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Be active   /bi ˈæktɪv/   Listen
Be active

verb
1.
Be in a state of action.  Synonym: move.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Be active" Quotes from Famous Books



... men shall be clothed with the monstrous authority to demoralize neighborhoods and scatter the fire-brands of death and destruction. The power to arrest this horrible work is in your hands. Be vigilant, be active. There is resistless might in the energy of earnest wills devoted to a noble cause. Petition, remonstrate, work while yet it is day. Say not that we can gain nothing by petitioning. Was it not through this means, we obtained the law under which ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... armour was getting rusty, and populations seemed to have become tame, licking the hands of masters who paid for a ready-made army when they wanted it, as they paid for goods of Smyrna. Even the fear of the Turk had ceased to be active, and the Pope found it more immediately profitable to accept bribes from him for a little prospective poisoning than to form plans either for ...
— Romola • George Eliot

... found to be active and useful in small matters and light duties suited to his age, and in the course of time was appointed to the position of steward's assistant, in which capacity he became deeply learned in the matter of washing cups, dishes, etcetera, besides acquiring a ...
— Shifting Winds - A Tough Yarn • R.M. Ballantyne

... same lobby and be seen at the same club, it is your duty to be civil both for your own sake and for that of the cause. It is for the hermits of society to indulge in personal dislikings,—for men who have never been active and never mean to be active. I had been telling Mr. Kennedy how much I thought of ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope

... ought to have something active. Why not try the whiskey with the white-pine chips in it? I'm sure it's indicated." In her long course of medication she had picked up certain professional phrases, which she used with amusing seriousness. "It would be active, at any rate." ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... then for doubt? Yes, for that philosophic doubt which is the evidence of a faculty doing its own work. It is more necessary for us to be active than to be orthodox. To be orthodox is what we wish to be, but we can only truly reach it by being honest, by being original, by seeing with our own eyes, by believing with our own heart. "An idle life," says Goethe, "is death anticipated." Better ...
— Natural Law in the Spiritual World • Henry Drummond

... it wishes to do good for God's sake. [But it is sheer hypocrisy. ] In this manner they teach that men merit the remission of sins by doing what is in them, i.e., if reason, grieving over sin, elicit an act of love to God, or for God's sake be active in that which is good. And because this opinion naturally flatters men, it has brought forth and multiplied in the Church many services, monastic vows, abuses of the mass; and, with this opinion the one has, in the course of time, devised this ...
— The Apology of the Augsburg Confession • Philip Melanchthon

... she retorted. "Although I have n't used that intelligence in the right way. Don't smile! I 'm not going to turn mawkish. I 'm not good. I don't know whether I want to be. But I know one thing: I 've got to keep busy—I 've got to be active. I 've ...
— Never-Fail Blake • Arthur Stringer

... immediately forthcoming. The Assembly of New Jersey unanimously declined to send any delegates, although it declared itself "not without a just sensibility respecting the late acts of Parliament," and wished "such other colonies as think proper to be active every success they can loyally and reasonably desire." For two months there was no indication that any colony would think it "proper to be active"; but during August and September the assemblies of six colonies chose deputies to the congress, and when that body finally assembled in October, ...
— The Eve of the Revolution - A Chronicle of the Breach with England, Volume 11 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Carl Becker

... of you gentlemen recommend a servant to me? He must be able to talk French as well as Italian. He must be active and intelligent. I should like him to be handy and accustomed to camp service, though this is not so important, for I want him as an interpreter before anything else. I should like him to be a lightweight, so as to be able to ride with me. He ...
— Won by the Sword - A Story of the Thirty Years' War • G.A. Henty

... love, hatred, &c. will be destroyed (V:ii.), but also that the appetites or desires, which are wont to arise from such emotion, will become incapable of being excessive (IV:lxi.). For it must be especially remarked, that the appetite through which a man is said to be active, and that through which he is said to be passive is one and the same. For instance, we have shown that human nature is so constituted, that everyone desires his fellow-men to live after his own fashion (III:xxxi.Note); ...
— Ethica Ordine Geometrico Demonstrata - Part I: Concerning God • Benedict de Spinoza

... said, as they waded across one, waist deep. "This is but a little stream, but if there are larger ones, as is like enough, we shall have to swim before we are done. There is one advantage; in such weather as this, even the Welsh will scarce be active." ...
— Both Sides the Border - A Tale of Hotspur and Glendower • G. A. Henty

... regarded by the sceptical mind with incredulity. They have determined their forms of belief before their years of discretion, and once those forms are determined they are not very easily changed. Within the shell it has adopted the intelligence may be active and lively enough, may indeed be extraordinarily active and lively, but ...
— Soul of a Bishop • H. G. Wells

... the relationship between the subject and the assertion made by the verb. The active voice shows the subject as actor (They elected Washington); the passive voice, as acted upon (Washington was elected). (A transitive verb may be active or passive, but an intransitive verb has no voice.) Mode indicates the manner of predicating an action, whether as assertion, condition, command, etc. There are three modes in English. The indicative mode affirms ...
— The Century Handbook of Writing • Garland Greever

