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Disavow   /dˌɪsəvˈaʊ/   Listen
Disavow

verb
(past & past part. disavowed; pres. part. disavowing)
1.
Refuse to acknowledge; disclaim knowledge of; responsibility for, or association with.



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"Disavow" Quotes from Famous Books



... against the Turks. At first, under the careful nursing of Metternich, the former motive prevailed. He struck the name of Alexander Ypsilanti from the Russian army list, and directed his foreign minister, Count Capo d'Istria, himself a Greek, to disavow all sympathy of Russia with his enterprise; and, next year, a deputation of the Greeks of the Morea on its way to the congress of Verona was turned back by his orders on the road. He made, indeed, some effort to reconcile the principles at conflict ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... keep holiday The wrong, than others the right way: Compound for sins they are inclin'd to, By damning those they have no mind to. Still so perverse and opposite, As if they worshipp'd God for spite. The self-same thing they will abhor One way, and long another for. Free-will they one way disavow, Another, ...
— English Satires • Various

... I! I disavow them! They were made By village chiefs whose vanity o'ercame Their judgment, and their ...
— Tecumseh: A Drama • Charles Mair

... return to power as the one sole means of relieving the country from its distress. The English gentleman who describes this scene represents himself as not to be outdone in patriotism of his own even by the exiled Prince. "I could not disavow much of what he said; yet I own I was piqued at it, for very often compassionate terms from the mouth of an adverse party are grating. It appeared to me so on this occasion; therefore I replied, 'It's true, sir, that our affairs in England lie at present ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume I (of 4) • Justin McCarthy

... utterly disavow this creed that life is desirable in itself. A fair woman in a ball-room, exquisitely dressed, and possessed of all that wealth could give, once declared to me her belief—and I think honestly—that no person over thirty ...
— Oldport Days • Thomas Wentworth Higginson

... to me less than his insolence," replied the Count; "but without discussing words, I am delighted to see that you disavow his conduct. I ought not to conceal from you the fact, that this scoundrel wished to make me believe that he acted upon your orders, and I was resolved to punish you severely. I see now that he has lied, and it ...
— Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne

... for him to rewrite these pages in other terms, but they appeared to him to be so well suited to the character of Napoleon that he has preferred to preserve them." In the will of Napoleon occurs (see end of this work): "I disavow the 'Manuscrit de Sainte Helene', and the other works under the title of Maxims, Sentences, etc., which they have been pleased to publish during the last six years. Such rules are not those which have guided ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton

... mingle little with those who study the finesse of life; and loving, as I do, my noble profession, Alida, was it so unnatural to believe that another might view it with the same eyes? But since you disavow the letter—nay, your disavowal is unnecessary—I see my vanity has even deceived me in the writing—but since the delusion is over, I confess that I rejoice it is ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper

... in violation of precedent, the seizure on a vessel of the United States of a passenger in transit charged with political offenses, in order that he might be tried for such offenses under what was described as martial law. I was constrained to disavow Mr. Mizner's act and recall him ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Volume IX. • Benjamin Harrison

... a pride which scorned concealment. Yes, he would own it here, where it would be in vain to deny it. He would not disavow the secret of his heart. Mothers have keen eyes, but hers were not keen, they were pitying,—more sad than tears. She looked at him, and once more softly shook her head. The blood had rushed again to his face, dyeing it ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant

... Moscow, which we have made heroic, and which will remain so? Has not a French General denied that utterance on the field of Waterloo which will immortalize it? And if I were not withheld by my respect for a sacred event, I might recall that a priest has felt it to be his duty to disavow in public a sublime speech which will remain the noblest that has ever been pronounced on a scaffold: "Son of Saint Louis, rise to heaven!" When I learned not long ago its real author, I was overcome by the destruction of my illusion, but before long ...
— Cinq Mars, Complete • Alfred de Vigny

... shut against conviction, that all the difficulties we encounter with the Indians, their hostilities, the murder of helpless women and children, along our frontiers, result from the conduct of agents of Great Britain in this country. In vain is it then for its administration in Britain to disavow having given orders which will warrant such conduct, whilst their agents go unpunished; while we have a thousand corroborating circumstances, and indeed as many evidences, some of which cannot be brought forward, to prove that ...
— An account of Sa-Go-Ye-Wat-Ha - Red Jacket and his people, 1750-1830 • John Niles Hubbard

... pursuing, are opposed to every principle of natural justice; whilst much abler heads than my own have fully convinced me, that they are not only repugnant to natural right, but subversive of the laws and constitution of Great Britain itself. ... I shall conclude with remarking that, if you disavow the right of Parliament to tax us, unrepresented as we are, we only differ in the mode of opposition, and this difference principally arises from your belief that they (the Parliament I mean), want a decent opportunity to repeal the acts; whilst I am fully convinced that there has been ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving

... continued the old man; "I know you will. Then, in the name of the merciful God, I implore, I entreat—and, if that will not do, then, as his servant, and the humble minister of his word and will—I command you to disavow the murderous purpose you have come to this night. Heavenly Father," said he, looking up with all the fervor of sublime piety, "we entreat you to take from these mistaken men the wicked intention of imbruing their guilty hands in blood; teach them a clear sense of Christian duty; ...
— Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton

... jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They, too, have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity which denounces our separation, and hold them as we ...
— A Brief History of the United States • Barnes & Co.

