"Defy" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... insufficient for those who defy it; useless for those who are already morally dead; excessive for those who repent with sincerity. Let us repeat it: society does not kill the murderer to cause him suffering, or to inflict the lex talionis; it kills him to prevent him from doing ...
— Mysteries of Paris, V3 • Eugene Sue
... and the grand but uncanny scenery of these high plateaux has influenced the art and ideas of the natives. The climate made it natural that priests should congregate in roomy strongholds, able to defy the cold and contain the stores necessary for a long winter, and the massive walls seem to imitate the outline of the rocks out of which they grow. But the strange shapes assumed by mists and clouds, often dyed many colours by the rising or setting sun, suggest to the least imaginative ...
— Hinduism and Buddhism, An Historical Sketch, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Charles Eliot
... seaward again. The wind still blew, but lightly, from the same quarter, and the sails would therefore be of no use. With their great oar-power they were confident that, once through the Danish flotilla, they could defy pursuit. ...
— The Dragon and the Raven - or, The Days of King Alfred • G. A. Henty
... like you to think me one, darling! Still less would I like to deserve it, whether you thought me one or not! But I could not be a tyrant to you if I would. You may defy me ...
— The Flight of the Shadow • George MacDonald
... grander scale. He only asks for a fraction of an acre in order to produce sufficient vegetables for a family; and to feed twenty-five horned beasts he needs no more space than he formerly required to feed one; his aim is to make his own soil, to defy seasons and climate, to warm both air and earth around the young plant; to produce, in a word, on one acre what he used to gather from fifty acres, and that without any excessive fatigue—by greatly reducing, on the contrary, the total of former labour. He knows that ...
— The Conquest of Bread • Peter Kropotkin
... sorcerer! base son of a base mother! dog of dogs! dost thou defy us? Does thy master Eblis whisper hope? Dost thou laugh at our punishments? Wilt thou fly into the air? wilt thou sink into the earth? eh, eh? Is it so, is it so?' The breathless monarch ceased, from the exhaustion of ...
— Alroy - The Prince Of The Captivity • Benjamin Disraeli
... defy thee! with a calm, fixed mind, All that thou canst inflict I bid thee do; Foul Tyrant both of Gods and Humankind, One only being shalt thou not subdue. 265 Rain then thy plagues upon me here, Ghastly disease, and frenzying fear; And let alternate frost and fire Eat into me, and be ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... oath the man drew his sword; but the youth laughed him to scorn as he stepped back out of reach of the formidable weapon. He well knew his advantage. Light of foot, though all unarmed, he could defy any horseman in this wooded spot. No horse could penetrate to the right or left of the narrow track. Even if the knight dismounted, the twin brothers, who knew every turn and winding of these dim forest paths, could lead him a fine dance, and then break away and ...
— In the Days of Chivalry • Evelyn Everett-Green
... in Saginaw; She lives with her mother; I defy all Michigan To find such another. She's tall and fat, her hair is red, Her face is plump and pretty, She's my daisy, Sunday-best-day girl,— And her front name ...
— Cowboy Songs - and Other Frontier Ballads • Various
... lifelong experience in Wall Street, I defy any broker to produce one customer who can show a profit after three consecutive ...
— The Climbers - A Play in Four Acts • Clyde Fitch
... There, we defy ye still, With sworn and resolute will; Courage ye cannot kill While we have breath! Stone walls your bolts may break, But, ere our souls ye shake, Of the whole land we'll make One ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... appalling temerity he clutched Tim's great miry boots to help him up and on his way round. Occasionally he swayed to and fro, with his teeth on exhibition, laughing and babbling and shrilly exclaiming, inarticulately bragging of his agile prowess, as if he were able to defy all the Quimbeys, who would not notice him. And when it was all over he went in his wriggling ursine gait back to the hearth-stone, and there he was sitting, demurely enough, and as if he had never moved, when his mother ...
— His "Day In Court" - 1895 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... long trail of fire he boasting goes, Dancing a war dance to defy his foes. His flesh is scorched, his muscles burn and shrink, But still he ...
— Flint and Feather • E. Pauline Johnson
... Sprot keep it back so long, and why, having kept it back, did he, almost in his last hour, produce it, and say (if he did) that it was genuine, and his model, as it certainly was? This is the last enigma of Sprot. His motives defy my poor efforts to decipher them. Even if the substance of IV is genuine, what were Sprot's motives? I do not feel assured that Sprot really maintained the genuineness of the handwriting of Letter IV. His remark that he kept Logan's letter only till ...
— James VI and the Gowrie Mystery • Andrew Lang
... you asked me if it was a family jewel; lied but did not take it off, perhaps because it clung so tightly, as if in remembrance of the vows it symbolized. But now the very sight of it gave me a fright. With his ring on my finger I could not defy him and swear his claim to be false the dream of a man maddened by his experiences in the Klondike. It must come off. Then, perhaps, I should feel myself a free woman. But it would not come off. I struggled with it and tugged in vain; ...
— The Filigree Ball • Anna Katharine Green
... oft-times affirm, there was not an oath from the great and tremendous oath of William the conqueror (By the splendour of God) down to the lowest oath of a scavenger (Damn your eyes) which was not to be found in Ernulphus.—In short, he would add—I defy a man to ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... too strong. What do you want?—It is not even moral, but it has character! And in art, after the moral idea comes character! Ah! bless me! character, that is something!—Otherwise, I disapprove. It is brutal, vulgar, that lack of ideal. I defy you to symbolize that. Love Avenging Itself Against Love—Jealousy Calling the Police to Its Aid in Order to Triumph over Dead Love! It is old, it lacks originality, it smacks of Prud'hon!—The Correggio of the decollete!—It is like Tassaert, ...