... her. I was just surprised, that's all. But deep behind the telepathic barrier he had erected against her probing mind, he was thinking something else. He had been assigned to London to capture the Controller—then unknown—who was said to be active in England. But his recall order had been decided upon before Harris was caught—or even suspected. Someone in the UN Psychodeviant Police Supreme Headquarters in New York must have known that Harris would be caught ...
— The Penal Cluster • Ivar Jorgensen (AKA Randall Garrett)

... the strawberry seemed to furnish the very tonic she needed, and the beauty that abounded on every side, and that was daily brought to her couch, conferred a happiness that few could understand. Long years of weakness, in which only her mind could be active, had developed in the invalid a refinement scarcely possible to those who must daily meet the practical questions of life, and whose more robust natures could enjoy the material side of existence. It was not strange, ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe

... almost forgot to say that we have two of the best Science Fiction authors as active members, and three more who are doing their best, but because of such work they cannot be active. ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science April 1930 • Various

... she was on her death-bed, sent for Isabel, and charged her to keep up, maintain, and promote certain pious societies which she had started in Trieste. One of these was "The Apostleship of Prayer," whose members, women, were to be active in doing good works, corporally and spiritually, in Trieste. This guild was one of two good works to which Isabel chiefly devoted herself during her life at Trieste. The other was a branch of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to ...
— The Romance of Isabel Lady Burton Volume II • Isabel Lady Burton & W. H. Wilkins

... migrations—"Better conditions for the babies." In the little fellows of seven or eight with their ill-fitting clothes and their dogged looks of determination one sees the makers of empire. Before a decade is past they will be active wheat-growers in their own right, making two grains grow where one grew before and so "deserving better of mankind than the whole race of politicians put together." I think it was President Garfield who said, "I always feel more respect for a boy than for a man. Who knows what ...
— The New North • Agnes Deans Cameron

... see it, and thought it was Hansel's finger, and was astonished that there was no way of fattening him. When four weeks had gone by, and Hansel still continued thin, she was seized with impatience and would not wait any longer. "Hola, Grethel," she cried to the girl, "be active, and bring some water. Let Hansel be fat or lean, to-morrow I will kill him, and cook him." Ah, how the poor little sister did lament when she had to fetch the water, and how her tears did flow down over her cheeks! "Dear God, do help ...
— Household Tales by Brothers Grimm • Grimm Brothers

... cognizant of and acquainted with all that is done. Thus the defects, if any there are, will be more known and observed; and if they arise from need the hospital will finally have more, and those from among the best in the state, who will be active in their efforts to supply and provide what ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume X, 1597-1599 • E. H. Blair

... Carlyon does, that there will be active life and work there?" and Elizabeth's large sad eyes were full of yearning as she asked ...
— Herb of Grace • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... in the past, but we are beginning to appreciate the reason for this evolutionary process. We have discovered that the cause depends upon certain active changes which take place in the sex organs. About this time the testicles begin to be active. For years these glands have been preparing themselves for this work, so they first grow rapidly, increasing in size until they are about eight times bigger than they were before this time, then they begin to pour into the circulation a secretion which stimulates ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol 2 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague

... happiness. Man can be happy only when in his own mind he realizes his happiness, and calm is necessary to give full play to his mind; therefore without calm man would truly never be completely happy, and pleasure, in order to be felt, must cease to be active. Then what do they mean by that ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... it. He makes it therefore his continual care to preserve those just and enlightened views, which through Divine mercy he has obtained. Not that he will retire from that station in the world which Providence seems to have appointed him to fill: he will be active in the business of life, and enjoy its comforts with moderation and thankfulness; but he will not be "totus in illis," he will not give up his whole soul to them, they will be habitually subordinate in his ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce

... words, the conclusion is expressed that no man may boast of life unless he has love. If it is true that faith must be active, it is conversely true that the absence of fruitage demonstrates one's continuance in the old Cain-like manner of existence, torpid and dead, bereft of solace and the experience of God's grace and life. Let no one presume to think he has passed ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. III - Trinity Sunday to Advent • Martin Luther

... with the irritating survivals of feudalism was not that the nation was miserable and oppressed above all others, but that it was sufficiently free and enlightened to realize the evils and absurdities of the old rgime. Mere oppression and misery does not account for a revolution, there must also be active discontent; and of that there was a great abundance in France, as we shall see. The French peasant no longer looked up to his lord as his ruler and protector, but viewed him as a sort of legalized ...
— An Introduction to the History of Western Europe • James Harvey Robinson

... of the Order, as he was called, a Vicar-General for Germany. To this association belonged the convent at Erfurt. Its inmates were treated with marked favour and respect by the higher and educated classes in the town. They were said to be active in preaching and in the care of souls, and to cultivate among themselves the study of theology. Arnoldi, Luther's teacher, belonged to this convent. As the Order possessed no property, but all its members lived ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin

... But obedience must be active, not passive. The obedience of the lower animals is automatic, and therefore in its limits measurably perfect. Lack of obedience means the extinction of the race. Only the obedient survive, and hence comes about obedience to ...
— The Story of the Innumerable Company, and Other Sketches • David Starr Jordan

... city by a certain route, chosen without any special reason from amongst many, but in the nature of things it is necessary that trust, and love which follows trust, and longing which follows love should be active in a soul if Christ is to ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren

... be personally happy. Society, in its future and its past, is a natural object of interest like art or science; it exists, like them, because only when lost in such rational objects can a free soul be active and immortal. But all these ideals are terms in some actual life, not alien ends, important to nobody, to which, notwithstanding, everybody is ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana

... likeness or unlikeness of these two components of value. Another theory which our author combats strongly is that the interest of the employer is sufficient to keep wages up to the highest profitable point. He holds that the laborer must be active in his own interests, or he will never obtain that rate of payment which is necessary to his proper maintenance. Bad food reduces the quantity and quality of the laborer's work, so that more men have to be hired for a given task, and the employer pays more in the end for his ...
— The Galaxy, Volume 23, No. 2, February, 1877 • Various

... the generous words of Henry Rayne, "and why would'nt you? I am too selfish to live. It will make a nice little trip and you'll feel all the more refreshed when you get back. But, think of how soon you must go—to-morrow morning at the latest, I tell you. So, now be active, my dear. Run and tell Nanette to get your things ready, and I'll drop a note to Guy to ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera

... not to buy a stock merely because somebody says it is a good thing to buy, unless the person making the statement is in the business of giving information on stocks, because it may be only a rumor with no substantial basis. Of course, if many people act on the rumor, there will be active trading in the stock, and it is frequently for that purpose that ...
— Successful Stock Speculation • John James Butler

... anyhow. You will be a man of property some day, and you will need to know enough about business to be able to supervise the managers of your estate. You know, I had Janet take a course at a business college, last winter, and Ross is in with his father and will be active for several years." ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips

... Iconoclasm. Buddhism, on the contrary, is the mother of art, and art is her ever-busy child and handmaid. The temples of the Kami were bald and bare. The Kojiki told nothing of life hereafter, and kept silence on a hundred points at which human curiosity is sure to be active, and at which the Yoga system was voluble. Buddhism came with a set of visible symbols which should attract the eye and fire the imagination, and within ethical limits, the passions also. It was a mixed and variegated system,—a resultant of many forces.[7] It ...
— The Religions of Japan - From the Dawn of History to the Era of Meiji • William Elliot Griffis

... gorgeous colours, and his mind away among the bright realms of eternal felicity. A faint breeze had arisen, and the heavy clouds began to sail along, denoting rain, when he gave his orders to his faithful dog, to gather his sheep for the night, and urged him to be active, to enable him to proceed home before the shower came on. Looking along in the direction of the road that led through the moor, he thought he could perceive, at a considerable distance, three objects, urging their way ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland Volume 17 • Alexander Leighton

... among the colored men circulars artfully designed and calculated to stir up discontent. Every single member, agent, friend, or sympathizer with these societies and their purposes were ascertained to belong to the Republican party, and generally to be active members thereof. Some of the circulars contained the grossest misrepresentation of facts, and in almost all cases the immigrants expected large aid from the government of clothes, or land, or money or free transportation, ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 4, 1919 • Various

... the ordinary class of spies, properly so called, forming a regular part of the army. Tu Mu says: "Your surviving spy must be a man of keen intellect, though in outward appearance a fool; of shabby exterior, but with a will of iron. He must be active, robust, endowed with physical strength and courage; thoroughly accustomed to all sorts of dirty work, able to endure hunger and cold, and to put up with shame and ignominy." Ho Shih tells the following story of Ta'hsi Wu of the Sui dynasty: "When he was governor of Eastern Ch'in, ...
— The Art of War • Sun Tzu

... which all the parts of the body are capable of performing their respective and mutual functions; but the characteristics of perfection of form in the female are very different; delicacy of frame and modesty of demeanour, with less capability to be active, constitute the ...
— The Life, Studies, And Works Of Benjamin West, Esq. • John Galt

... maintain his own opinions, or to frustrate those of his neighbour; to torment, to persecute, to massacre, those who will not be mad after his own peculiar manner. Nature exacts that man in society should cherish glory, labour to render himself estimable, endeavour to establish an imperishable name, to be active, courageous, industrious; superstition tells him to be abject, pusillanimous, to live in obscurity, to occupy himself with ceremonies; it says to him, be useless to thyself, and do nothing for others. Nature proposes ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 2 • Baron D'Holbach

... I have just been saying. When we are sleeping naturally, it is not necessary to believe, as has often been supposed, that our senses are closed to external sensations. Our senses continue to be active. They act, it is true, with less precision, but in compensation they embrace a host of "subjective" impressions which pass unperceived when we are awake—for then we live in a world of perceptions common to all men—and which reappear in sleep, when ...
— Dreams • Henri Bergson

