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More "Absolve" Quotes from Famous Books



... business of every human being, whatever his station, party, creed, capacities, tastes, duties, is morality; virtue, virtue, always virtue. Nothing that man will ever invent will absolve him from the universal necessity of being good as God is good, righteous as God is righteous, ...
— Daily Thoughts - selected from the writings of Charles Kingsley by his wife • Charles Kingsley

... and as I am a gentleman and a reveller, I'll make a piece of poetry, and absolve ...
— The Poetaster - Or, His Arraignment • Ben Jonson

... I promised thee was in my nonage; and beside, I count the Prince under whose banner now I stand is able to absolve me; yea, and to pardon also what I did as to my compliance with thee; and beside, O thou destroying Apollyon! to speak truth, I like his service, his wages, his servants, his government, his company and country better ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester

... focussed the period so as to distort the general perspective at the cost of other periods which have earned less attention; the twelfth century, for example. At any rate their efforts, with the amount they claim of your reading, absolve me from doing more than remind you that the Renaissance brought in the study of Greek, and Greek necessarily brought in the study of literature: since no man can read what the Greeks wrote and not have his eyes unsealed to what I have called a norm of human expression; a guide to ...
— On the Art of Writing - Lectures delivered in the University of Cambridge 1913-1914 • Arthur Quiller-Couch

... our house, for this dishonor which I have brought upon you; absolve me, ye grand ancestors; mine eyes are open now, and I perceive the sin, the shame, the sorrow of my deeds! Absolve me, ye great Gods, and ye glorious men; and thou, my father, think sometimes of the son, whom it repented of his guilt, but whom it pained not"—he ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 2 of 2) • Henry William Herbert

... crowns to every soldier who had been present at the scene. On reflection, thinking, perhaps, it was unwise to excommunicate so many soldiers, who might be needed to repel an Indian attack, he sent and told the Governor he was ready to absolve him upon easy terms. The Governor, who had made light of the first excommunication, was rather staggered when he found the second posted at the Cathedral door. And now a comedy ensued; for Don Gregorio went to the Bishop, and on his knees asked for forgiveness. He, ...
— A Vanished Arcadia, • R. B. Cunninghame Graham

... unworthy successor; and that princes, ecclesiastics, and courtesans were leagued to accomplish his death or exile. "By your authority," he exclaims, "relying upon the mercy of God and the pity of His Virgin Mother, I excommunicate Henry and all his partisans, and absolve his subjects from their allegiance. And even as Henry is justly deprived of his royalty by his pride, his disobedience, and perfidy, so are the same power and royal authority granted to Rodolph for his humility, ...
— The Truce of God - A Tale of the Eleventh Century • George Henry Miles

... translator of this peculiar mele is a difficult one. It involves a constant readjustment of the mental standpoint to meet the poet's vagrant fancy, which to us seems to occupy no consistent point of view. If this difficulty arises from the author's own lack of insight, he can at least absolve himself from the charge of negligence and lack of effort to discover the standpoint that shall give unity to the whole composition; and can console himself with the reflection that no native Hawaiian scholar with whom ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson

... of the idea, uttered an exclamation of surprise. "I mean," added Giotto, "I will show you the person whom I employed as my model in this picture, but it must be on condition that your holiness will absolve me from all punishment for the use which I have made of him." The Pope promised Giotto the absolution for which he stipulated, and accompanied the artist to his workshop. On entering, Giotto drew aside a curtain which ...
— Anecdotes of Painters, Engravers, Sculptors and Architects, and Curiosities of Art, (Vol. 2 of 3) • Shearjashub Spooner

... Ronald said, "you may not be a lay sister all your life; you have taken no vows that will bind you for ever, and I have no doubt that the lady superior can absolve you from your engagements should you at any time wish to go back to the world; if so, and if I am still in France, I will come to dance at your wedding, and will promise you as pretty a necklace and earrings as are to be found ...
— Bonnie Prince Charlie - A Tale of Fontenoy and Culloden • G. A. Henty

... charnel vault a part of Heaven—the graves there of those murdered knaves made rests of roses for our heads; it made him spring the bolt and lock us in. Where is the creed's foundation? I've shrived a thousand souls—I cannot now absolve my own. To quench this awful thirst, I cut an artery in my arm and sucked its blood. The thirstness did not cease. They lied. 'Twas not the vultures at Prometeus' heart, 'twas hunger at his vitals gnawed. The salt drops that I swallowed from that vein have set my brain on fire. What's that? ...
— Debris - Selections from Poems • Madge Morris

... like this: everything is got ready, and at the appointed moment I, as the official head of the nation, publicly and solemnly proclaim its independence, and absolve it from allegiance to any and all ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... will avoid the censure of his Bills, which every pitiful fellow, nay their very Boys will absolve or condemn at pleasure, and that openly too, nay sometimes to the Patient himself, and thereby call in his good Apothecaries Physician. Now what a shame is it, that a Physicians credit and livelihood, ...
— A Short View of the Frauds and Abuses Committed by Apothecaries • Christopher Merrett

... of the people around us. May I hint to such, 'Let the dead bury their dead; preach thou the gospel?' A Christian man's first business is to witness for Jesus Christ, and no amount of diligence in legitimate occupations or in work for the good of others will absolve him from the charge of having turned duties upside down, if he says, 'I cannot witness for Jesus Christ, for I am so busy about these other things.' This command has a special application to us ministers. There are hosts of admirable ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren

... who were inspired by hereditary valor and recent zeal, applauded the generous design of their monarch; expressed their resolution to conquer or die, since death and conquest would be equally profitable; and solemnly protested that they would never shave their beards till victory should absolve them from that inconvenient vow. The enterprise was promoted by the public or private exhortations of Clotilda. She reminded her husband how effectually some pious foundation would propitiate the Deity, and his servants: and the Christian hero, darting his battle-axe with a skilful and ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon

... long alive; Success, nay prudence, they may want, but yet They would be solvent, and deplore a debt; All means they use, to all expedients run, And are by slow, sad steps, at last undone: Justly, perhaps, you blame their want of skill, But mourn their feelings and absolve their will. There is a Debtor, who his trifling all Spreads in a shop; it would not fill a stall: There at one window his temptation lays, And in new modes disposes and displays: Above the door you shall his name behold, And what he vends in ample letters told, The words 'Repository,' 'Warehouse,' ...
— The Borough • George Crabbe

... Government declined to consent to clothing a submarine commander with the discretionary power of determining whether a vessel should be sunk on sight because of movements he considered suspicious. The German Government would absolve him from blame and repudiate any obligation to grant indemnity, even if the commander was mistaken in attributing aggressive intentions in a vessel's movements. Germany's precept, as laid down by Count von Bernstorff in his note of September 1, 1915, and Germany's practice, as illustrated ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume IV (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)

... difficulties where none exist?" he snarled. "If the agreement stands in the way, I absolve Mr. Royson from any promise he has made. I wanted to guard against treachery, not to tie him ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy

... he knew his obligation to love GOD in all things, and as he endeavored so to do, he had no need of a director to advise him, but that he needed much a Confessor to absolve him. That he was very sensible of his faults, but not discouraged by them; that he confessed them to GOD, but did not plead against Him to excuse them. When he had so done, he peaceably resumed his usual practice of love ...
— The Practice of the Presence of God the Best Rule of a Holy Life • Herman Nicholas

... have now only to establish the guilt of Fantomas and publish the story of his crime, to absolve the King in the eyes of all ... and that will mean the end ...
— A Royal Prisoner • Pierre Souvestre

... clear that education should have been the remedy for the defects of character upon which I am forced to dwell so much; and I cannot absolve any body of Irishmen, possessed of actual or potential influence, of failure to recognise this truth. But here I am dealing only with the political leaders, and trying to bring home to them the responsibility which their power imposes upon them, not only for ...
— Ireland In The New Century • Horace Plunkett

... forswore himself. [Footnote: Talmud, tract. Sanhedrin.] For He first swore, saith Rabbi Eliaser, that the children of Israel, who were wandering in the desert, should have no part in eternal life; and then His oath lay heavy on Him, so that He got the angel Mi to absolve ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold

... wrinkle, whom the Father hath appointed head over all his Church—he by his mercy absolves you, and we, by apostolic authority given unto us by the Most Holy Lord Pope Julius the Third, his vicegerent on earth, do absolve and deliver you, and every of you, with this whole realm and the dominions thereof, from all heresy and schism, and from all and every judgment, censure, and pain for that cause incurred; and we do restore you again into the unity of our Mother the Holy Church, in the name of the Father, ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude

... another, half a score of them reached Sir Peregrine, and then took place that terrible interview,—such as most young men have had to undergo at least once,—in which he was asked how he intended to absolve himself from the pecuniary liabilities ...
— Orley Farm • Anthony Trollope

... are concerned. A strict observance of such engagements is surely the condition of all honourable intercourse in society, and a duty from which no degree of confidence, friendship, or affection towards a third person, can absolve one. With respect to this particular case of the Duke of L., I am sure your own reflections will not suffer you to impute blame to me, if after having required from those with whom he was acting an engagement of secrecy, which he had a right ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham

... Lara and Calderon. Not that they have any longer either design or desire to stand before such cut-throats in a duel, nor any shame in shunning it. Their last encounter with the scoundrels would absolve them from all stigma or reproach for refusing to fight them—even were there time and opportunity. So, they need have no fear that their honour will suffer, or that any one will apply to them the opprobrious epithet—lache. Indeed, they ...
— The Flag of Distress - A Story of the South Sea • Mayne Reid

... lazy, drinking, and guttling monks and friars were able to make this same people to work and support them in their laziness and debaucheries, aye, and almost to adore them, too; to go to them, and kneel down and confess their sins to them, and to believe that it was in their power to absolve them of their sins. Now how was it that these fat, these bastard-propagating rascals succeeded in making the people do this? Why by fraud; by deception; by cheatery; by making them believe lies; by frightening them half out of their ...
— Political Pamphlets • George Saintsbury

... with the plagiarising pupil, clergyman, or statesman—they are called upon to do something in which they have only a secondary interest. The minister who reads a sermon on the text "Thou Shalt Not Steal," and considers that the fact that he has paid five dollars for it will absolve him from the charge of inconsistency, does not—cannot—feel any desire to impress his congregation with a desire for right living—he wants only to hold his job. The university student who, after ascertaining ...
— A Librarian's Open Shelf • Arthur E. Bostwick

... Holy Ghost.' Therefore we must not separate nor part God and man according to our natural reason and understanding. In like manner, every hearer must conclude and say, I hear not St. Paul, St. Peter, or a man speak; but I hear God himself speak, baptize, absolve, excommunicate, and administer the holy sacrament of ...
— Selections from the Table Talk of Martin Luther • Martin Luther

