"Adapt" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... plays—also of scenes, including interiors, exteriors, and a scheme for a Greek Theatre, all drawn to scale. Throughout the book color schemes, economy, and simplicity are kept constantly in view, and ingenious ways are given to adapt the same costumes or scenes to several different uses. HOW TO PRODUCE CHILDREN'S PLAYS The author is a recognized authority on the production of plays and pageants in the public schools, and combines enthusiastic sympathy ...
— Patriotic Plays and Pageants for Young People • Constance D'Arcy Mackay
... a subject permissible, nothing would suggest ideas more burlesque than this fantastic institution of hereditary kings. Would it not be believed, to look at them, that there really exist particular lineages possessing certain qualities which enter the blood of the embryo prince, and adapt him physically for royalty, as a horse for the racecourse? But then, in this wild supposition, it yet becomes necessary to assure the genuine family descent of the heir presumptive. To perpetuate the noble race of Andalusian ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... enough," he goes on. "For instance, I don't claim to invent new methods. I just adapt, pick out lines of proved success, and develop. Now, your business here—why, I could take hold of it, and in six months' time I'd have you occupying this entire building, with classes on every floor, a solarium ...
— Odd Numbers - Being Further Chronicles of Shorty McCabe • Sewell Ford
... since he had seen his parents last had not been altogether easy ones for him. He had had to face the bitterest disappointment of his life, to adapt himself to a new and uncongenial sphere, and, in spite of all his courage, there had been moments when the task had seemed too heavy to bear. It had been an effort to write cheerfully, and to refrain from repinings over his lost hopes, but ...
— More About Peggy • Mrs G. de Horne Vaizey
... avoid the manner of teaching, to which the public lecturer is in some degree compelled by his situation. A private preceptor, who undertakes the instruction of several pupils in the same family, will examine with care the different habits and tempers of his pupils; and he will have full leisure to adapt his ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... think," said Ned, "that it would be difficult to adapt it to the weight of different individuals, and also to their height. While it might not be too much for a strong man, it might be for a weak one; and if the position of steps and rail were adapted to a tall man, they wouldn't be ...
— The Land of the Kangaroo - Adventures of Two Youths in a Journey through the Great Island Continent • Thomas Wallace Knox
... might be told of them. Our friends in the East claim as much for the Delaware and others, with which we have not been able to succeed. And here let me say that the sooner we divest ourselves of the idea that one grape should be the grape for this immense country of ours; the sooner we try to adapt the variety to the locality—not the locality to the variety—the sooner we will succeed. The idea is absurd, and unworthy of a thinking people, that one variety should succeed equally well or ill in such a diversity of soil and climate ...
— The Cultivation of The Native Grape, and Manufacture of American Wines • George Husmann
... which I detested yet could not disobey. Yet when she died! Nay, then I was not miserable. I had cast off all feeling, subdued all anguish, to riot in the excess of my despair. Evil thenceforth became my good. Urged thus far, I had no choice but to adapt my nature to an element which I had willingly chosen. The completion of my demoniacal design became an insatiable passion. And now it is ended; there ...
— Frankenstein - or The Modern Prometheus • Mary Wollstonecraft (Godwin) Shelley
... immediate announcement then, Miss S. was justified. Janie had done the obviously right thing—and was obviously not quite sure that it was right. That mattered very little; it was done. It was for Mina Zabriska—and others concerned—to adapt themselves and conform their actions to the accomplished fact. But would Major Duplay take that view? To Mina was intrusted the delicate task of breaking the news to her uncle. It is the virtue of a soldier not to know when he ...
— Tristram of Blent - An Episode in the Story of an Ancient House • Anthony Hope
... be initiated into the mysteries of those fortunate and happy inhabitants: that is to say, by changing his name and dress, to gain admittance to their feasts and entertainments; and, as occasion offered, to those of their loving spouses; as he was able to adapt himself to all capacities and humours, he soon deeply insinuated himself into the esteem of the substantial wealthy aldermen, and into he affections of their more delicate, magnificent, and tender ladies: he made one in all their feasts, and at all their ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... Cephisus. The metopes, which generally represent single contests between the Athenians and the Centaurs, are in strong high relief, full of bold action and passionate exertion—though this is for the most part softened by great beauty of form and a masterly style of composition which knows how to adapt itself with the utmost freedom to the strict conditions of the space. These reliefs were placed high, as they were calculated for the full light of the sun, and to throw ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... the ceaseless longing for something else, which is the general source of all desires and wishes, is also the source of all endeavor and of all progress. Physiologically, it is the effort of our organization to adapt itself to the ever varying conditions which surround it; intellectually, it is the struggle to arrive at truth; in both, it is the effort to ...
— The Religious Sentiment - Its Source and Aim: A Contribution to the Science and - Philosophy of Religion • Daniel G. Brinton
... is plain to every scientific investigator. We have failed to study ourselves in relation to the great environmental problem of today. The stage-setting has been changed but not the play. The game is the same old game—you must adjust and adapt yourself to your environment or ...
— How to Analyze People on Sight - Through the Science of Human Analysis: The Five Human Types • Elsie Lincoln Benedict and Ralph Paine Benedict
... theirs which makes a trap for the stranger. One's first impression is that they are entirely soft. Then one comes suddenly upon something very hard, and you know that you have reached the limit and must adapt yourself to the fact. They have, for example, their insular conventions which ...
— His Last Bow - An Epilogue of Sherlock Holmes • Arthur Conan Doyle
... take her into his counsels and confidence. A woman must make herself obvious to her husband, or he will drift out beyond her horizon. She will be to him very nearly what she wills and works to be. If she adapts herself to her children, and does not adapt herself to her husband, he will fall into the arrangement, and the two will fall apart. I do not mean that they quarrel, but they will lead separate lives. They will be no longer husband and wife. There will be a domestic alliance, but no marriage. A predominant interest in the same objects ...
