Free Translator Free Translator
Translators Dictionaries Courses Other
Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Practicability   Listen
Practicability

noun
1.
The quality of being usable.  Synonym: practicableness.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |





"Practicability" Quotes from Famous Books



... realized, but was at the same time prepared to maintain that whether it existed or not made no difference to the philosopher, who will in any case regulate his life by it (Republic). He has now lost faith in the practicability of his scheme—he is speaking to 'men, and not to Gods or sons of Gods' (Laws). Yet he still maintains it to be the true pattern of the state, which we must approach as nearly as possible: as Aristotle says, ...
— Laws • Plato

... making Domestic Economy a branch of study, is, the fact, that neither parents nor teachers realize the importance, or the practicability of constituting it a ...
— A Treatise on Domestic Economy - For the Use of Young Ladies at Home and at School • Catherine Esther Beecher

... under the charge of M. Vallee. The "Apostle to the Idiots," however, to use a French expression, was Dr. Edward Seguin. The friend and pupil of Itard, the celebrated surgeon and philanthropist, he had in early youth entered into the views of his master respecting the practicability of their instruction; and when, during his last illness, Itard, with a philanthropy which triumphed over the terrible pangs of disease, reminded him of the work which he had himself longed to undertake, and urged him to devote ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, February, 1858 • Various

... removal out of London, not only of prisons and infirmaries (which no doubt are under the control of public authorities), but also of breweries, ironworks, and all factories not needed for daily or home work, as a means of giving us areas for housing the working class, suggestions the value or practicability of ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Vol. 2 • Stephen Gwynn

... Assembly of the Commonwealth of Virginia, on the 19th day of January inst., adopted resolutions inviting the sister States of this Union to appoint Commissioners to meet on the fourth day of February next, in the City of Washington, to consider the practicability of agreeing on terms of adjustment of ...
— A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention • Lucius Eugene Chittenden

... was the practicability of the new idea and how much further it could safely be carried in a loyal Dominion which was just getting on its industrial legs. It was debated with anxiety at Ottawa, and made the subject of special instruction ...
— The Imperialist • (a.k.a. Mrs. Everard Cotes) Sara Jeannette Duncan

... the majority of Americans. They will not concede its desirability, because the American habit is to proclaim doctrines and policies, without considering either the implications, the machinery necessary to carry them out, or the weight of the resulting responsibilities. But in estimating the practicability of the policy proposed, the essential idea must be disentangled from any possible methods of realizing it—such as the suggested treaty between the United States, Great Britain, and Canada. An agreement along those lines may never be either practicable or prudent, but ...
— The Promise Of American Life • Herbert David Croly

... of the art; and his work, most of all, therefore, makes us doubt the practicability of the thing undertaken. He works reverently, lovingly, surely with full apprehension of Chaucer; and yet, at every word where he leaves Chaucer, the spirit of Chaucer leaves the verse. You see plainly that his rule is to change the least that can possibly be changed. Yet the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol 58, No. 357, July 1845 • Various

... transmit twenty-one thousand horse power from Niagara to Montreal, Boston, New York, or Philadelphia. His statements appear to have been based on theoretical considerations; but there is no longer any doubt as to the possibility of transferring power in this manner—its practicability for industrial purposes must be determined by trial. Dr. Paget Higgs, a distinguished English electrician, is now experimenting on it in the City of ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 288 - July 9, 1881 • Various

... Urban laborers have contrived by one means or another to bring about a limitation of the number of hours per diem they are forced to toil. To the farmers such an alleviation of their hardships is not within the realm of practicability. They kick about it of course. They say it's a blooming nuisance. But neither their heartburnings nor their struggles can efface ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor

... of the left breast, and in a state of ulceration, applied to me two years since. The ulcer was then the size of a half-dollar, and discharged a considerable quantity of imperfect pus. The axillary glands were much enlarged, and, doubting the practicability of operating with the knife in such cases, I told her the danger of her disease, and ordered her to subsist upon bread and milk and some fruit, drink water, and keep the body of as uniform temperature as possible. I ordered the sore ...
— Vegetable Diet: As Sanctioned by Medical Men, and by Experience in All Ages • William Andrus Alcott

... those of Mitchell, Leichhardt, Sturt, Gregory, and Burke and Wills, who had sacrificed their lives to their zeal. (Hear, hear.) To the two latter explorers belonged the praise—which time would never obscure or diminish—of having been the first to solve the practicability of traversing this great continent from south to north. The names which he mentioned constituted a brilliant catalogue; and he ventured to think that no inferior splendour would henceforth illustrate ...
— Journal of Landsborough's Expedition from Carpentaria - In search of Burke and Wills • William Landsborough

... disgusting objects, it was natural to suppose that they would then remove them." But in truth these gentlemen had given proofs that they were under the influence of prejudice. Some of them had declared the abolition would ruin the West Indies; but this, it was obvious, must depend upon the practicability of keeping up the stock without African supplies; and yet, when they were questioned upon this point, they knew nothing about it; hence they had formed a conclusion without premises. Their evidence, too, extended ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson

... interesting, full of food for earnest reflection, and, for aught I know, may fully bear out your view of their effects. Still, I cannot see that your remedy for this state of affairs differs materially in its practicability from that of the departed philosopher of Chappaqua. He prescribed a division of the lands, while, if I understand you, you would have the Government in some way prescribe and control the municipal organisations ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee

... concerning the practicability of the route he had taken, said: "Undoubtedly the fine bottomland of the Colorado, if not of the Gila, will soon be settled; then all difficulty ...
— Mormon Settlement in Arizona • James H. McClintock

... imagination of the whites by picturing massacre and insurrection on the part of the negros if they were armed, thwarted the effort of Col. Lauren's and of Congress to raise a "negro army" at the South. The leaders were favorable to it, but the colonists, for the reason cited, were distrustful of its practicability. Though a strong effort was made, as will be seen, the scare raised by the Tories prevented its success. Notwithstanding, hundreds of colored men, slave and free, at the South, not only followed the army but in every engagement took an active part on the side of the colonist. They were not ...
— The Black Phalanx - African American soldiers in the War of Independence, the - War of 1812, and the Civil War • Joseph T. Wilson

... distinguished French diplomatist, Guillaume du Bellay-Langey, envoy to the Protestant princes of Germany. The interview paved the way for a long correspondence between Melanchthon and Du Bellay himself, in which the latter threw out suggestions of the practicability of some plan for bringing the intelligent and candid men in both countries to adopt a common ground in respect to religion. Finally, in response to Du Bellay's earnest request, his correspondent consented to draw up such a scheme as appeared to himself proper to serve for ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird

... any rate, clear from Amerigo's discovery that the westward route to the Spice Islands would have to be through or round this New World discovered by him, and a Portuguese noble, named Fernao Magelhaens, was destined to discover the practicability of this route. He had served his native country under Almeida and Albuquerque in the East Indies, and was present at the capture of Malacca in 1511, and from that port was despatched by Albuquerque with three ships to visit the far-famed Spice Islands. They visited Amboyna and Banda, and ...
— The Story of Geographical Discovery - How the World Became Known • Joseph Jacobs

... my best recollection, as well as any of the machines that have since been introduced. The only objection I recollect being made, was, that when the straw was wet, or there was much green grass among the wheat, the blades would choke. You certainly demonstrated in 1834 the practicability of cutting grain or grass with horse-power; and all the machines since introduced seem to have copied your machine ...
— Obed Hussey - Who, of All Inventors, Made Bread Cheap • Various

... impressed are some enterprising people of Minnesota with the practicability and advantage of this route, that measures have been already taken for building a steamer at Breckenridge, designed to navigate the waters of the Red River, Lake Winnepeg, and Saskatchewan, and to be ready for that purpose by the opening of next spring. Meantime as the greater part of the ...
— Handbook to the new Gold-fields • R. M. Ballantyne

... the by, that in order to test more fully the practicability of the thing, this was accomplished in one of ...
— Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands V2 • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... which I stand before you is full of interest. The eyes of all nations are fixed on our Republic. The event of the existing crisis will be decisive in the opinion of mankind of the practicability of our federal system of government. Great is the stake placed in our hands; great is the responsibility which must rest upon the people of the United States. Let us realize the importance of the attitude in which we stand ...
— U.S. Presidential Inaugural Addresses • Various

... the Imperium to go where they would enjoy all the rights of free men, and by picturing the demoralization and ruin of the South when they thus went forth. His suggestion met with much favor but he did not make clear the practicability of ...
— Imperium in Imperio: A Study Of The Negro Race Problem - A Novel • Sutton E. Griggs

... The practicability of a sudden and complete reform of every drunkard in the land calls for it. This, science has denied. Religion has only said, "With man it is impossible, but not with God; for with God all things are possible." But science yields to experiment, and religion marches ...
— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society

... creed, and the arguments by which they support and elucidate it they are preparing a few copies—not as meaning to publish them, but for private distribution. In this work they will have endeavoured to prove the exclusive justice of the system and its practicability; nor will they have omitted to sketch out the code of contracts necessary for the internal regulation of the Society; all of which will of course be submitted to the improvements and approbation of each component member. As soon as the work is ...
— Biographia Epistolaris, Volume 1. • Coleridge, ed. Turnbull

... condition of our foreign commerce, had advanced the market value of United States notes to ninety-seven and three-eighths per cent., or within nearly two and a half per cent. of coin. They had also conclusively demonstrated the practicability of restoring United States notes to par, in coin, by the time fixed by law, and that without disturbing either domestic or foreign trade or commerce. Every step had been accompanied with growing business, with the advance of public credit, and the steady appreciation ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman

... the peace so much condemned was the means of demonstrating to the world the existence of an Italian People. How far the French Emperor was self-deceived, and to what extent he believed in the practicability of the arrangements made at Villafranca and Zurich, are inscrutable mysteries. Que sais-je? might be the form of his own answer, were any one entitled to question him concerning his own opinion on his own acts of 1859. But of the effects of his attack on Austria there ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 39, January, 1861 • Various

... numbers at leisure, had already assumed a fearful aspect, and was running along the ground rapidly. I hardly dared to stop my work and watch the scene, so fearful was it. I had serious doubts as to the practicability of the plan which Fred proposed, yet I gave no evidence of my want of faith, and encouraged the men with example and words, and when a number of the trees began swaying to and fro, as the fire consumed their trunks, I remonstrated ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes

... capacity superintended the laying of lines in various parts of the British Isles, including in 1853 the first cable between Great Britain and Ireland, from Portpatrick to Donaghadee. His experiments convinced him of the practicability of an electric submarine cable connexion between Ireland and America; and having in 1855 already discussed the question with Cyrus Field, who with J. W. Brett controlled the Newfoundland Telegraph Company on the other side of the ocean, Bright organized with them the Atlantic Telegraph ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various

... or many. I, therefore, invite you to go to Calcutta with a united will and a united purpose, sanctified by a spirit of sacrifice, with a will of your own to convert those who are still undecided about the spirituality or the practicability of the weapon. ...
— Freedom's Battle - Being a Comprehensive Collection of Writings and Speeches on the Present Situation • Mahatma Gandhi

... Entries—The Register of Copyrights shall compile and publish at periodic intervals catalogs of all copyright registrations. These catalogs shall be divided into parts in accordance with the various classes of works, and the Register has discretion to determine, on the basis of practicability and usefulness, the form and frequency of ...
— Copyright Law of the United States of America: - contained in Title 17 of the United States Code. • Library of Congress Copyright Office

... instant from the Secretary of the Interior, transmitting copy of reports of Lieutenants Brown, Gurovits, and Suplee, United States Army, who were charged with the duty of inspecting the Navajo country, so that the Interior Department could be advised as to the practicability of restraining the Navajoes within their present reservations and of furnishing irrigation and water for their flocks, together with report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs upon the matter with draft of an item of appropriation to ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Volume IX. • Benjamin Harrison

... the governor of the place, stout Arnold Froenevelt, assisted by the rough and direct eloquence of Roger Williams, urge upon the Earl of Leicester and the States-General the necessity and the practicability of the plan proposed. The fleet never entered the harbour. There was no William of Orange to save Antwerp and Sluys, as Leyden had once been saved, and his son was not old enough to unravel the web of intrigue by which he was surrounded, or to direct ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... even though the steps toward embodying or approximating it will be many and arduous, perhaps discouragingly hard. They betoken the likelihood of appearing before men as the victims of ultimately unworkable dreams. In refreshing contrast is the seeming practicability of encouraging present tendencies. Your tendency is no far-off projection of mere thought; it is something solid and "real," here and now, respected at the bank, in the newspaper office, and other meeting ...
— College Teaching - Studies in Methods of Teaching in the College • Paul Klapper

... personal experience is worth a pound of second-hand recital, a brief statement may here be given of the way in which the present writer came to take up Esperanto, and of the experiences which soon led him to the conviction of its absolute practicability ...
— International Language - Past, Present and Future: With Specimens of Esperanto and Grammar • Walter J. Clark

... due to modern weapons is, however, only one consequence of their development. The practicability of aggressive war in settled countries now is entirely dependent on the use of elaborate artillery on land and warships at sea. Were there only rifles in the world, were an ordinary rifle the largest kind of gun permitted, and were ships specifically ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various

... international disputes, is a custom condemned alike by Religion, Morality, Reason, and Humanity, and believing that it is useful and necessary frequently to direct the attention both of Governments and Peoples to the evils of the War system, and the desirableness and practicability of maintaining Permanent ...
— Glances at Europe - In a Series of Letters from Great Britain, France, Italy, - Switzerland, &c. During the Summer of 1851. • Horace Greeley

