"Affirm" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... intend to twist the meaning of the substantive verb, and to say that merely to be is to do something,—that simply to exist is a certain form of exertion and action,—I shall grant, of course, that nothing whatever that exists is in that sense inert; but I shall affirm that you use the word inert in quite a different sense from the usual one. And in that extreme and non-natural sense of the word, the phenomenon is no more inert than is the essence. Certainly things seem to us to be: and if just to be is to be ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd
... brethren—to those persons, I mean, who are entering the profession of Literature. To begin with, I entirely agree with Mr. Grant Allen in his recent avowal that Literature is the poorest and least satisfactory of all professions; I will go even further, and affirm that it is one of the least ennobling. With a fairly extensive knowledge of the writers of my own period, I can honestly say that I have scarcely met one individual who has not deteriorated morally by the pursuit of literary ...
— The Idler Magazine, Vol III. May 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... already branded it as hostile to reason and knowledge, although theologians have sought to maintain that Almighty God has made the earth with all that is in it and upon it, just as it now exists, and have even gone so far as to affirm in opposition to the effect of geological discoveries, that God himself had created or deposited the fossil remains of animals found under the bed of the Euphrates (the spot where paradise is said to have been) exactly there ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, August 1887 - Volume 1, Number 7 • Various
... individual—the real, deep, personal, hidden, unseen, inner life of a human soul—is a wonderfully delicate thing, to be touched by another only with the profoundest love and deepest wisdom. Hence I have little to say about one's own inner struggles, except to affirm and reaffirm that wisdom, sanity, and religion itself are all against worrying about it. Study religion, consider it, accept it, follow it, earnestly, seriously, and constantly, but do it in a rational manner, seeking the essentials, accepting them and then ...
— Quit Your Worrying! • George Wharton James
... be dejected. But I will return from my digression. We must keep our boys, as I said, from association with all bad men, but especially from flatterers. For, as I have often said to parents, and still say, and will constantly affirm, there is no race more pestilential, nor more sure to ruin youths swiftly, than the race of flatterers, who destroy both parents and sons root and branch, making the old age of the one and the youth of the others ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... the Philippines affirm that the islands are, in many respects, Spain's best possessions, due to the abundance and variety of products, numerous and good ports, character of inhabitants, and on account of the vicinity of certain countries of eastern ...
— The Story of the Philippines and Our New Possessions, • Murat Halstead
... the purple, chose this island for his residence. Many authors affirm that his wife Helena was a Briton. It is more certain that his son Constantine the Great was born here, and enabled to succeed his father principally by the helps which ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... what befell her!" The old soldier looked as if he could annihilate the Intendant with the lightning of his eyes. "I affirm and will maintain that no saint in heaven was holier in her purity than she was in her fall! Chevalier Bigot, it is for you to answer these despatches! This is your work! If Caroline de St. Castin be lost, you know ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... disquiets, we are threatened with an invasion from the island of Blefuscu, which is the other great empire of the universe, almost as large and powerful as this of his majesty. For as to what we have heard you affirm, that there are other kingdoms and states in the world inhabited by human creatures as large as yourself, our philosophers are in much doubt, and would rather conjecture that you dropped from the moon, or one of the stars; because it is certain, ...
— Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift
... least, that their forefathers were intimately connected. If we may apply this inference to nations likewise, regardless of the distance that to-day separates the countries where they live, I can then affirm that the Mayas and the Egyptians are either of a common descent, or that very intimate communication must have existed in ...
— Vestiges of the Mayas • Augustus Le Plongeon
... Calais and Boulogne, we began to perceive the peculiarities of the husbandry of this part of France. These are just what were described by Arthur Young; and although it is possible, as the natives uniformly affirm, that the agriculture has improved since the revolution, this improvement must be in the details of the operations, and in the extent of land under tillage, not in the principles of the art. The most striking to the eye of ...
— Travels in France during the years 1814-1815 • Archibald Alison
... island I weighed twelve stone six pounds. When I was weighed at Dover, on my voyage home, I drew the beam at thirteen stone eight pounds; so I was not starved. I was as tough as whit-leather, and as strong as a horse, as we say in Norfolk. With this experience, therefore, I must certainly affirm that a diet of farinaceous food, fruit, vegetables, and fish, will not only give a man good health, but a clear brain, a strong body to perform heavy work, and staying power whenever anything unusual has to be endured or undertaken. ...
