"Flexibility" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... we have shown the disinterestedness which culture enjoins, and its obedience not to likings or dislikings, but to the aim of perfection, let us show its flexibility,—its independence of machinery. That [lii] other and greater prophet of intelligence, and reason, and the simple natural truth of things,—Mr. Bright,—means by these, as we have seen, a certain ...
— Culture and Anarchy • Matthew Arnold
... Gladstone described the Constitution as "the most wonderful work ever struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose of man." He knew, as should we, that the Constitution's words, its phrases, clauses, sentences, paragraphs, and sections still possess a miraculous quality—a mingled flexibility and strength which permits its adaptation to the needs of the hour without sacrifice of its essential character as the ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... even without the aid of any tracing, that the uppermost part of the stem bent successively to all points of the compass, like the stem of a twining plant. A little increase in the power of circumnutating and in the flexibility of the stem, would convert the common asparagus into a twining plant, as has occurred with one species in ...
— The Power of Movement in Plants • Charles Darwin
... habits and the tastes of the magistrate. The lawyers of the United States form a party which is but little feared and scarcely perceived, which has no badge peculiar to itself, which adapts itself with great flexibility to the exigencies of the time, and accommodates itself to all the movements of the social body: but this party extends over the whole community, and it penetrates into all classes of society; it acts upon the country imperceptibly, ...
— American Institutions and Their Influence • Alexis de Tocqueville et al
... plunging into the deep again. There was something in their large movements very imposing, and yet very graceless. There seemed to be no muscular effort, no exertion of any force from within, and no more flexibility in their motions than if they had been built of timber. They appeared to move very much as a wooden whale might be supposed to move down a mighty rapid, roiling and plunging and borne along irresistibly by the current. As they rose, we could see their mouths occasionally, and the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. VI.,October, 1860.—No. XXXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... anxious listener had conveyed to him the conviction, still vague but not less irresistible, that this direct contradiction was peculiarly creditable to the Right Hon. Gentleman addressing the House, displaying a flexibility of genius not ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 102, March 5, 1892 • Various
... probable reason to the contrary, but that we might as readily render the true reason of all their Phaenomena; as namely, what were the cause of the springingess, and toughness of some, both as to their flexibility and restitution. What, of the friability or brittleness of some others, and the like; but till such time as our Microscope, or some other means, enable us to discover the true Schematism and Texture ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke
... moment Caroline scowled; such flexibility was almost disconcerting. Then her natural good-humor and the training resulting from many summers with Miss Honey, who claimed all the best roles at once and shifted ...
— While Caroline Was Growing • Josephine Daskam Bacon
... greater reason to fear that too much would be attempted, and that violent movements would produce an equally violent reaction, than that too little would be done in the way of change. But narrowness of intellect, and flexibility of principle, though they may be serviceable, can ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... permanent stiffness seems to have been brought on, the warm-water treatment recommended above will bring about a loosening and softening of the joint, which will permit first of a slight bending, and then, with gentle encouragement, a complete flexibility. The complete restoration of the limb should be the object kept in view. No case of a stiffened joint, although it may be free from pain and disease, can be regarded as satisfactory, and hence treatment should be persevered ...
— Papers on Health • John Kirk
... di Figaro, by writing for a particular singer. The part of Figaro was, in fact, composed for Benucci. The sparkling brilliancy of Rossini would perhaps never have been so fully developed, had not the skill and flexibility of voice possessed by the singer David, for whom he wrote, enabled him to indulge it to the uttermost. The characters thus imparted to the music of the day are necessarily perishable and evanescent, to be again superseded by later artists, whose excellences ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... their social relationships, a new way of dealing with this ancient and perplexing human failing was developed. This third way involved a more careful analysis of relationships and motives, a greater variety in approach, an increased flexibility in treatment, a new faith, perhaps, in the re-creative powers latent in human nature. But it is unnecessary to enlarge upon a point of view which these pages admirably illustrate. Desertion laws continue to serve a definite purpose, as Miss Colcord makes clear, but ...
— Broken Homes - A Study of Family Desertion and its Social Treatment • Joanna C. Colcord
... mathematics. From the others free election among groups is allowed. The movement here and elsewhere seems to be in the direction of requiring the completion of a full four-year high school course, with increasing flexibility as to specific subjects. ...
— On the Firing Line in Education • Adoniram Judson Ladd
... I may say that they require of the pianist's fingers individualization and, consequently, a flexibility that is spiritual as well as material. The diligent daily study of Bach will form your style, your technics, better than all machines and finger exercises. But play him as if he were human, a contemporary and not a historical reminiscence. Yes, you may indulge in rubato. ...
— Old Fogy - His Musical Opinions and Grotesques • James Huneker
... sufficiently considered nor understood. No matter how much the player may feel the meaning of the music, he cannot express this meaning with stiff wrists and arms. Some people have a natural flexibility, and to such the securing of a musical tone presents far less difficulty; but with time, patience, and thought, I fully believe all ...
— Piano Mastery - Talks with Master Pianists and Teachers • Harriette Brower
... struck one of these standing very wide open, and trod upon a rope's end curled like a snake on the leads. I stooped down, and at a touch I knew that I had hold of Raffles's favourite Manila, which united a silken flexibility with the strength of any hawser. It was tied to the window-post, and it dangled into a room in which there was a dull red glow of fire: an inhabited room if ever I put my nose in one! My body must follow, however, ...
