"Understanding" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... baptised, the door was opened for us in Heaven, and Jesus said to us, "Behold, I set before you an open door." From that day we were permitted to look with the eye of faith upon those good things which pass man's understanding. But some of us would not look up. We were like travellers going along a muddy road on a starlight night, and who look down on the foul, dirty path, and never upwards to the bright sky above. My brother, turn your eyes from this world's dirty ways, look away from your selfish work, ...
— The Life of Duty, v. 2 - A year's plain sermons on the Gospels or Epistles • H. J. Wilmot-Buxton
... under the necessity of staying at home. But his acquaintance with her being too slight to furnish him with the means of executing this expedient, he devised another, which was practised with all imaginable success. Understanding that her grandmother had left her a sum of money independent of her parents, he conveyed a letter to her mother, intimating, that her daughter, on pretence of going to the masquerade, intended to bestow herself in marriage to a certain person, and that in a few days she would ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... She knew that the love of God toward the sinner, and the path of duty prescribed to the sinner, are both of an unchangeable nature. In a believing dependence on the one, and an affectionate walk in the other, she sought and found "the peace of God which passeth all understanding;" for "so ...
— The Annals of the Poor • Legh Richmond
... farewell kiss with composure. "Thy rod" is supporting her; "thy staff" is keeping at bay the passions and fears of the natural heart. So a widowed mother leaves a large family of young children, with a peace which passes all understanding. And the father of a dependent family, which never could, in a greater measure, need a father's presence, looks upon them from his dying bed, and says to them, with the serenity of the patriarch, "Behold, I die; but ...
— Catharine • Nehemiah Adams
... the secret was confined, above four hundred years, to the Romans of the East; and at the end of the eleventh century, the Pisans, to whom every sea and every art were familiar, suffered the effects, without understanding the composition, of the Greek fire. It was at length either discovered or stolen by the Mahometans; and, in the holy wars of Syria and Egypt, they retorted an invention, contrived against themselves, on the heads of the Christians. A knight, who ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... was Bob MacNair different from other men. Just and stern beyond his years, with a sternness that was firmness rather than severity; slow to anger, but once his anger was fairly aroused terrible in meting out his vengeance. Yet, withal, possessed of an understanding and a depth of sympathy, entirely unsuspected by himself, but which enshrined him in the hearts of his Indians, who, in all the world were the men ...
— The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx
... cut.' He expected her to die in state. Then, with all his bursts of tenderness he always mingled his own praises, hinting that though she was a good wife he knew he had deserved a good one, and remarking, when he extolled her understanding, that he did not 'think it the worse for her having kept him company so many years.' To all this Lord Hervey listened with, doubtless, well-concealed disgust; for cabals were even then forming for the future influence that might or ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 1 • Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton
... court martial, had an instinctive feeling that if his father were to learn the action they had taken, he would scarcely consider it to tally with the exercise of strict politeness to company. In short, without a word said, there was a tacit understanding in the corps that this was an affair to be kept ...
— Red, White, Blue Socks. Part Second - Being the Second Book of the Series • Sarah L. Barrow
... Wedgwood held the medium's hands and feet on both sides all the time. I found it so hot and tiring that I went away before all these astounding miracles, or jugglery, took place. How the man could possibly do what was done passes my understanding. I came downstairs, and saw all the chairs, etc., on the table, which had been lifted over the heads ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume II • Francis Darwin
... Doctor came out of the sick-room he had done what the other physicians had not done and could not do. He had fathomed the case, and, understanding the cause, he was ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... there to condole their misery, and to mourn under their distress: so all that day they spent their time in nothing but sighs and bitter lamentations. The next night she, talking with her husband further about them, and understanding that they were yet alive, did advise him to counsel them to make away with themselves. So when morning was come, he goes to them in a surly manner, as before, and perceiving them to be very sore with the stripes that he had given them the day before, ...
— Bible Stories and Religious Classics • Philip P. Wells
... kept up with great zest. It had proved true that the more one learned of his horse, the better he loved it, the greater the silent understanding between it and himself. They now had races of all sorts and daily. Hurdles had given place to great hedges and ditches, which most of the animals distinguished themselves in leaping. Monty was still the hindmost in everything, yet showed his pluck ...
— Dorothy on a Ranch • Evelyn Raymond
... you can give me," he declared, and at the sudden ring of autumnal ardor in his voice and the avid light in his eyes, she found herself shivering with fastidious distaste. She did not read the eyes with full understanding, yet instinctively she shrank, for they held the animal craving of a long-suppressed desire—the physical love of a man past his youth which can satisfy itself with mere possession. "I will take what ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... the woman said to her husband, "Moreover each of the four was habited in gaberdine and bonnet." But when the amourists heard these words every one of them said to himself, "Here be a judgment this strumpet of a woman hath wrought upon us, the whore! the witch!" and her husband understanding what she told him asked, "Wherefore didst thou not bring them hither that the sight might solace us?" "O my lord," answered she, "had I brought them what hadst thou said to them? indeed I fear me ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... favourable to herself; and a thought that, if true, could not do her any injury with him. This set her heart a little to rights, and she grew calm with a belief, that if so it was, as now she doubted not, a sight of her, or a future hope from her, would calm all his discontent, and beget a right understanding; she therefore resolves to write to him, and own her little fallacy: but before she did so, Octavio, whose passion was violent as ever in his soul, though it was oppressed with a thousand torments, and languished ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... always receive an annual pension Of 300 roubles. Natalia listened in silence to this. Then, taking the document in her hands and regarding it with a frown, she muttered something between her teeth, and darted from the room, slamming the door behind her. Not understanding the reason for such strange conduct, Mamma followed her presently to her room, and found her sitting with streaming eyes on her trunk, crushing her pocket-handkerchief between her fingers, and looking mournfully at the remains of the document, which was lying torn to pieces ...
