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Definite   Listen
adjective
Definite  adj.  
1.
Having certain or distinct; determinate in extent or greatness; limited; fixed; as, definite dimensions; a definite measure; a definite period or interval. "Elements combine in definite proportions."
2.
Having certain limits in signification; determinate; certain; precise; fixed; exact; clear; as, a definite word, term, or expression.
3.
Determined; resolved. (Obs.)
4.
Serving to define or restrict; limiting; determining; as, the definite article.
Definite article (Gram.), the article the, which is used to designate a particular person or thing, or a particular class of persons or things; also called a definitive. See Definitive, n. - -
Definite inflorescence. (Bot.) See Determinate inflorescence, under Determinate.
Law of definite proportions (Chem.), the essential law of chemical combination that every definite compound always contains the same elements in the same proportions by weight; and, if two or more elements form more than one compound with each other, the relative proportions of each are fixed. Compare Law of multiple proportions, under Multiple.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Definite" Quotes from Famous Books



... suddenly and so constantly in the God of the Christians, if their former life had not prepared them for the adoption of the new doctrine, and if the doctrine of monotheism had offered a real difficulty to their understanding? There was, probably, nothing clear and definite in their belief in an omnipotent God, which is said to have been the leading dogma of Druidism; but their simple minds had evidently a leaning toward the doctrine, which induced them to approve of it, as soon as it was presented ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud

... I quitted home I had any very definite idea of the life of a sailor; but I had some notion that his chief occupation was sitting with his messmates round a can of grog, and singing songs about his sweetheart: the reality I found ...
— Peter the Whaler • W.H.G. Kingston

... less distinct of that which we now term its "correlation and conservation." Considerations connected with the stability of the universe give strength to this view, since it is clear that, were there either an increase or a diminution, the order of the world must cease. The definite and invariable amount of energy in the universe must therefore be accepted as a scientific fact. The changes we witness are in ...
— History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science • John William Draper

... Sulla's time those guilty of such murderous measures had some excuse in their very hardihood: they were trying the method for the first time, and not with set intentions; hence in most cases they behaved less maliciously, since they were acting not according to definite plans but as chance dictated. And the victims, succumbing to sudden and unheard of catastrophes, found some alleviation in the unexpectedness of their experience. At this time, on the other hand, they were executing in person or beholding ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol. III • Cassius Dio

... blood was more than compensated for by the advantages of having a heart-to-heart talk with him on other subjects. Germany had already begun her peaceful penetration, and the real motive of the Emperor's visit was, after swords and orders had been exchanged, to make the definite request that bodies of colonising Germans should be allowed to settle on the Sultan's dominions in Asia Minor, and a hint no doubt was conveyed that there would be plenty of room for them now that there were so many Armenian farms unfortunately without a master. But, like Uriah Heep, ...
— Crescent and Iron Cross • E. F. Benson

... had already fathomed the chief prejudices of his Excellency, and knew exactly where and to what his political wishes tended, she heard nothing from her uncle but expressions of admiration for the just views, the clear and definite ideas, and the consummate skill with which that 'young fellow' ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever

... collect their scattered ideas, and the incidents of the last half-hour assumed a definite shape in their memories, the sound of hymn and bell had ceased—the chamber of penitence was deserted—the silence of death reigned throughout the subterrane—nor did even the faintest shriek or scream emanate from the cell in ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds

... disposed to look upon this matter as optional with them; but such is a mistake. The time comes in the experience of every true believer when the Holy Spirit brings before him the conditions of a definite and absolute consecration. A refusal to meet these conditions, done ignorantly, will bring a cloud over our experience of justification and, eventually, if persisted in wilfully, will bring us into God's utter disapproval. "Therefore ...
— Sanctification • J. W. Byers

... for, without having received any definite intelligence from the long absent relative, he had somehow persuaded himself that Uncle Jacob had accumulated a fortune at ...
— Five Hundred Dollars - or, Jacob Marlowe's Secret • Horatio Alger

... thus we are guided, almost forced, by the laws of nature, to do right in art. Had granite been white and marble speckled (and why should this not have been, but by the definite Divine appointment for the good of man?), the huge figures of the Egyptian would have been as oppressive to the sight as cliffs of snow, and the Venus de Medicis would have looked like some exquisitely graceful species of frog."—Slade Professor ...
— The Gentle Art of Making Enemies • James McNeill Whistler

... of water in a pipe depends on the pressure, or head of water, behind it, and there is, perhaps, no definite limit to the quantity of water that may be forced through a given orifice. More water, for instance, is often forced through the pipe of a fire-engine in full play, in ten minutes, than would run through a pipe of the same diameter, lying nearly ...
— Farm drainage • Henry Flagg French

... decree.] I am pleased to assure you that it is not necessary to understand this. You have only to believe it. You see that by the decree of God some men and angels are predestinated to heaven and others to eternal hell, and you observe that their number is so certain and definite that it can neither be changed nor altered. You are asked to believe that billions of years ago this God knew the names of all the men and women whom He was going to save. Had 'em in His book, that being ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll - Latest • Robert Green Ingersoll

... extraordinary gift for improvisation, began to tell the children stories in the nursery evenings; and these tales of giants and fairies grew to have an extreme fascination for the child; not that he peopled his own world with them, as some imaginative children do; the boy's perceptions were too definite for that; such beings belonged to a different region; he had no idea that they existed, or had ever existed. They belonged to the story world, which was associated in his mind with bright fires and toys put away, when he nestled as close as he could to his mother's knee, with her hand ...
— Beside Still Waters • Arthur Christopher Benson