— Mr. Justice Raffles • E. W. Hornung
... of flat thin strips of copper for flexibility. When the strips were allowed to lie closely together, the short conductor showed an enormous self-induction, which cut down the effective potential at its ends near the work. By spreading apart the strips so as to lengthen a line around the conductor, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 711, August 17, 1889 • Various
... was not there to enjoy it; to see the poor Count stand mute with a mixed passion of rage and distress for several seconds, and then to witness his fruitless attempts to view the full extent of the injury, which, notwithstanding the surprising flexibility of his vertebrae, he was unable to compass. Tom Pipes I felt certain would have died on the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 10, No. 274, Saturday, September 22, 1827 • Various
... of his memory, and not too old for the possibility of increasing the store. He was apparently about eight-and-thirty, less tall than his father had been, but admirably made; and his every movement exhibited a fine combination of strength and flexibility of limb. His face was somewhat thin and thoughtful, its complexion being naturally pale, though darkened by exposure to a warmer sun than ours. His features were somewhat striking; his moustache and hair raven black; and his eyes, denied the attributes of military keenness by reason ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... upward extremities. But any part or even the whole body may be involved; for example, Charles O. retained standing positions even where balance was difficult. This phenomenon is often accompanied by "waxy flexibility," where the joints move stiffly but retain whatever bend is given them, like ...
— Benign Stupors - A Study of a New Manic-Depressive Reaction Type • August Hoch
... the innumerable wanderings, fights, upturnings and cataclysms of the earth's stupendous career, each creature has been summoned under penalty of death to use what little wit he may have had, and the slightest trace of mental flexibility is of such priceless value in the struggle for existence that natural selection must always have seized upon it, and sedulously hoarded and transmitted it for coming generations to strengthen and increase. With the lapse of geologic time the upper ...
— The Meaning of Infancy • John Fiske
... returns, the "afterpiece" and "curtain raiser" have practically vanished from our stage. They have so completely vanished, in fact, that theatre goers have lost not only the habit of expecting them, but the imaginative flexibility to enjoy them. If you should play "Romeo and Juliet" to-day and then follow it with a one-act farce, your audience would be uncomfortably bewildered. They would be unable to make the necessary adjustment of mood. If you focus your vision rapidly from a near to a far object, you probably ...
— Washington Square Plays - Volume XX, The Drama League Series of Plays • Various
... of distinctive forms, and to the consequent flexibility of English speech, words which are usually other parts of speech are often used as nouns; and various word groups may take the place of nouns by being ...
— An English Grammar • W. M. Baskervill and J. W. Sewell
... — N. softness, pliableness &c. adj.; flexibility; pliancy, pliability; sequacity[obs3], malleability; ductility, tractility[obs3]; extendibility, extensibility; plasticity; inelasticity, flaccidity, laxity. penetrability. clay, wax, butter, dough, pudding; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... the moonlight, with his back to Jane, his face uplifted, and his hands clasped around one knee, Garth sang. Much practice had added greatly to the sweetness and flexibility of his voice; and he rendered perfectly the exquisite melody to ...
— The Rosary • Florence L. Barclay
... Fetid perspiration. The uses of the perspirable matter are to keep the skin soft and pliant, for the purposes of its easier flexibility during the activity of our limbs in locomotion, and for the preservation of the accuracy of the sense of touch, which is diffused under the whole surface of it to guard us against the injuries of external bodies; in the same manner as the secretion of tears is designed to ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. II - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin
... law? My dear lady, one might as well be sure of a woman—pardon me; you know that I regard this quality of infinite flexibility as one of the supreme charms of your sex. I can't say that I feel it to be the supreme charm of the law. Mrs. Temperley claims to have her authority through the mother, because she has the written consent ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... early a diplomatist. A mind equally powerful and supple, he lent himself equally to all—as fitted for action as for thought, he passed from one to the other with facility, according to the phases of his destiny. There was in him the flexibility of the Greek mind in the stirring periods of the democracy in Athens. His deep study early directed his mind to history, that poem of men of action. Plutarch nourished him with his manly diet. He moulded on the antique ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine
... sidewise, the gap from her crossed knee to her face being closed by a slender forearm and hand that held a lorgnette, through which she was gazing at the children with an apparently absorbed interest. This impression of willowy flexibility was somehow heightened by large, pear-shaped pendants hanging from her ears, by a certain filminess in her black costume and hat. Flung across the table beside her was a long coat of grey fur. She struck an odd note here, presented a strange ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... shattered in pieces, and published a warning that no future litigant should resort to the court of the contumacious praetor.[798] The vulgar mind is impressed, when it is not angered, by such scenes of violence. A repute for sternness is the best cloak for the flexibility which, if revealed, would excite suspicion. Scaurus to the popular mind was an embodiment of stiff patrician dignity, perhaps happily devoid of that touch of insolence which is often the mark of a career ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge
... figure, unable to stoop, without flexibility, could not express dejection. He was very tired suddenly; he dragged his feet going off the poop. Before he left it with nearly an hour of his watch below sacrificed, he addressed himself once more to our young man who ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad
... wearer coughs, sneezes or is under strain, the bowels leave their natural position, working out and in through the rupture opening (due to flexibility and stretching of straps), and the bowels when out are repeatedly pressed between the pelvic ...
— Cluthe's Advice to the Ruptured • Chas. Cluthe & Sons
... for years, been teaching that fighting demands supreme flexibility, adaptability; that war is full of surprises which must be met as they arise; that morale, the spiritual force of an army, is subject to fluctuations caused by dozens of conditions which cannot be foreseen and must be overcome. The phrase oftenest on his lips was: "What have ...
— Foch the Man - A Life of the Supreme Commander of the Allied Armies • Clara E. Laughlin
... steep activities, climbing rocks and traversing precipitous ledges, where even a mule dare not venture; and this again leads to the correction of another generally received error, that his legs are "formed more for strength than flexibility, and fitted to bear an enormous weight upon a level surface, without the necessity of ascending or descending great acclivities."[1] The same authority assumes that, although the elephant is found in the neighbourhood of mountainous ranges, and will ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent
... but that variety could be accommodated only to motion or duration, and different degrees of motion were perhaps expressed by verses rapid or slow, without much attention of the writer, when the image had full possession of his fancy: but our language having little flexibility, our verses can differ very little in their cadence. The fancied resemblances, I fear, arise sometimes merely from the ambiguity of words; there is supposed to be some relation between a SOFT line and SOFT couch, ...
