"Incapable" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and solely absorbed in the mysterious guest who had just come to make him a visit. Strange intensity of these visions of love printed on the very floor of his thought and nevertheless lacking in contour! Pierre would have been incapable of saying what was the form of her features or what the color of her eyes or the modeling of her lips. All he could bring back was the emotion already in himself. All his attempts to give precision to the image merely ended ...
— Pierre and Luce • Romain Rolland
... trouble would be the problem of determining what wages should be paid to shirkers and those incapable of working with efficiency. Would wage courts decide the value of their services? If so, how many thousands of such courts would be required? If not, would state officials or politicians decide the cases? The wages of such persons, no matter ...
— The Red Conspiracy • Joseph J. Mereto
... we have no foreign wars, if conquests have come to an end, we serve at least to defend the integrity of Spanish soil, to guard our own homes. Is it that you think," said the cadet nettled, "we are incapable of ...
— The Shadow of the Cathedral • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... these theorists are all extremes; and in proportion as they are metaphysically true, they are morally and politically false. The rights of men are in a sort of middle, incapable of definition, but not impossible to be discerned. The rights of men in governments are their advantages; and these are often in balances between differences of good,—in compromises sometimes between good and evil, and sometimes between evil and evil. Political reason is a computing ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. III. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... Laid waste for ever—that concerns not thee. Indifferent thou tramplest in the dust Their happiness, who most are thine. The god Whom thou dost serve, is no benignant deity. Like as the blind irreconcileable 50 Fierce element, incapable of compact, Thy heart's wild impulse only ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... by the way. It is a beautiful and significant fact that in all times the years of learning have been also the years of romance. Those who love girls and boys pray that our colleges may be homes of sound learning, for knowledge is the condition of every college blessing. "Let no man incapable of mathematics enter here," Plato is reported to have inscribed over his Academy door. "Let no one to whom hard study is repulsive hope for anything from us," American colleges might paraphrase. Accordingly in my talk today I shall ...
— Why go to College? an Address • Alice Freeman Palmer
... in the most affectionate manner to attend to this duty; you will find it will strengthen you in the performance of others. "The more we exert our faculties, the more we can accomplish. He that does nothing, renders himself incapable of doing any thing. While we are executing one work, we are preparing ...
— Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers • Elizabeth E. Lea
... expense, and most likely a whisky-drinking, irresponsible, and incapable man to boot. Besides, I'd have the business more at heart than any man we could hire. As for capability, I tell you I can sail all around the average broken captain or promoted able seaman you find in the South Seas. And you know I am ...
— Adventure • Jack London
... taught that He in the beginning, since He is good, did for man's sake create all things out of unformed matter; and if men by their works show themselves worthy of His design, they are deemed worthy, for so we have received, of reigning in company with Him, having become incorruptible and incapable of suffering. For as in the beginning He created us when we were not, so we consider that, in like manner, those who choose what is pleasing to Him are, on account of their choice, deemed worthy of incorruption and of fellowship with Him. For the coming into being ...
— A Source Book for Ancient Church History • Joseph Cullen Ayer, Jr., Ph.D.
... Wisconsin which have been farmed a little more than fifty years without fertilizing, it is found that about one-third of the phosphorus has been taken out of the soil, which would mean that in one hundred and fifty years, or a hundred years from now, the soil would be incapable of producing any living thing, and long before that time the crops would not pay for the labor of producing them. Almost every acre of land that has been farmed for ten years without fertilization is deficient in phosphorus, that is, so much has been ...
— Checking the Waste - A Study in Conservation • Mary Huston Gregory
... The archbishop was horror-stricken, settled an annuity upon the widow, and to the close of his life observed Tuesday, the day of the accident, as a weekly fast. This occurrence raised a hot dispute in the Church as to whether the archbishop, by having blood on his hands, had become incapable of discharging the duties of his sacred office. He retired to his hospital at Guildford while the inquiry was conducted, was ultimately exonerated, and in 1625 died. This hospital is built around a small quadrangle, ...
— England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook
... a single mind, her movements, for either good or evil, are wholly dependent on the caprice, the ambition, or the absurdity of the individual on the throne. The idea that Russia would weaken her power by the possession of Constantinople, seems to us utterly incapable of proof. She has been able to maintain her power at once on the Black Sea, seven hundred miles from her capital; on the Danube, at nearly the same distance, and on the Vistula, pressing on the Prussian frontier. In Constantinople she would have the most ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... mentioned, without a prefix, the fixed or fatty oils are always understood. The volatile or essential oils are a distinct class. Occasionally, the fixed oils are called hydrocarbons, but hydrocarbon oils are quite different and consist of carbon and hydrogen alone. Of these, petroleum is incapable of digestion, whilst others ...
— The Chemistry of Food and Nutrition • A. W. Duncan
... of birth to dread a mesalliance. Like many another parent, he resolved to marry his daughter, not so much on her account as for his own peace of mind. A noble or a country gentleman was the man for him, somebody not too clever, incapable of haggling over the account of the trust; stupid enough and easy enough to allow Nais to have her own way, and disinterested enough to take her without a dowry. But where to look for a son-in-law to suit father and daughter ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... know he did of me. The misconduct of the gunner grew more and more unbearable, and at length I was compelled to bring him, as also the boatswain and carpenter, to a court-martial. The result was that the former was broke, and rendered incapable of again serving his Majesty; while the other two, who did not deserve a less punishment, were severely reprimanded. They would have been broke likewise but for the difficulty which then existed of finding intelligent and educated men to fill ...
— Hurricane Hurry • W.H.G. Kingston
... that Hamlet really knew more of his father's death than he professed, took up a strange resolution, from that time to counterfeit as if he were really and truly mad; thinking that he would be less an object of suspicion when his uncle should believe him incapable of any serious project, and that his real perturbation of mind would be best covered and pass concealed under ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles Lamb and Mary Lamb
... lesson, however badly things might go down in the class, but contented himself with beating on the desk with his cane. He was little more than a shadow of his former self, his head was always shaking, and his hands were often incapable of grasping an object. He still brought the newspaper with him, and opened it out at the beginning of the lesson, but he did not read. He would fall into a dream, sitting bolt upright, with his hands on the desk and his back against ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... with the liveliest sensations, by reviving in the mind those pleasures which the study of their history afforded in early life. To Europeans the history of China has hitherto furnished no materials for such recurrence, and the country itself is therefore incapable of communicating such impressions. In vain should we here look for the massy and stupendous fabrics that appear in the pyramids and the pillars of the ancient Egyptians; the beautiful and symmetrical works of art displayed in the temples of the Greeks; the grand and magnificent remains ...
— Travels in China, Containing Descriptions, Observations, and Comparisons, Made and Collected in the Course of a Short Residence at the Imperial Palace of Yuen-Min-Yuen, and on a Subsequent Journey thr • John Barrow
... oath, or tremble; the story of Theramenes and the dream of Athalie are interdicted; you shall wander about them for the rest of your days, and never again be permitted to enter. You are a professor of philosophy; take the oath to M. Bonaparte,—if not, you become incapable of understanding the mysteries of the human conscience, and of explaining them to young men. You are a professor of medicine; take the oath,—if not, you no longer know how to feel the pulse of a feverish patient. But if the good professors ...
