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More "Subtile" Quotes from Famous Books



... they had true election. Well canst thou perceive it by their looks, and also by their childish voices, if thou lookest well upon them and if thou listenest to them. Now thou art perplexed, and in perplexity art silent; but I will loose for thee the strong bond in which thy subtile thoughts fetter thee.[6] Within the amplitude of this realm a casual point can have no place,[7] any more than sadness, or thirst, or hunger; for whatever thou seest is established by eternal law, so that here the ring answers exactly to ...
— The Divine Comedy, Volume 3, Paradise [Paradiso] • Dante Alighieri

... witty; the mathematics, subtile; natural philosophy, deep; morals, grave; logic and rhetoric, ...
— The Guide to Reading - The Pocket University Volume XXIII • Edited by Dr. Lyman Abbott, Asa Don Dickenson, and Others

... which the boys going home southwards could look in from time to time on the Free Kirkers, and he indicated his willingness to take charge of the operation. It was also said that an Episcopal or Papist school—we made no subtile direct distinctions at the Seminary—in the northern district might afford some sport, and the leadership in this case was to be left to Duncan Robertson, the other captain of the commonwealth. Snow did not last the whole year round even in a Scots ...
— Young Barbarians • Ian Maclaren

... the work is an autobiography. The thoughts with which it teems are delicate and subtile; the style, somewhat labored and over-refined, is in contrast with that of the Poesies, while it betrays the same struggle for a greater amplitude and independence. In point of art the book appears to us a failure. The theme is not objectionable in itself. It is similar to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various

... natural philosophy, and will hearken to no arguments but those which are derived from experience. It is full time they should attempt a like reformation in all moral disquisitions; and reject every system of ethics, however subtile or ingenious, which is not founded on fact and observation."—(IV. ...
— Hume - (English Men of Letters Series) • T.H. Huxley

... Venus' love; And for her sake she ever since that time Choosed doves to draw her coach through heaven's blue clime. Her plenteous hair in curled billows swims On her bright shoulder: her harmonious limbs Sustained no more but a most subtile veil, That hung on them, as it durst not assail Their different concord; for the weakest air Could raise it swelling from her beauties fair; 30 Nor did it cover, but adumbrate only Her most heart-piercing ...
— The Works of Christopher Marlowe, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Christopher Marlowe

... which on its original promulgation was declared to be peculiarly intended for the simple and poor. It will be abundantly evident however on a little reflection, and experience fully proves the position, that what has been required is not the perception of a subtile distinction, but a state and condition of heart. To the former, the poor and the ignorant must be indeed confessed unequal; but they are far less indisposed than the great and the learned, to bow down ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce

... and fine. Indigente, good clear witts, subtile, and the most litigious of England: they carry Littleton's Tenures at the plough taile. Sir Thorn. Browne, M. D., of Norwich, told me that their eies in that countrey doe quickly decay; which he imputes to the clearness and driness (subtileness) of the aire. Wormwood growes the most plentifully ...
— The Natural History of Wiltshire • John Aubrey

... a mock severity of tone, that left a mixed impression as to the beneficence of the nurture and the abiding quality of the admonition. Here he spent his school days, not in acquiring a broad or deep basis for future scholarship, but in studying the ways and whims of womankind, in practising the subtile arts whereby the boy of from six to fifteen attains a tyrannous mastery over the hearts of a feminine household, and in securing the leadership among the daring spirits of his own age and sex, for whom he was early able to furnish a continuous ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson

... yet every time, for a space of one year and seven months, when first unfolded, I distinctly perceived the odour. This appears an astonishing instance of the permanence of some matter, which nevertheless in its nature must be most subtile and volatile. Frequently, when passing at the distance of half a mile to leeward of a herd, I have perceived the whole air tainted with the effluvium. I believe the smell from the buck is most powerful at the period when ...
— A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World - The Voyage Of The Beagle • Charles Darwin

... Nature of these Vapours, and the Circumstance attending their Passage, they appear to us differently below. For if they be extremely subtile they mount very high, and there, according to the Sentiment of Sir Isaac Newton, form by Refraction the Azure, or blue Colour, that over-spreads the Sky in serene Weather. Clouds, while they remain visible, do not rise above the Height of a Mile; ...
— The Shepherd of Banbury's Rules to Judge of the Changes of the Weather, Grounded on Forty Years' Experience • John Claridge

... of indighting, is in a subtile, pressed, and fyled oracion, meete for causes that be a lytel sharper then are in the comon vse of speakynge. For it is a kynde of oracion that is lette downe euen to the mooste vsed custume of pure and clere speakyng. It hathe fyne sentences, subtile, ...
— A Treatise of Schemes and Tropes • Richard Sherry

... how he did, and what made him mourn so heavily in his sleep, he answered, "In my life-time, I have been often assaulted by Satan, and many times he hath cast my sins in my teeth, to bring me to despair; yet God gave me strength to overcome his temptations: and now that subtile serpent, who never ceaseth to tempt, hath taken another course, and seeks to persuade me, that all my labours in the ministry, and the fidelity I have showed in that service have merited heaven and immortality. But blessed be God, ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie

... soul a spirit infinite! An image of the Deity! A pure substantial light! That being greatest which doth nothing seem! . . . . . O wondrous Self! O sphere of light, O sphere of joy most fair; O act, O power infinite; O subtile and unbounded air! O living orb of sight! Thou which within me art, yet me! Thou eye And temple ...
— Mountain Meditations - and some subjects of the day and the war • L. Lind-af-Hageby

... to the advantage of health, put to every quart of ale, or other liquor, 10 or 12 drops of the true spirit of salt, and let them be well mixed together, which they will soon do it by the subtile spirits penetrating into all parts, and have ...
— The Practical Distiller • Samuel McHarry

... their hinder paws, and fawned upon Eurylochus and his men, who dreaded the effects of such monstrous kindness; and staying at the gate they heard the enchantress within, sitting at her loom, singing such strains as suspended all mortal faculties, while she wove a web, subtile and glorious, and of texture inimitable on earth, as all the housewiferies of the deities are. Strains so ravishingly sweet provoked even the sagest and prudentest heads among the party to knock and call at the gate. The shining gate the enchantress ...
— THE ADVENTURES OF ULYSSES • CHARLES LAMB

... thirst of riches, and the consciousness of success, redouble their valor, and valor is of more avail than arms or numbers. Be patient till they have loaded themselves with the encumbrance of wealth. The possession of wealth will divide their councils and assure your victory." This subtile policy is perhaps a refinement of the Arabian writers; and the situation of Charles will suggest a more narrow and selfish motive of procrastination—the secret desire of humbling the pride and wasting the provinces of the rebel duke of Aquitain. It is yet more probable, that the delays ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon

... were married, I would find that Wisdom, With a light rein to rule my Wife: if ever Woman Of the most subtile mould went beyond me, I would give the Boys leave to whoot me out ...
— Rule a Wife, and Have a Wife - Beaumont & Fletcher's Works (3 of 10) • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher

... and matter were the two separate entities. Now, the problem that arose at once was this: How can the souls of witches leave their bodies? "I conceive," he says, "the Divell gets into their body and by his subtile substance more operative and searching than any fire or putrifying liquor, melts the yielding Campages of the body to such a consistency ... and makes it plyable to his imagination: and then it is as ...
— A History of Witchcraft in England from 1558 to 1718 • Wallace Notestein

... southern sun.[210] On the other hand, intensity of heat is aggravated by the neighborhood of arid and sandy deserts, or rocky tracts. The action of long-continued heat creates a more permanent effect than the mere darkening of the outer skin: it alters the character of those subtile juices that display their color through the almost transparent covering.[211] We see that, from a constitutional peculiarity in individuals, the painful variety of the albino is sometimes produced in the hottest ...
— The Conquest of Canada (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Warburton

... return to the impression produced by the grand facade, we are more and more struck with the subtile art displayed in its adaptations and symbolisms. Never did any structure we have looked upon so fully justify Madame de Stael's definition of architecture, as "frozen music." The outermost towers, their pillars and domes, are all square, their outlines thus passing without too ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 12, No. 73, November, 1863 • Various

... with the doctrine of atoms: but I find it difficult to understand a vacuum, and I much prefer subtile matter. ...
— The Learned Women • Moliere (Poquelin)

... the two inferior attributes of Rajas and Tamas.[1907] Without doubt, the deities and the Rishis are wedded to the attributes of Sattwa, O best of kings. But then they that are divested of that attribute in its subtile form are always regarded to ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown

... exhausted. Heavily sighed her pipes. Broad over the swamps to the eastward Shone the full moon, and turned our far-trembling wake into silver. All was serene and calm, but the odorous breath of the willows Smote like the subtile breath of an infinite sorrow ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, Issue 35, September, 1860 • Various

... and Mr Barr sat on either side of Miss Kingsley, and I glanced from the one to the other, debating with myself whether I preferred the bold strong beauty of the artist, or the subtile and more delicate traits of feature of the philosopher. For though I had begun by regarding Mr. Spence almost as commonplace in appearance, the earnestness of his manner and the serious fervor of ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant

... indoors. If a sedate or fastidious caller is announced, a beautiful tea-gown, which is at hand, is slipped into, and the young lady is appropriately clad to suit even conventional requirements. The bicycle and lawn tennis costumes now becoming so popular also exercise a subtile but marked influence in favor of rational dress reform, not only giving young ladies the wonderful comfort and health-giving freedom which for ages have been denied her sex, but also by accustoming them to these ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 22, September, 1891 • Various

... less? Rumor's hundred tongues wag with the announcement, that his Excellency is no longer inconsolable for his wife's death; and desires to testify to the happiness of conjugal relations, by a renewal of the sweet bondage; a curiously subtile compliment to the deceased. If I may be pardoned the enormity of the heresy, I think Shakspeare blundered supremely, when he gave Iago's soul to a man. Diabolical cunning, shrewd malevolence pure and simple, armed with myriads of stings for hypodermic ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson

... figment. And if the arteries in their systole expel fuliginous vapours from their cavities through the pores of the flesh and skin, why not the spirits, which are said to be contained in those vessels, at the same time, since spirits are much more subtile than fuliginous vapours or smoke? And if the arteries take in and cast out air in the systole and diastole, like the lungs in the process of respiration, why do they not do the same thing when a wound is made in one of them, as in the operation of arteriotomy? When the windpipe ...
— The Harvard Classics Volume 38 - Scientific Papers (Physiology, Medicine, Surgery, Geology) • Various

... places of business and night after night he returned to his cheerless room with a faint heart and declining spirits. It was, after all, a more serious thing than he had imagined, to cut the cable which binds one to the land of one's birth. There a hundred subtile influences, the existence of which no one suspects until the moment they are withdrawn, unite to keep one in the straight path of rectitude, or at least of external respectability; and Ralph's life had been all in society; the opinion of his fellow-men had been the one force to which he implicitly ...
— Tales From Two Hemispheres • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen

... (spirits) in the deep woods. To him, the mere flutter of a leaf had a meaning; the sighing of the wind was intelligible language. So many generations of Indians had crossed that trail, and so few white people, I felt as if some subtile aroma of Indian spirit must linger still about the place, and steal into our thoughts. Occasionally an owl stirred in the thicket beside us, or we caught a glimpse of the mottled beauty of a snake gliding across our path. The great boom and crash of the falling ...
— Life at Puget Sound: With Sketches of Travel in Washington Territory, British Columbia, Oregon and California • Caroline C. Leighton

... Trelawny in some painful or preoccupied moment, or offended the robust man of the world by the mere delicate shyness of his look; he might also have puzzled and bewildered Mr. Hogg, being, perhaps, puzzled and bewildered himself, by some subtile mental speculation,—unconscious that for these things he was yet to be brought to judgment and turned into ridicule, for the coming generation, by these familiar men,—these drilled and pipe-clayed familiar men. He might have tossed up a paradox ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 6, No. 33, July, 1860 • Various

... satirical, the bucolic, the romantic, the reflective, the epic. The latter has to do with those towering creatures of action—Othello, Coriolanus, Virginius, Macbeth—somewhat deficient, whether good or evil, in the casuistry of more subtile dispositions, but giants in emotion, and kingly in repose. They are essentially masculine, and we connect their ideals with the stately figure, the deep chest-utterance, the slow, enduring majesty of mien. The genius of Mr. Booth has that feminine ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 103, May, 1866 • Various

... perceiued themselues deceiued of their expectation, for all their crafty allurements. [Sidenote: Their third and craftiest allurement.] Yet once againe to make (as it were) a full shew of their craftie natures, and subtile sleights, to the intent thereby to haue intrapped and taken some of our men, one of them counterfeited himselfe impotent and lame of his legs, who seemed to descend to the water side, with great difficulty: and to couer his craft the ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of The English Nation, Vol. XII., America, Part I. • Richard Hakluyt