— Jethou - or Crusoe Life in the Channel Isles • E. R. Suffling
... Beside these absurd contradictions, there is another remarkable fact, which must not be passed over; it is this:—the pistol found by Rey is of antique form, and the original owner of it has been found. He is a curiosity-merchant at Lyons; and, though he cannot affirm that Peytel was the person who bought this pistol of him, he perfectly recognizes Peytel as having been a frequent customer ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... affirm how necessary, in my opinion, is some kind of fixed recognition for every form of sexual relationship between a woman and a man, so that there may be an accepted standard of conduct for the partners entering into them. Regulation ...
— Women's Wild Oats - Essays on the Re-fixing of Moral Standards • C. Gasquoine Hartley
... the beginning of her confinement with scarcely any intermission. I was with her for the four last days of her life, and though I have had but little experience in scenes of this sort, yet I can confidently affirm that my imagination could never have pictured to me a mind so tranquil, under affliction so great. She was all kindness and attention, and cheerfully complied with everything that was recommended to her by her friends. ...
— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... two houses have assembled in their respective chambers, some person designated for that purpose administers to the members of each house the oath of office, in which they solemnly swear (or affirm,) that they will support the constitution of the United States, and the constitution of the state, and faithfully discharge the duties of ...
— The Government Class Book • Andrew W. Young
... other nations? If we consult Sir Thomas Munro, the eminent Governor of Madras, and the powerful advocate of the Ryotwar settlements, he tells us in so many words:[23] "I have had ample opportunity of observing the Hindus in every situation, and I can affirm, ...
— India: What can it teach us? - A Course of Lectures Delivered before the University Of Cambridge • F. Max Mueller
... its best to destroy individuality, the essence of which is sincerity of expression, it also does its best to foster individualism, by appealing, with its offer of prizes and other "distinctions," to those instincts which predispose each one of us to affirm and exalt that narrow, commonplace, superficial aspect of his being which he miscalls ...
— What Is and What Might Be - A Study of Education in General and Elementary Education in Particular • Edmond Holmes
... Thus, reflecting that the understanding of our soul is the eye of the owl, I find the soul's repose only in ignorance. For it is better both for the Catholic Faith and for Philosophic Faith to confess our blindness, than to affirm as evident what does not afford our mind the contentment which self-evidence gives. I do not accuse of presumption, on that account, all the learned men who [101] stammeringly have endeavoured to suggest, as far as in them lay, the immobility and the sovereign and eternal efficacy of the ...
— Theodicy - Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom of Man and the Origin of Evil • G. W. Leibniz
... certain footprints are to be taken as unquestionable evidence of the existence of birds, they are not known to occur in rocks earlier than the Trias, while indubitable remains of birds are to be met with only much later. Hence it follows that natural science does not "affirm" the statement that birds were made on the fifth day, and "everything that creepeth on the ground" on the sixth, on which Mr. Gladstone rests his order; for, as is shown by Leviticus, the "Mosaic writer" includes lizards among his ...
— Mr. Gladstone and Genesis - Essay #5 from "Science and Hebrew Tradition" • Thomas Henry Huxley
... God, that's cared for; our Hope and Fortune is escaped, so all news affirm, escaped from Bristol—if I thought otherwise, Albert, I should be as sad as you are. For the rest of it, I have lurked a month in this house when discovery would have been death, and that is no longer since than after Lord Holland ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott
... ascendency, and bent on getting the full product of their labor—would seek further to improve their vantage ground. Sooner or later they would inevitably make issue of the most urgent, the most persistent, economic evil, local as well as general, the inequality of rights in the land. They would affirm that, were the land of the community in use suitable to the general needs, the unemployed would find work and the total of production be largely increased. They would point to the vacant lots in and about the city, held on speculation, ...
— Direct Legislation by the Citizenship through the Initiative and Referendum • James W. Sullivan
... themselves. Both are complicated and artificial—both, perhaps, equally so. In contrast, however, to the more speculative and transcendental points, suggestive of recent development, there are others indicative of great antiquity. Nevertheless, it is as difficult to affirm that the primitive parts of the one creed are older than the most primitive parts of the other, as it is to affirm that the ...
— The Ethnology of the British Colonies and Dependencies • Robert Gordon Latham
... before Don John came to be L. there, hoping also to be so, when he and all his brood (my Lady his daughter and all) should be gone. At the hearing of this speech, the wasp got my brother by the nose, which made him in his rage to affirm, that he would be L. of Fulham as long as he lived in despite of all England. Nay, soft there, quoth M. Madox, except her Majesty. I pray you, that is my meaning, call dumb John, and I tell thee Madox that thou art but a Jack to use me so: Master Madox replying, said that ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury
... unbelief, the Bible was my favorite book, and the Psalms my adoration; and most truly can I affirm that my mental attitude has ever been one of ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al
... the long process of God's self-manifestation to Israel is that, while it emphasises all that nature and history affirm of Him, it sets Him forth as restoring the weak, as well as sustaining the strong. The sad contrast between the untroubled and unwearied strength of the calm heavens and the soon-exhausted strength of struggling and often beaten men strikes the poet prophet's sensitive ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... exact as that demanded by belief. To deny the unknowable is as impossible as to affirm it. If it be true that man knows too much to believe in miracles these days, it is just as true that he does not know enough to disbelieve in them. And, after all, there is no reason why anyone should believe in miracles; neither is there ...