— Napoleon the Little • Victor Hugo
... reason of our infringement of the old customs. Take, for example, the problem of the peculiar position of women among the Hindus. Perhaps"—and here the babou's voice grew very grave and earnest—"the human imagination is incapable of conceiving a lot more wretched than that of the Hindu widow. By immemorial tradition she could escape it only through the flames of the satti, the funeral-pile upon which she could burn herself with the dead body ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, April, 1876. • Various
... whether he be St. Dunstan, Pollaiolo, Torrigiano, or Walter Crane, only executes a drawing which leaves his hands for good, and is translated into embroidery by the patient needlewoman who simply fills in an outline, ignorant of art, unappreciative of its subtleties, and incapable of giving life and expression, even when she is aware that they are indicated in the original design. This is almost always the case; but there are exceptions. Charlemagne's dalmatic, for instance, shows signs of having been either the work of the artist himself, or else carried ...
— Needlework As Art • Marian Alford
... crest of it. These had been buried beneath the snow, and the crust had formed smoothly over them; and as it was upheld by no stronger support than such as the hidden shrubbery furnished, it was incapable ...
— Holiday Tales - Christmas in the Adirondacks • W. H. H. Murray
... generals. I have known others, who have distinguished themselves at sieges, and in the different evolutions of an army, lose their presence of mind and appear ignorant of their profession, the instant they were taken from that particular line, and be incapable of commanding a few squadrons of horse. Should a man of this cast be put at the head of an army, he will confine himself to mere dispositions and manoeuvres; to them he will look for safety; and if once thwarted, ...
— Elements of Military Art and Science • Henry Wager Halleck
... as to their superior numbers and resources effecting their natural result, and although Gordon himself declared that the Taeping cause was a lost one before he assumed the command, no cause could be pronounced irretrievable with a leader so expert and resolute as Chung Wang, and opponents so incapable and craven as his were. But another thing was certainly incontestable, and that was that the Taepings could not in any sense be regarded as patriots. Their regular mode of conduct stamped them at once as undiscriminating plunderers ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume I • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... called the same natives whom Ann and Lord had questioned, and this time, without exception, they reversed their testimony. Lord was willing to believe the language had caused the difficulty. Niaga's people were entirely incapable of deception; what ...
— Impact • Irving E. Cox
... of the empire and throne, than in the constitutional monarchy that preserved at once the king and liberty. Since the aristocracy lost the possession of the supreme power, its sole ambition—its only aim—was to see it fall into the hands of those most unworthy to hold it. Incapable of again rising by its own force, it sought to find in disorder the means of so doing; and from the first day of the Revolution to the last, this party had no other instinct, and it was thus that it ruined itself ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine
... I would have forgiven him if he had told the truth. I can bear with incompetency, but falsehood and deceit I cannot and will not tolerate," he said, so sternly that Dan's face paled. "I am convinced that you are incapable of either. Will you take ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... sufficient for the cure of the majority of ills. But when the internal physician, the man himself, was tired or incapable, some remedy had to be applied, which should antagonize the spiritual seed of the disease.[247:1] Such remedies, known as arcana, were alleged to possess marvellous efficiency, but their composition was kept secret. That is to say, they ...
— Primitive Psycho-Therapy and Quackery • Robert Means Lawrence
... fearlessly appeal to Y.R.H. for a testimony on this point for the satisfaction of H.R.H. Archduke Ludwig. As for the conduct of the mother of my nephew, it is easily to be inferred from the fact of her having been declared by the Court wholly incapable of undertaking the guardianship of her son. All that she plotted in order to ruin her poor child can only be credited from her own depravity, and thence arises the unanimous agreement about this affair, and the boy being entirely withdrawn from ...
— Beethoven's Letters 1790-1826 Vol. 2 • Lady Wallace
... possible for two natures so incapable of disguise—the one from simplicity and frankness, the other from ungovernable temper,—to have continued in relations of amity, notwithstanding their disagreement upon a question which was at that moment setting the world in arms, both themselves ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Vol 2 • Thomas Moore
... Attempts to write, sew, or draw are imperfectly performed. Such children are very often punished for supposed ill-behavior or careless habits. Later on the symptoms become more unmistakable, and the presence of the disease is readily recognized. The patient may become incapable of dressing, and the limbs and face are no longer under the control of the will. Uncontrollable movements of the fingers, hands, shrugging of the shoulders, dancing of the legs, grimaces of the face, and distortions ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce
... not marry the co-respondent during the lifetime of the other party. If any divorced woman, who shall have been found guilty of adultery, shall afterward openly cohabit with the person proved to have been the partaker of her crime, she is rendered incapable of alienating either directly or indirectly any of her lands, tenements or hereditaments, and all wills, deeds, and other instruments of conveyance therefor are absolutely void, and after her death ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... than prophecy, and those who have any regard for facts will not again speak lightly of an order having such ancestors as the great Comacine Masters. Had Fergusson known their story, he would not have paused in his History of Architecture to belittle the Free-masons as incapable of designing a cathedral, while puzzling the while as to who did draw the plans for those dreams of beauty and prayer. Hereafter, if any one asks to know who uplifted those massive piles in which was portrayed the great drama of mediaeval ...
— The Builders - A Story and Study of Masonry • Joseph Fort Newton
... between this part he play'd And him he play'd it for, he needs will be Absolute Milan. Me, poor man—my library Was dukedom large enough: of temporal royalties He thinks me now incapable; confederates,— So dry he was for sway,—wi' th' King of Naples To give him annual tribute, do him homage; Subject his coronet to his crown, and bend The dukedom, yet unbow'd—alas, poor ...
— The Tempest • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]
... suddenly took offence (or, at least, then first showed his offence) at something we had said, done, or omitted, and never spoke one syllable to either of us again. Being both of us amiably disposed, and incapable of having seriously meditated either word or deed likely to wound any person's feelings, we were much hurt at the time, and often retraced the little incidents upon the road, to discover, if possible, ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... Beth by the common standard of girls of her age, both failings and faults were more imaginary than real; yet it was her characteristic to suspect and despise in herself such weaknesses as others would condone, or at least regard leniently. For here was a girl true and staunch, incapable of intrigue or deceit, frank and outspoken, all these qualities having been proven more than once. Everyone loved Beth De Graf save herself, and at this stage of her development the influence of her cousins and of Uncle John had conspired to make the supersensitive girl more tolerant of herself ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in Society • Edith Van Dyne
... expectation of surprising Quebec, Arnold did not immediately relinquish the hope of obtaining possession of that important place. Not superior to the garrison in point of numbers, and without a single piece of artillery, he was obviously incapable of acting offensively; but he flattered himself that a defection in the town might yet put it in his hands. With this view, he paraded on the adjacent heights for some days, and sent two flags to demand a surrender. But the presence ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 2 (of 5) • John Marshall
... see how eternal punishment hereafter could accomplish any good end, therefore I am not able to believe in it. To chasten a man in order to perfect him might be reasonable enough; to annihilate him when he shall have proved himself incapable of reaching perfection might be reasonable enough; but to roast him forever for the mere satisfaction of seeing him roast would not be reasonable—even the atrocious God imagined by the Jews would ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... he never failed to repeat several times, "the fools," referring to these same city authorities. However that may be, the authorities of Tours, coming to the conclusion, at last, that a child of twelve was incapable of overthrowing the Republic, gave me a passport, with the injunction to leave the city within twenty-four hours, which I proceeded to do with a hearty good-will, but not without deep grief also at seeing myself alone, and on foot, with a long journey before me. After ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant
... to the figures of speech, one must be struck at once with the delicacy and the vigor of Lanier's imagination. The poet's fancy personifies what at first blush seems to us incapable of personification. Thus at one time*1* he likens men to clover-leaves and the Course-of-things to the browsing ox, which makes way with the clover-heads; while at another he addresses an old red hill of Georgia as "Thou gashed and hairy Lear Whom the divine Cordelia ...
