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Expedient   Listen
adjective
Expedient  adj.  
1.
Hastening or forward; hence, tending to further or promote a proposed object; fit or proper under the circumstances; conducive to self-interest; desirable; advisable; advantageous; sometimes contradistinguished from right or principled. "It is expedient for you that I go away." "Nothing but the right can ever be expedient, since that can never be true expediency which would sacrifice a greater good to a less."
2.
Quick; expeditious. (Obs.) "His marches are expedient to this town."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Expedient" Quotes from Famous Books



... long bearing necessary, producing enormous friction. This objection obtains equally with all pickets having expanding butts, and is a sufficient reason for their inferior accuracy to that of solid pickets fitted to the grooves at the muzzle with a patch. General Jacob says,—"I have tried every expedient I could think of as a substitute for the greased patch for rifle-balls, but had always to return to this"; and every experienced rifleman will agree with him. Yet both English and American (governmental) experiments ignore the fact, that ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various

... dread of a possible separation he proposed to fly with her to America, to the Alps, to "some unsuspected isle in the far seas;" and she suggested the idea of feigning death, like Juliet, and rising from the tomb. Neither expedient was called for. When the Count went to Bologna, in August, with his wife, Lord Byron was allowed to follow; and—after consoling himself during an excursion which the married pair made to their estate, by hovering about her empty rooms and ...
— Byron • John Nichol

... differed from Vivens, who thought it right to resist force by force; and in the event of any attempt being made to capture him, he considered it expedient to be constantly provided with arms. Yet he had only once occasion to use them, and it was the first and last time. The reward of ten thousand livres being now offered for the apprehension of Brousson and Vivens, or five thousand for either, an active search was made throughout the province. At ...
— The Huguenots in France • Samuel Smiles

... systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which also I believe—"That government is best which governs not at all"; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have. Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient. The objections which have been brought against a standing army, and they are many and weighty, and deserve to prevail, may also at last be brought against a standing government. The standing ...
— On the Duty of Civil Disobedience • Henry David Thoreau

... therefore, ordered here to impress him with the necessity of doing so, and, if he does not, we are to batter down his town, to take possession of his fleet—for it is said that he has got one—and to make such other reprisals as may be deemed expedient to bring him to reason. I heard the captain say that he paid a visit with one of the principal merchants residing here, who has transactions with the prince, to a Japanese official of high rank in the place—I forget his name—and ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston

... England is a very good thing, if it were not attended with an ugly circumstance of returning to Ireland. It is a shame you do not persuade your ministers to keep me on that side, if it were but by a court expedient of keeping me in prison for a plotter; but at the same time I must tell you, that such journeys very much shorten my life, for a month here is very much ...
— Selected English Letters (XV - XIX Centuries) • Various

... than any one woman breathing." Her caprice was so stubborn, that neither interest, nor threats, nor punishment had the least power over it; she herself declared that she could not command it, but that it for the most part commanded her. The best expedient to induce her to sing when she was in a bad humor was to prevail upon her favorite lover to place himself in the principal seat of the pit, or the front of a box, and, if they were on good terms—which was seldom the case, however—she should address her tender airs to him, and ...
— Great Singers, First Series - Faustina Bordoni To Henrietta Sontag • George T. Ferris

... than laudable. It is an imposition on public prostitutes, a duty upon the societies of dancing-girls,—those seminaries from which Mr. Hastings has selected an administrator of justice and governor of kingdoms. Debi Sing thought it expedient to farm this tax,—not only because he neglected no sort of gain, but because he regarded it as no contemptible means of power and influence. Accordingly, in plain terms, he opened a legal brothel, out of which he carefully reserved (you may be sure) the very flower of his collection for ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. X. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... you, my lad," said the captain. "I would not willingly have my name go out as one who would maim and torture a brave lad. My desperation is my excuse for my expedient of last evening. I want you to promise to keep that scene a secret. You may perchance some day have your own sins to cover. I have been reckoned brave and honorable, and I would not have my fair name ...
— The Boy Patriot • Edward Sylvester Ellis

... be expedient to suppress this mode of heating, which must be very inconvenient," Saniel said; "and my 'confrere' and myself will consider the question whether it will not be possible to give you the heat you need with this chimney, without fatiguing ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... procureur, who hitherto had endeavoured to extenuate or discredit the charges brought against Gilles do Retz, tried a last expedient to counterbalance the damaging confessions of Henriet, and to withhold Pontou ...
— The Book of Were-Wolves • Sabine Baring-Gould

... they had no water by which to extinguish the fast-threatening flames; yet in that moment of emergency they thought of an expedient. There were shovels in the waggons; and laying hold of these, they commenced flinging sand over the places that had caught fire, with the intent to smother the incipient blaze. Left alone, and with time, they might have succeeded. But they were not ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid

... Oudant, secretary to the late Princesse of Orange, did discourse of the convenience as to keeping the highways from being deep, by their horses, in Holland (and Flanders where the ground is as miry as ours is), going in their carts and, waggons as ours in coaches, wishing the same here as an expedient to make the ways better, and I think there is something in it, where there is breadth enough. Thence to my office, sent for to meet Mr. Leigh again; from Sir H. Bennet. And he and I, with Wade and his intelligencer ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... level (possibly) of a bed. I have never seen consternation painted in more lively colours than on the faces of my hosts. It was proposed to smuggle me forth into the garden, or to conceal my form under a horsehair sofa which stood against the wall. For the first expedient, as was now plain by the approaching footsteps, there was no longer time; from the second I recoiled ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson

... that she had "gone through": but she did not feel the necessity. She would have preferred much to know what was going to be done, to talk over everything, to be able to express without further sense that they were premature and inappropriate, as much as it would be expedient to express of her own wishes. The absolute repression of those five dark days, during which she had said nothing, had been almost more intolerable to her than years of the repression which was past. When you know that nothing you can do ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant

... operation of great industries, about which have grown up tangles of related and dependent interests, conduct them with some regard to the welfare of others? Before committing ourselves to the dubious and irretraceable course of "Government ownership," or to the infectious expedient of a "pension system," is there anything of promise yet untried?—anything of superior simplicity and easier application? I think so. Make a breach of labor contract by either parly to it a criminal offense punishable by imprisonment "Fine or imprisonment" will not do—the employee, unable ...
— The Shadow On The Dial, and Other Essays - 1909 • Ambrose Bierce

... stronger than itself, perishes by the assistance it receives. But the contrivers of this scheme of Government will not trust solely to the military power, because they are cunning men. Their restless and crooked spirit drives them to rake in the dirt of every kind of expedient. Unable to rule the multitude, they endeavour to raise divisions amongst them. One mob is hired to destroy another; a procedure which at once encourages the boldness of the populace, and justly increases their discontent. Men become ...
— Thoughts on the Present Discontents - and Speeches • Edmund Burke

... the former were. The Gentleman replied al such notes as I speake, are not of mine owne knowledge, yet from such men haue I receiued them, as I dare assure their truth: and but that by naming men wronged by such mates, more displeasure would ensue then were expedient, I could set downe both time, place, and parties. But the certaintie shal suffice without any such offence. As for such as that see their iniuries discouered, and (biting the lip) say to themselues, thus was I made a Conny: ...
— The Third And Last Part Of Conny-Catching. (1592) - With the new deuised knauish arte of Foole-taking • R. G.

... hardly commenced flowing when I experienced a sensible relief, and by the time I had lost about half a moderate basin full, most of the worst symptoms had abandoned me entirely. I nevertheless did not think it expedient to attempt getting on my feet immediately; but, having tied up my arm as well as I could, I lay still for about a quarter of an hour. At the end of this time I arose, and found myself freer from absolute pain of any kind than I had been during the last hour and a quarter of my ascension. The ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 1 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe

... he now came to complain of the treatment he had received. Perceiving that I was not in a humour to listen to his story, he shifted the conversation to my own, and observed, that I had been extremely ill-used. I told him that I was of a different opinion; that it was not only just, but expedient, that a young man of Mr. —'s fortune should think of making some alliance to strengthen and support the interest of his family; and that I had nothing to accuse him of but his letting me remain so long in ignorance of his intention. He then gave me to understand, ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett

... other promise to pay visits for next week and next, and told everybody, with considerable dignity, that my London season was over for this year, as it assuredly is—and I shall be worried no more, and let walk in the garden, and go to bed at ten o'clock, and get done with what is most expedient to do, and my 'flesh shall come again like a little child's,' and one day, oh the day, I shall see you with my own, own eyes ... for, how little you understand me; or rather, yourself,—if you think I would dare see you, ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett

... resolutions won by a fair majority, and again, in February, 1821, he secured the almost unanimous assent of the House to a resolution of sympathy with South America. Another resolution, expressing the readiness of that body to support the president whenever he should think it expedient to recognize the republics, passed by a vote of 86 to 68, and the triumphant Clay was placed at the head of a committee to wait on the president with this resolution.[Footnote: Ibid., 2229, and 2 Sess., 1081, 1091; ...
— Rise of the New West, 1819-1829 - Volume 14 in the series American Nation: A History • Frederick Jackson Turner

... was sometimes abused, but it certainly ought not to be regarded as a mere usurpation or engine of tyranny. Before the invention of writing, and during the infancy of the art, an aristocracy invested with judicial privileges formed the only expedient by which accurate preservation of the customs of the race or tribe could be at all approximated to. Their genuineness was, so far as possible, insured by confiding them to the recollection of a limited portion ...
— Ancient Law - Its Connection to the History of Early Society • Sir Henry James Sumner Maine

... proper, appropriate, congruous, adequate, expedient, congruent, apposite, qualified, eligible, competent, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming

... restraint. Natural liberty gives place in organized society to civil liberty, which is a much more modest and limited thing. "Civil liberty," says Blackstone, "is no other than natural liberty so far restrained by human laws as is necessary and expedient for the general advantage of the public."[34] In the same sense Austin defines it as "the liberty from legal obligation which is left or granted by a sovereign government to any of its own subjects."[35] But the most luminous definition is that of Montesquieu, who says: "La liberte ...
— Freedom In Service - Six Essays on Matters Concerning Britain's Safety and Good Government • Fossey John Cobb Hearnshaw

... he had suggested long before. Believing, moreover, that European princes had by this time lost their delicate sensibility, it seemed no monstrous crime to consolidate his empire for its commercial siege by the simple expedient of removing the Duke of Oldenburg from his hereditary domains which bordered on the ocean and offering him the inland sovereignty of Erfurt, or by adopting the alternative expedient of leaving him to enjoy ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane

... in Amos may have been inserted by a post-exilic editor, thus accounting for the occurrence of the same astronomical terms as are found in Job, which he assigns to the exilic or post-exilic period. This seems a dangerous expedient, as it might with equal reason be used in many other directions. Further, it entirely fails to explain the real difficulty that k[i]mah and k[)e]s[i]l have not been found as Babylonian constellation names, and that their astronomical ...
— The Astronomy of the Bible - An Elementary Commentary on the Astronomical References - of Holy Scripture • E. Walter Maunder