— Lives of the English Poets: Prior, Congreve, Blackmore, Pope • Samuel Johnson
... creations than Hamlet, and that Shakespeare's own fondness for this kind of play, like the fondness of the theatrical audience for it, diminished with time. But the main reason is surely that this tendency, as we see it in Hamlet, betokens a nimbleness and flexibility of mind which is characteristic of him and not of the later less many-sided heroes. Macbeth, for instance, has an imagination quite as sensitive as Hamlet's to certain impressions, but he has none of Hamlet's delight in freaks and twists of thought, or of his tendency to perceive and ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... vital and inclosing the seed of unguessed-at possibilities, to tally the fluid, indeterminate, outward-reaching spirit of democracy and a new world, the poet required a medium of corresponding scope and flexibility, all-inclusive and capable of endless modulation and variety. Finding none ready to his hand, he created it. Not that Whitman did not draw for his resources on the great treasury of world-literature; and he profited by the efforts and achievement of predecessors. ...
— The Gate of Appreciation - Studies in the Relation of Art to Life • Carleton Noyes
... to prevent bruising in handling. A bruise or mar may not be as conspicuous in a tomato as in a peach, but it is quite as injurious. It is a great deal better for pickers to use light pails rather than baskets, the flexibility of the latter often resulting in bruises. It is an advantage to have enough of these so that the sorting can be from the pail, but if this is not practical the fruit should be carefully emptied on a sorting table for grading. ...
— Tomato Culture: A Practical Treatise on the Tomato • William Warner Tracy
... been a few representations in English within this time and a considerable number in Italian, our operatic institutions being quick, as a rule, to put it upon the stage whenever they have at command a soprano leggiero with a voice of sufficient range and flexibility to meet the demands of the extraordinary music which Mozart wrote for the Queen of Night to oblige his voluble-throated sister-in-law, Mme. Hofer, who was the original representative of that character. The same operatic conditions having prevailed in New York and London ...
— A Book of Operas - Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... voices were very differently trained from heavy ones. Madame Carvalho, who began her studies in his school, did not alter the flexible but feeble organ she brought there. Mlle. Chaudesaigues and Mlle. Jacob, under Delsarte's tuition, attained to marvels of flexibility, without losing any of their ...
— Delsarte System of Oratory • Various
... intermediate points. Thus at liberty, they must finally take that position, wherein every one will be equally pressed; for if any one was more pressed than the neighboring point, it would give way, from the flexibility of the matter ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... each of which was a gate, and at the summit an eighth, that of the fixed stars. The first gate says Celsus, was that of Saturn, and of lead, by the heavy nature whereof his dull slow progress was symbolized. The second, of tin, was that of Venus, symbolizing her soft splendor and easy flexibility. The third, of brass, was that of Jupiter, emblem of his solidity and dry nature. The fourth, of iron, was that of Mercury, expressing his indefatigable activity and sagacity. The fifth, of copper, was that of Mars, expressive of his inequalities and variable nature. ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... bred a page at Whitehall, and had early acquired all the flexibility and the selfpossession of a veteran courtier. He was laborious, clearheaded, and profoundly versed in the details of finance. Every government, therefore, found him an useful servant; and there was nothing in his opinions or ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... any thing like consecutive progress within the historical period, and deduced from their special position, or collected from their particular history. Even looking to the manner of progress, the order of succession of social states, there is need of great flexibility in our generalizations. The limits of variation in the possible development of social, as of animal life, are a subject of which little is yet understood, and are one of the great problems in social science. It is, at all events, a ...
— A System Of Logic, Ratiocinative And Inductive • John Stuart Mill
... quality of utmost flexibility. This flexibility appears also in art instruction, and it is for this reason that in no two institutions of higher learning is the problem of art instruction attacked in the same way. There is, consequently, a great diversity ...
— College Teaching - Studies in Methods of Teaching in the College • Paul Klapper
... conspiracy with which the British democracy is now confronted—an attempt to place the main burden of taxation upon the shoulders of wage-earners and not on income-drawers, a disastrous blow at the prosperity, the freedom, the flexibility, and the expansive power of British industry, and a deadly injury to the purity of English public life. The Conservative Party tell us that if they win the victory they will screw a protective tariff on our necks. What do we say? What of the House ...
— Liberalism and the Social Problem • Winston Spencer Churchill
... statue, obscurely suggest to us the grandeur and perfection of the whole. Their very language—a type of the understandings of which it was the creation and the image—in variety, in simplicity, in flexibility, and in copiousness, excels every other language of the western world. Their sculptures are such as we, in our presumption, assume to be the models of ideal truth and beauty, and to which no artist of modern times ...
— A Defence of Poetry and Other Essays • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... of life is conceived, not for emergencies and dangers, but for tranquillity and harmony. And so where masses of people must cooperate in an uncertain and eruptive environment, it is usually necessary to secure unity and flexibility without real consent. The symbol does that. It obscures personal intention, neutralizes discrimination, and obfuscates individual purpose. It immobilizes personality, yet at the same time it enormously ...
