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Tear away   /tɛr əwˈeɪ/   Listen
Tear away

verb
1.
Rip off violently and forcefully.  Synonym: tear off.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Tear away" Quotes from Famous Books



... pain, he ranges along the lofty Oeta, no otherwise than if a tiger should chance to carry the hunting spears fixed in his body, and the perpetrator of the deed should be taking to flight. Often might you have beheld him uttering groans, often shrieking aloud, often striving to tear away the whole of his garments, and levelling trees, and venting his fury against mountains, or stretching out his arms towards the heaven of his father. Lo! he espies Lichas, trembling and lying concealed in a hollow rock, and, as his pain has summoned together all his fury, he says, "Didst thou, ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Copious Notes - and Explanations • Publius Ovidius Naso

... hard to hold," thought Sam, "and I mustn't trust to that thin cotton stuff. He'll tear away in a moment. But he hasn't a knife, as far as I can see. What's he got in ...
— In the Mahdi's Grasp • George Manville Fenn

... ourselves know to be a dream, and which, like other dreams, we can hardly embody in a distinct utterance. We know that what we see is but a sort of intellectual Siamese twins, of which one is substance and the other shadow, but we cannot set either free without killing both. We are unable to rudely tear away the veil of phantasy in which the truth is shrouded, so we present the reader with a draped figure, and his own judgment must discriminate between the clothes and the body. A truth's prosperity is like a jest's, it lies in the ear of him that hears it. Some may see our lucubration as we saw it; ...
— The Note-Books of Samuel Butler • Samuel Butler

... bore Hector forth and away. And even as beneath a tempest the whole black earth is oppressed, on an autumn day, when Zeus pours forth rain most vehemently, and all the rivers run full, and many a scaur the torrents tear away, and down to the dark sea they rush headlong from the hills, roaring mightily, and minished are the works of men, even so mighty was the roar of the Trojan ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer (Lang, Leaf, Myers trans.)

... had dealing, who would deem it a lawful business? If a man can get a living in his employment only by fitting out a privateer and preying upon the peaceful commerce of the world, who will deem it a lawful employment? If a man lives only to make a descent on the peaceful abodes of Africa, and to tear away parents from their weeping children, and husbands from their wives and homes, where is the man that will deem this a moral business? And why not? Does he not act on the same principle as the man who deals in ardent spirits—a desire to make money, ...
— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society

... Turner, with a determined look. "If we can't tear away the rocks with bars and sledges, we will send off for a barrel of gunpowder to blow them open; and if that fails, I will go into the cave, myself, and if I don't snake him out before I've done with him, he must be a harder customer than it has ever yet ...
— Gaut Gurley • D. P. Thompson

... Alexander's strength far more trying. Masses of peasants, hearing vague news of emancipation,—learning, doubtless, from their masters' own spiteful lips that the Emperor is endeavoring to tear away property in serfs,—take the masters at their word, and determine to help the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 61, November, 1862 • Various

... saluted with contumely from all quarters, manifested a stern deafness to criticism—it was William Wordsworth. And we thought the better of him by much for this haughty defiance to groundless judgments. But the cloak, which Boreas could not tear away from the traveller's resistance, oftentimes the too genial Phoebus has filched from his amiable spirit of compliance. These criticisms of Coleridge, generally so wayward and one-sided, but sometimes desperately opposed to every mode of truth, have been the means ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey

... "when we have slowly walked the ponies as near to the enemy as we dare, resting them all the while, I'll give the word to gallop off, and as the ponies are turned we two spring into the chariot as it passes, and we'll tear away for liberty. No stopping this time, ...
— Marcus: the Young Centurion • George Manville Fenn

... around trying to help somehow, but I did not know what to do. I smelled and then saw blood, which fact convinced me of disaster. Only the black horse that had hurdled the log made any effort to tear away. The other lay quiet. When finally it was extricated we found that the horse had a bad cut in the breast made by a snag on the log. We could find no damage done to the wagon. The harness Nielsen had cut could be mended quickly. What a fortunate ...
— Tales of lonely trails • Zane Grey

