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Circle   /sˈərkəl/   Listen
Circle

noun
1.
Ellipse in which the two axes are of equal length; a plane curve generated by one point moving at a constant distance from a fixed point.
2.
An unofficial association of people or groups.  Synonyms: band, lot, set.  "They were an angry lot"
3.
Something approximating the shape of a circle.
4.
Movement once around a course.  Synonyms: circuit, lap.
5.
A road junction at which traffic streams circularly around a central island.  Synonyms: rotary, roundabout, traffic circle.
6.
Street names for flunitrazepan.  Synonyms: forget me drug, Mexican valium, R-2, roach, roofy, rope, rophy.
7.
A curved section or tier of seats in a hall or theater or opera house; usually the first tier above the orchestra.  Synonym: dress circle.
8.
Any circular or rotating mechanism.  Synonym: round.



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"Circle" Quotes from Famous Books



... parish of Manordeivi, Pembrokeshire, of which he was Rector. He participated much in the Eisteddfodau of that period, and his poems gained many of their prizes. He also edited the "Gwladgarwr," or the Patriot, a monthly magazine, and afterwards the "Cylchgrawn," or Circle of Grapes, another magazine, under the auspices of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. The subjects of this poet's compositions were patriotic, sentimental and religious, and his poems are characterised by deep ...
— The Poetry of Wales • John Jenkins

... the bridegroom puts The eager boys to gather nuts. And now both love and time To their full height do climb: Oh! give them active heat And moisture both complete: Fit organs for increase, To keep and to release That which may the honour'd stem Circle with a diadem. ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick

... by scarlet fever, of little Flossie Yengst. Probably the child was not known outside of her little group of playmates; her father and mother are not of that advertised clique known of men as prominent people; he is an engineer on the Santa Fe, and the mother moves in that small circle of friends and neighbours which circumscribes American motherhood of the best type. And yet last night, when that little ten-line item was read by a thousand firesides in this town, thousands and thousands of hearts turned to that desolate home by the track, and ...
— In Our Town • William Allen White

... some of their comrades having such a good time, came right on and were close to the decoys and nests before they were aware of their blunder. Then the firing was rapid and destructive. Some of the flocks had dropped down so low that in order to rise up again they had to circle round and go back against the wind. Then there was double sport for the hunters. Often a flock would come in on the left side, and just as it was about to light among the decoys the guns would ring out and do their deadly work. ...
— Winter Adventures of Three Boys • Egerton R. Young

... it. It is always safe to go before them with plain principles of right, and with the conclusions that must be drawn from them by common sense, though this is what too many of our public men can never understand. Now joining a Know-Nothing "lodge," now hanging on the outskirts of a Fenian "circle," they mistake the momentary eddies of popular whimsy for the great current that sets always strongly in one direction through the life and history of the nation. Is it, as foreigners assert, the fatal defect of our system to fill our ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell

... tumbling in the brook, splashing and dashing, "for all the world like the forty little ducklings!" Uncle Jack said. "Oh! tell us about the little ducklings!" cried all the mice. And they climbed up the bank and sat down in a circle round their uncle, holding up their wet feet to dry in the sun. "About the ducklings, eh?" said Uncle Jack, "well, let me see ...
— Five Mice in a Mouse-trap - by the Man in the Moon. • Laura E. Richards

... Father Ignacio first addressed them. He stated that the English officer had come on a mission from the earl, and had arrived accidentally while the fight was going on, and that he was of opinion that the French offer of surrender should be accepted. A murmur of dissent went round the circle. ...
— The Bravest of the Brave - or, with Peterborough in Spain • G. A. Henty

... number, which has none in common arithmetic. After all, the imagination ought not to be startled any more at so many orders of infinites than at the so well-known proposition, viz., that curve lines may always be made to pass between a circle and a tangent; or at that other, namely, that matter is divisible in infinitum. These two truths have been demonstrated many years, and are no less incomprehensible than the things ...
— Letters on England • Voltaire

... could possibly mistake Captain Coke for any other species of captain than that of master mariner. He was built on the lines of a capstan, short and squat and powerful. Though the weather was hot, he wore a suit of thick navy-blue serge that would have served his needs within the Arctic Circle. It clung tightly to his rounded contours; there was a purple line on his red brows that marked the exceeding tightness of the bowler hat he was carrying; and the shining protuberances on his black ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy

... mothy owl that hunts quick mice. They went crying, crying, but I lost them Before I stept, with the first tips of light, On Raven Crag near by the Druid Stones; So I paused there and, stooping, pressed my hand Against the stony bed of the clear stream; Then entered I the circle and raised up My shining hand in cold stern adoration Even as the first great gleam went ...
— Georgian Poetry 1913-15 • Edited by E. M. (Sir Edward Howard Marsh)

... bands of light blue (top, double width), white (with a horozontal red stripe in the middle third), and light blue; a circle of 10 yellow five-pointed stars is centered on the hoist end of the red stripe and extends into the ...
— The 1995 CIA World Factbook • United States Central Intelligence Agency