... previous to finding a chance to make a safe flight, he secreted himself with his children in Norfolk, and so remained up to the day he left, a passage having been secured for them on one of the boats coming to Philadelphia. While the records contain no definite account of other children, it is evident that there were others, but what became ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still

... total amount which may have been successively produced and consumed during a given period.) The fact that bullock-waggons can travel in any direction, excepting near the coast, without more than occasionally half an hour's delay in cutting down bushes, gives, perhaps, a more definite notion of the scantiness of the vegetation. Now, if we look to the animals inhabiting these wide plains, we shall find their numbers extraordinarily great, and their bulk immense. We must enumerate the elephant, three species of rhinoceros, and probably, ...
— A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World - The Voyage Of The Beagle • Charles Darwin

... of Ohio, Hon. William Warner, of Missouri, and Major-General George Crook, of the United States Army, commissioners under the last-named law. They were, however, authorized and directed first to submit to the Indians the definite proposition made to them by the act first mentioned, and only in the event of a failure to secure the assent of the requisite number to that proposition to open negotiations for modified terms under the other act. The work of the commission was prolonged and arduous, but the assent of the requisite ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... We don't want no toffs 'ere." This was followed by more definite applause from the group immediately surrounding ...
— To Him That Hath - A Novel Of The West Of Today • Ralph Connor

... Battles, Sieges, Voyages, Rapes, Cattle Forays, etc.; and quite apart from the historic element, however faint and legendary, there are a set of stories ascribed by him, or rather his authorities, to definite persons, which had, even in his day, probably long been the property of Tis, their original owners not being known owing to lapse of time and the wear of memory, and the natural and accidental catastrophies that impair the human record. Such are the "Dragon-Slayer" ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")

... were two white men with him, dressed partly in the Indian style, with moccasons and hunting-shirts; the rest of his crew consisted of four favourite Indians. They had been prowling about the river, without any definite object until thay found themselves in the highlands; where they had passed two or three days, hunting the deer which still ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving

... La Jara for Joaquin and Manuelita Flores," she answered. "When they come, I shall be able to tell something definite concerning this child." ...
— When Dreams Come True • Ritter Brown

... the most definite instructions she had ever received in her life, and the most difficult to obey. She hung, clinging with both hands, still vainly seeking a foothold, desperately afraid to relinquish her hold and trust herself unreservedly to his single-handed strength. But, as he waited, it came to her that ...
— The Obstacle Race • Ethel M. Dell

... war-time," said Benjamin Franklin, "the bill comes later." Franklin, who was a pioneer in many so fields, seems to have been a pioneer in eugenics also by arguing that a standing army diminishes the size and breed of the human species. He had, however, no definite facts wherewith to demonstrate conclusively that proposition. Even to-day, it cannot be said that there is complete agreement among biologists as to the effect of war on the race. Thus we find a distinguished American zoologist, ...
— Essays in War-Time - Further Studies In The Task Of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis

... even the tiniest cottages, and at least one concert-room, with a stage properly fitted up, in even the smallest village. The Opera, too, was a great source of pleasure to many. But it was a period of transition—men were being demobilized freely, and it was with a sigh of relief that something definite had been fixed, as well as with many sighs of regret, that orders were eventually received that the 6th Division, as such, would cease to exist in the middle of March 1919. Farewell parades were held, farewell ...
— A Short History of the 6th Division - Aug. 1914-March 1919 • Thomas Owen Marden

... spent at the McCartys' had strengthened his honorable intentions and given them that definite purpose that is sometimes vulgarly ...
— The Varmint • Owen Johnson

... went to Germany in the spring of 1890 to engage singers and select a repertory he carried with him a definite policy, formulated by the directors, which was the fruit of a sentimental passion for the amiable Italian muse and a spirit of thrift. Italian opera under their own management seeming still impracticable because of its expensiveness, the ...
— Chapters of Opera • Henry Edward Krehbiel

... also. All of the vegetables were brought up from the cellar, of course, and as the weather has been very cold, the celery and other tender things were frozen. General and Mrs. Bourke have returned, and at once insisted upon our going to their house, but as there was nothing definite about the time when we will get our house, we said "No." We are taking our meals with them, however, and Hang is there also, teaching their new Chinaman. But I can assure you that I am more than cross. If Major Bagley had selected the house the first time he came, or even if ...
— Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888 • Frances M.A. Roe

... Nothing definite is known of Brest till about 1240, when it was ceded by a count of Leon to John I., duke of Brittany. In 1342 John of Montfort gave it up to the English, and it did not finally leave their hands till 1397. Its medieval importance was great enough to give rise to the saying, "He is not duke of Brittany ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various

... you must rather carry out and make provision for the smaller measure, and add to it, if it proves too small—{21} the total number of soldiers, I say, must be two thousand, and of these five hundred must be Athenians, beginning from whatever age you think good: they must serve for a definite period—not a long one, but one to be fixed at your discretion—and in relays. The rest must be mercenaries. With these must be cavalry, two hundred in number, of whom at least fifty must be Athenians, as with the infantry; ...
— The Public Orations of Demosthenes, volume 1 • Demosthenes

... insisted upon by his lordship. It feels that this is not warfare as the Council understands warfare, and the people share the feelings of the Council. It is felt that it would be worthier and more commendable if Lord Wellington were to measure himself in battle with the French, making a definite attempt to stem the tide ...
— The Snare • Rafael Sabatini

... Lord, be done,' and said it from my heart, did I get peace. Then I began to see that the girl had come into my life, not to be my wife, but to turn my life into new channels. I, with the rest of the world of which I was a part, had no definite views or high ideals of life, death, 'and that vast forever;' and something was needed to change my easy-going course. When I realized that Julia Elston had been the instrument of the Lord in doing that, I had ...
— Story of Chester Lawrence • Nephi Anderson