— His Excellency the Minister • Jules Claretie
... Saturday night. You and her brother will be under it ready to receive her; and when you have got the lady, you will bring her aboard the ship, which shall be ready to cut and run, I tell you; up killock, sheet home, and I'll defy all the cutters in Havana to overhaul us with an hour's start! Those chaps in Stockholm are almighty particular about your health, if your papers show that you left Havana after the first of June, and so, to pull the wool over their eyes, and save myself ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... due to nervousness are entirely purposeless; they even defy the most earnest efforts at inhibition. A marked feature of this type of involuntary action is the contraction of antagonist groups of muscles, productive of ...
— The Psychology of Singing - A Rational Method of Voice Culture Based on a Scientific Analysis of All Systems, Ancient and Modern • David C. Taylor
... they do not turn deadly dangerous all in a moment, as do bears and elephants, and occasionally deer. The ape who is falling from grace goes gradually, and gives warning signs that wise men recognize. They first become strong and boisterous, then they playfully resist and defy the keeper's restraining hand. Next in order they openly become angry at their keepers over trifles, and bristle up, stamp on the floor and savagely yell. It is then that the whip and the stick become not only useless but dangerous to the user, ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... reasons which none but the Buttons of this world can appreciate, Paul was forbidden, under pain of ghastly tortures, to go near the Sunday school again, and, lest he should defy authority, he was told off on Sunday afternoons to mind the baby, either in the street or the scullery, according to the weather, while the other little Buttons were not allowed to approach him. The defection of the brilliant scholar ...
— The Fortunate Youth • William J. Locke
... of Millie! How could one so shy, so gentle, so fond of showing her dimples, cast off all timidity and set herself in opposition to her father's authority and pride? I could but argue that she was wrong, that she had forgotten her duty, thus to stand out and violently defy him, and yet I admired her for the spirit she had shown. And I believed that Guinea was just as determined, just as passionate. ...
— The Jucklins - A Novel • Opie Read
... consecrated lays, Nor meanly blush to sing Jehovah's praise. Oh! did, like thee, each laurel'd bard delight, To paint Religion in her native light, Not then with Plays the lab'ring' press would groan, Nor Vice defy the Pulpit and the Throne; No impious rhymer charm a vicious age, Nor prostrate Virtue groan beneath their rage: But themes divine in lofty numbers rise, Fill the wide earth, and echo ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... sir! You're a faithful comrade! And so hand-in-hand with you Philip, I defy the Capulet ...
— The German Classics Of The Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries, Volume 12 • Various
... practices, in order to get deliverance from the malignant spirit which he still believes has power to torment him. Many a convert has fallen on the occasion of a funeral. It takes more faith than a Westerner can realise, to defy the legions of gwei which at that time threaten your home and its inhabitants with numberless ills; and strength of mind is required to resist heathen relatives who accuse you of slighting ...
— The Fulfilment of a Dream of Pastor Hsi's - The Story of the Work in Hwochow • A. Mildred Cable
... technical skill and scientific daring for its solution, while to raise the edifice, to seize the infrequent moments of low calm water for thrusting in the steel anchors and laying the heavy granite substructure on which shall rise the slender stone column that shall defy the assaults of wind and wave, demands coolness, determination, and reckless courage. Many lights have been built at such points on our coast, but the ponderous tower of Minot's Ledge, at the entrance to Boston Harbor, may well be taken ...
— American Merchant Ships and Sailors • Willis J. Abbot
... the police authorities have lately provided, that, in an out-of-the-way room, on a back street, the honest men of New York city may scan the faces of its thieves, and hold silent communion with that interesting part of the population which has agreed to defy the laws and to stand at issue with society. Without disturbing the deep pool of penalogy, or entering at all into the question, as to whether Actisanes was right, or whether the police of New York do not overstep their authority in putting on the walls this terrible bill of attainder ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 30, April, 1860 • Various
... men accepted the custom of branding cattle and horses as a matter of course. There was, in fact, nothing to do save accept it, for there was no other method of indicating the ownership of animals which could be reasonably relied on to defy the ingenuity of the thieves. Attempts to create opinion against it were regarded as sentimental and pernicious and ...
— Roosevelt in the Bad Lands • Hermann Hagedorn
... You, who dared in the dark eclipse,— When the pygmy heir of a giant name Dimmed the face of the land with shame,— Speak the truth with indignant lips, Call him little whom men called great, Scoff at him, scorn him, deny him, Point to the blood on his robe of state, Fling back his bribes and defy him! ...
— The Poems of Henry Van Dyke • Henry Van Dyke
... The republic of America; may her administration have virtue enough to defy the ordeal of patriotic societies, and patriotism enough to cherish instead ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing
... was ever in such a dreadful position in the world before, Dick!" she declared. "To tolerate it seems impossible, seems wrong. But to defy Rohscheimer, with your affairs as they are, ...
— The Sins of Severac Bablon • Sax Rohmer
... come to argue right and wrong?— Why lingers Dorax thus? Where are my guards, [BENDUCAR goes out for the Guards, and returns. To drag that slave to death?— [Pointing to SEB. Now storm and rage; Call vainly on thy prophet, then defy him For wanting power ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Vol. 7 (of 18) - The Duke of Guise; Albion and Albanius; Don Sebastian • John Dryden
... noise was repeated, and a second observation laid bare the real cause thereof. The scratching of the dog had caused the bolt to fall into the socket, and this produced the noise which had disquieted him. He writes in conclusion: "Thus many events which seem to defy all explanation have really come to pass by accident, or in the course of nature. Out of such manifestations as these the unlettered, the superstitious, the timorous, and the over-hasty make for themselves miracles."[274] Again, after telling a strange story of a boy who ...
