"Momentary" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... heeding the momentary silence, "to thank you in behalf of my wife as well. You have shown us both many kindnesses. You have ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... follows: Shut yourself in a dark closet for fifteen or twenty minutes to remove all trace of stimulation of the retina. With the eyes covered with several folds of thick black cloth go to a window, uncover the eyes and take a momentary look at the landscape, immediately covering the eyes again. The landscape will appear as a positive after-image, with the positive colors and lights and shades. The experiment is best performed on a ...
— The Science of Human Nature - A Psychology for Beginners • William Henry Pyle
... trembling against the wall, nearer to collapse than she had ever been before. But the momentary respite had its effect, and instinctively she began to gather herself together for fresh effort. He had wrested her deliverance from her, but she would never accept what he offered in exchange. She would never escape with his man. She would sooner—yes, ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... Nicodemus it was given to hear Him discourse on the new heart; some lawyer heard His story of the good Samaritan; others midst the press and throng caught a part of the tale of the prodigal son. But the momentary glimpse, the fragmentary word, the rumors strange and contradictory, yielded only confusion and mental unrest. But this brief biography exhibits to us His entire career, sets each eager listener down beside Christ while He unrolls each glowing parable, each ...
— A Man's Value to Society - Studies in Self Culture and Character • Newell Dwight Hillis
... multitude of diseases hanging, which they still pulled on their pates. Some were brawling, some fighting, riding, running, sollicite ambientes, callide litigantes for toys and trifles, and such momentary things, Their towns and provinces mere factions, rich against poor, poor against rich, nobles against artificers, they against nobles, and so the rest. In conclusion, he condemned them all for madmen, fools, idiots, asses, O stulti, quaenam haec ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... was only momentary. On the 25th, after two vigorous counter-attacks, one from south to north and the other from west to east, the enemy had to fall back. From that time a sort of balance was established on this terrain between the Germans and ourselves. ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... horseman galloped slowly toward the troops which were following the waggons down the slope. The general raised his carbine and held it in his arms. His eyes were fixed on the officer, and he stood as firm as a statue until the cavalryman reached his men. There was a momentary pause while the captain stood before his troops, then the horses were wheeled about and their hoofs sent showers of dust into the air as they carried their riders in retreat. General De Wet stepped forward several paces, raised his carbine to his shoulder, ...
— With the Boer Forces • Howard C. Hillegas
... eager listeners, and, recovering from her momentary tremor, told her story from beginning to end in ...
— The Girl Aviators on Golden Wings • Margaret Burnham
... to oblige him, and not as is really the case making him a puppet of her own. And not one of them all ever even knows of the existence of any other lover than himself. And Shatrunjaya is all the more to be excused, because she really took a momentary fancy to him, and cloyed him for a day or two with nectar that soon turned poison, as ...
— The Substance of a Dream • F. W. Bain
... and, through the medium of the tail piece T, will pull the valve V off its seat and allow the compressed air in the chamber C to rush into the resonator or pipe P. Owing to the inertia of the column of air contained in the pipe P, a momentary compression will take place at the lower end of the pipe, and the pressure of the air inside the motor M will, in consequence, be raised. The motor having now increased pressure both sides, will no longer keep the valve off its seat, and the spring S will open the motor and close the valve. ...
— The Recent Revolution in Organ Building - Being an Account of Modern Developments • George Laing Miller
... all, like a throbbing pedal note, ran his need of this girl. He would do anything, suffer anything, make any sacrifice, momentary or lifelong, if he could but see her again, hold her hand for one instant, look into her eyes mysterious with the secret of death. He had but three or four words to say to her, just to secure himself that she lived and was still his, and then ... then he would say ...
— The Necromancers • Robert Hugh Benson
... pleasant sensations of increased mental and physical power, which the use of alcohol produces, are deceptive and arise from the paralysis of the judgment and the momentary benumbing of the sense of fatigue which afterwards returns so imperiously with perhaps even greater intensity."—PROF. ADOLF ...
— Alcohol: A Dangerous and Unnecessary Medicine, How and Why - What Medical Writers Say • Martha M. Allen
... only a momentary glance, for Mike was coming slowly down the smooth shoot, sliding on his back, but lowering himself foot by foot, as he ...
— Cormorant Crag - A Tale of the Smuggling Days • George Manville Fenn
... by marriage, and it's my business to think and act for you: let me help you into this alley." A little further on there was a by-path through the shrubberies, and Lawrence drew her towards it, but her limbs were giving way under her, and after a momentary hesitation he carried her into it in his arms. "There: sit on this bank. Lean on me," he sat down by ...
