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Retract   /ritrˈækt/   Listen
Retract

verb
(past & past part. retracted; pres. part. retracting)
1.
Formally reject or disavow a formerly held belief, usually under pressure.  Synonyms: abjure, forswear, recant, resile.  "She abjured her beliefs"
2.
Pull away from a source of disgust or fear.  Synonym: shrink back.
3.
Use a surgical instrument to hold open (the edges of a wound or an organ).  Synonyms: draw back, pull back.
4.
Pull inward or towards a center.  Synonym: draw in.  "The cat retracted his claws"



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"Retract" Quotes from Famous Books



... Morton, with a smile; "that mute is a hero whose fame stands in the records of a dozen battles, and at least half as many bloody duels. Besides, he is the favorite emissary and bosom friend of Houston. If I have the good fortune to kill him, I think it will tempt the president to retract his vow against venturing any more on the field ...
— Thrilling Adventures by Land and Sea • James O. Brayman

... father," interposed Miss Haviland, with much feeling. "Do not, I beg of you, further and more inextricably involve yourself. You know how gladly I would have saved you from this; how often warned you of the consequences of persisting in your course. Perhaps it is not too late to retract, even now. Who knows but the council, who have done this but from a sense of duty to their country, and with no ill will against you personally, may yet be induced, if you will send in a pledge of neutrality, to reverse their ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson

... recollection serves me, that nothing better was to be found there as food for the people than sheeps' heads and boiled bagpipes; to which he retorted by asserting that we west-country folks were little better than heathens and had no more manners than blackamoors. As neither of us would retract what we had said, it was decided that our dispute could alone be settled by mortal combat. Pistols, we were aware, were the most gentlemanly weapons to be employed on such occasions; but we found that it would be impossible to obtain ...
— Hurricane Hurry • W.H.G. Kingston

... men to the highest stations. Besides, it is a presumption inherent in the Parisians to believe that they never can be mistaken. To reason with them on taste is useless; it is impossible to compel them to retract when they have once said "Cela ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon

... the matter before his partner could retract this somewhat grudging consent, Morris Perlmutter stalked out of the sample-room and made resolutely for the glass-enclosed office, where Miss Cohen was busy writing in a ledger. She looked up as he entered, and surveyed him calmly ...
— Abe and Mawruss - Being Further Adventures of Potash and Perlmutter • Montague Glass

... always hard," said Lady Laura, "for any one person to judge altogether of the mind of another. If I have said anything severe of your refusal of my brother, I retract it. I only wish that it could have ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope

... limp leaves Waited for rain, while the black clouds Gathered far distant, over Himavant. The jungle crouched, humped in silence. Then spoke the thunder 400 DA Datta: what have we given? My friend, blood shaking my heart The awful daring of a moment's surrender Which an age of prudence can never retract By this, and this only, we have existed Which is not to be found in our obituaries Or in memories draped by the beneficent spider Or under seals broken by the lean solicitor In our empty rooms 410 DA Dayadhvam: I have heard ...
— The Waste Land • T. S. Eliot

... Punches speak by the card. But as to even the smallest of the Punch family being "fed" on cards, or getting his or her living by cards, the statement is utterly at variance with the facts. Mr. P. is quite sure that the "Jacquard Automatic Reading and Punching Syndicate" will at once retract the injurious statement, or the youthful, vigorous and pugnacious Punches will be inquiring of Mr. P., as Sam Weller did of Mr. Pickwick when that gentleman's great name was apparently taken in vain, "Ain't nobody to be whopped ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 102, March 12, 1892 • Various

... that did not dare to turn behind. Bitterly he repented his confession; bitterly he felt that between his sufferings and human sympathy there could be no gentle and holy commune; vainly he sought to retract,—to undo what he had done, to declare all was but the ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... kneel! Retract thy curse! O, by my mother's ashes, Have pity on thy self-abhorring child! If not for me, yet for my innocent wife, 270 Yet for my country's sake, give my arm strength, Permitting me again ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... a wretch too infamous, even by his own confession, to be credited for a moment, though a beggar's character, not a prince's, were impeached? Fetch him hither, let the rack be shown to him; you will soon hear him retract the calumny which ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott

... in 1771, West departed from the venerated custom of clothing pictorial characters in Greek or Roman costume. Sir Joshua Reynolds, who had endeavored to dissuade him, later said, "I retract my objections. I foresee that this picture will not only become one of the most popular, but will occasion ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 1 (of 5) • John Marshall

... little retract from this sentence I have passed on myself. My mother, when dying, had, in addition to her other half-forgotten and misapplied lessons, committed, with solemn exhortation, her other child to my fraternal guardianship; and this one duty I performed to ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley

... prepossession or prejudice; he prayed and endeavoured to be free from the influence of human tradition, popular custom, and churchly sanction, or that more subtle hindrance, personal pride in his own consistency. He was humble enough to be willing to retract any erroneous teaching and renounce any false position, and to espouse that wise maxim: "Don't be consistent, but simply be true!" Whatever may have been the case with others who claim to have examined ...
— George Muller of Bristol - His Witness to a Prayer-Hearing God • Arthur T. Pierson

... right, was it right, all this?" he thought again as he went down the stairs. "Couldn't he stop and retract it all... and ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... serious in his intentions, but thought he meant to threaten the trustees into acquiescence. The doors had been closed against him, and Mr. Walby feared that now the step was known, it was too late to retract it. 'The ladies would never allow it,' he declared; 'there was no saying how virulent they were against Mr. Frost; and as to consideration for his family, that rather inflamed their dislike. They had rich relations enough! It would be only too good for so fine ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. II) • Charlotte M. Yonge

... Testament, God approved the vows of the Nazarenes, Num 6:2ff, and the vows of the Rechabites, who neither drank wine or ate grapes, Jer. 36:6, 19; while he strictly requires that the vow once made be paid, Deut. 23:21f; "It is ruin to a man after vows to retract," Prov. 20:25; "The vows of the just are acceptable," Prov. 15:8. God also teaches specifically through the prophet that monastic vows please him. For in Isa. 56:4, 5 it is read as follows: "Thus saith the Lord unto the eunuchs that keep my Sabbath, ...
— The Confutatio Pontificia • Anonymous