— Childhood • Leo Tolstoy
... perhaps be less drawn to this qualification of a statesman, comes this word of praise, with many of detraction: "Nature had combined in Sir Robert Peel many admirable parts. In him a physical frame incapable of fatigue was united with an understanding equally vigorous and flexible. He was gifted with the faculty of method in the highest degree, and with great powers of application, which were sustained by a prodigious memory, while he could communicate his ...
— Ten Englishmen of the Nineteenth Century • James Richard Joy
... at the least of making himself independent master of the districts he governed; and he entered into negotiations with the Duke of Aquitania to secure his support. In spite of religious differences their interests were too similar not to make an understanding easy; and the secret alliance was soon concluded and confirmed by a precious pledge. Duke Eudes had a daughter of rare beauty, named Lampagie, and he gave her in marriage to Abi-Nessa, who, say the chronicles, became ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume I. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... ideas of things which are unrealities in the abstract—for only what is true has actual substance—become real to the perverted understanding. Ah, child, there are strange contradictions and deep problems in life for each of ...
— After the Storm • T. S. Arthur
... necessary laws of thought, which determine it, by a spontaneous logic, to affirm the being of a God; and, furthermore, that this judgment may be called innate in the sense, that it is the primitive, universal, and necessary development of the human understanding which "is innate to itself and equal to ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker
... she had no accomplice, she had written from the Conciergerie to Penautier, begging him to do all he could for her, and to remember that his interests in this matter were the same as her own, she said that she never knew Penautier had had any understanding with Sainte-Croix about the poisons, and it would be a lie to say otherwise; but when a paper was found in Sainte-Croix's box that concerned Penautier, she remembered how often she had seen him at the house, and thought it possible that the friendship might have included some business ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... fall into the old groove at Brynderyn, as far as Cardo and his father were concerned, except that that which had been wanting before, namely, a warm and loving understanding between them, now reigned in both their hearts, and sweetened their daily intercourse. The west parlour and all the rooms on that side of the house, which had been unused for so many years, were opened up again, and delivered over to the care of Mr. and Mrs. Lewis Wynne, who kept their own establishment ...
— By Berwen Banks • Allen Raine
... something of someone when we say that he possesses prestige; but our statement is not clear, and the predicate cannot be distinguished from the subject. Of what is analysable, well-known, commonplace, or what we succeed in understanding thoroughly, in attaining or imitating, we do not ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... anger had melted at the sight of this child. Marguerite, with the perfect understanding born of love itself, had soon realised the charm which a woman like Mademoiselle Lange must of necessity exercise over a chivalrous, enthusiastic nature like Armand's. The sense of protection—the strongest perhaps that exists in a good man's heart—would draw him ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy
... idea that you understood German, or I should not have made any remarks," the lady said, smiling; "but so few French boys, out of Alsace, do understand it that it never struck me that you spoke the language. You will find it an immense advantage for, outside the towns, you will scarcely meet a person understanding French. But I am sure you must be all very hungry, ...
— The Young Franc Tireurs - And Their Adventures in the Franco-Prussian War • G. A. Henty
... all stain. But he soon began to annoy me with the most persistent courtship, looking, as I could see, to breaking down my reserve, and subjecting me to the domination of a passion for him. If I had ever really loved Mr. Seabrook, it would have been a love of the senses, of interest, of the understanding, and not of the imagination and heart. I was just on the eve of such a love when it was fortunately put in check by my suspicions. For him to endeavor to create a feeling now that might, nay, that was intended to subvert principle and virtue, appeared even to my small worldly sense, ...
— The New Penelope and Other Stories and Poems • Frances Fuller Victor
... external object, being distinct from all other modifications of thinking, furnishes the mind with a distinct idea which we call sensation; which is, as it were, the actual entrance of an idea into the understanding by ...
— Thaumaturgia • An Oxonian
... a fair account of what I dislike, in all those signs set over those houses that invite us to punch: I own it was a matter that did not need explaining, being so very obvious to the most common understanding. Yet, I know not how it happens, but methinks there seems a fatal blindness, to overspread our corporeal eyes, as well as our intellectual; and I heartily wish, I may be found a false prophet; for, these are not bare suspicions, but ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... you? What have I not endured from you—endured with angelic patience? Did I not find out, before our friendship was a fortnight old, that all your advanced views were merely a fashion picked up and followed like any other fashion, without understanding or meaning a word of them? Did you not, in spite of your care for your own liberty, set up claims on me compared to which the claims of the most jealous wife would have been trifles. Have I a single woman friend whom you have not ...
— The Philanderer • George Bernard Shaw
... in a half-incredulous tone. Then he looked inquiringly at the gentleman referred to, as if doubtful of his own understanding of the words he ...
— The Master of Silence • Irving Bacheller
... confidence, it regarded itself as the very summit of civilisation. It may be that such a phase was necessary before the awakening of a social conscience could arise. Old conceptions have become foolish in a New Age. A great motive, an enlarging dream, a quickening understanding of social responsibility, these ...
— The Truth About Woman • C. Gasquoine Hartley
... might be rescued from her condition. Night after night he patiently tried to teach her to read and to write, stopping again and again to humor her whims and indulge her foolish fancies. More than once he had surprised a new look in her eyes, a sudden gleam of sanity, of frightened understanding; and at such times she would cling to him for protection against that strange ...
— Mr. Opp • Alice Hegan Rice
... which man is adorned, those of the soul are the most noble and most important—for instance, the characteristics or bent, and the skill or understanding in the exercise of a man's reasonings and mental operations. And since the soul is so dependent on the body and on its sensations, the spiritual operations are tempered by the bodily characteristics. These characteristics (in the judgment of Galen, Plato, Aristotle, and Hippocrates), ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 (Vol 28 of 55) • Various
... do this is knowledge to be coveted as a most excellent gift. An understanding of the religion of our fellow-men is good, both for him who goes as a missionary and for him who at ...