— Nightfall • Anthony Pryde
... still. Ophelia, the sleeping Duncan, Cordelia rise to our minds. Nor need we quote the famous words of Webster's Ferdinand. It is enough that the greatest scene in Gorboduc is precisely that scene where pathos softens by a momentary dimness of vision our horror at ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... almost painful in its pleasure, agitating her bosom, as she sat watching the gateway they had entered. It was even a momentary relief to her that they had turned in there instead of riding directly to the house. It gave her time to collect her thoughts and summon all her fortitude for the coming interview. Her fingers wandered ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... sagacity,—the wonder and admiration of modern road-builders. By these means did Rome fasten together the constantly increasing fabric of her empire, so that not even the successes of Hannibal caused more than a momentary shaking of fidelity, for which ample punishment was ...
— History of Rome from the Earliest times down to 476 AD • Robert F. Pennell
... there a handful of potsherds or a flint arrowhead; sometimes, indeed, though rarely, the bones of their very bodies, laid aside in earth-barrows or stone coffins for this unknown length of years. And there the most unreflective among us feels a sudden awe and wonder at the momentary vision of the profound antiquity of this land in which we live, and for a few moments all desires and aims seem futile in face of this ...
— Lynton and Lynmouth - A Pageant of Cliff & Moorland • John Presland
... momentary. She was not, I suppose, unconscious for more than five seconds. It was, indeed, at her bidding that Anthony set her down ...
— Anthony Lyveden • Dornford Yates
... about Easter, when, taking advantage of a momentary tete-a-tete Colia handed Aglaya a letter, remarking that he "had orders to deliver it to her privately." She stared at him in amazement, but he did not wait to hear what she had to say, and went out. Aglaya broke the seal, and ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... all-important qualification in women, that nothing else can be compared with it. But to adopt this opinion would be grossly to exaggerate its importance. Nor can we believe, on the other hand, what some prudent writers for the young have affirmed, that the superiority of beauty is only momentary; that the eyes tire of a beautiful face which they see daily, that in all cases it vanishes with early youth. No, my child, I do not wish you to believe this, for I cannot believe it myself. For years, the beauty of my sister Elizabeth has been a daily source of pleasure to me, and I ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... have as many carriages and motors as we can afford to pay for. Kulin polygyny, though unlimited, is not really a popular institution: if you are a person of high caste you pay another person of very august caste indeed to make your daughter momentarily one of his sixty or seventy momentary wives for the sake of ennobling your grandchildren; but this fashion of a small and intensely snobbish class is negligible as a general precedent. In any case, men and women in the East do not marry anyone they ...
— Getting Married • George Bernard Shaw
... square of the Exchange in the well-conditioned city of Rotterdam. The day was warm—unusually so for the season—there was hardly a breath of air stirring; and the multitude were in no bad humor at being now and then besprinkled with friendly showers of momentary duration, that fell from large white masses of cloud which chequered in a fitful manner the blue vault of the firmament. Nevertheless, about noon, a slight but remarkable agitation became apparent in the assembly: the clattering of ten thousand ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 1 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... were differently placed. You became accustomed to gratifying your desires: you had little purpose in your actions; and, accordingly, you have now the habit of looking on each wish, whether of long standing or momentary, as something you might ...
— A Jolly by Josh • "Josh"
... swung him swiftly about. It came from the door of a noisy and crowded mart of chance recently erected, but already the scene of many quarrels. The blare of music which had issued from it swiftly ceased. There was a momentary silence; then a sound of shuffling ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... suddenly the earth bucked violently beneath his feet, and he had a momentary sensation of things flying madly by over his head, and then he knew nothing at all for a very long time. Then his head ached horribly and someone was popping at something valorously with a rifle, and he heard the nasty sharp explosions ...
— Morale - A Story of the War of 1941-43 • Murray Leinster
... verses, with a natural dignity of manners which became her station; the latter an improver and inventor, the first who applied steam to the purposes of navigation." But Burns's hasty judgments of men and things, the result of momentary feeling, are not to be too ...
— Robert Burns • Principal Shairp
... after her momentary unconsciousness, and was all right once more, though physically tired from her ...
— Patty in Paris • Carolyn Wells
... and devouring. There it is no longer the gradual darkening of the eye, the gradual fading of colour from the wall—movements of the shore-side, where the water flows down indeed, though in apparent rest—but the race of the mid-stream, a drift of momentary acts of sight and passion and thought. At first sight experience seems to bury us under a flood of external objects, pressing upon us with a sharp and importunate reality, calling us out of ourselves in a thousand forms of action. ...
— The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry • Walter Horatio Pater
... opened the billet. I did not know what the name would be, as I had mixed them under the table; yet I had a feeling that it was correct. I opened it and sure enough the name was "Cora Holt." I refolded it, placing it in my pocket. I must confess that I felt a momentary creepy feeling pass over me, as my emotions were wrought up to such a pitch by the intense manner in which I had watched all the details of the experiment. I informed him that he was right, but did not tell him the name. He now took my hand in his, and leading me into the parlor, had me state to ...