... and willfully," said Leone. "I will never retract, never go back, but go on to the ...
— A Mad Love • Bertha M. Clay

... letter, which gave as his reason disinclination to step into the cabinet over the bodies of his friends. It seems that Palmerston and Lord Lansdowne, who assists him, sent Canning to Lord Aberdeen to invoke his aid with Cardwell and prevail on him to retract. But Lord Aberdeen, though he told Canning that he disapproved (at variance here with what Graham and I considered to be his tone on Monday, but agreeing with a note he wrote in obscure terms the next morning), said he could not make such a request to Cardwell, or again play ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley

... shilly-shallying between two stools will secure your seat? You have gone too far with me to retract; don't you see that the jailer means to get you dismissed the next time the justices visit the jail for business? Can't you read your ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade

... treatise. [20:5] (83) It remains only to call attention to the fact that I have written nothing which I do not most willingly submit to the examination and approval of my country's rulers; and that I am willing to retract anything which they shall decide to be repugnant to the laws, or prejudicial to the public good. (84) I know that I am a man, and as a man liable to error, but against error I have taken scrupulous care, and have striven to keep in entire accordance with the laws ...
— A Theologico-Political Treatise [Part IV] • Benedict de Spinoza

... her offer. She had obeyed an impulse of her heart by wishing to do this thing, and now that obstacles stood in the way, she felt rather glad that it was to be left undone, and without her having been obliged to retract her promise. ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various

... his lips. It was too late to retract, and though he deeply repented having placed himself in such a humiliating situation, he faithfully related to his stern auditor the cause of his distress. The old man listened to him attentively, a sarcastic smile at times writhing his thin lips; and when Anthony implored him for the loan ...
— Mark Hurdlestone - Or, The Two Brothers • Susanna Moodie

... was taken from the court, and a resolution was formed by the council to burn him as a heretic if he would not retract. He was then committed to a filthy prison, where, in the daytime, he was so laden with fetters on his legs, that he could hardly move, and every night he was fastened by his hand to a ring against the walls ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox

... am so afraid of her that I am sure I spoke timidly and respectfully to her at first; but perhaps I showed more feeling at the end than I should. I am willing to apologize to her for any lack of courtesy, but I don't see how I can retract anything I said." ...
— Robinetta • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... but the love of marriage enters also into the will and the things which depend on it, consequently into every thing appertaining to man (homo); wherefore if the love of a mistress becomes the love of marriage, a man cannot retract from any principle of right, and without violating the conjugial union; and if he retracts and marries another woman, conjugial love perishes in consequence of the breach thereof. It is to be observed, that the love of a mistress is kept separate from conjugial love by this condition, ...
— The Delights of Wisdom Pertaining to Conjugial Love • Emanuel Swedenborg

... my miniature and a lock of my hair, that you may realize the great change that has been wrought in me by time. This letter I surely will post. May it take to you in the wilderness a part of my wretchedness, for so selfish am I that I would take comfort in knowing that I do not suffer alone. I retract the last sentence and in its place ask, not that you suffer, but that you do not forget. In health I am blessed beyond my deserts, and I hope the same comfort abides with you. You will hear from me never again. I have allowed myself this one delightful ...
— A Forest Hearth: A Romance of Indiana in the Thirties • Charles Major

... lord," said Glenvarloch firmly, and with some haughtiness, "the Duke of Buckingham, without the least offence, declared himself my enemy in the face of the Court; and he shall retract that aggression as publicly as it was given, ere I will make the slightest advance ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott

... has long lost its momentum and yielded to a contrary tendency. Just as the hypostasis of some terms in experience is sanctioned by reason, when the objects so fixed and externalised can serve as causes and explanations for the order of events, so the criticism which tends to retract that hypostasis is sanctioned by reason when the hypostasis has exceeded its function and the external object conceived is loaded with useless ornament. The transcendental and functional secret of such hypostases, however, is seldom appreciated by the headlong mind; so that ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana

... disappointed mother. Why brandish in that hand of thine a javelin of pointed steel? Why suffer that lip I have kissed a thousand times to equivocate? My daughter, let these tears sink deep into thy soul, and no longer persist in that which may be your destruction and ruin. Come, my dear child, retract your steps, and bear me company to your welcome home." Without one retorting word, or frown from her brow, she yielded to the entreaties of her mother, and with all the mildness of her former character she went along with the silver lamp of age, to the home of ...
— The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories • Mark Twain

... confessed nothing.' Further, you sent to him by your trusty Francis Kemish,[12] that one witness could not condemn; and therefore bade his lordship be of good courage. Came this out of Cobham's quiver? No: but out of Raleigh's Machiavelian and devilish policy. Yea, for Cobham did retract it; why then did ye urge it? Now then see the most horrible practices that ever came out of the bottomless pit of the lowest hell. After that Raleigh had intelligence that Cobham had accused him, he endeavoured ...
— State Trials, Political and Social - Volume 1 (of 2) • Various

... were accepted by Dr. Jameson's force, and they surrendered and laid down their arms, and no subsequent discussion amongst the Transvaal officers could retract the ...
— The Transvaal from Within - A Private Record of Public Affairs • J. P. Fitzpatrick

... his mind as to what he should do. The estate was entailed; that made him comparatively independent; and he would endeavour, as well as his impetuous passion would allow, to live on in the hope that at length his mother would give her consent, and that Catherine would retract her determination. In pursuance of this plan, he apologised to his mother for his previous wrath, and treated Lady Elizabeth, during the remainder of her visit, with politeness; but it was a studied, constrained, and ironical sort of courtesy, which ...
— Tales for Young and Old • Various