— Public Opinion • Walter Lippmann
... apart than before they were lovers. It was evident to her that he was, as he had said, living with paralyzed activities in his endeavour to think of a plan of procedure. She was awe-stricken to discover such determination under such apparent flexibility. His consistency was, indeed, too cruel. She no longer expected forgiveness now. More than once she thought of going away from him during his absence at the mill; but she feared that this, instead of benefiting him, might be the means of hampering and humiliating him yet more if ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... it is no fanciful theory, but may be demonstrated as clearly as the problems of the geometer. The naturalist has his mathematics, as well as the geometer and the astronomer; and if the mathematics of the Animal Kingdom have a greater flexibility than those of the positive sciences, and are therefore not so easily resolved into their invariable elements, it is because they have the freedom and pliability of life, and evade our efforts to bring all their external variety within the limits of the same structural law which nevertheless controls ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... it is hung over their graves. The largest cross-bows have a span of fully five feet, and require a pull of thirty-five pounds to string them. The bow is made of a species of wild mulberry, of great toughness and flexibility. The stock, some four feet long in the war-bows, is usually of wild plum wood, the string is of plaited hemp, and the trigger of bone. The arrow, of sixteen to eighteen inches, is of split bamboo, about four times the thickness of an ordinary knitting needle, hardened and pointed. ...
— Across China on Foot • Edwin Dingle
... seemed to me then, and still seems, the farthest reach of the author's great talent. It is couched, like so much of his work, in the autobiographic form, which next to the dramatic form is the most natural, and which lends itself with such flexibility to the purpose of the author. In 'Barry Lyndon' there is imagined to the life a scoundrel of such rare quality that he never supposes for a moment but he is the finest sort of a gentleman; and so, in fact, he was, ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... were all distinct, clear, and neat; proceeding from a strength so suppled, as to give their joints all the requisite flexibility and obedience ...
— A Treatise on the Art of Dancing • Giovanni-Andrea Gallini
... organ serves another purpose: that of a toilet-sponge and brush. At a moment of rest, after a meal, the Glow-worm passes and repasses the said brush over his head, back, sides and hinder parts, a performance made possible by the flexibility of his spine. This is done point by point, from one end of the body to the other, with a scrupulous persistency that proves the great interest which he takes in the operation. What is his object in thus sponging himself, in dusting and polishing himself so carefully? It is a question, apparently, ...
— The Wonders of Instinct • J. H. Fabre
... every individual to have a distinct sort of writing, as she has given a peculiar countenance, a voice, and a manner. The flexibility of the muscles differs with every individual, and the hand will follow the direction of the thoughts, and the emotions and ...
— The Detection of Forgery • Douglas Blackburn
... eastern Tennessee during those controversial years would possess the characteristics of a diplomat. Even his friends found him uncommunicative, too often defiant and violent in controversy, irritating in manners, indiscreet, and lacking flexibility in the management of men. The messages which he wrote as President were dignified and judicious, and his addresses were not lacking in power, but he was prone to indulge in unseemly repartee with his hearers when speaking on the stump. He exchanged epithets with bystanders ...
— The United States Since The Civil War • Charles Ramsdell Lingley
... parallelisms in thought and phrase, from inversions, archaisms, and the almost excessive wealth of metaphor and epithet. In its early stages, there is apparent perhaps a poverty of resource, a lack of flexibility; but this charge cannot be sustained against the best prose of the later period. In the translations from the Latin it shows a certain stiffness, and becomes sometimes involved, in the too conscientious effort of the translator to ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... to refined society. I wouldn't part with my French for the world. All the first families in Charleston are familiar with it. It's the modern gentleman's curt-blanche to society here. There's no language like it for beauty and flexibility; but one must go to France and learn to acquire its grace and ease," said he, in rapid succession, rolling out his words in imitation of a London sprig of the Inner Temple, and ...
— Manuel Pereira • F. C. Adams
... latter cannot be undertaken satisfactorily. A good and reliable technique is undoubtedly of primary necessity. But it is by no means all. One may have a voice which is well-posed and of good resonance, and also have sufficient flexibility to perform neatly all the rapid passages with which the pages of the classic composers abound. But this is not singing; nor is the possessor of these an artist. He has simply the necessary and preliminary knowledge which should enable him to become one, by further study of ...
— Style in Singing • W. E. Haslam
... Not that she was astonishingly beautiful, but she was tall and just good-looking enough to allow her to consider herself a beauty. Her chief attraction was her form, which, if somewhat flat-chested, had a feline flexibility rarer and more seductive than she imagined. She was content to believe that nature had fashioned her to play the part in life which, she knew, was hers of right. Her name, even, was most appropriate—dignified. ...
— Elder Conklin and Other Stories • Frank Harris
... the cotton trade; in other trades it might be impossible for technical reasons, or, where possible, it might in certain circumstances be highly undesirable. The point I wish to stress is that under an industrial scheme you have an immense flexibility, you can adapt all the details to the special conditions of the particular industry, and by that means you can secure results immeasurably superior to anything that is possible under a universal State system. Moreover, if certain features of the ...
— Essays in Liberalism - Being the Lectures and Papers Which Were Delivered at the - Liberal Summer School at Oxford, 1922 • Various
... imaginary products of a sort of artificial nature, which he got up especially for that purpose; as if he could invent better materials for poetic imagery than ancient Nature had furnished! Still, it is not unlikely that we owe to him somewhat of the polish and flexibility of the Shakespearian dramatic diction: that he could have helped the Poet in any thing beyond mere diction ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... and stiff as applied to a bit, we will describe the matter. A flexible bit is one in which the axles have their points of junction broad and smooth, (8) so as to bend easily; and where the several parts fitting round the axles, being large of aperture and not too closely packed, have greater flexibility; whereas, if the several parts do not slide to and fro with ease, and play into each other, that is what we call a stiff bit. Whatever the kind of bit may be, the rider must carry out precisely the same rules in using it, as follows, if he wishes to turn out a horse with the qualities ...
— On Horsemanship • Xenophon
... Several tufts of black and blonde hair. A human jaw, furnished with fine white teeth. A forearm and hand, all the fingers of the latter intact. The flesh was white and fresh, and both the arm and hand preserved a degree of flexibility in the articulations. ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... old. His limbs lost their flexibility, and some of his wiring started to corrode. Mark would spend hours keeping ...
