"Concentrate" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... "Never again call upon a mighty name—in vain. It is dangerous. Concentrate your mind upon what I now tell you, and you shall understand a part, at least, of my discovery. As I was saying, I have learned how to find the true name by means of the false; and understand, if you can, that to pronounce a true name correctly ...
— The Human Chord • Algernon Blackwood
... a pertinacious and inquiring mind, and he was also a great debater and student of Dante; and, taking to sculpture, he was one of those who, as we shall see in a later chapter, competed for the commission for the Baptistery gates. It was indeed his failure in that competition which decided him to concentrate on architecture. That he was a fine sculptor his competitive design, now preserved in the Bargello, and his Christ crucified in S. Maria Novella, prove; but in leading him to architecture the ...
— A Wanderer in Florence • E. V. Lucas
... routes. As one merchantman after another was sunk there could no longer be any doubt about it. What if, in panic, we had suddenly dispersed our naval force to every part of the globe? What then? But we didn't. What again if it had been determined, in accordance with some fanciful scheme, to concentrate our main striking force in the Mersey? Germany well might have captured the initiative. But authority was not distracted from its primary purpose. Was its policy a success? Come, now, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, January 12, 1916 • Various
... together with his life by drinking disintegrator concentrate. He carried a capsule of it when we escaped from Mercury, and I've heard him swear time and again that he would die before he would permit ...
— The Space Rover • Edwin K. Sloat
... small forces. This letter obliged the consuls hastily to conclude the levy, and go earlier than they had determined into their provinces, with the intention that each should keep his enemy in his own province, and not allow them to form a junction or concentrate their forces. This object was much aided by an opinion possessed by Hannibal; for although he felt assured that his brother would cross over into Italy that summer, yet when he recollected what difficulties he had himself experienced through a period of five months, first in crossing the Rhone, then ...
— History of Rome, Vol III • Titus Livius
... nothing whatever to do with producing the condition. That is for effect, merely. Those who are able to bring about a mesmeric condition, try to concentrate the mind on some particular thing, and by making gentle motions, or passes, this is more forcibly impressed ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Treasures of the Island • Roger Thompson Finlay
... beautiful out-of-doors that made it so hard for Genevieve to spend time on her lessons that autumn. Perhaps, too, her lack of enthusiasm for Miss Hart had something to do with it. Whatever it was, to concentrate her attention on Latin verbs and French nouns grew harder and harder as the days passed, until at last—in the frenzied rush of a study-hour one day—she did what she had never done before: wrote the meaning of some of the words under the ...
— The Sunbridge Girls at Six Star Ranch • Eleanor H. (Eleanor Hodgman) Porter
... Gentile in strength, but the average Jew surely does have the faculty of concentration which the average Gentile does not possess. And that is what constitutes strength—the ability to focus the mind on one thing and compass it: to concentrate is power. ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... superiority of numbers was so great that General Smith received an order countermanding the other, and remained in Missouri, joining forces with Rosecrans to oppose Price. Rosecrans's entire force still numbered only 11,000, and he deemed it prudent to concentrate his army around St. Louis. General Ewing's forces and a portion of General Smith's command occupied Pilot Knob. On Monday, the 24th of September, 1864, Price advanced against this position, but was repulsed ...
— Last of the Great Scouts - The Life Story of William F. Cody ["Buffalo Bill"] • Helen Cody Wetmore
... conducive. The only reason why anyone comes away from a summer at Marois Bay unbetrothed is because there are so many girls that he falls in love with that his holiday is up before he can, so to speak, concentrate. ...
— The Man with Two Left Feet - and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... men and wished to concentrate upon some economic question, I should put my time in on the cost of distribution. ... That is the economic problem of the next century—how to get the goods from the farm to the people with the lowest possible expenditure of effort; ...
— The Letters of Franklin K. Lane • Franklin K. Lane
... the city rate is to be expected, since with greater knowledge of sanitary matters, more precautions against disease would naturally be taken. But it is not likely that the country is becoming more careless, although the tendency to concentrate population even in rural hamlets may have an effect. It is rather more likely that the reports are made more carefully and that the records are more complete now than formerly. The apparent increase in the number of deaths in rural communities is, therefore, due to greater attention ...
— Rural Hygiene • Henry N. Ogden
... been ordered to concentrate his division at Savona, a small town, by the sea, ten leagues towards France from Genoa, set up his headquarters in the bishop's palace. The infantry was spread out among the market towns and villages of the neighbourhood to keep watch on the valleys from which emerged ...
— The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot, Translated by - Oliver C. Colt • Baron de Marbot
... has really done nothing but permit his absorbing worship of many demure little maids to focus and concentrate itself into an almost incredible transformation of what was the intrinsic nature of the writer into what was the intrinsic ...
— One Hundred Best Books • John Cowper Powys
... be remarked that space relations are by no means the only ones in which we think of things as existing. We attribute to them time relations as well. Now, when we think of occurrences as related to each other in time, we do, in so far as we concentrate our attention upon these relations, turn our attention away from space and contemplate another aspect of the system of things. Space is not such a necessity of thought that we must keep thinking of space when ...
— An Introduction to Philosophy • George Stuart Fullerton
... was still practically in the open. He could reach both these admirable positions before I could hope to get a man there. There was no effective cover whatever upon my right that would have permitted an advance up to the church, and so I decided to concentrate my whole force in a rush upon Hook's Farm, while I staved off his left with gun fire. I do not believe any strategist whatever could have bettered that scheme. My guns were at the points marked D C E, each ...
— Little Wars; a game for boys from twelve years of age to one hundred and fifty and for that more intelligent sort of girl who likes boys' games and books • H. G. Wells
... that quiet, iron look change but once. I will tell you about it. It was one of those days after the battle of Trenton, when he tried to concentrate the troops that he had scattered over the country, to bring them to bear upon the British. His object was to show the enemy that they could ...
