"Last resort" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... He had steeled himself against the hearing of some such words, and was determined not to be moved to argument or self-defence except as a last resort. ...
— Hyacinth - 1906 • George A. Birmingham
... and I never allowed myself to go longer than that without slumber, from fear of nervous disorder. From this statement it will be inferred that I had at my command some artificial means for inducing sleep in the last resort, and so in fact I had. If after two sleepless nights I found myself on the approach of the third without sensations of drowsiness, I called in ...
— Looking Backward - 2000-1887 • Edward Bellamy
... for the hand of the chief's own daughter, a quasi-widow, but the chief repulsed him because he had no horses. As a last resort the suitor appealed to the young woman herself, promising, if she favored him, that he would give her plenty of grease. This grease argument she was unable to resist, so she entreated her father to ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck
... was by to excuse and to protect. In vain Astier-Rehu scolded and snapped his jaw, a prominent feature which, in the days when he was a professor, had gained him the nickname of Crocodilus. In the last resort, he would threaten to pack his trunk and go back to ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet
... a throb of intense, overwhelming pride. The black flag had been overmatched by the good flag. In the last resort, those who lived right had proved themselves more than equal to those who lived wrong. Law and order were superior to piracy and chaos. Forgetful of his own safety, he hoped that the sloop would overtake the schooner, and obeying his impulse he uttered ...
— The Sun Of Quebec - A Story of a Great Crisis • Joseph A. Altsheler
... on the line of the outer settlements. Powder and lead came cheaper than attorneys' fees, and were, moreover, found to be more effective. Thus the rifle and pistol were almost invariably the cow-hunters' court of first and last resort for disputes of every nature. Except in rare instances where there happened to be survivors among the families of the original plaintiff and defendant, this form of litigation was never prolonged or tiresome. When there were any survivors the ...
— The Red-Blooded Heroes of the Frontier • Edgar Beecher Bronson
... this is the growing recognition of the folly and wastefulness of war. War is becoming a last resort, a hard necessity, rather than an opportunity of national glory. The growth of the idea of international peace, and the improvement and extension of the method of arbitration, are evidence of a yielding to the weight of the collective interests of humanity. They prove the ...
— The Moral Economy • Ralph Barton Perry
... "skin him alive." But Jack had been trained to submit to authority, and to run away now would lose him his winter's schooling, on which he had set great store. He made up his mind to face the punishment as best he could, fleeing only as a last resort if the beating should ...
— The Hoosier School-boy • Edward Eggleston
... of the dogs. He had done this once during the winter, when he and Abel Zachariah were hunting together and were suddenly overtaken by a storm. But at best this was an uncomfortable method of passing a night, and a last resort, and Bobby was therefore quite willing to endure preliminary discomfort in order ...
— Bobby of the Labrador • Dillon Wallace
... men," he said, "and for the same turn it has served us. For in his days there were many heathen round him, and flight or hiding might be the last resort at any time." ...
— Wulfric the Weapon Thane • Charles W. Whistler
... all would be, to train him up from his Childhood, in the Principles of Piety and Virtue, and to form his Will, before he understands his Power. Good Counsels and Persuasions go a great Way, provided they be seasonable and gentle. But the last Resort must be to beg of God, to incline the King's Heart to those Things that are becoming a ...
— Colloquies of Erasmus, Volume I. • Erasmus
... experience that before the Nemesis of these substantial elements his subjective power can dash itself only to be shattered. If he perversely and persistently rejects all our admonitions, we leave him, as a last resort, to destiny, whose iron rule must educate him, and reveal to him the God whom he ...
— Pedagogics as a System • Karl Rosenkranz
... attempted, the reputation of Barbara Thurston was of little account. Besides Bab had already blocked several of the players in the game. Revenge could very well enter into the present scheme of things, and a girl who had no one to defend her might prove a useful tool. As a last resort she could be ...
— The Automobile Girls At Washington • Laura Dent Crane
... with his cold smile and a look of delight at the glass flask. "It's also something more than nitro-glycerin—it's concentrated tears, repressed hatred, wrongs, injustice, outrage. It's the last resort of the weak, force against force, violence against violence. A moment ago I was hesitating, but you have come and decided me. This night the most dangerous tyrants will be blown to pieces, the irresponsible rulers that hide themselves behind God and the State, whose ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... let us indulge in no useless apprehensions on this point. Such a proposition, seriously entertained by the Richmond Government, is of itself the strongest evidence we could have of the exhaustion of their resources. Every other means has failed, and this is their last resort. We are reminded of that vivid description, in one of Cooper's novels, of an Indian in his canoe drawn into the rapids of Niagara and swept over the falls,—who, in his wild efforts to save himself, continued ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 86, December, 1864 • Various
... works were built on the road to Akhulgo, which was retained as a last resort, behind whose defences the mountaineers were resolved to conquer or die. Its garrison was composed of the flower of the Circassian warriors, while some fifteen thousand men beside stood ready to ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 8 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... expand. Use warmth and friction, and if possible prevent sleep for some hours, for which purpose the patient should be walked about between two persons, and if necessary a bunch of switches may be freely used. Finally, as a last resort, use artificial respiration, and a persistance in it will sometimes be rewarded with success in apparently hopeless cases. Galvanism should also ...
— Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889 • Barkham Burroughs
... the love or the tenderness of his parents, and the last resort of his yearning affections—so far as the world goes—is utterly gone. He is in the sure road to a bitter fate. His heart will take on a hard, iron covering, that will flash out plenty of fire in his after contact with the world, but ...
— Dream Life - A Fable Of The Seasons • Donald G. Mitchell
... the Abbe should be no more than a Canon. Still Gevresin mildly shook his head. Finally the prelate had his way, appealing to his friend's charity, and declaring that he ought to accept the post, in the last resort as ...
— The Cathedral • Joris-Karl Huysmans
... went to bed, hiccoughing from the water he had been drinking all day. By this time he had torn the paper from one of his cigarettes and was chewing the tobacco. This was his last resort, an expedient which he fell back upon only in great extremity, as it invariably made him sick to his stomach. He slept a little, but in half an hour was broad awake again, gagging and retching dreadfully. ...
— Vandover and the Brute • Frank Norris
... were his to choose between—three modes involving as many nice distinctions, plus a possible difference with the master. He could run away in his ship, run away with her, or as a last resort he could sacrifice his slops, his bedding, his pet monkey and the gaudy parrot that was just beginning to swear, and run from her. Which should it be? It was all a toss-up. The chance of the moment, instantly detected and as instantly acted ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson
... nothing else to do but walk. He must make his way afoot until he came to Sixth Avenue or on to Fifth, upon the chance of finding in one of these two thoroughfares a ranging nighthawk cab. As a last resort he could take the Subway or the L north. This contingency, though, Mr. Leary considered with feelings akin to actual repugnance. He dreaded the prospect of ribald and derisive comments from chance fellow travellers upon a ...
— The Life of the Party • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... and parcel of Christianity. It must also be noticed that Christianity was part and parcel of the articles of war; and so was duelling. Any officer speaking against religion was to be cashiered; and any officer receiving an affront without, in the last resort, attempting to kill his opponent, was also to be cashiered. Though somewhat of a book-hunter, I {402} have never been able to ascertain the date of the collected remonstrances of the prelates in the House of Lords against this overt inculcation of murder, under the soft name of satisfaction: ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan
... recalled, adjoined that of King Haffgo, and, although there was no wind blowing, the burning of the less important structure was sure to endanger the other. As a last resort, the white men might be driven out in ...
— The Land of Mystery • Edward S. Ellis
... "I know I've got Old Man Wisner broke right now. He's been over to Holland to see if he couldn't form a Dutch syndicate for to unload on. The Dutch is the last resort of the American landboomer. When you can't sell out a bunch of greasewood land for a pineapple colony to no one else, go over and sell it to them Dutch; they're easy. I seen a man one time sell almost all the north end of New Mexico to a Dutch syndicate for a coffee plantation. It was good for cows; ...
— The Man Next Door • Emerson Hough
... judges was always an assistant, and probate jurisdiction was given to the two held at Ipswich and at Salem. From the judgments entered here an appeal lay to the Court of Assistants, and then to the General Court, which was the tribunal of last resort. The clergy and gentry pertinaciously resisted the enactment of a series of general statutes, upon which the people as steadily insisted, until at length, in 1641, "The Body of Liberties" was approved by the legislature. This compilation was the work ...
— The Emancipation of Massachusetts • Brooks Adams
... still greater grief in store for her. Within a year or two the younger son began to show symptoms of the same character, and in spite of all that was done, rapidly sank into the same helpless state as his brother. As a last resort, the mother took her boys and came a long journey to place her sons under our care. At that time they were both nearly helpless. Neither could walk but a few steps. They reeled and staggered about ...
— Plain Facts for Old and Young • John Harvey Kellogg
... people who read it carelessly; and ultimately the only reason they can give you for their manner of interpreting the Bible is that the facts prove their interpretation to be correct; so that in the last resort you will always find you have got back to the old materialistic argument from past race-experience, which logically proves nothing. These are good well-meaning people with a limited idea which they read into the Bible, and so limit its promises by making physical death ...
— The Creative Process in the Individual • Thomas Troward
... As a last resort, a select committee was appointed, of which Senator Clayton became chairman. Within a week, a compromise was reported which embraced not only Oregon, but California and New Mexico as well. The laws of the provisional government of Oregon were ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson
... and criminal business of the kingdom was committed, in the last resort, to the very ancient tribunal of alcaldes de casa y corte, until, in 1371, a new one, entitled the royal audience or chancery, was constituted under Henry II., with supreme and ultimate jurisdiction in civil causes. These, in the first instance, however, might be brought before the alcaldes ...
