"Impracticable" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... calculated at five hundred thousand cubic feet in one second—sufficient to fill all the streams in Europe, and swell them to overflowing. No plummet has hitherto sounded the depth of its bed at this point, the force of the stream probably rendering the operation almost impracticable. ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... modern times; though I am sorry to say, it seems to be the mode amongst gentlemen to grow fat, and I am told I am at least fourteen pound below the fashion. However, I decrease instead of enlarging, which is extraordinary, as violent exercise in London is impracticable; but I attribute the phenomenon to our evening squeezes at public and private parties. I heard from Ridge this morning (the 14th, my letter was begun yesterday): he says the poems go on as well as can be wished; the seventy-five sent to town are circulated, and a demand for fifty more complied ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Letters and Journals, Vol. 1 • Lord Byron, Edited by Rowland E. Prothero
... may be handled to such an extent that the abscess will be forced to develop low down toward the groin, so low that the natural outlet, through the intestine, will be impracticable; under such circumstances an outside opening with drainage is the only choice in ...
— Appendicitis: The Etiology, Hygenic and Dietetic Treatment • John H. Tilden, M.D.
... affected: I am sure she has no feeling for your distresses; and, when you are ruined, she will appear to have no feeling for her own.' Finally, I took his word and honour that he would make an effort, such as I had advised; that he would form a plan of oeconomy, and, if he found it impracticable without my assistance, he would come to Bath in the winter, where I promised to give him the meeting, and contribute all in my power to the retrieval of his affairs — With this mutual engagement we parted; and I shall think myself supremely happy, if, by my means, a worthy man, whom I love ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... fidelity in council. Some pressed that with the first fair wind they should sail to the Sound, and so to Norway. They said the Danes would not dare to attack them, although they lay with so great a force right in the way. But the king was a man of too much understanding not to see that this was impracticable. He knew also that Olaf Trygvason had found it quite otherwise, as to the Danes not daring to fight, when he with a few people went into battle against a great body of them. The king also knew that in King Canute's ...
— Heimskringla - The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway • Snorri Sturluson
... the borders of the Gulf of Issus was nowhere broader than about a mile and a half. The range of Amanus on the east rose up with rugged and broken hills, so that on this side the operations of cavalry were impracticable. It would be impossible to form a line of battle containing in the front rank more than about 4000 men,1048 and difficult for either party to bring into action as many as 30,000 of their soldiers. Thus the vast superiority of numbers ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 5. (of 7): Persia • George Rawlinson
... Christians; and in reserve, most terrible of all weapons, were the powers of excommunication and interdict, which could shut men and cities from the rites of the Church and the presence of the Lord. Who shall say, remembering these things, that the aims of the mediaeval Church were visionary or impracticable? ...
— The Unity of Civilization • Various
... not now apply the flattering unction of servile compliance or blind complaisance. In a just and necessary war to maintain the rights or honor of my country, I would strip the shirt from my back to support it. But in such a war as this, unjust in principle, impracticable in its means, and ruinous in its consequences, I would not contribute a single effort, nor a single shilling. I do not call for vengeance on the heads of those who have been guilty; I only recommend to them to make their retreat; and let them make haste, or they may be assured that speedy ...
— Standard Selections • Various
... would dry their steaming garments. The smells caused by those operations, together with the fleas and mice with which the poorer inns were infested, made the stay anything but luxurious. Any complaint was met by the retort, "If you don't like it, go somewhere else," a usually impracticable alternative. When the traveller was escorted to his bedroom, he found it very cold in winter, though the featherbeds kept him warm enough. He would see his chamber filled with other beds occupied by his travelling companions of both {500} sexes, and he himself was often forced to share his bed ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... but in vain did the assembly rack their brains for some plan of action which might in any way be likely to serve the purpose they had in view. The first wild suggestion, that they should go in a body and carry Horace House by storm, was abandoned as impracticable; in hopeless inactivity they stood watching the long hand of the clock creep ...
— The Triple Alliance • Harold Avery
... which is put forward by educated socialists to-day as the only means of escape from the existing system of wages. And an escape from the wage-system—and one not theoretically impracticable—it no doubt is; but an escape into what? It is an escape into one of those systems which I have just now mentioned. That is to say, it is an escape into economic slavery. For the very essence of the position of the slave, as contrasted with the wage-paid labourer, is, so far as the direction ...
— A Critical Examination of Socialism • William Hurrell Mallock
... while undirected by science. When mankind first formed the idea of studying phenomena according to a stricter and surer method than that which they had in the first instance spontaneously adopted, they did not, conformably to the well-meant but impracticable precept of Descartes, set out from the supposition that nothing had been already ascertained. Many of the uniformities existing among phenomena are so constant, and so open to observation, as to force themselves upon involuntary recognition. Some facts are so perpetually and familiarly ...
— A System Of Logic, Ratiocinative And Inductive • John Stuart Mill
... retired to Bourges,—further from Court. He was naturally averse to a civil war, nor would his adherents have been more forward than himself if they had found their interests in his reconciliation to the Court; but this seemed impracticable, and therefore they agreed upon a civil war, because none of them believed themselves powerful enough to conclude a peace. They know nothing of the nature of faction who imagine the head of a party to be their master. His true interest is most commonly thwarted by the imaginary ...