... an unlooked-for spectacle, and desirous of a closer inspection, Tristram, with a supreme effort, managed to tear away his eyes from the mirror and to glance at the bed, where, to his unmitigated astonishment, he saw ...
— Animal Ghosts - Or, Animal Hauntings and the Hereafter • Elliott O'Donnell

... a bit of bread, to fill the gaps that I made with my saws in the grating, in order to avoid detection in case the room should be examined. In the course of about a week, I had cut through the iron so far that I knew it would be easy with one good wrench to tear away the grating; and then, with a throbbing pulse, in the afternoon I tied a piece of white cloth on the sash, as I had been directed. That night there was not a breath of wind, and I knew that I had no hope of rescue at present. I tried to sleep, but found myself constantly ...
— John Whopper - The Newsboy • Thomas March Clark

... I had been that winter night, when Colonel Keith helped me to carry the basket into the gates of that grim, black pile beyond. He was there yet. If I had been a bird, to have flown in and sung to him!—or, better, a giant, to tear away locks and bars, and let him out! And I ...
— Out in the Forty-Five - Duncan Keith's Vow • Emily Sarah Holt

... exhibited a series of experiments so atrocious as almost to shock belief. This M. Magendie got a lady's greyhound. First of all he nailed its front, and then its hind, paws with the bluntest spikes that he could find, giving as reason that the poor beast, in its agony, might tear away from the spikes if they were at all sharp or cutting. He then doubled up its long ears, and nailed them down with similar spikes. (Cries of 'Shame!') He then made a gash down the middle of the face, and proceeded to dissect all the nerves on one side of it.... After he had finished these operations, ...
— An Ethical Problem - Or, Sidelights upon Scientific Experimentation on Man and Animals • Albert Leffingwell

... door was shut behind my servant I sprang to my feet, crying in a low but very vehement voice, "Never!" I would not go. Had she not wounded me enough? Must I tear away the bandage from the gash? She had tortured me, and asked me now, with a laugh, to be so good as stretch myself on the rack again. I would not go. That laugh was cruel insolence. I knew that laugh. Ah, why so I did—I knew it well—how it rose and rippled ...
— Simon Dale • Anthony Hope

... is the whole of which they must be a part? Hidden behind the thin yet seemingly impassable veil which hides it from us as it hid all science, all art, all powers of man till he had the courage to tear away the screen. That courage comes only of conviction. When once man believes that the thing exists which he desires, he will obtain it at any cost. The difficulty in this case lies in man's incredulity. It requires a great tide ...
— Light On The Path and Through the Gates of Gold • Mabel Collins

... he said to the devil; "just spit on your hands, stick your claws in, and tear away, and let me see what ...
— Folk Tales Every Child Should Know • Various

... need me. You are like the others. When the fire has touched their eyes and indeed they see the things that are, they fall on their knees and they tear away at the weeds and rubbish that cumber the earth, and they never lift their eyes, and soon their frame grows weary and their heart cold. Be wise, man. The mark is upon you. Those live best and work best in this world who have a soul for its beauties. Women, for instance," ...
— A People's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... see my verses burn, Should seem to you a pleasant turn, Take them to freely tear away Or burn. But, oh! not so I'd say, If this were Mery's room to-day. That noble poet! Happy town, Marseilles the Greek, that him doth own! Daughter of Homer, fair to see, Of Virgil's son the mother she. To you I'd say, ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo

... equilibrium; for suddenly, with a wild change in his feelings, he bounded to his feet and repented. Again he was in darkness, and could not guess how much time had elapsed since his fatal act. Staggering to the closed doorway, he endeavored to tear away the bricks he had so recently placed there, but the mortar was hardening fast, and he was unable to find his trowel. Groping frantically along the floor, he searched in vain for some tool to open the vault ...
— The Ghost of Guir House • Charles Willing Beale

... flashed with scarlet and amber yellow, two lines of spear—armed Malays in admirable military order charged round the two angles of the mess-room right and left; and as the tiny square stood firm, it was to see the new-comers dash wildly past and tear away right before them in a fierce charge upon the advancing enemy, whose attack that had meant the extinction of the brave defenders was now turned into a repetition of the sham-fight's rout, as they scattered in wild retreat across ...
— Trapped by Malays - A Tale of Bayonet and Kris • George Manville Fenn