... he said; "one day I may kiss yours an you be active. The wide spaces of Destiny lie before you, though I shall not live to see it. But you must bestir you, for I am an old man, and have not far to travel now to the place from which one ...
— Red Axe • Samuel Rutherford Crockett

... to be dull and spiritless. Be active, sprightly, witty! Yours is not the way to attach your husband ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... it was the Future!" (Lady Maria knew that the word began in this case with a capital letter.) "No one knows what the Future is to poor women. One knows that one must get older, and one may not keep well, and if one could not be active and in good spirits, if one could not run about on errands, and things fell off, what could one do? It takes hard work, Lady Maria, to keep up even the tiniest nice little room and the plainest presentable wardrobe, if one isn't clever. If I ...
— Emily Fox-Seton - Being The Making of a Marchioness and The Methods of Lady Walderhurst • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... little time now we shall part, never, if I can help it, to meet again. You have seen me as a dangerous, reckless man, without any principles worth mentioning. Indeed, I have so few that I shall have recourse to violence, my son, if you do not assume a more reposeful manner. The evening will be active enough to make any further excitement quite superfluous. Have patience. An hour or so means little to anyone ...
— The Unspeakable Gentleman • John P. Marquand

... orders with the officers to follow as soon as they should have enlisted men sufficient to make up their companies. "The season of the year," added he, "calls for despatch. I depend upon your usual diligence and spirit to encourage your people to be active ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving

... the nature of the Institutions which Society needs, we have simply to consider by what mode we may best provide for the normal tendencies which ever have been and ever will be active in man. It is not in our power to change these tendencies, nor to prevent their play. But we may so order our social polity as to assist their natural drift, or to obstruct it. In the one case, the affairs of the community are conducted with harmony, and with the least possible friction. ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various

... Applehof suggests using a black plastic sheet slightly smaller than the inside dimensions of the container. Black material keeps out light and allows the worms to be active right on the surface. You may find that a plastic covering retains too much moisture and overly restricts air flow. When I covered my worm box with plastic it dripped too much. But then, most of what I feed the worms is fresh vegetable material ...
— Organic Gardener's Composting • Steve Solomon

... New York fill 330 printed pages. It is little wonder that American parties are beginning to study the organization of European parties, such as the labor parties and the social democratic parties, which have enlisted a rather fervent party fealty. These are propagandist parties and require to be active all the year round. So they demand annual dues of their members and have permanent salaried officials and official party organs. Such a permanent organization was suggested for the National Progressive party. But the early disintegration of the party made impossible what ...
— The Boss and the Machine • Samuel P. Orth

... not soe: those words Retaine affinity with that passion I hop'd youd left. The greatest of your Sinns Mercy will smile at, when you doe implore Its unconsuming grace: the dullest cloud Will, when you pray, be active as the ayre In opening to receive that breath to heaven Thats spent to purge your ills. Why, you may live To make a faire lustration for your faults And die ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Various

... that of Scotland's champion. Your work as messengers and scouts will be arduous and wearisome. You must be quiet and well behaved—remember that boys' tricks and play are out of place among men engaged in a desperate enterprise. Mingle not much with the others. Be active and prompt in obeying orders, and be assured that you will have opportunities of winning great honour and credit, and of having your full share of hard knocks. You will, as before, be divided into two companies, William Orr and Andrew Macpherson being your lieutenants ...
— In Freedom's Cause • G. A. Henty

... windows. Though it is she who now has ordered the unwelcome light to be admitted, he overlooks this in his enervation, and says how, before ever they met, he had observed that her windows were always blind till noon. The rest of the little world of Asolo would be active in the day's employment; but her house "would ope no eye." "And ...
— Browning's Heroines • Ethel Colburn Mayne

... foolish. Then methought "It were an easy leap to pluck bright honour from the pale-faced moon;" but now I am old and fat, and there is something in fat which chokes or destroys ambition. It would appear that it is requisite for the body to be active and springing as the mind; and if it is not, it weighs the latter down to its own gravity. Who ever heard of a fat man being ambitious? Caesar was a spare man; Buonaparte was thin as long as he climbed the ladder; Nelson ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat

... as to externals; whether to rule a province, a church, a school, a home; whether to keep accounts, or sweep a room; whether to evangelize the slums of a city, or the dark places of heathenism, or to teach language, or science, or music; whether to be active all day long, or to lie down alone to suffer; whatever be our actual place and duty in the world, "we worship." "We have set the Lord always before us." We have "sanctified Christ as LORD in our hearts" (1 Pet. iii. 15; so read). We belong to Him everywhere, ...
— Philippian Studies - Lessons in Faith and Love from St. Paul's Epistle to the Philippians • Handley C. G. Moule

... second emancipation proclamation of January 1, 1863, these became both numerous and notable. Southern friends, confident in the ultimate success of the Confederacy and equally confident that they had with them the great bulk of upper-class opinion in England, at first thought it unnecessary to be active in public expressions aside from such as were made through the newspapers. Up to November, 1862, The Index records no Southern public meeting. But by the summer of 1863, the indefatigable Spence had come to the conclusion ...
— Great Britain and the American Civil War • Ephraim Douglass Adams