— The Lock and Key Library/Real Life #2 • Julian Hawthorne
... Recalling the horses he and his companion had left picketed not far away, Jack felt a momentary qualm. If the Dinsmores should happen to stumble on them the situation would be an awkward one. The hunters would become the hunted. Deprived of their horses and supplies, the Rangers would be at a decided disadvantage. The only ...
— Oh, You Tex! • William Macleod Raine
... scarcely bring herself to open an envelope bearing another name than her own. Then, smiling at her momentary hesitation, she tore it open with the keen delight of one, who, accustomed to a dozen letters a day, has passed a ...
— The Mistress of Shenstone • Florence L. Barclay
... xxxi. 8. These prophecies found their fulfilment in the destruction of Sennacherib's host before Jerusalem,—an event which no human ingenuity could have known even a day beforehand. But Isaiah does not content himself with promising to trembling Zion the help of God against Asshur in that momentary calamity. In harmony with Hosea and Micah, he promises to Judah, in general, security from Asshur. He says to Hezekiah, after that danger was over, in chap. xxxviii. 6: "And I will deliver thee and this city out of the hand of the ...
— Christology of the Old Testament: And a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions. Vol. 2 • Ernst Hengstenberg
... court, and rode off with a small company to London. Rumour, which delights in dramatic explanations of great occurrences, has discovered that a handkerchief dropped by the queen, and caught by Norris, roused Henry's jealousy; and that his after conduct was the result of a momentary anger. The incidents of the preceding week are a sufficient reply to this romantic story. The mine was already laid, the match ...
— History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth. Vol. II. • James Anthony Froude
... thousand points around you, and swarm along the hedges, lighting each other to bed, till about midnight, which is their curfew; for you seldom meet one of these lantern-bearers later, though you may still, in returning from a late party, be stopped with momentary admiration at beholding a magnificent glow-worm burning her tail away at a great rate, and lighting up some dark recess unvisited by star or moon, herself a star, and giving sufficient light to enable you to read the small print of a newspaper a foot off! But who shall ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... always kinder thought we was suited to one another," Mr. Ramy continued, eased of his momentary doubt. "I always liked de quiet style—no fuss and airs, and not afraid of work." He spoke as though dispassionately ...
— Bunner Sisters • Edith Wharton
... "And extremely momentary except as to the lower floor, and the fire should have taken some time to spread from that. However, to turn to other matters—" He swung himself over the edge of the roof and went briskly down the lightning rod. Across the frozen ground he moved, with his eyes on the soil, and presently ...
— Average Jones • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... him without ringing, and as she was taking off her goloshes in the entry she heard a sound as of something running softly in the studio, with a feminine rustle of skirts; and as she hastened to peep in she caught a momentary glimpse of a bit of brown petticoat, which vanished behind a big picture draped, together with the easel, with black calico, to the floor. There could be no doubt that a woman was hiding there. How often Olga Ivanovna herself had ...
— The Wife and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... return, but are our natural and necessary foes: the orators who charm us with sentiment may find other less important arenas for their talents, in the place of one where the city pays a heavy penalty for a momentary pleasure, themselves receiving fine acknowledgments for their fine phrases; while indulgence should be shown towards those who will be our friends in future, instead of towards men who will remain just what they were, and as much ...
— The History of the Peloponnesian War • Thucydides
... vague outlines near the horizon seemed to have a funereal suggestion of tombs and grave mounds, and one—a low shed near the road—looked not unlike a halted bier. He hurriedly put up the shutters in a momentary lulling of the wind, and re-entering the store began to ...
— A First Family of Tasajara • Bret Harte
... essentially fitting for a father to support his son: and consequently he is bound to support him not only for a time, but for all his life, and this is to lay by. On the other hand, for the son to bestow something on his father is accidental, arising from some momentary necessity, wherein he is bound to support him, but not to lay by as for a long time beforehand, because naturally parents are not the successors of their children, but children ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... himself; so facing the elephant he boldly stood his ground, hoping that Nowell would kill the monster, or that he should be able to leap out of his way. Now on came the elephant, trumpeting loudly. Nowell lifted his rifle and fired. Dreadful was the momentary suspense. With a cry of rage the elephant threw himself at Dango. The Moor leaped aside, but not far enough to prevent the elephant from knocking him over with his trunk, and putting one of his huge feet on his leg. He would have been killed ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... There was a momentary silence. In the excitement of the occasion every one had forgotten sharks. What was to be done? The raft was utterly destroyed. Only a few of the logs which had formed it lay on the reef; the rest were floating ...
— Philosopher Jack • R.M. Ballantyne
... I make the request?" suggested Gratz with emotionless directness of speech and a momentary gleam of ...
— The Flaw in the Sapphire • Charles M. Snyder
... objects led him back to his habitual ideas. He put his hand upon his breast, and felt the portrait of his father which he always carried there; he untied it, contemplated the features, and the momentary happiness which he had just experienced, as well as the cause of that happiness, only recalled, with too severe a remembrance, the sentiment which had already rendered him so guilty towards his father: This reflection ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael
... trail rose abruptly in its ascent to the bench, the horse slackened his pace and she brought him to a stand, and for the first time since she left the town, realized she was not alone. The realization gave her a momentary start, as Purdy reined in close beside her; but a glance into the man's ...
