"Sharpen" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the little girl to run quickly and bring me a servant. When the man came I handed him six louis to sharpen his wits, and then solemnly gave him my orders: "When they ring for you in that saloon, do you tell that young Turk with a red vest on ... you will remember him?" "Yes, madame." "You will tell him that the countess his mother is waiting here for him, in room No. 7, at the end of ...
— The Cross of Berny • Emile de Girardin
... quiet fun of Lory and Raven, though Lory's lasted little longer than Jack's joy of his white mount. Of course Jack was too game to let on he knew he'd been done, but not too busy to sharpen ...
— The Red-Blooded Heroes of the Frontier • Edgar Beecher Bronson
... had descended upon him this afternoon that especial ecstasy that is surrendered once and again by the gods to men to lead them, maybe, into some especial blunder or to sharpen, for Olympian humour, the contrast of some ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole
... hours pass he observes new incidents to sharpen his suspicions and strengthen his ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid
... mighty hero, On the forest-fields surrounding; With his head the clouds he pierces, To his knees his beard extending, And his locks fall to his ankles; Far apart appear his eyeballs, Far apart his feet are stationed. Farther still his mighty shoulders. Now begins his axe to sharpen, Quickly to an edge he whets it, Using six hard blocks of sandstone, And of softer whetstones, seven. Straightway to the oak-tree turning, Thither stalks the mighty giant, In his raiment long and roomy, ...
— The Kalevala (complete) • John Martin Crawford, trans.
... toughness: They are formed of different sizes; some, that are intended for felling, weigh from six to eight pounds; others, that are used for carving, not more than so many ounces; but it is necessary to sharpen both almost every minute; for which purpose, a stone and a cocoa-nut shell full of ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 13 • Robert Kerr
... it is thirsty, and cares only to drink water; but as soon as it comes up, and has enjoyed the light and heat of the sun, it begins to get hungry, and takes in solid food with the water. The fresh air and sunshine sharpen its appetite, just as they do in ...
— Harper's Young People, June 29, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... customers. This was the part of wisdom in a cautious banker; and he was distressed when checks that were not self-explanatory passed through the receiving-teller's window. A small bank is a good place in which to sharpen one's detective sense. Every check tells a story and is in ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson
... though simple and anxious to be pleased, is shrewdly alert. Every now and then they shuffle the trains at Jamaica just to keep him guessing and sharpen his faculty of judging whether this train goes to Brooklyn or Penn Station. His decisions have to be made rapidly. We are speaking now of Long Island commuters, whom we know best; but commuters are ...
— Plum Pudding - Of Divers Ingredients, Discreetly Blended & Seasoned • Christopher Morley
... It was something to think about anyhow; something to sharpen her wits upon, just as a cat stretches her claws in the nap of the drawing-room rug. She rescued from oblivion half a dozen remarks heard during the morning, whose significance had gone over her head, and tentatively fitted them together like bits of a ...
— Mary Wollaston • Henry Kitchell Webster
... silent stranger stood amazed to see Contempt of wealth, and wilful poverty: And, though ill habits are not soon controll'd, A while suspended her desire of gold. But civilly drew in her sharpen'd paws, Not violating hospitable laws; And pacified her tail, and lick'd her frothy ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... quarrel is envenomed by private injuries, a blow that is not mortal or decisive can be productive only of a short truce, which allows the unsuccessful combatant to sharpen his arms for a new encounter. The strength of Alboin had been found unequal to the gratification of his love, ambition, and revenge: he condescended to implore the formidable aid of the chagan; and the arguments that he employed are expressive of the art and policy of the Barbarians. In ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon
... manner, expression, and play of features at a first interview. This process, however, seemed always amply sufficient for her; and in more than one instance events proved that her judgment had not been misled by it. Her affliction had tended, indeed, to sharpen her faculties of observation and her powers of analysis to such a remarkable degree, that she often guessed the general tenor of a conversation quite correctly, merely by watching the minute varieties of expression and gesture in the ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins
... Samson," but they continued their hostility, capturing the Ark of the Covenant in the days of Eli, and finally bringing Israel so completely under their power that they had to go to the Philistines to sharpen ...
— A Trip Abroad • Don Carlos Janes
... in the land called Svithjod, there stands a rock. It is a hundred miles high and a hundred miles wide. Once every thousand years a little bird comes to this rock to sharpen its beak. ...
— The Story of Mankind • Hendrik van Loon
... a few weeks, Victor Emmanuel lost his brother, his mother, and his wife. The King, who felt keenly when he did feel, was driven distraught with grief; no circumstance was wanting which could sharpen the edge of his sorrow. The two Queens, both Austrian princesses, had never interfered in foreign politics; what they suffered they suffered in silence. But they were greatly influenced by the ministers ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... hour is nigh: now hearts beat high; Each sword is sharpen'd well; And who dares die, who stoops to ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... passed dreadful hours of suspense during that long, cold December night. More than once they heard the creature "sharpen its claws" on tree trunks, and the sound was by no means cheerful. The brute seemed bent on remaining near the little camp. I remember that Grandsir Billy said that they heard it "garp" several times; I suppose he meant yawn. The circumstance seems rather ...
— A Busy Year at the Old Squire's • Charles Asbury Stephens
... the Count murder poor Mark, if you please? He was a fool and a bore, but I wished him no harm. I was sorry as any one when I heard of his death, and I offered a good reward for the catching of the mean skunk that killed him. If I had done so myself I wouldn't have been such a fool as to sharpen the scent of the hounds on my ...
— The Silent House • Fergus Hume
... and there is no reason why people should throw away their time and trouble more than their money. There are plenty of things that most boys would give their ears to know, these and these only are the proper things for them to sharpen their wits upon. ...