... Then a wicked fairy came and turned the skeleton in her beautiful body to gold; and, lo! the princess who had been fashioned to bless mankind carried, hidden from sight by her innocent and beneficent charms, a terrible curse. Men came to kiss, and stayed to tear away her flesh with their teeth. When her skeleton has been torn forth, even to the uttermost rib, then the spell of the wicked fairy will be broken, and California be the most gracious mother mankind ...
— The Californians • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton

... claw, clinch, clench, make sure of. catch at, jump at, make a grab at, snap at, snatch at; reach, make a long arm, stretch forth one's hand. take from, take away from; disseize^; deduct &c 38; retrench &c (curtail) 201; dispossess, ease one of, snatch from one's grasp; tear from, tear away from, wrench from, wrest from, wring from; extort; deprive of, bereave; disinherit, cut off with a shilling. oust &c (eject) 297; divest; levy, distrain, confiscate; sequester, sequestrate; accroach^; usurp; despoil, strip, fleece, shear, displume^, impoverish, eat out of ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... arrive too soon, my friend," rejoined the captain of the voyageurs, casting an eye back across the great lake, which lay black and ominous under a threatening sky, the sweep and swirl of its white caps ever racing hard after the frail craft, as though eager to break through its paper sides and tear away the human beings who ...
— The Mississippi Bubble • Emerson Hough

... multitudes of carnivorous snails are waiting to set their file-like tongues at work, which mercilessly drill through the lime shells, bringing death in a more subtle but no less certain form. Storms may tear away the support of these poor mollusks, and the waves dash them far out of the reach of the tides, while at low water, crows and gulls use all their ingenuity to get ...
— The Log of the Sun - A Chronicle of Nature's Year • William Beebe

... there were any prisoner within. He left the window when he saw them coming, and drew back into the remotest corner of the cell; but although he returned them no answer, they had a fancy that some one was inside, for they presently set ladders against it, and began to tear away the bars at the casement; not only that, indeed, but with pickaxes to hew down the very stones in ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various

... thought of it as a sort of armor in which her visitor was encased, an armor which rendered her invulnerable. What shaft could penetrate that smooth black and white, that flowing panoply, and reach the heart Lady Ingleton desired to pierce? Suddenly Lady Ingleton felt cruel. She longed to tear away from Rosamund all the religion which seemed to be protecting her; she longed to see her naked as Dion Leith ...
— In the Wilderness • Robert Hichens

... Zada's mind and heart was, curiously, the most dangerous thing in the world for Cheever. If she had stayed noisy and promiscuous and bad, he would have tired of her. But she was growing soft and homey, gentle as ivy, and as hard to tear away or to want to tear away. After all, marriage is only the formalizing of an instinct that existed long before—exists in some animals and birds who mate without formality and ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes

... another book opened, which is the book of life, and the dead judged out of those things which were written in the books according to their works[3]!" What would a man give, any one of us, who has any real insight into his polluted and miserable state, what would he give to tear away some of the leaves there preserved! For how heinous are the sins therein written! Think of the multitude of sins done by us since we first knew the difference between right and wrong. We have forgotten them, but there we might ...
— Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VII (of 8) • John Henry Newman

... "So I tear away the veils which made me ridiculous, I grant you. Donnegan, we have met each other just ...
— Gunman's Reckoning • Max Brand

... fall, and directly I perceived that the epaulette or shoulder-strap on the shoulder of each was a great hideous yellow worm, that gnawed away the shoulder and palsied the arm and ate into the vitals. Every second, one fell and died, making frantic efforts to tear away the reptile from its grasp, but in vain. Then the white mists rolled away, and I saw the strange woman standing where she had been when the first vision began. She was silent, the music was hushed, Adolph Von Berg had fallen hack asleep in his chair, and drawing ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various

... as the tiger darted across the park towards the carriage. 'He'll make at the horses. See! see! he has actually fastened upon poor Culina! No, 'tis Apicius, uncle's grand favourite. Look at the horses, how they rear and tear away!' ...
— Forgotten Tales of Long Ago • E. V. Lucas