... land will be active and adventurous, I'm sure, but some day, in one month, or two, or perhaps a year, you will find time to send me a letter to say how you are, and how ...
— In the Roaring Fifties • Edward Dyson

... ordered unexpectedly to Barry for loading, to take the place of an unready sister-ship; and Macandrew, of whom I have had much experience, would be active, critical of what a dog must put up with in life, and altogether unfit for intimate, amiable, and reminiscent conversation. Yet I wanted to see him again before he left, and went past the Board of ...
— London River • H. M. Tomlinson

... was to infiltrate whatever Czech groups might be active in the illicit movement and then, if he discovered there was a higher organization, a center of the movement, he was to attempt to become a part of it. If possible he was to rise in the organisation to as high a point ...
— Freedom • Dallas McCord Reynolds

... be active to a noteworthy degree. Although the numerals are already well known to the child, he still confounds them on all occasions, and in view of the absolute failure of the many attempts to teach the child the significance of the numbers ...
— The Mind of the Child, Part II • W. Preyer

... that wherever you are located you will do all that you can for community uplift. Be active in church and Sunday-school work, help to improve the public schools, assist in bettering health conditions, help the people to secure property, to buy homes and to improve them. In doing all these things, you will be carrying out the ...
— Booker T. Washington - Builder of a Civilization • Emmett J. Scott and Lyman Beecher Stowe

... not difficult to a skilful, hard-hitting king,—was pretty much all the actual fighting Olaf had to do in this enterprise. He various times met angry Bonders and refractory Things with arms in their hand; but by skilful, firm management,—perfectly patient, but also perfectly ready to be active,—he mostly managed without coming to strokes; and was universally recognized by Norway as its real king. A promising young man, and fit to be a king, thinks Snorro. Only of middle stature, almost rather shortish; but firm-standing, and stout-built; so that they got ...
— Early Kings of Norway • Thomas Carlyle

... feminine affectionateness and tenderness of heart,—and that keen, exquisite appreciation both of the joyful and the painful, which is a feminine characteristic, too. Yet he was far enough from being effeminate. He was thoughtful, naturally, yet he could be active and take pleasure in action. He was always ready to work, and feared neither hardship nor fatigue. When the great flood came and caused such terror and distress in the village, no one, not even Dick, home from Sandhurst for the midsummer holidays, was more energetic or worked harder or more effectually ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 5, No. 28, February, 1860 • Various

... Revolutionary epoch, that is, the last quarter of the eighteenth century, when the conscience of men began to be active on the subject of human bondage. We think that the disposition to recognize the wickedness and impolity of slavery was a part of the general movement which came on in civilization, tending to revolutionize not only the political but the social and ethical condition of mankind. We know well that ...
— Notable Events of the Nineteenth Century - Great Deeds of Men and Nations and the Progress of the World • Various

... master entered upon a dispute with the horseless man. The voices became excited and rose to vehement heights. But presently they subsided when Pat himself, anxious to be active, sounded a note of protest. Yet the argument proved to his benefit. Instead of mounting him behind his master, the odd man swung up behind another man on the sorrel. Then he was permitted to move forward, and as he approached the narrow defile ...
— Bred of the Desert - A Horse and a Romance • Marcus Horton

... the necessity of procuring her liberty, proved an incitement among all her partisans to be active in promoting her cause; and as her deliverance from captivity, it was thought, could nowise be effected but by attempts dangerous to the established government, Elizabeth had reason to expect little tranquillity so long as the Scottish queen remained a prisoner in her hands. ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume

... events, you have incurred suspicion. It is a pity that you mentioned what I confided to you: but what's done cannot be helped; you must now be active." ...
— Snarley-yow - or The Dog Fiend • Frederick Marryat

... one point of view, three great active volcanoes, each about seven thousand feet high. In addition to this, far to the south there were other lofty cones covered with snow, which, although not known to be active, must be in their origin volcanic. The line of the Andes is not, in this neighbourhood, nearly so elevated as in Chile; neither does it appear to form so perfect a barrier between the regions of the earth. This great ...
— A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World - The Voyage Of The Beagle • Charles Darwin

... Duke of Bedford, who was a very able man, began to be active for England, and, by bringing the war back into France and by holding the Duke of Burgundy to his faith, to distress and disturb Charles very much, Charles sometimes asked the Maid of Orleans what the Voices said about it? But, the ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens

... thought of the Twentieth Century will be religious men. They will not be religious in the fashion of monks, ascetics, mystic dreamers, or emotional enthusiasts. They will not be active in debating societies, discussing the intricacies of creeds. Neither will they be sticklers as to details in religious millinery. They will be simple, earnest, God-fearing, because they have known the God that makes for righteousness. Their religion of ...
— The Call of the Twentieth Century • David Starr Jordan

... soon completed. I worked with the spirit of enthusiasm—I had so many motives to be active; and, subordinate among these, but still important, I should get out of the reach of this very woman. I could not beat her myself but I wished her husband might do it, and not to anticipate my own story, ...
— Confession • W. Gilmore Simms