— Select Poems of Sidney Lanier • Sidney Lanier
... imbecile had succeeded distinguished incapable at London in the task of humiliating and bullying us into subjection. Now it was Granville, now Townshend, now Bedford, now North—all tediously alike in their refusal to understand us, and their slow ...
— In the Valley • Harold Frederic
... moot question," Roger replied. "Many affirm that he can do so, and assuredly many abbots have exercised that power; others again hold that, although abbots cannot lawfully do so, bishops can; while a few maintain that even these are incapable, and that nothing short of the absolution by the Holy Father himself is of avail. Still, whatever be the true state of things, I should be well satisfied with an abbot's absolution, and still more so by a bishop's; for though, were ...
— Both Sides the Border - A Tale of Hotspur and Glendower • G. A. Henty
... along the little brook. Packs and saddles had been removed. The men ate leisurely. There was little evidence of hurried flight. Yet Helen could not cast off uneasiness. Roy might have been deep, and careless, with a motive to spare the girls' anxiety, but Dale seemed incapable of anything ...
— The Man of the Forest • Zane Grey
... to my knowledge, has ever seen the bees house-hunting in the woods. Yet there can be no doubt that they look up new quarters either before or on the day the swarm issues. For all bees are wild bees and incapable of domestication; that is, the instinct to go back to nature and take up again their wild abodes in the trees is never eradicated. Years upon years of life in the apiary seems to have no appreciable effect towards their final, permanent ...
— Birds and Bees, Sharp Eyes and, Other Papers • John Burroughs
... was going to give an Instance how incapable these Pieces are of raising the Passions. A mournful Dialogue, or Elegy is formed upon the Death of some Person. But if this Elegy raises not our Pity, 'tis a Trifle, and only a childish Copy of Verses. But in order to raise that most ...
— A Full Enquiry into the Nature of the Pastoral (1717) • Thomas Purney
... from commerce, from public order, and from personal security, the human mind became conscious of powers which it did not formerly perceive, and fond of occupations or pursuits of which it was formerly incapable. Towards the beginning of the twelfth century, we discern the first symptoms of its awakening from that lethargy in which it had been long sunk, and observe it turning with curiosity and attention ...
— MacMillan's Reading Books - Book V • Anonymous
... the same effect on him, or rather that they did not produce the effect which he expected. This was a great relief to my mind, and on inquiry further of other students I found that those persons only who from natural imbecility appeared to be incapable of ever relishing those divine performances, made pretensions to instantaneous raptures on ...
— Six Centuries of Painting • Randall Davies
... getting it from those, who were then actually deriving their livelihood from the trade: and yet I was determined to persevere; for I thought that some might be found in it who were not yet so hardened as to be incapable of being awakened on this subject. I thought that others might be found in it who wished to leave it upon principle, and that these would unbosom themselves to me: and I thought it not improbable ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... and toy candy-boxes in the shapes of guitars and fire-crackers. Miss Georgie Lancaster, at twenty-eight, was still very girlish and gay, and she shared with her mother and sisters the curious instinctive acquisitiveness of the woman who, powerless financially and incapable of ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... Is thy progenitor alive, fair girl? And what doth he for lucre? Lo again! A shadow o'er the face of this fair dream! For thou may'st be as beautiful as Love Can make thee, and the ministering hands Of milliners, incapable of more, Be lifted at thy shapeliness and air, And still 'twixt me and thee, invisibly, May rise a wall of adamant. My breath Upon my pale lip freezes as I name Manhattan's orient verge, and eke the west In its far down extremity. Thy sire May be the signer ...
— The Humourous Poetry of the English Language • James Parton
... 'before we talk together, read these. One is a letter from the French Commissary—the other is my answer. I could not see you till I had written my reply, that you might be satisfied how safe you were with me, and how incapable I am of baseness.'"—Quarterly ...
— The Hour and the Man - An Historical Romance • Harriet Martineau
... (magnified be His name and glorified be His might!) abound in what confoundeth the thought of the keenest witted of human beings." Rejoined the Prince, "O sage, thou hast set before me of the power of the Creator what is incapable of denial; but tell me how He called His creatures into existence." Answered Shimas, "He created them by the sole power of His one Word,[FN121] which existed before time, and wherewith he created all things." Quoth the Prince, "Then Allah (be His name magnified ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 9 • Richard F. Burton
... the statue had ceased to give signs of life, the hairdresser remained gaping, incapable of thought or action. At last he ventured to approach cautiously, and on touching the figure, found it perfectly cold and hard. The animating principle had plainly departed, and left the ...
— The Tinted Venus - A Farcical Romance • F. Anstey
... whitewashing Richard III, or representing him as a man of erect and graceful figure. It is not the place for proving that Guy Fawkes was an earnest Presbyterian, that Nell Gwynn was a lady of the strictest morals, or that George Washington was incapable of telling the truth. The playwright who deals with Henry VIII is bound to present him, in the schoolboy's phrase, as "a great widower." William the Silent must not be a chatterbox, Torquemada a humanitarian, Ivan the Terrible a conscientious opponent of capital punishment. And legend has its fixed ...
— Play-Making - A Manual of Craftsmanship • William Archer
... (he said) by the great and very unexpected honour which you have done to me in drinking my health, because I trust that I may infer from it that in your judgment, Sir, and in that of this company, I am not so incorrigibly barbarous as to be incapable of feeling the humanising influences which fall upon us from the noble works of art by which we are surrounded. And, as I have ventured to approach so nearly to the margin of a burning question, I hope that I may be allowed to take one ...
— Letters and Journals of James, Eighth Earl of Elgin • James, Eighth Earl of Elgin
... religious teachings concerning such wonderful mysteries as the Immaculate Conception (the Mystic Birth), the Crucifixion (the Mystic Death), the cleansing blood, the atonement, and other doctrines of the Church, which the intellect refuses to believe, as they are incapable of demonstration, and seemingly at war with natural law. Material advancement may be furthered when intellect is dominant and the longings of the heart unsatisfied, but soul growth will be retarded until the heart ...