— The Texan - A Story of the Cattle Country • James B. Hendryx
... There was a momentary pang of regret on the morning of the 5th September, when I first learned that the "Pioneer" was to return into Wolstenholme Sound with provisions sufficient for herself and the "Intrepid" to meet two ...
— Stray Leaves from an Arctic Journal; • Sherard Osborn
... paper's all right—eh?" said he, supported by the brandy, which he had nearly finished. They turned towards him with a smile of momentary surprise, and then— ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... left me standing on the main-deck. My men, meanwhile, had, in obedience to my instructions, made their way below to the lower deck, and I could hear them now and then—during a momentary cessation in the din on deck and around me caused by the Spaniards' preparations for action—rummaging about below ...
— The Rover's Secret - A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba • Harry Collingwood
... a momentary lull in the talk of the men, a lull in keeping with the outer night, which was still and very dark. Presently a faint light flickered across the southern windows of the bunk house, followed by a low rumble ...
— Injun and Whitey to the Rescue • William S. Hart
... with a quick imagination, for a moment saw that it was possible this little stranger who, as Jack had already grasped, was not his real sister, might, in future years, destroy the harmony and peace of the home circle. But it was only a momentary hesitation; the thought flashed across her mind and vanished again, almost as quickly as it had come. Could she have known how true that prophetic instinct was, would she not have gone counter to all ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII: No. 356, October 23, 1886. • Various
... leaping desires, and upon that momentary hesitation hinged results out of all proportions to the gravity of the situation—issues destined to change the deepest channels of his life. Folsom hesitated, then he yielded to his impulse, and ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... shall meet with in Chapter VIII, under the name of psychic impotence, shows the powerful and disturbing interference of thoughts on the automatic action of instinctive sexual activity. A momentary psychic impotence is not necessarily pathological. While voluptuous sensations alternate during coitus with desire and corresponding erotic representations, a sudden idea of the ridiculousness of the situation, signs of pain ...
— The Sexual Question - A Scientific, psychological, hygienic and sociological study • August Forel
... allowed himself, set his hearers in a roar. He was as ready to hear a good story as to tell one, and his ringing laugh was a delight. The Bishop talked much and well. His use of the pause in speaking, with a momentary compression of the lips now and then between clauses, heightened the effect of crispness in his felicitously chosen phrases. He was a good listener if one had anything to say, but he was not averse to presiding in monologue ...
— The Story of Cooperstown • Ralph Birdsall
... in her native tongue, so she assured her mistress, except when carried away by momentary enthusiasm, or unwonted emotion. It was bad taste, she averred, and she desired to ...
— Madeline Payne, the Detective's Daughter • Lawrence L. Lynch
... in his tone puzzled the priest. What had come to the man, in that momentary interval, to nerve ...
— All's Well - Alice's Victory • Emily Sarah Holt
... their momentary hesitation, the men shook their bridles and, with wild huzzahs, dashed right through the enemy, shooting right and left. Wheeling rapidly about, as soon as the British line was passed the Kentuckians poured in a destructive volley on their rear, and they fled, or ...
— Sustained honor - The Age of Liberty Established • John R. Musick,
... the ear is not always so exacting; and ordinary writers, in ordinary moments, content themselves with avoiding what is harsh, and here and there, upon a rare occasion, buttressing a phrase, or linking two together, with a patch of assonance or a momentary jingle of alliteration. To understand how constant is this preoccupation of good writers, even where its results are least obtrusive, it is only necessary to turn to the bad. There, indeed, you will find cacophony supreme, the rattle of incongruous consonants only ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... trust in his honor is deceived by his momentary weakness, her scorn has a bitterness, and her indignation a force of expression almost fearful; and both are carried to an extreme, which ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson
... over you when you hear a tale of terror—that well-vouched tale which the narrator, having first expressed his general disbelief of all such legendary lore, selects and produces, as having something in it which he has been always obliged to give up as inexplicable. Another symptom is a momentary hesitation to look round you, when the interest of the narrative is at the highest; and the third, a desire to avoid looking into a mirror, when you are alone, in your chamber, for ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... In the momentary silence that ensued the blithe jingling of bells was heard, accompanied by the merry sound of ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... felt nothing beyond a momentary giddy spell, a bit of nausea and mental stiffness. It was strange, and I have a slight headache. ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science April 1930 • Various
... they had been several times interrupted by the crew, who now and then came by leading aft the stays of the mast now at length set up. Scarcely any of the men cast more than a momentary glance at the icebergs, but this glance showed that they looked on them with no favourable eyes. All the time, too, it must be remembered, the pumps were kept clanking away as before. No human beings ever worked harder than the crew of the "Ranger;" ...
