"Compass" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... explorer is impatient to be on his journey. No plan is then too great to be accomplished, no moral height too difficult to be attained. After all that has been said, the rapture of youth, when youth means opportunity, remains unexpressed. No poet will ever entirely compass it, as no poet will ever quite ensnare in speech the measureless joy of those festival mornings in June when Nature seems on the point of speaking in ...
— Essays On Work And Culture • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... taught like them, that the good willed by God in His Commandments was fulfilled in Christians by the simple fact of their belief in Christ, and as the fruit of His word of grace. Thus it came about that this tendency which Luther found represented in Agricola, stood out before him in all its compass and with its extremest and most alarming consequences, and called forth the boldest exercise of his zeal. It grieved him sorely, nevertheless, to have to enter into this dispute with his old friend. ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin
... does not make so much difference how you compass this general historical knowledge, if, in its main features, you do compass it. When Mr. Lincoln went down to Norfolk to see the rebel commissioners, Mr. Hunter, on their side, cited, as a precedent for the action which he wanted the President to pursue, the negotiations between Charles ...
— How To Do It • Edward Everett Hale
... making their way down the precipitous side of the hill to its western foot, struck off, under the lead of the hunter, in a line through the forest, preserving their points of compass, when none of their general landmarks were visible, by noting the peculiar weather-beaten appearance of the mosses on the north sides of the trees, and the usual inclination of the tips of the hemlocks from west to east. And ...
— Gaut Gurley • D. P. Thompson
... the circumstance that the curiosities collected by the county's Archaeological Society are preserved in the castle, Lewes is the museum of Sussex; for she has managed to compress into small compass more objects of antiquarian interest than any town I know. Chichester, which is compact ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... over the pages of this volume, one is struck by his breadth, his versatility, his compass, as evidenced ...
— Five Months at Anzac • Joseph Lievesley Beeston
... very much annoyed by the incursions of a lean ass belonging to his neighbour, resolved to compass the destruction ...
— Cobwebs From an Empty Skull • Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)
... tied in limits: though he be curst to thee, Yet of himself, he is loving to the world, And charitable to the poor; now men, that, As he, love goodness, though in smallest measure, Live without compass of our reach: his cattle And corn I'll kill and mildew; but his life (Until I take him, as I late found thee, Cursing and swearing) I have no power ...
— Discovery of Witches - The Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster • Thomas Potts
... of his deeds reached Norway, where they gave no small trouble of mind to Earl Haakon, who dreaded this young adventurer of royal descent, knowing well how much the people loved King Harold and his race. Haakon went so far as to try to compass his death, sending his friend Thore Klakka to Dublin, where Olaf then was, to kill him if he could, otherwise to entice him to Norway when he would himself ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 9 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality. Scandinavian. • Charles Morris
... so to tell the story as to give a general idea of the cycle, and of primitive heroic Irish life as reflected in that literature, laying the cycle, so far as accessible, under contribution to furnish forth the tale. Within a short compass I would bring before swift modern readers the more striking aspects of a literature so vast and archaic as ...
— The Coming of Cuculain • Standish O'Grady
... information, and so entertaining, that no tourist in Franche-Comte can afford to pass them by. The first, "La Franche-Comte et le pays de Montbeliard," is a succinct and admirably digested little history of the country. Its author, M. Castan, the learned librarian of Besancon, gives, in a small compass, what is not easy to get at elsewhere, enough, indeed, of history for all ordinary purposes. A second and no less admirable compendium of information for travellers in the Jura, is the, so-called, "Lectures ...
— Holidays in Eastern France • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... only get to the top of the house, I may get also to the root of the obstacle. It is a dangerous and an uncertain experiment; but, come what may of it, I will try and find out, if human ingenuity can compass the means, what Doctor Dulcifer's occupation really is, on the other side of ...
— A Rogue's Life • Wilkie Collins
... As, compass'd with a wood of spears around, The lordly lion still maintains his ground; Grins horrible, retires, and turns again; Threats his distended paws, and shakes his mane; He loses while in vain he presses on, Nor will his courage let him dare to run: So Turnus fares, and, ...