— The Rosicrucian Mysteries • Max Heindel
... than that he had invested money in it; by legal matters of assignment and settlement, conveyance here and conveyance there, suspicion of unlawful preference of creditors in this direction, and of mysterious spiriting away of property in that; and as nobody on the face of the earth could be more incapable of explaining any single item in the heap of confusion than the debtor himself, nothing comprehensible could be made of his case. To question him in detail, and endeavour to reconcile his answers; to closet him with accountants and sharp practitioners, learned in the wiles of insolvency ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... feverish eagerness to acquire and accumulate money—had he loved money for money's sake, and accumulated it from the love of accumulation, the case would have been totally different. He might then have been justly despised, and characterized as being of the earth, earthy—incapable of high and generous sentiments and aspirations—sordid, grovelling, and utterly despicable. Sir William Follett had, during twenty years of intense and self-denying toil, succeeded in acquiring an ample fortune, which he disposed of, at his death, justly and generously; ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various
... and Warwick fought with his rifle, and the native slashed again and again with the long knife that he carried at his belt. To a casual glance, a crocodile is wholly incapable of quick action. These two found him a slashing, darting, wolf-like thing, lunging with astounding speed through the muddied water, knocking them from their feet and striking ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... is thus somewhat incapable of strict formal definition, for all practical purposes it may be confined in Greek poetry to pieces written in a single metre, the elegiac couplet, the metre appropriated to inscriptions from the earliest recorded period.[1] ...
— Select Epigrams from the Greek Anthology • J. W. Mackail
... which elsewhere in North Italy garland happier trees and stretch gracefully from trunk to trunk. Especially the landscape looks sad and shabby about the little village of Villafranca, where, in 1864, the dejected prospect seemed incapable of a smile even in spring; as if it had lost all hope and cheerfulness since the peace was made which confirmed Venetia to the alien. It said as plainly as real estate could express the national sentiment, "Come si fa? Ci vuol pazienza!" and crept sullenly out ...
— Italian Journeys • William Dean Howells
... hundred and fifty had renounced Judaism at one time, but nearly all were soon driven back by persecution. Several of these now requested baptism, and were ready to suffer for the sake of becoming Christians; but they seemed incapable of understanding that anything more could be required of them than an exchange of external relations, and ...
— History Of The Missions Of The American Board Of Commissioners For Foreign Missions To The Oriental Churches, Volume II. • Rufus Anderson
... he had underestimated the brute courage of the fellow, the violent, desperate courage that is distilled of anger in men of his kind. Despising him, deeming him incapable of any overt act of villainy, Kirkwood had been a little less wary than he would have been with Calendar or Mulready. Hobbs had seemed more of the craven type which Stryker graced so conspicuously. But now the American ...
— The Black Bag • Louis Joseph Vance
... Homilies is splendid; indeed, we may confidently say that here English appears fully qualified to be the medium of the highest learning." This is high praise, and should be well considered by those disposed to consider the Anglo-Saxon as a rude tongue, incapable of great development in itself, and only enabled by the Norman infusion to give expression to ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... the Architect ought to consider, is the Convenience of the place where he would Build the Fabrick. This is the reason that Dinocrates was blamed by Alexander, for having propos'd him an Excellent Design for Building a City in a Barren place, and incapable of Nourishing those who ...
— An Abridgment of the Architecture of Vitruvius - Containing a System of the Whole Works of that Author • Vitruvius
... one of the most genial of companions; in character the personification of uprightness and honor; firm in his friendships and incapable of malice toward any one. Well situated financially, happy in his domestic circle, of wide popularity, and possessing the esteem of those who know him best, General Stager is one of those whose lot is enviable, and who has made his position thus enviable by his own force of character and ...
— Cleveland Past and Present - Its Representative Men, etc. • Maurice Joblin
... good deal else that we have, and would assuredly have spoilt other things that we have not. It has been observed, by all acute students of the novel, that the egotistic variety will not bear heavy crops of fruit by itself; and that it is incapable, or capable with very great difficulty, of letting the observed and so far altruistic kind grow from the same stool. Of what is sometimes called the dramatic faculty (though, in fact, it is only one side of ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... always something more, or something less, or something different, in one as compared with the other, which hinders this complete equivalence. And, those words being excepted which designate objects in their nature absolutely incapable of a more or less and of every qualitative difference, I should be disposed to consider other exceptions to this assertion exceedingly rare. 'In all languages whatever,' to quote Bentley's words, 'a word of a moral or of a political significance, containing several complex ideas arbitrarily ...
— On the Study of Words • Richard C Trench
... can compel me to take arms against you. I would refuse any proposition which should rank me as hostile to you, if the natural generosity of your enemies could so far forget it. In reality they are as incapable of ordering a bad action as I am of listening to those who should show themselves so devoid of sense as to propose such a thing to me. "I am persuaded that you have understood me, and I am fully cleared in your eyes. It would be delightful to me to ascertain this with certainty. ...
— "Written by Herself" • Baron Etienne Leon Lamothe-Langon
... subjection was like that of a bear, chequered with fits of surliness and rage; whereas Pickle bore the yoke like an ox, without repining. No wonder, then, that this indolence, this sluggishness, this stagnation of temper rendered Gamaliel incapable of withstanding the arguments and importunity of his friends, to which he at length surrendered. He acquiesced in the justice of their observations: and, taking his son by the hand, promised to favour him for the future with his love and ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... cushioned chair in her corner, and Biddy sat at her needle-work before the fire, and Joe sat next Biddy, and I sat next Joe in the corner opposite my sister. The more I looked into the glowing coals, the more incapable I became of looking at Joe; the longer the silence lasted, the more unable I felt ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... myself, at translating, when I return; for I believe the language-master totally incapable ...
— The Letters of Lord Nelson to Lady Hamilton, Vol II. - With A Supplement Of Interesting Letters By Distinguished Characters • Horatio Nelson
... he asked himself, with a sudden start. "If he has his way he will die. Peevish, fretful, spoiled by the flattery of fools, he is incapable of taking care of himself under the conditions in which he finds himself. If I consent to his death am I not guilty of murder? Out of the heart are the issues of life! Have I the right to apply his own law? Could I save him in spite of himself if I made up my mind to do it? Pride and ceremony, high ...
— The Root of Evil • Thomas Dixon
... music (if such they may be called) which I saw amongst them, were a rattle, and a small whistle, about an inch long, incapable of any variation, from having but one hole. They use the rattle when they sing; but upon what occasions they use the whistle I know not, unless it be when they dress themselves like particular animals, and endeavour to imitate ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... her that she was now at liberty to return to her home or go where she pleased. The joy expressed by the girl and by all who witnessed this scene was very great; for they had all considered him to be a mere ruffian, incapable of anything ...
— A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II • William Sleeman
... even more completely than the financier. He realized that her extortion of a pledge from him had been subterfuge; her triumphant eyes flashed complete information on that point. Both anger and bewilderment made him incapable of any sane attempt to press his case with Marston at that time. He turned and started ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... own level and disgrace her as well as yourself. Thank God, my eyes are now opened to your true character. No self-respecting woman could afford to allow her name to be associated with yours. You are as incapable of disinterested friendship as you are of common honesty." Coldly she added: "I hope you quite understand that henceforth my house is closed to you. If we happen to meet in public, it ...