— Gala-days • Gail Hamilton
... was not so comfortable as being at home, but we were ready enough to adapt ourselves to circumstances; and any change was agreeable ...
— Devon Boys - A Tale of the North Shore • George Manville Fenn
... yielded reluctantly. He was absorbed in the role he had created for himself. As is often the case with those gifted with an ardent imagination, though he had long known that Moscow would be abandoned he knew it only with his intellect, he did not believe it in his heart and did not adapt himself mentally to ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... authors of sects to task for being hard-hearted tyrants. They despise the weak and demand that everything be just so. Nothing suits them except what they do. Unless you eulogize whatever they say or do, unless you adapt yourself to their slightest whim, they become angry with you. They are that way because, as St. Paul says, they "think themselves to be something," they think they know ...
— Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians • Martin Luther
... world's events. Men will go on planting potatoes, and nothing else but potatoes, till a potato disease comes and forces them to find out the advantage of a varied crop. Selfishness, stupidity, sloth, persist in trying to adapt the world to their desires, till a time comes when the world manifests itself as too decidedly inconvenient to them. Wisdom stands outside of man and urges itself upon him, like the marks of the changing seasons, before it finds a home within him, directs his ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot
... our southern flank," the paper said further, "will ally his name with those of Washington and Jackson as a defender of the liberty of the country. If in delivering Mexico he should model its States in form and principle to adapt them to our Union, and add a new southern constellation to its benignant sky while rounding off our possessions on the continent at the Isthmus, ... he would complete the work of Jefferson, who first set one foot of our colossal ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay
... childish method of reasoning cannot be imagined. The simple reflection that the newborn antiquity and the boundless enlargement of human thought and knowledge which was due to it, might give splendid confirmation to a religion able to adapt itself thereto, seems never even to have occurred to the good man. He wanted to forbid what he could not deal with by any other means. In fact, he was anything but liberal, and was ready, for example, to send ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt
... of London during the season. She was a good woman in her way, and—also in her way—a clever one; but she had been brought up in another atmosphere from that which her husband loved, elevated in a totally different school, and she was not of a nature to adapt herself to what she did not ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... against a man who prospered under Cromwell and Charles II., and was a favourite of both, a presumption of excessive pliancy, of too much readiness to adapt himself to his environment, of time-serving, if you like, and insincerity. It cannot be proved that he was not a Vicar of Bray, the title which at once suggests itself. Tolerance, geniality, and charity are virtues which have their own defects, and some measure of austerity is ...
— The Life and Times of John Wilkins • Patrick A. Wright-Henderson
... the Aborigines we wish to preserve a friendly and bloodless intercourse; if we wish to have their children at our schools to be taught and educated; if we hope to bring the parents into a state that will better adapt them for the reception of christianity and civilization; or if we care about staying the rapid and lamentable ravages which a contact with us is causing among their tribes, we must endeavour to do so, by removing, as far as possible, all sources ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre
... world to be worshipped instead of God, and as God, and the many stratagems he made use of to delude mankind to their ruin; how he had a secret access to our passions and to our affections, and to adapt his snares to our inclinations, so as to cause us even to be our own tempters, and run upon our destruction by ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe Of York, Mariner, Vol. 1 • Daniel Defoe
... admire the facility with which you adapt yourself to circumstances," scornfully. "You knew that I was but playing. I am fully capable of repaying any insolence offered to me, whether from D'Herouville, the vicomte ...
— The Grey Cloak • Harold MacGrath
... and interesting tragedy of Tancrede would adapt itself much better to this epoch, than to the date (A.D. 1005) which Voltaire himself has chosen. But I must gently reproach the poet for infusing into the Greek subjects the spirit of modern knights ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... ideas and interests of their own. If real and genuine and intelligent opinion was more split up than it used to be, and if we could not now classify everybody by the same simple process, we must accept the new conditions and adapt our machinery to them, our party organization, our representative system, and the whole scheme and form of our government." This is not a chance saying, standing by itself, for a fortnight later, speaking at Morley, Mr. Asquith added: "Let them have a House ...
— Proportional Representation - A Study in Methods of Election • John H. Humphreys
... mind. One could not help modifying one's views almost daily, because one had to adapt them to the conditions of life which were always changing. And if he had believed in spiritual marriages in the days gone by, he had now come to lose faith in marriages of any sort whatever. That was progress in the direction of radicalism. And as to the spiritual, ...
— Married • August Strindberg
... have the gift to write for children, Mr. Woodworth stands among the first; and, what is best of all, with the ability to adapt himself to the wants and comprehension of children, he has that high moral principle which will permit nothing to leave his pen that ...
— Mike Marble - His Crotchets and Oddities. • Uncle Frank
... rules, will speedily be made aware that the English language "super-abounds in short syllables." Why then should we rigidly adhere to rules repugnant to the genius of our language, if they can be modified so as to adapt the sonorous Hexameter to the structure of our mother-tongue? Can they be so modified? I have attempted it. I venture to change ...
— Legends of the Northwest • Hanford Lennox Gordon
... sympathy with those at a distance, and not simply upon the desire to make them hear. Short passages of a vital and animated nature should be practised with varying degrees of radiation, so that the consciousness of the student may adapt itself to the idea of including in his sympathies a larger or smaller number of people. The thought of sympathy with, or nearness to, those addressed is a most important principle in the development of this power. It is never the ...