— The Note-Books of Samuel Butler • Samuel Butler
... teach the use of tools; how to sharpen them; to design and layout work. Printed from new plates and bound in cloth. Profusely illustrated. Each book is wrapped in ...
— Boy Scouts in the North Sea - The Mystery of a Sub • G. Harvey Ralphson
... weeks ago, and now, on this soft, pearly evening, she was waiting eagerly for the sky to deepen, and the light of the stars to sharpen, and the orange to fall over the wall. For the Druze had come many times, and no one had discovered the lovers, screened by masses of roses in the buttress-sheltered corner of the wall. In fact, for the last weeks ...
— Six Women • Victoria Cross
... for cutting on either edge, and that are carried in sheathes, to prevent the mechanics from cutting their neighbours' fingers. These files were to be distributed to the paupers in Ireland, to enable them to sharpen their teeth, so that they could masticate animal food at the grand barbecue that was to be given on the landing of our vessel. Another portion of the cargo was 200,000 puff-balls and sugar-plums, for gratuitous distribution among our English friends ...
— The Dock and the Scaffold • Unknown
... that although we found no kind of metal in any of these islands, yet, the inhabitants of all of them, the moment they got a piece of iron in their possession, began to sharpen it, but made no such attempt ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... Yes, if her instincts be pure and harmonious, and her worldly knowledge that of a child. Her discrimination between right and wrong would be at once accurate and involuntary, like the test of poison. Love for the criminal would but sharpen her intuition. The sentence would not be spoken, but would be readable in eyes untainted alike by ...
— Idolatry - A Romance • Julian Hawthorne
... so I might reduce this grosser material frame, and sharpen and quicken every nerve, and stimulate every fibre of the brain. So alone could I most nearly approach to the commune of spirits. Thus had those saints and prophets of old done when they had entered upon the search after this ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... made something of a stir about the year 1160. He was as full of fun as he could be, and used to take his old saber and sharpen it up, and get in a convenient place on a dark night, and stick it through people as they went by, to see them jump. He was a born humorist. But he got to going too far with it; and the first time he ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... the brilliant young men of his day, he attached himself for a time to the philosopher Socrates, for whom he seems to have felt a warm admiration. But his connexion with that great teacher and thinker, though it served to sharpen his understanding, could not eradicate the effects of evil habit and example. His wilful, selfish, and despotic temper soon broke loose from that salutary restraint, and henceforth we find him pursuing a course of action which brought ...
— Stories From Thucydides • H. L. Havell
... historical or purely imaginary subjects; and it would be impossible to conceive any reading more utterly unprofitable. But the elder Seneca was steeped to the lips in an artificial rhetoric; and these highly elaborated arguments, invented in order to sharpen the faculties for purposes of declamation and debate, were probably due partly to his note-book and partly to his memory. His memory was so prodigious that after hearing two thousand words he could repeat them again in the same order. Few of those who have possessed ...
— Seekers after God • Frederic William Farrar
... of the senses and less refined than those of the intellect. He looked upon imaginative pleasure as consisting in resemblances discovered between imitations and things imitated, between copies and originals, an exercise adapted to sharpen the spirit ...
— Aesthetic as Science of Expression and General Linguistic • Benedetto Croce
... tribulations, and a wasting frame seemed only to sharpen the wits of the indomitable warrior. New Songs (1844) contains, along with negligible cynical pieces, a number of love songs no whit inferior to those of the Book of Songs, romances, and scorching political satires. The Romanzero (1851) ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... his keen, watchful eyes, and then with eager hands he would sharpen a piece of stone, choose out the smoothest rock, and try to draw on its flat surface all those wonderful shapes which had filled his eyes with their beauty. Olive-trees, flowers, birds and beasts ...
— Knights of Art - Stories of the Italian Painters • Amy Steedman
... recapitulation, where he is merely slaying the slain, and where his wisdom was not needed. Had he applied it to the service of the Pendle witches, he would have found still grosser contrarieties, and as great absurdity. But in that case, there was no horror of Popery to sharpen his faculties, or Jesuit in the background to call his ...
— Discovery of Witches - The Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster • Thomas Potts
... party to bring up the other articles. It was heavy work toiling over the sand, but Owen, setting the example, the rest cheerfully obeyed. It took several days to fit the boat for sea. The tools were blunt, and no means existed to sharpen them. ...
— Owen Hartley; or, Ups and Downs - A Tale of Land and Sea • William H. G. Kingston
... EXPERIMENT 71. Sharpen two pencils. About halfway between the point and the other end of each pencil cut a notch all the way around and down to the "lead," or burn a notch down by means of the glowing resistance wire. What you ...
— Common Science • Carleton W. Washburne
... up and turned his face towards the westering sun. What was there in the stillness of its beautiful splendour that seemed to sharpen his horror and difficulty, and yet to stir him to such a daring and devilry as he had never known since he was a boy? There was little sound of life; somewhere an unknown bird was singing, and a ...
— The Return • Walter de la Mare
... The driver was new to these parts; he had but lately come from the Baron's establishment in St. Petersburg. He had never been in this wood after dark, and he had never seen a wolf save in the Zoological Gardens. The atmosphere now began to sharpen. From being merely cold it became positively icy, and muttering, "I never felt anything like this in St. Petersburg," the driver shrank into the depths of his furs, and tried to settle himself more comfortably in his seat. The horses, too, four in number, were strangers in Estonia, the ...