— The Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz, Complete • Jean Francois Paul de Gondi, Cardinal de Retz
... General) Nathaniel Lyon appeared with an overwhelming force of Federal troops, surrounded this holiday encampment, and demanded an unconditional surrender. Resistance was impracticable, and none was attempted; the militia surrendered, and were confined as prisoners; but prisoners of what? There was no war, and no warrant for their arrest as offenders against the law. It is left for the usurpers to frame a ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis
... was only an aggravation of former misconduct, and a proof of the unnatural and impracticable character of her son. The fact that it was written from a prison was hideous, to begin with. That, after all the pains at which she had been to teach him what was right, he could suggest that she was in part to blame for his course seemed such black ingratitude that ...
— A Knight Of The Nineteenth Century • E. P. Roe
... deplorable situation than that in which Peterborough was now placed. He had always objected to the scheme of besieging Barcelona. His objections had been overruled. He had to execute a project which he had constantly represented as impracticable. His camp was divided into hostile factions and he was censured by all. The Archduke and the Prince blamed him for not proceeding instantly to take the town; but suggested no plan by which seven thousand men could be enabled to do the work of thirty thousand. Others ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... dying to self, to self-righteous pride, vain confidence, self-love, and self-complacency, is hard work to the old man; yea, it is both impracticable and impossible to him. It is only grace that can conquer and subdue him; and where grace reigns, this work is carried on day by day. And yet the old man of sin, and ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... heed of the sentiments involved in processioning Purdee's land. He stood leaning on his Jacob's-staff, as interesting to him as Moses' rocks, and in his view infinitely more useful, and wiped his brow, and looked about, and yawned. To him it was merely the surveying for a foolish cause of a very impracticable and steep tract of land, and the only reason it should be countenanced by heaven or earth was the fees involved. And this was what he saw at the ...
— The Riddle Of The Rocks - 1895 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... connexion with its effect; and let him show distinctly the origin of the idea, expressed by the definition; and I shall readily give up the whole controversy. But if the foregoing explication of the matter be received, this must be absolutely impracticable. Had not objects a regular conjunction with each other, we should never have entertained any notion of cause and effect; and this regular conjunction produces that inference of the understanding, which ...
— An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding • David Hume et al
... in total darkness. Terror now usurped the place of every other interest, and he was utterly perplexed how to proceed. He feared to go on, lest the steps above, as infirm as those below, should yield to his weight;—to return was impracticable, for the darkness precluded the possibility of discovering a means. He determined, therefore, to remain in this situation till light should dawn through the narrow grates in the walls, and enable him to contrive some method of letting himself ...
— A Sicilian Romance • Ann Radcliffe
... rugged and broken, and is fronted by many breakers, on which the sea is eternally roaring. Mr. King and myself were anxious to return, if it had been possible, on foot along this coast; but even the Indians said it was quite impracticable. We were told that men have crossed by striking directly through the woods from Cucao to S. Carlos, but never by the coast. On these expeditions, the Indians carry with them only roasted corn, and of this they eat ...
— The Voyage of the Beagle • Charles Darwin
... a liberal mixing of alcohol with the gasolene afforded a safeguard against any sudden freezing of the vital fluids. The engine was, of course, jacketed, but was air-cooled, as water circulation would have been impracticable ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... Magruder had in mind when he proposed that the forces of Steele, Cooper, Bankhead, and Cabell should cooeperate to recover Forts Smith and Gibson, something more easily said than done. It was no sooner said than brigade transfers rendered it quite impracticable, Cabell and Bankhead both being needed to give support to Price. In charge now of the Northern Sub-district of Texas was Henry E. McCulloch. From him Steele felt he had a right to expect cooeperation, since ...
— The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War • Annie Heloise Abel
... order," and an assurance, on the part of the initiated, that he believes himself to be a converted person by God's special grace. This is all that is required besides evidence of good moral character; more than this is impracticable. The spirit of Calvinism can never be fully embodied in a system of Ecclesiastical polity corresponding exactly with its own nature, and marked by its own exclusiveness; for ...
— On Calvinism • William Hull
... afford to grant inspection. A few of the very largest poultry packers would like to see poultry inspection for the same reason, but with the business so thoroughly scattered as to render Government inspection so expensive as to be quite impracticable, any such bill would certainly be killed in ...
— The Dollar Hen • Milo M. Hastings
... necessary, together with a teacher who has had some experience or training as a printer. The expense per pupil for equipment, for the space it occupies, and for instruction renders special training for such small classes impracticable. All of the skilled occupations, with the exception perhaps of the machinist's trade, are in the same case. An attempt to form separate classes for each of the eight largest trades in the city would result in two classes of not over five pupils, three classes of not over ...
— Wage Earning and Education • R. R. Lutz
... the year, and these are not many. The majority of Spanish rivers are very scanty of water during the summer time, and very rapid in their flow when filled by rains or melting snow: during these periods they are impracticable for boats. They are, moreover, much exhausted by being drained off, bled, for the purposes of artificial irrigation. The scarcity of rain in the central table-lands is much against a regular supply of water to the springs of the rivers: the water is soon sucked up by a parched, dusty, ...
— A Supplementary Chapter to the Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... of boats. There was no lack of dams, dykes and roads through the forests and swamps, constructed of trunks, of trees and logs, but now the dykes became soft and the stumps in the low, wet places endangered travel, or the roads were rendered altogether impracticable. The most difficult part for the Bohemian to traverse was the lake-land region of Wielkopolska, where every spring the thaw was greater than in any other part of Poland. Consequently the road was specially difficult ...