... desired that this act should be sanctioned by the acquiescence of the nation: they signed it merely as a protection from the present effects of the anger of Northumberland, whom most of them hated as well as feared; each privately hoping that he should find opportunity to disavow the act of the body in time to obtain the forgiveness of Mary, should her cause be found finally to prevail. The selfish meanness and political profligacy of such a conduct it is needless to stigmatize; but this was not the age of public virtue ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin

... soldiery dared attempt nothing fresh; and they only saw in her refusals to "abjure" an immediate reason for handing her over from the ecclesiastical justice to the secular, whose ways were swifter. But merely burning Jeanne would not have been enough. She had to confess her sins, to disavow her mission, to be received into the bosom of the Church and pardoned, and then—to be discovered in fresh crime. One of the consequences of her "abjuration" was that she was wearing woman's dress that very afternoon. Two days afterwards ...
— The Story of Rouen • Sir Theodore Andrea Cook

... as it prevented in others. But nobody had then discovered that the law was unconstitutional. Yet in 1822, that doctrine was broached and zealously maintained by three or four members from the South, so as to induce Mr. Lowndes, who was himself opposed to a bankrupt law, to disavow the doctrines of his associates. That exemplary man, the character of whose mind was sufficiently inclined to refined speculation, if it had not been so tempered by candour and sound practical sense, never lost ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various

... the predictions of diviners or oracles, when they are followed by fulfilment, we can hardly disavow that the evil spirit intervenes, and discovers the future to those who consult him. St. Augustine, in his book de Divinatione Daemonum,[199] or of predictions made by the evil spirit, when they are fulfilled, supposes that ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet

... doctrine called Philosophical Necessity, which prevents the opposite party from recognizing its truth, I believe to exist more or less obscurely in the minds of most necessitarians, however they may in words disavow it. I am much mistaken if they habitually feel that the necessity which they recognize in actions is but uniformity of order, and capability of being predicted. They have a feeling as if there were at bottom a stronger tie ...
— A System Of Logic, Ratiocinative And Inductive • John Stuart Mill

... stamped him as a personality, that accounted for his extraordinary success. It was obvious that, as one of a new and aspiring class, a class that once more cherished ideal aims and was not content with actual forms of existence, Gorki, the proletaire and railway-hand, would not disavow Life, but would affirm it, affirm it with all the force of his ...
— Maxim Gorki • Hans Ostwald

... but that private grief was not to affect his public policy; and Charles, Francis, and even the Pope, became more or less eager competitors (p. 350) for Henry's favour. The bull of deprivation, which had been drawn up and signed, became a dead letter, and every one was anxious to disavow his share in its promotion. Charles obtained the suspension of its publication, made a merit of that service to Henry, and tried to represent that it was Francis who, with his eyes on the English crown, had extorted the bull from the Pope.[978] Paul ...
— Henry VIII. • A. F. Pollard

... had seized the mouths of the Cattaro. The Austrian officers, appointed to hand over the territory to the French, had not opposed any resistance to the Russians. The two Emperors of Austria and Russia hastened to disavow their agents; on 20th July Oubril signed with France ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt

... their present state acknowledged also their brotherhood with the roue whom I had seen in the next room or the cabman sitting outside on his box in a half-stupor. I might envy the good fortune which allowed them to move in the same world as Penelope Blight, but to disavow intimacy with them, even to one so strangely ambitious as Tom Marshall, called for no loss of pride. With some show of temper I avowed that I hardly knew them. I had only met them once or twice at the house of friends. But the sincerity with which I disowned them ...
— David Malcolm • Nelson Lloyd

... not only teaches us that our best actions are those which we ought most steadily to disavow, but carries distrust and suspicion into all our most familiar relations. The man I want to deceive, and throw out in the keenness of his hunting, is my landlord. But how shall I most effectually conceal the truth from him? May I be allowed to tell it to my wife or my child? I had better not. ...
— Thoughts on Man - His Nature, Productions and Discoveries, Interspersed with - Some Particulars Respecting the Author • William Godwin

... appear some indications that Caesar, who certainly now possessed regal power, would like the regal name. Ambitious men, in such cases, do not directly assume themselves the titles and symbols of royalty. Others make the claim for them, while they faintly disavow it, till they have opportunity to gee what effect the idea produces on the public mind. The following incidents occurred which it was thought indicated such a design on the ...
— History of Julius Caesar • Jacob Abbott

... exclude him. He is authorised by custom to enter all houses, at all hours, where he is received and treated almost as a god. These are facts which can be vouched by all Spaniards, by whom they are spoken of without the least reserve. In laying them before the English public, we disavow all idea of calumniating an entire class of Spanish society. Our object is to point out one of the causes which, in our opinion, enters into the number of those which, most effectively, have contributed to the decline of so sensible and generous ...
— Roman Catholicism in Spain • Anonymous

... to Sir William Chambers appearing soon after his arrival at Bath, and being by many imputed to a writer who had lately so much distinguished himself by his talent for satire, he was at considerable pains to disavow that publication; and by some lines containing a deserved compliment to his sovereign, gave a sufficient pledge for the honesty of ...
— Lives of the English Poets - From Johnson to Kirke White, Designed as a Continuation of - Johnson's Lives • Henry Francis Cary

... last-mentioned, by her conduct during the War and after the peace, justified least a near right of entry. It would be incontestablement plus naturel (of how many things does nature occupy herself!) to let Austria enter first if she will disavow the policy of reattachment—that is, being purely German, renounce against the principle of nationality, in spite of the principle of auto-decision, when she cannot live alone, to unite herself to Germany; Bulgaria and Turkey as long as they ...
— Peaceless Europe • Francesco Saverio Nitti

... in their offices without any signification to them of his Majesty's displeasure at any of their measures, whilst persons considerable for their rank, and known to have had access to his Majesty's sacred person, can with impunity abuse that advantage, and employ his Majesty's name to disavow and counteract the proceedings of his official servants, nothing but distrust, discord, debility, contempt of all authority, and general confusion, ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... us as a Court; and therefore for you to address yourself to us, not acknowledging us as a Court to judge of what you say, it is not to be permitted. And the truth is, all along, from the first time you were pleased to disavow and disown us, the Court needed not to have heard you one word; For unless they be acknowledged a Court, and engaged, it is not proper for you to speak. Sir, we have given you too much liberty already, and admitted of too much delay, ...
— State Trials, Political and Social - Volume 1 (of 2) • Various