— Werwolves • Elliott O'Donnell
... goats; and that will be less than thy desert, for thy doings to me and the daughter of thy uncle before me." When I looked to my life and found myself at the mercy of her slave women, with my cheeks dust soiled, and saw her sharpen the knife, I made sure of death.—And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased to say ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... shave with that (handing knife to the President). That is the sort of edge to use in all our grafting work, the sort of edge that will bring terror to the heart of the mother of boys. I find very few people who really can sharpen a knife. I have been surprised at the small proportion of people who are really able to do it. They put on a feather edge, or they leave a round edge, or at any rate they are unable apparently to use the little finesse required to put the finishing ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the 13th Annual Meeting - Rochester, N.Y. September, 7, 8 and 9, 1922 • Various
... August, and pretty still and intense, and then some bees that had taken up residence between the floors did not like the noise he made, and occasionally came down to see about it. At such times he made what was in the nature of a spring for the door, explaining later that he had been to sharpen his adz. During quieter moments I went over, at his suggestion, to measure up and see if the beam wasn t high enough. It was on the afternoon of the second day that I told him that if he would now trim up and round off the corners a little I thought I might be able to pass under it without ...
— Dwellers in Arcady - The Story of an Abandoned Farm • Albert Bigelow Paine
... because, according to the expression of the missionaries, the fat of ants (the white part of the abdomen) is a very substantial food. When the cakes of cassava were prepared, Father Zea, whose fever seemed rather to sharpen than to enfeeble his appetite, ordered a little bag to be brought to him filled with smoked vachacos. He mixed these bruised insects with flour of cassava, which he pressed us to taste. It somewhat resembled rancid butter mixed with crumb of bread. The cassava ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V2 • Alexander von Humboldt
... about till it is very lightly browned; now gradually stir in half an ounce of flour; add a little broth, and a little pepper and salt; boil up for a few minutes; add a table-spoonful of claret, or port wine, and same of mushroom catchup, (you may sharpen it with a little lemon-juice or vinegar,) and rub it through a ...
— The Cook's Oracle; and Housekeeper's Manual • William Kitchiner
... blank verse puts the poet to the severest test, and Cowper does not survive the test. Had The Task been written in couplets he might have been forced to sharpen his wit by the necessity of rhyme. As it is, he is merely ponderous—a snail of imagination labouring under a heavy shell of eloquence. In the fragment called Yardley Oak he undoubtedly achieved something worthier of a distant disciple of ...
— The Art of Letters • Robert Lynd
... dared, after all you have done, to put yourself in my power!' cried she. 'Well, you sha'n't escape me THIS time!' And she took down a large knife and began to sharpen it.' ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... through the window they saw a great crowd of people come rushing into the courtyard of the building to sharpen weapons at a huge grindstone that stood there. They were going to murder the prisoners with which the jails were by ...
— Tales from Dickens • Charles Dickens and Hallie Erminie Rives
... almost capering. "Splendid!" he cried. "Splendid! That will sharpen his temper if it don't his wits. The Squire's house was tried, you say?" He turned on the farmer again. "Hullo, my friend! I understood there were no law-breakers in ...
— Two Sides of the Face - Midwinter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... and presently returned with a string of big gray trout. Sitting down, he began to sharpen his knife, but ...
— Partners of the Out-Trail • Harold Bindloss
... puts half-sick, unprofitable stock in the | |money-making class. | | | |Pratts Animal Regulator, America's original guaranteed Stock Tonic and | |Conditioner, is not a food. It is a combination of roots, herbs, spices | |and medicines which sharpen appetite and improves digestion, regulates | |the bowels, makes rich, red blood, and naturally invigorates the | |organs of production. It promotes growth, improves health and strength, | |increases production. And all at very little cost. | | | |Packed in handy cartons, pails and boxes. ...
— Pratt's Practical Pointers on the Care of Livestock and Poultry • Pratt Food Co.
... Kinglake's "Invasion of the Crimea" (four vols., large 8vo, half-calf). She saw through his disguise immediately, and, with great courage and independence, bade him begone. Rebuffed, he was not deflected. Indeed it would seem that Clio's high spirit did but sharpen his desire. Hardly a day passed but he appeared in what he hoped would be the irresistible form—a recently discovered fragment of Polybius, an advance copy of the forthcoming issue of "The Historical Review," the note-book of Professor ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm
... my drawers and towel, and stumbled dismally off. But I haven't enjoyed it. They seem to keep a specially cutting east wind, waiting for me, when I go to bathe in the early morning; and they pick out all the three-cornered stones, and put them on the top, and they sharpen up the rocks and cover the points over with a bit of sand so that I can't see them, and they take the sea and put it two miles out, so that I have to huddle myself up in my arms and hop, shivering, through six inches of water. And when I do get to the sea, ...
— Three Men in a Boa • Jerome K. Jerome
... would have hated themselves for it: they thought they were doing God service. The fervour of their love towards him was probably greater than mine; yet this did not make them superior to prejudice, or sharpen their logical faculties to see that they were idolizing words to which they attached no ideas. On several occasions I had distinctly perceived how serious alarm I gave by resolutely refusing to ...
— Phases of Faith - Passages from the History of My Creed • Francis William Newman
... boys warned me that the fresh air might sharpen up some of our appetites," replied Thad; "and I ...
— The Boy Scouts' First Camp Fire - or, Scouting with the Silver Fox Patrol • Herbert Carter
... stupid when he went into society. Unlike Mr. Spraggon, he had a tremendous determination of words to the mouth, and went best pace with his tongue instead of coughing and hemming, and stammering and stuttering—wishing himself 'well out of it,' as the saying is. His seclusion only seemed to sharpen his faculties and make him enjoy society more. He gushed forth like a pent-up fountain. He was not a bit afraid of the ladies—rather the contrary; indeed, he would make love to them all—all that were good-looking, at least, for he always candidly ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... instinct and insight of the Greeks. The poet, it is true, must be born a poet, and the critic is the child of culture. But as the poet, to perfect his birthright, has need of culture, so the man whom culture can shape and sharpen to the good critic, must be born with many gifts, to be susceptible of such shaping. And when we reflect that the task of the critic is to see clearly into the subtlest and deepest mind, to measure its hollows and its elevations, to weigh all its individual and its composite powers, and, that from ...