... eye, who was dressed in the ragged vestiges of a uniform that reflected both the poverty of his environment and, inversely, the richness of his commanding officer. For in China the officer enriches himself by the twofold expedient of drawing pay for soldiers who have no existence, except in his statement of claim, and by diverting the pay of his soldiers who do exist from their ...
— An Australian in China - Being the Narrative of a Quiet Journey Across China to Burma • George Ernest Morrison

... That expedient succeeded only so far as to save them from a fall, for the fog crawled along the damp earth and seemed to cling to it. It was very hard walking, and they were so exhausted by it that they stopped when they at last found a dry ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand

... set we could not fail to have been so. Not, we knew, that so small a craft as ours would be considered worth overhauling; but in case we might give information of the pirate's whereabouts, it might be thought expedient to put us out of the way. So we feared. We therefore watched the progress of the Mignonne and the brig with intense interest, earnestly hoping that the latter would lead the pirate a long chase before she was captured, if she could ...
— James Braithwaite, the Supercargo - The Story of his Adventures Ashore and Afloat • W.H.G. Kingston

... force of his desire, was somehow due to him a thing only momentarily out of his hands, like one's brief loan to a friend. Presently it would come his way and be his; and it belongs to his sense of security in his right that not once, not even when he remembered it most avidly, did he think of the expedient of buying it from the sick peddler by paying him ...
— Those Who Smiled - And Eleven Other Stories • Perceval Gibbon

... the lists of the various city stores and their estimated contents, missing from Mr. Woslosky's own inconspicuous trunk in a storage house. On that had been based the plan for feeding the revolution, by the simple expedient of exchanging by organized pillage the contents of the city stores for food stuffs from the farmers ...
— A Poor Wise Man • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... boatmen at Avalon, has fixed ideas about the Tuna Club and its records and requirements. It is all right, I suppose, for a club to have rules, and not count or credit an angler who breaks a rod or is driven to the expedient I had proposed. But I do not fish for clubs or records. I fish for the fun, the excitement, the thrill of the game, and I would rather let my fish go than ...
— Tales of Fishes • Zane Grey

... Llorente, Schoelcher, the Abb Grgoire, and others, conclusively show. That historian says that Las Casa, disheartened by the difficulties which he met from the colonists and their political and ecclesiastical friends at home, had recourse to a new expedient, to solicit leave for the Spaniards to trade in negroes, "in order that their labor on the plantations and in the mines might render that of the natives less severe." This proposition, made in 1517, has been wrongly supposed to signalize the first introduction of blacks into America. Nor was ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various

... it be expedient for her to accept Lord Fawn when he came? She could not, of course, be sure that any renewed offer would be the result of his visit;—but she thought it probable that with care she might bring him to that. Why should he come to her if he himself had no such intention? Her ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope

... Jimmy shouted: "Sure, bhoys, let's hitch to that and give it to 'em. Lord knows their black souls need it." He pointed to a great barrel half full of whitewash standing in a wagon ready for delivery next day at the little steamer dock, where a coat of whitewash on the wharf and shed was the usual expedient to take the place ...
— The Preacher of Cedar Mountain - A Tale of the Open Country • Ernest Thompson Seton

... irritated it, and driven the foreign substance farther still into the delicate nerves of the sensitive organ. At length a skilful young physician thought of a new expedient. He came one day without lancet and probes, and holding in his hand a small but powerful magnet, which he kept before the wounded eye, as close as it could bear. Immediately the piece of steel began to move toward the powerful attraction, and soon flew up to meet ...
— Days of Heaven Upon Earth • Rev. A. B. Simpson

... great exertions which were making in Carthage to send Hasdrubal and Massinissa with a numerous army over the Pyrenees, resolved to despatch to Spain new reinforcements and an extraordinary general of higher rank, the nomination of whom they deemed it expedient to leave to the people. For long—so runs the story—nobody announced himself as ready to take in hand the complicated and perilous business; but at last a young officer of twenty-seven, Publius Scipio (son of the general ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen

... father," said Doctor Chord modestly, "I may be able to suggest some expedient way of gaining entrance ...
— The O'Ruddy - A Romance • Stephen Crane

... my suit, to throw myself at her feet, and woo her boldly, as man woos woman. But this poor, unhappy, friendless, lovely girl! What could I do? Day and night I pondered the problem, and at last an expedient occurred to me. ...
— Caesar's Column • Ignatius Donnelly

... the facts are these—yes, I fear it is a question of money, after all. The Joy-bell is a new magazine; we are most anxious to extend its circulation by every means in our power. We have hit on what we consider a novel, but effective expedient. Each contributor to our pages is expected to subscribe for a hundred copies per month of our magazine—these copies he is asked to disseminate as widely as possible amongst his friends. The magazine is only sixpence a month. Of course you get your ...
— The Palace Beautiful - A Story for Girls • L. T. Meade

... a sudden and unpremeditated act cannot be maintained; but it does not follow that the only alternative is to believe that it was the aim of every measure of the Government for two years before. Catherine had long contemplated it as her last expedient in extremity; but she had decided that she could not resort to it while her son was virtually a minor.[52] She suggested the idea to him in 1570. In that year he gave orders that the Huguenots should be slaughtered at Bourges. The letter is preserved ...
— The History of Freedom • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton

... and Locke, who dug deeper, found the difficulty of keeping out this enemy still to increase; but they laboured honestly in the design. Then Berkeley, who carried on the work, despairing of securing all, bethought himself of an expedient: By giving up the material world, which he thought might be spared without loss, and even with advantage, he hoped by an impregnable partition to secure the world of spirits. But, alas! the Treatise of Human Nature wantonly sapped the foundation of this partition and drowned all in one ...
— Man or Matter • Ernst Lehrs

... brought before the Committee of the whole House of Commons, "That it is expedient to remove all civil disabilities affecting Her Majesty's subjects of the Jewish religion with the like exceptions as are provided by the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829, with reference to Her Majesty's subjects ...
— Diaries of Sir Moses and Lady Montefiore, Volume I • Sir Moses Montefiore

... he was, felt it would be useless to contend with twenty angry men, and he knew the passengers would not befriend him: he therefore deemed it expedient to endeavor to conciliate them by promises he never intended to perform, and, after a few hours' confusion, ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne

... following, Governor Harrison concluded a treaty with the Sacs and Foxes, under his instructions. As this treaty has formed the basis of all the subsequent ones made with these tribes, and as its validity, has been disputed by some of the Sac nation, it is deemed expedient, to copy it entire, in this place, more especially as it will be matter of frequent reference in the subsequent pages ...
— Great Indian Chief of the West - Or, Life and Adventures of Black Hawk • Benjamin Drake

... and worked till the perspiration poured from our faces. Every expedient was tried, until the physician at last desisted and stood back for ...
— A Day Of Fate • E. P. Roe

... Jean, and impulsive. You will see the matter in a different light when you have given the subject more thought. I am old now. For over half a century I have studied the affairs of men, and I tell you the time is not now expedient for such an issue to ...
— The Daughter of a Republican • Bernie Babcock

... Jews of old, who would not understand, that they might act well. These men we must resist, do just the contrary to what they do, and be bold to give them offence, lest by this impious notion of theirs they should deceive many along with themselves. Before the eyes of these men it is expedient to eat flesh, to break fasts, and to do in behalf of the liberty of faith things which they hold to be the greatest sins. We must say of them, "Let them alone; they be blind leaders of the blind" (Matt. xv. 14). In this way Paul also would ...
— Concerning Christian Liberty - With Letter Of Martin Luther To Pope Leo X. • Martin Luther

... actual process by which he cast and figured his reflectors. We are however, told that in later years, after his telescopes had become famous, he made a considerable sum of money by the manufacture and sale of great instruments. Perhaps this may be the reason why he never found it expedient to publish any very explicit details as to the means by which ...
— Great Astronomers • R. S. Ball

... of a great many Nonconformists: 'Moreover, there are those among them who have very little grasp of principle, even from the natural temper of their minds. They see this thing is beautiful, and that is in the Fathers, and a third is expedient, and a fourth pious; but of their connection one with another, their hidden essence and their life, and the bearing of external matters upon each and upon all, they have no perception or even suspicion. ...
— Obiter Dicta • Augustine Birrell

... accrue to the church by the departure of the Saviour and the consequent advent of the Spirit to take his place? That it would be so is what is plainly affirmed in the following text: "Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart I will send him unto you" (John 16: 7). If the Spirit is simply the measure of the Son, his sole work being to communicate ...
— The Ministry of the Spirit • A. J. Gordon

... enjoining the necessity of ignorance and folly. Reason before all; in her alone lay salvation. If at Lourdes, whilst bathed in tears, softened by the sight of so much affliction, he had said that it was sufficient to weep and love, he had made a dangerous mistake. Pity was but a convenient expedient. One must live, one must act; reason must combat suffering, unless it be desired that ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola

... regret, sir, that I bring bad news; But urgent danger forces me to do so. A close and intimate friend of mine, who knows The interest I take in what concerns you, Has gone so far, for my sake, as to break The secrecy that's due to state affairs, And sent me word but now, that leaves you only The one expedient of sudden flight. The villain who so long imposed upon you, Found means, an hour ago, to see the prince, And to accuse you (among other things) By putting in his hands the private strong-box Of a state-criminal, whose guilty secret, You, failing ...
— Tartuffe • Jean-Baptiste Poquelin Moliere

... enemy unnaturally lashed to the stake of the defensive stood the Germans in excellent stead in 1870. On every occasion they resorted to the offensive against an enemy in the field; strictly refraining, however, from that expedient when it was a fortress and not soldiers en vive force that stood in the way. At St. Privat their offensive would probably have been worsted if Canrobert had been reinforced or even if a supply of ammunition had reached him; and a loss ...
— Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places • Archibald Forbes

... American history, the election settled nothing, for the victorious Whigs, as in 1840, had no program, and their candidate had no political record. When the Administration began its work, it was found expedient to underwrite practically all that the Polk Administration had accomplished. There was no idea of reopening the bank or financial questions; and the tariff was already so successful that it would have been plain folly to change it. In the foreign policy ...
— Expansion and Conflict • William E. Dodd

... much more said between him and Mr. Low than could be laid before the reader in the last chapter. Mr. Low had urged him again and again, and had prevailed so far that Phineas, before he left the house, had promised to consider that suicidal expedient of the Chiltern Hundreds. What a by-word he would become if he were to give up Parliament, having sat there for about a week! But such immediate giving up was one of the necessities of Mr. Low's programme. According to Mr. Low's teaching, a single year passed amidst the ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope

... pursue it to a finish. The Kansas was being swiftly carried along in a strong and deep tidal current. Happily, the wind followed the set of the sea, else there would be no chance of success for his daring plan. His expedient was the desperate one of keeping the vessel in the line of the current, and, if day broke before he reached the coast, he would steer for any opening which presented itself in the fringe of reefs which must ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy

... they are of the same province and tongue as the ancient dominions of the prince are easily retained. It is enough to have rooted out the line of the reigning prince. But where the language and usages differ the difficulty is multiplied. One expedient is for the prince himself to dwell in the new state, as the Turk has done in Greece. Another is to send colonies into one or two places which may become keys to the province; for the cost of troops is far greater. In such provinces, moreover, ...
— The World's Greatest Books—Volume 14—Philosophy and Economics • Various

... some of the weaker brethren in order to receive the pardon which was promised by the King. But no such confession was made. All the prisoners denied the charges brought against them. Then the usual mediaeval expedient was resorted to, and torture was used to extort acknowledgments of guilt. The unhappy Templars in Paris were handed over to the tender mercies of the tormentors with the usual results. One hundred and forty were subjected to ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... memorial from the Kentucky Abolition Society praying that the free people of color be colonized on the public lands. The committee to whom the memorial was referred for consideration reported that it was expedient to refuse the request on the ground that, as such lands were not granted to free white men, they saw no reason for granting ...
— A Century of Negro Migration • Carter G. Woodson

... undutifulness of their children, the smokiness of their chimneys, and the deficiency of their digestive organs. And though, with a true and close friend, it is a great relief, and a special tie, to have spoken out your heart about your burdens and sorrows, it is expedient, in conversation with ordinary acquaintances, to keep ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various

... and then he made it on his own. I no longer had any doubt that he was a Christian. I longed to ask him about Jerry, but I found that he did not understand a word of English. It was so dark, also, that he could scarcely see my gestures. I tried every expedient to make him comprehend my meaning. I ran on, and then seized an imaginary person, and conducted him back to the fort. I raised my hands in a supplicating attitude. I shook his hands warmly, to show how grateful I should be if he granted my request. ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston

... the prophet, and were called Surahs, and formed separate chapters in the Koran as we have it to-day. Some of these Surahs contradict what had previously been uttered by the prophet, but this discrepancy is obviated by the expedient of what is called "abrogation," and the more recent utterances were held to supersede and rescind those which were contradictory to it in ...
— Sacred Books of the East • Various

... gone Olga threw herself on a couch upon the terrace and read a French Play just published. There was a heroine with a past who loved quite madly a young man with a future and she succeeded in killing his love for her by the simple expedient of telling him the truth. At this point Olga dropped the book upon the flagging and sat up abruptly, her ...
— Madcap • George Gibbs

... machinery, and, performing as much labour as he can perform without exerting himself to an extent prejudicial to his health or inconsistent with his reasonable comfort, produce an output as large as possible. In the interest of the people as a whole it is expedient that the remuneration of the labour of the industrial classes shall be increased, and since this remuneration is paid out of the national income, it is a matter of great importance not only that the working classes shall succeed in obtaining for themselves ...
— Rebuilding Britain - A Survey Of Problems Of Reconstruction After The World War • Alfred Hopkinson

... seem that certain definite counsels are not fittingly proposed in the New Law. For counsels are given about that which is expedient for an end, as we stated above, when treating of counsel (Q. 14, A. 2). But the same things are not expedient for all. Therefore certain definite counsels should ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I-II (Pars Prima Secundae) - From the Complete American Edition • Saint Thomas Aquinas

... his behaviour towards Gordon. The governor, he thought, had been guilty of an 'outrageous stretch of power,' and had hanged Gordon, not because it was necessary to keep the peace, but because it seemed to be expedient on general political grounds. This was what the law called murder, whatever the propriety of the name. Fitzjames made an application in January 1867 before Sir Thomas Henry, the magistrate at Bow Street, to commit for trial the officers responsible for the court-martial proceedings ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen

... I want to talk to you about that. I take it you will admit that a blockade is a justifiable expedient of war. There have been one or two of them in history. In the American Civil War, for instance, the North established a pretty successful blockade against the Southern ports. British cotton ships ...
— Getting Together • Ian Hay

... that Englishmen should employ their wealth in building and endowing institutions for educational purposes. But, five or six hundred years ago, deeds of foundation expressed or implied conditions as nearly as possible contrary to those which have been thought expedient by Sir Josiah Mason. That is to say, physical science was practically ignored, while a certain literary training was enjoined as a means to the acquirement of knowledge ...
— Science & Education • Thomas H. Huxley

... audience with a bow, and rose to speak with Mme. de Pimentel, who came to the boudoir. The news of old Negrepelisse's elevation to a marquisate had greatly impressed the Marquise; she judged it expedient to be amiable to a woman so clever as to rise the higher for ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac

... have expressed the real sentiment of the Regents; but the actual measure passed was a resolution declaring, that in view of the fact that a new Board of Regents was to take charge and appoint a President, it was expedient that the terms of Professors Williams, Whedon, and Agnew terminate at the close of the year. This was an out and out partisan matter, as there was no reason for such action inherent in the change of the governing body, particularly as it did not affect ...
— The University of Michigan • Wilfred Shaw

... the defences, as from the height of the mountains and rugged rocky surface of the country it was necessary to penetrate; and so considerable were these obstacles, against the usual mode of attack, that it was judged expedient to adopt rapid and forward movements, instead of ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) • James Harrison