... Gazette of France[317]; and Renaudot, in the account he gave, named the English before the Swedes, and spoke of the affair as accommodated. Grotius was very angry at this: he sent to tell him, to name the Swedes first in another Gazette, and to retract what he had said of the accommodation: Renaudot was even threatened, that if he did not give this satisfaction to the Swedes, he would be made to feel to his cost that Sweden was powerful enough to do herself justice. The ...
— The Life of the Truly Eminent and Learned Hugo Grotius • Jean Levesque de Burigny

... me and wished me to retract that "untruth." He said there was no such portrait, and that if I wanted to be sure of it I could go to Boston and see for myself. I explained that my "last night" meant a good while ago; that I did not doubt his assertion that there was no such portrait there now, but that I should continue ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... last assertion disproves the first!" I replied; "but I retract, I will not, even for the sake of a syllogism, abuse my own sex; women are never envious except when men make them so, by casting down among them the golden ...
— Sea and Shore - A Sequel to "Miriam's Memoirs" • Mrs. Catharine A. Warfield

... suddenly he threw himself on Bernard with the agility of a tiger and knocked him to the floor. From secret closets in the room sprang six able bodied men. They soon had Bernard securely bound. Belton then told Bernard that he must retract what he had said and agree to keep his revealed purpose a secret or he would never leave ...
— Imperium in Imperio: A Study Of The Negro Race Problem - A Novel • Sutton E. Griggs

... purpose, we believe to be the door of hope to the soul, the Christian valley of Achor, and one which every sin-sick soul seizes with avidity, as being far more comforting than embarrassing. And this opportunity remains a permanent institution with us—to confess, retract our wrongs as memory may recall them; and aids individuals in so thoroughly repenting of past sins that they are enabled to leave them in the rear, while they pass on to greater salvations. It often takes years for ...
— The Communistic Societies of the United States • Charles Nordhoff

... Synod in America was called upon her account. It convened August 30, 1637, sat three weeks, and proclaimed eighty-two errors extant; among them the tenets taught by Mistress Hutchinson. She was called before the church and ordered to retract upon twenty-nine points. The infant colony was shaken by this discussion, which took on a political aspect.[30] Mistress Hutchinson remained steadfast, and was sustained by many important people, among whom was the ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... sudden. But he being urgent with her to exchange a vow of love with him that night, she said that she already had given him hers before he requested it; meaning, when he overheard her confession; but she would retract what she then bestowed, for the pleasure of giving it again, for her bounty was as infinite as the sea, and her love as deep. From this loving conference she was called away by her nurse, who slept with her, and thought it time for her to be in bed, ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb

... stopping just before it arrives at the edge of the deltoid, in order to avoid injury of the cephalic vein. It must include skin, fascia, and platysma, and the flap must be thrown upwards. The clavicular portion of the pectoralis major must then be divided right across its fibres, which will retract. The arm must then be brought close to the side to relax the pectoralis minor, which must be drawn aside. The artery will then be felt pulsating, but hidden by the costo-coracoid membrane, which acts as its sheath. This must be ...
— A Manual of the Operations of Surgery - For the Use of Senior Students, House Surgeons, and Junior Practitioners • Joseph Bell

... Wace can find no difficulty in pointing out the passage of M. Renan's writings, by which he feels justified in making his statement, I shall wait for further enlightenment, contenting myself, for the present, with remarking that if M. Renan were to retract and do penance in Notre-Dame to-morrow for any contributions to Biblical criticism that may be specially his property, the main results of that criticism, as they are set forth in the works of Strauss, Baur, Reuss, and Volkmar, for example, would ...
— Collected Essays, Volume V - Science and Christian Tradition: Essays • T. H. Huxley

... most of his works form in a certain measure one great whole, and mutually supply each other; and because too, the author having in part first explored unknown regions, and having of course sometimes found it necessary to retract hypotheses started in his earlier writings, his works cannot well be separated. He wrote mostly in German; sometimes in Latin; while comparatively very few of his numerous books are in the Bohemian language. ...
— Historical View of the Languages and Literature of the Slavic - Nations • Therese Albertine Louise von Jacob Robinson

... their expression. It is now twelve years since he began almost constant travelling, winter and summer, in the interior of Alaska. He has described nothing that he has not seen; ventured no judgment that he has not well digested, and has nothing to retract or even modify; but he would repeat and emphasise a caution of the original preface. Alaska is not one country but many countries, and so widely do they differ from one another in almost every respect that no general statements about Alaska can be true. The present author's knowledge ...
— Ten Thousand Miles with a Dog Sled - A Narrative of Winter Travel in Interior Alaska • Hudson Stuck

... an opinion that the erection of a place of Christian worship on an open space outside the bounds of a clergyman's domain ought not to be held to be objectionable by that clergyman;—and that as he had already given the spot, he could not retract the gift. These letters, however, had been written before the first brick had been laid, and the world in that part of the country was of opinion that the Marquis might have retracted his gift. After this ...
— The Vicar of Bullhampton • Anthony Trollope

... what he had said saw his error. "No, I retract that. He is human, therefore a soul to be saved, as one of God's creatures, but whether the man can be reinstated in society is a doubtful matter. You are right to defend him, and I am sad only when I grudge you those memories of him. You knew ...
— Ringfield - A Novel • Susie Frances Harrison

... own betise as it left his lips, and felt the immeasurable depth of it, but he had not time to retract before every personal consideration was wiped from his mind by a cry from Isabel in a very different accent—"Lawrence! ...
— Nightfall • Anthony Pryde

... labored to counteract the same by the grossest misrepresentation. They related that the king, at the moment of his death, had spoken both as a Christian and an infidel revolutionist. They made him thus retract his retractation. "In all that I have done, I am conscious of having always fulfilled my duties as a citizen and a prince, and of having done nothing against the religion of my ancestors." As his conscience was thus at ease, for ...
— Pius IX. And His Time • The Rev. AEneas MacDonell

... she was in love, she was certainly very quiet about it; but the Doctor was of course prepared to admit that her quietness might mean volumes. She had told Morris Townsend that she would not mention him to her father, and she saw no reason to retract this vow of discretion. It was no more than decently civil, of course, that after having dined in Washington Square, Morris should call there again; and it was no more than natural that, having been kindly received on this occasion, he should continue to present himself. ...
— Washington Square • Henry James

