"Refute" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... her face was beautiful and fine as marble in its soft rays. For a moment he hesitated, overwhelmed by a sudden realization of her attractiveness. He had just been saying that the law of nature was the law of change, and nature itself stood up to refute him. ...
— Dennison Grant - A Novel of To-day • Robert Stead
... Botticelli's "Nativity," and some defenders of Savonarola have hoped to read 1511 in the strange character of its inscription, so that this beautiful picture, standing forth as the work of one for many years under the influence of "the Frate," may refute the common calumny that that influence was unfriendly to art. Our catalogue, indeed, unhesitatingly asserts of Botticelli, that "he became a follower of Savonarola and no doubt suffered from it;" but ...
— The Old Masters and Their Pictures - For the Use of Schools and Learners in Art • Sarah Tytler
... men themselves was all that was required to refute the notorious untruths. Few had placed any belief in the reports, and ...
— Last of the Great Scouts - The Life Story of William F. Cody ["Buffalo Bill"] • Helen Cody Wetmore
... they felt that hitherto inexplicable contempt of their mothers for La Blanchotte growing upon them. As for Simon, he had leaned against a tree to avoid falling, and he remained as if prostrated by an irreparable disaster. He sought to explain, but could think of nothing-to say to refute this horrible charge that he had no papa. At last he shouted at them quite recklessly: "Yes, ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... had been supplied with materials and machinery, so as to be efficient in producing the various munitions and equipments, the want of which had caused early embarrassment. Thus a good deal had been done to produce the needed material of war, and to refute the croakers who found in our poverty application for the ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis
... cattle-man, and not refresh yourself with good liquor? You refute all the precedents! Come over ...
— Ben Blair - The Story of a Plainsman • Will Lillibridge
... "Jew's Letters," which he had lent me. Have I mentioned them? They are a mighty well written defence of the Mosaic law and mission, and as orthodox for Christians as for Jews, with regard to their main tenor, which is to refute the infidel doctrine of Voltaire up to the time of our ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madam D'Arblay Volume 2 • Madame D'Arblay
... Nevertheless we should remember that precisely this kind of symbolism was very popular in Spain in the seventeenth century, and gave rise to the splendid literary art of the autos sacramentales. Galds then goes on to refute the allegation of certain critics that he was ...
— Heath's Modern Language Series: Mariucha • Benito Perez Galdos
... mentioned Irish and Jack Bates, meaning to refute the tales they had told of him, and she had asked about the black lamb and the white, and then had told him that he must go out to the whistling buoy and see the real whale they had anchored out there, and related with much detail how ...
— The Happy Family • Bertha Muzzy Bower
... adoption. They reproached him for his want of education, more especially for his ignorance of Latin and Greek; and they assailed him with quotations from ancient writers, which he was unable either to verify or refute. But the best answer to his assailants was the success of his practice. The wounded soldiers called out everywhere for Pare, and he was always at their service: he tended them carefully and affectionately; and he usually took ...
— Self Help • Samuel Smiles
... at this instance of the young gentleman's perceptive faculties, and not exactly able to refute the charge, was somewhat at loss how ...
— Wired Love - A Romance of Dots and Dashes • Ella Cheever Thayer
... he laughed; and it was a laugh calculated to acknowledge the fitness of her question, rather than to refute it as he intended. "Am I a clown, Cynthia, to own myself unhappy at such a season and while you honour me with ...
— The Tavern Knight • Rafael Sabatini
... at the moment regardless of the result, the penalty of the crime; he did not resist, but yielded; and as to the argument of the learned counsel, that Mr. S. did not see what he testifies to have seen, it is useless to refute such an unfounded allegation. Can you suppose Smith to be benefited by this prosecution further than to see justice have its dues? Settle it then in your minds that Mr. Smith did actually see all he says he did. We come next to the description given ...
— Town and Country, or, Life at Home and Abroad • John S. Adams
... discussed the product from passing water over heated charcoal. He had been endeavoring to refute certain statements made by Cruikshank. There is no question but that he had carbon monoxide in hand, and had it as early as 1799, and that he had obtained it in several different ...
— Priestley in America - 1794-1804 • Edgar F. Smith
... power of administering the Holy Eucharist was the attribute of a sacred order founded by Christ Himself? Did not the Fathers refer to the tradition of the Church as to something independent of the written word, and sufficient to refute heresy, even alone? Was it not, therefore, God's unwritten word? And did it not demand the same reverence from us as the Scriptures, and for exactly the same reason—BECAUSE IT WAS HIS WORD? The Doctors of Divinity ...
— Eminent Victorians • Lytton Strachey
... enquiring for Lord Elmwood, disclosed to him his errand. It was to ask him to be his second;—the young Earl started, and wished to consult his tutor, but that, his kinsman strictly forbade; and having urged his reasons with arguments, which at least he could not refute, he was at length prevailed upon to promise that he would accompany him to the field, which was at the distance only of a few miles, and the parties were to be there at ...
— A Simple Story • Mrs. Inchbald
... to refute these arguments to the full extent in which this is possible. Besides, Renan, who has put the case for both sides of the question with equal vigour, definitively closed the debate in the following words: "It may be said that some researches are useless ...
— Introduction to the Study of History • Charles V. Langlois
... renounced. International Law has not been so understood abroad; and it may be frankly confessed that the Spanish arguments were learned, acute, sustained by the general judgment of Europe, and not easy to refute. ...
— Problems of Expansion - As Considered In Papers and Addresses • Whitelaw Reid
... denied in himself, he found his most useful levers in the humble labourers whose characters he had studied, whose condition he sought to make themselves desire to elevate. Unconsciously his whole practice began to refute his theories. The abuses of the old Poor Laws were rife in his neighbourhood; his quick penetration, and perhaps his imperious habits of decision, suggested to him many of the best provisions of the law now called into operation; but he was ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book II • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... accident than skill, to break it. The cartridges, of course, fitted into the empty cylinder. But before inserting them she closed the pistol once more, cocked it, and held it out. Her arm trembled violently as she pulled the trigger. Could she do it? As though to refute this doubt of her ability to carry out an act determined upon, she broke the weapon once more, loaded and closed it, and thrust it in the pocket of her coat. Then, washing the grease from her hands, she put on her gloves, and ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... salvation of man has not taken place; since the effect must be proportionate to the cause. The third reason is taken from the dignity of the Person assuming, Whom it did not become to have anything fictitious in His work, since He is the Truth. Hence our Lord Himself deigned to refute this error (Luke 24:37, 39), when the disciples, "troubled and frighted, supposed that they saw a spirit," and not a true body; wherefore He offered Himself to their touch, saying: "Handle, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as you see ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... would serve to give the President an undue influence over the Senate, and in others that it would have an opposite tendency, a strong proof that neither suggestion is true. To state the first in its proper form, is to refute it. It amounts to this: the President would have an improper INFLUENCE OVER the Senate, because the Senate would have the power of RESTRAINING him. This is an absurdity in terms. It cannot admit of a doubt that the entire power of appointment would enable ...
