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Abusive   /əbjˈusɪv/   Listen
Abusive

adjective
1.
Expressing offensive reproach.  Synonyms: opprobrious, scurrilous.
2.
Characterized by physical or psychological maltreatment.  "Argued...that foster homes are abusive"






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"Abusive" Quotes from Famous Books



... Pao-yue chimed in, "give her this abusive epithet? But however much she may make allowance for this, can she, when there are so many others who tell idle tales on her account, put up with your coming and telling her ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... surrendered to us, and our consequent right to keep possession for the king of England, which we were determined upon doing to the utmost of our power, wishing them to be well advised in their proceedings, as they might expect to be shortly called to answer for their abusive words and injurious conduct to the English. We also demanded the restoration of Puloway, which had likewise been lawfully surrendered to the king of England. After this, we enquired if they had received any previous ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume IX. • Robert Kerr

... the tribulation. He was in a state of the highest Paddy excitement. He grinned and bounced like a caravan of monkeys. But he was not much scared; he was mainly in a furious rage. Pointing his musket first at one and then at another, he returned yell for yell, and was in fact abusive. ...
— Overland • John William De Forest

... liturgy has met with such persistent, abusive, and often ignorant criticism as her hymns ...
— The Divine Office • Rev. E. J. Quigley

... on board, I was invited below by Bolidar, where I found they had emptied the case of liquors, and broken a cheese to pieces and crumbled it on the table and cabin floor; the pirates, elated with their prize (as they called it), had drank so much as to make them desperately abusive. I was permitted to lie down in my berth; but, reader, if you have ever been awakened by a gang of armed, desperadoes, who have taken possession of your habitation in the midnight hour, you can imagine my feelings.—Sleep was a stranger ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms

... haughty and devout Empress-Queen would seize a speedy opportunity of taking a crushing vengeance; France would this time be on the side of righteousness and truth. For the moment a churchman might be pardoned if he thought that superstition, ignorance, abusive privilege, and cruelty were on the eve of the smoothest and most triumphant days that they had known since ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists (Vol 1 of 2) • John Morley

... after her beloved Endimion. But I will say no more, for I had rather they should be told of their faults by Momus, who was want formerly to sting them with some close reflections, till nettled by his abusive raillery, they kicked him out of heaven for his sauciness of daring to reprove such as were beyond correction: and now in his banishment from heaven he finds but cold entertainment here on earth, nay, is denied all admittance into the court of princes, where notwithstanding my ...
— In Praise of Folly - Illustrated with Many Curious Cuts • Desiderius Erasmus

... the hut. When parcels came from England, addressed to the senior non-commissioned officer of his regiment, for him to distribute; he called the guards in. Shortly they went out with their coats bulging suspiciously. We were then called to receive ours whilst he stood over, bullying us with all the abusive "chatter" which the British service so well teaches. And afterward we watched covertly, with all the cunning of the oppressed, and saw him receive other stealthy favours from the guards that were not within his arrangement ...
— The Escape of a Princess Pat • George Pearson

... possessed of "sedakat," the meaning is that he is a credulous, contemptible simpleton.' [Footnote: Life and Manners in Persia, p. 247.] It is to the honour of the Latin tongue, and very characteristic of the best aspects of Roman life, that 'simplex' and 'simplicitas' never acquired this abusive signification. ...
— On the Study of Words • Richard C Trench

... also become so completely transformed by drink that, in his wild, drunken frenzy, he would be cross and even abusive to his wife and children; and there was that shadow of a great sorrow ever lowering over them, and that wearing unrest and fear that is ever the patrimony of those who are the ...
— From Wealth to Poverty • Austin Potter

... John Russell's candidature for Parliament for the Morning Observer. The election was a very exciting one, and the great novelist, it was said, found food for one of his novels in the ever-famous Eatonswill, and the ultra-abusive editors. Four years afterwards Dickens leased a cottage at Alphington, a village about a mile and a half away from Exeter, for his father and mother, who resided there for three and a half years. Dickens frequently came to see them, and "Mr. Micawber," with his ample seals and air of importance, ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor

... passed over in silence. But, by the end of the second lecture, the missionaries entered a protest, urging that the Christian Chapel should not again be used for such lectures. The faculty, however, were not ready to criticise their beloved teacher. The third lecture proved as abusive as the others; the speaker seemed to have no sense of propriety. A glimpse of his thought, and method of expression may be gained from a single sentence: "I have been commissioned, gentlemen, by Jesus Christ, to tell you that ...
— Evolution Of The Japanese, Social And Psychic • Sidney L. Gulick

... the remaining seven. And not only does this anomaly meet us full in view, but we have also to consider and digest the fact, that the maintenance of this Church for near three centuries in Ireland has been contemporaneous with a system of partial and abusive government, varying in degree of culpability, but rarely, until of later years, when we have been forced to look at the subject and to feel it, to be exempted in common fairness from the reproach of ...
— The Grand Old Man • Richard B. Cook

... offended the Danish Queen; had, though hardly able to govern his own kingdom, assumed the title "king of Denmark," and laid claim to Norway, too; and when she blamed him for it he had answered her disdainfully. In a letter he had used foul and abusive language, calling her "a king without breeches," and the "abbot's concubine" (abbedfrillen), on account of her particular attachment to a certain abbot of Soro, who was her spiritual director. It is, however, true, that her intimacy with this monk gave room for some ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... result was that when I was drawing the full bucket up, the rope snapped, the bucket fell to the bottom with a clatter, and I (to make the accident more convincing) toppled over on my back. Up came one of the guard, and rated me soundly for my clumsiness, employing a succession of abusive terms which I stored in my memory for use ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang

... were steps back and forth; they heard a hammering and pounding as if some one were trying to open a box. This was followed by a sound that resembled the falling of paper on the floor; it lasted for some time, bunch apparently following bunch. Listen! Some one is talking in an abusive voice! What's that? A gruesome, sing-song voice repeating unintelligible words: "I-oi! huh, huh! I-oi, huh-huh!" There is a sound as if of crackling fire. The flames cannot be seen; but they ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann

... exceeded the hours limited for his absence, except on one occasion, when he had been to spend an evening in the company of his mother and some friends. Once only he incurred correction. His old schoolmaster had received an abusive anonymous letter; and Lambert having discovered from the hand-writing, which was ill disguised, and by the paper, which was the same as that used in his office, that Chatterton was the writer, thought it necessary to check so mischievous a ...
— Lives of the English Poets - From Johnson to Kirke White, Designed as a Continuation of - Johnson's Lives • Henry Francis Cary

... man deserved a cudgelling for writing Leviathan; and two or three cudgellings for writing a pentameter ending so villanously as—"terror ubique aderat!" But no man ever thought him worthy of anything beyond cudgelling. And, in fact, the whole story is a bounce of his own. For, in a most abusive letter which he wrote "to a learned person," (meaning Wallis the mathematician,) he gives quite another account of the matter, and says (p. 8,) he ran home "because he would not trust his safety with the French clergy;" insinuating that he was ...
— Miscellaneous Essays • Thomas de Quincey

... it, or from a sense of religious duty, far be it from us to interfere. His peace, his reputation, and his religion are his own concern; and he, like the nobleman to whom his treatise is dedicated, has a right to do what he will with his own. But, if he has adopted his abusive style from a notion that it would hurt our feelings, we must inform him that he is altogether mistaken; and that he would do well in future to give us his arguments, if he has any, and to keep his anger for those ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 2 (of 4) - Contributions To The Edinburgh Review • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... a quotation from P.L. Courier, made in the Cornhill many years since by the once famous "Jacob Omnium" when replying controversially to the author of Ionica, "Je vois"—says Courier, after recapitulating a string of abusive epithets hurled at him by his opponent—"je vois ce qu'il veut dire: il entend que lui et moi sont d'avis different; et c'est la sa maniere de s'exprimer." It was also the manner ...
— De Libris: Prose and Verse • Austin Dobson

... Leavenworth, Kansas, the possessor of $60,000 and a mule train of fifteen wagons, which he had obtained some way or other, the Devil knows how. He was a peculiar man and totally unable to keep a man in his employ. He was abusive, ...
— The Second William Penn - A true account of incidents that happened along the - old Santa Fe Trail • William H. Ryus

... Harvey wrote letters to Spenser with their well-known criticism and recommendation of classical forms, and Foure Letters Touching Robert Greene and Others: with the Trimming of Thomas Nash, Gentleman. A sample of him, not in his abusive-dull, but in his scholarly-dull manner, ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury

... abusive We fail our point to gain, Disgracefully exclusive These ancient seats remain: But yet a future we foresee When Women will the rulers be, And Men will beg a Pass-degree, Will ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, March 25, 1893 • Various

... farm. After dinner I go back to the inn, where I generally find the host and a butcher, a miller, and a pair of bakers. With these companions I play the fool all day at cards or backgammon: a thousand squabbles, a thousand insults and abusive dialogues take place, while we haggle over a farthing, and shout loud enough to be heard from ...
— Machiavelli, Volume I - The Art of War; and The Prince • Niccolo Machiavelli

... to pay off my taxi, the driver of which was very cantankerous and abusive over his fare. As I came back to Professor Summerlee, he was having a furious altercation with the men who had carried down the oxygen, his little white goat's beard jerking with indignation. One of the fellows called him, I remember, "a silly old bleached cockatoo," ...
— The Poison Belt • Arthur Conan Doyle

... Allah make cold thy face!"may it show want and misery. "By Allah, a cold speech!"a silly or abusive tirade (Pilgrimage, ii. 22). ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton

... of the epistle Jude himself gives in explicit terms (verses 3, 4). It is to guard believers against the seductions of false teachers, corrupt in practice as well as doctrine; whose selfishness, sensuality, and avarice; whose vain-glorious, abusive, and schismatic spirit, he describes in vivid language, denouncing upon them at the same time the awful judgment of God. The apostolic portraiture has not yet become antiquated in ...
— Companion to the Bible • E. P. Barrows

... so-called "charters" were called in question as having been unauthorised by the aldermen of the city and as tending to favour the richer members of the guilds to the prejudice of the poorer. After a "wordy and most abusive dispute" carried on in the Guildhall between the ex-mayor and Gregory de Rokesley who acted as spokesman for the body of aldermen, Hervy left the hall and summoned the craft-guilds to meet him in Cheapside. There he told them that it was the wish of Henry le Galeys (or Waleys) ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume I • Reginald R. Sharpe

... Cat, "I ate a basketful of cakes, I ate my friend the Parrot, I ate the abusive old Woman, and shall I blush ...
— The Talking Thrush - and Other Tales from India • William Crooke

... replied the matrons, "has been told to go, but it happens that he's under the effects of drink and making free use again of abusive language." ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin

... directors, and declared that he had not words to express his disgust at one who, for the sake of his own personal profit, could condescend to depreciate the property of his constituents. The accused retorted, and the meeting growing stormy and abusive, ended late at ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 460 - Volume 18, New Series, October 23, 1852 • Various

... citizens have been maltreated. The flags of friendly nations have been powerless to protect the houses where they were displayed. I have ordered an inquiry on the subject, and I now command that all persons guilty of these abusive practices shall be arrested. A special service has been organized in order to prevent the enemy from keeping up any communication with any of its partisans in the city; and I remind everybody that excepting in such instances as are ...
— My Days of Adventure - The Fall of France, 1870-71 • Ernest Alfred Vizetelly

