"Conceive" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... dreadfully hard up a short time ago, and of course my bills were ten times as big as usual. I had no money coming in, and could not conceive how I was to meet ...
— Lazy Thoughts of a Lazy Girl - Sister of that "Idle Fellow." • Jenny Wren
... much, Mr. Davis. I did suppose you intended some of the remarks in your last sermon should apply directly to myself and family; but of the first one, I had only one idea. As I have before said to you, the thought of a burning hell always makes me shudder. I never could conceive of such torture at the hand of a wise and loving God. If there is punishment awaiting the unrighteous, it is not of literal fire. I am well persuaded of this, for if it were a literal fire, a body would soon be consumed; hence, ...
— The Harvest of Years • Martha Lewis Beckwith Ewell
... him that he understood it as well as I did, at all events; that I could not conceive why I should get into these difficulties, one after the other; but that I believed I was a crazy man on this one subject—matrimonial monomania; that when I had gone through with one of these scrapes, and had suffered the severe punishment that was almost certain to follow, the whole was like ...
— Seven Wives and Seven Prisons • L.A. Abbott
... poor wretches import arms to defend themselves. Very well: very well, messieurs! But your Government allow the importation of guns for sport. Ha! and then, if one can find money, and an ingenious English firm to make rifle-barrels to fit into the sporting-gun stock can you conceive any greater fun than smuggling these barrels into the country? My dear fellow, it is glorious: we could have five hundred volunteers! But at the same time I say your work is more valuable to ...
— Sunrise • William Black
... width and half a mile deep, and from the dark abyss comes rolling up a cloud of sulphurous vapors. Monte Somma in the time of Strabo was a miniature; but this crater is on the top of a mountain four times the height of the Italian volcano. Imagination finds it difficult to conceive a spectacle of more fearful grandeur or such solemn magnificence. It well accords with Milton's picture of the bottomless pit. The united effect of the silence and solitude of the place, the great depth of the cavity, the ...
— The Andes and the Amazon - Across the Continent of South America • James Orton
... beaks, crying out, and swallowing with avidity all the food brought by their father. The female did not leave her family till the morrow; confinement and fatigue had made her very thin. Her plumage had lost its lustre; but in seeing her contemplate her little ones, you might conceive the maternal joy which filled her, and by what ineffable compensations she felt herself indemnified for all her privations and sufferings. After a short time the little creatures had advanced in figure; their large yellow bills were transformed into little black and charming ones; ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various
... strange feelings art thou made! Thou hast the beauty of the flower and the intellect of the leaf. To let that awful black-and-yellow fiend descend to the earth! To call up to a cruel death and ask it to come down-stairs and meet you on the lowest step! Skies! How can the mind of man conceive of it?' ...
— John Gayther's Garden and the Stories Told Therein • Frank R. Stockton
... some natural degree of soreness exists upon their minds. Out of regard, however, to my poor brother (though I saw very little of him of late years), I am willing to waive those feelings which, as a father and a husband, you may conceive that I share with the rest of my family. You will probably now decide on living with some of your own relations; and that you may not be entirely a burden to them, I beg to say that I shall allow you a hundred a year; paid, if ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 1 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... connection with this I beg to say that the devotion to duty and uniform kindness of all the camp authorities has been wonderful and the relations of our Embassy with them always most agreeable. It is impossible to conceive of better camp commanders than Graf Schwerin ...
— The Better Germany in War Time - Being some Facts towards Fellowship • Harold Picton
... I dared not walk too fast lest I attracted attention, and yet I wanted to put the river, the Pont Neuf, and a half dozen streets between me and the Chancellerie of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. No one who has not gone through such an exciting adventure as I have just recorded can conceive what were my feelings of relief and of satisfaction when I at last found myself quietly mounting the stairs which led to my office on the top floor of No. ...
— Castles in the Air • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... of bears, in like manner with all other animals, was accredited at a time when breechloaders and high velocities were unknown, but with a '577 rifle and 6 drams of powder, or a No. 12 spherical and 7 drams of powder, I cannot conceive the possibility of escape for any bear or other creature below the standard of a buffalo, if the hunter is a cool and steady shot. The conditions of this theory will include a solid bullet, not a hollow projectile dignified by the ...
— Wild Beasts and their Ways • Sir Samuel W. Baker
... the crowds that gaze upon the building ever pause to admire the flowerwork of St. Paul's?... It is no part of it. It is an ugly excrescence. We always conceive the building without it, and should be happier if our conception were not disturbed by its presence. It makes the rest of the architecture look poverty-stricken, instead of sublime; and yet it is never enjoyed ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of St. Paul - An Account of the Old and New Buildings with a Short Historical Sketch • Arthur Dimock
... darkened with an angry purple. Pyrot was the cause of it. Justice Chaussepied could not understand how an officer could have committed so black a crime as to hand over eighty thousand trusses of military hay to a neighbouring and hostile Power. And he could still less conceive how a scoundrel should have found official defenders in Penguinia. The thought that there existed in his country a Pyrot, a Colonel Hastaing, a Colomban, a Kerdanic, a Phoenix, spoilt his hyacinths, his violin, his heaven, and his earth, all nature, and even ...
— Penguin Island • Anatole France
... are said to be devoid of reason in two ways. First, when they are feeble-minded, as a man who sees dimly is said not to see: and since such persons can conceive some devotion towards this sacrament, it is ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... conceive how you should want so large a sum at this time," Miss Pritchard began. "I trust you so thoroughly that I believe it must be for something worth while—at least you think it is, child. And I feel that you so trust me that you will ...
— Elsie Marley, Honey • Joslyn Gray
... ocean, is to us incomprehensible; and yet it remains a fact that they did so regard them. How the Scandinavians could have supposed the mountains to be the mouldering bones of a mighty Jotun, and the earth to be his festering flesh, we cannot conceive; yet such a theory was solemnly taught and accepted. How the ancient Indians could regard the rain-clouds as cows with full udders milked by the winds of heaven is beyond our comprehension, and yet their Veda ...
— Myths and Myth-Makers - Old Tales and Superstitions Interpreted by Comparative Mythology • John Fiske
... chapter of the Mahawanso, and Mr. TURNOUR has noticed the strong similarity between this story and Homer's account of the landing of Ulysses in the island of Circe. The resemblance is so striking that it is difficult to conceive that the Singhalese historian of the 5th century was entirely ignorant of the works of the Father of Poetry. Wijayo and his followers, having made good their landing, are met by a "devo" (a divine spirit), who blesses them and ties a sacred thread as a charm on the arm of each. One of the band presently ...
— Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and • James Emerson Tennent
... illustration, there is a constant progress from specific action for particular occasions, to arrangements which, once established, shall continue to answer for a great multitude of occasions. Such plans the enlightened readily form for themselves, and conceive as being adopted by all who have to attend to a multitude of affairs, while the ignorant suppose every act of the greatest public functionary to be the result of some special consideration and care on his part alone. Are we to suppose the Deity adopting plans which harmonize only ...
— Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation • Robert Chambers
... cannot hear" (Isa 59:1). Wherefore he saith again, "If any of them be driven out unto the outmost parts of heaven, from thence will the Lord thy God gather thee, and from thence will he fetch thee" (Deu 30:4). God has a long arm, and he can reach a great way further than we can conceive he can (Neh 1:9): When we think his mercy is clean gone, and that ourselves are free among the dead, and of the number that he remembereth no more, then he can reach us, and cause that again we stand before him. He could reach Jonah, tho' in the belly of hell (Jonah 2); and reach thee, even ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... "I CANNOT conceive," said one nobleman to another, "how you manage; my estate is better than yours, yet you ...
— The Book of Anecdotes and Budget of Fun; • Various
... respect the stores were in a low state. We had really wanted nothing, but there was scarcely any thing left. Well, while we were in prayer to God, your letter came. One of the sisters opened the door and received it, and after prayer it was given to me. You will be able to conceive the greatness of our joy, on opening it, and finding it to contain 5l. I cannot express how much I felt. During the trial I had been much comforted by the Lord's sending a little token of his love every day. It just proved that He was mindful of us in our poverty, and that when His time ...
— A Narrative of some of the Lord's Dealings with George Mueller - Written by Himself. Second Part • George Mueller
... Moreover, in an age when it would have seemed the most absurd of paradoxes to suggest that the general level of the sea is constant, while that of the solid land fluctuates up and down through thousands of feet in a secular ground swell, it may well have appeared far less hazardous to conceive that fossils are sports of nature than to accept the necessary alternative, that all the inland regions and highlands, in the rocks of which marine shells had been found, had once been covered by the ocean. It is not so surprising, therefore, ...
— The Rise and Progress of Palaeontology - Essay #2 from "Science and Hebrew Tradition" • Thomas Henry Huxley
... general way most people are in the habit of speaking of music as the language of the emotions. The elements which enter into vocal music (of necessity the earliest form of music) are unvolitional products which we must conceive as co-existent with the beginnings of human life. Do they then antedate articulate speech? Did man sing before he spoke? I shall not quarrel with anybody who chooses so to ...
— How to Listen to Music, 7th ed. - Hints and Suggestions to Untaught Lovers of the Art • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... a worshipper of Pan, loving the woods and waters, and preferring to go to them (when my heart was stirred thereto by that mysterious power which, as I conceive, cares little for worship made stately and to order on certain recurring calendar days) rather than to most of the brick and mortar pens that are supposed to hold in some way that which the visible universe no more contains ...
— Literary Hearthstones of Dixie • La Salle Corbell Pickett
... white buildings; each little eminence crowned with its church or fort; ships at anchor or in motion; and innumerable boats flitting about in such a delicious climate,—combine to render Rio de Janeiro the most enchanting scene that imagination can conceive. We anchored first close to a small island, called Villegagnon, about two miles from the entrance of the harbour. That island, however small, was the site of the first colony founded by the Frenchman Villegagnon, under the patronage of Coligny, whom he betrayed. The admiral had intended ...
— Journal of a Voyage to Brazil - And Residence There During Part of the Years 1821, 1822, 1823 • Maria Graham
... doing their best, in one way at least, to raise and improve the degraded race, and the bastard population which forms so ominous an element in the social safety of their cities certainly exhibit in their forms and features the benefit they derive from their white progenitors. It is hard to conceive that some mental improvement does not accompany this physical change. Already the finer forms of the European races are cast in these dusky moulds: the outward configuration can hardly thus improve without ...
— Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation - 1838-1839 • Frances Anne Kemble
... lead me to conclude, that this climate agrees fully as well with Europeans as with the natives, indeed that the susceptibility to fever and ague is greater in the natives than in Europeans of good habits. The cause I conceive to be this: the early settlers had to encounter swamps of the most pestilential description, and dense forests through which the sun's rays had never penetrated, and which industry and cultivation have since made in a great ...
— A Ramble of Six Thousand Miles through the United States of America • S. A. Ferrall
... plan of campaign. To make quite sure of victory they directed twenty-five thousand of their best men on it under the Commandant-General himself. Flushed with the spirit of invasion, they scarcely reckoned on a fortnight's resistance; nor in their wildest nightmares did they conceive a four months' siege terminating in the furious inroad of ...
— London to Ladysmith via Pretoria • Winston Spencer Churchill
... Daniel Granger was not such a one; he was not given to undervalue the advantage of his friendship or patronage. A career of unbroken prosperity, and a character by nature self-contained and strong-willed, combined to sustain his belief in himself. He could not for a moment conceive that Mr. Lovel declined his acquaintance as a thing not worth having. He therefore concluded that the banished lord of Arden felt his loss too keenly to endure to look upon his successor's happiness, and he pitied him ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon
... theory it is quite reasonable to conceive of the clairvoyant sense being able to register and interpreting these higher vibrations which are beyond the power of even the most delicate instruments of science. It must be admitted that the existence of ...
— Genuine Mediumship or The Invisible Powers • Bhakta Vishita
... with accuracy unless he told them himself. His only, but his fully sufficient defence was in the word. But who would know the tone? Who would understand the look of the man's eye and the smile on his mouth? Who could be made to conceive, as the Dean himself had conceived, the aggravated injury of the premeditated slander? He would certainly write and tell Lord George everything. But to his daughter he thought that he would tell as little as possible. Might God in his mercy save her ears, her sacred feelings, her pure heart ...
— Is He Popenjoy? • Anthony Trollope
... it that the man who knows his own subject most thoroughly is most likely to excite interest about it in the minds of other people. We hear, perhaps more often than we like, that we live in a democratic age. It is true enough, and I can conceive nothing more democratic than such a movement as this, nothing which is more calculated to remedy defects that are incident to democracy, more thoroughly calculated to raise modern democracy to heights which other forms of government and older orderings ...
— Studies in Literature • John Morley
... all that I went by," Fischer confessed gloomily. "It was the English Admiralty announcement that did it. Can you conceive," he went on, striking the table with his fist, "any nation at war, with a grain of common sense or an ounce of self-respect, issuing a statement like that?—an apology for a defeat which, damn it all, never happened! Say the thing was a drawn battle, which is about what it really was. It didn't ...
— The Pawns Count • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... miracle had been worked he couldn't conceive, and Tanqueray was careful to leave him unenlightened. It had been simply a stock instance of Jinny's way. Jinny, whose affairs were in Tanqueray's hands, had been meditating an infidelity to Messrs. Molyneux, by whom Tanqueray vehemently assured her she had been, and always would be, "had." ...
— The Creators - A Comedy • May Sinclair
... reader, how polite they were, but you can neither see nor conceive how great was the effort made by each to conceal the tumult that agitated the breast and flushed the countenance, while the tongue was thus ably controlled. It did not last long, however. Oliver, being thrown off his guard, asked a number of confused questions, and ...
— Deep Down, a Tale of the Cornish Mines • R.M. Ballantyne
... seriously defective. The Apostles, who were eye-witnesses of the public life of Christ, could impart correctness to the narratives, giving them a fixed character in regard to authenticity and form. In this manner an original oral Gospel in Aramaean was formed. We must not, however, conceive of it as put into the shape of any of our present Gospels, or as being of like extent; but as consisting of leading particulars in the life of Christ, probably the most striking and the most affecting, ...
— The Freethinker's Text Book, Part II. - Christianity: Its Evidences, Its Origin, Its Morality, Its History • Annie Besant
... world's pleasures, had meekly consecrated herself to the lowly duties which lay nearest to her. For Bathsheba's phrasing of life was in the monosyllables of a rigid faith. Her conceptions of the human soul were all simplicity and purity, but elementary. She could not conceive the vast license the creative energy allows itself in mingling the instincts which, after long conflict, may come into harmonious adjustment. The flash which Myrtle's eye had caught from the gleam of the golden bracelet filled Bathsheba with a sudden fear ...
— The Guardian Angel • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... desired that the Constitution should be modified under the influence of the English Ambassador. Instructions to A'Court, March 14, 1814, marked "Most Secret"; Records: Sicily, vol. 99. A'Court himself detested the Constitution. "I conceive the Sicilian people to be totally and radically unfit to be entrusted with political power." ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... and Chong Mong- ju, apparently sulking on the north-east coast, had been anything but idle. His emissaries, chiefly Buddhist priests, were everywhere, went everywhere, gathering in even the least of the provincial magistrates to allegiance to him. It takes the cold patience of the Asiatic to conceive and execute huge and complicated conspiracies. The strength of Chong Mong-ju's palace clique grew beyond Yunsan's wildest dreaming. Chong Mong-ju corrupted the very palace guards, the Tiger Hunters of Pyeng-Yang whom Kim commanded. ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... European society, in the last century, as a gentleman in a cocked hat and brocaded waistcoat. Hudson asked Rowland questions which poor Rowland was quite unable to answer, and of which he was equally unable to conceive where he had picked up the data. Roderick ended by answering them himself, tolerably to his satisfaction, and in a short time he had almost turned the tables and become in their walks and talks the accredited source of information. Rowland told ...
— Roderick Hudson • Henry James
... and to Whitby we went—the road to the last-named place, by the way, being execrable. Evidently Bindo's present object was to ingratiate himself with young Clayton, but with what ulterior motive I could not conceive. ...
— The Count's Chauffeur • William Le Queux
... third time and made a longer wait. But no one made a sign; no one stirred, though the two lads sat in agony, building up in imagination a very mountain of horror and despair branded failure in their minds, for they could hardly conceive that their plans were being carried out so silently ...
— Fitz the Filibuster • George Manville Fenn
... rational, benevolent, and just,—it is, moreover, so calculated to increase every wise and prudent man's sense of self-respect, and to encourage him in the performance of all proper social duties,—that we cannot conceive of any possible objection that can be urged against it; and it is only to be regretted that the practice is not far more general and customary than it is, amongst all classes ...
— Thrift • Samuel Smiles
... arrived, my dearest love, in perfect health, at the house of an American officer; and, by the most fortunate chance in the world, a French vessel is on the point of sailing; conceive how happy I am. I am going this evening to Charlestown, from whence I will write to you. There is no important news. The campaign is opened, but there is no fighting, or at least, very little. The manners in this part of the world are simple, polite, and worthy in every ...
— Memoirs, Correspondence and Manuscripts of General Lafayette • Lafayette
... the subject with Sir John Williams—one of the greatest authorities on the diseases of women—he said, "I do not see that any harm could arise from women riding like men. Far from it. I cannot indeed conceive why the side saddle was ever invented at all." What more could be urged ...
— A Girl's Ride in Iceland • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... colours some of the actualities of elementary education, I will now try to set forth its possibilities. In opposing the actual to the possible, I am perhaps running the risk of being misunderstood. The possible, as I conceive it, is no mere "fabric of a dream." What are possibilities for the elementary school, as such, are already actualities in certain schools. Were it not so, I should not speak of them as possibilities. ...
— What Is and What Might Be - A Study of Education in General and Elementary Education in Particular • Edmond Holmes
... life as in ours—youth believes and trusts, and advancing years bring the consciousness of the trials of life; the necessity of enduring, and in some cases the power to overcome them. Who but she who suffers it, can conceive the Sioux woman's greatest trial—to feel that the love that is her right, is gone! to see another take the place by the household fire, that was hers; to be ...
— Dahcotah - Life and Legends of the Sioux Around Fort Snelling • Mary Eastman
... you fail to understand me, do not charge it against yourself, but list it with my other faults. What I have recently gone through with is quite enough to unstring the nerves of a stronger woman than I am, and what must be my condition? Worn out and weary of any life that I could conceive of here—don't you see how I am floundering about? But give me time and in all honesty you shall know the true state of my mind. Many a time father has said that he did not understand me, and more than once you have charged me with being strange. But I am sure that I have never tried to be mysterious. ...
— An Arkansas Planter • Opie Percival Read
... Conceive their grief, therefore, when he suddenly sickened and died. Now ensued an anxious time pending the appointment of his successor. Two names were foremost for consideration—that of Jean Mignon, chief canon of the Church of the Holy Cross, ...
— Historic Ghosts and Ghost Hunters • H. Addington Bruce
... vividly that I almost point you to that sunrise and say, 'See yon beautiful city whose palaces and churches tower with the grace and splendors of all known architecture; those rural plains and vales of park and garden, where every home nestles so as one could not conceive it more lovely; that race of heroes and goddesses in strength and thought; those proud tablets and monuments of national and international honor and achievement and blessing.' And if any say, 'How can we attain to that greatness?' ...
— The Young Seigneur - Or, Nation-Making • Wilfrid Chateauclair
... appeared to me, when I saw them unexcited by war, to be of a very mild character, and most anxious to act rightly and honestly, according to their notions, towards each other. Of course, I judged them by their own standard of right and wrong, as I conceive the only fair way to form a just estimate of the character of a people is to calculate the advantages they possess. Alas! I fear that, were the behaviour of Englishmen thus to be judged, their characters would often sink very very much below the standard at which, in ...
— Mark Seaworth • William H.G. Kingston
... whispered to him in such awe, not only because he was her father, but because he was so much a man among men, a giant, with a great, lumbering mind, slow to conceive, but moving in a large, impressive way when once conception came. To her he had been more than father; he had been a patriarch, a leader, a viking, capable of the fury of a Scythian lord, but with the tenderness of a peasant father to his ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... his subjects, which he considered as so many testimonies of his own virtues; for, certain it is that, when kings are fathers of their people, their subjects will have for them more than the filial love or veneration of sons. The mind of man cannot conceive any thing so august, as that of a king beloved by his subjects. Could kings but taste this pleasure at their first mounting the throne, instead of drinking of the intoxicating cup of power, we should see them considering ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Bampfylde Moore Carew • Unknown
... concerned with the maintenance of peace, and this can be achieved, not so much by the action of Governments, or the efforts of the League of Nations, as by the personal association of individuals of one nation with those of another, and an increasing recognition of common interests. I conceive that civil aviation, by reducing the time factor of intercommunication, will tend to bring peoples into closer touch with each other and will make for mutual understanding. The Peace Treaty provided for an Air Convention ...
— Aviation in Peace and War • Sir Frederick Hugh Sykes
... who have not loved as I have, to conceive my joy and pride when, after the ring and all was done, and the parson had blessed us, she turned and gazed on me. Her eyes were so full of faith and devotion that I was amazed, thoroughly as I knew them. But when I stooped to kiss her, as the bridegroom is allowed to do, a shot rang through ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol. I • Various
... doing. London, hateful London, alone is at fault. Anywhere else my duties and occupations would be light, and my pleasures would be so not in name only.... How could I beg Mama, as I used to do, to have more parties and dinners and balls! I cannot now conceive the state of mind which made me actually wish for such things. Now I have them in my power without number, and I detest them all. The world has passed its judgment on me. I am reckoned cold, dull, and unworthy of such a husband; and it ...
— Lady John Russell • Desmond MacCarthy and Agatha Russell
... which belong intirely to the mind, or intellectual faculties; as for example, especially an attentive and judicious discernment of the most interesting truths of human nature. How extensive a study this exacts, it is more easy to conceive than to attain. ...
— A Treatise on the Art of Dancing • Giovanni-Andrea Gallini
... the end and in small type so that those who, like myself, detest explanations might have avoided this one. I am the more severe about this, because there can be no two opinions as to Mr. FREDERICK PALMER'S success in achieving his purpose, which, obviously, was to conceive modern warfare as between two First-class Powers, fighting in the midst of civilisation, and to reduce it to terms of exact realism, showing the latest devices of destruction at work, but carefully excluding those improbable and ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, July 15, 1914 • Various
... systematically burned down, mines flooded, factories reduced to ashes, orchards devastated, cathedrals shelled and fired—all that deliberate savagery, aimed to destroy national wealth, nature, and beauty, which the imagination could not conceive at a distance from the men and things that have endured it and ...
— Winning a Cause - World War Stories • John Gilbert Thompson and Inez Bigwood
... able to do is to conceive of a polygon having an infinite number of sides, and so an infinite number of angles, the versed sines of which are infinitely small, and having, also, an infinite number of tangential directions, in which the body can successively move. Still, we have not ...
— Scientific American Supplement, Vol. XXI., No. 531, March 6, 1886 • Various
... Whatsoever of woman's beauty and sweetness and wisdom was expressed in her life and manners could not but be caught and repeated in his susceptive and fertile mind. He must have grown familiar with the noblest parts of womanhood somewhere; and I can scarce conceive how he should have learned them so well, but that the light and glory of them beamed upon him from his mother. At the time of her death, the Poet was in his forty-fifth year, and had already produced those mighty works which were to fill the world with his fame. For some years she ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... lieuteuancy of New France for eleven thousand crowns, and continuing Champlain in command. Champlain had succeeded in binding the company of merchants with new and more stringent engagements; and, in the vain belief that these might not be wholly broken, he began to conceive fresh hopes for the colony. In this faith he embarked with his wife for Quebec in the spring of 1620; and, as the boat drew near the landing, the cannon welcomed her to the rock of her banishment. The buildings were falling to ruin; rain entered on all sides; the ...
— Pioneers Of France In The New World • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... thus when we heard a voice saying, "I have been searching for you, my friends, for a long time, and could not conceive where ...
— The Cruise of the Dainty - Rovings in the Pacific • William H. G. Kingston
... significant ecclesiastical movement which the Church of England in the nineteenth century has seen, the Oxford or Tractarian movement, as it has been called. There was conscious recurrence of a mind like that of Newman to the Catholic position. He had never been able to conceive religion in any other terms than those of dogma, or the Christian assurance on any other basis than that of external authority. Nothing could be franker than the antagonism of the movement, from its inception, to the liberal spirit of the age. By inner ...
— Edward Caldwell Moore - Outline of the History of Christian Thought Since Kant • Edward Moore
... off with his little dog Dan slinking at his heels. It should be said in behalf of Dan, however, that his bristles were up, and that he looked back and growled. It may be that the dog had the advantage of insignificance, but it is difficult to conceive how a dog bold enough to raise his bristles under Calderwood's very eyes could be as insignificant as Free Joe. But both the negro and his little dog seemed to give a new and more dismal aspect to forlornness as they turned into the road ...
— Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches • Joel Chandler Harris
... wonder if these good mothers can conceive what it is to write a story in words of one syllable, and make it interesting, sensible, and grammatical? If they can not, I entreat them to try a page or two of this utterly distracting style of composition; they will very soon have a realizing sense of ...
— The First Little Pet Book with Ten Short Stories in Words of Three and Four Letters • Frances Elizabeth Barrow
... "I conceive it might require peculiar qualities in the physician but I do not despair. I was telling her of some of your doings this morning, and happy to see that they met with her ...
— Queechy, Volume II • Elizabeth Wetherell
... that is, I conceive so," said Plotinus. "But one may be an exceptional woman without being ...
— The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales • Richard Garnett
... individual' is a counsel of perfection—that is the only drawback to it. If the great mass of people were only nearer perfection the rein could be given to individualism; as it is it's a dangerous horse to drive—it so often runs away with its driver. Conceive now of the immense advantage it would be if, instead of a criminal being tried by the clumsy machinery of the law, the judge were to investigate the case quietly and thoroughly himself, get to know the man, his belongings and environment, and then deal with him as he ...
— Secret Bread • F. Tennyson Jesse
... can't conceive such a thing. The reason is, there's a fire in the mine; if the fan is set to working, the coal will burn. But at the same time, some of the passages could be got clear of smoke, and some of the men could ...
— King Coal - A Novel • Upton Sinclair
... 1000 feet. But another explanation is open to us, and one not inconsistent with what we now know of the physical changes to which the Mediterranean has been subjected since early Tertiary times. To my mind it is difficult to conceive how such a volcanic mountain as that of Santorin could have been formed under water; while, on the other hand, its physical structure and contour bear so striking a resemblance (as already observed) ...
— Volcanoes: Past and Present • Edward Hull
... talents; some, miniatures—some, sketches of French and Swiss scenery—some, illustrations of Racine and the French theatre; and, of course, many with embroidery, and the graceful works of the needle. Strangers are too apt to conceive that Paris is France and that the frivolity of life in the capital was always its model in the provinces. I here saw evidence to the contrary, and was not a little surprised to see performances so ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 334, August 1843 • Various
... believe it? I had to wear that beastly box tied to my collar! Retrievers, I know, are used to that sort of thing; but I'm a Collie. All that day I hung about on my old beat, and every now and then somebody gushed and called me silly names, and dropped a penny into my box. Conceive the hideous mockery of my position! By four o'clock there was I sitting outside that confectioner's, wearing enough pennies to buy the shop out, and yet not a Bath bun ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, November 4, 1914 • Various
... and the laws of that progress. Hence tragedy on the one hand and comedy, or more broadly humour, on the other hand, have their great place in literature; for they are forms of the intermediate world of conflict. I speak of the spiritual world of man's will. We may conceive of the world optimistically as a place in which all shall issue in good and nothing be lost; or as a place in which, by alliance with or revolt from the forces of life, the will in its voluntary and individual action may save or lose the soul at its ...
— Heart of Man • George Edward Woodberry
... after all, they would probably be happier if they were not to marry, for I don't believe the state to be a happy one, and that's the reason, Niven, that I never entered into it myself; but it's too late now, though I cannot conceive why it should ever be too late, for if people can be happy at all, ...
— Shifting Winds - A Tough Yarn • R.M. Ballantyne
... son of the caitiff Covenanter, Waristoun, wrote to Baillie of Jerviswoode, the Whigs made party capital out of the proceedings against Green: they said it was a Jacobite plot. I conceive that few Scottish Whigs, to be sure, marched under ...
— Historical Mysteries • Andrew Lang
... mind. We mortals are much addicted to talking of our minds and our souls and treating our bodies as mere dross. But I hold—it is a personal opinion—that in the vast majority of cases the former are largely governed by the last. I conceive, therefore, that a novel which takes our daily sustenance as one of its themes has the best of all raisons d'etre. A foreign writer of far more consequence and ability than myself—Signor Edmondo de Amicis—has proclaimed the present ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola
... you conceive yourself as merely a tradesman. What I'm telling you is that the bookseller is a public servant. He ought to be pensioned by the state. The honour of his profession should compel him to do all he can to spread the distribution of ...
— The Haunted Bookshop • Christopher Morley
... said that that presupposed that he was knocked out by some malign or indifferent force. "It is possible—isn't it?" he added, "that he was needed elsewhere and summoned away." "Then why was he so elaborately tortured first?" said Kaye. "Well," said Father Payne, "I can conceive that if he had recovered his health, and escaped from his engagement with Fanny Brawne, he might have been a much finer fellow afterwards. There were two weak points in Keats, you know—his over-sensuousness ...
— Father Payne • Arthur Christopher Benson
... for light more than for anything else. It is difficult to conceive the misery of existence under complete darkness; and I could now well comprehend the reason why the "dungeon" has always been regarded as the most awful punishment which a prisoner can be made to endure. No wonder men's hair has turned grey, and their senses have forsaken ...
— The Boy Tar • Mayne Reid
... of genius the world has ever produced has come from a little belt of land in the North Temperate Zone. Snow and cold, rock and mountain, danger and difficulty—these are the conditions required to make men. The heaven of which I can conceive is a place with plenty of oxygen, sunshine and water. In a mountainous country water runs (I hope no one will dispute this) and winds blow, and running water and air in motion ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... week we arrived there, your aunt, then Miss Gardiner, came out from England, to her father, our colonel. The instant I saw her I was impressed with the idea that I knew her intimately. I recollected her face, her figure, and the very tone of her voice, but wherever I had met her I could not conceive. Upon the occasion of my first introduction to her I could not help telling her that I was convinced that we had met, and asking her if she did not remember it. No, she did not remember, but very likely ...
— Among Malay Pirates - And Other Tales Of Adventure And Peril • G. A. Henty
... it, by instinct. It was always springtime once in my heart. My temperament was akin to joy. I filled my life to the very brim with pleasure, as one might fill a cup to the very brim with wine. Now I am approaching life from a completely new standpoint, and even to conceive happiness is often extremely difficult for me. I remember during my first term at Oxford reading in Pater's Renaissance—that book which has had such strange influence over my life—how Dante places low ...
— De Profundis • Oscar Wilde
... strange to conceive "how, in an age so addicted to the muses, pastoral poetry never comes to be so much as thought upon." His wonder seems very unseasonable; there had never, from the time of Spenser, wanted writers to talk occasionally of Arcadia ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. in Nine Volumes - Volume the Eighth: The Lives of the Poets, Volume II • Samuel Johnson
... your correspondent searches for the solution of his difficulty on different grounds from those I have mentioned, it would not satisfy him to be more diffuse; and if the whole reason be that which I conceive, quite enough has been said ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 30. Saturday, May 25, 1850 • Various
... quickly find themselves wet through, and altogether the prospect was a pitiable one. Again and again did Max try to conceive of a better plan. He even went prowling around down below again, hoping to make some little discovery that would turn out to be of benefit to the three girls; but when he once more rejoined the others on the roof his face failed ...
— Afloat on the Flood • Lawrence J. Leslie
... extravagance in dress; while the tenth complains of the improvident and wasteful felling of trees in the English forests. This last Nymphal, though designedly an epilogue, is probably rather a warning than a despairing lament, even though we conceive the old satyr to be Drayton himself. As a whole the Nymphals show Drayton at his happiest and lightest in style and metre; at his moments of greatest serenity and even gaiety; an atmosphere of sunshine seems to envelope them all, though the ...
— Minor Poems of Michael Drayton • Michael Drayton
... altogether banish, still at times checked and restrained Mildred. Could she but have secured Tims's assistance in keeping Milly away, she would have felt more confident of success. It was hopeless to appeal directly to the hypnotist, but her daring imagination began to conceive a situation in which mere good sense and humanity must compel Tims to forbid the return of Milly to a life made impossible for her. She had not seen Tims for many weeks, not since the Easter Vacation, which had already receded into a remote distance; ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods
... any noise was heard above, make some excuse—say anything but what you really saw, and never let a word or look between us, recall this circumstance. I trust to you. Mind, I trust to you. How much I trust, you never can conceive.' ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... critics are too little skilled in social questions and moral discussions to be able to conceive that respectable gentlemen like themselves, who would instantly call the police to remove Mrs Warren if she ventured to canvass them personally, could possibly be in any way responsible for her proceedings. They ...
— Mrs. Warren's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... have been recovered in the art provinces of Mexico and the Cordilleras, especially in Chiriqui, between Costa Rica and Colombia. It must be admitted, however, that both the tools and the processes have escaped the archaeologist, as they did "the ablest goldsmiths in Spain, for they never could conceive how they had been made, there being no sign of a hammer or an engraver or any other instrument used by them, the Indians having none ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... one thing we haven't considered," I pursued, "and that is Mr. Alexander Burke. You say Mr. Fluette despises him: if he does, it is not without warrant, I 'd be willing to swear. What that fellow's game is I can't just at this time conceive, but I 'm confident that he 's playing one of some kind—a deep one, too. If he is, the potentialities are endless with such ...
— The Paternoster Ruby • Charles Edmonds Walk
... has suggested, proposes to separate in the holy scripture, or in the immemorial teaching of the church, that which it regards to be the eternal element of revealed truth from that which it ventures to conceive to be temporary; the heavenly treasure from the earthen vessels in which it is contained. The literary parallel to this tendency is not to be found in the deism of the last century, but in some of the schools of free thought in ...
— History of Free Thought in Reference to The Christian Religion • Adam Storey Farrar
... pillar by the Jews, he was scourged!' At these words the bright figure disappeared, and the darkness became total. Suddenly we heard the sound of hundreds of scourges descending upon the bare flesh. I can not conceive any thing more horrible. Before ten minutes had passed, the sound became splashing from ...
— Mexico and its Religion • Robert A. Wilson
... back as I have described, went softly on, into a vaulted chamber, now used as a store-room: once the chapel of the Holy Office. The place where the tribunal sat, was plain. The platform might have been removed but yesterday. Conceive the parable of the Good Samaritan having been painted on the wall of one of these Inquisition chambers! But it was, and ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens
... "You would scarcely conceive the magnificence of this residence, or the tremendous devastation the French have committed. The throne-room was lined with ebony, carved in a marvellous way. There were huge mirrors of all shapes and ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume I • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... have summoned a vision of a huddled figure in his stable-yard, dying, and cursing him as he died. Had Jim Doyle, cunningly plotting the overthrow of law and order, been able in his arrogance to conceive of such a thing, it might have been Anthony Cardew he saw. Neither of them, for a moment, dreamed of it as an elderly Scotch Covenanter, a plain little womanly figure, rocking in a cane-seated rocking chair, and making the ...
— A Poor Wise Man • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... me free of a circulating library in King Street, Cheapside."—"Here," he proceeds, "I read through the catalogue, folios and all, whether I understood them, or did not understand them, running all risks in skulking out to get the two volumes which I was entitled to have daily. Conceive what I must have been at fourteen; I was in a continual low fever. My whole being was, with eyes closed to every object of present sense, to crumple myself up in a sunny comer, and read, read, read,—fancy myself on Robinson Crusoe's island, ...
— Biographia Epistolaris, Volume 1. • Coleridge, ed. Turnbull
... He could not conceive what had happened; the place that was usually so lonely, the people that had been so lazy and dull—everything within sight seemed transformed into some mad scene of carnival. The crowd swept past him, greeting him only with shouts and smiles and grimaces. He knew from the number ...
— The Mermaid - A Love Tale • Lily Dougall
... surprise, "surely no one would be ungallant enough not to lend their services to two such fair maidens. Never! I cannot conceive it." ...
— Heiress of Haddon • William E. Doubleday
... all claim to be treated by this gentleman with courtesy or common politeness, I am quite at a loss to conceive; but I beg to remind him that vituperation does not carry conviction, and that criticism is enfeebled ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 189, June 11, 1853 • Various
... anyone suppose that the son of a pastor could conceive the idea of hanging himself on the crossbeam of a signboard, because a big monsieur and an old soldier had done so? We must admit, Master Christian, that the thing was not probable; these reasons would not have seemed sufficient to myself or ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne
... "Conceive a jelly-fish such as sails in our summer seas, bell-shaped and of enormous size—far larger, I should judge, than the dome of St. Paul's. It was of a light pink colour veined with a delicate green, but the whole huge fabric so tenuous ...
— Danger! and Other Stories • Arthur Conan Doyle
... on what he leaves behind him? Does he forget the torture of seeing it at the command, in the enjoyment of another—his will concerning this thing or that but a mockery? Does he know that he who then holds them will not be able to conceive of their having been or ever being another's ...
— The Elect Lady • George MacDonald
... beyond its apparent importance. She could conceive of no possible reason for Julius interfering in Harry's life, and she had the feeling of a person facing a danger in the dark. Julius was also annoyed at her discovery. "It precipitates matters," he said ...
— The Squire of Sandal-Side - A Pastoral Romance • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... still. And the time will come when some enterprising showman will obtain and exhibit the last issue of that delectable sheet as the acme of treason and corruption during the war, and as an illustration of what villainy the mind of man may conceive, when he once ...
— The Great North-Western Conspiracy In All Its Startling Details • I. Windslow Ayer
... When did each stage of our mental growth begin? When or where did the English language begin, or the French, or the German? Was there a first English word spoken? From the first animal sound, if we can conceive of such, up to the human speech of to-day, there is an infinite gradation ...
— Time and Change • John Burroughs
... fragments, to arrange them and fit them, and thus to show that language is something rational, human, intelligible, the very embodiment of the mind of man in its growth from the lowest to the highest stage, and with capabilities for further growth far beyond what we can at present conceive or imagine. ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... general term for a health resort possessing mineral waters, but in the days of Dr. Timothy Bright no such meaning attached to it; Spa was the celebrated German health resort, and one can readily conceive with what patriotic enthusiasm Dr. Timothy Bright would proclaim the Tuewhit Well as "The English Spa" when the medicinal properties of this Well were found to resemble those of the two famous medicinal springs of Sauveniere and ...
— Spadacrene Anglica - The English Spa Fountain • Edmund Deane
... happy that, dizzy with heaven, They drop earth's affections, conceive not of woe? I think not. Themselves were too lately forgiven Through that love and sorrow which reconciled ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... unhappy, but she's off now, and will probably bring up in some Turkish harem, where she will end her days. Not so bad a fate either," continued the oarsman. "Surrounded by every luxury the heart could wish or the imagination conceive, it's a better lot ...
— The Circassian Slave; or, The Sultan's Favorite - A Story of Constantinople and the Caucasus • Lieutenant Maturin Murray
... a man's voice—that of Dick of the Muir, as he was styled—the individual who kept the gate of the Tower—was heard shouting to some one without, in reply to some request made by the latter. It was now about two in the morning, and Marjory could not conceive what could be the purpose of the stranger's visit at ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume III • Various
... still abed. It was not, therefore, amazing that he should have been admitted to her presence. She was alone save for her lady-in-waiting, Madame de Lannoi, who was, we are told, aged, prudent and virtuous. Conceive, therefore, the outraged feelings of this lady upon seeing the English duke precipitate himself wildly into the room, and on his knees at the royal bedside seize the coverlet and ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini
... stupid about such things, noticed it in Venice.... But then it was so different. No one could possibly have thought of marrying him then; whereas now of course every woman is trying for him. Oh, Susy, whatever you do, don't miss your chance! You can't conceive of the wicked plotting and intriguing there will be to get him—on all sides, and even where one least suspects it. You don't know what horrors women will do-and even girls!" A shudder ran through her at the ...
— The Glimpses of the Moon • Edith Wharton
... beyond credence! What do you conceive to be the idea involved in the word 'father,' ...
— Penelope's Experiences in Scotland • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... devoted with all my heart and soul. I have never regretted the choice, and have spent my life there, except when in Washington, for considerably more than half a century. In that time Worcester has grown from a city of fifteen thousand to a city of one hundred and thirty thousand people. I can conceive of no life more delightful for a man of public spirit than to belong to a community like that which combines the youth and vigor and ambition of a western city with the refinement and conveniences, ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar
... monarchy. It would not become me to say that the fears of these patriots have been already realized; but as I sincerely believe that the tendency of measures and of men's opinions for some years past has been in that direction, it is, I conceive, strictly proper that I should take this occasion to repeat the assurances I have heretofore given of my determination to arrest the progress of that tendency if it really exists and restore the Government to its pristine health and vigor, as far as this can be effected by any legitimate exercise ...
— Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Harrison • James D. Richardson
... into a tremendous peal, in which his companion joined, for anything more comic than the aspect of the "Solemn-un" up to his neck in the bog it would be hard to conceive. ...
— Dick o' the Fens - A Tale of the Great East Swamp • George Manville Fenn
... tepid livers—that are really incapable of ideality, of real and adequate aspiration; nature works by flux and reflux; and if we waive the rough temper and the coarse edge of passion due to youth, it will not be impossible to conceive another picture of these girls. Sally, good-hearted and true, full of sturdy, homely sense, willing to take care of a man's money, and make him a straightforward wife; Maggie, gentle and sinuating— always a little false, but always attractive, the ...
— Spring Days • George Moore
... passed. I was growing tired of trotting about. Not tired of London in particular. The gray, dingy, historic, wonderful old city was still fascinating. It is hard to conceive of an intelligent person's ever growing weary of the narrow streets with the familiar names—Fleet Street, Fetter Lane, Pudding Lane and all the rest—names as familiar to a reader of history or English fiction as that of his ...
— Kent Knowles: Quahaug • Joseph C. Lincoln
... readily conceive that statutes bristling with difficulties remain unrepealed in the volumes of the law of Russia as well as of other nations. Even we ourselves have our obsolete "blue laws," and their literal enforcement, if such a thing were ...
— Notes on the Diplomatic History of the Jewish Question • Lucien Wolf
... diet of those wishful to lose their superfluous adipose tissue. Here, again, they disagree with their professional forebears. The experts of the preceding generations, being mainly Englishmen and Germans, could not conceive of living without drinking. Some advocated wines, some ales, some a mixture of both with an occasional measure of spirits added for the sake of digestion. But among the dependable dietetic authorities of the present day there ...
— One Third Off • Irvin S. Cobb
... to be Christ's vicar-general over Christ's visible Church on earth. So that all the question here will be about the ministerial power, whether any such belong to the civil magistrate. 2. What is meant by power, properly, internally, formally, or virtually ecclesiastical? Thus conceive: These several terms are purposely used, the more clearly and fully to distinguish power purely ecclesiastical, which is denied to the magistrate, from power purely political about ecclesiastical objects, which is granted to him; which is ...
— The Divine Right of Church Government • Sundry Ministers Of Christ Within The City Of London
... embarrassment, how it is to escape from the poverty that seems to be overwhelming it, and how the government is to quiet the multitudes that are already turbulent and clamorous, and are yet but in the beginning of their real miseries, I cannot conceive." ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... the pride or rather the foresight of the King of Versailles, who caused to be pulled down the ancient castles that once adorned this part of Germany. Looking at this marvellous country, covered with forests, where the picturesque charm of the middle ages abounds, though in ruins, we are able to conceive the German ...
— The Red Inn • Honore de Balzac
... two or three undulatory movements of his glistening body finished the work. Then he cautiously raised himself up, his tongue flaming from his mouth the while, curved over the nest, and with wavy subtle motions, explored the interior. I can conceive of nothing more overpoweringly terrible to an unsuspecting family of birds than the sudden appearance above their domicile of the head and neck of this arch-enemy. It is enough to petrify the blood in their veins. Not finding ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... of the felon-catching sort, and in real life, for that matter, the law-breaker always did leave a clew for the pursuers. Thereupon arose a determination to demonstrate practically that it was quite as possible to create an inerrant fugitive as to conceive an infallible detective. Joining the passers-by on the sidewalk, he made his way leisurely to Canal Street, and thence diagonally through the old French quarter toward the French Market. In a narrow alley giving upon the levee he ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde
... being the weaker, dies first: but the charcoal dies also. When it has exhausted all the oxygen of the room, it cools, goes out, and is found in the morning half-consumed beside its victim. If you put a giant or an elephant, I should conceive, into that room, instead of a human being, the case would be reversed for a time: the elephant would put out the burning charcoal by the carbonic acid from his mighty lungs; and then, when he had exhausted all the air in the room, die likewise of his ...
— Health and Education • Charles Kingsley
... it does break over us, it will certainly send us to the bottom. The captain ordered the slow match to be brought to him, and went forward to the gun, which had been loaded and run out. On came the water-spout. I could not conceive what he was going to do. He stooped down, and, running his eye along the gun, fired a shot right through the watery pillar. Down came the liquid mass with a thundering sound into the sea, but clear of the ship, though even our deck got a little ...
— Old Jack • W.H.G. Kingston
... a full view and circle of myself, without this reasonable moderatour, and equall piece of justice, Death, I doe conceive my self the most miserablest person extant; were there not another life that I hoped for, all the vanities of this world should not intreat a moment's breath from me; could the Devil work my belief to imagine I could never die, I would not outlive that very thought: I have so abject a conceit ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... the President. The first news came to us the night after the dastardly deed, the telegraph operator having taken it from the wires while in transmission to General Meade. The despatch ran that Mr. Lincoln had been, shot at 10 o'clock that morning at Willard's Hotel, but as I could conceive of nothing to take the President there I set the story down as a canard, and went to bed without giving it further thought. Next morning, however, an official telegram confirmed the fact of the assassination, though eliminating the distorted circumstances ...
— The Memoirs of General P. H. Sheridan, Complete • General Philip Henry Sheridan |