— The Knights of the Cross • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... he realized that several mingling emotions had been at the root of it. In the first place, he had said "yes" because his craven spirit had screamed "no" so loudly. He felt that the project was not only dangerous, but impracticable, yet something, which he chose to term his over-will, had warned him that he must not upon any account give way to fear lest he weaken his already insecure hold upon himself. Again, Donnelly had appealed to him in a way hard to resist. ...
— The Net • Rex Beach
... You reported that canyon impracticable for a railroad, and yet I have just driven through it without once dismounting from this buckboard. Moreover, we shall find in Copah to-morrow a re-survey of the line showing its entire practicability, Mr. Ford—a report not made ...
— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde
... tubes are fitted, "tin" the ends with a wash of solder before returning them to their holes. If there is a gap at any point wide enough to let the solder run through, either beat out the tube from the inside into contact, or, if this is impracticable, place a bit of brass wire in the gap. Use powdered resin by preference as flux for an iron kettle, as it does not cause the rusting produced by spirit of salt. If the latter is used, wipe over the solder with a strong ammonia or soda solution, in order ...
— Things To Make • Archibald Williams
... impossible to see exactly how he could make use of them without arousing the household. He thought of various devices, such as a muffled hammer, or a crowbar to wrench the door from its hinges, but these were discarded in turn as impracticable, from the fact that they were unobtainable. He looked about him among the shrubbery, but there was nothing to aid him; and, indeed, how could he expect to find tools where there were no servants to use them? He got up and walked down the path, absorbed in reverie, and although unable to devise ...
— The Ghost of Guir House • Charles Willing Beale
... four miles' ride to the point where the road divided, one branch going towards the river, some seventy or eighty yards away. Here stood a square building of some size, used as a refuge by travellers who arrived when the Liddel was swollen, and the ford impracticable. ...
— Both Sides the Border - A Tale of Hotspur and Glendower • G. A. Henty
... the insects, the other insisted on having green wood lighted beneath the toldo, in the hope of driving away the mosquitos by the smoke. The painful sensations of the eyes, and the increase of heat, already stifling, rendered both these contrivances alike impracticable. With some gaiety of temper, with feelings of mutual good-will, and with a vivid taste for the majestic grandeur of these vast valleys of rivers, travellers easily support ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V2 • Alexander von Humboldt
... slave of one of the seven, to ride in haste from Thebes, meet his master on the road, and bid him and his companions to go back to Athens, as circumstances had arisen which made their coming dangerous and their project impracticable. ...
— Historic Tales, vol 10 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... "Ong! Ong!" It took me some time to grasp that this was Tommy's abbreviated version of "Allez vous en" (Clear out). In any event it proved quite useless, as he continued to pat the Tommies affectionately and to bombard them with impracticable suggestions. ...
— The White Road to Verdun • Kathleen Burke
... community, not a menace to it. Segregation is recommended so far as practicable, but in view of the large number (estimated at 300,000 to 400,000 in the U. S.) Goddard considers segregation of all impracticable. Nevertheless he urges further and energetic efforts in this direction, that as many as possible may be segregated as a safeguard against their reproduction. In individual cases "sterilization wisely and carefully practiced" must be employed ...
— The Journal of Abnormal Psychology - Volume 10
... miles distant from the flow of the tide. A similar body of running water, perfectly clear and transparent, with so many hundred cascades as beautify the Susquana, is perhaps no where else to be met with. Unfortunately these very beauties render the navigation of this noble river impracticable. ...
— Travels in the United States of America • William Priest
... It is impracticable to give the record of many of the distinguished members of such a family, but a brief notice of a few will give some idea of the standard ...
— Jukes-Edwards - A Study in Education and Heredity • A. E. Winship
... Here he could lay aside that growing discontent, that dissatisfaction, that was growing upon him. Here, in the excitement of distinguishing the better from the worse, he could forget Ruth and the increasingly impracticable condition of his relations ...
— Youth Challenges • Clarence B Kelland
... written in this age and country on the subject of what is technically called woman's rights; and, in the course of such agitation, many good and true things have been thought out and made available to the bettering of her condition, besides many foolish and impracticable, arising from a too grasping desire for a wider and more exciting sphere of effort, as well as from a palpable misapprehension of their own nature and their legitimate sphere, which prevails quite extensively among women. The pioneers of the rights of ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 4, October, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... warfare, their impracticable and unprogressive temperament showed itself even in the era of their military and political ascendancy, and had much to do, as far as human causes are concerned, with their defeat at Lepanto. "The signal for engaging was no sooner given," says ...
— Historical Sketches, Volume I (of 3) • John Henry Newman
... Strasbourg or Frankfort so soon as the news should be received of the transfer of Havre, thirty thousand more within a month thereafter. The other forty thousand were in lieu of the defence of Rouen and Dieppe, should it seem impracticable to undertake it. Havre was to be held until the Prince should have effected the restitution of Calais and the adjacent territory according to the treaties of Cateau-Cambresis, although the time prescribed by those treaties had not expired, and until the one hundred ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... by any other means which might not make so great a noise, the sultan could secure himself against any ill designs Prince Ahmed may have against him, and not involve his majesty's honour. If his majesty has any confidence in my advice, as genies and fairies can do things impracticable to men, he will touch Prince Ahmed's honour, and engage him, by means of the fairy, to procure certain advantages. For example, every time your majesty takes the field you are obliged to go to a great expense, not only in pavilions and tents for yourself and army, ...