— Beside Still Waters • Robert Sheckley
... Mignonne was gone. He mounted the little hill to scan the horizon, and perceived her in the far distance returning with the long bounds peculiar to these animals, who are prevented from running by the extreme flexibility of ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various
... the tail consisted of jointed segments till its termination; in others, as in Illaenus, there was a great caudal shield, that in size and form corresponded to the shield which covered the head; the segments of Calymene, from the flexibility of their joints, fitted close to the cerebral rim; while the same effect was produced in the inflexible shields, caudal and cephalic, of Illaenus, by their exact correspondence, and the flexibility of the connecting rings, which enabled them ...
— The Testimony of the Rocks - or, Geology in Its Bearings on the Two Theologies, Natural and Revealed • Hugh Miller
... theologian. It is perhaps the first attempt towards a philosophical history of dogma, less patient and minute than the works of the specialists of modern Germany on the same subject, but for spirit, clearness, and breadth it is superior to those profound but somewhat barbarous writers. The flexibility of intellect which can do justice in quick succession to such diverse subjects is very extraordinary, and assuredly implies great width of sympathy ...
— Gibbon • James Cotter Morison
... admixture with boracic acid, salicylic acid, and glycerol, is used in the production of the so-called transparent leather. The latter is very flexible and possesses great tensile strength, but loses the latter quality when exposed to heat, and, when stored, also loses its flexibility. By simply washing with water, the leather is ...
— Synthetic Tannins • Georg Grasser
... character'; perhaps it is, indeed, the only way. We can put in the quaint figure that spoke a hundred words with us yesterday by the wayside; but do we know him? Our friend with his infinite variety and flexibility, we know-but can we put him in? Upon the first, we must engraft secondary and imaginary qualities, possibly all wrong; from the second, knife in hand, we must cut away and deduct the needless arborescence of his nature, but the trunk and the few branches that ...
— The Pocket R.L.S. - Being Favourite Passages from the Works of Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson
... da Cordova raised her head and looked over the grand piano, and her lips parted, and boredom vanished very suddenly; for even those who did not take much pleasure in the music were amazed by the mere sound of her voice and by its incredible flexibility. ...
— The Primadonna • F. Marion Crawford
... and the circulation is more languid in the later period of life. The joints are less supple; the arteries are more or less "ossified." Something like these changes has taken place in the mind. It has lost the flexibility, the plastic docility, which it had in youth and early manhood, when the gristle had but just become hardened into bone. It is the nature of poetry to writhe itself along through the tangled growths of the vocabulary, as a snake ...
— Over the Teacups • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... plays. Peele's are long monologues, and when Sackville's or Wilmot's characters discourse it is in the fashion of a set debate. Faustus and Mephistophilis, on the other hand, meet in real conversation, and it is in their question and answer that the flexibility and naturalness of blank verse are shown to advantage for the first time by Marlowe. The second feature is the infusion of pure poetry into drama. Hitherto the opinion seems to have held that dramatic verse must keep as close to prose as possible ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... for the first time between 1815 and 1821, the great essayists, M. de Bonald and M. de Maistre (those two eagles of thought)—all the lighter French literature, in short, that appeared during that sudden outburst of first vigorous growth might bring delight into her solitary life, but not flexibility of mind or body. She stood strong and straight like some forest tree, lightning-blasted but still erect. Her dignity became a stilted manner, her social supremacy led her into affectation and sentimental over-refinements; she queened it with her foibles, after the usual fashion of those ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... house would please you very much, would it, darling?" says Adolphe, clasping Caroline round the waist, and noticing that she leans upon him as if to show the flexibility of her form. ...
— Petty Troubles of Married Life, Part First • Honore de Balzac
... gaze at her had been one of mild interest rather than of rapture. But she looked so lovely in the green world about her, her pink cheeks, her simple light dress, and the delicate flexibility of her movement acquired such rarity from their wild-wood setting, that his eyes kindled as he ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy
... line of precedents leads to wrongful conclusions, the legislature must intervene with a statute rectifying the wrong. The Romans, who were gifted with a higher legal genius than we, managed better. The praetor, by his edict, suppressed inconvenient precedents, and hence the Romans maintained flexibility in their municipal law without falling into confusion. We have nothing to correspond to ...
— The Theory of Social Revolutions • Brooks Adams
... extremely like the cypress, straight, slender, with erect, compressed ramification, and feathered to the ground, but its foliage is neither so dark nor so dense, the tree does not attain the majestic height of the cypress, nor has it the lithe flexibility of that tree. In mere shape, the Lombardy poplar nearly resembles this latter, but it is almost a profanation to compare the two, especially when they are agitated by the wind; for under such circumstances, the one is the most majestic, the other the most ungraceful, or—if ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... introduction of hollow backs is probably somewhat as follows: Leather was doubtless first chosen for covering the backs of books because of its toughness and flexibility; because, while protecting the back, it would bend when the book was opened and allow the back to "throw up" (see fig. 1, A). When gold tooling became common, and the backs of books were elaborately decorated, it was found that the creasing of the leather injured the ...
— Bookbinding, and the Care of Books - A handbook for Amateurs, Bookbinders & Librarians • Douglas Cockerell
... interest of the Government to encourage the development and settlement of the country and its duty to follow up its citizens there with the benefits of legal machinery, I earnestly urge upon Congress the establishment of a system of government with such flexibility as will enable it to adjust itself to the future ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... black plaits coiling twice round her head, and a tawny tint in her complexion and especially in the color of her slender but graceful and muscular arms and neck. By the grace of her movements, by the softness and flexibility of her small limbs, and by a certain coyness and reserve of manner, she reminded one of a pretty, half-grown kitten which promises to become a beautiful little cat. She evidently considered it proper to show an interest in the general conversation by smiling, but in spite ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... face which varied so much in expression. Not only was there a marked difference at all times between one side and the other, due partly to the contrast between the two eyes and partly to a loss of flexibility in the muscles of the right side, but almost from moment to moment the general appearance of the face moved between a lively, genial animation, a cruel and wolf-like scowl, and a heavy and hopeless dejection. No face was capable of showing greater tenderness; none could assume a more ...
— An Adventure With A Genius • Alleyne Ireland
... pens at Washington, having brought over from England some of those made by Joseph Gillott, at Birmingham. Before this goose-quill pens had been exclusively used, and there was in each House of Congress and in each Department a penmaker, who knew what degree of flexibility and breadth of point each writer desired. Every gentleman had to carry a penknife, and to have in his desk a hone to sharpen it on, giving the finishing touches on one of his boots. Another new invention of that epoch was the lucifer match-box, ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... among dancing folk, attaining such a vogue as almost to cause a panic among the tribunes and censors of society. Even to one who cares nothing for the hula per se, save as it might be a spectacle out of old Hawaii, or a setting for an old-time song, the innocent grace and Delsartian flexibility of this solo dance, which one can not find in its Keltic or African congeners, associate it in mind with the joy and light-heartedness of ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson
... it was, there was no room for doubt. He was glad he had ordered the Challonari to withdraw from contact. To accept the existence of such beings required a flexibility under shock, an adaptability of reasoning, that the limited Challonari could never rise to. It was like a blow at the structure of the universe, but it raised a fascinating, age-old problem—what possible means of adequate communication could ...
— The Short Life • Francis Donovan
... possess all the requisites of a first-class spring, combining in its construction extreme simplicity with great strength, and a feature whereby the power of the spring increases with increase of the load, and vice versa, so that its flexibility remains nearly constant for ...
— Scientific American, Volume XXIV., No. 12, March 18, 1871 • Various
... indicate his vision of the world by means of words which have acquired no thick accretion of traditional crust but are fresh and supple and organic. He should use such words, in fact, as might be said to have the flexibility of life, and like living plants to possess leaves and sap. He should avoid as far as he can such metaphors and images as already carry with them the accumulated associations of traditional usage, and he should select his expressions so that they shall give ...
— The Complex Vision • John Cowper Powys
... ground to question whether the substitution of a smattering of broken English for the flexibility and picturesque expressiveness of an indigenous tongue, thoroughly understood, carries with it any great intellectual gain, though to suggest such a doubt is treason to some minds. The time threatens ...
— Ten Thousand Miles with a Dog Sled - A Narrative of Winter Travel in Interior Alaska • Hudson Stuck
... wanted. I wonder if these two are fitted for each other. I am fond of them both. I think you know that, but—she's not very flexible, this child. And she hasn't much humor. I love her, but I know those things are true. I wonder if one ought to marry Ste. Marie without flexibility ...
— Jason • Justus Miles Forman
... harmony and proportion—made them in politics and letters the leaders of mankind. "Do nothing in excess," was their favorite maxim. They hated every thing that was out of proportion. Their language, without a rival in flexibility and symmetry and in perfection of sound, is itself, though a spontaneous creation, a work of art. "The whole language resembles the body of an artistically trained athlete, in which every muscle, every sinew, is developed into full play, where there ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... reasoning, Julian had arrived at the same conclusion; in which, therefore, he heartily acquiesced. During the seaman's prosing, he was reflecting within himself, how much of the singular flexibility of her limbs and movements the unfortunate girl must have derived from the discipline and instructions of Adrian Brackel; and also how far the germs of her wilful and capricious passions might have been sown during her wandering and adventurous ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... him with the spirited version in quatrains of Dr. Parsons, in the passages cited from the "Inferno," or with those from the "Paradiso," in Mr. Longfellow's less free unrhymed version, the resources and flexibility of Mr. Dayman in handling the difficult measure will be again manifest. To enable our readers to compare the translations with the original and with one another, we will give the Italian, and then the three versions, of the latter part ...
— Essays AEsthetical • George Calvert
... out of childhood, her style lost its early simplicity and became stiff and, as she says, "periwigged." In these years the fear came many times to Miss Sullivan lest the success of the child was to cease with childhood. At times Miss Keller seemed to lack flexibility, her thoughts ran in set phrases which she seemed to have no power to revise or turn ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller
... etc., are longer, and being more slender, have a certain amount of flexibility, but it does not appear that this latter qualification is sought for or considered indispensable. On the other hand, the now nearly obsolete Kokiu of Japan had a bow of about forty-five inches in length that was extremely elastic. It was made ...
— The Bow, Its History, Manufacture and Use - 'The Strad' Library, No. III. • Henry Saint-George
... about style. Stevenson said that he arrived at flexibility of style by frank and unashamed imitation of other writers; he played, as he said, "the sedulous ape" to great authors. This system has its merits, but it also has its dangers. A sensitive literary temperament ...
— From a College Window • Arthur Christopher Benson
... closely and perceived that in all probability he spoke the truth. His flesh and dress had all of the texture of marble, but now the question came up as to the gift of speech and movement and the marvellous and graceful flexibility ...
— Olympian Nights • John Kendrick Bangs
... of the Irish opposition, and the flexibility of some members of the Government combining, the Irish Parliament voted the regency to the Prince without any limitation whatever. This naturally directed the attention of ministers to the hazard of ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various
... rose graciously and extended his royal right hand. Mary Louise made a low curtsey, finding it much easier now that she was a mermaid to perform this little act of graciousness on account of the flexibility of her tail. ...