— Who Spoke Next • Eliza Lee Follen
... see—oh, yes. Did you notice how unhealthy the children looked? Race is undoubtedly dying out; fact. No hope. Weak. No spontaneity either—rather languid, did you notice? Yes, and their heads—small and narrow—no brain capacity. They can't concentrate; notice how some slept when Dr. Boldish was speaking? Mr. Cresswell says they own almost no land here; think of it? This land was worth only ten dollars an acre a decade ago, he says. Negroes might have bought all and been rich. Very shiftless—and that singing. Now, I wonder where ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... when you hinted that I could spare her humiliation!" I said, half in laughter, half in bitterness, suddenly able to concentrate my mind upon the talk. "Do you think a man would want a girl to take him for such a reason, when she's caring for some ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson
... excursions, since the 15th November 1772. He was forty-nine years of age. Since his unfortunate experiences in England, the loss of his fortune and the failure of his efforts to obtain congenial and remunerative employment in Germany or Russia, he had come to concentrate his efforts on a return to ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... to concentrate his mind on other things. Seven or eight miles to the south and west was the cabin of Jacques Pierrot, a half-breed, who had a sledge and dogs. He would hire Jacques to accompany him on his patrol in place of Bucky Nome. Then he would return to Nelson House and send in his report of Bucky Nome's ...
— Philip Steele of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • James Oliver Curwood
... distractions of this new and very different mode of life, I diligently strove to concentrate and steel my soul against these influences, bearing in mind my experiences of success in the past. By May of my thirtieth year I had finished my poem Der Venusberg ('The Mount of Venus'), as I called Tannhauser at that time. I had not yet by any ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... the ramparts and forts three hundred cannon, for the most part supplied by the city of Nuremberg, were placed in position. As the camp between the ramparts and the town was traversed by the river Pegnitz numerous bridges were thrown across it, so that the whole force could concentrate on either side in case of attack. So vigorously did the army, assisted by the citizens, labour at these works, that they were completed in fourteen days ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty
... on a horse most distinctly; he is dressed most queerly, and glitters all over—why, it's a soldier! a soldier in uniform, but it's not an officer." My excitement on hearing this was so great that I ceased to concentrate my attention upon the thought of my friend, and the vision faded away and could not ...
— The Making of Religion • Andrew Lang
... For that which is right has all the powers of the universe on its side, and can afford to wait; but the wrong, having all those vast forces against it, must hurry to its fulfilment, reserve nothing, concentrate all its ecstasies upon to-day. Malbone, greedy of emotion, was drinking to the dregs a passion ...
— Malbone - An Oldport Romance • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... matchless power of silence! There are words that concentrate in themselves the glory of a lifetime; but there is a silence that is more precious than they. Speech ripples over the surface of life, but silence sinks into its depths. Airy pleasantnesses bubble up in airy, pleasant words. Weak sorrows quaver out ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... establishment of another like it. It is fervently hoped that thus admonished those who have heretofore favored the establishment of a substitute for the present bank will be induced to abandon it, as it is evidently better to incur any inconvenience that may be reasonably expected than to concentrate the whole moneyed power of the Republic in any form what so ever or under ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... all the same, to concentrate on herself instead of the work, the job, the employment agency. It took effort to sit down on a bench in the park, near the building where the case workers were, and plan out the ...
— Hex • Laurence Mark Janifer (AKA Larry M. Harris)
... general situation as xl.-xlviii.; but whereas the earlier chapters deal incidentally with the victories of Cyrus and the folly of idolatry, xlix.-lv. concentrate attention severely upon Israel herself, which is often addressed as Zion. The group begins with the second of the "servant" songs, xlix. 1-6, its theme being Israel's divine call, through suffering and redemption, ...
— Introduction to the Old Testament • John Edgar McFadyen
... prominent anti-slavery man, and in 1859 was mentioned as a candidate for the presidency. He was warmly supported by his own State, and for a time it seemed that the opposition to Governor Seward might concentrate on him. In the National Republican Convention, 1860, he received forty-eight votes on the first ballot, but when it became apparent that Abraham Lincoln was the favorite, Mr. Bates withdrew his name. Mr. Lincoln appointed Judge Bates Attorney ...
— From the Darkness Cometh the Light, or Struggles for Freedom • Lucy A. Delaney
... could never," had said Lutwyche to Gottlieb, "be supercilious enough on that matter. . . . He was not to wallow in the mire: he would wait, and love only at the proper time, and meanwhile put up with statuary." So Lutwyche had resolved that precisely "on that matter" should his malice concentrate. He happened to hear of a young Greek girl at Malamocco, "white and quiet as an apparition, and fourteen years old at farthest." She was said to be a daughter of the "hag Natalia"—said, that is, by the hag herself to be so, but Natalia was, in plain words, a procuress. ...
— Browning's Heroines • Ethel Colburn Mayne
... found there, and this was the too early beginning of disputes which lasted for the remainder of their union. In the year of his marriage we find Comte writing to the most intimate of his correspondents:—'I have nothing left but to concentrate my whole moral existence in my intellectual work, a precious but inadequate compensation; and so I must give up, if not the most dazzling, still the sweetest part of my happiness.' We cannot help admiring the heroism which cherishes great ideas in the midst of petty miseries, and intrepidly ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 3 of 3) - Essay 10: Auguste Comte • John Morley
... accident, and, I fancy, must have taken her nurse into her confidence. She did not tell me. A fire was made in her boudoir, and, with some change of dress, she sat down to think. She knew that, soon or late, the count must confess his loss, and then that the whole police force of Paris would concentrate its skill first on preventing her from using the papers, and finally on securing them. They would at once suspect that she had made her singular dash for the chalet to conceal the papers, as the count must have inferred. She was one woman against the power, intelligence, and limitless resources ...