... tormenting fire to die, they lay Hands on the maid; her arms with rough cords twining. Rudely her mantle chaste they tear away, And the white veil that o'er her drooped declining: This she endured in silence unrepining, Yet her firm breast some virgin tremors shook; And her warm cheek, Aurora's late outshining, Waned into whiteness, and a color took, ...
— National Epics • Kate Milner Rabb

... house has been badly constructed at first, in repairing it, would you tear away the walls at random, at the risk of bringing all ...
— The Monikins • J. Fenimore Cooper

... drain twenty minutes, lying flesh side up in a flat dish, then trim off the under side and edges neatly, removing rusty fat, strings, etc., and cutting through the skin at the hock end. Turn over and remove the skin—taking care not to tear away too much fat with it. Remove the ham to a clean, deep dish, or bowl—the closer fitting the better, then pour around it either sound claret, or sweet cider, till it stands half way up the sides. Add a little tabasco or Worcester to the liquor, if ...
— Dishes & Beverages of the Old South • Martha McCulloch Williams

... straightened him out sadly—putting his hat over his face and drawing his arms to his sides. Above, he saw with sudden nausea, buzzards circling—little cared they whether the dead were American or Spaniard, as long as there were eyes to pluck and lips to tear away, and then straightway, tragedy merged into comedy as swiftly as on a stage. Out of the woods across the way emerged a detail of negro troopers—sent to clear the woods behind of sharpshooters—and last came Bob. The detail, passing ...
— Crittenden - A Kentucky Story of Love and War • John Fox, Jr.

... and stayed with him longest was one connected with the great roll of fat under Losson's right ear. He noticed it first on a moonlight night, and thereafter it was always before his eyes. It was a fascinating roll of fat. A man could get his hand upon it and tear away one side of the neck; or he could place the muzzle of a rifle on it and blow away all the head in a flash. Losson had no right to be sleek and contented and well-to-do, when he, Simmons, was the ...
— This is "Part II" of Soldiers Three, we don't have "Part I" • Rudyard Kipling

... one may put away to wear a coat, And doff that for a jacket, like the loves We men are wont to have as loves or wives. She is the very one, the soul of souls, And when you put her on you put on light, Or wear the robe of Nessus, poisonous fire, Which if you tear away you tear your life, And if you wear you fall to ashes. So 'Tis not her bed-vow broke, I have broke mine, That ruins me; 'tis honest faith quite lost, And broken hope that we could find each other, And that ...
— Toward the Gulf • Edgar Lee Masters

... tear away— Crush down the pain! "Dulce et decus," be Fittest refrain! Why should the dreary pall Round him be flung at all? Did not ...
— Beechenbrook - A Rhyme of the War • Margaret J. Preston

... COMMENTARII SENATUS, minutes of the discussions and decisions of the Roman senate. Before the first consulship of Julius Caesar (59 B.C.), minutes of the proceedings of the senate were written and occasionally published, but unofficially; Caesar, desiring to tear away the veil of mystery which gave an unreal importance to the senate's deliberations, first ordered them to be recorded and issued authoritatively. The keeping of them was continued by Augustus, but their publication was forbidden (Suetonius, ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... will tear away the leaf Wherein it's writ; or, if fate won't allow So large a gap within its journal-book, I'll blot ...
— Miscellanies, Volume 2 (from Works, Volume 12) • Henry Fielding

... stood in this pulpit until now, I have desired to tear away from every heart that obscuring veil of pagan thought which first attributes a wrathful justice to the Father and a tender mercy to CHRIST, and then represents the Son as dying to soothe the anger and satisfy the relentless demands of the Father. Such unholy and revolting ...
— Personal Experience of a Physician • John Ellis

... house to find scent for big-side hare-and-hounds," exclaimed Tadpole. "Tear away; there's no time to lose ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes

... board. The yacht, now a helpless wreck, pitched and tossed, but still shot onward, impelled by the wild fury of the gale. Gigantic waves at intervals swept the deck, each torrent as it retreated carrying with it all it could tear away, and making huge gaps in the bulwarks, to which the sailors were clinging with all the energy of desperation. Monte-Cristo had grasped the stump of the mast, and the captain clung with all his strength to the remains of the wheel. The lightning had become terrific, and the almost continuous roar ...
— Edmond Dantes • Edmund Flagg