— The Religions of Japan - From the Dawn of History to the Era of Meiji • William Elliot Griffis
... heart, that he might read his heart there. The heart is deaf and dumb and blind, but it has more in it—more life and blessedness, more torture and death—than any poor knowledge-machine of a brain can understand, or even delude itself into the fancy of understanding. ...
— Alec Forbes of Howglen • George MacDonald
... constitution, but had disgracefully and without compunction violated every one of its conditions, and perpetrated cruelties and injustices which would have appalled the judges of imperial Rome, and defended them by a casuistry which surpassed in its insult to the human understanding that of the priests ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume X • John Lord
... sexual intercourse is wrong except between married people, and that it is wrong to tell a lie, even if the lie be a perfectly harmless one, exist of themselves. That we cannot bring abstract moralities into the focus of our understanding is no argument. As well deny the stars because we cannot understand them. That abstract moralities impose on us should be a sufficient argument that they cannot be the futilities that Owen would argue them to be—not them, he only protested against one.... ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... very simplest arithmetical operations. Still less do we doubt the validity of mathematical reasoning because not only children and savages, but sometimes even distinguished classical scholars—a Macaulay, a Matthew Arnold, a T. S. Evans,—were wholly incapable of understanding very simple mathematical arguments. Equally little do we deny a real difference between harmony and discord because people may be found who see no difference between 'God save the King' and 'Pop goes the Weasel.' ...
— Philosophy and Religion - Six Lectures Delivered at Cambridge • Hastings Rashdall
... made use of the term concupiscence, but we have also said that "the fear of God and faith are wanting." This we have added with the following design: The scholastic teachers also, not sufficiently understanding the definition of original sin, which they have received from the Fathers, extenuate the sin of origin. They contend concerning the fomes [or evil inclination] that it is a quality of [blemish in the] body, and, with their usual folly, ask whether this quality be ...
— The Apology of the Augsburg Confession • Philip Melanchthon
... young inquiring men, a higher than literary, a kind of prophetic or magician character. He was thought to hold, he alone in England, the key of German and other Transcendentalisms; knew the sublime secret of believing by "the reason" what "the understanding" had been obliged to fling out as incredible; and could still, after Hume and Voltaire had done their best and worst with him, profess himself an orthodox Christian, and say and print to the Church of England, with its singular ...
— The Life of John Sterling • Thomas Carlyle
... in the habit of reading the Scriptures just as they find them, and of understanding them according to the established rules of interpretation, will never be at a loss to understand so plain a passage as the following: "And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it; because that in it he had rested from ...
— The Seventh Day Sabbath, a Perpetual Sign, from the Beginning to the Entering into the Gates of the Holy City, According to the Commandment • Joseph Bates
... moon and stars were a later development. They found, too, that the light could not be made to reach certain recesses in the cavern where the roof approached the earth, so they finally built a great wall to keep the inhabitants within proscribed boundaries, and to prevent them from understanding the machinery ...
— The Land of the Changing Sun • William N. Harben
... a world-wide power, and a wealth per capita greater than those of any other country; that her power and wealth, as compared with her home area, are so much greater than those of any other country as to stagger the understanding; that she could not have done what she has done without her navy; that she has never hesitated to use her navy to assist her trade, and yet that she has never used her navy to keep ...
— The Navy as a Fighting Machine • Bradley A. Fiske
... to be taken notice of by them. Besides that our Analysis by how much the more obvious we make it, by so much the more suittable it will be to the Nature of that Doctrine which 'tis alledged to prove, which being as clear and intelligible to the Understanding as obvious to the sense, tis no marvail the learned part of Mankind should so long and so generally imbrace it. For this Doctrine is very different from the whimseys of Chymists and other Modern Innovators, of whose Hypotheses we may observe, as Naturalists do of less perfect ...
— The Sceptical Chymist • Robert Boyle
... whom he showed it. He told me it was written in a kind of English he could not understand, and that he had been afraid to let any one see it. He wanted me to accept the document in payment of the rent he owed me, with the understanding that I was not to look at it, and that if he got well I was to give it back. If he pulled through, he was to pay me in some other way; but if he died I was to keep the document. About a month ago he ...
— My Buried Treasure • Richard Harding Davis
... that sacrifices were instituted by men, by the priesthood, not by God, and continued, making plain once for all his understanding of the way God wanted men to ...
— Stories of the Prophets - (Before the Exile) • Isaac Landman
... FEWER personal attachments to gratify, than a body of men who may each be supposed to have an equal number; and will be so much the less liable to be misled by the sentiments of friendship and of affection. A single well-directed man, by a single understanding, cannot be distracted and warped by that diversity of views, feelings, and interests, which frequently distract and warp the resolutions of a collective body. There is nothing so apt to agitate the passions of mankind as personal considerations whether they relate to ourselves ...
— The Federalist Papers
... a woman just refreshed in water, whose only artifice consisted in being whiter than her muslins, sweeter than all perfumes, more seductive than any siren, always loving and therefore always loved. This admirable understanding of a wife's business was the secret of Josephine's charm for Napoleon, as in former times it was that of Caesonia for Caius Caligula, of Diane de Poitiers for Henri II. If it was largely productive to women of seven or eight lustres what a weapon is it in the hands of young women! A husband gathers ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac
... movements of events and ideas, the more clearly we find the moral nature of the cause at issue emerging in the field and in the study; that all honest persons with average natural sensibility, with respectable understanding, educated in the school of northern teaching, will have eventually to range themselves in the armed or unarmed host which fights or pleads for freedom, as against every form of tyranny; if not in the front rank now, then in the rear rank by and by;—assuming these ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... know. It might come round to their ears, and that would make things more difficult still; but I am hoping it won't be long. Now, Claire, I've told you, because you are such a kind understanding little soul, and it's a comfort to talk things out; but I'll kill you if you dare to breathe a word to another soul—Sophie Blake, or Mrs Willoughby, or even your mother when you write to her. You can never tell ...