— A Diplomatic Adventure • S. Weir Mitchell
... and limitations of most Mexicans. Knowing how tenaciously they clung to political notions, he believed that it was safer and wiser to forego, at least for a time, real popular government and to concentrate power in the hands of a strong ...
— The Hispanic Nations of the New World - Volume 50 in The Chronicles Of America Series • William R. Shepherd
... the decline and fall of the city first started to my mind." The scene, the contrast of the old religion and the new, the priests of Christ replacing the flamens of Jupiter, the evensong of Catholic Rome swelling like a dirge over the prostrate Pagan Rome might well concentrate in one grand luminous idea the manifold but unconnected thoughts with which his mind had so long been teeming. Gibbon had found his work, which was destined to fill the remainder of his life. Henceforth there is a fixed centre around which ...
— Gibbon • James Cotter Morison
... granted during this month, to persons who had served their terms of transportation; and, in order to concentrate as much as possible the effective strength of the New South Wales corps (which appeared to be necessary from the turbulent disposition of the Irish prisoners), the presence of an officer was dispensed with at the Hawkesbury. Mr. ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 2 • David Collins
... the belief that war was coming, had ordered a provisional mobilization of the Corps some days before it was actually declared. Thanks to this step and to the work done at our Concentration Camp at Netheravon in June, 1914, the greater part of the Royal Flying Corps was enabled to concentrate without hitch at our aerodrome at Dover, and the machines flew via Calais ...
— Aviation in Peace and War • Sir Frederick Hugh Sykes
... weapons, radically changed since Cochrane, in a series of singularly audacious exploits, had overcome the fleets of Spain. Sea-fighting had become purely a matter of science. The object of strategy was to concentrate faster ships and more powerful guns against weaker force. The odds with which Cradock was to contend against the Germans were greater in proportion, if less in bulk, than the odds with which Cochrane had contended, with his peasant ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various
... shaded candle, and for a moment or two her white hands flashed deftly in and out amongst the dark, silky coils of disordered hair. Paul sat down, and taking up a magazine which he found lying on the divan, tried to concentrate his thoughts upon its contents. But he could not. Every moment he found his eyes and his thoughts straying to that slim, lithe figure, watching the play of her arms and the grace of her backward pose. When ...
— A Monk of Cruta • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... operations are those followed by an army which operates between the enemy's lines in such a way as to be able to concentrate his forces on one of these lines before the other can be brought to its assistance. For example, Napoleon's line of operations in 1814, between the Marne and the Seine, where he manoeuvred with so much skill and success against the immensely ...
— Elements of Military Art and Science • Henry Wager Halleck
... ten times more buds than it ought to be allowed to carry. Nothing is gained, but a good deal is lost, by allowing so many embryo flower-buds to be formed or partially developed. It is in fact far wiser to take off the majority of the excess at the earliest possible point, so as to concentrate the strength of the plant into those ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 508, September 26, 1885 • Various
... reinforced, making a strong resistance to Russian progress, with the aid of the heavy German artillery. The shattered Austrian armies, under Generals von Auffenberg and Dankl, were making desperate endeavors to concentrate in the vicinity of Rawaruska, but were apparently surrounded by the Russians, who continued to capture Austrian prisoners by the thousand. Fears were entertained for Cracow, one of the strongest fortresses in Austria, if not in Europe, ...
— America's War for Humanity • Thomas Herbert Russell
... passed, and old habits of mind resumed sway, she began to concentrate her thoughts on three questions: Should she accept Graydon and take her chances with him? Should she accept Mr. Arnault, with his wealth, and be safe? or should she hesitate a little longer, in the hope ...
— A Young Girl's Wooing • E. P. Roe
... to consider the very close relation that exists between the health of the body and the health of the spirit. A strong will, showing itself in ability to concentrate its efforts on a chosen purpose, is not to be expected in a child whose muscles are flabby and whose nerves quickly tire. Since the will expresses itself in action, it can be best cultivated in a body capable of ...
— Your Child: Today and Tomorrow • Sidonie Matzner Gruenberg
... to note any change. It was too much to expect that the great Jocelyn could concentrate on any but his own ...
— Bambi • Marjorie Benton Cooke
... withdrawn from the stockades and small frontier forts, and most of the troops from Winchester, to strengthen Fort Cumberland, which was now to become headquarters; thus weakening the most important points and places, to concentrate a force where it was not wanted, and would be out of the way in most cases of alarm. By these meddlesome moves, made by Governor Dinwiddie from a distance, without knowing any thing of the game, all previous arrangements were reversed, every thing ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving
... the Italian, affected by the melancholy tone common to the man of one idea who must, to concentrate his thoughts, set aside other ties ...
— The Son of Clemenceau • Alexandre (fils) Dumas
... warfare? will the militia undertake it? Can an American fleet of sufficient power and resources be kept in the Pacific to counteract and send supplies? He who knows the western wilds well knows that once concentrate Indian warfare, and it would be impossible to keep together or to supply such an army as that of the Republic, unsupported, as it must necessarily be, by ...
— Canada and the Canadians, Vol. 2 • Richard Henry Bonnycastle
... every limb, and feeling faint, almost to falling, followed the mother-superior's example, and tried to concentrate ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth
... I came out with some fingers frozen I was nine pounds heavier. Used to sit in my office afterwards and dream about the glittering lakes and the stiff white pines; saw them crowding round the lonely camps, when I ought to have been studying the market reports. Well, I couldn't concentrate on buying and selling things. Betting on the market and getting after other people's money seemed a pretty mean business." He paused and added with a twinkle: "That's how I felt then, and I don't know that I've changed my ...