... purpose being immediate and practical; and on no theory of religion could these hurried offices be of much consequence. We forget them in speculating how one who had been always so desirous of beauty, but desired it always in such definite and precise forms, as hands or flowers or hair, looked forward now into the vague land, and experienced ...
— The Renaissance - Studies in Art and Poetry • Walter Pater

... however, could he gain definite information that might assure him positively that the child was ahead of him. Not a single native they questioned had seen or heard of this other party, though nearly all had had direct experience with the Russian or had ...
— The Beasts of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... the only person in whom Eugene's engagement to Kate Bernard inspired some surprise. But neither he nor any one else succeeded in formulating very definite reasons for the feeling. Kate was a beauty, and a beauty of a type undeniably orthodox and almost aristocratic. She was tall and slight, her nose was the least trifle arched, her fingers tapered, and so, it was believed, did her feet. Her hair was golden, her mouth was small, and her accomplishments ...
— Father Stafford • Anthony Hope

... not known, either, whether he believed in chance, or in those tiny eventualities which so often impress a definite color on subsequent years. The trend of his mind was to move forward rather than back, and it is questionable if he gave much thought to second causes. The fruit dangled before his eye even as he planted the vine, and if this induced in him a certain ruthlessness it could only be because those ...
— The Rapids • Alan Sullivan

... as may serve to show them struggling, joying, sorrowing, loving. If the incidents will do this for us we are satisfied. It is not necessary that those incidents should be made to go through cunning evolutions to a definite end. Each is admirable in itself, and admirably adapted to its immediate purpose. ...
— Life of Charles Dickens • Frank Marzials

... the bundle of arrows held in one talon or the other of the eagle. On a few of our earlier coins the number of these arrows was four or six, or even more; but commonly there have been three, and now they are uniformly of that number. They are arranged at a pretty definite angle. The two obliquely transverse ones are in position and in form precisely like the two flashes of lightning across the thunderbolt of Zeus, only the zigzag lines have been straightened into arrow-shafts. It seems highly probable that the point of the bolt ...
— The New England Magazine Volume 1, No. 6, June, 1886, Bay State Monthly Volume 4, No. 6, June, 1886 • Various

... his Imperial Majesty has heard the details which Your Highness has communicated to him in his last despatches, on the question of the marriage of the Emperor of the French. It would be difficult to form any definite conclusion from the different data that reach us. It is impossible not to see a certain official character in the explanations, vague as they are, which the Minister of Foreign Affairs has had with Your ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand

... Gortz, and while he was taken a prisoner to the archduke, I was allowed to pursue my way. I had many difficulties and dangers, and was some weeks in finding my way back. Nothing was known of the king when I returned. Indeed, I was the first bearer of any definite news concerning him since the day when he sailed from Acre. Three weeks ago, as you may have learned, the news came that he is now detained in captivity by the emperor, who demanded his delivery by the Archduke John, into whose hands he first fell. But where he is no one exactly ...
— The Boy Knight • G.A. Henty

... better acquainted with Holman Sommers than with Starr, whose name she still did not know, although he had stayed an hour talking to Vic and praising her cooking the night before. She did not, for all the time she had spent with him, know anything definite about Starr, whereas she presently knew a great deal about Holman Sommers, and approved of ...
— Starr, of the Desert • B. M Bower

... grow tired of watching Captain West. In a way he bears a sort of resemblance to several of Washington's portraits. He is six feet of aristocratic thinness, and has a very definite, leisurely and stately grace of movement. His thinness is almost ascetic. In appearance and manner he is the ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London

... pretend that he was a precursor of the Darwinian theory. Evolution, as a possible explanation of the ordering of the universe, is a great deal older than either Emerson or Darwin. What Darwin did was to work out in detail and with masses of minute evidence a definite hypothesis of the specific conditions under which new forms are evolved. Emerson, of course, had no definite hypothesis of this sort, nor did he possess any of the knowledge necessary to give it value. But it was his good fortune that some ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Vol. 1, Essay 5, Emerson • John Morley

... said by the ladies from Von Blonk Park in relation to this proposed excursion; but for some reason of his own the commander had not yet given a definite answer. They all attended the same church at home, and the captain and the two ladies were members of it. While the others of the party were deeply interested in the Biblical history, they were not so enthusiastic ...
— Asiatic Breezes - Students on The Wing • Oliver Optic

... prospect of affluence; justice restored to the full exercise of her balance and sword; religion separated from fanaticism, and reinstated in decent splendor; a hereditary King, a regular government, ancient institutions, definite laws, certain privileges, personal safety, and the restitution of property—such were the glorious themes which employed the thoughts of the contemplative, elevated the devotion of the pious, and made the unreflecting multitude frantic with wild delight. No period of English ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West

... intervals, such as you see where gravel pits break a green common. Not a sign of life or movement, save some wheeling crows. And yet down there, within a mile or so, is the population of a city. Far away a single train is puffing at the back of the German lines. We are here on a definite errand. Away to the right, nearly three miles off, is a small red house, dim to the eye but clear in the glasses, which is suspected as a German post. It is to go up this afternoon. The gun is some distance ...
— A Visit to Three Fronts • Arthur Conan Doyle

... service of the village falls on very few, because of these and other like exemptions by the gobernadorcillos and cabezas for money, by which they themselves alone profit. For this reason, one must assign a definite number of bilangos or constables, outside of which number the gobernadorcillo cannot assign others. It appears sufficient that in villages of five hundred tributes twelve bilangos be appointed, so that each ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 (Vol 28 of 55) • Various

