"Defensive" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... that. He would not love me because he chose to do so, but because he could not help doing so. At least, that is my idea of love. He would love me as I was, with all my faults and follies, and I should love him the same way. I should be as proud of his personality as I would be defensive of my own. I should not ask him to be like me; I should only ask him to be truly himself and to let me be truly myself. If our personalities diverged, perhaps they would go around the circle and meet on the ...
— The Precipice • Elia Wilkinson Peattie
... course since the conditions that produced the setting up of the defensive machinery were unhappy, I'd say that happiness will play a large part in the situation. That happiness and a normal occupation will do a great deal to maintain the status quo. Of course I would advise no return to the unhappy environment, and no shocks. ...
— The Breaking Point • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... is sensible. Naturally he wants to live. He knows we'll shoot him if he tries to trick us, and he knows we'll do it if we're attacked! We'll of course leave men at all defensive stations. If there is a weakness here, if the ranch is vulnerable—we should learn what it is. It'll cost us nothing. We can't lose, and we might be saving everything. Of course we won't let him ...
— The Bluff of the Hawk • Anthony Gilmore
... doesn't speak to you in work hours?" asked Mary, with a mischievous glance that would have surprised her mill mates had they seen it. Already the leaven of kindness was working in her neglected life, and for the moment she forgot to be upon the defensive against ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond
... suggestion. Cut the second, 'The Fiend in Discourse,' represents him, not reasoning, railing rather, shaking his spear at the pilgrim, his shoulder advanced, his tail writhing in the air, his foot ready for a spring, while Christian stands back a little, timidly defensive. The third illustrates these magnificent words: 'Then Apollyon straddled quite over the whole breadth of the way, and said, I am void of fear in this matter: prepare thyself to die; for I swear by my infernal den that thou ...
— Lay Morals • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Germans had superiority in the air. They had concentrated on aircraft the effort which we had expended on perfecting the tank. The one can be used effectively in wet weather, but the other cannot. The German had another defensive surprise for us. Owing to the nature of the ground the deep dugout was practically an impossibility. In the place, therefore, of this the German devised the concrete blockhouse or 'pill-box' as it was called. For miles behind their ...
— Q.6.a and Other places - Recollections of 1916, 1917 and 1918 • Francis Buckley
... Altogether, their defensive force consisted now, therefore, of the lieutenant, captain, and three other officers—for Sprott would fight, and Jack Harper was quite as good with a revolver as any of his seniors—and fifteen men, counting in Snowball, ...
— The Penang Pirate - and, The Lost Pinnace • John Conroy Hutcheson
... playing chess and checkers, and usually acted cautiously upon the defensive until the game had reached a stage where aggressive movements were clearly justified. He was also somewhat fond of ten-pins, and occasionally indulged in a game. Whatever may have been his tastes in his younger days, at this period ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... his opinion. This produced an argument, and Mr. Randolph now played off on him the same arts which he himself had so often practiced on his country customers; drawing him out by questions, endeavoring to puzzle him by subtleties, assailing him with declamation, and watching continually the defensive operations of his mind. After a considerable discussion, he said, 'You defend your opinions well, sir; but now to the law and to the testimony.' Hereupon he carried him to his office, and, opening the authorities, ...
— Patrick Henry • Moses Coit Tyler
... that," she said, on the defensive. "And you're not to tell. It's the last day of ...
— Boy Woodburn - A Story of the Sussex Downs • Alfred Ollivant
... between Russia and Japan for the control of Eastern Asia or between Germany and France for the control of the iron and coal deposits of Western Europe. In such cases the wars are justified to the home populations as necessary defensive measures. ...
— The Next Step - A Plan for Economic World Federation • Scott Nearing
... gun, the one to conquer the forces of wild nature, the other to battle against savage man and beast—these were the twin weapons that the pioneer always kept beside him, whether on the march or during a halt. In defensive warfare the axe was scarcely less potent than the gun, for with its keen edge the great logs were hewed which formed the block-house, and the tall saplings shaped, which were driven into the earth to make the stockade. We know too that woman could ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... await the return of my father & my uncle, who would revenge upon the English the insult which they had made me, without their tarnishing the glory that they had merited in chastising the English & the savages, their friends, of their perfidy. We were nevertheless always upon the defensive, & we apprehended being surprised at the place where we were as much on the part of the English, as of those of the savages, their friends; that is why we resolved of coming to establish ourselves in the place ...
— Voyages of Peter Esprit Radisson • Peter Esprit Radisson
... many years. The chronic form is characterized by periods of slow or rapid advance when conditions arise in the body favorable for the growth of the bacilli, and periods when the disease is checked and quiescent, the defensive forces of the body having gained the upper hand. Often the intervention of some other disease so weakens the defences of the body that the bacilli again find their opportunity. Thus typhoid fever, scarlet fever and other diseases may be followed by a rapidly fatal advance of the tuberculosis, ...