— Jerome Cardan - A Biographical Study • William George Waters
... answered with a sneer, I like the blue no better than the black, My faith consists alone in savoury cheer, In roasted capons, and in potent sack; But above all, in famous gin and clear, Which often lays the Briton on his back; With lump of sugar, and with lymph from well, I drink it, and defy the fiends of hell.' ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... here," observed the captain, as his son appeased his hunger, with the keen relish of a traveller. "Even Woods might stand a siege in a house built and stockaded like this. Every window has solid bullet-proof shutters, with fastenings not easily broken; and the logs of the buildings might almost defy round-shot. The gates are all up, one leaf excepted, and that leaf stands nearly in its place, well propped and supported. In the morning it shall be hung like the others. Then the stockade is complete, and has not a speck of decay about it yet. We shall keep a guard of twelve ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper
... of Scottish independence, born in Renfrewshire, second son of Sir Malcolm Wallace of Elderslie; was early seized with a desire to free his country from foreign oppressors, and ere long began to figure as chief of a band of outlaws combined to defy the authority of Edward I., who had declared himself Lord of Scotland, till at length the sense of the oppression became wide-spread, and he was appointed to lead in a general revolt, while many of the nobles held aloof or succumbed ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... would prevail; to which he responded in a strain of insolent invective against France and her designs, saying that her object was to extort concessions from us which we should never make, and that now we were strong in our alliance with the other Powers we might defy her to injure us. This letter Clarendon showed to Melbourne, who had asked him if he knew what Palmerston's feelings were (he himself knowing nothing), and he was, of course, struck with the bitterness and asperity of his ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... a lawful adventure, and for some it is an absolute duty, to follow and challenge the Presence in word and deed. Englishmen who live in her shadow have sometimes for their honour to grasp and defy her; to assume that they are bound to question her authority. India for all her unknown terror has to be wrestled with for the blessing that England requires upon the labour of the English. Though the ...
— Rudyard Kipling • John Palmer
... pet forms of the longer names, though it is not always possible to establish the connection. Many of them have double forms with a long and short vowel respectively. It is to this class that we must refer the large number of our monosyllabic surnames, which would otherwise defy interpretation. Anglo-Sax. Dodds gave Dodd, while Dodson's partner Fogg had an ancestor Focga. Other examples are Bacga, Bagg, Benna, Benn, Bota, Boot and dim. Booty, Botts, Bolt, whence Bolting, Bubba, Bubb, Budda, Budd, Bynna, Binns, Cada, Cade, Cobbs, Cobb, Coda, Coad, ...
— The Romance of Names • Ernest Weekley
... abundance." The family, as at present arranged by Mr. J. G. Baker, of the Kew Herbarium, consists of twenty-one species, with several sub-species and varieties; all of which should be grown. They are all, with the exception of the Algerian species, which almost defy cultivation in England, most easy of cultivation—"Magna cura non indigent Narcissi." They only require after the first planting to be let alone, and then they will give us their graceful flowers in varied beauty from February to May. The first will usually be the grand N. maximus, ...
— The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare • Henry Nicholson Ellacombe
... the heath, with withering brake grown o'er, Lends the light turf that warms the neighbouring poor; From thence a length of burning sand appears, Where the thin harvest waves its withered ears; Rank weeds, that every art and care defy, Reign o'er the land, and rob the blighted rye; There thistles stretch their prickly arms afar, And to the ragged infant threaten war; There poppies nodding, mock the hope of toil; There the blue bugloss paints the sterile soil; Hardy and high, above the slender ...
— Hours in a Library - New Edition, with Additions. Vol. II (of 3) • Leslie Stephen
... England. For a meagre, powdered figure, hung with tatters, a-la-mode de Paris, to affect the airs of a coxcomb, and the importance of a sovereign, is ridiculous enough; but if it makes a man happy, why should he be laughed at? It must blunt the edge of ridicule, to see natural hilarity defy depression; and a whole nation laugh, sing, and dance, under burthens that would nearly break the firm-knit sinews of a Briton. Such was the picture of France at that period, but it was a picture which our English satirist ...
— The Works of William Hogarth: In a Series of Engravings - With Descriptions, and a Comment on Their Moral Tendency • John Trusler
... irreparable—breach between the thought and the religion of England. A comprehensive, all-embracing, truly Catholic Christianity which knows what is essential to religion, what is temporary and extraneous to it, may defy the world.' ...
— Historical and Political Essays • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... nearly finished their work; the grave was filled up, and they were carefully replacing the turf. This done, they scattered dry leaves over the place. "And now," said the leader, "I defy the devil ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving
... Series, i. 365), says: "Altogether I have long since arrived at the conclusion that there are more 'devils' in a printing office than are dreamt of in our philosophy— the blunder fiends to wit—ever busy in peppering the 'formes' with errors which defy the minutest revisions of reader, author, sub-editor, and editor.'' Mr. Sala gives an instance which occurred to himself. He wrote that Dr. Livingstone wore a cap with a tarnished gold lace band; but ...
— Literary Blunders • Henry B. Wheatley
... them," she said passionately. "Send them if you like; but he wouldn't read them——" She was not conscious of the admission in her words—she only knew that the knowledge that Micky was there somewhere in the background gave her the strength to defy Ashton. ...
