I told you, women vote now in Alberta, and what they say goes. Men are always ready to help women in any good ...
— The Next of Kin - Those who Wait and Wonder • Nellie L. McClung

... changed his mind, apparently, and went away, leaving Mr. Bates to infer that the throwing of that particular lever would leave them all in darkness; later, with Biff ready to spring upon him, he threw that switch to show that it had no important function to perform at all. To all these and many more ingenious tricks to humiliate him, Mr. Bates paid not the slightest attention, but, as calmly and as impassively as Fate, kept as nearly as he could to the four-foot distance ...
— The Making of Bobby Burnit - Being a Record of the Adventures of a Live American Young Man • George Randolph Chester

... community—one might call it sociability. What happened was that this communal life became a sort of reserve and refuge behind the individual life; a hospital for every kind of hospitality. We shall see later how this same function of the common life was given to the common land. It is hard to find an image for it in individualist times; but in private life we most of us know the friend of the family who helps it by being outside, like a fairy godmother. It ...
— A Short History of England • G. K. Chesterton

... enormously overpopulated. Thousands of birds every year laid eggs for the maintenance of fat and pompous reptiles, without reflecting that there were other and lizardless isles on which the vital function of incubation might be performed without loss. Years after other men of science sought the isle. Birds seemed to be as numerous as ever, but the lizards had disappeared. Had the birds been wise enough to perceive that the ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield

... the sacred function, after having drawn his sleeve across his mouth, and muttered, 'Well! I don't know as I see my way to hitting any of you quite in the right place neither.' He said this with a dark smile, and then began to bellow. What we were specially to be preserved from, according to his solicitations, ...
— George Silverman's Explanation • Charles Dickens

... inevitable result of their disobeying the divine law and commandment, they became liable to the physical ailments and bodily frailties to which mankind has since been the natural heir.[38] Those bodies, which before the fall had been perfect in form and function, were now subjects for eventual dissolution or death. The arch-tempter through whose sophistries, half-truths and infamous falsehoods, Eve had been beguiled, was none other than Satan, or Lucifer, that rebellious and ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage

... whose BRAINS, and all their voluntary existence flowing from their brains, have a systole and diastole as regular as that of the heart itself. Habit is the approximation of the animal system to the organic. It is a confession of failure in the highest function of being, which involves a perpetual self-determination, in full view of all existing circumstances. But habit, you see, is an action in present circumstances from past motives. It is substituting a vis a tergo for the evolution ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... been the function of race differences up to the present time. What shall be its function in the future? Manifestly some of the great races of today—particularly the Negro race—have not as yet given to civilization the full spiritual message ...
— The Conservation of Races - The American Negro Academy. Occasional Papers No. 2 • W. E. Burghardt Du Bois

... that species of aliment which the body in a morning and afternoon requires. While it attenuates, it restores the tone and substance of the juices, strengthens the solids, invigorates every natural function, and thus affords the means of enjoying all the comfort that a healthy body and ...
— A Treatise on Foreign Teas - Abstracted From An Ingenious Work, Lately Published, - Entitled An Essay On the Nerves • Hugh Smith

... second place, Darwin applied the evolution-idea to particular problems, such as the descent of man, and showed what a powerful organon it is, introducing order into masses of uncorrelated facts, interpreting enigmas both of structure and function, both bodily and mental, and, best of all, stimulating and guiding further investigation. But here again it cannot be claimed that Darwin was original. The problem of the descent or ascent of man, and other particular cases of ...
— Darwin and Modern Science • A.C. Seward and Others

... The function of a decoration must always be to preserve the feeling of the wall, as opposed to the work of the easel painter, who wants to assist in forgetting that there is a canvas and to suggest that we are ...
— The Art of the Exposition • Eugen Neuhaus

... further, another of the elements which is converted from being a terror into a joy is that Death, the separator, becomes to Christ's servants Death, the uniter. We all know how that function of death is perhaps the one that makes us shrink from it the most, dread it the most, and sometimes hate it the most. But it will be with us as it was with those who were to be initiated into ancient religious rites. Blindfolded, ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) • Alexander Maclaren