— Disease and Its Causes • William Thomas Councilman
... the days grew shorter and there was an end to the pretty tea-parties on the lawn. But our young woman had long indoor conversations with her fellow visitor, and in spite of the rain the two ladies often sallied forth for a walk, equipped with the defensive apparatus which the English climate and the English genius have between them brought to such perfection. Madame Merle liked almost everything, including the English rain. "There's always a little of it and never too much at once," she said; "and it never wets you and ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 1 (of 2) • Henry James
... of it before, but I will think of it now," said Warner. "In any event, we are quite sure that the President has a great task before him. We hear that the South will soon have a quarter of a million troops in the field. Her position on the defensive is perhaps worth as many more men to her. Hence let x equal her troops, let y equal her defensive, and we have x plus y, which is equal to half a million men, the number we must have before we can meet the South ...
— The Guns of Shiloh • Joseph A. Altsheler
... he saw them to be middle-aged and young—a mother and daughter evidently. The elder with a quick, defensive movement walked to the doorway and stood there, blocking it. He heard the younger exclaim, "A tramp!" and then she came forward, squeezing in beside her mother. Hostility and apprehension were on both ...
— Treasure and Trouble Therewith - A Tale of California • Geraldine Bonner
... wasted blow, and with a dexterous twist laid him flat on his back, with a sounding thump upon the deck. And as the infuriated scamp rose—which he did with a bound that placed him on his feet and in defensive posture; as though the deck had been a spring-board—Kirkwood leaped back, seized a capstan-bar, and ...
— The Black Bag • Louis Joseph Vance
... at the spitting business, and well up in the trade, can do a smart thing or two in the defensive line—as when confronted by a dog, for instance. If the feline can only keep up a vigorous and well directed spitting, the canine is almost sure to retreat, with his tail between his legs, (if it is not ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 15, July 9, 1870 • Various
... need only a set of notes to reveal their approximate faithfulness to things that actually happened. But there is an emphasis upon revolt and disillusion and confusion in these latest novels that is new. They are no longer on the defensive, no longer stories of boys struggling to adapt themselves to a difficult world (men of forty- odd still write such stories); their authors are on the offensive, and with a reckless desire to accomplish their objectives, ...
— Definitions • Henry Seidel Canby
... her mother's, and her curly hair, he preserved a frozen indifference. For Camors had other anxieties, of which Madame de Tecle knew nothing. The manner of Madame Campvallon toward him had assumed a more marked character of aggressive raillery. A defensive attitude is never agreeable to a man, and Camors felt it more disagreeable than most men—being so ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... He suggested that she should remove her mackintosh. She consented. He had no idea that the effect of the removal of the mackintosh would be so startling as it was. She stood intimately revealed in her frock. The mackintosh was formal and defensive; the ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... forts north of the city. The point of Namur, as we shall see in a moment, was twofold. First, its fortifications, so long as they held out, commanded the crossings both of the Sambre and of the Meuse within the angle of which the French defensive lay; secondly, its fortified zone formed the support whereupon the whole French right reposed. It was this unexpected collapse of the Belgian defence of Namur which, coupled with the unexpected magnitude of the forces Germany had been able ...
— A General Sketch of the European War - The First Phase • Hilaire Belloc
... fortune or a competence, inspires its possessor with anti-revolutionary sentiments; consequently, he is for the moment an obstruction; "You are rich," says Cambon, making use of a personification, "you cherish an opinion, which compels us to be on the defensive; pay then, so as to indemnify us and be thankful for our indulgence which, precautionary and until peace is declared, keeps you under bolt and bar."[41122] Rich, anti-revolutionary, and vicious," according to Robespierre,[41123] "these three traits depend ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 4 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 3 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... dear. We all have 'em. Sometimes, if I didn't smoke I should scream. No woman really likes to see her husband flirting openly with her friends. I'm no saint; but my wickedness is defensive. Now, are you ready?" ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... furious strokes from without resounded upon the door. Robin, Marian, and the baron threw by their pilgrim's attire, and stood in arms on the defensive. They were provided with swords, and the cottager gave them bucklers and helmets, for all Robin's haunts were furnished with secret armouries. But they kept their swords sheathed, and the baron wielded a ponderous spear, which he pointed towards the door ...
— Maid Marian • Thomas Love Peacock
... financial genius was constantly being rewarded by many new phases of materiality chiefly by an offensive and defensive alliance he was now able to engineer between himself and the house of Haeckelheimer, Gotloeb & Co. Seeing the iron manner in which he had managed to wrest victory out of defeat after the first seriously contested election, these gentlemen had experienced a change of heart and announced that they ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser
... adversaries of the forest. It was Ralph who became incautious. His fury could not long be held in check, and his cunning at the start of the fight soon gave place to a wild and slashing onslaught, while Nick fought on the defensive, reading in his brother's eyes the warning ...