... picturesque interest. She seized upon the Lancashire dialect often overheard, as upon a game, and practiced it until she gained the facility of use shown in her mining and factory stories. One day the strong and beautiful figure of a young woman, followed by a coarse and abusive father, caught her attention, and years afterward she developed Joan ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various

... who had grown old in the royal service, would return to his duty and abandon the service of the usurper, Centeno and all his followers would be happy to serve under his command." To this message Carvajal only returned abusive language, and the two parties mutually reproached each other as rebels and traitors. After some time spent in this manner, the fifteen royalists discharged their musquets and returned to Centeno, to whom they gave an account of the number and disposition of the enemy. This ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 5 • Robert Kerr

... could to annoy the editors of the two hostile papers. Very soon the whole colony was divided into two great classes—the one needlessly extolling the Governor, the other denouncing him as the most cowardly and brutal of men. For four years this abusive warfare lasted, till at length the opponents of Darling won the day; and in 1831 he was recalled by the ...
— History of Australia and New Zealand - From 1606 to 1890 • Alexander Sutherland

... demanded satisfaction in a dignified letter,[20] were snubbed by their superiors. About the same time (April 1645) Schoock was summoned before the university of Groningen, of which he was a member, and forthwith disavowed the more abusive passages in his book. So did the effects of the odium theologicum, for the meanwhile ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 2 - "Demijohn" to "Destructor" • Various

... is known as the Reformation. The first steps of the Reformation in England were taken as the result of a dispute between King Henry VIII and the Pope. In the first place, several laws were passed through Parliament, beginning with the year 1529, abolishing a number of petty evils and abusive practices in the church courts. The Pope's income from England was then cut off, and his jurisdiction and all other forms of authority in England brought to an end. Finally, the supremacy of the king over the church and ...
— An Introduction to the Industrial and Social History of England • Edward Potts Cheyney

... other book,[168] and find him dreadfully abusive of poor Mr. Sharpe. I can no longer take his part against you, as I did ...
— Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters - A Family Record • William Austen-Leigh and Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh

... best I can, my dear, but I'm sure I shall break down; you have made it so very abusive,' said ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope

... dog." Further than this, the evidence given by the mutineers, and supported in all essentials by the people cut adrift in the boat, was to the effect that there had been repeated floggings; that Bligh had continually used violent and abusive language to officers and men; that he was a petty tyrant and was guilty of all sorts of mean forms of aggravation. Here is one instance: he accused officers and men, from the senior officer under him downwards, of being thieves, alleging ...
— The Naval Pioneers of Australia • Louis Becke and Walter Jeffery

... it turned out that Jimmy Quick, who secretly had notions of his own as to the beauty and desirability of the object of Andre's affections, had composed a proposal of all the vile and abusive words in the English language. Jimmy was too big for Andre to chastise, but as the rumor of the incident spread and the comedians began to quote freely some of the indecent phrases of the hoax, Andre fled the ...
— David Lannarck, Midget - An Adventure Story • George S. Harney

... in distributing "C" Company among some dozen houses. One old gentleman, with a black alpaca cap and a six-days beard, proprietor of a lofty establishment at the corner of the street, proved not only recalcitrant, but abusive. With him Cockerell ...
— All In It K(1) Carries On - A Continuation of the First Hundred Thousand • John Hay Beith (AKA: Ian Hay)

... serfage the domestic serfs had much to bear from their capricious, violent master. They lived in an atmosphere of abusive language, and were subjected not unfrequently to corporal punishment. Worse than this, their master was constantly threatening to "shave their forehead"—that is to say, to give them as recruits—and occasionally he put his threat into execution, in spite of the wailings and entreaties of ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace

... and have long learned to call mathematicians and astronomers cheats and charlatans. They freely used their vocabulary for the benefit of De Morgan, whom they denounced as a scurrilous scribbler, a defamatory, dishonest, abusive, ungentlemanly, ...
— Myths and Marvels of Astronomy • Richard A. Proctor

... he faced his visitor, and his reply was abusive in the extreme. Kent waited, with an air of impersonal interest, until he was done and had turned his face away as though the subject was ...
— Lonesome Land • B. M. Bower

... a cooler for Cowels. It took a vast amount of wind out of his sails, but he was on his feet and so had to make a speech. He was not very abusive, but managed to make it plain that there were others ready and able to lead if their leader failed to do his duty. When he had succeeded in getting his train of thought out over the switches his hearers, especially the no-surrenderers, began to enthuse. His speech was ...
— Snow on the Headlight - A Story of the Great Burlington Strike • Cy Warman

... low-skilled work in Iraq; some of these workers are deceived as to the true location and nature of this work, and others are subjected to conditions of involuntary servitude in Iraq tier rating: Tier 3 - insufficient efforts in 2007 to prosecute and punish abusive employers and those who traffic women for sexual exploitation; the government failed for the fourth year in a row to live up to promises to provide shelter and protective services for victims of involuntary domestic servitude and other ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... were the surmises that passed hurriedly among them, and there was obviously an increased disposition to resist Waverley's departure. He attempted to argue mildly with them, but his voluntary ally, Mrs. Mucklewrath, broke in upon and drowned his expostulations, taking his part with an abusive violence which was all set down to Edward's account by those on whom it was bestowed. 'YE'LL stop ony gentleman that's the Prince's freend?' for she too, though with other feelings, had adopted the general opinion respecting Waverley. 'I ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott

... the issue fairly, and acknowledging the error of his position, Perkins became obstinately harsher and harsher. Not only was he unnecessarily abusive to old Jeremiah, but his treatment of the whole troop was stern to a degree. Finally, on this third day, after a violent harangue in presence of the troop, he reduced the old negro from first sergeant ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. XXXI, No. 3, July 1908. • Various