— The Voyages of the Ranger and Crusader - And what befell their Passengers and Crews. • W.H.G. Kingston
... with all its phases of humour, are best expressed by a child, who has few second thoughts to divide the image of his momentary feeling. His simplicity adds much to the manifestation of his intelligence. The child is the last and lowest of rational creatures, for in him the "rational soul" closes its long downward flight with the ...
— The Children • Alice Meynell
... Abel had felt his power, or had been of consequence to any one, since the boys had turned him out from their games; and it gave him a momentary activity, and an unsettled sort of spirit, which he had never known since then. He had been shunned and abhorred; and he believed himself the victim of some demoniac power. To have another in this fearful bondage with him, as Paul had intimated, was a relief from ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... weight. Mr. N. Wallerius has since observed that ice at the time of its congelation evaporates faster than water in its fluid form; which may be accounted for from the heat given out at the instant of freezing; (Saussure's Essais sur Hygromet. p. 249.) but this effect is only momentary. ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin
... only repeat her own words; the soundness of her judgment soon pointed out to her the dangers of such a proceeding. "I should descend from the throne," said she, "merely, perhaps, to excite a momentary sympathy, which the factious would soon render more ...
— Memoirs Of The Court Of Marie Antoinette, Queen Of France, Complete • Madame Campan
... away his momentary doubts, Frank reflected on the matter and was honestly glad to vary the monotony of his close confinement to ...
— When Egypt Went Broke • Holman Day
... I did not answer discouragingly. After a momentary pause for thought and prayer, I replied, 'Well, if you feel you ought to stay, stay. We have trusted the Lord once for our support, and we can trust ...
— The Authoritative Life of General William Booth • George Scott Railton
... interest ceases to be momentary, and becomes life-long and even hereditary, the better does it harmonize with the feeling ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • William Roscher
... disposed of, he gave himself entirely to the enjoyment of the walk with her, and she noticed for the first time his boyish delight in the simplest details of life. With the simplicity of a man to whom large pleasures are unknown, he threw himself whole-heartedly into the momentary diversion of small ones. Every person in the crowd, she discovered, excited his interest, and his humour bubbled over at the most insignificant things—at the grimace of a newsboy who offered him a paper, at the absurd hat worn by a woman in a motor car, at ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... definite retrospect? How is it possible? But, I have done nothing; I have had no time; I have only been preparing myself—a mere apprentice to life. My brain is at some prank; I am suffering a momentary delusion; I shall shake myself, and return to common sense—to my schemes and ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing
... affirm boldly, that great tumults have been excited in the Eastern States, on account of their reluctance to the war, when there is not the slightest foundation in fact for such an assertion. This I suppose, is calculated to give a momentary popularity ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. XI • Various
... Tito Melema, and has all Tito's charm and grace and fascination. Yet he is different. He would never have denied Baldassare in the Square at Florence, nor lied to Romola about Tessa. He has a magnificent, momentary sincerity, a boyish unconsciousness of all that life signifies, an ardent enthusiasm for all that life cannot give. There is nothing calculating about him. He never thinks evil, he only does it. From a psychological point of view he is one of the most interesting characters ...
— Reviews • Oscar Wilde
... ought to have satisfied me that Mrs. Urquhart had simply suffered from some nightmare horror at which she was as ready to laugh now as he. But my nature is a contradictory one, and I was not satisfied. The echo of her cry was still ringing in my ears, and I felt as if I would give the world for a momentary peep into their room. Influenced by this idea, I boldly knocked, and in an instant—too soon for him not to have been standing near the door—I heard his breath through the keyhole ...
— The Forsaken Inn - A Novel • Anna Katharine Green
... negotiations makes most amusing reading. The diplomats reached the American capital at one of the most dramatic moments of American history. On the very day of their arrival the Kansas-Nebraska Bill passed Congress. It meant the momentary triumph of the South and the extension of slavery into the great hinterland beyond the Mississippi. {151} The passage of the bill was celebrated by the salute of a hundred guns; and, fearing trouble, legislators sat in the House armed to ...
— The Winning of Popular Government - A Chronicle of the Union of 1841 • Archibald Macmechan
... the wicked old earth. Not that she did not inhale their faint fragrance with a certain pleasure, and feel their beauty as none whose souls are not wholly shriveled and hardened can help doing, but the world was, in her estimate, a vale of tears, and it was only by a momentary forgetfulness that she could be moved ...
— The Guardian Angel • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... another, the lost dog had been able to gather some ready money. He was cheerful because of this momentary purseful of prosperity. ...
— The Virginian - A Horseman Of The Plains • Owen Wister
... you, you will smash the boat!" Bill cried again, making a dive for the steering oar; but just then the boat struck the ice, and both Bill and I were thrown backward into the bottom of the boat. But the boat didn't smash. There was a momentary grinding and crunching noise, and, much to my surprise, I found that the old scow had lifted itself clean out of the water, and was skating right along on the ice. Then Dutchy could control himself no ...