... productions and our commerce which transports them to the level of the richest and the greatest nations of Europe. And the admirable adaptation of our political institutions to their objects, combining local self-government with aggregate strength, has established the practicability of a government like ours to cover a continent with ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 4) of Volume 5: Franklin Pierce • James D. Richardson

... that the measure of success in selling is not 100% of closed sales; every possible order secured and none lost. Success is made certain when failures are reduced to the minimum and successes are increased to the maximum of practicability. There can be no question that if you use the right processes in closing, your chances for success will be so greatly increased that your batting average of actual sales should take you far above the failure line. Your career as a salesman involves ...
— Certain Success • Norval A. Hawkins

... the standardization should be carried out, and also what variations should be introduced into its application. That such cases are not infrequent is borne out by the Australasian experience of which Mr. Collier writes, "In regard to the practicability of the common rule, opinion differs. In some staple industries such as coal mining, it has been said to operate fairly. But its application to small industries and retail stores, where conditions vary more widely, is fraught with considerable ...
— The Settlement of Wage Disputes • Herbert Feis

... length he reached, as he believed, such a spot, where the black rock seemed to have been riven by some mighty natural convulsion, the rift forming a steep and exceedingly narrow gully leading to the summit. Naturally, he at once started to climb this gully, with the object of testing its practicability; and he had traversed nearly two-thirds of its length when, as he scrambled up, his attention was suddenly attracted to a sort of pocket in the rock, which had been laid open by a fall. What particularly attracted ...
— In Search of El Dorado • Harry Collingwood

... to-day and of yesterday; I am a Republican of twenty years' standing. Entertaining such hopes for Italy, when many excellent, many sincere men held them as Utopian, shall I denounce these men because they are now convinced of their practicability?" ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli

... and had known him quite well. When I graduated, which was two years after he did, I worked for about a year in his laboratory, and my knowledge of the improvement which had made the Hadley rocket motor a practicability came from first hand knowledge and not from an interview. That was several years before but I knew that he never forgot an acquaintance, let alone a friend, and while I had left him to take up other work our parting had been pleasant, and I looked forward with real pleasure to ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science July 1930 • Various

... standard converts the listener into the critic; and I am surely speaking within bounds when I say, that for every miscalled element in discourse, ten succeeding words are lost to the greater part of an audience."—Ibid., p. 350. These quotations plainly imply both the practicability and the importance of teaching the pronunciation of our language analytically by means of its present orthography, and agreeably to the standard assumed by the grammarians. The first of them affirms that it has been done, "with the best success," according to some ancient method ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown

... or even practicability of instituting a body of this nature so long as fourteen years back, I am aware that there exists a great difference of opinion among the respectable class of the colonists themselves. For my own part, however small ...
— Statistical, Historical and Political Description of the Colony of New South Wales and its Dependent Settlements in Van Diemen's Land • William Charles Wentworth

... and independent citizens, and that at an all-round cost of about one-fifth of the price of the guardians' method for converting them into human wrecks and permanent charges upon the State. The wise practicability of this lady's system was admitted by independent experts, and denied by nobody. But it was swept aside and crushed, beaten down with vicious, angry thoroughness, in one quarter—the quarter of vested ...
— The Message • Alec John Dawson

... began to exercise their minds on this important question, without devoting any more attention to the propriety or the practicability of procuring another boat. That question was regarded ...
— All Aboard; or, Life on the Lake - A Sequel to "The Boat Club" • Oliver Optic

... his expression was mild, vague, and sad. He had a look of race and blood; and yet, at the first glance, one saw that he was lost in dreams, and one guessed that the dreams would never be of great practicability in their application. Some such impression of Fisbee was probably what caused the editor of the "Herald" to nickname him (in his own mind) "The White Knight," and to conceive a strong, if ...
— The Gentleman From Indiana • Booth Tarkington

... is not over the innate reasonableness of it: the universe is immeasurably more reasonable with it than without it; but over its practicability after the body is gone. We, in our immeasurable wisdom, don't see how it can work—we don't see how a universe that we don't begin to know, which already has given us genius and beauty and love, and which seems to like to give us all it can—birds, ...
— The Unpopular Review, Volume II Number 3 • Various

... speak to you as a professional who has given some study to the subject. I am convinced that on the lines of a general pact as opposed to the particular pact, a general defensive agreement as opposed to separate alliances, followed by reduction on a great ratio, the practicability of which has been proved at Washington, a solution can be reached. Given goodwill—that is the point. At the last Assembly of the League of Nations a report was presented by the Commission, of which Lord Robert Cecil was a member, and it wound up with ...
— Essays in Liberalism - Being the Lectures and Papers Which Were Delivered at the - Liberal Summer School at Oxford, 1922 • Various

... progress—not the spirit of the huckster, anxious for present gain, but the enlarged view of the patriot, anxious for the future weal of his country and his race. A striking expression of this spirit is shown in the report made in 1812 by Gouverneur Morris, De Witt Clinton and other eminent men on the practicability and prospects of the proposed Erie Canal. After boldly stating that the tolls from this work would amply repay the outlay required for its construction, the report adds: "It is impossible to ascertain and ...
— The Land We Live In - The Story of Our Country • Henry Mann

... is a curious fact that Morin had about this time proposed to determine the longitude by the moon's distance from a fixed star, and that the commissioners assembled in Paris to examine it requested Galileo's opinion of its value and practicability. Galileo's opinion was highly unfavourable. He saw clearly, and explained distinctly, the objection to Morin's method, arising from the imperfection of the lunar tables, and the inadequacy of astronomical instruments; but he seemed not to be conscious that the very same objections ...
— The Martyrs of Science, or, The lives of Galileo, Tycho Brahe, and Kepler • David Brewster

... Alva soon accumulated a chemical outfit, constituting the first in a long series of laboratories. The word "laboratory" had always been associated with alchemists in the past, but as with "filament" this untutored stripling applied an iconoclastic practicability to it long before he realized the significance of the new departure. Goethe, in his legend of Faust, shows the traditional or conventional philosopher in his laboratory, an aged, tottering, gray-bearded investigator, who only becomes youthful upon ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin

... supply is preserved, but since the growth is rather slow and a thin stand will remain limby, it may pay to hasten returns by supplementary artificial planting. Some authorities question the financial practicability of this on the ground that since spruce is of slower growth it will pay better to use the ground for fir, but the latter is unlikely to ...
— Practical Forestry in the Pacific Northwest • Edward Tyson Allen

... There they could all sleep with perfect confidence of safety. There, on going out to hunt, he could leave the children, with the certainty of finding them on his return. An admirable idea!—how about its practicability? ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid

... next meeting of Congress. We have since seen the same thing take place, in the Directory of France; and I believe it will for ever take place in any Executive consisting of a plurality. Our plan, best, I believe, combines wisdom and practicability, by providing a plurality of Counsellors, but a single Arbiter for ultimate decision. I was in France when we heard of this schism and separation of our Committee, and, speaking with Dr. Franklin of this singular disposition ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson

... to meditate on the practicability of reviving a confederation of regenerators. To get a clear view of his own ideas, and to feel the pulse of the wisdom and genius of the age, he wrote and published a treatise, in which his meanings were carefully wrapt up in the ...
— Nightmare Abbey • Thomas Love Peacock

... between the spirits of good and evil, the one advising clemency and the other murder. M. de Villars not being able to make up his mind, on reaching Nimes, d'Aygaliers assembled the principal Protestants of the town, told them of his plan, showing them its practicability, so that also joined in the good work, and drew up a document in which they asked the marechal to allow them to take up arms and march against the rebels, as they were determined either to bring them back into ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... one point, the possibility of reaching the Pole and getting home. Perhaps it is rest I need—to sleep, sleep! Am I afraid of venturing my life? No, it cannot be that. But what else, then, can be keeping me back? Perhaps a secret doubt of the practicability of the plan. My mind is confused; the whole thing has got into a tangle; I am a riddle to myself. I am worn out, and yet I do not feel any special tiredness. Is it perhaps because I sat up reading last night? ...
— Farthest North - Being the Record of a Voyage of Exploration of the Ship 'Fram' 1893-1896 • Fridtjof Nansen

... earnestly pressed the ministry to do, although the advantage to England of securing such a market for her manufactures was clearly perceived. Among the officers who had been most confidentially consulted by Mr. Pitt, on the practicability of obtaining a settlement on the La Plata, was Sir Home Popham; and it was probably his knowledge of the views so long entertained by that minister, that induced him to take the hazardous step, of leaving the Cape of Good Hope so soon after it had been occupied by the English forces, in ...
— Journal of a Voyage to Brazil - And Residence There During Part of the Years 1821, 1822, 1823 • Maria Graham

... what it meant; and the savant, without considering the practicability or the possibility of subjecting him to such an operation, was filled with rage and horror. The principal went on deck, and from the paper taken from Perth called the roll of the conspirators, summoning them to ...
— Dikes and Ditches - Young America in Holland and Belguim • Oliver Optic

... hazardous duty, exposing them to peril of their lives; but these brave young fellows executed their task in safety, and, unobserved by the enemy, few of whom seemed to be keeping watch on the ramparts, returned to report the perfect practicability of the ...
— A Narrative Of The Siege Of Delhi - With An Account Of The Mutiny At Ferozepore In 1857 • Charles John Griffiths

... individual potentialities which are the very lifeblood of the existing order of society; if all these things hold no value for us, then we shall gravitate to Socialism as surely as a river will find its way to the sea. Socialism—granted its practicability, and its practicability can never be disproved except by trial, by long and repeated trial—holds out the promise of great blessings to mankind. And some of these blessings it is actually capable of furnishing, even if in the end it should prove to be a failure. Above all it could completely ...
— What Prohibition Has Done to America • Fabian Franklin

... most profitable postal and mercantile steam marine that floats the seas. Several large companies, authorized to transport the mails to all parts of the world, were immediately organized, and paid liberal allowances for their peculiar duties. Where the practicability of the service was considered doubtful, larger sums were paid, and a greater length of time granted for making the experiment. The contracts were generally made for twelve years; and when their terms expired ...
— Ocean Steam Navigation and the Ocean Post • Thomas Rainey

... men, working in the Central Park Aug^st 17^th 1858 Present this tankard to Cyrus W. Field, as an expression of their respect, for the untiring labor which on that Day resulted in proving the practicability of Trans-Atlantic Communication, ...
— Presentation Pieces in the Museum of History and Technology • Margaret Brown Klapthor

... least a generation before Whitney. One of the earliest of these English pioneers was John Wilkinson, inventor and maker of the boring machine which enabled Boulton and Watt in 1776 to bring their steam engine to the point of practicability. Without this machine Watt found it impossible to bore his cylinders with the necessary degree of accuracy.* From this one fact, that the success of the steam engine depended upon the invention of a new tool, we may judge of what a great part the inventors of machine tools, of whom ...
— The Age of Invention - A Chronicle of Mechanical Conquest, Book, 37 in The - Chronicles of America Series • Holland Thompson

... breakfast-things were removed, and the coast clear, he took a peep into the pantry, and, after throwing his eye over its contents, sat down at the fire, making Phaddhy take a seat beside him, for the especial purpose of sounding him as to the practicability of effecting a certain design, which was then snugly latent in his Reverence's fancy. The fact was, that on taking the survey of the premises aforesaid, he discovered that, although there was abundance of fowl, and fish, and bacon, and hung-beef—yet, by some unaccountable and ...
— The Station; The Party Fight And Funeral; The Lough Derg Pilgrim • William Carleton

... the world is apt to consider the practicability of a scheme. And yours seems to me eminently practical. If you can only get the Mohamedans and the Brahmins to come in! The Roman Catholics might of course be easily won, though it would involve doing away with the Pope. There was a prophecy, by-the-way, that after the ninth Pius ...
— Vixen, Volume III. • M. E. Braddon

... is why, with a body of scientific men spread all over the face of France and constituting a part of the administration,—a body which ought to enlighten every region on the subject of its resources,—this is why we are still discussing the practicability of railroads while other countries are making theirs. If ever France was to show the excellence of her institution of technical schools, it should have been in this magnificent phase of public works, which is destined to change the face of States and nations, to ...
— The Village Rector • Honore de Balzac

... Marchena, and assured the marques of Cadiz of the practicability of scaling the castle of Alhama and taking it by surprise. The marques had a secret conference with Don Pedro Enriques, adelantado of Andalusia, Don Diego de Merlo, commander of Seville, Sancho de Avila, alcayde of Carmona, and others, who all ...
— Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada • Washington Irving

... the founder of a doctrine, the practicability of which nations desire to learn, and yet do not wish ...
— Who Was Who: 5000 B. C. to Date - Biographical Dictionary of the Famous and Those Who Wanted to Be • Anonymous

... to test a pile to ascertain the practicability of employing it in telegraphy, it is necessary to make it perform a work which shall be as nearly as possible identical with that which it will be called on to do, until it is used up, to estimate the ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 365, December 30, 1882 • Various

... examine this criticism, partly because it was made by an able man of known sympathy with mission work, and partly because it relates to the city where, if anywhere, in China, overcrowding exists. In considering Peking, therefore, we are really considering the broad question of the practicability of withdrawing some missionary agencies in the interest of comity and efficiency. The Presbyterian missionaries themselves opened the way for the discussion of the question by proposing to the Congregational missionaries, after ...
— An Inevitable Awakening • ARTHUR JUDSON BROWN