— The Lure of the North • Harold Bindloss
... fire high explosive instead, as that would tend to disperse the gas which other Batteries would be simultaneously firing on the same targets. The method adopted on this and later occasions, when gas was used, was that a number of our own Batteries should concentrate for, say, five minutes at the fastest rate of fire possible on a particular enemy Battery, then all switch together to another enemy Battery, and so on, all coming back together on to the first enemy Battery after an interval sufficient to lull the human ...
— With British Guns in Italy - A Tribute to Italian Achievement • Hugh Dalton
... down to her notes; but she could not concentrate herself upon her work. The imaginary history of the young man obtruded upon her; she decided that she would go out for a walk, and take up her work again when she returned. She was getting her coat and hat when Mr. Clendon began to play; she changed ...
— The Woman's Way • Charles Garvice
... later, about 10 P. M. TED is sitting in a corner with a book, but unable to concentrate. He is wretchedly unhappy ...
— Class of '29 • Orrie Lashin and Milo Hastings
... proofs of identification—papers which Chatfield no doubt took from the dead man. Of course, the solicitors never doubted for a moment that he was the real Marston Greyle!—never dreamed of fraud: Well—the next step. We must concentrate on finding this man. And Swallow has nothing to tell—yet. He has never seen anything more of him. You'd better turn all your attention to that, Gilling—you and Swallow. As for Chatfield and his daughter, I suppose we shall ...
— Scarhaven Keep • J. S. Fletcher
... through the efforts of Pope Gregory VII., who strove to subject practical and civil life entirely to the control of ecclesiastics and monks, standing for contemplative, supernatural life. The latter included all purely mental work, which more and more tended to concentrate itself upon religion and confine itself to the clergy. In this way it came to be considered an utter disgrace for any man engaged in mental work to take any part in the institutions of civil life, and particularly ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... pace brought me within a yard or two of my quarry. But it darted from me with a startled exclamation and moved off rapidly up the hill. I followed, distressed. The pace was proving too much for me. The sun blazed down. It seemed to concentrate its rays on my back, to the exclusion of the surrounding scenery, in much the same way as the moon behaves to the heroine of a melodrama. A student of the drama has put it on record that he has seen the moon follow the heroine round the stage, and go off with her (left). The sun was just ...
— Love Among the Chickens - A Story of the Haps and Mishaps on an English Chicken Farm • P. G. Wodehouse
... all his dreams of conquest. She was pale and shivering and so sorely distressed that he had it in his heart to clasp her in his arms as one might do in trying to soothe a frightened child. Her face grew cloudy with the effort to concentrate her thoughts; a piteous frown ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... ought to be put in large letters, that every one who has to train children may be daily reminded by it; and not exercise his soul and spend his force in trying to overcome little things which may perhaps be objectionable, but which will vanish to-morrow. Concentrate your energies on the overcoming of such tendencies as may in time develop into ...
— Study of Child Life • Marion Foster Washburne
... good cover. The men then removed their great-coats, and stayed for some minutes watching the Boer shells passing over their heads. Eventually the King's Royal Rifles, Royal Irish Fusiliers, and the battalion were ordered by the General to move in extended order through the town, and to concentrate in the spruit already occupied by 'B' and 'E' companies. The Leicesters and 67th Battery were left near the camp to watch Impati Mountain, since it was probable that the Boer force which had occupied Newcastle would appear from that direction. The mounted troops (18th Hussars and the Mounted Infantry ...
— The Second Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers in the South African War - With a Description of the Operations in the Aden Hinterland • Cecil Francis Romer and Arthur Edward Mainwaring
... who tries to keep alive the habitual sense of God's presence makes his whole life a prayer, of which the stated devotions only form a natural part. It is comparatively easy for such a one to concentrate his thought and to keep his attention fixed ...
— The Discipline of War - Nine Addresses on the Lessons of the War in Connection with Lent • John Hasloch Potter
... answer: the slave trade. Not simply the sale of men, but an organized traffic of such proportions and widely organized ramifications as to turn the attention and energies of men from nearly all other industries, encourage war and all the cruelest passions of war, and concentrate this traffic in precisely that part of Africa farthest from the ancient ...
— The Negro • W.E.B. Du Bois
... or night, even in their deepest dugouts. The British varied their times of attack. At dawn, at noon, when the sun was reddening in the west, just before the dusk, in pitch darkness, even, the steady, regular bombardment that had never ceased all through the days and nights would concentrate into the great tumult of sudden drum-fire, and presently waves of men—English or Scottish or Irish, Australians or Canadians—would be sweeping on to them and over them, rummaging down into the dugouts with bombs and bayonets, gathering ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs
... said Mike, and set his teeth. Forty to win! A large order. But it was going to be done. His whole existence seemed to concentrate itself on those ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... Finally, the sovereign may concentrate the whole government in the hands of one man. This is the third and commonest form of government, and is called Monarchy ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... to concentrate all her affections on us two. I don't think, however, that any woman could have a warmer or larger heart than hers, although many may have a wider scope for the exercise of their feelings. She never turned a beggar away from her door without some relief even in ...
— Peter Trawl - The Adventures of a Whaler • W. H. G. Kingston
... up a proper balance; or, it may assist toward the diurnal rotation of the earth, the free motions of the tides, &c.; or the water on one side may give a freer passage to the rays of the sun, and being convex and transparent, may concentrate, or at least condense, the solar rays internally, for some benefit to the land that lies on the other side."—This sort of reasoning, from our ignorance, is no doubt liable to objection, and Mr Jones had good sense and candour enough to admit, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 15 (of 18) • Robert Kerr
... repealed in that state, but the securing of national prohibition by peaceful means will be an impossibility. Viewing the conditions in Kansas as I do, I am moved to make this appeal to the National Committee of the prohibition party to concentrate its forces in that state, with the view of arousing sufficient sentiment among the people there to drive every "joint" from within her borders. "On to Kansas" should be the battle cry of the prohibitionists of the nation. It is more important ...