... of the polis is a Phoenician invention, even this has been imitated by the Hellenes. For a long time they dabbled in everything, like joyful dilettanti. Aphrodite is likewise Phoenician. Neither do they disavow what has come to them through immigration and does not originally belong to their ...
— We Philologists, Volume 8 (of 18) • Friedrich Nietzsche

... JOHNSON. 'No, Sir; there will always be some truth mixed with the falsehood, and how can it be ascertained how much is true and how much is false? Besides, Sir, what damages would a jury give me for having been represented as swearing?' BOSWELL. 'I think, Sir, you should at least disavow such a publication, because the world and posterity might with much plausible foundation say, "Here is a volume which was publickly advertised and came out in Dr. Johnson's own time, and, by his silence, was admitted by him to be genuine."' JOHNSON. 'I shall give myself ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell

... fact, a group of interests quite unlike any other group, peculiar and special, and one to be thoroughly ashamed of. Nevertheless, Ann Veronica found it a difficult matter not to think of these things. However having a considerable amount of pride, she decided she would disavow these undesirable topics and keep her mind away from them just as far as she could, but it left her at the end of her school days with that wrapped feeling I have described, and ...
— Ann Veronica • H. G. Wells

... factions in the Mogul's court) accepted a power to make a treaty of mutual alliance under the sanction of his sovereign. And it does not appear that he, Warren Hastings, did discountenance the double-dealing and fraudulent agencies of his and the Company's minister at that court, or did disavow any particular in the letter from him, the said Browne, of the 30th of December, 1783, stating the offers made on his part to the Mogul, so contradictory to his late declarations to the heir-apparent of that monarch, or did ...
— The Works Of The Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IX. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... and of the Sabellians. But as those opposite extremes seemed to overthrow the foundations either of natural or revealed religion, they mutually agreed to qualify the rigor of their principles; and to disavow the just, but invidious, consequences, which might be urged by their antagonists. The interest of the common cause inclined them to join their numbers, and to conceal their differences; their animosity was softened by the healing counsels of toleration, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon

... upon Saguntum in violation of the treaty, and had refused even to receive the communication which had been sent him by the Roman senate through them. They demanded that the Carthaginian government should disavow his acts, and deliver him up to them, in order that he might receive the punishment which his violation of the treaty, and his aggressions upon an ally of the Romans, so ...
— Hannibal - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... ever made to cast even a shadow of ridicule on the Knight Templar, on Dryfesdale, on the gypsy, or even on the crawling Dwining, he manifestly takes great pains to render as contemptible and laughably absurd as possible this type of the very great majority of modern infidels, who disavow religion because they fear it, and ridicule Christianity from sheer, shallow ignorance. Our own country at present abounds in 'Bletsons,' in conceited, ignorant 'infidel' scribblers of many descriptions, in of all ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... he has drawn from nature, to stop your mouths, weigh, I must own to you, but very little with me. This same Nature is, indeed, a specious word, nay there is a great deal in it, if it is properly understood and applied; but I cannot bear to hear people using it, to justify what common sense must disavow. Is not nature modified by art in many things? Was it not designed to be so? And is it not happy for human society, that it is so? Would you like to see your husband let his beard grow, until he would be obliged to put the end of it in his pocket, because this beard is the ...
— Letters of the Right Honourable Lady M—y W—y M—e • Lady Mary Wortley Montague

... coast beyond this Colony, and brought from thence here, the infringement of neutrality will be so palpable and flagrant that Her Majesty's Government will probably satisfy the claims of the owners gracefully and at once, and thus remove all cause of complaint. In so doing it will have to disavow and repudiate the acts of its executive agents here—a result I have done all ...
— The Cruise of the Alabama and the Sumter • Raphael Semmes

... that his name had been removed. The letter said, "While there might be no desire to define Christianity in the case of those who claim that they are in any sense of the term entitled to be called Christians, for those persons who, like yourself, disavow the name, there seems to be no need of raising any question as to how broad a range of opinion the name may ...
— Unitarianism in America • George Willis Cooke

... she say when she discovers the truth? My conscience will not allow me to dissemble. It will not disavow the name or withhold the duties of a wife. Too well do I conceive what she will say,—how ...
— Jane Talbot • Charles Brockden Brown

... whole of humanity with charity and love, and saving the world from the frightful social cataclysm that threatens it by leading it to the real Kingdom of God: the Christian communion of all nations united in one nation only. "And can the Holy Father disavow me?" he continued. "Are not these his secret ideas, which people are beginning to divine, and does not my only offence lie in having expressed them perhaps too soon and too freely? And if I were allowed ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola

... may, in their derision, term such weak and idle inquiries. But on them, the most powerful minds that ever illuminated this world, have fastened, with an intense curiosity; and, owning their fears, or their ignorance, have not dared to disavow ...
— Dr. Johnson's Works: Life, Poems, and Tales, Volume 1 - The Works Of Samuel Johnson, Ll.D., In Nine Volumes • Samuel Johnson

... Secretary of War wrote to Hull, saying his action respecting Canadian Indians "met with the approval of the Government." Evidently ashamed, upon reflection, of Hull's threat, that same Government later instructed its commissioners at the Treaty of Ghent, when peace was restored, "to disown and disavow" their former Indian policy. ...
— The Story of Isaac Brock - Hero, Defender and Saviour of Upper Canada, 1812 • Walter R. Nursey

... 1917, the Slovak political leaders, especially their two deputies, Father P. Juriga and Dr. P. Blaho, and the veteran leader of the Slovak National Party, M. Dula, have been subjected to all sorts of persuasions and threats on the part of the Magyars who were anxious that the Slovaks should disavow the declaration of the Bohemian Club in favour of the union of all Czechs and Slovaks in an independent state. The Slovak leaders, however, refused to become the dupes of ...
— Independent Bohemia • Vladimir Nosek

... no answer: to disavow her marriage, when thus formally called upon, was every way unjustifiable; to acknowledge it in her present situation, would involve her ...
— Cecilia vol. 3 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)