— Essays AEsthetical • George Calvert
... a timely pronouncement of the United States would avert and prevent a second interference of Russia. She must sharpen the fangs of her Bear, and get a host of other beasts into her menagerie, before she will provoke the Eagle of America. But beware, beware of loneliness. If your protest be delayed too long, you will have to fight alone against the world: while now, you will only ...
— Select Speeches of Kossuth • Kossuth
... lines of the form will not only aid one in adopting a more becoming style of dress, but will sharpen the artistic perceptions, thus adding to the ...
— What Dress Makes of Us • Dorothy Quigley
... the lad. 'Just let me sharpen it for you, and then you'll find it easier work to ...
— Popular Tales from the Norse • Sir George Webbe Dasent
... and, raising his right hand, asked the Chamberlain for his snuffbox; he took several pinches, but did not vouchsafe to finish his tale, as though he wished to sharpen the curiosity of his hearers. At last he was beginning—when that tale, so curious and so diligently hearkened to, was again interrupted! For some one had unexpectedly sent a man to the Judge, with the message that he was waiting on business that brooked no delay. The Judge, ...
— Pan Tadeusz • Adam Mickiewicz
... stranger, seen with Doe at the fire among the assailants at the memorable ruin, whose appearance had awakened the first suspicion that there was more in the attack than proceeded from ordinary causes. This was a discovery well fitted to increase the interest, and sharpen the curiosity, of the man of peace: who peering in upon the pair from the chink, gave all his faculties to the duty of listening and observing. The visage of Doe, dark and sullen at the best, was now peculiarly moody; and he sat gazing into the fire, apparently regardless ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird
... took his text 'bout Paul and Silas layin' in jail and dat it was not 'ternally against a church member to go to jail. Him dwell on de life of labor and bravery, in tacklin' kickin' hosses and mules. How him sharpen de dull plow points and make de corn and cotton grow, to feed and clothe de hungry and naked. He look up thru de pine tree tops and say: 'I see Jacob's ladder. Brother Wash is climbin' dat ladder. Him is half way up. Ah! Brudders ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves • Works Projects Administration
... Harry also brutal? The sight of that brutality awake, feeding, as it were, on the fluttering little figure before it, distressed her. How long were they going on putting an edge to their argument? There was continually with her the fear that it might sharpen into a quarrel; for now the goldsmith had ceased his gesticulation and became suddenly immobile, and still Harry was requiring of him the same thing. It was insisted upon, by all the lines of his stiff braced figure, and she had a fluttered expectancy that if the little man didn't do something ...
— The Coast of Chance • Esther Chamberlain
... every boy who reads and studies it, a machinist; nor have we any desire to present a lot of useful articles as samples of what to make. The object is to show the boy what are the requirements necessary to make him a machinist; how to hold, handle, sharpen and grind the various tools; the proper ones to use for each particular character of work; how the various machines are handled and cared for; the best materials to use; and suggest the numerous things which can be done in a shop which will pave the way for ...
— Practical Mechanics for Boys • J. S. Zerbe
... a power of distinguishing as metaphysical, and in their natural and unperverted tendency they are ennobling and exalting. Some such studies are wanted to counteract the operation of legal studies and practice, which sharpen, indeed, but, like a grinding-stone, ...
— Specimens of the Table Talk of S.T.Coleridge • Coleridge
... use of talking?" she exclaimed in reproof to herself. "I never said so much before, believe me! The tables will be turned yet!" she added after a pause. "As you so wisely say, let us sharpen our teeth, and pull down all the ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac
... the adversaries become heated in the dispute, which always happens, when they suppose the matter important, or when they would defend the cause of their own self-love; from thence their passions sharpen, they grow angry, quarrels are provoked, they hate each other, and end by reciprocal injury. It is thus, that for opinions, which no man can demonstrate, we see the Brahmin despised; the Mahommedan hated; the Pagan held in contempt; that they ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 1 • Baron D'Holbach
... a grin. "Steel spears. They make steel wire, you know, down to two-thousandths of an inch and finer. Probably our friend has some in his laboratory. Now, if we grind two pieces about a quarter of an inch long off such a wire, and sharpen the ends as well as we can, we'll have short spears we ...
— The Raid on the Termites • Paul Ernst
... monikin philosopher, affirming that he should like no better sport than to hear him lecture in the streets of Stunin'tun, where, he assured me, such doctrine would not be tolerated any longer than was necessary to sharpen a harpoon, or to load a gun. Indeed, he did not know but the Doctor would be incontinently kicked over into Rhode ...
— The Monikins • J. Fenimore Cooper
... forging weapons. Hence "there was no smith found throughout all the land of Israel; for the Philistines said, Lest the Hebrews make them swords or spears. But the Israelites went down to the Philistines, to sharpen every man his share, and his coulter, and his axe, ...
— Industrial Biography - Iron Workers and Tool Makers • Samuel Smiles
... designs that might be had upon Pat, his mother went to sharpen her own wits for whatever the morrow might have in ...
— The Widow O'Callaghan's Boys • Gulielma Zollinger
... she said quite seriously. "Most people have their own little failings and idiosyncrasies, but one need not make copy out of them. Don't you agree with me, Mr. Herrick, that there is too little sense of honour in these matters? To raise a laugh, or to sharpen their own wit, many people will expose their ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... Napier known to history as the "hero of Saint Jean d'Acre," but better known to sailors in the British navy as "Old Sharpen Your Cutlasses!" This quaint soubriquet he obtained from an order issued by him when he commanded a fleet in the Baltic, anticipating ...
— The Land of Fire - A Tale of Adventure • Mayne Reid
... your Improved Tories," he wrote, "I think the scheme is excellent. You sharpen your wits on other people's, and you keep in touch with all kinds of opinions. That's excellent! Your father, and you, too, used to say we were rather one-eyed in Dublin, and I think there's a good deal of truth in that, so I'm trying to get a group of people in Dublin ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine
... her hand under the pretext of picking up a case knife to sharpen her pencil. Now though her lids were lowered as she hacked at the stubby point, she was perfectly aware of the hopeful curiosity in the freshman's side glance at her. Lila despised the habit of side glances. For the past few days she had felt increasing scorn of ...
— Beatrice Leigh at College - A Story for Girls • Julia Augusta Schwartz
... to distinguish consonants from vowels, and afterwards divide them into semivowels and mutes; but because, to those who enter the interior parts of this temple of science, there will appear in many things a great subtilty, which is fit not only to sharpen the wits of youth, but also to exercise the loftiest erudition and science."—De Institutione Oratoria, Lib. ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... the pigeon, and some one plucked ye?" she asked, and went on without waiting for his answer. "Never mind! We'll sharpen up our wits afresh and earn a breakfast. Are ...
— Seven Miles to Arden • Ruth Sawyer
... said that competition was the mainspring of life; they seemed to think exercise was the goal of existence. A man whom I saw there and who, I learnt, had been chosen to teach the young on account of his wisdom, told me that competition trained the man to sharpen his faculties; and that the tension which it provoked is in itself a useful training. I do not believe this. A cat or a boa constrictor will lie absolutely idle until it perceives an object worthy of its appetite; it will then catch it and swallow it, and once ...
— Orpheus in Mayfair and Other Stories and Sketches • Maurice Baring
... his uncle one rainy Saturday morning, a week later, "it's such a bad day we can't do anything outdoors, so we'd better sharpen up the tools; there's a lot ...
— Hidden Treasure • John Thomas Simpson
... mighty sons, tall as Ledwin's were once, To the court-yard old Budrys advances; "Your best steeds forth lead ye, to saddle them speed ye, And sharpen your swords and ...
— Targum • George Borrow
... "Talk to me of a wasp's nest! Bosekop! You shall hear of me there enough to satisfy your appetite for news. Bosekop! In the days when my race ruled the land, such people as they that dwell there would have been put to sharpen my sword on the grindstone, or to wait, hungry and humble, for the refuse of the food ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... when it was bogged up to de hub and lift and heft dat wagon and set it outside de ruts it was bogged down in. Him stayed at de blacksmith shop, work on de wagons, shoe de mules and hosses, make hinges, sharpen de plow points and fix de iron ...
— Slave Narratives Vol. XIV. South Carolina, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... a bad drop in you that attached to you out of the grandfather. What did your languages do for you but to sharpen your tongue, till the scrape of it would take the skin off, the same as a cat! My blessing on you, Conan, but my curse ...
— Three Wonder Plays • Lady I. A. Gregory
... healthy mind ought to be inseparable. We need not be passionless because we reason correctly. Strange to say, one's feelings will often sharpen one's knowledge of the truth, as they do one's ...
— Daily Thoughts - selected from the writings of Charles Kingsley by his wife • Charles Kingsley
... bolos, [118] a sharpening stone, and a bamboo tube for water, and started for the hill. Upon reaching his land he cut some small trees to make a bench. When it was finished, he sat down on it and said to the bolos, "You bolos must sharpen yourselves on the stone." And the bolos went to the stone and were sharpened. Then to the hatchets he said, "You hatchets must be sharpened," and they ...
— Philippine Folk Tales • Mabel Cook Cole
... similar splurge, they have as good as stopped once more. The correspondents just sent over by our "enterprising" newspapers, are hardly yet recovered from their sea-sickness. Just as they begin to sharpen their pencils, presto! the war is over, and the occupation of these hardy ...
— Punchinello Vol. II., No. 30, October 22, 1870 • Various
... wandering about the scrub in the neighborhood of Ballarat one day, sat down at the foot of a tree to rest. While sitting there he took out his knife to cut a stick, and finding the knife was dull, he proceeded to sharpen it by rubbing it upon a stone that lay almost completely imbedded in the ground. As he rubbed, he found that the surface of the stone became yellow. He was greatly surprised at this, and then he dug ...
— The Land of the Kangaroo - Adventures of Two Youths in a Journey through the Great Island Continent • Thomas Wallace Knox
... paean swells within my breast, And I must mouth it, else this heart will burst! (Sings) We'll smite the grafters; smite them hip and thigh; Our motto shall be ever, "Do or die." We've got 'em on the run, And with every rising sun, We'll oil the new machine; Its blade we'll sharpen keen. Revenge shall fill the goblet to the brim, And "Pleasure saturnine" shall be our hymn. Francos, applauding: 'Twere well, sweet Quezox! Thou in happy tone Hast voiced a noble sentiment in rhyme. But lurking in my mem'ry it doth seem That I recall in part those words so apt. (Francos and Quezox ...
— 'A Comedy of Errors' in Seven Acts • Spokeshave (AKA Old Fogy)
... or convex part. Most of them that we saw were about the breadth and thickness of an iron-hoop, and their singular form marks that they are not of European make. Probably they are imitations of their own original instruments, used for the same purposes. They sharpen these iron tools upon a coarse slate whetstone, and likewise keep the whole instrument ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... beauty did not depend for its existence upon the eyes that look upon it, I should want to give more to my hero than love and beauty. I should want to give him help in the battle of life, Henry. I should want to buckle on his armour, and sharpen the point of his lance, and whet the edge of his sword; a rich man's armour is bank-notes, and Winnie knows nothing of such paper. His spear, I am told, is a bullion bar, and Winnie's fingers scarcely ...