— In the Brooding Wild • Ridgwell Cullum
... falling-back: "It was totally unexpected to me: I thought it was part of the plan to attack him as quickly as possible. We had surprised them, and were strong enough to attack them." "After Friday I was apprehensive we should not have the success we had expected." "I think it was a mistake to fight a defensive battle after surprising the enemy." "I think we should have attacked the enemy immediately." "I must give my opinion, since you ask me; for I have an opinion, as a military man, from the general facts I know, and that I suppose I am obliged to ...
— The Campaign of Chancellorsville • Theodore A. Dodge
... all of the most quaint and curious forms, but yet of the most elaborate and beautiful workmanship. There were swords, and daggers, and bows and arrows, and spurs, and shields, and coats of mail, and every other species of weapons, offensive and defensive, that the warriors of the middle ages were accustomed to use. Rollo was most interested in the bows and arrows. They were of great size, and were made in a style of workmanship, and ornamented with mountings and decorations, which Rollo had ...
— Rollo on the Rhine • Jacob Abbott
... architecture should persist through such long series of compulsory removals, but while the builders were held together by the necessity for defense against their wilder neighbors or against each other, this strong defensive motive would perpetuate the laborious type of construction. Such conditions would contribute to the rapid development of ...
— A Study of Pueblo Architecture: Tusayan and Cibola • Victor Mindeleff and Cosmos Mindeleff
... his religion upon the people of the Netherlands, or to utterly exterminate them. Upon the other were a scanty people, fishermen, sailors, and agriculturalists, broken up into communities with but little bond of sympathy, and no communication, standing only on the defensive, and relying solely upon the justice of their cause, their own stout hearts, their noble prince, and their one ally, the ocean. Cruelty, persecution, and massacre had converted this race of peace loving workers into heroes capable ...
— By Pike and Dyke: A Tale of the Rise of the Dutch Republic • G.A. Henty
... to denounce the existing system of government. Working in close co-operation with the Amsterdam Chamber of the West India Company, he played a skilful game, and succeeded in delaying and in part averting hostile action on the part of the States General. The piece which follows is his chief defensive recital of the acts of the administration, and ...
— Narrative of New Netherland • J. F. Jameson, Editor
... of his machine, and presented his stooping back in a defensive manner against anyone who might come out. He wasn't a footman, anyhow. He'd rung that bell all right, and now he must see to ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... time, indeed, since the beginning of the Protectorate, had there been such activity in that foreign and diplomatic department of the Protector's service to which Milton belonged. Cromwell's alliance offensive and defensive with France against Spain (March 23, 1656-7), leading immediately to the transport of an English auxiliary army under General Reynolds to co-operate with the French in Flanders (ante pp. 140-141), would in itself have caused an increase of such activity; but, in addition ...
— The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 • David Masson
... before she found her vicious legs again. And a mile beyond them, at the foot of a long hill, was Rattlesnake Creek. Dick knew that here was the crucial test of his ability to perform his enterprise, set his teeth grimly, put his knees well into her flanks, and changed his defensive tactics to brisk aggression. Bullied and maddened, Jovita began the descent of the hill. Here the artful Richard pretended to hold her in with ostentatious objurgation and well-feigned cries of alarm. It is unnecessary to add that Jovita instantly ran away. Nor need I state ...
— Mrs. Skaggs's Husbands and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... perfect in her somewhat different style. She might be called impressive and imposing in her grand-costume, which she wore for this visit. It was a black silk dress, with a crape shawl, a firmly defensive bonnet, and an alpaca umbrella with a stern-looking and decided knob presiding as its handle. The dried-leaf rustle of her silk dress was suggestive of the ripe autumn of life, bringing with it those golden fruits of wisdom and experience ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... belongeth vengeance and recompense." Personally I blame the press for loss of life to both the Indian and the white men, for having schooled the white man erroneously. Travelers crossing the plains were always on the defensive, and ever ready to commence war on any Indian who came within the radius of their firearms. When I was a boy I read in my reader: "Lo, the cowardly Indian." The picture above this sentence was that of an Indian in war ...
— The Second William Penn - A true account of incidents that happened along the - old Santa Fe Trail • William H. Ryus
... internal trouble in the American contingent, and that one of the officers is hated. Whether this is really so or not, I do not know; we never know anything certain now. But although the American has but little discipline, as a sharpshooter on the defensive he is quite unrivalled by reason of his superior intelligence and the interest he takes in devoting himself to the matter in hand. You only have to see these mutinous marines at work for five minutes as snipers ...
— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale
... soon after the 10th of June. A frigate brought the orders to set all ships and cannon in defensive condition; an East Indian ship had reported the proximity of many American privateers. One of these had even been captured. The Hessian officers thereupon set all cannon in order and arranged for the distribution of the men in the case of an attack. ...
— The Voyage of The First Hessian Army from Portsmouth to New York, 1776 • Albert Pfister
... justification the later masters of the old school were only dimly conscious. They builded better than they knew. When any teacher of the transition period was called upon to explain his manner of imparting the correct vocal action he was at once put on the defensive. No champion of the imitative faculty could be found. This lack of understanding of the basis of the empirical method, on the part of its most intelligent and successful exponents, was the first cause of the weakness of this method ...