— The Scientific American Boy - The Camp at Willow Clump Island • A. Russell Bond
... art The herald of the ill in splendour hid! Thou echo of the hollow heart Of monarchy, bear me to thine abode 955 When desolation flashes o'er a world destroyed: Oh, bear me to those isles of jagged cloud Which float like mountains on the earthquake, mid The momentary oceans of the lightning, Or to some toppling promontory proud 960 Of solid tempest whose black pyramid, Riven, overhangs the founts intensely bright'ning Of those dawn-tinted deluges of fire Before their waves expire, When ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... more in life, then would ye devote yourselves less to the momentary. But for waiting, ye have not enough of capacity in you—nor even ...
— Thus Spake Zarathustra - A Book for All and None • Friedrich Nietzsche
... up, yawning, and walked to the door, and Mr. Spriggs, after a momentary idea of breaking him in pieces and throwing him out into the street, blew out the lamp and went upstairs to discuss the matter with ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs
... extent of sea in other quarters. Our passage was of two hours, at the end of which we landed on French soil, and found ourselves immediately in the clutches of the custom-house officers, who, however, merely made a momentary examination of my passport, and allowed us to pass without opening even one of our carpet-bags. The great bulk of our luggage had been registered through to Paris, for examination ...
— Passages From the French and Italian Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... till he has finished jerking out sentences while stamping up and down the room, says gently, taking no notice of his denials,—"If you will not tell me I must find out from some one else—that is all." Then, her quick eyes noting his momentary hesitation, she lays her little hand on his rough paw, and, with the shamelessness of a woman who loves deeply, wheedles everything out of him that he has promised ...
— John Ingerfield and Other Stories • Jerome K. Jerome
... or disagreements, and often, even when severely wounded, will turn about and go away, not seeming to realize that a momentary pressure of one of their huge feet, or one straight blow with their tusks, would be more than sufficient to finish their enemies. More often than not the most an Indian elephant will do to his foe is to kick him from one huge foot to another until ...
— Rataplan • Ellen Velvin
... gaze, was subtly conscious of an odd sense of repulsion, almost amounting to dread, and then Elisabeth, making some trivial observation as she moved nearer to the fire, smiled across at her, and, in the extraordinary charm of her smile, the momentary sensation ...
— The Hermit of Far End • Margaret Pedler
... prepared to let himself over the precipice. This incident inspired hope. It did more. It gave a moment's confidence, and the certainty that all was not lost. They looked at each other, and wept tears of joy. But soon that momentary hope vanished, and uncertainty returned. After all, what did the stranger's gesture mean? He might have seen her—but how? He might reach her, but would she be safe from harm? Could such a thing be hoped for? Would she not, rather, be all marred ...
— The American Baron • James De Mille
... had known him in Vienna, when the now great violinist was a mere lad, and I had heard that he forgot no one, so the sight gave me a merely momentary surprise. ...
— Told in a French Garden - August, 1914 • Mildred Aldrich
... receive the interloper. They "dressed up" sullenly as Jack called the roll for the last time, and received Trask, the new orderly, at a "present," which, though not in the tactics, Jack exacted as a penitence for the momentary revolt. Poor Trask looked very unhappy indeed as his displaced rival stepped back to the rear and left the new orderly to march the company out from the narrow way to take its place in the parade. It was easy to see that he would have been very glad to postpone or evade his new honors, on any pretext, ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... immediately wanted, they assert. Now this was a mere pretence, which the parties clearly understood, to give a momentary effect to a most untenable charge. Events ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... his body in the fire. Old Nick Hargus and his son had it in their power at last to take satisfaction for the humiliation to which he had bent them. A thousand regrets for his simplicity in falling into their trap came prickling him with their momentary torture, succeeded by wild gropings, frantic seekings, for some plan ...
— The Duke Of Chimney Butte • G. W. Ogden
... nature of despotism to abhor power held by any means but its own momentary pleasure; and to annihilate all intermediate situations between boundless strength on its own part, and total debility on the part ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke
... in her eyes, that suggestion of power and of unspoken threats which she had adopted since the episode in the Bath Street house. For an instant an ugly frown further disfigured his sour face: but this frown was only momentary, it soon gave way to a suave smile. He took her hand and lightly touched ...
— The Nest of the Sparrowhawk • Baroness Orczy
... Mrs. Blossom's face grew deadly pale as he spoke. It was momentary, however; and might have passed away entirely, had not a strange suspicion fastened itself on his mind. He added in a slow tone: 'What ailed him, you ...
— Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, March 1844 - Volume 23, Number 3 • Various
... even in slight degree the conflict which followed, one must remember at every turn, that no interests save religious interests were of even momentary importance. Every member of the Colony had hard, laborious work to do, but it was hurried through with the utmost speed, in order to have time for the almost daily lectures and expoundings that made their delight. Certain more worldly minded among them had petitioned for a shortening of these ...