— Aylwin • Theodore Watts-Dunton
... them fame. When Earl Haakon's ship drew up beside that of Bue, two of the viking champions, Haavard the Hewer and Aslak Rock-skull, leaped on deck and made terrible havoc. In the end an Icelander picked up an anvil that was used to sharpen their spears and hurled it at Aslak, splitting his skull, while Haavard had both legs cut off. Yet the indomitable viking fought on, ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 9 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality. Scandinavian. • Charles Morris
... "I sharpen serpents' teeth from time to time," offered Bell amiably. He recognized the man, suddenly. "Hullo, Jamison, you look like ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, May, 1930 • Various
... denunciations of misunderstood people and views, atheism toward the revelations of all the sciences (particularly the science of biblical criticism, which he hated worse than he hated Haeckel), and a narrowness that kept trying to sharpen ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes
... action the sense of contrast is an especially lively one. In a later chapter this principle, as applied to explanation and argument, will be discussed. Just here, the point is that the constant study of contrasts will sharpen the language sense ...
— Public Speaking • Clarence Stratton
... the spoils of the disgraced Monmouth.[1] If there wanted further impulse to induce Dryden, conscious of his strength, to mingle in an affray where it might be displayed to advantage, he had the stimulus of personal attachment and personal enmity, to sharpen his political animosity. Ormond, Halifax, and Hyde, Earl of Rochester, among the nobles, were his patrons; Lee and Southerne, among the poets, were his friends. These were partisans of royalty. The Duke ...
— The Dramatic Works of John Dryden Vol. I. - With a Life of the Author • Sir Walter Scott
... these cases support the theories that birds sharpen their faculties by the exercise of defensive and offensive tactics, and also that they ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield
... illustrious prisoner as a defender of their rights, and sympathized with him. To sharpen this sympathy, the adepts of the Italian vente everywhere represented their chief as a martyr to his love of the people, and a victim of monarchy. Most injurious charges were everywhere circulated against Fernando IV. It was said that he had inherited the hatred of Carlos III. to the Monte-Leoni, ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... in a glass case; And F a Foramen, that pierced the skull's base. G was a Grinder, who sharpen'd the fools; And H means the Half-and-half drunk at the schools. Fol ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... the cock in condition: thirdly, take his wings and spread them forth by the length of the first rising feather, and clip the rest slope-wise with sharp points, that in his rising he may therewith endanger the eye of his adversary; fourthly, scrape, smooth, and sharpen his spurs with a pen-knife; fifthly, and lastly, see that there be no feathers on the crown of his head for his adversary to take hold of; then, with your spittle moistening his head all over, turn him into the pit TO ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume II (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... de las' bro' mus' have spoken under 'xcitement. Every man don' have his price! An' I hope de bro' will recant—like as de Psalmist goes out o' his way to say 'In my haste I said, All men are liars.' He was a very busy man, de Psalmist—writin' down hymns all day, sharpen'n' his lead-pencil, bossin' 'roun' de choir—callin' Selah! Well, bro'n an' sisters "—both arms going out, and his voice going up—" one day, seems like, he was in gre't haste—got to finish a psalm for a monthly concert, or such—and some ...
— Eli - First published in the "Century Magazine" • Heman White Chaplin
... cossetting her, became quite a subject of conversation between the two children, Bija sitting demurely threading beads and inventing new methods of just punishment, and the Heir-to-Empire lolling on the floor pretending to sharpen his tinfoil sword, and interposing objections such as, "But you couldn't do that, Bija, you're not strong enough," or "That wouldn't be fair, Bija, for he only hurt you a little, you know." For Akbar was born with a sense of fair-play and justice which ...
— The Adventures of Akbar • Flora Annie Steel
... butler, who admitted that 'John did blow like a pauper' (meaning, as I suppose, a porpoise), and undertook to break the subject to him. It is quite common to find candidates for service very deaf, and if they contrive to pass their 'entrance examination' (for which no doubt they sharpen their faculties), they stay with you for a month at least with an excellent excuse for making it a holiday, since, whatever you tell them to do they cannot hear and do not do it, or do something else which they like better. Mistresses who are silent about moral disqualifications are much ...
— Some Private Views • James Payn
... wife of eighteen is studying with her husband and he gets smitten with another woman, isn't he likely to lose interest in his wife's studies for that reason, and is not his wife's interest in her studies likely to languish for the same reason? Would not the mere sight of those books of hers sharpen the pain that is in her heart? This sudden breaking down of a mutual intellectual interest of two years' standing is coincident with Shelley's re-encounter with Cornelia; and we are allowed to gather from that time forth for nearly two months ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... mellow hour; Fill your pipe, and taste the wine— Warp your face, if it be sour, I can spare a smile from mine; If it sharpen up your wit, Let me feel the edge of it— I have eager ears to lend, Tom Van Arden, ...
— Riley Love-Lyrics • James Whitcomb Riley
... that the blow, or whatever had struck Jan Cuxson down on the threshold of the temple, had served to sharpen his wits; anyway, for some unknown reason, words uttered by the priest on the first day of his imprisonment began to repeat themselves over and over again in his brain, as he sat uncomfortably with his back to the wall ...
— Leonie of the Jungle • Joan Conquest
... out into the long grass the sun was not yet risen, but there were already many colours in the eastern sky, and I made haste to sharpen my scythe, so that I might get to the cutting before the dew should dry. Some say that it is best to wait till all the dew has risen, so as to get the grass quite dry from the very first. But, though it is an advantage to get the grass quite dry, yet it is not worth while to wait till ...
— Hills and the Sea • H. Belloc
... John now began to sharpen the end of his pea-stick. "It was a good many years ago," said he, "more than twenty—and I was then a seafaring man. I was on board a brig, cruising in the West Indies, and we were off Porto Rico, about twenty miles northward, I should say, when we ran into something in ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... "Come, children, sharpen claws and beak, krak, krak, For here's a feast not far to seek, krak, krak, This young girl's corse so white and ...