— The Federalist Papers
... lieutenant in the Black mousquetaires, returned to him—so he said—twelve hundred pistoles which he had lent to the marquis for the purpose of emigrating. This event made a sensation; it was used later to refute the sarcasms of the "Constitutionnel," on the method employed by some emigres in paying their debts. When this noble act of the Marquis de Pombreton was lauded before the chevalier, the good man reddened even to his right cheek. Every one rejoiced frankly at this windfall for Monsieur ...
— An Old Maid • Honore de Balzac
... we went to sie the charlatan at the Marcher Vieux, who took occasion to show the spectators some vipers he had in a box wt scalves[168] in it, as also to refute that tradition delivered by so many, of the young vipers killing their mother in raving[l69] her belly to win furth, and that wt the horrid peine she suffers in the bringing furth her young she dies, which also I have heard Mr. Douglas—preaching ...
— Publications of the Scottish History Society, Vol. 36 • Sir John Lauder
... radiation of the earth's surface, it follows that the temperature of any elevated point must be modified in a very important degree by the proximity and extent of the surrounding plains. These observations seem satisfactorily to refute the objections made by certain savants respecting the great height of the Himalaya mountains, which may be, therefore, safely pronounced to be the loftiest mountain chain on the ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part III. The Great Explorers of the Nineteenth Century • Jules Verne
... publication? Even that great work, the treatise of Locke on Government, itself, which is justly regarded as the political Bible (I mean no irreverence) of Englishmen, would never have seen the light, but that it was written to refute the base and detestable tenets of Barclay and Filmer. Their political treatises were false and slavish, and even illegal; for they were the same for which Dr. Sacheverel was afterwards impeached by the Parliament; and which he would not have been ...
— A Sketch of the Life of the late Henry Cooper - Barrister-at-Law, of the Norfolk Circuit; as also, of his Father • William Cooper
... scarcely reasonable, for its admission would entail the reversal of what are called the sound notions of logic! But what will the logician say if I affirm that in a certain case, one and one make but one-half? Would he even take the trouble to refute me? No, he would laugh in my face; he would not listen to me; he would tax me with absurdity and insanity, preferring thus to lose a chance of instruction rather than confess ...
— Delsarte System of Oratory • Various
... his knowledge of the incident with any one. But that it had leaked out was cruelly self-evident, and the worst part of it was that the malicious gossip was founded on so much actual fact that it was difficult—almost impossible, in fact—to combat or refute it. She felt helpless in the face of the detestable scandal which had reared itself upon a foundation of ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler
... "that I have been lately the subject of some anonymous slanders, and Grant has taken the trouble to track them down for me. It is a calumny that goes back as far as Sidon, and I may want your level head and good memory to help me to refute it." He then repeated calmly and clearly, with no trace of the fury that had raged within him a moment before, the ...
— A First Family of Tasajara • Bret Harte
... letter to the Times, that the article had been inserted by the proprietor without being first submitted to the editorial eye, and that he was in no way responsible for its contents. Colburn also wrote to the Times to refute the Quarterly reviewer's statements regarding the sales of Italy, and publicly to declare his entire satisfaction at the result of the undertaking, and his willingness to receive from the author another work of equal interest on the same terms. In short, never was ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston
... you are acquainted with any circumstances which could tend to confirm or refute the narrative of Sidi Hamet, as given by Riley, or throw light upon Riley's general credibility; or if you have ever heard any report of such a city as Wassanah, I should feel particularly obliged to you for communicating ...
— An Account of Timbuctoo and Housa Territories in the Interior of Africa • Abd Salam Shabeeny
... constitutional power of Congress to construct internal improvements within the States has been so frequently and so elaborately discussed that it would seem useless on this occasion to repeat or to refute at length arguments which have been so often advanced. For my own opinions on this subject I might refer to President Polk's carefully considered message of the 15th December, 1847, addressed to the House of Representatives whilst I was ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 4 (of 4) of Volume 5: James Buchanan • James D. Richardson
... the warnings of the faithful will not be forgotten—that they will be kept in mind by the exultations occasioned by deliverance from the fears of religion, and from the presence of those who had excited those fears, by exhibiting proofs of religion which they could not refute. And how natural and common are such exultations, with those devoid of religious fear? But agreeably to the view given by the apostle, when such shall have become the state of the world, and the nations shall be thus felicitating themselves in full persuasion that all religion is a dream, ...
— Sermons on Various Important Subjects • Andrew Lee
... assigned for the outrage offered to him as ten times worse than the outrage itself. There is such a strange confusion of ideas on this subject, that it is far more difficult to understand the nature of the charge than to refute it when understood. Mr. Fox's friends were, it seems, seized with a sudden panic terror lest he should pass for a republican. I do not think they had any ground for this apprehension. But let us admit they had. What was there in the Quebec ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IV. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... bristled with indignation at this remark. He was about to refute the stigma laid on his little pet town, when the door opened and in walked Scarlett, dressed still in his travel-stained clothes, and ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace
... searching one, for an important London newspaper had hinted that, owing to the parsimonious policy of the Admiralty, certain of their aeroplanes were not of the same stability as those owned by private individuals. Hence the authorities at Whitehall had set themselves to refute such damaging allegations. ...
— The White Lie • William Le Queux
... other person who has ever been born of an earthly mother. Certainly it does, the theologian may declare, and rightly so, for that gulf exists; He assumed human nature, but He was eternally divine before He did so, and we are not. I do not need to refute this argument; the trend of modern thought is already doing so most effectually. It is a gratuitous assumption without a shred of evidence to support it. Besides, unfortunately for this kind of statement, ...
— The New Theology • R. J. Campbell
... nullification is peaceful and efficient, and so deeply intrenched in the principles of our system, that it cannot be assailed but by prostrating the Constitution, and substituting the supremacy of military force in lieu of the supremacy of the laws. In fact, the advocates of this bill refute their own argument. They tell us that the ordinance is unconstitutional; that it infracts the Constitution of South Carolina, although, to me, the objection appears absurd, as it was adopted by the very authority which adopted the Constitution ...