... Romulus and Hersilia, produced 10 August. She also spoke Mrs. Behn's famous epilogue reflecting upon the Duke of Monmouth. Two days later a warrant was issued for the arrest of 'Lady Slingsby, Comoedian, and Mrs. Aphaw Behen,' to answer for their 'severall Misdemeanours' and 'abusive reflections upon Persons of Quality.' Even if they were actually imprisoned, of which there is no evidence, the detention both of actress and authoress was very brief. On 4 December of the same year, ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn

... if you want to quarrel with your best friend, all right! I've stood by you so far, and dragged you out of the deepest danger, but if you get too abusive—good-by! You may ...
— All Aboard - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry

... see me at their Grotto," resumed Cazaban, with his rageful air. "What an abusive use they make of that Grotto of theirs! They serve it up in every fashion! To think of such idolatry, such gross superstition in the nineteenth century! Just ask them if they have cured a single sufferer belonging to the town during the last twenty years! Yet there are plenty of infirm ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola

... "Ulster deadheads," and assertions made that the opposition only proceeds from a few aristocratic Tory landlords. Hard words do us no harm; but abusive epithets will not lessen Ulster opposition. Indeed the more we are reviled by our opponents, the more we believe they recognize the futility of persuading us ...
— Against Home Rule (1912) - The Case for the Union • Various

... alarmed by their violence, listened impatiently to their complaints and promised to render them satisfaction. The people were appeased, and were quietly retiring when the partisans of the ministers rode among them, assailing them with abusive language, crowding them with their horses, and even striking at them with their whips. The populace, incensed, began to pelt them with stones, and though the guard of the tzar came to their rescue, they escaped with difficulty to the ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott

... abusive," Sir Edward answered blandly. "By the bye, the police declare that they have a definite clue this time, and are going to arrest the murderer of Hamilton Fynes and poor dicky Vanderpole tonight ...
— The Illustrious Prince • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... kept to the tent. Whoever else had business in the yard made common cause and cursed the girl for making the disturbance, frightening camels, horses, asses and themselves. And she ignored them all, unless it was on purpose that she brought her stallion's heels too close for safety to the most abusive. ...
— The Eye of Zeitoon • Talbot Mundy

... of money while at Charlottesville had been liberal, but he quitted the place very much in debt; and when Mr. Allan refused to accept some of the drafts with which he had paid losses in gaming, he wrote to him an abusive letter, quitted his house, and soon after left the country with the quixotic intention of joining the Greeks, then in the midst of their struggle with the Turks. He never reached his destination, and we know but little of his adventures in Europe for nearly a year. ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various

... not gregarious in his habits. A few youth of his own age sometimes called upon him, but they eventually became abusive, and their visits were more strictly predatory incursions for old bottles and junk which formed the staple of McGinnis's Court. Overcome by loneliness one day, Melons inveigled a blind harper into the court. ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various

... French. But the people and the national guard did not accompany the French soldiers quietly; on the contrary, the bewildered prince distinctly heard the sneers, the derisive laughter, and jeers of the crowd; even the boys in the tree-tops were casting down their abusive epithets. When the procession drew nearer, and the people surrounded the prince, he discovered the meaning of these outbursts of scorn ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach

... attitude of one of the smaller men in the great army. Codrus Urceus was first the tutor of the last Ordelaffo, Prince of Forli, and afterwards for many years professor at Bologna. Against the Church and the monks his language is as abusive as that of the rest. His tone in general is reckless to the last degree, and he constantly introduces himself in all his local history and gossip. But he knows how to speak to the edification of the ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt

... was well acquainted with the capabilities of English officers with regard to abusive language, he went away convinced that "Pondicherry" and "Hindustani" insults were perhaps taught in English schools ...
— A Tramp's Notebook • Morley Roberts

... And so it turned out. As the armies approached one another in full battle array they presented quite an imposing appearance, and when a suitable distance separated them they halted for the inevitable abusive parley. Into the undignified abuse, needless to remark, I did not enter, but kept well in the background. The spokesman of my tribe accused the enemy of being without pluck—said that they were cowards, and would soon ...
— The Adventures of Louis de Rougemont - as told by Himself • Louis de Rougemont

... instant Eva was stunned. What did the man mean? But as Balcom showed no signs of regaining control of himself, and every moment became more abusive and violent, indignation gave place to every other sentiment, and she sharply ordered Balcom to leave ...
— The Master Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve and John W. Grey

... Western papers praised the scout very highly, and some of them said that if there were more such men in the army the cause of the Union would progress more rapidly; whereas the Southern papers, though paying a high tribute to the dash and courage of the scout, were highly abusive. He was "one of Lincoln's hirelings" and as villanous ...
— A Little Union Scout • Joel Chandler Harris

... questions which we could discuss the rest of our lives," said Durtal, "I marvel at the placidity of the Utopian who imagines that man is perfectible. There is no denying that the human creature is born selfish, abusive, vile. Just look around you and see. Society cynical and ferocious, the humble heckled and pillaged by the rich traffickers in necessities. Everywhere the triumph of the mediocre and unscrupulous, everywhere ...
— La-bas • J. K. Huysmans

... inhabitant of this Jurisdiction Who shall defend the horrible opinions Of Quakers, by denying due respect To equals and superiors, and withdrawing From Church Assemblies, and thereby approving The abusive and destructive practices Of this accursed sect, in opposition To all the orthodox received opinions Of godly men shall be forthwith commit ted Unto close prison for one month; and then Refusing to retract and to reform The opinions as aforesaid, he shall ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

... acqu^td, is now in Phila^d. at the Gen. Assem. of the Pres. Ch. He wrote home lately that he never saw a mob that made use of viler language than did the best of citizens there in their denouncings of the South. I confess, however, that this is not a one-sided affair; for I have heard equally abusive language applied to the North by the people South. As before, then, let us "strike hands" on this point also, for both sections are equally culpable. As to the strength of individuals in the two sections, it must be tested ...
— Letters of Ulysses S. Grant to His Father and His Youngest Sister, - 1857-78 • Ulysses S. Grant

... they dared venture into all the vices and corruptions of the British government; and it was no more consistent with the policy of Mr. Washington and those who immediately surrounded him than it was with that of Robespierre or of Pitt that I should survive." As he grew more angry, he became more abusive. He ridiculed Washington's "cold, unmilitary conduct" during the War of Independence, and accused his administration, since the new constitution, of "vanity," "ingratitude," "corruption," "bare-faced treachery," and "the tricks of a sharper." He closed this ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 26, December, 1859 • Various

... circumstances the American Loyalists who had joined the royal standard were of great service, but their services were ill requited, and several of them, disgusted by the abusive language and even blows, which they received from some of the officers, left the British army forever. At length the troops passed the Catawba, and on the 29th of October (1780) reached Wynnesborough, an ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing

... good schoolmaster never lost his temper. There was a man who thought he would try to make him angry. He said many harsh and abusive words to the teacher, and even cursed him. But the only reply the teacher made was, "Friend, may the Lord have ...
— Stories of American Life and Adventure • Edward Eggleston

... character of the man who had always proved himself equal to every emergency, and defied any attempt to thwart his designs. The language used by the miserable man on the present occasion was bitter and abusive; it related to his children, who he said were being taken away that they might be delivered to the white man; but his words fell idly upon the ears of the Indians, who only shuddered as they gazed upon his dark ...
— Owindia • Charlotte Selina Bompas

... says {ei pant' autou beltio phes einai, k.t.l.}, the sense seems to be: "No, if you say that all these prime creatures are better than he is, you are an abusive person still." ...
— The Symposium • Xenophon

... pacify her husband, but Piotr Andreitch would hear nothing. He pounced down like a hawk on his son, reproached him with immorality, with godlessness, with hypocrisy; he took the opportunity to vent on him all the wrath against the Princess Kubensky that had been simmering within him, and lavished abusive epithets upon him. At first Ivan Petrovitch was silent and held himself in, but when his father thought to fit to threaten him with a shameful punishment he could endure it no longer. "Ah," he thought, "the fanatic Diderot is brought out again, then I will take the bull by the horns, ...
— A House of Gentlefolk • Ivan Turgenev

... Greene attacked the poet furiously when the remodelled work was produced, calling upon his brother dramatists of repute to beware of upstart puppets and "rude groomes." But Shakespeare was serenely unmoved by these abusive epithets, for which Greene's publisher apologised later. He was in the historical vein, and proceeded to write "Richard III.," in which Richard Burbage is said to have made a great sensation; the following play was "Richard II.," and the poet was clearly responsive ...
— William Shakespeare - His Homes and Haunts • Samuel Levy Bensusan

... fierce scorn and wrath which possessed him against the older and the received philosophies. He tried his hand at declamatory onslaughts on the leaders of human wisdom, from the early Greeks and Aristotle down to the latest "novellists;" and he certainly succeeded in being magnificently abusive. But he thought wisely that this was not the best way of doing what in the Commentarius Solutus he calls on himself to do—"taking a greater confidence and authority in discourses of this nature, tanquam sui certus et de alto despiciens;" and the rhetorical Redargutio Philosophiarum ...
— Bacon - English Men Of Letters, Edited By John Morley • Richard William Church

... of our bewitched people, was haunted with a most abusive Spectre, which came to her, she said, with a sheet about her. After she had undergone a deal of Teaze, from the Annoyance of the Spectre, she gave a violent snatch at the sheet, that was upon it; wherefrom she tore a corner, ...
— The Wonders of the Invisible World • Cotton Mather

... proper respect due from man to man. It is wholly beside the mark to say that he will not put up for a moment with the cuffs and kicks so freely administered to his Indian colleague. A respectable Chinese servant will often refuse to remain with a master who uses abusive or violent language, or shows signs of uncontrollable temper. A lucrative place is as nothing compared with the "loss of face" which he would suffer in the eyes of his friends; in other words, with his loss ...
— The Civilization Of China • Herbert A. Giles

... my mouth as soon as you get out of this room and not before," I remarked. Nor did I. My abusive language was, of course, interlarded with the inevitable epithets. The more I talked, the more vindictive he became. He said nothing, but, unhappily for me, he expressed his pent-up feelings in something more effectual than words. After he had laced the jacket, and drawn my arms across ...
— A Mind That Found Itself - An Autobiography • Clifford Whittingham Beers

... very peremptory, and even abusive. He charges every body who has said any thing to the contrary with imposture. "Egli non v' ha dubbio, che le troppe imprudenti e temerarie parole, che il Tasso si lascio uscir di bocca in questo ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Vol. 2 • Leigh Hunt

... Boers use strong and abusive language towards prisoners-of-war. On the contrary they would converse with them in a most genial and friendly spirit; so much so, that the onlooker could scarcely distinguish between Boer and Briton, friend or foe. Now when the Boers behaved thus towards their ...
— In the Shadow of Death • P. H. Kritzinger and R. D. McDonald

... among those, felt very ill afterward from their efforts to repress their laughter. The miserable individual thus endued with the "robe of honor" would have infinitely preferred the most scandalously abusive epithet to that fervid compliment. He would have parted with half his bank shares at a discount (they were paying about 14 per cent. then—you can get them tolerably cheap now) to have been able to sink into his shoes on the spot; indeed these were almost large enough to form ...
— Sword and Gown - A Novel • George A. Lawrence

... heart, and soaked in the national tradition. He was easiest intrigued, not by force and originality, but by a sickly, Ladies' Home Journal sort of piquancy; it was this that made him see a genius in the Philadelphia Zola, W. B. Trites, and that led him to hymn an abusive business letter by Frank A. Munsey, author of "The Boy Broker" and "Afloat in a Great City," as a significant human document. Moreover Howells ran true to type in another way, for he long reigned as the leading Anglo-Saxon authority on the Russian novelists without knowing, so far as I ...
— A Book of Prefaces • H. L. Mencken

... throughout.] Well, he was very bad last night; he did n't seem to know what he was about. He was very late, and he was most abusive. But ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... ship's officers drove the men to their work but they were less abusive than usual. They seemed to reflect Blackbeard's milder humor and it was manifest that they wished to avoid the crew's resentment. Joe Hawkridge was puzzled and began to ferret it out among his friends who were trustworthy. They had their own suspicions and the general opinion was that ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine

... a semi-amicable vein, Loeb went on citing cases of what he termed cutthroat competition on our part, till he worked himself into a passion and became abusive again. The drift of his harangue was that "smashing" prices was something distasteful to the American spirit, that we were only foreigners, products of an inferior civilization, and that we ought to know ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan

... once the man became abusive, just as a dog gains courage as his enemy passes. Bobby listened, his eyes wide with dismay and shock. Never had he heard quite that sort of language. Finally Mr. Kincaid happened to glance down at his small companion. He ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White

... and which brought down on him the most violent and implacable hatred, was the ordinance by which all ascending or descending the Nile were obliged to provide themselves with a passport bearing a tax. This exorbitant claim was carried out with an abusive and arbitrary sternness. A poor widow, the Oriental writers say, was travelling up the Nile with her son, having with her a correct passport, the payment of which had taken nearly all she possessed. The young man, while stretched along the boat to ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 11 (of 12) • S. Rappoport

... Valentine's face while Dora was convulsed with passion. He remembered the utter wonder in Valentine's eyes when Dora's flamed upon them. He remembered the sickening sense of shame that had cowed him as he listened to her angry, abusive words. And this untrained, ignorant, ill-bred woman was his wife! For her he had given up home, parents, position, wealth—all he had in life worth caring for. For her, and through her, he stood there alone in ...
— Dora Thorne • Charlotte M. Braeme

... received from Prof. Webster, in which he confessed that he killed Dr. Parkman with a single blow from a stick, but claimed that it was done without premeditation, in a moment of great excitement caused by abusive language. He gave at length a statement of the whole transaction. After considering the subject fully and carefully, acting under the advice of the Council, Governor Briggs decided against the application, and appointed ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various

... but let the monkey into a free state where there's no one to take it by the collar, and it relaxes at once and shows itself in its true colours. Look how bold they are in picture galleries, in museums, in theatres, or when they talk of science: they puff themselves out and get excited, they are abusive and critical . . . they are bound to criticise—it's the sign of the slave. You listen: men of the liberal professions are more often sworn at than pickpockets—that's because three-quarters of society are ...
— The Duel and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... gave us the limited influence of the Westminster Review. The Cornhill was neutral; Chambers's respectfully inimical; Bentley and Colburn antagonistically flat; Maxwell's tri-visaged publications grinningly abusive; Good Words had neither good nor bad words for us; Once a Week and All the Year Round gave us a shot now and then. Blackwood and Fraser disliked our form of Government, and all its manifestations. ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend

... the occasion of some dispute between Fimbria and the quaestor Flaccus threatened to send him back to Rome whether he liked it or not, and when the other consequently made some abusive reply deprived him of his command. Fimbria set out upon his return with the worst possible will and on reaching the soldiers at Byzantium greeted them as if he were upon the point of departure, asked for a letter, and lamented ...
— Dio's Rome, Volume 1 (of 6) • Cassius Dio

... on our bones, or rather at that malignity and rebellion that is in the mind of man against the Lord, by reason of which the members of the body are used this way, and also sometimes that, to accomplish its most filthy and abusive deeds (Gal 5:17-21). "They were—enemies in [their] mind by wicked works" ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... wherever you see a flower in a cottage garden, or a bird at the window, you may feel sure that the cottagers are better and wiser than their neighbours." Vol. i. p. 4. Yet with what wretched taste is this morality sought to be perverted in an abusive notice of Mr. Bulwer's Eugene Aram, in a Magazine of the past month, by a reference to Clark and Aram's stealing flower-roots from gentlemen's gardens to add to the ornaments of their own. The writer might as well have said that Clark and Aram were fair specimens of the whole ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume 19, No. 536, Saturday, March 3, 1832. • Various

... good things which she had put in his way. He had first been, as she thought, ignorant and arrogant, fancying that the good things ought to be made his own without any trouble on his part;—and then awkward, not knowing how to take the trouble when trouble was necessary. And as to that matter of abusive language and turning out of the house, Miss Stanbury was quite convinced that she was sinned against, and not herself the sinner. She declared to Martha, more than once, that Mr. Gibson had used such language to her that, coming out of a clergyman's mouth, it had quite dismayed her. ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope

... with the sword said to the other:—"This, sister Panthea, is my dear Endymion, my Ganymede, who by day and by night has laughed my youth to scorn. This is he who, despising my passion, not only defames me with abusive language, but is preparing also for flight; and I forsooth, deserted through the craft of this Ulysses, like another Calypso, am to be left to lament in ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner

... honorable to Bonivard from the fact that this wife, like the others, had provoked him. Only a few months before he had been compelled to appear before the consistory to answer for treating her in a public place with profane and abusive language, applying to her some French term which is expressed in the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various

... sending Freshmen on errands was abused in some cases, we see from an account of "a meeting of the Corporation in Cambridge, March 27th, 1682," at which time notice was given that "great complaints have been made and proved against ——, for his abusive carriage, in requiring some of the Freshmen to go upon his private errands, and in striking ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall

... entered into the real spirit and meaning of the Wagnerian style of singing. But numerous experiences lead me to believe the contrary. Allow me to quote, for example, an extract from one of those letters, abusive or censorious, which musical editors receive almost daily. "Is it not undeniable," writes a correspondent, "that as long as the world lasts, one of its greatest delights will consist in listening ...
— Chopin and Other Musical Essays • Henry T. Finck

... first lesson in aviation immediately. The Englishman attempted to dissuade him, but immediately the black became threatening and abusive, since, like all those who are ignorant, he was suspicious that the intentions of others were always ulterior unless they perfectly coincided with ...
— Tarzan the Untamed • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... able to stand it he did not know. He determined, however, to do his duty as well as he knew how, and not to reply when the head clerk was insolent and abusive. ...
— Andy Grant's Pluck • Horatio Alger

... of planters. Telfair prescribed: "If there is any fighting on the plantation, whip all engaged in it, for no matter what the cause may have been, all are in the wrong." Weston wrote: "Fighting, particularly amongst women, and obscene or abusive language, is ...
— American Negro Slavery - A Survey of the Supply, Employment and Control of Negro Labor as Determined by the Plantation Regime • Ulrich Bonnell Phillips

... Costa, the Spanish merchant, has been insinuating very unpleasant hints, and that he must have a conversation with you at your earliest convenience; and when, sir, I ventured to remonstrate about the unreasonableness of attending to what Mr. Da Costa said, Mr. Jessopp was quite abusive, and declared that there seemed some very mysterious communication between you (begging your pardon, sir) and me, and that he did not know what business I, who had no share in the firm, had ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... might not have been so held at the common law; but such legislation has always the advantage of getting a uniform line of decisions from all the judges. The New York statute passed many years ago may serve as a sample: It provides in substance that any threat or intimidation or abusive epithets or the hiding of tools or clothes, when done even by one individual, is an unlawful act; therefore when strikers, although engaged in a lawful strike, as to raise their own wages, or any one of ...
— Popular Law-making • Frederic Jesup Stimson

... that not the least of Arthurs' troubles was the incessant gibing of the students on the platform. There was always a crowd watching the practice, noisy, scornful, abusive. They would never recover from the shock of having that seasoned champion varsity barred out of athletics. Every once in a while one of them would yell out: "Wait, Worry! oh! Worry, wait till the old varsity ...
— The Young Pitcher • Zane Grey

... the unhappy defaulters with every abusive epithet he could devise (and being called names in German is no joke, I can tell you); and, lastly, he swore by everything he could think of that, if their rent was not paid on the morrow, themselves and their families should be turned out of doors to sleep on the snow, ...
— In the Yule-Log Glow, Book II - Christmas Tales from 'Round the World • Various

... old man, and his name was Jim, And he had a pet bear who was fond of him; But the man was very cruel and abusive to his pet, And one day his people missed him, and they haven't found ...
— The Arkansaw Bear - A Tale of Fanciful Adventure • Albert Bigelow Paine

... without the savage brutality of the lash, and the teacher who met his pupils with a caressing smile was considered unworthy his vocation. Learning must be thrashed into the tender mind; nothing was such a stimulus to the young memory as the lash and the vulgar, abusive reproof of the gentle ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks

... speakers of Cornish sometimes wished to express contempt or dislike by abusive terms. These often take the form of epithets added to the word pedn, head. Thus, Pedn brâs, literally “great head,” is equivalent to the impolite English “fat-head”; Pedn Jowl, devil’s head; Pedn mousak, stinking head; these three are given as common ...
— A Handbook of the Cornish Language - chiefly in its latest stages with some account of its history and literature • Henry Jenner

... "Frankly, yes. You were abusive. You are too well self-governed to understand the working-man's temptations. You preached from the heart as you felt, without the charity of ...
— Westways • S. Weir Mitchell

... countess's love for one whom she might for ever lose received a fresh impulse, which made her reckless of concealment. The knowledge of her passion, therefore, coming to Charles's ears, a bitter feud sprang up between them, during which violent threats and abusive language ...
— Royalty Restored - or, London under Charles II. • J. Fitzgerald Molloy

... on the point of changing my tirade into the apostrophic form, and at the same time ordering the man out of my sight, when something in his look influenced me to remain silent. I could not tell whether he had heard or understood to whom my abusive epithets had been applied; but there was nothing in his manner that betrayed his having done so. I observed only the same look that had at first attracted me—the same expression ...
— The Scalp Hunters • Mayne Reid

... that may be," cries the justice, "and indeed perjury is but scandalous words, and I know a man cannot have no warrant for those, unless you put for rioting [Footnote: Opus est interprete. By the laws of England abusive words are not punishable by the magistrate; some commissioners of the peace, therefore, when one scold hath applied to them for a warrant against another, from a too eager desire of doing justice, have construed a little ...
— Amelia (Complete) • Henry Fielding

... quarrels with the Assembly. It had usually fallen to Franklin's lot to draft the replies of the Assembly, and by Franklin's own admission these documents of his, like those which they answered, were "often tart and sometimes indecently abusive." Franklin now found his old antagonist so excited that it seemed best to refuse to have any direct dealings ...
— Benjamin Franklin • John Torrey Morse, Jr.

... looked them over carefully. They were most unpleasant reading. They all seemed to be about money; some begged to remind him of this or that debt, of which he had thought continuously for the last month, while others were abusive and insolent. Each of them gave him actual pain. One was the last letter he had received from his father just before leaving Paris, and though he knew it by heart, he read it over again for the last time. ...
— Gallegher and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis

... keen discussions, bitter quarrels, and scurrilous and abusive newspaper articles! A bloodless war of squibs, broadsides, pamphlets, and frenzied oratory ...
— Hero Stories from American History - For Elementary Schools • Albert F. Blaisdell

... southwestern flank of the Konahuanui range of mountains, a region of legend and romance, since the coming of the white man given over to the ravage and desolation that follow the free-ranging of cattle and horses, the vaquero, and the abusive use of fire and ax by ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson

... unfortunate Whiskers-on-the-moon by his coat collar. Mr. Pryor had not "stopped" when so bidden, but he stopped now, perforce, for Norman, his long red beard literally bristling with fury, was shaking him until his bones fairly rattled, and punctuating his shakes with a lurid assortment of abusive epithets. ...
— Rilla of Ingleside • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... This abusive correspondent, who declared that he was supplanted by a young woman who did his work for smaller payment, doubtless had a grievance. But, in the miserable disorder of our social state, one grievance had to be weighed against another, and Miss Barfoot held that there ...
— The Odd Women • George Gissing

... the populace, 'pas populaciere;' whom no clamour of unwashed mobs without doors, or of washed mobs within, can scarce from his way! Dumont remembers hearing him deliver a Report on Marseilles; 'every word was interrupted on the part of the Cote Droit by abusive epithets; calumniator, liar, assassin, scoundrel (scelerat): Mirabeau pauses a moment, and, in a honeyed tone, addressing the most furious, says: "I wait, Messieurs, till these amenities be exhausted."' (Dumont, ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle

... enraged at the replies made by the prisoner, that he struck him on the face, used many abusive speeches, and attempted to stab him, which he had certainly done had he not been prevented by the Jesuits: and from this time he never ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox

... is no abusive language that may not be employed to render any man odious—for every man commits sin of some kind, and every sin is like some other sin, in many respects, and in certain aggravated cases, may be bad, or ...
— An Essay on Slavery and Abolitionism - With reference to the duty of American females • Catharine E. Beecher

... Mansel, for dignified demeanour in his office, and a past reputation for convivial wit. His attentions to Professor Hailstones at Harrowgate were graciously offered and received; but in a letter to Murray he gives a graphically abusive account of Porson, "hiccuping Greek like a Helot" in his cups. The poet was first introduced at Cambridge to a brilliant circle of contemporaries, whose talents or attainments soon made them more or less conspicuous, and most ...
— Byron • John Nichol

... torrents from the mountain. I accordingly took a party of the "Forty Thieves," and following along the edge of the ravine, ascended the slope that led to the stockades upon the heights. Great numbers of natives had assembled, and were shouting the most abusive epithets in Arabic until we arrived at about a hundred yards from the foremost stockade. This now opened fire upon us, the natives being concealed within, and aiming with their muskets between the interstices ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker

... fingers in her ears to shut out the clamor of abusive profanity; but the man on the bank paid no attention to the richly emphasized command to come aboard. Instead, he ran swiftly to the mooring-post, took a double turn of the trailing hawser around it and stood by until the straining line snubbed the steamer's ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde

... or three men were also killed, and several others were wounded. The great mass of the people on that occasion were simply curious spectators, though men were sprinkled through the crowd calling out, "Hurrah for Jeff Davis!" and others were particularly abusive of the "damned Dutch" Lyon posted a guard in charge of the vacant camp, and marched his prisoners down to the arsenal; some were paroled, and others held, till afterward they ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan

... not seem to please Thompson, but after a time he concluded to buy me, and sent his son to Wilson with the purchase money. The purchase at that particular time was lucky for me, as Wilson had written Thompson a very abusive letter, and it was received by Mr. Thompson on the evening of the day on which his son went to Wilson's to buy me. The bargain was made, however, and I was duly transferred to my new master, by delivery and a bill of sale. The personal matter between ...
— Biography of a Slave - Being the Experiences of Rev. Charles Thompson • Charles Thompson

... principles was the cause of much abusive criticism, as well as failure to obtain aid and sympathy. Had Sorosis started to do any one thing, from building an asylum for aged and indigent 'females' to supplying the natives of Timbuctoo with pocket ...
— Memories of Jane Cunningham Croly, "Jenny June" • Various

... fatigued with hauling the water-barrel to and fro, it stopped at the foot of the slope near a corner of the garden, and refused to budge. Peegwish lashed it, but it did not feel—at all events, it did not care. He tried to wheedle it, but failed: he became abusive, and used bad language to the ox, but without success. He was in the height of his distress when Petawanaquat passed by with a load of firewood on his shoulder. The red man having been reconciled to his old enemy, had remained at Red River, partly to assist him, partly to ...
— The Red Man's Revenge - A Tale of The Red River Flood • R.M. Ballantyne

... grow dark at nine o'clock, and a hold-up or two took place on the creek. The weather was rainy and cold, with frosty nights between, and as we were all in tents, and these sometimes leaked, which did not improve the head cook's temper and he grew almost abusive; we retired, went to town, and left him alone to meditate. Here he hastily and angrily for a few days longer tossed up nondescript messes for the men, which none could eat, and ...
— A Woman who went to Alaska • May Kellogg Sullivan

... child? Why, I never saw any thing less so. It is dreadfully serious. It is even sanguinary; sadder still, abusive and vulgar. What ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 7, May 14, 1870 • Various

... should die in my Lord's absence, of which I was glad. Then to the Cook's with Mr. Shepley and Mr. Creed, and dined together, and then I went to the Theatre and there saw Bartholomew Faire, the first time it was acted now a-days. It is a most admirable play and well acted, but too much prophane and abusive. From thence, meeting Mr. Creed at the door, he and I went to the tobacco shop under Temple Bar gate, and there went up to the top of the house and there sat drinking Lambeth ale a good while. Then away home, and in my way called upon Mr. Rawlinson (my ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... will be greatly obliged if I will drop my absurd fashion of calling you "Enemy"? I will drop my absurd fashion of calling you Enemy just as soon as you drop your absurd fashion of getting angry and abusive and insulting the moment ...
— Dear Enemy • Jean Webster



Words linked to "Abusive" :   abuse, harmful, offensive



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