— Fairy Tales of the Slav Peasants and Herdsmen • Alexander Chodsko
... hole in the rock, sat down on a heap of ore, and ate his supper. Then he leaned back for five minutes' rest before beginning his work again, and laid his head against the rock. He had not kept the position for one minute before he heard something which made him sharpen his ears. It sounded like a voice inside the rock. After a while he heard it again. It was a goblin voice—there could be no doubt about that—and this time he could make ...
— The Princess and the Goblin • George MacDonald
... will be able to detect the relation which the abstractions corresponding to each letter bear to the defined application in the following words. Ak, to be sharp; Ank, to bend; Idh, to kindle; Ar, to move; Al, to burn; Ka, to sharpen; Har, to burn; Ku, to hew; Sa, to produce; Gal, to be yellow or green; Ghar, to be yellow or green; Thak, to thaw; Tar, to go through; Thu, to swell; Dak, to bite; Nak, to perish; Pa, to nourish, to feed; Par, to spare; Pi, to swell, to be ...
— AE in the Irish Theosophist • George William Russell
... they show themselves infected with any moral fanaticism, seem like those intercalated periods of restraint and fasting, during which an impulse learns to humble and submit itself—at the same time also to PURIFY and SHARPEN itself; certain philosophical sects likewise admit of a similar interpretation (for instance, the Stoa, in the midst of Hellenic culture, with the atmosphere rank and overcharged with Aphrodisiacal odours).—Here also is a hint for the explanation of the paradox, why it was precisely ...
— Beyond Good and Evil • Friedrich Nietzsche
... a perturbing odour, and suddenly fomenting all that emotion, fear, and anger in the Chamber, was after all but an opportunity for political strife, a field on which the voracious appetites of the various "groups" would take exercise and sharpen; and, at bottom, the sole question was that of overthrowing the ministry and replacing it by another. Only, behind all that lust of power, that continuous onslaught of ambition, what a distressful prey was stirring—the whole people with all ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... take and sharpen a good bread-knife', said Dapplegrim,' and do as if you were going to cut in two the third loaf on the left hand of those four loaves which are lying on the dresser in the king's kitchen, and you'll ...
— Popular Tales from the Norse • Sir George Webbe Dasent
... justice exist at all, it certainly is not a Good, for if it were, it would be a Good for all, and, as we agree, there is no such thing. Men like Bentham, therefore, to you will be mere visionaries, and the legal system as a whole will have no sense or purport, except so far as it contributes to sharpen your wits and fill your pocket And so, in general, with all professions and occupations; whichever you may adopt, you will treat it merely as a means to your own Good; and since you have no Good which is also ...
— The Meaning of Good—A Dialogue • G. Lowes Dickinson
... amusing to the American boy who has ever learned to manipulate them, and it is wonderful how much skill can be attained in their use. Any boy with a little mechanical ingenuity can make a pair of skis (pronounced skees). They can be made from two barrel staves. Select staves of straight grained wood. Sharpen the ends of each and score each end by cutting grooves in the wood, as shown in the cut, Fig. 7. A pocket knife or small gouge will suffice for this work. Then smear the end of the staves with oil and hold them close to a hot ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics
... rubbing out the pencil lines the ink lines are reduced in blackness and the surface of the paper becomes roughened, so that it will soil easier and be harder to clean. In order to produce fine pencil lines without requiring a very frequent sharpening of the pencil it is best to sharpen the pencil as in Figures 7 and 8, so that the edge shall be long in the direction in which it is moved, which is denoted by the arrow in Figure 7. But when very fine work is to be done, as in the case of Patent Office drawings, a long, round point is preferable, because ...
— Mechanical Drawing Self-Taught • Joshua Rose
... Bence Jones to milk the cows and to attend to the dairy. The road is slippery on the high ground hard by, and it is debated at Lisselan House whether the farrier of the Dragoon Guards shall not be asked to "sharpen" the shoes of the animals employed there, for no local workman will ...
— Disturbed Ireland - Being the Letters Written During the Winter of 1880-81. • Bernard H. Becker
... Newcastle Street, and to these he returned in the evening, remaining there alone with his little library, and seldom moving out of doors. He was unhealthy constitutionally, and his habits contributed to make him more so. Everything which he saw which was good seemed only to sharpen the contrast between himself and his lot, and his reading was a curse to him rather than a blessing. I sometimes wished that he had never inherited any love whatever for what is usually considered to be the Best, and that he had been endowed with an organisation coarse and ...
— Mark Rutherford's Deliverance • Mark Rutherford
... is physical in love, and happy enough not to know these preferences which sharpen the appetite for it, at the same time that they increase the difficulty of satisfying such appetite, men, in a state of nature, must be subject to fewer and less violent fits of that passion, and ...
— A Discourse Upon The Origin And The Foundation Of - The Inequality Among Mankind • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... as to the facts, Kent spent a forenoon in the State library. He stayed on past the luncheon hour, feeding on a dry diet of Digests; and it was not until hunger began to sharpen his faculties that he thought of going back of the statutory law to the fountain-head in the constitution of the State. Here, after he had read carefully section by section almost through the entire instrument, his eye lighted upon a clause which ...
— The Grafters • Francis Lynde
... things that can be imposed by authority. Standards exist in the mind, where they grow out of that personal sense of values which is one of the twin pillars on which civilization rests. All that authority can do is to stimulate and sharpen that sense by subtle education and absolute sincerity. The critic can put good things in another man's way and present them in a sympathetic light; also, he can resolutely refuse ever to pretend that he likes what he does not like. Standards are imposed from above in the sense that people who ...