— The Phantom Lover • Ruby M. Ayres
... I repeated angrily. "I have done nothing of the kind. I defy you to prove it. When have you known me forget that I ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... I say, as for conclusion, That I shall have of this avision Adversity; and I say furthermore, That I ne *tell of laxatives no store,* *hold laxatives For they be venomous, I wot it well; of no value* I them defy,* I love them never ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... is over, and I have nothing to do now but to be happy. But being engaged is not half so nice as I expected it would be. I suppose it is owing to my being obliged to defy mother's judgment in order to gratify my own. People say she has great insight into character, and sees, at a glance, what others only learn after ...
— Stepping Heavenward • Mrs. E. Prentiss
... with any special equipment. A brief glance over our own records for only a few months past enables me to classify them roughly as athletic or outdoor, purely social, educational, debating, political, labor, musical, religious, charitable or civic, and expository, besides many that defy ...
— A Librarian's Open Shelf • Arthur E. Bostwick
... on the verge of Europe and Asia. Inaccessible to the menaces of their enemies, and perhaps to the complaints of their people, they received, with each wind, the tributary productions of every climate; while the impregnable strength of their capital continued for ages to defy the hostile attempts of the Barbarians. Their dominions were bounded by the Adriatic and the Tigris; and the whole interval of twenty-five days' navigation, which separated the extreme cold of Scythia from the torrid zone of Aethiopia, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon
... domain. Something like this must have come into his mind—if I only can get man ruined and turn him against God, if I can make of man a rebel and lay hold on him, I shall get back the place which once was mine and then defy God. ...
— Studies in Prophecy • Arno C. Gaebelein
... clothys how euyll he was arayed, whych causyd many that stode therby to laughe apace. Than quod Skelton: yf it lyke your lordeshyp, I haue brought you a dyshe to your super, a cople of Fesantes. Nay, quod the byshop, I defy the and thy Fesantys also, and, wrech as thou art, pyke the out of my howse, for I wyll none of thy gyft how * * * * Skelton, than consyderynge that the bysshoppe called hym fole so ofte, sayd to one of hys famylyers therby that, thoughe it were euyll to be christened a fole, ...
— Shakespeare Jest-Books; - Reprints of the Early and Very Rare Jest-Books Supposed - to Have Been Used by Shakespeare • Unknown
... to prepare me for what you think will be a shock, uncle!" I answered; "but I want no preparing. Out with your worst! I defy you!" ...
— The Flight of the Shadow • George MacDonald
... be possible to achieve the aims of their policy without the risk of a conflict in arms. The Republics were "playing for time," but in another sense. They were waiting until their military preparations were sufficiently complete to allow them to defy the ...
— Lord Milner's Work in South Africa - From its Commencement in 1897 to the Peace of Vereeniging in 1902 • W. Basil Worsfold
... struggle; to accept from Dissent any rebuff, persecution, spoliation—while steadily ignoring it. In every parish my Church's attitude should be this: 'You may deny me, hate me, persecute me, strip me: but you are a Christian of this parish and therefore my parishioner; and therefore I absolutely defy you to escape my forgiveness or my love. Though you flee to the uttermost parts of the earth, you shall not escape these: by these, as surely as I am the Church, you shall be mine in the end.' . . . And do you think, Mr. Simeon, any man in England could ...
— Brother Copas • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... magic in my fairyland than I dreamed of," remarked the beautiful Ozma, with a sigh of regret. "It seems that my laws have not been obeyed, for even these monstrous spiders defy me ...
— Glinda of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... noise and more refinement. Out of the mechanical grinding of the hand organ, with the accompaniment of city omnibuses, we get the very breath of spring in almost intolerable sweetness. This poem affects the head, the heart, and the feet. I defy any man or woman to read it without surrendering to the magic of the lilacs, the magic of old memories, the magic of the poet. Nor has one ever read this poem without going immediately back to the first line, and reading ...
— The Advance of English Poetry in the Twentieth Century • William Lyon Phelps
... Missouri Synod Dr. Mann wrote in 1866: "These theological scratchbrushes (Kratzbuersten) of the West do an important work. They discipline thousands of Germans ecclesiastically, as otherwise only Catholic priests are able to do. Most of them lead a rough, self-denying life. They defy effeminate, sentimental, hazy ecclesiastical Americanism. There is a firm character here. They will not always remain as rugged as they are now. The coming generation will be English and milder in many respects. The Missourians are a power in the West, where the Germans generally are becoming ...
— American Lutheranism - Volume 2: The United Lutheran Church (General Synod, General - Council, United Synod in the South) • Friedrich Bente
... love, you are like those unpleasant persons who are resolved to torture themselves. In the first place, you have looked into medical books, which is the very height of imprudence. I defy you to read a description of any sort of disease without fancying that either you or some friends of yours have the symptoms of it. In the next place, you are mixing up things; the effects of fear and of a chronic ...
— The Deputy of Arcis • Honore de Balzac
... him and receive fresh books—he stayed either with Dalaber, or with Radley, the singing man; and in both their lodgings were cleverly-concealed hiding-places, where books could be stowed, that would defy all search, save that of ...
— For the Faith • Evelyn Everett-Green
... what they were told respecting the cause in which they fought: it would have been a high breach of discipline to doubt it; and they, I conceive, are men better skilled in handling a musket, than in sifting evidence, and detecting imposture. But I defy any one of them to come forward and declare, on his own knowledge, what was the cause in which he fought,—under whose commands the opposed generals acted,—and whether the person who issued those commands did really perform the mighty achievements ...
— Historic Doubts Relative To Napoleon Buonaparte • Richard Whately
... rest, and tried to defy sickness for a time, but it would not do. The strong man was obliged to succumb to a stronger than he—not, however, until he had assisted as best as he could ...