— The Independence of Claire • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... admired. Her uncle naturally believed that he was the cause of it, but the truth was that the way he advertised her would have spoiled the whole thing for any one else. She could endure the advertisement. And now he had been put aside, without himself understanding how it had happened. He, who on this day had organised the whole assembly, was standing quivering with eagerness to be abreast of the situation; but he could not. It all went on over his head, as though on the second ...
— Captain Mansana and Mother's Hands • Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson
... Cyrus the Persian to Sparta in her contest with Athens, as related in a preceding chapter, was bestowed with the understanding that Sparta should give him her assistance against his elder brother, Artaxerxes Mne'mon, should he ever require it. Accordingly, when the latter succeeded to the Persian throne, on the death of his father, Cyrus, still governor of the maritime region of Asia Minor, ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... but the great respect that my people had for me, and the love that I bore towards them, over and above the sign that was given to me in the removal of the royal candle-stick from its place, worked upon my heart and understanding, and I could not stand out. So, on the last Sabbath of the year 1810, I preached my last sermon, and it was a moving discourse. There were few dry eyes in the kirk that day; for I had been with the aged from the beginning—the young considered me as their natural pastor—and my bidding them all ...
— The Annals of the Parish • John Galt
... Edison says: "My copy looked fine if viewed as a whole, as I could write a perfectly straight line across the wide sheet, which was not ruled. There were no flourishes, but the individual letters would not bear close inspection. When I missed understanding a word, there was no time to think what it was, so I made an illegible one to fill in, trusting to the printers to sense it. I knew they could read anything, although Mr. Bloss, an editor of the Inquirer, made such bad copy that one of his editorials was ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... am beating a perforated drum, Eleanore." After a pause he added: "But whatever people may do or fail to do, between us two there must be a clear understanding: Are you ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... the fair sex, there is no understanding them in the least. No one can say how a woman will act in a given situation; for feminine actions are based less on logical foundations than on the emotion of ...
— The Silent House • Fergus Hume
... determined by the expression of opinion, that is by means of the votes given by the majority of its citizens. It is by intelligence and not by brute force that the world is now being ruled, and with the growth of intelligence and a better understanding of the principles of government, it is in order not only on the grounds of justice but for the best interests of the state to widen the foundations of representative government, so as to make available for voting and for official responsibilities all the intelligence that is comprised within ...
— A Short History of Women's Rights • Eugene A. Hecker
... as it were, unpicked and unravelled every stitch in plain work, till she has discovered and laid bare its intention, its construction, and effect. She, has also given us rules made clear to the dullest understanding, instructing us how to teach the young and ignorant. She shows us the quickest and most perfect way of working different materials for different purposes, and tells us how to select them. I will, therefore, refer my readers to her most useful and instructive books,[321] ...
— Needlework As Art • Marian Alford
... Ahimsa necessarily includes truth and fearlessness. As man cannot deceive the loved one, he does not fear or frighten him or her. Gift of life is the greatest of all gifts; a man who gives it in reality, disarms all hostility. He has paved the way for an honourable understanding. And none who is himself subject to fear can bestow that gift. He must, therefore, be himself fearless. A man cannot then practice Ahimsa and be a coward at the same time. The practice of Ahimsa calls forth the greatest courage. ...
— Third class in Indian railways • Mahatma Gandhi
... bombast and make-believe, this acute understanding of man as the eternal tragic comedian, is at the bottom of that compassionate irony which paces under the name of the maternal instinct. A woman wishes to mother a man simply because she sees into his helplessness, his need of an amiable environment, his touching self delusion. That ironical ...
— In Defense of Women • H. L. Mencken
... miserable fates, to loathe one's own soul, to find the most despicable of creatures enclosed within one's own skin. To play Siamese twin to a pustulous convict were a trifle beside this. To be your own black beast; to loathe your own soul; with a full heart to despise your own understanding—this is to start upon Despair's Last Journey in one sense or another, to find either the gulf or the gates of hope. For the alternative is eternal, and it will yet be known to all men—if not here, then elsewhere—that the way ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray
... captain's tales afterwards, and Mr. Chalk, with the stem of his long pipe withdrawn from his open mouth, would sit enthralled as his host narrated picturesque incidents of hairbreadth escapes, or, drawing his chair to the table, made rough maps for his listener's clearer understanding. Sometimes the captain took him to palm-studded islands in the Southern Seas; sometimes to the ancient worlds of China and Japan. He became an expert in nautical terms. He walked in knots, and even ordered a new carpet in fathoms—after the shop-keeper had demonstrated, by means ...
— Dialstone Lane, Complete • W.W. Jacobs
... this he and Mignon had come to a definite understanding regarding the operetta. Mignon had informed him boldly that she wished to sing the part of the Princess, and he had assured her that he would arrange matters to her satisfaction. It, therefore, became incumbent ...
— Marjorie Dean - High School Sophomore • Pauline Lester
... this steak was burned, and a little spotted with cinders, but the inside was raw and full of blood; however it was necessary not to show any repugnance, and to make a cannibal feast, otherwise my hosts would have been affronted, and I was anxious to live with them for some days on a good understanding. I therefore eat my portion of the stag, which, after all, was not bad: my Indians did as I had done. Good relations were thus established between us, and treachery was not ...