— Fairy Tales From The Arabian Nights • E. Dixon
... all war between the civilized nations of the world can, as I see it, only be brought about in two ways, both Utopian and likely impracticable, for many years to come. War could be made only to cease entirely if all the nations of Europe could be organized into a United States of Europe and if free trade were established throughout the world. In the first instance, the extreme nationalism, which has ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol. 1, January 9, 1915 - What Americans Say to Europe • Various
... estate, both of them appointments which implied a certain degree of intelligence and character. He also at one period was deputy-auditor of the exchequer. Mrs Clayton soon obtained the confidence of that most impracticable of all ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 • Various
... off the city, we got at last set fast; when, growing impatient of such close confinement, I requested the captain to set me on shore. The thing was voted impracticable; but I decided to make the attempt, and was accordingly rowed to the right bank of the river, when I took to the swamp, hungry and savage enough to have eaten any alligator fool-hardy enough to assail me. After a hard scramble, together with ...
— Impressions of America - During The Years 1833, 1834, and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Tyrone Power
... do not think you need be anxious about the party, even if you find a search impracticable, having regard to your future movements, and you will remember that the search will be more easily prosecuted ...
— South with Scott • Edward R. G. R. Evans
... impeded his progress, and prevented us approaching him, or seeing what was the cause of his flight. Missing his steps from one hard spot to another he repeatedly fell into the water, but he rose and resumed his flight. I advanced as far as the sods would bear my weight, but to go further was impracticable. Just within ball-range there was an open space, and, as the man gained it. I saw that he was pursued by a bear and two cubs. As the person of the fugitive covered the bear, it was impossible to fire without risk. At last he fall exhausted, and the bear being close upon him, I discharged ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent
... belong not to the grace of our Saviour; you will therefore perish, for it is on him alone, says the apostle, that the Father has placed our salvation. A complaint is sometimes made that we render piety disgusting and impracticable, by prohibiting many pleasures which the world authorizes. But, my brethren, what is it we tell you? allow yourselves all the pleasures which Christ would have allowed himself; faith allows you no other; mix with your piety all the ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... to the difficulties it presents to pupils. Its seven pedals must be employed in different ways when notes are to be raised or lowered a semitone; chromatic passages easy of execution on the piano are almost impracticable on the harp. The same may be said of the shake; and it is only after long and exclusive devotion to its study that the harp can become endurable in the hands of an amateur, or the means of furnishing a professional ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 643, April 28, 1888 • Various
... labor has become there a servile act—it is blighted, as it were, in its essence. A competent writer said the other day: "If Algeria had been subjected to the sway of slavery, cultivation there would have been reputed impracticable for the French, and examples of mortality would not have been wanting." The whites have labored in the Antilles; the whites can labor, not only in all the slave States of the intermediate region, but in Louisiana. Cotton is already produced in Texas, thanks to its German settlers. ...
— The Uprising of a Great People • Count Agenor de Gasparin
... if he did, doesn't he take it out o' me in the corns? That vanity which wine inspires That "to stand was to fall," That land of punch, priests, and potatoes The divil a bit better she was nor a pronoun The tone of assumed compassion The "fat, fair, and forty" category There are unhappily impracticable people in the world There is no infatuation like the taste for flirtation They were so perfectly contented with their self-deception Time, that 'pregnant old gentleman,' will disclose all Unwashed hands, and a heavy ...
— Quotes and Images From The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer • Charles James Lever
... the mysterious darkness of the soil; in broad daylight, the attack would not be delivered, for the victim must remain where it is and then and there receive the egg, which is unable to thrive and develop except under the warm cover of vegetable mould. If direct observation is impracticable, we can at least foresee the main outlines of the drama by allowing ourselves to be guided by the warlike manoeuvres ...
— More Hunting Wasps • J. Henri Fabre
... is more lovable than I even to a beast, and Irene, Irene—" She sighed deeply at the name, and would have sunk down on her trunk there to consider of new ways and means—all of which however she was forced to reject as foolish and impracticable—but on the chest lay a little shirt she had begun to make for little Philo, and this reminded her again of the sick child and of the duty ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... very enjoyable, but where there are more than eight or ten at table general conversation becomes impracticable. Twenty-four, and even thirty, guests, however, when well selected, may make a very brilliant and successful gathering. Too brilliant a conversationalist is not always a desirable acquisition, since he may silence and put in the shade the remainder ...
— Social Life - or, The Manners and Customs of Polite Society • Maud C. Cooke
... what he had done, his hopes did not succeed to his mind, as to the rest of his life; for although he was delivered from the fear of his brethren being his rivals as to the government, yet did he find it a very hard thing, and almost impracticable, to come at the kingdom, because the hatred of the nation against him on that account was become very great; and besides this very disagreeable circumstance, the affair of the soldiery grieved him still more, who were alienated from him, from which yet these kings derived all the safety which ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... which, as a general rule, have been avoided: the truth is, that they were sometimes found so indissolubly intertwined with the more popular matter which preceded and followed, as to make separation impracticable. There are very many to whom no apology will be necessary in this respect; and the Editor only adverts to it for the purpose of obviating, as far as may be, the possible complaint of the more general reader. But there ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge
... the fact that adoption of such resolutions by the Assembly might be held to commit the Governments there represented to the acceptance of its provisions, and in view of the difficulty which Delegations found in consulting their Governments, this proposal was found to be impracticable. It was thereupon decided that the Protocol should be drawn up as a separate instrument, and that its acceptance should be recommended by the Assembly to all States Members ...
— The Geneva Protocol • David Hunter Miller
... a new man of you," said he to me. "It will take your mind off your impracticable star-gazing and moonshining, and divert your attention into the channels of realism. These premises are so spacious as to admit of your engaging to a considerable extent in agriculture; you can now lay aside the telescope and the spectrum for the spade and the hoe; the field ...
