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Aspersion   /əspˈərʒən/   Listen
Aspersion

noun
1.
A disparaging remark.  Synonym: slur.  "It is difficult for a woman to understand a man's sensitivity to any slur on his virility"
2.
An abusive attack on a person's character or good name.  Synonyms: calumny, defamation, denigration, slander.
3.
The act of sprinkling water in baptism (rare).  Synonym: sprinkling.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Aspersion" Quotes from Famous Books



... side because he foresaw the need of it. But there was no sign of any softening upon Linforth's face. He could be hard, but on the other hand, when he gave his faith he gave it without reserve. Almost every word which Ralston had spoken had seemed to him an aspersion upon Violet Oliver. He said nothing, for he had learned to keep silence. But his anger was hotter than ever against Shere Ali, since but for Shere Ali the aspersions ...
— The Broken Road • A. E. W. Mason

... sure that I should attain to such a peaceful state of mind as not to "feel funny"; but Sally had called me a baby, and I had to redeem myself from that aspersion at any price. So I tried to compose my countenance over a beating heart, and think about other things on the way to the beach, as you do if you ...
— Lady Betty Across the Water • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson

... a denunciation no more than his little subject; and he vindicated the stage from so hard an aspersion, with a warmth not wholly ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay

... You are wild dogs without a leader. You want one that you can trust; you want no coward, but one who fears you not at your wildest. Well, I will be your leader. I do not fear you, and I do not love you, for how have you deserved my love? By ingratitude and aspersion? Who has the King's favour? Francois Bigot. Who has the ear of the Grande Marquise? Francois Bigot. Who stands firm while others tremble lest their power pass to-morrow? Francois Bigot. Who else dare invite revolution, this danger"—his ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... of rich gold deposits had lured them thither— work, by the way, in which there was as little mental satisfaction as pecuniary profit; for a bullet from the pistol of a public-spirited citizen had put that imaginative gentleman beyond the reach of aspersion on the third day of the camp's existence. Still, his fiction had a certain foundation in fact, and many had lingered a considerable time in and about Hurdy-Gurdy, though now all ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce

... disgraceful light, by the passages selected from Lord Byron's letters, and by the remarks of his biographer, I feel bound to justify their characters from imputations which I know to be false. The passages from Lord Byron's letters, to which I refer, are the aspersion on my mother's character (vol. iii. p. 206. last line):—'My child is very well, and flourishing, I hear; but I must see also. I feel no disposition to resign it to the contagian of its grandmother's society.' ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore

... not help laughing at this, in spite of the aspersion on the climate of her country. Such a quip, however, could not go unrequited, and she sought for means of retaliation. She decided that Flossie deserved a "booby trap", and fled back early to the classroom after lunch, to set it for her. It was a rather difficult and delicate operation, ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil

... attack upon my language! what do you think of that?—an aspersion upon my parts of speech! was ever such a brute! Sure, if I reprehend any thing in this world, it is the use of my oracular tongue, and a nice ...
— The Rivals - A Comedy • Richard Brinsley Sheridan

... madam, you will admit that you are mistaken," said the Professor, at the door of the cage, "and will see that you have cast a serious aspersion on the character of an innocent animal and the genuineness of a reputable museum." He stirred up the huge, hairy body lying in the straw in the Missing Link's cage. "If you come inside the creature may attack you, but you are ...
— The Missing Link • Edward Dyson

... alone is subject. I have inadvertently wandered from my purpose, which was to expose quite an opposite blunder, into which we are no less apt to fall, through hate. How ugly a person looks upon whose reputation some awkward aspersion hangs, and how suddenly his countenance clears up with his character! I remember being persuaded of a man whom I had conceived an ill opinion of, that he had a very bad set of teeth; which, since I have had better opportunities of being acquainted with his face and facts, ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb

... but as though to make up for his mate's aspersion, said, "I know nothing of this business, but I know the police. If they're not turned into a holy show when they set foot in this camp to look for you, may I never find another ounce of gold. Keep your end up, Benjamin. So-long." And he followed ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace

... your heart in thrall?" bantered the queen, for she was malicious enough to plunge him in further difficulty. Here also was a coil for Beatrice was jealous of Sancie's beauty, and her lover, Charles of Anjou, sat beside her quick to resent any aspersion upon his mistress. ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney

... come into his own, as all great poets must at last, in defiance of the puritan, in defiance of public opinion, and in spite of all aspersion. He has come into his own; and no one who loves poetry can afford to pass ...
— Suspended Judgments - Essays on Books and Sensations • John Cowper Powys

... effect and cause. There was never anything less proved or less probable: our happiness is never in our own hands; we inherit our constitution; we stand buffet among friend and enemies; we may be so built as to feel a sneer or an aspersion with unusual keenness, and so circumstanced as to be unusually exposed to them; we may have nerves very sensitive to pain, and be afflicted with a disease very painful. Virtue will not help us, and it is not meant to help us. It is not even its own reward, except for the self-centred and—I ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... the way their organization withstood the shock and wrack of battle. It was the German machine which broke down first. On that field a new France was born. Let no German ever again say that she is effete. It was purely a French victory. This is no aspersion upon the Belgians and the British; the slight part which they played in this battle is explained by their small numbers. At Liege and Namur, at Mons and St. Quentin they helped win for France a fighting chance behind the Marne. All hail to them ...
— The Note-Book of an Attache - Seven Months in the War Zone • Eric Fisher Wood

... you, and a dashed sight better, I don't mind betting," Bob returned with heat. In some circles it is an aspersion upon a man's manliness to have it hinted that a petticoat presenting ...
— Once Aboard The Lugger • Arthur Stuart-Menteth Hutchinson

... and given a great entertainment in honor of their kinsman, it turns out that, on the glorious 19th, he ran away to Brussels faster than even the French to Charleroi; for which act, however, there was no aspersion ever cast upon his courage, that quality being defended at the expense of his honesty; in a word, he was the paymaster of the company, and had what Theodore Hook calls an 'affection of his chest,' that required change of air. Looking only to the running away part ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)

... in which she was hereafter to be clothed, were sanctified by the aspersion of holy water: then followed several prayers to God, that "As he had blessed the garments of Aaron, with ointment which flowed from his head to his beard, so he would now bless the garments of his servant, with the copious dew of his benediction." When the garment was thus blessed, ...
— Sketches of the Fair Sex, in All Parts of the World • Anonymous

... aspersion," continued the cobbler, with an oratorical flourish, "that has been cast upon a ...
— The Vanishing Man • R. Austin Freeman

... think he believed it himself. All women were lovely and of good report in his eyes, because of one he had loved. The only time I ever saw Uncle Jesse really angered was when someone in his hearing cast an aspersion on the character of a shore girl. The wretched man who did it fairly cringed when Uncle Jesse turned on him with lightning of eye and thundercloud of brow. At that moment I no longer found it hard to reconcile Uncle Jesse's simple, kindly ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1909 to 1922 • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... am by nature incapable of repaying kindness by aspersion, I feel that I am no less above the meanness of attempting a return in that base coin—flattery; that which I saw I say, and as I saw it. I blame none of my predecessors for their general views, but claim the right of differing from them wherever I think fit; and if my account of things ...
— Impressions of America - During the years 1833, 1834 and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Tyrone Power

... remarkable in it. Officers were frequently hurried off on sudden orders, and there was no reason why society should be exercised over it. Elmendorf promptly disavowed any intention of casting the faintest aspersion on Mr. Forrest, whom he at least had found to be certainly quite the equal of his comrades in most things pertaining to the officer and gentleman, although there were some things, perhaps, which to a humble civilian like himself might call for explanation. He was merely ...
— A Tame Surrender, A Story of The Chicago Strike • Charles King

... support their respective claims. Inferior in enterprise? Let the sail that whitens every ocean, and the commercial spirit that braves every element and visits every bustling mart, refute the unfounded aspersion. Inferior in deeds of zeal and valor for the Church? Let our missionaries in the bosom of our own forest, in the distant regions of the East, and on the islands of the great Pacific, answer the question. Inferior in science and letters and the ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various

... think I can't manage her?" demanded the first officer, indignant that such an aspersion should be cast ...
— Little By Little - or, The Cruise of the Flyaway • William Taylor Adams