... they used every threat and argument in their power to induce me to change my purpose, but in vain. My reason for this, was to avoid the violence of mob law. While in the hands of the populace, there was danger of the summary infliction of punishment that the military authorities could disavow, if our government threatened retaliation. But if I was once under the regular military jurisdiction, they would be responsible both to the United States ...
— Daring and Suffering: - A History of the Great Railroad Adventure • William Pittenger

... regard to those, on which they are known to excel.—But why counsel this disingenuous fraud? Why add to the numberless arts of deceit, this practice of deceiving, as it were, on a settled principle? If to disavow the knowledge they really have be a culpable affectation, then certainly to insinuate an idea of their skill, where they are actually ignorant, is a most ...
— Essays on Various Subjects - Principally Designed for Young Ladies • Hannah More

... against me, not against the Atomic Power Authority. And, in the second place, if he does and it goes to Federal mediation, his demand for the reinstatement of those men will be thrown out, and his own organization will have to disavow his action, because he'll be calling the ...
— Day of the Moron • Henry Beam Piper

... remonstrances on this subject, he thought it due to give all the explanation in his power;' and he writes: 'The authors continue to preserve the silence upon this subject, which they before thought prudent; but they disavow, in explicit terms, the design of laying down a system of education founded upon morality, exclusive of religion. . . . We most earnestly deprecate the imputation of disregarding religion in Education. . . . We ...
— Richard Lovell Edgeworth - A Selection From His Memoir • Richard Lovell Edgeworth

... them to escape censure by some, and factious crimination by many. If they avow and approve Jackson's conduct, they incur the double responsibility of having made a war against Spain, in violation of the constitution, without the authority of Congress. If they disavow him, they must give offence to his friends, encounter the shock of his popularity, and have the appearance of truckling to Spain. For all this I should be prepared; but the mischief of this determination lies deeper. 1. It is weakness, ...
— Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams. • Josiah Quincy

... to disavow his crime, When that, for which he is accused and seized, He bears about him still! My eyes confess it; My every action speaks my heart aloud: But, oh, the madness of my high attempt Speaks louder yet! and all together cry,— I love ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden

... had taken pleasure in giving me a specimen of its despotic caprice, and had insured my happiness through means which sages would disavow, had not the power to make me adopt a system of moderation and prudence which alone could establish my future welfare on ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... enticing visions quickly faded away from their sight. At an early day after the inauguration of their government, they were compelled to disavow the design of reopening the slave trade, and in no event is it probable their recognition will be yielded by foreign governments, except on the basis of ultimate emancipation. How such a proposition will be received by their deluded followers, ...
— The Continental Monthly , Vol. 2 No. 5, November 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... speech crept into every corner of the room. Lionel did not look puzzled any more. He stood up very straight and stiff; only his eyes changed. He could not look at her; they were filled with contempt. He gave her a moment or two to disavow her words; he would have given his right hand ...
— The Dark Tower • Phyllis Bottome

... frankly, you know, I didn't think of you." But the mounting tide of her poor dishonored memories swept it indignantly away. If it was his correctness toignore, it could never be hers to disavow. ...
— Tales Of Men And Ghosts • Edith Wharton

... directors. Parliaments and States-General were opposed to monopolistic and privileged companies, and threw what obstacles they could in their way; and political exigencies often forced even the sovereigns who had given them their charters to disavow and discourage them. [Footnote: Letter of October 8, 1607, from Zufiiga to the king of Spain, in Brown, Genesis of the United States, I., 121.] Their greatest difficulties, how-ever, arose from the very nature of the problem which they were trying ...
— European Background Of American History - (Vol. I of The American Nation: A History) • Edward Potts Cheyney

... have sported with, are they not types of many other far more serious ones which we cram down the throats of our rising generation, long after we ourselves have begun to disbelieve them? There is a conventional teaching which we decorously administer, and leave our pupils to disavow it when they can. History is still taught in our public and private schools, seasoned with all the exploded blunders of the past. Men grow up to full manhood with ideas of foreign lands as ridiculous and unfounded as the pictures over ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... he announced, staccato, "we entirely disavow Mr. Elderberry's circular of 1914. It was issued without our knowledge or authority. It is no evidence that the mine was worth ten millions or any ...
— Tutt and Mr. Tutt • Arthur Train

... his jealousy been aroused by the suspicion that Levasseur intended to declare himself an independent prince.[114] So the governor-general, already in bad odour at court for having given Levasseur means of establishing a little Geneva in Tortuga, began to disavow him to the authorities at home. He also sent his nephew, M. de Lonvilliers, to Tortuga, on the pretext of complimenting Levasseur on his victory over the Spaniards, but really to endeavour to entice him back to St. Kitts. Levasseur, subtle and penetrating, skilfully avoided the ...
— The Buccaneers in the West Indies in the XVII Century • Clarence Henry Haring

... 236) proceeding which ought to have shown Cooper that they were not so utterly given over to the father of all evil as he fancied them. But the author of this impudent falsehood never withdrew it, nor did the publishers of the volume, in which it was contained, disavow it. The extract given above is taken from an edition which bears ...
— James Fenimore Cooper - American Men of Letters • Thomas R. Lounsbury

... girl. "Why, I don't know her any better than I know you, Captain Barry. Why should I ask her to disavow something that ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle

... other writings, in the space of four years, no less than ten thousand nine hundred and ninety-seven pounds, six shillings, and eight pence, out of the Treasury.' But frequently, through his fury or folly, he exceeded all the bounds of his commission, and obliged his honourable patron to disavow his scurrilities.—P. ...
— Poetical Works of Pope, Vol. II • Alexander Pope

... in the very ideal of the quoit-player, the cricketer, not to give expression to mind, in any antagonism to, or invasion of, the body; to mind as anything more than a function of the body, whose healthful balance of functions it may so easily perturb;—to disavow that insidious enemy of the fairness of the bodily soul ...
— Greek Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater

... souls to the voice of conscience, disavow a belief in destiny and shut our eyes to those forces of the Invisible which, in spite of ourselves, we know to exist, but how is it, that no man ever succeeds in escaping ...
— When Dreams Come True • Ritter Brown

