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Condone   /kəndˈoʊn/   Listen
Condone

verb
(past & past part. condoned; pres. part. condoning)
1.
Excuse, overlook, or make allowances for; be lenient with.  Synonym: excuse.  "She condoned her husband's occasional infidelities"






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Condone" Quotes from Famous Books



... Ramillies; at the right moment he was to clothe the head of the President with it; and—Bless thee, Bottom, how art thou translated! In that woolly panoply, if one could not allow for Cato and the balanced antitheses of the grand manner, or condone rhetoric infinitely remote from life past, present or to come—well, one would never understand Addison, or ...
— In a Green Shade - A Country Commentary • Maurice Hewlett

... she saw Buck Thornton's teeth. But no longer in a smile. He had seemed to condone the act of old Adams as a bit of senility; the look in his eyes was one of blazing rage as this other man drew back and back ...
— Six Feet Four • Jackson Gregory

... question may be succinctly stated as follows: Without entering into details, it will be generally admitted that I am accurate in saying that many people condone in young men a course of conduct with regard to the other sex which is incompatible with strict morality, and that this dissoluteness is pardoned generally. Both parents and the government, in consequence of this view, may be said to wink at profligacy, and even in the last ...
— The Kreutzer Sonata and Other Stories • Leo Tolstoy

... of no infamy which that journal was not ready to condone, no offence it would not seek to justify—save and except the crime of patriotism, loyalty, avowed love of Britain. And this obscene, mad-dog policy, so difficult even to imagine at this time, was by curious devious ways identified with Socialism. ...
— The Message • Alec John Dawson

... crime, my lord, the sum I am authorised to place in your Lordship's hands, on receiving his pardon, will, I hope, condone it." ...
— Roger Willoughby - A Story of the Times of Benbow • William H. G. Kingston

... disgraced themselves by taking part in the raid, does not affect my judgment in the least. Any one who becomes a party to a mob bent upon unlawful violence, cannot expect the truly patriotic men of the American Legion to condone his act." ...
— The Centralia Conspiracy • Ralph Chaplin

... not to do. It is difficult to speak in measured tones or moderate language of the savagery and venom with which unions have been assailed by the injunction, and to the working classes, as to all fair-minded men, it seems little less than a crime to condone or tolerate it."[132] This is strong language, but who shall say that it is too strong when we remember the many injunctions which have been hurled at organized labor since the famous Debs case brought this ...
— Socialism - A Summary and Interpretation of Socialist Principles • John Spargo

... publish the Idylls at once. There had been years of silence since Maud, and the Master suspected that "mosquitoes" (reviewers) were the cause. "There is a note needed to show the good side of human nature and to condone its frailties which Thackeray will never strike." To others it seems that Thackeray was eternally striking this note: at that time in General Lambert, his wife, and daughters, not to speak of other characters ...
— Alfred Tennyson • Andrew Lang

... race. We never forgive insults; never condone wrongs; and expecting loyalty in our own blood, we cannot live long enough to pardon its treachery. Once, I made an idol of my beautiful, graceful, high-bred girl; but she stabbed my pride, dragged my name through ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson

... the minds of our gentle readers—his pride, his carelessness for the bodily or mental sufferings of others—all these things were nought to the Norman noble, he loved to see his son stark and fierce, and smiled as he heard of deeds which better men would have sternly refused to condone. ...
— The Rival Heirs being the Third and Last Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake

... wife back to accept an accomplished fact and to keep silent upon what she knew. In this I fancy that in any case he made a miscalculation, and that, if we had not been there, his doom would none the less have been sealed. A woman of Spanish blood does not condone such an injury so lightly. And now, my dear Watson, without referring to my notes, I cannot give you a more detailed account of this curious case. I do not know that anything essential has been ...
— Hound of the Baskervilles • Authur Conan Doyle

... conjugal infidelity and the frailty of virgins, which were the sole themes of Restoration comedy. Massinger's heroes are not always gay seducers. His husbands are not always fools. Pepys might quite consistently scorn the ribaldry of Etherege and condone the obscenity of Fletcher. It was a question of degree. Pepys was clear in his own mind that a line must be drawn somewhere, though it would probably have taxed his logical power to make the ...
— Shakespeare and the Modern Stage - with Other Essays • Sir Sidney Lee