... boy his orders and the advance began. Henry was to circle and enter the woods from the rear. Roy was to approach from one side and Willie from the other. Lew was to go in at the front. Captain Hardy and the secret service man were to station themselves outside the wood so that they could see every point of its exterior ...
— The Secret Wireless - or, The Spy Hunt of the Camp Brady Patrol • Lewis E. Theiss

... have one, or even two missionaries, with school-masters and schoolmistresses, and the nearest population, fifty or one hundred miles off, cannot feel their influence. Believers will not, in many cases, go beyond the circle of ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie

... another advantage possessed by water-power over its two rivals, steam and gas: It gives the most even flow of power. A gas engine "kicks" a wheel round in a circle, by means of successive explosions in its cylinders. A reciprocating steam engine "kicks" a wheel round in a circle by means of steam expanding first in one direction, then in another. A water wheel, on the other hand, is made to revolve by means of the pressure of water—by the constant force ...
— Electricity for the farm - Light, heat and power by inexpensive methods from the water - wheel or farm engine • Frederick Irving Anderson

... plays. He found it difficult to endow them, one and all, with any sense of life. He saw them groping in thick darkness, snatching with hands of shadow at things of even thinner shadow, all moving in a wild and frantic circle of artificial desires, while just beyond, absurdly close to many, blazed this great living sunshine of Reality and Peace and Beauty. If only ...
— The Centaur • Algernon Blackwood

... in an average village community accomplish if they intelligently directed the power of religion to foster the sense of fraternal unity and to promote the institutions which make for unity? How could they draw the new, the strange, and the irregular families into the circle of neighborly feeling? In what way could they help to assimilate immigrants and to prevent the formation of several communities in the same section, overlapping, alien, and perhaps hostile? How would it affect the recreational situation if the churches ...
— The Social Principles of Jesus • Walter Rauschenbusch

... drinkers and the women were the experienced elite of the society that sups. Their wits were bright, their eyes glistened, but with no loss of intelligence, though the talk drifted into satire, anecdote, and gossip. Conversation, hitherto confined to the inevitable circle of racing, horses, hammerings on the Bourse, the different occupations of the lions themselves, and the scandals of the town, showed a tendency to break up into intimate tete-a-tete, ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac

... of failure creates an expectancy in us of inferring the presence of the gamya in that thing in which the gamaka is perceived to exist in exactly the same relation [Footnote ref 2]. In those cases where the circle of the existence of the gamya coincides with the circle of the existence of the gamaka, each of them becomes a gamaka for the other. It is clear that this form of inference not only includes all cases of cause and effect, of genus and species but ...
— A History of Indian Philosophy, Vol. 1 • Surendranath Dasgupta

... by Miss Meredith gave a signal to the orchestra, and big girls and little, Old and New, formed a great triple hand-clasped circle and sang together as was the custom, "Should Auld Acquaintance be Forgot?" And if some of the Old Girls found they couldn't sing at all because their voices grew hoarse and husky, as they thought of what old acquaintance in York Hill had meant to them ...
— Judy of York Hill • Ethel Hume Patterson Bennett

... with skins of snakes and weasels, came skipping in, followed by six others similarly arrayed. Rattling gourds and chanting most dismally, they marched about Captain Smith, the chief priest in the lead and trailing a circle of meal, after which they marched about him again and put down at intervals little heaps of corn of five or six grains each. Next they took some little bunches of sticks and put one between every two heaps of corn. These proceedings, lasting ...
— England in America, 1580-1652 • Lyon Gardiner Tyler

... his wife, who was quite flustered by the distinguished strangers, and received the cushions with awe; and next we were carried off to the Gasthaus and exhibited to the village circle, where we talked ducks and weather. (Nobody takes us seriously; I never felt less like a conspirator.) Our friend, who is a feather-headed chatterbox, is enormously important about his ridiculous little port, whose principal customer seems to be the Langeoog post-boat, a galliot running ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers

... the next two or three years Schubert made a number of friends, and the circle of his admirers was considerably extended. The same remarkable productivity continued. In the summer of 1818 he went to the country seat of Count Esterhazy, where he remained several months. This was in Hungary, and the Hungarian pieces are supposed to date from his residence there. It was not until ...
— A Popular History of the Art of Music - From the Earliest Times Until the Present • W. S. B. Mathews

... me," the young trout broke in. He flung his nose jauntily against the surface, and the surface swung from it in widening eddies, circle after circle. "I can be up to the weir and down again before you are halfway across the stream. When humans build their destroyers, they model them on me. I know that, because I have seen their clumsy models, trout-shaped, save ...
— "Wee Tim'rous Beasties" - Studies of Animal life and Character • Douglas English

... prizing until the next crop had been planted. Meanwhile the spare time of the gang was employed in clearing new fields, tending the subsidiary crops, mending fences, and performing many other incidental tasks. With some exaggeration an essayist wrote, "The whole circle of the year is one scene of bustle and toil, in which tobacco claims ...
— American Negro Slavery - A Survey of the Supply, Employment and Control of Negro Labor as Determined by the Plantation Regime • Ulrich Bonnell Phillips