— The Psychology of Singing - A Rational Method of Voice Culture Based on a Scientific Analysis of All Systems, Ancient and Modern • David C. Taylor
... his own dominions. The king of Sardinia augmented his forces to six-and-thirty thousand; and the Austrian army, under the prince of Lichtenstein, amounted to a much greater number; so that the enemy were reduced to the necessity of acting on the defensive, and retired towards the Mantuan. In February, baron Leutrum, the Piedmontese general, invested and took the strong fortress of Aste. He afterwards relieved the citadel of Alexandria, which the Spaniards ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... traced back in a similar way, though it must be admitted that the racial survivals are usually less convincing than those from the infancy of the individual. The nasal expression in disgust was originally a defensive movement against bad odors; and the set lips of determination went primarily with the set glottis and rigid chest that are useful in lifting heavy weights or in other severe muscular efforts. Such movements, directly useful in certain simple situations, become ...
— Psychology - A Study Of Mental Life • Robert S. Woodworth
... founded in 1291 as a defensive alliance among three cantons. In succeeding years, other localities joined the original three. The Swiss Confederation secured its independence from the Holy Roman Empire in 1499. Switzerland's sovreignty and neutrality have long been ...
— The 2005 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... dreaded not so much because she was actually of much importance, but because she might be. That empire was Russia. The last thing in the world Bismarck desired was precisely that approximation between France and Russia which ended in the strange phenomenon of an offensive and defensive alliance between a western republic and a ...
— Armageddon—And After • W. L. Courtney
... defensive. G.J. grew self-conscious. Moreover, her slang disturbed him. It was the first slang he had heard her use, and in using it her voice had roughened. But he remembered that Concepcion also ...
— The Pretty Lady • Arnold E. Bennett
... was told, but he realised they had been speaking of him and felt on the defensive. However, he sat down as near to Caesar as he could. They talked of all manner of people and things of which he knew nothing, traditional jokes cropped up, and Aymer's propensity for teasing asserted itself in a prominent manner. Renata never failed to respond ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant
... deliberately stilled his rage and objectively considered what he should do about it. With the obvious source of the androids logically deduced, there was only his own defensive procedures to be considered. And they had to be considered carefully. As he saw himself, he stood alone, against a group of bumbling idiots, with the future of the nation at stake. What ...
— Ten From Infinity • Paul W. Fairman
... all defensive armour, is far the most prominent. They were often painted with devices, such as Hamlet's shield, Hildiger's Swedish shield. Dr. Vigfusson has shown the importance of these painted shields in the ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... the horse, they kept from fighting a long time; for the soothsayers, by the sacrifices, foretold the victory both to Greeks and Persians, if they stood upon the defensive part only, but if they became aggressors, the contrary. At length Mardonious, when he had but a few days' provision, and the Greek forces were increasing continually, impatient of delay, determined to lie still no longer, but passing ...
— The Boys' and Girls' Plutarch - Being Parts of The "Lives" of Plutarch • Plutarch
... the reason Roye was not considered in need of a serious defensive effort by Earth's strategists—the vast distances between it and any troubled area, and so the utter improbability that a Geest ship might come close enough to discover that here was another world as well suited for its race as for human beings. And then a final factor: the instrument attached ...
— Watch the Sky • James H. Schmitz
... aeroplane until he had it about where he thought Jack would want it. The latter pressed the releasing lever and the bomb descended. It was the most powerful of the lot, and when it struck and exploded it not only demolished the defensive battery, making a hole in the place where it had stood, but it tore down part of the prison fence, and made such destruction generally ...
— Air Service Boys in the Big Battle • Charles Amory Beach
... which lash its exposed and sea-girt site. Three other ancient towers, including the barbican already mentioned, strengthened the position; and others, with ramparts, curtains, and bastions, were added to the works in succeeding times, till the whole circuit of the rocky plateau bristles with defensive works. Within these the town is closely packed in narrow streets;—but of ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester
... reverenced the sublime mind of Mr. Falkland; I reverenced it still. My offence had merely been a mistaken thirst of knowledge. Such however it was, as to admit neither of forgiveness nor remission. This epoch was the crisis of my fate, dividing what may be called the offensive part from the defensive, which has been the sole business of my remaining years. Alas! my offence was short, not aggravated by any sinister intention: but the reprisals I was to suffer are long, and can terminate only with ...
— Caleb Williams - Things As They Are • William Godwin
... or near the base of the mountain the party found the other apostles, and with them a multitude of people, including some scribes or rabbis.[797] There was evidence of disputation and disturbance amongst the crowd; and plainly the apostles were on the defensive. At the unexpected approach of Jesus many of the people ran to meet Him with respectful salutations. Of the contentious scribes He asked: "What question ye with them?" thus assuming the burden of the dispute, whatever it might be, and so ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage
... to my query as to "the meaning of the term Pisan, used in old records for some part of defensive armour," but he seems to have forgotten that I expressly stated that term had no relation to "the fabrics of Pisa;" at least such is my belief. With regard to the inventory of the arms and armour ...