— Remarks of Mr. Calhoun of South Carolina on the bill to prevent the interference of certain federal officers in elections: delivered in the Senate of the United States February 22, 1839 • John C. Calhoun
... almost unearthly brilliance, as he rose and walked away. For some time he stood before the window, with his arms folded; and, laying her head on the stool of the melodeon, Beulah knelt just as he left her It has been said, "Who can refute a sneer?" Rather ask, Who can compute its ruinous effects. To that kneeling figure came the thought, "If he, surrounded by wealth and friends, and blessings, cannot believe in God, what cause have I, poor, wretched, ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans
... author of "Uncle Tom's Cabin," and to fortify herself against them by a published statement of incontrovertible facts. It was claimed on all sides that she had in her famous book made such ignorant or malicious misrepresentations that it was nothing short of a tissue of falsehoods, and to refute this she was compelled to write a "Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin," in which should appear the sources from which she had obtained her knowledge. Late in the winter ...
— The Life of Harriet Beecher Stowe • Charles Edward Stowe
... concerned, emphasizing it, and disposing of it entirely so far as his speech was concerned. He had just enumerated the wealth of the colonies as represented by their commerce. He knew that the war party would argue, "If America is so wealthy, it is worth fighting for." That was the place, then, to refute them. To introduce his material he had to make clear the transition from the colonial wealth to his arguments. Notice how plainly the first paragraph quoted here does this. Having given his four reasons against the use of force, notice that ...
— Public Speaking • Clarence Stratton
... Voltaire, and the page was opened at his argumentative assertion of the existence of the Supreme Being. ("Histoire de Jenni.") The margin was covered with pencilled notes, in the stiff but tremulous hand of old age; all in attempt to refute or to ridicule the logic of the sage of Ferney: Voltaire did not go far enough for the annotator! The clock struck two, when the sound of steps was heard without. The stranger silently seated himself on the farther side of the bed, and ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... as soon as the men were gone, "before I refute the charge you make, let me clearly understand it. From the expressions you have used I gather it to be this: A conspiracy was laid a little time ago at Sant' Angelo which had for object to supplant you on the throne of Babbiano and set me in your place. You charge me ...
— Love-at-Arms • Raphael Sabatini
... many drawbacks to the amenities of the place as a residence for a European; but these were not of a nature that my readers would perhaps imagine. There was scarcely any danger from wild animals— it seems almost ridiculous to refute the idea of danger from the natives in a country where even incivility to an unoffending stranger is a rarity. A jaguar, however, paid us a visit one night. It was considered an extraordinary event, and so much uproar was made by the men who turned out with guns and bows ...
— The Naturalist on the River Amazons • Henry Walter Bates
... facts most conclusively refute the statements too often made that "men won't work," and "there's work enough if men are only willing to do it." Such is not the truth. I can find you many instances where good, steady workmen have offered to the foremen ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 24, November, 1891 • Various
... chemist, by discovering the laws of nature, do not bind unconnected phenomena; but they refute the hasty conclusion of sensuous thought, that the phenomena ever were unconnected. Men of science do not introduce order into chance and chaos, but show that there never was chance or chaos. The poet ...
— Browning as a Philosophical and Religious Teacher • Henry Jones
... gradually I was given to perceive and feel it. Therefore, as soon as an evil afterwards entered my will or a falsity into my thought, I investigated the source of it. I inquired from whom it came. This was disclosed to me, and I was also allowed to speak with those spirits, refute them, and compel them to withdraw, thus to take back their evil and falsity and keep it to themselves, and no longer infuse anything of the kind into my thought. This has occurred a thousand times. I have remained in this state for many years, and still do. Yet ...
— Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence • Emanuel Swedenborg
... assemblage of works of art, the accumulation of years, fell a sacrifice to the hammer of the auctioneer, producing little more than four thousand nine hundred guilders. By its list, however, we are enabled to refute the assertion of many of his biographers, that he neglected the antique, and the works of the great masters of the Italian school, the catalogue including casts from ancient sculpture, and drawings and prints after Michael Angelo, Raffaelle, and Titian, ...
— Rembrandt and His Works • John Burnet
... doctrines abounding in it, the sense thereof inflamed my breast with a just and holy indignation against the work, and that devilish spirit in which it was brought forth; wherefore, finding my spirit raised and my understanding divinely opened to refute it, I began the book again, and reading it with pen in hand, answered it paragraphically as I went. And so clear were the openings I received from the Lord therein, that by the time my friend came back I had gone through the greatest part of it, and was too far engaged ...
— The History of Thomas Ellwood Written by Himself • Thomas Ellwood
... time, the one the least handsome will sometimes please you most, because there exists a greater sympathy between you and her, than between you and the more beautiful woman. Without attempting to refute this absurd doctrine of corpuscles, I shall only observe that this young Frenchman is completely smitten, and declares that no woman in the world can be compared ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... even from inferring, that beyond the region of the Knowable Mind does not exist, it remains logically possible to institute a metaphysical hypothesis that beyond this region of the Knowable Mind does exist. There being a necessary absence of any positive information whereby to refute this metaphysical hypothesis, any one who chooses to adopt it is fully justified in doing so, provided only he remembers that the purely metaphysical quality whereby the hypothesis is ensured against disproof, likewise, and in the same degree, precludes it from the possibility of proof. ...
— A Candid Examination of Theism • George John Romanes
... Christian religion among infidels." Benjamin read all of these, and his father was delighted to have him read them at the time, thinking that the moral results would be good. But the sequel will show that the effect of reading them was bad. In order to refute the arguments of deists, it was necessary to print them in the tracks. So Benjamin read both sides, and he thought, in some respects, that the deists ...
— From Boyhood to Manhood • William M. Thayer
... which he seemed to consider little short of nectar, and was astonished at my ignorance when, appealed to, I was obliged to plead guilty of not being acquainted with its virtues. He was the first Frenchman I ever heard refute the calumnies against our climate; for, though he agreed that we had fogs in London occasionally somewhat denser than in Paris, he had not fallen into the error,—which it is thought heresy to dispute,—that, at Brighton, Richmond, or Windsor, the blue sky is ...
— Barn and the Pyrenees - A Legendary Tour to the Country of Henri Quatre • Louisa Stuart Costello
... Court, describing himself and his terrible affliction [a cancer on the lip]. The passage is given in English, but the original Latin may be seen in the British Museum (Add. 6789). It seems to have been written on purpose to refute ...