... thing by peace and love; by making herself so much respected, esteemed and loved, that to yield to her opinions and to gratify her wishes, will be the free-will offering of the heart. But this is to be all accomplished in the domestic and social circle. There let every woman become so cultivated and refined in intellect, that her taste and judgment will be respected; so benevolent in feeling and action, that her motives will be reverenced;—so unassuming and unambitious, that collision and competition will be banished;—so "gentle and easy ...
— An Essay on Slavery and Abolitionism - With reference to the duty of American females • Catharine E. Beecher

... wherein Ruth Bellenden lived. No picture from the gallery of a high tower could have been more beautiful than that strange land with the wild reefs lying about it and the rollers cascading over them, and the black glens above which we stood, and the great circle of the water like some measureless basin which the whole earth bounded. I did not wonder that old Clair-de-Lune was silent when he looked down upon a scene so grand. It seemed a crime to speak of food and drink in such a ...
— The House Under the Sea - A Romance • Sir Max Pemberton

... more than this; for it was my happiness, during my Senior year, to have lodgings in the same house with him, and to eat at the same table, in the family of one of the professors, and as one of a small circle, all connected with college, and a good deal remarkable for the freedom and vivacity of their conversation. After graduating, I saw him only occasionally, until the last few months of his life, which he passed here, near the close of my first year's residence at the college as a teacher,—months ...
— The History of Dartmouth College • Baxter Perry Smith

... father graciously. Of course she was bound to her husband. She did not wish not to be bound to him. She was quite sure that she loved her husband with a perfect love. But her marriage happiness could not be complete unless her father was to make a part of the intimate home circle of her life. She was now so animated in her request to him, that her manner told all her little story,—not only to him, ...
— Is He Popenjoy? • Anthony Trollope

... the third gate was flung open and seven swordsmen came forth. They made themselves like a half circle and came towards the King of Ireland's Son. He dazzled their eyes with a wide sweep of his sword. He darted it swiftly at each of them and on the seven swordsmen too he inflicted ...
— The King of Ireland's Son • Padraic Colum

... Sixty years ago I perceived what we all see now (teste Lord Sherborne) that a most imperfect classical education, such as was then provided for us, was the least useful introduction to the real business of life, except that it was fashionable, and gave a man some false prestige in the circle of society. At about sixteen I left Charterhouse for a private tutor, Dr. Stocker, then head of Elizabeth College, Guernsey, seeing my father wished to do him a service for kindly private reasons; I was not at the College, but a pupil in his own house: however, as this other ...
— My Life as an Author • Martin Farquhar Tupper

... plantation. Upon this plantation he sets himself down, and being both landlord and farmer, immediately finds himself an independent man. Having his capital in lands and negroes around him, and his affairs collected within a narrow circle, he can manage and improve them as he thinks fit. He soon obtains plenty of the necessaries of life from his plantation; nor need he want any of its conveniencies and luxuries. The greatest difficulties he has to surmount arise from the marshy soil, and unhealthy climate, which ...
— An Historical Account Of The Rise And Progress Of The Colonies Of South Carolina And Georgia, Volume 2 • Alexander Hewatt

... through the gloom that was gathering over the poet. Toward the end of the year he receives another Christmas invitation to Barton. A country Christmas! with all the cordiality of the fireside circle, and the joyous revelry of the oaken hall—what a contrast to the loneliness of a bachelor's chambers in the Temple! It is not to be resisted. But how is poor Goldsmith to raise the ways and means? His purse is empty; his booksellers are ...
— Oliver Goldsmith • Washington Irving

... came to an end. She accordingly bought a book entitled "North American Homes"; then, having, in addition, begged or borrowed everything within two covers relating to architecture that was to be found in her immediate circle of acquaintance, she plunged into that ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various

... then near the meridian of Flores, in the Azores, and found the variation no longer easterly, but more than a point westerly. His explanation that the pole-star, by means of which the change was detected, was not itself stationary, is very plausible. For the pole-star really does describe a circle round the pole of the earth, equal in diameter to about six times that of the sun; but this is not equal to the change observed in the direction of the ...
— The Northmen, Columbus and Cabot, 985-1503 • Various

... easily persuaded of Piero's guilt, and having put out his eyes, he imprisoned him. Driven to despair at the loss of that fair world, Piero dashed his head against the walls of his prison, and so died. Dante meets him among the suicides in the seventh circle of ...
— Florence and Northern Tuscany with Genoa • Edward Hutton

... iron semi-circle which the milk maid used to hold her pails off her skirts, became, with Sophia's handling, the most complex thing, and would in no wise adjust itself. Alec jumped from his horse, hung his bridle-rein over the gate-post as he entered the pasture, and made as ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall

... is the same as ordinary pool, except that the player, after taking a life, plays upon the ball nearest to the upper or outer side of the baulk; or, if his ball be in hand, upon the ball nearest the baulk semi-circle. ...
— Enquire Within Upon Everything - The Great Victorian Domestic Standby • Anonymous

... This said, the winged warrior low inclined At his Creator's feet with reverence due; Then spread his golden feathers to the wind, And swift as thought away the angel flew, He passed the light, and shining fire assigned The glorious seat of his selected crew, The mover first, and circle crystalline, The firmament, where fixed ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso

... such a beastly existence! And a card stood me a lot of ale and stuff, and we got swipey, talking about music-halls and the piles of tin I got for singing; and then they got me on to sing 'Around her splendid form I weaved the magic circle,' and then he said I couldn't be Vance, and I stuck to it like grim death I was. It was rot of me to sing, of course, but I thought I could brazen it out with a set of yokels. It settled my hash ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... glared. But there the Germans were, drawing an iron ring about three sides of the watch-tower; and as one peered through an embrasure of the ancient walls one gradually found one's self re-living the sensations of the little mediaeval burgh as it looked out on some earlier circle of besiegers. The longer one looked, the more oppressive and menacing the invisibility of the foe became. "There they are—and there—and there." We strained our eyes obediently, but saw only calm hillsides, dozing farms. It was as ...
— Fighting France - From Dunkerque to Belport • Edith Wharton

... woman took him to the reception-room, just as she had taken Miss Abbott in the morning, and dusted a circle for him on one of the horsehair chairs. But it was dark now, so she left the guest ...
— Where Angels Fear to Tread • E. M. Forster

... fixed against one of the towers, and an Indian ascended upon each; at first they cast an inquisitive glance through the holes upon both sides of the door, but we concealed ourselves. Then all the Umbiquas formed in a circle round the ladders, with their bows and spears, watching the loop-holes. At the chiefs command, the first blows were struck, and the Indians on the ladders began to batter both doors with their tomahawks. While in the act of striking for the third time, the Umbiqua ...
— Monsieur Violet • Frederick Marryat

... work, and the W. side of the N.W. tower is ornamented with two tiers of arcades. "The lower arcade contains five pointed arches, with a trefoiled arch within each. These rest on triple shafts, with carved caps and rounded abaci. Over each shaft and between the arches there is a circle containing a boldly carved Norman head. The feature is unique and its effect is fine. The upper arcade consists of three larger arches, each containing two smaller arches, and all resting on shafts with carved and rounded caps. ...
— Scottish Cathedrals and Abbeys • Dugald Butler and Herbert Story

... Still less can we compare the generous and popular hospitality of Kimon with the Eastern profusion and extravagance of Lucullus's table; for Kimon, at a small expense, fed many of his countrymen daily, while the other spent enormous sums to provide luxuries for a small circle of friends. Yet this difference in their habits may have been caused by the times in which they lived; and no one can tell whether Kimon, if he had returned home and spent an old age of indolence and unwarlike repose, might not have ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume II • Aubrey Stewart & George Long

... the cowboys threw up their hats and cheered the 'tenderfoot.' Then I took down the reins of the hackamore (the Mexican Jaquema), bent the brute's head around, and tied him in a half circle to his own tail. Then, borrowing a cowboy's whip, I tapped him gently with it, and kept him turning and tumbling until he was covered with foam, and I saw he was completely subdued. Then I untied the rope, gave him his head, ...
— The Wedge of Gold • C. C. Goodwin

... latter was most unfortunate; for independently of the cold rendering it very necessary, it was our chief protection against the wolves. Doing the best we could under such unfavourable circumstances, we drew up the carts in the form of a half circle, of which the two extremities rested against the wall of snow it our rear, and within the sort of fortification thus formed we placed the horses and our sledge. Our arrangements were scarcely completed ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXII. - June, 1843.,Vol. LIII. • Various

... in the case, I assure you, my dear," returned Mrs. Downe Wright. "This is a most comfortable room; and I could go nowhere that I would meet a pleasanter little circle," looking round. ...
— Marriage • Susan Edmonstone Ferrier

... strength, and which was irrefragable and celestial. And he fixed on it a fierce arrow, resembling a snake of virulent poison and possessed of the splendour of fire. That arrow, resembling a fire of fierce flame, while within the circle of his bow, looked like the autumnal sun of great splendour within a radiant circle. Beholding that blazing bow bent with force by Prishata's son, the troops regarded that to be the last hour (of the world). Seeing that arrow aimed at him, the valiant ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... circumstance was drawing a narrower circle around the Intendant. The advent of peace would, he believed, inaugurate a personal war against himself. The murder of Caroline was a hard blow, and the necessity of concealing it irritated him with a sense of fear foreign ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby

... marriage to Asenath (supposed to mean 'One belonging to the goddess Neith'), a daughter of a high officer of state, Poti-phera (meaning, like its shortened form, Potiphar, 'The gift of Ra' the sun-god). Such an alliance placed him at once in the very innermost circle of Egyptian aristocracy. It may have been a bitter pill for the priest to swallow, to give his daughter to a man of yesterday, and an alien; but, just as probably, he too looked to Joseph with some kind of awe, and was ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren

... circle, each man whirling both swords around his head and the head of the man in front of him at a speed that passed belief. Their long black hair shook and swayed. The sweat began to pour from them until their arms and shoulders glistened. The speed increased. ...
— King—of the Khyber Rifles • Talbot Mundy

... quaint remark of a tourist that one of the great delights of travelling is the thought and anticipated pleasure of coming home again. From the subjects chosen for many of her poems the author has evidently made appeal rather to the narrow circle of her own near relations and friends than to that ever-increasing one which is expressed by the phrase of the "reading public." She writes thus in her preface, the brevity of which is much to be commended:—"They ...
— Home Lyrics • Hannah. S. Battersby

... Jim cut down a side road and commenced to circle back by the low road, past the lake and once again toward the ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson

... and way to dispose of me. They collected in the cabin where I lived. While they were in council their dinner was cooking. There were about ten in number, and they all sat down on the floor in a circle, and then commenced by ...
— Narrative of the Captivity of William Biggs among the Kickapoo Indians in Illinois in 1788 • William Biggs

... Wise Men of the East as they are told in the "Golden Legend" of Jacobus de Voragine and other mediaeval books. But of the Fourth Wise Man I had never heard until that night. Then I saw him distinctly, moving through the shadows in a little circle of light. His countenance was as clear as the memory of my father's face as I saw it for the last time a few months before. The narrative of his journeyings and trials and disappointments ran without ...
— The Story of the Other Wise Man • Henry Van Dyke

... in the family circle. One evening it would be at brother Anderson's house, and the next evening at another brother's house, and so on until the meetings had gone around the whole community. A deep work of grace was in progress. ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams

... figure of no distinction—short, rounded, decked in carelessly worn garments of no elegance. It slouched inquiringly toward us between rows of sprouted corn. Then I saw that the head surmounting it was a noble head. It was uncovered, burnished to a half circle of grayish fringe; but it was shaped in the grand manner and well borne, and the full face of it was beautified by features of a very Roman perfection. It was the face of a judge of the Supreme Court or the face of an ideal senator. His large grave eyes bathed us in a friendly regard; ...
— Somewhere in Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson

... creeping thing upon my chest, I stirred not, nor uttered a word of panic. Danger and fear may occasionally dull the sense and paralyse the faculties, but they more frequently sharpen both, and ere I could wink my eye, I was broad awake and aware that, coiling and coiling itself up into a circle of twists, an enormous serpent was on my breast. When I tell you that the whole of my chest, and even the pit of my stomach, were covered with the cold, scaly proportions of the reptile, you will own that it must have ...
— Thrilling Adventures by Land and Sea • James O. Brayman

... legitimate offspring of the President's message. When the Democratic convention at St. Louis met, the declaration was made that the President's message, the Mills Bill, the Democratic platform of 1884 and the Democratic platform of 1888, were all the same—all segments of one circle; in fact, they were like modern locomotives—"all the parts interchangeable." As soon as the Republican convention met, made its platform and named its candidates, it is not free trade, but freer trade; and now Mr. Mills, ...
— The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Volume VIII. - Interviews • Robert Green Ingersoll

... that you suspect I have formed a large circle of acquaintance by this time. No: I cannot say that I have. I doubt whether I possess either the wish or the power to do so. A few friends I should like to have, and these few I should like to know well; If such knowledge brought proportionate regard, I could ...
— The Life of Charlotte Bronte • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... circle is large, as I before remarked. A Crown colony where the Government has it all its own way must be the paradise of officials, and the high sense of honor and the righteous esprit de corps which characterize our ...
— The Golden Chersonese and the Way Thither • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs. Bishop)

... a mad circle around the mercenary. His Excellency's Peacekeeper turned to stay facing the dog but found himself turning his back on Peter. He stepped back and to one side and reached for his heavy-duty pencil—the dog gave a low growl of warning and ...
— History Repeats • George Oliver Smith

... acting, what was not there before; he increases the stock, upon which human ingenuity and the arts of life are destined to operate. He does not, as the poet may be affirmed by his censurers to do, travel for ever in a circle, but continues to hasten towards a goal, while at every interval we may mark how much further he has proceeded from the point at which his ...
— Thoughts on Man - His Nature, Productions and Discoveries, Interspersed with - Some Particulars Respecting the Author • William Godwin

... to him by inheritance from both the father and mother, and they were nurtured and cultivated in the circle of relatives and family friends with whom his holidays were spent. A sub-master at Westward Ho, though little satisfied with the boy's progress in the studies of the school, gave to him the liberty of his own excellent library. The holidays ...
— Kipling Stories and Poems Every Child Should Know, Book II • Rudyard Kipling