— Notes and Queries 1850.02.23 • Various
... 16s. for a plate of 8 little wretched mutton chops; we resented the imposition, although the sudden appearance of 4 or 5 officers of the imperial guard almost rendered it doubtful whether we ought to act too warmly on the defensive, as they seemed to patronise our hostess; however, we refused to pay ...
— Before and after Waterloo - Letters from Edward Stanley, sometime Bishop of Norwich (1802;1814;1814) • Edward Stanley
... expand their wings, and, like a vessel, make all sail. Of mammalia, the jaguar, or South American tiger, is the most formidable. It frequents the wooded and reedy banks of the great rivers. There are four species of armadilloes, notable for their smooth, hard, defensive covering. Of reptiles there are many kinds. One snake, a trigonocephalus, has in some respects the structure of a viper with the habits of a rattlesnake. The expression of this snake's face is hideous and fierce. I do not think I ever saw anything more ugly, excepting, ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various
... conclusion would, I believe, be desperately hasty, a sort of pouring out of the child with the bath. Logically it is possible to believe in superhuman beings without identifying them with the absolute at all. The treaty of offensive and defensive alliance which certain groups of the Christian clergy have recently made with our transcendentalist philosophers seems to me to be based on a well-meaning but baleful mistake. Neither the Jehovah of the old testament nor the heavenly father ...
— A Pluralistic Universe - Hibbert Lectures at Manchester College on the - Present Situation in Philosophy • William James
... all its meager earnings to a small invalid brother or drunken father. But the Sawyer orphans were neither pensive nor appealing. There was a defiant belligerency about them that stifled the avenues of pity and put one on the defensive. They were wild and gay, and uproarious, too, and with the exception of Tim, the eldest, they were strong and robust. He certainly looked as though he had been starved, body and soul; but his other unorphan-like qualities were ...
— Treasure Valley • Marian Keith
... "I asked for bread," he replied, stung to the defensive. "They always gave me bread and sometimes meat, and they let me sleep in the barns where the straw was, and once a woman took me into her house and offered me money, but I would not take it. I—I think I'd like to send her a present, if ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow
... a revolt had become a Revolution, and once more the Marquis de Lafayette was in charge of the municipal troops, which assembled at St. Cloud and other defensive points. ...
— A Short History of France • Mary Platt Parmele
... circular form of the earthwork enclosing Stonehenge, as well as the straight and parallel banks of the Avenue, are specially worthy of notice. They belong to a class of earthwork quite unlike the usual planning of cattle enclosures, and defensive works, and exhibit a precision in setting out which is only associated with the sepulchral and religious earthworks of prehistoric times ...
— Stonehenge - Today and Yesterday • Frank Stevens
... Sledd, of local railroad management and stock-investment fame; and Norrie Simms, president of the Douglas Trust Company, who, however, was little more than a fiscal agent. The general feeling was that Cowperwood's defensive tactics—which consisted in having the city council refuse to act—could ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser
... of utmost importance. Break up your opponent's rhythm, never allow him to get grooved, frequently do the unexpected, so that he loses confidence in his anticipation and, subsequently, goes on the defensive. ...
— Squash Tennis • Richard C. Squires
... have not engaged in real hostilities with the Miwok or Maidu for well over a century and Paiute hostilities appear to have taken the form of occasional defensive skirmishes; thus the details of war magic are vague. However, Washo tradition repeatedly mentions a month-long period during which doctors gathered and made medicine against the enemy before launching a campaign. Usually this took place at Woodfords, which was the site of a ...
— Washo Religion • James F. Downs
... writing of romance (unless it had been cast in the severely allegorical form of The Pilgrim's Progress), and if we are to account for that ebullition, we shall be driven—like Darwin with his confounding peacock—to take refuge in some theory of exuberance. The later works have been so defensive and, in one sense, didactic that one is apt to forget that many of the earlier books, and all the short stories, must have originated in ...
— H. G. Wells • J. D. Beresford
... century, the traces of incipient degeneracy can already be noted amid much brilliant performance. From that time completeness of military achievement became in men's minds less of an object than accurate observance of rule, and in practice the defensive consideration of avoiding disaster began to preponderate over offensive effort for ...
— Types of Naval Officers - Drawn from the History of the British Navy • A. T. Mahan
... content to stand on their own strength, They try to hire the enginry of Heaven. I am no theologian, but I laugh That men can be so grossly logicless, When war, defensive or aggressive either, Is in its essence pagan, and opposed To the whole ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... Waterloo. It is true, the Emperor sent Marshal Grouchy the next day at noon, with thirty-two thousand men to look after the enemy, but then it was quite too late. In those fifteen hours they had time to re-form, to communicate with the English, and to act on the defensive. ...