... "That this Cooeperation shall embrace such of the Churches contending for the primitive faith and order as shall willingly be placed upon the list of Churches printed in its Annual Report. That the Churches thus cooeperating disavow any intention or desire to recognize themselves as a denomination, or to limit their fellowship to the Churches thus cooeperating; but, on the contrary, they avow it both a duty and a pleasure to visit, receive, and cooeperate with Christian Churches, without reference ...
— A Trip Abroad • Don Carlos Janes

... the God of Abraham to be still her God, and the God of this her seed. That scene had not failed to make deep impressions upon the other children; and now it was proposed to one of them that she should, by connecting herself in marriage, disavow her mother's right to cling, in those hours of anguish, to that asylum of the fatherless, infant baptism,—that very present help in trouble, the covenant of God with believers and their offspring. The little child, ...
— Bertha and Her Baptism • Nehemiah Adams

... products which intelligence has anticipated,—all are transformed into "something rich and strange" by the poet's alchemy, without any sacrifice of truth, or the insertion of details which a farmer would disavow as inaccurate or sentimental. The "Ik" is a full counterpoise to the "Marvel," even to the most literal reader of the volume, though it is certain that no book has ever before appeared in our country in which the farmer-life of New England ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various

... there is too often a great indifference manifested as to their fate. I do not wish it to be understood that such is always the case; on the contrary, I know that the better, and right thinking part of the community, in all the colonies, not only disavow such feelings, but are most anxious, as far as lies in their power, to promote the interests and welfare of the natives. Still, there are always some, in every settlement, whose passions, prejudices, interests, or fears, obliterate their sense ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre

... but suggested by my good friend the censor; and it will serve to indicate how great was the bowing down before the house of De Beers. I wish to disavow any compliment I may have appeared to pay that company in my telegram, for I think they did their bare duty. What they did was to provide a ration of soup for the inhabitants as long as some bullock meat which they possessed lasted; to organise relief works by making roads and fences in a town ...
— The Relief of Mafeking • Filson Young

... spy stood. What is the punishment threatened to the spy who is caught at such a task? Death! What will the Government he serves do to help him? Nothing at all, nothing. It may be a Government quite friendly to the land where the spy is seized. It will disavow him, and leave him to his fate. Yet that Government was quite willing to profit by his labours; nay, sent him there to gain that information. Yes, because Governments act upon the idea that the friend of to-day may be the foe of to-morrow, so they use such ...
— The Wolf Patrol - A Tale of Baden-Powell's Boy Scouts • John Finnemore

... by private men, but by public council, that 'No faith is to be kept with heretics.' This has been openly avowed by the Council of Constance; but it has never been openly disclaimed. Whether private persons avow or disavow it, it is a fixed maxim of the Church of Rome. But as long as it is so, nothing can be more plain than that the members of that Church can give no reasonable security to any government for their allegiance and peaceable behavior. Therefore, they ought not ...
— Americanism Contrasted with Foreignism, Romanism, and Bogus Democracy in the Light of Reason, History, and Scripture; • William Gannaway Brownlow

... unconscious of the breadth of his own philanthropy, we wonder less at the liability of noble men to admit some average folly of their age. This is the ridiculous and astonishing feature of their costume, the exceptional bad taste which their spiritual posterity learn to disavow. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various

... prescription, could not really be in favour of sweeping away the whole complex social structure, levelling Windsor Castle as Burke put it in his famous metaphor, and making a 'Bedford level' of the whole country. The Whigs had to disavow any approval of the Jacobins; Mackintosh, who had given his answer to Burke's diatribes, met Burke himself on friendly terms (9th July 1797), and in 1800 took an opportunity of public recantation. He only expressed the natural ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume I. • Leslie Stephen

... needs must be When Love His name shall disavow, When christen'd men His wrath shall dree, Who mercy scorn'd in this their day; But what? He turns not yet away, ...
— Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Jean Ingelow

... the world at a single stroke of the pen." Well, let it go. I am quite sure that if these poetic dreamers had ever come across a shepherdess in real life—dirty, unkempt, ignorant, coarse, immoral—they would themselves have made haste to disavow their heroines and seek less malodorous "maidens" for embodiments of their exalted fancies of love[128]. Richard Wagner was promptly disillusioned when he came across some of those modern shepherdesses, the Swiss dairy-maids. "There ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck

... pathetic generous lines on the death of his son, Major Howard. He acted just in the same way every time he thought he had any fault to repair. But could this same love of justice, that had guided him through life, have caused him equally to disavow what he said of Lord Castlereagh and of Ireland in "Avatar?" of Southey and the Austrians at Venice? or the greater part of the satirical traits contained in "Don Juan" and the "Age of Bronze?" I do not think so. I believe, ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli

... musket at the window, and shot her dead on the spot in the midst of her terrified family. On the intercession of a friend the dead body was permitted to be removed when the house was set on fire. This atrocious deed excited such general horror and detestation that the British thought proper to disavow it, and to impute the death of Mrs. Caldwell to a random shot from the retreating militia, though the militia did not fire a musket in the village. The wanton murder of the lady might be the unauthorized act of a savage individual, but can the burning of ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing

... at Rome publicly to disavow sentiments, the truth of which must have been to him abundantly manifest. "Are these then my judges?" he exclaimed, in retiring from the inquisitors, whose ignorance astonished him. He was imprisoned, and visited ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... base designs, or gratification of their wild passions) really do themselve embroil things, and raise miserable combustions in the world. So it is that they who have the conscience to do mischief, will have the confidence also to disavow the blame and the iniquity, to lay the burden of it on those who are most innocent. Thus, whereas nothing more disposeth men to live orderly and peaceably, nothing more conduceth to the settlement and safety of the public, nothing so much draweth blessings down from heaven upon the commonwealth, ...
— Sermons on Evil-Speaking • Isaac Barrow