— The Aeneid • Virgil
... affection, and even procured Epictetus, whom I studied with much interest. My friend unwillingly let me have my way in this one-sidedness, from which he could not draw me; for, in spite of his varied studies, he did not know how to bring the leading question into a narrow compass. He need only have said to me that in life action is every thing, and that joy and sorrow come of themselves. However, youth should be allowed its own course: it does not stick to false maxims very long; life soon tears or ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... of a more surpassing interest than this. Others, however, must be content with seeking such insight into their native language as may be within the reach of all who, unable to make this the subject of especial research, possessing neither that vast compass of knowledge, nor that immense apparatus of books, not being at liberty to dedicate to it that devotion almost of a life which, followed out to the full, it would require, have yet an intelligent interest in their mother tongue, and desire ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench
... journey about one o'clock this morning, after taking the compass bearings of the principal points within sight on Wrangell Land, and making a hasty collection of the flowering plants on my way. I found one species of poppy, quite showy, and making considerable masses of color on ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 312, December 24, 1881 • Various
... present. When the Mass was done, the King gave the said Lord Granthuse a cup of gold, garnished with pearl. In the midst of the cup was a great piece of unicorn's horn, to my estimation seven inches in compass; and on the cover of the cup a great sapphire." After breakfast the King came into the Quadrangle. "My Lord Prince, also, borne by his Chamberlain, called Master Vaughan, which bade the Lord of Granthuse welcome. Then the King had him and all his company ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... who well knew that part of the country; and, being experienced bushmen themselves, they determined upon taking that course in preference to the more circuitous, though better defined, dray road and townships. With this intention, provided with a descriptive sketch of the country, a pocket compass, and the sagacity and instinct of their black boy, they started for Barra Warra, a station distant about fifty miles; which was centrally situated, and from whence there was a postman's track to Brompton. To reach this point before dark, it was necessary ...
— Fern Vale (Volume 1) - or the Queensland Squatter • Colin Munro
... across Thy pathway thrust? Are there no thorns that compass it about? Nor any stones that Thou wilt deign to trust ...
— Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Jean Ingelow
... within the heart as being of small compass, and this agrees indeed with the individual soul which elsewhere is compared to the point of an awl, but not with Brahman, which is greater than everything.—The reply to this objection has virtually been given before, viz. under I, 2, 7, where it is said that Brahman ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut
... I hate scorn. A soul with no religion— My mother used to say that such a one Was without rudder, anchor, compass—might be Blown everyway with every gust and wreck On any rock; and tho' you are good and gentle, Yet ...
— Becket and other plays • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... in number. The smallest weighs several hundred pounds, while the largest weighs several thousand. The musical range is an octave and a quarter, rather a limited scale, it is true, but the ringer is a thorough musician, and has managed to ring out many an air within this compass, which but for his ingenuity would have been unsuited to these bells. The largest bell, the "Big Ben," and several others, are connected with the clock, and the former strikes the hours, while the rest of this set chime the quarters. Five of the bells, the large ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... bathed face and hands. Carlsen left the cabin. The main room was empty when Rainey entered, but there was a place set at the table. Through the skylight he noted, as he glanced at the telltale compass in the ceiling, that the sun was low ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn
... miles long through the Hoosac Mountains. In the early part of the work the engineers sunk a shaft near the middle 1028 feet deep. Then the question to be settled was where to go so as to meet the approaching excavations from the east and west. A compass could not be relied on under a mountain. The line must be mechanically fixed. A little divergence at the starting-point would become so great, miles away, that the excavations might pass each other without meeting; the grade must also rise toward the central shaft, ...
— Recreations in Astronomy - With Directions for Practical Experiments and Telescopic Work • Henry Warren
... A word of advice would have been worth something to me at that time. Well! I got it: a policeman advised me to move on. He was quite right; what else could I do? I looked up at the sky, and there was my old friend of many a night's watch at sea, the north star. 'All points of the compass are alike to me,' I thought to myself; 'I'll go your way.' Not even the star would keep me company that night. It got behind a cloud, and left me alone in the rain and darkness. I groped my way to a cart-shed, fell asleep, and dreamed of old times, ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins
... is victorious, every refinement of outrage which is within the compass of the German imagination will be inflicted on us in every aspect of our lives. Realize, too, that if the Allies are beaten there will be no spot on the globe where a soul can escape from the domination of this enemy ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... well that this appearance of sunshine was entirely deceptive, and that Selim only professed to believe in his innocence until the day should arrive when the sultan could safely punish his treason. He sought therefore to compass the latter's downfall, and made common cause with his enemies, both internal and external. A conspiracy, hatched between the discontented pachas and the English agents, shortly broke out, and one day, when Ali was presiding at the artillery practice of some French ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - ALI PACHA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... be tedious to detail how Lord Auckland, under evil counsel, gradually boxed the compass from peace to war. The scheme of action embodied in the treaty which, in the early summer of 1838, was concluded between the Anglo-Indian Government, Runjeet Singh, and Shah Soojah, was that Shah Soojah, with a force officered from an Indian army, and paid ...