— History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella V1 • William H. Prescott
... would infer from hence, Their Church, in last resort, should judge the sense. But first they would assume, with wondrous art, Themselves to be the whole, who are but part, Of that vast frame the Church; yet grant they were 360 The handers down, can they from thence infer A right to interpret? or would they alone Who brought the present, claim it ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... has thus been taken on by American law. It is noticeable both in legal text-books and in the opinions of the courts of last resort. In the latter precision of statement and method in discussion are invited by the uniform practice of preparing written opinions. The original practice of reading these from the bench has been generally discontinued. ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... United States bonds and paper money were a drug on the stock market; it was reported that Grant was drinking deeply. Lincoln knew that to remove his general would be tantamount to surrender, for B. F. Butler, then on the lower James, would be the only and last resort, and Lee would make short work of that remarkable commander. There was a little encouragement in the fighting of Sherman against Joseph E. Johnston, who was yielding more and more of northern Georgia to his rival. But June and July, 1864, were the darkest hours of the ...
— Expansion and Conflict • William E. Dodd
... bargain. Thus, New York can legally be deprived of the authority to punish for theft, to lay out highways, to incorporate banks, and all the ordinary interests over which she at present exercises control, every human being within her limits dissenting. Now as sovereignty means power in the last resort, this amendatory clause most clearly deprives the State of all sovereign power thus put at the disposition of Conventions of the several States; in fact, the votes of these Conventions, or that of the ...
— New York • James Fenimore Cooper
... interests of Canada their measures may be, they must be acquiesced in, until it shall pretty clearly appear that public opinion will support a resistance to them. There is no middle course between this line of policy, and that which involves in the last resort an appeal to parliament to overrule the wishes of the Canadians, and this I agree with Gladstone and Stanley in thinking impracticable."[15] The only precaution he bade Elgin take was to register his dissent carefully in cases ...
— British Supremacy & Canadian Self-Government - 1839-1854 • J. L. Morison
... such ratification of a State that any obligation was imposed upon its citizens. Thus believing, it is the opinion of the people of Carolina that it belongs to the State which has imposed the obligation to declare, in the last resort, the extent of this obligation, as far as her citizens are concerned; and this upon the plain principles which exist in all analogous cases of compact between sovereign bodies. On this principle the people of the ...
— Remarks of Mr. Calhoun of South Carolina on the bill to prevent the interference of certain federal officers in elections: delivered in the Senate of the United States February 22, 1839 • John C. Calhoun
... their torment. He was quite willing, O yes! that the Church of England should be thenceforward Presbyterian; but then what about the rights of the individual subject and the relations of the Church to the State? The State or central Power in every community must be, in the last resort, the guardian of all the rights and liberties of the individual subjects; there had been but one Sanhedrim in the Jewish Commonwealth, supreme in causes ecclesiastical as well as in causes civil; but the Presbyterian Divines of the Assembly, with the Scots for their advisers, ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... enacted by Congress forbidding plural marriages, which laws have been pronounced constitutional by the court of last resort, I hereby declare my intention to submit to those laws, and to use my influence with the members of the Church over which I preside ...
— A Young Folks' History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints • Nephi Anderson
... incidental piece. The nymph Walla loved the river-god Tavy, and while gathering flowers to weave a garland for him was surprised by a satyr, who pursued her into a wood. She sought refuge in a cave, where, being overtaken by her pursuer, she prayed to Diana, and in the last resort to Ina, by whom she was transformed into a spring, which, after drowning the venturesome satyr, ran on to join its waters with those of her beloved Tavy. Thus Browne wove the common names of his familiar home into a romance of pastoral invention. The metamorphosis of Arethusa ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg
... said nothing for a moment. He was opposed to the use of force. Force, he believed, was the last resort of incompetence; he had said so frequently enough since this operation had begun. Of course, he was absolutely right, though not in the way he meant. Only the incompetent wait until the last extremity to use force, and by then, it is usually too late to use anything, ...
— A Slave is a Slave • Henry Beam Piper
... punishment of commissioned officers who are willing to participate in these crimes, the savage practices threatened in the orders alluded to be persisted in, we shall reluctantly be forced to the last resort of accepting the war on the terms chosen by our enemies, until the voice of an outraged humanity shall compel a respect for the recognized usages of war. While the President considers that the facts referred to would justify a refusal on our part to execute the cartel by which we have ...
— A Life of Gen. Robert E. Lee • John Esten Cooke
... Independence was but the logical conclusion of the argument of James Otis; but that conclusion would not have established anything, had it not been confirmed by the inexorable logic of cannon. The last resort of kings was then on the side of the people, and gave them the victory. The fifteen years that passed between the time when James Otis spoke in Boston and the time when John Adams spoke in Philadelphia belong properly ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 45, July, 1861 • Various
... the old girl bringing her in. There's that apron between the Companies' Launching cradles and the Center—. It's clear there and we could give an E signal coming down which would make them stay rid of it. But I won't try it except as a last resort." ...
— Plague Ship • Andre Norton
... it were a final stand against the passing of her girlhood, Miss St. Clair had gone further than most. First, in very desperation, she had colored her graying mouse-tinted hair a glowing red; and then, as a last resort, had heroically, but ...
— Apron-Strings • Eleanor Gates
... trusted to represent us, without betraying the source from which their instructions were derived; and we found the old rascal's advice well worth paying for. It is quite likely that he may not succeed so well in your case. Try the police, by all means; and, if they fail, why, there is Sharon as a last resort." ...