... the words may as well admit of another meaning, and import no more, than the preference of a single life to marriage; unless the gentlemen in orders will assert, that an unmarried Clergyman cannot live without a mistress. But the bishop was soon convinced that this aspersion against him, was no more than an effort of malice, as Mr. Pomfret at that time was really married. The opposition which his enemies made to him, had, in some measure, its effect; for by the obstructions he met ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. III • Theophilus Cibber

... that what skill he had lay entirely in the knowledge of Astrology; and, as this rumour operated greatly to his prejudice,[261] he resolved to perfect himself in Medicine and free his reputation from this aspersion. He had quarrelled violently with the physicians over the case of Count Borromeo's child which died, and with Borromeo himself, and, almost immediately after this, he published his book, De Astrorum Judiciis, a step which tended to identify him yet more closely ...
— Jerome Cardan - A Biographical Study • William George Waters

... desolated, who live to see their country rescued from its present despotic tyrants, will still be strangers to repose, even at the natal home for which now every earthly sigh is heard, till, with their restituted property, they have cleared their dignity of character from every possible aspersion of calumny, and returned—not to their benefactors—whose accounts, far more nobly, will be settled elsewhere!——but to the poor of the kingdom at large, that bounty which has sustained them in banishment ...
— Brief Reflections relative to the Emigrant French Clergy (1793) • Frances Burney

... to persuade others; his whole life became a multiplied action, tending to one end, the abolition of theocracy, and the establishment of religious toleration and liberty. He toiled at this with all the powers with which God had gifted him; he even employed falsehood (ruse), aspersion, cynicism, and immorality: he used even those arms that respect for God and man denies to the wise; he employed his virtue, his honour, his renown, to aid in this overthrow; and his apostleship of reason had too often the appearance of a profanation ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine

... he said, "you have given your evidence, and speaking for myself, I believe it to be entirely trustworthy. I wish to say that your character is perfectly clear. No aspersion whatever has been made on it, except that you said a note had been delivered at the door, though you knew it to have been not so delivered. You made that statement through fear of a certain individual; you were frightened into ...
— The Blotting Book • E. F. Benson

... this letter filled me with dismay for Helen's future life and mine, there was one great source of consolation: it was now in my power to clear her name from every foul aspersion. The Millwards and the Wilsons should see with their own eyes the bright sun bursting from the cloud—and they should be scorched and dazzled by its beams;—and my own friends too should see it—they whose suspicions had been such gall ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte

... appointed hour the pupils, wreathed and attired like nymphs and dryads, assemble in the halau, sweet with woodsy perfumes. At the door they receive aspersion with consecrated water. ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson

... of Transplanting the Irish into Connaught Vindicated from the unjust Aspersion of Colonel Richard Laurence and ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 24. Saturday, April 13. 1850 • Various

... to the validity of the ordinance. It was usually dispensed by immersion or affusion, [479:2] but when the health of the candidate might have been injured by such an ordeal, sprinkling was deemed sufficient. Aspersion was commonly employed in the case of the sick, and was known by the designation of clinic or bed baptism. Cyprian points out to one of his correspondents the absurdity of the idea that the extent to which the water is applied can affect the character of the ...
— The Ancient Church - Its History, Doctrine, Worship, and Constitution • W.D. [William Dool] Killen

... not hardened, with simple tastes, with frank manners, and with a capacity for friendship. No stain of treachery, of ingratitude, or of cruelty rests on his memory. Factious hatred, while flinging on his name every other foul aspersion, was compelled to own that he was not a man of blood. This would scarcely seem a high eulogium on a statesman of our times. It was then a rare and honourable distinction. The contests of parties in England had long been carried on ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... beneath a niche, and partly projecting from the wall, a stone basin: this was the stoup, or receptacle for holy water, called also the aspersorium, into which each individual dipped his finger and crossed himself when passing the threshold of the sacred edifice. The custom of aspersion at the church door appears to have been derived from an ancient usage of the heathens, amongst whom, according to Sozomen[154-*], the priest was accustomed to sprinkle such as entered into a temple with moist branches of olive. The stoup ...
— The Principles of Gothic Ecclesiastical Architecture, Elucidated by Question and Answer, 4th ed. • Matthew Holbeche Bloxam