... degrees of crime. And finally, when the German legislator concluded to make no distinction between incompleted and attempted crime and to recognize only the completed crime in his code of 1871, we witnessed the spectacle of Carrara praising that legislator for leaving that subtile distinction out of his code. A strange conclusion on the part of a science, which cudgels its brains for a century to find the marks of distinction between attempted and incompleted crime, and then praises the legislator for ignoring it. And another classic jurist, Buccellati, ...
— The Positive School of Criminology - Three Lectures Given at the University of Naples, Italy on April 22, 23 and 24, 1901 • Enrico Ferri

... no respect reciprocal, as where habit in the individual and custom in society oppose themselves bitterly to free will and advancing thought: yet even here the special warfare is but the material of a broader and more subtile alliance. An obstinate fixity in one's bosom often serves as a rock on which to break the shell of some hard inclosed faculty. Upon stepping-stones of our slain selves we mount to new altitudes. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 43, May, 1861 • Various

... of which the sense is too subtile and evanescent to be fixed in a paraphrase; such are all those which are by the grammarians termed expletives, and, in dead languages, are suffered to pass for empty sounds, of no other use than to fill a verse, or to modulate a period, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume V: Miscellaneous Pieces • Samuel Johnson

... in prudery, a certain pedantry which is pleasing to women. The coquette and the pedant are neighbours. Their kinship is visible in the fop. The subtile is derived from the sensual. Gluttony affects delicacy, a grimace of disgust conceals cupidity. And then woman feels her weak point guarded by all that casuistry of gallantry which takes the place of scruples in prudes. It is a line of circumvallation with ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo

... soul Which Music's wings infold, Stealing away the memory Of sorrows new and old! Yet happier he whose inward sight, Stayed on his subtile thought, Shuts his sense on toys of time, To vacant bosoms brought. But best befriended of the God He who, in evil times, Warned by an inward voice, Heeds not the darkness and the dread, Biding by his rule and choice, ...
— Poems - Household Edition • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... By imitating the awful secrecy which reigned in the Eleusinian mysteries, the Christians had flattered themselves that they should render their sacred institutions more respectable in the eyes of the Pagan world. But the event, as it often happens to the operations of subtile policy, deceived their wishes and their expectations. It was concluded, that they only concealed what they would have blushed to disclose. Their mistaken prudence afforded an opportunity for malice to invent, and for suspicious ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon

... our readers—a fast increasing number—as have read and enjoyed The Patience of Hope, listening to the gifted nature which, through such deep and subtile thought, and through affection and godliness still deeper and more quick, has charmed and soothed them, will not be surprised to learn that she is not only poetical, but, what is more, a poet, and one as true as George Herbert and Henry Vaughan, ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier

... all were in, during our stay at this celebrated city. If, however, it still has a reputation for the cure of a particular disorder, perhaps that may arise from the impurity of the air,—and that the air which is so prone to engender verdigris, may wage war with other subtile poisons; yet, as I found some of my countrymen there, who had taken a longer trial of the air, and more of the physic, than I had occasion for, who neither admired one, nor found benefit from the other, I will not recommend Montpellier as having ...
— A Year's Journey through France and Part of Spain, 1777 - Volume 1 (of 2) • Philip Thicknesse

... in his dissertation "that the sun, moon, and fixed stars mutually affect each other in their orbits; that they cause and direct in our earth a flux and reflux not only in the sea, but in the atmosphere, and affect in a similar manner all organised bodies through the medium of a subtile and mobile fluid, which pervades the universe, and associates all things together in mutual intercourse and harmony." This influence, he said, was particularly exercised on the nervous system, and ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay

... exquisite descriptions with which his writings are filled, and while, with picture-words, he could reproduce all the tender beauty of a sunset in the Alps, or the soft, singing gurgle of the mountain-brook, no one better than he could also portray every subtile shade and feature of the human mind. He excelled in analyzing character. His mental perception was sympathetic and ready. His mind-eye was so keen and so piercing, that nothing could escape its searching glance. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various

... you seen the beast, you would have said The light and subtile wind his father was; For if his course upon the sands he made No sign was left what way the beast did pass; Or if he menaged were, or if he played, He scantly bended down the tender grass: Thus mounted rode the Earl, and as he went, Thus prayed, to ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso

... Gothic architecture, and Saracenic tracery, Etruscan gold-work stands absolutely alone,—the result of an artistic instinct deeper than any rules or any instruction, and therefore not to be improved or repeated. It is characterized by the most subtile and lovely use of decorative masses and lines,—not for representation or imitation, which are not motives to enter into pure ornament, but for the highest effect of beautiful form and rich color, without ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 108, October, 1866 • Various

... and honored, we repeat, we would fain bow in reverence. But it may not be; we cannot receive him as a true poet—as in any poetic quality the peer of his matchless wife. We hear much of his subtile psychology—we deem it psychological unintelligibility. His rhythm is rough and unmusical, his style harsh and inverted, his imagery cold, his invective bitter, and his verbiage immense. His illustrations are sometimes coarse, his comparisons diminish ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 5, May, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... now where he comes! Not the Christ of our subtile creeds, But the light of our hearts, of our homes, Of our hopes, our prayers, our needs, The brother of want and blame, The lover of ...
— Personal Friendships of Jesus • J. R. Miller

... only one chair in the room. Kora perceived for the first time that it had been given to her while the Marquise stood. She arose to her feet, and with a deference that lent a subtile grace to her expression, offered ...
— The Bondwoman • Marah Ellis Ryan

... little unhospitable, and others may call it a subtile piece of malice, that, because there may be a dozen families in this Town, able to entertain their English friends in a generous manner at their tables, their guests upon their return to England, shall report that we wallow in ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift

... building. There must be no fluid oozing through the walls or the floor of the kennel, and producing damp and unhealthy vapours. When we have not a deep supersoil of clay, one or two layers of bricks or of stone may line the floor, and then, not even the most subtile vapour can penetrate through the floor. A clean bed of straw should be allowed every second day, or oftener when the weather is wet. The lodging-houses should be ceiled, and there should be shutters to the windows. A thatched roof is preferable to tiles, being ...
— The Dog - A nineteenth-century dog-lovers' manual, - a combination of the essential and the esoteric. • William Youatt

... statement of the connection between mind and body, studying their subtile interworkings by the light of the most recent physiological investigations. The summary in Chapter V., of the investigations of Dr. Lionel Beale of the embodiment of the intellectual functions in the ...
— Fungi: Their Nature and Uses • Mordecai Cubitt Cooke