— Anne Bradstreet and Her Time • Helen Campbell
... momentary vertigo, often produced by changing from a horizontal to a vertical position, seasickness, pain in movement in cases of meningitis, epileptic attacks at night, etc., may be by this explained. These views of Luys are ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 520, December 19, 1885 • Various
... over our later actions and the conduct of our lives; and that regard for moral obligations, loyalty to our friends, patience in finishing our work, obedience to a rule of life, have a surer foundation in habits solidly formed and blindly followed than in these momentary transports, ardent but sterile. They would have preferred to Bloch, as companions for myself, boys who would have given me no more than it is proper, by all the laws of middle-class morality, for boys to give one another, who would not unexpectedly send me a basket of fruit because they happened, ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... gained was only momentary. The Indians slowly advanced in front and on the flank, and only the incessant fire of the scouts sufficed to keep them in check. A second savage attempted to gain the eminence which commanded the position where the scouts ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... noiseless was their approach that they were within a few yards of the vessel before a watchful sentry, the boatswain, discerned them. At his warning cry the crew leapt to their quarters. The bow gun thundered out, and its flash gave the little band on the boat a momentary glimpse of a horde of painted enemies. There was no time to reload the gun. The canoes were all about the schooner, and yelling warriors were clambering over the stern and bow and swarming on the deck. The crew discharged their muskets into the savages, and ...
— The War Chief of the Ottawas - A Chronicle of the Pontiac War: Volume 15 (of 32) in the - series Chronicles of Canada • Thomas Guthrie Marquis
... courteous and well-bred—to babble unintelligible but violent reproaches against his niece and servant, because he himself had dropped a teacup in attempting to place it on a table at his elbow. His eyes caught a momentary fire from his irritation; but he struggled in vain for words to express himself adequately, as, looking from his servant to his niece, and then to the table, he laboured to explain that they had placed it (though it touched his chair) at too great a ...
— Chronicles of the Canongate • Sir Walter Scott
... don't you put on airs of any sort! I understand your game. You want, for some reason, to get rid of me, and you have seized the opportunity with a sharpness that does credit to your cunning. I don't condescend to deny this report,"—speaking in this lofty strain, Bartley had a momentary sensation of its being a despicable slander,—"but I see that as far as you are concerned it answers all the purposes of truth. You think that with the chance of having this thing exploited against ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells
... the old lady broke forth, in momentary impatience. "Don't stan' here talkin'. You better have your mind on Stella. Fever's a quicker complaint than old age. It al'ays was, an' al'ays ...
— Meadow Grass - Tales of New England Life • Alice Brown
... face he regarded was slight, but it was unmistakable. It was the sudden meeting of the eyebrows, accompanied with the sudden jerk of the shoulder and bend of the neck, which betoken a man taken by surprise, and who pauses to reflect before he replies. His pause was but momentary, ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... with alacrity. In the hobo's one uninjured optic shone a momentary gleam of intelligence, as he continued to stare at Gully, like a dog at its master. The gleam was reflected in a pair of shadowy, deep-set eyes, unblinking ...
— The Luck of the Mounted - A Tale of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • Ralph S. Kendall
... instant—an instant which he regretted till the end of his life—Montagu drew himself up and hesitated. He had been deeply wronged, deeply provoked, and no one could blame him for the momentary feeling: but Eric had observed the gesture, and his passionate pride took the alarm. "It's come to this, then," he thought; "Montagu doesn't think me good enough to ...
— Eric • Frederic William Farrar
... because of the spits which of themselves turned round and round." They appealed strongly to Washington Irving, who, when recording his visit to the shrine of Shakespeare, says: "To a homeless man, who has no spot on this wide world which he can truly call his own, there is a momentary feeling of something like independence and territorial consequence, when after a weary day's travel he kicks off his boots, thrusts his feet into slippers, and stretches himself before an inn fire. Let the world without go as it may; let kingdoms ...
— Vanishing England • P. H. Ditchfield
... only a momentary flash. He settled back into the easy-chair with invalid languor, and began to tell me good-naturedly about his old velocipede, describing its construction, and the feats he had been able to perform on it, clumsy though it was. He could keep up with a fast horse in ...
— The Last Leaf - Observations, during Seventy-Five Years, of Men and Events in America - and Europe • James Kendall Hosmer
... about the errand on which he had been sent, and she had time to quiet herself. But there was a look on her face as she sat there, gently stroking his fair hair with her hand, that was sad to see. Marian saw it with momentary wonder, and then coming up to her, she laid her arm gently over her ...