... remark the probable antiquity of its construction. The centre still retains the drawbridge; and the whole fabric appears to have been widened, when wheel carriages came into fashion, with a supplementary parallel slice, riveted on to it by iron bolts. This expedient rather reminded me of a story which I had heard in my infancy, of a prudent housewife, who first roasted half a turkey for the family dinner, and when it had been twenty minutes on the spit, sewed on the remaining half to ...
— Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone - Made During the Year 1819 • John Hughes

... she lose till Melchior went into the library next the laboratory, and then she thought it expedient to leave her hiding-place and ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... effective Indian photograph for home consumption. But the poles, draped with pink muslin, were a grateful sight only because they told us that we were on the right track. Also, a coat of gravel newly spread along the lane was a welcome indication that there was no need to walk with the caution which is expedient in most of the ...
— India and the Indians • Edward F. Elwin

... the game to arrange the count so that the various bids be as nearly as possible equalized, every suit given a real rating, and the maximum competition created. After some little experimentation, the very simple expedient now in vogue was suggested. It makes the game in reality what it ...
— Auction of To-day • Milton C. Work

... of the opinion that it would be expedient for the legislature to coincide with the suggestion of Thomas Cooper and so recommended to the Legislature. Their report was adopted, 39 to 31. It was strongly advocated by Jesse Moore, Esq., General Mitchell and N. Ferguson from the ...
— Priestley in America - 1794-1804 • Edgar F. Smith

... his brow beaded with cold perspiration, the Marquis de Clameran breathlessly awaited the issue of this expedient, upon which depended the life of ...
— File No. 113 • Emile Gaboriau

... character of a national compact has been claimed for the Missouri act of 6th March, 1820. No man who will calmly and intelligently and without prejudice examine its history, can fail to see that however expedient it might have been at the time, there is no compact—no sacred character about it. Looking on the whole question as one of constitutional power and policy, I am free to say I think the South and not the North were in the ...
— The Relations of the Federal Government to Slavery - Delivered at Fort Wayne, Ind., October 30th 1860 • Joseph Ketchum Edgerton

... goaded as they were by the influence of the penal laws, and the dreadful persecution which they caused them to suffer, should flock to the standard of Prince Charles, himself a Catholic, she deemed it expedient, in due time, to relax a little, and accordingly she "checked her hand, and changed her pride." Milder measures were soon resorted to, during this crisis, in order that by a more liberal administration ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton

... is expedient that on the second Monday in May next a convention of delegates, who shall have been appointed by the several States, be held at Philadelphia for the sole and express purpose of revising the Articles of Confederation and reporting to Congress ...
— The Constitution of the United States - A Brief Study of the Genesis, Formulation and Political Philosophy of the Constitution • James M. Beck

... progressive income tax is both economically and socially sound. A capital tax is wholly unsound and economically destructive. It may nevertheless become necessary in the case of some of the belligerent countries to resort to this expedient, but I can conceive of no situation likely to arise which would make it necessary or advisable in this country. More than ever would such a tax be harmful in times of war and post-bellum reconstruction, when beyond almost all other things it is essential to ...
— Right Above Race • Otto Hermann Kahn

... have said more, but she did not think it expedient, remembering what she had brought ...
— Only An Irish Boy - Andy Burke's Fortunes • Horatio Alger, Jr.

... up an arrangement by which Barreze would send to Elaine, in the guise of payment for the uncompleted work she had done for him, a substantial sum of money. It was a temporary expedient only, but it ...
— Swirling Waters • Max Rittenberg

... bungalow, in his eagerness to secure something for supper he might not pause to discriminate between brute and human; and as his awe-inspiring voice is heard again, apparently quite near by, I deem it expedient to warn him off. So reaching my Smith & Wesson from under the pillow, I fire a shot up into the thatched roof. The little intruders, whatever they may be, scamper out of the bungalow, nor wait upon the order of their ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens

... about that fine portion of England; much better roadsteads and bays could generally be used by the coming or the parting vessel; and far more important signal-stations were to be met with, all along that coast. Nevertheless, the roadstead was entered when calms or adverse winds rendered it expedient; the hamlet had its conveniences, and, like most English hamlets, its beauties; and the hall and park were not without their claims to state and rural magnificence. A century since, whatever the table of precedency or Blackstone may say, an English ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper

... had to stoop down, in order to breathe the purer and cooler air near the ground, and the boys were put to the same expedient. ...
— The Khaki Boys Over the Top - Doing and Daring for Uncle Sam • Gordon Bates

... this observation as fully as the nature of the subject will permit, it will be expedient to enquire into the end which Lyric Poetry proposeth to obtain, and to examine the original standards from which the rules ...
— An Essay on the Lyric Poetry of the Ancients • John Ogilvie

... perhaps, not foreseen that his words would be construed into an invitation to scrutinise every part of the administration, and to offer suggestions touching matters which parliaments have generally thought it expedient to leave entirely to the Crown. Some of the discontented peers proposed that a Committee, chosen partly by the Lords and partly by the Commons, should be authorised to inquire into the whole management of public affairs. But it was generally apprehended that such a Committee would become a second ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... having wakened to full life, that remembering the lateness of the breakfast hour, he decided on hastening out to lay his anxious, throbbing feelings before his God, if only to join in the prayer that our desires may be granted as may be most expedient for us. ...
— That Stick • Charlotte M. Yonge