... indeed, to moralize about matters of inferior station and mesalliance; but I believe that few could have seen little Jessie, as she first appeared to me, and not have felt some secret inclination to give way before those subtile charms of beauty and manner which invested her. Moreover, let it here be mentioned that she was not at all of humble birth or education. Old Barkstead was himself a gentleman by culture and station, and had once been the master of a gallant ship. In ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 9 • Various

... smitten him for which he did do make a salve of volatile salt and chrism as much as he might suffice. And he said now that he should go in to that castle for to make merry with them that were there. And the traveller Leopold said that he should go otherwhither for he was a man of cautels and a subtile. Also the lady was of his avis and repreved the learningknight though she trowed well that the traveller had said thing that was false for his subtility. But the learningknight would not hear say nay nor do her mandement ne have him in aught contrarious to his list and he said how it was a marvellous ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce

... wherever fun is possible, fairly bubbles over with laughter. From the oldest masters down to Hokusai, it is constantly welling up in the drollest conceits. It is of all descriptions, too. Now it lurks in merry ambush, like the faint suggestion of a smile on an otherwise serious face, so subtile that the observer is left wondering whether the artist could have meant what seems more like one's own ingenious discovery; now it breaks out into the broadest of grins, absurd juxtapositions of singularly happy incongruities. For ...
— The Soul of the Far East • Percival Lowell

... being destitute of boat, barke, and all company, had scarsely sufficient number to conduct back his barke againe. He could not now convey himselfe ashore to rescue his men—if he had been able—for want of a boat; and againe the subtile traitours were so wary, as they would after that never come ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various

... sonnets are gems, unsurpassed in any language, and the one called "Pride" seems to me in its grand simplicity to be without a rival. If there is any American poem which sings itself like "All's well," it is Longfellow's ballad of "Mary Garvin." "The Plover" has a pensive grace which is as rare as its subtile and elevated thought. They are however few in number and he did not think there was enough of them to publish in a volume. They were finally published post mortem in what was, if the truth be told, a rather unfortunate manner. Two of ...
— Sketches from Concord and Appledore • Frank Preston Stearns

... the more fixt part of the arsenick and the sulphurs that come forth are so much the more subtile, as they are separated from what did fix them before, and this appears to be so, because the sulphurs must of necessity pass through all the book to make a writing of a clear and invisible liquor appear black and visible: and to facilitate this penetration the book is ...
— Forty Centuries of Ink • David N. Carvalho

... succeeded in producing a series of criticisms in relation to creative literature which are satisfactory as well as subtile—which are not only ingenious, but which possess the rarer recommendation of being usually ...
— The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.] - Introduction and Publisher's Advertising • William Shakespeare

... of detail that accomplishes this in one case and the other. In either, the point of view alone is fixed. The rest is variable, and depends, it may be, on the nature of that subtile and volatile ether ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 107, September, 1866 • Various

... had that appearance. And it bounded the Pyramid for a clear mile upon every side, and burned for ever; and none of the monsters had power ever to pass across, because of what we did call The Air Clog that it did make, as an invisible Wall of Safety. And it did give out also a more subtile vibration, that did affect the weak Brain-Elements of the monsters and the Lower Men-Brutes. And some did hold that there went from it a further vibration of a greater subtileness that gave a protecting ...
— The Night Land • William Hope Hodgson

... broken into gigantic continents and a Polynesia of rose-coloured islands that no ships might approach; while in this nether world the middle of the Calabro-Sicilian strait was occupied by a condensation of vapour, (one could never profane them by the term of sea-mist or fog,) the most subtile and attenuated which ever came from the realms of cloud-compelling Jove. This fleecy tissue pursued its deliberate progress from coast to coast, like a cortege of cobwebs carrying a deputation from the power-looms ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various

... more subtile than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden? And the woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden: but ...
— True Words for Brave Men • Charles Kingsley

... being amongst us the foundation of monarchy itself, much more clearly and much more peculiarly is it the ground of all parliamentary power. Parliament is a security provided for the protection of freedom, and not a subtile fiction, contrived to amuse the people in its place. The authority of both houses can, still less than that of the crown, be supported upon different principles in different places, so as to be, for one part of your subjects, a protector of liberty, and for another ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke

... Dress has a subtile influence upon our actions: one gown can make a romp, another a princess, another a boor, another a sparkling coquette, out of the same woman. The female mood is susceptibly sympathetic to the fitness or unfitness of dress. Now, Ruth was without doubt ...
— Other Things Being Equal • Emma Wolf

... to hereditary rule, but indignant at the contamination of the blood-royal. It was impossible for persons eminent for birth to sin in secret; and one bad action of theirs, divulged to the public, did more injury than the machinations of the most subtile traitor. Woe would it be to England, if her liberties were thus made to depend on the mercy and prudence of those who grasped her sceptre in despite of law, while its rightful owner discovered such base propensities as made it safer even in an Usurper's hands than in his, who less prized the inheritance ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West

... science to grow more complex. As he says: "And Newton's law itself? Its simplicity, so long undetected, is perhaps only apparent. Who knows whether it is not due to some complicated mechanism, to the impact of some subtile matter animated by irregular movements, and whether it has not become simple only through the action of averages and of great numbers? In any case it is difficult not to suppose that the true law contains complementary terms, which would become sensible at small distances." ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman

... The cows came briskly from their stalls to the space cleared for them, and were soon ruminating in placid content. What though the snow covered the ground deeper than at any time during the winter, the subtile spirit of spring was recognized and welcomed not only by man, but also by the ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe

... the Spaniard's mind became singularly crystallized, and she turned this result to good account: in proportion as he associated himself with the real Marianne, he created a fictitious Marianne, ideal, kind, spirituelle, perhaps ignorant, but subtile and corrupted in mind, who amused and disconcerted him at one and the same time. He had left the Continental Hotel, and rented a house on Avenue Montaigne, Champs-Elysees, where he sometimes entertained ...
— His Excellency the Minister • Jules Claretie

... which he[C] by his instruments put in ure every wher in y^e days of queene Mary & before, he then begane an other kind of warre, & went more closly to worke; not only to oppuggen, but even to ruinate & destroy y^e kingdom of Christ, by more secrete & subtile means, by kindling y^e flames of contention and sowing y^e seeds of discorde & bitter enmitie amongst y^e proffessors & seeming reformed them selves. For when he could not prevaile by y^e former means against the principall ...
— Bradford's History of 'Plimoth Plantation' • William Bradford

... prejudice declares, "Without language, no understanding"! Subtile distinctions between understanding and reason have limited the statement to the latter term. But even in the restricted form, "Without verbal language, no reason," ...
— The Mind of the Child, Part II • W. Preyer

... leader of these soldiers read from a parchment—"whereas the King's stepmother, Queen Jehane, is accused by certain persons of an act of witch-craft that with diabolical and subtile methods wrought privily to destroy the King, the said Dame Jehane is by the King committed (all her attendants being removed) to the custody of Sir John Pelham, who will, at the King's pleasure, confine her within Pevensey Castle, there to be kept under Sir John's control: ...
— Chivalry • James Branch Cabell

... as a sufficient sanction in the eyes of the public for those manifestations of favor and esteem with which she was pleased to honor him. But whether the affection which she entertained for him best deserved the name of friendship or a still tenderer one, seems after all a question of too subtile and obscure a nature for sober discussion; though in a French "cour d'amour" it might have furnished pleas and counterpleas of exquisite ingenuity, prodigious sentimental interest, and length interminable. What is unfortunately too certain is, that he was a favorite, and in the common ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin

... now freely propose, what I think most probable on the subject. One kind of contagion is more subtile than another; for there is a sort, which is taken into the body by the very breath; such as I have elsewhere said to exist in the plague, small pox, and other malignant fevers. But there is another sort, which ...
— Medica Sacra - or a Commentary on on the Most Remarkable Diseases Mentioned - in the Holy Scriptures • Richard Mead

... dressed after their sin were the fleshly bodies they were compelled to assume on being expelled from the Paradise of their previous existence; that in proportion to their sins they are confined in subtile or gross bodies of adjusted grades until by penance and wisdom they slowly ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger

... theological men of science in the early Middle Ages—Bede the Venerable. The nucleus of his theory also is to be found in the accepted view of the "firmament" and of the "waters above the heavens," derived from Genesis. The firmament he holds to be spherical, and of a nature subtile and fiery; the upper heavens, he says, which contain the angels, God has tempered with ice, lest they inflame the lower elements. As to the waters placed above the firmament, lower than the spiritual ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White

... inapplicable to human affairs. The theorist railed at the folly of the world, instead of confessing his own; and the men of practice unjustly blamed philosophy, instead of condemning the sophist. The causes which the politician has to consider are, above all others, multiplied, mutable, minute, subtile, and, if I may so speak, evanescent; perpetually changing their form, and varying their combinations; losing their nature, while they keep their name; exhibiting the most different consequences in the endless variety of men and nations on whom they operate; in one degree of strength producing ...
— A Discourse on the Study of the Law of Nature and Nations • James Mackintosh

... I am sure he is right! You leave nothing to the imagination. Now a subtile veiled idealism—" He was ...
— Melomaniacs • James Huneker

... will happen communicacion of Religion: And then though it happ so that through want of learninge / our weaklinges do not slyppe and foile them selues / Yeat bicause they can not dissolue / and answer vnto the arguments / and subtile reasons of the aduersaries aptly / ther arisith then contentius stryfes betwen them / and not only this / but euel speakings / reproches / and hatreds / which thinges ar so farr from edifying / that they do altogether hynder and lett it: furthermor in these conflictes it happenith / that ...
— A Treatise of the Cohabitation Of the Faithful with the Unfaithful • Peter Martyr

... destined to give way to the turbine form of engine which, applied thus far to torpedo-boats only, has made a record of forty-four miles an hour. Iron, which stood for a revolution in 1842, has itself given way to steel. And a new force, subtile, swift, and powerful, has found endless application in the body of the great ships, so that from stem to stern-post they are a network of electric wires, bearing messages, controlling the independent engines ...
— American Merchant Ships and Sailors • Willis J. Abbot

... that they were attached for a time to certain spots and certain edifices which they infested. They believed that souls separated from the gross and terrestrial body, preserved after death one more subtile and elastic, having the form of that they had quitted; that these bodies were luminous, and like the stars; that they retained an inclination for those things which they had loved during their life on earth, and that often they ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet

... Drummond is my guest,—my guest, remember; introduced to me by one of the first men in New York; received everywhere. You are both strangers to me. This is a matter of purely individual testimony," Mr. Brown went on, feeling that he was growing exquisitely subtile, and clothing himself in imaginary ermine as he spoke. "He may tell me that you are a rascal. In that event, how am I to know who is the honest man and who the villain? Shall I believe you, or shall I believe him, in the absence of documentary evidence and disinterested statement? ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, Old Series, Vol. 36—New Series, Vol. 10, July 1885 • Various

... of Trent, where the doctrines of the Schoolmen have great sway; that the schoolmen were like Astronomers, which did faigne Eccentricks and Epicycles and Engines of Orbs to save the Phenomena; though they know there were no such Things; and in like manner that the Schoolmen had framed a number of subtile and intricate Axioms and Theorems, to save the practice of the Church.' This is true of much else besides scholastic axioms and theorems. Subordinate error was made necessary and invented, by reason of some pro-existent main stock ...
— On Compromise • John Morley

... those qualifications. For there are men whose manifold experience supplies some literary defects. But when a whole body of ministers are illiterate, they are not able to defend the truth of the Gospel against the subtile attacks of enemies. Suppose false teachers were to make a spurious translation of the Scriptures, how could such an illiterate body of ministers detect the forgery? If the knowledge of the original tongues should ever become extinct, the Gospel might soon become forged and corrupted. It is ...
— American Lutheranism - Volume 1: Early History of American Lutheranism and The Tennessee Synod • Friedrich Bente

... or a multitude of worldly acquaintances, negro minstrelsy, ancient love ditties, bar room roundelays, passionate scenes from favorite operas, with snatches from instrumental symphonies, concertos, or what not! Music, as I have said, is even more subtile in its power of expression than speech, and the new words, which we may perhaps not even hear, can never banish from our minds the old impressions associated with the melody. The ears may even be cognizant of the holy sentiments intended to be conveyed, but the mind's eye will see ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various

... "The most subtile diplomatist," thought Vivian, as he recalled to mind his own introduction, "would be puzzled to decide to which interest his ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield

... purpose not only of confirming their identity (378.), but also of demonstrating certain general principles (366, 377, &c.), and creating an extension of the means of investigating and applying the chemical powers of this wonderful and subtile agent. ...
— Experimental Researches in Electricity, Volume 1 • Michael Faraday

... fly to a sick carkcass, especially if it be fat, as ravens does to their prey. Their insteed of confirming and strenthening the poor folk to dy wt the greater alacrity, they besett them wt all the subtile mines imaginable to wring and suck money from them, telling them that they most leive a dozen or 2 of serviets to the poor Cordeliers; as many spoones to the godly Capuchines who are busie praying ...
— Publications of the Scottish History Society, Vol. 36 • Sir John Lauder

... complotters of these rebellious, being subtile and cautelous in their actions, howsoeuer apparant the factes of their seditious ministers seeme to bee, yet peraduenture the Spaniard himself wil denie them to be his precepts, and directions. Did he then chastise those his ministers being returned into Spaine, as transgressers ...
— A Declaration of the Causes, which mooved the chiefe Commanders of the Nauie of her most excellent Maiestie the Queene of England, in their voyage and expedition for Portingal, to take and arrest in t • Anonymous

... pencil master was or stile, That could portray the shades and traits which there Would cause each subtile genius to admire? ...
— Dante's Purgatory • Dante

... applied to the various sects that resisted the successors of the apostles. "They presume to alter the Holy Scriptures, to abandon the ancient rule of faith, and to form their opinions according to the subtile precepts of logic. The science of the church is neglected for the study of geometry, and they lose sight of heaven while they are employed in measuring the earth. Euclid is perpetually in their hands. Aristotle and Theophrastus are the objects of their admiration; and they express an ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon

... races, so also with sexes, changed social conditions may render exactly those subtile qualities, which in one social state were a disadvantage, of the highest ...
— Woman and Labour • Olive Schreiner

... acts, it will often happen that their true value and significance can best be learned, not from his own personal recital, but from an analytic study of the deeds themselves. Yet into them, too, often enters, not only the subtile working of their author's natural qualities, but also a certain previous history of well-defined opinions, of settled principles firmly held, of trains of thought and reasoning, of intuitions wrought into rational convictions, all of which betray both ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan

... familiarity had of late merged into something different: a reserve, a timidity, a subtile suspicion of change had crept into their intimacy. Nan felt that Dick's manner had altered, but somehow she liked it better: his was always a sweet bountiful nature, but now it seemed to have deepened into greater ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey

... Diction), all point to 1601 as the probable date of composition. It has been said that a true taste for Shakespeare is like the creation of a special sense; and this saying is nowhere better approved than in reference to his subtile variations of language and style. He began with what may be described as a preponderance of the poetic element over the dramatic. As we trace his course onward, we may discover a gradual rising of the latter element into greater strength and prominence, until at last it had the former in ...
— The New Hudson Shakespeare: Julius Caesar • William Shakespeare

... Euripides; and it is, indeed, with some penetration of wonder that one observes how deep and productive a relation to man the ocean has sustained. Some share in the greatest enterprises, in the finest results, it seldom fails to have. Not capriciously did the subtile Greek imagination derive the birth of Venus from the foam of the sea; for social love,—that vast reticulation of wedlock which society is—has commonly arisen not far from the ocean-shore. The Persian is the only superior civilization, now occurring to our recollection, which has no intimate relation ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 12, October, 1858 • Various

... with bards and sages old, Immortal sons of praise. These flattering scenes, To this neglected labour court my song; Yet not unconscious what a doubtful task To paint the finest features of the mind, And to most subtile and mysterious things Give colour, strength, and motion. But the love Of Nature and the Muses bids explore, Through secret paths erewhile untrod by man, 50 The fair poetic region, to detect Untasted springs, to drink inspiring ...
— Poetical Works of Akenside - [Edited by George Gilfillan] • Mark Akenside

... wherein the Salt is evidently found, which preserves from putrefaction so that nothing might be consumed by Corruption. At the beginning and birth Quick-silver is first operated, which stands yet open with a subtile coagulation, because little Salt is imparted to it, whereby he manifests a more spiritual than corporal Body; but all the other Metals which follow out of its Essence, and have more Salt, whereby they become ...
— Of Natural and Supernatural Things • Basilius Valentinus

... pantomime actor than to a tragedian, not because his gesture is more refined, but because he has no tongue. And the proportions of our common Greek work are important to it undoubtedly, but not because they are or even can be more subtile than Gothic proportion, but because that work has no sculpture, nor color, nor imagination, nor sacredness, nor any other quality whatsoever in it, but ratios of measures. And it is difficult to express with sufficient force the absurdity ...
— Lectures on Architecture and Painting - Delivered at Edinburgh in November 1853 • John Ruskin

... in the use of any form of illuminating gas, since all produce asphyxiation. Accordingly, all gas fixtures of the house should be regularly inspected to see that there is no escape of the subtile, destructive fluid. The odor of escaping gas which is so unpleasant is really a blessing, in that it informs the householder of his danger. A cock that turns completely around and, after extinguishing ...
— Practical Suggestions for Mother and Housewife • Marion Mills Miller

... what is above written, and who was present at the dispute, as he himself informs us, in his book of Travels, gives us no account of the answers which were made by Xavier. "I have neither knowledge nor presumption enough," says he, "to relate those subtile and solid reasons, with which he confuted the mad imaginations of the Bonza." We only have learnt from this Portuguese, that Fucarandono was put to silence upon the point in question, and that, a little to save his reputation, he changed the subject, but to no purpose, for even there too ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Volume XVI. (of 18) - The Life of St. Francis Xavier • John Dryden

... verges on severity with a quick and delicately thrilled sensibility for all that is rich and beautiful and generous, which is his by right of inheritance from the race of Non-conformist colonizers. How subtile and various this sympathy is, between himself and the past of his people, we shall see more ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop

... whence he could neither retreat nor extricate himself fairly. Even for this I liked him the better. For fairer is the modesty of a candid mind, than the knowledge of those things which I desired; and such I found him, in all the more difficult and subtile questions. ...
— The Confessions of Saint Augustine • Saint Augustine

... and great; and therefore when near disturb old men, whose eyes are stiff and not easily penetrated; but when they are separated and diffused into the air, the thick obstructing parts are easily removed, and the subtile remainders coming to the eye gently and easily slide into the pores; and so the disturbance being less, the sight is more vigorous and clear. Thus a rose smells most fragrant at a distance; but if you bring it near the nose, it is not so pure ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch

... not enough to say of these volumes that they are bright, piquant, genial, affectionate; nor is it enough to speak of their artistic worth, the subtile appreciation of painting in the first series, and of music in the second; it is not enough to refer to the glimpses which they give of eminent artists,—Chopin, Rossini, Donizetti, Hiller, and Moscheles,—nor the side-glances at Thorwaldsen, Bunsen, the late scholarly ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 87, January, 1865 • Various

... Japanese thought is best expressed by using the possessive pronoun and omitting the derogative adjective altogether. Japanese indirect methods for the expression of the personal relation are thus numberless and subtile. May it not be plausibly argued since the European has only a few blunt pronouns wherewith to state this idea while the Japanese has both numberless pronouns and many other delicate ways of conveying the same idea, that the latter is ...
— Evolution Of The Japanese, Social And Psychic • Sidney L. Gulick

... aromas into poison-drops, Narcotic drugs of dangerous strength and power,— And wines of paradise to thee become Intoxicating essences of hell. Cold crystallizer of the warm heaven's gold! Thou rigorous analyst! thou subtile brain! Gathering thought's sunshine to a focus heat That blinds and burns and maddens! What, my friend! Are we, then, salamanders? Do we live A charmed life? Do gases feed like air? Pray you, pack up your crucibles and go! Your statements are too awfully abstract; ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II., November, 1858., No. XIII. • Various

... verbiage in "Bothwell") but it is paler, colder, and poetically inferior. The voluptuous warmth and wealth of color, the exquisite levity, the debonnaire grace of the Swinburnian drama we seek in vain. Bjoernson is vigorous, but he is not subtile. Mere feline amorousness, such as Swinburne so inimitably portrays, he would disdain to deal with if even he could. Such a bit of intricate self-characterization as the English poet puts into the Queen's mouth in the first scene with Chastelard, in the third act, lies utterly beyond the range ...
— Essays on Scandinavian Literature • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen

... thou hast my sympathy For this fat prophet wore an honest mien So that e'en I who boast a subtile brain Did fall before his wordy blandishments. 'Tis well! we then are quits. But why this call? What matter of great ...
— 'A Comedy of Errors' in Seven Acts • Spokeshave (AKA Old Fogy)

... You haue your wish: my will is euen this, That presently you hie you home to bed: Thou subtile, periur'd, false, disloyall man: Think'st thou I am so shallow, so conceitlesse, To be seduced by thy flattery, That has't deceiu'd so many with thy vowes? Returne, returne, and make thy loue amends: For me (by this pale queene ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... the chariot of a Roman conquering general to say to him at intervals, as his triumphal procession moved with pomp and splendor through the swarming streets, "Remember that thou art a man." But this is too subtile a conjecture. The ceremony was but a silent way of saying, "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die," which, as Paul's solemn irony makes but too plain, must be the philosophy of life to those who believe that the dead rise not, which was the case with the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 17, March, 1859 • Various

... the difference in their common merits. We shall then notice that "richness in colour" does not mean the same in both cities. As opposed to the abundance of glowing colours on the exuberant Venetian palette, we should place the subtile gradations, the well-balanced and restrained splendour and the endless variations of the seemingly restricted colour scale of the Dutch artist. We shall so learn to love both better than we did before and, needless to say, our eyes will then be more open to the value ...
— Rembrandt's Amsterdam • Frits Lugt

... left him conscious of the fact that two vastly different strains of blood ran through their veins. Apart, he would not have perceived this marked difference in them. Hetty represented the violet, Sara the pansy. The distinction may be subtile. However, it was the estimate he formed in that moment ...
— The Hollow of Her Hand • George Barr McCutcheon

... called Questiones Quodlibeticae; and they were generally so ridiculous that we have retained the word Quodlibet in our vernacular style, to express anything ridiculously subtile; something which comes at length to ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... physiognomy, nor go about to inquire, I believe, at this time, as Evodius inquired of St. Austin, whether our immaterial part, the soul, does not remain united, when it forsakes this gross terrestrial body, to some ethereal body more subtile and more fine; which was one of the Pythagorean and Platonic whimsies: nor be under any concern to know, if this be not the case of the dead, how souls can be distinguished after their separation—that of Dives, for example, from that ...
— Letters to Sir William Windham and Mr. Pope • Lord Bolingbroke

... divisions he framed the heaven above and the earth beneath; in the midst he placed the subtile ether, the eight regions, and the permanent receptacle ...
— Ten Great Religions - An Essay in Comparative Theology • James Freeman Clarke

... founder of the sect of Manichees, in the third century, taught that there are two principles from which all things proceed; the one is a pure and subtile matter, called Light, and the other a gross and corrupt substance, called Darkness. Each of these is subject to the dominion of a superintending being, whose existence is from all eternity. The being who presides over the light is called God; he that rules over the darkness is ...
— The Symbolism of Freemasonry • Albert G. Mackey

... sweet and subtile, wild and sleepy, by turns; oftentimes rising to the clouds, oftentimes challenging the heavens. She wears a diadem round her head. And I knew by childish memories that she could go abroad upon the winds, when ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various

... from our grateful lips in ready words. But we do not suspect how these manifestations of material Beauty are received by the mysterious alembic of the soul,—how they are worked up there by exquisite and subtile processes of moral chemistry, humanized, spiritualized, and appropriated unconsciously to sweet uses of piety and affection. We do not know how the star, the flower, the dear human face, the movement of a wave, the song of a bird,—we do not know how ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 44, June, 1861 • Various

... might accompany Bridge upon the road, pleading that his mother was dead and that he could not return home after his escapade. And Bridge could not find it in his heart to refuse him, for the man realized that the boyish waif possessed a subtile attraction, as forceful as it was inexplicable. Not since he had followed the open road in company with Billy Byrne had Bridge met one with whom he might care to 'Pal' before The Kid crossed his path on the dark and storm swept ...
— The Oakdale Affair • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... this there is an easy answer, and Mr. Spencer makes it effectively. In some well-written pages at the end of the first volume of his Psychology he shows us that a 'matter' so infinitely subtile, and performing motions as inconceivably quick and fine as those which modern science postulates in her explanations, has no trace of grossness left. He shows that the conception of spirit, as we mortals hitherto ...
— Pragmatism - A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking • William James

... from many lands, Who crossed the wide seas and the desert sands To learn of him the occult significance Of some perplexing omen, or perchance To hear forewhisperings of their destiny And know what things in aftertime should be. "Now surely," thought the Prince, "this subtile seer, To whom the darkest things belike are clear, Could read the riddle of my dream and tell Where lieth that strange land delectable Wherein mine empress hath her dwelling-place. So might I look at last upon her face, ...
— The Poems of William Watson • William Watson

... publishing his compositions only as private tracts, or in letters to such far-from-reverberant organs of publicity as the Gazette or the Recorder of his native Amsterdam, or the Utica Herald or the Albany Times. Odd places for such subtile efforts to appear in, but creditable to American editors in these degenerate days! Once, indeed, the lamented W. T. Harris of the old "Journal of Speculative Philosophy" got wind of these epistles, and the result was a revision of some of them for that ...
— Memories and Studies • William James

... Notwithstanding the subtile reasonings I have met with in the books of the Peripateticks, and the pretty experiments that have been shew'd me in the Laboratories of Chymists, I am of so diffident, or dull a Nature, as to think that if neither of ...
— The Sceptical Chymist • Robert Boyle

... given a keen scent for the vague quality which we call "feeling," the eye would better be trained still further, for herein lies the secret of success in difficult places, and not only that, but if he have not this sense he is deprived of one of the most subtile thrills that ...
— The Tapestry Book • Helen Churchill Candee

... restless, and Isabel said, with a subtile interpretation of his uneasiness, "I don't want anything to eat, Basil, but I think I know the weaknesses of men; and you had better go and pass the next half-hour over a plate of ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... Divine fiat, civilized man has never desecrated them with his unsparing devastations; that a peculiar race, born for these solitudes, once dwelt amidst their shades, living as Nature's woodland children, until a more subtile being than the serpent of Eden crept amongst them, and, with his glittering novelties and dangerous beauty, caused their total annihilation! I see, in spirit, the red hunter, lofty, fearless, and stern, stalking in his painted nudity, ...
— Canada and the Canadians - Volume I • Sir Richard Henry Bonnycastle

... clerkes in writing Thing that was made of auctours them beforn They may of newe finde & fantasye: Out of olde chaffe trye out full fayre corne, Make it more freshe & lusty to the eye, Their subtile witte their labour apply, With their colours agreable of hue, To make olde thinges ...
— Early Theories of Translation • Flora Ross Amos

... giuen vs some graines, but to no purpose, so that this day wee tooke not by estimation aboue one hundreth pound waight of Graines, by meanes of their Captaine, who would suffer no man to sell any thing but through his hands, and at his price: he was so subtile, that for a bason hee would not giue 15. pound waight of Graines, and sometimes would offer vs smal dishfuls whereas before wee had baskets full, and when he saw that wee would not take them in contentment, the Captaine departed, and caused all the rest of the boates to depart, thinking belike ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of - The English Nation, Vol. 11 • Richard Hakluyt

... toiler is writing, The boyish Old Man whom no fate ever floored; Karl's in New York with his briefs and his logic, That subtile mind ...
— More Songs From Vagabondia • Bliss Carman and Richard Hovey

... book? What are you doing? What do you think of your Miss Martineau now? Is n't the Seven Gables a subtile matter, both in ...
— Autobiography and Letters of Orville Dewey, D.D. - Edited by his Daughter • Orville Dewey

... our actions is the resurrection, and a stable apprehension that our ashes shall enjoy the fruit of our pious endeavours; without this, all religion is a fallacy, and those impieties of Lucian, Euripides, and Julian, are no blasphemies, but subtile verities; and atheists have been the ...
— Religio Medici, Hydriotaphia, and the Letter to a Friend • Sir Thomas Browne

... lend a hand, for a time, to the Huguenots," said Catherine, "if only to revenge myself on that soldier and that priest and that woman!" As she spoke, she called attention with her subtile Italian glance to the duke and cardinal, and then to the second floor of the chateau on which were the apartments of her son and Mary Stuart. "That trio has taken from my hands the reins of State, for which I waited long while the old woman filled my place," she said gloomily, glancing ...
— Catherine de' Medici • Honore de Balzac

... and in glorification. Ready now for their admission, she lets the eager public in; but what they were most intent to find still eludes them. In the "Histoire de ma Vie" are the records of her parentage, birth, education. Here are detailed the subtile influences that aided or hindered Nature in one of her most lavish pieces of work; here are study, religion, marriage, maternity, authorship, friendship, travel, litigation: but the passionate loving woman, and whom she loved, are not here. To the world's triumph they belong not, and we honor ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 49, November, 1861 • Various

... hated to be in the house; and, on the other hand, while I enjoyed being out-of-doors, I hated all manner of out-door employment. I was not lazy, but I possessed—well, let us call it the true aboriginal temperament; though I fear that this distinction will be found too subtile, even for the well-educated, unless, along with their education, they have a certain sympathetic bias, which, after all, is the main thing to be depended on in ...
— Birds in the Bush • Bradford Torrey

... been a great consumption of the most hard and solid parts of the land; and therefore that there must necessarily have been a still much greater destruction of the more soft and tender substances, and the more light and subtile parts which, during those operations of water, had been floated away into the sea. This appears from the enormous quantities of stones and gravel which have been transported at distances that seem incredible, and deposited at heights above the present rivers, which renders ...
— Theory of the Earth, Volume 2 (of 4) • James Hutton

... Rambouillet; but that taste was not judiciously refined this Temple of Taste might more properly have been named a Laboratory of Wit, where good sense was put to the torture, in order to extract from it the most subtile essence. There it was that Voiture labored hard and incessantly to create wit. At length, Boileau and Moliere fixed the standard of true taste. In spite of the Scuderys, the Calprenedes, etc., they defeated and put to flight ARTAMENES, JUBA, OROONDATES, and all those heroes of romance, ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield

... the glamour of the red lamp after the other guests had left. It was discovered that they had twice gone to the theater together. The art student had met them coming in late. As a topic of conversation among the boarders the affair was more popular than food complaints. A subtile atmosphere of understanding enveloped the two. It became so marked at last that even Mrs. Hilary perceived it—although Elsie always insisted ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VII. (of X.) • Various

... their philosophy, from the earth, as the principle of Nature, they ascended through the more subtile elements of water, air, and fire, to a spiritual conception of the universe; so, as regards their faith, its highest incarnation was through the symbolism of fire, as representative of that central Power under whose influence all things arose through endless ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 34, August, 1860 • Various

... for? &c. Canst thou dance no better? &c. Ransack the old records of all past times and places in thy memory; canst thou not there find out some better way of trampling? Pump thine invention dry; cannot the universal seed-plot of subtile wiles and stratagems spring up one new method of cutting capers? Is this the top of skill and pride, to shuffle feet and brandish knees thus, and to trip like a doe and skip like a squirrel? And wherein differ thy leapings from the ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott

... banquet of the year long simmering, had suddenly taken the lid off, to let you perceive with every gladdening sense what a feast you were going to have presently in the way of summer. From the delectable vision rises a subtile haze, which veils the day just a little from its own loveliness, and lies upon the sighing and expectant city like the substance of a dream made visible. It has the magic to transmute you to this substance yourself, so that while you dawdle ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells









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