— Expressive Voice Culture - Including the Emerson System • Jessie Eldridge Southwick
... not wholly bad, too good to be good enough. But the long practice had given him a certain mastery of technique, and when she had set his brain on fire he had had less trouble than most young playwrights in compelling his imagination to adapt itself to the inexorable framework. He had always felt that the imagination, what is called, for want of a better term, the "creative faculty," was there, but it was lethargic; it sometimes roused itself to spurts ...
— Black Oxen • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... appearance; but it lacked the little tokens of love which oft-times turn the sick chamber into a kind of paradise. No flowers, no little contrivances for amusement, no delicate article of food to tempt his sickly appetite. Poor Joe! Edith soon saw this, and yet it needs experience in illness to adapt one's self to sick nursing. Besides she was afraid, she did not like to offer books and flowers, and these visits were quite dreaded ...
— Emilie the Peacemaker • Mrs. Thomas Geldart
... you consider this, it is the most serious fact of the whole incident—far more disquieting in reality than the fact of the speech itself, especially when we remember that Lord Roberts did but adopt and adapt the arguments already used with more sensationalism and less courtesy ...
— Peace Theories and the Balkan War • Norman Angell
... his attention before it dawned upon one person at least that neither Madam nor Mrs Eleanor had much to do with his frequent visits to Cressingham. Mrs Dorothy Jennings quickly noticed that Mr Welles was quite clever enough to discover what pleased different persons, and to adapt himself accordingly with surprising facility; and she soon perceived that the attraction was Rhoda, or rather Rhoda's prospects as the understood heiress of White-Ladies. Mr Welles accommodated himself skilfully to the prejudices of Madam; his manners assumed a graver and ...
— The Maidens' Lodge - None of Self and All of Thee, (In the Reign of Queen Anne) • Emily Sarah Holt
... conservatory I had often used it for watching my wife,—not of course with any miserable design of playing the spy upon, her,—but to observe her various moods, in order to adapt, my own conduct and the progress of my system to them. One night, after we had entertained a party of visitors, whom I had made instruments of torture to my wife by their common-place eulogies of Frank's contributions, I ascended my perch in the conservatory. ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol I, Issue I, January 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... using the term in its broader sense as applied to the natives of the province of Kuangtung, are the Catalans of China. They are as enterprising as the Scotch, adapt themselves as readily to circumstances, are enduring, canny, and successful; you meet them in the most distant parts of China. They make wonderful pilgrimages on foot. They have the reputation of being the most quick-witted of all Chinese. ...
— An Australian in China - Being the Narrative of a Quiet Journey Across China to Burma • George Ernest Morrison
... our study? On the whole, decidedly favorable to the Italian, while recognizing the vicious and undesirable element that forms a comparatively small part of the whole. The Italian in general is approachable, receptive to American ideas, not criminal by nature more than other races, not difficult to adapt himself to new environment, and eager to earn and learn. He furnishes excellent raw material for American citizenship, if he does not come too rapidly to be Americanized. But what he will mean to America, for good or ill, depends almost wholly upon what America ...
— Aliens or Americans? • Howard B. Grose
... to London, and met two persons of distinction, the Regent and Lord Byron. There seems to be a little doubt whether George did or did not adapt the joke of the hanging judge, about 'checkmating this time,' to the authorship of the Waverley novels; but there is no doubt that he was very civil. With Byron Scott was at once on very good terms, for Scott was ...
— Sir Walter Scott - Famous Scots Series • George Saintsbury
... that ancient time," says Carlyle,[24] "when man was in his childhood, when the universe within was divided by no wall of adamant from the universe without, and the forms of the Spirit mingled and dwelt in trustful sisterhood with the forms of the Sense, was not easy to seize and adapt with any fitness of application to the feelings of modern minds. It was to penetrate into the inmost shrines of Imagination, where human passion and action are reflected in dim and fitful, but deeply significant resemblances, and to copy these with the guileless, humble ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... "adaptive-morphological characters." The former reveal no relation to utility, they are innate and distinguish the organism from other organisms; the latter can be explained by means of certain vital functions, hence they possess a certain utility and adapt themselves more or less to environment. The former are permanent, the latter changeable. Darwinians regard all the characters of organisms as useful, physiological, and adaptive. If they have been hitherto unable to make good this assumption, ...
— At the Deathbed of Darwinism - A Series of Papers • Eberhard Dennert
... on Mr. Tucker's doing his work thoroughly well and charging a fair price. It is not possible for him to say aforehand, in such a case, what it will cost, I imagine, as he will have to adapt his work to the place. Nathan's stage knowledge may be stated in the following figures: 00000000000. Therefore, I think you had best refer Mr. Tucker to me, and I will apply all needful screws and ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 1 (of 3), 1833-1856 • Charles Dickens
... well what I mean, Phil. This is a serious time in your life. You've got to adapt yourself to the ways of the world—the world of convention. You must consider yourself as a member of society. It's only in a limited sense that we can be individualists. And I can't have my daughter weighed down with ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson
... extend about three-quarters of an inch above or below the guides, the letter O was run over about half an inch at both top and bottom, and the points of the w were made to project about the same distance. In pen lettering, however, it is possible and preferable to adapt each letter more perfectly to its individual surroundings by judgment of the eye than to rely upon any hard ...
— Letters and Lettering - A Treatise With 200 Examples • Frank Chouteau Brown
... realized when I reached my destination that I had to change my accustomed mode of living and adapt myself to such a life as people had led eighteen hundred years ago. I thought that if I took the example of the Saviour's life for my guiding star, I would certainly get along very well. Undoubtedly this would have sufficed in a spiritual sense, but I found that it would be impractical as applied ...
— Tales of Aztlan • George Hartmann
... the mind of the true teacher is: What can I do to insure the happiness of these beings confided to my charge, whose minds it is given to me to fashion, not according to my will, but according as my skill and judgment shall, more or less, enable me to adapt my teachings to their natures? What shall I seek to engrave upon the clear tablets of their young and tender minds, in order that their future lot may be a joyous one? Let me illustrate (he will say) my profession. I will raise it high as the most honored among men, and for my monument ...