... the enemy's country; but Rita is not slow to retort, and presently they both have to admit that their recriminations are only a vain attempt to drown the voice of self-reproach. In a sort of fierce frenzy they tear away veil after veil from their souls, until they realise that Eyolf never existed at all, so to speak, for his own sake, but only for the sake of their passions and vanities. "Isn't it curious," says ...
— Little Eyolf • Henrik Ibsen

... face now, saw those signs which not the hardest of the world's hard uses can cut or tear away. "Oh!" she said, in a tone of sympathy. "He is down, isn't he? But he'll pull ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips

... I can. I wish to sit here and look at you and think only of you. It would be a painful wrench to tear away my thoughts from you and employ them upon anything else. Let me sit here in my heaven!" ...
— Victor's Triumph - Sequel to A Beautiful Fiend • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth

... presumption, might not earnest humility recover that mysterious lurking-place? Might not one, by devoted toil, by utter self-sacrifice, with eyes purified by long searching from worldly and selfish pollution,—might not such a one tear away the veil of centuries, and, even though dying in the attempt, gain one look into this arcanum? Might not I?—The unutterable thought thrilled me and left me speechless, even in thinking. I strained my forehead against the darkness, as if I could ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 30, April, 1860 • Various

... have a will of adamant, as people find, who tear away the amiable flowers and light soil that cover it; and she had reached the impenetrable, firm rock. I neither made any advances towards a reconciliation nor invited any. But I'll tell you what I did do, as ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 10, August, 1858 • Various

... again. The Family Rise is the commonest phenomenon. Is not the name Legion of those of whom men say, partly with the pride of connecting themselves with greatness, partly with the natural desire, which small men always show, to tear away something of that greatness, 'Why, I knew him when his father had a shop!' The Family Fall is less conspicuous. Yet there are always as many going down as climbing up. You cannot, in fact, stay still. You must either climb or slip ...
— As We Are and As We May Be • Sir Walter Besant

... back to station. Catch early cattle-train going back to Berlin. Jump on engine, and declare myself. Wire approach down line, and tear away with the cattle, at seventy miles an hour, getting back to Berlin just in time for breakfast. Fancy I woke them up! Altogether, ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100., Jan. 31, 1891 • Various

... party laid aside their weapons on approaching the cage to tear away the brush. Eight brigands, at a sign from their chief, surrounded the investigators, who ...
— The Adventures of Kathlyn • Harold MacGrath

... they slept, these tarpaulins threw off the waves that frequently broke over the boat, and more than once bid fair to sink her altogether. These arose in enormous billows, and the gale was so violent that only the smallest corner of the foresail could be raised—even that was almost sufficient to tear away ...
— The Red Eric • R.M. Ballantyne

... that Lyte was trying to apprehend his sister. In half a dozen ways he advertised his displeasure at Lyte's presence, but Lyte ignored him. I imagined Lyte was a bit sorry for him, for the hardest duty of his office was the apprehension of lepers. It is not a nice thing to go in to a man's house and tear away a father, mother, or child, who has done no wrong, and to send such a one to perpetual banishment on Molokai. Of course, it is necessary as a protection to society, and Lyte, I do believe, would have been the first to apprehend his own father did ...
— The House of Pride • Jack London

... like mine, with lips that laughed and eyes that shone, and a mango flower in her hair? Say, dost thou never dream of her? And she shook his arm with frenzy, and exclaimed: Ha! wake from thy magic sleep, and tear away the curtain that hides me from thy blinded soul. I will, I will awake thee. I will not be forgotten. And all at once, she burst into a passion of tears. And she reeled, as though about to fall, and tottered, and threw herself, sobbing ...
— An Essence Of The Dusk, 5th Edition • F. W. Bain