— The Third Degree - A Narrative of Metropolitan Life • Charles Klein and Arthur Hornblow
... component parts and contributing to the strength and stability of the Empire; or whether the several Provinces of which it is constituted shall remain in their present fragmentary and isolated condition, comparatively powerless for mutual {85} aid, and incapable of undertaking their proper ...
— The Fathers of Confederation - A Chronicle of the Birth of the Dominion • A. H. U. Colquhoun
... viscous cohesive saliva, by licking its body with its tongue, which facilitates the power of swallowing it entire; this process is tedious, and it gradually sucks in the body, which, if large, renders it incapable of moving for some time, until it digests; and this is the period which the hunters watch to destroy it: it makes a hissing noise like a serpent, and has recourse to a variety of expedients to conceal itself; it is called by ...
— Observations Upon The Windward Coast Of Africa • Joseph Corry
... of Harcourt, invited Edward to Normandy, where he landed, and having consumed his supplies was on his march to Flanders, when Philip, with the whole strength of the kingdom, endeavoured to intercept him at Crecy in Picardy, in 1348. Philip was utterly incapable as a general; his knights were wrong-headed and turbulent, and absolutely cut down their own Genoese hired archers for being in their way. The defeat was total. Philip rode away to Amiens, and Edward laid siege to Calais. The place was so strong that he was forced to blockade ...
— History of France • Charlotte M. Yonge
... it does," said Mr. Palford, curtly. He had less and less taste for the situation. There was neither dignity nor proper sentiment in it. The young man was utterly incapable of comprehending the meaning and proportions of the extraordinary event which had befallen him. It appeared to present to him the aspect of a somewhat slangy ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... a moment ago—" her mother began, and then subsided. She was accustomed to small tangles in her own processes of thought, and quite incapable, after years of blind ...
— The Delectable Duchy • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... to begin with, a nervous, excitable people. Multitudes of children, probably the great majority in the upper walks of life, are born into the world with weaknesses of the nervous organization, or of the brain or stomach, which make them incapable of any strong excitement or prolonged exertion without some lesion or derangement; so that they are continually being checked, laid up, and invalided in the midst of their drugs. Life here in America is so fervid, so fast, our climate is so stimulating, with its clear, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... thin puff of smoke, and a screaming echo went rolling and reverberating down the Wabash. Abram's eyes widened, and a curious whiteness settled on his lips. He stood as if incapable of moving. "Clang! Clang!" came Maria's ...
— The Song of the Cardinal • Gene Stratton-Porter
... contemporary social novel. We have left behind the theoretic enthusiast, perplexed by the contrast between the semi-barbarism of the country and the old-fashioned apathy of its rulers; we have no more descriptions, serious or sarcastic, of rakish subalterns and disorderly regiments under ancient, incapable colonels; we are introduced to a reformed Anglo-India, full of hard-working, efficient officers, civil and military, and sufficiently decorous, except where hill-stations foster flirting and the ordinary dissipation of any garrison ...
— Studies in Literature and History • Sir Alfred Comyn Lyall
... that crushed attitude while Heyst talked to him soothingly with the utmost courtesy. The Swede was as much distressed as Morrison; for he understood the other's feelings perfectly. No decent feeling was ever scorned by Heyst. But he was incapable of outward cordiality of manner, and he felt acutely his defect. Consummate politeness is not the right tonic for an emotional collapse. They must have had, both of them, a fairly painful time of it in the cabin of the brig. In the end Morrison, ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... in a loose sort of way which suggested the West and the open, in contrast to Gordon's metropolitan sophistication and immaculate tailoring. He was every inch the man, and a splendid actor—I knew. Yet there was the touch of youth about him. He seemed incapable of a crime such as this, unless it was in anger, or as the result of some deep- running ...
— The Film Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve
... were meditating his destruction. His opinion is that a patriotic Minister should regard no others as his enemies but those conspiring against their country, and acknowledge no friends or favourites incapable of well serving the State. Prince de Z———— waited on him one day, and, after hesitating some time, began to compliment him on his liberal sentiments, and concluded by asking the place of a governor for his cousin, with whom he had reason to suppose the Count much offended. "I am happy," ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... times, and he treated prisoners with the severity of a Biblical Jehovah. Moreover, the infirmity which was the worry of his life, the childish lisp which, in his opinion, had alone prevented him from shining as a public prosecutor, made him ferociously ill-tempered, incapable of any intelligent indulgence. There were smiles, which he divined, as soon as he raised his sharp, shrill little voice, to ask his first questions. That droll voice of his took away whatever majesty might have remained attached to these proceedings, ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... newcomer intended no harm—quite the contrary! After an instinctive recoil, he leaned against a table and wiped his forehead, breathing in gasps, incapable ...
— Messengers of Evil - Being a Further Account of the Lures and Devices of Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... October I sent Raouf Bey to Gondokoro, with orders to despatch to Khartoum all the really sick and incapable, but upon no account to permit any man to return unless he ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker
... Dichotomy," "Achilles and the Tortoise," "The Arrow" and "The Stadium."] If movement is not everything, it is nothing, and if we postulate, to begin with, that the motionless is real, then we shall be incapable of grasping reality. The philosophies of Plato, of Aristotle, and of Plotinus were developed from the thesis that there is more in the immutable than in the moving, and that it is by way of diminution that we pass from the ...
— Bergson and His Philosophy • J. Alexander Gunn
... the commissioner to suspect Monsieur Florentin," cried the concierge. "He is a good young man, incapable of harming a fly. And then, there is a good reason why death could not have taken place between three o'clock and half-past; it is that Monsieur Caffie's lamp was lighted, and you know the poor gentleman was not a man to light his lamp in broad daylight, ...
— Conscience, Complete • Hector Malot
... one premise, and want of power over another, infer want of power over a conclusion. {335} As "Some men are not capable of tracing consequences; we cannot be sure that there are beings responsible for consequences who are incapable of tracing consequences; therefore, we cannot be sure that all men are responsible for the ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan
... confining his operations to an aimless expedition whose advance extended only as far as Blain's crossroads, whence it was soon withdrawn. Meanwhile General Foster had superseded Burnside, but physical disabilities rendered him incapable of remaining in the field, and then the chief authority devolved on Parke. By this time the transmission of power seemed almost a disease; at any rate it was catching, so, while we were en route to Dandridge, Parke transferred the command ...
— The Memoirs of General P. H. Sheridan, Complete • General Philip Henry Sheridan
... that a much smaller provision than 7000L would support her in affluence. For their brother's sake, too, for the sake of his own heart, she rejoiced; and she reproached herself for being unjust to his merit before, in believing him incapable of generosity. His attentive behaviour to herself and his sisters convinced her that their welfare was dear to him, and, for a long time, she firmly relied on the liberality of ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... accounts of the terrific cannonade and the murderous hand-to-hand struggles. At night she would start up from vivid dreams wherein she saw the field with thousands of ghastly faces turned towards the white moonlight. In her belief Merwyn was incapable of looking upon such scenes. Therefore why should she think of him with scorn and bitterness? She herself had never before realized how terrible they were. Now that the dread emergency, with its imperative demand for manhood and action, had passed, her heart became softened and ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe
... the Helvetii were terrified in the face 68 of danger. At the first alarm they had chosen Claudius Severus general, but they knew nothing of fighting or discipline and were incapable of combined action. An engagement with the Roman veterans would be disastrous; and the walls, dilapidated by time, could not stand a siege. They found themselves between Caecina and his powerful army on the one side, and on the other the Raetian ...