— Janet's Love and Service • Margaret M Robertson
... sigh of the pines and the dash of the waves mingling in unison as they used to do when she sat at the old farm-house window and span, little dreaming then how her life would change—how all those familiar things would be swept away as though they had never been. She roused herself from this momentary reverie, and glancing down at the recumbent gentleman at her feet, touched his shoulder lightly with ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... creaking corridor. As I turned into the common passage, a white figure, holding a lamp, stood full before me. I thought at first it was one of those images made to stand in niches and hold a light in their hands. But the illusion was momentary, and my eyes speedily recovered from the shock of the bright flame and snowy drapery to see that the figure was a breathing one. It was Iris, in one of her statue-trances. She had come down, whether sleeping or waking, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... her pride, that one grand feature of her character, got the better of her grief and anger. She rose from her bed, dried her eyes, arranged her hair, and with a carriage as erect as her soul was haughty, once more entered her father's library. The momentary emotion and pathos of their last embrace had been overpowered in both by stronger sensations; in him by the remembrance of Lady Mary Nugent's fascinations, in her by the sense of that lady's ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... he went on. "The world has been bitter hard on you. Your uncle is a disgrace to mankind. Believe me, madam, there is no young gentleman in all France but would be glad of my opportunity, to die in doing you a momentary service." ...
— New Arabian Nights • Robert Louis Stevenson
... only procure for the workers momentary and illusory relief, and whereas, by their very nature, wages will always be limited to the strictly necessary means of subsistence in order to keep the worker from dying ...
— Violence and the Labor Movement • Robert Hunter
... The momentary silence which followed was interrupted by a sudden confusion among the prisoners on the platform. Two of the guards sprang in among them. There was the thump of a heavy fall—a scream of terror from some of the female prisoners—then another dead silence, broken by one of the guards, ...
— After Dark • Wilkie Collins
... matter, and Bruff being judge, I will plead boy Gerrard's cause against Paddy O'Grady, Esquire, midshipman of his Majesty's frigate Cerberus," cried Devereux, striking the table with his fist, a proceeding which obtained a momentary silence. "To commence, I must go back to first causes. You understand, gentlemen of the jury, that there is a strong wind blowing, which has kicked up a heavy sea, which is tossing about our stout ship in a way to make it difficult for a seaman, and much more ...
— Paul Gerrard - The Cabin Boy • W.H.G. Kingston
... his visit to the governess's sitting-room the next evening to bid his nephews and niece good-night, found there, not the children, but a stranger. His momentary look of surprise vanished as he recollected; and, while he spoke a few rather embarrassed words of greeting and welcome, ...
— A Bachelor's Dream • Mrs. Hungerford
... sorrow, I have often hours of vivid enjoyment, enjoyment which has nothing to do with happiness, or peace, or hope; momentary flashes, bright gleams of exquisite pleasure, of which the capacity seems indestructible in my nature; and whatever bitterness may lie at my heart's core, it still leaves about it a mobile surface of sensibility, which reflects with a sort of ecstasy every ray of light ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... assist in the fun he would have with Sewall. He did not contemplate a joke on the papers themselves. As a matter of fact, no one saw the "sell" and most of the papers printed his story of the petrified man as a genuine discovery. This was a surprise, and a momentary disappointment; then he realized that he had builded better than he knew. He gathered up a bundle of the exchanges and sent them to Sewall; also he sent marked copies to scientific men in various parts of the United States. The papers had taken ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... superhuman persons—and by having called this city Lichfield? The portrait did not only flatter Lichfield, it flattered human nature. So, naturally, it pleased everybody. Yes, that, I take it, is the true secret of romance—to induce the momentary delusion that humanity is a superhuman race, profuse in aspiration, and prodigal in the exercise of glorious virtues and stupendous vices. As a matter of fact, all human passions are depressingly chicken-hearted, I find. Were it not for the police court records, I would pessimistically ...
— The Rivet in Grandfather's Neck - A Comedy of Limitations • James Branch Cabell
... read 'The Phantom Bride'? It 's perfectly thrilling! There 's a regular rush for it at the library; but some prefer 'Breaking a Butterfly.' Which do you like best?" asked a pale girl of Polly, in one of the momentary lulls ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott
... are ideas to which no outward things correspond; the (so-called) outward things are like the things seen in dreams. The three schools mentioned agree in holding that the things admitted by them have a momentary existence only, and do not allow that, in addition to the things mentioned, viz. elements and elemental things, mind and mental things, there are certain further independent entities such as ether, Self, and so on.—Others finally assert a universal void, i.e. ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut
... are going to be recompensed for our diligence?" continued the mercer, with a trifling alteration in his voice—so trifling, indeed, that d'Artagnan did not perceive it any more than he had the momentary shade which, an instant before, had darkened the countenance ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... man made such a pitiful struggle for self-mastery as the gallows often reveals. If there was a momentary flash of hope based on a transient determination to plead, it faded instantly before the stern and implacable eyes that greeted him from all sides of the table. Certainly there was a fierce struggle under which his soul ...
— The Ape, the Idiot & Other People • W. C. Morrow |