... creation of abstract form; and if we are to find in art emotional satisfaction, it is essential that we shall become creators of form. We must not be content to contemplate merely; we must create; we must be active in our ...
— Art • Clive Bell

... in Roger de Blonay's beacon. They begin to see that we are in danger on the shore, and they cast out their signals to give us notice to be active. They think us be-stirring ourselves like stout men, and those used to the water, while, in truth, we are as undisturbed as if the bark were a rock that might laugh at the Leman and its waves. The man is benumbed," continued Maso, turning away towards the anxious listeners; ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper

... said, "but I feel that I must bring the matter up again. As a scout and leader of irregulars for the Confederacy. I must be active in order to cope with the enemy's own scouts and spies. I shall return ...
— The Rock of Chickamauga • Joseph A. Altsheler

... and earnestly upon them. It is astonishing to witness how events, people, circumstances, and things seem to move in place in actual life as if urged by some mighty power to serve to materialize the conditions so imaged in the mind of the man. But, understand, there must be active mental effort behind the imaging. Day dreamers do not materialize thought—they merely dissipate energy. The man who converts thought in activity and material being throws energy into the task, and puts ...
— Clairvoyance and Occult Powers • Swami Panchadasi

... 'We must be active, Oliver, and not give way to useless grief,' said Mrs. Maylie, laying her finger on her lip, as she looked steadily into his face; 'this letter must be sent, with all possible expedition, to Mr. ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens

... caprice, but according to his law,—commanding to vow, and finding those who enter into covenant bound by his authority through their own deed. Let us not be undecided. There is duty incumbent on us which we cannot devolve on others. Let us be active, lest even the tide of liberalism, like a refluent wave, bring society back to a sea of trouble, before the glorious work of Covenanting which will be performed in future times will be begun, and ...
— The Ordinance of Covenanting • John Cunningham

... religion, especially in the early teens, must be active not passive. She must be made to feel—and be given the right outlet for the feelings aroused within her, to dream—and be helped to find a way to work out her dreams. She must be given knowledge and be shown the way in which to ...
— The Girl and Her Religion • Margaret Slattery

... was a right clever gentlemanly fellow, but ignorant of law, and completely at the disposal of the General. I saw him several times when I was passing backwards and forwards, and he looked to me as if the beef was a little too thick on the outside of his forehead, for the brains to be active inside. Still, the Colonels have no fault to find with him, except that between times he would talk about drinking to Little Mac, and brag about the prospect, as the papers seem to say, of Fitz John Porter's being cleared. But then most of the ...
— Red-Tape and Pigeon-Hole Generals - As Seen From the Ranks During a Campaign in the Army of the Potomac • William H. Armstrong

... so far as men are assailed by emotions that are passions, they can be different in nature (IV:xxxiii.), and at variance one with another. But men are only said to be active, in so far as they act in obedience to reason (III:iii.); therefore, what so ever follows from human nature in so far as it is defined by reason must (III:Def.ii.) be understood solely through human nature as its proximate cause. But, since every man by the laws of ...
— Ethica Ordine Geometrico Demonstrata - Part I: Concerning God • Benedict de Spinoza

... of this kind, literary men—that is to say, the men whose business is to think—are likely to be active, and in France, at least, are apt to become prominent and influential. But they, of all men, by the very fact that they think, are least under the control of party affinities and fixed doctrines, the most liable to be swayed by discussion and reflection. Hence the spectacle, so frequent at ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various

... friend, we will not speak of it again. You will go back to Belle Plain with Yancy and Cavendish; you must represent me there. We have as good as found Hannibal, but we must be active in Miss Malroy's behalf. For us that has an important bearing on the future, and since I can not, you must be at Belle Plain when Carrington arrives with his pack of dogs. Give him the advantage of your sound and mature judgment, Solomon; don't ...
— The Prodigal Judge • Vaughan Kester

... arouses the lower nature of man (the Titans). The still immature divine child is torn in pieces. Thus the divine child is present in man as intellectual science broken up. But if there be enough of the higher wisdom (Zeus) in man to be active, it nurses and cherishes the immature child, which is then born again as a second son of God (Dionysos). Thus from science, which is the fragmentary divine force in man, is born undivided wisdom, which is the Logos, the son of God and of a mortal mother, of the perishable human soul, ...
— Christianity As A Mystical Fact - And The Mysteries of Antiquity • Rudolf Steiner

... could have compassed such a destiny. All my life long my word has been, "This is well, and to-morrow it will be better; and God knows when to bring that morrow." You mistake me if you thought I ever believed that we should not be active for others. That is of course. With regard to our own minds, it seems to me we should take holy care of the present moment, and leave the ...
— Memories of Hawthorne • Rose Hawthorne Lathrop

... Milton, who proved that he could be active enough when occasion called for it, in spite of his size and weight. "But I heard some one riding off down the gully, and if it was any of our boys, or any of the fellows around here, they wouldn't have run. Besides, these steers ...
— The Boy Ranchers - or Solving the Mystery at Diamond X • Willard F. Baker

... the views of thinkers. When with low frequencies and insignificant potentials indications of that property may be noted, how must a gaseous medium behave under the influence of enormous electrostatic stresses which may be active in the interstellar space, and which may alternate with inconceivable rapidity? The existence of such an electrostatic, rhythmically throbbing force—of a vibrating electrostatic field—would show ...
— Experiments with Alternate Currents of High Potential and High - Frequency • Nikola Tesla

... and inertia are not infrequently commented on by moralists, but it is not laziness and inertia per se; certainly in normal individuals in the temperate zone, to do something most of their waking time is a natural tendency and one intrinsically pleasant to practice. That the tendency to be active should vary in different individuals and at different times is, of course, as important a fact as it is a familiar one. Some of the causes of this variation will be ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman

... the accepted code I suppose I should make a clean breast of it, even to Dorothy, and go into retirement," she said at length. "I have thought of that, too; but I cannot feel it. I want to be active; to be able to use myself for betterment; make of myself an example of good and not of evil. What I did was because of what I was. I am that no longer, and my expression must be of the new thing that has become me—a soul!" she ...
— Out of the Ashes • Ethel Watts Mumford

... all, we shall most undoubtedly learn—the means whereby we can purify it, and still further increase it. As we observe its incessant activity in the depths of our heart, the only temple where it can truly be active: as we watch it blending with all that we think, and feel, and do, we shall quickly discover which are the things that throw light upon it, and which those that plunge it in darkness; which are the things that ...
— The Buried Temple • Maurice Maeterlinck

... and personal piety was a matter of official enforcement. For a number of reasons religious zeal declined in the eighteenth century. After the Revolution, under the influence of the new political theories and of French skepticism the percentage of students professing to be active Christians fell very low. In the early nineteenth century the interest of students in religion increased, and religious organizations in a number of colleges were founded. Practically all of these later gave way to the Young Men's Christian Association, ...
— College Teaching - Studies in Methods of Teaching in the College • Paul Klapper

... imminent. The event showed that his suspicions were ill-founded; but in justice to him it must be remembered that he was governor of Canada at a dangerous time, when Napoleon was at the zenith of his power and when agents of this arch-enemy of England were supposed to be active in Canada. Moreover, the blame for Craig's action during this period must be partly borne by the 'Bureaucrats' who surrounded him. There is no absolute proof, but there is at least a presumption, that some of these men ...
— The 'Patriotes' of '37 - A Chronicle of the Lower Canada Rebellion • Alfred D. Decelles

... among the innumerable examples that exist, a stronger example of the immensely superior importance of sentiment to what is called practicality than this case of the two sister nations. It is not that we have encouraged a Scotchman to be rich; it is not that we have encouraged a Scotchman to be active; it is not that we have encouraged a Scotchman to be free. It is that we have quite definitely encouraged a ...
— All Things Considered • G. K. Chesterton

... stay at Authie rumours began to be active. It was persistently reported that the 'great offensive' would be in full swing before September was out. Some of the A.S.C., who had been buying coal at Marles-les-Mines, reported that the country round Bethune was incredibly thick with guns, while a similar and ...
— The War Service of the 1/4 Royal Berkshire Regiment (T. F.) • Charles Robert Mowbray Fraser Cruttwell

... regent by Baldwin IV., but he declined battle and he was consequently deposed both from his regency and from his right of succession, while Sibylla's son by her first husband was crowned king as Baldwin V. in 1183. For a time Baldwin IV. still continued to be active; but in 1184 he handed over the regency to Raymund of Tripoli, and ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various

... He asks permission to leave the table; he says,] [Sidenote B: it is not meet that Arthur should be active in the matter,] [Sidenote C: while so many bold ones sit upon bench.] [Sidenote D: Although the weakest, he is quite ready to meet the Green Knight.] [Sidenote E: The nobles entreat Arthur to ...
— Sir Gawayne and the Green Knight - An Alliterative Romance-Poem (c. 1360 A.D.) • Anonymous

... the most fully gratified, can make a man. The silent inward satisfactions of domestic happiness he neither had nor sought. He had a body suited to the character of his mind, erect, firm, large, and active, whilst to be active was a praise,—a countenance stern, and which became command. Magnificent in his living, reserved in his conversation, grave in his common deportment, but relaxing with a wise facetiousness, he knew how to relieve his mind and preserve his dignity: for he never forfeited by a personal acquaintance ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... really sad, because their faces are bright and happy. Fancy meeting twenty or thirty boys going along together, every one of them lame or deformed in some way! Some go on crutches, and some hobble, and others limp; but they do not seem to mind, because, perhaps, they have never known what it is to be active like other boys, and there are plenty of pleasant things they ...
— The Children's Book of London • Geraldine Edith Mitton