... softly repelling her, charmed and irritated at once, and exasperated at all these eyes rudely fixed on him. For none of the passengers had gone out. They were all there, staring and gazing. Hector and Jenny were surrounded by a circle of curious folks. ...
— The Mystery of Orcival • Emile Gaboriau

... B.C. in regard to (1) his idea of God, (2) his sense of Duty. No help from Epicurism, which provided no religious sanction for conduct; Lucretius, and Epicurean idea of the Divine. Arrival of Stoicism at Rome; Panaetius and the Scipionic circle. Character of Scipio. The religious side of Stoicism; it teaches a new doctrine of the relation of man to God. Stoic idea of God as Reason, and as pervading the universe; adjustment of this to Roman idea of numina. Stoic idea of Man as possessing Reason, ...
— The Religious Experience of the Roman People - From the Earliest Times to the Age of Augustus • W. Warde Fowler

... there being always a small body of patrons who are willing to check the tendency to deteriorate, common to all productions, by encouraging the worker with extra remuneration, in order that a high degree of excellence may be maintained; but in matters confined to a small circle, as in the case of Violin-making, the number of those willing to encourage artistic workmanship is so minute as to fail even to support one maker of excellence, and thus, when deprived suddenly of its legitimate protection, the art, with other similar ...
— The Violin - Its Famous Makers and Their Imitators • George Hart

... me a long while to get out of my miry hole, where I was as fast as a swine in its Arkansas sty; and then I looked about for my wallet, which I had dropped. I could see which way it had gone, for, close to the yawning circle from which I had just extricated myself; there was another smaller one two yards off; into which my wallet had sunk deep, though it was comfortably light, which goes to illustrate the Indiana saying, that there is no conscience so light but will sink in the bottom of the Wabash. Well, ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat

... them across the river. The Professor absent on their return. Searching for the Professor. A shot heard. Going in the direction of the shot. Another shot from vicinity of the team. Returning in the direction of last shot. Find the Professor with team on way to river. How they made a circle without knowing it. A lesson ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Exploring the Island • Roger Thompson Finlay

... foot of the mountain, where she had seen the figure of him she supposed to be the peddler. It was still early, but the darkness and the dreary nature of a November evening would, at any other moment, or with less inducement to exertion, have driven her back in terror to the circle she had left. Without pausing to reflect, however, she flew over the ground with a rapidity that seemed to bid defiance to all impediments, nor stopped even to breathe, until she had gone half the distance to the rock that she had marked as the spot where Birch made ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper

... I'll station you, Mr. Clark," said Sandy simply. "Patrol this border as far as the bonfire; then turn backward and go until you meet Bernardo. Donald will pace between the next two fires, and the Mexicans and myself will complete the circle round the flock. Be careful lest bob-cats steal down on you unawares; they come softly as mice, make no fuss, and kill so quickly that they seldom disturb the herd. It is likely we will no be troubled with them because of the fenced-in pasture. Now cougars will leap the fence ...
— The Story of Wool • Sara Ware Bassett

... undervalue Mr. Flaps, and even (I hardly like to allude to such reprehensible and disgusting absurdity) to recall the memory of a vulgar red-haired impostor, who gained a brief entrance into our family circle. I am not consulted as I should be in these fluctuations of opinion, but there are occasions when it is necessary that the head of a family should exercise his discretion and his authority, and, so to speak, put down his ...
— Brothers of Pity and Other Tales of Beasts and Men • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing

... and his satisfaction in it might not be appreciated by those who looked on from the outside of his circle of influence; but there was another kind, both of success and of satisfaction in it, which they could appreciate, and at which they ...
— Allison Bain - By a Way she knew not • Margaret Murray Robertson

... not be too liberal; and a ghost story can be brought into our charmed and charming circle only if we have made up our minds to believe in the ghosts; otherwise their introduction would not be a square deal. It would not be fair, in other words, to propose a conundrum on a basis of ostensible materialism, ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne

... time moves quickly after youth is over, the old man was left standing alone amongst the ranks of a generation that did not know him. So little was he known or regarded, that when his works were first exhibited, no one took the trouble to see them; and when a small circle of admirers, with the great English critic, John Ruskin, at their head, started a subscription for the forgotten artist, "the attempt was a failure—hundreds being received when thousands were expected." It will be remembered that ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt

... when they were all in; we must not be interrupted;" and, making them stand in a circle, he looked around at them ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne

... in her own flank. So swift was the swordfish (he was a kind of giant mackerel, with all the mackerel's grace and fire and nimbleness) that he seemed to be everywhere at once. The whale was kept spinning around in a dizzy circle of foam, like a whirlpool, with the bewildered calf on the inside. The mighty twisting thrusts of her tail, with its flukes twenty feet wide, set the whole surface boiling for hundreds ...
— Children of the Wild • Charles G. D. Roberts

... the river, remained seated in their semicircle, without stirring a limb or moving a muscle, motionless as so many statues. Mr. Hunt and his companions advanced without hesitation, and took their seats on the sand so as to complete the circle. The band of warriors who lined the banks above stood looking down in silent groups and clusters, some ostentatiously equipped and decorated, others entirely naked but fantastically painted, and ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving

... of giving satisfaction for the seizure of the Royal Company's ships, and not "so hott" for sending a fleet immediately to Guinea as he had been at first.[107] Even Downing was for the time being deceived. His spy, who was well within DeWitt's immediate circle, for once was not on duty to give his usual faithful report to his benefactor. DeWitt was accustomed to resort to the same trickery and deceitful diplomacy that was so characteristic of Downing. Indeed it would ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 4, 1919 • Various

... first is twice as great as when a bit of meat is laid on the surface of one lobe; and as the two lobes come into almost close contact, the secretion, containing dissolved animal matter, spreads by capillary attraction, causing fresh glands on both sides to begin secreting in a continually widening circle. The secretion is almost colourless, slightly mucilaginous, and, judging by the manner in which it coloured litmus paper, more strongly acid than that of Drosera. It is so copious that on one occasion, when a leaf was cut open, on which a small ...
— Insectivorous Plants • Charles Darwin

... cannot fail to recognize the conviction of Jesus' followers that their Lord had returned to them and was alive with power. We must remember that it was to faith alone that the risen Jesus showed Himself, and that no one outside the circle of believers (unless we except Saul of Tarsus) saw Him after His death. Historical research, independent of Christian faith, may not be able positively to affirm the correctness of the Easter faith of the disciples, for the data lie, in part ...
— Some Christian Convictions - A Practical Restatement in Terms of Present-Day Thinking • Henry Sloane Coffin

... and whizzing wings create a musical, but wild, continued roar. You now begin to realize he is determined to understand all about the feathered bees, as large as little birds, the village boy had seen. The circle continues to decrease in size, but increases the revolution until all the living, breathing ring swings over the stream in the field of your vision, and you begin to enquire what means all this mighty ...
— Birds Illustrated by Colour Photography, Vol II. No. 4, October, 1897 • Various

... professors and certain radio announcers, or go all out for the sonorous intonations which are beloved by many of the clergy. Many young officers get into these same cadences whenever they talk to men, and before they know it, they are trying the same thing in the family circle. They sound like alarm clocks running down, but instead of arousing the house, they are an invitation to slumber. Either on the lecture platform, or in man-to-man conversation, there is no valid reason why it is ever necessary to take the tone which suggests that the talk is one-sided. Words ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense

... again. After two more spoonfuls, you find the wheelers playing cat's-cradle with the centres' traces. Perhaps the wheel-driver is asleep, and you get up and put them right. Then the grazing operations of the leaders bring them round in a circle to the wheelers. Up you get, and finally, as the fifth spoonful is comforting a very empty stomach, you hear, "Stand to your horses!" "Mount!" You hurriedly stuff the tin into a muzzle hanging from the saddle, where you have leisure to observe ...
— In the Ranks of the C.I.V. • Erskine Childers

... was still queen in her circle, and found admirers in plenty. Perhaps she even enjoyed the freedom; for, to a woman of spirit, the constraints of taboo must be irksome at times. Not the Brahmin, who fears to tread upon sole-leather from the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 19, May, 1859 • Various

... passed the statue of Flora, which Frederick greeted gayly, and the marquis with profound reverence then mounted two small steps and stood upon the green circle. The king paused and looked down thoughtfully upon a gravestone which ...
— Berlin and Sans-Souci • Louise Muhlbach

... progressing in the cabin, others of no less importance were taking place on deck. Once they were well off the land, Funk lost no time in calling a meeting of the crew of the yacht, who formed a circle around him. ...
— His Lordship's Leopard - A Truthful Narration of Some Impossible Facts • David Dwight Wells

... wholesome counterpoise to each other; and also, in the general course of events, as they actually occurred, affording the best commentary on the true motives of the parties. The actor, engaged in the heat of the strife, finds his view bounded by the circle around him and his vision blinded by the smoke and dust of the conflict: while the spectator, whose eye ranges over the ground from a more distant and elevated point, though the individual objects may lose somewhat of their vividness, takes ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott

... this foul parasite was shocked into the austerest form of religion by something he had seen going forward. At Naples Temple's dark life became still darker. He dallied, it is true, with Neo-Platonism, and boasts that he, like Plotinus, had twice passed the circle of the nous and enjoyed the fruition of the deity; but the ideals of even that easy doctrine grew in his evil life still more miserably debased. More than once in the manuscript he made mention by name of the Gagliarda ...
— The Lost Stradivarius • John Meade Falkner

... soul. The gate to Heaven is thus kept, not by St. Peter or by any other saint of the calendar; it is kept by each individual person himself as he opens or closes within himself the spiritual circuit of connection with God. The door into the Eternal swings within the circle of our own inner life, and all things are ours if we learn how to use the key that opens, for "to open" and "to find God" are one and the same thing. The emphasis in "Nature Mysticism" lies not so much ...
— Spiritual Reformers in the 16th & 17th Centuries • Rufus M. Jones