... resolution[509] calling for a report from the government on "all negro or colored, male or female quadroon, mulatto, samboes, half breeds or mules, mongrels or conglomerates" in public institutions. Larwill was at once called to account for his action and a resolution was introduced calling upon him to retract. ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 3, 1918 • Various

... may smile at the sanguine utterances of the first four lectures: but it has not been wholly my own fault that they have remained unfulfilled; nor do I retract one word of hope for the success of other masters, nor a single promise made to the sincerity of the student's labor, on the lines here indicated. It would have been necessary to my success, that I should have accepted permanent residence in Oxford, and scattered none of my energy in other tasks. ...
— Lectures on Art - Delivered before the University of Oxford in Hilary term, 1870 • John Ruskin

... was too blind and selfish to accept this mild redress of a fault that would have justified instant displacement from command. He preferred that the President should openly direct him to make the correction. Admitting that he decided in one night upon the measure, he added: "If I were to retract it of my own accord, it would imply that I myself thought it wrong, and that I had acted without the reflection which the gravity of the point demanded." The inference is plain that Fremont was unwilling to lose the influence of his hasty step upon public opinion. ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay

... denoted a troubled mind. When our hands met, I found the Mongo's cold and clammy. I refused wine under a plea of illness; and when, with incoherent phrases and distracted gestures, he declared his willingness to retract his refusal and accept a share of the Felix's cargo, I thought it best to adjourn the discussion until the following day. Whilst on the point of embarking, I was joined by the faithless servant, whom I bribed to aid me in my affair with the Dane, and was told ...
— Captain Canot - or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver • Brantz Mayer

... word to grant it; I cannot retract," she answered him, after a pause. "I will press nothing more on you. But—as an obligation to me—can you find no way in which a rouleau of gold would ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]

... weirdly on the stone behind—both the kneeling angels (who, by the way, are holding censers), are beautiful. Did I say above that one of the faces of the twelve Apostles was the most beautiful in the tympanum? if I did, I retract that saying, certainly, looking on the westernmost of these two angels. I keep using the word beautiful so often that I feel half inclined to apologise for it; but I cannot help it, though it is often quite inadequate to express the loveliness of some of the figures carved here; ...
— The World of Romance - being Contributions to The Oxford and Cambridge Magazine, 1856 • William Morris

... Charlemagne. The Emperor, however, listening to nothing but his resentment and grief for the death of his son, refused to be satisfied; and under the plea that Huon had not succeeded in making his accuser retract his charge seemed resolved to confiscate his estates and to banish him forever from France. It was not till after long entreaties on the part of Duke Namo and the rest that he consented to grant Huon his pardon, under ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch

... his words to Simmy: "I can't trust myself!" There was but one object in his mind and that was to retract the unnecessary challenge with which he had closed his letter to her in January. Why should he have demanded of her a sacrifice for which he could offer no consolation? He now admitted to himself that when he wrote the blighting postscript he was inspired by a mean ...
— From the Housetops • George Barr McCutcheon

... severely handled by Mansfield. In the commons Alderman Beckford, a hot-headed admirer of Chatham, said that "if the public was in danger the king had a dispensing power," and was forced by Grenville to retract his words. The debates on this matter injured the reputation of the ministry though they did ...
— The Political History of England - Vol. X. • William Hunt

... friendship, and will pardon me. It is not that I am more exempt from youthful folly than others. Born with a heart too susceptible for my peace, I am continually guilty of irregularities, that I immediately wish, but am unable to retract. But friendship, in however frail a bosom she resides, cannot permit her own follies to dispense her from guarding those she loves ...
— Italian Letters, Vols. I and II • William Godwin

... with frankness lend; His money built the Jail, nor prisoner yet Sits at his ease, but he must feel the debt; To these let candour add his vast display; Around his mansion all is grand and gay, And this is bounty with the name of pay." I grant the whole, nor from one deed retract, But wish recorded too the private act: All these were great, but still our hearts approve Those simpler tokens of the Christian love; 'Twould give me joy some gracious deed to meet That has not call'd for glory through the ...
— The Borough • George Crabbe

... for anything; but if she could see her as I have, when she sup- posed herself entirely alone, except her little dog Fido, lamenting her loneliness and complexion, I think, if she is not past feeling, she would retract. In the summer I was walking near the barn, and as I stood I heard sobs. 'Oh! oh!' I heard, 'why was I made? why can't I die? Oh, what have I to live for? No one cares for me only to get my work. And I feel sick; who cares for that? Work as long as I can stand, ...
— Our Nig • Harriet E. Wilson

... I do not retract what I then said. Cotton Mather was in advance of his times, in liberality of feeling, in reference to sectarian and denominational matters. He was, undoubtedly, a great student, and had read all that an American scholar ...
— Salem Witchcraft and Cotton Mather - A Reply • Charles W. Upham

... me! I shall live here!" cried Mrs. Jack. "I said that a few times in Wales, but I retract it. You had better live here, too, Atlas; there aren't any ...
— Penelope's Postscripts • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... study and contemplation. There is an element of monasticism even in Plato's communism. If he could have done without children, he might have converted his Republic into a religious order. Neither in the Laws, when the daylight of common sense breaks in upon him, does he retract his error. In the state of which he would be the founder, there is no marrying or giving in marriage: but because of the infirmity of mankind, he condescends to allow the law of ...
— The Republic • Plato

... together, of the Rais'd with the Natural, and the Soft with the Strong and the Eloquent—-thatnever Sentiments were finer, and fuller of Life! never any were utter'd so sweetly!—-Even in what relates to the pious and frequent Addresses to God, I now retract (on these two last Revisals) the Consent I half gave, on a former, to the anonymous Writer's Proposal, who advis'd the Author to shorten those Beauties.——Whoever considers his Pamela with a View to find Matter for Censure, is in the Condition of a passionate ...
— Samuel Richardson's Introduction to Pamela • Samuel Richardson