— Tacitus: The Histories, Volumes I and II • Caius Cornelius Tacitus
... sting the insect in a vital part,—for in that case it would not keep fresh for its young,—but introduces its poison into certain nervous ganglia, the injury to which has the effect of paralyzing the victim and making it incapable of motion, though ...
— The Writings of John Burroughs • John Burroughs
... people. How does he succeed here? He sends his messengers again, his angels, his prophets, one after another. He inspires a certain number of men to write a book to deliver his will to the people, fallen into such condition that they are incapable of discovering the truth for themselves. But, after all his efforts, they are so far from the truth that, when the second person of the Trinity appears, they have nothing to do with him except to put him to death. After that, God ...
— Our Unitarian Gospel • Minot Savage
... Spencer Clay got hold of the facts of the case; and when young Clay got hold of anything, Marois Bay at large had it hot and fresh a few hours later; for Spencer was one of those slack-jawed youths who are constitutionally incapable of ...
— The Man with Two Left Feet - and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... The body has been found. I do not make excuses for not having sent off my news by last night's mail, for the simple reason that I was incapable of putting pen to paper. The events that attended the discovery bewildered me so completely that I needed what I could get of a night's rest to enable me to face the situation at all. Now I can give you my journal of the day, certainly the ...
— A Thin Ghost and Others • M. R. (Montague Rhodes) James
... advancing force has passed, and thus they may be led into killing those whom they would otherwise have spared. There will also be instances in which men intoxicated with the frenzy of battle slay even those whom on reflection they might have seen to be incapable of further harming them. The same kind of fury may vent itself on persons who are already surrendering, and even a soldier who is usually self-controlled or humane may, in the heat of the moment, go on killing, especially in a general melee, ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 3, June, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... know all things, that you were acquainted with all languages, the courses of the stars, and all the rest, what is there in that to be proud of? A single demon knows more on these subjects than all the men in this world put together.[17] But there is one thing that the demon is incapable of, and which is the glory of man: ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier
... a grand old Boer in many respects, and no better, more righteous, and more upright man ever lived. He worked long and faithfully for his people, and he undoubtedly strove to do that which he believed to be the best for his country, but he was incapable of performing the duties of his office as a younger, more energetic, and a more warlike man would have attended to them. Joubert was in his dotage, and none of his people were aware of it until the crucial moment of the war was ...
— With the Boer Forces • Howard C. Hillegas
... material expression of the ideas communicated. Considering the operation of this law under these conditions, we find that the thought communicating only, as nearly as may be, the generic idea, will be distinguished from it by the addition of but a single attribute as the generic by itself is incapable of being represented in concrete form, the expression of this thought in form will present us matter distinguished from matter in general by but a single attribute. The least possible individualizing attribute added to the highest possible generalization ...
— The Philosophy of Evolution - and The Metaphysical Basis of Science • Stephen H. Carpenter
... if between these two Powers, which were more illusory than real, pending the advent of Russia, whose hour had not yet struck; in this gap in history, between a nation on the verge of its decline, or at least seemingly incapable of defending itself, and a nation that was still too young and incapable of attack, fate offered a magnificent place to whoso cared to take it. This is what Germany felt, at first instinctively, urged by all the ill-defined forces that impel mankind, ...
— The Wrack of the Storm • Maurice Maeterlinck
... much envy and fraud and hypocrisy the state of a tyrannous king is subject unto, and how they who are commonly called [Eupatridas Gk.], i.e. nobly born, are in some sort incapable, or void of ...
— Meditations • Marcus Aurelius
... magnificent specimen of crude humanity; strong, lithe, graceful, and not too big—just such a man as your novelist would picture as the nurse-swapped offspring of some rotund or ricketty aristocrat. But being, for my own part, as I plainly stated at the outset, incapable of such romancing, I must register Dixon as one whose ignoble blood had crept through scoundrels since the Flood. Though, when you come to look at it leisurely, this wouldn't interfere with aristocratic, or ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... predestined to torment and the second death; for my theme is of heaven, not of lost souls. I am speaking of the elect—those worms preordained to salvation and rebirth.) Probably they can feel only very weak sensations: they are certainly incapable of prayer. But if they were able to pray, they could not ask for anything more than they already receive from the youth who feeds and tends them. He is their providence, —a god of whose existence they can be aware in only the vaguest possible way, ...
— In Ghostly Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... to the donga. We had lain nine hours behind those ant-hills, and, strange to say, there were only two wounded on our side. We decided not to run the same risk again. In this way we lost our confidence in men like the brothers Erasmus, General and Commandant, who, in the first place, were incapable of organizing a good plan of attack, and, secondly, never took ...
— On Commando • Dietlof Van Warmelo
... by the coqueros. After a long and attentive observation of the effects of coca, I am fully convinced that its use, in moderation, is no way detrimental to health; and that without it the Peruvian Indian, with his spare diet, would be incapable of going through the labor which he now performs. The coca plant must be considered as a great blessing to Peru. It is an essential means of preserving the nationality of the Indians, and in some measure mitigating the melancholy fate of that once great race which disease and excessive ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi
... in England, she found that her school had suffered considerably in her absence. It can be little reproach to any one, to say that they were found incapable of supplying her place. She not only excelled in the management of the children, but had also the talent of being attentive and obliging to the ...
— Memoirs of the Author of a Vindication of the Rights of Woman • William Godwin
... to see that his companion trembled in every limb, he raised himself and held out to him the flask with Sirona's wine, which the other, incapable of controlling himself, snatched eagerly from his hand, and emptied with frantic thirst. The fiery liquor revived his failing strength, brought the color to his cheeks, and lent a strange lustre to his eyes. "How much good that has done me!" he cried with a deep sigh and ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... quite incapable of taking his Cabinet colleagues so seriously as people of that sort take themselves. Indeed, but for the more prominent ones, he never could remember what their jobs were, nor even recollect their names. It put one in a cold perspiration to hear him remark, when recounting ...
— Experiences of a Dug-out, 1914-1918 • Charles Edward Callwell
... Every breeze wafts gaseous nutriment to their expanded leaves, and their rootlets ramify throughout the soil in search of appropriate mineral aliment. But no matter how abundant, or however easy of reach may be the food of plants, the vegetable organism is incapable of partaking of it unless under the influence of light. Exposed to this potent stimulus, the plant collects the gaseous carbonic acid and the vaporous water, solidifies them, decomposes them, and combines their elements ...