— Waterloo - A sequel to The Conscript of 1813 • Emile Erckmann
... the support of his presence. On the 21st Frederick won the decisive battle of Burkersdorf, and a few weeks later was master of Silesia. In western Germany, where the war more immediately concerned England, Prince Ferdinand showed consummate skill in forcing the French to act on the defensive. On June 24 the allies defeated them at Wilhelmsthal. The victory was decided by Granby, who, after a fierce engagement, destroyed the pick of the French army under Stainville. A series of successes followed; Gottingen was evacuated, the ...
— The Political History of England - Vol. X. • William Hunt
... Allies made ready to crush Napoleon. He was now on the defensive with enemies hemming him in on every side, and although he fought a brilliant campaign it was hopeless. On April 11, 1814, Napoleon was compelled to resign the crown, and obliged to go into exile; and the island of Elba in the Mediterranean Sea was chosen as the ...
— A Treasury of Heroes and Heroines - A Record of High Endeavour and Strange Adventure from 500 B.C. to 1920 A.D. • Clayton Edwards
... that I might now commence the attack, but my master's lessons all came clear and vivid before me, and knowing that, as the weaker, it was my duty to act on the defensive, I waited, while we watched each other cautiously, my adversary evidently ...
— Burr Junior • G. Manville Fenn
... Apuleius in memory of his son's friend, his elder daughter's fiance. During the preparation of these two little books, our relations became more intimate, and our friendship continued unbroken until in the month of February, 1872, a remark in one of my defensive articles caused him to take up his pen against me. My remark was to the effect that there were men of the same opinions as myself even among the priests of the established church. Caspar Paludan- ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes
... Protestantism. {392} Practically nothing was defined save what had already been taken up in the Augsburg Confession or in the writings of Calvin, of Zwingli and of the Anabaptists. Inevitably, a spirit so purely defensive could not be animated by a primarily philosophical interest. The guiding star was not a system but a policy, and this policy was nothing more nor less than that of re-establishing tradition. The practice of the ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... that there was something tense and nervous in his alertness, something wary and defensive in his readiness, and his own ...
— The Fortieth Door • Mary Hastings Bradley
... warriors continually changing their point of attack. By three o'clock, although the majority of the savages had departed down the river, enough remained to keep up a galling fire, and hold Reno strictly on the defensive. These reds skulked in ravines, or lined the banks of the river, their long-range rifles rendering the lighter carbines of the cavalrymen almost valueless. A few crouched along the edge of higher eminences, their shots crashing ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish
... army acts now wholly on the defensive, strongly fortified in their trenches: and the young French King sendeth overtures for a treaty of peace, by the Duke of MANTUA; which, because it is a matter of State that concerneth us here at home, I shall speak no ...
— An English Garner - Critical Essays & Literary Fragments • Edited by Professor Arber and Thomas Seccombe
... the ground with the war chief, should he come and attempt to drive us. We therefore directed the express to say to the war chief "if he wished to fight us he might come on." We were determined never to be driven, and equally so, not to make the first attack, our object being to act only on the defensive. This we ...
— Autobiography of Ma-ka-tai-me-she-kia-kiak, or Black Hawk • Black Hawk
... essayed reading the telegram with an effect of being in the air, such was his defensive agility. "He's coming, I guess," he said. "I don't think anything very bad has happened. I don't think it's an accident or anything, but the writing is awful. I should think that telegraph man would be ...
— The Debtor - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... the town of Wakefield, which, until the recent great growth of Leeds, was the head-quarters of the Yorkshire clothing-trade. It was here that in the Wars of the Roses the battle of Wakefield was fought on the closing day of the year 1460. The Duke of York wished to remain at Wakefield on the defensive against Queen Margaret's Lancastrian army of twenty thousand men, for his forces were barely one-fourth that number. The Earl of Salisbury, however, prevailed on him to advance to meet the queen, and he probably had no idea of ...
— England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook
... Government; but Lord Buckingham's official despatch, dated the 23rd of March, not only shows that statement to be erroneous, but establishes the fact that Lord Buckingham peremptorily refused to entertain the negotiation until he should have received a positive assurance that a certain defensive and hostile agreement, into which those gentlemen had entered, was to be considered as abandoned. This agreement, or association, was called the Round Robin (although not really a round robin, being merely a declaration, followed in the usual way by the signatures ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham
... was resumed at a meeting on the following day; but Lincoln decided that the time was inopportune. While he thought that more evil than good would be derived from the wholesale arming of Negroes, yet he was not unwilling that the commanders arm, purely for defensive purposes, those slaves who came within the Union lines. But the President had reached a decision on the correlated policy of emancipation with which it appears that his cabinet was not in accord. They were surprised when he read to them the first draft of ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 7, 1922 • Various
... an altitude of from two thousand to three thousand metres, the other, thirty-five hundred to five thousand metres. J. B. and I were on high patrol. Owing to our inexperience, it was to be a purely defensive one between our observation balloons and the lines. We had still many questions to ask, but having been so persistently inquisitive for three days running, we thought it best to wait for Talbott, who was leading our patrol, ...