— Thomas Hariot • Henry Stevens
... warranted by anything contained in that message, yet aware from experience that detached passages of an argumentative document, when disconnected from their context and considered without reference to previous limitations and the particular positions they were intended to refute or to establish, may be made to bear a construction varying altogether from the sentiments really entertained and intended to be expressed, and deeply solicitous that my views on this point should ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 2) of Volume 3: Andrew Jackson (Second Term) • James D. Richardson
... Extravagant theories however in those parts of philosophy, where our knowledge is yet imperfect, are not without their use; as they encourage the execution of laborious experiments, or the investigation of ingenious deductions, to confirm or refute them. And since natural objects are allied to each other by many affinities, every kind of theoretic distribution of them adds to our knowledge by developing some of ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin
... lair! A varlet who his wine hath spilt As Scorpions smote him treblefold, Is thrown into a stagnant sea By Lordly Helm of bad repute, Whose visage, curl'd in ughly mien, Vext at each leper's font of spleen, Invokes a hairless witch to scan The shambling hordes that boon refute, Who lifts her unguis, long and lean, To curse each vyper's bloody dream, Each mongrel and forsaken man. Then quivers that cippus' hurl'd As templed vaults are splinter'd wide; And fearful fancies cleave the night When reeking gores pierce ...
— Betelguese - A Trip Through Hell • Jean Louis de Esque
... dogmatism and unbelief? to disperse these cloudy doubts, and to analyse and repel these many ambiguous statements?—Once more. A fool can assert, and in a moment, that 'There is no GOD.' But it requires a wise man to refute the lie; and his refutation will probably demand a volume.—I say, it was in vain to urge such considerations as these. "Why does no one reply to these 'Essays and Reviews?'" was asked,—till, I apprehend, pens enough have been unsheathed ...
— Inspiration and Interpretation - Seven Sermons Preached Before the University of Oxford • John Burgon
... read what they choose, and still more because I like to think that there are so many intelligent people in the world who are wearisomely familiar with ideas which have only slowly and gradually dawned upon myself. I have no intention of trying to refute or convince my critics, and I beg them with all my heart to say what they think about my books, because only by the frank interchange of ideas can we arrive at ...
— At Large • Arthur Christopher Benson
... measures which you are taking, on this account, lest he should change his sentiments. Tell your father that you consent; so that although he may desire it, he may not be able to be angry at you with reason. For that which you rely on, I will easily refute; "No one," {you think}, "will give a wife to {a person of} these habits." But he will find a beggar for you, rather than allow you to be corrupted {by a mistress}. If, however, he shall believe that you bear it with a contented mind, you will render him indifferent; at ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence
... presented to you for judgment, and its discussion is therefore entirely irrelevant. If my statements are false, they are false; if my arguments are inconclusive, they are inconclusive: disprove the one and refute the other. But whether this state of things be owing to a want of experience, or inability to use experience aright, or any personal circumstance whatever, is a matter in regard to which all the laws of literary courtesy forbid ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 75, January, 1864 • Various
... not only didactic, but argumentative, and in parts highly controversial. Nor are these difficulties in the least degree evaded or smoothed over by the poet. As a teacher, he is in deadly earnest; as a controversialist, his first object is to refute and convince. The graces of poetry are never for a moment allowed to interfere with the full development of an argument. Much of the poem is a chain of intricate reasoning hammered into verse by sheer force of hand. The ardent imagination ...
— Latin Literature • J. W. Mackail
... three-quarters of an hour,[8] no animalcules ever made their appearance within them. It must be admitted that the experiments and arguments of Spallanzani furnish a complete and a crushing reply to those of Needham. But we all too often forget that it is one thing to refute a proposition, and another to prove the truth of a doctrine which, implicitly or explicitly, contradicts that proposition; and the advance of science soon showed that though Needham might be quite wrong, it did not follow that Spallanzani ...
— Discourses - Biological and Geological Essays • Thomas H. Huxley
... mean its readers to understand by its account? Was it a jealous rivalry between herself and Madame Strahlberg?—Was M. de Cymier meant by the cock? And Fred had heard all this—he had drawn his sword to refute the calumny. Brave Fred! Alas! he had been prompted only by chivalric generosity. Doubtless he, also, looked upon her ...
— Jacqueline, v3 • Th. Bentzon (Mme. Blanc)
... and it has now adopted 'factio' in a third shape, that is, in our English 'fashion'; from 'pietas', 'pitie' and 'piete'; from 'capitulum', 'chapitre' and 'capitule', a botanical term. So, too, in Italian, 'manco', maimed, and 'monco', maimed of a hand; 'rifutare', to refute, and 'rifiutare', to refuse; 'dama' and ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench
... also received the same revelation; and the ground upon which it was based, in fact, rendered its acceptance easy. Even I, shielded as I was by the protecting arms of a pure love, sought in vain for arguments to refute a doctrine, the practical operation of which, I saw, might be so dangerous. The soul had a right to seek its kindred soul: that I could not deny. Having found, they belonged to each other. Love is the only law which those who love are bound to obey. I shall not repeat all ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, No. 38, December, 1860 • Various
... probable for reasons to be developed in the next paragraph. But if social conditions were not the determining factor, we are left with the somewhat grotesque theory of innate ideas. It is hardly necessary to refute this origin of ...
— Kinship Organisations and Group Marriage in Australia • Northcote W. Thomas
... sufficient for establishing the present theory, to refute that most unscientific hypothesis, adopted by some eminent philosophers, of mountains and valleys being the effect of currents in the ocean; it is necessary to see what is their proper cause, and to show that by no other cause known could the general effect, which is of such importance in the system ...
— Theory of the Earth, Volume 2 (of 4) • James Hutton
... including Walter White, pressed for the creation of an experimental integrated division of volunteers. White argued that such a unit would lift black morale, "have a tremendous psychological effect upon white America," and refute the enemy's charge that "the United States talks about democracy but practices racial discrimination and segregation."[2-28] The NAACP organized a popular movement in support of the idea, which was endorsed by many important individuals and organizations.[2-29] Yet this experiment ...
— Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 • Morris J. MacGregor Jr.
... French army: "Yes, the French soldier is a fine fellow. I have served against them in Holland and in Egypt, and I will never flinch from rendering justice to their exemplary conduct and lofty valour." He takes trouble to refute the exaggerated reports which were then circulated all over Europe about the cruelties and vandalism practised by the French: "If the French since the Revolution have not always fought for liberty, they have done so invariably for science; and wherever ...
— After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819 • Major W. E Frye
... matter of fact; but as it is not without good reason that this naturalist has been induced to look out for a petrifying cause different from any hitherto supposed, and as he has endeavoured very properly to refute the systems of petrification hitherto received, I would beg leave to transcribe his reasoning upon the subject in corroboration of the present theory of consolidation by the means ...