... remaining at liberty should be placed at the foot of the decree, it was a bold stroke; the Committee did not conceal from itself that it was a list of proscription offered to the victorious coup d'etat ready drawn up, and perhaps in its inner conscience it feared that some would disavow it, and protest against it. As a matter of fact, the next day we received two letters, two complaints. They were from two Representatives who had been omitted from the list, and who claimed the honor of being reinstated there. I reinstate these ...
— The History of a Crime - The Testimony of an Eye-Witness • Victor Hugo

... race most deeply and directly. Against the convict lease system, the Jim Crow car laws, lynchings and all other barbarities which degrade us, we shall protest with such force of logic and intensity of soul that those who oppress us will either cease to disavow the inalienability and equality of human rights, or be ashamed to openly violate the very principles upon which this government was founded. By discharging our obligation to the children, by coming into the closest possible touch with the masses of our people, by studying the labor ...
— Twentieth Century Negro Literature - Or, A Cyclopedia of Thought on the Vital Topics Relating - to the American Negro • Various

... complied with, yet in a communication not addressed to His Majesty's Government not a disrespectful term is employed, nor a phrase that his own sense of propriety, as well as the regard which one nation owes to another, would induce him to disavow. On the contrary, expressions of sincere regret that circumstances obliged him to complain of acts that disturbed the harmony he wished to preserve with a nation and Government to the high characters of ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 2) of Volume 3: Andrew Jackson (Second Term) • James D. Richardson

... last speeches and dying words urged upon the millions of his followers the necessity of giving their lives to the cause of the Union. So critical was the situation that when nominations were made for elective office in the Middle States or the West in 1861, the Administration party took pains to disavow its former attitude and put forward candidates who had been regular Democrats, thus following the same compromising policy which Davis inaugurated in the South. Daniel S. Dickinson, a member of the old Polk and Pierce party ...
— Expansion and Conflict • William E. Dodd

... Prince John has already shown that he is ready, if need be, to oppose the authority of the holy father, and he may well, therefore, despise any local wrath that might be excited by an action which he can himself disavow, and for which, even at the worst, he need only inflict some nominal punishment upon his vassal. Bethink thee, lady, whether it would not be safer to send the Lady Margaret to the care of some person, where she may be concealed from ...
— The Boy Knight • G.A. Henty

... last, however, he had hopes of Edith. Not that he cared to save her. But he hated to acknowledge a failure. He disliked to disavow his own judgment. ...
— Love Stories • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... of all the blacks and people of color in these states, sooner or later, by such means as your humanity, and the wisdom of our rulers may suggest; and though we think the existing laws of some of the states unnecessarily severe; yet we pointedly disavow any wish to contravene them, while they remain in force, or to hazard the peace and safety of the community by the adoption of ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 6, 1921 • Various

... in secret bless'd, Above him in the clouds doth rest An oak-wreath, verdant and sublime, Placed on his brow in after-time; While they are banish'd to the slough, Who their great master disavow. ...
— The Poems of Goethe • Goethe

... briefer examples of Bunyan's experience and Bunyan's teachings that are here presented. And even to others of more affluence and leisure, this manual may serve to commend the author's works in their entireness. Mr. Chaplin himself would most anxiously disavow any claim to have exhausted the mines from which he brings these gatherings. His specimens resemble rather those laces which the good Bunyan tagged in Bedford jail—not in themselves garments, but merely adjuncts and ornaments of larger fabrics. ...
— The Riches of Bunyan • Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin

... continued to agitate his mind more and more, and his reflections on these occasions were particularly trying; for, according to his view of the word of God, no other church with whom he could associate, or that he was acquainted with, was right; consequently, if he was to disavow the doctrine of the church with whom he was then associated, he knew of no other way of obtaining a living, except by manual labor, and at that time he had a wife ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn

... that the carriage of greatness, in a plain and open manner (so it be without arrogancy and vain glory) doth draw less envy, than if it be in a more crafty and cunning fashion. For in that course, a man doth but disavow fortune; and seemeth to be conscious of his own want in worth; and doth but teach others, ...
— Essays - The Essays Or Counsels, Civil And Moral, Of Francis Ld. - Verulam Viscount St. Albans • Francis Bacon

... but the infatuation of Henry for the fascinating favourite was so well known, that the conspirators were assured of the eagerness with which he would welcome any explanation, however doubtful; and they accordingly instructed the Marquise boldly to disavow the authorship of the obnoxious packet. The advice was, unfortunately, somewhat tardy; as, in her first terror, Madame de Verneuil had declared her inability to deny that she had written the letters which had aroused the anger of the King; but she modified the admission, by declaring ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe

... cares to bowl at me. But whatever else they think of me—sceptical though they deem me on subjects where perhaps you are, many of you, a little prone to dogmatize—I claim the character at least of an honest sceptic. I do not altogether disavow the title, but I understand it to mean "inquirer." I confess myself, after long years of perfectly unbiassed inquiry, still an investigator—a sceptic. It is the fashion to abuse St. Thomas because he sought sensible proofs on ...
— Mystic London: - or, Phases of occult life in the metropolis • Charles Maurice Davies

... allowed by Protestant controversialists to assume this perfect consistency in Romish doctrine. The truth is, you have read very little; and you judge of truth, not by facts, but by notions; I mean, you think it enough if a notion hangs together; though you disavow it, still, in matter of fact, consistency is truth to you. Whether facts answer to theories you cannot tell, and you don't inquire. Now I am not well read in the subject, but I know enough to be sure that Romanists will have more work to prove their consistency than you ...
— Loss and Gain - The Story of a Convert • John Henry Newman

... means of giving further publicity to an unfounded report—at all events to the report of a wretchedness which I had thought it prudent (since the world regards wretchedness as a crime) so publicly to disavow. In a word, venturing to judge your noble nature by my own, I felt grieved lest my published denial might cause you to regret what you had done; and my first impulse was to write you, and assure you, even at the risk of doing so too warmly, of the sweet emotion, made up of respect ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various