— The Use and Need of the Life of Carry A. Nation • Carry A. Nation
... seemed to know. The minor details of the engagement are still unknown. They will come later. The consoling feature is that the enemy were compelled to withdraw, which would indicate that they were worsted. The remnants, I suppose, will concentrate at New York. There will ...
— The Loyalist - A Story of the American Revolution • James Francis Barrett
... owing to the difference of dominant ideas in the races, and to the difference of social custom. Religion naturally played a foremost part in the art-evolution of both epochs. The anthropomorphic Greek mythology encouraged sculptors to concentrate their attention upon what Hegel called "the sensuous manifestation of the idea," while Greek habits rendered them familiar with the body frankly exhibited. Mediaeval religion withdrew Italian sculptors and painters from the ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds
... his direction; the monumental coiffure nodded exorbitantly at her slightest movement. "You must make an effort," she said. "When I can't sleep, I concentrate my will: I say, 'I will sleep, I am asleep!' And pop! off I go. That's the ...
— Crome Yellow • Aldous Huxley
... how to account for it, but since the coming of the Hardings my game has fallen off several strokes. It seems impossible for me to concentrate ...
— John Henry Smith - A Humorous Romance of Outdoor Life • Frederick Upham Adams
... even one's secretest thoughts were admiring and respectful. He was so far removed from the very shadow of such things as these, that it did one's conscience a sort of violence to think of him in connection with them. I tried to dismiss the memories from my mind. I wished to concentrate wholly upon the problem of ...
— Slippy McGee, Sometimes Known as the Butterfly Man • Marie Conway Oemler
... smoked and chatted. If there were Moslem women, I had two separate reception-rooms, and went from one to the other, as the women will not unveil before strange men. It was a most tiring day; for not only did people come all through the day, but I was obliged to concentrate all my thought not to make a mistake in etiquette. There were many grades and ranks to be considered, and the etiquette in receiving each guest was different according to the rank. The dragoman in attendance upon me would whisper until I knew it, "One step," or "Two steps," or "Half ...
— The Romance of Isabel Lady Burton Volume II • Isabel Lady Burton & W. H. Wilkins
... crisis arose which brought about the last election, in which Union Government swept the West, the farmers saw the gravity of the situation and were prepared to forego immediate discussion of tariff amendments to concentrate on winning the war. Some of the farmers' candidates even withdrew in favor of Union candidates. All those who remained in ...
— Deep Furrows • Hopkins Moorhouse
... finds his true inspiration only when he forgets that he is a schoolmaster. It is my hope that in this school a nucleus has been formed, round which an indigenous University of our own land will find its natural growth—a University which will help India's mind to concentrate and to be fully conscious of itself; free to seek the truth and make this truth its own wherever found, to judge by its own standard, give expression to its own creative genius, and offer its wisdom to the guests who come from other parts ...
— Creative Unity • Rabindranath Tagore
... other soldiers came and gazed curiously at him through the grated door, always speaking of him as "el Yanko," and making merry at his expense. Thus several hours passed, and he still sat motionless, trying to think; but his brain was in a whirl, and he seemed as powerless to concentrate his thoughts as he was friendless. He realized dimly that at regular intervals a guard, pacing the outer corridor, paused before the door of his cell to peer in at him, and so make sure of his presence; but he paid slight attention to this ...
— "Forward, March" - A Tale of the Spanish-American War • Kirk Munroe
... a time trying to think of something else, or trying, with renewed resolution, to concentrate his attention upon ...
— A Captain in the Ranks - A Romance of Affairs • George Cary Eggleston
... of the hydrogen to which, you know, that manner of burning is peculiar. —Have you not remarked also that brandy and alcohol will burn without a wick? —They take fire at so low a temperature, that this assistance is not required to concentrate the heat ...
— Conversations on Chemistry, V. 1-2 • Jane Marcet
... conservative; and because I am a conservative, I am a State Rights man. I believe that in the rights of the States are to be found the only effectual means of checking the overaction of this government; to resist its tendency to concentrate all power here, and to prevent a departure from the Constitution; or in case of one, to restore the government to its original simplicity and purity. State interposition, or to express it more fully, the right of a State to interpose ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... rosiest hopes of the Emperor. The immediate consequence of the policy he adopted toward Finland was that the country quickly became calmed and settled after the fierce war that had been waged there, and that in this way Russia was enabled to concentrate all her forces upon the contest with Napoleon. According to the words of Alexander I. himself, the annexation of Finland "was of the greatest advantage to Russia; without it, in 1812, we might not, perhaps, have won success, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor
... which correspond to the note we sing. This, then, suggests that by attuning the mind to certain things we automatically throw it out of tune with conflicting ideas. The successful artist, as a rule, is one who has learnt to render himself oblivious to distractions, and so is enabled to concentrate his attention solely on the work in hand. The artist who will be permanently unsuccessful is the one whose enthusiasms attract him first to one thing and then another, never allowing him to remain absorbed by the one thing long enough to bring it to a satisfactory ...
— Spirit and Music • H. Ernest Hunt
... the wind freshened and increased, with constant squalls of rain until on the third night the most furious storm was raging which I can ever recollect in England. I felt that it was positively useless to go to bed, nor could I concentrate my mind sufficiently to read a book. I turned my lamp half down to moderate the glare, and leaning back in my chair, I gave myself up to reverie. I must have lost all perception of time, for I have no recollection how long I sat there on the borderland betwixt thought and slumber. ...