— Adventures in the Philippine Islands • Paul P. de La Gironiere
... 758. ratification, completion, signature, seal, sigil[Lat], signet. V. contract, covenant, agree for; engage &c. (promise) 768. treat, negotiate, stipulate, make terms; bargain &c. (barter) 794. make a bargain, strike a bargain; come to terms, come to an understanding; compromise &c. 774; set at rest; close, close with; conclude, complete, settle; confirm, ratify, clench, subscribe, underwrite; endorse, indorse; put the seal to; sign, seal &c. (attest) 467; indent. take one at one's word, bargain by inch ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... have gone on in exactly the same way indefinitely had not a little lassie who loved horses and animals as she loved human beings, and whose understanding of them and their understanding of her was almost uncanny, chosen Columbia Heights School ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... of eighteen months, Bianconi's apprenticeship was out; and Faroni then offered to take him back to his father, in compliance with the original understanding. But Bianconi had no wish to return to Italy. Faroni then made over to him the money he had retained on his account, and Bianconi set up business for himself. He was now about eighteen years old; he was strong and healthy, and able to walk with a heavy load on his back ...
— Men of Invention and Industry • Samuel Smiles
... my friends, to dedicate to you these beginnings of my thoughts upon the most important subject of these or any times. And when I state the reason to be, that you have been more profitable to my faith in orthodox doctrine, to my spiritual understanding of the Word of God, and to my right conception of the Christian Church, than any or all of the men with whom I have entertained friendship and conversation, it will perhaps still more astonish the mind, and stagger the belief, of those who have adopted, as ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Vol. 6) - Letters 1821-1842 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... feeling of resentment, and there followed a period during which the policy of Great Britain was to show no consideration for colonial trade, and the policy of the principal colonies was to impose heavy duties upon British trade. By a gradual process of better understanding, largely helped by the development of means of communication, the antagonistic extreme was abandoned, and a tendency towards a system of preferential duties within the empire ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various
... the morning, is too long to be told here, for it was accomplished only after hours of the talk and "face saving" so dear to the heart of the Oriental. Suffice it to say that through the exercise of great tact and a thorough understanding of the Chinese character they were able to settle ...
— Camps and Trails in China - A Narrative of Exploration, Adventure, and Sport in Little-Known China • Roy Chapman Andrews and Yvette Borup Andrews
... so. When a woman's in a damned bad temper she always reads Shakespeare, or Locke on the Human Understanding. Come ...
— The Tysons - (Mr. and Mrs. Nevill Tyson) • May Sinclair
... understanding the thought of the author in this sentence, renders—"his destiny did not extend to a connexion with the bowl;" but the term "destiny" suggests a controlling or directing power without. The king thought that his virtue in the past was not yet sufficient ...
— Record of Buddhistic Kingdoms • Fa-Hien
... had not been done, and a great audience on that side of the bay had assembled in the Tabernacle, many going as early as 1 o'clock, and had waited until 6. Knowing there was some mistake they separated with the understanding that if Miss Shaw could be secured for the evening the church bells would be rung. That lady had just seated herself at the dinner table when a telegram was received explaining the situation. She replied at once: "I will be with you at half-past eight." Miss Anthony would not let her go ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 2 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... whole rounded circle of truth and opinion. It would be pleasant to let every mental tendency run its length; but I could not do so. It may be pride or narrowness; but I must keep on some terms with myself. I cannot find my understanding falling into contradiction with the judgments it formed last month or last year, without suspecting not only that there was something wrong then, but that there is something wrong now, to be resisted. That "there is a mean in things" is held, I believe, to be but a mean apothegm ...
— Autobiography and Letters of Orville Dewey, D.D. - Edited by his Daughter • Orville Dewey
... and then, with a sudden change of manner, as though all at once understanding what previously had puzzled him. "Lum-me," he cried, "is that where you keep the silver? Lor', and to think I never even ...
— The Bittermeads Mystery • E. R. Punshon
... God we must not be influenced by any will of sense. The impulse of sense is so deceptive that, if we are not very watchful and fully surrendered to God with an intense desire to know and do his will, it will prevent our understanding his will to us. It may not be difficult to convince you that it is God's will that your brother should go as a missionary to some foreign field, but very difficult to convince you that it is God's will for you to ...
— How to Live a Holy Life • C. E. Orr
... hand before it slightly hollowed, with the palm upwards, and the fingers open, as if you were going to support the base of some great bowl, larger than you could easily hold, and sketch your hand as you see it in the glass, with the points of the fingers towards you, it will materially help you in understanding the way trees generally hold out their hands; and if then you will turn yours with its palm downwards, as if you were going to try to hide something, but with the fingers expanded, you will get a good type of the action of the lower boughs in cedars ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... the type. I know now why you don't understand the Irish. Sometimes you think it's soft, and sometimes sly, and sometimes murderous, and sometimes uncivilized; and all the time it's only civilized; quivering with the sensitive irony of understanding all ...
— The Trees of Pride • G.K. Chesterton
... honourable feeling of several officers of the Parisian guards, and the judicious conduct of M. de Vaudreuil, lieutenant-general of marine, and of M. de Chevanne, one of the King's Guards, brought about an understanding between the grenadiers of the National Guard of Paris and the King's Guard. The doors of the oeil-de-boeuf were closed, and the antechamber which precedes that room was filled with grenadiers who wanted to get in ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... have heard," said Sir Christopher Hall, "that our fine undertaking in Cumberland is all blown up. The militia would not march into Scotland, and your prick-ear'd Covenanters have been too hard for our friends in the southern shires. And so, understanding there is some stirring work here, Musgrave and I, rather than sit idle at home, are come to have a campaign among ...
— A Legend of Montrose • Sir Walter Scott
... thyself. For to one man has god given for his portion the works of war, [to another the dance, to another the lute and song,] but in the heart of yet another hath far-seeing Zeus placed an excellent understanding, whereof many men get gain, yea he saveth many an one, and himself best knoweth it. But, lo, I will speak even as it seemeth best to me. Behold all about thee the circle of war is blazing, but the great-hearted Trojans, now that they have got down the wall, are some with their arms ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer (Lang, Leaf, Myers trans.)