... far be the thought from me To slay Telemachus! it were a deed Momentous, terrible, to slay a prince. First, therefore, let us counsel ask of heav'n, And if Jove's oracle that course approve, I will encourage you, and will myself Be active in his death; but if the Gods Forbid it, then, by my advice, forbear. So spake Amphinomus, whom all approved. Arising then, into Ulysses' house 480 They went, where each his splendid seat resumed. A novel purpose occupied, meantime, Penelope; she purposed to appear Before her suitors, ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer

... stand by him. One and all swore they would fight the ship to the bottom, rather than fall into the privateer's hands. The captain immediately gave the word for a clear deck, prepared his firearms, and begged them to be active and obey orders; and perceiving the privateer out-numbered our hands by abundance, he commanded all the small arms to be brought upon deck loaded, and to run out as many of the ship's guns as she could bring to on one side, and to charge them all with small shot, then stand to till he ...
— Life And Adventures Of Peter Wilkins, Vol. I. (of II.) • Robert Paltock

... lamps, To be active in entertaining the company, To be liberal in dispensing ale, To tell stories briefly, To be of joyous countenance, To keep silence ...
— The High Deeds of Finn and other Bardic Romances of Ancient Ireland • T. W. Rolleston

... Bernardo, the first matador, whom he brought to present to us. I send you the white satin note of invitation, with its silver lace and tassels, to show you how beautifully they can get up such things here. The matador is a handsome but heavy-looking man, though said to be active and skilful. Tomorrow I shall write you an ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon De La Barca

... or forward, either in her feelings or her habits, the girl was goaded by a sense of wrongs not altogether merited, incited by the hopelessness of a future that seemed to contain no resting place, and still more influenced by feelings that were as novel to her as they proved to be active and engrossing. The opening was too good, therefore, to be neglected, though she came to the subject with much of the indirectness and perhaps ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper

... at the Fountain, Lord Carteret and Lord Winchilsea (461) refused to go, only saying, that they never dined at a tavern. Pultney and the new chancellor of the exchequer went, and were abused by his Grace of Argyll. The former said he was content with what was already done, and would not be active in any further proceedings, though he would not desert the party. Sandys said the King had done him the honour to offer him that place; why should he not accept it? if he had not, another would: if nobody would, the King ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole

... other feelings, expresses itself in the forms of mythology, and half personifies the outer world, giving the tree her Dryad and the fountain her Nymph, making Pan and Echo meet in the forest glade. When the mythological instinct has ceased to be active, it results in sentimental description, sometimes realistic in detail, sometimes largely or even wholly conventional. It has always in it something of a reaction, real or affected, from crowds and the life of cities, an attempt to regain ...
— Select Epigrams from the Greek Anthology • J. W. Mackail

... twenty minutes they had got in the studding-sails, and all the standing canvas to the topsails, the fore-course, and a forward stay-sail. The three topsails were then reefed, with sundry urgent commands to the crew to be active, for, "The Englishman was coming up like a horse, ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper

... the children six years of age and upward, it is assumed that Mother (or Father) will be active as a leader; therefore it is addressed, first of all, to the parent, whom throughout we ...
— Woodland Tales • Ernest Seton-Thompson

... Timor for wax are Dili, Cootababa, Ocussi, Sitranny, Nilow, and Manatronto. It is gathered in June, cleaned in July, and sold principally in that and the two following months; but a vessel should be active, as enterprising people go along the coast and buy it up for the Kupang merchants, who send it to Batavia where it is said to sell for 120 rupees the picul; the price at Cootababa, being lately about 80 rupees at 2 1/2 to ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 1 (of 2) • George Grey

... engrossed in business since coming to Cleveland, Mr. Myers has found time to be active in many benevolent movements. For thirty years he has been a useful member of the Baptist church. His Christian labors have been generously given to the Sunday schools and mission work, and he is at this time superintendent of the First Baptist church Sunday school ...
— Cleveland Past and Present - Its Representative Men, etc. • Maurice Joblin

... English, to do them justice, can be active and generous in any cause in which they are really interested, and it is a fact that we could not get up a subscription in England even for Garibaldi's muskets lately, while France ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume II • Elizabeth Barrett Browning

... be active participants in the lesson. They must use their eyes, hands, and even their noses in gaining first-hand impressions, and they are to be required to express in their own way the things that they discover. The beautiful flower with its face like that of an animal ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Nature Study • Ontario Ministry of Education

... spread out on a glass slip, under the microscope; compare it with your own. Before using the high power, put a cover glass over the object, of course. Scrape the roof of the mouth of the frog gently, to obtain ciliated epithelium; and mount in very weak salt solution— the cilia will still be active. Squamous epithelium may be seen by the student similarly scraping the interior of his own cheek. Take a piece of muscle from one of the frog's limbs, tease out with needles upon a glass slip, and examine. To see the ...
— Text Book of Biology, Part 1: Vertebrata • H. G. Wells

... little too far when he said that "honesty's nothing without force of character." Still, Honesty has no business to be helpless and draggle-tailed;—she must be active and brisk, and make use of her wits; or, though she keep clear or the prison, 'tis no very great wonder if ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 5 • Edward Bulwer Lytton



Words linked to "Be active" :   bestir, rouse, rest, move



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