"Retract" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... javelin of pointed steel? Why suffer that lip I have kissed a thousand times to equivocate? My daughter, let these tears sink deep into thy soul, and no longer persist in that which may be your destruction and ruin. Come, my dear child, retract your steps, and bear me company to your welcome home." Without one retorting word, or frown from her brow, she yielded to the entreaties of her mother, and with all the mildness of her former character she went along with the silver lamp of age, to the home of candor and benevolence. Her father ...
— The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories • Mark Twain
... this demand; he loved the mouse, but he detested the bride; he hesitated; he desired time to think upon the proposal. He would have been glad to consult his friends on such an occasion. "Nay, nay," cried the odious fairy, "if you demur, I retract my promise; I do not desire to force my favours on any man. Here, you my attendants, (cried she, stamping with her foot,) let my machine be driven up; Barbacela, queen of Emmets, is not used to contemptuous treatment." She had no sooner spoken than her fiery chariot ...
— The Story of the White Mouse • Unknown
... his book had gone through ten editions, and the demand for it had become so great as "to call forth twenty thousand copies during the year," the prudent author, intending to veer his course according to the trade-wind, thought it expedient to retract his former acknowledgement to "our best modern philologists," and to profess himself a modifier of the Great Compiler's code. Where then holds the anchor of his praise? Let the reader say, after weighing ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... tract, tractor, intractable, abstracted, retract, protract, detract, distract, attractive, contractor, trace, trail, train, trait, portray, retreat; (2) traction, tractate, distraught, ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... Upon a simple and plain confession, the court hath nothing to do but to award judgment; but it is usually very backward in receiving and recording such confession out of tenderness to the life of the subject; and will generally advise the prisoner to retract it and plead to the indictment. 4 Blackst. Comm. 329. 2 Hale, ...
— An Essay on Professional Ethics - Second Edition • George Sharswood
... retract unreservedly what I offered on this subject in a former work (Last Twelve Verses, &c., pp. 225, 226). I was misled by one who seldom indeed misleads,—the learned editor of the Codex ...
— The Causes of the Corruption of the Traditional Text of the Holy Gospels • John Burgon
... this language unbecoming in me, and perhaps it will seal my fate. But I am here to speak the truth, whatever it may cost; I am here to regret nothing I have ever done—to retract nothing I have ever said. I am here to crave, with no lying lip the life I consecrate to the liberty of my country. Far from it, even here—here, where the thief the libertine, the murderer, have left their footprints in the dust; here on this spot, where the shadows ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... themselves into the spore or "gonidium," as Carpenter calls it, in distinction from the true sexual spores, which he terms "oospores." At the extreme end of the filament (which is obtusely conical in shape) the chlorophyl grains retract from the old cellulose wall, leaving a very evident clear space. In a less noticeable degree, this is also the case in the other parts of the circumference of the cell, and, apparently, the granular contents have secreted ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 460, October 25, 1884 • Various
... J. Twang sat down amid immense cheers; at the conclusion of which, Mr. Peter P. Pellican, from the back-woods, requested—he, Peter P. Pellican, being from Orleans—that Mr. Jonathan J. Twang would retract certain words derogatory to the state represented by Peter P. Pellican. Mr. Jonathan J. Twang replied in the following determined refusal:—"I beg to inform the last speaker, Mr. Peter P. Pellican, from the back-woods, that I'll see him tee-totatiously ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, October 23, 1841 • Various
... and asked me to do him a great service by taking it to the editor of the morning paper. If the editor refused to print it, I was to tell him that he would be answerable to Ordinsky "in person." He declared that he would never retract one word, and that he was quite prepared to lose all his pupils. In spite of the fact that nobody ever mentioned his article to him after it appeared—full of typographical errors which he thought intentional—he got a certain satisfaction from believing that the citizens of Lincoln ...
— My Antonia • Willa Sibert Cather
... "I will retract," said Leicester, whispering to me, and gazing ardently at Dorothy's ankles. "God has made something more beautiful than Mistress Vernon's arms. By Venus! I suppose that in His omnipotence He might be able to create something more beautiful ...
— Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall • Charles Major
... yield to the authority of the senate, rather than suffer the tribunitian power to be suppliantly appealed to against them. That even then, if circumstances permitted, he would still give them time to retract an opinion too pertinaciously adhered to. But since the exigences of war do not await the counsels of men, that the public weal was of deeper importance to him than the good will of his colleagues, and if the senate continued in the same sentiments, he would, on the following ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius
... laughing. 'I retract—you are sane and clear. I am sure she thinks there won't be any harm,' I ...
— A London Life; The Patagonia; The Liar; Mrs. Temperly • Henry James
... from 1827; Collected Writings, 1881; Anti-Savarese, edited with an appendix by P. Knoodt), who in 1857 was compelled to retract his views, invokes the spirit of Descartes in opposition to the Hegelian pantheism. In agreement with Descartes, Guenther starts from self-consciousness (in the ego being and thought are identical), and brings not only the Creator ...