— Danger! and Other Stories • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Grandcourt, came to tell her that he was in the drawing-room? The hours of preparation and the triumph of the situation were apparently of no use: she might as well have seen Grandcourt coming suddenly on her in the midst of her despondency. While walking into the drawing-room, she had to concentrate all her energy in that self-control, which made her appear gravely gracious—as she gave her hand to him, and answered his hope that she was quite well in a voice as low and languid as his own. A moment afterward, when they were both ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... affright the remembrance of the apparition that had so appalled him, the recollection only served to kindle and concentrate his curiosity into a burning focus. He had said aright,—LOVE HAD VANISHED FROM HIS HEART; there was no longer a serene space amidst its disordered elements for human affection to move and breathe. The enthusiast ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... it the most diabolically dangerous proposal to be made in this Hall in the last six centuries!" old Admiral Gaklar shouted. "This is a proposal to concentrate all the armed force of the Empire in the hands of one man. Who can say what unscrupulous use might ...
— Ministry of Disturbance • Henry Beam Piper
... political decisions of those days Constantine took not the smallest part. His importance in political history dates only from the moment when the emperor Alexander entrusted him in Poland with a task which enabled him to concentrate all the one-sidedness of his talents and all the doggedness of his nature on a definite object: that of the militarization and outward discipline of Poland. With this begins the part played by the grand-duke in history. In the Congress-Poland created by Alexander he received ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 7, Slice 2 - "Constantine Pavlovich" to "Convention" • Various
... be directed aright. The simplest illustration of this is seen in naval gunnery; for there the effect of good fire-control is to limit the dispersion of the various shots fired, relatively to each other; to make a number of shots fired simultaneously to bunch closely together, that is to concentrate; getting away from the shotgun effect, and approximating the effect of a single shot. Obviously, if the fire-control and the skill of the gunners are so great that the shots fall very close together, the chance of hitting the target is less than if the ...
— The Navy as a Fighting Machine • Bradley A. Fiske
... attempting to interview a large number of ex-slaves the workers should now concentrate on one or two of the more interesting and intelligent people, revisiting them, establishing friendly relations, and drawing them out over ...
— Slave Narratives, Administrative Files (A Folk History of - Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves) • Works Projects Administration
... type of modern romance. This culminated in the permanent and monumental work began by Boiardo in the morning, and completed by Ariosto in the meridian of the Renaissance. Within the circuit of the Court the whole life of the Duchy seemed to concentrate itself. From the frontier of Venice to the Apennines a tract of fertile country, yielding all necessaries of life, corn, wine, cattle, game, fish, in abundance, poured its produce into the palaces and castles of the Duke. He, like other ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds
... height. At Twin Hollow, thirteen miles from St. Louis and six miles from Horse-Tail Bar, there was found a sand bar extending over the widest portion of the river on which the engineering forces were engaged. Hurdles are built out from the shore to concentrate the stream on the obstruction, and then to protect the river from widening willows are interwoven between the piles. At Carroll's Island mattresses 125 feet wide have been placed, and the banks revetted with stone from ordinary low water to a 16 foot stage. ...
— Scientific American Supplement No. 360, November 25, 1882 • Various
... a specimen of rattle-brainishness—of levity—and of childishness; so desperate, that I began to doubt whether this absurd Jack ought to be regarded as a responsible being. It seemed simply impossible for him to concentrate his impulsive mind on any thing. He flings himself one day furiously into an elopement scheme—the next day, at a slight, he forgets all about the elopement, and, in a towering rage against Miss Phillips, devotes himself desperately to Louie. And now when the elopement ...
— The Lady of the Ice - A Novel • James De Mille
... other attractions we would like to concentrate our attention on these beautiful creatures alone. For they fascinate us by the daring of their colours, by their bold designs, by the way in which they blend the colours with one another, and by the extreme delicacy and chasteness ...
— The Heart of Nature - or, The Quest for Natural Beauty • Francis Younghusband
... in his mind's eye. It had to be something vivid that would be easy to concentrate on. The first thing that came to mind was the brilliant necktie that the President had used in his test several months before. He conjured it up in all its chartreuse glory, then he animated it. Mauve satyrs danced with rose-pink nymphs and chased ...
— The Foreign Hand Tie • Gordon Randall Garrett
... the imperial theorist, and the creator with Ockam of the Ghibelline philosophy that has ruled the world, was a friend of religious liberty. Marsilius assuredly was not a Whig. Quite as much as any Guelph, he desired to concentrate power, not to limit or divide it. Of the sacred immunities of conscience he had no clearer vision than Dante. But he opposed persecution in the shape in which he knew it, and the patriarchs of European emancipation have not done more. He never says that there is no case in which a ...
— The History of Freedom • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... the quiet I so much need, while awaiting that day in which a greater quiet—that which can be never broken—shall come to wrap me all about. I dream of a bench before the threshold, and of fields spreading away out of sight. But I must have a fresh smiling young face beside me, to reflect and concentrate all that freshness of nature. I could then imagine myself a grandfather, and all the long void of my life would ...
— The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard • Anatole France
... trafficking organizations operate out of Istanbul; laboratories to convert imported morphine base into heroin are in remote regions of Turkey as well as near Istanbul; government maintains strict controls over areas of legal opium poppy cultivation and output of poppy straw concentrate ...
— The 1995 CIA World Factbook • United States Central Intelligence Agency
... fight—the arena where I have moderately indulged my combative proclivities with the weapons I know best how to use—the arena where there is no quarter given or received. The most satisfying retaliation is to make money out of your enemies. Concentrate your energy; don't waste it in words. Allow me to add ...