... the Guard looked at them, then they looked at Grey Dick and gave him a wide berth. Also Ambrosio said something about having offered to fight a man and not a fiend. But it was too late to retract, for the Doge, taking, as was natural, no share in this small matter, had ...
— Red Eve • H. Rider Haggard

... despairing. So many blows had struck her that she hardly knew from which she suffered most. How she longed to retract the words she had spoken, to take from Andree even the chance of the happiness which she still hoped she would refuse; but if she refused, would not the king's suspicions reawaken, and everything ...
— The Queen's Necklace • Alexandre Dumas pere

... highest. Since the publication of the conclusion of the Homilies the question has been set at rest. Hilgenfeld, who had hitherto been a determined advocate of the negative theory, at once gave up his ground [Endnote 288:1]; and Volkmar, who had somewhat less to retract, admitted and admits [Endnote 288:2] that the fact of the use of the Gospel must be considered as proved. The author of 'Supernatural Religion' stands alone in still resisting this conviction [Endnote 288:3], but the result ...
— The Gospels in the Second Century - An Examination of the Critical Part of a Work - Entitled 'Supernatural Religion' • William Sanday

... 1: This gloss has in view the mercy of God, which leads us to glory. Nevertheless, if it is referred to the mercy shown the human race by the Incarnation of Christ, we must reflect that, as Augustine says (Retract. i), the time of the Incarnation may be compared to the youth of the human race, "on account of the strength and fervor of faith, which works by charity"; and to old age—i.e. the sixth age—on account of the number of centuries, ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas

... waiting, sir!' shrieked the exquisite. 'S'death, sir! This toucheth mine honour very nearly! I have seen blood flow, yes, sir, and wounds gape on less provocation. Retract, sir, retract!' ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle

... whole of the generals, and personally received them. After pouring out the bitterest reproaches and abuse against the court, he reminded them of their opposition to the proposition set before them on the previous evening, and declared that this circumstance had induced him to retract his own promise, and that he should at once resign ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty

... 50,000 horse, besides a vast host of foot. The sultan would now have delayed his expedition, as the enemy possessed all the ferries of the Kistnah, but that his tents were pitched, and it would have been disgraceful to retract from his declarations He therefore marched with 7000 horse, all foreign, and encamped on the bank of the river opposite to the enemy, waiting to prepare floats to cross ...
— A Forgotten Empire: Vijayanagar; A Contribution to the History of India • Robert Sewell

... It is too late to look back, or to retract anything I have promised. I have consented to become General Harrington's wife—to fill the place of one who took me to her heart as if I had been her own child, bestowing upon me the fondness which I could have no right to claim, except ...
— Mabel's Mistake • Ann S. Stephens

... acquainted them with the whole Conspiracie, and they affecting the Plot, offered the adventure of their lives in the businesse. Then very warily he undermined the English Renegado, which was the Gunner, and three more his Associats, who at first seemed to retract. Last of all were brought in the Dutch Renegadoes, who were also in the Gunner roome, for alwayes there lay twelve there, five Christians, and seven English, and Dutch Turkes: so that when another motion had settled their resolutions, and Iohn Rawlins his constancie ...
— Great Pirate Stories • Various

... reader to take notice that though I confess that this way removes all notions of a miraculous conduct, yet I do not retract what I have said formerly, that the system of occasional causes does not bring in God acting miraculously. (See M. Leibniz's article in Histoire des Ouvrages des Savants, July 1698.) I am as much persuaded ...
— Theodicy - Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom of Man and the Origin of Evil • G. W. Leibniz

... have sufficiently recovered to retract my disbelief in kitchen soap, and—and in your skill," she added, with a ...
— Only an Incident • Grace Denio Litchfield

... many without rendering myself obnoxious to some, especially those whose histories are already finished and made public; even if what I say should be approved by them, it would be madness to expect that they should retract anything or alter that which had been once established and, as it were, laid up in royal repositories. It may not be amiss, however, to give them these instructions, that in case of another war, the Getae against the Gauls, or the Indians, perhaps, against the barbarians (for with regard to ourselves ...
— Trips to the Moon • Lucian

... the consequent determinations of the Lords; and we do not think such a mode of proceeding at all justified by the most numerous and the best precedents. None of these sentiments is the Committee, as I conceive, (and I feel as little as any of them,) disposed to retract, or to soften in ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XI. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... conclusion, would have inaugurated the socialism and communism of modern times; but he shrank from the consequences of his own doctrines, and the necessity of his standing well with the German princes caused him, during the War of the Peasants, almost to retract his first utterances and take his stand midway between Catholic principles and the thorough nihilism of later times. It is known that in the after-part of his life he endeavored to repair the ruins of every dogma, social and religious, ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud

... death, and waited for an opportunity of obtaining it without staining his own character by the cowardice of suicide, or distressing me by an act of butchery. This event gave the finishing stroke to my afflictions;—yet let me retract;—another misfortune awaited me when I least expected one. The Chevalier de Menon died without a will, and his brothers refused to give up his estate, unless I could produce a witness of my marriage. ...
— A Sicilian Romance • Ann Radcliffe

... conceal her faults; if not so, there will be no occasion to bring them to light. And even if, after a long courtship, something wrong should be discovered, either you have proceeded too far in honour to retract, or are so blinded by your own feelings as to extenuate it. Now, it is only the parents and near relations of a young woman who can be witnesses to her real character, unless it be, indeed, her own maid, whom one could not condescend ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat

... made a second call on Clara and her Aunt Maria, to retract, contradict, and disprove all that he had said in favor of the isthmus and ...
— Overland • John William De Forest

... you. Ah! Brigitte," I continued, throwing myself on my knees before her, "you thought you were alone when your aunt died! That is the most cruel punishment you could inflict on me; never, have I so keenly felt the misery of my love for you. You must retract those terrible words; I deserve them, but they will kill me. O God! can it be true that I count for nothing in your life, or that I am an influence in your life only because of the evil I ...
— The Confession of a Child of The Century • Alfred de Musset