... retire with all the dignity which a pension could confer. He not only wrote for hire, but valued himself on it; proud of the pliancy of his pen and of his principles, he wrote without remorse what his patron was forced to pay for, but to disavow. It was from a knowledge of these "Authors by Profession," writers of a faction in the name of the community, as they have been well described, that our great statesman Pitt fell into an error which he lived to regret. He did not distinguish between ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli

... not been Atheists; and even were we convinced that Materialists professing religion were illogical or inconsequent reasoners, we should not be justified in ascribing to them those consequences of their system which they explicitly disclaim and disavow. Still it is competent, and it may be highly useful, to entertain the question, What are the grounds on which the theory of Materialism rests? And whether, if these grounds be valid, they would not lead, in strict logic, to conclusions ...
— Modern Atheism under its forms of Pantheism, Materialism, Secularism, Development, and Natural Laws • James Buchanan

... by a strong force of cavalry for some weeks to come, and no new foray need be dreaded yet awhile. Red Cloud's people would "lay low" and watch the effect of this exploit before attempting another. If the White Father "got mad" and ordered "heap soldiers" there to punish them, then they must disavow all participation in the affair, even though one of their best young braves was prominent in the outrage, and had paid for the luxury with his life—even though Burning Star was trying to hide the fresh scar of a rifle bullet along his upper arm. Together ...
— Warrior Gap - A Story of the Sioux Outbreak of '68. • Charles King

... that the firm of Breitkopf and Hartel, which already possessed LOHENGRIN and the three operatic poems, would, in my opinion, be the most eligible for that purpose. I have not kept a copy of my letter, but can assure you that you need not disavow a single word of it. Hartal's letter of March 16th is identical with that addressed to you. As matters stand, I am very doubtful whether the Hartels will make you a new offer of honorarium unless, of course, the immediate ...
— Correspondence of Wagner and Liszt, Volume 2 • Francis Hueffer (translator)

... to appear. Prussia and Austria, as well as this country, have acted also on Jacobinical principles. The conduct of this country towards Ireland has been perfectly Jacobinical. How, then, can we define these principles, when persons who would now disavow them fall by some fatality into an unavoidable acknowledgement of them? The objections that have been raised to peace have been entirely Jacobinical. If we seek for peace, it must be done in the spirit of peace. We are not to make it a question who was the first aggressor, or ...
— Selected Speeches on British Foreign Policy 1738-1914 • Edgar Jones

... received into her house. This society, after the death of De Tencin, assembled in the house of Geoffrin. It appears, however, that Madame de Tencin, as well as the whole fashionable world to which she belonged, could never altogether disavow their contempt for science, if indeed it be true, that she was accustomed to call her society by the indecent by-name of her menagerie. Fontenelle, Montesquieu, Mairan, Helvetius who was then quite young and present rather as a hearer than a speaker, ...
— International Weekly Miscellany Of Literature, Art, and Science - Vol. I., July 22, 1850. No. 4. • Various

... this affair—no, no, madame; there may be reprehensible things done; with an inheritance in view one is dragged on... especially with nine hundred thousand francs in the balance. Well, now, you could not disavow a man like Maitre Godeschal, honesty itself, but you can throw all the blame on the back of a ...
— Cousin Pons • Honore de Balzac

... which has appeared in "La Musique" I have all sorts of excuses to make to you. The editors of the paper thought fit, I do not know why, to give it a title which I completely disavow, and which would certainly have never entered into my mind. Moreover the printer has not been sparing of changing several words and omitting others. Such are the inevitable disadvantages of articles sent by post, and of which the proof ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 1, "From Paris to Rome: - Years of Travel as a Virtuoso" • Franz Liszt; Letters assembled by La Mara and translated

... of animals, which fell into his hands; nevertheless, because he has copied them badly, and changed the order, and denied certain metaphysical truths upon which all Physics ought to be based, I am obliged wholly to disavow his work, and here to request readers not to attribute to me any opinion unless they find it expressly stated in my own writings, and to receive no opinion as true, whether in my writings or elsewhere, unless they see that ...
— The Principles of Philosophy • Rene Descartes

... unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them, by the ties of our common kindred, to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They, too, have been deaf to the voice of justice and consanguinity. We must therefore acquiesce in the necessity which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold ...
— Key-Notes of American Liberty • Various

... means used by him were honest, he had no doubt. In the same letter he referred to the opposition offered to him, even by some of his own relatives, on account of his conduct. "Mr. Cochrane has thought proper to disavow, through the public papers, any connection with my politics. The consciousness that I am acting as I ought makes that light which I should otherwise feel as a heavy clog in following that course which I think honour ...
— The Life of Thomas, Lord Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald, G.C.B., Admiral of the Red, Rear-Admiral of the Fleet, Etc., Etc. • Thomas Cochrane, Earl of Dundonald

... leave us the West-Indies, although useless to them. Such is their object and their earnest desire—an increase of territory and power for themselves, and the humiliation of England. The very eagerness with which the Americans bring up this question on purpose that they may disavow their wishes, is one of the strongest proofs of their anxiety to blind us on the subject; but they will never lose sight of it; and if they thought they had any chance of success, there is no expense which ...
— Diary in America, Series Two • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)

... thrashing, and sent them off vowing vengeance. Fearing retaliation, the habitants armed themselves, and to the number of several hundred prepared to attack any regular forces which might be sent against them. Through the discretion of Governor Carleton, however, who hastened to send one of his officers to disavow the action of the seigneur, and to promise the habitants that if they returned quietly to their homes they would not be molested, they were persuaded to disperse.' [Footnote: Maseres, Additional Papers concerning the ...
— The Seigneurs of Old Canada: - A Chronicle of New-World Feudalism • William Bennett Munro