— Theory of the Earth, Volume 1 (of 4) • James Hutton
... . . I have written a long letter . . . with my own heart's blood. . . . Think over it well, before you despise it. . . . And if you can refute it for me, and sweep the whole away like a wild dream when one awakes, none will be more thankful—paradoxical as it may ...
— Yeast: A Problem • Charles Kingsley
... lawless, wild, dangerous, and intoxicating. However convinced he might be that the reasoning of Mrs. Morison was fallacious, he did not find it easy to tell just wherein the fallacy lay. He felt that as a priest he should be able to refute her, and he was filled with dismay to discover that he was rather himself falling into the attitude ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates
... many such travellers might be well pleased to be courteously accosted, in a foreign land, by Englishmen of honourable name, distinguished appearance, and insinuating address. It was not to be expected that a lad fresh from the university would be able to refute all the sophisms and calumnies which might be breathed in his ear by dexterous and experienced seducers. Nor would it be strange if he should, in no long time, accept an invitation to a private audience at ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 5 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... elocution. His principal emissaries were obliged to task their faculties to their full exertion, to puzzle and perplex where they could not demonstrate and convince, to misrepresent what they could not vindicate, and to elude the arguments which they could not refute. In the house of commons, lord Hervey, lately appointed vice-chamberlain of his majesty's household, made a motion for an address of thanks, in which they should declare their entire approbation of the king's conduct, acknowledge the blessings they enjoyed tinder his ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... forth in this narrative enlighten every reader, and arm him with "the Sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God," to meet and refute the false teachings now abroad ...
— Around Old Bethany • Robert Lee Berry
... a laboratory in Washington, D.C., along with the scoutmaster's story. Our question here was, "Does the cap in any way (burns, chemicals, etc.) substantiate or refute ...
— The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects • Edward Ruppelt
... return, she repeated her former expressions of displeasure; then endeavoured at some length to refute the objections brought against the match; and finally, her "great misliking" of all opposition, and her earnest desire for the marriage, being reported to her faithful council, they agreed, after long consultations, to offer her their services in furtherance ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... knowledge of truth, he proportionally declined in the practice of virtue; and the same year of his reign in which he convened the council of Nice, was polluted by the execution, or rather murder, of his eldest son. This date is alone sufficient to refute the ignorant and malicious suggestions of Zosimus, who affirms, that, after the death of Crispus, the remorse of his father accepted from the ministers of Christianity the expiation which he had vainly solicited from the ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... their age. "Hello, sweetheart!" It had stuck. Sweetheart. In the hard years that followed—years in which the blood-thirsty and piratical games of his boyhood paled to the mildest of imaginings—the nickname still clung, long after he had ceased to resent it; long after he had stripes and braid to refute it. ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber
... full head over all. Catching him up (for that was easy amid the rout), she runs him through, and thus cries above her enemy: 'Thou wert hunting wild beasts in the forest, thoughtest thou, Tyrrhenian? the day is come for a woman's arms to refute thy words. Yet no light fame shalt thou carry to thy fathers' ghosts, to have fallen under the weapon of Camilla.' Next Orsilochus and Butes, the two mightiest of mould among the Teucrians; Butes she pierces in the [692-725]back with her spear-point between corslet ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil • Virgil
... wish to bring home to the American people a clear realization of the threatening calamity, we ourselves must not only be thoroughly equipped with knowledge of the Socialistic teachings and their evil consequences, but must also be able to refute the alluring and deceptive arguments of the revolutionists. We must acquire a thorough knowledge of Socialism. But to do this, it almost goes without saying that we should carefully read and study the excellent and thoroughly up-to-date anti-Socialistic works that ...
— The Red Conspiracy • Joseph J. Mereto
... wiser. What could be the meaning of this—that he who knew nothing, and knew that he knew nothing, should be declared by the oracle to be the wisest of men? Reflecting upon the answer, he determined to refute it by finding 'a wiser;' and first he went to the politicians, and then to the poets, and then to the craftsmen, but always with the same result—he found that they knew nothing, or hardly anything more than himself; and that the little advantage ...
— Apology - Also known as "The Death of Socrates" • Plato
... for arriving at truth in the order of nature is an active search according to certain well-known methods. It farther involves the negative condition of perfect freedom to canvass, to controvert, or to refute, every received doctrine or opinion. There is no use in going after new facts, or in rising to new generalities, if we are not to be allowed to displace errors. This is now conceded, except at the points of contact of the natural ...
— Practical Essays • Alexander Bain
... expressed his determination to abide. M. Le Montey referred the matter to two commissioners—one being M. Raynouard, a well-known and useful writer, the other M. Neufchateau, the author whom Llorente's work was intended to refute. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 344, June, 1844 • Various
... ambition was that of being worthy to be honored as a philosophical poet. His theory that the poet's function is limited to an exact representation of the real and the natural, a heresy which his own best poems triumphantly refute, often led him to triviality and meanness in the choice both of subjects and diction, and marred the beauty of many otherwise fine poems. A fascinating airiness and delicacy of conception prevail in these poems, and the tender sweetness of expression is often wonderfully touching. ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... this sum, with the difficulties which William found in raising it, suffices alone to refute the account which is heedlessly adopted by historians, of the enormous revenue of the Conqueror. Is it credible that Robert would consign to the rapacious hands of his brother such considerable dominion, for a sum, which, according ...
— The History of England, Volume I • David Hume
... all thoughts or recollections of those terrible events. Time is the best physician, and would, I trusted, heal the wounds produced by those days of torture; yet my mind to-day recoils with undiminished horror as I endeavor to speak of this dreadful subject. Heretofore I have never attempted to refute the villainous slanders which have been circulated and published about me. I feel it my duty to make this statement, however, because I am convinced of your willingness to do justice to all who were concerned in that dreadful affair, and heretofore ...
— History of the Donner Party • C.F. McGlashan
... because you have not religion, and religion alone teaches us what Nature is, wherein it is good, and how it has been made evil. However, you must not expect me to answer you; God has vouchsafed me, to refute your errors, neither eloquence nor force of intellect. I should only be afraid, by my inadequate replies, of giving you occasion to blaspheme and further reasons for hardening your heart. I feel a strong desire to help you; yet the sole fruit of my ...
— The Gods are Athirst • Anatole France
... rock-pigeon. On the contrary, from time immemorial, pigeon-fanciers have had essentially similar methods of treating their pets, which have been housed, fed, protected and cared for in much the same way in all pigeonries. In fact, there is no case better adapted than that of the pigeons to refute the doctrine which one sees put forth on high authority, that "no other characters than those founded on the development of bone for the attachment of muscles" are capable of variation. In precise contradiction of this hasty assertion, Mr. Darwin's researches prove that the skeleton of the wings ...