... has no evil passions, therefore we say he is a virtuous fish. We never ask ourselves—"Has he any good passions?" A lion's behaviour is often such as no just man could condone. Has he not his ...
— The Second Thoughts of An Idle Fellow • Jerome K. Jerome

... touched the girl, and after a quick half-ashamed glance, she thought she had misjudged him. It was not her physical charm that had made him willing to condone her offense, for he showed none of the bold admiration she had shrunk from in other men. Instead, he was compassionate and, she imagined, anxious to ...
— Brandon of the Engineers • Harold Bindloss

... to say, that they now own them; and suffice it too, that Confiscation is the only way by which we can dispossess them of plunder, that the welfare of the country demands should be returned? In Confiscation alone will the people find a servant who will not condone the past, but will follow up this breed of the grabber and restore what it finds, as it has already done ...
— Confiscation, An Outline • William Greenwood

... *Derigo, directum direct dirge, dirigible, address *Dexter right, right hand ambidextrous, dexterity Dico speak, say abdicate, verdict *Dies day diary, quotidian Dignus worthy, fitting dignity, condign Do, datum give condone, data *Doceo, doctum teach document, doctor *Dominus lord dominion, danger *Domus house domicile, majordomo *Dormio sleep dormant, dormouse Duco lead traduce, deduction *Duo two dubious, duet Durus hard durable, obdurate Eo, itum go exit, initial Error, erratum ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor

... There had been no question then of her taking refuge under that woman's roof. Now she had repelled Lady Aylmer's counsels with scorn, was living as a guest in Mrs Askerton's house; and yet he was willing to pass over the Askerton difficulty without a word. He was willing not only to condone past offences, but to wink at existing iniquity! But she,—she who was the sinner, would not permit of this. She herself dragged up Mrs Askerton's name, and seemed to glory in her ...
— The Belton Estate • Anthony Trollope

... her father—and her mother had tried, in spite of all, to hide or condone his faults; and more than once before she died, had made Kate promise to hunt him up and go to him. What the timid girl dreaded most was finding another woman installed in his household—in which case she meant to make ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman

... children that there is a moral order which we are endeavouring to administer. If parents and schoolmasters, who are both judges and executioners, allow their own rule to be fortuitous, indulge their own irritable moods, punish severely a trifling fault, and sentimentalise or condone a serious one, a child is utterly confused. I know several people who have had their lives blighted, have been made suspicious, cynical, crafty, and timid, by severe usage and bullying and open contempt in childhood. The thing to avoid, for all who are responsible in the smallest ...
— Where No Fear Was - A Book About Fear • Arthur Christopher Benson

... some time ago in a letter from a priest in another part of Ireland, that "martial law" might be proclaimed in Clare and Kerry to "stamp out the Moonlighters, those pests of society." That in Clare and Kerry priests should be found not only disposed to wink at and condone the proceedings of these "pests of society," but openly to co-operate with them under the pretext of a "national" movement, is surely a thing equally intolerable by the Church and dangerous to the cause of Irish autonomy. This I am glad to say is strongly felt, and has been on ...
— Ireland Under Coercion (2nd ed.) (2 of 2) (1888) • William Henry Hurlbert

... are old soldiers of the former Emperor. I see. I understand. You love him as I and mine the King. It is as much as my life is worth, as much as my honor, to condone it. Yet I would not be a tale-bearer, but this ...
— The Eagle of the Empire - A Story of Waterloo • Cyrus Townsend Brady

... ruthlessly, and that have derived their living from your glad anguish, each day will, be appearing a little less intimately yours, until these children find their mates. Thereafter you will be a tolerated intruder into these children's daily living, and nobody anywhere will do more than condone your coming: you will weep secretly: and I, whom some call Beda, and others call Kruchina, shall be monstrously amused ...
— Figures of Earth • James Branch Cabell

... "He'll have to condone, or compromise, or compound, or what do they call it, for the sake of his family—for your sake, and my sake, my darling! He can't be so vindictive as expose his own son! We won't think more about it! Let ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald

... not mean that he cares much if we do or not. But in our country, in the Orient, even a Diogenes does not disdain to handle the coin of affability. We are always meekly asked, even by the most supercilious, to overlook shortcomings, and condone. ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani

... facts of the situation," said he at last, mopping his heated brow. "Now, gentlemen, I cannot make my point better than by detailing to you what I have myself done this morning. You will the more easily condone any mental aberration upon your own part when you realize that even I have had moments when my balance has been disturbed. We have had for some years in this household a housekeeper—one Sarah, with whose second name I have never attempted to burden ...
— The Poison Belt • Arthur Conan Doyle

... camps of the volunteers. He was a handsome boy, a healthy, hearty boy, and, as boys go, rather a good boy—a boy in whom his mother would have found, had she not long since been lifted above the cares of this world, much of comfort and more to condone, but a boy, nevertheless, who had given his old dragoon of a dad many an anxious hour. Now, just as he neared the legal dividing line between youth and years of discretion, Billy Gray had joined the third battalion of his regiment, full of pluck, hope and health, full of ambition to make ...
— Found in the Philippines - The Story of a Woman's Letters • Charles King

... most pathetic little picture in black. I wish you could have seen her, Paul; then you might understand and condone." ...
— The Orchard of Tears • Sax Rohmer

... be blamed," he said, quietly. "But don't you see, dearest, that, if they stay, we seem to condone the marriage, to say that it doesn't matter,—what they have done?—when in truth it seems to ...
— The Coryston Family • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... determined to bring the full weight of his vengeance upon him. Clifford was directed to come privately to England, and cast himself at the foot of the throne, imploring pardon for his past offences, and offering to condone his folly by any services which should be required of him. Henry, accepting his penitence, informed him that the only reparation he could now make was by disclosing the names of his abettors; and the ...
— Celebrated Claimants from Perkin Warbeck to Arthur Orton • Anonymous

... in the sacredness of marriage, I cannot conceive of a civilization worth while without it," The Laird declared earnestly. "Nevertheless, while I know naught of Nan Brent's case, except that which is founded on hearsay evidence, I can condone her offense because I can understand it. She might have developed into a far worse girl than it appears from Donald's account she is. At least, Nellie, she bore her child and cherishes it, and, under the rules of society as we play it, that required a kind of courage ...
— Kindred of the Dust • Peter B. Kyne

... jungle of old reckless years, May serpents crawl across our path some day And pierce us with their fangs? Oh, I am not A prude or bigot; and I have not lived A score and three full years in ignorance Of human nature. Much I can condone; For well I know our kinship to the earth And all created things. Why, even I Have felt the burden of virginity, When flowers and birds and golden butterflies In early spring were mating; and I know How loud that call of sex must sound to man Above the feeble protest of the ...
— Poems of Purpose • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... greatest error of all: she had let him be disenchanted by familiarity. Passion will pardon rage, will survive absence, will forgive infidelity, will even thrive on outrage, and will often condone a crime; but when it dies of familiarity it is dead ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida

... exoneration, quittance, release, indemnity; bill of indemnity, act of indemnity, covenant of indemnity, deed of indemnity; exculpation &c. (acquittal) 970. longanimity[obs3], placability; amantium irae[Lat]; locus paenitentiae[Lat]; forbearance. V. forgive, forgive and forget; pardon, condone, think no more of, let bygones be bygones, shake hands; forget an injury. excuse, pass over, overlook; wink at &c. (neglect) 460; bear with; allow for, make allowances for; let one down easily, not be too hard upon, pocket the ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... Flavia's exquisite beauty, as she stood before him, humble with the proud humility of one who has everything to give and nothing to receive; chaste with that pure ignorance which refuses to know what it cannot condone, and withal a perfect woman, imbued with a fascination which no man had ever been able to resist, for it was the fascination of youthful loveliness combined with the stately aloofness of ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy

... deepest sympathy and pity, but with hardly any anger: in fact, I have known him very seriously offend the company he has been in, I have even heard him stigmatized as of loose principles, from his readiness, even anxiety, to condone a sensual offence in a man of ...
— Memoirs of Arthur Hamilton, B. A. Of Trinity College, Cambridge • Arthur Christopher Benson

... and appreciatively. He surprised a member of his cabinet on a certain occasion, by objecting to a proposed appointment on the ground that the man designated had voted for Benton's expunging resolution at the close of Jackson's administration, —an offense which the President would not condone. The seven members of his cabinet, actively engaged in politics all their lives, had forgotten an important fact which the ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine

... course of her outer life as to leave all her powers free to do what she alone could do for the world and for the many who looked to her for help and guidance. No doubt this devotion brought its own reward; but we are exacting for our idols and do not care to have even a generous error to condone, and therefore we are glad to know that, great as his reward was, it was no greater than was merited by the most perfect love that ever crowned a woman's life." Mr. Kegan Paul also writes of the mutual helpfulness and harmony of purpose which grew out of this marriage. "Mr. ...
— George Eliot; A Critical Study of Her Life, Writings & Philosophy • George Willis Cooke

... fault is nearly always indulged in by the timid, whom it soothes, not simply because of its maliciousness, but because envy seems to them to condone their own inertia by giving them an excuse ...
— Poise: How to Attain It • D. Starke

... on. You were always hard. You say you condone things, but you condone nothing, and you're not ...
— The Immortal Moment - The Story of Kitty Tailleur • May Sinclair

... eyes and hack away thy tongue and strike off thy head with the sword-edge and then make thee meat for the wolves; and so exact retaliation from thine abominable actions." Hereupon Nadan made answer and said to Haykar his uncle, "Do with me whatso thy goodness would do and then condone thou to me all my crimes, for who is there can offend like me and can condone like thee? And now I pray thee take me into thy service and suffer me to slave in thy house and groom thy horses, even to sweeping away their dung, and herd thy hogs; for verily I ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton

... no fighting inside our frontiers outside the amphitheatres. I'll not condone any corpses on the pavement of any street or on the road of any highway or byways. I'll not permit any battles, set- tos, affrays or brawls in towns or villages or on roads. You hear me? You hear me, Vedius? You hear me, Satronius? You hear me, all ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White

... made for himself. He had pledged himself and his Government to make demands of a helpless enemy inconsistent with solemn engagements on our part, on the faith of which this enemy had laid down his arms. There are few episodes in history which posterity will have less reason to condone,—a war ostensibly waged in defense of the sanctity of international engagements ending in a definite breach of one of the most sacred possible of such engagements on the part of victorious champions ...
— The Economic Consequences of the Peace • John Maynard Keynes

... same evening of rehabilitations. "Since such characters are to be found in real life, I suppose they may have a place in a book. But you must not commit the unpardonable sin of making your readers condone the evil in her for the sake ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde

... inconvenient, if not actually impossible, to keep two quarrels burning briskly at the same time. When, a week or two before, Mrs. Ford had been seriously angry with Mrs. Gregg, she confided her grievances to Dr. O'Grady. Now that she was annoyed with him she would be compelled to condone Mrs. Gregg's offence in order to tell her what Dr. O'Grady had done. In due time, so Dr. O'Grady knew, he would be forgiven in order that he might listen to the story of the quarrel, which by that time she ...
— General John Regan - 1913 • George A. Birmingham

... to America. It is made in a monster dirigible—though the present tendency is to reject the dirigible for the swifter, less costly, and more airworthy (leave "seaworthy" to the plodding ships on old ocean's breast) airplanes. If, however, we condone this glaring improbability we find Mr. Kipling's tale full of action and imaginary incident that give it an air of truth. His ship is not docked on the ground at the tempest's mercy, but is moored high in air to the top of a tall tower up which passengers ...
— Aircraft and Submarines - The Story of the Invention, Development, and Present-Day - Uses of War's Newest Weapons • Willis J. Abbot

... experience, I can confidently affirm that a well- bred golden collie is far more interesting to operate upon than a mongrel sheep-dog. Nor can I comprehend Mr. Benson's blame of Denys l'Auxerrois as too extravagant and even unwholesome, when the last quality, so obvious in Uthwart, he seems to condone. ...
— Masques & Phases • Robert Ross

... that is based on hypocrisy. He realized, further, that the grave question of men's rights must be interpreted in terms of the Christian religion. His fellow Friends, incited by selfish motives, had become unmindful of the basic elements of their religion. In their attempt to condone slavery and embrace the religion of brotherhood, they had made Christianity appear farcical. John Woolman's task, then, was not to propagate a new religion, but to make fashionable the Christian religion in which all professed a belief. He succeeded because he was allied to the ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 • Various

... silence the stories. But there were too many stories and they were so unspeakable that even those in high places were made furiously indignant. He was not received here at Court afterwards. His own emperor could not condone what he did. Public ...
— The Head of the House of Coombe • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... electronics factory of his own, as well as a rather extensive library. He's obviously spending a lot of time at his activities, and that time must come out of his community performance. This certainly is not routine, and I can't condone your failure to make a ...
— Final Weapon • Everett B. Cole