— My Lady's Money • Wilkie Collins
... escort must be provided. The commander of an escort will not engage the enemy if his task can be accomplished without fighting. If fighting is inevitable the enemy should be engaged as far from the Convoy as possible, and it will not be halted and parked, except as a last resort. In the case of mechanical transport the whole of the escort will be carried in motor vehicles, and except where parallel roads are in existence, little can be done to secure flank protection while on the move. A portion of such escort will move with the ...
— Lectures on Land Warfare; A tactical Manual for the Use of Infantry Officers • Anonymous
... merely a university lecturer, but also an author of educational works and a student of general education. His most important educational work is his "Treatise on Studies." Rollin anticipated modern practice by seeking to make learning pleasant and discipline humane. He would use the rod only as a last resort—a theory quite contrary to the practice of that time. Too much freedom, he thought, would have a tendency to make children impudent; too frequent appeal to fear breaks the spirit; praise arouses and encourages the child, but too much of it makes him vain. Therefore the teacher ...
— History of Education • Levi Seeley
... telephone-office and began calling up hospitals. There were one or two that reported young women brought in, but the description was not at all like the girl of whom he was in search. He jotted them down in his note-book, however, with a feeling that they might be a last resort. ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... through the stands and a pall of silence fell. Grinnell—attempting a field goal as a last resort ... attempting to pull a lost ...
— Interference and Other Football Stories • Harold M. Sherman
... his own precentor, as, according to the law and regulation of the kirks of Scotland, he always is in the last resort, however he may choose to delegate his authority. He gave out from his swallow's nest the Twenty-third Psalm, and led it off himself in a powerful and expressive voice, which sounded strangely in the empty ...
— Bog-Myrtle and Peat - Tales Chiefly Of Galloway Gathered From The Years 1889 To 1895 • S.R. Crockett
... the arena, ready to snatch the prize when we should have disabled one another, From a dream of Bruhl and myself as engaged in a competition for the king's favour, wherein neither could expose the other nor appeal even in the last resort to the joint-enemies of his Majesty and ourselves, I awoke to a very different state of things; I awoke to find those enemies the masters of the situation, possessed of the clue to our plans, and permitting them only as long as they ...
— A Gentleman of France • Stanley Weyman
... Priests and Levites ordained to minister at the altar; and there was, also, a supreme ecclesiastical tribunal, with the High Priest at its head. All matters of religious controversy were referred to this tribunal and in the last resort to the High Priest, whose decision was enforced under pain of death. "If there be a hard matter in judgment between blood and blood, cause and cause, leprosy and leprosy, ... thou shalt come to the Priests of the Levitical race and to the judge, ... and ...
— The Faith of Our Fathers • James Cardinal Gibbons
... considered the case. But it may be that already it had been heard and adjudged. Long since, perhaps, at some court of last resort, the Paliser Case had ...
— The Paliser case • Edgar Saltus
... defense was now made for us. First rifles, then, at closer quarters, revolvers. If it came to a hand-to-hand conflict we had our knives as a last resort. ...
— An Autobiography of Buffalo Bill (Colonel W. F. Cody) • Buffalo Bill (William Frederick Cody)
... those waiting dreams are satisfied; From twilight to the halls of dawn he went; His lance is broken; but he lies content With that high hour, in which he lived and died. And falling thus he wants no recompense, Who found his battle in the last resort; Nor needs he any hearse to bear him hence, Who goes to join the men ...
— A Treasury of War Poetry - British and American Poems of the World War 1914-1917 • Edited, with Introduction and Notes, by George Herbert Clarke
... having removed his trousers, began a feverish examination of the garments hanging in a clothes-closet. There were two pairs of flannel trousers which would probably again be white and possible, when cleaned and pressed, but a glance showed that until then they were not to be considered as even the last resort of desperation. Beside them hung his "last year's summer ...
— Seventeen - A Tale Of Youth And Summer Time And The Baxter Family Especially William • Booth Tarkington
... expressing our astonishment at these circumstances, fifteen Indians came out of the morass in the most submissive manner, and told us that they had been forced to the construction of this fortress as their last resort, in an unsuccessful war with a neighbouring nation, called the Lazandones as far as I can now remember. They brought back the inhabitants, whom we treated with kindness, and from whom we received farther information, respecting, the Spanish settlement, to which ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. IV. • Robert Kerr
... nothing. An army might beat the stony face with ballista and ram, and be laughed at. Against him alone, the gigantic southeast turret looked down in the self-containment of a hill. And he thought, cunning is so easily baffled; and God, always the last resort of the helpless—God is ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... Napoleon's reverses in Spain, which, by opening much of that country and of her colonies to trade, at once in large measure relieved Great Britain from the pressure of the Continental system and the embargo; while the second, the last resort of nations, War, was declared shortly before the great Russian catastrophe, which, by rapidly contracting the sphere of the Emperor's control, both widened the area of British commerce and deprived the United States of a diversion of British effort, upon which calculation had rightly been ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 1 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... attempting a dispassionate, impartial, and comprehensive consideration of the question. In the majority of the commissions, their voice was suppressed and silenced. In these circumstances the Jewish members were forced, as a last resort, to defend the interests of their coreligionists in writing, by submitting memoranda and separate opinions. However, the instances were rare in which these memoranda and protests were dignified by being read ...