— The Iceberg Express • David Magie Cory
... first to take his seat: scarcely twenty-eight years of age, his black and piercing eyes, the flexibility of his features, and the elegance of his figure revealed one of those ardent temperaments in whom everything is light, ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XII. - Modern History • Arthur Mee
... solemnity, with which we all approached what, for aught we knew, might prove to be a revelation of a power as wonderful as any with which, as yet, we had ever been brought into acquaintance. Just before we opened the slates it was noticed that at one corner, owing to the flexibility of the wooden frames, it was quite possible to stretch the slates far enough apart to permit the insertion of the blade of a knife, and an examination of the edges at this point revealed only too plainly discolored abrasions. ...
— Preliminary Report of the Commission Appointed by the University • The Seybert Commission
... morning sleep among the vines, when the fatigue of the night was over—dew-drenched garments—the serf lying at his ease at last: the artists, then so [62] numerous at the place, caught what they could, something, at least, of the richness, the flexibility of the visible aspects of life, from all this. With them the life of seeming idleness, to which Denys was conducting the youth of Auxerre so pleasantly, counted but as the cultivation, for their due service to man, of delightful natural things. And the powers of nature concurred. ...
— Imaginary Portraits • Walter Horatio Pater
... flexibility, no command over mirthful inspiration, such as we hear in Mozart, Rossini, or even Donizetti. But his monotone is in sublile rapport with the graver aspects of nature and life. Chorley sums up this characteristic of Bellini ...
— Great Italian and French Composers • George T. Ferris
... to all, as is also the case in, let us say, The Tempest. But what distinction, what variation of tone, what delicacy and expressiveness of modulation! As a simple matter of fact, few writers have ever had a greater flexibility ...
— An Introduction to the Study of Browning • Arthur Symons
... pliableness &c adj.; flexibility; pliancy, pliability; sequacity^, malleability; ductility, tractility^; extendibility, extensibility; plasticity; inelasticity, flaccidity, laxity. penetrability. clay, wax, butter, dough, pudding; alumina, argil; cushion, pillow, feather ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... are more or less spasmodically active. Then comes creeping, with use of the hip muscles, while all below the knee is useless, as also are the fingers. Slowly the leg and foot are degraded to locomotion, slowly the great toe becomes more limited in its action, the thumb increases in flexibility and strength of opposition, and the fingers grow more mobile and controllable. As the body slowly assumes the vertical attitude, the form of the chest changes till its greatest diameter is transverse instead of from front to back. The shoulder-blades are ...
— Youth: Its Education, Regimen, and Hygiene • G. Stanley Hall
... major industrial nations. In this market-oriented economy, private individuals and business firms make most of the decisions, and government purchases of goods and services are made predominantly in the marketplace. US business firms enjoy considerably greater flexibility than their counterparts in Western Europe and Japan in decisions to expand capital plant, lay off surplus workers, and develop new products. At the same time, they face higher barriers to entry in their ...
— The 1996 CIA Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... international financial markets. To meet increased competition - especially from new EU members and Central European countries - Austria will need to continue restructuring, emphasizing knowledge-based sectors of the economy, and encouraging greater labor flexibility and greater labor ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... brought to bear upon his task the power of sublime and graceful verse, and it has been said that but for him "we could never have formed an adequate idea of the strength of the Latin language. We might have dwelt with pleasure upon the softness, flexibility, richness, and musical tone of that vehicle of thought which could represent with full effect the melancholy tenderness of Tibullus, [Footnote: Albius Tibullus was a poet of singular gentleness and amiability, who wrote verses of exquisite finish, gracefully ...
— The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic • Arthur Gilman
... will have to be sufficient authority lodged in those who exercise oversight to enable them to lead the Christian forces and administer their resources. But we dare not curtail the freedom of conscience, or impede liberty of prophesying, or turn flexibility of organization into rigidity, lest we hamper the Spirit, who divideth to every man severally even as He will. We do not want "metallic beliefs and regimental devotions," but the personal convictions of thinking sons and daughters ...
— Some Christian Convictions - A Practical Restatement in Terms of Present-Day Thinking • Henry Sloane Coffin
... but my limbs were cold, and my joints had almost lost their flexibility. My efforts were repeated, and at length I attained a sitting posture. I was now sensible of pain in my shoulders and back. I was universally in that state to which the frame is reduced by blows of a club, mercilessly and endlessly repeated; my temples throbbed, and my face was covered with ...
— Edgar Huntley • Charles Brockden Brown
... than wearied by prescription. Delight condones offence. The only question for the writer is, whether the offence is so trivial as to be submerged in the delight. And he will do well to remember that the greater flexibility belonging to the novel by no means removes the novel from the laws which rule the drama. The parts of a novel should have organic relations. Push the licence to excess, and stitch together a volume of unrelated chapters,—a patchwork of descriptions, dialogues, and incidents,—no one will call ...
— The Principles of Success in Literature • George Henry Lewes
... for the transmission of power vary in size from 3/8 to 7/8 inch diam. For from 3 to 300 horse power; to promote flexibility, the rope, made of iron, steel, or copper wire, as may be preferred, is provided with a core of hemp, and the speed is 1 mile per minute, more or less, as desired. Tho rope should run on a well-balanced, ...
— Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889 • Barkham Burroughs
... oppose a perpetual debt, and could with difficulty be persuaded to consent to it for any incidental purpose however desirable. But so long as a National debt exists no use has been found for it more conducive to the general prosperity than making it the basis of a banking system in which flexibility and safety are combined to a degree never before enjoyed in this country and never excelled in any other. In no other system of banking have the bills had such wide circulation and such absolute credit. They are not limited ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... hold which the ship has upon the whale when moored alongside, is by the flukes or tail; and as from its greater density that part is relatively heavier than any other (excepting the side-fins), its flexibility even in death, causes it to sink low beneath the surface; so that with the hand you cannot get at it from the boat, in order to put the chain round it. But this difficulty is ingeniously overcome: ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... of these three Gaboon tongues, as the Rev. Mr. Mackey observes, is "the surprizing flexibility of the verb, the almost endless variety of parts regularly derived from a single root. There are, perhaps, no other languages in the world that approach them in the variety and extent of the inflections ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... as well as you would do, my dear," said I. "There are plenty of young women in our Boston high-schools who are going through higher fields of mathematics than are required by the architect, and the schools for design show the flexibility and fertility of the female pencil. The thing appears to me altogether more feasible than many other openings which ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... The throat was exquisitely round. The bust, well curved and carefully covered, attracted the eye and inspired reverie. It lacked, no doubt, the grace which a fitting dress can bestow; but to a connoisseur the non-flexibility of her figure had its own charm. Eugenie, tall and strongly made, had none of the prettiness which pleases the masses; but she was beautiful with a beauty which the spirit recognizes, and none but artists truly love. A painter seeking here below for a type ...
— Eugenie Grandet • Honore de Balzac
... have heavier tasks laid upon them than where questions of conformity to, or dissent from, the mores are raised. It is by the dissent and free judgment of the best reason and conscience that the mores win flexibility and automatic readjustment. Dissent is always unpopular in the group. Groups form standards of orthodoxy as to the "principles" which each member must profess and the ritual which each must practice. Dissent seems to imply a ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner
... eliminated all these objectionable features. They have overcome the condition of bulk and heaviness of structure by their government chemists devising the formula of a material that is lighter than aluminum, yet which possesses all of that metal's density and which has also the flexibility of steel. Airships not among the twelve that Germany admits officially are made of this material. Its formula is a government secret and England or France would give thousands ...
— The Secrets of the German War Office • Dr. Armgaard Karl Graves
... left us without the power of moving a limb. The only member over which we had any control was the head; and this, thanks to the flexibility of our necks, we could turn about, so as to see what was going on in front or on either side ...
— The Scalp Hunters • Mayne Reid
... stage sundial flourished in all its glory, generally flooded, to be sure, with moonlight—that peculiar moonlight of the American theatre which turns grease-paint to a horrible magenta—and we youths, with the divine flexibility of imagination only youth can know, responded alike to Hedda Gabler and An Enemy ...
— Penguin Persons & Peppermints • Walter Prichard Eaton
... bonds, and feels its relationship to the soul. By a gentle morning blush stealing over the whole form, the coming soul announces itself; it is not yet present, but everything prepares for its reception by the delicate play of gentle movements; the rigid outlines melt and temper themselves into flexibility; a lovely essence, neither sensuous nor spiritual, but which cannot be grasped, diffuses itself over the form, and intwines itself with every outline, every vibration of ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... improved by the experience and study of mankind; dexterity and application in business; a judicious mixture of liberality and economy, of mildness and rigor; profound dissimulation, under the disguise of military frankness; steadiness to pursue his ends; flexibility to vary his means; and, above all, the great art of submitting his own passions, as well as those of others, to the interest of his ambition, and of coloring his ambition with the most specious pretences ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... here, for the sake of younger inquirers, if not for the sake of us all, it is worth while to dwell for a moment on a power which Faraday possessed in an extraordinary degree. He united vast strength with perfect flexibility. His momentum was that of a river, which combines weight and directness with the ability to yield to the flexures of its bed. The intentness of his vision in any direction did not apparently diminish his power of perception in other directions; and when he attacked a subject, expecting results ...
— Faraday As A Discoverer • John Tyndall
... clenched between his white teeth, and there was a sparkle of amusement in his grave eyes. He stood seventy inches in his stockings, and an excellent judge of men who looked him over, noted the set and width of shoulders, the upward lift of chin, the tanned face and flexibility of body, marked him down "soldier"—either American ...
— The Book of All-Power • Edgar Wallace
... achieved, while the large elasticity of demand maintains a price nearly the same as before, the wide margin of profit which might fix the actual price at that point for a monopolist only serves to stimulate such increased output on the part of trade competitors as will continue until the flexibility of demand weakens, and prices are lowered to such a point as will yield the normal margin or ...
— The Evolution of Modern Capitalism - A Study of Machine Production • John Atkinson Hobson
... and its expression in literature that we reap the real benefit of knowing a foreign tongue. There is no other way—not even residence in a foreign land if we are ignorant of the language—to take us out of the customary circle of our own traditions. It imparts a mental flexibility and emotional sympathy which no other discipline can yield. To ordain that all non-English-speaking peoples should learn English in addition to their mother tongue, and to render it practically unnecessary for English-speakers (except the ...
— The Task of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... the sanction of the Church—but all that is past, and he is now ready to marry one who can be a wife to him—only my conscience did hurt me a little, and brother Cyrus said to me, 'You see Linford and tell him I sent you. Linford is a man of remarkable breadth, of rare flexibility.'" ...
— The Seeker • Harry Leon Wilson
... commissaire, whose face appeared to lose all flexibility of expression the moment the discovery was made, presenting now merely the stern, impassible, mechanical look of an officer on duty, 'these are the identical articles for which I have been searching ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 427 - Volume 17, New Series, March 6, 1852 • Various
... language has been increased by continual transfusions from the French. To these have been added, from time to time, similar accessions from other languages, both ancient and modern. Thus a copiousness and a flexibility, which in the instance of the Greek seem to have arisen out of that subtilty of intellect which gave birth to endless subdivision and distinction, have been in some measure compensated in our own ...
— Lives of the English Poets - From Johnson to Kirke White, Designed as a Continuation of - Johnson's Lives • Henry Francis Cary
... straight lines is afforded by the use of the curved line in decoration, which offers soft, rich and lovely effects. In general, curved lines make for grace, flexibility and softness. ...
— Prepare and Serve a Meal and Interior Decoration • Lillian B. Lansdown |