— History Of Modern Philosophy - From Nicolas of Cusa to the Present Time • Richard Falckenberg
... pass the worm at all. If you don't retract it wholly I shall put you down at the first tram, and let you get back to Bloomsbury ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page
... them the sins for which his judgments were sent upon them. The sins which he charged upon them in all his visitation are upon record. Let any man find involuntary slavery in any of God's indictments against them, and I will retract ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various
... to its effect upon his earthly reputation, his attitude is not wholly clear. Much elegiac verse expresses such stereotyped sorrow for a departed bard that it is not significant. In other cases, one seems to overhear the gasp of relief from a patron whom time can never force to retract his superlative ...
— The Poet's Poet • Elizabeth Atkins
... I am not returning to England to retract what I said to Nugent. I still leave him free to plead his own cause with Lucilla in his own person. I am still resolved not to distress myself and distress them, by returning to Dimchurch. But I have a longing that nothing can subdue, ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins
... limited power, may err without causing great mischief in the State. Congress may decide amiss without destroying the Union, because the electoral body in which Congress originates may cause it to retract its decision by changing its members. But if the Supreme Court is ever composed of imprudent men or bad citizens, the Union may be plunged into anarchy ...
— Democracy In America, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alexis de Tocqueville
... them to renounce their principles, if they bore fresh in their mind all the obloquy that follows "a revoke"? Would they misquote their statistics in face of the shame that attends on "a false score"? Would they be so ready to assert what they know they must retract, if they had a recent recollection of being called on "to ...
— Cornelius O'Dowd Upon Men And Women And Other Things In General - Originally Published In Blackwood's Magazine - 1864 • Charles Lever
... piqued at being justly reproved by his wife for a delinquency he had not himself remarked; irate at his wife's imputation, and fearful of having forfeited her respect, he starts out to redeem his reputation in her eyes, and to maker her retract any insinuation she had made. Erec is simply angry with himself, but he expends his wrath upon his defenceless wife until he is reassured of her love and respect ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes
... I never have been able personally to verify the fact, that the Ceylon leopard exhibits a peculiarity in being unable entirely to retract its claws ...
— Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and • James Emerson Tennent
... embarrassed in appointing this commission, between his sense of what was due to the character and services of Columbus, and his anxiety to retract with delicacy the powers vested in him. A pretext at length was furnished by the recent request of the admiral that a person of talents and probity, learned in the law, might be sent out to act as chief judge; and that an impartial umpire might ...
— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving
... said, at first utterly denied the substitution, but he insinuated that, plied with questions, and overcome by the evidence, she had, in a moment of despair, confessed all, declaring, soon after, that she would retract and deny this confession, being resolved at all hazards that her son ...
— The Widow Lerouge - The Lerouge Case • Emile Gaboriau
... how easily the exigencies of party mould men, and how readily under that pressure they unsay their maxims, and retract their principles. The object of the commercial treaty was, to put our commerce in some degree on a fair footing with that of France. The object of Mr Grey's rhetoric was, to show that the commercial treaty was altogether ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847 • Various
... waiting, sir!' shrieked the exquisite. 'S'death, sir! This toucheth mine honour very nearly! I have seen blood flow, yes, sir, and wounds gape on less provocation. Retract, sir, retract!' ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... refutations of his arguments had appeared; the Parliament of Paris burned the book, and the Grand Vicar of the archdiocese of Mechlin threw him into prison and kept him there until he was forced, not only to retract his statements, ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... are not young men; we must not be so hasty. You carry things with too high a hand, as veteran officers are apt to do. Sir, I make allowance for you; I retract my menace, and apologize. We move in different spheres of life, Sir, or I would ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore
... endeavour to prevent litigious suits, and conciliate differences. And no suit is to be commenced before the parties have discussed the dispute at their weekly meeting. If a reconciliation should, in consequence, take place, it is to be registered, and the parties are not allowed to retract. ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... ultimate reprieve, as none but the supposed impenitent sorcerers were executed. Thus only the truthful and conscientious suffered from the effects of this odious insanity. Some among the wretched people who had confessed witchcraft showed a subsequent disposition to retract. A man named Samuel Wardmell, having solemnly recanted his former statement, was tried, condemned, and executed. Despite this terrible warning, a few others followed the conscientious but fatal example. Every one of the sufferers ...
— The Conquest of Canada (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Warburton
... inexpressiveness, want of character, want of charm—is flatly a falsehood.[509] Neither mouth nor eyes can beat it in that respect; and if it has less variety individually, it gives perhaps more general character to the face than either. However, he is, if I mistake not, obliged to retract partially ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... extreme degree of depressive retardation. [This possibility has been discussed in the chapter on Affect.] His description seems perhaps to include cases which we would regard as perplexity states or absorbed manias. Activity is reduced, they lie in bed mute, do not answer, may retract shyly at any approach, but on the other hand may not ward off pin pricks. Sometimes there is catalepsy and lack of will, again there may be aimless resistance to external interference. They hold anything put into their hands, ...
— Benign Stupors - A Study of a New Manic-Depressive Reaction Type • August Hoch
... it is—how very hard! One can never, alas! retract one's downward steps. I am "The Count's Chauffeur," and shall, I suppose, continue to remain so until the black day when we all fall into the hands of ...