— The Stock-Feeder's Manual - the chemistry of food in relation to the breeding and - feeding of live stock • Charles Alexander Cameron
... the Asiatic population. If it be, there is an end to republican government there, because it is very well ascertained that those people have no appreciation of that form of government; it seems to be obnoxious to their very nature; they seem to be incapable either of understanding it or of carrying it out; and I can not consent to say that California, or Oregon, or Colorado, or Nevada, or any of those States, shall be given over to an irruption of Chinese. I, for my part, ...
— History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States • Wiliam H. Barnes
... add to these strange circumstances the facts that the French King, Charles VI., was mad, and incapable of any real share either in the internal government of his country or in resistance to its invader: that his only son, the Dauphin, was no more than a foolish boy, led by incompetent councillors, and even of doubtful legitimacy, regarded with hesitation and uncertainty by many, ...
— Jeanne d'Arc - Her Life And Death • Mrs.(Margaret) Oliphant
... that the young lady preserved her presence of mind, for Bruce seemed incapable of connected thought or action. He roused himself, indeed, at his daughter's call, but gazed stupidly about him, stammered in his speech, and faltered in his step when he crossed the room. The shock of grief had evidently overmastered his faculties—something, too, besides ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville
... said it thoughtfully, but his mind was not working with his speech. The coals, as he knew—though he did not propose to tell the Doctor, at any rate just yet—had been delivered by Sam Bossom. Of complicity in any such plot as this Sam was by nature incapable. On the other hand, Sam was just the fellow to help a couple of children out of mere kindness of heart. Mr. Hucks decided to have a talk with Sam before committing himself. He suspected, of course—nay, was certain—that Glasson ...
— True Tilda • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... The old pressman was the only hand left in the printing-house; and when the master (otherwise the "gaffer") died, leaving a widow, but no children, the business seemed to be on the verge of extinction; for the solitary "bear" was quite incapable of the feat of transformation into a "monkey," and in his quality of pressman had never learned to read or write. Just then, however, a Representative of the People being in a mighty hurry to publish the Decrees of the Convention, bestowed ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... to explain matters in detail. I declined to listen to these explanations, being incapable of understanding business methods in general, and those of Maitre Mouche in particular. The notary then took it upon himself to justify Mademoiselle Prefere's educational system, and observed ...
— The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard • Anatole France
... Arondelle remembered the "dream" Miss Levison had told him of the two persons whom she mistook to be himself and Rose Cameron talking together under her window. But Miss Levison was so far incapable of giving evidence as to be lying at the point of death with brain fever. So it would have been worse than useless to have spoken of her dream, ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth
... medical gentleman, who had been physician in ordinary to Louis XIV., and was still living at the time of the marriage of Louis XV., told M. Campan's father an anecdote which seems too remarkable to have remained unknown; nevertheless he was a man of honour, incapable of inventing this story. His name was Lafosse. He said that Louis XIV. was informed that the officers of his table evinced, in the most disdainful and offensive manner, the mortification they felt at being obliged to eat at the table of the comptroller of the kitchen along with Moliere, ...
— Memoirs Of The Court Of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Complete • Madame Campan
... here he had fondly hoped, that when men with affections and feelings like our own had been torn from their country, and everything dear to them, he should have found some mitigation of their sufferings; but the sad reverse was the case. This was the most wretched part of the whole subject. He was incapable, of impressing the House with what he felt upon it. A description of their conveyance was impossible. So much misery condensed, in so little room was more than the human imagination had ever before conceived. Think only of six hundred persons linked together, trying to get rid ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... which now animated him. As from a far country his mind, she perceived, often traveled to meet hers. "There was a door to which she found no key." But Katherine, happily, could respect the individuality even of her best beloved. Unlike the majority of her sex she was incapable of intrusion, and did not make affection an excuse for familiarity. Love, in her opinion, enjoins obligation of service, rather than confers rights of examination and direction. She had learned the condition in which his servants had found Richard, in the opera box of the great theatre at ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... reactions that increase in number the graver the peril becomes. We have all read of the "fascination" of the bird by the serpent, and there are other animals that in the presence of an enemy become so palsied with fear as to become incapable of defence, even that of flight. And with man it is not as the danger becomes most acute that his nerves become steadier and his courage firmer. The opposite is probably more often the case. In all these cases ...
— Theism or Atheism - The Great Alternative • Chapman Cohen
... house, says he, shall tremble, and the soldiers shall give way, and the diminished grinders shall cease. The limbs, and firmest parts of the body, are damaged by age: the hands and knees grow weak, thro' the relaxation of the nerves. Hence those are rendered incapable of defending us against injuries, and of performing innumerable other good offices, for which they were originally intended; and these becoming unequal to the weight they were wont to sustain, lose their ...
— Medica Sacra - or a Commentary on on the Most Remarkable Diseases Mentioned - in the Holy Scriptures • Richard Mead
... that little Di was probably a good judge on that point, being herself nearly incapable ...
— Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished - A Tale of City Arab Life and Adventure • R.M. Ballantyne
... causation to people who show so much ingenuity in the construction of houses, boats, weapons, and a great variety of mechanical devices, such as traps, and in other operations involving the intelligent application of mechanical principles. These operations show that, though they may be incapable of describing in abstract and general terms the principles involved, they nevertheless have a nice appreciation of them. If a trap fails to work owing to its faulty construction, the trapper treats it purely as a mechanical ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... they directed their course. Trusting to the fleetness of their steeds, they had reason to hope that they should keep ahead of their pursuers; for the Indians' horses, though strong and possessed of great endurance, were incapable, they knew, of going at any ...
— The Frontier Fort - Stirring Times in the N-West Territory of British America • W. H. G. Kingston
... possessed by any strong feeling, to show it. You see all this in children: this is the point which the pendulum starts from. It swings over, and we find a reaction from this. The reaction is, to maintain and exhibit perfect coolness and indifference in danger; to pretend to be incapable of fear. This state of things we find in the Red Indian, a rude and uncivilized being. But it is plain that with people who are able to think, there must be a reaction from this. The pendulum cannot ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd
... seemed to be at last almost assured, and largely thanks to Indian enterprise, it was gravely compromised by the miserable breakdown of the most important of all the services on which the very life of industry depends. The Indian railways proved altogether incapable of meeting the new demands made upon them. Even in the essential matter of coal supplies, though the output of the Indian coal mines suffices for present requirements, huge dumps of coal accumulated round the mines and could not be moved owing to the lack of rolling-stock and to the general inadequacy ...
— India, Old and New • Sir Valentine Chirol
... opinion that all mathematics was arcane gobbledygook, and his precise knowledge of the mathematical odds in poker and dice games didn't abate that opinion one whit. Obviously, a mind like that is utterly incapable of understanding a projected thought of scientific content; such a thought bounces off the impregnable mind shield that the bigot has set up around his little area ...
— The Foreign Hand Tie • Gordon Randall Garrett
... placed on the bolster of the truck-bed destined presently for your devoted head. Oh! to do justice to a Sicilian locanda is plainly out of question, and the rest of our task may as well be sung as said, verse and prose being alike incapable of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... child born in this country, in fifty years, will be unfit; and, in one hundred years, the American race will have ceased to exist. We mean by this that every second child born will be born to die in infancy, or, if it lives, will be incapable of self-support during its life, because either of mental degeneracy or physical inefficiency. This appalling situation immediately becomes a problem of civilization. No state can exist under these conditions. If these statistics ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Volume I. (of IV.) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague, M.D.