... be successful, the ground must be carefully selected; for a defeat might be fatal. The Lords must wait for some occasion on which their privileges would be bound up with the privileges of all Englishmen, for some occasion on which the constituent bodies would, if an appeal were made to them, disavow the acts of the representative body; and this was not such an occasion. The enlightened and large minded few considered tacking as a practice so pernicious that it would be justified only by an emergency which would justify a resort to physical ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 5 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... I follow my present plan, I shall be obliged to ascribe certain sentiments, words, and even acts, to you, which you might perhaps disavow, and—" ...
— Baron Trigault's Vengeance - Volume 2 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau

... sometimes satisfaction. Is there any deformity in doing amiss, that can excuse us from confessing ourselves? It is so great a pain to me to dissemble, that I evade the trust of another's secrets, wanting the courage to disavow my knowledge. I can keep silent, but deny I cannot without the greatest trouble and violence to myself imaginable to be very secret, a man must be so by nature, not by obligation. 'Tis little worth, in the service ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne

... could have to this property you would have to derive from ME. The only excuse you could have for this act of lawlessness would be orders from ME. And all that you have done this morning is only the assertion of MY legal right to this house. If I disavow your act, as I might, I leave you as helpless as any tramp that was ever kicked from a doorstep,—as any burglar that was ever collared on the ...
— Susy, A Story of the Plains • Bret Harte

... distinctly disavow any right whatever in itself, or in the citizens of this commonwealth, to interfere in the institution of domestic slavery in the southern states: it having existed therein before the establishment of the Constitution; it having been recognised by that instrument; ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society

... which the world protests, to disavow it with indignation, to swear by all the gods, to declare himself an honest man,—and then, at the moment when people are reassured, and laugh at the enormity in question, to execute it. This was his course with respect ...
— Napoleon the Little • Victor Hugo

... was right when he said some one had sounded Saxe, only the some one was not Hugues the valet. The letter must be ignored, or, better still, it might even help to make his—Commines'—position more secure than ever. It was Louis' habit to disavow his failures. He would, of course, repudiate Saxe and disavow the mission to Amboise, and because of the disavowal he would, openly at least, welcome the Dauphin's loyalty. That was Louis' way. Yes, ...
— The Justice of the King • Hamilton Drummond

... hate. Perverted spirits; reckless, and unblest; Ye slaves to lust; ye duellists profess'd; Vainer than woman; more unclean than hogs; Your life the felon's; and your death the dog's! Fight on! while honour disavow your brawl, And outraged courage disapprove the call— Till, steep'd in guilt, the devil sees his time, And sudden death shall ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846 • Various

... courts the practice disallow, I ne'er a friend will disavow: It may be very wrong to know him, And very prudent to forego him; 'Tis said that prudence changes friends Oft as it suits one's private ends. Ah, Dean! and you have many foes, Behind, before, beneath your nose, And fellows very high in station. Of high and ...
— Fables of John Gay - (Somewhat Altered) • John Gay

... It is their misfortune, and not their criminal neglect, which consents to so dismal a relaxation of academic habits. But let them not urge this misfortune in excuse at one time, and at another virtually disavow it. Never let them take up a stone to throw at Oxford, upon this element of a wise education; since in them, through that original vice in their constitution, the defect of all means for secluding and insulating their society, discipline is abolished by anticipation— being, in fact, an impossible ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey

... into terms of reconciliation with Texas, which, affecting the domestic institutions of Texas, would operate most injuriously upon the United States and might most seriously threaten the existence of this happy Union. Nor could it be unacquainted with the fact that although foreign governments might disavow all design to disturb the relations which exist under the Constitution between these States, yet that one, the most powerful amongst them, had not failed to declare its marked and decided hostility to the chief feature ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Tyler - Section 2 (of 3) of Volume 4: John Tyler • Compiled by James D. Richardson

... Benfield went to the devil, I believe. Boyd, a man of a very different stamp, went over to Paris to look after some large claims which his house had over the French Government. They were such as it seems they could not disavow, however they might be disposed to do so. But they used every effort, by foul means and fair, to induce Mr. Boyd to depart. He was reduced to poverty; he was thrown into prison; and the most flattering prospects were, on the other hand, held out to him if he would compromise his ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott

... is one of which the language employed is a most incorrect exponent. It has been again and again demonstrated, that those who are accused of despising facts and disregarding experience build and profess to build wholly upon facts and experience; while those who disavow theory cannot make one step without theorizing. But, although both classes of inquirers do nothing but theorize, and both of them consult no other guide than experience, there is this difference between them, and a most important difference ...
— Essays on some unsettled Questions of Political Economy • John Stuart Mill

... that no supplies should be sent. The Burgomaster telegraphed the Prime Minister in Antwerp, and placed the entire situation before him, and Monsieur de Brocqueville promptly telegraphed back that since the American Vice-Consul had given his word of honour to the German General it was impossible to disavow the agreement, and that the supplies should be sent out immediately. This was a pretty high stand for the Belgians to take, but they feel that Van Hee saved Ghent from destruction, and are correspondingly grateful ...
— A Journal From Our Legation in Belgium • Hugh Gibson

... I believe cabinet minister. The declaration was liable to many interior objections. Seven out of the thirteen who signed did so without (I believe) any kind of sequel. I wish you to know that I entirely disavow and disclaim Manning's statement as it stands. And here I have to ask you to insert two lines in your second or next edition; with the simple statement that I prepared and published with promptitude an elaborate argument to show ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley

... the perpetual alterations of his copy made to please Dr. Fell, delighted to alter it the more; while the greater executioner supervising the printed sheets, by "correcting, altering, or dashing out what he pleased," compelled the writer publicly to disavow his own work! Such I have heard was the case of Bryan Edwards, who composed the first accounts of Mungo Park. Bryan Edwards, whose personal interests were opposed to the abolishment of the slave-trade, would not suffer any passage ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli

... Germany was still silent regarding the report of the submarine commander, on whose version of the Arabic's destruction hinged the question whether Germany would disavow his act. The report that the submarine had been sunk revived in London, but the British admiralty maintained an impenetrable silence regarding its truth or falsehood. The circumstantial story was that the submarine later ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume IV (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)



Words linked to "Disavow" :   avow, deny



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