... they were no use to the corpse, and he determined to possess them. Accordingly he proceeded in the dead of night to the vault where she lay interred, and commenced the work of sacrilegious spoliation. He first unscrewed the coffin lid. He then removed it altogether, and proceeded to tear away the shroud which interposed between him and his prey. But what was his horror to perceive the corpse clasp her hands slowly together, then rise, and finally sit erect in the coffin. He was rooted to the earth. The corpse made as ...
— Folk-lore and Legends: German • Anonymous

... I hold that Oros also lies, or if he lies not, then he dreams, or perchance that voice he heard was thine own. Now if thou art this undying woman, this Ayesha, let proof be made of it to these two men who knew thee in the past. Tear away those wrappings that guard thy loveliness thus jealously. Let thy shape divine, thy beauty incomparable, shine out upon our dazzled sight. Surely thy lover will not forget such charms; surely he will know thee, and bow the knee, saying, 'This is my Immortal, ...
— Ayesha - The Further History of She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed • H. Rider Haggard

... dear face, and hearing that well-known voice to-morrow, keeps me in a perpetual fever of excitement. If I only had the privileges of a man, I would order out Sir Percival's best horse instantly, and tear away on a night-gallop, eastward, to meet the rising sun—a long, hard, heavy, ceaseless gallop of hours and hours, like the famous highwayman's ride to York. Being, however, nothing but a woman, condemned to patience, propriety, and petticoats for life, I must respect the house-keeper's opinions, ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins

... to cover the greatest infamy. Do not these disorders prove that religion, instead of restraining the passions of men, does but cover them with a cloak that sanctifies them; and that nothing would be more beneficial than to tear away this sacred cloak of which men make such a bad use? What horrors would be banished from society, if the wicked were deprived of a pretext so plausible ...
— Superstition In All Ages (1732) - Common Sense • Jean Meslier

... which will tear away the fundamental pillar of Methodist theology, was urged in all force, sincerity, and enthusiasm by the Rev. Cadman, pastor of the Metropolitan Temple, before the regular weekly meeting of the Methodist ministers ...
— The Gospel Day • Charles Ebert Orr

... had put them in their car, and had taken leave of them with a look which he found it hard to tear away, plain and unpretentious travellers though they were that night, he went striding back through the April midnight to the little old house the Englishman ...
— The Brown Study • Grace S. Richmond

... This man had never before been consciously brought to the fork in the road; but now the two ways are before him, and, knowingly, he chooses the worse. Christ did not desire him to do so; but He did desire that he should choose, and should know that he did. It was the truest kindness to tear away the veil of surface goodness which hid him from himself, and to force him ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren

... part of his argument. Moreover, his precise aim in writing compelled him to make these resemblances as prominent, as significant, and as effective as possible. Griesbach says well, in his learned and able essay, "When it was impossible for the Jews, lately brought to the Christian faith, to tear away the attractive associations of their ancestral religion, which were twined among the very roots of their minds, and they were consequently in danger of falling away from Christ, the most ingenious author of this epistle met the case by a masterly ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger

... do it!" Max was saying to himself, as he continued to watch the wretched man tear away at the food, and act as though he were a wild beast rather than a human being, once gifted with a mind that could reason, love, ...
— The Strange Cabin on Catamount Island • Lawrence J. Leslie

... will teach you nothing but Pagan fables or Romish ceremonies. Can Aristotle preach the Gospel? Do those church-histories tell us about saving faith? I tell you nay; therefore burn them altogether, and break the idols in pieces, and tear away the paintings, and demolish the Jewish instruments that send forth sounds of levity when the player upon them is disposed to provoke his hearers to wanton dances and vain mirth. So let us purify the place with fire, that the slumbering watchman may be awakened to a consideration of his ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West

... is bright with beauty, and its days Are filled with music; could we only know True ends from false, and lofty things from low; Could we but tear away the walls that graze Our very elbows in life's frosty ways; Behold the width beyond us with its flow, Its knowledge and its murmur and its glow, Where doubt itself ...
— Among the Millet and Other Poems • Archibald Lampman