— High Adventure - A Narrative of Air Fighting in France • James Norman Hall
... various buildings, which went to make up one of these vast establishments, may be gathered from that of St Bernard's own abbey of Clairvaux, which is here given. It will be observed that the abbey precincts are surrounded by a strong wall, furnished at intervals with watch-towers and other defensive works. The wall is nearly encircled by a stream of water, artificially diverted from the small rivulets which flow through the precincts, furnishing the establishment with an abundant supply in every part, for the litigation of the gardens and orchards, the sanitary ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... must be admitted, the efficiency under the boss's whip will go further. For defensive war, or war for high moral aims, it is desirable that the individual soldier should think for himself, respond to the high appeal. Thus for such warfare the efficiency of voluntary effort and cooperation is superior. An autocracy would better rule its soldiers by a military caste; there can be ...
— The Soul of Democracy - The Philosophy Of The World War In Relation To Human Liberty • Edward Howard Griggs
... of men. He taught them agriculture, while Isis invented laws. He built temples to the Gods, and established their worship. Both were the patrons of artists and their useful inventions; and introduced the use of iron for defensive weapons and implements of agriculture, and of gold to adorn the temples of the Gods. He went forth with an army to conquer men to civilization, teaching the people whom he overcame to plant the vine and ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... artillery is overwhelmingly stronger than the defending artillery, defensive infantry in an entrenched position cannot be ousted from its position unless the attackers outnumber their opponents by six or seven to one, and are prepared to lose heavily. The murderous zone of a thousand yards lying between the armies cannot be crossed save at fearful sacrifice, and the bayonet ...
— The World's Greatest Books—Volume 14—Philosophy and Economics • Various
... that their crafty foe had no equal in ambuscades and surprises; and that, while a defeat might ruin the French, it would only exasperate an enemy whose resources in men were incomparably greater. Therefore, when the dogs sounded the alarm, he kept his followers close, and stood patiently on the defensive. They chafed under this Fabian policy, and at length imputed it to cowardice. Their murmurings grew louder, till they reached the ear of Maisonneuve. The religion which animated him had not destroyed the soldierly pride which takes ...
— The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century • Francis Parkman
... was not going to get it. The law had Ross sewed up tight this time. Why didn't they get about the business of shipping him off? Why had he had that afternoon session with the skull thumper? Ross had been on the defensive then, and he had not liked it. He had given to the other's questions all the attention his shrewd mind could muster, but a faint, very faint, apprehension still clung to ...
— The Time Traders • Andre Norton
... which names were distinguished the scattered and heartless adherents of Charles), the nobility and gentry, in arms, hurried to oppose the march of the English army, which now advanced towards their borders. At the head of their defensive forces they placed Alexander Lesley, who, with many of his best officers, had been trained to war under the great Gustavus Adolphus. They soon assembled an army of 26,000 men, whose camp, upon Dunse-law, is thus described by ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3) • Walter Scott
... leaving my guide to take charge of the horses until my return in the evening. About an hour's walk from the camp I met an Indian, who on perceiving me instantly strung his bow, placed on his left arm a sleeve of raccoon skin and stood on the defensive. Being quite sure that conduct was prompted by fear and not by hostile intentions, the poor fellow having probably never seen such a being as myself before, I laid my gun at my feet on the ground and waved my hand for him to come to me, which he did slowly and with great caution. I then ...
— The Mountains of California • John Muir
... Brussels has informed the German Commander that the French Government has declared to the Belgian Government the impossibility of giving them any offensive assistance whatever, as they themselves are forced to adopt the defensive." ...
— A Journal From Our Legation in Belgium • Hugh Gibson
... walls; you "reentered" it at every possible angle; you did everything apparently but pass through it. You thought yourself well out of it, and were stopped by a bastion. Its circumvallations haunted you until you came to the next station. It had pressed even the current of the river into its defensive service. There were secrets of its foundations and mines that only the highest military despots knew and kept to themselves. ...
— Stories in Light and Shadow • Bret Harte
... George felt a quick gust of pleasure and romance sweep across him. It was as though senses that had been for long on the defensive, tired, or teased merely by the world, gave way in a moment to joy and poetry. He looked from the face beside him to the pictured scene in which they stood—the soft air filled his lungs—what ailed him?—he only knew that after many weeks he was, ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... the secretary came to me and ordered me to provide passports, duly visaed, for The Saleve party—seven in all, myself included. I told him that I would appeal direct to the delegates themselves, with whom I had already done some defensive propaganda on my own. He told me it was nothing to do with the delegates; it was the delegates' ladies. Fool that I was, I had never thought ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, December 15, 1920 • Various
... pasquinade and sneer is to put the prospective daughter-in-law on the defensive, and prepare her mind, unconsciously to herself, to regard her future husband's mother as her natural enemy. Many a girl marries with the preconceived notion that, to preserve her individual rights, and to rule in her own small household, she must carefully guard against the machinations of the ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland
... humanity in war than in peace. Non-resistance to evil implies resistance to good, and to take the offensive, leaving the defensive out of the question, is perhaps the divinest thing in humanity. War is the school of fraternity and the bond of love; it is war that has brought peoples into touch with one another, by mutual aggression and ...