— The Count's Chauffeur • William Le Queux
... little, which I thought most essential to remember. I am willing to say nothing more about his case, until his execution; if I am satisfied it will be beneficial to the community, as well as Wyatt. But to retract one syllable, I cannot, unless I find myself mistaken, in which case I will make any ...
— Secret Band of Brothers • Jonathan Harrington Green
... my dear Reginald, and you are deprived of your rightful inheritance, it will be my pride and joy to try and make amends to you for your loss of fortune; and I am very sure that my father would not retract his promise under any circumstances which may occur." ...
— The Young Rajah • W.H.G. Kingston
... secure.'—'Well,' returned I, 'if what you tell me be true, and if I am to be a beggar, it shall never make me a rascal, or induce me to disavow my principles. I'll go this moment and inform the company of my circumstances; and as for the argument, I even here retract my former concessions in the old gentleman's favour, nor will I allow him now to be an husband in any ...
— The Vicar of Wakefield • Oliver Goldsmith
... passed my word to grant it; I cannot retract," she answered him, after a pause. "I will press nothing more on you. But—as an obligation to me—can you find no way in which a rouleau of gold would benefit ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]
... spoken warmly for it in private conversation with the Prince, condemned this resolution, and endeavoured to instil some suspicion of the courage and fidelity of those who had promoted it. The Prince was easily persuaded that he had been too complaisant in consenting to a retreat, but would not retract the consent he had given, unless he could bring back those to whom he had given it over to his own sentiments; which he hoped he might be able to do, since the Secretary had altered his opinion. With this view he called another meeting of the Council, in the evening, but found all the rest, ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume III. • Mrs. Thomson
... but hurried on. "You would forgive could you read my heart. No matter. Every sentiment in that letter, except those which conveyed admiration, I retract. Be mine, and instead of presuming to check in you the irresistible impulse of genius to the first place in the head or the heart of the world, I teach myself to encourage, to share, to exult in it. Do you know what ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... side, the true interests of mankind. If any false opinion, embraced from appearances, has been found to prevail; as soon as farther experience and sounder reasoning have given us juster notions of human affairs, we retract our first sentiment, and adjust anew the boundaries of moral ...
— An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals • David Hume
... offender in mind," replied Mr. Morton more evenly. "In a case of this kind we must proceed with such absolute caution and reserve that we will not be obliged to retract afterwards in ...
— The High School Captain of the Team - Dick & Co. Leading the Athletic Vanguard • H. Irving Hancock
... tempt me not too far," exclaimed Nigel, his cheek flushing, and springing towards him, his hand upon his half-drawn sword. "By heaven, wert thou not my mother's son, I would compel thee to retract these words, injurious, unjust! How darest thou judge me coward, till my cowardice is proved? Thy blood is not ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar
... at least, dear Anna, go to London,' I said, 'and implore my mother to retract this wish, unsay her words. I would rather give up the world, than take it without your cheerful acquiescence. Your happiness is every thing to me. You shall decide ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various
... Huon to Charlemagne. The Emperor, however, listening to nothing but his resentment and grief for the death of his son, refused to be satisfied; and under the plea that Huon had not succeeded in making his accuser retract his charge seemed resolved to confiscate his estates and to banish him forever from France. It was not till after long entreaties on the part of Duke Namo and the rest that he consented to grant Huon his pardon, under ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... you interrupted me; but my first consideration was to establish my good fame, from the imputation cast upon it by you; which imputation, I am fain to believe, was uttered in a moment of hastiness; and which, after I have explained the circumstances of the case, you will be happy to retract. However, sir, permit me to continue. The black, I have every reason to believe, is in the service of Mr. Ferguson at Fern Vale; for he came over this morning, while you were absent at the bridge, with ...
— Fern Vale (Volume 1) - or the Queensland Squatter • Colin Munro
... another hint at the same time: that as soon as the pains were gone, she would retract the confession. That hint was ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc Volume 2 • Mark Twain
... picture, and examined it with deep and minute attention for about half an hour. He then rose, and said to His Grace, Mr. West has conquered. He has treated his subject as it ought to be treated. I retract my objections against the introduction of any other circumstances into historical pictures than those which are requisite and appropriate; and I foresee that this picture will not only become one of the most popular, but occasion a revolution in ...
— The Life, Studies, And Works Of Benjamin West, Esq. • John Galt
... genuine effusion of anxiety and friendship, and will pardon me. It is not that I am more exempt from youthful folly than others. Born with a heart too susceptible for my peace, I am continually guilty of irregularities, that I immediately wish, but am unable to retract. But friendship, in however frail a bosom she resides, cannot permit her own follies to dispense her from guarding those she loves against committing ...
— Italian Letters, Vols. I and II • William Godwin
... Moors," that we envied not the eagle or any other bird his wings, and showed cause why we preferred our own feet. Had Puck wings? If he had, we retract, and would sport Puck. ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... the way you handle your private affairs it doesn't look promising for whoever employs you. No, I'll retract that, and on second thought reverse that judgment. I'll say that if you invariably put your employer's interests before your own your sole chance to succeed is to become a member of any firm you work for. I suggest that you ...