... pointed to the stoker, a bristling, sooty "wild Irishman." The stoker resented the insinuation, and I overheard him berating the old lady in Irish so sharply and threateningly (I had no doubt of his guilt) that she was quite frightened, and ready to retract the charge to hush the man up. She seemed to think her troubles had just begun. If they behaved thus to her on the little tug, what would they not do on board the great black steamer itself? So when she got separated from her luggage in getting aboard the vessel, her excitement was ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs

... free to do as I please now. I have offered your cousin to bear him company to Europe, he has accepted with enthusiasm, and I cannot retract." ...
— Roderick Hudson • Henry James

... not able to retract acquiescence in the principle, and I am as little inclined to concede the conclusions you ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers

... development in other men, are due to our early forefathers having been provided with these formidable weapons, will probably reveal, by sneering, the line of his descent. For though he no longer intends, nor has the power, to use these teeth as weapons, he will unconsciously retract his "snarling muscles" (thus named by Sir C. Bell) (46. The Anatomy of Expression, 1844, pp. 110, 131.), so as to expose them ready for action, like a ...
— The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex • Charles Darwin

... easily recant its error and applaud what it condemned before; and therefore all wise men have ever justly esteemed it a great virtue to disdain the false values it commonly sets upon all things and which itself is so apt to retract. For as those who go uphill use to stoop and bow their bodies forward, and sometimes creep upon their hands, and those that descend to go upright, so the lower a man stoops and submits in these endearing offices, the more sure ...
— Character Writings of the 17th Century • Various

... that the yield of serum may be the largest possible. Amongst these that the blood should be received in longish vessels, which must be especially carefully cleaned, and free from all traces of fat. If the blood-clot does not spontaneously retract it must be freed from the side of the glass with a flat instrument like a paper-knife without injuring it. If no clot occurs in the cold, a result may perhaps ...
— Histology of the Blood - Normal and Pathological • Paul Ehrlich

... into the midst of the story. "These introductory chapters," he observes in a note on the fifth of them, "have been a good deal censured as tedious and unnecessary; yet there are circumstances recorded in them which the Author has not been able to persuade himself to retract or cancel." These "circumstances" are probably the studies of Waverley, his romantic readings, which are really autobiographic. Scott was, apparently, seriously of opinion that the "mental discipline" of a proper classical education would have been better for ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott

... things wilt thou not one day turn to dreams? Some dreams wilt thou not one day turn to fact? The thing that painful, more than should be, seems, Shall not thy sliding years with them retract— Shall fair realities not counteract? The thing that was well dreamed of bliss and joy— Wilt thou not breathe thy ...
— A Book of Strife in the Form of The Diary of an Old Soul • George MacDonald

... he followed, he dismissed it finally, 96 making it clear at the same time that he was acquainted with that story also: and according to the manner in which he described 97 the wanderings of Alexander in the Iliad (nor did he elsewhere retract that which he had said) it is clear that when he brought Helen he was carried out of his course, wandering to various lands, and that he came among other places to Sidon in Phenicia. Of this the poet has made mention in the "prowess of Diomede," and ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 1(of 2) • Herodotus

... the Review of Burke was the best prose. I augurd great things from the 1st number. There is some exquisite poetry interspersed. I have re-read the extract from the Religious musings and retract whatever invidious there was in my censure of it as elaborate. There are times when one is not in a disposition thoroughly to relish good writing. I have re-read it in a more favourable moment and hesitate not to pronounce it sublime. ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas

... at the principal, whose face was rigid in its purpose, then sank into the nearest vacant seat, saying defiantly: "You may keep me here all night if you like, but, I meant what I said, and I shall retract nothing." ...
— Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School - Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities • Jessie Graham Flower

... rule in Egypt and Syria and a clout hung over the door shows that women are bathing. I have heard, but only heard, that in times and places when eunuchs went in with the women youths managed by long practice to retract the testicles so as to pass for castratos. It is hard to say what perseverance may not effect in this line; witness Orsini and his abnormal development of hearing, by exercising muscles which ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 9 • Richard F. Burton

... will give Mrs. Palling the opportunity she longs for—that of proving it; and she will appear like an avenging fury armed with a flaming sword in the shape of a bumper of her noxious brew, stand over me until I drink it, and force me under pain of repeated doses to retract all the unkind remarks I have made about it. Mrs. Palling has a horrible way of getting the better of me in the end. I am beginning to think that a person who is always right is very trying to live with. So much wisdom gives me a sort of mental indigestion. ...
— East of the Shadows • Mrs. Hubert Barclay

... all that has past; I will not, therefore, pretend to take any merit from revealing it: I will only add, that my consent to this transaction has made me miserable almost from the moment I gave it; that I meant and wished to retract as soon as reflection pointed out to me my error, and that circumstances the most perverse, not blindness to propriety, nor stubbornness in wrong, led me to make, at last, that fatal attempt, of which the recollection, to my last ...
— Cecilia vol. 3 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)

... me as if she were going to retract her permission; but she was stopped, I should say, for the first and last time in her life, by Uncle Joseph, who waved his hand ...
— Nat the Naturalist - A Boy's Adventures in the Eastern Seas • G. Manville Fenn

... for acting a useful part in life without qualifying them for that which is great and brilliant. If it be true, as we have heard, that he has declined advantageous prospects in business, for the sake of indulging his poetical humour; we hope it is not yet too late to prevail upon him to retract his resolution. With the help of COCKER and common industry, he may become a respectable Scrivener: but it is not all the ZEPHYRS, and AURORAS, and CORYDONS, and THYRSIS's; aye, nor his "junketing Queen MAB" and "drudging Goblins," that will ever make him ...
— An English Garner - Critical Essays & Literary Fragments • Edited by Professor Arber and Thomas Seccombe