... to become of her? She had no home, for she had made up her mind she would not go back to her mother and Miss Pinwell was equally impossible. This impeccable spinster would never condone such an offence as that of which she had been guilty. Neither did Lavinia wish the compromising affair to be known in the school and talked about. She felt she had left conventional schooling for ever and she yearned to go back to life—but not ...
— Madame Flirt - A Romance of 'The Beggar's Opera' • Charles E. Pearce

... at his unconscious divination. "I do not know," she said. "But you are one person, Jim Daly is another. You have had every advantage; he is a—er—blatherskite. Yet you condescend to put yourself on a par with him, and condone the offence on the ground that your little world ...
— The Law-Breakers and Other Stories • Robert Grant

... moment to me, inasmuch as there was involved in it a menace against the life of one of my companions; and, indeed, this matter was one which startled our whole camp, for it was nothing less than a formal offer on the part of the Priest Captain to condone the rebellion, and to compromise with the rebels, on certain ...
— The Aztec Treasure-House • Thomas Allibone Janvier

... till the storm had spent itself, there was no sign of softening upon her face. Remorse and regret she could understand and condone, but this excusing of self, as she called Joan's explanation, struck her as being ...
— To Love • Margaret Peterson

... the animal urged him to do it despite all opposition from others, and Sylvia, having had her first "cry" over the question of the visit, gave up the point. This was the first difference of their short married life, and she hastened to condone it. In the sunshine of Love and Marriage—for Maurice at first really loved her; and love, curbing the worst part of him, brought to him, as it brings to all of us, that gentleness and abnegation of self which ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke

... number of spiders, comprise the remainder of the insect diet. All these are more or less harmful, except a few predaceous beetles, which amount to 8 per cent., but in view of the large consumption of grasshoppers and caterpillars, we can at least condone this offense, if such it may be called. The destruction of grasshoppers is very noticeable in the months of August and September, when these insects form more than 60 ...
— Ohio Arbor Day 1913: Arbor and Bird Day Manual - Issued for the Benefit of the Schools of our State • Various

... failing I argue that Clemens's affection for me must have been great to enable him to condone in me the final defection which was apt to be the end of our enterprises. I have fancied that I presented to him a surface of such entire trustworthiness that he could not imagine the depths of unreliability beneath it; and that never realizing it, he always broke through with ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... Mrs. Hunter, "the story has come very straight—straight from that young Mrs. Willoughby, who, with her husband, seems as ready to forget and condone all that the South has suffered as your devoted admirer himself. Devoted indeed! He is now paying his devotions at another shrine. A Northern girl with her Northern gold is the next and natural step in his career, and ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe

... way of wooing," Rosmore said presently, "and my love must condone them all. The siege shall begin forthwith. A man may win any woman if he is subtle enough; in that conviction lies the secret of the success with which rumour credits me. I may persuade your niece to believe my ...
— The Brown Mask • Percy J. Brebner

... Then comes a man who says: "An accounting—I want an accounting! What have you done? Out with it. Give me an accounting. Go on now! Don't try to cheat, for I know you. I demand an account for each and every single item. I will not condone a single drop of blood, I will not absolve you ...
— Savva and The Life of Man • Leonid Andreyev

... alive,—has he not reminded them of it in his first ambassadorial utterances?—and the journal is not beyond resuscitation. That is why Washington does not know whether to be chagrined or angry, whether to disavow or to condone. The discomfited Republicans frankly do not know what to think of it and probably will not so long as the amazing ambassador ...
— The Mirrors of Washington • Anonymous

... archbishop and even his own wife for their share in this villainy that had compromised his word as a cavalier, but his fury was so great that even the Moors were moved, and the Alfaqui went out to meet him, begging him to condone the deed as it was accomplished, as the injured parties would agree to it, and in the name of the conquered he relieved him from keeping his word, because the possession of a building was not a sufficient ...
— The Shadow of the Cathedral • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... insight, sensitiveness to nature, things we are bound to love, but particularly do not wish to love in them. This villainous faculty, which puts us in a rage and forces us to be amiable, is almost enough to make us like, or at all events condone, its contrary in our own dear friends. I mean that marvellous transformation to which so many of those we love are subject; creatures, supple, subtle and sympathetic in the flesh, in speech and glance and deed, becoming stiff, utterly impervious and heartless once they ...
— Hortus Vitae - Essays on the Gardening of Life • Violet Paget, AKA Vernon Lee