— The Philosophy of Teaching - The Teacher, The Pupil, The School • Nathaniel Sands
... of little consequence whether or not the place would suit me, sir; only let me have the opportunity, and I will endeavor to adapt myself to it.' ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... which is always in my thoughts; but French rather than German, and Italian rather than French or German. The Wendlings, one and all, are of opinion that my compositions would please much in Paris. I have no fears on the subject, for, as you know, I can pretty well adapt or conform myself to any style of composition. Shortly after my arrival I composed a French song for Madlle. Gustel (the daughter), who gave me the words, and she sings it inimitably. I have the pleasure to enclose it for you. It is sung every ...
— The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, V.1. • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
... of Madame de Menon; and the pleasant gaiety of the pavilion seemed peculiarly to adapt it for the scene of social delights. On the evening of a very sultry day, having supped in their favorite spot, the coolness of the hour, and the beauty of the night, tempted this happy party to remain there later than usual. Returning home, they were ...
— A Sicilian Romance • Ann Radcliffe
... and stern as she fixed them on Mr. Allen. "I wonder I believe any thing you say, Mr. Allen. How many things do you keep back from me, or state differently from what they are, to save my feelings? or to adapt the truth to my feebleness, which is not like the feebleness of old age, to be sure, but is feebleness in comparison with your knowledge and strength? I hate, hate, hate, your theories about deceiving people. I shall certainly tell my mother, if I keep on ...
— Mercy Philbrick's Choice • Helen Hunt Jackson
... offence to one party, and triumph to the other. Many must doubtless have escaped our notice; but enough remains to shew the singular felicity with which Dryden, in the present instance, as in that of "Absalom and Achitophel," could adapt the narrative of ancient or foreign transactions to the political events of his own time, and "moralize two meanings in one word." Altogether abstracted from this consideration, the "Duke of Guise," as a historical play, possesses merit amply sufficient to rescue it from ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Vol. 7 (of 18) - The Duke of Guise; Albion and Albanius; Don Sebastian • John Dryden
... entertaining. I cannot answer you in one word -, because there are two ways, as there are two sorts of readers. I should therefore say, to please antiquaries of judgment, as you have treated them, with arguments and proofs; but, if you would adapt antiquities to the taste of those who read only to be diverted, not to be instructed, the nostrum is very easy and short. You must divert them in the true sense of the word diverto; you must turn them out of the way, you must treat them with digressions nothing ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... read his Gospel more diligently of late, and had taken comfort from those sublime pages. Do they not contain consolation, hope, promise for all—for the weary man of the world as well as for the saint? There is to be found the only creed that can adapt itself to every condition of life, and has a margin wide enough for every weakness of erring humanity. Buddhism may contain a scheme of morality almost as perfect; Mahomet may have expounded hopes that seem well-nigh as divine; but in the Gospel is the only ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon
... however, Fannie was still a tender care in the memory of John March—if we may adapt one of his mother's gracefulest verses. He went to his hotel fairly oppressed with the conviction that for Fannie's own sake it was his duty to drop a few brief lines to Barbara Garnet—ahem! Mr. March's throat was absolutely sound, ...
— John March, Southerner • George W. Cable
... theoretically, only the exact Roman form sloped, and with such changes as are necessitated by the sloping of the letters. Practically, however, it will be found that certain alterations in the outlines of the Roman letters must be made after giving them a slope in order to adapt them to their new requirements of inter-juxtaposition; and, by a reflex action, when words in Italic capitals are used in the same panel with upright Roman letters, certain variations must be made in the latter, such as accenting the Roman O in the same fashion as the ...
— Letters and Lettering - A Treatise With 200 Examples • Frank Chouteau Brown
... he proposed was "that the present state of the representation of this country in parliament requires the most serious consideration of this house." In his speech on this occasion he laid down two premises: first, "that it was a matter of paramount importance to adapt every government to the wants and wishes, the prejudices and existing circumstances of the country for which it was intended; and that the people of this country had arrived at a degree of knowledge, intelligence, and wealth, which made them a ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... without our apergetic outfits even on Jupiter, for, though our weight will be more than doubled, we can take off one quarter of the whole by remaining near the equator, their rapid rotation having apparently been given providentially to all the large planets. Nature will adapt herself to this change, as to all others, very readily. Although the reclamation of the vast areas of the North American Arctic Archipelago, Alaska, Siberia, and Antarctic Wilkes Land, from the death-grip of the ice in which they have been held will relieve the pressure of population ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds • J. J. Astor
... class in civil government, is not confined to the pupils. The teacher will find the exercise both interesting and profitable to himself. Although pains have been taken to adapt the work to the capacities of youth, the definition of many terms and phrases, and the further explanation of many subjects, have necessarily been left to be supplied by teachers. The study and investigation which may in some cases be required to qualify them for the task, will be amply rewarded ...
— The Government Class Book • Andrew W. Young
... 181, 182, 183).—The outlining, padding and button-holing of these scallops is executed in the manner already described. Be careful to adapt the length of the stitches to the shape and size of the scallops. If they are pointed (figs. 182, 183), the stitches will have to be set very closely together on the inner line, and a little play allowed them on the outer, to come exactly ...