... invented, and that we make use of logarithms as much as they do in the country where the idea of them was first conceived, I exclaimed, "Let others invent!"—a paradoxical expression which I do not retract. We Spaniards ought to appropriate to ourselves some of those sage counsels which Count Joseph de Maistre gave to the Russians, a people not unlike ourselves. In his admirable letters to Count Rasoumowski on public education in Russia, he said that a nation ...
— Tragic Sense Of Life • Miguel de Unamuno

... she pleaded, embracing her fondly; "forgive me if I am constrained to speak in a manner that you think is wrong; but I can retract nothing of what I have said. Let me go to my father; he is my natural protector, and he alone has the right to ...
— Sister Carmen • M. Corvus

... Comic Dramatists of the Restoration.] because in many things he has taxed me justly, and I have pleaded guilty to all thoughts and expressions of mine which can be truly argued of obscenity, profaneness, or immorality, and retract them. If he be my enemy, let him triumph; if he be my friend, as I have given him no personal occasion to be otherwise, he will be glad of my repentance. It becomes me not to draw my pen in the defence of a bad cause when ...
— English literary criticism • Various

... thinking; and it was for this reason she worked with such unflinching industry, just as she had worked in the last month or two at the Grange, trying to shut her eyes to that hateful future which lay so close before her. Mr. Whitelaw had no reason to retract what he had said in his pride of heart about Ellen Carley's proficiency in the dairy. She proved herself all that he had boasted, and the dairy flourished under the new management. There was more butter, and butter of a superior quality, ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon

... The price was agreed upon, but the gentleman had arrived with an immense carriage case, which he insisted upon embarking, in spite of the many difficulties that opposed the operation. The fisherman wished to retract. He had even threatened, but his threats had procured him nothing but a shower of blows from the gentleman's cane, which fell upon his shoulders sharp and long. Swearing and grumbling, he had recourse to the syndic of his brotherhood at Antibes, who administer justice among themselves ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... what, alas, can these my single arms? What propugnation is in one man's valour To stand the push and enmity of those This quarrel would excite? Yet, I protest, Were I alone to pass the difficulties, And had as ample power as I have will, Paris should ne'er retract what he hath done Nor ...
— The History of Troilus and Cressida • William Shakespeare [Craig edition]

... charm—is flatly a falsehood.[509] Neither mouth nor eyes can beat it in that respect; and if it has less variety individually, it gives perhaps more general character to the face than either. However, he is, if I mistake not, obliged to retract partially ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury

... That He may preserve to us for a due season of repentance the gifts of His good grace, steadfastness of faith, loftiness of hope, and the widest charity to all men. That He may turn our haughty will to lament its faults, that it may deplore its past most vain elations, may retract its most bitter indignations, and detest its most insane delectations. That His virtue may abound in us, when our own is found wanting, and that He who freely consecrated our beginning by the sacrament of baptism, and advanced our progress to the seat of the Apostles without ...
— The Philobiblon of Richard de Bury • Richard de Bury

... the night in his clothes on deck. Sleep was impossible; and, in the hope that she would relent and creep on deck to find him and retract the hard things she had said, he haunted the companion till the stars paled and the day ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi

... no more. Extraordinary was the effect produced upon the mysterious usurer by this declaration. By the most touching and humble entreaties, and by promises of munificent reward, he essayed, but in vain, to induce my father to retract his decision and resume his task. He even prostrated himself before him and implored him to terminate the picture, saying that upon its completion hung his fate, and his very existence. And then he threw out dark and confused hints of supernatural agency, by which, if ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 • Various

... at the same time: that as soon as the pains were gone, she would retract the confession. ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc Volume 2 • Mark Twain

... Locke did not mean, we think, to retract or modify the doctrine which he had taught respecting the radical distinction betwixt mind and matter; he intended merely to intimate that, in adopting that doctrine, he proceeded on grounds different from those which had been assumed by some other writers; that his belief ...
— Modern Atheism under its forms of Pantheism, Materialism, Secularism, Development, and Natural Laws • James Buchanan

... was a real change of sentiment or only artifice, on a supposition of our being too far engaged in affection to retract, and therefore that we should steal a marriage, which would leave them at liberty to give or withhold what they pleas'd, I know not; but I suspected the latter, resented it, and went no more. Mrs. Godfrey brought me ...
— Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin • Benjamin Franklin

... powers of management. His dealings with Augustus indicate much suppleness and dexterity. If he did not in the course of his long reign advance the Parthian frontier, at any rate he was not obliged to retract it. Apparently, he ceded nothing to the Scyths as the price of their assistance. He maintained the Parthian supremacy over Northern Media. He lost no inch of territory to the Romans. It was undoubtedly a ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 6. (of 7): Parthia • George Rawlinson

... I thought, "it's coming now. I've pushed it too far—never thought what I was doing: she will certainly accept me, and I cannot retract." It took me but a moment to see my danger and to make up my mind. A gentleman will always sustain his word. My voice was shaking a little from the greatness of the resolution I had made, but I managed to say pretty steadily, "Of course I do." It ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 87, March, 1875 • Various

... that, with such mighty enemies, we can do nothing by halves. We cannot afford to retract, mutilate, or moderate our original determination. He who swerves from the straight road at the beginning is lost; he who stumbles at the first step is apt to fall down the whole staircase. If, on account of imaginable necessity, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... hostile: on the contrary, my whole thoughts were engrossed by one whom I had reason to consider as my worst literary enemy, nor could I foresee that his former antagonist was about to become his champion. You do not specify what you would wish to have done. I can neither retract nor apologize for a charge of falsehood which ...
— The Life of Lord Byron • John Galt

... century, to disguise the peculiar character of Christ's miracles, and draw an invidious parallel between the Pythagorean philosopher and the divine founder of Christianity. Subsequently to Blount's death, his friend Gildon, who lived to retract his opinions,(383) published a collection of treatises, entitled "The Oracles of Reason;" a work which may be considered as expressing the opinions of a little band of unbelievers, of whom Blount was one.(384) The mention of two ...
— History of Free Thought in Reference to The Christian Religion • Adam Storey Farrar