... of all methods of making a fire, but one that is practiced by some of the Western Indians, is by friction between two pieces of wood. I had often heard of this process, but never gave credit to its practicability until I saw the experiment successfully tried. It was done in the following manner: Two dried stalks of the Mexican soap-plant, about three fourths of an inch in diameter, were selected, and one of them made flat on one side; near the edge of this flat surface a very small indentation ...
— The Prairie Traveler - A Hand-book for Overland Expeditions • Randolph Marcy

... they certainly could not be under secession. Others sympathized fully with what was called the Southern cause, held firmly the right of secession, and hated cordially the Yankees, but doubted either the practicability or the expediency of secession, and opposed it till resolved on, but, after it was resolved on, yielded to none in their earnest support of it. These last comprised the immense majority of those ...
— The American Republic: Its Constitution, Tendencies, and Destiny • A. O. Brownson

... have been the cause of the liveliest joy in this army as well as in the country. The admiration excited by your skill and boldness has been constantly mingled with solicitude for your situation. The practicability of reinforcing you has been the subject of the gravest consideration. It has been determined to do so at the expense of weakening this army. Brigadier-General Lawton with six regiments from Georgia is on his way to you, and Brigadier-General Whiting with ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston

... this idea struck the listeners, and several even avowed their approbation of the scheme aloud. Hubbard received it as a new thought, but was more reluctant to admit its practicability. As might be expected from a lawyer accustomed to practise in a small way, his objections savoured more of narrow views than of the ...
— The Redskins; or, Indian and Injin, Volume 1. - Being the Conclusion of the Littlepage Manuscripts • James Fenimore Cooper

... a scheme for fixing the reflections of objects in a pool of water, and thus taking the most life-like portraits imaginable; and the same gentleman demonstrated the practicability of giving a permanent dye to ladies' dresses, in the gorgeous clouds of sunset. There were at least fifty kinds of perpetual motion, one of which was applicable to the wits of newspaper editors and writers of every description. Professor Espy was here, with a tremendous ...
— The Hall of Fantasy (From "Mosses From An Old Manse") • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... referred to the strong feeling prevailing at Sydney against the practicability of Dr Leichhardt's projected expedition, to the numerous efforts made to induce him to abandon it, and to the confident predictions of its failure, and of the destruction of all engaged in it. It will be remembered, also, that about a month after the departure ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 385. November, 1847. • Various

... benevolent effort was too sudden and excessive to last in the same measure. The advantage gained by the elevation thus reached, was the practicability of keeping the converts up to giving according to their ability, which is the Gospel standard. Dr. Perkins, writing two years later, thought there was a real gain by this effort, though it had reacted somewhat. Most of the pledges were redeemed ...
— History Of The Missions Of The American Board Of Commissioners For Foreign Missions To The Oriental Churches, Volume II. • Rufus Anderson

... and of all the writers of the "storm and stress" period, he is the most interesting, because, in his renowned book, "What Is to Be Done?" he applied his theories to practical life. His success was due, not to the practicability of his theories, to his literary qualities, to his art, but to the fact that he contrived to unite two things, each one of which, as a rule, is found in a writer; he simultaneously touched the two most responsive chords in the human heart—the thirst ...
— A Survey of Russian Literature, with Selections • Isabel Florence Hapgood

... mind still greater than that of Raymond Lulli. Roger Bacon firmly believed in the philosopher's stone, and spent much of his time in search of it. His example helped to render all the learned men of the time more convinced of its practicability, and more eager in the pursuit. He was born at Ilchester, in the county of Somerset, in the year 1214. He studied for some time in the university of Oxford, and afterwards in that of Paris, in which ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay

... mode of culture in this country. Although it is but a few years since experiments were commenced here, some of our fruit growers have acquired such skill and experience, as to enable them to realize considerable profits from their investments in a money point of view, besides demonstrating the practicability of the system. ...
— Woodward's Graperies and Horticultural Buildings • George E. Woodward

... the deepest and best sense human which in the truest and highest sense is not also Christian. The characteristic feeling about Christmas, as it is revealed in literature and tradition and association, is the striking and beautiful tribute to the practicability ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Vol. II, No. 6, March, 1885 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various

... the practicability of escape when I examined the exterior, when we were ushered into the interior of the fortress, I felt that it was impossible, and I stated my opinion to O'Brien. We were conducted into a yard surrounded by a high wall; the buildings appropriated for the ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat

... letting Mr. Henderson go ahead whenever he likes. I will write my story up to its legitimate conclusion; and then we shall be in a position to judge whether a sequel would be desirable, and I would then myself know better about its practicability from the story-teller's point of view.—Yours ever ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... into some port," volunteered Giton; "tell him your brother's nearly dead from seasickness: your woebegone face and streaming tears will lend color to your deception, and the pilot may be moved to mercy and grant your prayer." Eumolpus denied the practicability of this. "It is only with difficulty," affirmed he, "that large ships are warped into landlocked harbors, nor would it appear probable that my brother could have been taken so desperately in so short a time. And then, Lycas ...
— The Satyricon, Complete • Petronius Arbiter

... appearance of the return of a House of Commons very favourable to the present Government, but the Tory party keeps together in the House of Lords, and they are animated with vague hopes of being able to turn out the Ministry, more from a spirit of hatred and revenge than from any clear view of the practicability of their carrying on the Government. I conceive, however, that as soon as Parliament is up there will be a creation of Peers. In the House of Commons the Irish Tithe question has been the great subject of ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. II • Charles C. F. Greville

... perhaps this branch of physical science which may claim the palm for its practical fruits, no less than for the aid which it has furnished to the investigation of other parts of the field of physical science. The idea of the practicability of establishing a communication between distant points, by means of electricity, could hardly fail to have simmered in the minds of ingenious men since, well nigh a century ago, experimental proof was given that electric disturbances ...
— The Advance of Science in the Last Half-Century • T.H. (Thomas Henry) Huxley

... Hester had busied herself in arranging for a journey to the ruins of Palmyra. The expedition was considered not only difficult but dangerous, and she was assured that a large body of troops would be necessary to protect her from the robber tribes of the desert. While the practicability of the enterprise was still being anxiously discussed by her Turkish advisers, Lady Hester received a visit from a certain Nasar, son of Mahannah, Emir of the Anizys [Footnote: Dr. Meryon's somewhat erratic spelling ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston

... decides against the practicability of such an expedition; nevertheless, I am at your service. My duty is to obey." This was Washington's ...
— From Farm House to the White House • William M. Thayer

... substantially over by half-past seven in the morning. At eleven o'clock I started to visit all the corps commanders to see for myself the different positions gained and to get their opinion of the practicability of doing anything more ...
— Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, Complete • Ulysses S. Grant

... in tunnels by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad and was subsequently studied and adopted by railroads in Europe, made it possible to avoid the difficulty of ventilation connected with steam traction in tunnels, and permitted the use of grades practically prohibitive with the steam locomotive. The practicability of the tunnel extension project finally adopted was ...
— Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, Vol. LXVIII, Sept. 1910 • Charles W. Raymond