... while indulging in the violent and uncompromising language already quoted, had nevertheless here and there interjected phrases indicating a willingness to come to an understanding and adjustment, but their object in this seemed to be twofold: for a few days longer it would serve as a partial screen to their more active conspiracy, and in the possible event (which they evidently did not expect) of a complete surrender and abdication ...
— Abraham Lincoln, A History, Volume 2 • John George Nicolay and John Hay
... impediment is want of unanimity amongst the settlers themselves. The Dutchman clinging to his ancient customs and habits, which are an abomination in the eyes of the Englishman; and the natives having been once subjected to the tender mercies of the white man, not understanding the use of freedom, or the benefits of self-government, live literally from "hand to mouth," in constant dread of recapture, and being forced, under the eyes of intelligent masters, to ...
— Kathay: A Cruise in the China Seas • W. Hastings Macaulay
... ease and please make a Rhyme, and to count ten Syllables on her Fingers.—This is the Stock with which she sets up for a Wit, and among some ignorant Wretches passes for such; but with People of true Understanding, nothing affords more subject of ridicule, than that incoherent Stuff which she calls Verses.—She bribed, with all the Favours she is capable of conferring, a Bookseller [Curll] (famous for publishing soft things) to print some ...
— The Life and Romances of Mrs. Eliza Haywood • George Frisbie Whicher
... left us sitting, when shortly after in came a nobleman, high in the cabinet, as I think he must have been, and he having politely asked leave to take his tea at our table, because of the great throng in the house, we fell into a conversation together, and he, understanding thereby that I was a minister of the Church of Scotland, said he thought he could help us into a place to see the funeral; so, after he had drank his tea, he took us with him, and got us into the ...
— The Ayrshire Legatees • John Galt
... of her sympathy for Aunt Trudy who was white to the lips with fright, Rosemary wanted to laugh, as Sarah, not realizing that her aunt was really in terror, and intent only on winning understanding for her snake, continued to advance on the unhappy lady, the spotted snake dangling ...
— Rosemary • Josephine Lawrence
... different connections. In one place, a Mimingus, a wood-satyr, and possessor of a sword and jewels, is interwoven into the myth of Balder and Hoder. The Edda gives a higher position to its Mimer. He has a fountain, in which wisdom and understanding lie hidden: drinking of it every morning, he is the wisest, most intelligent, of men. To Mimer's fountain came Odin, and desired a drink, but did not receive it till he had given one of his eyes in pledge, and hidden it in the fountain: ...
— The Story of Siegfried • James Baldwin
... passed their whole life in a Government Department, where records were kept; had been born there, bred there, grown old there, and consequently hadn't the least understanding for anything outside of the Department; and the only words they knew were: "With assurances of the highest esteem, I ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... remained in O Tuai, to maintain the newly-restored tranquillity. This female, who had already distinguished herself in Vancouver's time, unites a clear understanding with a masculine spirit, and seems to have been born ...
— A New Voyage Round the World, in the years 1823, 24, 25, and 26, Vol. 2 • Otto von Kotzebue
... these beautiful expressions, this outpouring of genius? If such there be, his heart and understanding must be sadly warped, any appeal would be in vain, for him the Veil of Isis could never be lifted. After a careful study of Shelley's works I can find nothing to warrant the execration formerly levelled at his head, not even in the "Refutation of Deism," that remarkable argument in ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley as a Philosopher and Reformer • Charles Sotheran
... have to portray an absolutely nonsensical character. Of course Hamlet appeals powerfully to our sense of the mystery of life, but so does every good tragedy; and it does so not because the hero is an enigma to us, but because, having a fair understanding of him, we feel how strange it is that strength and weakness should be so mingled in one soul, and that this soul should be doomed to such ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... This yearly miracle fails to impress us as it should do because we have witnessed it every year of our lives, and so, too, the great transformation from child to budding woman fails to make its appeal to our understanding and sympathy because it is of so common occurrence. If it were possible for adults to really remember their own feelings and aspirations in adolescent years, or if it were possible for us with enlightened sympathy to gain ...
— Youth and Sex • Mary Scharlieb and F. Arthur Sibly
... about the Castle to-day—in an hour, say? Can you take a party of one rubbernecking this A.M.? I like you, Hobbs. You are the best interpreter of English I've ever seen. I can't help understanding you, no matter how hard I try not to. I want you to get me into the Castle grounds to-day and show me where the duchesses dawdle and the countesses cavort. I'm ashamed to say it, Hobbs, but since yesterday I've quite lost interest in the ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... realignments marked the growing tension of these years. In 1905 England extended for ten years her understanding with Japan. By the Entente Cordiale with France in 1904 and a later settlement of outstanding difficulties with Russia, she also practically changed the Dual Alliance into a Triple Entente, though without positively binding herself to assistance ...
— A History of Sea Power • William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott
... dinner was very much like the meals at Carvel Place. I noticed that Paul was placed between Mrs. Carvel and his mother, while Hermione was on the opposite side of the table. But their eyes met constantly, and there was evidently a perfect understanding between them. Paul looked once more as I had seen him when he was talking to Hermione in England, and the coldness I so much disliked had temporarily disappeared from his face. I did not know what had occurred during the afternoon, since I ...
— Paul Patoff • F. Marion Crawford
... interest, except in connection with the dangers to which the integrity of the Turkish empire became exposed. The establishment of the empire in France consolidated the amity between that country and the British government and people. With Europe generally the best understanding existed. Various treaties were formed with countries of minor power, all having a tendency to preserve peace and promote commerce. The public were made acquainted with others which had been made or ratified ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... well in place: it is lighted up where it should be, and it is also properly tinted according to the demands of the principal object, its purpose being to accompany or serve as a relief to the latter. With a wise understanding of the law of contrasts, the painter has beautifully graded the strong tints and the dark shading of the animal. The darkest part is opposed to the light portion of the sky, and the most energetic and ingrained characteristic of the bull is opposite to ...