... it or cause pain. The more muscular, primitive and healthy the woman the tougher and less sensitive the hymen, and the less likely to break or bleed. I think one great function of the foreskin also is to moisten the glans, so that it can be lubricated for entrance, and then to retract, moist side out, to make entrance still easier. I think that in nature the glans penetrates within the labia, is withstood a moment, vibrating, and then all resistance is withdrawn by a sudden 'flashing open' of the gates, permitting easy entrance, and ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 5 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... offer this peace to you at the price of restitution. The lives you have rifled from us you cannot restore, but the noble Lord Douglas, whom you now unjustly detain a prisoner, we demand; and that you retract those claims on our monarchy, which never had existence till ambition begot them on the basest treachery. Grant these just requisitions, and we lay down our arms; but continue to deny them, and our nations is ready to rise to a man, and with heart ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter

... was forced to deny myself even the poor consolation of a Frankfort cigar. So matters went on for nearly a year. I became a morose and melancholy man. This will account for all the bitter and ill-natured things I said of the Germans in some of my sketches, every word of which I now retract. ...
— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne

... has been discussed in the chapter on Affect.] His description seems perhaps to include cases which we would regard as perplexity states or absorbed manias. Activity is reduced, they lie in bed mute, do not answer, may retract shyly at any approach, but on the other hand may not ward off pin pricks. Sometimes there is catalepsy and lack of will, again there may be aimless resistance to external interference. They hold anything put ...
— Benign Stupors - A Study of a New Manic-Depressive Reaction Type • August Hoch

... false, for Captain Kearney was not in the remotest manner connected with my family, yet having once asserted it, he could not retract, and the consequence was, that I was much the gainer by his falsehood, as he treated me very kindly afterwards, always calling ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat

... almost forgotten her morbid shrinking from visitors; and Bessie infused into her praise and congratulations a hint that a refusal would have been much against Alick's reputation, so that she resolved to keep up to the mark, even though he took care that she should know that she might yet retract. ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge

... kneel, I kneel! Retract thy curse! O, by my mother's ashes, Have pity on thy self-abhorring child! If not for me, yet for my innocent wife, 270 Yet for my country's sake, give my arm strength, Permitting me again to call ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... continued to propagate his views, was called on by the Inquisition to retract and abjure, and the formal notice to him to do so states expressly that the declaration of 1616 was made by the Pope himself, and that resistance to it was, therefore, heresy, contrary to the doctrine ...
— The Christian Foundation, June, 1880

... she persisted, going on now in sheer desperation, having proceeded too far to retract. 'My petals are delicately fair, with just a faint rosy blush, my pistils and stamens of a tender yellow, and my form, if fragile, is very ...
— Parables from Flowers • Gertrude P. Dyer

... "Then, I retract the scurvy things I said back there. I asked her to marry me three times and she refused me three times. What I said about the brambles was rotten. I'd ask her again if I thought she'd have me. There you are, old fellow. I'm a rotten ...
— The Hollow of Her Hand • George Barr McCutcheon

... that's the way you handle your private affairs it doesn't look promising for whoever employs you. No, I'll retract that, and on second thought reverse that judgment. I'll say that if you invariably put your employer's interests before your own your sole chance to succeed is to become a member of any firm you work for. I suggest that you put that ...
— Mixed Faces • Roy Norton

... hateful to law, for this stops its sport at the outset. It is the surrender of the fox to the hounds. 'We don't want your stinking body,' says the lawyer; 'we want the run after the scent. Away with you, be off; retract your admission, take the benefit of telling a lie, give us employment, and let us take our chance of hunting out, in our roundabout ways, the truth, which we will not take when it lies ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper

... they can say so," answered Canute; "we have been acting strangely enough during the last few days,—it is time for us to retract. It has really gone far when we can dig up, each his own grandfather, to make way for a railroad; when in order that our loads may be carried more easily forward, we can violate the resting-place of the dead. For is not overhauling ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors • Various

... since given up, so far a sort of guilt attaches to me, not only for that vain confidence, but for all the various proceedings which were the consequence of it. But under this first head I have the satisfaction of feeling that I have nothing to retract, and nothing to repent of. The main principle of the movement is as dear to me now, as it ever was. I have changed in many things: in this I have not. From the age of fifteen, dogma has been the fundamental principle of my religion: ...
— Apologia Pro Vita Sua • John Henry Cardinal Newman

... that the orthodox world could boast. I soon found out my mistake, but I did not feel at liberty to withdraw my challenge. When I learned the infamous character of his personal lectures, I declined all further correspondence with him till he should retract his slanders; but still I did not feel free to say I would not debate with him, if his friends should bring him to reasonable terms. His friends in Halifax succeeded in doing so, and out of regard to the wishes of my friends, I submitted to the temporary degradation ...
— Modern Skepticism: A Journey Through the Land of Doubt and Back Again - A Life Story • Joseph Barker

... like to retract my refusal of your very kind invitation for to-morrow evening. I have explained to you my weak avoidance of crowds. I have determined to overcome it in this case, and I want your permission to bring ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall

... promised to confine your attention to a trifling number; by advertising that one or two are still wanting, or by decreasing your terms, attempt immediately to retract this promise. Apply to your first benefactors; hope they will permit you to accommodate a few pretty little masters, sons of Mr. Such-a-one, who may be of the greatest service to you. They will ...
— The Academy Keeper • Anonymous

... frankness of a soldier and the candour of a gentleman, he might expect an ingenuous declaration. That if, as he had reason to believe, General Hamilton had used expressions derogatory to his honour, he would have had the magnanimity to retract them; and that if, from his language, injurious inferences had been improperly drawn, he would have perceived the propriety of correcting errors which might thus have been widely diffused. With these impressions Colonel Burr was greatly surprised at receiving a letter ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis



Words linked to "Retract" :   invaginate, flinch, shrink, repudiate, introvert, disown, renounce, draw, cringe, quail, draw back, recant, wince, pull in, funk, squinch, retraction, attract, recoil, pull



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