— The Afghan Wars 1839-42 and 1878-80 • Archibald Forbes
... to stage effect, he would not in the first two acts have stretched the voice through all the tones and intervals of passion, and then demand more thrilling intonations and louder outcries to meet and match the tumult of the storm. This greatest of all tragedies is written beyond the compass of the human voice, and can only be fully represented on that ideal stage, where, instead of hoarse lament and husky indignation, we hear each of us the tones that most impress and affect us, and can command the true degrees of feeling in ...
— The Contemporary Review, January 1883 - Vol 43, No. 1 • Various
... of the planet, the Space Devil's altitude, and the speed of the jet boat. He drew a line between the Space Devil and Polaris, checked it on the astro compass, and reached for the intercom mike. He ran a dry tongue over his lips and ...
— Danger in Deep Space • Carey Rockwell
... engraver's art, perpetuate in a durable form and within a small compass which the eye can embrace at a glance, not only the features of eminent persons, but the dates, brief accounts, and representations (direct or emblematical) of events; they rank, therefore, among the most valuable records of the past, especially when they recall men, deeds, or circumstances ...
— The Medallic History of the United States of America 1776-1876 • J. F. Loubat
... this, prevailed upon him to make Margaret promise to talk with him from her lady's chamber window that night, after Hero was asleep, and also to dress herself in Hero's clothes, the better to deceive Claudio into the belief that it was Hero; for that was the end he meant to compass ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... the thoughts of spirit-stricken fear in souls forecasting Hell, the deep void seems to yawn beyond fear's reach, and higher than sight Rise the walls and roofs that compass it about with ...
— A Century of Roundels • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... picturesque, devil-may-care abandon. It was a lawless draggle of wooden huts and houses, built in crooked lines, wrangling around the boggy shore of the island for a mile or so in the general form of the letter S, without the slightest subordination to the points of the compass or to building laws of any kind. Stumps and logs, like precious monuments, adorned its two streets, each stump and log, on account of the moist climate, moss-grown and tufted with grass and bushes, but muddy on the sides below the limit of the bog-line. The ground in general was ...
— Travels in Alaska • John Muir
... mystical beauty till then unknown in music. He is also entitled to lasting memory on account of his having first discovered the phenomenon of "combination tones," the under resultant which is produced when two tones are sounded together upon the violin, especially in the higher parts of the compass. These tones are the roots of the consonances sounding, and Tartini directed the attention of his pupils to them as a guide to correct intonation in double stops, since they do not occur unless the intonation is pure. He made this important discovery about 1714, ...
— A Popular History of the Art of Music - From the Earliest Times Until the Present • W. S. B. Mathews
... at the mercy of guides who did not know their own country, and when I insisted on following the compass, they threatened, 'no food for five or ten days in that line.' They brought us down to the back or north side of Bangweolo, while I wanted to cross the Chambeze and go round its southern side. So back again southeastward we ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie
... that the Pope's injunctions had much to do with these increasing severities. Beginning in March, 1569, the Parliament of Bordeaux issued a series of decrees condemning a crowd of Protestants to death. The names that appear upon the records within the compass of one year number not less than twelve hundred and seventeen. The victims were taken out of all grades of society—from noblemen, military men, judges, priests and monks, down to humble mechanics and laborers. The lists made out by their enemies prove at least one fact ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... Irtutsk," was the answer. "We are heading north," he went on, as he looked at the compass, "and I think about right to land somewhere near where my brother is confined in ...
— Tom Swift and his Air Glider - or, Seeking the Platinum Treasure • Victor Appleton
... the right wing, when Fabius perceived that the enemy shouted not as loudly as before, nor cast their javelins with as much strength, he commanded the captains of the horsemen to take a compass with their squadrons and fall upon the Samnites in the rear when he should give the signal. This done he bade the legions advance their standards. And when he saw that the enemy were beyond all doubt wearied with fighting, he ...
— Stories From Livy • Alfred Church
... remembered that she had seen two of the most celebrated in that direction playing with a party of young men and boys on the croquet ground, and laughing most uproariously over their defeat. It was all nonsense to try to compass her brain with such an argument as that; she shook her ...
— The Chautauqua Girls At Home • Pansy, AKA Isabella M. Alden
... gained by the mind itself. This is so true that philosophers also say that the knowledge concerning the soul is a principle for the knowledge of separate substances. For by knowing itself, it attains to some knowledge of incorporeal substances, such as is within its compass; not that the knowledge of itself gives it a perfect and absolute knowledge ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... so conceived the case; he was capable of that great-mindedness, and could snatch at times very luminous glances at the broad reflector which the world of fact lying outside our narrow compass holds up for us to see ourselves in when we will. Unhappily, the faculty of laughter, which is due to this gift, was denied him; and having seen, he, like the companion of friend Balsam, could go no farther. For a good wind of ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... merely lying there inert, as a dead fact, in our sterile self. Do we not see this on all sides, examples of life into which all the dignified things have been crammed and all the beautiful ones, and which despite the statues, pictures, poems, and symphonies within its narrow compass, is yet so far from ...