... improbable that they were bedecked with the most valuable of their gems. The danger of being waylaid and robbed was much greater in those days than it is to-day, and it was probably only within palace or castle doors, or at some great State function, that the costliest jewels were worn. Hence nothing distantly approaching the rather excessive splendor of a New York or London opera night could ever ...
— Shakespeare and Precious Stones • George Frederick Kunz

... of separation gained here in concrete form becomes typical of that condition which must always exist in any growth—the seed breaks through its coverings, and seems to divide itself into distinct parts, each having its function in the growth of the ...
— Froebel's Gifts • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... by choice, Saumarez's lot throughout life was thrown with the line-of-battle force of the navy, that body of heavy fighting ships which constitute the true backbone of a sea service, because their essential function is to fight, not singly, but in masses, co-operating with others like themselves. In that respect they correspond to the solid masses of infantry, which, however disposed tactically, form the strength ...
— Types of Naval Officers - Drawn from the History of the British Navy • A. T. Mahan

... inferred rather than anywhere, with absolute definiteness, certainly ascertained. Perhaps, because similar sporangia in the group to which either belongs, do come under other circumstances, to more perfect individual form and function—perhaps for this reason we may look upon these aethalia as exhibiting a suspended performance; the sporangia have failed to go forward to what was evidently a possible, though apparently not an essential destiny in form ...
— The North American Slime-Moulds • Thomas H. (Thomas Huston) MacBride

... love of grand terms which a new country is apt to evince, the head-master was called "The Principal," and his assistants "Professors." The New College was understood to have the future of a university, but its present function was merely that of a ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall

... content with things as they exist. It requires a special set of conditions to precipitate a Swift. Happily, if we will have it so, the conditions in which we find ourselves ask for that kind of journalist whose function is amply fulfilled when he has measured the movements of the hour by the somewhat higher standards of the day. The conditions under which Swift lived demanded a journalist of an entirely different calibre; and they got ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IX; • Jonathan Swift

... a clear idea will have been obtained of the power house building and its adjuncts, as well as of the features which not only go to make it an architectural landmark, but which adapt it specifically for the vital function that it is called upon to perform. We now come to a review and detailed description of the power plant equipment in its general relation to the building, and "follow the power through" from the coal pile to the shafts of the engines or steam turbines attached to the dynamos ...
— The New York Subway - Its Construction and Equipment • Anonymous

... place at Winnipeg. H—- and Dick are both rather unwell to-day, and I hear poor Mr. Walter Brown is dying. I am well enough now. It is extremely hot, but there is always air. John has shirked the Toronto function, and also the American Association at Philadelphia—some of the B. A. are starting there soon. We go alone to Toronto, and also to Winnipeg and the Rocky Mountains. Miss Becker and Mrs. Hallett called to see me, and I signed a memorial of thanks to Sir John ...
— The British Association's visit to Montreal, 1884: Letters • Clara Rayleigh

... Tory party, and believing it to be rather their duty to hold and express strong political opinions than to adopt the moderating and conciliatory attitude in matters of government that is now understood to be the true function of the Royal House. ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria

... the former is only a section) or general biology. Everywhere the peculiar form of the organism and its structures, internal and external, is directly related to the special physiological functions which the organism or organ has to execute. This intimate connection of structure and function, or of the instrument and the work done by it, is seen in the science of evolution and all its parts. Hence the story of the evolution of structures, which is our immediate concern, is also the history of the development of functions; and this holds good of the human ...
— The Evolution of Man, V.1. • Ernst Haeckel

... to which men must bow, it had enough in common with fatality to demand a philosophy of resignation and to hinder the creation of an optimistic atmosphere of hope. It was this order which kept things in their places, assigned to each its proper sphere and function, and drew a definite line, for instance, between men and gods. Human progress towards perfection—towards an ideal of omniscience, or an ideal of happiness, would have been a breaking down of the bars which divide the human from the divine. Human nature does not alter; ...
— The Idea of Progress - An Inquiry Into Its Origin And Growth • J. B. Bury

... inhabited the single diocese of London. Of the parochial clergy a large proportion were pluralists and resided at a distance from their cures. There were some who drew from their benefices incomes of little less than a thousand a year, without ever performing any spiritual function. Yet this monstrous institution was much less disliked by the Puritans settled in Ireland than the Church of England by the English sectaries. For in Ireland religious divisions were subordinate ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... Neither had as yet attained to anything more than a local reputation. Prescott, a gay and light-hearted young man,—gay and light-hearted, in spite of partial blindness,—the darling of society and the idol of his home, was silently and resolutely preparing himself for his chosen function by a wide and thorough course of patient study. Bancroft was in Germany, and working like a German. Emerson was a Junior in College. Hawthorne, Longfellow, Holmes, Whittier, and Poe were school-boys; Mrs. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various