— The Origin of Species - From 'The Westminster Review', April 1860 • Thomas H. Huxley
... glowed within her. Even thus, and not otherwise, would she have desired him to refute the slander. It was a test she had promised herself; she could have laughed for joy. Her voice ...
— The Crown of Life • George Gissing
... distinguished in his science both by his renown and by his true merit. With him I remained for some time, at first indeed well liked of him; but later I brought him great grief, because I undertook to refute certain of his opinions, not infrequently attacking him in disputation, and now and then in these debates I was adjudged victor. Now this, to those among my fellow students who were ranked foremost, seemed all the more insufferable because ...
— Historia Calamitatum • Peter Abelard
... which Sir Thomas Browne set himself to refute, were such as these: That dolphins are crooked, that Jews stink, that a man hath one rib less than a woman, that Xerxes's army drank up rivers, that cicades are bred out of cuckoo-spittle, that Hannibal split Alps with vinegar, ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... know that Nicomachus, induced by my personal enemies, brought the case into court, not hoping to prove me guilty, but expecting to be bribed. For, in proportion as such charges are most easily imputed and most difficult to refute, so much the more do all men endeavor to avoid them. 40. I, (members of the) Boule, did not think it right (to shun trial), but when he brought the charge submitted myself entirely to your disposal, nor did I try to conciliate any one of my enemies ...
— The Orations of Lysias • Lysias
... one of the horrid creatures who write with a wink at you, which sets the wicked part of us on fire: I have known it myself, and I own it to my shame; and if I happened to be ignorant of the history of Countess Fanny, I could not refute his wantonness. He has just the same benevolent leer for a bishop. Give me, if we are to make a choice, the beggar's breech for decency, I say: I like it vastly in preference to a Nymney, who leads you up to the curtain and agitates it, and bids you to retire on tiptoe. You cannot help being angry ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... reflection of preceding events convinced Graydon that personally he had little ground for complaint against the late occupants of the convent. For unintentional as undoubtedly had been the act through which at the very point of death his existence had been preserved, there was no evidence to refute the hypothesis that the shot which had killed his assailant in the plaza had been fired by one of the ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon
... had believed that the breath of scandal could not come near him. He crossed himself repeatedly and muttered prayers. But these misgivings were secreted from the world, before which he appeared as the intrepid champion of his absent nephew, prepared to refute the story in ...
— The Valley of the Kings • Marmaduke Pickthall
... He had written a book on London and French Essays and Profiles and Hours with Famous Parisians before he returned to Kansas for a subject. Some of his non-complimentary characterizations of westerners aroused a mighty roar among panegyrists of the West. They did not try to refute his anecdote about the sign of the Bull Head Saloon. This sign showed the whole of a great red bull. The citizens of Abilene were used to seeing bulls driven through town and they could go out any day and see bulls with cows on the prairie. Nature might be good, ...
— Guide to Life and Literature of the Southwest • J. Frank Dobie
... praise, Whose judging voice and eye alone direct The boundless power to cherish or reject; If e'er frivolity has led to fame, And made us blush that you forbore to blame— If e'er the sinking stage could condescend To soothe the sickly taste it dare not mend— All past reproach may present scenes refute, 60 And censure, wisely loud, be justly mute![42] Oh! since your fiat stamps the Drama's laws, Forbear to mock us with misplaced applause; So Pride shall doubly nerve the actor's powers, And Reason's voice be echoed back ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... that a house cannot be built without an architect," answered Contini, laughing, "and it has always been plain to me that there can be no architects without houses to build. But as for any especial credit to me, I refute the charge indignantly. I except the matter of the turret, which is evidently what has attracted the buyer. I always thought it would. You would never have thought of a turret, would ...
— Don Orsino • F. Marion Crawford
... too, but his peculiar kind of intellectual piety lacked the imagination of Pascal. He could play, cleverly enough, with hypothetical infidelity, and refute it, so to say, "in his study" with his eye on the little chapel door; but there was a sort of refined shrinking from the jagged edges of reality in his somewhat Byzantine temperament which throws a certain suspicion of special ...
— Suspended Judgments - Essays on Books and Sensations • John Cowper Powys
... moment to venture my present life, and but through that religion I have no hopes of any other; yet I am not forced to be silly because I am pious; nor will I ever join in eulogiums on my faith which every man of common reading and common sense can so easily refute. ...
— Peter Plymley's Letters and Selected Essays • Sydney Smith
... thence, to retire, if not with the shame of defeat, yet with but doubtful and imperfect success. Paley, with his intuitive sagacity, saw through the difficulty of answering Gibbon by the ordinary arts of controversy; his emphatic sentence, "Who can refute a sneer?" contains as much truth as point. But full and pregnant as this phrase is, it is not quite the whole truth; it is the tone in which the progress of Christianity is traced, in comparison with the rest of the splendid and prodigally ornamented ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... ministers believed that they had nothing but the truth on their side, they would freely embrace every opportunity of coming to the light, so that they might show that their works are wrought in God, and refute their opponents' calumnies? That a public debate would create animosity is no reason that it should be omitted. Would it offend real Christians? By no means. It indeed might offend false teachers and their votaries, who for the want of argument would substitute ...
— American Lutheranism - Volume 1: Early History of American Lutheranism and The Tennessee Synod • Friedrich Bente
... as beacons and others that they were intended simply as receptacles for the sacred fire known to have formerly been in use in the British Isles. Although numberless arguments have been brought forward to refute these theories, it is thought that the expensive architecture alone of the elegant and stately columns known as Round Towers contradicts all these "guesses," and that their grandeur and almost absolute ...
— The God-Idea of the Ancients - or Sex in Religion • Eliza Burt Gamble
... train of the Empress's robe, which consequently must be carried by Ladies of Honor or of the Palace." This remark displeased the Emperor, and many members of the council cited many examples to refute it, notably that of Maria de' Medici. Joseph, who had foreseen their arguments, displayed unexpected erudition: "Maria de' Medici," he said, "was accompanied only by Queen Margaret, the first wife of Henri IV., and by Madame (Catherine of Bourbon), the King's ...
— The Court of the Empress Josephine • Imbert de Saint-Amand
... yet tasted grass." Again said the Wolf: "You drink of my well." "No," exclaimed the Lamb, "I never yet drank water, for as yet my mother's milk is both food and drink to me." On which the Wolf seized him, and ate him up, saying: "Well! I won't remain supperless, even though you refute every one ...