— The House - An Episode in the Lives of Reuben Baker, Astronomer, and of His Wife, Alice • Eugene Field
... Democrats of the north, who opposed the Nebraska and Kansas law was that the law was a violation of existing compromises, designed to extend slavery over free territory, that it ought to be repealed, but, if repeal was impracticable, organized effort should be made to make both territories free states. "Slavery shall gain no advantage over freedom by violating compromises," was the cry of a new party, as yet without ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... governments are, and must always be, mixed. But we may safely challenge Mr Mill to give any definition of power, or to make any classification of governments, which shall bear him out in his assertion that a lasting division of authority is impracticable. ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 2 (of 4) - Contributions To The Edinburgh Review • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... road that conducted to la Moncelle. It was said that there had been a violent altercation between him and General Ducrot, each upholding his own plan, and decrying the plan of the other—one asserting that retreat by way of Mezieres had been impracticable all that morning; the other predicting that, unless they fell back on Illy, the army would be surrounded before night. And there was a great deal of bitter recrimination, each taxing the other with ignorance of the country and of the ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... not been the active perpetrator of the massacre, but, he was mixed up with the atrocities that had been committed, and Livingstone could have nothing to do with him. It was a great trial, for, as the Banian men were impracticable, there was nothing for it now but to go back to Ujiji, and try to get other men there with whom he would repeat the attempt to explore the river. For twenty-one months, counting from the period of their engagement, he had ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie
... is, nothing annoys him more than the desire manifested by the premier and the Parliament to remove all just grounds of complaint, and therefore it is that he has fixed on "repeal of the union," which he knows to be impracticable. A man's own interest must be considered, and "the Liberator" is well aware that, if agitation ceased, the twenty thousand a-year paid him by the "starving people" as a recompense for having patriotically rejected an office worth ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 350, December 1844 • Various
... experienced by a soldier. Absorbed in reflections on what I heard, and in fancies of a world of which I knew so little, it is not to be doubted that I constructed ideals far beyond the humdrum reality of home life, impracticable ideals that tended only to separate me more from other men. Their world was not my world; this I knew full well, and I sometimes thought they knew it; for while no rude treatment marked their intercourse with me, yet few sought ...
— Who Goes There? • Blackwood Ketcham Benson
... reached, for their mean height is between eleven and twelve thousand six hundred feet. Fortunately the weather was calm and the sky clear, in addition to the season being favorable, but in Winter, from May to October, such an ascent would have been impracticable. The intense cold quickly kills travelers, and those who even manage to hold out against it fall victims to the violence of the TEMPORALES, a sort of hurricane peculiar to those regions, which yearly fills the abysses of the Cordilleras with ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne
... myself," he said, "am one of six brothers. We were all given good, old-fashioned Christian names, but all those names were shortened into meaningless or feeble monosyllables by our friends. I shall name my children so that it will be impracticable to curtail their names." ...
— Best Short Stories • Various
... it commanded that this was to be done with the greatest mildness possible. Consequently, as this mildness was not and could not be exercised, the imposition occasioning only great troubles and difficulties, the decree itself intimates, as if by express statements, that the said collection was impracticable. ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXV, 1635-36 • Various
... just making that a little bit impracticable. A small pebble in the keyhole and—why, see now, his horse is walking off! Gee! I must have fastened him badly. I shouldn't wonder if he trotted all the way to town. But it can't be helped. I can not be supposed to race after him. Are you ready now, sir? ...
— The Woman in the Alcove • Anna Katharine Green
... of the first part of his Memoirs for the press, yet, in perusing the proofs, he found several errors of that kind. It was intended that he should have read the proofs of this part also, but the progress of his disease unfortunately rendered it impracticable. ...
— The Life, Studies, And Works Of Benjamin West, Esq. • John Galt
... goods is not to be regarded as an absolute precedent for our imitation, considering that it is impracticable in all cases, was chiefly restricted to one Christian society in a very peculiar situation, and is never enjoined upon others; yet, no duty is more expressly commanded, or more solemnly inculcated in Scripture, than that of liberality to the poor. In the enactments ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. II • Francis Augustus Cox
... solution separated into two layers, the upper or murial solution containing the bases, the lower or aqueous solution containing the acids. This method of separation is very slow. In one case it worked very well, but as a rule appeared to be almost impracticable. Benzol and naphtha were tried, instead of ether, but the results were less satisfactory. On suggestion of Prof. Ordway, potassium chloride was added to the soap solution partially separated by ether and water. This caused an immediate ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 497, July 11, 1885 • Various
... to mount to the very pinnacle; or bouton of the spire; but the ascent was impracticable—owing to the stair-case being under repair. On the summit of this spire, there once stood a statue of the Virgin, above a cross. That statue was taken down at the end of the fifteenth century, and is now placed over the south ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Two • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... not framed itself in her mind before it was answered. Without water they would not be able to exist at Steer Wells for twenty-four hours. A retreat would be equally impracticable. It was all horribly clear. The theft of the water was the first step in a deliberate plan to drive them out. The motive, too, was plain enough in the light of the overheard conversation at the National ...
— The Girl Aviators on Golden Wings • Margaret Burnham
... in its acuteness that evening as she read for the third time a letter which had come from Edinburgh by the hands of Grimond. At the sight of the writing her pulse quickened, and Grimond marked, with jealous displeasure (for that impracticable Scot never trusted Jean), the flush of love upon her cheek and its joy in her eyes. She now drew the letter from her bosom, and this is what she read, but in a different spelling from ours and with some slight differences in construction, ...