... to become a doctor. From earliest childhood he had practised writing recipes on little slips of paper. Mrs. Peterkin, to be sure, was afraid of infection. She could not bear the idea of his bringing one disease after the other into the family circle. Solomon John, too, did not like sick people. He thought he might manage it if he should not have to see his patients while they were sick. If he could only visit them when they were recovering, and when the danger of infection was over, ...
— The Peterkin Papers • Lucretia P Hale

... Diana had spent most of their playtime that summer on and about the pond. Idlewild was a thing of the past, Mr. Bell having ruthlessly cut down the little circle of trees in his back pasture in the spring. Anne had sat among the stumps and wept, not without an eye to the romance of it; but she was speedily consoled, for, after all, as she and Diana said, big girls of thirteen, going on fourteen, were too old for such childish ...
— Anne Of Green Gables • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... the lady giving the entertainment issues her invitations, and usually summons the famous Brown, the Sexton of Grace Church, to assist her in deciding who shall be asked beyond her immediate circle of friends. Mr. Brown is a very tyrant in such matters, and makes out the list to suit himself rather than to please the hostess. He has full authority from her to invite any distinguished strangers who may be ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe

... a heart that beats no more, This convent seems. Above, below, all peace! Silence and solitude, the soul's best friends, Are with me here, and the tumultuous world Makes no more noise than the remotest planet. O gentle spirit, unto the third circle Of heaven among the blessed souls ascended, Who, living in the faith and dying for it, Have gone to their reward, I do not sigh For thee as being dead, but for myself That I am still alive. Turn those dear eyes, ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

... against Buonaparte—with as much apparent ardour, and perhaps with about as much honesty, as in other times he had ever brought to the service of the Emperor. "Gentlemen," said Napoleon, as he walked round the circle, "it is disinterested people who have brought me back to my capital. It is the subalterns and the soldiers that have done it all. I owe everything to the ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart

... endowed with a soul of more intense brooding, but he remained within the circle of this peace. He developed in solitude exquisite grace of language, and in other respects was an artist, the mate of Poe in the tale and exceeding Poe in significance since he used symbolism for effects of truth. ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... contractors in black and white, who had found out this effect of a brown face and a blue coat upon a woman otherwise immovable. This man, Cipriani de Lloseta, who contemplated life, as it were, from a quiet corner of the dress circle, kept his knowledge for his ...
— The Grey Lady • Henry Seton Merriman

... with all that is least generic, least specific, all that is most intimately personal and individual, in sexual selection. It is the final point in which the decreasing circle of sexual attractiveness is fixed. In the widest and most abstract form sexual selection in man is merely human, and we are attracted to that which bears most fully the marks of humanity; in a less abstract form it is sexual, and we are attracted to that which most vigorously ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 5 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... than any grandest of poets; for these their inventions did more than rectify for them the wrongs of their existence, not only making of their chaos a habitable cosmos, but of themselves heroic dwellers in the same. Within the charmed circle of this their well-being, their unceasing ministrations to her wants, their thoughtfulness about her likings and dislikings, their sweetness of address, and wistful watching to discover the desire they might satisfy or the solace ...
— Paul Faber, Surgeon • George MacDonald

... of the tribe seated themselves in a circle, as if holding a council to determine our fate, while the squaws and the young boys amused themselves by holding stout sticks in the fire until one end was a living coal, and then placing these against our hands, until the ...
— The Minute Boys of the Mohawk Valley • James Otis

... that the ambitious views of Napoleon were at that moment directed. Being repeatedly pressed by the Austrian envoys to explain his definitive intentions, he at last declared that he wished Carniola, the circle of Wilbach, and the right bank of the Save as far as Bosnia; ceding Linz, and keeping Salzburg. He thus became master of 1,500,000 souls in Austria. In Galicia he claimed all the territory which Austria ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt

... like to show him our society in Peonia," was Ratcliffe's reply; "he would find a very brilliant circle there of nature's ...
— Democracy An American Novel • Henry Adams

... Chicopee burying-ground, Mary looked out to catch a glimpse of the thorn-apple tree, which overshadowed the graves of her parents, and then, as she thought how cold and estranged was the only one left of all the home circle, she drew her veil over her ...
— The English Orphans • Mary Jane Holmes



Words linked to "Circle" :   horsy set, arc, revolve, disc, party, circumambulate, victory lap, pace lap, seats, locomote, parhelic circle, theatre, oval, compass, orb, orbit, travel, circle round, jet set, social group, lap of honour, seating room, horsey set, dip circle, conspiracy, circular, road, roach, form, rotating mechanism, ingroup, clique, pack, move, house, camp, seating area, disk, ellipse, equator, flunitrazepan, go, locomotion, car pool, troll, roundabout, company, epicycle, confederacy, band, walk around, shape, Rohypnol, revolve around, traffic circle, route, cohort, family circle, circumnavigate, inner circle, junction, circulate, theater, loop, lap, four hundred, seating, circlet, coterie



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