... to sum up the evidence and reach definite conclusions about the motives which led men of the warring nations to kill one another year after year in those fields of slaughter, the ideals for which so many millions of men laid down their lives, and the effect ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs

... been the greatest height he had ever reached. When he went to Alaska he carried with him all the hypsometrical instruments that were used in the ascent as well as his personal climbing equipment. There was no definite likelihood that the opportunity would come to him of attempting the ascent, but he wished to be prepared with instruments of adequate scale in case the opportunity should come; and Hicks, of London, made ...
— The Ascent of Denali (Mount McKinley) - A Narrative of the First Complete Ascent of the Highest - Peak in North America • Hudson Stuck

... mental life, are, in his view, reactions of the immaterial soul to sense stimuli, which operate merely as occasional causes. On the other hand, he emphasizes more strongly than Condillac the dependence of psychical phenomena on physiological conditions, and endeavors to show definite brain vibrations as the basis not only of habit, memory, and the association of ideas, but also of the higher mental operations. In harmony with these views he adheres to determinism, and finds the motive of all endeavor: in self-love, and its ultimate aim in happiness. To the latter ...
— History Of Modern Philosophy - From Nicolas of Cusa to the Present Time • Richard Falckenberg

... each other in different directions. His old, youthful ideal of Mrs. Vostrand finally perished in its presence, though still he could not blame her for wishing to see her daughter well married after having seen her married so ill. He asked himself, without getting any very definite response, whether Mrs. Vostrand had always been this kind of a woman, or had grown into it by the use of arts which her peculiar plan of life had rendered necessary to her. He remembered the intelligent toleration of Cynthia in speaking of her, and his indignation ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... of sucking is pleasurable in itself, and so the baby begins to suck his thumb or his quilts or his rattle. Later, this impulse to stimulate the nerves about the mouth finds its satisfaction in kissing, and still later it plays a definite part in the wooing process; but at first the child is self-sufficient and finds his pleasure entirely within himself. Other regions of the body yield similar pleasure. We often find a tiny child rubbing his genital organs or his thighs or taking exaggerated pleasure in riding on someone's ...
— Outwitting Our Nerves - A Primer of Psychotherapy • Josephine A. Jackson and Helen M. Salisbury

... sarcastic reference drawn, I imagine from Palamon and Arcite) were Coleridge and Wordsworth, then in Germany. Nothing definite is known, but they seem quite amicably to have decided to ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas

... orders came for us to go to Kruisstraat at once. We marched by Companies, and on arrival bivouacked in a field close to the Indian Transport Lines, where we met several Battalions of the 3rd Division on their way up to Hooge, though they were unable to tell us anything definite about what had happened. The wildest rumours were heard everywhere, that the Germans had used burning oil, vitriol, and almost every other acid ever invented, that the salient was broken, that our Division ...
— The Fifth Leicestershire - A Record Of The 1/5th Battalion The Leicestershire Regiment, - T.F., During The War, 1914-1919. • J.D. Hills

... "For certain very definite reasons with which you needn't trouble yourself just now," Lutchester pronounced. "The formula has gone, without a doubt, but it certainly isn't in the hands of any of the ...
— The Pawns Count • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... recognises the incompatibility of the Infinite with the Definite; of a Being who loves, who thinks, who hates; of an Actus purus who is called jealous, wrathful and revengeful, with an Eternal that makes for righteousness. In the presence of the endless contradictions, which spring from the idea ...
— The Kasidah of Haji Abdu El-Yezdi • Richard F. Burton

... downcast. His news was to be read in his countenance. "The task appointed me was difficult," said he. "I have done my best. Yet I could scarce go about it in such a fashion as to draw definite conclusions. But this I know, my lord, that he will be reckless indeed if he dares to take up arms against thee and challenge thine authority. So much at least I am ...
— The Sea-Hawk • Raphael Sabatini

... a precedent so dangerous to the stability of State government, if not of the National Government also, should be recognized by Congress. I earnestly ask that Congress will take definite action in this matter to relieve the Executive from acting upon questions which should be decided by the legislative branch of ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Ulysses S. Grant • James D. Richardson

... it sets forth in a definite shape a picture of the struggle in which so many perish, and because every individual life is implicated in it through memory. Ah! I, hapless wretch, should have been too happy to hear the sound of those heavenly voices I ...
— Gambara • Honore de Balzac

... as they are extremely fine and flexible. Moreover, owing to the hypocotyls being soon developed and becoming arched, the whole radicle is quickly displaced and confusion is thus caused. A large number of trials were made, but without any definite result, excepting on two occasions, when out of 23 radicles 10 were deflected from the attached squares [page 170] of card, and 13 were not acted on. Rather large squares, though difficult to affix, seemed more efficient ...
— The Power of Movement in Plants • Charles Darwin

... with truth, that "before any definite solution of the Homeric problem could derive scientific support from such analogies" (with epics of other peoples), "it would be necessary to show that the particular conditions under which the Homeric poems appear in early Greece had been reproduced with sufficient closeness ...
— Homer and His Age • Andrew Lang

... you did wrong," was the somewhat definite answer. "I wish I had been alongside of you when the request ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner

... during the First Empire, offers a striking example of that mania for the control of the general will which philosophers had so attractively taught and Napoleon so profitably practised. It is the first definite outcome of a desire to subject education and learning to wholesale regimental methods, and to break up the old-world bowers of culture by State-worked steam-ploughs. His aims ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose

... fears, the flute, the violin, the violoncello, promising, urging, entreating, inspiring; the life beset with trials, lured with pleasures, hesitating, doubting, questioning; its purpose at length grows more certain and fixed, the bell tolling becomes a prolonged undertone, the flow of a definite life; the music goes on, twining round it, now one sweet instrument and now many, in strife or accord, all the influences of earth and heaven and the base underworld meeting and warring over the aspiring soul; the struggle becomes more earnest, the undertone is louder and clearer; the accompaniment ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... designated. Owing to the sparseness of the population there was little danger of dispute as to boundaries, and this segregation in the majority of cases had been neglected before our acquisition of the country. From the size of the grants and the want of definite boundaries, arose nearly all the difficulties and complaints of the early settlers. Upon the discovery of gold, immigrants from all parts of the world rushed into the country, increasing the population in one or two years ...
— Personal Reminiscences of Early Days in California with Other Sketches; To Which Is Added the Story of His Attempted Assassination by a Former Associate on the Supreme Bench of the State • Stephen Field; George C. Gorham

... thought, the ground or possibility of being. The fundamental principle of thought is, according to him, the law of identity; logical thinking is real thinking. The matter upon which thought operated is in itself indefinite and is rendered definite through the action of thought. Bardili worked out his idea in a one-sided manner. He held that thought has in itself no power of development, and ultimately reduced it to arithmetical computation. He published Grundriss der ersten Logik (Stuttgart, 1800); ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various

... but that John was in the right. How in the right, and how suspected of being in the wrong, she could not divine. Some vague idea that he had never really assumed the name of Handford, and that there was a remarkable likeness between him and that mysterious person, was her nearest approach to any definite explanation. But John was triumphant; that much was made apparent; and she ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens

... sovereignty, and governments included in this publication are not independent, and others are not officially recognized by the US Government. "Independent state" refers to a people politically organized into a sovereign state with a definite territory. "Dependencies" and "areas of special sovereignty" refer to a broad category of political entities that are associated in some way with an independent state. "Country" names used in the table of contents or for page headings are usually the short-form ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency

... memorandum pocket-book of this distinguished patriotic soldier. On page 13 is an entry which, on its realization, sent a thrill of joy throughout the land: "April the 17th day, great talk of peace in the year 1783." The definite treaty was not signed until the 30th of September following, and a new Republic ...
— Sketches of Western North Carolina, Historical and Biographical • C. L. Hunter

... Houghton, Osgood & Co. It was better printed, the list of contributors was enlarged, and in many ways the paper was improved. A number of Dwight's friends promised to stand behind it for a year or two with definite sums of money, that it might be improved, and an effort made to reach a larger public. From some cause, not easy to understand, the response on the part of the public was not large enough to warrant the additional outlay; the list of paid contributors had to be abandoned, ...
— Early Letters of George Wm. Curtis • G. W. Curtis, ed. George Willis Cooke

... indeed so intolerable that Fritz is with difficulty dissuaded from running away. The time comes when he will not be dissuaded, resolves that he will endure no longer. There were only three definite accomplices in the wild scheme, which had a very tragical ending. Of the three, Lieutenant Keith, scenting discovery, slipped over the border and so to England; his brother, Page Keith, feeling discovery certain, made confession, after vigilance had actually stopped the prince when he ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XII. - Modern History • Arthur Mee

... was fruitless: nothing definite, nothing tangible, rewarded it. Worse still, a new doubt grew out of it—a doubt whether the motive which Sir Patrick had avowed (through Blanche) was the motive for helping her which was really in ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins

... opinion at the time that anything definite would come of the deliberations of this committee, and the fact, never before publicly stated till this moment, that of the deputies appointed to serve upon it the greater number were men who had ...
— A Short History of the Book of Common Prayer • William Reed Huntington

... very busy man. There were a thousand and one matters demanding his attention, for in the three months' regime of his predecessor many things had come to loose ends. All through Conference territory agents had to be reassured; there were certain legal preparations to be made; definite instructions for a new plan of campaign had to be given to field men and office force. Smith found very little time to consider the two questions which most interested him—of which one was the next probable move ...
— White Ashes • Sidney R. Kennedy and Alden C. Noble

... Frederick, "you don't know how astonishing it is to be raised from the dead. Conceive a man who has taken definite leave of everything that was dear to him in life, who has felt the rattle in his throat, and received extreme unction, and death, death itself, has settled on his flesh and limbs. I still feel death in my joints. And yet I am sitting here in safety, in the pleasant lamplight, ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann

... matters began to take a graver aspect. A definite charge[61] emerged that some ten or eleven years earlier[62] Luis de Leon had translated from the Hebrew into Spanish the Song of Solomon, to which he appended a commentary, also in Spanish. This he did at the request of a nun whose name is incidentally revealed ...
— Fray Luis de Leon - A Biographical Fragment • James Fitzmaurice-Kelly

... the higher plane; and he had opened his spiritual eyes on to a terrible future for which he had had but little preparation. The result had been a kind of paralysis of his whole nature, and henceforward the rest of his life, Sir John maintains, had been darkened by his first definite experience in the mystical region. If indeed this King was none other than Henry the Sixth, Sir John's explanation is an interesting commentary on that melancholy personage. Richard then, according to this hypothesis, found joy in his contemplation because he had been ...
— The History of Richard Raynal, Solitary • Robert Hugh Benson

... that 'atonement' means 'at-one-ment'—the setting at one of those who were at twain before, namely God and man, and they will attach to 'atonement' a definite meaning, which perhaps in no way else it would have possessed for them; and, starting from this point, you may muster the passages in Scripture which describe the sinner's state as one of separation, estrangement, alienation, from God, the Christian's state as one in ...
— On the Study of Words • Richard C Trench