— Graham of Claverhouse • Ian Maclaren
... the application of commercial fertilizers. This practice is followed extensively in the Eastern states and in Europe. The large areas of dry-farms and the high prices of commercial fertilizers will make this method of manuring impracticable on dry-farms, and it may be dismissed from thought until such a day as conditions, especially with respect to price of nitrates and potash, ...
— Dry-Farming • John A. Widtsoe
... that it was, to say the least, awkward; but then he never did this, certainly never did it thoroughly. Sometimes he felt himself near the wind when settling-day came, or the Jews appeared utterly impracticable; but, as a rule, things had always trimmed somehow, and though his debts were considerable, and he was literally as penniless as a man can be to stay in the Guards at all, he had never in any shape realized the want of money. He ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]
... cover, by the most profound dissimulation, his fierce and savage nature, the numerous issue of Edward, together with the two children of Clarence, seemed to be an eternal obstacle to his ambition; and it appeared equally impracticable for him to destroy so many persons possessed of a preferable title ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 8 - The Later Renaissance: From Gutenberg To The Reformation • Editor-in-Chief: Rossiter Johnson
... inconveniences, to which residents in the interior are subjected. After long and continued wet or dry weather, when travelling is rendered difficult or impossible, from the country being impassable by floods, or impracticable from drought and absence of feed, settlers in the remote districts are often reduced to states bordering on absolute starvation, or at least to a subsistence on meat, without any concomitant "fixins." When such cases ...
— Fern Vale (Volume 1) - or the Queensland Squatter • Colin Munro
... within the Bounds of Sobriety and Moderation. Know, Sir, that there is no such Animal in Nature as a Basilisk; that Health is to be secur'd by Temperance and Exercise; and that the Art of making Health consistent with Luxury, is altogether as impracticable, and an Art, in all Respects, as idle and chimerical, as those of the Philosopher's Stone, judicial Astrology, or any other Reveries of the like ...
— Zadig - Or, The Book of Fate • Voltaire
... silk has been obtained and woven into a delicate kind of material; but as each spider only yields one grain of silk, and 450 were required to produce one yard, the process was found to be impracticable. The insect possesses silk of two colours, silver-grey and yellow; one is used for the foundation-lines of the web, and the other for the interlacing threads. The silk is drawn by the spider from its four spinnerets, and issues from them in a ...
— Wild Nature Won By Kindness • Elizabeth Brightwen
... virtues are famous among men; his daring and resource might turn the tide or war; his energy would have animated a whole people; his achievements are upon record; but it must also be set down that few more uncertain and impracticable forces than Gordon have ever been introduced ...
— The River War • Winston S. Churchill
... an impracticable proposition to expect parents to withdraw their children from schools and colleges and establish their own institutions or to ask lawyers to suspend their practice and devote their whole time attention to national ...
— Freedom's Battle - Being a Comprehensive Collection of Writings and Speeches on the Present Situation • Mahatma Gandhi
... obscurities, reconciling difficulties, and shedding upon their darker details the light of a more modern criticism. Rosweid's fame was European in the first quarter of the seventeenth century; and his proposal attracted the widest attention. To the best judges it seemed utterly impracticable. Cardinal Bellarmine heard of it, and proved his keenness and skill in literary criticism by asking what age the man was who proposed such an undertaking. When informed that he was about forty, "Ask him," said the learned Cardinal, "whether ...
— The Contemporary Review, January 1883 - Vol 43, No. 1 • Various
... clearance, Rotch was directed to enter a protest at the Custom House, and to apply to the governor for a pass to proceed on this day with his vessel on his voyage for London. He replied that it was impracticable to comply with this requirement. He was then reminded of his promise, and on being asked if he would now direct the "Dartmouth" to sail, replied that he would not. The meeting, after directing him to use all possible dispatch in ...
— Tea Leaves • Various
... Mississippi by means of gunboats. Mr. Eads warmly indorsed the plan, and was introduced by Mr. Bates to the President and members of the Cabinet. When the plan was proposed to the Cabinet, the Secretary of War pronounced it unnecessary and impracticable, but the Secretary of the Navy was much impressed with it, and requested Mr. Eads to submit his views in writing, which was done. The paper embodied Judge Bates's general plan in addition to Mr. Eads's own views, and contained suggestions ...
— Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made • James D. McCabe, Jr.
... that it was not easy to see where were the sullen group of diggers presided over by the quondam duellists of Thirsk, Kitson and Trenton, now the most inseparable and impracticable of men; but James and his companions had ridden about two miles from the market-place, when Ralf Percy came out of the mist, exclaiming, 'Is it you, Sir King? Maybe you can do something with those rascals! I've talked ...
— The Caged Lion • Charlotte M. Yonge
... civilized man for nearly sixty years! There, not three hours' steaming distance from the regular track of Chilean commerce, was a place so guarded by reefs on one hand, and impenetrable, ice-capped mountains on the other, that a proper survey was deemed impracticable even by officers of the British Navy, a service which has charted nearly every rock and shoal and tiny islet on the ...
— The Captain of the Kansas • Louis Tracy
... and the all-prevailing flavour of fear, did our bearers struggle along, till at length we came to open rolling ground quite uncultivated, and mostly treeless, but covered with game of all sorts, which lies beyond that most desolate, and without guides utterly impracticable, district. And here on the following morning we bade farewell, not without some regret, to old Billali, who stroked his white beard and ...