... This horrid aspersion (I regret I am no longer exposed to that sort of insult) made me huffy too. I felt ready in my own mind to back up every assertion of Schomberg's and on any subject. In a moment, devil only knows why, Hermann and I were ...
— Falk • Joseph Conrad

... Truscott's coming his progress had been satisfactory. Officers and ladies were already making sly allusions in his presence as to his prospects for a second entanglement, and were heard with complacent undenial. Ever since the day of his aspersion of Ray he had been losing ground, however, and now, confound it! here was Ray looming up as a hero again, making a wild night-ride with despatches. He felt that things must be brought to a crisis speedily. He knew that, properly handled, he had the means of clouding Ray's ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King

... point-blank, with a bearing of such superiority as an attack of the sort can hardly ruffle. "Not to you, so forgetful of your honour, have I need here to reply. I set aside your evil aspersion; truth will hardly suffer from the like!"—"If I am in his eyes not worthy of reply," Friedrich bitterly re-attacks, "I call upon you, King, high in honour indeed. Will he, on the ground of insufficient nobility, refuse likewise to answer you?" Aye, the Knight refuses again, with an assurance ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall

... himself, from his conjunction with Mr. Addison, that he was the first who desired him to distinguish his papers in the Spectator, and after the death of that great man was a faithful executor of his fame, notwithstanding an aspersion which Mr. Tickell was so unjust to throw upon him. Sir Richard's greatest error was want of oeconomy, as appears from the two following instances related by the elegant writer of Mr. Savage's Life, to ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. IV • Theophilus Cibber

... wit to fleer and gibe? Who with less designing ends Kindlier entertains her friends; With good words and countenance sprightly, Strives to treat them more politely? Think not cards my chief diversion: 'Tis a wrong, unjust aspersion: Never knew I any good in 'em, But to dose my head like laudanum. We, by play, as men, by drinking, Pass our nights to drive out thinking. From my ailments give me leisure, I shall read and think with pleasure; Conversation learn ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift

... those portions of the miserable woman's confession which related to myself, with unaffected surprise, and, I can honestly add, with sincere distress. I had regretted, truly regretted, the aspersion which I had thoughtlessly cast on her memory, before I had seen a line of her letter. But when I had advanced as far as the passage which is quoted above, I own I felt my mind growing bitterer and ...
— The Moonstone • Wilkie Collins

... she tranquilly. "I was simply stating a fact without aspersion. It is the more to your credit that you have been able to raise yourself up among us—and so very young! You are not more ...
— The Fashionable Adventures of Joshua Craig • David Graham Phillips

... which, in the estimation of some already biased minds, might be considered as indirectly substantiated by what has been said of the Frenchman's two whales. Elsewhere in this volume the slanderous aspersion has been disproved, that the vocation of whaling is throughout a slatternly, untidy business. But there is another thing to rebut. They hint that all whales always smell bad. Now how did this odious stigma originate? I opine, that it is plainly ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville

... earned, criticism is deprecated, importance is attached to the babbling of blockheads, and even to the opinion of fools. What should have been self-respect in Major Colquhoun had degenerated into a devouring vanity, which rendered him thin-skinned to the slightest aspersion. He had married Evadne in order to win the credit of having secured an exceptionally young and attractive wife, and now all he thought of was "what fellows would say" if they knew of the slight she had put upon him. To conceal this was the one object of his life at present, the ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand

... such an account of me; do but let me vindicate my conduct, and declare to you the true cause of my remaining in the ship, and you will then see how little I deserve censure, and how I have been injured by so gross an aspersion. I shall then give you a short and cursory account of what has happened to me since; but I am afraid to say a hundredth part of what I have got in store, for I am not allowed the use of writing materials, ...
— The Eventful History Of The Mutiny And Piratical Seizure - Of H.M.S. Bounty: Its Cause And Consequences • Sir John Barrow

... with indignation, exclaimed, 'Oh!' then checked herself, as if such an aspersion was not worthy of her taking the trouble ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge

... go before an excited people full of anxiety and uncertainty for the future, and by them be elected instead of the sound, wise, and conservative gentlemen usually selected to represent those States. Those elections would be a mad scene of aspersion and vituperation. I cannot, I will not trust them. Rather give me in those States the glorious results ...
— A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention • Lucius Eugene Chittenden

... says: "The practice of the Church of interceding for the dead at the celebration of the Eucharist, is so general and so ancient, that it cannot be thought to have come in upon imposture, but that the same aspersion will seem to take hold of the ...
— Purgatory • Mary Anne Madden Sadlier

... blame—and your husband all the profit, all the importance. He lived poor, and died so; without a knowledge of those profitable results to his brother of which the latter has made his own avails by leaving my father's memory to aspersion which he did not deserve, and his son to destitution and reproach which he merited as little. My father's memory is liable to no reproach when every creditor knows that he died in a state of poverty, in which his only son has ever lived. Neither he nor I ever ...
— Confession • W. Gilmore Simms

... They are indeed," interrupts Mrs. Chichester, who seems to be enjoying herself. "But what an aspersion on poor Sir Maurice." ...
— The Hoyden • Mrs. Hungerford

... dislikes. Van Buren scrupulously observed the amenities of debate. He was uniformly courteous towards adversaries; and the calm self-control saved him, as some great orators were not saved, from a descent to the aspersion of motive so common and futile ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander

... reign; but it was by his own indiscreet zeal, that he brought on himself the first violence and persecution. A report being spread that Cranmer, in order to pay court to the queen, had promised to officiate in the Latin service, the archbishop, to wipe off this aspersion, published a manifesto in his own defence. Among other expressions, he there said, that as the devil was a liar from the beginning, and the father of lies, he had at this time stirred up his servants to persecute Christ and his ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. - From Henry VII. to Mary • David Hume

... Jacobites, endeavour to alienate the hearts of the people, to defame the prince, and then dethrone him (for these are your expressions) and that I am their patron, their bulwark, their hope, and their refuge? Can you think I will descend to vindicate myself against an aspersion so absurd? God be thanked, we have had many a change of ministry without changing our prince: for if it had been otherwise, perhaps revolutions might have been more frequent. Heaven forbid that the welfare of a great kingdom, and ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift

... trenches, spending ammunition with their customary lavishness. The day's shelling justified the Russian opinion that of the German forces their artillery and cavalry are the weakest arm and their infantry is the best. The positions are not greatly disturbed by the day-long aspersion with shrapnel, and the Russians are more than ready for the attack. On this front the infantry attacks usually in line, but this night they came up in dense columns. The Russian guns were at work promptly with the fuses of the shells reduced, so ...
— The New York Times Current History: the European War, February, 1915 • Various

... memory, without improving the mind or advancing any real knowledge; and, where the science is carried no farther than a mere systematic classification, the charge is but too true. But the botanist that is desirous of wiping off this aspersion should be by no means content with a list of names; he should study plants philosophically, should investigate the laws of vegetation, should examine the powers and virtues of efficacious herbs, should promote their cultivation; and graft the ...
— The Natural History of Selborne, Vol. 2 • Gilbert White

... pitiless nakedness in which he leaves them. But there are even stronger reasons for recalling contemporary verdicts pronounced on Earle as a man. Hallam, in the "Literature of Europe,"[E] has a short notice of him, and though it shews some appreciation of his ability, it contains a very unworthy aspersion on his character. "The chapter on the sceptic," he says, "is witty, but an insult to the honest searcher after truth, which could only have come from one that was content to take up his own opinions for ease or profit." If we accept all that ...
— Microcosmography - or, a Piece of the World Discovered; in Essays and Characters • John Earle

... handkerchief, dropped from his pocket a love-letter to Mademoiselle de Mortemart, afterwards Madame de Montespan, which was picked up by one of the attendants of the princess. The king, on the other hand, was at one time attracted by the charms of Madame de Frontenac, against whom, however, no aspersion is cast. ...
— Count Frontenac and New France under Louis XIV • Francis Parkman

... used during the earlier centuries must now be noticed. They are the following:—(1) Use of fonts; (2) Status of baptizer; (3) Immersion, submersion or aspersion; (4) Exorcism; (5) Baptismal formula and trine immersion; (6) The age of baptism; (7) Confirmation; (8) Disciplina arcani; (9) Regeneration; (10) Relation to repentance; (11) Baptism for the dead; (12) Use of the name; (13) Origin of the ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various