— The Lady Doc • Caroline Lockhart
... that it will be increased in case of necessity; and to produce that effect it will be proper to put our country in a better state of defence, by invigorating the militia system and increasing the naval force." "Victorious at sea, Great Britain finds herself compelled to concentrate her force so much in this quarter, that she would not only be unable to annoy us essentially in case of war, but even to protect her commerce and possessions elsewhere, which would be exposed to our attacks."[124] Most true when written, in 1805; the time had passed in 1813. "Harassed as they ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 1 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... long life the Chinese have recourse to certain complicated charms, which concentrate in themselves the magical essence emanating, on homoeopathic principles, from times and seasons, from persons and from things. The vehicles employed to transmit these happy influences are no other than grave-clothes. These are provided by many Chinese in their lifetime, and most people ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... sale of the book. But the Comstocks were pursuing larger fish, and so left me to the righteous indignation of right-thinking reviewers, especially the suffragists. Their concern, after all, is not with books that are denounced; what they concentrate their moral passion on is ...
— In Defense of Women • H. L. Mencken
... brilliant improvisatore; rapid in thought, in word and in act; everywhere the promptest and least hesitating of men. I likened him often, in my banterings, to sheet-lightning; and reproachfully prayed that he would concentrate himself into a bolt, and rive the mountain-barriers for us, instead of merely playing on ...
— The Life of John Sterling • Thomas Carlyle
... lead out in the Park for exercise—to curl up here in front of the fire; and I'm going to have foils and masks over the chimney. As soon as I'm a member of the Synthesis I'm going to get them to let me be one of the monitors: that'll concentrate me, if anything will, keeping the rest in order, and I can get a lot of ideas from posing the model; don't you think so? But you've got all the ideas you want, already. Aren't you going to join the ...
— The Coast of Bohemia • William Dean Howells
... not waste my time," the Count would say almost weepingly. "But it's no use, my things aren't here. And I'm getting old too; couldn't concentrate in this stinking hole of a ...
— The Enormous Room • Edward Estlin Cummings
... sterling exchange, for instance, and at the same time think about irrelevant things; but it is easy to run an adding machine, or even to add, and think simultaneously. On the cash book Evan found himself engaged in all kinds of work; on some of it he had to concentrate (although no "brain power" was necessary), while on some of it he worked mechanically. Whenever a period of serious dissatisfaction, brought on by something Robb or Key had said, troubled him, it was of short duration: something always broke into his mind and scattered ...
— A Canadian Bankclerk • J. P. Buschlen
... first two of these departments that William Brown and Augustus Grier were to concentrate their mental efforts. They had, as already related, earned this long-hoped-for opportunity to gain technical knowledge and training by showing what they could do along these lines. They had installed ...
— Radio Boys Loyalty - Bill Brown Listens In • Wayne Whipple
... be too careful, he thought. Of course, he could deal with any recalcitrant slave by other means, but the distorter was convenient and could be depended upon to give any degree of pressure desired. And it was a lot less trouble to use than to concentrate on more fatiguing efforts such as ...
— The Weakling • Everett B. Cole
... free such a flow of creative power that destruction itself makes for progress. These disasters concentrate upon constructive enterprise stories of emotional energy that in other times are expended in the ...
— The True Story of Our National Calamity of Flood, Fire and Tornado • Logan Marshall
... But the whole question is one of extreme intricacy; all we know is that some animals and plants, like some men, devote great pains to the perfection of the mechanism with which they wish to work, while others rather scorn appliances, and concentrate their attention upon the skilful use of whatever they happen to have. I think, however, that in the clumsiness of the chamois foot must lie the explanation of the fact that sometimes when chamois are out of season, they do nevertheless ...
— Alps and Sanctuaries of Piedmont and the Canton Ticino • Samuel Butler
... benefit. The lack of thought pressure made it easier for him to concentrate. In spite of his fatigue the ...
— Deathworld • Harry Harrison
... I do not know that I could wholly blame her," she said. "I fancy that it is not easy for any woman of great beauty to concentrate her whole devotion on one man. It must seem to her that she is giving too much to an individual, however good ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... ceremony of that morning, the dinner, the ball. I said to myself, clenching my fists to concentrate my thoughts: "How was Marie dressed? She was dressed in—dressed in—dressed in—" I repeated the words aloud to impart more authority to them and oblige my mind to reply; but do what I would, it was impossible for me to drive away the thought ...
— Monsieur, Madame and Bebe, Complete • Gustave Droz
... upon their own destruction; fighting the North like fiends, because it would rescue them from themselves, and save both North and South from a common abyss of ruin!) The national government alone is strong at home and respected abroad. It alone can concentrate the energies and resources of thirty-four States, and of thirty-one millions of people, into any one or many modes of activity which the nation may judge best for its own interest. It is thus resistless. No single foreign power in the world nor ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No. V, May, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... (Bourges). Caesar hastened back from Italy, slipped past Vercingetorix and reached Agedincum (Sens), the headquarters of his legions. Vercingetorix saw that Caesar could not be met in open battle, and determined to concentrate his forces in a few strong positions. Caesar first besieged and took Avaricum, whose occupants were massacred, and then invested Gergovia (near the Puy-de-Dome), the capital of the Arverni, but suffered a severe ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... minute, half-minute, or second, and then of dismissing the matter altogether, and directing his thoughts, without loss of time, to whatever next might be presented. One thing at a time is a law which no finite power can violate; and ability in execution depends upon the ability to concentrate all the powers of the mind, at a given moment, upon the assigned topic, and then to change, without friction or loss of time, ...
— Thoughts on Educational Topics and Institutions • George S. Boutwell
... of the matter I have not, however, been specially concerned. It has been left on one side in order to concentrate attention upon another and a more neglected aspect of the subject—that of the conditions that have served to perpetuate the religious idea. Grant, what cannot be well denied in the face of modern investigation, that ideas of the supernatural ...
— Religion & Sex - Studies in the Pathology of Religious Development • Chapman Cohen
... enormous advantage in the use to which she has put her mental machinery from time immemorial. The truth is that women think out things for themselves a great deal more than does the average man. As, however, they concentrate their attention for the most part on what are called the minor interests of life, whilst men are occupied with bigger and more important things, it has come to be accepted that the mind of woman is inferior ...