... misery the gentle girl had endured in the midst of her unhallowed surroundings, the kind-hearted ecclesiastic relented, and forthwith despatched Brother Lawrence to examine and counsel the maid, hear her confession, and absolve her from her offences, and then, if all seemed well, to perform the rite of betrothal, which was almost as binding as the marriage service itself, and generally preceded it by a few weeks or months, as the case might be. So Jack rode off in high feather, and talked so unceasingly of his Eva ...
— In the Wars of the Roses - A Story for the Young • Evelyn Everett-Green

... extorted by threats and violence is binding on none; even human laws decree this. Divine laws, especially in a case of this nature, absolve the human conscience beyond a doubt. If you were orthodox, I would go to Rome—yes, I would go on foot—to get you absolved from so rash a vow; but you are not a submissive child of the Pope, Edmee—nor ...
— Mauprat • George Sand

... him. Travel across the mountain to the town, The first cathedral town upon the road That leads to Rome,—a sage and reverend priest, The Bishop Adrian, bides there. Say you have come From his leal servant, Friar Lodovick; He hath vast lore and great authority, And may absolve you freely ...
— The Poems of Emma Lazarus - Vol. I (of II.), Narrative, Lyric, and Dramatic • Emma Lazarus

... the ensuing four hours in wondering—not so much what he should say to Christina as what she would say to him. For himself, he was determined to make a clean breast of it; at the same time, he was not going to absolve Christina of all responsibility. He had behaved like a fool, he admitted, but he still had a just grievance. Yet it was with no very stout heart that he alighted in the big station, where everything was strange except the colour of ...
— Wee Macgreegor Enlists • J. J. Bell

... sound principles and such blindness to our previous experience could be explained only by a desire to force this country to use a silver coinage only, and had its origin with the owners of silver-mines, aided by the desires of debtors for a cheap unit in which to absolve themselves from their indebtedness. There was no pretense of setting up a double standard about it; for it was evident to the most ignorant that so great a disproportion between the mint and market ratios ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • John Stuart Mill

... foregone conclusion that the finding at the coroner's inquest, to be held the next day, would absolve him; foregone, also, that no prosecutor would press for his arraignment on charges and that no grand jury would indict. So, soon all the evidence in hand was conclusively on his side. He had been forced into a fight not of his own choosing; ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... woman living near me who has a warm house, with a stove in it,— and blankets to cover her, and a bit of money put by, and I envy her her blankets and her stove and her house and her money. Is that a sin?' And he said it was a sin; but that he would absolve me from it if I said ten Paters and ten Aves before Our Lady of Bon-Secours. And then he gave me his blessing,—but no blankets and no stove and no money. And I have not said ten Paters and Aves yet, because ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli

... would have been more wise than to reckon upon a faith which no ink and no parchment can render valid, if the Church absolve the compact. Thou ...
— Leila, Complete - The Siege of Granada • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... centre of his court, the Lord of Misrule bade his herald declare that from Christmas Eve to Twelfth Night he was Lord Supreme; that, with his magic art, he transformed all there into children, and charged them, on their fealty to act only as such. "I absolve them all from wisdom," he said; "I bid them be just wise enough to make fools of themselves, and do decree that none shall sit apart in pride and eke in self-sufficiency to laugh at others"; and ...
— Historic Girls • E. S. Brooks

... they have never troubled me; and, as I have had no trouble here to get out of, I do not well know how to help others out. Wherefore, if any one be still annoyed by these things, I will turn him over to the elegant criticism of the poet Campbell: "Before I say more of this dramatic treasure, I must absolve myself by a confession as to some of its improbabilities. Rosalind asks her cousin Celia, 'Whither shall we go?' and Celia answers, 'To seek my uncle in the Forest of Arden.' But, arrived there, and having purchased a cottage and sheep-farm, ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson

... your actions?" cried Francine. "Evil is so mixed with good in your nature. Yes, Saint Anne of Auray, to whom I pray to save you, will absolve you for all you do. And, Marie, am I not here beside you, without so much as knowing where you go?" and she kissed her ...
— The Chouans • Honore de Balzac

... impure habit? Why did you not listen to the counsels of your confessor? Why did you not, even after you had fallen the first or the second or the third or the fourth or the hundredth time, repent of your evil ways and turn to God who only waited for your repentance to absolve you of your sins? Now the time for repentance has gone by. Time is, time was, but time shall be no more! Time was to sin in secrecy, to indulge in that sloth and pride, to covet the unlawful, to yield to the promptings of your lower nature, to live like ...
— A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man • James Joyce

... passed. They know it as well as we do. I have seen the writing on the wall for months. To-day I have concluded all my arrangements. I have broken off all negotiations with Berlin. They recognise the authority and they absolve me. They know that it will be well to have a friend here when the time comes for drawing up ...
— The Kingdom of the Blind • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... is not for my own sake—it is for the sake of the poor girl upstairs. I had promised to say nothing of that to anyone—to try and save her—and I left you and ran the risk of for ever forfeiting your affection. But if Beth is better in the morning I will try to get her to absolve me from my promise ...
— The Mystery of the Four Fingers • Fred M. White

... be; *confessed Or any woman, be she young or old, That hath y-made her husband cokewold,* *cuckold Such folk shall have no power nor no grace To offer to my relics in this place. And whoso findeth him out of such blame, He will come up and offer in God's name; And I assoil* him by the authority *absolve Which that by ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer

... true she had given her promise blindly, in ignorance of the facts, but that could not absolve her. It was not Garth who had forced the promise from her. It was she who had impetuously offered it, never conceiving such a possibility as that he might be guilty of the one sin for which, in her eyes, there could ...
— The Hermit of Far End • Margaret Pedler

... this rebellion, they have acted as States, claiming to be sovereign over all persons and property within their respective limits, and claiming the right to absolve their citizens from their allegiance to the Federal Government. Several of these States have combined to form a new Confederacy, claiming to be acknowledged by the world as a sovereign State. Their right to do so is now being decided ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, August, 1863, No. 70 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various

... are instructed by our clients," they added, "to ask you to bear in mind that the child has been admitted, and is a member of the Catholic Church, owing allegiance to the Holy Father at Rome, a bond from which only the Papal excommunication can absolve him." ...
— Ginx's Baby • Edward Jenkins

... of the said prior-general, desirous moreover of rewarding him with especial favors and graces [we hereby,] in order that these presents alone be carried into effect, do absolve him and declare him thus absolved from whatsoever excommunication, suspension, interdict, and other ecclesiastical sentences, censures, and penalties incurred by law or individual court, should he in any manner have ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 (Vol 28 of 55) • Various

... man's name for his own? a little reflection shows us he would not. Now, as for the other art, could the people read bad books had they never learned the alphabet? If there is a man present who can say to the contrary, I absolve him from his respect, and invite him to speak boldly, for there is no Inquisition in Vaud, but we invite argument. This is a free government, and a fatherly government, and a mild government, as ye all know; ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper

... 1881, I had made a trip down the Volga to Southern Russia with that most delightful of men, the late Vicomte Eugene Melchior de Vogue, the French Academician and man-of-letters. I absolve Vogue from the accusation of being unable to observe like the majority of his compatriots, nor, like them, was he a poor linguist. He had married a Russian, the sister of General Anenkoff of Central Asian fame; spoke Russian fluently, and very ...
— Here, There And Everywhere • Lord Frederic Hamilton

... from the slightest and most frivolous occasions. Solon was no very cruel, though, perhaps, an unjust legislator, who punished neuters in civil wars; and few, I believe, would, in such cases, incur the penalty, were their affection and discourse allowed sufficient to absolve them. No selfishness, and scarce any philosophy, have there force sufficient to support a total coolness and indifference; and he must be more or less than man, who kindles not in the common blaze. What wonder then, that moral sentiments are found of such influence ...
— An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals • David Hume

... Movements also manifested themselves within France itself, which awoke hopes in the King that he might make himself master of the French crown as easily as his father had once done of the English. Leo X had already been persuaded to absolve the subjects of Francis I from their oaths to him. It was in connexion with this that the second man in France, the Constable of Bourbon, slighted in his station, and endangered in his possessions, resolved to help himself by revolting from Francis I. He wished then to recognise ...
— A History of England Principally in the Seventeenth Century, Volume I (of 6) • Leopold von Ranke

... nation; I wish the Lord to pardon them. I say no more——but God hath laid engagements on Scotland. We are tied by covenants to religion and reformation, those who were then unborn are yet engaged, and it passeth the power of all the magistrates under heaven to absolve from the oath of God. These times are like to be either very sinning or suffering times, and let Christians make their choice, there is a sad dilemma in the business, sin or suffer, and surely he that will choose the better part will choose to suffer, others that will choose to sin will ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie

... the history of St. Martin, that when he absolved certain notorious sinners, he was rebuked by Satan for doing so. St. Martin is said to have replied, "Why, I would absolve even thee, if thou wouldst say from thy heart, I repent of having sinned against the Son of God, and I pray for pardon." But the devil never does this. For he persists in committing sin and defending ...
— Commentary on Genesis, Vol. II - Luther on Sin and the Flood • Martin Luther

... afraid I shall be a forsworn man, in that case," said the veteran, smiling grimly. "Should the Emperor again set foot in France his presence would absolve us from all vows. I only serve under the King's colors because no others fly ...
— The Eagle of the Empire - A Story of Waterloo • Cyrus Townsend Brady

... apparently an illegitimate son, and as such ineligible to the throne. Who could say what evil act upon the part of a monarch justified his people in setting him aside? Who was the judge in such a case? Yet, on the other hand, the man had notoriously broken his own pledges, and that surely should absolve his subjects from their allegiance. It was a weighty question for a country-bred lad to have to settle, and yet settled it must be, and that speedily. I took up my hat and wandered away down the village street, turning the ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle

... generals before the tribunals. He also infringed the iniquitous orders of the thirty tyrants of Athens. The satires of Aristophanes neither moved nor irritated him. The same dauntless firmness he displayed when brought before his judges, charged with impiety. 'If it is your wish to absolve me on condition that I henceforth be silent, I reply I love and honor you, but I ought rather to obey the gods than you. Neither in the presence of judges nor of the enemy is it permitted me, or any other man, to use every sort of means to escape death. It is not death ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker

... father, and the misfortune of being ruined by that honour?" "I have, indeed, heard of that Partridge," says Jones, "and have always believed myself to be his son." "Well, sir," answered Benjamin, "I am that Partridge; but I here absolve you from all filial duty, for I do assure you, you are no son of mine." "How!" replied Jones, "and is it possible that a false suspicion should have drawn all the ill consequences upon you, with which I am too well acquainted?" ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding

... themselves on the floor. It seems to have been their wish to begin by intimidation; but if they hoped to succeed, they knew little of the intrepid spirit of their opponent. Pretending to have received their commission from Henry, they ordered the Primate to absolve the excommunicated prelates. He replied with firmness, and occasionally with warmth, that if he had published the papal letters, it was with the royal permission; that the case of the Archbishop of York had been reserved to the Pontiff; but that he was willing to absolve the others ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various

... world. Hence it is a safe principle in the criticism of art that technical proficiency, and brilliancy of fancy or execution, cannot avail to establish a great reputation. They may dazzle for a moment, but they cannot absolve an artist from the need of having an important ...
— Winds Of Doctrine - Studies in Contemporary Opinion • George Santayana

... may be said, did not absolve the ships listening on their hydrophones, who should have been able to detect the approach of a submarine from the sound of her engines. During the first year of war the hydrophone was a very imperfect instrument, and although the sound might be heard ...
— Submarine Warfare of To-day • Charles W. Domville-Fife

... discretion does not exempt him from the honour he is bound by the law of God and nature to pay to his parents.[19] The son is under a perpetual obligation to honour his father by all outward expressions, and from this obligation no state can absolve him. 'The honour due to parents' (says Locke) 'a monarch on his throne owes his mother, and yet this lessens not his authority, nor subjects him to her government.'[20] The monarchical theory ascribes to the King of England two bodies ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville

... lines, commencing at the top of page 252, I could wish to be not exactly what it is. In what is there expressed, the writer has not correctly understood me. I have never had a theory that secession could absolve States or people from their obligations. Precisely the contrary is asserted in the inaugural address; and it was because of my belief in the continuation of those obligations that I was puzzled, for a time, as to denying the legal rights ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln

... Warlock. "But you cannot judge until you know with what reason I hated my brother. It is a very old story. However, now I hate no one. I will not apologise for what I have done. I do not want your forgiveness. I had to absolve ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole

... utterly, that the only people who really mattered were all in the secret; they knew that it was Antigone who had let him in for Wrackham; they wouldn't take him and his Wrackham seriously; and he might be sure that Ford Lankester would absolve him. It was high comedy after Lankester's own heart, and so on. But nothing I said could move him. He stuck to it that the people in the secret, the people I said mattered, didn't matter in the least, that his duty was to the big outside public for whom ...
— The Return of the Prodigal • May Sinclair

... looking up into his flushed face, while a bright blush suffused her own sweet countenance; "you may receive my vows, but surely you can have no power to absolve me from their observance!" ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper

... that the fault should be corrected. Nevertheless, no transgressor is spoken of by his name. In this manner he absolves the people by advising them that they should beware of sins of the aforesaid kind. Afterward he offers sacrifice to God, that he should pardon the State and absolve it of its sins, and to teach and defend it. Once in every year the chief priests of each separate subordinate State confess their sins in the presence of Hoh. Thus he is not ignorant of the wrongdoings of the provinces, and forthwith he removes them with ...
— The City of the Sun • Tommaso Campanells

... count never mentioned Henrietta's name in Szilard's presence again—and who knows whether there was not some impediment between these two from which no sacrament could absolve them. Who knows whether it might not after all have been as well for Vamhidy to avoid any meeting whatever with—the widow ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai

... the great ones for the end so as to finish with the avowal of his carnal misdeeds: "if I succumb then I can explain myself in two words. My God! may the prior only not remain silent as he did yesterday, may he only absolve me!" ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans

... virtue, When to perform it were the worst of crimes, 'Twas wrong to swear; be with that wrong contented. A second fault cannot make right the first; And acts of guilt absolve no ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various

... planets concentric with the sun, and not far from him with regular motions. [3126]Christopher Shemer, a German Suisser Jesuit, Ursica Rosa, divides them in maculas et faculas, and will have them to be fixed in Solis superficie: and to absolve their periodical and regular motion in twenty-seven or twenty-eight days, holding withal the rotation of the sun upon his centre; and all are so confident, that they have made schemes and tables of their motions. The [3127]Hollander, in his dissertatiuncula ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior

... taper in his hand, had repaired to the royal chapel and knocked humbly for admittance; how a priestly voice from within had demanded who was there, how Sunderland had made answer that a poor sinner who had long wandered from the true Church implored her to receive and to absolve him; how the doors were opened; and how the neophyte partook of the ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... message is the only extenuating circumstance in the whole guilty affair. Aniela knows that I wanted to undo the wrong, that I loved her then, suffered, and repented,—am repenting still, and that if we are unhappy she too helped to bring that unhappiness on both. She is bound to absolve me in her heart, regret the past and dream what the future might have been but for my misdeeds and her severity. Even then I was reading in her face that she felt frightened at her own thoughts and visions, and tried to drive them away by a conversation upon indifferent subjects. My aunt is so full ...
— Without Dogma • Henryk Sienkiewicz

... the great fellow, "for the sake of Holy Church, I did indeed confiscate that temptation completely, and if you must needs have proof in order to absolve me from my sins, come with me now and you shall sample the excellent discrimination which the Bishop of Norwich displays in the selection of ...
— The Outlaw of Torn • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... so easy to absolve Gibbon from the charge of prejudice in reference to his treatment of the Early Church. It cannot be denied that in the two famous chapters, at least, which concluded his first volume, he adopted a tone which must be pronounced offensive, not only from the Christian point of view, but on ...
— Gibbon • James Cotter Morison

... i, can. Ex auctoritate) as saying: "By authority of this decree framed in virtue of our apostolic power and the duty of our office, be it lawful to monk priests who are configured to the apostles, to preach, baptize, give communion, pray for sinners, impose penance, and absolve from sin." ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas

... myself," she said. "I am satisfied with my own innocence and certain of my doom on earth and my hope in Heaven. What I do desire, is to induce the authorities to take time, and to use caution in receiving and strictness in sifting testimony; and so shall they ascertain the truth, and absolve the innocent, the blessing of God being ...
— The Witch of Salem - or Credulity Run Mad • John R. Musick

... heavier and unmitigated cruelty. The truth is, he did not dare to kill, while he had no desire to save. Over and over again, in the course of the monstrous burlesques which were enacted in judicial robes as legal inquiries, did Philip privately, both orally and in writing, exonerate and absolve the murderer. Prosecutors and judges were bridled and overawed—kinsmen were abashed—popular indignation was quelled by reiterated assurances and reports, that the confidential secretary of state had been the passive and faithful ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various

... from aristocracy its privileges, from nobility its pride, from the clergy its fanaticism—a Revolution which has dried up so many golden sources from the grasp of the priesthood, torn so many frocks, crushed so many theories—do you believe that such a Revolution will absolve you? No—no!—this Revolution will have a denouement, and I say—and with no intention of provocation—that we must advance boldly towards this denouement. The more you delay, the more difficult and blood-stained will be that ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine

... prevailed but friendship and affection! And how much more melancholy must be the present emotions of your Majesty's heart and mind to see such words applied to a beloved brother-in-law, whom yet—however much you love him—your conscience cannot absolve from the crime of having brought upon the world wilfully ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume III (of 3), 1854-1861 • Queen of Great Britain Victoria

... sake, my charming Frau v. Genzinger. Oh! how I do wish that I could only play over these sonatas once or twice to you; how gladly would I then reconcile myself to remain for a time in my wilderness! I have much to say and to confess to you, from which no one but yourself can absolve me; but what cannot be effected now will, I devoutly hope, come to pass next winter, and half of the time is already gone. Meanwhile I take refuge in patience, and am content with the inestimable privilege of subscribing myself ...
— Haydn • J. Cuthbert Hadden

... keep the Constitution of the United States, and the Constitution is found to be wrong in certain particulars; then his oath is not morally binding, for before his oath, by his very existence, he is morally bound to keep the law of God as fast as he learns it. No oath can absolve him from his natural allegiance to God. Yet I see not how a man can knowingly, and with a good Conscience, swear to keep what he deems it wrong to keep, and will not keep, and does not ...
— The Trial of Theodore Parker • Theodore Parker

... Herod himself; he is to be sure more concerned for himself than for the laws; but my complaint is against yourselves, and your king, who gave him a license so to do. However, take you notice, that God is great, and that this very man, whom you are going to absolve and dismiss, for the sake of Hyrcanus, will one day punish both you and your king himself also." Nor did Sameas mistake in any part of this prediction; for when Herod had received the kingdom, he slew all the members ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus

... high obligation because of their lowness, yet certainly all are debt bound this way, and must one day give account. You that are poor and unlearned, and have not received great things of that nature from God, do not think yourselves free, do not absolve yourselves, for there is infinite debt besides. You will have no place for that excuse, that you had not great parts, were not learned, and so forth. For as the obligation reaches you all, so there is as ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning

... reached the passage in the Book of Numbers dealing with the remission of vows, the king put the question: "If a man desires to be released from a vow, what steps must he take?" The Sanhedrin replied: "He must repair to a scholar, and he will absolve him from his vow." Whereupon Nebuchadnezzar exclaimed: "I verily believe it was you who released Zedekiah from the vow he took concerning me." And he ordered the members of the Sanhedrin to leave their state chairs and sit on the ground. (3) They were forced to admit, that they had not acted ...
— THE LEGENDS OF THE JEWS VOLUME IV BIBLE TIMES AND CHARACTERS - FROM THE EXODUS TO THE DEATH OF MOSES • BY LOUIS GINZBERG

... "Political opposition can never absolve gentlemen from the necessity of a rigid adherence to the laws of honor and the rules of decorum. I neither claim such privilege, nor ...
— Something of Men I Have Known - With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective • Adlai E. Stevenson

... for the sale of all the property which has been mortgaged to myself. At the same time, knowing that, in addition, your frivolous stepfather has squandered money which is exclusively yours, I have decided to absolve him from a certain moiety of the mortgages on his property, in order that you may be in a position to recover of him what you have lost, by suing him in legal fashion. I trust, therefore, that, as matters now stand, this action of ...
— The Gambler • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... courage, was a Christian virtue; and they who had received their Christianity at the hands of the English Church had duties towards it from which neither dissatisfaction nor the idea of something better could absolve them. Spartam nactus es, hanc exorna is the motto for every one whose lot is cast in any portion of Christ's Church. And as long as he could speak with this conviction, the strongest of them could not break away from his restraint. ...
— The Oxford Movement - Twelve Years, 1833-1845 • R.W. Church

... the Minster twins convict you. Do you remember that I told you one day in early summer—that Sheila and Dorothy and Gladys would mark you for their own? Oh, my inconstant courtier, they are yonder!—And I absolve you. Adieu!" ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers

... its truth mathematically. (84) Who, unless he were desperate or mad, would wish to bid an incontinent farewell to reason, or to despise the arts and sciences, or to deny reason's certitude? (85) But, in the meanwhile, we cannot wholly absolve them from blame, inasmuch as they invoke the aid of reason for her own defeat, and attempt infallibly to prove her fallible. (86) While they are trying to prove mathematically the authority and truth of theology, and to take away the ...
— A Theologico-Political Treatise [Part III] • Benedict de Spinoza

... opportunity to do the King justice. Upon this M. de Lionne sent word to the Cardinal that he hoped very shortly to acquaint him of my being prisoner in the Castle of Saint Angelo, and that the Cardinal would be no better off for his Majesty's amnesty, because the Pope said none but he could absolve or condemn cardinals. Meantime all my domestics who were subjects of the King of France were ordered to quit my service, on pain of being treated as rebels and traitors. I could have little hope of protection from the Pope, for he was become quite another man, never spoke one word of truth, ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... expectations knowingly and voluntarily. Like the other obligations of justice already spoken of, this one is not regarded as absolute, but as capable of being overruled by a stronger obligation of justice on the other side; or by such conduct on the part of the person concerned as is deemed to absolve us from our obligation to him, and to constitute a forfeiture of the benefit which he has been led ...
— Utilitarianism • John Stuart Mill

... promise, Csar might have found that he had laid himself under very embarrassing obligations; but, as the case stood, he had, through all his following campaigns, the total benefit of such a promise, and yet could always absolve himself from the penalties of responsibility which it imposed, by appealing to the evidence of those who happened to stand in the first ranks of his audience. The blunder was gross and palpable; and yet, with the unreflecting and ...
— The Caesars • Thomas de Quincey

... trouble thee no more." The soul of Guido di Montefeltro, overhearing the great Mantuan speak in a Lombard dialect, asked him news of the state of things in Romagna; and then told him how he had lost his chance of paradise, by thinking Pope Boniface could at once absolve him from his sins, and use them for his purposes.[34] He was going to heaven, he said, by the help of St. Francis, who came on purpose to fetch him, when a black angel met them, and demanded his absolved, indeed, but unrepented victim. "To repent evil, ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Volume 1 • Leigh Hunt

... clear field," observed the old factor. "Your own are the only cattle endangered, and since you are the applicant for the bill of health, you absolve the authorities from all concern. Hurry in your other shipments, and the railroad can use its influence—it'll want cattle to ship next year. The ranges must ...
— Wells Brothers • Andy Adams

... the monk, with a laugh that made the sufferer's hair stand on end; "I absolve you? I ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various

... time being, I have to deal with Mikolka; there are facts which implicate him—what are facts, after all? If I tell you all this now, as I am doing, I do so, I assure you, most emphatically, so that your mind and conscience may absolve me from my behavior on the day of our interview. 'Why,' you will ask, 'did you not come on that occasion and have my place searched?' I did so, hah! hah! I went when you were ill in bed—but, let me tell you, not officially, not in my magisterial capacity; but go I did. We had your rooms ...
— The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII., Mystery Tales • Various

... man must be a nonconformist.[165] He who would gather immortal palms must not be hindered by the name of goodness, but must explore if it be goodness.[166] Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind. Absolve you to yourself, and you shall have the suffrage[167] of the world. I remember an answer which when quite young I was prompted to make to a valued adviser, who was wont to importune me with the dear old doctrines of the church. On my saying, What have I to do with the sacredness ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... her voice by the consciousness of the truth of her story. Really, seeing them thus face to face, he cold and calm, stretched out in his armchair, with his hands in the pockets of his gray swansdown waistcoat, she carefully choosing her words, as if each of them might condemn or absolve her, you would never have said that it was a child before her grandfather, but an accused person ...
— Fromont and Risler, Complete • Alphonse Daudet

... not go out with an eyed needle, nor with a signet ring, nor with a spiral head-dress, nor with a scent-box, nor with a bottle of musk; and if she go out she is guilty of a sin-offering." The words of Rabbi Meier. But the Sages "absolve the scent-box and ...
— Hebrew Literature

... How can a mother ensure that the man to whom she gives her daughter will be the husband of her heart? You pour scorn on the miserable creatures who sell themselves for a few coins to any passer-by, though want and hunger absolve the brief union; while another union, horrible for quite other reasons, is tolerated, nay encouraged, by society, and a young and innocent girl is married to a man whom she has only met occasionally during the previous three months. She is sold for her whole lifetime. It is true that the price is ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Honore de Balzac

... shall do a great damage to the friendship between your nation and mine, if I presume to take you across the German border without your consent. I have been much moved by his advice. He has already written to the Wilhelmstrasse in your behalf. I cannot yet absolve you from your promise since my own actions in Austria have been far from conventional. Herr Renwick, if he chooses, can make my visit to Sarajevo most unpleasant. But I see no reason, after our purpose has been achieved, why you should not ...
— The Secret Witness • George Gibbs

... then they do it by experiment; For which the law not only doth absolve them, But gives them great reward: and he is loth ...
— Volpone; Or, The Fox • Ben Jonson

... promises him nothing except teaching, inspiration, comradeship, an occasion for the confession of his faith and some opportunity for service. His ministers are only such as he; they may exhort but they dare not absolve. He is greatly dependent, then, for his sense of the reality of religion upon his own spiritual states. If he is spiritually sensitive and not too much troubled by doubt, if he possesses a considerable capacity for religious understanding, if his Bible is still for him the authoritative word ...
— Modern Religious Cults and Movements • Gaius Glenn Atkins

... citizens of Mecklenburg county, do hereby dissolve the political bands which have connected us to the mother country, and hereby absolve ourselves from all allegiance to the British Crown and abjure all political connection, contract, or association with that nation, who have wantonly trampled on our rights and liberties, and inhumanly shed the blood of American patriots ...
— Sketches of Western North Carolina, Historical and Biographical • C. L. Hunter

... attitude of prayer, her head pillowed in its last sleep on that ledge of the rock, knelt all that was mortal of Isabel La Despenser. With her had been no priest to absolve—save the High Priest; no hand had smoothed her pathway to the grave but the Lord's own hand, who had carried her so tenderly through the valley of the shadow of death. Painlessly the dark river was forded, silently the pearl-gates were thrown open; and now she stood within the veil, in the innermost ...
— The Well in the Desert - An Old Legend of the House of Arundel • Emily Sarah Holt

... course, are absolved from your engagement. But mind, I do not say that you are justified in changing only in case of a change on the opposite side: you may very possibly become simply tired. In this case, your prior promise to yourself will absolve you from the performance of ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various

... situation I'm in. A hundred thousand dollars wouldn't indemnify me in having my cattle refused as late as the middle of September at Fort Buford. And believing that I will be turned down, under my contract, so Sutton says, I must tender my beeves on the appointed day of delivery, which will absolve my bondsmen and me from all liability. A man can't trifle with the government—the cattle must be there. Now in my case, ...
— The Outlet • Andy Adams

... or whatever she does, she knows that the child is walking in her footsteps and reenacting her conduct. Her status is irrevocably fixed in the life of the child, nor can any philosophy or sophistry absolve her from the situation. She cannot abdicate her place in favor of another, nor can she win immunity from responsibility. She is the child's ideal for weal or woe, nor can men or angels change this big fact. Through all the hours of the day she hears the child saying, "Whither ...
— The Vitalized School • Francis B. Pearson

... the Christian Ministry. The word is a corruption of Presbyter (which see). In common with Bishops, Priests have the power to absolve, to consecrate, and to bless, but not to ordain. The difference between a Priest and a Deacon is far greater than that between a Deacon and ...
— The Church Handy Dictionary • Anonymous

... be punished in some other way—but threatening that, if they allowed that term to pass over without repentance, they should be dealt with according to the utmost rigor of the law. Many ran to the convent of St. Paul, hoping to merit some small measure of indulgence. But the inquisitors would not absolve them until they had disclosed the names, calling, residence, and given a description of all others whom they had seen, heard, or understood to have apostatized in like manner. After getting this information, they bound the terrified informers to secrecy. This ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 8 - The Later Renaissance: From Gutenberg To The Reformation • Editor-in-Chief: Rossiter Johnson

... that I know is, that there exist, between this Prince and the Roman Pontiff great differences, and an irreconcileable hatred. God only knows which of the two is wrong. Therefore with all my power I excommunicate him who injures the other; and I absolve him who suffers, to the great scandal ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli

... phrases, or twists his metre into harsh inversions. The sense, however, of his words is strained when "he views the Ganges from Alpine heights"—that is, from mountains like the Alps. And the pedant surely intrudes (but when was blank verse without pedantry?) when he tells how "Planets ABSOLVE the stated ...
— Lives of the Poets: Gay, Thomson, Young, and Others • Samuel Johnson

... in Socrate, Constantine besought To cure his leprosy Sylvester's aid, So me to cure the fever of his pride This man besought: my counsel to that end He ask'd: and I was silent: for his words Seem'd drunken: but forthwith he thus resum'd: "From thy heart banish fear: of all offence I hitherto absolve thee. In return, Teach me my purpose so to execute, That Penestrino cumber earth no more. Heav'n, as thou knowest, I have power to shut And open: and the keys are therefore twain, The which my predecessor meanly priz'd." Then, yielding to the ...
— The Divine Comedy • Dante

... all yet to come. The mere fact of doing a noble deed does not absolve one often from very mean and petty consequences. Before the winter was half over she had found out how rapid is the descent from good report. The neighbors were deeply offended at her for giving ...
— Winter Evening Tales • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr

... sins, and going, little by little, as much as possible, by imperceptible degrees, to the most criminal actions. As it seems evident that the penitent referred to in your questions of yesterday is unwilling to make a full and detailed confession of all her iniquities, you cannot promise to absolve her without assuring yourself, by wise and prudent questions, ...
— The Priest, The Woman And The Confessional • Father Chiniquy

... child, there was no other way in which you could honourably earn your dot in a single hour. To-morrow I shall take you back to the cure of Montreuil, who will, I trust, absolve us both. He will forgive you for playing in a comedy ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 29, May 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various

... she, with a bewitching smile, "that is a secret between us and God; and only to Him alone can we confess it; because He alone can absolve us from it. Farewell, then, Seymour, farewell, and think of me till we see each other again! But when—say, ...
— Henry VIII And His Court • Louise Muhlbach

... rights of his own crown rather than to impair those of the Holy See in the least particular. Consequently, when Alva entered Rome in peaceful pomp, he did homage for his master to the Pope, who was generously willing to absolve him for his past offences. Paul IV. publicly exulted in the abasement of his conquerors, declaring that it would teach kings in future the obedience they owed to the Chief of the Church. But Alva did not conceal his discontent. It ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds

... own will, they denied its right to involve other nations, absolutely and unconditionally, in the consequences of the changes which it may think proper to make. They maintained the right of a nation to absolve itself from the obligations even of real treaties, when such a change of circumstances takes place in the internal situation of the other contracting party, as so essentially to alter the existing state of things, ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 5 (of 5) • John Marshall

... French literature, there must be exceptions to the rule. This tale will be one of the two instances in these Studies of violation of the laws of narrative; for to give a just idea of the unconfessed struggle which may excuse, though it cannot absolve Dinah, it is necessary to give an analysis of a poem which was the outcome ...
— Parisians in the Country - The Illustrious Gaudissart, and The Muse of the Department • Honore de Balzac

... begged, besought, implored that she might be spared this further disgrace, and that her mother might be spared the grief and pain of it; but this could not be: duty required this sacrifice, duty takes precedence of all things, nothing can absolve one from a duty, with a ...
— The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories • Mark Twain

... Mr. Gordon presented his compliments and begged to reply that he had large business interests in this part of the country that necessitated a visit of some length, and probably in the end a permanent residence here; and that he would very fully absolve Miss Valdes of any responsibility ...
— A Daughter of the Dons - A Story of New Mexico Today • William MacLeod Raine

... mercies, blessed Virgin, absolve me of the sin—if sin it be to rush unbidden to the presence of my Judge! My burden is too ...
— The Three Brides, Love in a Cottage, and Other Tales • Francis A. Durivage

... next me in our heaven, Lustrous and costly, great renown hath left, And not to perish, ere these hundred years Five times absolve their round. Consider thou, If to excel be worthy man's endeavour, When such life may attend the first. Yet they Care not for this, the crowd that now are girt By Adice and Tagliamento, still Impenitent, ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri

... than she can upon justifiable occasions. She is not always imagining herself looked down upon because she is poor. She knows full well that out of her own heart and mouth proceed the only witnesses that can absolve or condemn her. If she is quick to be courteous, unselfish, gentle and retiring in speech and manner in public places, she is true gold, even though her dress be faded and her hat a little out of style. You cannot mistake any such ...
— The Girl Wanted • Nixon Waterman

... gods, lives in the waters of Mansarowar," exclaimed my bearer in a poetic mood. "I have bathed in its waters, and of its waters I have drunk. I have salaamed the great Kelas, the sight of which alone can absolve all sins of humanity; I shall ...
— In the Forbidden Land • Arnold Henry Savage Landor

... I do want to lay on the consciences of all you Christian people this, that nothing can absolve you from the obligation of personal, direct speech to some one of Christ and His salvation. Unless you can say, 'I have not refrained my lips, O Lord! Thou knowest,' there frowns over against you an unfulfilled duty, the neglect of ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) • Alexander Maclaren

... strike, in justice she could hardly be held guilty of more than an act of folly. Essentially, the final situation was what it would have been without any intervention whatsoever on her part. In going over the succession of events logically and calmly, Hamilton came to the decision that he would absolve his wife from any real guilt in the affair. He even felt a half-hearted kindliness toward her for her blundering good-will. But he was none the less resolved that he would tolerate no further injection of this charming ...
— Making People Happy • Thompson Buchanan

... Scheldt, a large portion of the western provinces of Belgium is capable of being inundated; and if this fresh calamity ensue, as a second resource on the part of the besieged, from the adoption of which the recognised laws of warfare cannot absolve them, not only Antwerp will have ceased to exist, but her citadel will rear its head, a frowning islet, amidst a waste of waters. As to the blockade of the Scheldt, it will be impotent with regard ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, No. - 581, Saturday, December 15, 1832 • Various

... it," replied the dying man; "but my sight fails me; be quick, absolve me." And the paper was signed, with difficulty, as the priests supported the dying man. "And ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Captain Frederick Marryat

... Atahualpa had offered such a deadly insult to his religion and rushed back to Pizarro, exclaiming, "Do you not see that while we stand here wasting our breath in talking with this dog, full of pride as he is, the fields are filling with Indians? Set on at once! I absolve you for whatever you do!" I would fain do no man an injustice. Therefore, I also set down what other authorities say, namely, that Valverde simply told Pizarro what ...
— South American Fights and Fighters - And Other Tales of Adventure • Cyrus Townsend Brady

... all the arrogance of youth, "they put a gipsy or fortune-teller into prison for getting money out of silly people who think they have supernatural power; why should they not put a clergyman in prison for pretending that he can absolve sins, or turn bread and wine into the flesh and blood of One who died two thousand years ago? What," he asked himself, "could be more pure 'hanky-panky' than that a bishop should lay his hands upon a young ...
— The Way of All Flesh • Samuel Butler

... the million or not; there is no business-parallel here. If, owing you love, he gives you hate, you, owing him love, have yet to pay it. A love unpaid you, a justice undone you, a praise withheld from you, a judgment passed on you without judgment, will not absolve you of the debt of a love unpaid, a justice not done, a praise withheld, a false judgment passed: these uttermost farthings—not to speak of such debts as the world itself counts grievous wrongs—you must pay him, whether he pay you or not. We have a good while ...
— Unspoken Sermons - Series I., II., and II. • George MacDonald

... where none exist?" he snarled. "If the agreement stands in the way, I absolve Mr. Royson from any promise he has made. I wanted to guard against treachery, not to tie him ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy

... the Holy Ghost.' Therefore we must not separate nor part God and man according to our natural reason and understanding. In like manner, every hearer must conclude and say, I hear not St. Paul, St. Peter, or a man speak; but I hear God himself speak, baptize, absolve, excommunicate, and administer the holy sacrament of ...
— Selections from the Table Talk of Martin Luther • Martin Luther

... the diplomatists have no right to complain, because they recognize his character, as an independent sovereign. Should he promise all they ask and afterwards break his word, diplomacy is equally without a ground of complaint. Is it not the admitted right of the Sovereign Pontiff to absolve men even from the most solemn oaths? And finally, should he yield to the solicitation of Europe, and enact liberal laws one day, only to let them fall into desuetude the next, diplomatists are once more disarmed. To violate its own laws is a ...
— The Roman Question • Edmond About

... the absolution to penitents immediately after their confession and before the penance was performed. (4) Until the Middle Ages the form of absolution after private confession was of the nature of a prayer, such as "May the Lord absolve thee''; and this is still the practice of the Greek church. But about the 13th century the Roman formula was altered, and the council of Trent (1551) declared that the "form'' and power of the sacrament of ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... no sentence of death can be passed upon any one soever,'—Talmud, Bab. 'Of Idolatry' 1:8. 'A sentence of death can be pronounced only so long as the Sanhedrin holds its sessions in the appointed place.'—Maimonides, 14. See further Levit. 21:10; compare 10:6. 'Let the judges each in his turn absolve or condemn.'—Mishna, San. 15:5. 'The members of the Sanhedrin were seated in the form of a semicircle, at the extremity of which a secretary was placed, whose business it was to record the votes. One of these secretaries recorded the votes in favor of the accused, ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage

... Galileus supposed, but planets concentric with the sun, and not far from him, with regular motions. Christopher Schemer' [a significant way of spelling Scheiner's name], 'a German Suisser Jesuit, divides them in maculas et faculas, and will have them to be fixed in solis superficie and to absolve their periodical and regular motions in 27 or 28 dayes; holding withall the rotation of the sun upon his centre, and are all so confident that they have made schemes and tables of their motions. The Hollander censures all; and thus they disagree among themselves, ...
— Myths and Marvels of Astronomy • Richard A. Proctor

... is a woman living near me who has a warm house, with a stove in it,— and blankets to cover her, and a bit of money put by, and I envy her her blankets and her stove and her house and her money. Is that a sin?' And he said it was a sin; but that he would absolve me from it if I said ten Paters and ten Aves before Our Lady of Bon-Secours. And then he gave me his blessing,—but no blankets and no stove and no money. And I have not said ten Paters and Aves yet, because my bones have ached too much all the week for me to walk up the hill to Bon-Secours. ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli

... "I will absolve her of it presently," said De la Marck, "for here, with one stroke of a cleaver, will I consecrate myself Bishop of Liege, and I trust one living bishop is ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott

... communicate, and by the grace of your Holiness regain the grace of my Lord God." Upon this the Pope, with a scarcely perceptible sigh, remembering perhaps his former trials, spoke as follows: "Benvenuto, I thoroughly believe what you tell me; it is in my power to absolve you of any unbecoming deed you may have done, and, what is more, I have the will. So, then, speak out with frankness and perfect confidence; for if you had taken the value of a whole tiara, I am quite ready to pardon ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini

... Sylvester within Soracte to cure his leprosy,[4] so this one besought me as master to cure his proud fever. He asked counsel of me, and I kept silence, because his words seemed drunken. And then he said to me, 'Let not thy heart mistrust; from now I absolve thee, and do thou teach me to act so that I may throw Palestrina to the ground. Heaven can I lock and unlock, as thou knowest; for two are the keys that my predecessor held not dear.' Then his grave ...
— The Divine Comedy, Volume 1, Hell [The Inferno] • Dante Alighieri

... don't, dear," said Maggie. "I'll go to him myself to-morrow, and tell him that you wish Philip to come. I've thought before of asking him to absolve me from my promise, but I've not had the ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot

... alter his laws; but that they should own, confess, stand by, and acknowledge him for their rightful king, in defiance to any that do or hereafter shall, by any pretence, law, or title whatever, lay claim to the town of Mansoul; thinking, belike, that Shaddai had not power to absolve them from this covenant with death, and agreement with hell. Nor did the silly Mansoul stick or boggle at all at this most monstrous engagement; but, as if it had been a sprat in the mouth of a whale, they swallowed it without any chewing. Were ...
— The Holy War • John Bunyan

... according to its own will, they denied its right to involve other nations, absolutely and unconditionally, in the consequences of the changes which it may think proper to make. They maintained the right of a nation to absolve itself from the obligations even of real treaties, when such a change of circumstances takes place in the internal situation of the other contracting party, as so essentially to alter the existing state of things, that it may with good faith be pronounced to render a continuance of the connexion ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 5 (of 5) • John Marshall

... me to avow myself?" she asked. "May Heaven absolve me if I err herein! No, give me leisure to reflect: this were too sudden. These passion-hurried vows were too much like those vapors, that, igniting, rush like to unorbed stars across the night, then, vanished, leave it blacker. Do not tempt me. To act in haste is to ...
— The Advocate • Charles Heavysege

... thou didst save From Gallows, Fire, and from the Grave, For which we can't endure thee; The one can ne'er absolve thy Sins, And th'other (tho' he now begins) Of ...
— Quaint Gleanings from Ancient Poetry • Edmund Goldsmid