— Their Yesterdays • Harold Bell Wright
... not a good man; so do you, I will venture to say, Claudia. And I know that he marries you for some selfish or mercenary motive—your money, possibly. And so also do you know it, Claudia, I dare to affirm." ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... of Enquiry came to the following conclusion on this point: "This allegation is false, and those who put it forward have been powerless to give it the appearance of truth, even though it has been their custom to fire shots in the neighbourhood of dwellings, in order to be able to affirm that they have been attacked by innocent inhabitants, on whose ruin or massacre ...
— Their Crimes • Various
... "I am bound to believe what I cannot disprove, and what you so solemnly affirm. If there be no truth in your words, you may yet repent having so solemnly sworn; but whether true or false, I can never repent doing you ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume VI • Various
... own words); it is one which, had it been less ingenious, I could hardly believe to have proceeded from so great a man. Indeed, I am lost in wonder, that a philosopher, who had stoutly asserted, that he would draw no conclusions which do not follow from self-evident premisses, and would affirm nothing which he did not clearly and distinctly perceive, and who had so often taken to task the scholastics for wishing to explain obscurities through occult qualities, could maintain a hypothesis, beside which occult qualities ...
— Ethica Ordine Geometrico Demonstrata - Part I: Concerning God • Benedict de Spinoza
... not be an infinite being. I neither affirm nor deny. I am honest enough to say that I do not know. I am candid enough to admit that the question is beyond the limitations of my mind. Yet I think I know as much on that subject as any human being knows or ever ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll - Latest • Robert Green Ingersoll
... phenomena, and so clearly indicative of the care and discrimination with which the various observations were made, that there seems no good reason, unless we find such in the nature of the phenomena themselves, for refusing to give it credence. Several of the writers expressly affirm the accuracy of M. Hebert's narrative, and all of them, by the details they furnish, corroborate it. Mainly from that narrative, aided by some of the observations of M. de Faremont, I compile the following brief statement of the chief facts ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 83, September, 1864 • Various
... to apply a test whereby a true species may be known from a mere variety? Is there no criterion of species? Great authorities affirm that there is—that the unions of members of the same species are always fertile, while those of distinct species are either sterile, or their offspring, called hybrids, are so. It is affirmed not only that this is an ...
— The Darwinian Hypothesis • Thomas H. Huxley
... make no better start than by assuring them of the truth that Emerson expresses when he defines the true scholar as the man who remains firm in his belief that a popgun is only a popgun although the ancient and honored of earth may solemnly affirm it to be the ...
— Craftsmanship in Teaching • William Chandler Bagley
... I venture, therefore, to affirm that, on the theory of the upward growth of the corals during the sinking of the land, all the leading features of those wonderful structures, the lagoon-islands or atolls, as well as the no less wonderful barrier-reefs, whether encircling small islands, or ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various
... will believe that we are being drawn together by sharing these hardships. Well, yes. In a way. And yet I don't feel easy about it. We are quite in sympathy, but there is a difference in our point of view. Mine, I affirm, is the nobler. I economize, although I loathe it; while she, I am convinced, is beginning to like it. I don't mean to say that she does it on purpose, but that phrase may give you an idea what I mean. I sometimes wonder wistfully if the hand ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, January 10, 1917 • Various
... Pottawattomie,—this much I knew even in that hasty shrouded glance. Writers of history affirm my opponent was Peesotum, the same fierce warrior whose cruel hand slew the brave Captain Wells and wrenched his still beating heart from out the mutilated body. All I realized then were his broad sinewy shoulders, his ...
— When Wilderness Was King - A Tale of the Illinois Country • Randall Parrish
... places whence ships depart and those they touch at, many persons affirm that the navigation is performed in the following order: Most of the Chinese ships take in their cargoes at Siraff[7], where also they ship their goods which come from Basra, Oman, and other ports; and this is done because there ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... in Vienna (1311) reaffirmed the denunciations of previous popes and councils, and then adds: "If any shall obstinately persist in the error of presuming to affirm that the taking of usury is not a sin, we decree that he shall ...