— History of the Jews in Russia and Poland. Volume II • S.M. Dubnow
... Jail looks somewhat like a conservatory of music, but as soon as one enters he readily discovers his mistake. The structure has 100 feet frontage, and a court, which is sometimes called the court of last resort. The guest can climb out of this court by ascending a polished brick wall about 100 feet high, and then letting himself down in a similar way on the Ludlow ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VIII (of X) • Various
... the subject of these contests here, since it is on these occasions, perhaps, that parents are most frequently led, or, as they think, irresistibly impelled, to the infliction of bodily punishments as the last resort, when they would, in general, be ...
— Gentle Measures in the Management and Training of the Young • Jacob Abbott
... between Francis and Charles made the French King loth to weaken his friendship with Henry. The English King was careful to impress upon the French ambassador that he could, in the last resort, make his peace with Charles by taking back Catherine and by restoring Mary to her place in the line of succession.[883] Francis had too poignant a recollection of the results of the union between Henry and Charles from 1521 to 1525 ever to risk its renewal. The age of the crusades and chivalry ...
— Henry VIII. • A. F. Pollard
... that the most essential quality in an historian was imagination. This true and profound remark is peculiarly liable to be misunderstood. People who do not know what imagination means are apt to confound it with invention, although the latter quality is really the last resort of those who are destitute of the former. Froude was an ardent lover of the truth, and desired nothing so much as to tell it. But it must be the truth as perceived by him, not as it might appear to others.* His readers are expected, if not to see with his eyes, at least to look ...
— The Life of Froude • Herbert Paul
... thirsts. The hunger for fat was not appeased; a dog or two was killed, but his carcass went to the Esquimos and the entrails were fed to the rest of the pack. We ate no dogs on this trip, for various reasons, mainly, that the eating of dog is only a last resort, and we had plenty of food, and raw dog is flavorless and very tough. The killing of a dog is such a horrible matter that I will not describe it, and it is permitted only when all other exigencies ...
— A Negro Explorer at the North Pole • Matthew A. Henson
... students who did not get the prizes for which they competed, but who declared that the reason of their failure was, that, though they competed for the prizes, they did not wish to get them. I have known a fast young woman, after many engagements made and broken, marry as the last resort a brainless and penniless blackguard; yet all her family talk in big terms of what a delightful connection she was making. Now, where all that self-deception is genuine, let us be glad to see it; and let us not, like Mr. Snarling, take a spiteful pleasure in undeceiving ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., April, 1863, No. LXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics. • Various
... Lee had given to Myles to strike at his adversary's helm was a piece of advice he probably would not have given to so young a knight, excepting as a last resort. A blow perfectly delivered upon the helm was of all others the most difficult for the recipient to recover from, but then a blow upon the helm was not one time in fifty perfectly given. The huge cylindrical tilting helm was so constructed in front as to slope at an angle in all directions to one ...
— Men of Iron • Ernie Howard Pyle
... high and thrilling pleasures connected with it, do not obliterate its original absurdity. And Voltaire—this sane sun-born child of the shameless intellect—never permits us for a moment to forget how ridiculous in the last resort all this fuss ...
— Suspended Judgments - Essays on Books and Sensations • John Cowper Powys
... tidings had a conflicting effect upon me. At first I was indignant; but, at last, almost approved. The landlord's energetic, summary disposition, had led him to adopt a procedure which I do not think I would have decided upon myself; and yet, as a last resort, under such peculiar circumstances, ...
— The Piazza Tales • Herman Melville
... it, as, once off the bank, we should have perforce to remain at anchor where we were until morning, any attempt at navigating those shallows in darkness being the most utter madness. I therefore left the canvas stowed, resolving to seek its aid only as a last resort, and in the event of all other means failing, and ordered the messenger to be passed and the capstan manned. The anchor was already laid out to leeward, so the slack of the cable was soon hove in, and a steady strain brought to bear upon it, after which ...
— The Rover's Secret - A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba • Harry Collingwood
... fat and good-natured, they had had abundance of food. If, while the people looked fairly well, the dogs were thin and wolfish, we knew they had fared but moderately. If the dogs were all gone and the people looked gaunt and famine-stricken, we knew they had had hard times, and, as a last resort, had eaten their poor ...
— By Canoe and Dog-Train • Egerton Ryerson Young
... many of the games of life the true trump cards are Diamonds; which, according to the fortune-teller's lore, stand for wealth. Indeed, Hearts are by many considered so valueless that they are thrown away at the very outset; whereas they should, like trumps, only be played as a last resort. No trick that can be won with any other card, should be taken with a heart—the card will be gone and nothing to show for it. If you wish wealth, win it if you can—honestly, of course—but don't throw in the heart. Are you ambitious—would you ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various
... and maize products and fresh fruits and vegetables taken from the captured stores and gardens. Such captured foods, however, had all been inspected by the dieteticians, and those of doubtful wholesomeness destroyed or placed under lock and key to be used only as a last resort. ...