... note in my mother's voice and in her eyes a light of pride as she regarded me inquiringly. Whatever obligation lay on me to till the ancestral acres, there was a higher duty which would absolve it. This she had pointed out. My plans at once took a concrete form, and though my first faltering assent might have savored of hypocrisy, I was soon sincere in my determination. And now the opposition crumbled and my parents found pride in a son whose heart at the age of ten was stirred ...
— David Malcolm • Nelson Lloyd

... George? Your life isn't wrecked. The Court will absolve you of all blame; your friends will sympathise with you, and tell you that I was a designing woman who deliberately took ...
— Second Plays • A. A. Milne

... irrevocable.—Wherever she goes or whatever she does, she knows that the child is walking in her footsteps and reenacting her conduct. Her status is irrevocably fixed in the life of the child, nor can any philosophy or sophistry absolve her from the situation. She cannot abdicate her place in favor of another, nor can she win immunity from responsibility. She is the child's ideal for weal or woe, nor can men or angels change this big fact. Through all the hours ...
— The Vitalized School • Francis B. Pearson

... is contained in the word. Or you wish to explain 'absolution.' Many will know that it has something to do with the pardon of sins; but how much more accurately will they know this, when they know that 'to absolve' means 'to loosen from': God's 'absolution' of men being his releasing of them from the bands of those sins with which they were bound. Here every one will connect a distinct image with the word, such as will always come to his help when he would ...
— On the Study of Words • Richard C Trench

... Ay; and from whatsoever sin Lieth around it and within, From all crimes in which it may involve thee, I now release thee and absolve thee! ...
— The Golden Legend • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

... "you may not be a lay sister all your life; you have taken no vows that will bind you for ever, and I have no doubt that the lady superior can absolve you from your engagements should you at any time wish to go back to the world; if so, and if I am still in France, I will come to dance at your wedding, and will promise you as pretty a necklace and earrings as are to be ...
— Bonnie Prince Charlie - A Tale of Fontenoy and Culloden • G. A. Henty

... this peculiar mele is a difficult one. It involves a constant readjustment of the mental standpoint to meet the poet's vagrant fancy, which to us seems to occupy no consistent point of view. If this difficulty arises from the author's own lack of insight, he can at least absolve himself from the charge of negligence and lack of effort to discover the standpoint that shall give unity to the whole composition; and can console himself with the reflection that no native Hawaiian scholar with whom he has conferred has been ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson

... confident that O'Dowd's system of espionage would quickly absolve him of all interest in or connection with the plans of Albert Roon; it remained therefore for him to convince the Irishman that he had no notions or vagaries inimical to the well-being of Green Fancy or its occupants. With that result achieved, he need have no ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon

... but friendship and affection! And how much more melancholy must be the present emotions of your Majesty's heart and mind to see such words applied to a beloved brother-in-law, whom yet—however much you love him—your conscience cannot absolve from the crime of having brought upon the world wilfully and frivolously such ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume III (of 3), 1854-1861 • Queen of Great Britain Victoria

... to preach, as 1 Tim. iv. 14; 2 Tim. i. 6: and to be deacons, Acts vi. 6, and also in after missions, as Acts xiii. 1-3. 4. The community, without officers, may not exercise any act of jurisdiction authoritatively and properly; may not admonish, excommunicate, or absolve. For we have no precept that they should do it; we have no example in all the New Testament that they ever did do it; we have both precept and example, that select officers both did and ought to do it. "Whatsoever ye bind on earth" (saith Christ to his ...
— The Divine Right of Church Government • Sundry Ministers Of Christ Within The City Of London

... know of no other advice to offer. For that you should be silent and express no opinion at all, were a course hurtful for your prince or city, and which would not absolve you from danger, since you would soon grow to be suspected, when it might fare with you as with the friend of Perseus the Macedonian king. For Perseus being defeated by Paulus Emilius, and making his escape with a few companions, it happened that one ...
— Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius • Niccolo Machiavelli

... duty of all to adopt money-making as a conscious aim; that the money is to be economically used, the final object being net profit, that balance or remainder which is carried forward as created capital. Inability to increase a fixed income does not absolve one from the duty of doing one's part in the creation of capital through thrift and saving. The business enterprise, moreover, is required by economic necessity to aim at money-making—meaning, however, profits in the long ...
— Creating Capital - Money-making as an aim in business • Frederick L. Lipman

... or even of implied engagements to others, not to divulge points in which they are concerned. A strict observance of such engagements is surely the condition of all honourable intercourse in society, and a duty from which no degree of confidence, friendship, or affection towards a third person, can absolve one. With respect to this particular case of the Duke of L., I am sure your own reflections will not suffer you to impute blame to me, if after having required from those with whom he was acting an engagement of secrecy, which he had a right to demand from them, his own levity, ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham

... get rid of the New Humour, yet to stand at its unprophetic source. And we love such authors as Dickens and this American for their own sake, refusing to be aware of their corrupt following. We would make haste to ignore their posterity, and to assure them that we absolve them from any fault of theirs ...
— The Rhythm of Life • Alice Meynell

... that it was Anne Turner and Lady Essex who corrupted the lad Reeves, who with Weston administered the poisoned clyster that murdered Overbury. Nothing was done at all to absolve the apothecary Loubel, Reeves's master, of having prepared the poisonous injection, nor Sir Theodore Mayerne, the King's physician, of having been party to its preparation. Yet it was demonstrably the injection that killed Overbury if he was killed ...
— She Stands Accused • Victor MacClure

... Miss Kingsley would say concerning me, for I felt by no means sure that her remarks would be wholly complimentary. Freely as I blamed myself for my conceited notions at the time, regarding the attentions of the two philosophers, I was not ready to absolve her from the imputation of jealousy. It was difficult to explain her conduct on any other ground, and I remembered what Mrs. Marsh had said as to tender relations between her and Mr. Spence. Indeed, I felt some irritation against her and a conviction that ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant

... legal effect of the words which absolve the subject from his allegiance? Is it meant that a person arraigned for high treason may tender evidence to prove that the Sovereign has married a Papist? Would Whistlewood, for example, have been entitled ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... in a trap, having induced him to waive justice and to absolve the guilty by an arbitrary act. Then she turns upon him with an application to his own case, and bids him free himself from the guilt of double measures and inconsistency by doing with his banished son the same thing—viz. abrogating law and bringing back the offender. ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... my father," she sobbed. "For my rebellion the gods may absolve me, but I have been unfilial and for that there is no justification. If aught should befall thee in these awful days, how I should reproach myself! Sawest thou not the Hebrew's gaze upon thee? Say thou dost ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller

... the bishops in revolt, under the direction of Henry. On learning this, Gregory celebrated at Rome, in the year 1080, a regular council, in which he again excommunicated Henry, and especially the antipope, whom he would never absolve. ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 5 • Various

... grief and dishonour, oh crew of the Neversink!" sighed Jack. "Barber, come closer—now, tell me, my friend, have you obtained absolution for this deed you are about to commit? You have not? Then, barber, I will absolve you; your hands shall be washed of this sin; it is not you, but another; and though you are about to shear off my manhood, yet, barber, I freely forgive you; kneel, kneel, barber! that I may bless you, in token that I cherish ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville

... by threats and violence is binding on none; even human laws decree this. Divine laws, especially in a case of this nature, absolve the human conscience beyond a doubt. If you were orthodox, I would go to Rome—yes, I would go on foot—to get you absolved from so rash a vow; but you are not a submissive child of the Pope, ...
— Mauprat • George Sand

... was impious, and that thou oughtest to keep them in prison; and if thou thinkest any thing further necessary, thou mayst indeed so punish them, that thou mayst not appear to indulge thy anger more than to govern thyself by judgment; but if thou inclinest to the milder side, thou mayst absolve them, lest perhaps thy misfortunes be rendered incurable; and this is the opinion of the greatest part of thy friends at Rome also." Whereupon Herod was silent, and in great thoughtfulness, and bid Nicolaus sail ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus

... priest, the same as if you were in my place! My soul is in danger. I have spoken with Woden, but a short while ago. He said the ale was ready which we were to drink together to-night. For God's sake absolve me well of ...
— Poet Lore, Volume XXIV, Number IV, 1912 • Various

... "Well, I see that I must be dreadfully brief in what I have to say; and this is it. I have asked no reward for returning you your trinket, have I? But that does not absolve you from the courtesy of offering one; now, it seems to me that it is not at all amiss, in fact it is quite fitting, that I should dictate the terms of it. I am sure that this attitude of mine appeals, if not to your generosity, to your sense ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow

... to be blest and Sanctyfyed by the poluted words and hands of a wretched priest, a Spawn of the whore of Babylon, who is a Monster of Nature and a Servant to the Devill, Who for a Riall will pretend to absolve them from perjury, Incest and parricide, and Cannonize them for Cruelties Committed to we Herreticks, as they stile us, and Even Rank them in the Number of those Cursed Saints who by their Barbarity have Rendered their Names Immortall and Odious to all true Beleivers. tis by such Devills they ...
— Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period - Illustrative Documents • Various

... incidents may be noted. The chief object of the Patriarch was to induce him to say, that his faith was like that of the Romish Church. This he declined doing, as it would be a falsehood. The Patriarch offered to absolve him from the sin of falsehood, to which Asaad replied, "What the law of nature condemns, no man can make lawful." Accompanied by a priest, he visited his own college of Ain Warka, but gained no light; and the same was true of his ...
— History Of The Missions Of The American Board Of Commissioners For Foreign Missions To The Oriental Churches, Volume I. • Rufus Anderson

... future, and I need this devoted mother on the day of triumph! When shall I reach it? Take good care of our mother, Laure, for the present and the future.... Some day, when my works are unfolded, you will see that it must have taken many hours to think and write so many things; and then you will absolve me of everything that has displeased you, and you will excuse, not the selfishness of the man (the man has none), but ...
— The Galaxy, Volume 23, No. 2, February, 1877 • Various

... far as I am concerned in it, his sister's happiness, at his disposal. When I told her that I loved her, I did not speak, as you seem to think, from an impulse of the moment. I spoke because I loved her; and as I love her, I shall of course try to win her. Nothing can absolve me from my engagement to her but her ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope

... satisfied. You have now a right to know my history, and if you repent, I absolve you ...
— Crotchet Castle • Thomas Love Peacock

... him nothing except teaching, inspiration, comradeship, an occasion for the confession of his faith and some opportunity for service. His ministers are only such as he; they may exhort but they dare not absolve. He is greatly dependent, then, for his sense of the reality of religion upon his own spiritual states. If he is spiritually sensitive and not too much troubled by doubt, if he possesses a considerable capacity ...
— Modern Religious Cults and Movements • Gaius Glenn Atkins

... absolve me from the charge of ill completing my work; for any curiosity with which this narrative may leave the reader burdened ...
— The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer

... book, the priest forthwith went to Pizarro and reported the conduct of the Inca, saying, "It is useless to talk to this dog. At them at once; I absolve you." ...
— Wealth of the World's Waste Places and Oceania • Jewett Castello Gilson

... might be entreated to pronounce his absolution. The same Alexander was nearly suffocated in the Vatican by the French soldiers who crowded round to kiss his mantle, and who had made him tremble for his life a few days previously. Cellini on his knees implored Pope Clement to absolve him from the guilt of homicide and theft, yet spoke of him as 'transformed to a savage beast' by a sudden access of fury. At one time he trembled before the awful Majesty of Christ's Vicar, revealed in Paul III.; at another he reviled him as a man 'who neither believed in God nor in any other ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volume 1 (of 7) • John Addington Symonds

... Cabinet. A distinguished Member of the House of Commons said to a friend of mine, immediately after the accession of the present Government to office, 'You have a war Ministry, and you will have a war.' But I leave this question to point out the disgraceful feebleness of the Cabinet, if I am to absolve them from the guilt of having sought occasion for war. They promised the Turk armed assistance on conditions, or without conditions. They, in concert with France, Austria, and Prussia, took the original dispute out of the hands of Russia and Turkey, ...
— Speeches on Questions of Public Policy, Volume 1 • John Bright

... son, deep in ascetic devotions, accomplished in the study of the Vedas, and endued with the full force of my asceticism, is born of (the womb of) a she-snake that had drunk my vital fluid. He is able to absolve thee from all offences save those committed against Mahadeva. But he hath one particular habit, viz. he would grant to any Brahmana whatever might be begged of him. If thou canst put up with it, then thou take him.' Janamejaya thus addressed ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)

... correspondence with Hamilton just before the challenge that led to the duel, said,—"Political opposition can never absolve gentlemen from the necessity of a rigid adherence to the laws of honor and the rules of decorum. I neither claim such privilege, nor indulge it in others." This has been called affectation; but we have no doubt that Burr uttered the truth in the sentences quoted. He was exactly ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various

... now only to establish the guilt of Fantomas and publish the story of his crime, to absolve the King in the eyes of all ... and that will mean the ...
— A Royal Prisoner • Pierre Souvestre

... All that he owed to the Emperor was effaced from his mind; what he himself had done for the Emperor was imprinted in burning characters on his memory. To his insatiable thirst for power, the Emperor's ingratitude was welcome, as it seemed to tear in pieces the record of past favours, to absolve him from every obligation towards his former benefactor. In the disguise of a righteous retaliation, the projects dictated by his ambition now appeared to him just and pure. In proportion as the external circle of his operations was narrowed, the world of hope expanded before him, and his dreamy ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... was put to death by the emperor. The pagan account of the quarrel was that, when Constantine had killed his son, he applied to Sopator to be purified from his guilt; and when the platonist answered that he knew of no ceremony that could absolve a man from such a crime, the emperor applied to the Christians for baptism. This story may not be true, and the ecclesiastical historian remarks that Constantine had professed Christianity several years before the murder of his son; but then, as after his conversion he had got Sopator to consecrate ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 11 (of 12) • S. Rappoport

... single-handed against and overmastering three ruffians, and declining all other reward from those he had preserved than a written attestation of their gratitude. In all countries, valour ranks high in the list of virtues; in no country does it so absolve from vices as ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... that it amounted to the old proverb, "All's fair in love and war". And, putting aside a few moral prejudices, one can easily enough absolve him.—The fact is, I had long ago surmised that his motives in taking to such a career had more reference to this world than the next. You know, I had several long talks with him; I told you how he interested me. Now I can piece together ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing

... promised to cleave to you through health and sickness, poverty and wealth, and I must keep that vow till you absolve me from it. Forgive me, but I knew misfortune had befallen you, and, remembering all you had done for me, came, hoping I might comfort ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... thee was in my nonage; and, besides, I count the Prince under whose banner now I stand is able to absolve me; yea, and to pardon also what I did as to my compliance with thee; and besides, O thou destroying Apollyon! to speak truth, I like his service, his wages, his servants, his government, his company, and country, better than ...
— The Pilgrim's Progress - From this world to that which is to come. • John Bunyan

... There is no God like ours. Do you say that the oath, taken by your ancestors, binds you not to raise your arms against the khan? But we, your metropolitan bishop, and all the other bishops, representatives of Jesus Christ, absolve you from that oath, extorted by force; we all give you our benediction, and conjure you to march against Akhmet, who is but a brigand and an enemy ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott

... soul of Guido di Montefeltro, overhearing the great Mantuan speak in a Lombard dialect, asked him news of the state of things in Romagna; and then told him how he had lost his chance of paradise, by thinking Pope Boniface could at once absolve him from his sins, and use them for his purposes.[34] He was going to heaven, he said, by the help of St. Francis, who came on purpose to fetch him, when a black angel met them, and demanded his absolved, indeed, but unrepented victim. "To repent evil, and to will to do it, at ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Volume 1 • Leigh Hunt

... me. I am a wicked man. Father, I have made my confession. Will you give me a penance and absolve me?" ...
— The Broken Soldier and the Maid of France • Henry Van Dyke

... sufficient, would hurl the wrath of heaven's viceregent on my devoted head, go, leave me to the fate it brings; your oath of allegiance is dissolved. I have yet faithful followers, to make one bold stand against the tyrant, and die for Scotland; but if ye absolve me, if ye will yet give me your hearts and swords, oh, fear me not, my countrymen, ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar

... faith in Christ's meritorious death, and that alone is sufficient to secure my salvation. I look upon the sacrifice of the Mass as an act dishonouring Him. I believe that no human person has power to absolve me from sin; that all must enter the kingdom of heaven here who are to belong to it hereafter, and thus that masses for the dead are a deceit and fraud; that Christ hears our prayers more willingly than any human mediator or being who has once dwelt on earth; that His mother was honoured ...
— The Golden Grasshopper - A story of the days of Sir Thomas Gresham • W.H.G. Kingston

... father; who, when you read this, will have been for years among the dead, though the evil that he caused may still remain unexpiated. Oh! think that this is his voice crying out from the dust, beseeching you to absolve his memory. Save me from the horrible thought, now haunting me evermore, that the being who owes me life may one day heap ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)

... regard me as their guest during the two months which they intended to spend in pilgrimage to and round the Kang Rinpoche. They thought that their pilgrimage over such holy ground, while serving such a holy man as I now was to them, would absolve them completely ...
— Personality in Literature • Rolfe Arnold Scott-James

... raging round Quesnel's book, another incident occurred that tended to arouse all the old partisan feeling. A confessor submitted to the judgment of the Sorbonne the celebrated case of conscience. He asked whether a priest should absolve a penitent, who rejected the teaching set forth in the five propositions of Jansenius, but who maintained a respectful silence on the question whether or not they were to be found in the book /Augustinus/. In July 1701 forty doctors of the Sorbonne gave an affirmative reply ...
— History of the Catholic Church from the Renaissance to the French • Rev. James MacCaffrey

... design of their monarch; expressed their resolution to conquer or die, since death and conquest would be equally profitable; and solemnly protested that they would never shave their beards till victory should absolve them from that inconvenient vow. The enterprise was promoted by the public or private exhortations of Clotilda. She reminded her husband how effectually some pious foundation would propitiate the Deity, and his servants: and ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon

... own life will be endangered; but my danger will be proportioned to the duration of my stay in this seat of infection. The death or the flight of Wallace may absolve me from the necessity of spending one night in the city. The rustics who daily frequent the market are, as experience proves, exempt from this disease; in consequence, perhaps, of limiting their continuance in the city to a few hours. May I not, in this respect, conform to ...
— Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 • Charles Brockden Brown

... promise, Caesar might have found that he had laid himself under very embarrassing obligations; but, as the case stood, he had, through all his following campaigns, the total benefit of such a promise, and yet could always absolve himself from the penalties of responsibility which it imposed, by appealing to the evidence of those who happened to stand in the first ranks of his audience. The blunder was gross and palpable; and yet, with the unreflecting ...
— The Caesars • Thomas de Quincey

... XIV., with whose sins avenging gods are out of all proportion. Love for him is an intellectual exercise and a pastime. 'Constancy,' he says, 'is only good for fools. We owe ourselves to pretty women in general, and the mere fact of having met one does not absolve us from our duty to others. The birth of passion has an inexplicable charm, and the pleasure of love is in variety.' And Zorilla, whose version is the most poetic of them all, has succeeded in giving only a ridiculous ...
— The Land of The Blessed Virgin; Sketches and Impressions in Andalusia • William Somerset Maugham

... sin, only, is offense in the eyes of the gods. But sin and error are one in the unpardoning eye of nature. Thus, if thou dost err, though in all innocence, though the gods absolve thee, thou wilt reap the bitter harvest of thy misguided sowing, one day—thou or thy children after thee. The doom is spoken, and however tardy, must fall—and the offense is never expiated. There is ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller

... people of a single State to absolve themselves at will and without the consent of the other States from their most solemn obligations, and hazard the liberties and happiness of the millions composing this Union, can not be acknowledged. Such authority is believed to be utterly repugnant ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 4 (of 4) of Volume 5: James Buchanan • James D. Richardson

... your sake, my charming Frau v. Genzinger. Oh! how I do wish that I could only play over these sonatas once or twice to you; how gladly would I then reconcile myself to remain for a time in my wilderness! I have much to say and to confess to you, from which no one but yourself can absolve me; but what cannot be effected now will, I devoutly hope, come to pass next winter, and half of the time is already gone. Meanwhile I take refuge in patience, and am content with the inestimable privilege of subscribing myself your sincere and obedient ...
— Haydn • J. Cuthbert Hadden

... overlook a great deal. When I get out of the country, I'm going to make a fresh start. Ormsby has set spies around the house like flies, and, as you've thrown him over now, he'll be doubly venomous. I only wanted to set myself right in your eyes, and absolve you from all pledges." ...
— The Scarlet Feather • Houghton Townley

... order, and were permitted to exercise every {95} priestly function, parochial rights notwithstanding, among all classes of men, even during an interdict; but, also (what is not even permitted to archbishops unconditionally), they could absolve from all sins and ecclesiastical penalties, change the objects of the vows of the laity, acquire churches and estates without further papal sanction, erect houses for the order, and might, according ...
— Mysticism and its Results - Being an Inquiry into the Uses and Abuses of Secrecy • John Delafield

... friends, have ever thought of paying their debt of gratitude to the memory of Frank Abney Hastings. While stars and ribands have been lavishly conferred on those whose power was supposed to influence the arrival of expected millions, the heirs of Hastings were forgotten. We are bound, however, to absolve a considerable portion of the nation from the charge of ingratitude and avarice, which we only thereby concentrate against the government, and the leading statesmen ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 360, October 1845 • Various

... it; but that does not absolve me from doing something. But, to change the subject, I do not quite like to have you accused of robbing ...
— Down The River - Buck Bradford and His Tyrants • Oliver Optic

... Sir, I must venture that. But your Company I'll expect, the Ladies may clap on their Vizards, and make a masquerading Night on't: tho such Freedoms are not very usual in Spain, we that have seen the World, may absolve one another. ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. I (of 6) • Aphra Behn

... to summon Mary to his aid would not improve his case. It was desirable to compromise with Tabitha. The only way that he could see to do it was to deny his action. If he did commit a sin in speaking falsely, he said to himself, it was Tabitha's fault for forcing him to it, and Father Bastian would absolve ...
— All's Well - Alice's Victory • Emily Sarah Holt

... with some declamation I do not remember. I know that it was sincere, and that my wish and aim were to absolve her to herself. In fact, in her case ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte

... have been more wise than to reckon upon a faith which no ink and no parchment can render valid, if the Church absolve the compact. Thou understandest ...
— Leila or, The Siege of Granada, Book II. • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... to become engaged before the year was out. Tell her that I absolve her from that ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant

... being so soon summoned away, is that of leaving matters unsettled with Messrs. De Lara and Calderon. Not that they have any longer either design or desire to stand before such cut-throats in a duel, nor any shame in shunning it. Their last encounter with the scoundrels would absolve them from all stigma or reproach for refusing to fight them—even were there time and opportunity. So, they need have no fear that their honour will suffer, or that any one will apply to them the opprobrious epithet—lache. Indeed, they have not, and their only ...
— The Flag of Distress - A Story of the South Sea • Mayne Reid

... previous experience could be explained only by a desire to force this country to use a silver coinage only, and had its origin with the owners of silver-mines, aided by the desires of debtors for a cheap unit in which to absolve themselves from their indebtedness. There was no pretense of setting up a double standard about it; for it was evident to the most ignorant that so great a disproportion between the mint and market ratios must inevitably lead to the disappearance of gold entirely. This ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • John Stuart Mill

... let me tell you about it, and then I am sure you will absolve me from all willful neglect," Ray said, as he led her to a tete-a-tete and seated himself beside her. "But first tell me," he added, "how I happen to find you here. Are you ...
— Mona • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

... strangest suspicions. The street outside looked comparatively deserted, and prompted, primarily, by an emotion which I did not pause to analyze, I adopted a singular measure; without doubt I relied upon the unusual powers vested in Nayland Smith to absolve me in the event of error. I made as if to go out into the street, then turned, leaped past the shopman, ran behind the counter, and ...
— The Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer

... know the Pope Will ne'er absolve me from my priestly vow But by absolving me from the revenue 65 Of many a wealthy see; and, Beatrice, I think to win thee at an easier rate. Nor shall he read her eloquent petition: He might bestow her on some poor relation Of his sixth cousin, as he did her sister, 70 And I should ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley

... Edith, his brother's freedom, were at stake. Casuistry, or even law, would have absolved him easily; an oath taken under duresse is of no avail. But Harold's "honour rooted in dishonour stood," and he cannot so readily absolve himself. Bruce and the bishops who stood by Bruce had no such scruples: they perjured themselves often, on the most sacred relics, especially the bishops. But Harold rises above the mediaeval and magical conception of the oath, and goes to his doom conscious of a stain on his ...
— Alfred Tennyson • Andrew Lang

... liberty; render free, emancipate, release; enfranchise, affranchise[obs3]; manumit; enlarge; disband, discharge, disenthrall, disenthral, dismiss; let go, let loose, loose, let out, let slip; cast adrift, turn adrift; deliver &c. 672; absolve &c. (acquit) 970. unfetter &c. 751, untie &c. 43; loose &c. (disjoin) 44; loosen, relax,; unbolt, unbar, unclose, uncork, unclog, unhand, unbind, unchain, unharness, unleash; disengage, disentangle; clear, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... thought I. No power save that of the Pope could absolve the boy from his oath, and I knew that the power of ten score of popes could not move him from its complete fulfilment. The oath of Maximilian of Hapsburg, whose heart had never coined a lie, was as everlasting as the rocks of his native land ...
— Yolanda: Maid of Burgundy • Charles Major

... taking with them Ranulf de Broc and a band of men, and murdered the Archbishop in Canterbury Cathedral. In the altercation which took place before the consummation of the terrible deed, the Primate was asked to absolve the bishops whom he had excommunicated, but he refused in a defiant and insulting manner. "Then die," exclaimed FitzUrse, striking at Becket's head with his weapon; but the devoted cross-bearer warded off the blow with his own arm, which was badly cut, so that the Archbishop ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson

... thus you pay the clerk his hire, Oft may you forfeit, I desire. You are a perfect penitent, And well you do your wrong repent: For this your highness' liberal gift I here absolve you ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VIII (4th edition) • Various

... proctors from the benefit of the Charity, was that a proctor had been employed to make his will, whereby he had given all the estates to himself; but I am inclined to believe that the word proctor is derived from procurator, who was an itinerant priest, and had dispensations from the Pope to absolve the subjects of this realm from the oath of allegiance to Queen Elizabeth, in whose reign there were many ...
— A Week's Tramp in Dickens-Land • William R. Hughes

... again, my exasperating insight into Alfred's self-complacent soul, his freedom from all the doubts and fears, the unsatisfied yearnings, the exquisite tortures of sensitiveness, that had made the web of my life, seemed to absolve me from all bonds towards him. This man needed no pity, no love; those fine influences would have been as little felt by him as the delicate white mist is felt by the rock it caresses. There was no evil in store for ...
— The Lifted Veil • George Eliot

... they enjoin we must obey. Do not the cities which gave us birth yield them obedience also? For my own part, inasmuch as Dexippus, I believe, keeps telling Cleander that Agasias would never have done this had not I, Xenophon, bidden him, I absolve you of all complicity, and Agasias too, if Agasias himself states that I am in any way a prime mover in this matter. If I have set the fashion of stone-throwing or any other sort of violence I condemn myself—I say that I deserve the extreme penalty, ...
— Anabasis • Xenophon

... Gordon presented his compliments and begged to reply that he had large business interests in this part of the country that necessitated a visit of some length, and probably in the end a permanent residence here; and that he would very fully absolve Miss Valdes of any responsibility for ...
— A Daughter of the Dons - A Story of New Mexico Today • William MacLeod Raine

... man's nature without calling on him to trust me with all the secrets—all the errors, if you will—of his past life? Will not the calling to which I may now hold myself destined give me power and commandment to absolve all those who truly repent and unfeignedly believe? Oh, Mr. Waife! if in earlier days you have sinned, do you not repent? and how often, in many a lovely gentle sentence dropped unawares from your lips, have I had cause to know that you ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... and stops it. Christ does not die a second time indeed for the pardon of sinners, but he is a powerful Advocate interceding still to his Father for sinners. Can he forsake those he redeemed at so dear a rate? Can the devil enslave, and Christ not absolve his servants? He alleges St. Peter denying Christ after he had been baptized, St. {559} Thomas incredulous, even after the resurrection; yet pardoned by repentance. He answers his objections from scripture, ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... all, Honor, go on—I have been a brute I see—but it was not I, it was the demon of jealousy within me, will you not say that you absolve me Honor, for believe me I knew not what ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera

... on the public list, on a Saturday evening. After the Audiencia saw what difficulties would follow on the excommunication of your royal officials, and after it had examined the proceedings in the report made to the judge, it passed an ordinance, asking and requiring the bishop to absolve and reinstate the officials until the documents could be examined in the council-room. To this he gave a certain reply, and after considering this, with the documents, another decree was made, in which it was declared to the bishop that ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, V7, 1588-1591 • Emma Helen Blair

... that Congress did not exceed its powers in making this definition of "intoxicating liquor"; and, while this does not absolve the makers of the law of the offense against strict truthfulness, it may rightly be regarded as evidence that the transgression was not of the sort that constituted a substantial usurpation—the assumption ...
— What Prohibition Has Done to America • Fabian Franklin

... not a gardener refer one back to February as the real culprit. The tree blossomed too early; the late frosts killed it; in the annoyance of the moment one may reproach the gardener for allowing it to blossom so prematurely, but one cannot absolve February of all blame. ...
— Not that it Matters • A. A. Milne

... the truth of her story. Really, seeing them thus face to face, he cold and calm, stretched out in his armchair, with his hands in the pockets of his gray swansdown waistcoat, she carefully choosing her words, as if each of them might condemn or absolve her, you would never have said that it was a child before her grandfather, but an accused ...
— Fromont and Risler, Complete • Alphonse Daudet

... pertinent. Did you not ask me to sit in judgment upon this matter? And unless you confess to me, how am I to absolve you?" ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini

... has in his possession the keys of heaven. I was very curious to see these keys, but all my endeavors were in vain. His power, not only over his own subjects, but the whole human race, consists principally in that he can absolve those whom God condemns, and condemn those whom God absolves; an immense authority, which the inhabitants of our subterranean world seriously believe is not becoming to any mortal man. But it is an ...
— Niels Klim's journey under the ground • Baron Ludvig Holberg

... permitted to divulge the facts. That the true tale of my unhappy friend will touch different chords in different breasts, I am well aware. The sportsman, I think, will hesitate to approve him; the fair, I hope, will absolve. Who are we, to scrutinise human motives, and to award our blame to actions which, perhaps, might have been our own, had opportunity beset and temptation beguiled us? There is a certain point at which the keenest sense of honour, the most chivalrous affection ...
— Angling Sketches • Andrew Lang

... expiration, as far as the Mantineans were concerned, of the thirty years' truce, consequent upon the battle of Mantinea. On their refusal, therefore, to raze their fortification walls the ban was called out against them. Agesilaus begged the state to absolve him from the conduct of this war on the plea that the city of Mantinea had done frequent service to his father (6) in his Messenian wars. Accordingly Agesipolis led the expedition—in spite of the cordial relations ...
— Hellenica • Xenophon

... declaration is based. Whether the retirement of the State from the Union be the exercise of a right reserved in the Constitution, or a revolutionary movement, it is certain that you have not in either case the authority to recognize her independence or to absolve her from her Federal obligations. Congress, or the other States in Convention assembled, must take such measures as may be necessary and proper. In such an event, I see no course for you but to go straight onward in the path you have hitherto trodden— ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine

... the States under the Constitution is indissoluble; and no State can secede from the Union, or nullify an act of Congress, or absolve its citizens from their paramount obligations of obedience to the Constitution and laws of ...
— A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention • Lucius Eugene Chittenden









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