— Encyclopedia of Needlework • Therese de Dillmont
... Teutonic order were chiefly from South Germany, the inferior colonists from Low Germany of the Elbe, Weser and Rhine. Hence the necessity for a lingua communis, a mode of expression that should adapt itself to the needs of a mixed population. The dialect which proved itself most available was one which stood midway between High (South) and Low (North) German, and which itself might almost be called a linguistic compromise—namely, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XVII. No. 101. May, 1876. • Various
... ashamed to possess, and the mere mention of which should cause a painful blush."[33] The average unthinking woman accepts the incongruity of this opposition without question, and grows accustomed to adapt herself to each of the incompatibles according to circumstances. The more thoughtful woman works out a private theory of her own. But in very many cases this mischievous opposition exerts a subtly perverting influence on the whole outlook ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... enough to show that the time has come when novelists, if they do not wish to be left behind in the race, must adapt themselves to modern conditions. One does not wish to threaten, but, as I say, we astigmatics are in a large minority and can, if we get together, make our presence felt. Roused by this article to a sense of the injustice of their treatment, the great army of glass-wearing ...
— A Wodehouse Miscellany - Articles & Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... separated, Lodloe going to his room and Calthea walking towards the summer-house. She had come that day to the Squirrel Inn with a purpose; she was going to be taught by Mr. Tippengray. In this world we must adapt ourselves to circumstances, and she was going to adapt herself to the Greek scholar's hobby. She was a sensible woman, and did not for a moment purpose to ask him to teach her the dead languages, philosophy, ...
— The Squirrel Inn • Frank R. Stockton
... the disagreeable temper and offensive manners of many. I well understand that it requires great prudence and skill for a man, living among social vices of every sort, so many and so serious, to avoid giving offence, causing scandal, or falling into traps, and in his single person to adapt himself to such a vast variety of character, speech, and feeling. Wherefore, I say again and again, go on persistently in the path you have begun: put yourself above rivalry in eloquence; it is by this that people at Rome ...
— The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1 - The Whole Extant Correspodence in Chronological Order • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... his own, by a fire which was solely his property, in a room which was nobody else's paradise! He could imagine so well how she would regard such a state of affairs as a nice little joke, and would pretend to adapt herself to her position with divers daring witcheries practised upon himself to the dethroning of his reason; how she would make innocent, wicked speeches, and be coaxing and dazzling and mock-matronly by turns; and above all, how she would enjoy ...
— Vagabondia - 1884 • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... very slight a modification will suffice to render Mr. Ricardo's doctrine completely true. It is even doubtful whether he himself, if called upon to adapt his expressions to this peculiar case, would not have so explained his doctrine as to ...
— Essays on some unsettled Questions of Political Economy • John Stuart Mill
... messes into which we have divided our party leaving to each the care of preserving and the discretion of using it, but we find that they make such prodigal use of it when they hapen to have a tolerable stock on hand that we have determined to adapt a different system with our present stock of seven Elk; this is to jerk it & issue it ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al
... working class, built up, as they hold, through long years, for the protection of their own standards of life, and, on the other, in the slowness of many of the smaller English employers (I am astonished, however, at the notable exceptions everywhere!) to realise new needs and processes, and to adapt themselves to them. Could any one have made such an omelet without breaking a great many eggs? Is it wonderful that the employers have sometimes felt themselves unbearably hustled, sometimes misunderstood, ...
— The War on All Fronts: England's Effort - Letters to an American Friend • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... deformed and had an impediment in her speech, which made her unavailable as a reader. The other two, Mary and Deborah, might now have been of inestimable service to their father, had their dispositions led them to adapt themselves to his needs, and the circumstances of the house. Unfortunate it was for Milton, that his biblical views on the inferiority of woman had been reduced to practice in the bringing up of his own daughters. It cannot indeed be said that the poet whose imagination created the Eve ...
— Milton • Mark Pattison
... If one has the placing of the trees, he may see that they are not scattered aimlessly; but if good trees are already growing on the place, it would be folly to think of removing them merely because they are not in the best ideal positions; in such case, it may be very necessary to adapt the treatment of the area to the trees. The home-maker should always consider, also, the planting of a few trees in such places as to shade and protect the residence: the more closely they can be made ...
— Manual of Gardening (Second Edition) • L. H. Bailey
... past on the stream of sensation; it is the cement that binds into an edifice seemingly of adamant the loose sand of isolated perceptions. Deprived of the knowledge which this tendency procures for us we should be powerless to foresee the succession of phenomena and so to adapt ourselves to it. We should be bewildered by the apparent disorder and confusion of everything, we should toss on a sea without a rudder, we should wander in an endless maze without a clue, and finding no way out of it, or, in plain words, unable to avoid a single one of the ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer
... from the men who think that we are confronted by facts, not theories, and that theories must be given up in the face of opposing facts; who think that the Church in her wisdom must rise up to meet this opportunity and responsibility, must adapt and adjust her system to the facts; who say that if a negro Bishop is acknowledged to be the best means to Christianize and save the negroes, then we must have a negro Bishop. This answer, again, ...
— Church work among the Negroes in the South - The Hale Memorial Sermon No. 2 • Robert Strange
... not only received and sold fish for the Friday markets of northern Europe, but sold all kinds of manufactured goods. It was said that they had two sets of scales—one for buying and one for selling. Norwegians had either to adapt themselves to the new methods or give their sons to the ceaseless battle of the open sea. From the Baltic and Icelandic fisheries, the North Sea and the Lofoden Islands, their ships got the heaviest and the hardest of ...
— Days of the Discoverers • L. Lamprey
... favourite son, and Henry was indeed a brilliant boy. The versatility of his genius was surprising, and the visitors at Plumstead Episcopi were often amazed at the marvellous manner in which he would, when called on, adapt his capacity to apparently most uncongenial pursuits. He appeared once before a large circle as Luther the reformer, and delighted them with the perfect manner in which he assumed the character; and within three days he again astonished them by acting ...