... to vindicate his character from the foul aspersion cast upon him; but when she came he was so shocked by her appearance that he was unable to speak ...
— Mark Hurdlestone - Or, The Two Brothers • Susanna Moodie

... not been wholly confined to water. To my knowledge he had a wife in Goa, yet I feared he had his flirtations here in London. Once I charged him with inconstancy to the lady in Goa, but he repudiated the aspersion with the quaint denial: "No, master, many ladies are loving me, but I don't ...
— The Idler Magazine, Vol III. May 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various

... province Mortal Man resides. He also testified that he was on intimate terms with the 437:3 plaintiff, and knew Personal Sense to be truthful; that he knew Man, and that Man was made in the image of God, but was a criminal. This is a foul aspersion on man's 437:6 Maker. It blots the fair escutcheon of omnipotence. It in- dicates malice aforethought, a determination to condemn Man in the interest of Personal Sense. At the bar of Truth, 437:9 in the presence of divine Justice, before the Judge of our higher tribunal, the Supreme ...
— Science and Health With Key to the Scriptures • Mary Baker Eddy

... of getting people to talk about him—being regardless whether they spoke well of him or ill. He only wished that she could have heard the bishop. He felt as a man feels whose character has just been cleared in a court of law from an aspersion that has rested on it for some time. He wondered if that truly noble man whom he was privileged to call his Father in God, would have any objection to give him a testimonial to the effect that in his opinion,—the opinion of his Father in God,—there was no ...
— Phyllis of Philistia • Frank Frankfort Moore

... Tulliwuddle, and meaning to convey no aspersion whatsoever upon your character, I would venture to inquire what are your views upon some of the current topics. Take any one you like, sir, so long as it's good and solid, and let me hear what you have to say about it. What you favor us with will not be ...
— Count Bunker • J. Storer Clouston

... intentions regarding our client, and we will meet him on his own ground. In the coming contest we will not only establish beyond all shadow of doubt our client's sole right and title to the Mainwaring estate, but we will, at the same time, forever refute and silence any and every aspersion which Ralph Mainwaring may seek to cast upon him. Even were there any truth in these insinuations, it would be time enough, when the charges should be preferred against our client, to brazen them before ...
— That Mainwaring Affair • Maynard Barbour

... to be tossed and bandied about before the multitude. Clarence had been solemnly attainted by act of parliament, and his children were out of the question. The doubts on the validity of Edward's marriage were better grounds for Richard's proceedings than aspersion of his mother's honour. On that invalidity he claimed the crown, and obtained it; and with such universal concurrence, that the nation undoubtedly was on his side —but as he could not deprive his nephews, on that foundation, without bastardizing their sisters too, no wonder, ...
— Historic Doubts on the Life and Reign of King Richard the Third • Horace Walpole

... of her court, visited Dr Dee's house to see his library; but having buried his wife only a few hours before, he could not entertain her Majesty in the way he wished. However, he brought out a glass, the properties of which he explained to his royal mistress, hoping to wipe off the aspersion, under which he had long ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby

... about the origin of this stone. Among the Indians and Persians pearls are found in strong white sea-shells, being created at a regular time by the admixture of dew. For the shells, desiring as it were a kind of copulation, open so as to receive moisture from the nocturnal aspersion. Then becoming big they produce little pearls in triplets, or pairs, or unions, which are so called because the shells when scaled often produce only single pearls, which then ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus

... unbuckle his helmet, in which office he was assisted by the trumpeter. When the headpiece was removed, the hapless knight of the Griffin appeared in the pale livery of death, though he was only in a swoon, from which he soon recovered by the effect of the fresh air, and the aspersion of cold water, brought from a small pool in the neighbourhood. When he recognised his conqueror doing the offices of humanity about his person, he closed his eyes from vexation, told Sir Launcelot that his was the fortune of the day, though he himself owed his mischance ...
— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett

... excellently-conducted vehicles, or that any actual driver was either intemperate or incompetent; and that, should such an impression have been unfortunately produced—which he hopes is impossible—no one would regret so unjust an aspersion more sincerely ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 103, October 22, 1892 • Various

... that I am equally ignorant of the whole affair with any other gentleman in this house; that I never saw the paper till it was delivered to me at the door, nor the author till he appeared at the bar. Having thus cleared myself, sir, from this aspersion, I declare it as my opinion, that every gentleman in the house can safely purge himself in the same manner; for I cannot conceive that any of them can have written a libel like this. There are, indeed, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 10. - Parlimentary Debates I. • Samuel Johnson

... the only means I can devise, At once to wipe away this foul aspersion, And all the other ...
— The Female Gamester • Gorges Edmond Howard

... He told me, that it was his ill fortune, and he supposed he was not singular, to have enemies, that made it their business to misrepresent every circumstance of his conduct. He had been calumniated, cruelly calumniated, and could he discover the author of the aspersion, he would vindicate his honour with his sword. In fine, he explained the whole business in such a manner, as, though I could not entirely approve, yet evinced it to be by no means subversive of the general amiableness ...
— Italian Letters, Vols. I and II • William Godwin

... their king,—passed once more through all the tortures they had suffered, anxious to go and rejoin them, and rejoicing at each step towards death. At length, after she had undergone fire, the talons of beasts, and agonizing aspersion, she was wrapped in a network and thrown to a bull that tossed her in the air; she was already unconscious of all that befell her, and seemed altogether taken up with watching for the blessings that Christ had in store for her. Even the Gentiles allowed that never a woman ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume I. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... was young enough to be startled at the suggestion, which sounded confidential and blood-curdling in the dusk. He said sharply that it was not very likely, as if defending the absent victim of the accident from an unkind aspersion. He felt, in fact, indignant. The other emitted a short stifled laugh of a conciliatory nature. The second bell rang under the poop. He made a movement at the ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad

... cannot be left to chance. We public men, madam, often have to do very hard and even inhumane things for no apparent reason. Our consciences alone support us. An impression, I am told, sometimes gets abroad that we yield to clamour. Those alone who know us realize how unfounded that aspersion is." ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... Title of "A Letter to the Bishop of Ely, upon the Occasion of his suppos'd late Charge, said to be deliver'd at Cambridge August 7, 1716, &c." in which he pursues the Ironical Scheme laid down in the said Title, and endeavours to vindicate his Lordship from the Aspersion of writing such a mean Pamphlet, as ...
— A Discourse Concerning Ridicule and Irony in Writing (1729) • Anthony Collins

... light—of dispelling the clouds of calumny and misconception with which it has been darkened, I feel that my best course is to give a simple, dignified narration of the plain facts, and allow the unprejudiced to judge for themselves. My chief object, I candidly confess, is to clear myself from unjust aspersion. Spurred by this motive—and I think it is an honourable and a right motive—I find I am enabled to overcome my usual repugnance to talking about myself, and ...
— Told After Supper • Jerome K. Jerome

... friendship," declared Nicholas, flaring up and turning away as if from a shameful aspersion. "It is not from friendship at all; I simply feel that the army ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy

... lying for some distance in the same direction. Wilhelm liberated their officers, and thus the two potentates had scant escort to their respective cities. Their men he refused to release, which refusal both Treves and Mayence accepted with bad grace, saying the withholding cast an aspersion on their honour. This example was not followed by the suave Archbishop of Cologne, who departed some days after his colleagues. He laughed when Wilhelm informed him that his troops would remain in Frankfort, and said he ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr

... undeserved aspersion on Gerrard's sincerity. "It is well thought of," he said. "Moreover, it seemed to me but now that I heard a cry or gasp. What if it were Jirad Sahib's voice calling to us, and we ...
— The Path to Honour • Sydney C. Grier

... fear is. If your unconstant Daughter will not dwell on certainties, must you thenceforth conclude that I am fickle? what have I omitted, to make good my integrity and truth? nor can her lightness, nor your supposition, cast an aspersion on me. ...
— The Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher - Vol. 2 of 10: Introduction to The Elder Brother • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... were there; now it will gradually all come out, your crimes and your miseries—how often you went up by the Mail to London and threw away fifty guineas at a tavern, and how often you were on the point of hanging yourself, restrained only, as some ill-natured aspersion upon poor old Winton has it, by the want of a tree within some miles of the city. Charles Knight and his companions passed through Chawton about 9 this morning; later than it used to be. Uncle Henry and I had a glimpse of his handsome ...
— Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters - A Family Record • William Austen-Leigh and Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh

... fishy, as you call it, at all, Mr. Chayne, and I'm surprised at your casting such an aspersion on my character. I had a short letter from Mrs. Prescott yesterday enclosing four other letters which she asked me to stamp and post, as I owed her ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke

... or not, Rafael Rocas—for he is the owner of the hut—is not the man to trouble himself about denying it. He would scarce consider smuggling an aspersion on his character; and indeed, under old Mexican administration, it would have been but slight blame, or shame, to him. And not such a great deal either under the new, at the time of which we write, but perhaps still less. Compared with other crimes then rife in California, contrabandism ...
— The Flag of Distress - A Story of the South Sea • Mayne Reid

... Pleydell,' said Julia, unable to suppress her resentment at this undesigned aspersion of her admirer, 'that young Hazlewood is so handsome in the eyes of the young ladies of this country that they think every person shocking who ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... foolish tirade of a Senator from Louisiana, who "took pains to run a contrast between the slaves of the South and the laboring people of the North, giving the preference, in all points of condition, of comfort, and happiness, to the slaves of the South." Webster made a complete reply to this aspersion on Northern labor; but, as his purpose was to conciliate, he did not blast the libeller by quoting the most eminent example that could be named demonstrating the falsehood of the slave-holding Senator's assertion. Without deviating from the conciliatory attitude he had assumed, one could easily ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster

... How could yer, Mr. ——?" said the sergeant grievously. "The British Army never runs, sir! They doubles." The cadet blushed at the aspersion upon the reputation of the British Army into which he had ...
— Leaves from a Field Note-Book • J. H. Morgan

... adoration likewise and invocation. For we ought at all times to adore Christ, and may in our necessities address our prayers to him as often as we please; and there are many reasons to induce us to do this freely." There are some who like accuracy, even in aspersion—A. ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan

... cases where civilisation has gone stale through inefficiency of the minimal dose is not properly to be found fault with; it is of a blameless character, conventionally; nor is there any intention here to cast aspersion on the desolate. The like effects of the like causes are to be seen in the American colleges and universities, where business principles have supplanted the pursuit of learning, and where the commercialisation of aims, ...
— An Inquiry Into The Nature Of Peace And The Terms Of Its Perpetuation • Thorstein Veblen

... Preface to Lasselia (1723), for instance, she feels obliged to defend herself from "that Aspersion which some of my own Sex have been unkind enough to throw upon me, that I seem to endeavour to divert more than to improve the Minds of my Readers. Now, as I take it, the Aim of every Person, who pretends to write (tho' in the most insignificant ...
— The Life and Romances of Mrs. Eliza Haywood • George Frisbie Whicher

... again remarks, "that the majority of women (happily for society) are not very much troubled with sexual feeling of any kind." The supposition that women do possess sexual feelings he considers "a vile aspersion." ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 3 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... concerning the "Romance," I am in honour bound not to disclose the names of my correspondents, and this necessary reticence will no doubt induce the incredulous to declare that they are not genuine epistles, but mere inventions of my own. I am quite prepared for such a possible aspersion, and in reply, I can but say that I hold the originals in my possession, and that some of them have been read by my friend Mr. George Bentley, under whose auspices this book has been successfully launched on the sea of public favour. I may add that my correspondents are ...
— A Romance of Two Worlds • Marie Corelli

... the Society. In your declaration you say (not on account of "clamour," or accusations of editors or others, but on account of editorial remarks in the Guardian), "you express your sentiments to save your character from aspersion." In this you imply that the editor of the Guardian has misrepresented your sentiments, and aspersed your character; and, if so, has he not changed his principles? And, if he has changed his principles, is he not guilty of falsehood, since he has positively declared to the reverse? You ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson



Words linked to "Aspersion" :   depreciation, baptism, derogation, attack, ethnic slur, disparagement, asperse



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