— She • H. Rider Haggard
... to have stifled the thoughts of the union as a thing impracticable, when one Seigensius, a Lutheran minister, a person of great abilities, and one whom the Elector of Saxony made great use of in matters of policy as well as religion, contrived ...
— Memoirs of a Cavalier • Daniel Defoe
... not mean that," was the half-apologetic rejoinder; "I did not mean to question your sincerity at all; but the truth is, there has been so much impracticable theorizing upon this subject that one who looks for results can scarcely restrain an expression of impatience when that answer is dogmatically given to such ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... calm, the common surf of the sea pours inward with tremendous and combing waves, which threaten the boats of all who venture among them without experienced skill. Indeed, the landing at New Sestros would be impracticable were it not for the dexterous Kroomen, whose canoes sever and surmount the billows in spite ...
— Captain Canot - or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver • Brantz Mayer
... the most expert on each subject. But the choice of the expert, though a good deal easier than the choice of truth, is still too difficult and often impracticable. The experts themselves are not in the least certain who among them is the most expert. And at that, the expert, even when we can identify him, is, likely as not, too busy to be consulted, or impossible to get at. But there are people whom we can identify easily enough because they ...
— Public Opinion • Walter Lippmann
... government," he declares, "can only exist where the people can exercise control over their representatives at all times and under all circumstances." The method proposed to obtain this control is to give a majority of the constituents power to dismiss a representative at any time, and is utterly impracticable. Imagine the position of a member elected by a majority of one or two votes! The true way to prevent members abusing their trust is not to increase the direct control of the people, but to prevent the control of the press and all other irresponsible agencies over ...
— Proportional Representation Applied To Party Government • T. R. Ashworth and H. P. C. Ashworth
... window, and striking his thigh with his hand with a sort of convulsive motion, he exclaimed, "No, gentlemen: I will have no Regency! With my Guards and Marmont's corps I shall be in Paris to-morrow." Ney and Macdonald vainly endeavoured to undeceive him respecting this impracticable design. He rose with marked ill-humour, and rubbing his head, as he was in the habit of doing when agitated, he said in a loud ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... the first opined would not hold more than two enormous portmanteaus in some odd corner out of sight (portmanteaus which could now no more be got in at the door, not to say stowed away, than a giraffe could be persuaded or forced into a flower-pot): that this utterly impracticable, thoroughly hopeless, and profoundly preposterous box, had the remotest reference to, or connection with, those chaste and pretty, not to say gorgeous little bowers, sketched by a masterly hand, in the highly ...
— American Notes for General Circulation • Charles Dickens
... accepted the charge. She would have willingly assumed the support of the child, but if it had been possible would have greatly preferred providing for him elsewhere to bringing him home with her. This, however, was impracticable, and so there came to be a baby ...
— Miss Ludington's Sister • Edward Bellamy
... mere musketeers left bare, and thinks that will settle the account: but it could in no wise be done. The Austrian Horse, after their fifth trial, renounce charging; fairly refuse to charge any more; and withdraw dispirited out of ball-range, or in search of things not impracticable. The Hussar part of them did something of plunder to rearward;—and, besides poor Maupertuis's adventure (of which by and by), and an attempt on the Prussian baggage and knapsacks, which proved to be "too well guarded,"—"burnt the Church of ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... like a well-planted battery clearing the way for the opening battle. The laughing and chattering topmen were soon dispersed: some ascending beyond the power of the engine, and others retreating into the neighbouring top, along ropes, and across giddy heights, that would have seemed impracticable to any animal ...
— The Red Rover • James Fenimore Cooper
... refinements of cruelty familiar to the conquistadores, had added fierce resentment to the natural racial antipathy already existing in the savage tribes of the country, and communication between provinces and towns was difficult in all cases, while in many it was altogether impracticable. There remained numerous bands of roving savages, fierce and predatory, to render travel unsafe; and though the efforts of the missionaries and others brought gentler ways to some in course of time, the whole of the colonial era was characterized by the presence of utterly ...
— South America • W. H. Koebel
... resolution not to abandon the wounded man opposed an insurmountable obstacle to their escape, and before long the fires lighted by the Indians along each bank, threw a red light over the stream, and rendered this plan impracticable. Except for these fires, the most complete calm reigned, for no enemy was visible, no human voice troubled the silence of the night. However, the fog grew more and more dense, the stream disappeared from view, and even the fires looked only like pale and indistinct lights under ...
— Wood Rangers - The Trappers of Sonora • Mayne Reid
... arranged among those in the body of the work; in the order of their respective dates; but as the latter have been stereotyped before the former had been transmitted to the American editor, this design was rendered impracticable. They have therefore from necessity been added in a supplemental form with the marginal notes which ...
— Memoirs, Correspondence and Manuscripts of General Lafayette • Lafayette
... to pay the rest on delivery, as we formerly advised you. Your vigorous exertions in these matters are the more necessary, as during the apparent, or supposed uncertainty of our affairs, the loan we were directed to obtain of two millions sterling has hitherto been judged impracticable. ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. I • Various
... the geographical and climatic changes hitherto effected by man is impracticable, and we possess, in relation to them, the means of only qualitative, not quantitative analysis. The fact of such revolutions is established partly by historical evidence, partly by analogical deduction from effects produced, in our ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... to construct the pyramids of Egypt. He considers a railway in the heart of a town to be an absolute and intolerable nuisance; and, on the whole, looking at the plan before him, he has come to the conclusion, that a more dangerous and impracticable line was never yet laid before a committee of the United Parliament of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 358, August 1845 • Various
... is found to be inexpedient and wrong to agitate the subject of slavery, when it is known to be impracticable, impossible, and unjust to emancipate the slaves, then let us go on in our career of greatness, with success and tranquility. Let us watch with jealous care the honor of our country, and scorn the aspersions of its vilifiers. Let us honor and vindicate our country in its attitude of justice, and ...