... that does not interest me. All the waywardness of humanity provokes a smile; there is no wickedness so great that I cannot pity; no folly that I cannot condone; patient to wait for the unravelling of the skein of life till the great Creator willeth, meanwhile looking at all things sub specie aeternitatis, and ever finding new food for humility in the barrenness ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan

... Mr. Rattar. He was of medium height, slender, and dark-haired. His features were remarkably regular, and though his face was somewhat small, there could be no doubt that he was extremely good looking, especially to a woman's eye, who would be more apt than a fellow man to condone something a ...
— Simon • J. Storer Clouston

... English. I shall not be misunderstood"—a slight embarrassment became perceptible in his manner—"if I say that the visitor quite openly tried to bewitch me; and since we are all human, you will perhaps condone my conduct when I add that she succeeded, in a measure, inasmuch as I consented to speak to Sir Baldwin, although he was actually playing ...
— The Hand Of Fu-Manchu - Being a New Phase in the Activities of Fu-Manchu, the Devil Doctor • Sax Rohmer

... he took Macnaghten's lakhs, but furtively maintained close relations with Persia. Detecting the double-dealing, Macnaghten urged on Lord Auckland the annexation of Herat to Shah Soojah's dominions, but was instructed to condone Kamran's duplicity, and try to bribe him higher. Kamran by no means objected to this policy, and, while continuing his intrigues with Persia, cheerfully accepted the money, arms and ammunition which Macnaghten supplied ...
— The Afghan Wars 1839-42 and 1878-80 • Archibald Forbes

... had gone well with me since I entered on board the Saint Vincent, for I had never got into any trouble beyond a slight scrape or two; but tow the Fates, as if to condone the previous good fortune with which they had favoured me, all at once did me a very bad turn, ...
— Young Tom Bowling - The Boys of the British Navy • J.C. Hutcheson

... should have thought it necessary to lay the facts before the College of Pontiffs and ask their opinion. It looks fishy, stravaging all over the landscape after dark with a cavalier beside your litter all night long. I comprehend, I condone, I judge that you have not impaired your qualifications for your high office. I have no qualms. But it is well for you that Father instructed me. Go on, tell me the rest." Over the fight he rubbed his hands and chirruped ...
— The Unwilling Vestal • Edward Lucas White

... mythology who feed on human flesh. But he is not a mere automaton or ogre. There is a better side to his nature, as we often discover, to our amazement, when we learn about the facts of his private life. These private virtues do not indeed condone his social sins—far from it—but they indicate that there exists a better side. If that side could be made victorious, if conditions could be shaped so as to starve out the worse nature and bring to the fore the better nature in the oppressor as well as in the oppressed, the problem ...
— The Essentials of Spirituality • Felix Adler

... with stern words that Wolfe met his soldiers. He was not a man to condone a lack of discipline because it had been ...
— French and English - A Story of the Struggle in America • Evelyn Everett-Green

... spinsters driven by the furies within them to assertions that established nothing and to practical demonstrations that only left everybody thoroughly uncomfortable. Far better to leave all these matters to calm, patient men in easy chairs, weighing typical cases impartially, ready to condone, indisposed to envy. ...
— The Secret Places of the Heart • H. G. Wells

... motives of personal aggrandisement or in a pure spirit of adventure. Both Velasquez in Cuba and Cortes in Mexico were destitute of any royal authority for their undertakings, and only the splendour of their successes sufficed to condone their license, when they were able to confront the King with a profitable fait accompli. The royal instructions to all governors and representatives of the Spanish Crown were, on the contrary, filled with injunctions to treat the Indians humanely, to provide for ...
— Bartholomew de Las Casas; his life, apostolate, and writings • Francis Augustus MacNutt

... happily, no need for us to carry the party system quite so far as that. Party discipline there must be, but it can be kept well within bounds. Nothing is more wholesome than for party leaders to know that if they push things too far and too often ask their followers to condone doubtful acts, their followers will leave them. Clearly, as the Irishman said of the truth, this spirit of independence must not be dragged out on every paltry occasion. It must, however, always remain ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey

... passionate zeal suffuses what is perhaps the most spontaneous reform enthusiasm of our time. Looked at externally it is a curious focusing of attention. Nor is it explained by words like "chivalry," "conscience," "social compassion." Magazines that will condone a thousand cruelties to women gladly publish series of articles on the girl who goes wrong; merchants who sweat and rack their women employees serve gallantly on these commissions. These men are not conscious hypocrites. Perhaps ...
— A Preface to Politics • Walter Lippmann

... Science? for had it not softened the cruel pride that had so encrusted her before? He knew nothing of this. He perceived a change in her manner and even character since he last saw her two years before, although even then his great love had been able to condone all weaknesses, or what others would call weaknesses. To him they were part ...
— The Right Knock - A Story • Helen Van-Anderson

... constructed specially for the wearing of a dark red royal fringe and other ornaments. Today she was in her most cheerful and condescending mood, in fact she was what is usually called in a good temper. It was a great satisfaction to her that Hyacinth was at last settled; and she decided to condone the rather wilful way in which the engagement had been finally arranged without reference to her. With the touch of somewhat sickly sentiment common to most hard women, she took great pleasure in a wedding (if it were only moderately a ...
— Love's Shadow • Ada Leverson

... authoritative declarations condemned the condition of our laws which permit the collection from the people of unnecessary revenue, and have in the most solemn manner promised its correction; and neither as citizens nor partisans are our countrymen in a mood to condone the ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... was not conclusive. It never might be clearer with Paul hung or in a madhouse. If we had taken proper action to restrain this madman, the murder never would have occurred. Better to take decisive steps and assist the officers than appear to condone crime. All we had planned and worked for would fare better through prompt procedure. Possibly out of this very tangle might come clearance of the ...
— Oswald Langdon - or, Pierre and Paul Lanier. A Romance of 1894-1898 • Carson Jay Lee

... to be just! No doubt of that. The law should be sustained, and no sentimental pity should interfere. We must not condone crime, or the very object of law and penalty will be annulled. Philanthropy should be tender, but not weak; and if tears are shed and bouquets of flowers sent, it should rather be to the victims of crime, than to the criminal. But when a man is crushed with a sense of guilt, and down ...
— Holidays at the Grange or A Week's Delight - Games and Stories for Parlor and Fireside • Emily Mayer Higgins

... slavish flattery on damned vices / so great men act them'. The effective conclusion of her involvement as early as the end of 3.2 impoverishes the rest of the play. The Queen's less admirable character is highlighted by the way she is prepared to condone the taking of life in order to secure her position. Her ruthless outlook is punished when she is deprived of her position and forced to ...
— The Noble Spanish Soldier • Thomas Dekker

... many married women put up with it nowadays?' said Miranda; 'aren't there ever so many wives who condone their husband's infidelity, and endure it as best they can, for the sake of the children, or for social reasons, or because they're sufficiently attached to the man to prefer a share of him to life alone without him? And what is that but ...
— Modern marriage and how to bear it • Maud Churton Braby

... Martin Renard gives you. I must point out that you condone a thing when you accept the benefit of it. Either you shouldn't have come to me at all, or you should deny yourself the gratification ...
— Widdershins • Oliver Onions

... she do? she asked herself many times, to bring a strength-giving peace to her father's troubled mind. Even Mrs. Porter, implacably bitter against racing, must condone what was so evidently Allis's study, if it tended to their happiness; the mother had softened somewhat in the austerity of ...
— Thoroughbreds • W. A. Fraser

... her sake? The supposition Is not probable in fact, To imagine it is sufficient. I by no means say you should Each your chances try to win her At one time, for I would blush Such a craven proposition Came from me, because the lover Who could keep his jealousy hidden, Would condone even shame thereafter, Were the opportunity given; But I say that you should learn Which of you it is your mistress Gives the preference ...
— The Wonder-Working Magician • Pedro Calderon de la Barca

... than of any three of its customs." And when I remembered for my own part, how fatal in my own neighbourhood were any proceedings of an unusual nature, and how all his innocence, and his ten years of martyrdom, had not sufficed with many of Mr. Wood's neighbours to condone the "fact" that he had been a convict, I agreed with Alister that Dennis ought not to risk the possible ill effects of what, as he said, had a ne'er-do-weel, out-at-elbows, or, at last and least, an uncommon look about it; and that having resumed his proper social ...
— We and the World, Part II. (of II.) - A Book for Boys • Juliana Horatia Ewing