— The Curse of Education • Harold E. Gorst
... park the scenes of which he had pictures in his portfolio. The most charming contrasts of foliage, the rarest trees, long valleys, and prospects the most picturesque that could be brought from abroad, Borromean islands floating on clear eddying streams like so many rays, which concentrate their various lustres on a single point, on an Isola Bella, from which the enchanted eye takes in each detail at its leisure, or on an island in the bosom of which is a little house concealed under the drooping foliage of a century-old ...
— The Physiology of Marriage, Part I. • Honore de Balzac
... must be plain that the best course is to drop all other steps and concentrate every bit of your energy and ingenuity on getting hold of ...
— The Motor Boat Club and The Wireless - The Dot, Dash and Dare Cruise • H. Irving Hancock
... ambition; it was to the right of keeping he sacrificed the right of having. The whole extent of his fault was revealed to him by the simple sight of the pretender. All which passed in the mind of Fouquet was lost upon the persons present. He had five minutes to concentrate his meditations upon this point of the case of conscience; five minutes, that is to say, five ages, during which the two kings and their family scarcely found time to breathe after so terrible a shock. D'Artagnan, leaning against the wall, in front of ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... it up to them as a sporting proposition, and they were game. They have agreed to take him for one month and concentrate upon his remaking all their years of conserved force, to the end that he may be fit for adoption in some moral family. They both have a sense of humor and ACCOMPLISHING characters, or I should never have dared to propose it. And really I believe it's going to be the one way of ...
— Dear Enemy • Jean Webster
... thankful for copy. We'll exhibit the first Saturday in the New Year. For a week we'll have follow-up articles, and then Constantine will take it. You blessed people," and she rose to go, "don't have any anxiety. Suffragists always put things through, and I shall concentrate on this for the next three weeks. ...
— The Nest Builder • Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
... of loneliness takes the form of a restless inability to concentrate. It is as if the victim wanted to escape from himself. After Cosme's departure Sheila prowled about the silent cabin, began this bit of work and that, dropped it, found herself staring vaguely, listening, waiting, and nervously shook herself into activity again. She tried to whistle, but it ...
— Hidden Creek • Katharine Newlin Burt
... time for leisure sounds good. Very much more leisure than most people now have, however, is apt to present trouble in itself. Since it appears that the time is not far away when those living in the highly developed countries will no longer have to concentrate their prime energies on the traditional quest for food, clothing, and shelter, a potentially dangerous vacuum may be the result. At least the psychologists seem agreed that people must feel a useful purpose in their lives and have ways to ...
— The Practical Values of Space Exploration • Committee on Science and Astronautics
... leg movements are to be done together, the pupil has to concentrate his mind on the four movements. To start, one must have the legs straight behind, keeping them motionless till the pupil gets to fourth movement of the arm stroke, when the arms and legs should be the same as in Fig. 14. On the first ...
— Swimming Scientifically Taught - A Practical Manual for Young and Old • Frank Eugen Dalton and Louis C. Dalton
... was in March—she was sitting in Mr. Fraser's study reading the "Shakespeare" which Arthur had given to her, and in the woes of others striving to forget her own. But the attempt proved a failure; she could not concentrate her thoughts, they would continually wander away into space ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard
... the death-rate from the birth-rate and calling the remainder the survival-rate. If we are really concerned with the question of the alleged suicide of the race, and do not wish to be befooled, we must pay little attention to the birth-rate, for that by itself means nothing: we must concentrate on the survival-rate. Then we may soon convince ourselves, not only that the human race is not committing suicide, but that not even a single one of the so-called civilised nations of which it is mainly composed is committing suicide. Quite the contrary! Every one of them, even ...
— Little Essays of Love and Virtue • Havelock Ellis
... forces know no pity. In the second place, if a natural philosopher should discuss all the bodies which may fall, he would go entirely astray, and would certainly do no good. The same is true of the sociologist. He must concentrate, not scatter, and study laws, not all conceivable combinations of force which may occur in practice. In the third place, nobody ever saw a body fall as the philosophers say it will fall, because they can accomplish nothing unless they study forces ...
— What Social Classes Owe to Each Other • William Graham Sumner
... tended to concentrate absolute power in the hands of the Grand Princes of Moscow, beginning with Ivan III. But no counterbalancing power had arisen in Russian society; there was no independent life, no respect for the individual, no public opinion to counteract the abuse of ...
— A Survey of Russian Literature, with Selections • Isabel Florence Hapgood
... other devices of a similar character were used. Objects having many details and those lending themselves readily to suggestions of action (as a china animal) were the most helpful in enabling the subject to concentrate his attention on their image to the exclusion of another. Some subjects conceived themselves as tracing with a pencil the outline and details of the retained image. Frequently, when the two images were originally near each other and one alone was being held by close scrutiny ...
— Harvard Psychological Studies, Volume 1 • Various
... can't help it," he reiterated. "It's new to me, this. I can't concentrate on my work. I keep thinking of you. If that isn't being in love, what in thunder is? I'm talking to you as straight as I'd talk to a man. I believe I love you as much as any woman was ever loved. You don't know much about me, but I'm considered a good man in my profession. ...
— Desert Conquest - or, Precious Waters • A. M. Chisholm
... agreement between Bulgaria and Turkey might engage the Greek army in a struggle with the forces of three Powers at once. Even if the attack came from Bulgaria alone, he added, the Greek army needed three weeks to concentrate at Salonica and another month to reach the theatre of the Austro-Servian conflict, and in that interval the Bulgarian army, invading Servia, would render impossible all contact between the Greek and ...
— Greece and the Allies 1914-1922 • G. F. Abbott |