— Aesop's Fables - A New Revised Version From Original Sources • Aesop
... knowledge must clear up any seeming contradiction, he reasoned. Ingersol was more readable, snappy, witty, hitting the Bible in a fearless way. Dorian had no doubt that all of Ingersol's points could be answered, as he himself could refute many ...
— Dorian • Nephi Anderson
... imprudently associate themselves with men of mere popular talent or independence of feeling!—It is the same in prose works. The Editor scorns to enter the lists of argument with any proscribed writer of the opposite party. He does not refute, but denounces him. He makes no concessions to an adversary, lest they should in some way be turned against him. He only feels himself safe in the fancied insignificance of others: he only feels himself superior to those whom he ...
— The Spirit of the Age - Contemporary Portraits • William Hazlitt
... rights and privileges, and he was their strenuous opponent. To enable himself still more effectually to oppose the emancipists, he sent for all the works which appeared on the subject of emancipation, that he might refute them, as he believed himself fully able to do. He read and read on, and got more and more puzzled how to contradict the statements which he saw put forth, till at length, his mind being an honest and clear one, he came completely round to the opinion of the emancipists. He now conscientiously ...
— Captain Mugford - Our Salt and Fresh Water Tutors • W.H.G. Kingston
... dubious position in society. Lavretsky did not lose his temper. He did not raise his voice (he recollected that Mihalevitch too had called him antiquated but an antiquated Voltairean), and calmly proceeded to refute Panshin at all points. He proved to him the impracticability of sudden leaps and reforms from above, founded neither on knowledge of the mother-country, nor on any genuine faith in any ideal, even a negative one. He brought forward his ...
— A House of Gentlefolk • Ivan Turgenev
... rising to his feet, denounced his ingratitude in language which was seldom allowed to pass unchallenged in the presence of his wife, while that lady contributed examples of deceitfulness in the past of Mr. Heard, which he strove in vain to refute, Meanwhile, her daughter patted ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs
... reasoning, which—so I at least hold—has been answered and refuted again and again. And I trust in God and in Christ sufficiently to believe that He will raise up sound divines and true philosophers in His Church, who will refute it once more. But meanwhile I can only appeal to your common sense; to the true and higher reason, which lies in men's hearts, not in their heads; and ask—And is it come to this? Is this the last outcome of civilization, the last discovery ...
— Westminster Sermons - with a Preface • Charles Kingsley
... that all this is only a perhaps. Very well; it is only a perhaps, but that is all we want in order to refute the logic of the article just quoted. The scientific sceptic says, "I will not believe that Jesus was really seen after death, because that would be a violation of a law of nature." We reply, "No, not necessarily. It might ...
— Orthodoxy: Its Truths And Errors • James Freeman Clarke
... book on science that is more than ten years old is obsolete. Now, that puzzles me no little. If that is true, why don't they wait till matters scientific are settled, and then write their books? Why write a book at all when you know that day after tomorrow some one will come along and refute all the theories and mangle the facts? These science chaps must spend a great deal of their time changing their intellectual clothing. It would be great fun to come back a hundred years from now and read the books on science, psychology, and pedagogy. I suppose ...
— Reveries of a Schoolmaster • Francis B. Pearson
... whatever that was. It was but an unsatisfactory visit to Mrs. Boucher; she considered herself as an ill-used woman by her poor husband's suicide; and there was quite germ of truth enough in this idea to make it a very difficult one to refute. Still, it was unsatisfactory to see how completely her thoughts were turned upon herself and her own position, and this selfishness extended even to her relations with her children, whom she considered as incumbrances, even in the very midst ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... October 12, 1916. It threw no new light on the subject, the bearings of which were dealt with in a previous volume. The American contentions, so far from being conceded, were themselves attacked in an argument intended to refute them. The Allied governments were only prepared to give assurances that they would continue to lessen the annoyances caused by the practice and were "ready to settle responsibility therefor in accordance with the principles of law and justice, which it never was and is not now their ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume VI (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... France to invade Belgium. That intention, and the realization of that intention belongs exclusively to Germany and they must be left in her possession. This is especially the case in view of the fact that the military dispositions undertaken by France absolutely refute the allegations of the German Chancellor. So true is this that when the violation of Belgian territory became an accomplished fact, and when the King of Belgium appealed under the terms of the treaty of 1839 for support, in maintaining the neutrality of Belgium which these powers ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War from the Beginning to March 1915, Vol 1, No. 2 - Who Began the War, and Why? • Various
... I have heard, and have so often attempted to refute, are, that the generality of missionaries are a fanatical class of men, who are more anxious to inculcate the peculiar tenets of their own sects and denominations than the religion of our Saviour; that most of them are ...
— The Mission • Frederick Marryat
... more of them, nor of your suspicions, which I do not refute one by one, because they are all equally devoid of probability. And to make amends for the unpleasant commencement of this letter, I will tell you something which I know will ...
— Hortense, Makers of History Series • John S. C. Abbott
... second book De Divinatione, undertakes to refute the arguments of the Stoics, 'the force of whose mind, being all turned to the side of morals, unbent itself in that of religion.' The divining faculty is divisible generally into the artificial and ...
— The Superstitions of Witchcraft • Howard Williams
... at the text, so that he might refute Nathan; but somehow that night he was too dull to refute anybody, and by-and-by he pushed the black-lettered page aside, and, crouching over the fire, held out his hands to the blaze. He thought, vaguely, of the big fireplace in the old study, and suddenly, ...
— The Way to Peace • Margaret Deland
... of his brother, he became so studious and industrious that he could not bear to lose a moment. He read at every meal, using all the time he could get for self-improvement. He said that Paine's "Age of Reason" made him an author, for it was by his attempt to refute its arguments that he was first known ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... discuss your interests, form general and local unions for their consideration, etc., is a question which depends upon the political situation and upon political legislation, and therefore it is not worth the trouble even to refute such a narrow view ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... to retract? I thought your book an imposture. I think it an imposture still. For this opinion I have given my reasons to the public, which I dare you to refute. Your rage I defy. Your abilities, since your Homer, are not so formidable, and what I hear of your morals inclines me to pay regard, not to what you shall say, but to what you shall prove. You may print this ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... who would allow no private ownership of capital, but would have all capital to be State property, are called Socialists. They stand distinctly apart from the Communists, whom we have been labouring to refute in the last section. The Communist forbids all private property: the Socialist allows private property, but in the shape of consumer's wealth alone. The Communist ignores the necessity of labour: the Socialist schemes to make all men work. The Communist contemplates ...
— Moral Philosophy • Joseph Rickaby, S. J.