— Usury - A Scriptural, Ethical and Economic View • Calvin Elliott
... was making this statement to the people of Amiens, I believe, and I have ever since been trying to understand what he meant: "There is no patriotism without agriculture!" Well, I have just discovered his meaning, and I affirm in my turn that there is no love without a mustache. When you say it that way it sounds comical, does ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... consent to be called, because Fourier is only one among the great teachers of mankind; because many of his assertions are concerning spheres of thought which exceed our present ability to test, and of which it would be presumption for us to affirm with confidence; and because we regard this as a holy and providential movement, independent of every merely individual influence or guidance, the sure and gradual evolving of man's great unitary destiny ...
— Brook Farm • John Thomas Codman
... would teach "all the churches, that it is he who searcheth the reins and hearts,"—demonstrating his divine omniscience.—"But unto you I say." Where now is to be discovered, in this address of the Saviour, that "presiding minister," or diocesan bishop, whom the anti-christian prelates affirm our Lord addresses in all these epistles? "And unto the rest in Thyatira,"—still no prelate addressed; but those laborious and patient ones previously commended, who "had not known the depths of Satan." Those deceivers pretended to instruct their deluded followers in the "deep ...
— Notes On The Apocalypse • David Steele
... right of secession, the writer has not the impudence to express—and scarcely to entertain—an opinion. That is a question for American lawyers and publicists to discuss and determine; the obfuscated British mind being entitled to affirm only this: that there seems to have been something to say on the Southern side of the question, as well as a good deal on the Northern. The writer apprehends that the abstract right of insurrection on the one hand, and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various
... went on to affirm, That the Reduction of the Prices of our Manufactures by the Addition of so many new Hands, would be no Inconvenience to any Man: But observing I was something startled at the Assertion, he made a short Pause, and then ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele
... this opinion of Paracelsus, perhaps it will not be impertinent if, before I proceed, I acquaint your Lordship with a conceit of that deservedly famous mechanician and Chymist, Cornelius Drebel, who, among other strange things that he perform'd, is affirm'd, by more than a few credible persons, to have contrived for the late learned King James, a vessel to go under water; of which, trial was made in the Thames, with admired success, the vessel carrying twelve rowers, besides passengers; one which is yet ...
— Aircraft and Submarines - The Story of the Invention, Development, and Present-Day - Uses of War's Newest Weapons • Willis J. Abbot
... Island began less than two leagues from the mouth of the strait, if more it was only a little more. The coast of the island then turned north close to that of Spain, and was joined to the island of Cadiz or Gadiz, or Caliz, as it is now called. I affirm this for two reasons, one by authority and the other by conjectural demonstration. The authority is that Plato in his Critias, telling how Neptune distributed the sovereignty of the island among his ten sons, said that the second son was called ...
— History of the Incas • Pedro Sarmiento de Gamboa
... cannot understand the language of the next. Malay, being most easy to pronounce, is most common. From the variety of languages it is inferred that these islands have been populated by different nations. Antiquity, and the art of navigating in those districts, is ascribed to the Chinese. Others affirm that the Malucos are descended from the Javanese, who, attracted by the sweetness of the odors wafted by the spices, stopped at Maluco. They took a cargo of cloves, which until then were unknown, and, continuing to trade in these, ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XVI, 1609 • H.E. Blair
... moreover affirm that our wisdom itself, and wisest consultations, for the most part commit themselves to ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... under the law of nations. The territory of the United States must be regarded as sacredly secure against all such invasions until they shall voluntarily acknowledge their inability to acquit themselves of their duties to others. And in announcing this sentiment I do but affirm a principle which no nation on earth would be more ready to vindicate at all hazards than the people and Government of Great Britain. If upon a full investigation of all the facts it shall appear that ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... cessation of arms for the space of two years, the Romans themselves soon furnished them with a pretense, by making proclamation, out of some jealousy or slanderous report, in the midst of the spectacles, that all the Volscians who had come to see them should depart the city before sunset. Some affirm that this was a contrivance of Marcius, who sent a man privately to the consuls, falsely to accuse the Volscians of intending to fall upon the Romans during the games, and to set the city on fire. ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... Great Stone Face became one to him. When the toil of the day was over, he would gaze at it for hours, until he began to imagine that those vast features recognized him, and gave him a smile of kindness and encouragement, responsive to his own look of veneration. We must not take upon us to affirm that this was a mistake, although the Face may have looked no more kindly at Ernest than at all the world besides. But the secret was, that the boy's tender and confiding simplicity discerned what other people could not ...
— Short Stories Old and New • Selected and Edited by C. Alphonso Smith
... Italian, lie deep in Lido sand, waved over with wild grass and poppies. I would fain believe that no neglect, but rather the fashion of this folk, had left the monuments of generations to be thus resumed by nature. Yet, knowing nothing of the history of this burial-ground, I dare not affirm so much. There is one outlying piece of the cemetery which seems to contradict my charitable interpretation. It is not far from San Nicoletto. No enclosure marks it from the unconsecrated dunes. Acacia-trees sprout amid the monuments, and break the tablets with their thorny shoots ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... read the passages of Scripture referred to in this charge. He did not, he said, affirm that woman had no work in the church. She had a great and glorious sphere; she had no right to teach and speak in public meetings, but she could teach children and ignorant men in private. He would not ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... possess, were I to obtrude the details of my own personal and private affairs upon the public. And I offer to those who have so interpreted me a declaration which I trust may relieve them from all responsibility of this kind in future; I hereby declare, asseverate, affirm, and whatever else means to swear, that I never have offered and never intend to offer any history whatever of my personal experience, social, literary, or emotional, to the readers of any magazine, newspaper, novel, or correspondence whatever. Nor is there any one human being who ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 5, No. 28, February, 1860 • Various
... curing the monarch, told him that his one chance of recovery lay in bathing in the fresh blood of a newborn child, and eating its heart just as it was taken out of the body. That the king adopted this horrible remedy we are left to doubt, but of Louis XI of France, several chroniclers affirm that he went even farther than the others, and, in order to become rejuvenated, drank large quantities of the blood of young children. In all these cases the character of the child as fetich seems to ...
— The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought • Alexander F. Chamberlain
... improbable, but I have been so completely deceived, even by daylight, that I dare not affirm that it would prove impossible. Your counterfeit is certainly ...
— The Case and The Girl • Randall Parrish
... the planet around the light. Friends, the present hour in which I am addressing you, is a gloomy hour; but these are terrible purchases of the future. A revolution is a toll. Oh! the human race will be delivered, raised up, consoled! We affirm it on this barrier. Whence should proceed that cry of love, if not from the heights of sacrifice? Oh my brothers, this is the point of junction, of those who think and of those who suffer; this barricade is not made of paving-stones, ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... saving money, they are industrious and thrifty. I wish these facts could be given to the world to show the rich what the poor have done for suffering Ireland, and especially that the Irish landlords might be made aware of what their former tenants are doing for their present ones. I can affirm on my own responsibility that the amount stated is not exaggerated, and also that from Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and New Orleans, similar remittances are made, though not to the same amount.' With regard to the feeling in America upon the calamity under which the Irish people are ...
— Facts for the Kind-Hearted of England! - As to the Wretchedness of the Irish Peasantry, and the Means for their Regeneration • Jasper W. Rogers
... weeks to round the cape that marked their way to India. But Sir Francis Drake, who passed it coming home westward from his ever-famous voyage round the world, had a more auspicious experience: "We ran hard aboard the Cape, finding the report of the Portuguese to be most false, who affirm that it is the most dangerous cape of the world, never without intolerable storms and present danger to travellers who come near the same. This cape is a most stately thing, and the finest cape we saw in the ...
— Impressions of South Africa • James Bryce
... cavities, scarlet fever germs, adenoids, cross-eyes, uncleanliness, broken legs, inflamed eyes, overeating. The organic, structural defects which are to be sought by physical examination are all admitted by mental hygienists. They work for an orderly, daily routine and affirm the penalties of its violation. They would even favor going periodically to a physician, provided that we never go to him except when organic or structural disorders may safely be assumed from the fact that cheer and relaxation treatment does not give relief. Unhygienic living and mind cure ...
— Civics and Health • William H. Allen
... he replied, "dare you affirm that your frigate would not as soon have pursued and cannonaded a submarine boat ...
— Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea • Jules Verne
... women of Boston affirm," continued he, "that after he has once got possession of a person's face and figure, he may paint him in any act or situation whatever,—and the picture will be ...
— The Prophetic Pictures (From "Twice Told Tales") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... however, able to affirm that the interior is all one immense elevated plateau. Information which I obtained from an elderly missionary at Hopedale, together with numerous indications that an intelligent naturalist would know how to construe, enabled P—— ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 91, May, 1865 • Various
... patient sitter vacated her post, and he flew down to the nest. The top was hidden by leaves, so that I cannot positively affirm that he sat on the eggs, but it is certain that he remained perfectly silent and motionless there for forty-five minutes. Then I caught sight of Madam returning. She came in from the woods, behind and at the level of the nest; there was ...
— Little Brothers of the Air • Olive Thorne Miller
... say there is no will power in the East, for there is. Nor do I say there is no weak yielding to fate in lands that have the doctrine of the Creator, for there is. But, putting the East and West side by side, one need not hesitate to affirm that the reason the will power of the East is weak cannot be fully explained by any mere doctrine of environment, but must also have some vital connection with the fact that the idea of a personal almighty ...
— The Religions of Japan - From the Dawn of History to the Era of Meiji • William Elliot Griffis
... project has permitted its promoter to affirm that in a few months, and with nine millions, he ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 455, September 20, 1884 • Various
... caricature of Brook Farm. Just as the fanatic is the caricature of the true reformer, so was Alcott the caricature of Ripley. This is not meant as disparaging either Alcott's sincerity or his intelligence, but to affirm that he lacked judgment, that he miscalculated means and ends, that he jumped from theory to practice without a moment's interval, preferred to be guided by instinct rather than by processes of reasoning, and deemed this to be ...
— Life of Father Hecker • Walter Elliott
... but there is a sufficient reason for believing that they will know it in their turn in a few centuries. In the meantime, it has made marvellous progress among us, especially in those great armies composed of honest well-disciplined hirelings, who decide the destiny of states; for we may safely affirm that when an army of thirty thousand men fights another of an equal number, there are about twenty thousand of ...
— Candide • Voltaire
... lips when the thought came to her that perhaps just here lay a sure way to prove to this man before her that there was, indeed, no need for him to teach her, to save her, or yet to sympathize with her. She could not affirm, of course; but she ...
— Miss Billy Married • Eleanor H. Porter
... bucket or a pump. Are these too low?—then find out grander, Call my LORD CUTTS a Salamander.[3] 'Tis well;—but since we live among Detractors with an evil tongue, Who may object against the term, Pliny shall prove what we affirm: Pliny shall prove, and we'll apply, And I'll be judg'd by standers by. First, then, our author has defined This reptile of the serpent kind, With gaudy coat, and shining train; But loathsome spots his body stain: Out from some hole obscure he flies, When rains descend, and tempests ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift
... Martin did divine this. Perhaps he was a mere trimmer, a rank side-stepper, steeped in deceit and ever ready to mouth the abominable phrase "political expediency." It were rash to affirm this, for no analyst has ever fathomed the heart of a man who has come to his late forties a bachelor by choice. One may but guess ...
— The Sturdy Oak - A Composite Novel of American Politics by Fourteen American Authors • Samuel Merwin, et al.
... fresh and uninjured to a remote period of life, constitutes one of the loftiest prerogatives of genius. If this be true, and I am not disposed to dispute it—what a gifted people must be the worthy inhabitants of Dublin; for I scruple not to affirm, that of all cities of which we have any record in history, sacred or profane, there is not one so little likely to disturb the tranquil current of such reminiscences. "As it was of old, so is it now," enjoying a delightful permanency in all its habits and customs, ...
— The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer, Complete • Charles James Lever (1806-1872)
... examinations of the uterus, or as being unappreciative of the aid afforded in such investigations by the speculum, and the beneficial effects of local applications made directly to the womb through that instrument. What we affirm is, that such examinations and applications are, in the practice of most modern physicians, made unnecessarily frequent, resulting many times in lasting injury to ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce
... radiates assurance, and imparts to others confidence that he can do the thing he attempts. As time goes on, he is reenforced not only by the power of his own thought, but also by that of all who know him. His friends and acquaintances affirm and reaffirm his ability to succeed, and make each successive triumph easier of achievement than its predecessor. His self-poise, assurance, confidence, and ability increase in a direct ratio to the number of his achievements. As the savage Indian thought ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... tending to make you conceited: to encourage in you a belief that you can do things, when it were better that you merely admired. Well I would not dishearten you by telling to what a shred of conceit, even of hope, a man can be reduced after twenty-odd years of the discipline. But I can, and do, affirm that the farther you penetrate in these discoveries the more sacred the ultimate mystery will become for you: that the better you understand the great authors as exemplars of practice, the more certainly you will realise what is ...
— On the Art of Writing - Lectures delivered in the University of Cambridge 1913-1914 • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... civilization is deep under our feet: but not six hundred years deep. The primitive fires still smoke on our Mexican borders and in the Balkans. And blow holes open from time to time through our own seemingly solid crust—in Colorado, in West Virginia, in the Copper Country. It is evidently premature to affirm that the security of property has ...
— The Unpopular Review, Volume II Number 3 • Various
... scale and approach the border land where botanist and zoologist meet on a common ground. Sea-anemones are fixed to the rock on which they grow, while some of the lower plants are able to move from place to place, and it is hardly safe to affirm that a jelly-fish is more conscious of its actions than is a Sensitive Plant, the leaves of which close when the ...
— Outlines of Lessons in Botany, Part I; From Seed to Leaf • Jane H. Newell
... of all that have occurred in the state within my memory, in which there was not certain to be some form of constitution remaining, whichever of the two sides prevailed. In this war, if we are victorious, I should not find it easy to affirm what kind of constitution we are likely to have; if we are conquered, there will certainly never be any. 1 therefore proposed severe measures against Antony, and severe ones also against Lepidus, and not so much out of revenge as in order that I might for the present prevent unprincipled ...
— Letters of Cicero • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... they have already, out of their own number and others, a Council of State, And, although it may seem strange at first hearing, by reason that men's minds are prepossessed with the conceit of successive Parliaments, I affirm that the GRAND OR GENERAL COUNCIL, being well chosen, should sit perpetual: for so their business is, and they will become thereby skilfullest, best acquainted with the people, and the people with them. The Ship of the Commonwealth ...
— The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 • David Masson
... commonly said that a sugar planter expects that the rum and the molasses should defray the whole expense of his cultivation, and that his sugar should be all clear profit. If this be true, for I pretend not to affirm it, it is as if a corn farmer expected to defray the expense of his cultivation with the chaff and the straw, and that the grain should be all clear profit. We see frequently societies of merchants in London, and other trading towns, purchase waste lands in our sugar ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... thousand times more terrible than the struggle for life, that gives its tone, colour, and character to our society, in which the medieval faith in the immortal soul is passing away. Each one seeks to affirm himself, if only ...
— Tragic Sense Of Life • Miguel de Unamuno
... Crusoe," we read, "do affirm that the story, though allegorical, is also historical, and that it is the beautiful representation of a life of unexampled misfortune, and of a variety not to be ...
— Vanishing Roads and Other Essays • Richard Le Gallienne
... the remembering of former good things (as they affirm) be that which most contributes to a pleasurable living, not one of us will then credit Epicurus when he, tells us that, while he was dying away in the midst of the strongest agonies and distempers, he yet bore himself up with the memory of the pleasures he formerly enjoyed. ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch
... training was of the briefest, perhaps fortunately, for though my way of life has made me acquainted with all sorts and conditions of men, from the highest to the lowest, I deliberately affirm that the society I fell into at school was the worst I have ever known. We boys were average lads, with much the same inherent capacity for good and evil as any others; but the people who were set over ...
— Autobiography and Selected Essays • Thomas Henry Huxley
... believed that the creed was the all-important thing; that God would send to hell those who entertained wrong notions of his scheme of salvation. "We utterly abhor," says the Scots' Confession of 1560, "the blasphemy of those that affirm that men who live according to equity and justice shall be saved, what religion so ever they ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... on the other hand, affirm that the castle at Oxford was built by Robert D'Oiley, who came into England with William the Conqueror; and the Chronicles of Osney Abbey, preserved in the Cottonian library, even ascertain the precise date of this great baron's undertaking, viz. A.D. 1071. No question, therefore, can remain, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, - Vol. 12, Issue 328, August 23, 1828 • Various
... this picture almost everywhere. I do not affirm that this is the original. But it has always been in the family, and old inventories attribute it to Michael-Angelo. That is all I ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... of these roles with success, and my forlorn and disreputable appearance would doubtless secure for me at least two tincupfuls of soup; but what I longed for most was coffee, and that beverage was not to be had in the Cuban soup-kitchen. I resolved, therefore, to go to the pier, affirm with uplifted hand that I was not suffering from yellow fever, typhus fever, remittent fever, malarial fever, pernicious fever, cholera, or smallpox, and beg somebody to lower to me over the ship's side a cup of coffee in an old tomato-can and a mutton-chop at ...
— Campaigning in Cuba • George Kennan
... being! If we accept, affirm, profoundly rest in what is presented to us, we have the first condition of that repose which is the essence of the aesthetic experience. And from this highest demand can be viewed the hierarchy of the lesser perfections ...
— The Psychology of Beauty • Ethel D. Puffer
... that a Fable ask's, to render it compleat, is a Moral Result. I need not trouble you with a Proof of a Moral's being necessary; 'tis plain that every Poem should be made as perfect as 'tis capable of being, and no one will ever affirm a Moral to be unnatural in Pastoral. But if any one should demand a Proof, 'tis thus: Poetry aim's at two Ends, Pleasure and Profit; but Pastoral will not admit of direct Instructions; therefore it must contain a Moral, or lose one End, which is Profit. We might as easy show that the other ...
— A Full Enquiry into the Nature of the Pastoral (1717) • Thomas Purney
... that each will be held strictly to the following schedule: Affirmative, 4 min., first. Negative, 4 min., first. Affirm, 2 min., second. Neg., ...
— Ramsey Milholland • Booth Tarkington
... believe that the engineer's apprehensions would not be justified, and that the presence of this vessel in the vicinity of the island was fraught with no danger. Pencroft, after a minute examination, was able positively to affirm that the vessel was rigged as a brig, and that she was standing obliquely towards the coast, on the starboard tack, under her topsails and topgallant-sails. This was confirmed by Ayrton. But by continuing in this direction she must soon disappear behind Claw Cape, as the wind was from the south-west, ...
— The Secret of the Island • W.H.G. Kingston (translation from Jules Verne)
... nails of the fingers, the deep scratches on the chest and throat of Mademoiselle Stangerson show that the wretch who attacked her attempted to commit a frightful crime. The medical experts who examined these traces yesterday affirm that they were made by the same hand as that which left its red imprint on the wall; an enormous hand, Monsieur, much too large to go into my gloves," he added with ...
— The Mystery of the Yellow Room • Gaston Leroux
... science and poetry were as deadly opposites as the shallow often affirm, the method and scheme indicated above would at least make it possible to convey something of the splendour of the long battle for the light in its most human aspect. Poetry has its own precision of expression and, in modern times, ...
— Watchers of the Sky • Alfred Noyes
... ordered the Chancellor to silence him and his adherents on pain of being himself treated as a heretic. The Chancellor fell back on the liberties of the University, and appointed as preacher another Wyclifite, Repyngdon, who did not hesitate to style the Lollards "holy priests," and to affirm that they were protected by John of Gaunt. Party spirit meanwhile ran high among the students. The bulk of them sided with the Lollard leaders, and a Carmelite, Peter Stokes, who had procured the Archbishop's letters, cowered panic stricken ...
— History of the English People, Volume II (of 8) - The Charter, 1216-1307; The Parliament, 1307-1400 • John Richard Green
... our authority. I venture to affirm that, in the whole of Italy and Spain, no convent of monks or nuns contains a bath; and that the worst inmate of either would shudder at the idea of observing such a practice in common with the unbeliever. For the washing of the feet ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor
... insatiable activity of his intelligence. The antique symbol of the serpent biting its tail is, above all, applicable to science. It would appear that Claude Frollo had experienced this. Many grave persons affirm that, after having exhausted the fas of human learning, he had dared to penetrate into the nefas. He had, they said, tasted in succession all the apples of the tree of knowledge, and, whether from hunger or disgust, had ended by tasting the forbidden fruit. He had taken his place by turns, ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo
... would grossly misrepresent their countrymen if they were to affirm that their loyalty to their Sovereign would be diminished in the slightest degree by the withdrawal, through the unfriendly action of a foreign Government, of mere commercial privileges, however valuable these might be deemed, they think they cannot err ...
— Canada and the States • Edward William Watkin
... without direct relations with their precursors; for I think no one will seriously pretend that the numerous types of Cycloids and Ctenoids, almost all of which are contemporaneous with one an other, have descended from the Placoids and Ganoids. As well might one affirm that the Mammalia, and man with them, have descended directly from fishes. All these species have a fixed epoch of appearance and disappearance; their existence is even limited to an appointed time. And yet they present, as a whole, numerous ...
— Louis Agassiz: His Life and Correspondence • Louis Agassiz
... wisdom and love, is still not foreign to His own infinite life, but one with it. In the knowledge of the minds that know Him, in the self-surrender of the hearts that love Him, it is no paradox to affirm that He knows and loves Himself. As He is the origin and inspiration of every true thought and pure affection, of every experience in which we forget and rise above ourselves, so is He also of all these the end. If in one point of view religion is the work of man, in another it ...
— Christian Mysticism • William Ralph Inge
... wondering post that very night,—women flitting with it from door to door,—that every vestige of her beauty was gone;—she looked at least a dozen years older. Blake, when questioned, after the first rapture of the home-coming had subsided, would neither affirm nor deny. "She would neither speak to me nor harken," said he, whimsically. "The only thing she showed ...
— A Daughter of the Sioux - A Tale of the Indian frontier • Charles King
... turnips are tending to become men;" who is so ignorant of paleontology, that he can talk of the "flowers and fruits" of the plants of the carboniferous epoch; of comparative anatomy, that he can gravely affirm the poison apparatus of the venomous snakes to be "entirely separate from the ordinary laws of animal life, and peculiar to themselves;" of the rudiments of physiology, that he can ask, "what advantage of ...
— The Reception of the 'Origin of Species' • Thomas Henry Huxley |