— Laurus Nobilis - Chapters on Art and Life • Vernon Lee
... answer, but when the vessel faded into a hazy mass ahead he started the engine and steered into her eddying wake, which ran far back into the dark. Then after a glance at the compass, he beckoned ...
— Brandon of the Engineers • Harold Bindloss
... every individual germ, the richer will be the harvest in no distant future. Such is the mystery of individuality that I do not wonder if even those philosophers who, like Mill, confine the use of the word sacred within the very smallest compass, see in each individual soul something sacred, something to be revered, even where we cannot understand it, something to be ...
— Chips From A German Workshop, Vol. V. • F. Max Mueller
... investigation? It was not now practicable to give that investigation. This was one of those questions which it would be intolerable to mix up with purely political and party debates. If there was a subject in the whole compass of human life and experience that was sacred beyond all other subjects it was the character and position of woman. Did his honorable friend ask him to admit that the question deserved the fullest consideration? He gave him that admission ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... spirit ruled the hour; Old jealousies were drowned in brotherhood, Philanthropy rejoiced that skill and power, Servants to science, compass all men's good; And over all Religion's banner stood, Upheld by thee, true Patriarch of the plan Which in two hemispheres was schemed to shower Mercies from God on universal man. Yes, this electric chain from East to West More than mere metal, more than Mammon can, Binds us together kinsmen, in ...
— My Life as an Author • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... reason why such an advantage should not be secured, for, although the moon was of no help to him in determining his course, he had studied the whole thing so carefully while lying in the lodge of the chieftain Ogallah, that he was as sure of the direction as if he held a mariner's compass in his hand. ...
— Camp-fire and Wigwam • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... spirit has sent you hither from Olympus? Have you no pity upon the Trojans, and would you incline the scales of victory in favour of the Danaans? Let me persuade you—for it will be better thus—stay the combat for to-day, but let them renew the fight hereafter till they compass the doom of Ilius, since you goddesses have made up your ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... continued the young man, as if he scarcely heard Lady Audley's interruption—"that wonderful fabric which is built out of straws collected at every point of the compass, and which is yet strong enough to hang a man. Upon what infinitesimal trifles may sometimes hang the whole secret of some wicked mystery, inexplicable heretofore to the wisest upon the earth! ...
— Lady Audley's Secret • Mary Elizabeth Braddon
... he went on. "The ship's surgeon let fall an opinion to the captain, one day, that 'twas some condition o' the light and the magnetic currents that let them see those folks. 'Twa'n't a right-feeling part of the world, anyway; they had to battle with the compass to make it serve, an' everything seemed to go wrong. Gaffett had worked it out in his own mind that they was all common ghosts, but the conditions were unusual favorable for seeing them. He was always talking about the Ge'graphical Society, but he never took proper steps, as I viewed ...
— The Country of the Pointed Firs • Sarah Orne Jewett
... young man," said Heriot, shaking his head, "make me believe that if you can.—To sum the matter up," he said, rising from his seat, and walking towards that occupied by the disguised female, "for our matters are now drawn into small compass, you shall as soon make me believe that this masquerading mummer, on whom I now lay the hand of paternal authority, is a French page, ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... the length of this story with that of others in the book. Which authors get their effects in a small compass? Could any parts of ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various
... objections, enlightening thick understandings, gently reducing decorously opposing wills. Commissariat, transport, housing of guests, and the servants of guests—all these entered into the matter of the coming wedding. To compass the doing of all things, not only decently and in order, but handsomely, and with a becoming dignity, this required time and thought. And so, it was not until after dinner that Katherine found herself ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... though his walls are hung with pictures, his drawing-rooms filled with bijouterie, how is it that the windows of his hall, his library, his staircase, are neglected? The reason is obvious. The magnificent historical old stained glass might be envied, but could not be brought within the compass ...
— Enquire Within Upon Everything - The Great Victorian Domestic Standby • Anonymous
... light with those of darkness; with heroism, reduced to its bare chance, yet ever and anon snatching victory from the jaws of death. But in this unspeakable Chautauqua there was no potentiality of death in sight anywhere, and no point of the compass visible from which danger might possibly appear. The ideal was so completely victorious already that no sign of any previous battle remained, the place just resting on its oars. But what our human emotions seem to require is the sight of the struggle going on. The moment ...
— Talks To Teachers On Psychology; And To Students On Some Of Life's Ideals • William James
... Canadian "bush." Each fellow began in a systematic way to make a list of the various "signs," so that when called upon to give his opinion he would be able to repeat the entire assortment, just as a sailor, forward or backward, is able to rattle off the thirty-two points of the mariner's compass. ...
— Boy Scouts on Hudson Bay - The Disappearing Fleet • G. Harvey Ralphson
... fires of love, and how much of strength concealment adds to those fires, they know who have proved it. Moreover, restrained by the will, the caprice, the commandment of fathers, mothers, brothers, and husbands, confined most part of their time within the narrow compass of their chambers, they live, so to say, a life of vacant ease, and, yearning and renouncing in the same moment, meditate divers matters which cannot all be cheerful. If thereby a melancholy bred of amorous desire make entrance ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio
... would have to make the hardest fight of his life if he meant not to have more of her than this brief acquaintance, so touched by sensation and romance. He was, maybe, somewhat sensational; his career had, even in its present restricted compass, been spectacular; but romance, with its reveries and its moonshinings, its impulses and its blind adventures, had not been ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... has benefited, it has also injured the human race; and the invention of the compass has brought disease as well as wealth ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 532. Saturday, February 4, 1832 • Various
... this was not all; his complexion, usually sallow and sunburnt, was now ghastly and blue, like that of the corpse of a drowned man; the muscles of the neck, and the flesh of the cheeks and chin were rigid and fixed, and shrunk into one half of their usual compass; the lips were so compressed that they had almost entirely disappeared, and all that marked his mouth was a black line; the nostrils were distended, and thin and transparent, while the forehead was shrivelled ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... Cosmo say he much preferred good Scotch to would-be English, and therefore spoke with what breadth she could compass. In her head, not-withstanding, she despised everything homely, for she had been to school in the city, where, if she had learned nothing else, she had learned the ambition to APPEAR; of BEING anything she had no notion. She had a loving heart, though—small for her size, but ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... extra pair of gaiters. The former regulation army gaiter of canvas, laced, rolls up in a small compass and weighs ...
— Notes of a War Correspondent • Richard Harding Davis
... angle; and the reader will easily understand that the passing of the one of these lines into the other is productive of the most exquisite and wonderful series of curvatures possible within such compass, no two views of the capital giving the same contour. Upon these profoundly studied outlines, as remarkable for their grace and complexity as the general mass of the capital is for solid strength and proportion to its necessary service, ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume II (of 3) • John Ruskin
... peace. The stranger's gong sounded again, and she also went on her way. There was scarcely a word spoken above a whisper until her lights had disappeared; then the schooner's own lanterns were hauled down, her head was turned to the point of the compass toward which it had been directed when the steamer was first discovered, and Captain Beardsley was ...
— Marcy The Blockade Runner • Harry Castlemon
... agitated. C. D. confident. C. (a long way down in perspective) submissive. All wet through. No poles. Not so much as a walking-stick in the party. Reach the summit, at about one in the day. Dead darkness as of night. Mr. P. (excellent fellow to the last) uneasy. C. D. produces compass from pocket. Mr. P. reassured. Farm-house where dog-cart was left, N.N.W. Mr. P. complimentary. Descent commenced. C. D. with compass triumphant, until compass, with the heat and wet of C. D.'s pocket, breaks. Mr. P. (who never had a compass), inconsolable, confesses he ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... it a masterpiece than any other mortals. We believe that club Asthmats (it is quite as good a word as "AEsthetes") practise in the Reading Room of the British Museum, where they acquire their extraordinary compass and mastery of various notes. Be this as it may, the cough which drives every one but its owner out of the room (though doubtless an affliction to the proprietor) gives him rank as a club-bore of the finest water. The bore who always ...
— Lost Leaders • Andrew Lang
... and WILL love her more—I have an opportunity of winning favour, of doing service, which shall bind him to me; yes, he shall have the girl, if I have art to compass the matter. ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume II. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... and inaccurately translated passage of this Genesis, a key that unlocks the whole "mystery of life," as the great battle is now waging between the materialists and vitalists of this country and Europe, it will most conclusively establish the point we shall here make—that in no equally limited compass, in ancient or modern manuscript or published volume, since the first dawn of letters to the present time, are there to be found so many conclusively established facts of genuine scientific value as in ...
— Life: Its True Genesis • R. W. Wright
... diversity, into so many ears and hearts? Much less are we able to analyze the inner workings of the mind—its thoughts, its meditations, its memory. Why, then, should we presume, with our reason, to compass and comprehend the ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. III - Trinity Sunday to Advent • Martin Luther
... Yes, Honour decks the turf that wraps their clay! Vain Sophistry! in these behold the tools, The broken tools, that tyrants cast away By myriads, when they dare to pave their way With human hearts—to what?—a dream alone. Can despots compass aught that hails their sway? Or call with truth one span of earth their own, Save that wherein at last they crumble bone ...
— Childe Harold's Pilgrimage • Lord Byron
... of destiny had pointed him plain, for he stood on the Place of Death. It was lifeless yet, save for the uneasy eagles who watched him from a splintered crag; and the clean, black shadow that lapped out over the plain held the woman and the treasures in its compass. ...
— Silver and Gold - A Story of Luck and Love in a Western Mining Camp • Dane Coolidge
... of fear of our anger, and more still of the danger lest our friendship to the surrounding tribes might lead to the unconditional deliverance of the Masai into the hands of their hereditary foes. The numerous embassies which had appeared from all points of the compass (for the Wa-Kikuyu, Wa-Taveta, Wa-Teita, and Wa-Duruma—even the Wa-Kwafi and Swahili tribes—had sent representatives laden with rich presents to take part in the Naivasha festival) were significant reminders to them. But now they ...
— Freeland - A Social Anticipation • Theodor Hertzka
... now beyond expression wretched, The wit you brag'd of fool'd, that boasted honour, As you believ'd compass'd with walls of brass, To guard it sure, subject to be o'rethrown With the least blast ...
— The Little French Lawyer - A Comedy • Francis Beaumont
... whose colonel his other orders were directed, but they had no information, except that in the morning that regiment had been stationed farther over on the right. Sam started out again, guiding himself as best he could by a compass which he had in his pocket. He selected the paths which seemed most promising, but the jungle between was impenetrable on horseback. The firing on the extreme right seemed to be farther in the rear, and he made his ...
— Captain Jinks, Hero • Ernest Crosby
... hand, and for exactness in the details of their existence, that he has considered this Meditation too necessary for the tranquillity of a great number of husbands, to be omitted. It would have been cruel to leave men, who are possessed with the passion for learning the hour of the day, without a compass whereby to estimate the last variations in the matrimonial zodiac, and to calculate the precise moment when the sign of the Minotaur appears on the horizon. The knowledge of conjugal time would require a whole ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... admit the existence of world which is not God. He was a monotheist, but his monotheism was pantheism. He saw God in all the manifestations of Nature. This did not satisfy him nor resolve his doubts, and he therefore confessed that reason could not compass the exalted aims of philosophy. But there was no cynicism in his doubt. It was the soul-sickening consciousness that reason was incapable of solving the mighty questions that he burned to know. There was no way ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume I • John Lord
... people are greater in death than the first living lord of the treasury,—a time, in short, for scoffing and railing, for speaking lightly of the opera, and all our most cherished institutions. A little while you are free and unlabelled, like the ground you compass; but civilization is coming, and coming; you and your much-loved waste-lands will be surely inclosed, and sooner or later you will be brought down to a state of utter usefulness,—the ground will be curiously sliced into acres and roods and perches, and you, for ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various
... age: that three hundred millions of gold or silver were annually paid to the treasury of the caliphs. [133] Our reason must be startled by these extravagant assertions; and they will become more palpable, if we assume the compass and measure the extent of habitable ground: a valley from the tropic to Memphis seldom broader than twelve miles, and the triangle of the Delta, a flat surface of two thousand one hundred square ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... attempts were made to deflect or guide its course by the use of oars. Those who made these attempts were almost unanimous in declaring that the use of oars enabled them to alter the course of a balloon by several points of the compass. Another method of steering employed sails, held up to the wind by the drag of a guide-rope on the ground. The control to be obtained by means like these was pathetically small, and the real problem was soon seen to be the problem of a motor. The spherical balloon is obviously ...
— The War in the Air; Vol. 1 - The Part played in the Great War by the Royal Air Force • Walter Raleigh
... spoke, besides Mandingo, the language of a large tribe in the interior. His baggage consisted only of a small stock of provisions, beads, amber and tobacco, for the purchase of food on the road; a few changes of linen, an umbrella, pocket compass, magnetic compass and thermometer, with a fowling-piece, two pair of pistols and other small articles. Four Mahommedan blacks also offered their services as his attendants. They were going to travel on foot, driving their ...
— Great African Travellers - From Mungo Park to Livingstone and Stanley • W.H.G. Kingston
... He's up to a stone over your weight, and can do any mortal thing within a horse's compass. Cox won't ride him because he baulks, and so he has come into my stable. If you'll only let him know that you're on his back, and have got a pair of spurs on your heels with rowels in them, he'll take you anywhere. Good-night, ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... in the end. We want thought on the subject of Marriage—calm, consecutive, serious thought. Nothing else will do. We have passion, zeal, impulse, imagination; but we lack thought. Thought is the helm of passion, the ballast of imagination, the compass of impulse. Let youth think on the subject as they ought, and they ...
— Aims and Aids for Girls and Young Women • George Sumner Weaver
... have said, the weather was very hot, the surface of the water was as smooth as a mill-pond, the wind was all up and down the mast, and so the old ship was boxing the compass all to herself, and not making a foot ...
— Not Pretty, But Precious • John Hay, et al.
... letter was ineffectual. The Monarch, "whose views and affections were, according to Lord Chesterfield, singly confined to the narrow compass of his Electorate," and for "whom England was too big," acted with a promptness and decision which gave no time for the workings of faction. An immediate change of ministry was announced by Kryenberg, the Hanoverian resident, ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745. - Volume I. • Mrs. Thomson
... I said before we worked in shifts, one week at night, the next during the day. It was during the night shift that we planned to get away; but there were two things we needed badly—namely, a map and a compass. We were talking this thing over one night when Sammy said, "I have a scheme." We told him to get it off his chest. "Well," he said, "I think I know where I can get a map and a compass; I work with a German civilian whom I think could be easily bribed." ...
— Into the Jaws of Death • Jack O'Brien
... rank in our day. But much learning had made him morally mad; his extensive reading had engendered in his mind an extreme scepticism concerning all existing religious systems. In inborn integrity and steadfast principle he had no faith whatever. He sincerely believed that every man strove to compass his own ends, per fas et nefas. The mens sibi conscia recti was to him an hallucination, for which he entertained profound contempt; and he honestly pitied the delusion that pinned its faith on human truth and virtue. He was a provoking ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens
... resistance to his competitors. On the other hand, with this kind of support, and deriving his title in any degree from the favor of the Imperial Court, he became almost in that extent an object of hatred at home and within the 30 whole compass of his own territory. He was at once an object of hatred for the past, being a living monument of national independence ignominiously surrendered; and an object of jealousy for the future, as one who had already advertised himself to be ...
— De Quincey's Revolt of the Tartars • Thomas De Quincey
... will be a matter of our sorrow. But a little time will put me again into my settled state of mourning; for a mourner I must be all my days on earth, and there is no need I should be other. My glass runs low: the world does not want me nor do I want it: my business is at home and within a narrow compass. I must not deny, as there was something so glorious in the object of my biggest sorrow, I believe that in some measure kept me from ...
— Excellent Women • Various
... lights of truth divine, So numberless the stars, that to our eye It makes all but one galaxy. Yet reason must assist too; for, in seas So vast and dangerous as these, Our course by stars above we cannot know Without the compass too below. ...
— Lives of the Poets, Vol. 1 • Samuel Johnson
... principles laid down are applicable with equal force to town or city life; but as a people we dwell mostly in the country, and, even in villages or small towns, each house is likely to have its own portion of land about it, and to look toward all points of the compass, instead of being limited to two, as in city blocks. Of the comparative advantages or disadvantages of city or country life, there is no need to speak here. Our business is simply to give such details as ...
— The Easiest Way in Housekeeping and Cooking - Adapted to Domestic Use or Study in Classes • Helen Campbell
... language (Latin, Arabic, Finnish) the concepts cluster more thickly, the words are more richly chambered, but there is a tendency, on the whole, to keep the range of concrete significance in the single word down to a moderate compass. A polysynthetic language, as its name implies, is more than ordinarily synthetic. The elaboration of the word is extreme. Concepts which we should never dream of treating in a subordinate fashion are symbolized by derivational affixes or ...
— Language - An Introduction to the Study of Speech • Edward Sapir
... solders of different metallic proportions. The differing lines of shadow, caused by the difference in the solders, were visible evidence that a new means of detecting flaws and chemical variations in metals had been found. A photograph of a compass showed the needle and dial taken through the closed brass cover. The markings of the dial were in red metallic paint, and thus interfered with the rays, and were reproduced. "Since the rays had this great penetrative ...
— Little Masterpieces of Science: - Invention and Discovery • Various
... touch the real underlying trouble. The white settlers were unflinchingly bent on seizing the land over which the Indians roamed but which they did not in any true sense own or occupy. In return the Indians were determined at all costs and hazards to keep the men of chain and compass, and of axe and rifle, and the forest-felling settlers who followed them, out of their vast and lonely hunting-grounds. Nothing but the actual shock of battle could decide the quarrel. The display of overmastering, overwhelming force might have cowed the Indians; but it was not possible for ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Three - The Founding of the Trans-Alleghany Commonwealths, 1784-1790 • Theodore Roosevelt
... toward a quarter which he had, thus far, kept out of the compass of observation. He looked up the jagged range of Broadway where, over a terra-cotta pile, floated a crimson flag with "John Wingfield" ...
— Over the Pass • Frederick Palmer
... necessity required, generally after settlement had been made upon it. The tracts were of very irregular shapes. The boundary lines, usually starting from some natural object, were measured by rods or chains, running in certain directions as ascertained by the use of the compass. This method of survey is still in use in the Eastern States. According to a law of 1785, a uniform system of "rectangular survey" was applied to all lands belonging to the United States. This survey has preceded settlers, and has to some extent ...
— Our Government: Local, State, and National: Idaho Edition • J.A. James
... as far as Tony desired he made Mark send it straight ahead. The boy adjusted the air tube to carry the craft toward the south, but Tony, seeing by a compass in which direction they were headed, ordered Mark to ...
— Five Thousand Miles Underground • Roy Rockwood
... soon to discover the true metal from the base counterfeit: its effect upon litigation. A decision in conformity to established precedents is the mother of repose on that subject; but one that departs from them throws the professional mind at sea without chart or compass. The cautious counsellor will be compelled to say to his client that he cannot advise. One cause is the general uncertainty to which it leads. Men will persuade themselves easily, when it is their interest to be persuaded, that if one well-established rule ...
— An Essay on Professional Ethics - Second Edition • George Sharswood
... late at night before they finished their work. Their hands were sore and bleeding, and they were completely worn out with fatigue. They had saved, from their dinner, a good-sized piece of bread. They folded up into a small compass the leaf from his pocketbook, upon which Charlie had written in Hindostanee his letter to Hossein, and thrust this into the centre of the piece of bread. Then Charlie told Tim to lie down and rest for three hours, while he kept watch; as they must take it ...
— With Clive in India - Or, The Beginnings of an Empire • G. A. Henty
... was to compass the situation as a worldwide war and summon and put into an effective fighting machine the ...
— The Audacious War • Clarence W. Barron
... eight horses to be consecrated to royal use. Not at all, we assured him; Pickford, the great carrier, always horsed his wagons with eight. And the law knew of no distinction between wagon and post- chaise, coach-horse or cart-horse. However, we could not compass this point of the eight horses, the double quadriga, in one single instance; but the true reason we surmised to be, not the pretended puritanism of loyalty to the house of Guelph, but the running short of the innkeeper's funds. If he had to meet ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... was already agog with the tragic events of the two preceding days, and the sound of the shots was a signal for wild and instant excitement. In a few moments a crowd had gathered and people were pouring in by the hundred from every point of the compass. Jackson and his wife had fled and at first nobody knew what had happened, but the surmise that Charles had recommenced his bloody work was on every tongue and soon some of the bolder found their way to the ...
— Mob Rule in New Orleans • Ida B. Wells-Barnett
... Italian, named Basa, and a Spaniard, called Salseda, were detected in a scheme to administer poison to both princes, and when arrested, confessed that they had been hired by the Prince of Parma to compass this double assassination. Basa destroyed himself in prison. His body was, however, gibbeted, with an inscription that he had attempted, at the instigation of Parma, to take the lives of Orange and Anjou. Salseda, less fortunate, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... English, I found that he was only accustomed to coast along the Norwegian shore; and had been only once across to Stromstad. But he had brought with him a fellow better acquainted, he assured me, with the rocks by which they were to steer our course, for we had not a compass on board; yet, as he was half a fool, I had little confidence in his skill. There was then great reason to fear that we had lost our way, and were straying amidst a labyrinth of ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... asked what kind of wine we preferred I must say I was struck all in a heap, for wines to Jone and me is like a trackless wilderness without compass or binnacle light, and we seldom drink them except made hot, with nutmeg grated in, for colic; but as I wanted her to understand that if there was any luxuries we didn't order it was because we didn't approve of them, I told her that we was total abstainers, and at that ...
— Pomona's Travels - A Series of Letters to the Mistress of Rudder Grange from her Former - Handmaiden • Frank R. Stockton
... by this time Lydia would be at home. Yet still she walked away from her own street. She said to herself that five-and-twenty minutes must pass before Gilbert would leave the house to return to his work. The way in which she now was would bring her by a long compass into Kennington Road. Rain threatened, and she had no umbrella; none the less, ...
— Thyrza • George Gissing
... wounds had been dressed and bandaged the first of the pursuing cavalry returned with the prisoners they had captured. An hour later the last of them rode in, reporting that the braves who had escaped capture had scattered to the four points of the compass, making further ...
— Bert Wilson in the Rockies • J. W. Duffield
... with Relatives, I quite My compass lost: to shift our bearing, "Who is the Lady on ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, April 4, 1891 • Various |