... confident. Like Clay, he never dreamed that Jackson would dare to persist in a hostility against the enlightened public sentiment of the country. But Jackson was the idol of the Democracy, who would support all his measures and condone all his faults, and the Democracy ruled,—as it always will rule, except in great public dangers, when power naturally falls into the hands of men of genius, honesty, and experience, almost independently of ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XII • John Lord

... Further, as is written (Ps. 24:10): "All the ways of the Lord are mercy and truth." But it does not seem necessary that He should suffer on the part of the Divine mercy, which, as it bestows gifts freely, so it appears to condone debts without satisfaction: nor, again, on the part of Divine justice, according to which man had deserved everlasting condemnation. Therefore it does not seem necessary that Christ should have suffered for ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas

... and freely; he strove to discern the energy of the soul in all men; he could forgive everything except meanness, cowardice, egotism and conceit; there was no fault of a generous and impulsive nature that he could not condone. ...
— Ionica • William Cory (AKA William Johnson)

... have been inclined to condone this last offense, as he had condoned others; but when he parted from Denyven, Richard's heart was still hot with his cousin's insult. As he turned into the yard, not with his usual swinging gait, but with a quick, wide ...
— The Stillwater Tragedy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich

... people. George F. Hoar, John Sherman, Rutherford B. Hayes, Grover Cleveland and many others were incorruptible. The exposure of scandalous actions on the part of certain high officials blasted their careers, indicating that the body of the people would not condone dishonesty, and the parties found it advisable to accept the resignations of some of their more notorious campaign managers. Moreover, the American people of all classes were a political people, with a capacity for political organization and activity, ...
— The United States Since The Civil War • Charles Ramsdell Lingley

... preacher, very severe on human weaknesses, who could condone naught and thought he had done everything when he had inspired terror. He threatened her with hell fire for having washed her ...
— The Merrie Tales Of Jacques Tournebroche - 1909 • Anatole France

... known for a gentle, kindly lad, in all things the very opposite of the turbulent Sir Oliver, and it was assumed that Sir Oliver in his present increasing harshness used his brother ill because the lad would not condone his crime. A deal of sympathy was consequently arising for Lionel and was being testified to him on every hand. Were he to accede to such a proposal as Oliver now made him, assuredly he ...
— The Sea-Hawk • Raphael Sabatini

... proposed to pay up a royalty upon all the copies he had sold if Ruskin would recognise him as accredited publisher in America. The offer of so large a sum would have been tempting, had it not meant that Ruskin must condone what he had for years denounced, and sanction what he strongly disapproved. The case would have been different if proposals had been made to reproduce his books in his own style, under competent supervision. This was done in 1890, when arrangements were made with Messrs. Charles E. Merrill & Co., ...
— The Life of John Ruskin • W. G. Collingwood

... the vilest literature in the cheapest printed forms, the attainability, by the poorest, of the noblest productions of literary genius. Or if in congratulating yourself upon the marvellous progress of Scientific Inventions, hailing from the keen-brained West, you could condone the degradation of the English language in the mouths of Shakespeare's countrymen and countrywomen by the use of American slang phrases, common, vulgar, coarse, alternating with choice expressions culled from the vocabulary of the ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves

... justified in holding higher hopes if it could but reconcile itself to making bold and judicious use of its growing resources, material and intellectual. It is fear that holds us back. And fear is begotten of ignorance and uncertainty. And these mutually reinforce one another, for we feebly try to condone our ignorance by our uncertainty and to excuse ...
— The Mind in the Making - The Relation of Intelligence to Social Reform • James Harvey Robinson

... and daughters of the race will consent to sit by meek and silent while the men in their madness are blowing each other's brains out and making mountains out of corpses. It is hardly to be expected that war will cease from the earth this side of the millennium; but women will surely only, condone it when urged by some tremendous need or enthusiasm; they will not rejoice—as men sometimes do—in the mere lust of domination and violence. With their keen perception of the little things of life, and the way in which the big ...
— The Healing of Nations and the Hidden Sources of Their Strife • Edward Carpenter

... writhed in silent agony, a prey to the savage jealousy that grew and grew until it absorbed all other emotions. Scandal, divorce, dishonour, murder swept before the mind of this man who had been of the people and who could not condone. The people kill. ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon



Words linked to "Condone" :   condonation, forgive, excuse



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