— Great Pictures, As Seen and Described by Famous Writers • Esther Singleton
... is from eighty to a hundred leagues in extent. They, however, assist the Cheveux Releves against the Gens de Feu. But with the Iroquois and our allies they are at peace, and preserve a neutrality. There is a cordial understanding towards both of these nations, and they do not venture to engage in any dispute or quarrel, but on the contrary often eat and drink with them like good friends. I was very desirous of visiting this nation, but the people where we were dissuaded me from ...
— Voyages of Samuel de Champlain V3 • Samuel de Champlain
... folly, is it hypocrisy, to say to such, a creature, "You must be born again before you can see the kingdom of God?" Is that Redeemer to be disclaimed who offers you his divine aid to form anew your character, to exalt your affections, to enlighten your dreary and desolate understanding? ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... wants, which, unless we supply them with the good food which God has made for them, will supply themselves with poison— indications of spiritual faculties, which it is as wicked to stunt or distort by mis-education as it is to maim our own limbs or stupefy our understanding. Our humanity is an awful and divine gift; our business is to educate it throughout—God alone must judge which part of it shall preponderate over the rest. But in the last generation— and, alas! in this also—little or no proper care has been taken of the love for all which is romantic, marvellous, ...
— Literary and General Lectures and Essays • Charles Kingsley
... yet Hast thou to hear from me, friend! Hast for years Lived in incomprehensible illusion. Before thine eyes is treason drawing out As black a web as e'er was spun for venom: A power of hell o'erclouds thy understanding. I dare no longer stand in silence—dare No longer see thee wandering on in darkness, Nor pluck ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... calls benefitting his country." "Why," answers his friend, "it will throw such a light on affairs, that we shall find it necessary to change both men and measures." The popular notion of the day that there had been some understanding between "Boney" and the Yankees, was scarcely unnatural under the circumstances we have narrated. The President himself is made to say to his companion, "Who would have thought of this man, to oblige us to run from the best cabinet ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... that must be," says Harker. "More fun than higher mathematics and Locke on the Understanding, ...
— Reginald Cruden - A Tale of City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... They have power, even as you have, and they have the will to destroy, which is a thing that I cannot understand. However, if it is graven upon the Sphere that we are to pass, it means only that upon the next plane we shall continue our searches—let us hope with better tools and with greater understanding than we ...
— Skylark Three • Edward Elmer Smith
... value to the praise which he receives, and considers the sentence passed in his favour as the sentence of discernment. We admire in a friend that understanding that selected us for confidence; we admire more in a patron that bounty which, instead of scattering bounty indiscriminately, directed it to us; and if the patron be an author, those performances which gratitude forbids us to blame, affection will ...
— Samuel Johnson • Leslie Stephen
... which we are to examine, it is not bitterness or hate, but love, that is their mainspring. It is difficult not to hate those who torture the objects of our love. Though difficult, it is not impossible; but it requires a breadth of outlook and a comprehensiveness of understanding which are not easy to preserve amid a desperate contest. If ultimate wisdom has not always been preserved by Socialists and Anarchists, they have not differed in this from their opponents; and in the source of their inspiration ...
— Proposed Roads To Freedom • Bertrand Russell
... sent us several messages. Mr. Rassam took advantage of this circumstance to complain bitterly of the unfair treatment inflicted upon us. He said, "Tell his Majesty that I have done my best to bring on a good understanding between my country and him; but when to-day's work is known, whatever the consequences may be, let him not throw the blame upon me." Theodore sent back word, "If I treat you well or not; it is the same; my enemies ...
— A Narrative of Captivity in Abyssinia - With Some Account of the Late Emperor Theodore, - His Country and People • Henry Blanc
... a name for their interesting Dictionary of Anglo-Indian words. The law is well recognised, though it has lacked the name, such as I now venture to give it. When a word comes from a foreign language, those who use it, not understanding it properly, give a twist to the word or to some part of it from the hospitable desire to make the word at home in its new quarters, no regard, however, being paid to the sense. The most familiar instance in English is crayfish from the French ecrevisse, though it is well known that a crayfish ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris
... some friends, when he chanced to recognize the fiery horses across the street. The carriage-top was thrown back, and by the neighbouring gaslight he saw Irene's white face turned toward him, then the horses sprang off. Mr. Campbell noticed, without understanding, the sudden start, and bitter though triumphant smile that crossed his face in ...
— Macaria • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... gentleman gravitated towards insanity. The inner mind was exasperated by barefaced injustice and oppression; above all, by his letters being stopped; for that convinced him both Baker and Bailey, with their see-saw evasions, knew he was sane, and dreaded a visit from honest, understanding men: and the mind's external organ, the brain, which an asylum professes to soothe, was steadily undermined by artificial sleeplessness. A man can't sleep in irons till he is used to them and, when Alfred was relieved of these, ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... from my personal experience that there is kindness everywhere in different proportions, and more goodness and tenderheartedness than we read of in the moralists. People have been kind to me, even without understanding me, and pitiful to me, without approving of me:—nay, have not the very critics tamed their beardom for me, and roared delicately as sucking doves, on behalf of me? I have no harm to say of your world, though I am not of it, as you see. And I ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett
... postpone action against the preachers. It was the misfortune of her position from the beginning of the struggle that Mary of Lorraine was driven to subterfuges which made impossible any permanent understanding with her discontented subjects; and it was of evil omen for the success of her policy that she now allowed herself to commit a serious breach of faith. In the teeth of her promise to Erskine, she proclaimed the preachers as outlaws when ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1-20 • Various
... "Boasts about understanding boys and young men," I said bitterly, "and does not know how to be just. I wish I was out of it all, and could go away, so that I could be where people ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn
... her great eyes, thinking he was making game of her. Then he told her of his meeting with the baron at the funeral of de Mora and the understanding they had ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... all animals the lion is the chief; and of beasts the ass is the meanest; yet, with the concurrence of the wise, the burden-bearing ass is preferable to the man-devouring lion. "The poor ass, though devoid of understanding, will be held precious when carrying a burden; oxen and asses that carry loads are preferable to men that ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 2, Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous
... with a more detailed explanation. And maybe the old man did understand some of it. He was no fool in his own subject, certainly. Sather Karf pondered for a moment, and then nodded with apparent satisfaction. "Your world was more advanced in understanding than I had thought. This computer is a fine scientific instrument, obeying natural law well. We have applied the same methods, though less elaborately. But the basic magical principle of similarity is the ...