— The Right of American Slavery • True Worthy Hoit
... body servant Robin was to be emancipated and, if he chose, sent to Liberia, in which event he should receive one hundred dollars. But if he preferred to remain in the Commonwealth, he should receive but fifty dollars; and if it turned out to "be impracticable to liberate him consistently with law and his own inclination," he was to select his master from among the children, "that he may always be treated as a ...
— John Marshall and the Constitution - A Chronicle of the Supreme Court, Volume 16 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Edward S. Corwin
... mental road pointed out by this finger-post of thought, I sat down and allowed my fancy to carry me into all manner of worthless and impracticable plans of rescue in which I could dispense with Brunow's aid. I was engaged in this unprofitable exercise, when I suddenly discerned a carriage near the hill-top. It came on with difficulty, and the two horses that drew it were dead blown ...
— In Direst Peril • David Christie Murray
... coal mining industry in this country, Mr. Brown observed that there was a general awakening to the necessity of adopting, in the newer and deeper mines, more economical appliances. It was true it would be impracticable, and probably unwise, to alter much of the existing machinery, but, by the adoption of the best known types of electrical plant, and air compression in our new and deep mines, the consumption of coal per horse power would be reduced, and the ...
— Scientific American Supplement No. 822 - Volume XXXII, Number 822. Issue Date October 3, 1891 • Various
... relative to the ceded provinces, which would necessarily cause a very considerable delay; so that he would not look upon a final arrangement with Russia as being likely to ensue before the winter should set in, and render navigation impracticable. ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez. Vol II • Sir John Ross
... the nature and condition of the rock provided frequent faults and crevices that permitted the driving of spikes, the descent must soon have become impracticable. But the engineer invariably found some chink in which to hammer a spike with his powerful blows. As, time after time, he overcame difficulties so great that his companion could perceive no possible solution, ...
— Out of the Depths - A Romance of Reclamation • Robert Ames Bennet
... up one of her sleeves, but seeing this was impracticable, would have unfastened her dress, had not ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... the friends who had power or interest which he believed they could exert on his behalf. Their omitting or declining to give this help could not seem to him so clearly as to them an inevitable consequence of his having become impracticable, or at least of his passing for a man whose views were not likely to be safe and sober. Each friend in turn offended him, though unwillingly, and was suspected of wishing to shake him off. It was not altogether so; but poor Merman's ...
— Impressions of Theophrastus Such • George Eliot
... the rocks, but so mixed with the sea-water that it was unfit for use; and therefore they were obliged to go farther. The first thing they did was to make a deck to their boat, because they found it was impracticable to navigate those seas in an open vessel. Some of the crew joined them by the time the work was finished; and the captain having obtained a paper, signed by all his men, importing that it was their desire that he should go in search of water, he immediately put ...
— Early Australian Voyages • John Pinkerton
... laugh. Honora and Fanny had gone on a voyage of discovery through the sea of heads, and had found that most excellent and sensible John stuck close to the door; but as to getting the carriage up, impracticable. We had only to wait and be ready instantly, as it would have to drive off as soon as called. Workmen, bawling to one another, were hauling and hoisting out all the peeresses' benches, stripped of their scarlet; and the short and the very long of ...
— The Life and Letters of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... is to make to windward along the coast of Upolu after leaving Apia. A large boat cannot be taken all the way inside the reef, owing to the many coral patches which, at low tide, render this course impracticable. The first place of any importance is Saluafata, fifteen miles from Apia (I must mention that Apia is in the centre of Upolu, and on the north side), then Falifa|, an exquisitely pretty place, and then Fa|goloa Bay and village, eight miles further ...
— By Rock and Pool on an Austral Shore, and Other Stories • Louis Becke
... first part of the Messiah overture, it may be necessary to beat eight for each measure in order to insure rhythmic continuity. There are many examples of triple measure in which the movement is so rapid as to make it impracticable to beat three in a measure, and the conductor is therefore content merely to give a down-beat at the beginning of each measure; waltzes are commonly conducted by giving a down-beat for the first measure, an up-beat for the second, et cetera; a six-part measure in rapid tempo ...
— Essentials in Conducting • Karl Wilson Gehrkens
... "clap-trap," our volume will embrace nearly every known example of the various devices used for the capture of Bird, Beast, or Fowl, in all countries, simplifying such as are impracticable on account of their complicated structure, and modifying others to the peculiar adaptation of the ...
— Camp Life in the Woods and the Tricks of Trapping and Trap Making • William Hamilton Gibson
... 1778. He was educated at a private school at Hackney, kept by a clergyman named Eyre, who must have had a good deal of discernment of character, for he said, "There is no milk and water in that boy. He will be either something very bad or very good." One day, when he was in an obstinate and impracticable state of idleness, Mr. Eyre said, "Daniel, you are not worth flogging, or I would flog you," which so stung him that he never fell into similar disgrace again; nay, one morning when he had failed in his appointed task, ...
— Pioneers and Founders - or, Recent Workers in the Mission field • Charlotte Mary Yonge |