... function of these watchers seems to have been to prevent dogs from entering the Acropolis. Probably they were inefficient old men favored ...
— A Day In Old Athens • William Stearns Davis

... earth. But to think that the duty of literature is to unearth the pearl from the refuse heap means to reject literature itself. "Artistic" literature is only "art" in so far as it paints life as it really is. Its vocation is to be absolutely true and honest. To narrow down its function to the particular task of finding "pearls" is as deadly for it as it would be to make Levitan draw a tree without including the dirty bark and the yellow leaves. I agree that "pearls" are a good thing, but then a writer is not a confectioner, not a provider ...
— Letters of Anton Chekhov • Anton Chekhov

... of inscriptions are epitaphs graven on tombs. Certain others fill the function of our placards, containing, as they do, a law or a regulation that was to be made public. The science of ...
— History Of Ancient Civilization • Charles Seignobos

... rescues us from the temporary and transient. Politics and history are interwoven, but are not commensurate. Ours is a domain that reaches farther than affairs of state, and is not subject to the jurisdiction of governments. It is our function to keep in view and to command the movement of ideas, which are not the effect but the cause of public events;[5] and even to allow some priority to ecclesiastical history over civil, since, by reason of the graver issues concerned, ...
— A Lecture on the Study of History • Lord Acton

... the fact that there were no old maids in that polygamous country. Old maids naturally were not allowed! And there being none, there were of course no cats to kill the mice that eat the bumble-bees' nests; thus, no bumble-bees to fertilize it, therefore no clover. Old maids have found their function. ...
— Ranching, Sport and Travel • Thomas Carson

... unchangeable attribute; the poet has none, no identity." [Footnote: Letter to Richard Woodhouse, October 27, 1818.] The same conviction is differently phrased by Landor. The poet is a luminous body, whose function is to reveal other objects, not himself, to us. Therefore Landor considers our scanty knowledge of Shakespeare as compared with lesser poets a natural consequence of the ...
— The Poet's Poet • Elizabeth Atkins

... and was shaped very much like a log, his neck being as large as his head. It was said that the Australian authorities had tried to hang him several times, but failed because the noose slipped over his chin and ears, refusing its usual function. So he finally had been given a "ticket of leave" and had come to California. Curiously enough the Bruiser never drank. He prided himself on his sobriety and the great strength of his massive hands in which he could squeeze the water out of ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman

... mother that within a month the child will recover. For the present he can but prescribe a purgative and a massage of the arm and spine. On the third visit, he examines the child's faeces and is happy to have discovered the seat and cause of the affection. The liver is not performing its function; and given such weak nerves as the child's, a torpid liver in certain cases will ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani

... this country. The festival of the Boy-Bishop, however, was conducted with a decency hardly to be expected in view of its apparent associations. It would seem, indeed, to have been an impressive and edifying function, and that reasonable exception can be taken to it only on the score of childishness, and the absence of any warrant from Scripture, apart from the rather doubtful sanction of St. Paul's words, "The elder shall serve ...
— The Customs of Old England • F. J. Snell

... Covenant, and there is no obligation upon any one Christian man to devote himself for Christ's sake to Christ's service and man's help (which is Christ's service), that does not lie equally upon all Christian people. The function is the same for all; the methods of discharging it may be widely different. Within the limits of the priestly tribe there may still be those whose office it is to carry the vessels, and those whose office ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren

... issue of money to meet expenses was also provided for. In a word, every function of government was from that time exercised in the name and by the authority of the people of North Carolina. Virtually the province was under martial law, but it was under ...
— School History of North Carolina • John W. Moore

... the expression may be allowed; and the friction is often such as to injure the works, and disturb the just arrangements and regular motions of the social machine. But by Christianity all these roughnesses are filed down: every wheel rolls round smoothly in the performance of its appointed function, and there is nothing to retard the several movements, or break in upon the general order. The religious system indeed of the bulk of nominal Christians is satisfied with some tolerable appearances of virtue: and accordingly, while ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce

... from Pretoria the United States consul was authorized, upon the request of the British Government and with the assent of the South African and Orange Free State Governments, to exercise the customary good offices of a neutral for the care of British interests. In the discharge of this function, I am happy to say that abundant opportunity has been afforded to show the impartiality of this Government toward both ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... in the legacy was negative. The Temple and the Sacrificial system were gone for ever. That this must have powerfully affected Judaism goes without saying. Synagogue replaced Temple, prayer assumed the function of sacrifice, penitence and not the blood of bulls supplied the ritual of atonement. Events had prepared the way for this change and had prevented it attaining the character of an upheaval. For synagogues had grown up all over the land soon after the fifth century B.C.; regular ...
— Judaism • Israel Abrahams

... to which most classes of earthen products were applied are easily determined. Whistles, drums, rattles, and spindle whorls have definite duties to perform, and vessels, as to general scope of function, answer for themselves: but when we come to inquire into the particular uses of the various groups of vessels we are often at a loss. The majority of the pieces show no abrasion by handling or discoloration by fire or by contents, and I am inclined to believe that ...
— Ancient art of the province of Chiriqui, Colombia • William Henry Holmes

... our government, federal or particular, to admit a consul among us: and if it be true, as the papers say, that you have lately sent one over, he cannot be admitted by any power in existence to an exercise of any function. Nothing less than a new article, to be agreed to by all the States, would enable Congress, or the particular States, to receive him. You must not be surprised then, ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson

... said I. "You are perfectly right about that. What you want is one function a week during the summer season. Open with the trolley-party as No. 1 of your first series. Follow this with 'An Evening of Vaudeville: The Grand Tour of the Roof Gardens.' After that have a 'Sunday at the Sea-side—Surf Bathing, ...
— The Enchanted Typewriter • John Kendrick Bangs

... occasions, but the dancing and music have a terrifying effect on the former, while on the latter they act as an incentive to come nearer and take possession of the performers or of the beneficiary of the function by entering through the top of the head. A primitive jews'-harp, universally found among the tribes, is played to frighten away antohs, and ...
— Through Central Borneo: - An Account of Two Years' Travel in the Land of Head-Hunters - Between the Years 1913 and 1917 • Carl Lumholtz

... 'Tuesdayed' or 'Wednesdayed.' You see? The term is what we may call a vulgarism—you perceive that, do you not?—likewise 'in our midst,' which is not accurate, of course, and which would be indelicate if it were. Now I let my eye descend the column to your account of a certain social function. You say, 'The table fairly groaned with the weight of good things, and a good time was had by all present.' Surely, Mr. Denney, you are a man not without culture and refinement. Had you but taken thought, you could as well have said that 'An elegant collation was served, the menu including many ...
— The Boss of Little Arcady • Harry Leon Wilson

... incense,' 2 Chron. xxvi. 18. Let this therefore be our second conclusion: That the power of the sword, and of the keys, are two distinct ordinances of God; and that the prince hath no more authority to enter upon the execution of any part of the priest's function, than the priest hath to intrude upon any part of the office of the prince." In his speech delivered in the Castle-chamber at Dublin, &c., concerning the oath of supremacy, pages 3, 4, 5. Further differences ...
— The Divine Right of Church Government • Sundry Ministers Of Christ Within The City Of London

... battlefields of sulphurous smoke and scattering fire might it prevent. He has been called a public benefactor who makes two blades of grass grow where one grew before. He is as great a benefactor, who in an age of verbiage makes one word perform the function of two. Wonderful is the precision with which this mental mechanism may be made to work. Some men can even think their best on their feet in the presence of a great assembly. There are others whose spontaneous thoughts move by informal syllogisms. Emmons sometimes ...
— The History of Dartmouth College • Baxter Perry Smith

... everything, the refined taste of the audience, who could on the same day attend a sermon of Bourdaloue and a tragedy of Racine, all tended to lead pulpit eloquence to a high degree of perfection; and, accordingly, we find the function of court preacher exercised successively by Bossuet (1627-1704), Bourdaloue (1632-1704), and Massillon (1663-1742), the greatest names that the Roman Catholic Church has boasted in any age or country. Bossuet addressed the conscience through the imagination, ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta

... States, we find the clearest examples of the beginnings of state control and maintenance of elementary schools—something destined to grow rapidly and in the nineteenth century take over the school from the Church and maintain it as a function of the State. The Prussian kings early made grants of land and money for endowment funds and support, and state aid was ordered granted by Maria Theresa for Austria (R. 274 a), in 1774. In the New ...
— THE HISTORY OF EDUCATION • ELLWOOD P. CUBBERLEY

... definite function of a field-secretary is organization. This work implies the double duty to spread, by an intelligent and well thought-out propaganda, the knowledge of the Home and Foreign Missions and of the responsibility it entails, and to found and maintain ...
— Catholic Problems in Western Canada • George Thomas Daly

... to health. It should never be forgotten that by cleanliness infectious materials are removed from the surface of the body, and at the same time the skin is put into a condition to eliminate from the system those waste products which it is its special function to remove. The close relationship of the proper activity of the skin to health is perhaps not generally sufficiently appreciated—for it is true that the body cannot remain normal when the secretory power of its glands is impaired, and that even ...
— Health on the Farm - A Manual of Rural Sanitation and Hygiene • H. F. Harris

... is this giving of motion to water to be considered as confined only to the surface of the earth. A no less important function of the hills is in directing the flow of the fountains and springs, from subterranean reservoirs. There is no miraculous springing up of water out of the ground at our feet; but every fountain and well is supplied from a reservoir ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin

... a vacancy, is to create illusions, or, if there be a certain occult mental activity, such as that I have alluded to in my Pittsfield experience, to intensify its action to such a degree that it finally usurps the function of the senses. In the solitude of the great Wilderness, where I have passed months at a time, generally alone, or with only my dog to keep me company, airy nothings became sensible; and, in the silence of those nights in the forest, ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I • Stillman, William James

... also the determining of the location of Portland Canal, and the question whether the coastal girdle should cross or pass around the heads of the fjords of the coast. The tribunal was an ad-)udication board and not an actual court of arbitration, since its function was not to decide the boundary but to settle the meaning of the Anglo-Russian treaty, which provided for an ideal (and not a physical) boundary. This boundary did not fit in with geographical facts; hence the adjudication was based ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... Condemne the fault, and not the actor of it, Why euery fault's condemnd ere it be done: Mine were the verie Cipher of a Function To fine the faults, whose fine stands in record, And let ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... distance of sixty-three miles. It was commenced in 1803 and completed in 1847, and cost L1,256,000. Other canals of importance are the Great Canal, which connects the North Sea with the Atlantic Ocean, and the Grand Function Canal, which is over one hundred miles long and connects most of the water-ways of central England with the Thames River. It is estimated that there were over 2,200 miles of navigable canals in Great Britain before the introduction ...
— The Railroad Question - A historical and practical treatise on railroads, and - remedies for their abuses • William Larrabee

... be tonic all may readily agree; That its function is emetic I, for one, could never see; And so I'm glad to find The Times Lit. Supp. has grown annoyed At the undiscriminating cult of ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, March 10th, 1920 • Various

... this weapon grew out of the same situation. The legislative machinery, while empowered to give us redress, failed to function, and so we ...
— Jailed for Freedom • Doris Stevens

... honest trotters, wear our shoes and keep them from wrinkling. No valet could do more. And as for laying out our clothes, has not the kind Clothing Industry provided handy manuals of instruction? With their assistance any man can lay out the garments proper to any function, be it a morning dig in the garden, a noon wedding at the White House, or (if you can conceive it) a midnight supper with Mrs. ...
— The Perfect Gentleman • Ralph Bergengren

... no certitude. The conscience may have nothing to say concerning the honesty of a cause to which we are about to commit ourselves. This state of uncertainty and perplexity is called doubt. To doubt is to suspend judgment; a dubious conscience is one that does not function. ...
— Explanation of Catholic Morals - A Concise, Reasoned, and Popular Exposition of Catholic Morals • John H. Stapleton

... for the purpose of Indian Government. It is our business to give to those who represent Her Majesty in India ample information as to what we believe to be sound principles of Government: and it is, of course, the function of this House to comment upon any case in which we may think they have failed to give due effect ...
— Indian speeches (1907-1909) • John Morley (AKA Viscount Morley)



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