— The Lively Poll - A Tale of the North Sea • R.M. Ballantyne
... Hayne and Webster debated in Eighteen Hundred Thirty, and Grover Cleveland and John P. Altgeld fought over in Eighteen Hundred Ninety-four. The Elector Frederick prepared for a legal battle, and would defy the "Federal Arm" by force if ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 7 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Orators • Elbert Hubbard
... himself until he was able to puff up the cold-air flue in the stilly reaches of the night without having to grope his way back to the bed and watch the room careen about him. He did not inhale, but he had learned to imitate the process so as to defy detection, as ...
— Skippy Bedelle - His Sentimental Progress From the Urchin to the Complete - Man of the World • Owen Johnson
... consideration to be taken into account. If an article had to be bought, Mrs Webster gave consideration to strength and durability, and to strength and durability alone. In buying curtains, for instance, she sought for a nondescript colour which would defy the sun's rays, a material that would stand repeated washings, and a pattern which would conceal possible stains. A discovery that the cloth would ultimately cut up into desirable dusters was sufficient to ...
— Etheldreda the Ready - A School Story • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... turn, the change in his fellows' eyes. He knew the stern law of the pack—the instant and inevitable doom of its hurt member. The average gray wolf knows how to accept the inevitable. Fate itself—the law of the pack—he does not presume to defy. He will fight—to justify his blood, and, perhaps, to drug his despair and die in the heat of the struggle. But he does not dream of ...
— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts
... way. So Canada gained from the embargo much of what the Americans were losing. Quebec and Halifax swarmed with contrabandists, who smuggled back return cargoes into the New England ports, which were Federalist in party allegiance, and only too ready to evade or defy the edicts of the Democratic administration. Jefferson had, it is true, the satisfaction of inflicting much temporary hardship on cotton-spinning Manchester. But the American cotton-growing South suffered ...
— The War With the United States - A Chronicle of 1812 - Volume 14 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada • William Wood
... and will rest the case mainly on the effect of an exclusively masculine handling of the two fields of history and fiction. In poetry and the drama the same influence is easily traced, but in the first two it is so baldly prominent as to defy objection. ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... liquor born on my birthday, a twin to me, Whether ordained wit and mirth to put into me, Or passions that witch and defy us, Or, peradventure, ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 102, March 26, 1892 • Various
... steps have been made. Scrawny firs are trying to grow where they ought not to. Quasi-natural urns overflow with captive flowers, geraniums and nasturtiums predominating. Ferns hang as gracefully as shirtings displayed in a department store window. Stone lions defy, and terra cotta stags run away from, porcelain dogs. There are bowers and ...
— Riviera Towns • Herbert Adams Gibbons
... I could stand it—I thought I could defy him; I had no idea being imprisoned was so awful. I wish I could die and make an end of it! I'd starve myself to death, only I get so dreadful hungry, and I daren't cut my throat, because the sight of blood makes me sick, and I know it must hurt. Oh, Mollie Dane, you miserable little ...
— The Unseen Bridgegroom - or, Wedded For a Week • May Agnes Fleming
... her for this, and yet it made him uneasy. A woman who could defy an edict of fashion was a new thing under the sun, and it ...
— The Clansman - An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan • Thomas Dixon
... off, tick off; register, enroll, inscroll[obs3]; file &c. (store) 636. burn into memory; carve in stone. Adv. on record. Phr. exegi monumentum aere perennium [Lat][obs3][Horace]; "read their history in a nation's eyes" [Gray]; " records that defy the tooth of time ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... end must have been somewhat discreditable, for in the reports sent to the Emperor, who was daily informed of the progress of the affair, things were manifestly misrepresented. The following facts cannot be questioned: Le Chevalier had found in Paris "an impenetrable retreat where he could boldly defy all the efforts of the police;" Fouche, guessing at the feelings of the fugitive, issued a warrant against Mme. Thiboust. By whom was Le Chevalier informed in his hiding-place of his sister-in-law's arrest? It is here, evidently, that a third person intervened. However that ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre
... are told that now and then the most respectable father of a family will "side track," and go off on a jaunt with a glaringly golden-haired chorus lady! But one thing is better than with us, the eldest sons don't defy fate and marry them! When he gets to fifteen I shall begin to have nightmares in case Hurstbridge should bring me home a Gaiety daughter-in-law, though probably by then there will be such numbers of Birdie and Tottie and Rosie Peeresses, that I shall have ...