— Since Cezanne • Clive Bell
... dignity upon him, regard was had not only to the memory of the dead man and the grief of his father, but also to the effect it would have upon others. When such splendid rewards are bestowed upon young men—provided they deserve them—they will serve to sharpen the inclinations of the rising generation to the practice of the honourable arts; they will make our leading men more desirous of bringing up their children, increase the joy they will have in them if they survive, and provide a glorious consolation ...
— The Letters of the Younger Pliny - Title: The Letters of Pliny the Younger - - Series 1, Volume 1 • Pliny the Younger
... mowing in a field as a Wanderer went by clad in a dark blue cloak and carrying a wanderer's staff in his hand. One of the thralls spoke to the Wanderer: "Tell them in the house of Baugi up yonder that I can mow no more until a whetstone to sharpen my scythe is sent to me." "Here is a whetstone," said the Wanderer, and he took one from his belt. The thrall who had spoken whetted his scythe with it and began to mow. The grass went down before his scythe as if the wind had cut it. "Give us the whetstone, give us ...
— The Children of Odin - The Book of Northern Myths • Padraic Colum
... in slices about one inch thick, from half as large as the hand to four times that size. Sharpen a stick or branch of convenient length—say, from two to four feet long—and weave the point of the stick through the steak several times, so that it may be readily turned over a few brisk coals or on the windward side of a small fire. Allow to brown nicely, turning frequently. Salt and pepper ...
— Manual for Noncommissioned Officers and Privates of Infantry • War Department
... wrong with a slimy coat of respectability, and glorifies selfishness with the aureole of sacrifice. It sets down all collisions as foreordained, and never observes that they occur because people will not smooth off their angles, but sharpen them, and not only sharpen them, but run them into you. It forgets that the Lord made man upright, but he hath sought out many inventions. It attributes all the collision and inaptitude which it ...
— Gala-days • Gail Hamilton
... interest or inclination of ministers to apply that influence to the electors: on the contrary, it renders it much more necessary to them, if they seek to have a majority in parliament to increase the means of that influence, and redouble their diligence, and to sharpen dexterity in the application. The whole effect of the bill is therefore the removing the application of some part of the influence from the elected to the electors, and further to strengthen and extend a court interest ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke
... circumference of the tube, and plot the centre lines on it. The paper is then applied to the tube again, and poppet marks made with a centre punch opposite to or through the marks on the paper. Drive a wire-nail through a piece of square wood and sharpen the point. Lay the flue on a flat surface, apply the end of the nail to one of the poppet marks, and draw it along the flue, which must be held quite firmly. When all the lines have been scored, the centring of the water tubes is a very ...
— Things To Make • Archibald Williams
... long foretokened it. As he confronts the disgrace almost face to face, how changed is the hideous aspect of his deed, from that fair face of promise with which it tempted him! Conscience, and honor, and plain honesty, which left him when they could not restrain, now come back to sharpen his anguish. Overawed by the prospect of open shame, of his wife's disgrace, and his children's beggary, he cows down, and slinks out of ...
— Twelve Causes of Dishonesty • Henry Ward Beecher
... from right be equally reprehensible; these, and other questions of the same sort, occupied the brains, the tongues, and the pens of the ablest men in the civilised world during several centuries. This sort of philosophy, it is evident, could not be progressive. It might indeed sharpen and invigorate the minds of those who devoted themselves to it; and so might the disputes of the orthodox Lilliputians and the heretical Blefuscudians about the big ends and the little ends of eggs. But such disputes could add nothing to the stock of knowledge. ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... these questions were not considered satisfactory, they next endeavoured to sharpen his wits by torturing a German coiner in his presence; and when this mode of persuasion failed, they tortured Augusta himself. They stripped him naked. They stretched him face downwards on a ladder. They smeared his hips with boiling pitch. ...
— History of the Moravian Church • J. E. Hutton
... hundreds hang'd in Kent. The tigress had unsheath'd her nails at last, And Renard and the Chancellor sharpen'd them. In every London street a gibbet stood. They are down to-day. Here by this house was one; The traitor husband dangled at the door, And when the traitor wife came out for bread To still the petty treason therewithin, Her cap would ...
— Queen Mary and Harold • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... free, aff-han', your story tell, When wi' a bosom crony; But still keep something to yoursel', Ye scarcely tell to ony: Conceal yoursel' as weel's ye can Frae critical dissection; But keek thro' ev'ry other man, Wi' sharpen'd, sly inspection. ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... sir," shouted Nahum Beals, "the time will come when you will all thank God that you belong to the poor and down-trodden of this earth, and not to the rich and great—the time will come. There's knives to sharpen to-day, and wood for scaffolds as plenty as in the days of the French Revolution, and the hand that marks the time of day on the clock of men's patience with wrong and oppression has near gone round to the same ...
— The Portion of Labor • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... to the cavern, he looked down And saw a gloomy place, dismal as hell; But not one cursed, impious sorcerer Was visible in that infernal depth. Awhile he stood—his falchion in his grasp, And rubbed his eyes to sharpen his dim sight, And then a mountain-form, covered with hair, Filling up all the space, rose into view. The monster was asleep, but presently The daring shouts of Rustem broke his rest, And brought him suddenly upon his feet, When seizing a huge mill-stone, forth he ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 1,Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous
... those who are not connected in some way with Gipsies, that the slightest indication of it is invariably taken as an irrefutable proof of relationship with them. It is but a few weeks since, as I was walking along the Marine Parade in Brighton, I overtook a tinker. Wishing him to sharpen some tools for me, I directed him to proceed to my home, and en route spoke to him in Gipsy. As he was quite fair in complexion, I casually remarked, "I should have never supposed you could speak Rommany—you don't look like it." To which he replied, very gravely, in a tone as of gentle reproach, ...
— The English Gipsies and Their Language • Charles G. Leland |