— In the Clutch of the War-God • Milo Hastings
... debt unthrifty, careless to repay, And usury still watching for its day: Hence perjuries in every wrangling court; And war, the needy bankrupt's last resort," N. ROWE. ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IX; • Jonathan Swift
... the courts. The third injustice has been the waste occasioned by the system. The injured workman or the family deprived of its support by accident is not so circumstanced that the case can be contested with the corporation to the court of last resort. The need of funds compels compromise on a base that is not always equitable. Human nature many times drives sharp bargains that can hardly be endorsed by the moral scale. In the final analysis the cost of attorney fees is so heavy that the amount which finally accrues in cases of accident ...
— The Progressive Democracy of James M. Cox • Charles E. Morris
... having tried all constitutional remedies without the hope of redress, may have a natural right, when their happiness can be no otherwise secured, and when they can do so without greater injury to others, to absolve themselves from their obligations to the Government and appeal to the last resort, needs not on the ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, - Vol. 2, Part 3, Andrew Jackson, 1st term • Edited by James D. Richardson
... we are able to decide whether what theology asserts concerning this being and his attributes is true or otherwise. Truth for men is only conformity to reason; and thus the same reason which the clergy proscribe is, in the last resort, our only means of judging the system that religion proposes for our assent. That God can only be the true God who is most conformable to our reason, and the true worship can be no other than ...
— Letters to Eugenia - or, a Preservative Against Religious Prejudices • Baron d'Holbach
... stealthy attempt to open it, but found his key on the inside and were unable to open the door, but woke the victim, who, however, dared not raise an alarm. One of the smaller students tried to climb in through the ventilator, but this was nailed down, and then as a last resort the "smoking machine" was brought into action. This was an "infernal machine," employed in hazing students who had in any way offended the opinion of the class, especially by indecorous subservience to the authorities or informing against their fellow students. The latter was a rare offense ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I • Stillman, William James
... Wartburg in Thuringia were the acknowledged centres of taste and good breeding. They were the courts of last resort in all questions ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XVII. No. 101. May, 1876. • Various
... and dependent on them. Faith takes the lead, knowledge follows it: but of course in concrete cases it could not always be decided what was [Greek: logos tes pisteos], which implicitly contained the highest knowledge, and what the special [Greek: gnosis]; for in the last resort the nature of the two was regarded as identical, both being represented as produced by ...
— History of Dogma, Volume 1 (of 7) • Adolph Harnack
... men. Last of all, he had gained courage to taunt Pierre to his face with weakening, had bitterly accused him of using Elise as a means of ingratiating himself with the Rainbow crowd. Pierre was not above taking a human life as a last resort; but even then he must see clearly that the gain warranted the risk. Morrison had been weighed and passed upon. A dead Morrison meant a divided following. A living Morrison, cowed and beaten and shamed before them all, was dead to Pierre. This was Pierre's reasoning, ...
— Blue Goose • Frank Lewis Nason
... that the Court of last resort has set the example which the lower courts have followed. The Supreme Court of the United States, it seems, may be relied upon to sustain any law born of prejudice against the Negro, and to demolish any law constructed in his interest. ...
— Imperium in Imperio: A Study Of The Negro Race Problem - A Novel • Sutton E. Griggs
... is the duty of every honest statesman to try to guide the nation so that it shall not wrong any other nation. But as yet the great civilized peoples, if they are to be true to themselves and to the cause of humanity and civilization, must keep ever in mind that in the last resort they must possess both the will and the power to resent wrong-doing from others. The men who sanely believe in a lofty morality preach righteousness; but they do not preach weakness, whether among private citizens or among nations. We believe that our ideals should be high, but not ...
— African and European Addresses • Theodore Roosevelt
... porter's leeway is a very considerable one. His instructions are never to say "Against the rules!" but rather "I do not know what can be done about it"—and then to make a quick reference to the Pullman conductor, who is his arbiter and his court of last resort. His own initiative, ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... his feet. Commonly, too, he would manage to score upon one or more of his adversaries before succumbing, for while it was permissible for a contestant to leave the ring, he could only do so after he had thrown his knife and as a last resort against the bull's charge. When the animal's attention had been diverted by an attack from another quarter, the disarmed contestant would vault again into the ring and recover his weapon. Here, indeed, was a game that might well stir the coldest blood, since life itself ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen
... ever prompts the brute creation to self-preservation. The ship was freighted with live cattle; in a dreadful storm she was dismasted, and became a mere wreck. The crew being unable to manage her, it occurred to the captain, whose name was Drummond, as a last resort, to attach some ropes to the horns of some of the bullocks, and turn them into the sea. This was done, the bullocks swam towards land and towed the ship to the shore. Thus the lives ...
— Thrilling Stories Of The Ocean • Marmaduke Park
... be held, that every one of the cases similarly decided ought to be reversed; that the judgments without number under which parties have been sent for execution are all erroneous judgments, and ought to have been reversed, and must have been reversed, if they had been brought before the last resort!" ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 349, November, 1844 • Various
... Then Penniston would be aware of most portentous pauses (which a delectable and lazy conference of leaves made eloquent) because of many unfinished sentences. "Oh, YOU know what I mean, dear!" one would say as a last resort. And she-why, bless her heart! of course, she always did. . . . Heigho, youth's was a pleasant ...
— The Certain Hour • James Branch Cabell
... and will make you feel how heavily the curse falls which, in the last resort, I shall not ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... Rosamund interfered again, and Mrs. Ruthven was confronted with the choice of a squabble for possession of young Innis, of conspicuous silence, or of resuming once more with Selwyn. And she chose the last resort. ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers
... bring the hocks and heels upward. If this can be accomplished, nooses are placed on the limb further and further down until the fetlock is reached and brought into position. If failure is met with, then amputation at the hips is the last resort. ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture
... day Borgert was in severe financial straits, and then, all his other sources failing, he had repaired to Kolberg for the money as a last resort. And Kolberg on his part had been shrewd enough to use the opportunity to place Borgert under obligations, for he knew the latter's influence on his younger comrades. Therefore, Kolberg managed to raise ...
— A Little Garrison - A Realistic Novel of German Army Life of To-day • Fritz von der Kyrburg
... the situation at its face value, as irremediable. Upon this was she firmly determined: the night was not to pass unmarked by some manner of attempt to escape or summon aid. She even found herself willing to consider arson as a last resort: the hotel afire would make a famous torch to bring assistance from the mainland. Only ... she shrank from the attempt, her soul curdling with the sinister menace ...
— The Bandbox • Louis Joseph Vance
... kind can evidently apply only to men; the last kind must of necessity, be employed against bodies politic, or communities, or States. It is evident that there is no process of a court by which the observance of the laws can, in the last resort, be enforced. Sentences may be denounced against them for violations of their duty; but these sentences can only be carried into execution by the sword. In an association where the general authority is confined to the collective bodies ...
— The Federalist Papers • Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison
... passed among the ensigns of mortality. His mind was closed against all general considerations. He was incapable of interest in the fate and fortunes of another, the slave of his own desires and low ambitions. Cold, light, and selfish in the last resort, he had that modicum of prudence, miscalled morality, which keeps a man from inconvenient drunkenness or punishable theft. He coveted, besides, a measure of consideration from his masters and his fellow-pupils, and he had no desire ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 3 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... back to soberness and morality and good government by that peculiar invention of Anglo-Saxon republican America—the solemn, awe-inspiring Vigilance Committee of the most grave and respectable citizens; the last resort of the thinking and the good, taken only when vice, fraud, and ruffianism had entrenched themselves behind the forms of law, ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard
... House of Lords and the Judicial Committee.*—Of superior tribunals there are two others of large importance, the House of Lords and the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. The functions of the House of Lords as a court of last resort have been described elsewhere.[252] By the act of 1876 the appellate jurisdiction of the Lords, withdrawn by the act of 1873, was restored and provision was made for the strengthening of the legal element in the chamber by the creation ...
— The Governments of Europe • Frederic Austin Ogg
... surrender a certain temptation to jealousies and divisions? Will they recollect that Christ has so committed Himself to them to manifest to the world that it is the "only" thing in life, after all, in the last resort, to be practically true to Him? Then the Missionary will be happy; his "joy ...
— Philippian Studies - Lessons in Faith and Love from St. Paul's Epistle to the Philippians • Handley C. G. Moule
... through adherence to physi- 166:24 ology and hygiene, the despairing invalid often drops them, and in his extremity and only as a last resort, turns to God. The invalid's faith in the divine Mind is less 166:27 than in drugs, air, and exercise, or he would have resorted to Mind first. The balance of power is conceded to be with matter by most of the medical systems; but when 166:30 Mind at ...
— Science and Health With Key to the Scriptures • Mary Baker Eddy
... the Sirius stood by. And high time, too. As a last resort, when it was found that the repaired pumps could not keep the water down in the hold, so big was the leak, the signal of distress had been hoisted. And, after many anxious hours, it had been ...
— The Moving Picture Girls at Sea - or, A Pictured Shipwreck That Became Real • Laura Lee Hope
... I operated on your little sister's brain, to-night. Wait. It was absolutely necessary, if she were to have even a single chance for life. She was dying, Judd. The operation was a desperate one—a last resort. I can't promise you anything certainly, but she's still alive, and I honestly believe that she is going to live—and ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... full autocracy. He made peace and war, he nominated the high officers of state, even one of the two Consuls, who still kept alive the fiction of the Roman Republic; he probably regulated the admissions to the Senate; he was even in the last resort arbiter of the fortunes ...
— Theodoric the Goth - Barbarian Champion of Civilisation • Thomas Hodgkin
... each case. I turned out 37,000 words in 25 working days; and the reason I think I started right every time is, that not only have I approved and accepted the several articles, but the court of last resort (Livy) has done ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... nothing like spines. 'The fox's tricks are many; one is enough for the urchin.' What is the one unfailing, all-sufficing trick? The proper and judicious use of spines. All of you would use spines if you could. Most of you do. Think of the bramble-thickets, think of the furze, the last resort of valiant stoat and viper, think of the holly, where the ...
— "Wee Tim'rous Beasties" - Studies of Animal life and Character • Douglas English
... slipped the big fur mitten from her right hand and unbuttoned her coat so that she could quickly and easily reach an inside pocket in which was Peter's revolver. She smiled just a bit grimly, as her fingers touched the cold steel. It was to be her last resort. And she was thinking in that flash of the days "back home" when she was counted the best revolver shot at the Piping Rock. She could beat Peter, and Peter was good. Her fingers twined a bit fondly about the pearl-handled thing in her pocket. The last resort—and from the ...
— Back to God's Country and Other Stories • James Oliver Curwood
... like these! Have you or I, young fellows, looked more lean Since this new holder came upon the scene? Holder, I say, for tenancy's the most That he, or I, or any man can boast: Now he has driven us out: but him no less His own extravagance may dispossess Or slippery lawsuit: in the last resort A livelier heir will cut his tenure short. Ofellus' name it bore, the field we plough, A few years back: it bears Umbrenus' now: None has it as a fixture, fast and firm, But he or I may hold it for a term. Then live like men of courage, ...
— The Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry • Horace
... situation I was in, (a prisoner in my father's house, and my whole family determined to compel me to marry a man unworthy of me, and that speedily, and whether I consented or not,) admitted of delay in the preventive measures he was desirous to put me upon, in the last resort only. Nor was there a necessity, he said, if I were actually in Lady Betty's protection, that I should be his, if, afterwards, I should see any ...
— Clarissa, Volume 1 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... a sort of place of last resort for those who are discouraged elsewhere, for Washington is no longer a city of set routine and fixed habit. It is at last the center of the nation. New York is no longer even the financial center. The newspapers are edited from here. Society centers here. All ...
— The Letters of Franklin K. Lane • Franklin K. Lane
... realizing that the conflict of feeling in the matter of personal associations involves decisions which are entirely outside the competence of legal tribunals, recognize that such tribunals are necessary in order to deal with the property of divorced persons, and also, in the last resort, with the question of the care of the children. They should not act in public. These writers propose that each party should choose a representative, and that these two should choose a third; and that this tribunal should privately investigate, and if they agreed should register the divorce, ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... and out of season, to defend the cause of the progressive Briton against the Conservative Boer, and especially to advocate the Cause of the Reformers and Uitlanders against the old Tory Administration of President Kruger. By agitation, by pressure, and even, if need be, in the last resort by legitimate insurrection, I had always been ready to seek the establishment of a progressive Liberal Administration in Pretoria. And I have at least the small consolation of knowing that if any of the movements which I defended had succeeded, the present crisis would never ...
— A Century of Wrong • F. W. Reitz
... last resort, to clear the doubt, They got old GOVERNOR HANCOCK out. The Governor came, with his Light-horse Troop And his mounted truckmen, all cock-a-hoop; Halberds glittered and colors flew, French horns whinnied and trumpets blew, The yellow fifes whistled between ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... on, frightened by the strange faces around her, and as he did not come she threw herself upon the floor, and began to bump her head up and down, her last resort when her paroxysms were ...
— The Cromptons • Mary J. Holmes
... power to make payment, and they will not part with their property for rags so rotten. They may wish success to the Confederate cause, but "they must live," and live they cannot on paper that is nothing but paper. The journal that is understood to speak for Mr. Davis recommends a forced loan, the last resort of men the last days of whose power are near at hand. Another cause of the scarcity of food in the South is to be found in the condition of Southern communications. If all the food in the Confederacy could be equally distributed, now and hereafter, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various
... We should exercise the greatest care in saving the teeth. The last resort of all is to lose a tooth by extraction. The skilled dentist will save almost anything in the shape of ...
— A Practical Physiology • Albert F. Blaisdell
... clothes she would begin to think about his, and if that were to happen it wouldn't be long before all men in creation would be going about looking as if somebody had picked them off a Christmas tree. In the matter of clothes woman is the court of last resort, and it is better for men that she should concentrate all her ...
— The Autobiography of Methuselah • John Kendrick Bangs
... almost menacing. The consul at Canton reported the case to the governor of Hong-Kong, Sir John Bowring. The reclamations of that functionary were treated as disdainfully as those of the consul, and it became necessary, as a last resort, to appeal to arms. The outrage upon the lorcha was committed on the 8th of October, 1856. On the 22nd of October, Rear-admiral Sir Michael Seymour, on board the Coromandel, accompanied by a squadron of gun-boats, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... often, a harmless powder of coral; less frequently, an inert prescription of pleasing amber; and (let me say it softly within possible hearing of his honored descendant), twice or oftener,—let us hope as a last resort,—an electuary of millipedes,—sowbugs, if we must give them their homely English name. One or two other prescriptions, of the many unmentionable ones which disgraced the pharmacopoeia of the seventeenth century, ...
— Medical Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. |