... Plants, their Products and their Culture," has been furthered consistently though results are slow. For the future we should work, 1. For a greater membership. 2. To stimulate interest in horticultural institutions, especially in nut breeding. 3. To give definite information that will encourage nut tree planting for profit by individuals. 4. To promote roadside, memorial and public place planting of nut trees. 5. To discover still more of our valuable native nut ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Sixth Annual Meeting. Rochester, New York, September 1 and 2, 1915 • Various

... story ends well and naturally. No reader should imagine he has read all this before; the admixture of fairy imagination with the intensely practical things of life is something new, and there is a definite purpose in it all. The book may be labelled intellectual, but the characters always remain very human; thus George, finding himself back in the times of a thousand years ago, says critically, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, March 10th, 1920 • Various

... group of young and vigorous synthesists who are showing with intelligence what they have learned from the newest and most engaging development of art, which is to say—modern art. The names which have been inserted above are the definite indication, and one may go so far as to say proof, of this argument that modern art in America is rapidly becoming an ...
— Adventures in the Arts - Informal Chapters on Painters, Vaudeville, and Poets • Marsden Hartley

... Not a definite answer could be extracted from him in reply to all the warm invitations to Beachharbour that were lavished on us by the father, while the daughter expatiated on its charms; the rocks I might sketch, the waves and the delicious boating, and above all ...
— Chantry House • Charlotte M. Yonge

... decided that for the present, the engagement should not be known outside the family. The wedding would not take place immediately, William said, and it was just as well to keep the matter to themselves until plans were a little more definite. ...
— Miss Billy • Eleanor H. Porter

... the law of definite chemical combination was firmly established, the circumstance that changes of temperature accompanied most chemical combinations was noticed, and chemists were not long in suspecting that the amount of ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 441, June 14, 1884. • Various

... temperatures. These specimens were obtained late in the season, and their electric responsiveness was much lower than those obtained earlier. The plant, previously kept for five minutes in water at a definite temperature (say 17 deg. C.), was mounted in the vibration apparatus and responses observed. The plant was then dismounted, and replaced in the water-bath at a higher temperature (say 30 deg. C.) again, for five minutes. ...
— Response in the Living and Non-Living • Jagadis Chunder Bose

... to a Conestoga wagon appears under date of 1717 in James Logan's "Account Book, 1712-1719," the manuscript original of which is in the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia. It is likely that the reference was only to a wagon from Conestogoe, and not to a definite type of vehicle.] ...
— Conestoga Wagons in Braddock's Campaign, 1755 • Don H. Berkebile

... Torrens—a feat which would have excited great interest a few years ago—and made for Lake Pando, or Lake Hope, as it is better known. From here he went north, crossing the country so often described, wherein Cooper's Creek is lost in many watercourses. He now got more definite details about the whites that he had formerly heard of, and pressed forward to the place indicated by the natives, and on the 18th October, formed a depot camp for his main party, and started ahead in company with two ...
— The History of Australian Exploration from 1788 to 1888 • Ernest Favenc

... consulted. There was for a time a real danger of war. In the end peace was maintained by the cession by France of considerable areas in the Congo as the price of German abstention from intervening in a sphere where she had no right to intervene. But Morocco was left under a definite French protectorate. ...
— The Expansion of Europe - The Culmination of Modern History • Ramsay Muir

... parents and guardians that no matter what the girl's circumstances may be, she ought always to have an abundance of employment. The ideas of obligation and of duty should not be discarded when school and college life cease. The well-to-do girl should be encouraged to take up some definite employment which would fill her life and provide her with interests and duties. Any other arrangement tends to make the time between leaving school or college and a possible marriage not only a wasted time but also a seed-time during which a crop is sown of bad habits, laziness of body, and ...
— Youth and Sex • Mary Scharlieb and F. Arthur Sibly

... around on the Capitol Avenue side. As I was passing the right wing of the building I saw lights in the governor's room, and in a sudden fit of desperation resolved to go up and have it out with Bucks. It was abnormally foolish, I'll confess. I had nothing definite to go on; but I—well, I was keyed up to just about the right pitch, and I thought I might ...
— The Grafters • Francis Lynde

... sum was spent on computers. In his retirement the work made good progress, and on Dec. 31st, 1882, he made the following note: "I finished and put in general order the final tables of Equations of Variations. This is a definite point in the Lunar Theory.... I hope shortly to take up severely the numerical operations of the Lunar Theory from the very beginning." The work was continued steadily through 1883, and on Mar. 24th, 1884, he made ...
— Autobiography of Sir George Biddell Airy • George Biddell Airy

... a Sutra the case is different. It comes from the same root as the word "sew," and means, indeed, a thread, suggesting, therefore, a close knit, consecutive chain of argument. Not only has each Sutra a definite place in the system, but further, taken out of this place, it will be almost meaningless, and will by no means be self-evident. So I have thought best to adhere to the original word. The Sutras ...
— The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali • Charles Johnston

... been restricted to members of the Royal Family alone, when used with the Christian name only. A great deal of this feeling was still left; and it will be commonly found (I do not say universally) that when persons of the sixteenth century used the definite article instead of the possessive pronoun, before a title and a Christian name, they meant to indicate that they regarded him of whom they spoke as a royal person. Let me instance Lord Guilford Dudley. Those who called him "the Lord ...
— Robin Tremain - A Story of the Marian Persecution • Emily Sarah Holt

... sanguine," Mr. Ruskin went on; "but there is certainly strong ground for hope. I shall be able to give a more definite opinion, in the course of a few hours. He must, of course, be kept perfectly quiet; with no more nourishment than is absolutely necessary, and that in the shape of beef tea. I should make him a bed here. We will manage to slide a door under him, ...
— A Final Reckoning - A Tale of Bush Life in Australia • G. A. Henty