... game does not promise to last here for a number of days, and this circumstance combined with many others to induce our going on as soon as possible. Our Indian information as to the state of the Columbia is of a very alarming kind, and our first object is of course to ascertain the practicability of descending it, of which the Indians discourage our expectations. It was therefore agreed that captain Clarke should set off in the morning with eleven men, furnished, besides their arms, with tools for making canoes; that he should take Chaboneau and his wife ...
— History of the Expedition under the Command of Captains Lewis and Clark, Vol. I. • Meriwether Lewis and William Clark

... was addressed to the bishops "in council," and prayed for the appointment of a commission to report upon the practicability of making this Church a central bond of union among the Christian people of America, by providing for as much freedom in opinion, discipline, and worship as might be held to be compatible with the essential faith and order of ...
— A Short History of the Book of Common Prayer • William Reed Huntington

... Pony Express failed in a financial way; it had served the country faithfully and well. It had aided an imperiled Government, helped to tranquilize and retain to the Union a giant commonwealth, and it had shown the practicability of building a transcontinental railroad, and keeping it open for traffic regardless of winter snows. All this Pony Express did and more. It marked the supreme triumph of American spirit, of God-fearing, man-defying American pluck and ...
— The Story of the Pony Express • Glenn D. Bradley

... his own considering, pursued his inquiries, and gained the interview. He proposed to the young lady in presence of the principal, and in so very business-like a way as convinced both the elder and the younger that there was more practicability beneath that poetical exterior, than the latter would have suggested or ...
— Hubert's Wife - A Story for You • Minnie Mary Lee

... Conservation Conference of December, 1908, suggested to me the practicability of holding a North American Conservation Conference. I selected Gifford Pinchot to convey this invitation in person to Lord Grey, Governor General of Canada; to Sir Wilfrid Laurier; and to President Diaz of Mexico; giving as ...
— Theodore Roosevelt - An Autobiography by Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt

... unmischievous mouth and fangs so minute that, although classed as venomous, it is not considered injurious to man. Though strange and interesting, on the plea that the family is quite sufficiently represented, the derelict was unwelcome, save as a living proof of the practicability of natural transports. By what grace, indeed, could the creature which earned the Almighty's bitter curse be accepted as "wilsam"—goods of God's mercy driven ashore, no wreck or ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield

... bridges, except a stone one near Khurbet Hadra, and this one was naturally strongly guarded. At the mouth of the river there was a ford, but its exact position was doubtful, and very little was known of its practicability for troops. Some said it was 18 ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison

... Fielding of course was only following the lead of Cervantes and Le Sage; but Dickens rightly judged his purpose also to have been, to supply a kind of connection between the episode and the story. "I don't see the practicability of making the History of a Self-Tormentor, with which I took great pains, a written narrative. But I do see the possibility" (he saw the other practicability before the number was published) "of ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster

... year in New York in the most patient endeavors to overcome the difficulties in heating his compound. Before he had succeeded, their resources failed. But he had made such progress in demonstrating the practicability of his process, that his brother-in-law, William De Forrest, a noted woollen manufacturer, took hold of the project in earnest, and aided him to bring it to perfection. Once more, however, he was imprisoned for ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton

... his mind had wholly survived his body.' He wished to give my mother the copyright of all his works, made out lists how to arrange them, and gave her carte-blanche to cut out what she pleased, and was especially eager that she should do a prose translation of his songs against her opinion of its practicability. To please him she translated 'Almanzor' and several short poems into ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon

... of events made me decide to complete my original sketch of the Nibelungen, and to bring it out in our theatres without paying any regard to the practicability of its various parts. In order to do this I felt that I must free myself from all obligations to the management of the Weimar theatre. I had already drawn six hundred marks salary from this source, but Karl was enchanted to place this sum at my disposal in order that I might return ...
— My Life, Volume II • Richard Wagner

... confine our thought to the dwellers on our street or in our town, it may not seem utterly hopeless to try to remedy their distress; to improve the situation of the laborers in one's own shop or factory lies within the limits of practicability. But the Christian doctrine of the universal brotherhood of man is becoming a working principle at last; and millions of dollars and thousands of our ablest young men and women are crossing the oceans to uplift and civilize the more backward nations, in ...
— Problems of Conduct • Durant Drake

... troubled with the passion for reforming the world, and meditated on the practicability of reviving a confederacy of regenerators. He wrote and published a treatise in which his meanings were carefully wrapped up in the monk's hood of transcendental technology, but filled with hints of matters deep and dangerous, which he thought would set the whole nation in a ferment, and ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various

... wrong about it is no objection from my standpoint," said he. "In fact, I think I prefer to have it morally right rather than otherwise, other things being equal, you know. As for its practicability, you watch the Captain, ...
— Aladdin & Co. - A Romance of Yankee Magic • Herbert Quick

... given what was considered a favourable reply, for Andrew Stuart, a fellow-guardian of the Duke along with Mure, writes the latter acknowledging receipt of his letter "intimating"—these are the words—"the practicability of having Mr. Smith," but the Duke's mother (then Duchess of Argyle) and the Duke himself preferred Dr. John Moore, the author of Zelucco, who was the family medical attendant, and was indeed chosen because he could act in that capacity to his very ...
— Life of Adam Smith • John Rae

... Government a fleet of thirty steam gunboats, intended to guard Cuba against filibustering parties. In 1881 he devised his latest war vessel, the Destroyer, the object of which he said was "simply to demonstrate the practicability of submarine artillery, unquestionably the most effective, as well as the cheapest, device for protecting the sea-ports of the Union against iron-clad ships. I do not," he continued, "seek emoluments, as I am financially independent; but I am anxious to benefit ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 6 of 8 • Various

... 21st, 1846.—After a quiet cosy breakfast, served up on a little round table for myself alone, I sat down to test the practicability of the plan I had formed at home for my peregrinations in England:—viz., to write until one, P.M., then to take my staff and travel on, eight or ten miles, to another convenient stopping-place for the night. As much depended upon the success of the ...
— Jemmy Stubbins, or The Nailer Boy - Illustrations Of The Law Of Kindness • Unknown Author

... one stroke from a nation of landlords into a nation of peasant proprietors—apparently without loss to any one, and with gain to everybody concerned, except the British Government, who neither gain nor lose in the matter. The practicability, however, of such a scheme depends altogether on the security against loss afforded to the British tax-payer, for he is industrious and heavily burdened, and cannot be expected to assent to any plan which will land him in any appreciable loss. Here it is that the plan of Mr. ...
— Handbook of Home Rule (1887) • W. E. Gladstone et al.

... "(1) intent; (2) not leaving the mosque save of necessity; (3) not having to do with a woman; (4) fasting; and (5) abstaining from speech." Q "Under what conditions is the Hajj or Pilgrimage[FN321] obligatory?" "Manhood, and understanding and being a Moslem and practicability; in which case it is obligatory on all, once before death." Q "What are the Koranic statutes of the Pilgrimage?" "(1) The Ihrm or pilgrim's habit; (2) the standing at Arafat; (3) circumambulating the Ka'abah; ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton

... the lessons of that humanism which had carried the Gracchi beyond the bounds of Roman caution, but which might suffuse a more conservative mind with just sufficient enlightenment to see that much was wrong, and that moderate remedies were not altogether beyond the limits of practicability. But this section of senatorial opinion could find no voice and take no independent action. It was crushed by the reactionary spirit of the majority of the peers, and frightened at the results to which its theories seem to lead, when their cautious qualifications, never likely to find ...
— A History of Rome, Vol 1 - During the late Republic and early Principate • A H.J. Greenidge

... previously held the idea that the petroleum might be produced by the action of heat on the coal and the vapour going up into the sandstone to be condensed. He made a great many experiments in retorts, with the view of testing the practicability of this idea, and the results obtained were very various. He had no fixed data to guide him, and he sometimes got one thing, sometimes another. At last, however, success rewarded his labours, and he was entitled ...
— Western Worthies - A Gallery of Biographical and Critical Sketches of West - of Scotland Celebrities • J. Stephen Jeans

... of the spot, the site of the tree, its dimensions, and the direction of its growth, convinced me fully of the practicability of this expedient, and I determined to carry it into immediate execution. For this end I must hasten home, procure an axe, and return with all expedition hither. I took my former way, once more entered the ...
— Edgar Huntley • Charles Brockden Brown

... strives to interest us in the monstrous fables of the Hindoo mythology, and in "Roderick, the Last of the Goths," the story contains circumstances that deform the fairest proof the author gave of the practicability of ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta

... written in his own peculiar style: the first contains excellent ideas and energetic exposures of the general defects and evils in the state, as well as plans for remedying them; the second adds some proposals regarding the courts of justice, and the composition of the senate, the utility and practicability of which appear somewhat doubtful. The authenticity of these epistles, therefore, is still a matter of uncertainty. Lastly, there are two Declamations (declamationes), the one purporting to be by M. Cicero against Sallust, and the other by Sallust against ...
— De Bello Catilinario et Jugurthino • Caius Sallustii Crispi (Sallustius)

... have been made upon the use of the invisible rays which accompany visible rays. The practicability of signaling with invisible rays depends upon producing them efficiently in sufficient quantity and upon separating them from the visible rays which accompany them. Some successful results were obtained with a 6-volt electric lamp possessing a coiled filament at the focus ...
— Artificial Light - Its Influence upon Civilization • M. Luckiesh

... this sentiment in the closing pages of his recent work, to which we have more than once referred. Speaking of those who distrust the practicability of securing such legislation as will effectually destroy the liquor trade, he says: "They are appalled at the power of the traffic. They see that it has uncounted wealth at its command; that it is organized and unscrupulous; that it has the support ...
— Grappling with the Monster • T. S. Arthur

... Her plan was simple; it was to slip out of Matocton at dawn, and walk to the near-by station. There they would take the train, and snap their fingers at convention. The scheme sounded preposterous in outline, but she demonstrated its practicability in performance. And ...
— The Rivet in Grandfather's Neck - A Comedy of Limitations • James Branch Cabell

... poured forth from the daily, weekly, and monthly press. I was therefore much pleased, soon after the article appeared, to be honored with a visit from President Gilman, who had been impressed with my views, and wished to discuss the practicability of the Johns Hopkins University, which was now being organized, doing something to promote the higher forms of ...
— The Reminiscences of an Astronomer • Simon Newcomb

... divided text; and 2d, the key to it. For that purpose I must see whether I shall succeed in executing the most difficult part, Isaiah and Jeremiah. And I have advanced so far with this since yesterday evening, that I see the child can move, it can walk. The outward practicability depends on many things, but I have thoroughly worked through the ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller

... a certain scientific practicability even in his love-making, and it here came out excellently. But she sat on with suspended breath, her heart wildly beating, while he waited in open-mouthed expectation. Each was swayed by the emotion within ...
— Two on a Tower • Thomas Hardy

... have fled in the opposite direction, he reined his steed on his haunches. He could touch the precipice with his bridle-hand half outstretched; his sword-hand half outstretched would have dropped a stone to the bottom of the ravine. There was no room to wheel. One desperate practicability alone remained. Turning his horse's head towards the edge, he compelled him, by means of the powerful bit, to rear till he stood almost erect; and so, his body swaying over the gulf, with quivering and straining ...
— The Portent & Other Stories • George MacDonald

... sympathies and sense of justice were immediately aroused and he inquired of General Curtis, in the field, as to the practicability of occupying "the Cherokee country consistently with the public service."[600] Curtis evaded the direct issue, which was the Federal obligation to protect its wards, by boasting that he had just driven the enemy into the Indian Territory "and beyond" and by doubting "the expediency ...
— The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War • Annie Heloise Abel

... Calvinistic preachers of the time, in view of the prevalence of Arminianism. In the more recent revivals, however, a similar prominence seems to be given to moral agency, in the forms of present obligation to duty, its present practicability, &c. The preaching, thus distinguished in its more prominent characteristics, has been undeniably owned and blessed by the Spirit of God, although we are very apt to believe that what is true of one kind of preaching at one time, must ...
— The Book of Religions • John Hayward

... be apprehended that the additional value put on the articles above-mentioned, would produce in their consumption a diminution equal to the difference in prices, in which cases no advantage would be gained. The practicability of the operation, in my opinion, depends on the proportion in which the means of obtaining the articles in question respectively stand with the probability of their being consumed. I will explain myself. If, for example, the ...
— The Former Philippines thru Foreign Eyes • Fedor Jagor; Tomas de Comyn; Chas. Wilkes; Rudolf Virchow.