— The Warden • Anthony Trollope
... always the way with these really great people, my dear," she said with effusion. "I have always noticed that the nobility are condescending; they adapt themselves so entirely to their surroundings." Miss Joliffe fell into a common hyperbole in qualifying an isolated action as a habit. She had never before been brought face to face with a peer, yet she represented ...
— The Nebuly Coat • John Meade Falkner
... young woman of Rosella's complexity, of her extreme sensitiveness, could have conceived "Patroclus," nor could she herself hope to complete it successfully at any other period of her life. Any earlier she would have been too immature to adapt herself to its demands; any later she would have lost the spontaneity, the jeunesse, and the freshness which were to contribute ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various
... administer in the least degree to their self-love; and when I would be a little complaisant, a Master, more powerful than myself, restrains me. I cannot give such persons any other place in my heart, than God gives them. I cannot adapt myself to their superficial state, neither respond to their professions of friendship; these are ...
— Letters of Madam Guyon • P. L. Upham
... and a half of cataclysmic events, the Constitution has successfully withstood test after test. No crisis—foreign or domestic—has impaired its vitality. The system of checks and balances which it sets up has enabled the growing nation to adapt itself to every need and at the same time to checkrein every bid ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... in detail from old sources or new, it is well to explain that as a rule only those showing some attempt to adapt the drawing to a child's taste have been selected. Mere dull transcripts of facts please children no less; but here space forbids their inclusion. Otherwise nearly all modern illustration would ...
— Children's Books and Their Illustrators • Gleeson White
... see much of her after I grew up. I moved away from the old county. Most others did the same. It had been desolated by the war, and got poorer and poorer. With an old maid's usual crankiness and inability to adapt herself to the order of things, Cousin Fanny remained behind. She refused to come away; said, I believe, she had to look after the old place, mammy, and Fash, or some such nonsense. I think she had some idea that the church would go down, or that the poor people around would miss her, or something ...
— The Burial of the Guns • Thomas Nelson Page
... that the book is in no sense intended as a rival to the many and excellent manuals of bacteriology at present in use, but aims only at supplementing the usually scanty details of technique, and at instructing the student how to fit up and adapt apparatus for his daily work, and how to carry out thoroughly and systematically the various bacterioscopical analyses that are daily demanded of the bacteriologist ...
— The Elements of Bacteriological Technique • John William Henry Eyre
... pieces, as does also the automatic breech-closing and firing mechanism. In fact there is no pronounced deviation from the prevailing Krupp system, and only such modifications as are necessary to adapt the arm to its special duty. When the gun is elevated to high angles the shell, after insertion the breech is prevented from slipping out by means of a special device, so that the proper and automatic closing of the breech is not impaired in ...
— Aeroplanes and Dirigibles of War • Frederick A. Talbot
... of the ordinary thickness such an action has never been experienced; nor is it the fact, that the intermediate shaft of steam vessels, to which part alone the motion is communicated by the engine, requires to adapt itself to the altering forms of the vessel, as the engine and intermediate shaft are rigidly connected, although the paddle shaft requires to be capable of such an adaptation. Even if this objection ...
— A Catechism of the Steam Engine • John Bourne
... enough. But he no doubt recollected his having rated me for supposing that he could be at all disconcerted by any company, and he therefore resolutely set himself to behave quite as an easy man of the World, who could adapt himself at once to the disposition and manners of those whom he might ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Vol. V (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland III • Various
... described very amusingly the entrance into the new home, the furnishing, the discovery of all the beauties and advantages which we found as an old possession in Keilhau, and the endeavour, so characteristic of Middendorf, to adapt even the less attractive points to his own ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... already managed to get into intelligent society, donated something to some enterprise or another and thus at once came to the front. Judging from his face, he is a sharper of the highest degree, but he will play a prominent part, for he knows how to adapt himself. Yes, friend, Africashka is a liberal. And a liberal merchant is a mixture of a wolf and a pig with a ...
— Foma Gordyeff - (The Man Who Was Afraid) • Maxim Gorky
... masters and servants, high and low, who live in ease and respectability very many there are; but of those who exercise any forethought, or make any provision, there is not even one. In their daily wants, their extravagances, and their expenditure, they are also unable to adapt themselves to circumstances and practise economy; (so that though) the present external framework may not have suffered any considerable collapse, their purses have anyhow begun to feel an exhausting process! But this is a mere trifle. There is another ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... demand will not be made in vain. For more than a hundred years, in the time of the Company and under the rule of the Crown, the Indian Civil Service has never failed to respond to whatever call has been made upon it or to adapt itself to the changing environment of the time. I feel no doubt that officers will be found who possess the natural gifts, the loyalty, the imagination, and the force of character which will be requisite for the conduct of the administration under ...
— Indian speeches (1907-1909) • John Morley (AKA Viscount Morley)
... Old Michael for a time or two. It seemed at first as if he were to be a favourite. He could adapt himself with all the art of his race. And before Lancaster he was intensely Southern in his views, whipping the North in many a broguey strife. Until—it befell through a slip of the tongue—a slip that sent him packing off. For he boasted how, in ...
— The Plow-Woman • Eleanor Gates
... the long procession of the ages, naturalists have been constantly striving to find the connecting link between them all, and to prove that each such creation has been a normal and natural growth out of the preceding one. With this aim they have tried to adapt the phenomena of reproduction among animals to the problem of creation, and to make the beginning of life in the individual solve that great mystery of the beginning of life in the world. In other words, they have endeavored ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 61, November, 1862 • Various
... be Episcopalians, others Presbyterians, and others Nonconformists of all denominations. Many exerted their talents in the invention of new sects, and they were certain to gain proselytes, being well versed in the study of human nature. They knew thoroughly how to adapt the principles they advocated, and the tenets they taught, to the tastes of their hearers, and there can be no doubt that the rise of the many strange sects which appeared at different times, from the accession of Elizabeth, was owing to the efforts of these Popish emissaries. ...
— John Deane of Nottingham - Historic Adventures by Land and Sea • W.H.G. Kingston
... one of those names which appear from time to time in the theatrical gossip of the newspapers as having adapted, or as being about to adapt, something or other for the stage which was not meant for the stage. It had never, however, appeared on the playbills of the theatres; except once, when, at a benefit matinee, the great John Pilgrim, whom to mention is to worship, had recited verses specially ...
— A Great Man - A Frolic • Arnold Bennett
... impressed that, if he himself could only imitate, however minutely, the phlegm of a machine, he might learn to ape something of its efficiency and so, ultimately, prove himself of some worth to the world—and, incidentally, to Nathaniel Duncan. Thus far his spasmodic attempts to adapt to the requirements and limitations of the world of business his own equipment of misfit inclinations and ill-assorted abilities, had unanimously turned out signal failures. So he envied Spaulding ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... officer of a brave and even temerarious disposition. He greeted the news with delight, and hastened to make ready. Long practice and a varied acquaintance of life had given him a singular facility in disguise; he could adapt not only his face and bearing, but his voice and almost his thoughts, to those of any rank, character, or nation; and in this way he diverted attention from the Prince, and sometimes gained admission for the pair into strange ...
— New Arabian Nights • Robert Louis Stevenson
... 'Pilly!' among the ruins; he dug trenches, and we jumped them; we had to be dragged by the legs from beneath his engines, he sunk wells, and in we went. But though there were never circumstances to which boys could not adapt themselves in half an hour, older folk are slower in the uptake, and I am sure they stood and gaped at the changes so suddenly being worked in our midst, and scarce knew their way home now in the dark. Where had been formerly but the click of the shuttle was soon the roar of 'power,' ...
— Margaret Ogilvy • James M. Barrie
... Lord Verulam, "is man added to Nature" (homo additus naturae); and we may modernize his statement, and adapt it to the demands of aesthetics, if we define art to be Nature infused with and shaped by the imaginative faculty of man; thus, as Bacon says elsewhere, "conforming the shows of things to the desires of the mind." Art always platonizes: it results from a certain ...
— The Function Of The Poet And Other Essays • James Russell Lowell
... command over their machinery, that no new-comer, however well provided, or however skilful generally, can expect to cope with them. Hence it arises, that boats of a man-of-war are found almost invariably inferior, in some respects, to those of the port at which she touches. The effect of seeking to adapt our boats to any one particular place would be to render them less serviceable upon the whole. After remaining some time at a place, we might succeed in occasionally outsailing or outrowing the natives; but what sort of a figure would our boats cut at the next point ...
— The Lieutenant and Commander - Being Autobigraphical Sketches of His Own Career, from - Fragments of Voyages and Travels • Basil Hall
... Kimberley brought out the weak side of his character, his egotism and impatience, his lack of power to adapt himself even temporarily to unaccustomed conditions, it will be remembered that these defects were inherent and that his marvellous success in life had accentuated them. The acts of a public man are so variously regarded by his opponents and his admirers, ...
— A Handbook of the Boer War • Gale and Polden, Limited
... heart not at all. Of course your wishes shall be my law, and my wishes will lead me to seek your acquaintance with deep and undisguised interest. You see the trouble with me is that I have not changed, and it will require a little time for me to adapt myself to the new order of things. I am now somewhat stunned and paralyzed. In this imbecile state I am both stupid and selfish. I ought to congratulate you, and so I do with all the shattered forces of my mind and reason. You have improved amazingly. You are destined to become a belle ...
— A Young Girl's Wooing • E. P. Roe
... intelligent men could persuade themselves that Ireland was chiefly suffering from want of understanding and want of sympathy on the part of England, when all the time her only ailment has been want of liberty. To adapt the organ-grinder's motto, ...
— The Art of Letters • Robert Lynd
... the expedition to the Highlands were very small. I had gone there to paint detailed work from nature, when I ought to have gone to sketch, and so adapt my work to the peculiar character of ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... enough, too. He approached Redclyffe without hesitation, and, lifting his hat, addressed him in a way that made Edward wonder whether he could be an Englishman. If so, he must have known that Edward was an American, and have been trying to adapt his manners to those of a ...
— Doctor Grimshawe's Secret - A Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... admired him tremendously," Mrs. Carew went on to say. "He said that he was one of the cleverest men in France, but that he had fallen in a wrong season, and would not adapt himself. Had France been a monarchy, the Vicomte d'Audierne would have been ...
— The Slave Of The Lamp • Henry Seton Merriman
... ambition seemed to possess the players on this afternoon. They appeared to adapt themselves to the conditions much more readily than at any time in the past It might be the steady work of the coach was beginning to make itself shown; and that the boys who remained, under the belief that they ...
— Jack Winters' Gridiron Chums • Mark Overton
... stern integrity and the dignity of unsullied honor will attain them only rarely and by accident. To be able to serve the country well, will cease to be a reason why the great and wise and learned should be selected to render service. Other qualifications, less honorable, will be more available. To adapt one's opinions to the popular humor; to defend, apologize for, and justify the popular follies; to advocate the expedient and the plausible; to caress, cajole, and flatter the elector; to beg like a spaniel for his vote, even if he be a negro three removes ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... eccentric proceeding on the part of either rivers or creeks. Unless the fish are prepared to shift their liquid quarters at a moment's notice they will find themselves often left high and dry on the deserted shingle-bed. But eels are proverbially accustomed to adapt themselves to circumstances, and a fisherman may always count on getting some if he ...
— Station Amusements • Lady Barker
... a metamorphosis would naturally transfer themselves more easily to a new residence, as they had only themselves and not at the same time multifarious young forms to adapt to the new conditions. But in the case of animals with a metamorphosis, the mortality among the larvae, always considerable, must have become still greater under new than under accustomed conditions, every step towards the simplification of the process of development must therefore ...
— Facts and Arguments for Darwin • Fritz Muller
... journey will be a long one, and every attempt to hurry it will only prolong it further; it will throw us back for years, or it may be decades. Above all things, we must know whither we are going. In order to adapt ourselves to a new form of society we must know what it may look like, what it ought to look like, and what it will look like. We shall find that Germany is not going to be landed in an earthly Paradise, but in a world ...
— The New Society • Walther Rathenau
... you chance to jar the string among those who are either above or below your own height, instead of subscribing to your doctrine, they will tie you fast, call you mad, and feed you with bread and water. It is therefore a point of the nicest conduct to distinguish and adapt this noble talent with respect to the differences of persons and of times. Cicero understood this very well, when, writing to a friend in England, with a caution, among other matters, to beware of being cheated by our hackney-coachmen (who, it seems, in those days were as arrant rascals as they are ...
— A Tale of a Tub • Jonathan Swift
... rate to the new conditions, or being exposed to them in different degrees, a wide and almost unparalleled dissimilarity has today arisen between the different individuals composing our societies; where, side by side with men and women who have rapidly adapted or are so successfully seeking to adapt themselves to the new conditions of knowledge and new conditions of life, that, were they to reappear in future ages in more co-ordinated societies, they might perhaps hardly appear wholly antiquated, are to be found men and women whose social, religious, and moral ideals would not constitute ...
— Woman and Labour • Olive Schreiner
... often remove to other states, and by commercial and other dealings and social associations they mix together, so that, notwithstanding the dissimilarity of conditions in different states, the people easily adapt themselves to the local surroundings, and, so far as I can find, no friction or quarrel has ever arisen between two states. However, would it not be better for all the states to appoint an interstate committee to revise and codify their laws with a ...
— America Through the Spectacles of an Oriental Diplomat • Wu Tingfang
... amid the waves of the world, truly and exactly performing all parts of our duty. 'Tis, peradventure, more easy to keep clear of the sex than to maintain one's self aright in all points in the society of a wife; and a man may with less trouble adapt himself to entire abstinence than to the due dispensation of abundance. Use, carried on according to reason, has in it more of difficulty than abstinence; moderation is a virtue that gives more work than suffering; the well ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... proper time. The child cannot use its limbs properly, although these are right enough in shape and size. The cure for this is persistent gentle rubbing with warm oil, as recommended above, over the whole body, but especially over the back. Feel for the muscles and bones, and adapt your hand to their shape, going down into the hollows immediately on each side of the spine, and paying particular attention to the upper part in the failure of the arms, and the lower part in failure of the legs. This rubbing is a most powerful ...
— Papers on Health • John Kirk
... touch of the philosopher in him. He had the ability to adapt himself to circumstances. It had been no part of his plans to come whizzing down off the rail into this singularly soup-like water which tasted in equal parts of oil and dead rats; but, now that he was here he was prepared to make the best of the situation. ...
— Three Men and a Maid • P. G. Wodehouse
... a learned mendicant author! The scenes which are here exhibited appear to have disordered an intellect which had never been firm; in vain our author attempted to adapt his talents to all orders of men, still "To the crazy ship all ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... paper, and on the opposite page were copied out extracts of translations from illustrative authors, often as many as eight to a single sermon, so that he had in fact a huge secretion of stores, which he could adapt according to the needs of his congregation, and he made notes of what he found fall flat and incomprehensible, or what he felt was stirring the souls of his audience; and this time was most profitably spent, not only for his immediate congregation, but in laying up a provision for the busier days ...
— Pioneers and Founders - or, Recent Workers in the Mission field • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... premise—a mere begging of the very question in dispute. Did Atheists admit the universe was contrived, designed, or adapted, they could not deny there must have been at least one Being to contrive, design, or adapt; but they see no analogy between a watch made with hands out of something, and a universe made without hands out of nothing—Atheists are unable to perceive the least resemblance between the circumstance of one intelligent body re-forming or changing the condition of some other ...
— An Apology for Atheism - Addressed to Religious Investigators of Every Denomination - by One of Its Apostles • Charles Southwell
... adapt himself to his surroundings, nodded. "That is what you would consider a soft job in ...
— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss
... is admirably fitted up; and there must have been something very excellent and comprehensive in the domestic arrangements of the monks, since they adapt themselves so well to a state of society entirely different from that in which they originated. The library is a very comfortable room, and provocative of studious ideas, tho lounging and luxurious. It is long, and rather ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume I. - Great Britain and Ireland • Various
... man able to outwit his follows, to destroy them in physical, or ruin in financial, combat, is not therefore a superior human creature. Even physical superiority, as a fighter, does not prove the kind of vigor best calculated to resist disease, or to adapt ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... number of relationships. A reader of James Harvey Robinson's MIND IN THE MAKING will find it very reasonable to define a civilization as a system of society-making ideas at issue with reality. Just so far as the system of ideas meets the needs and conditions of survival or is able to adapt itself to the needs and conditions of survival of the society it dominates, so far will that society continue and prosper. We are beginning to realize that in the past and under different conditions from our own, societies have existed ...
— The Pivot of Civilization • Margaret Sanger
... A visitor should adapt herself to the ways of the household, be punctual at meals, and make no plans or arrangements without consulting ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... it was no good trying to fight against the consummate coolness of this young man, so with a great effort resolved to adapt himself to the exigencies of the case, and fight his adversary with his ...
— Madame Midas • Fergus Hume |