... noted the shanties which were derived from popular songs, also the type which contained a definite narrative. Except where a popular song was adapted, the form was usually rhymed or more often unrhymed couplets. The topics were many and varied, but the chief ones were: (1) popular heroes such as Napoleon, and 'Santy Anna.' ...
— The Shanty Book, Part I, Sailor Shanties • Richard Runciman Terry

... fellow, after all. He told me, just as you have, and as Hardy did, the words he spoke in passion. He was afraid, he said, they might be brought up against him. And so he came to 'own up,' and account for his time; and to beg me to believe that he never had any definite thought of harm. I told him I did believe it; and then the poor fellow, rough as he is, turned pale, and burst into tears. Last night gave him a lesson, I think, that will go far to take the hardness out of him. Blasland ...
— Faith Gartney's Girlhood • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney

... who received from the king full powers to treat with Llewelyn, and a promise that Henry would accept any terms that he thought fit to conclude. Llewelyn thereupon sent ambassadors to Shrewsbury, and the negotiations went on so smoothly that on September 25 a definite treaty of peace was signed. On Michaelmas day Henry met Llewelyn at Montgomery, received his homage, and witnessed the formal ratification of ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout

... emotions he had closed a lid. Yet he had set out with a vague reluctance to Little Beeding; and once his motor-car had passed Hindhead and dipped to the weald of Sussex the reluctance had grown to a definite regret that he should once more have come into this country. His recollections were of a dim far-off time, so dim that he could hardly believe that he had any very close relation with the young struggling ...
— Witness For The Defense • A.E.W. Mason

... pawn all her jewels. She pawned them on these first two occasions I've described. I say she pawned them, but I never had definite proof of it. However, I was sure of it. I don't know that she had come to this in Furmville. If she hadn't she ...
— The Winning Clue • James Hay, Jr.

... Stanford University, and permit wide liberty of choice to both teacher and pupil. Few triumphs of the uniformitarians, who sacrifice individual needs to mechanical convenience in dealing with youth in masses, have been so sad as marking off and standardizing a definite quantum of requirements here. Instead of irrigating a wide field, the well-springs of literary interest are forced to cut a deep canyon and leave wide desert plains of ignorance on either side. Besides imitation, which reads what others do, is the desire to read something ...
— Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene • G. Stanley Hall

... Estates, because he did not go daily to business in the city, as most of them did; nor did he lead a life of brilliant amusement like the Airedales, the wealthy people whose great house was near by. Mr. Poodle, the conscientious curate, had called several times but was not able to learn anything definite. There was a little card-index of parishioners, which it was Mr. Poodle's duty to fill in with details of each person's business, charitable inclinations, and what he could do to amuse a Church Sociable. ...
— Where the Blue Begins • Christopher Morley

... have?" instantly the brain becomes a blank, and not a single suggestion is forthcoming. The Garnetts stared at one another in labouring silence. It was too late for parties; too early for pantomimes, a definite gift, failed to meet the case, since each girl thought with a pang, "What's the use? I might not be here to enjoy it!" Extra indulgences, such as sitting up at night, or being "let off" early morning practising, did not appear sufficiently important, since, with a little scheming, ...
— A College Girl • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... other prospect has been opened to Mr. Sawin, and that he has not made this great sacrifice without some definite understanding in regard to a seat in the cabinet or a foreign mission. It may be supposed that we of Jaalam were not untouched by a feeling of villatic pride in beholding our townsman occupying so large a ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell

... take some rest and refreshment before going back in to the woods. While they were sitting in the kitchen, Uncle Alec, who was exceedingly fond of Bert, and felt more concerned about him than he cared to show, having no appetite for food, went off toward the red gate with no definite purpose except that ...
— Bert Lloyd's Boyhood - A Story from Nova Scotia • J. McDonald Oxley

... winter! Whether I may succeed in this endeavor or no I cannot yet say, but I am trying HARD. So in the mean time don't contradict the rumor. In the course of a few mails I hope to be able to give you positive and definite information ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields

... indescribable danger; that to-day five thousand orphans and destitute children, constituting the largest family in the world, are being cared for, trained, and put on a different footing to that of shoeless and stockingless, it will be at once understood that a definite and particular direction must be chosen in which to allow one's thoughts and investigations to travel. I immediately select the babies—the little ones of five years old and under; and it is possible that ere the last words of this paper are written, the Doctor may have disappeared from these pages, ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 26, February 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various

... active causes. Since both intellect and nature act for an end, as proved in Phys. ii, 49, the natural agent must have the end and the necessary means predetermined for it by some higher intellect; as the end and definite movement is predetermined for the arrow by the archer. Hence the intellectual and voluntary agent must precede the agent that acts by nature. Hence, since God is first in the order of agents, He must ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas

... been the writer's good fortune to listen to one of Franklin Pierce's public speeches, whether at the bar or elsewhere; nor, by diligent inquiry, has he been able to gain a very definite idea of the mode in which he produces his effects. To me, therefore, his forensic displays are in the same category with those of Patrick Henry, or any other orator whose tongue, beyond the memory of man, has moulded into dust. ...
— Sketches and Studies • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... disappear suddenly," he resumed, "suspicion, if it took a definite shape, would fall on me. You would not be thought of ...
— Cast Adrift • T. S. Arthur

... favors, and not rights, shall obtain from his Majesty a more respectful acceptance; and this his Majesty will think we have reason to expect, when he reflects that he is no more than the chief officer of the people, appointed by the laws, and circumscribed with definite powers, to assist in working the great machine of government, erected for their use, and, consequently, subject to their superintendence; and in order that these, our rights, as well as the invasions of them, may be laid more fully ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson

... of their triumph through Dylks's failure to work the miracle he had promised, and then his failure to show himself in the Temple; but they pushed on with no definite purpose except perhaps to break up some meeting of his followers, when one of the Hounds, yelping and baying in acceptance of their nickname, broke upon them from the woods they were passing with word that they had found Dylks in ...
— The Leatherwood God • William Dean Howells

... surprise and annoyance of the majority of the nobles, brought in a verdict of not guilty. Brembre was not to be allowed thus to escape. The lords sent for two representatives of the various crafts of the city to depose as to Brembre's guilt; but even so, the lords failed to get any definite verdict. At last they sent for the mayor, recorder, and some of the aldermen (seniores) to learn what they had to ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume I • Reginald R. Sharpe

... silent and uncomfortable as he made the effort. How was it Dwight never mixed the two? He began to feel that keen, observing eyes were pretty good things to have. He should certainly cultivate his own, in future! As this undercurrent of musings reached definite conclusion, he ...
— All Aboard - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry

... Tom's cautiousness; he had a way of assenting to a statement without committing himself to definite agreement. I once asked him who the leaders had been in a disorderly incident, being aware that he knew; I suggested the names, but the nearest approach to assent which I could extract was, "If you spakes ...
— Grain and Chaff from an English Manor • Arthur H. Savory

... apply to Lowell's map. We pick out preferably, of course, the most complete and definite curves. The chain of canals of which Acheron and Erebus are members mark out a fairly definite curve. We produce it by eye, preserving the curvature as far as possible, till it cuts the equator. Reading the span on the equator we find' it to be 255 degrees. In the first ...
— The Birth-Time of the World and Other Scientific Essays • J. (John) Joly

... rose to their feet.... Canes were thump'd upon the floor. From all parts of the house angry mutterings. Some left the place, but more remain'd, with exclamations, flush'd faces and eyes. This was the definite utterance, the overt act, which led to the separation. Families diverg'd—even husbands and wives, parents and ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman

... and he ended by thinking of himself. He was under that delicious and dreamy excitement which we experience when the image of a lovely and beloved object begins to mix itself up with our own intense self-love. She was the heroine rather of an indefinite reverie than of definite romance. Instead of his own image alone playing about his fancy, her beautiful face and springing figure intruded their exquisite presence. He no longer mused merely on his own voice and wit: he called up her tones of thrilling power; he imagined her in all the triumph ...
— The Young Duke • Benjamin Disraeli

... moment, and it was not until he had satisfied his usual morning appetite that he remembered the woman and glanced her way again. Two men were sitting at her table, apparently endeavoring to engage her in conversation. They belonged to the type loosely known as men about town, of no definite position, but with money to spend and a turn ...
— Sleeping Fires • Gertrude Atherton

... for what had been for a time indistinct now grew plainer and plainer and shaped itself into what looked to be quite a strong body of men, evidently rough sailors, creeping slowly through a plantation of sugar-cane and making for some definite place. One minute they would be quite indistinct and faint; the next they would stand out quite clearly; and it soon became plain that they were well-armed, for from time to time there was a faint gleam that Murray made out to be shed from the ...
— Hunting the Skipper - The Cruise of the "Seafowl" Sloop • George Manville Fenn

... since March. Mirah was no longer so critically placed with regard to the Meyricks, and Deronda's own position had been undergoing a change which had just been crowned by the revelation of his birth. The new opening toward the future, though he would not trust in any definite visions, inevitably shed new lights, and influenced his mood toward past and present; hence, what Hans called his hope now seemed to Deronda, not a mischievous unreasonableness which roused his indignation, but an unusually persistent bird-dance of an extravagant fancy, and he ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot

... traced to within 6 inches of the inner wall of the kiva. This also may be the remains of a chimney-like structure. There are other points in the canyon where the same feature occurs, but in none of them is the evidence of an opening or doorway more definite than ...
— The Cliff Ruins of Canyon de Chelly, Arizona • Cosmos Mindeleff

... Faraday would have subscribed to what is here written; probably his habitual caution would have prevented him from committing himself to anything so definite. But some such idea filled his mind and coloured his language through all the later years of his life. I dare not say that he has been always successful in the treatment of these theoretic notions. In his speculations he mixes together light and darkness ...
— Faraday As A Discoverer • John Tyndall

... case how could she again come to terms with St John and St Nicholas? And how was she to live? Should she lose her lover, as she now told herself would certainly be her fate, what possibility of life was left to her? From day to day and from week to week she had put off to a future hour any definite consideration of what she and her father should do in their poverty, believing that it might be postponed till her marriage would make all things easy. Her future mode of living had often been discussed ...
— Nina Balatka • Anthony Trollope

... he began his explanations over again. Philippe next repeated his, in less definite terms, this time, and with a hesitation which old Morestal, absorbed in his grievances, did not observe, but which could ...
— The Frontier • Maurice LeBlanc

... The definite object proposed in this work is an examination of the general history of Europe and America with particular reference to the effect of sea power upon the course of that history. Historians generally ...
— The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 • A. T. Mahan

... decided where that "next" was to be—all these questions we had not considered at all. I, for my part, was curiously uninterested in the future. I was enjoying myself in an idle, irresponsible way, and I could not seem to concentrate my thoughts upon a definite course of action. If I did permit myself to think I found my thoughts straying to my work and there they faced the same impassable wall. I felt no inclination to write; I was just as certain as ever that I should never write again. Thinking along this line only brought ...
— Kent Knowles: Quahaug • Joseph C. Lincoln



Words linked to "Definite" :   explicit, decisive, definite quantity, law of definite proportions, definiteness, definite integral, decided, distinct, clear, defined



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