... therefore, as usual, went my own headstrong way, and eventually got into very serious trouble. I was obliged to fly; and learning that your mother—by this time married—was in Rome, I resolved to seek her in the first instance, and beg of her that pecuniary assistance which my other friends were incapable of affording me. I did so, found her, and, after considerable difficulty, succeeded in obtaining a private interview with her. I represented to her the danger of the position ...
— The Rover's Secret - A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba • Harry Collingwood
... (undrinkable) water; hence, desalination is the reverse process; also involves the accumulation of salts in topsoil caused by evaporation of excessive irrigation water, a process that can eventually render soil incapable of supporting crops. siltation - occurs when water channels and reservoirs become clotted with silt and mud, a side effect of deforestation and soil erosion. slash-and-burn agriculture - a rotating cultivation technique ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... off. Only the tender care of Frederick, who was with him, and the swift rush of Lockwood and Brainard to his aid, saved him from death. It tells a fine story of the unselfish devotion of the men, that this poor wreck, maimed and helpless, so that he had to be fed, and incapable of performing one act in his own service, should have been nursed throughout the winter, fed with double portions, and actually saved living until the rescue party arrived, while many of those who cared for him yielded up their ...
— American Merchant Ships and Sailors • Willis J. Abbot
... when Louis dived between the table and the form, with some trouble, and, at the expense of receiving a few unceremonious kicks, recovered the book and gave it to Ferrers, who hardly thanked him, but leaning his head on his hand, seemed almost incapable of doing any thing. Presently he looked up, and asked in a tone of mingled anger and weariness, what had become of the inkstand ...
— Louis' School Days - A Story for Boys • E. J. May
... assertions, but adduced no specific proof of them. The source of such criticisms was obvious enough, but they did no harm, and were not accompanied by denials of my facts. The only other form of attack brought against the book is comprised in the claim that I am a writer of fiction and as such incapable of telling the truth, about anything; that I was the dupe of designing persons who made me the mouthpiece for their factitious grievances or spites; and that I was myself animated by a spirit of revenge for the injury ...
— The Subterranean Brotherhood • Julian Hawthorne
... recent modifications of this civil status, many of the special rules of law flowing from and dependent upon this cardinal principle still exist in full force in most States. One of these is, that a married woman is incapable, without her husband's consent, of making contracts which shall be binding on her or him. This very incapacity was one circumstance which the Supreme Court of Illinois deemed important in rendering a married woman incompetent fully to perform ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... regimen to be observed, certain strict rules of life to be kept, a certain asceticism to be imposed on the person, which was not quite agreeable to young men; and after the period of youth was passed, the human frame became incapable of being regenerated from the seeds of decay and death, which, by that time, had become strongly developed in it. In short, while young, the possessor of the secret found the terms of immortal life too ...
— Septimius Felton - or, The Elixir of Life • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... fatuous speech which has been put into her Majesty's gracious mouth, shall be allowed to pass unquestioned. Then the leader of the House thanks his adversary for his consideration, explains to all men how happy the country ought to be that the Government has not fallen into the disgracefully incapable hands of his right honourable friend opposite; and after that the Address is carried amidst universal serenity. But such was not the order of the day on the present occasion. Mr. Mildmay, the veteran leader of the liberal side of the House, had moved an amendment to ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... time, pervaded the two opposing armies. The British, flushed by their successes, and confident in that strength before which every opposing obstacle had thus far given way, were looking down with little other than absolute contempt on the American forces in their front, believing them wholly incapable, either from numbers or courage, of opposing any serious resistance to their march, when they chose to move forward. And here thus lay their proud and infatuated chief for weeks, dreaming of coronets, frittering away ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson
... frame, with shaggy hair hanging about his visage, which was grimed with the vapors of the furnace. This personage had been Aylmer's underworker during his whole scientific career, and was admirably fitted for that office by his great mechanical readiness, and the skill with which, while incapable of comprehending a single principle, he executed all the details of his master's experiments. With his vast strength, his shaggy hair, his smoky aspect, and the indescribable earthiness that incrusted him, he seemed to represent man's physical nature; while Aylmer's slender figure, ...
— Mosses from an Old Manse and Other Stories • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... incapable of speech, Innes shouldered his rod, made a gesture of farewell, and strode off down the burn-side. Archie watched him go without moving. He was sorry, but quite unashamed. He hated to be inhospitable, but in one ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Dick, with open eyes. It was the one manly accomplishment of which he was himself incapable. In the order of the things that he admired, next to having killed a man in single fight, came swimming. "Well," he said, "here is a lesson to despise no man. I promised to care for you as far as Holywood, and, by the rood, Jack, y' are ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 8 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... not restrict a commander, in his choice of a physical objective, to the armed forces of the enemy. Nor do these considerations require him to search for and destroy the enemy forces before directing his effort toward the attainment of an objective under circumstances where the enemy is seen to be incapable of presenting ...
— Sound Military Decision • U.s. Naval War College
... have come under my observation and immediate attention, and suffice it to say, I have never failed to ameliorate the condition of every individual that has applied to me, who was suffering under chronic affections, if they would follow my prescriptions—unless the system was incapable ...
— Vegetable Diet: As Sanctioned by Medical Men, and by Experience in All Ages • William Andrus Alcott
... leper. The king made an offensive remark, and the good knight quitted the ball-room, followed by poor Marie in despair at the speech. She had in every way ruined the man she loved: she had destroyed his honour, and marred his life, since the physicians and master surgeons advance as a fact, incapable of contradiction, that persons Italianised by this love sickness, lost through it their greatest attractions, as well as their generative powers, and their ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... not a question," Lance implored. The mere suggestion increased a panic which seemed incapable of increase. "And for the shadow, why, that's true. The pipe's the shadow, and the shadow frightens me. A shadow! Yes! A shadow is a horrible, threatning thing! Show me a shadow cast by nothing and I am with you. But you might as easily hold that ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... heroic in size and manner. The lovely heiress to the house of the Capulets, on the turn of sixteen, swept in upon the stage as if she were mistress of the house, situation, and of fate, and bent on bringing the enemy to terms. Her face is sweet, at times positively beautiful, but incapable of expression. Her voice, while clear, is hard, metallic, at intervals nasal, and all the while stagey. She has been trained in the old Kemble tragic pump-handle style of elocution, that runs talk on stilts. Her manner is crude and awkward. In the balcony ...
— Mary Anderson • J. M. Farrar
... the canyon, the hold-up, and the double murder, a slight sound caused me to turn my head, and I saw in a doorway that led to another room the erect figure of Major Lessard listening intently, a black frown on his eagle face. When MacRae had finished his story and the incapable blockhead behind the desk sat there regarding the two of us as though he considered that we had been the victims of a rank hallucination, Lessard slammed the door shut behind him and ...
— Raw Gold - A Novel • Bertrand W. Sinclair |