— Tragic Sense Of Life • Miguel de Unamuno
... Pernambuco and Rio Grande unite in a fraternal league, offensive and defensive, to assemble all their forces against any aggression of the Portuguese Government, or that of the Government of Rio de Janeiro, to reduce these provinces ...
— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 2 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald
... newly-acquired privileges to vote away the independence of the country. The view was not unnatural under the circumstances, and this measure, had it not been a violation of pledges, might have found defenders among impartial persons; but unfortunately it proved to be not so much a stringently defensive measure which time and circumstances might induce them to modify, as the first step in a policy of absolute and perpetual exclusion. It was the first deliberate violation of the spirit of the settlement, and, although there is ...
— The Transvaal from Within - A Private Record of Public Affairs • J. P. Fitzpatrick
... to argue a desperate combat; both were tall, strong, and courageous, both had defensive armour, and the fatal and desperate poniard was their only offensive weapon. They paused facing each other, and examined eagerly into their respective means of defence before hazarding a blow, which, if it missed, its attaint would ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... configuration of the territory of Greece, its forms of relief, "so like, in many respects, to Switzerland," could not fail to exert a powerful influence on the character and destiny of its people. Its inclosing mountains materially increased their defensive power, and, at the same time, inspired them with the love of liberty. Those mountains, as we have seen, so unique in their distribution, were natural barriers against the invasion of foreign nations, and they ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker
... the average infantryman's defensive weapons tells us that to be able to march, maneuver, and fight efficiently in this armor implies that the Athenian soldier is a well-trained athlete. The whole panoply weighs many pounds.[*] The prime parts in the armor are the helmet, the cuirass, the greaves, and the ...
— A Day In Old Athens • William Stearns Davis
... and wept aloud. At a late hour this evening a trusted agent left here for the Tribune office. He is said to have held a long conference with Mr. GREELEY, the particulars of which have not transpired. It is supposed by many to portend an alliance, offensive and defensive, between the King of Central and the Philosopher ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 25, September 17, 1870 • Various
... ideals was demolished by the intimacy of common life, and she found him as merely human as the Hintock people themselves, a new foundation was in demand for an enduring and stanch affection—a sympathetic interdependence, wherein mutual weaknesses were made the grounds of a defensive alliance. Fitzpiers had furnished none of that single-minded confidence and truth out of which alone such a second union could spring; hence it was with a controllable emotion that she now watched the mare ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... and that perhaps to show us that the war that the church makes with Antichrist is rather defensive than offensive. Shields and targets are weapons defensive, weapons provided for self-preservation, not to hurt others with. A Christian also, if he can but defend his soul in the sincere profession of the ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... most fashionable and eminent German theologians have enthusiastically endorsed the official view of Germany as the hierophant of Peace and Concord reluctantly forced into a defensive war by the perfidy of England. As worshippers in the new Temple of Teutonic Truth they may be imagined to ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, September 23, 1914 • Various
... "ministers;" after whom followed the Taranteen embassy, consisting of about a dozen noble looking Indians of various ages, from thirty to seventy; and the whole was closed by two or three hundred men, completely armed with both the offensive and defensive arms of the period. The steeple-crowned hats, the slashed sleeves, the red stockings, russet boots, and rosettes on the shoes, made a combination which, if it would be quaint and grotesque in our eyes, was striking to those ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams
... starkly incredible power bit at and clung to equally capable defensive screens of pure force. As these inconceivable forces met, the glare of their neutralization filled all nearby space. And ships and skeletons alike were disappearing in chunks, blobs, gouts, streamers and sparkles of rended, ...
— Masters of Space • Edward Elmer Smith
... "strength." This is positive equipment for active service. The defensive is changed to the offensive, and in the "strength" of the Lord we advance against the foe. We "ride abroad, redressing human wrongs." We "tread upon the lion and the adder, the young lion and the dragon we trample under foot." ...
— My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year • John Henry Jowett
... moon, answered her lord after a moment's reflection, saying, 'Listen, O monarch of the monkeys! That foremost of bowmen, endued with great might, Rama the son of Dasaratha, whose spouse hath been ravished, hath made an alliance offensive and defensive with Sugriva! And his brother the intelligent Lakshmana also of mighty arms, the unvanquished son of Sumitra, standeth beside him for the success of Sugriva's object. And Mainda and Dwivida, and Hanuman the son of Pavana, and Jamvuman, the ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli |
