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Contrary   /kˈɑntrɛri/  /kəntrˈɛri/   Listen
Contrary

adjective
1.
Very opposed in nature or character or purpose.  "The facts point to a contrary conclusion"
2.
Of words or propositions so related that both cannot be true but both may be false.
3.
Resistant to guidance or discipline.  Synonyms: obstinate, perverse, wayward.  "An obstinate child with a violent temper" , "A perverse mood" , "Wayward behavior"
4.
In an opposing direction.  Synonym: adverse.  "A contrary wind"



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"Contrary" Quotes from Famous Books



... Christ, until a full-length figure of the Saviour appeared, dressed in purple robes, carried on a platform by four men, and guarded on all sides by soldiers. It is singular, that after all there is nothing ridiculous in these exhibitions; on the contrary, something rather terrible. In the first place, the music is good, which would hardly be the case in any but a Mexican village; the dresses are really rich, the gold all real, and the whole has the effect of confusing the imagination into ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon De La Barca

... the moment when I ought to have been acclaimed, and overwhelmed with grateful acknowledgments as an heroic rescuer, who had risked her own life to save a feeble and suffering old man; but not at all! Quite the contrary! No sooner was his flight safely stopped than the General turned and roared at me ...
— The Lady of the Basement Flat • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... efforts to the contrary, the wonder and admiration grew deeper in Luigi's eyes. "Thou ...
— Golden Stories - A Selection of the Best Fiction by the Foremost Writers • Various

... inquiries we are strictly confined to revelation, for there is no indication in nature, or in any of its laws, of a day of rest; but on the contrary a state of progression marks every day alike. Our Lord has taught us that 'the Sabbath was made for man,' and therefore did not exist among the angels, prior to the creation of man, as all moral or universal obligations must have existed; for they are the same from eternity ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... departed from this harborough towards England, and the wind tooke vs contrary, so that we were faine to go to another harborough the same day at 11. of the clocke. And there came to vs 39. of the people, and brought vs 13. Seale skins, and after we receiued these skins of them, the Master sent the carpenter to change one of ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of The English Nation, Vol. XII., America, Part I. • Richard Hakluyt

... gardens, and have seen these women proceed to the scene of unrequited toil, carrying their own food on their heads, their children on their backs, and instruments of labor on their shoulders. Nor have the Boers any wish to conceal the meanness of thus employing unpaid labor; on the contrary, every one of them, from Mr. Potgeiter and Mr. Gert Krieger, the commandants, downward, lauded his own humanity and justice in making such an equitable regulation. "We make the people work for us, in consideration of allowing them to live in ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone

... themselves—that they could never fade and wither; such days in human existence are the period of joyous German student life. You can believe it. Leonhard has told you enough of Jena. He understood how to unite work and pleasure; I, on the contrary, learned little on the wooden benches, for I rarely occupied them, and the dust of books certainly didn't spoil my lungs. But I read Ariosto again and again, devoted myself to singing, and when a storm of feeling seethed within my breast, composed many songs for my own pleasure. We learned ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... the practice of the constitution, of supporter of the government against undue encroachments on its power and dignity, or against over-hasty action by the leaders of the people. The government undoubtedly had a case. It was contrary to all accepted notions of order and decency that a protected king should be used as a political instrument by a turbulent tribune. Memmius had impeached no one and had given no notice of a public trial; yet he intended to bring Jugurtha before a gathering of the rabble and ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge

... the same two contrary orders. One prayer is mechanical, it is hard, formal, metallic. The other is spontaneous, forceful, and irresistible. Listen to the Pharisee—"Lord, I thank Thee that I am not as other men are." It is the click ...
— My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year • John Henry Jowett

... used up in about six thousand years, burning at the pace he does. Now, we know that the ancient Egyptians kept careful note of the heavenly bodies, and if the sun were really burning away he must have been very much larger in their time; but we have no record of this; on the contrary, all records of the sun even to five thousand years ago show that he was much the same as at present. It is evident that we must search elsewhere for an explanation. It has been suggested that his furnace ...
— The Children's Book of Stars • G.E. Mitton

... in that city! Determined not to lose it, I took the return train to Baltimore, and put up at Barnum's Hotel. Here I met with Mr. Abell, publisher of the Baltimore Sun, an old acquaintance. Somewhat contrary to my expectations, knowing him to be a native of the North, I found him an ardent secessionist. So enthusiastic was he in the cause, that he denounced both Maryland and Virginia for their hesitancy in following the example of the Cotton States; and ...
— A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital • John Beauchamp Jones

... the fugitives, who were fain to escape, as many as could, to the other side of the river, leaving 500 prisoners, including 70 chief citizens of Waterford behind them. These were all inhumanly massacred, according to Giraldus, the eulogist of all the Geraldines, by the order of Herve, contrary to the entreaties of Raymond. Their legs were first violently broken, and they were then hurled down the rocks into the tide. Five hundred men could not well be so captured and put to death by less than an equal number of hands, ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee

... therto, and shall{e} be vnderwriten; the nombre vnto the which{e} addicio{u}n shall{e} be made to is that nombre that resceyueth{e} the addicion of at other, and shall{e} be writen above; and it is convenient that the lesse nombre be vnderwrit, and the more added{e}, than the contrary. But whether it happ{e} one other other, the same comyth{e} of, Therfor, yf ow wilt adde nombre to nombre, write the nombre wherto the addicio{u}n shall{e} be made in the omest ordre by his differences, so that the first of the lower ordre be vndre the first of the ...
— The Earliest Arithmetics in English • Anonymous

... open and square and there never was a sneak among them." It was Rodney Grant, of Texas, who made the claim to his friend, Ben Stone, and this story shows how he proved the truth of this statement in the face of apparent evidence to the contrary. ...
— A Sweet Little Maid • Amy E. Blanchard

... been her life for many years. Wild and despotic were her words and manner to those few people who came across her path. The country-folk did her imperious bidding, because they feared to disobey. If they pleased her, they prospered; if, on the contrary, they neglected or traversed her behests, misfortune, small or great, fell on them and theirs. It was not detestation so much as an indefinable ...
— Curious, if True - Strange Tales • Elizabeth Gaskell

... power of organization common among orators? It seems to me that, on the contrary, it is very rare. In some of Burke's speeches, in which his sensibility and imagination were thoroughly under the control of his judgment, as, for instance, his speech on Conciliation with America, that on Economical Reform, and that to the Electors ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster

... bent only upon destroying and cutting off nations not a few (chap. x. 7), who does not give rest until he has fully cast down to the ground the broken power. The Servant of God, far from breaking the bent reed, shall, on the contrary—this is the positive opposed to the negative—care for, and assist the wretched with tender love. Just thereby does He accomplish the object of His efforts. The confirmation of the character here ...
— Christology of the Old Testament: And a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions. Vol. 2 • Ernst Hengstenberg

... of starlings were frequently at this ledge last autumn, very late in autumn, and I suspect they had a winter brood there. The starling does rear a brood sometimes in the midst of the winter, contrary as that may seem to our general ideas of natural history. They may be called roof-residents, as they visit it all the year round; they nest in the roof, rearing two and sometimes three broods; and use it as their club and place of meeting. Towards July ...
— The Open Air • Richard Jefferies

... circumstances around him, but yet had been allowed no voice in them. In this affair that was so peculiarly his own,—this of his promised bride, he was determined that no voice should be heard but his own; and now, contrary to his wont, he was ready enough to quarrel ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope

... mustered as aforesaid, be entitled to the location and grant of one right, in manner as in and by this act is directed; and shall be, and hereby is, discharged from any future maintenance of such slave, any law to the contrary notwithstanding: And such slave so entered as aforesaid, who shall serve for the term of three years or until regularly discharged, shall, immediately after such service or discharge, be, and is hereby declared to be, a free man of ...
— History of the Negro Race in America From 1619 to 1880. Vol 1 - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George W. Williams

... by its tendency to abstract oxygen for the purpose of complete combustion, easily reduces oxidated substances brought into it, and it is, therefore, called the flame of reduction. In the oxidizing flame, on the contrary, all the carbon which exists in the interior of the flame is oxidized into carbonic acid (CO^{2}) and carbonic oxide (CO), while the blue color of the cone of the flame is caused by the complete combustion of the carbonic oxide. These two portions of the flame—the oxidizing and the reducing—are ...
— A System of Instruction in the Practical Use of the Blowpipe • Anonymous

... through the host that Thiodolf was certainly not slain. Slowly he had come to himself, and yet was not himself, for he sat among his men gloomy and silent, clean contrary to his wont; for hitherto he had been a merry man, and a ...
— The House of the Wolfings - A Tale of the House of the Wolfings and All the Kindreds of the Mark Written in Prose and in Verse • William Morris

... gain strength during the first week of his stay at Muro, he appeared to lose it even more rapidly after that memorable afternoon. It was not that he lost heart and control of courage; on the contrary, he spoke all at once more hopefully, and grew most particular in the carrying out of each detail of the day, precisely in the manner prescribed by the doctors. He forced himself to eat, he did his best to sleep a certain number of hours, ...
— Taquisara • F. Marion Crawford

... Shakespeare was "a careful and prudent man of business," for in a dozen plays the personages who are his heroes and incarnations pour contempt on those who would lock "rascal counters" from their friends, and, in default of proof to the contrary, we are compelled to assume that he practised the generosity which he so earnestly and sedulously praised. At least it will be advisable for the moment to assume that he pictured himself as generous Antonio, ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris

... from myself and what I deserve," she cried. "I am perfectly sane and you know it, and you are doing me no favor in trying to create the contrary impression. I demand an—" ...
— In the Bishop's Carriage • Miriam Michelson

... 'I do most devoutly believe in the Holy Gospel, whatever any Arabian may say to the contrary. But is it for this, pray, that you propose to light ...
— The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay • Maurice Hewlett

... which he could not for his life have described one feature of the Queen's face; but when she spoke to him, his heart leapt and his eyelids quivered, and her image was fixed upon his memory forever. Young though he was, it would have been contrary to his grave and rather melancholy disposition to lose his heart at first sight to any woman, and it was neither love, nor love's forerunner, that overcame him as he gazed at the Queen. It was a purely visual impression, like that of being dazzled by a bright light, ...
— Via Crucis • F. Marion Crawford

... recently been directed against him. If Pope had expected by the publication of the 'Dunciad' to crush the herd of scribblers who had been for years abusing him, he must have been woefully disappointed. On the contrary, the roar of insult and calumny rose louder than ever, and new voices were added to the chorus. In the year 1733 two enemies entered the field against Pope such as he had never yet had to encounter—enemies of high social position, of acknowledged wit, and of a certain, though as the sequel ...
— The Rape of the Lock and Other Poems • Alexander Pope

... heard the story he was not angry, as Wilkins had been half afraid that he would be; on the contrary, he laughed outright, and called Fauntleroy up to him, and made him tell all about the matter from beginning to end, and then he laughed again. And actually, a few days later, the Dorincourt carriage stopped in the green lane before ...
— Little Lord Fauntleroy • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... was any thing so perfectly false (I cannot help referring to it again,) as that religion is discouraged among our slaves. It is precisely the contrary. Most of them have the same opportunities of attending worship as their owners. They generally prefer the Methodist and Baptist denominations; they worship with the whites, or they have exclusive occasions for themselves, which they ...
— Aunt Phillis's Cabin - Or, Southern Life As It Is • Mary H. Eastman

... dimensions of material things. But in their hearts they knew the truth. It is the American way to mask the beauty of our nobler selves, or real selves under a gibing deprecation. So we wear the veneer of materialism, and beneath it we are intense idealists. And woe to him who reckons to the contrary! ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White

... pretty to see (it being St. Andrew's day,) how some few did wear St. Andrew's crosse; but most did make a mockery at it, and the House of Parliament, contrary to practice, did sit also: people having no mind to observe the Scotch saint's days till they hear better ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys

... and murmured: "Oh, no, quite the contrary." A remark which did not enlighten Franz particularly as to the status of the man who had just left them. There was a note of fear in the housekeepers's voice and she added hastily: "Does any one besides ourselves know that he ...
— The Lamp That Went Out • Augusta Groner

... in line to pass leathern buckets from hand to hand, filled with water from the fountain. Even at this extremity two guards with drawn scimitars walked to and fro in front of the row, each looking and walking in the contrary direction to the other, changing their direction at the same moment as they went and returned, so that no slave was for a moment out of sight of the watchmen with the keen bright weapons. And every man knew, instinctively, that the least movement which looked suspicious might bring the flashing blade ...
— The House of Walderne - A Tale of the Cloister and the Forest in the Days of the Barons' Wars • A. D. Crake

... implied even in the character of a saint. It seems that the failure of an inheritance, which he had every reason to expect, was the cause of his first disadvantage in the world; and since then, in consonance with that curious natural law which seems so contrary to justice, yet constantly consonant with fact, this evil has been cumulative, and he has had nothing but disappointments ever since. He has a very small living now, and is never likely to get a better, for he is getting ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant

... (with dignity). I didn't say I always went to Margate. On the contrary I have never been here before, and shouldn't be here now, if my doctor hadn't told me it was my ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 103, September 3, 1892 • Various

... was said of him, that in the cabinet he opposed everything, proposed nothing, and was ready to support anything. I remember Lord Camden's saying to me one night, when the chancellor was speaking contrary, as he thought, to his own conviction, 'There now! I could not do that: he is supporting what he does ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 572, October 20, 1832 • Various

... black gown, I gave it pretty much over, till my daughters grew up, who, being all tolerably good singers, plagued me for words to some of their favourite tunes, and so extorted those effusions which have made a public appearance, beyond my expectations, and contrary to my intentions; at the same time, I hope there is nothing to be found in them uncharacteristic or unbecoming the cloth, which I would always wish to see respected." Some of Mr Skinner's best songs were composed at a ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various

... But it would only have been at the loss of your letter. As for me, Heaven knows, I should not mind if all the world knew how much I adore you. On the contrary, I should glory ...
— Victor's Triumph - Sequel to A Beautiful Fiend • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth

... little Mary, With her face of winning grace, Chattering tongue that runs apace, And her ways contrary ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole

... should think fit to ascertain its right to levy taxes, by any Act levying a small tax, contrary to their opinion, would they submit ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 1 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Egerton Ryerson

... expressed to him great amazement at her father's being no richer, and said she had no notion but he must have been worth L10,000. Mr. Goosetree prudently told her the less she said about that the better, and she never said it afterwards, but the contrary." Miss Talbot adds that certain letters in Lord Macclesfield's hands "falsify others of her affirmations." By 5th May, 1753, Mrs. Delany writes, "We are now very full of talk about ...
— Trial of Mary Blandy • William Roughead

... his time that his works can even now be read with ease, without the help of dictionary or glossary. In spite of his church training and his residence abroad, his works are surprisingly free from Latin or French forms of speech; on the contrary, they are, in the main, characterised by a strong Saxon directness of expression which must have tended greatly to the continuance of their popularity, and have exercised a strong and advantageous ...
— The Ship of Fools, Volume 1 • Sebastian Brandt

... again met Craven Le Noir, who, contrary to his usual custom of accompanying his father upon his annual migrations to the metropolis, had, upon this occasion, remained home in close attendance upon his cousin, the ...
— Capitola's Peril - A Sequel to 'The Hidden Hand' • Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth

... to bed that night I did not throw myself into an easy-chair and gaze musingly out into the night. On the contrary, I stood up sturdily with my back to the mantel-piece, and with the forefinger of my right hand ...
— A Bicycle of Cathay • Frank R. Stockton

... desired, I will do so in response to a direct inquiry, that every dollar of the proceeds of four per cent. bonds sold during the present year had been applied on calls for refunding, and it is my purpose to continue this unless I give public notice to the contrary. ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman

... in existence when the compilation of the Rig-Veda took place".(1) The Atharva refers to some poets of the Rig (as certain hymnists in the Rig also do) as earlier men. If in the Rig (as Weber says) "there breathes a lively natural feeling, a warm love of nature, while in the Atharva, on the contrary, there predominates an anxious apprehension of evil spirits and their magical powers," it by no means follows that this apprehension is of later origin than the lively feeling for Nature. Rather the reverse. There appears to be no doubt(2) that the style and ...
— Myth, Ritual, and Religion, Vol. 1 • Andrew Lang

... up the scent again. He certainly has not treed, there is neither earth nor hollow to hide him, and yet the scent has gone! And it never came back. If any reader can tell what became of that fox, he is a wiser man than I. Certain it is that we never heard of him again; and for aught I know to the contrary, he may have been that identical Japanese animal which turns into tea-kettles and vanishes in puffs of smoke. It does not take long, however, to make another find, and we go home after a three hours' chase with two fine brushes and appetites which ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - February, 1876, Vol. XVII, No. 98. • Various

... contrary. It appears their intercourse had been very much broken by various causes. He had, as he informed me proudly, managed to nurse Kurtz through two illnesses (he alluded to it as you would to some risky feat), but as a rule Kurtz wandered alone, far in the depths of ...
— Heart of Darkness • Joseph Conrad

... States ought not to indulge a persuasion that, contrary to the order of human events, they will forever keep at a distance those painful appeals to arms with which the history of every other nation abounds. There is a rank due to the United States among nations ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 2) of Volume 3: Andrew Jackson (Second Term) • James D. Richardson

... with respect to the result of that election: there was no doubt that there was not only not a preponderating majority in favour of a change in the laws [free trade] passed in the last few years, or even of modifying them in any degree; but that on the contrary there was a decisive opinion on the part of the country that that settlement should not be disturbed.' Mr. Gladstone wrote to Lord Aberdeen (July 30) that he thought the government absolutely chained to Mr. Disraeli's next budget, and 'I, for ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley

... years. Mr. Warren was a man of good connexions, and some education, but of no fortune whatever, who had gone into the Church—it was the church of his ancestors, one of whom had actually been an English bishop, a century or two ago—from choice, and contrary to the wishes of his friends. As a preacher, his success had never been great; but for the discharge of his duties no man stood higher, and no man was more respected. The living of St. Andrew's, Ravensnest, would have been poor enough, had it depended on the contributions of the parishioners. ...
— The Redskins; or, Indian and Injin, Volume 1. - Being the Conclusion of the Littlepage Manuscripts • James Fenimore Cooper

... or geocentric system, it was deemed prudent not to teach it to the masses. Hence, hiding it away among the other secrets of the Esoteric philosophy, the knowledge of it was lost during the Middle Ages; and when rediscovered, the hierarchy of the Church of Rome, upon the plea that it was contrary to the teachings of Scripture, resorted to inquisitorial tortures to suppress its promulgation; but, in spite of all their efforts, it has been universally accepted; and, in this otherwise enlightened age, we have presented to us the anomaly of a religion based upon a false ...
— Astral Worship • J. H. Hill

... a school room in his life; but it didn't follow that he did no studying for all that. On the contrary, he sat there, on the steps of his father's grocery store, with his chin between his little brown palms, doing up more thinking than the schoolma'am would have ...
— Little Ferns For Fanny's Little Friends • Fanny Fern

... is entirely contrary to my usual mode of life, but I will not be outfaced by a mere boy. (Slapping his bowler-hat on ...
— First Plays • A. A. Milne

... mentioned to you, promised to put me on shore at Arendall or Gothenburg in his way to Elsineur, but contrary winds obliged us to pass both places during the night. In the morning, however, after we had lost sight of the entrance of the latter bay, the vessel was becalmed; and the captain, to oblige me, hanging out a signal for a pilot, bore down ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft

... stopped at nothing. Even they brought wild-dog and set him upon Jerry. But it was contrary to wild-dog's nature to attack an enemy that could not move, even if the enemy was Jerry who had so often bullied him and rolled him on the deck. Had Jerry, with a broken leg or so, still retained power ...
— Jerry of the Islands • Jack London

... who is constantly keeping his eye on the reward he aims at is very likely to stumble and fall, and never to reach it. He, on the contrary, who thinks only how he can best perform his duty will be upheld and encouraged, and very probably obtain a higher reward than any at which he might have aspired. Pearce Ripley found this to be true in his case. ...
— The Grateful Indian - And other Stories • W.H.G. Kingston

... degree surprising, since, from my earliest youth, I had accustomed myself to the use of the sword, and was reputed a thorough master of the weapon. Neither could I believe that Duke Albrecht was capable, after having given his solemn pledge to the contrary, of any ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various

... after Imperialism, on the contrary, we may expect a temporarily successful Liberal policy based on capitalistic collectivism, and even on complete political democracy, where the small farmers are sufficiently numerous. This view would accord ...
— Socialism As It Is - A Survey of The World-Wide Revolutionary Movement • William English Walling

... enemy. The wind was threatening, and, the supply of provisions beginning to fail, Howard and Drake determined on returning homeward, leaving a couple of pinnaces to dog the Spaniards past the Scottish isles. Though the wind was contrary, they beat back against it without loss, and in four or five days the vessels, with their half-starved crews, all safely arrived in Margate Roads, having done the noblest service that fleet ever rendered to a country in the ...
— Ten Great Events in History • James Johonnot

... are mistaken; I have never attempted to influence your nephew's political opinions. On the contrary, if, at his age, he can be said to have formed any opinions, I am greatly afraid—that is, I think his opinions are by no means sound—that is, constitutional. I mean, I mean—" And the poor parson, anxious to select a word that would not offend ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... expectation, if I may so express myself. What I expected was a furious outbreak from the man of fierce and violent passions, thus taunted and driven to bay by the repeated insults of the general. No outburst came, however. On the contrary, the Federal officer bowed his head, and listened in silence, while a mortal pallor diffused itself over his swarthy face. His gaze was bent upon the ground, and his brows so closely knit that they ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke

... noir of Mr. Moore's? Again, in that sublimest passage in the sublimest of the Latin poets (Lucretius), which bursts forth in honour of Epicurus, is there anything that speaks to us of sadness? On the contrary, in the three passages we have referred to, especially in the two first quoted, there is something splendidly luminous and cheering. Joy is often a great source of the sublime; the suddenness of its ventings ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... he soon fell into many of the quaint expressions of the mountaineers and their odd, slow way of speech. This course was effective, and in time the shyness wore away and left between them a comradeship as pleasant as unique. Sometimes they took long walks together on the mountains. This was contrary to mountain etiquette, but they were remote even from the rude conventionalities of the life below them. They even went hunting together, and Easter had the joy of a child when she discovered her superiority ...
— A Mountain Europa • John Fox Jr.

... near an untruth, as when she led Meta to believe this was the sole reason. But, after all, what did Flora herself know to the contrary? ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge

... that face did not convey the idea of any great satisfaction. Quite the contrary. Odalite looked ...
— Her Mother's Secret • Emma D. E. N. Southworth

... circumstances. During the next few weeks Pixie was sent to Coventry by her companions, to her own unutterable grief and confusion. No one offered to help her with difficult lessons; no one invited her to be a companion in the daily crocodile; no one made room for her when she entered a room; on the contrary, she was avoided as if her very presence were infectious, and when she spoke a silence fell over the room, and several moments elapsed before a cold, stern voice would vouchsafe a monosyllabic answer. She was at the bottom of her classes too, being unable ...
— Pixie O'Shaughnessy • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... more remorseful feeling which Richard might have conceived was drowned in his apprehensions that she would be overheard by his servants or his guests,—a masculine apprehension, with which females rarely sympathize; which, on the contrary, they are inclined to consider a mean and cowardly terror on the ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... person could scarcely be said to affect his (Brass's) legal knowledge in any material degree, Mr Brass humbly suggested that it must have been forgotten over night, and was, doubtless, at that moment in its native key-hole. Notwithstanding that Mr Quilp had a strong conviction to the contrary, founded on his recollection of having carefully taken it out, he was fain to admit that this was possible, and therefore went grumbling to the door where, sure enough, he ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens

... are so much alike in habits and general appearance, and their characteristics so well-known, that it would be idle to give any description of them here. We shall only remark that the pig, if fairly treated, is by no means an animal of filthy or dirty habits, as is generally supposed. On the contrary, it is cleanly in its nature; and its slovenliness is brought upon it by the manner in which it is styed up, in its own filth. Neither is it a stupid creature, but possesses considerable intelligence; as is proved ...
— Quadrupeds, What They Are and Where Found - A Book of Zoology for Boys • Mayne Reid

... envoys around all the states, which border on the Tuscan Sea and the Tiber, to purchase the corn. The envoys were prevented from trading in an insolent manner by the Samnitians, who were in possession of Capua and Cumae; on the contrary, they were kindly assisted by the tyrants of Sicily. The Tiber brought down the greatest supplies, through the very active zeal of the Etrurians. In consequence of the sickness, the consuls laboured under a paucity of hands in conducting the government; ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius

... to their causes, in order to suggest suitable modifications of existing conditions. He could not see how impossible it was to sweep away all institutions and impose a wholly new social order irrespective of the natures, faculties, and desires of those whom he wished to benefit; on the contrary, he exaggerates the passivity and plasticity of men and circumstances, and dreams that his model legislator, who apparently is to initiate the new society, will be able to repress all anti-social feelings. He ...
— The Rise of the Democracy • Joseph Clayton

... encased in an old pair of slippers, had descended some six inches below a pair of blue overalls before they touched the ground. If he had been inclined to corpulency, his frame was ample to build upon for a man of Websterian proportions, but he was not so inclined; on the contrary, he simulated other great men in his personality—Jackson, or our modern Abraham Lincoln. He was spare, bony, nervous. His heavy eyebrows, his dark hair well sprinkled with gray, which arose straight upward from his high, indented forehead, and his large, half Roman ...
— Brook Farm • John Thomas Codman

... three threads in width and six in height, and lie from right to left and from left to right. In the second row, which must be two threads distant from the first, the stitches must lie in the contrary direction. In the lozenge-shaped space between, make four cross stitches, over four threads in height and two ...
— Encyclopedia of Needlework • Therese de Dillmont

... to the common capital but one thing—your brains. Later on, if the play goes against us, you may have to throw on the table your liberty, and, in the last extremity, your life. But that is the utmost limit of your losses. I, on the contrary, must contribute myself to the hazard, and no man understands what ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen

... newspapers of the country, however, urged the contrary. Citing the progress of the Negroes since emancipation to show that the blacks were doing their full share toward developing the wealth of the South, the Indianapolis Journal characterized as barbarism the suggestion ...
— A Century of Negro Migration • Carter G. Woodson

... constituent. Our constitutions emanate not from the government, but the State, the society, the creator of the government; and are, therefore, in the strictest sense of the words, leges legum. The radical principle of our system is, that the act of the legislative body, beyond or contrary to the power confided to it by the Constitution, is a nullity, and absolutely void. The courts must so pronounce, and the executive must execute their judgments with the whole force of the State. Upon such ...
— An Essay on Professional Ethics - Second Edition • George Sharswood

... enlisting. Evidently the young men were attracted by all our wonderful treasures, and would have liked to see the country where all these things came from. They imagined the plantations must be very beautiful places, while the old men had vague notions to the contrary, and were afraid of losing ...
— Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific • Felix Speiser

... I find the Injury I have done both to you and my self to be so great, that though the Part I now act may appear contrary to that Decorum usually observed by our Sex, yet I purposely break through all Rules, that my Repentance may in some measure equal my Crime. I assure you that in my present Hopes of recovering you, ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... robbed us of our territory, but to this day asserts her right to its possession! No, your majesty—so long as France retains that which belongs to Austria, Austria will neither forgive her enmity nor forget it. See, on the contrary, how the maritime powers have befriended us! It was THEIR gold which enabled us first to withstand France, and afterward Prussia—THEIR gold that filled your majesty's coffers—THEIR gold that sustained and confirmed the prosperity ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach

... "On the contrary, he was a moral prig," Haythorne blurted out, with apparently undue warmth. "He was a little scholastic shrimp without a drop of ...
— Love of Life - and Other Stories • Jack London

... indicating, even in the slightest degree, any idea on my part that the old occult teaching, and the observed phenomena accompanying the same, regarding the human aura, require any proof or backing up on the part of material scientists. On the contrary, I feel that material science should feel flattered by the backing up by occult science of the new discovery (!) of the "human atmosphere." A little later on, material science may also discover (!) the auric colors, and announce ...
— The Human Aura - Astral Colors and Thought Forms • Swami Panchadasi

... why should she remain and endure that dreadful Mrs. Middleton? What good would it do? Mightn't it, on the contrary, do real harm? The girl couldn't imagine it as being any easier as the days went by, but in case it should, what would it mean but that she ...
— Elsie Marley, Honey • Joslyn Gray

... An oft-repeated assertion to the contrary, which goes back to Karoline von Wolzogen, "Schillers Leben", Achter Abschnitt, is contradicted by a letter of Schiller to Goethe, ...
— The Life and Works of Friedrich Schiller • Calvin Thomas

... suited to our needs, and put an e on to it to keep its sound distinct from that of our own word moral, just as we have done with the French local (English locale) and the German Choral (English chorale), and as, using contrary means for the same end of fixing a sound, we have turned French diplomate into English diplomat. Our English forte ('Geniality is not his forte,' &c.) is altered from the French fort without even the advantage of either keeping the French sound or distinguishing the spoken word from our ...
— Society for Pure English, Tract 3 (1920) - A Few Practical Suggestions • Society for Pure English

... in agriculture. The old state has no superiority over the young one in the price of producing food; on the contrary, it is decidedly its inferior. There, as in love, the apprentice is the master. The proof of this is decisive. Poland can raise wheat with ease at fifteen or twenty shillings a quarter, while England requires fifty. The serf of the Ukraine would make a fortune on the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 341, March, 1844, Vol. 55 • Various

... given drawing (named as one of the chief in the series), Turner's pencil did not move over the thousandth of an inch without meaning; and you charge this expression with extravagant hyperbole. On the contrary, it is much within the truth, being merely a mathematically accurate description of fairly good execution in either drawing or engraving. It is only necessary to measure a piece of any ordinary good work to ascertain this. Take, for instance, ...
— The Two Paths • John Ruskin

... war, together with the supplications of Provinciall Assemblies and Presbyteries, all tending to the composing of the present unhappy differences, and to the begetting of a right understanding, have not produced the desired and wished-for effect; but on the contrary our just grievances being still more and more heightned, iniquity established by a law; and that law put in execution; We cannot chuse but declare and give warning to all the people of GOD in this land, concerning the sinfulnesse and unlawfulnesse of the present Engagement: ...
— The Acts Of The General Assemblies of the Church of Scotland

... your letter of credit. I doubt if you will need the whole amount of it. If, on the contrary, you find you want more for anything special, write ...
— The Title Market • Emily Post

... again, is very light and graceful, yet having a character somewhat between a fancy piece of tone-poetry and an exercise, being capable of receiving either construction, according to the ability and skill of the player. The fugue, on the contrary, is rather firm, resolute, and marked, yet with distinct touches of sentiment—which latter quality is always to be sought for in the playing, but without resorting to rubato. It is not enough to present these selections, they must be made to display the ...
— The Masters and their Music - A series of illustrative programs with biographical, - esthetical, and critical annotations • W. S. B. Mathews

... they all engaged to amend what was amiss, and not to offend any more, which I pray God may be the case. I told them also, that old king Foyne had complained to me, threatening, if any more of them went ashore to fight and shed blood, contrary to the laws of Japan, he would order them to be cut in pieces, as he was determined strangers should have no more licence to infringe the ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume IX. • Robert Kerr

... holy and just and good. And he made up his mind to keep this holy and just and good law of God. But he soon discovered that beside this law of God outside him, which was holy and just and good, that there was another law inside him directly contrary to this law of God outside him. While the law of God outside him said, "This good thing" and "this good thing" and "this good thing" and "this good thing thou shalt do," the law within him said, "You cannot do this good thing that you would;" and a fierce combat ...
— The Person and Work of The Holy Spirit • R. A. Torrey

... which the sordid law would not see or recognize and the average court think absurd, and that the Telegraph might legally refuse to pay him at all. He hoped the Telegraph would do this! But it did not; on the contrary, he received the next day a check for his month's work. He held ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various

... contrary to the current opinion, that during the next decade such a change will have taken place in the condition of our railways, that we shall see them averaging eight to ten per cent, dividends on their legitimate cost. We propose in the present article to give the reasons which have ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various

... another little chance, had been still left there: "Can the Herr Lieutenant-Colonel tell me where General Nostitz is?" Benkendorf can tell;—will himself take the message: but Benkendorf looks into the important Pencil Document; thinks it premature, wasteful, and that the contrary is feasible! persuades Nostitz so to think; persuades this regiment and that (Saxon, Austrian, horse and foot); though the cannon in retreat go trundling past them: "Merely shifting their battery, don't you see:—Steady!" And, in fine, organizes, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVIII. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Seven-Years War Rises to a Height.—1757-1759. • Thomas Carlyle

... the truth, I thought of that. But Dilks doesn't look like a sharper; quite the contrary. Of course, I'll have to keep my eyes open. We will have a written agreement, and I will not let the outfit go out of my sight, at least not until I know ...
— Young Auctioneers - The Polishing of a Rolling Stone • Edward Stratemeyer

... any kind or friendly remarks they may make, I shall feel grateful; while any of a contrary nature will neither ...
— Trade and Travel in the Far East - or Recollections of twenty-one years passed in Java, - Singapore, Australia and China. • G. F. Davidson

... contrary, the most ancient profane books that we have—Hesiod and Homer—represent their Zeus as the only thunderer, the only master of gods and men; he even punishes the other gods; he ties Juno with a chain, and drives Apollo ...
— The Christian Foundation, Or, Scientific and Religious Journal, - Volume I, No. 9. September, 1880 • Various

... the night passes away. At last, brutalized by the accursed thing, he staggers along with rage, and, shivering with cold, he makes his appearance. Not a murmur is heard from her lips. On the contrary, she meets him with a smile—she caresses him with tender arms, with all the gentleness and softness of her sex. Here, then, is seen her disposition, beautifully arrayed. Woman, thou art more to be admired than the spicy gales of Arabia, ...
— The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories • Mark Twain

... deck was devoted to live stock. Pigs grunted in one pen, sheep bleated in another, whilst ducks quacked and turkeys gobbled in coops on either side of them. No one ever thought of grumbling; on the contrary, we all experienced that stupid sense of reflected pride which passengers in a crack liner feel, for the Britannia then enjoyed a tremendous reputation in the Pacific. Certainly, seen from the shore, the ...
— Here, There And Everywhere • Lord Frederic Hamilton

... writes, "among working-women, contrary to the general impression, is not new. Women, from the beginning of the trade-union movement in this country have occupied an important place in the ranks of organized labor. For eighty years and over, women wage-earners in America have ...
— The Trade Union Woman • Alice Henry

... the two men until they found themselves in the smoking-room of Trent's house. A servant noiselessly arranged decanters and cigars upon the sideboard, and, in response to an impatient movement of Trent's, withdrew. Francis lit a cigarette. Trent, contrary to his custom, did not smoke. He walked to the door and softly locked it. Then he returned and stood looking down ...
— A Millionaire of Yesterday • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... lose all consciousness of error, if God be conscious of it? God has not forbidden man to know Him; on the contrary, the Father bids man have the same Mind "which was also in Christ Jesus,"—which was certainly the divine Mind; but God does forbid man's acquaintance with evil. Why? Because evil is no part of the ...
— Unity of Good • Mary Baker Eddy

... can be secured or averted. It does not appear, however, that supernaturalists have attained to any agreement about these matters, or that history indicates a widening of the influence of supernaturalism on practice, with the onward flow of time. On the contrary, the various religions are, to a great extent, mutually exclusive; and their adherents delight in charging each other, not merely with error, but with criminality, deserving and ensuing punishment of infinite ...
— Collected Essays, Volume V - Science and Christian Tradition: Essays • T. H. Huxley

... had stultified the labors of foreign poets. What people had discovered to be good in me before seemed now to be forgotten, and all talent was denied to me. The composer Weyse, my earliest benefactor, whom I have already mentioned, was, on the contrary, satisfied in the highest degree with my treatment of these subjects. He told me that he had wished for a long time to compose an opera from Walter Scott's "Kenilworth." He now requested me to commence the joint work, and write the text. I had no idea of the summary justice ...
— The True Story of My Life • Hans Christian Andersen

... continental limitations, and extend its rule over semi-tropical countries with mixed populations. Others ask if it would not be the wisest policy to give them away after conquering them, or abandon them. They say it would be ruinous to admit them as States to equal rights with ourselves, and contrary to the Constitution to hold them permanently as Territories. It would be bad policy, they argue, to lower the standard of our population by taking in hordes of West Indians and Asiatics; bad policy to run any chance of allowing these ...
— Problems of Expansion - As Considered In Papers and Addresses • Whitelaw Reid

... not seeking world conquest. On the contrary, they are bent upon maintaining their traditional aloofness by having a Monroe Doctrine for the East. This doctrine will be summed up in the phrase, "The East for the Easterners,"—the easterners being the Japanese. Such a policy would prove a serious menace to the trade of the United ...
— The American Empire • Scott Nearing

... money was paid down, nor any deposit or security whatever given to the Company by the supposed purchasers; so that if the stock had fallen, as might have been expected had the act not passed, they would have sustained no loss. If, on the contrary, the price of stock advanced (as it actually did by the success of the scheme), the difference by the advanced price was to be made good by them. Accordingly, after the passing of the act, the account of stock was made up and adjusted with Mr. Knight, and the pretended purchasers were paid ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury

... vanquished. Now yesterday, for instance, some very stiff problems occurred to me—as thus: Can a man justly lay claim to merit for the talents he possesses, and is it immodest of him to let others perceive by his conversation that he is quite aware he possesses them? Or, on the contrary, is not the fact that he is talented purely a piece of good fortune, and would it not be the merest humbug on his part to pretend to be blind to it? Again, if a man performs what is called a good deed, ought he to claim merit for that? Does not the performance of such a deed give one pleasure, ...
— Cleo The Magnificent - The Muse of the Real • Louis Zangwill

... but you have deserved a little lesson in modesty and humility. Good gracious! you think perhaps it was for your merits that I chose you, insisted on you. You would be far from the mark, my poor dear. It is, on the contrary, because of your want of merit. Now, as to M. de Courtalin. Why, there is a man of merit! I had, from morning to night, M. de Courtalin's merit dinned into my ears, and that was why I had taken a dislike to him. What I dreaded ...
— Parisian Points of View • Ludovic Halevy

... my story: I did not at all relish the idea of Mamma's supervision, it was repugnant to my idea of personal liberty, and had the contrary effect, in making me restive under such restraint, and firmly resolved to do as I liked every chance I could get. One morning I had a most pleasant dream. "I was in a beautiful garden, laying on the soft turf under ...
— Forbidden Fruit • Anonymous

... seraphim around that 'it was very good.' There is a view of the world which calls itself pious, but is really an insult to God; and the irreligious pessimism that is fashionable nowadays, as if human life were a great mistake, and everything were mean and poor and insufficient, is contrary to the facts and to the consciousness of every man. But if you make things first which were meant to be second, then you make what was meant to be food 'ashes.' They are all good in their place. Wealth is good; wisdom is good; success is good; love is good. ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren

... explored, but it is known that they are by no means extensive. In the Pyrenees there is but one great glacier, though the height of these mountains is such, that, were the shape of their valleys favorable to the accumulation of snow, they might present beautiful glaciers. In the Tyrol, on the contrary, as well as in Norway and Sweden, we find glaciers almost as fine as those of Switzerland, in mountain-ranges much lower than either of the above-named chains. But they are of diversified forms, and have valleys widening upward on the slope of long crests. The glaciers on the Caucasus ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 12, No. 73, November, 1863 • Various

... happy. Misery has no place in the Divine scheme of things—it is the result of Man's own opposition to Natural Law. In Natural Law, all things work calmly, slowly and steadfastly together for good—Nature silently obeys God's ordinance. Man, on the contrary, questions, argues, denies, rebels,—with the result that he scatters his force and fails in his highest effort. It is in his own power to renew his own youth—his own vitality,—yet we see him sink of his own accord into feebleness and decrepitude, ...
— The Life Everlasting: A Reality of Romance • Marie Corelli

... "On the contrary, I like it very much. You sing very well indeed, Filipo. Would you mind telling me where you heard the ...
— The Perils of Pauline • Charles Goddard

... in course; that is your little game! But we kalkilated, Jack, even on that, on yer bein' rambunktious and contrary; and so we went ter Red Gulch, and found Sandy. Ye know I take a kind o' interest in Sandy: he's the second husband of my wife, the woman you run away with, pard. But thar's nothin' mean about ...
— Two Men of Sandy Bar - A Drama • Bret Harte

... Andrew, but you'd never suspect it," said Mrs. Zelotes. She had used to have a fancy that Andrew and Cynthia might make a match. She had seen no reason to the contrary, and she always looked at Cynthia with a curious sense of injury and resentment when she thought of what might ...
— The Portion of Labor • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... educated, more active in affairs, better equipped for self-government than any other entire people numbering six millions, unless it be other citizens of our own country, surrounded by the same circumstances and conditions?" Not the Easy Chair, certainly. On the contrary, it says Amen. ...
— From the Easy Chair, vol. 1 • George William Curtis

... The Prince of Tarki was a tall, well-made youth, of frank countenance; black curls streamed behind his ears from under his cap—a slight mustache shaded his upper lip—his eyes glittered with a proud courtesy. He rode a bright bay steed, which fretted under his hand like a whirlwind. Contrary to custom, the horse's caparison was not the round Persian housing, embroidered all over with silk, but the light Circassian saddle, ornamented with silver on a black ground; and the stirrups were of the black steel of Kharaman, inlaid with ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXIX. - March, 1843, Vol. LIII. • Various

... he said, "and I don't deny that your situation might be an awkward one if this wasn't a neutral State. But you're in the service of the Crown of Salissa now, and I reckon that any attempt to inflict punishment on you would be contrary to international law." ...
— The Island Mystery • George A. Birmingham

... words she retired into another chamber, leaving our adventurer confounded by the repulse he had sustained. Not that he was discouraged from prosecuting his aim—on the contrary, this rebuff seemed to add fresh vigour to his operations. He now thought it high time to bring over Madam la Mer to his interest; and, to facilitate her conversion, took an opportunity of bribing her with some inconsiderable presents, after ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett

... it may call to remembrance our sins and the sins of our forefathers, who have turned this Feast, pretending the memory of Christ, into an extreme forgetfulness of him, by giving liberty to carnal and sensual delights; being contrary to the life which Christ himself led here upon earth, and to the spiritual life of Christ in our souls; for the sanctifying and saving whereof Christ was pleased both to take a human life, and ...
— Christmas in Ritual and Tradition, Christian and Pagan • Clement A. Miles

... was safe enough; Smut couldn't reach it, and he was almost frightened out of his senses. You know animals, when they have their young to take care of or their lives to defend, can do things which seem contrary to their nature. Birds don't make their perches on cats' backs, ...
— Woodside - or, Look, Listen, and Learn. • Caroline Hadley

... contrary wind forbidding our departure, Brother Kohlmeister, accompanied by Jonathan, Jonas, and Thukkekina, walked across the country to the N.W. bay, to return their visit. When they saw them coming at a distance, they fired their pieces, to direct them to the tents, ...
— Journal of a Voyage from Okkak, on the Coast of Labrador, to Ungava Bay, Westward of Cape Chudleigh • Benjamin Kohlmeister and George Kmoch

... character in a state of society is not a tree that grows into uprightness by the law of its own strength, though an adorable instance here and there of rectitude and moral loveliness that seem intuitive may sometimes tempt us into a moment's belief in a contrary doctrine. In Rousseau's case this serious problem was never solved; there was no deliberate preparation of his impulses, prepossessions, notions; no foresight on the part of elders, and no gradual acclimatisation of a sensitive ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley

... broken up like the Western. The emperors reigned at Constantinople in great state and splendour, in palaces lined with porphyry and hung with purple, and filled with gold and silver. The Greeks of the east had faults the very contrary to those of the Teutons of the west. Instead of being ignorant, rude, and savage, they were learned, courtly, and keen-witted; but their sharpness was a snare to them, for what they were afraid to do by force, ...
— The Chosen People - A Compendium Of Sacred And Church History For School-Children • Charlotte Mary Yonge

... bless ourselves? We worked hard then, too, but we had time for long walks together across the prairies—time to sit in the dusk by the water and plan our lives together. We have done well; we have land, horses, machinery, money. But have we the happiness we knew when we had none of these? On the contrary, are you not worried morning, noon, and night over your work and your property? Don't you complain about the kind of help the farmers have to hire nowadays, and the wages they have to pay? And if you get more land won't all your troubles be increased in proportion? John, sit down and think this ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead

... is sufficient to prove a general; but I could name several people, within the knowledge of some of their neighbors and families yet living, who showed the contrary to an extreme. One man, the master of a family in my neighborhood, having had the distemper, he thought he had it given him by a poor workman whom he employed, and whom he went to his house to see, or went ...
— History of the Plague in London • Daniel Defoe

... to her. Here is the prospectus of that school Mr. Montague Jones is governor of. He is evidently a little afraid of you and your stately airs'—here the lawyer's eyes twinkled—'not that he thinks the less of you for them, quite the contrary. However, to resume, it seems an excellent school; the teaching staff is first-rate, the building palatial, and the fees most moderate—two guineas a term. Moreover, as it is in the City, not far from your own office, you could go there and back together, which would ...
— A City Schoolgirl - And Her Friends • May Baldwin



Words linked to "Contrary" :   logical relation, unfavorable, disobedient, contrariness, different, wayward, opposition, oppositeness, antonymous, perverse, contrary to fact, to the contrary, unfavourable



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