"Electrify" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... you can understand," he said, "why it was necessary to keep Hartoo absolutely hidden. In a month's time my papers will be ready. Then I shall electrify the world. I shall write not a new page but a new volume across the history of ...
— The Black Box • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... contract nor a judicial contract. The analysis (of the jurist) leads to vicious results. Man is governed by imagination only; without imagination he is a brute. It is not for five cents a day, simply to distinguish himself, that a man consents to be killed; if you want to electrify him touch his heart. A notary, who is paid a fee of twelve francs for his services, cannot do that. It requires some other process, a legislative act. Adoption, what is that? An imitation by which society tries ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 5 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 1 (of 2)(Napoleon I.) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... novel as becoming, and which prompted her to whisper, "You enact your role to the life, and shall enjoy a foretaste of your reward at once. I want excitement; let us show these graceless, frozen people the true art of dancing, and electrify them with the life and fire of a ...
— Pauline's Passion and Punishment • Louisa May Alcott
... incident had one compensating factor. Although too late to electrify Densmore and Principal Haime with my scholarship, I was determined to go to college now, somehow, sometime. I would show my father, these companions of mine, and above all Nancy herself the stuff of which I was made, compel them sooner or later to admit ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... friend has gotten in a little too deep. He has overreached himself. These elevated-road schemes of his have eaten up too much capital. There is another election coming on next fall, and he knows we are going to fight tooth and nail. He needs money to electrify his surface lines. If we could trace out exactly where he stands, and where he has borrowed, we might know ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser
... soul was of fire and that the fire caught her listeners; she had power, genius, dramatic force enough in her to electrify a whole theater full of people, to lift them out of the commonplace, to take them with her into the fairyland of romance and genius, to make them forget everything ...
— A Mad Love • Bertha M. Clay
... upon one; come like a thunder clap, burst like a thunderclap, thunder bolt; take by surprise, catch by surprise, catch unawares, catch napping; yach [S. Afr.]. pounce upon, spring a mine upon. surprise, startle, take aback, electrify, stun, stagger, take away one's breath, throw off one's guard; astonish, dumbfound &c (strike with wonder) 870. Adj. nonexpectant^; surprised &c v.; unwarned, unaware; off one's guard; inattentive 458. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... said Mr. Montfort, abstractedly. "Pigtail—yes, by all means. And how will you and Peggy amuse yourselves, my dear? No Rita this summer to electrify us all. You will not ...
— Fernley House • Laura E. Richards
... frosty weather the friction of a tortoise-shell comb will electrify the hair and make it cling to the teeth. Sometimes persons emit sparks in pulling off their flannels or silk stockings. The fur of a cat, or even of a garment, stroked in the dark with a warm dry hand will be seen to glow, and perhaps heard to ...
— The Story Of Electricity • John Munro
... was saying, "that I don't love Denis sufficiently to go mad about him. You know what I mean: he may be the best specimen of manhood who has ever crossed this threshold, but he does not electrify me." ...
— Too Old for Dolls - A Novel • Anthony Mario Ludovici
... eye had seen in J. Brabazon the seeds of domestic greatness. Before they parted, he had come to terms with him. Nor had the latter failed to justify his intuition. He made an admirable editor. It was not Mr. Renshaw's fault that the new paper had failed to electrify America. It was the public on whom the responsibility for the failure must be laid. They spoiled the whole thing. Certain of the faithful subscribed, it is true, and continued to subscribe, but the great heart of the public remained untouched. The ...
— The Prince and Betty - (American edition) • P. G. Wodehouse
... time left in which to entertain in return. In earlier days the girls had delighted to discuss gorgeous and bizarre ideas, smacking more of the Arabian Nights than of an English country house, by the execution of which they hoped to electrify the county and prove their own skill as hostesses; but of late these schemes had been unmentioned. Ruth was too much crushed by her disappointment to have spirit for frivolities, and the shadow of the universal ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... the speech in full, and bore warm testimony to its merit and effect. "Mr. Lincoln is one of nature's orators," said the "Tribune," "using his rare powers solely to elucidate and convince, though their inevitable effect is to delight and electrify as well. We present herewith a very full and accurate report of this speech; yet the tones, the gestures, the kindling eye, and the mirth-provoking look defy the reporter's skill. The vast assemblage frequently rang with ...
— Abraham Lincoln, A History, Volume 2 • John George Nicolay and John Hay
... Atlantic, in the shadow of the Pyrenees, events had been developing themselves to the consummation that should overturn a splendid throne, shake Europe to its foundations, and electrify Spanish America with a sympathetic current of revolution, flashing from the pines of Oregon ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various
... came to the entanglement, he probed the barbed wire carefully with his wand, watching for an ensuing spark. For the Germans more than once had been known to electrify their wires, with fatal ...
— Bruce • Albert Payson Terhune
... piece of sentiment cheaper, falser, more tawdry? Who applauds a man for not turning his old mother out of doors at the impertinent request of a meddling nobody? Look at the stormy small capitals of this oatmeal hero, who is supposed to electrify us by the mere fact of his not being an incredible ass and scoundrel! Does any sober person think for a moment that a man of genius could have made this revolting blunder? It is beyond comparison the densest bit of stupidity in dealing with the emotions I have encountered anywhere. Anybody but ...
— My Contemporaries In Fiction • David Christie Murray
... sublime inspiration of eloquence, and being invited to preach on his return to the old home for vacation, he selected the somewhat startling text "and the dumb ass opened his mouth and spake." On this elevating theme he wrote a sensational sermon and committed it to memory in order that he might electrify his audience with eye power as well as by verbal flow of soul. The awful day arrived, but when the young apostle arose to preach, stage fright banished from his mind ...
— The Gentleman from Everywhere • James Henry Foss
... all the physical force of the North? It is not treason against the cause of liberty to cry, "Down with every slave-holding Union!" Therefore, I raise that cry. And O that I had a voice louder than a thousand thunders, that it might shake the land and electrify the dead—the dead in sin, I mean—those slain by ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke
... secretly hoping that his side would be defeated, so that Miss Harman might see him for once as a loser; but the knowledge of our presence seemed to electrify him, and by the spark of his own magnetism he fired his fellows until they commenced to play like madmen; I have no doubt they were precisely that. His spirit was like some galvanic current, and he directed them with a master mind. He was a natural-born ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... same kind of mind as our own, but disembarrassed from our temptations and unnerved by the thousands of influences that blind and deaden us. There is a healthful vivacity of moral feeling on this subject that must electrify our paralyzed vitality. For this reason, therefore, I rejoice when I see minds like your lordship's turning to this subject; and I feel an intensity of emotion, as if I could say, Do not for Christ's sake let go; you know not ...
— The Life of Harriet Beecher Stowe • Charles Edward Stowe
... matured thoughts, Red Jacket comes to this council gathering. Its bearing on his nation and race, he deeply scans, and treasures up those burning thoughts, with which he is to electrify, and set on fire the bosoms ...
— An account of Sa-Go-Ye-Wat-Ha - Red Jacket and his people, 1750-1830 • John Niles Hubbard
... comprehensive meaning of Quenisset—"shedding blood, in fact!" At the wine-shop meetings the French conspirator tells us that there was "an old man, a locksmith," who would read revolutionary themes, and "electrify the souls of the young men about him!" The locksmith of the Rue de Courcelles was the crafty, sanguinary policy of the monarch of the barricades. We now come to ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, November 27, 1841 • Various
... then young, delicate, as brilliant as a comet, and almost as erratic. Without research or mental discipline, he could electrify an audience beyond all living men, and arouse in the minds of those who heard him ...
— Something of Men I Have Known - With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective • Adlai E. Stevenson
... brightly lighted main street and stopped in front of the most populous cafe. There he called loudly for a policeman, and when the latter elbowed his way through the crowd, Gray told him, in plain hearing of all, enough of his experience to electrify everybody. He told the story well; he even made known the value of his diamond stock; mercilessly he pilloried the two blindfolded bandits. When he drove to the jail the running boards of his car were jammed with inquisitive citizens, and those who could ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... the village of Klin. A year after his wife's death Michael Gregoriev had sold the place, which he had always detested. Of it Ivan now dreamed, incessantly; till, late in April, he entered into negotiations that were presently to electrify his household and that part of Moscow's population with whom he figured as ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter
... judge of the happiness I experienced at that moment. After twenty-years of exile, I touched again the sacred soil of my country. I found myself with Frenchmen whom the recollection of the Empire was again to electrify. ...
— Hortense, Makers of History Series • John S. C. Abbott
... precise spice of initiative which we, only we in the world, can lend them. Advice, cash, munitions aren't enough; our palpable presence is the point. The arrival of Birdwood, Hunter-Weston and Gouraud at Odessa would electrify the ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume I • Ian Hamilton
... at him with eyes unlit by glory. In his turn, he looked at them, indignant at their indifference, seeking for some word that could make a grand impression, electrify this placid country and make good his mission. The inspiration come, and turning to Pommel, he said: "Lieutenant, go and get the bust of the ex-Emperor, which is in the Council Hall, and bring it to me ...
— Selected Writings of Guy de Maupassant • Guy de Maupassant
... spirit of distrust makes the soldier suspicious, and intimidates the general. The first discerns treason in every danger; the second, always placed between the necessity of conquest and the image of the scaffold, dares not raise himself to bold conception, and those heights of courage which electrify an army and insure victory. Turenne, in our time, would have carried his head to the scaffold; for he was sometimes beat: but the reason why he more frequently conquered was, that his discipline was severe; it was, that his soldiers, confiding in his talents, never muttered discontent ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. V. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... along the scale between ecstacy and despair. In mental disease there is the same abnormal structural change as in other local diseases; but for these sick mind-centres there is no rest. There must be still thinking and feeling, no matter how chaotic, to tax them, and there is no cheer to electrify the stomach into easy display of power. We may well marvel that powers so wonderful as the power to think, love, admire, see, hear, and feel are located in structures so fragile as the brain; and we may well marvel at the provision of the turret of flinty ...
— The No Breakfast Plan and the Fasting-Cure • Edward Hooker Dewey
... Marvin made his professional call in the evening. Mr. Alvord, Squire Bartley, and the minister also happened in, and all were soon chatting around Mr. Clifford's ruddy hearth. The pastor of this country parish was a sensible man, who, if he did not electrify his flock of a Sunday morning, honestly tried to guide it along safe paths, and led those whom he asked to follow. His power lay chiefly in the homes of his people, where his genial presence was ever welcomed. He did ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... portion of the city, the enemy could not destroy a great many houses by bombardment. But if defeated and driven back, our troops would make a heroic defense in the streets, in the walled grave-yards, and from the windows. Better electrify the world by such scenes of heroism, than surrender the capital and endanger the cause. I besought him by every consideration not to abandon Richmond to the enemy short of ...
— A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital • John Beauchamp Jones
... the tall walnut-trees of the primeval forest, enough rails to surround them with a fence. Little did either dream, while engaged in this work, that the day would come when the appearance of John Hanks in a public meeting, with two of these rails on his shoulder, would electrify a State convention, and kindle throughout the country a contagious and passionate enthusiasm, whose results would reach to ...
— Abraham Lincoln: A History V1 • John G. Nicolay and John Hay
... fanciless way of thinking, to which every thing appears unnatural that does not suit its tame insipidity. Hence an idea has been formed of simple and natural pathos which consists in exclamations destitute of imagery, and nowise elevated above every-day life; but energetic passions electrify the whole mental powers and will, consequently, in highly-favored natures, express themselves in an ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson
... machine only is a machine because it cannot think. But he was a thinking man, and a plain man at the same time. All his wonderful successes, that looked like conjuring, had been gained by plodding logic, by clear and commonplace French thought. The French electrify the world not by starting any paradox, they electrify it by carrying out a truism. They carry a truism so far—as in the French Revolution. But exactly because Valentin understood reason, he understood the limits of reason. Only a man who knows ...
— The Innocence of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... Benjamin Franklin had been a printer and had eaten only an apple and a bunch of grapes for his dinner. Orion decided to emulate Franklin, and for a time he took only a biscuit and a glass of water at a meal, foreseeing the day when he should electrify the world with his eloquence. He was surprised to find how clear his mind was on this low diet and how rapidly ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... opinion that went beyond the Jefferson proviso of 1784. Like Jefferson and Lafayette, he had faith in the intuitions of the people, and read those intuitions with rare sagacity. He knew how to bide time, and was less apt to run ahead of public thought than to lag behind. He never sought to electrify the community by taking an advanced position with a banner of opinion, but rather studied to move forward compactly, exposing no detachment in front or rear; so that the course of his administration ...
— Our American Holidays: Lincoln's Birthday • Various
... the fowl-run, professor," I broke in, with a moist, tingling feeling across my forehead and up my spine. I saw the professor stiffen as he walked, while his face deepened in colour. Ukridge's breezy way of expressing himself is apt to electrify the stranger. ...
— Love Among the Chickens • P. G. Wodehouse
... speeches he made as his manner. His enthusiasm was contagious. If a scheme was started, if an experiment was suggested, Cecil's cheque-book came out directly, and the thing was set on foot without delay. His easy, elastic step, his bright eye, his warm, hearty handshake, seemed to electrify people—to put some of his own spirit into them. The circle of his influence was ever increasing—the very oldest fogeys, who had prophesied every kind of failure, were ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... stepped on board Mrs. Godfrey thought she noticed a tear on his cheek. As usual she saluted him and asked him on board, and as he stepped over the rail she took his hand in her own. This act of kindness on the part of Margaret seemed to electrify his whole frame. She said to him, "And how is Paul this morning." Without answering her he placed his hand on his left breast and sighed deeply. "Is my Paul ill this morning," she again asked, thinking that ...
— Young Lion of the Woods - A Story of Early Colonial Days • Thomas Barlow Smith
... rustic companion, a tall negro fellow, with a long good-humored face, and the profile of a horse, which stood out from beneath a narrow-rimmed straw hat, stuck on the back of his head. The explosions of laughter of these two varlets on meeting and exchanging compliments were enough to electrify the ...
— The Crayon Papers • Washington Irving |