— The Sky Is Falling • Lester del Rey
... not the familiar thing it is now in the north country. The bull in the fields had not yet come to an understanding of its rights, and was frequently tempted into argument with a locomotive. Bill Fountain, who came out of a back township, one day had even tied his faithful hound ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller
... The Americans were to give its interior a sanitary improvement by way of a set of modern plumbing. But the thing that pleased the wounded doughboy most was to find himself, when in dreadful need of the probe or knife, under the familiar and understanding and sympathetic eyes of Majors Henry or Longley or some other American officer, to find his wants answered by an enlisted man who knew the slang of Broadway and Hamtramck and the small town slang of "back home in Michigan, down on the farm," and to find his food ...
— The History of the American Expedition Fighting the Bolsheviki - Campaigning in North Russia 1918-1919 • Joel R. Moore
... younger sort who by their sulphurous instinct, are subject to the tickling desires of nature, and look upon that thing called Love through a multiplying glass, it is somewhat pardonable: But that those who are once come to the years of knowledge and true understanding should be drawn into it, methinks is most vilely foolish, and morrice fooles caps were much fitter for them, then wreaths of Lawrel. Yet stranger it is, that those who have been for the first time in that horrible estate, do, by a decease, ...
— The Ten Pleasures of Marriage and The Confession of the New-married Couple (1682) • A. Marsh
... compared with the great judges of other countries. He has been compared with Lord Mansfield; and although he did not possess the extensive learning and elegant accomplishments of that renowned jurist, the comparison is not inappropriate when we consider their breadth of understanding and powers of reasoning; and yet Mansfield, as a member of the House of Lords, defending the prerogatives of the Crown and Parliament, and Marshall as an American patriot, sword in hand, resisting in the field the assumptions ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XI • John Lord
... "Get wisdom; and with all thy getting get understanding," which does not mean simply, "Whatever else you get, be sure to get understanding." The marginal reference is to Matt. xiii. 44: wisdom, like the pearl of great price, is to be secured with, i.e. at the cost and sacrifice of, everything else that can be gotten. (See J.R. Lumby on ...
— The Teaching of Jesus • George Jackson
... fish, though I cannot get a chance to find out whether it can swim or not. It merely lies around, and mostly on its back, with its feet up. I have not seen any other animal do that before. I said I believed it was an enigma, but she only admired the word without understanding it. In my judgment it is either an enigma or some kind of a bug. If it dies, I will take it apart and see what its arrangements are. I never had ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... a benevolent organization. There are some who get excited about this part of it, just as one hears of Free-Masons who believe that the sun rises and sets to exemplify their ceremonies. Others take their duties more quietly, and, understanding just what it all amounts to, make the best of it, like you ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... imaginations were soon exhausted, and they found, as at other times, that they must have recourse to new expedients. The first artifice of shallow courtiers is to elude with promises those complaints which they cannot confute, a practice that requires no understanding or knowledge, and therefore has been generally followed by the administration. This artifice they quickly made use of, when they found that neither the merchants nor the nation were to be silenced by an affectation of negligence, or the sallies of mirth; that it was no longer safe to jest ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 11. - Parlimentary Debates II. • Samuel Johnson
... mild soft air of that particular neighborhood. Soon after the arrival of these ladies in their new abode, the old wine-merchant in his courtesy and kindliness of heart saw fit to pay them a visit, and in due time and form the visit was returned, and a friendly come-and-go understanding established between the two houses. In this manner it happened that Stephen, the elder son, by living always in his father's house, from which he was absent only during the office-hours of the day, saw a great deal of Adelais Cameron, and learnt before long to love her with all the depth ...
— Dreams and Dream Stories • Anna (Bonus) Kingsford
... extreme toryism, used to fraternize in their drinking bouts, and though they would, when sufficiently stimulated, boozily wrangle over their cups, there was in their common dissipation a ground for mutual understanding. But in his sober moments the radical had the most supreme contempt for his tory associate, and, sometimes, could not suppress its manifestation. The other, however, was too great a toady to be too ...
— From Wealth to Poverty • Austin Potter
... sought safety and strength in gagging the local Press of Apia. If it be otherwise—if we cannot be relieved, if the Powers are satisfied with the conduct of Mr. Cedercrantz and Baron Senfft von Pilsach; if these were sent here with the understanding that they should secretly purchase, perhaps privately edit, a little sheet of two pages, issued from a crazy wooden building at the mission gate; if it were, indeed, intended that, for this important end, they should divert (as it seems they have done) public funds and affront ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... their posterity from the loins of the sons of Adam." The commentators say that God passed his hand down Adam's back, and extracted all the generations which should come into the world until the resurrection. Assembled in the presence of the angels, and endued with understanding, they confessed their dependence on God, and were then caused to return into the loins of their great ancestor. This is one of the most curious doctrines within the whole range of philosophical history. It implies the strict ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger |
