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Contaminate   Listen
adjective
Contaminate  adj.  Contaminated; defiled; polluted; tainted. "Contaminate drink."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Contaminate" Quotes from Famous Books



... direction. Those women who stroll about the streets with uncovered faces, who paint their eyebrows and lips for the diversion of strangers, who are shut out from the world like mad dogs, that they may not contaminate the people—all these women were now let loose! Some of them had grown old since the prison-gates had been closed upon them, but the flame of evil passion still flickered in their sunken eyes. Alas! what pestilence has been let loose upon the Mussulman population. And thou, ...
— Halil the Pedlar - A Tale of Old Stambul • Mr Jkai

... which makes up the sum of my inner life would find rest and stability in you. My unsatisfied and restless spirit, harried by a perpetual warfare between attraction and repulsion, eternally and irremediably alone, would find in yours a haven of refuge against the doubts which contaminate every ideal, and weaken the will. There are men more unfortunate, but I doubt if in the whole wide world there was ever one ...
— The Child of Pleasure • Gabriele D'Annunzio

... periodically recurring impurity of women has by no means died out to-day. Among a very large section of the women of the middle and lower classes of England and other countries it is firmly believed that the touch of a menstruating woman will contaminate; only a few years since, in the course of a correspondence on this subject in the British Medical Journal (1878), even medical men were found to state from personal observation that they had no doubt whatever on this point. Thus, one doctor, who expressed surprise that any doubt could be ...
— Religion & Sex - Studies in the Pathology of Religious Development • Chapman Cohen

... one moment did he understand that other scepticism which, forced out of faith, clasps and clings to reverence; which, though it count the rite inefficient, yet sees the meaning, and counts the moment so holy that to contaminate the ...
— Lady Good-for-Nothing • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... miserable, when all the World were happy: But I will not go too for in repeating the sorrowes which are vanish't, or uncover the buried memory of the evils past; least whilst we strive to represent the vices of others, we seem to contaminate your Sacred purple, or alloy our present rejoycing; since that only is sign of a perfect and consummate felicity, when even the very remembrance of evils past, ...
— An Apologie for the Royal Party (1659); and A Panegyric to Charles the Second (1661) • John Evelyn

... a less forced construction, and coincides with the rest of the passage,—"I am contaminate through thee, though in ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various

... entry for this obnoxious merchandise, simply because it was a little town, and could not keep English ships out of its waters. A meeting of the patriotic citizens was held, and it was resolved that no tea should go out of Greenwich to comfort the bodies and contaminate the principles of people in any part of the Colonies; and they would show their British tyrants that it was just as unsafe to send tea into Cohansey Creek as it was to send it into the ...
— Stories of New Jersey • Frank Richard Stockton

... not a flatterer. I am going to follow the example of the man who cast pearls before swine—I'm going to cast you a pearl from one of my own poems. You may listen. It will pass your ears, that's all. You cannot contaminate it by taking it in, so I repeat it for my own entertainment, to refresh ...
— The Landloper - The Romance Of A Man On Foot • Holman Day

... extensive information in the national councils, and that they will be less apt to be tainted by the spirit of faction, and more out of the reach of those occasional ill-humors, or temporary prejudices and propensities, which, in smaller societies, frequently contaminate the public councils, beget injustice and oppression of a part of the community, and engender schemes which, though they gratify a momentary inclination or desire, terminate in general distress, dissatisfaction, and disgust. Several additional reasons of considerable force, to fortify ...
— The Federalist Papers

... justice' sake? What villain touch'd his body, that did stab, 20 And not for justice? What! shall one of us, That struck the foremost man of all this world But for supporting robbers, shall we now Contaminate our fingers with base bribes, And sell the mighty space of our large honours 25 For so much trash as may be grasped thus? I had rather be a dog, and bay the moon, ...
— The New Hudson Shakespeare: Julius Caesar • William Shakespeare

... that because her mother was a flighty woman with bad taste and the wrong surrounding her poor little girl would contaminate me?" ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... failed to follow the Master's teaching in its true perfection. We have planted in ourselves a seed of corruption, and we have permitted—nay, some of us have encouraged—its poisonous growth, till it now threatens to contaminate the whole ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli

... inducing him to confess the indwelling of an evil spirit and thus free himself from the great impostor. And if he did not confess then it were better that he be killed, lest the devil through him contaminate all. Why, says Mather, in his Wonders of the Invisible World: "If the devils now can strike the minds of men with any poisons of so fine a composition and operation, that scores of innocent people shall unite in confessions of a crime which ...
— Woman's Life in Colonial Days • Carl Holliday

... daughter, and whose kindness, whose generosity the unhappy girl repaid by an ingratitude so bad, so dreadful, that at last her excellent patroness was obliged to separate her from her own young ones, fearful lest her vicious example should contaminate their purity: she has sent her here to be healed, even as the Jews of old sent their diseased to the troubled pool of Bethesda; and, teachers, superintendent, I beg of you not to allow the waters ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte

... I have said, it is evident, that in large and populous towns, where combustion and respiration are continually performed on a large scale, the air must be much less pure than in the country, where there are few of these causes to contaminate the atmosphere, and where vegetables are continually tending to render it more pure; and if it was not for the winds which agitate this element, and constantly occasion its change of place, the air of large towns would probably soon become unfit for respiration. Winds bring ...
— A Lecture on the Preservation of Health • Thomas Garnett, M.D.

... from his seat with an oath. "I tell you what it is, Trevelyan;—if you speak of your wife in that way, I will not listen to you. It is unmanly and untrue to say that her presence can—contaminate any house." ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope

... children—should be of a wholesome kind. This does not mean that the stories must be about paragons of virtue; the villains of fiction and history have their value in teaching life and character, and we need not fear that they will contaminate the minds of the young, for in most children the instincts may be relied upon to reject the allurement of the base character. But fiction that is false in its sentiment, that does not present truthful pictures of life, is likely to give perverted ideas of human relations ...
— Your Child: Today and Tomorrow • Sidonie Matzner Gruenberg

... gentlemanly lot of fellows, and you never hear any of them swear. The colonel is very severe on those who use bad language, and if he hears any he says, 'I tell you I will not allow it. If you want to use such language go out on to the veldt and swear at the stones, but I will not permit you to contaminate the men by such language in the lines. I ...
— With the Guards' Brigade from Bloemfontein to Koomati Poort and Back • Edward P. Lowry

... but a faint emblem of their situation to say, that as well may a man commence a habit of intoxication for the purpose of having five years' pleasure, and then halting in his career, as the Jews may contaminate themselves tentatively with idolatrous connections under the delusion that it would always be time enough for untreading their steps when these connections had begun to produce evil. For they could not recover the station from which they swerved. They that had ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. 1 (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey

... represented the more permanent landed interest, united themselves by marriage (which sometimes was the case) with the other description, the wealth which saved the family from ruin was supposed to contaminate and degrade it. Thus the enmities and heart burnings of these parties were increased even by the usual means by which discord is made to cease and quarrels are turned into friendship. In the mean time, the pride ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. III. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... the perversity of those who use them wrongfully. Corrupt mind never understood word healthily, and even as seemly words profit not depraved minds, so those which are not altogether seemly avail not to contaminate the well-disposed, any more than mire can sully the rays of the sun or earthly foulness the beauties of the sky. What books, what words, what letters are holier, worthier, more venerable than those of the Divine Scriptures? Yet many there be, who, interpreting them perversely, have brought themselves ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio

... Grace will not contaminate your presence with these wretches," pleaded Campo-Basso. "Consider the danger to yourself, my dear lord. They are desperate men, who would gladly give their lives to take yours and save their country. I beg you out of the love I bear Your Grace, ...
— Yolanda: Maid of Burgundy • Charles Major

... were principally English soldiers; and you will remark that the man in whose house the priest was discovered generally shared his fate. But it was useless. They were hung, they were tortured, they were transported to Barbadoes, and, finally, such numbers were captured, that it was feared they would contaminate the very slaves, and they were confined on the island of Innisboffin, off the coast of Connemara. Yet more priests came to take the place of those who were thus removed, and the "hunt" was ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack

... one may contemplate without the obstruction of one's own personality continually recedes from him—and thus, let him learn, travel, and collect as he may, he must always live an exiled life at a remote distance from a higher life and from true culture. For true culture would scorn to contaminate itself with the needy and covetous individual; it well knows how to give the slip to the man who would fain employ it as a means of attaining to egoistic ends; and if any one cherishes the belief ...
— On the Future of our Educational Institutions • Friedrich Nietzsche

... us, That struck the foremost man of all this world, But for supporting robbers;—shall we now Contaminate our fingers with base bribes? And sell the mighty space of our large honors For so much trash as may be grasped thus? I'd rather be a dog, and bay the moon, Than such a Roman. 237 SHAKS.: Jul. Caesar, ...
— Handy Dictionary of Poetical Quotations • Various

... Chastisement! Bru. Remember March, the Ides of March remember! Did not great Julius bleed for justice' sake? What villain touched his body, that did stab, And not for justice?—What! shall one of us, That struck the foremost man of all this world, But for supporting robbers,—shall we now Contaminate our fingers with base bribes, And sell the mighty space of our large honors For so much trash as may be graspd thus?— I had rather be a dog, and bay the moon, Than such a Roman! Cas. Brutus, bay not me! I'll not endure it. You forget yourself, ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick

... American Legion assembled are of the opinion that these would-be Americans who turned in their first papers to avoid service are in our opinion neither fish, flesh, nor fowl and if allowed to remain in this country would contaminate the 100% true American soldiers and sailors who will return to again engage in the gainful pursuits of life. Therefore, ...
— The Story of The American Legion • George Seay Wheat

... honour, and there where you are going everyone, without counting my lord, will try to rob you of it, but you see well what it is worth; for that reason do not lose it save willingly and in proper manner. Now in order not to contaminate your virtue before God and before man, except for a legitimate motive, take heed that your chance of marriage be not damaged beforehand, otherwise you will ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 1 • Honore de Balzac

... comprehending of all these now engender in the learners both unspeakable delights and a marvellous height of spirit. And it doth in no wise beseem me, by comparing with these the fulsome debauchees of victualling-houses and stews, to contaminate Helicon ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch

... he said, 'but surely oftentimes you play music from the abominable Mass, not fitting indeed in a holy place set apart for the worship of the Lord according to our pure faith?' 'Ah! Pastor, but the notes cannot contaminate,' Monsieur Gabriel would answer; 'Luther himself made use of the monk's melodies in his canticles.' And Pastor Mueller retired to his dirty, airless house, feeling rebuked himself where ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay

... healed, fever and a train of disastrous symptoms may nevertheless supervene. Whence it appears that the contagion impressed upon or deposited in a particular part, is by-and-by carried by the returning current of blood to the heart, and by that organ is sent to contaminate the whole body. ...
— The Harvard Classics Volume 38 - Scientific Papers (Physiology, Medicine, Surgery, Geology) • Various

... are led to commit a crime by some isolated evil impulse, have a bad influence on the other inmates. Unlike other lunatics, they do not shrink from the company of others, whom they torment with their violence and contaminate with that spirit of restlessness and discontent which distinguished them even before they became insane or criminals. Firm in the belief that they are always being ill treated and insulted, they instil these ideas ...
— Criminal Man - According to the Classification of Cesare Lombroso • Gina Lombroso-Ferrero

... organic wastes. The refuse of the kitchen sink is free from faecal matter; but it contains, in a greater or less degree, precisely the kind of organic material which has gone to make up the more offensive substance. If its final disposition is such as to contaminate the water that we drink or the air that we breathe with the products of their decay, the danger to life is hardly less than that from the ...
— Village Improvements and Farm Villages • George E. Waring

... divinely ordered system, which includes man, the roof and crown of things, and Christ, in whom is revealed to us its inner character and meaning. It is not the province of faith either to flout scientific knowledge, or to contaminate the material on which science works by intercalating what M. Le Roy calls 'transhistorical symbols'—myths in fact—which do not become true by being recognised as false, as the new apologetic seems to suggest. ...
— Outspoken Essays • William Ralph Inge

... I wish to communicate; and if you will allow it a place in your Literary Chronicle, it may perhaps tend to put the unwary on their guard against the practice of preparing this sauce by boiling it in a copper, which certainly may contaminate the liquor, ...
— A Treatise on Adulterations of Food, and Culinary Poisons • Fredrick Accum

... things placed beyond the capacity of his sensations. He loved not poetry—nor ever took a lonely walk to meditate—never beheld virtue, which he did not try to disbelieve, or female beauty and innocence, which he did not lust to contaminate. ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb

... characteristical name of Hotspur.) All the amiability and attractiveness is certainly on the side of the prince: however familiar he makes himself with bad company, we can never mistake him for one of them: the ignoble does indeed touch, but it does not contaminate him; and his wildest freaks appear merely as witty tricks, by which his restless mind sought to burst through the inactivity to which he was constrained, for on the first occasion which wakes him out of his unruly levity he distinguishes himself without effort in the most chivalrous guise. Percy's ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel

... thousand souls, and out of these scarcely ten or fifteen thousand do any work, and they are always lean from overwork and are getting weaker every day. The rest become a prey to idleness, avarice, ill-health, lasciviousness, usury and other vices, and contaminate and corrupt very many families by holding them in servitude for their own use, by keeping them in poverty and slavishness, and by imparting to them their own vices. Therefore public slavery ruins them; useful works, in the field, in military service and in arts, except those which ...
— Ideal Commonwealths • Various

... possession. The priests bore it out on a bed or a carpet, and exposed it to the light of the sun. The demon was thus exorcised; and the body became further purified in being eaten by the sacred animals, and no putrescence was left to contaminate earth, water, or fire.35 Furthermore, it is to be noticed that the modern Parsees dispose of their dead in exactly the same manner depicted in the earliest accounts; yet they zealously hold to a literal ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger

... is so fond of me that he imagines—he imagines that you are going to contaminate us with your atheism, your disregard for public opinion, your strange ideas. I have told him repeatedly that, at bottom, you ...
— Dona Perfecta • B. Perez Galdos

... city in Turkestan famous for its beauties)?—He who has in both his hands such dates as he can relish, will not think of throwing stones at the bunches of dates on their trees. In common, such as are in indigent circumstances will contaminate the skirt of innocency with sin; and such as are suffering from hunger will steal bread:—When a ravenous dog has found a piece of meat, he asks not, saying: Is this the flesh of the prophet Salah's camel or Antichrist's ass? Many are the chaste who, because of their poverty, have fallen ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 2, Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous

... and degraded populace of great and wealthy cities are not the accidental victims of misfortune; they are born to its hard inheritance, and their numbers contaminate more, who, were it not for their own misconduct and imprudence, might ...
— An Inquiry into the Permanent Causes of the Decline and Fall of Powerful and Wealthy Nations. • William Playfair

... offerings are carried into the temple upon white wooden trays of curious form, and laid upon white wooden tables of equally curious form;—the faces of the bearers being covered, below the eyes, with sheets of white paper, in order that their breath may [141] not contaminate the food of the gods; and the trays, for like reason, must be borne at arms' length .... In ancient times the offerings would seem to have included things much more costly than food,—if we may credit the testimony of what are probably the oldest documents extant ...
— Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation • Lafcadio Hearn

... the inanimate enemies of books is dust. In some libraries the atmosphere is dust-laden, to a degree which seems incredible until you witness its results in the deposits upon books, which soil your fingers, and contaminate the air you breathe, as you brush or blow it away. Peculiarly liable to dust are library rooms located in populous towns, or in business streets, and built close to the avenues of traffic. Here, the ...
— A Book for All Readers • Ainsworth Rand Spofford

... black people found on some islands, "whose complexion still remains a few shades deeper than that of certain families in the same islands" were to be accounted for by certain families making it "a point of honour not to contaminate their blood." The theory is at all events striking. We have a "White Australia policy" on the mainland to-day; this speculation assumes a kind of "Black Australasia policy" on the part of certain families of islanders ...
— Laperouse • Ernest Scott

... low lands will float over into and contaminate the pure air of the guarded pleasure gardens, and the evil germs will carry disease, crime and death, no matter how many fountains and white statutes and posies you may set up between. Envy, Discontent and ...
— Around the World with Josiah Allen's Wife • Marietta Holley

... intermediary too trivial—that divine refreshment of whose meaning I had no guess; and I seized on the idea of that mystic shoe-horn with delight, even as, a little later, I should have written flagon, chalice, hanaper, beaker, or any word that might have appealed to me at the moment as least contaminate with mean associations. In this string of pictures I believe the gist of the psalm to have consisted; I believe it had no more to say to me; and the result was consolatory. I would go to sleep dwelling with restfulness ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... used, but they should be avoided as much as possible. They should never be constructed near to dwellings, and must always be well ventilated. Care should be taken to make them watertight, otherwise the foul matter may percolate through the ground, and is likely to contaminate the water supply. In some old houses cesspools have been found actually under ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 384, May 12, 1883 • Various

... that much for him, Aldous didn't see his way to that, though he isn't the kind of Conservative I want to see in Parliament by a long way. Besides, it's such stuff! They say sport brutalises us, and then they want to go and contaminate the labourer. But we won't take the responsibility. We've got our own vices, and we'll stick to them; we're used to them; but we won't hand them on: we'd ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... or even villany, by a title or a ribbon, sacrifice as much to vanity as the poor wit who is desirous to read you his poem or his play? My second remark was, that vanity is the worst of passions, and more apt to contaminate the mind than any other: for, as selfishness is much more general than we please to allow it, so it is natural to hate and envy those who stand between us and the good we desire. Now, in lust and ambition ...
— Joseph Andrews, Vol. 2 • Henry Fielding

... and in the seeds of strophanthus. When pure it forms colorless needles melting at 140 deg. C., and, as with all alkaloids, gives a weak basic reaction. It is very soluble in water, slightly soluble in alcohol, and only very slightly soluble in ether, chloroform or benzol, so that it does not contaminate the caffein in the determination of the latter. Its effects on the body have not been studied, but they are probably not very great, as Polstorff obtained only 0.23 percent from ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers

... the seed and propagate the growth of the evil which they boldly sought to eradicate? To the eternal infamy of our country this will be handed down to posterity, written in the blood of African innocence. If your forefathers have been degenerate enough to introduce slavery into your country to contaminate the minds of her citizens, you ought to have ...
— Anti-Slavery Opinions before the Year 1800 - Read before the Cincinnati Literary Club, November 16, 1872 • William Frederick Poole

... where She might with all convenience live alone. And this besought he of his consort fair, As thinking, that the rustics, which on down Pasture their flocks, or fruitful fallows till, Could ne'er contaminate her ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto

... those wretches, male and female, haven't you, reader? Such people are great nuisances—half the discomforts of life are bred by them; they contaminate and poison the air they breathe, with their noisome breath, like the odor of ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley

... may contaminate a flock, so one evil associate— particularly if he be daring, may seriously injure the morals of many. Every young man can recall the evil influence of one bad boy on a whole school, but he cannot so readily point to the schoolmate, ...
— How to Get on in the World - A Ladder to Practical Success • Major A.R. Calhoon

... family (sacerdotium Flaviae gentis). The exculpation is given by Constantine himself in his address of thanks to the Hispellates: "We are pleased and grateful for your determination to raise a temple in honor of our family and of ourselves; and we accept it, provided you do not contaminate it with superstitious practices." The honor of a temple and of a priesthood, therefore, was offered and accepted as a political demonstration, as an act of loyalty, and as an occasion for public festivities, ...
— Pagan and Christian Rome • Rodolfo Lanciani

... down which generations of boys had ruined their pants in hilarious coasting; near by, the ancient well-swipe, and the old oaken bucket which rose from the well; beyond this, of course, as usual, the piggery and hennery to contaminate the water and breed typhoid fever, and in the house cellar, the usual dampness from the hillside to supply us all with ...
— The Gentleman from Everywhere • James Henry Foss

... contrasts between the homespun of the modern dialect and the exquisite silk and gossamer of the vocabulary of romance of a "cultured language." Madhus has been successful in rendering into Landsmaal scenes as different as the witch-scene, the porter-scene (which Lassen omitted for fear it would contaminate the minds of school children), the exquisite lines of the King and Banquo on their arrival at Macbeth's castle, and Macbeth's last, tragic soliloquy when he learns of the ...
— An Essay Toward a History of Shakespeare in Norway • Martin Brown Ruud

... digger, who is willing to pay the odious tax demanded of him by government, and not be compelled to stand in the rain or sun, or treated as if the 'distinguished government official' feared that the digger was a thing that would contaminate him by a closer proximity; so the 'fellah' is kept by a wooden rail from approaching within a couple of yards of the tent. In consequence, many persons mistaking the licence-office for the commissioner's water-closet, a placard has been placed ...
— The Eureka Stockade • Carboni Raffaello

... the unbroken, self-conscious existence of the white or dominant ethnic group is synonymous with the preservation of all that has meaning and inspiration in its past and hope for its future. It forbids by law, therefore, or by the equally effective social taboo, anything that would tend to contaminate the purity of its stock or jeopardize the integrity of its ...
— Applied Eugenics • Paul Popenoe and Roswell Hill Johnson

... other hand, always remained a possession of the crown. No Huguenots or Protestants were allowed in these colonies for fear that they might contaminate the Indians with their dangerous Protestant doctrines and would perhaps interfere with the missionary work of the Jesuit fathers. The English colonies, therefore, had been founded upon a much healthier basis than their French neighbours and ...
— The Story of Mankind • Hendrik van Loon

... Consultation konsiligxo. Consume konsumi. Consumer konsumanto. Consummate plenigi. Consummation plenigo. Consumption (phthisis) ftizo. Consumption konsumigxo. Contact kontakto. Contagious komunikebla. Contain enhavi. Contaminate malpurigi. Contemn malestimi. Contemplate rigardadi. Contemporary samtempa. Contempt malestimo. Contemptible malestima. Contend batali. Content kontentigi. Contentedness kontenteco. Contention kontrauxstaro. Contentious malpacula. Contentment kontenteco. Contents enhavo. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes

... Brussels, a jesuit, thought proper to publish them with great omissions, particularly of this letter of Folliot's. Perhaps Becket made no answer at all, as not deigning to write to an excommunicated person, whose very commerce would contaminate him; and the bishop, trusting to this arrogance of his primate, might calumniate him the more freely. (6.) Though the sentence pronounced on Becket by the great council implies that he had refused to make any answer to the king's court, this does ...
— The History of England, Volume I • David Hume

... liquids coming into contact with it, micro-organisms (especially the mould fungi) commence to multiply, and the long thread forms rapidly penetrate the substance of the plug, and gain access to and contaminate the interior of ...
— The Elements of Bacteriological Technique • John William Henry Eyre

... the doctor. "In work of that kind you get into every variety of place; and some of it is new to you. Never mind! No one can contaminate you. It is the law that only a man can degrade himself. Knowing things will not harm you. Doing them is a different matter. What you know will be a protection. What you do ruins——if it is wrong. You are not harmed, ...
— The Harvester • Gene Stratton Porter

... florid beauty groves and fields appear, 125 Man seems the only growth that dwindles here. Contrasted faults through all his manner reign; Though poor, luxurious; though submissive, vain; Though grave, yet trifling; zealous, yet untrue; And e'en in penance planning sins anew. 130 All evils here contaminate the mind, That opulence departed leaves behind; For wealth was theirs, not far remov'd the date, When commerce proudly flourish'd through the state; At her command the palace learn'd to rise, 135 Again the long-fall'n column sought the skies; The canvas glow'd ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Oliver Goldsmith • Oliver Goldsmith

... as princes of the blood are treated when convicted of capital crimes, which is by putting them into a large iron caldron, and pounding them to pieces with wooden pestles, because none of their royal blood must be spilt on the ground, it being, by their religion, thought great impiety to contaminate the divine blood by mixing it with earth." When Kublai Khan defeated and took his uncle Nayan, who had rebelled against him, he caused Nayan to be put to death by being wrapt in a carpet and tossed to and fro till he died, "because he would not have the ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer

... Man seems the only growth that dwindles here. Contrasted faults through all his manners reign: Though poor, luxurious; though submissive, vain; Though grave, yet trifling; zealous, yet untrue; And ev'n in penance planning sins anew. 130 All evils here contaminate the mind That opulence departed leaves behind; For wealth was theirs,[16] not far removed the date When commerce proudly nourished through the state, At her command the palace learnt to rise,[17] 135 Again ...
— Selections from Five English Poets • Various

... wanting those who yet openly defend the practice, deeming it indeed no sin, but rather a benefit to the water, to take from it some of the superfluous fish, which, say they, would otherwise almost certainly die of disease and contaminate the stream. ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang

... post and head for San Antonio, New Mexico, a town 28 kilometers northwest of the Guard Post. The Base Commander had noted that portions of the cloud were heading northwestward and, fearing that fallout from the cloud would contaminate Guard Post 2, had ordered the military police to evacuate. The chief monitor, however, had found no significant radiation levels anywhere along the northern part of Broadway nor around Guard Post 2. The Base Commander, after being contacted by the chief monitor, ...
— Project Trinity 1945-1946 • Carl Maag and Steve Rohrer

... is no sewage to contaminate the soil, a hard, well-beaten dirt floor is not particularly objectionable, except that it cannot well be cleaned. Boards raised from the ground by small blocks nailed to the under side, and leading to bins, cupboards, and furnace ...
— The Complete Home • Various

... "insurrection," and alarming "race riots," it never occurred to the white man, that his wife and children were in danger of assault. Nor in the Reconstruction era, when the hue and cry was against "Negro Domination," was there ever a thought that the domination would ever contaminate a fireside or strike to death the virtue of womanhood. It must appear strange indeed, to every thoughtful and candid man, that more than a quarter of a century elapsed before the Negro began to show signs of ...
— The Red Record - Tabulated Statistics and Alleged Causes of Lynching in the United States • Ida B. Wells-Barnett

... collect some family portraits; he recommended to him a fine Velasquez. "Velasquez!—who's he?" said the head of his family. "It is a superb picture, sir—a genuine portrait by the Spaniard, and doubtless, of some Spanish nobleman. "Then," said he, "I won't have it; I'll have no Spanish blood contaminate my family, sir." "Spanish blood," rejected by the plebeian! I have known better men than you, Eusebius—excuse the comparison—vamped up and engraved upon the spur of the moment, for celebrated highwaymen or bloody murderers. But this digression won't help you out in your sitting. Let ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various

... POTATOES.—In general, potatoes are stored or preserved in pits, cellars, pies, or camps; but, whatever mode is adopted, it is essential that the tubers be perfectly dry; otherwise, they will surely rot; and a few rotten potatoes will contaminate a whole mass. The pie, as it is called, consists of a trench, lined and covered with straw; the potatoes in it being piled in the shape of a house roof, to the height of about three feet. The camps are shallow pits, filled and ridged up in a similar manner, covered ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton

... personal injury received, but for prevention.... Serpents, toads, and vipers, &c., are noxious to the body, and poison the sensitive life: these poison the soul, corrupt our posterity, ensnare our children, destroy the vital of our happiness, our future felicity, and contaminate the whole mass.' And he concludes: 'Alas, the Church of England! What with Popery on the one hand, and schismatics on the other, how has she been crucified between two thieves! Now let us crucify the thieves! Let ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen

... to consider air and water common property, free to be abused by anyone without regard to the consequences. Instead, we should begin now to treat them as scarce resources, which we are no more free to contaminate than we are free to throw garbage ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... weight since I left your cursed, detestable, and abhorred abode of scandal, where, excepting yourself and John Becher, [3] I care not if the whole race were consigned to the Pit of Acheron, which I would visit in person rather than contaminate my sandals with the polluted dust of Southwell. Seriously, unless obliged by the emptiness of my purse to revisit Mrs. B., you will see ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Letters and Journals, Vol. 1 • Lord Byron, Edited by Rowland E. Prothero

... for as diphtheria is frequently caused by deficient ventilation, the best remedy is thorough ventilation. Look well both to the drains and to the privies, and see that the drains from the water-closets and from the privies do not in any way contaminate the pump-water. If the drains be defective or the privies be full, the disease in your child will be generated, fed, and fostered. Not only so, but the disease will spread in your family and ...
— Advice to a Mother on the Management of her Children • Pye Henry Chavasse

... Man seems the only growth that dwindles here. Contrasted faults thro' all his manners rein; Though poor, luxurious; though submissive, vain; Though grave, yet trifling; zealous, yet untrue; And e'en in penance planning sins anew. All evils here contaminate the mind, That opulence departed leaves behind: For wealth was theirs, not far remov'd the date, When commerce proudly flourish'd thro' the state; At her command the palace learn'd to rise, Again the ...
— Sketches of the Fair Sex, in All Parts of the World • Anonymous

... been exemplified and reviewed are based on the feeling that woman is possessed of a demonic power, or perhaps of a mana principle which may work injury; or else upon the fear that she may contaminate man with her weakness. It is very probable that many of these taboos originated even as far back as the stage of society in which the line of descent was traced through the mother. There seems little doubt that the framework of ancient society rested on the basis of kinship, ...
— Taboo and Genetics • Melvin Moses Knight, Iva Lowther Peters, and Phyllis Mary Blanchard

... thence that drop again, Without addition or diminishing, As take from me thyself, and not me too. How dearly would it touch thee to the quick, Should'st thou but hear I were licentious, And that this body, consecrate to thee, By ruffian lust should be contaminate! Wouldst thou not spit at me and spurn at me, And hurl the name of husband in my face, And tear the stain'd skin off my harlot brow, And from my false hand cut the wedding-ring, And break it with a deep-divorcing vow? I know ...
— The Comedy of Errors • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]

... surprised that Sprague had been there, and that she couldn't understand why he had behaved so strangely. Then Lois said she might as well go fetch Peter from the library, since Sprague was no longer there to contaminate the ...
— Murder at Bridge • Anne Austin

... upon closer view, it is not easy by any means to take an adequate vengeance for any injury beyond a very trivial standard; and that with common magnanimity one does not care to avenge. Whilst I was in this mood of mind, still debating with myself whether I should or should not contaminate my hands with the blood of this monster, and still unable to shut my eyes upon one fact, viz. that my buried Agnes could above all things have urged me to abstain from such acts of violence, too evidently useless, listlessly and scarcely knowing what ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey, Vol. 2 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey

... was not gained without some sacrifice of his spiritual character, and the "secular" Brahmin had to bow, quoad sacra, to the penniless Bhut, or "regular" Brahmin, who, refusing to contaminate his sanctity by doing any kind of work, ate of the temple, or lived by royal bounty or private charity, and by the free breakfasts without which a marriage, "thread ceremony" or funeral in a gentleman's house could not be respectably celebrated. Idleness and sanctity are a powerful combination, and ...
— Concerning Animals and Other Matters • E.H. Aitken, (AKA Edward Hamilton)

... mas, one of the maples, and is much more in reputation for its shade than it deserves; for the honey-dew leaves, which fall early (like those of the ash) turn to mucilage and noxious insects, and putrifie with the first moisture of the season; so as they contaminate and mar our walks; and are therefore by my consent, to be banish'd from all curious gardens and avenues. 'Tis rais'd of the keys in the husk (as soon as ripe) they come up the first Spring; also by roots and layers, in ground ...
— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn

... recollected spectre than a renewed acquaintance. When we came to the iron rails poor Miss Planta, in much fidget, begged to take the books from M. d'Arblay, terrified, I imagine, lest French feet should contaminate the gravel within!—while he, innocent of her fears, was insisting upon carrying them as far as to the house, till he saw I took part with Miss Planta, and he was then compelled to let us lug in ten volumes ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay

... smirch; begrease[obs3];.dabble, drabble[obs3], draggle, daggle[obs3]; spatter, slubber; besmear &c., bemire, beslime[obs3], begrime, befoul; splash, stain, distain[obs3], maculate, sully, pollute, defile, debase, contaminate, taint, leaven;, corrupt &c. (injure) 659; cover with dust &c. n.; drabble in the mud[obs3]; roil. wallow in the mire; slobber, slabber[obs3]. Adj. dirty, filthy, grimy; unclean, impure; soiled &c. v.; not to be handled with kid gloves; dusty, snuffy[obs3], smutty, sooty, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... following caution be given, when art of every kind must contaminate the mind; and why entangle the grand motives of action, which reason and religion equally combine to enforce, with pitiful worldly shifts and slight of hand tricks to gain the applause of gaping tasteless fools? "Be even cautious in displaying your ...
— A Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Title: Vindication of the Rights of Women • Mary Wollstonecraft [Godwin]

... We Catholics know what foreigners are, how they work for evil in places high and low. One cannot take up a daily paper without seeing some exposure of their many-sided viciousness. They contaminate the land with their godless depravity. Nobody can count on immunity. The highest officials in the land, the very Ministers of the Crown, are subjected to their vile disguised attempts at bribery and corruption, no humble peasant girl, no child, is ...
— South Wind • Norman Douglas

... me, as you came into the room, as a man who is at peace with himself." Lord Alberan snorted, and was about to speak, but Sir Robert held up his hand. "Tell me, Dr. Harden, did you actually contaminate the water ...
— The Blue Germ • Martin Swayne

... hurt me as you did. I never did care for him ... like that. It was ... because ... you seemed to think my society contamination ... to an honest boy. I did care for him, but not like that. I cared too much for him to let him marry me ... to contaminate him ...
— No Hero • E.W. Hornung

... do? shall we be governed still By this false hand, contaminate with blood? Or else depart and travel forth, until To Euphrates we come, that sacred flood, Where dwells a people void of martial skill, Whose cities rich, whose land is fat and good, Where kingdoms great we may at ease provide, Far from these ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso

... 14th of August this invitation had been withdrawn, Hagen had left Whitefield's house, and had been refused work on Whitefield's plantation, for fear that he might contaminate the Whitefield converts. The trouble arose over a discussion on Predestination,—not the first or last time this has happened,—and the two men found themselves utterly at variance, for Whitefield held the extreme Calvinistic view, while Hagen argued ...
— The Moravians in Georgia - 1735-1740 • Adelaide L. Fries

... retire at sundown or retire in the dark. Whatever water was needed had to be carried from the nearest well and even after the mains had been restored to normal efficiency this practice was continued for fear that the possibly broken sewers might contaminate or pollute the water. No fires nor cooking were permitted in any building until every chimney and flue had been passed upon by ...
— The Spirit of 1906 • George W. Brooks

... and portrait painting." The troubles and death of Charles I. were a sad obstacle to art. "His son, in possession of the Cartoons of Raphael, and with the magnificence of Whitehall before his eyes, suffered Verio to contaminate the walls of his palaces, or degraded Lely to paint the Cymons and Iphigenias of his court; whilst the manner of Kneller swept completely what might yet be left of taste under his successors. Such was the equally contemptible and deplorable state of English art, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 54, No. 338, December 1843 • Various

... observe that the quality of inertia is one which ought to be removed as far as possible from each social system. Inertia was regarded as a capital crime by the Egyptians. Solon ordained that inert persons should be put to death, and not contaminate the community. As savages bury living men, so does inertia practise the same barbarous custom upon States and individuals. Observe the putrid state of inert water, the clear and sparkling beauty of the ...
— The Romance of Mathematics • P. Hampson

... had the courage to throw themselves amid the flying weapons, and making a rush across, to part the incensed armies, and assuage their fury; imploring their fathers on the one side, their husbands on the other, "that as fathers-in-law and sons-in-law they would not contaminate each other with impious blood, nor stain their offspring with parricide, the one [19]their grandchildren, the other their children. If you are dissatisfied with the affinity between you, if with our marriages, turn your resentment against us; we are the cause ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius

... speak of the guilt of this community; sometimes in variance with reason and truth. That guilt belongs only to the guilty; it cannot contaminate those who were helpless spectators, or involuntary agents. The doctrine of common responsibility, can only be applicable where all are actors, or one is the representative of all. The colonist may say, "I owe ...
— The History of Tasmania , Volume II (of 2) • John West

... off by sight, as that Ephesian did of whom [4958]Philostratus speaks, of so pernicious an eye, he poisoned all he looked steadily on: and that other argument, menstruae faminae, out of Aristotle's Problems, morbosae Capivaccius adds, and [4959]Septalius the commentator, that contaminate a looking-glass with beholding it. [4960] "So the beams that come from the agent's heart, by the eyes, infect the spirits about the patients, inwardly wound, and thence the spirits infect the blood." To this ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior

... win over the courts, however, the railroads do by no means confine their attention to the judges. They are well aware that a biased jury is often more useful to them than a biased judge, and efforts are made by them to contaminate juries, or at least prejudice them in their favor. A prominent Iowa attorney, the legal and political factotum of a large railroad corporation, for years made it a practice to supply jurors with passes. In one instance, when ...
— The Railroad Question - A historical and practical treatise on railroads, and - remedies for their abuses • William Larrabee

... at times the arts have been sensualized, the emphasis has been put on the form of expression, not on the life expressed; and then reformers, like the Puritans and the Quakers, have endeavored to exclude the arts from religion, lest they should contaminate it. But the exclusion has been accomplished with difficulty, and to maintain it has been impossible. It is neither an accident, nor a sign of decadence, that painting and sculpture are creeping back into the Protestant churches, to combine with poetry and music in expressing ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various

... the distance named, it is not likely that any surface pollution in the vicinity of the well could ever damage the water. Figure 28 shows the section of a well where no such precautions have been taken, and it is evident that not only surface wash, but subsurface pollution may readily contaminate the water. Figure 29 (after Imbeaux), on the other hand, shows a shallow well properly protected by a good wall and water-tight cover. Figure 30 shows a photograph also of this latter type of well. Even if a cesspool ...
— Rural Hygiene • Henry N. Ogden

... diseased man, in his unbridled career of licentiousness, contaminate ever so many of these poor beings—who, to the honor of woman be it said, are mostly driven by bitter want or through seduction to ply their disgraceful trade,—the scurvy fellow remains unmolested. But woe to the woman who does not forthwith submit to inspection and treatment! ...
— Woman under socialism • August Bebel

... fixing her eyes on Mrs. Temple, cried—"You know not, Madam, what you do; you know not whom you are relieving, or you would curse me in the bitterness of your heart. Come not near me, Madam, I shall contaminate you. I am the viper that stung your peace. I am the woman who turned the poor Charlotte out to perish in the street. Heaven have mercy! I see her now," continued she looking at Lucy; "such, such was the fair bud of innocence ...
— Charlotte Temple • Susanna Rowson

... to deny that he believed Senator Dilworthy to be guilty—but what then? Was it such an extraordinary case? For his part, even allowing the Senator to be guilty, he did not think his continued presence during the few remaining days of the Session would contaminate the Senate to a dreadful degree. [This humorous sally was received with smiling admiration—notwithstanding it was not wholly new, having originated with the Massachusetts General in the House a day or two before, upon the ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... the covenant, could not fail of multiplying the judgments of God upon the land; an inquiry was instituted into the characters of numerous individuals; and eighty officers, with many of their men, were cashiered,[c] that they might not contaminate by their presence the army of the saints.[1] Still it was for Charles Stuart, the chief of the malignants, that they were to fight, and therefore from him, to appease the anger of the Almighty, an ...
— The History of England from the First Invasion by the Romans - to the Accession of King George the Fifth - Volume 8 • John Lingard and Hilaire Belloc

... deprave, soil, stain, taint, besmear, contaminate, defile, pollute, spoil, sully, vitiate. ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald

... are equal. First, there is the taint of the political corruption in America which must, as has been said, in some measure contaminate the community. Then, England is an old country, with all the machinery of society running in long-accustomed grooves; above all it is a wealthy country and the first among creditor nations, to whose interest it has been, ...
— The Twentieth Century American - Being a Comparative Study of the Peoples of the Two Great - Anglo-Saxon Nations • H. Perry Robinson

... would touch thee to the quick, Shouldst thou but hear I were licentious, And that this body, consecrate to thee, By ruffian lust should be contaminate! Wouldst them not spit at me and spurn at me, And hurl the name of husband in my face, And tear the stain'd skin off my harlot brow, And from my false hand cut the wedding-ring...? My blood is mingled with the crime of lust: For, if ...
— William Shakespeare • John Masefield

... Ursula. "Nasty German rubbish. I wonder it didn't contaminate the cellar. Now we ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, September 23, 1914 • Various

... have these would-be republicans to allege as an excuse in their favour? They have no convents to initiate young girls in the arts of dissimulation; no debauched court to contaminate, by its example, the wavering principles of the weak part of the sex, or sap the more determined ones of those whose mind is of a firmer texture; nor have they any friendly, sympathizing confessors to draw a spunge, as it were, over the trespasses ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon

... exclaimed. "Nobody else would have thought of it." And he sat down in a rocking-chair, in which some cushions had been placed, and, not wishing to contaminate his surroundings by smoke, he leaned back and enjoyed it as he had enjoyed few things in his life. "Yes, she done it," he kept saying. "She slipped over here, busy as she is at home, and done it just to please me. She is ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben

... abolitionists is implied in the inquiry you make, whether since they do not "furnish in their own families or persons examples of intermarriage, they intend to contaminate the industrious and laborious classes of society of the North by a revolting admixture of the ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society

... me for? I am no sneak and traitor, and not for ten thousand dollars—not for a hundred thousand dollars—not to save my very life would I do such a dastardly thing! You have made a mistake in your man! Take back your dirty money! I would not touch a dollar of it for the world! It would contaminate me!" ...
— Frank Merriwell's Races • Burt L. Standish

... magistrate thought his a most interesting case, and believed in his heart that he had been the means of turning him from the error of his ways—he and the chaplain between them, anyhow. He even helped him to be allowed to be kept a little separate from the other prisoners (lest they should contaminate him!), and in lots of ways made his life a bit easier ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood

... Many a heart has been softened, many a burden made lighter, by a few kind, cheerful words. There are none so low, none so degraded, as to be beneath consideration. To take the hand of the hardest criminal will not contaminate—vice is not contagious. ...
— Bohemian Society • Lydia Leavitt

... reflection and stimulate to virtue. For this reason, women are more pious than men; and for this reason, too, they are more eminent in purity. Contact with the domestic circle does not contaminate or corrupt, as the baser contact with the world is ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks



Words linked to "Contaminate" :   colly, contaminative, contaminant, taint, pollute, contamination, alter, grime, dirty, foul, modify, soil, infect, change, bemire



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