— Mixed Faces • Roy Norton
... death or remediless disgrace that awaited him, even if victorious, for having struck his superior officer, were present to the mind of the young officer in gloomy and terrible colors; but it was too late to retract. The fury of the Baron threw him off his guard—he received a mortal wound, and fell dead. The unhappy survivor stood for some seconds gazing upon the inanimate form before him; and as the features, after being convulsed for a little, settled into the iron stiffness of everlasting ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... window to pace up and down his chamber, Hannah's argument came back to him with new energy. He felt with a kind of panic that his confident answer to her might have been wrong. When a girl appeared in the archway, he moved impulsively toward her, as if to retract the command that would send her out into this land that the Lord had spoken against, but the strength and repose in her face ...
— The City of Delight - A Love Drama of the Siege and Fall of Jerusalem • Elizabeth Miller
... few principles which they have chanced upon absurdly; care not to innovate, which draws unknown inconveniences; use extreme remedies at first; and, that which doubleth all errors, will not acknowledge or retract them—like an unready horse, they ...
— The Golden Censer - The duties of to-day, the hopes of the future • John McGovern
... suddenly he threw himself on Bernard with the agility of a tiger and knocked him to the floor. From secret closets in the room sprang six able bodied men. They soon had Bernard securely bound. Belton then told Bernard that he must retract what he had said and agree to keep his revealed purpose a secret or he would never ...
— Imperium in Imperio: A Study Of The Negro Race Problem - A Novel • Sutton E. Griggs
... dark streets across town he was vaguely wondering whether Jane's eyes would ever lose the pained, hopeless expression he had last seen in them. He wondered whether she would retract her avowal that she could not be his wife with the shame upon her; he rejoiced in her tearless, lifeless promise to hold him in no fault for ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon
... respectful apologies, or do I owe any excuses to you, who have deceived me, lied to me, who have introduced yourself here like a spy, and carried on your mean and degrading speculations up to the very moment when you thought it impossible for me to retract my word? Once more, sir, I tell you, you are mistaken in my character. I will never pardon a man who ...
— Major Frank • A. L. G. Bosboom-Toussaint
... "I should like to retract my refusal of your very kind invitation for to-morrow evening. I have explained to you my weak avoidance of crowds. I have determined to overcome it in this case, and I want your permission to ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall
... our early forefathers having been provided with these formidable weapons, will probably reveal, by sneering, the line of his descent. For though he no longer intends, nor has the power, to use these teeth as weapons, he will unconsciously retract his "snarling muscles" (thus named by Sir C. Bell) (46. The Anatomy of Expression, 1844, pp. 110, 131.), so as to expose them ready for action, like a dog ...
— The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex • Charles Darwin
... words, under such an infinite discrepancy in position, bespeak a fool as surely as a dream bespeaks overcrowded waking hours. Oh fear, then, to utter one syllable thoughtlessly or without meaning, for One listens to whom a vow once uttered must be paid, for not lightly canst thou retract the spoken vow with the excuse "It was unintentional,—it was not seriously meant." His Messenger or Angel is not so deceived; and quickly wilt thou find, in thy wrecked work and purposes astray, that it is God thou hast angered by thy light speech. Then ...
— Old Groans and New Songs - Being Meditations on the Book of Ecclesiastes • F. C. Jennings
... so much, tries to retract a little.] Disgrace was too strong a word—I didn't mean that. I'm in trouble. I'm in trouble. Good God, can't you see it? And if you love me, why ...
— The Climbers - A Play in Four Acts • Clyde Fitch
... couldn't find anything else. Pauline, in giving you what I am about to give you, I show a high appreciation of your character. I remember now what my present is. I had an awful night in consequence of it. I felt as though one of my limbs was being severed from my body. Nevertheless, my dear, I don't retract nor go back, for that is not my way. I give you this most noble gift with a distinct object. I have lately been examining all your foreheads. Although I have appeared to take little notice of you, I have watched you as day by day I have ...
— Girls of the Forest • L. T. Meade
... the daughter, shaken by the sight of her father's passion. "Fight straightforwardly for Fricka," he orders her, in the excess of bitterness; "what she has chosen I choose likewise; of what good to me is a will of my own?" "Oh, retract that word!" she beseeches, "you love Siegmund.... Never shall your discordant dual directions enlist me against him. For your own sake, I know it, I will protect the Waelsung!" At this first intimation of rebellion in his child,—this incipient ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... testimony to the sin of man, so others to his infirmity, to the limitation of human faculties and human knowledge, to the truth of the proverb, that 'to err is human.' Thus 'to retract' means properly no more than to handle again, to reconsider. And yet, so certain are we to find in a subject which we reconsider, or handle a second time, that which was at first rashly, imperfectly, inaccurately, stated, which needs therefore to ...