... frantic creature cast one of them to her blood-thirsty pursuers. This stopped their career for a moment; but, after devouring the poor child, they renewed the pursuit, and a second time came up with the vehicle. The mother, driven to desperation, resorted to the same horrible expedient, and threw another of her offspring to her ferocious assailants. The third child was also sacrificed in the same way, and soon after, the wretched being reached her home in safety. Here she related what had happened, and endeavoured to palliate her own conduct, by describing the dreadful ...
— Anecdotes of the Habits and Instinct of Animals • R. Lee

... prevented any unity of action. The accusation of treason, sometimes brought against them, is false and ungenerous; and the insinuations of Napoleon himself were unworthy of him. They may have erred in judgment, but they acted as they thought expedient, and they never showed more devotion to their country and to their chief than on ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 7, May, 1858 • Various

... the rest, on which account he sometimes called it the greater Dunciad; and it would have been easy for him, with a shallow Warburtonian ingenuity, to invent links that might have satisfied a mere verbal sense of connection. But he disdained this puerile expedient. The fact was, and could not be disguised from any penetrating eye, that the poem was not a pursuit of the former subjects; it had arisen spontaneously at various times, by looking at the same general theme of dulness (which, in Pope's sense, includes all aberrations of the intellect, nay, ...
— Biographical Essays • Thomas de Quincey

... the throng also increased. At this juncture Mr. Lavender, the head of the police establishment of Manchester, interfered, and entreated that the Duke's train should move on, or he could not answer for the consequences. Under these circumstances, and the day being well advanced, it was thought expedient at all events to move forward while it was still practicable to do so. The order was accordingly given, and the train passed along out of the immediate neighbourhood of Manchester without accident to anyone. When they had proceeded ...
— Railway Adventures and Anecdotes - extending over more than fifty years • Various

... did. He was one of those men of whom all times have their share. The bravest of his time, he satisfied himself with alluring the beardless Emperor by petty crime from public wrong; he could flatter him to the expedient. He dared not ...
— The Man Without a Country and Other Tales • Edward E. Hale

... that none will be made, unless it comes from New Mexico. It must be born in mind that the Gadsden Purchase was not originally an integral part of New Mexico; that it was acquired years after the treaty of Gaudaloupe Hidalgo, and was only attached to the territory of New Mexico as a temporary expedient. It must also be remembered that the Gadsden Purchase, with the portion of New Mexico which it is proposed to include within the limits of the territory of Arizona, is separated from New Mexico proper by natural boundaries; that it derives no benefit from ...
— Memoir of the Proposed Territory of Arizona • Sylvester Mowry

... and chance frequently corrected mischance. Moreover, did not the man who had a well-frequented consulting-office, possess a thousand means, if he was clever, of placing all the chances on his side, in the hazardous profession he followed, and of reading in the stars anything he thought expedient? He observed the earth rather than the sky, and took care not to fall ...
— The Oriental Religions in Roman Paganism • Franz Cumont

... common horizon, that Mrs. Devar's sneer should pass unchallenged. Though that lady herself was not fashioned of the softer human clay which expresses its strenuous emotions by fainting fits or hysteria, some such feminine expedient would certainly have prevented her from going another hundred yards along the south road had some wizard told her how nearly she had guessed ...
— Cynthia's Chauffeur • Louis Tracy

... as "compulsory detention." For twenty years it has been the law in New Zealand that an authorized medical practitioner may examine any person suspected to be suffering from any infectious diseases (save venereal diseases), and the Medical Officer of Health may, if he deems it expedient in the interests of the public health, compel the removal to a hospital of any person so suffering. This long-established procedure as referable to venereal diseases is by antagonists termed "compulsory examination" and ...
— Venereal Diseases in New Zealand (1922) • Committee Of The Board Of Health

... As a last expedient one fell back upon a standing column, a moth-eaten collection of alleged jests which had been set up years ago to meet the worst emergencies. It was, however, considered a confession of weakness and a degradation ...
— Not George Washington - An Autobiographical Novel • P. G. Wodehouse

... Kansas in 1858, and there found an element ripe for any daring and adventurous deeds in unknown lands. Many of the border desperadoes, then engaged in that hard-fought prelude to the civil war, found it desirable and expedient to leave a place where their violent deeds became too well known; and these, together with others who hoped to find in a new country relief from the anarchy which reigned at home, fell into the wake of the pioneers. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XXVI., December, 1880. • Various

... single, pious and godless; it even spread like a sacred rinderpest amongst the Wesleyans, who at that time were very strong in Longton—captivating leaders, members, and some of the scholars in fine style; and the chapel of this body was so emptied by the Mormon crusade, that it was found expedient to reduce it internally and set apart some of it for school purposes. To this day the village has not entirely recovered the shock which Mormonism gave it 30 years ago. During the heat of the conflict ...
— Our Churches and Chapels • Atticus

... eum ... societas, the famous First Triumvirate. 'It was at first an expedient to secure, as we should say, aworking majority for a vigorous democratic policy, but the bitterness of its enemies transformed the coalition itself from an honourable union into the semblance of a three-headed tyranny.' —Warde Fowler. 4-7. ...
— Helps to Latin Translation at Sight • Edmund Luce

... significance of the head, by allowing it to be sufficient if the head alone were buried in holy ground. In Art it is naively indicated by exaggerated size of the head and of the eyes,—a very common trait of the earlier times, and not quite obsolete at the time of the Pisani. This clumsy expedient is relinquished, but the need it indicated continued, without the possibility of finding any complete satisfaction in Sculpture, instead of the intensity and directness that Art now insists upon, Sculpture can give only extension and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 76, February, 1864 • Various

... ever so long a time. Nevertheless, when we came to the Rue de la Seine, the idea of my doll suddenly returned to my mind, and excited me in an extraordinary way. My head was on fire. I resolved upon a desperate expedient. We were passing before the window. She was there, behind the glass—with her red cheeks, and her flowered petticoat, and ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie

... tenderest tones of remonstrance and affection at these times. If her words failed—if the discipline of the day and the gentle sympathy of these moments at night did not effect their purpose, she had yet another expedient—the vicar was asked to see the girl who would not yield ...
— A World of Girls - The Story of a School • L. T. Meade

... upshot of all his schemes of reform. He will make a speech of seven hours' duration, and this will be its quintessence: that, seeing the exceeding difficulty of putting salt on the bird's tail, it will be expedient to consider the best method of throwing dust in the bird's eyes. All the ...
— Crotchet Castle • Thomas Love Peacock

... Hollingford? The disturbing event which immediately followed had put Miss Tomalin into the distance; his mind had busied itself continuously with surmises as to the nature of the benefit he might expect if he married Constance. After all, Lady Ogram's niece might have had recourse to this expedient. She, at all events, knew that he was staying at Rivenoak, and might easily not have heard on what day he would leave. Or, perhaps, knowing that he left yesterday, she had calculated that the letter would reach him ...
— Our Friend the Charlatan • George Gissing

... United States from invasion, and protect the inhabitants thereof from captivity and murder by the enemy, you are also authorized to arm, uniform, equip, and receive into the service of the United States, such number of volunteers of African descent as you may deem expedient, not exceeding five thousand, and may detail officers to instruct them in military drill, discipline, and duty, and to command them. The persons so received into service, and their officers, to be entitled to, and receive, ...
— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson

... have her stand aloof. But this phase of the subject has been so much misunderstood, both by men and women, that time is needed to clear away the mists of misconception which envelop it; and to prove that the co-operation of women in political life is not only just and expedient, but absolutely indispensable to the ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 2 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper

... and sempiternal things, surrounded too with evanescent forms, that like these crystals, trodden underfoot, or melted by the Foehn-wind into dew, flash, in some lucky moment, with a light that mimics stars! But to allegorise and sermonise is out of place here. It is but the expedient of those who cannot etch sensation by the burin of their ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds

... consulting other and more distinguished persons. At the suggestion, which he accepted as being composed of truth, he paused, the enlightened zeal with which he had been inspired dying out as he plainly understood the difficulties by which he was enclosed. There seemed a single expedient path for him in the matter; so, directing a person of exceptional trustworthiness to prepare himself for a journey, he inscribed a communication to the Mandarin Li Keen, in which he narrated the facts and asked for speedy directions, and then ...
— The Wallet of Kai Lung • Ernest Bramah

... fell apart in an utter and boundless amazement; for the person she had run against was that Prince—the last of the series, distinguished from the rest by his having quenched the Grand Duke's irrelevant effervescence by the simple expedient of saying Bosh—who had so ...
— The Princess Priscilla's Fortnight • Elizabeth von Arnim

... scene, every circumstance concurs to turn tragedy to farce. The wild absurdity of the expedient; the contemptible subjection of the lover; the folly of obliging him to read the letter, only because it ought to have been concealed from him; the frequent interruptions of amorous impatience; the faint expostulations of a voluntary slave; the imperious haughtiness of a ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson

... demon nurses. Such was the nameless one of whom we speak. We cannot say he thrived; but he would not die. So at two years of age, his mother being lost sight of, and the weekly payment having ceased, he was sent out in the street to "play," in order to be run over. Even this expedient failed. The youngest and the feeblest of the band of victims, Juggernaut spared him to Moloch. All his companions were disposed of. Three months' "play" in the streets got rid of this tender company,—shoeless, half-naked, and uncombed,—whose ...
— Sybil - or the Two Nations • Benjamin Disraeli

... and her mental vigor was shown in many public addresses. Jennie Collins was a noble illustration of the best form of Spiritualism. She was accompanied, inspired, and sustained by spirit influence, but did not deem it expedient to let this fact be generally known. The world is ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, September 1887 - Volume 1, Number 8 • Various

... the paper on which a prescription has been written is still a common expedient for the cure of disease in Tibet, where the Lamas use written spells, known as "edible letters."[50:1] The paper containing cabalistic words and symbols, taken internally, constitutes the remedy, and through ...
— Primitive Psycho-Therapy and Quackery • Robert Means Lawrence

... his patient to converse in a manner which could excite or exhaust him, with anyone; he suffered him merely as briefly as possible to express his immediate wants. And it was not until the fourth day after my early visit, the particulars of which I have just detailed, that it was thought expedient that I should see him, and then only because it appeared that his extreme importunity and impatience to meet me were likely to retard his recovery more than the mere exhaustion attendant upon a short conversation could possibly do; perhaps, too, my friend entertained some hope that if ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume I. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

... enemy to make further depredations whenever in want of money; and accordingly, a Danish fleet threatened London the very next year (992) and again in 994. On this last occasion, the same wretched expedient was resorted to, and the Danes were ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume I • Reginald R. Sharpe

... and will be some expedient," replied Caroline, resolutely. "Permit me to alight for a moment, and speak to the postilion ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach



Words linked to "Expedient" :   makeshift, convenient, temporary expedient, expediency, stopgap, carpetbagging, improvisation, utile, inexpedient, carpetbag, opportunist, means, politic



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