... complicated problem, needless to say, but it had been solved successfully, and patents had been applied for, and a working model constructed. But it had proved unexpectedly difficult to interest the officials of the great steamship companies in the device. There was no doubt about the practicability of the machine, or the economies it would effect; but the officials raised trivial objections, and caused delays, and offered prices that were ridiculously inadequate. So the young inventor had conceived the idea ...
— The Metropolis • Upton Sinclair

... Within a month it had been followed by another, proposed by the Abbe Sieyes, a busy priest who boasted that he had made himself master of the whole science of politics, but who was in fact a mere slave of abstract theories, the safety or even the practicability of which he was utterly unable to estimate. On his motion, the Assembly, in a single evening, abolished all the ancient territorial divisions of the kingdom, and the very names of the provinces; dividing the country anew into eighty-three ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge

... interrupts: "let the south be true to herself, and there's no fear of that. But I confess, deacon, there is something good as well as curious about your way of treating niggers." And Mr. Scranton shakes his head, as if the practicability yet remained the great obstacle in his mind. "Your niggers ain't every body's," ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams

... person. As the projector of the present Bank of Scotland, as the very soul of the celebrated Darien Company, and as the founder of the Bank of England, he deserves notice. A speculator as well as an adventurous man, he proved his belief in the practicability of the Darien scheme by accompanying that unfortunate expedition; and the formation of the Bank of England was the object of his desires and the subject of his thoughts for a long time previous to ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 12 • Editor-In-Chief Rossiter Johnson

... advantages to be expected by such a system of inland navigation. This letter was "one of the ablest, most sagacious, and most important productions of his pen," says Mr. Sparks, "presenting first a clear statement of the question, and showing the practicability of facilitating the intercourse of trade between the East and the West, by improving and ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing

... Mr. Burges and myself started at 7.30 a.m. in a north-easterly course, to ascertain the practicability of proceeding in that direction, taking two of the strongest horses. After riding four hours over an open, scrubby sand-plain, with circular valleys, we again fell in with thickets of wattles so dense that, although burnt by the native fires about four years previous, they would have been impassable ...
— Journals of Australian Explorations • A C and F T Gregory

... The several varieties of each kind, as, for instance, those of turnip, cabbage, beet, lettuce, are planted widely apart, to guard against possible admixture; but the chances of that result must be much less than is popularly supposed, efforts having been used experimentally to test its practicability, and that between kindred closely allied, without success. Although the extent of the grounds would appear to be formidable, even for a farm conducted in the usual mode, it is insufficient for the demands on the proprietors, without diligent ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., April, 1863, No. LXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics. • Various

... "a labor of love, and no less so to recall the manners and incidents introduced."[107] It was starting from the same house, when the poem itself had made some progress, that he put to the test the practicability of riding from the banks of Loch Vennachar to the Castle of Stirling within the brief space which he had assigned to Fitz-James's Grey Bayard, after the duel with Roderick Dim; and the principal landmarks in the ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart

... sentiment for art pure and simple will gradually expand into a greater veneration for the scientific elements of their professional career, and the necessity of clearly demonstrating to the uneducated comprehension of mechanics the practicability of their designs will induce those habits of thought and investigation which, if honestly pursued, will elevate the standard of professional attainments. As a natural result, their designs when executed will give us edifices artistic in conception and detail, well ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, November 1885 • Various

... the practicability of procuring needful supplies for men and animals, and transporting baggage is a point to be well considered. Should the president be disappointed in his cherished hope that you will be able to reach the interior of Upper California before winter, you are then desired to make the best arrangement ...
— The Adventures of a Forty-niner • Daniel Knower

... have already intimated, this was only an experimental trip. By visiting this little nearby island in the ocean of space, Mr. Edison simply wished to demonstrate the practicability of his invention, and to convince, first of all, himself and his scientific friends that it was possible for men—mortal men—to quit and to revisit the earth at their will. That aim this ...
— Edison's Conquest of Mars • Garrett Putman Serviss

... Ericson, is one of the "Essays of a Dreamer" which are regularly appearing in the Budget. The effort is marked by much sincerity and idealism, though in grammar and practicability it is less distinguished. We might mention the erroneous use of whom for who (a not uncommon defect amongst amateur writers), the faulty use of the word usurping where depriving is meant, and ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft

... of free trade; and it may be admitted it wears at first sight a seducing and agreeable aspect. Let us now enquire how far experience, the great test of truth, has verified its doctrines, or demonstrated its practicability. To illustrate this matter, we shall have recourse to no mean or doubtful authority; we shall have recourse to the statement of an enlightened but candid contemporary, whose advocating of a moderate system of free trade has excited no small ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various

... step or two to see whether there was any practicability of moving, he instantly called out against his attempting to go away. He was in a good deal of pain, and high- spirited boy as he was, was thoroughly unnerved and appalled, and much less able to consider than the usually quieter and more timid Armine. ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge

... were cut from the river; the whole track, moreover, passes through virgin forests rich in inexhaustible supplies of fuel.* (* The commission appointed by the United States Government to examine into the practicability of making a canal across the isthmus reported in favour of the Nicaraguan route, and the work was begun at Greytown in 1889. But after an expenditure of 4,500, 000 dollars, the scheme was abandoned, for political reasons, in favour of ...
— The Naturalist in Nicaragua • Thomas Belt

... problem, the Admiralty sent an inquiry to Admiral Carden, in command on the scene, as to the practicability of forcing the Dardanelles by the use of ships alone, assuming that old ships would be employed, and "that the importance of the results would justify severe loss." He replied on January 5: "I do not think the Dardanelles can be rushed, but they might be forced by extended operations ...
— A History of Sea Power • William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott

... the Rousseau of English democracy. For, if his arguments lacked the novelty of those of the Genevese thinker (and even they were far from original), they equalled them in effectiveness, and excelled them in practicability. "The Rights of Man" (Part I) may be termed an insular version of the "Contrat Social," with this difference, that the English writer pointed the way to changes which were far from visionary, while the Genevese seer outlined a polity fit only for a Swiss canton peopled by philosophers. ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose

... the conception of the Chinese mind and character as a whole, so glaring are the inconsistencies of the Chinese nature. And as one sees for himself in this great city, particularly in official life, the businesslike practicability on the one hand and the utter absurdity of administration on the other, in all modes and methods, one is almost inclined to drop his pen in disgust at being unable to come ...
— Across China on Foot • Edwin Dingle

... earnestness and constancy in promoting the well-being of all men. It was an object sufficiently noble, one would think, worthy of the greatest brain and the largest heart, and having certain very commendable traits in the way of practicability and substantial possibilities. His desire was to see the community prosperous, comfortable, happy, advancing in the accumulation of money and of all physical goods, but not to the point of luxury; ...
— Benjamin Franklin • John Torrey Morse, Jr.

... speech made on January 22 of this year, showed the English how they could protect themselves against the effects of submarine warfare by increased production in their own country. The practicability and effectiveness of his counsels are more than doubtful. He makes no attempt, however, to instruct his Allies how they are to protect themselves against the throttling of the ...
— In the World War • Count Ottokar Czernin

... digest and finally master them. However, much to his surprise and delight, at the very threshold of the work, the display of energy, ability and mental acuteness on the part of the entire club membership, dispelled the last remaining doubt from his mind; he was convinced of the practicability and final success of ...
— Solaris Farm - A Story of the Twentieth Century • Milan C. Edson

... island on the other side of the globe was represented in such striking language as to interest the honour and pride of the colonists in renouncing the government of Great Britain. The necessity, the advantage and practicability of independence were ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 2 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Edgerton Ryerson



Words linked to "Practicability" :   impracticableness, utility, feasibility, usefulness, practicableness, practicable, feasibleness, impracticability



Copyright © 2024 Free-Translator.com