— Elizabeth Visits America • Elinor Glyn
... Shall burst its bag; and, fighting out their way, The various venoms on each other prey. The presbyter, puff'd up with spiritual pride, Shall on the necks of the lewd nobles ride: His brethren damn, the civil power defy; 300 And parcel out republic prelacy. But short shall be his reign: his rigid yoke And tyrant power will puny sects provoke; And frogs and toads, and all the tadpole train, Will croak to heaven for help, from this devouring crane. The cut-throat sword and clamorous gown ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... by Orestes, son of Agamemnon, was sent to Epirus to demand the death of Astyanax, lest in manhood he might seek to avenge his father's death. Pyrrhus told Andromache he would protect her son, and defy all Greece, if she would consent to marry him; and she yielded. While the marriage rites were going on, the Greek ambassadors fell on Pyrrhus and murdered him. As he fell he placed the crown on the head of Andromache, who ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... Parlements partaking of the nature of high courts of justice, and in Germany by the local Diets (Landtag) of the larger states, exercised a very real and in some cases a decisive influence on public policy. The monarch of half the world dared not openly defy the Cortes of Aragon or of Castile; the imperious Tudors diligently labored to get parliamentary sanction for their tyrannical acts, and, on the few occasions when they could not do so, hastened to abandon as gracefully as possible their previous intentions. In Germany ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... defy me with grievous rebellion? He shall pay the utmost penalty. For he shall be buried and transpierced under showers of lances, and shall fall lifeless in atonement for his insolent attempt. Nor shall the guilt of his wanton rancour be unpunished; and, as I forebode, as soon as ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... not two eunuchs, with a few miserable women clinging about them, that they had to seize, but that they had to break through all the guards which we see lovers sometimes breaking through, when they want to get at their ladies. Hardly ever did the beauty of a young lady excite such rapture; I defy all the charms this country can furnish to produce a more wonderful effect than was produced by the hoards of these two old women, in the bosoms of Sir Elijah Impey and Mr. Middleton. "We have got," he exultingly says, "we have got to the secret hoards ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XII. (of XII.) • Edmund Burke
... home, and all the family were acquainted with a certain secret hiding place that existed, cleverly contrived in the rambling old building, which, with its various levels and its wilderness of chimneys, might well defy detection, even with the most skilled search. But the boy knew of no such passage or chamber in connection with their sleeping room, and he was sure his parents did not know of one either, or any member of the household. Therefore it was immensely surprising ...
— The Secret Chamber at Chad • Evelyn Everett-Green
... Gabriel fought, And with fierce Ensigns pierc'd the deep array Of Moloc, furious King, who him defy'd, And at his chariot wheels to drag him bound Threatened, nor from the Holy one of Heavn Refrain'd his tongue blasphemous; but anon Down cloven to the waste, with shatter'd arms ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... learn that they were to be sisters. But her own papa, how would he feel—what would he say? Only the other day he had reminded her how entirely she belonged to him—that no other had the slightest claim upon her, and as he spoke, the clasp of his arms seemed to say that he would defy the whole world to take her from him. No, he would never give her up; and somehow she was not at all miserable at the thought; but on the contrary it sent a thrill of joy to her heart; it was so sweet to be so loved and cherished by him, "her ...
— Elsie's Girlhood • Martha Finley
... Fielding. Nay, the French, from whom they were borrowed, did not talk of le sentiment in that sense till long after Louis XIV.'s reign. No such thing is to be found in Madame de Sevigne, la Bruyere, etc., etc., etc. At home or abroad I defy Lord Dundee ever to have met with the expression. Mr. Peter Pattieson had been reading the Man of Feeling, and it was a slip of his tongue, which I am less inclined to excuse than Mause's abstruse Scotch, which I duly reverence, as she did Kettledrummle's sermons, because I do not understand ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume V (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... Mexico, Where the barren volcanoes throw Their fierce peaks high to the sky, With the strength of a tawny brute That sees heaven but to defy, And the soft, white hand of the snow Touches and ...
— Dreams and Days: Poems • George Parsons Lathrop
... ye servants to Saul? Choose you a man for you, and let him come down to me. If he be able to fight with me, and to kill me, then will we be your servants: but if I prevail against him, and kill him, then shall ye be our servants, and serve us. And the Philistine said, I defy the armies of Israel this day; give me a man, that we may fight together. When Saul and all Israel heard those words of the Philistine, they were dismayed, and ...
— The Ontario Readers - Third Book • Ontario Ministry of Education
... fragments of modems (his friends with tails, wings, etc.), hastily wash his hands, trot along in front of them to his place of business, and in a brief space of time turn out some complicated legal instrument with which it would defy the sharpest critic ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... pictures. Our object has been to take the Bible text always as our basis, to include no feature which is contradicted by it, and to introduce as many comicalities and anachronisms as possible consistently with this rule. We are therefore able to defy criticism. Bibliolators may vituperate us, persecute us, or imprison us, but they cannot refute us.. We can safely challenge them to prove that a single incident happened otherwise than we have depicted it. We can candidly say to them—"The thing must ...
— Comic Bible Sketches - Reprinted from "The Freethinker" • George W. Foote
... holders, to the remark that this event hushed the old slander about inferior natures in the negro, thence to the philosophy of slavery, and so through many detached thoughts to the end. It was nearly two hours long, but was very commanding. He looked genial and benevolent, as who should smilingly defy the world, the flesh, and the devil to ensnare him. The address will be published by the society; and he will probably write it more fully, and chisel it into fitter grace for the public criticism. He spoke of ...
— Early Letters of George Wm. Curtis • G. W. Curtis, ed. George Willis Cooke
... agreed. Paulsberg very seldom said that much; usually he sat, distant and unfathomable, and listened without speaking; he was respected by all. Only Irgens thought he could defy him; he was always ready ...
— Shallow Soil • Knut Hamsun
... seems before a hallowed shrine; Yet not the majesty of Art it feels, But Nature's law divine— The presence of her mighty Architect! Who piled these pyramidal hills sublime, That still, pure moon, thy radiance will reflect, And still defy the crumbling touch of Time: Who built this temple of gigantic trees, Where Nature's worshipers repair To pray the heart's unuttered prayer, Whose veiled thought the great ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 5 November 1848 • Various
... which he and the cause finally went down together, had not yet done their work. There were many murmurers at real, many growlers at supposed, errors; but no opposition party—truer to itself and its interests than to the cause—had yet been organized on a basis strong enough to defy and ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... your knowledge places at the command of your art, what would you give for one which would enable you to defy and to deride a rival where you place your affections, which could lock to yourself, and imperiously control, the will of the being whom you desire to fascinate, by an ...
— A Strange Story, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... a sharp upward look, his eyes seemed to push away that fat chap's curiosity, and defy him to see the bitter ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... understand it. It all seems impossible. You resolve to believe that a widow never burnt herself willingly, but went to her death because she was afraid to defy public opinion. But you are not able to keep that position. History drives you from it. Major Sleeman has a convincing case in one of his books. In his government on the Nerbudda he made a brave attempt on the 28th of March, 1828, to put down Suttee on his own ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... Here springs the temple grand, Whose mighty arches take in all the land! Its twilight aisles stretch far away and reach 'Mid lights and shadows which defy my speech: And near its portal which Morn opened wide— Grey Janitor!—to let in all this tide Of prayerful men, most solemnly there stands One recollection, which, for pious hands Is ready like the Minster's sculptured vase, With holy ...
— A Wreath of Virginia Bay Leaves • James Barron Hope
... asked himself that perplexing question! All the pursuing demons seemed to shout it in his ears, and defy him to answer. If she had escaped the perils he most dreaded, where had she hidden herself? Perhaps she had only taken out a passport for England, with a view of throwing those who sought to track her steps, off the right scent. If she had gone to England, her passport must have been vised ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie
... lips curled into a more and more decided smile, till at last she took off her hat, leaned forward and kissed the cold glass which had looked so warm. How could she believe in sorrow? If it attacked her, she felt the force to crush it, to defy it, or run away from it, as she had done already. Anything seemed more possible than that she could go on bearing miseries, great ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... heaven is from hell between the conduct of the Divine Master who "went about healing all that were oppressed," and the man who prostitutes the healing art to the service of libertines, in making it healthier, if possible, for them to defy the commandments of that same Divine Master. Such doctors are the offscouring of ...
— Heathen Slaves and Christian Rulers • Elizabeth Wheeler Andrew and Katharine Caroline Bushnell
... to believe that the bulk of the Democrats in both Houses of Congress, who had the virtue to defy the threats and cajolements of their party-leaders, when this great public crime was demanded at their hands, were sincere in the resistance they opposed to this subversion of all the principles in which they had been bred, and of which their party had always professed to be the special defence and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various
... by his mother and sister on his return from Massachusetts. He had grown to a handsome young man, whose daring blue eye and bold, honest face seemed born to defy tyrants. Rebecca, his sister, was a beautiful maiden, just budding into womanhood. She possessed her father's quiet, gentle, modest demeanor with her mother's beauty. Her great dark eyes were softer than her mother's, ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick
... have been central and southern Italy and the worst-administered parts of Spain, except those which fell into the hands of the Turks. "Whenever numerous troops of banditti, multiplied by success and impunity, publicly defy, instead of eluding, the justice of their country, we may safely infer that the excessive weakness of the government is felt and abused by the lowest ranks of the community," is the judgment passed by Gibbon on the disorders of Sicily in ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various
... spiritual tyrannies, weak men repine at them, and great men break them down. But to defy the world is a serious business, and requires the greatest courage, even if the defiance touch in the first place only the world's ideals. Most men's conscience, habits, and opinions are borrowed from convention and gather continual comforting ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... men-at-arms the most desperate ruffians, outlaws and outcasts whom he could collect, mostly men under sentence of banishment or death for highway robbery and murder, whose only chance of escaping torture and death lay in risking life and limb for a master strong enough to defy the law, the 'bargello' and the executioner, in his own house or castle, where such henchmen were lodged and fed, and were controlled by nothing but fear of the Baron himself, of his sons, when they were ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 1 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... fairly well, sir, in our youth; but you will allow me to observe that neither I nor any friend of yours ever heard of a wife or a son. I defy Sir Charles Tregellis to say that he ever dreamed that there ...
— Rodney Stone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Mr. Steadman harshly, "you defy me then, and when you defy me, you defy the Government of the Province, the arm of the Government reaches far—Driggs, and you know that before you are done, I'll put you out of business before two weeks have gone by. You owe every one—you owe the paper people—you owe on your printing press. ...
— Purple Springs • Nellie L. McClung
... passion is this? Why, Nigel, this is King Cambyses' vein!—You have frequented the theatres too much lately—Away with this folly, man; go, dine upon soup and salad, drink succory-water to cool your blood, go to bed at sun-down, and defy those foul fiends, Wrath ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... "I defy you to find one that isn't improved and finished and rounded off by an Amen at the end." He selected a hymn at random, and sang a stanza in his rich voice that poured itself out gloriously ...
— The End of the Rainbow • Marian Keith
... and again his wild demoniac laugh pealed out through the black loneliness of the night. "No, I don't intend to kill you. I want to see you suffer and die by inches. I want you to call upon God to help you, so that I can mock at you, and defy Him to ...
— The Ebbing Of The Tide - South Sea Stories - 1896 • Louis Becke
... traitor brood. Whose patriot arm hurl'd down Hbert and Rousin, and the villain friends 25 Of Danton, foul apostate! those, who long Mask'd treason's form in liberty's fair garb, Long deluged France with blood, and durst defy Omnipotence! but I it seems am false! I am a traitor too! I—Robespierre! 30 I—at whose name the dastard despot brood Look pale with fear, and call on saints to help them! Who dares accuse me? who shall dare belie My spotless name? ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... drunkard frae his whusky, the deboshed frae his debosh, the sweirer frae his aiths, the leear frae his lees; and giena ony o' them ower muckle o' yer siller at ance, for fear 'at they grow fat an' kick an' defy God and you. That's my advice ...
— Robert Falconer • George MacDonald
... come, and bid them welcome, and you will see them pouring in from the north, from the south, from the east, and from the west; your wildernesses will be cleared and settled, your deserts will smile, your ranks will be filled, and you will soon be in a condition to defy ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various
... the astonishment of all. "We spent our youth together. I see him in my mind's eye, Sire, throw down the gauntlet in Nell's name and defy the world for her. Fill the cups. We'll drink to my new-found hero! Fill! Fill! To Beau Adair, as you love me, gallants! Long ...
— Mistress Nell - A Merry Tale of a Merry Time • George C. Hazelton, Jr.
... shouldn't I draw up a chair before the fire for you, and another for myself, with the cigarettes and a world between us, to discuss conditions as they are, not as they might be if we were discovered? Shall I? Good! I defy any one's father to get me out of this chair until I am ready to relinquish ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... stood near—still maintaining a silence worthy of Eastern mutes; and Gascoyne, feeling that he was completely in their power, stepped quickly into the boat, and sat down beside the "individual" referred to by Dick, who was so completely enveloped in the folds of a large cloak as to defy recognition. But the pirate captain was too much occupied with his own conflicting thoughts and feelings to bestow more than a passing glance on the person who sat at his side. Indeed, it was not surprising that Gascoyne was greatly perplexed by all ...
— Gascoyne, The Sandal Wood Trader - A Tale of the Pacific • R. M. Ballantyne
... the advancing army, which penetrated to his capital. Dhuspas was soon captured, but Sharduris took refuge in his rocky citadel which he and his predecessors had laboured to render impregnable. There he was able to defy the might of Assyria, for the fortress could be approached on the western side alone by a narrow path between high walls and towers, so that only a small force could find room to operate against ...
— Myths of Babylonia and Assyria • Donald A. Mackenzie
... find no easy task on't Alone; come both together, I defy you! Curse on this disguise, that has betrayed me Thus ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. II • Edited by Walter Scott
... northern continent into the Mediterranean, at least taken as a whole. Even there however—in the north and west of Spain, in the valleys of the Ligurian Apennines and the Alps, and in the mountains of Macedonia and Thrace—tribes wholly or partially free continued to defy the lax Roman government. Moreover the continental communication between Spain and Italy as well as between Italy and Macedonia was very superficially provided for, and the countries beyond the Pyrenees, the Alps, and the Balkan chain—the great river basins of the Rhone, the Rhine, and ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... outlast them all, praise God!" replied the Doctor. "As a 'Government of the people, for the people, and by the people shall not perish from the earth,' so shall our flag and staff defy all the Arctic storms that ...
— Doctor Jones' Picnic • S. E. Chapman
... especially Louis and I, and many times we had been punished for it, for disobedience in my father's eyes was the greatest of all crimes; but never had we dared to defy him openly. ...
— Paula the Waldensian • Eva Lecomte
... will may dictate? Have you come to join yourself to those miserable spectres who go shrinking through the world, afraid of their own past, and anxious to hide it from those they hold dear; or do you propose to defy the world, to help form within it the community of outcasts with whom shame is not shame, nor dishonor, dishonor? How will you like the society of those uncertain men, ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells
... situation invites and enables us to pursue a different course. If we remain one people, under an efficient government, the period is not far off when we may defy material injury from external annoyance; when we may take such an attitude as will cause the neutrality we may at any time resolve upon to be scrupulously respected; when belligerent nations, under the impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard ...
— From Isolation to Leadership, Revised - A Review of American Foreign Policy • John Holladay Latane
... our drawings. If the variations from strict accuracy made under the influence of feeling are too great, the result will be a caricature. The variations in a beautiful drawing are so subtle as often to defy detection. The studies of Ingres are an instance of what I mean. How true and instinct with life are his lines, and how easily one might assume that they were merely accurate. But no merely accurate work would have the impelling quality these drawings possess. ...
— The Practice and Science Of Drawing • Harold Speed
... genial was the weather that certain lads, imbued with that spirit of lawlessness and adventure which seems inherent in the nature of the young Briton, had conspired together to defy the authority of their schoolmaster by playing truant from afternoon school and going to bathe in Firestone Bay. And it was while these lads were dressing, after revelling in their stolen enjoyment, that their attention was attracted by the appearance of a tall ship gliding up the Sound before ...
— The Cruise of the Nonsuch Buccaneer • Harry Collingwood
... saide thus; "By God that sitt'th above, *N'ere it* that thou art sick, and wood for love, *were it not* And eke that thou no weap'n hast in this place, Thou should'st never out of this grove pace, That thou ne shouldest dien of mine hand. For I defy the surety and the band, Which that thou sayest I have made to thee. What? very fool, think well that love is free; And I will love her maugre* all thy might. *despite But, for thou art a worthy gentle knight, And *wilnest to darraine her by bataille*, ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... nations, desperate in their greed, banded together to defy our old German God, and destroy His chosen people. But this was only a divine trial of our worth, for the plans of God are for eternity. His days to us are centuries. And we did well to patiently abide the complete unfoldment of ...
— City of Endless Night • Milo Hastings
... more or less, equal and free. Equal because a man on a horse would feel himself a man indeed; because the art of riding called out an independence, a self-help, a skill, a consciousness of power, a personal pride and vanity, which would defy slavery. Free, because a tribe of riders might be defeated, exterminated, but never enchained. They could never become gleboe adscripti, bound to the soil, as long as they could take horse and saddle, and away. History ...
— The Ancien Regime • Charles Kingsley
... misunderstand the position of Virginia. She is armed to the teeth, and she now proposes to step in between the Government and the States. I understand her attitude. It is an attitude of menace. It gives aid and comfort to those who trample upon the laws and defy the authority ...
— A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention • Lucius Eugene Chittenden |