... convey- ance, wherewith mortality is not acquainted. If they have that intuitive knowledge, whereby, as in reflection, they behold the thoughts of one another, I cannot peremptorily deny but they know a great part of ours. They that, to refute the invocation of saints, have denied that they have any knowledge of our affairs below, have proceeded too far, and must pardon my opinion, till I can thoroughly answer that piece of Scripture, "At the conversion of a sinner, the angels in ...
— Religio Medici, Hydriotaphia, and the Letter to a Friend • Sir Thomas Browne
... doing so, the Revelation of God known as Catholicism; and of knowing their limitations where they cannot. Many sciences, at this time, had gone no further than to establish certain facts which appeared, to the very imperfectly educated persons of that period, to challenge and even to refute certain facts or deductions of Revelation. Psychology, for example, strange as it now appears in our own day, actually seemed to afford other explanations of the Universe than that of Revelation. (We will discuss details presently.) Social Science, at that time, too, moved in the direction ...
— Dawn of All • Robert Hugh Benson
... humility of inquiries or disquisitions, have only proposed them to more ocular discerners. And we shall so far encourage contradiction as to promise no disturbance, or re- oppose any pen, that shall fallaciously or captiously refute us. And shall only take notice of such whose experimental and judicious knowledge shall be employed, not to traduce or extenuate, but to explain and dilucidate, to add and ampliate, according to the laudable custom of the ancients in their sober promotions of learning. Unto whom, notwithstanding, ...
— Sir Thomas Browne and his 'Religio Medici' - an Appreciation • Alexander Whyte
... Adelaide promptly took her up, gave instance after instance in proof that European aristocrats were in fact as vulgar in their satisfaction in servility as were the newest of the newly aristocratic at home, but simply had a different way of showing it. "A more vulgar way," she said, Janet unable to refute her. "Yes, far more vulgar, Jen, because deliberately concealed; just as vanity that swells in secret is far worse ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips
... attention to the world he believed he had abjured; she called into being his interest in his own field of action, reading to him by the hour from the writings of other men, or advancing and championing theories which she knew to be false and ridiculous, but which she goaded him to deny and refute. ...
— A Man's Woman • Frank Norris
... convenience of saying grace over the whole barrel of salt fish, in bulk, as the mercantile phrase would be. By the time that he was sixteen, Shaftesbury and Collins, efficiently aided by the pious writers who had endeavored to refute them, had made him "a real doubter in many points of our religious doctrine;" and while he was still his brother's apprentice in Boston, he fell into disrepute as a skeptic. Apparently he gathered momentum in moving along this line of thought, until in England ...
— Benjamin Franklin • John Torrey Morse, Jr.
... Major should never be likened to that of the Sage of Chelsea. Carlyle vented his spleen on the nearest object, as irate gentlemen sometimes kick at the cat; but Johnson merely sparred for points. When Miss Monckton undertook to refute his statements as to the shallowness of Sterne by declaring that "Tristram Shandy" affected her to tears, Johnson rolled himself into contortions, made an exasperating grimace, and replied, "Why, dearest, that is because you are a dunce!" Afterward, when reproached for the ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... that he should be able, well informed, energetic, and active. The ability and information of Francis were admitted; and the very animosity with which he was reproached, whether a virtue or a vice, was at least a pledge for his energy and activity. It seems difficult to refute these arguments. But the inveterate hatred borne by Francis to Hastings had excited general disgust. The House decided that Francis should not be a manager. Pitt voted with the majority, Dundas with ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... court, Reynard hypocritically regrets so many people have slandered him to the king, and tries to refute every charge. He is, however, sentenced to the gallows, but even on the road thither devises a plan to escape. Pretending regret for his past, he humbly begs the king's permission to address the spectators, and in a lengthy speech describes how he was ...
— The Book of the Epic • Helene A. Guerber
... curious people in the world, people whose reasoning methods are inexplicable, whose conclusions are not based upon any system of ethics or of logic. They believe what they choose to believe, irrespective of the quality of the testimony which may be advanced to refute their belief. The following incident illustrates this peculiar perversity: A woman patient of mine suffered from an obstinate and harassing cough. Though her general health was rather poor, her lungs were not affected. The cough persisted in spite of all efforts of ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol. 3 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague
... contradict it is illusion. The logic which thus arises is not quite disinterested or candid, and is inspired by a certain hatred of the daily world to which it is to be applied. Such an attitude naturally does not tend to the best results. Everyone knows that to read an author simply in order to refute him is not the way to understand him; and to read the book of Nature with a conviction that it is all illusion is just as unlikely to lead to understanding. If our logic is to find the common world intelligible, ...
— Mysticism and Logic and Other Essays • Bertrand Russell
... as the champion of the "wets" and the "antis," paid the salary of Edward J. Handley, an ex-newspaperman of Newark, and gave him a suite of offices in the Wise building with several clerks. His "publicity" kept the amendment on the front pages of the papers and the suffragists were always able to refute and disprove his statements. The intensive campaign carried on among the editors for the past two or three years bore fruit and 80 per cent. of the newspapers by actual canvass favored the amendment, and frequently when ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI • Various
... of great importance. Madame Evangelista invited all Bordeaux to witness the signature of the contract, and showed her intention of displaying in this last fete a luxury which should refute the foolish lies of ...
— The Marriage Contract • Honore de Balzac
... pleased with that passage in the eleventh Iliad where Achilles is said to have bound two sons of Priam upon a mountain, and afterwards to have released them for a sum of money. This was, he said, alone sufficient to refute those who affected a contempt for the wisdom of the ancients, and an undeniable testimony of the great antiquity of priggism.[Footnote: This word, in the cant language, signifies thievery.] He was ravished ...
— The History of the Life of the Late Mr. Jonathan Wild the Great • Henry Fielding
... after him, but Jerry did not even wait to refute that charge, for he knew he was in danger of proving it if he remained ...
— The Circus Comes to Town • Lebbeus Mitchell
... of public amusement known, a few years since, to the late-roaming youth of London by the name of the Snuggery, affords, among hosts of other instances which might be cited, a notable example to refute the assertion of the ancient poet. The place was principally devoted to the exhibition of musical talent, and opened at a period of the night when the performances at the theaters were over. The orchestral arrangements were comprised in one bad piano, to which were occasionally ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins
... have written by conjecture, that Socrates was indeed excellent in exciting men to virtue, but that he did not push them forward to make any great progress in it, let such reflect a little on what he said, not only when he endeavoured to refute those that boasted they knew all things, but likewise in his familiar conversations, and let them judge afterwards if he was incapable to advance his friends ...
— The Memorable Thoughts of Socrates • Xenophon |