... descriptive of the beneficent arts of peace, can it in any sense come under the head of what is termed war literature. Yet it is safe to affirm that without the great rebellion this book had never been written. It is full of novel, picturesque, and widely suggestive ideas. Some of its statements tear away old fallacies as by a cannon ball. For instance, where the young settler ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 1, July, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... passage all together, all clamoring, and one man wasted no time at all but began to tear away bloody bandages to show his wound. The hardest thing now was to get and keep some kind of order, and for ten minutes Ismail and Darya Khan labored, using threats where argument failed, and brute force when they dared. It was like beating ...
— King—of the Khyber Rifles • Talbot Mundy

... semblance of order restored than some exceptionally heavy wave would tear away the lashing and the work had to be done all ...
— Scott's Last Expedition Volume I • Captain R. F. Scott

... few, to whom I address myself, I would say—Shake off at once and for ever the fancies and feelings, the creeds and customs that shackle you, and be true. We have come to a time when wise men will not be led blindfold in the footsteps of their predecessors, but will tear away the bandage and see for themselves. I have torn away mine, and looked. There is no Faith—it is shaken to its rotten foundation; there is no Hope—it is disappointed every day; there is no Love at all. There is nothing for any man ...
— Melchior's Dream and Other Tales • Juliana Horatia Ewing

... the children say," said his friend. "But the piece was hardly half an inch across; there was no room for one word, let alone five. Can you think of anything hardly bigger than a comma which the man with hell in his heart had to tear away as ...
— The Innocence of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton

... property and lives at the feet of him they call, only with their lips, their adored Monarch. On the other hand, desiring to distinguish themselves before each other in deeds and not in words only, they tear away the fathers and the bread-winners from their orphaned families, preparing them for slaughter. The worse the position of Russia, the more recklessly do the journalists lie, transforming shameful defeats into victories, knowing that no one will contradict them; and they quietly collect ...
— "Bethink Yourselves" • Leo Tolstoy

... not wonder now that you were shaken," said he at last. "My God, what a net was cast round me! Had this vile charge been brought against me, you, my dearest friend, would have been compelled to tear away the last doubt as to my guilt. And yet, in spite of what you have seen, Charles, I am as innocent in the ...
— Rodney Stone • Arthur Conan Doyle

... salutation is excessively rough and rude. Honeyed words were not in his line; he had not lived in the desert for all these years, and held converse with God and his own heart, without having learned that his business was to smite on conscience with a strong hand, and to tear away the masks which hid men from themselves. The whole spirit of the old prophets was revived in his brusque, almost fierce, address to such very learned, religious, and distinguished personages. Isaiah in his day had called their predecessors 'rulers of Sodom'; John was not scolding when ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren

... mother, lady. You could not hate my mother!" and the blind eyes flashed as if they would tear away the veil of darkness in which they were enshrouded, and gaze upon a woman who could hate ...
— Cousin Maude • Mary J. Holmes

... mysterious people I discovered, have been justly described. I may fail to interest the public; which is the one difficulty most likely to occur, and most to be regretted—not for my own sake, but theirs. It is so hard to get human nature out of the ruts it has moved in for ages. To tear away their present faith, is like undermining their existence. Yet others who come after me will be more aggressive than I. I have this consolation: whatever reception may be given my narrative by the public, I know that it has been written ...
— Mizora: A Prophecy - A MSS. Found Among the Private Papers of the Princess Vera Zarovitch • Mary E. Bradley

... American. "They've all got to be there, according to my notions, and come crowding after me. I run as I never ran before, straight for the narrow way here, dash through, making for the old camp, and they tear away to cut me off before I can get under cover of our marksmen. But all at once I dodge in among the stones and begin to climb up to the terraces, get up to the top step-way in the square pit, and loosen out the stones there, after blocking the place below. One of these two bits of work is bound to ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn

... goodnatured man, whose generous heart wanted to punish himself alone for the error of this marriage, which weighed so heavily on husband and wife; and, in order to procure peace to both, he resolved to become an exile, to tear away pitilessly the attractive ties which society, friends, and women, had woven around him. If he could not be a good husband, he might at least be a good soldier; and, whereas his heart could not adopt the resolution ...
— The Empress Josephine • Louise Muhlbach

... wild search for the thing that had stung him, and which he fancied he felt boring its way still farther down his back. Julian Ives took his hand from his hip and slapped it against his breast, where a red-hot lance seemed to have been driven with torturing suddenness. Then he began to tear away his beautiful necktie and to recklessly rumple his ...
— Frank Merriwell's Reward • Burt L. Standish

... "where man may be found, and how he may be known; his flesh is surely the natural food of a vulture. Why have you never brought a man in your talons to the nest?" "He is too bulky," said the mother; "when we find a man, we can only tear away his flesh, and leave his bones upon the ground." "Since man is so big," said the young ones, "how do you kill him? You are afraid of the wolf and of the bear, by what power are vultures superior to man? ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson

... thus lightly masked, stood the more formidable safe door itself. Durkin drew in a sharp breath of relief as he looked at it with critical eyes. It was not quite the sort of thing he had expected. If it had been a combination lock he had intended to tear away the woodwork covering it, pad the floor with the bed mattress, and then pry it over on its face, to chisel away the cement that he knew would lie under its vulnerable sheet-iron bottom. But it was an ordinary, old-fashioned lock and key "Mennlicher," ...
— Phantom Wires - A Novel • Arthur Stringer

... night that followed Mary slept little. She was engaged in trying to loosen and tear away those tendrils of the heart that had begun to climb and spread more than she knew. Toward the early dawn it seemed to her she heard slight sounds in her mother's room. But ...
— The Case of Richard Meynell • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... flames reached the powder, the nine sick men must infallibly be blown up, and returning to the charge, he dashed forward, with eyes shut, through the midst, and with face, hands, hair, and clothes singed and burnt, he made his way to the magazine, in time to tear away, and throw to a distance from the powder, the mass of paper in which the cartridges were packed, which was just about to ignite, and appearing at the window, with loud shouts for water, thus showed the possibility ...
— A Book of Golden Deeds • Charlotte M. Yonge

... saw at the end of his troubles that which you can as well imagine as he did; so played he his share of the game manfully, taking cheerfully the punishment bestowed upon him. By so much hustling about, scuffling, and struggling he managed at last to tear away a sleeve, to slit a petticoat, until he was able to place his hand upon his own property. This bold endeavour brought Madame to her feet and drawing the king's dagger, "What would you with ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 1 • Honore de Balzac

... tokens that pointed to me. Some unknown instigation was at work within him, to tear away his remnant of humanity and fit him for the office of my murderer. I knew not how the accumulation of guilt could contribute to his gratification or security. His actions had been partially exhibited and vaguely seen. What extenuations or omissions had vitiated his former or recent ...
— Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 • Charles Brockden Brown

... resentment in the poise of her white shoulders as Ransom's voice came to them in a loud laugh from behind the palms; her red lips showed disdain and anger. She hated Ransom for breaking in; she despised Philip for allowing the interruption to tear away her triumph. Her own betrayal of herself was like tonic to Philip. He laughed joyously when he was alone out in the cool night air. Ransom never knew why Philip hunted him out and shook his fat hand ...
— Flower of the North • James Oliver Curwood

... Blind Girl, tortured, as it seemed, almost beyond endurance, 'why did you ever do this! Why did you ever fill my heart so full, and then come in like Death, and tear away the objects of my love! O Heaven, how blind I am! How helpless ...
— The Cricket on the Hearth • Charles Dickens

... wrenched the secret from my heart in agony and with fear. I have told all: though things which I believe are fiends have started forth from the grim walls around to forbid it; though dark wings have swept by me, and talons, as of a bird, have attempted to tear away the paper on which I write; though eyes, whose light was never drunk from earth, have glared on me; and mocking voices and horrible laughter have made my flesh creep, and thrilled through the marrow of my bones,—I have told all; ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... shown, all lies have some truth in them. That is why they kick, and struggle, and die so hard. Now, take the truth, tear away the lies patched about it, tell it all, and you have quenched that particular lie that worried you, do you not see? and every lie that roots itself in that given truth, or lives on its distortion. Declare your one truth convincingly, clearly, warmly as if you loved it, and the work ...
— Continental Monthly, Volume 5, Issue 4 • Various



Words linked to "Tear away" :   tear off, remove, take away, take, withdraw



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