— On the Study of Words • Richard C Trench
... can't put any one out of here." The curate repented of his threat, but it was too late to retract, so he made a sign to his companion, who arose with regret, and the two went out together. The persons attached to them followed their example, casting looks of hatred ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... Petersburg, at Paris and Vienna, in the next three weeks, there were TE-DEUMS, Ambrosian chantings, fires-of-joy; and considerable arguing among the Gazetteers on both parts,—till the dust settled, and facts appeared as they were. To the effect: "TE DEUM non LAUDAMUS; alas no, we must retract; and it was ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVIII. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Seven-Years War Rises to a Height.—1757-1759. • Thomas Carlyle
... sorry for it," Buckingham rejoined; "but if he will retract what he has said, and express compunction, with promise of amendment in future, I will exert my influence to have ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 1 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... may or may not have a knob-like swelling. The animal within the cup may or may not be borne on a stalk, and this stalk may or may not be knobbed. The cups are colorless or brown. The animal is very contractile and may stretch half its length out of the cup or retract well into it. There is no operculum. The length of the cup varies from 70 mu to 200 mu (C. gigantea; Vag. grandis, ...
— Marine Protozoa from Woods Hole - Bulletin of the United States Fish Commission 21:415-468, 1901 • Gary N. Galkins
... beauty, rare, erect carriage, and eyes of a strange, violet-gray, full of much meaning. This was all Pinckney had time to note; it was no one he had ever seen before. He had gone up like a hunter, sure of his game, and too far in it to retract. The embarrassment of the situation was such that Pinckney forgot all his cleverness of manner, and blurted out the ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various
... the Utilitarian Philosophy, which, when they first appeared, attracted some notice, but which are not in the American editions. He has however determined to omit these papers, not because he is disposed to retract a single doctrine which they contain, but because he is unwilling to offer what might be regarded as an affront to the memory of one from whose opinions he still widely dissents, but to whose talents and virtues he admits that he formerly did not do ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Contibutions to Knight's Quarterly Magazine] • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... me. Choose now, and abide by that choice without a shadow of turning, as I abide by mine. Take me as I am; help me willingly and unwillingly; and in the end receive the promised gift—years like the days you have called heaven upon earth. Or retract the vows you plighted, receive again the heart and name you gave me, and live unvexed by the stormy nature time alone can tame. Here is the ring. Shall I restore or ...
— Pauline's Passion and Punishment • Louisa May Alcott
... edge of the deltoid, in order to avoid injury of the cephalic vein. It must include skin, fascia, and platysma, and the flap must be thrown upwards. The clavicular portion of the pectoralis major must then be divided right across its fibres, which will retract. The arm must then be brought close to the side to relax the pectoralis minor, which must be drawn aside. The artery will then be felt pulsating, but hidden by the costo-coracoid membrane, which acts as its ...
— A Manual of the Operations of Surgery - For the Use of Senior Students, House Surgeons, and Junior Practitioners • Joseph Bell
... "Then I retract my words in asking you if you feared to go to the fort as courier, for your volunteering as driver ...
— Buffalo Bill's Spy Trailer - The Stranger in Camp • Colonel Prentiss Ingraham
... more damage to them than he could possibly do to these dreadful Brethren of the Coast, and that, unless he wished to bring upon them troubles greater than those of famine or pestilence, they begged that he would retract his oath. ...
— Buccaneers and Pirates of Our Coasts • Frank Richard Stockton
... were related to my father and other relations by Mr. Symmes; but they had gone too far in making themselves parties to the quarrel either to retract or forgive; and I was forbidden to correspond with him, or to be seen ...
— Clarissa, Volume 1 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... environs. In the mean time a distinguished friend of Cajetan, one Urbanus of Serralonga, tried to persuade him, in a flippant and, as Luther thought, a downright Italian manner, to come forward and simply pronounce six letters—"Revoco" ("I retract"). Urbanus asked him with a smile if he thought his sovereign would risk his country for his sake. "God forbid!" answered Luther. "Where then do you mean to take refuge?" he went on to ask him. ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various
... Le Noir, striding toward Traverse and raising his hand over his head, with a fearful oath, "retract your words or—" ...
— Capitola the Madcap • Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... said Editor Westbrook. "You work up to your climax like an artist. And then you turn yourself into a photographer. I don't know what form of obstinate madness possesses you, but that is what you do with everything that you write. No, I will retract the comparison with the photographer. Now and then photography, in spite of its impossible perspective, manages to record a fleeting glimpse of truth. But you spoil every denouement by those flat, drab, obliterating strokes of your brush that I have so often complained of. If you ...
— Strictly Business • O. Henry
... some way to Lucy—to others; I could convince them that I'm sorry. And," she added, with some of the old proud fire flashing out, "I will not go away because people say false things of me. They shall learn to retract them. If I must go away at last, because—because others wish it, I will not ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... showed no disposition to retract, and she steadily resisted all Mrs. Bingley's solicitations to remain with her. She knew the risk she was running in leaving her situation, and yet she felt she must yield to an instinct like that which impels the hunted animal to leave the cover and seek safety in the open country. ...
— Esther Waters • George Moore
... ascertained in the preparation of diphtheria serum, so that the yield of serum may be the largest possible. Amongst these that the blood should be received in longish vessels, which must be especially carefully cleaned, and free from all traces of fat. If the blood-clot does not spontaneously retract it must be freed from the side of the glass with a flat instrument like a paper-knife without injuring it. If no clot occurs in the cold, a result may perhaps follow at ...
— Histology of the Blood - Normal and Pathological • Paul Ehrlich
... eight, as though it had been paid for the three. When Broome, in spite of his subservience, became a little restive under this treatment, Pope indirectly admitted the truth by claiming only twelve books in an advertisement to his works, and in a note to the Dunciad, but did not explicitly retract the other statement. Broome could not effectively rebuke his fellow-sinner. He had, in fact, conspired with Pope to attract the public by the use of the most popular name, and could not even claim his own afterwards. He had, indeed, talked ...
— Alexander Pope - English Men of Letters Series • Leslie Stephen
... gave voice to conscience. He had bidden her go, when, perchance, a word would have checked her. Should he write, or even go to her straightway and retract what he had said? His will prevailed, ...
— Eve's Ransom • George Gissing
... bastinade, and I will stand by and count them." "For God's sake," the merchant screamed, "I can never endure it." "We will see about that," the favorite said, coldly, "and if you die under it, it was allotted you by fate; I am not going to retract my orders." ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume IV (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... other. Underneath all that roughness of speech and violence of statement, there was great tenderness and understanding. He spoke his mind, and more than his mind, but he was generous and quick to retract and quicker to console. "I'm an Ulsterman," he said once. "Ulster to the marrow, an' begod I'm ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine
... by the king's confession and communion, cunningly labored to counteract the same by the grossest misrepresentation. They related that the king, at the moment of his death, had spoken both as a Christian and an infidel revolutionist. They made him thus retract his retractation. "In all that I have done, I am conscious of having always fulfilled my duties as a citizen and a prince, and of having done nothing against the religion of my ancestors." As his conscience was thus at ease, for what did he ...
— Pius IX. And His Time • The Rev. AEneas MacDonell
... principally to have valued himself on this piece, because it contains some scenes executed in rhyme, in what was then called the heroic manner. Upon this opinion, which Dryden lived to retract, I have ventured to offer my sentiments in the Life of the Author. In other respects, though not slow in perceiving and avouching his own merit, our author seems to consider the "Rival Ladies" as no ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. II • Edited by Walter Scott
... point for the present, reserving still a right to retract my opinion, in case I shall hereafter discover any false step ...
— Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous in Opposition to Sceptics and Atheists • George Berkeley
... the darkness before his straining eyes. Could he receive the ordination to-morrow? He had promised—but the assumption of its obligations would brand his shrinking soul with torturing falsehood! If he sank under doubt and fear, could he still retract? What then of his mother and his promise to her? What of the Rincon honor and pride? Living disgrace, or a living lie—which? Sacrifice of self—or mother? God knew, he had never deliberately countenanced a falsehood—yet, through circumstances which he did ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... until she was left alone that the Duchess saw the full extent of her folly and rashness. She was terrified at the promise that she had given in a weak moment, and would have given worlds had she been able to retract. ...
— The Champdoce Mystery • Emile Gaboriau
... and difficulty of the ground upon which we stand in this question. I could wish, indeed, that they who advise the crown had not left Parliament in this very ungraceful distress, in which they can neither retract with dignity nor persist with justice. Another Parliament might have satisfied the people without lowering themselves. But our situation is not in our own choice: our conduct in that situation is all that is in our own option. The substance of the question is, to ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... been neutral, in this Italian War, as his engagements bore; but has joined his force to that of the Spaniards, declared enemies of his Britannic Majesty; which rash step his Britannic Majesty hereby requires him to retract, if painful consequences are not at once to ensue!' That is Martin's message; to which he stands doggedly, without variation, in the extreme flutter and multifarious reasoning of the poor Court of Naples: 'Recall your 20,000 men, and keep them recalled,' persists ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIV. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... justice of saying that he's not afraid of his party. If he means it, he means it altogether, and will not retract it, even though the party should refuse as a body to support him. I give him no other credit, but I ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... much embarrassed, but it was certain he had said the words, and therefore he felt in honour bound not to retract, although he had little dreamed of ever being placed in such a predicament. Just at that moment all the seven daughters began crying for bread, and the father had no ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various
... "The prisoner can retract that declaration, if he please," remarked another judge. "His confession, if taken, goes fully to ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... hand is then free for the manipulation of forceps, and the insertion of the bronchoscope or other instrument. During introduction, the fingers of the right hand retract the upper lip so as to prevent its being pinched between the laryngoscope and the teeth. The introduction of the direct laryngoscope and exposure of the larynx is best described in two stages. 1. Exposure and identification of the epiglottis. 2. Elevation of the epiglottis ...
— Bronchoscopy and Esophagoscopy - A Manual of Peroral Endoscopy and Laryngeal Surgery • Chevalier Jackson
... bosoms of the French people, that they could not conduct their monarch to the scaffold without the deepest emotions of awe. A feeling of consternation oppressed every heart in view of the deed now to be perpetrated. But it was too late to retract. Perhaps there was not an individual in that vast throng who did not shudder in view of the crime of that day. At one spot on the line of march, seven or eight young men, in the spirit of desperate heroism which the occasion ...
— Maria Antoinette - Makers of History • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott
... at length, "we do not meet again. I await now your full apology for these things you have said. Such secrets as I have learned of England's, you know will remain safe with me. Also your own secret will be safe. Retract, then, what you have said, of ...
— 54-40 or Fight • Emerson Hough
... close his mouth by a sudden and violent effort, and is as ferocious and as dangerous as one the muscles of whose face are unaffected. At other times the palsy is complete, and the animal is unable to close his mouth or retract his tongue. These latter cases, ...
— The Dog - A nineteenth-century dog-lovers' manual, - a combination of the essential and the esoteric. • William Youatt
... quiet about it; but the Doctor was of course prepared to admit that her quietness might mean volumes. She had told Morris Townsend that she would not mention him to her father, and she saw no reason to retract this vow of discretion. It was no more than decently civil, of course, that after having dined in Washington Square, Morris should call there again; and it was no more than natural that, having been kindly received on this occasion, he should continue ...
— Washington Square • Henry James
... master of his own house, and would not give up the point till much eloquence and authority had been used. He had come to wish with all his heart that he had never seen Linda Tressel or the red house; but he had gone so far that he could not retract. Linda never flinched, never uttered a word of complaint; sat silent while Peter was smoking, and awaited her doom. Once her aunt spoke to her about her feelings as a bride. "You do love him, do you not, Linda?" said Madame Staubach. "I do not love him," Linda had replied. ...
— Linda Tressel • Anthony Trollope
... me read it: "I apologise to Captain Dancy for the reckless and monstrous charge I made against him, and I retract every word of it." ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... joking matter," began Tanaroff, looking flushed and angry. "Are you prepared to retract your words, or are ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef
... poor, damned little fool, how bitterly you'll retract that prating! Not everything? Isn't water everything in a parched desert? Isn't the sun everything to a frozen world?" He stopped, suddenly loosing the boy, casting him from him, a ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... in France able to show that this calculation is false, I summon him to appear; and I promise to retract all that I have wrongfully and wickedly uttered in my ...
— What is Property? - An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government • P. J. Proudhon
... marriage. Then there was the war. It had been engaged in by his father, with the approbation of the former Parliament; and engagements had been made with allies, which now they could not honorably retract. He urged them, therefore, to grant, without delay, ...
— Charles I - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... the principal, whose face was rigid in its purpose, then sank into the nearest vacant seat, saying defiantly: "You may keep me here all night if you like, but, I meant what I said, and I shall retract nothing." ...
— Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School - Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities • Jessie Graham Flower
... began almost constant travelling, winter and summer, in the interior of Alaska. He has described nothing that he has not seen; ventured no judgment that he has not well digested, and has nothing to retract or even modify; but he would repeat and emphasise a caution of the original preface. Alaska is not one country but many countries, and so widely do they differ from one another in almost every respect that no general statements about Alaska can be true. The present author's knowledge ...
— Ten Thousand Miles with a Dog Sled - A Narrative of Winter Travel in Interior Alaska • Hudson Stuck
... willing to adopt this course, because the most of his works form in a certain measure one great whole, and mutually supply each other; and because too, the author having in part first explored unknown regions, and having of course sometimes found it necessary to retract hypotheses started in his earlier writings, his works cannot well be separated. He wrote mostly in German; sometimes in Latin; while comparatively very few of his numerous books are in the Bohemian language. ...
— Historical View of the Languages and Literature of the Slavic - Nations • Therese Albertine Louise von Jacob Robinson
... you! How dare you pollute that holy name, Deschenaux? Retract that toast instantly, or you shall drink it in blood—retract, ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... 15th of July, 1520, three months before the coronation of Charles V., the pope issued his world-renowned bull against the intrepid monk. He condemned Luther as a heretic, forbade the reading of his writings, excommunicated him if he did not retract within sixty days, and all princes and states were commanded, under pain of incurring the same censure, to seize his person and punish him and his adherents. Many were overawed by these menaces of the holy ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott
... as the hypostasis of some terms in experience is sanctioned by reason, when the objects so fixed and externalised can serve as causes and explanations for the order of events, so the criticism which tends to retract that hypostasis is sanctioned by reason when the hypostasis has exceeded its function and the external object conceived is loaded with useless ornament. The transcendental and functional secret of such hypostases, however, ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... kneel! Retract thy curse! O, by my mother's ashes, Have pity on thy self-abhorring child! If not for me, yet for my innocent wife, 270 Yet for my country's sake, give my arm strength, Permitting me ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... after he had given the license aforesaid, and that in consequence thereof the booty found in the castle, to the amount of 23,27,813 current rupees, was distributed among the soldiers employed in its reduction, the said Hastings did retract his declaration of right, and his permission to the soldiers to appropriate to themselves the plunder, and endeavored, by various devices and artifices, to explain the same away, and to recover the spoil aforesaid for the use ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VIII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... justice. In the preface to the Fables, he makes the amende honorable. "I shall say the less of Mr. Collier, because in many things he has taxed me justly; and I have pleaded guilty to all thoughts and expressions of mine, which can be truly argued of obscenity, profaneness, or immorality, and retract them. If he be my enemy, let him triumph; if he be my friend, as I have given him no personal occasion to be otherwise, he will be glad of my repentance. It becomes me not to draw my pen in the defence of a bad cause, ...
— The Dramatic Works of John Dryden Vol. I. - With a Life of the Author • Sir Walter Scott
... her authority which no other influence can supplant. If in anything published by us a passage can be found which is contrary to that doctrine, incompatible with that devotion, or disrespectful to that authority, we sincerely retract and lament it. No such passage was ever consciously admitted into the pages either of the late Rambler or of this Review. But undoubtedly we may have committed errors in judgment, and admitted errors ...
— The History of Freedom • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... deliverance, though it did not wreck the Ministry, placed it in a dilemma. He was urged by some of his colleagues to explain away what he had said, but he had made up his mind and was in no humour to retract. ...
— Lord John Russell • Stuart J. Reid
... published some ten years later, in 1811, in the preface of which the authors say, 'It is due to the public to state that twelve years' additional experience in a numerous family, and careful attention to the results of other modes of education, have given the authors no reason to retract what they ...
— A Book of Sibyls - Miss Barbauld, Miss Edgeworth, Mrs Opie, Miss Austen • Anne Thackeray (Mrs. Richmond Ritchie)
... advance more convenient to the French finances, and facilitate the augmentation of the total sum, destined for the United States. I repeated the same thing to the Director-General of Finance, but their answer was, the King had passed his word and could not retract. ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. IX • Various
... I retract what I have said if it is to have that effect. It is only my own expressions that seem tiresome. I could not be happy without your voice in my ears, though you repeat from morn till ...
— Daybreak: A Romance of an Old World • James Cowan
... said, "I do not retract my opinion. What the Rajah really is I don't pretend to know, but I am quite sure that the character of a smiling host is not his real one, and that for some reason or other he is simply playing ...
— Rujub, the Juggler • G. A. Henty
... man be assured that, with such mighty enemies, we can do nothing by halves. We cannot afford to retract, mutilate, or moderate our original determination. He who swerves from the straight road at the beginning is lost; he who stumbles at the first step is apt to fall down the whole staircase. If, on account of imaginable necessity, we postpone that ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... I retract my wishes about crying, for when I do begin, I cry in such a very disagreeable way—no spring shower, but a perfect tempest of tears. Philip's unexpected generosity upset me, and I sobbed till I frightened ...
— A Great Emergency and Other Tales - A Great Emergency; A Very Ill-Tempered Family; Our Field; Madam Liberality • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
... feared that the caged lion would burst his bars. Indeed, the trusty secretary Fain asserts that when on Easter Monday, the 11th, Caulaincourt brought back the allies' ratification of this deed, Napoleon's first demand was to retract the abdication. It would be unjust, however, to lay too much stress on this strange conduct; for at that time the Emperor's mind was partly unhinged ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... lock of my hair, that you may realize the great change that has been wrought in me by time. This letter I surely will post. May it take to you in the wilderness a part of my wretchedness, for so selfish am I that I would take comfort in knowing that I do not suffer alone. I retract the last sentence and in its place ask, not that you suffer, but that you do not forget. In health I am blessed beyond my deserts, and I hope the same comfort abides with you. You will hear from me never again. I have allowed myself this one delightful moment ...
— A Forest Hearth: A Romance of Indiana in the Thirties • Charles Major
... terrible words she had just heard, and her mother tried to calm her; but she herself was disturbed. She went immediately to Madame de la Roche-Jugan, and supplicated her to have pity on them and to retract the abominable innuendo she had thrown out, or to explain it more fully. She made her understand that she would inform M. de Camors of the affair in case of need, and that he would hold his cousin Sigismund responsible. Terrified in her turn, Madame ...
— Monsieur de Camors, Complete • Octave Feuillet
... human actions can be traced up, by a necessary chain, to the Deity, they can never be criminal; on account of the infinite perfection of that Being from whom they are derived, and who can intend nothing but what is altogether good and laudable. Or, Secondly, if they be criminal, we must retract the attribute of perfection, which we ascribe to the Deity, and must acknowledge him to be the ultimate author of guilt and moral ...
— An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding • David Hume et al
... great conceptions, no great words of consolation: patriotism, right, freedom, humanity, art? Yes; those words there are, and many men live by them and for them. And yet it seems to me that if Shakespeare could be born again he would have no cause to retract his Hamlet, his Lear. His searching glance would discover nothing new in human life: still the same motley picture—in reality so little complex—would unroll before him in its terrifying sameness. The same credulity and the same cruelty, the same lust of blood, of gold, of filth, the ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... oppose the marriage, and had declared that she would never be the cause of a breach between father and son. Bob asked for his father's consent, and hoped to have it, but he thought it only right to add that he had given his word and his love, and did not mean to retract either. He spoke of his visit to Brampton, and explained that Cynthia was teaching school there, and urged his father to see her before he made a decision. Mr. Worthington read it through to the end, his lips closing tighter and tighter until his mouth was but a line across his face. There was ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... I kneel, I kneel! Retract thy curse! O, by my mother's ashes, Have pity on thy self-abhorring child! If not for me, yet for my innocent wife, 270 Yet for my country's sake, give my arm strength, Permitting me again to ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge |
