"Alternative" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... pustulous convict were a trifle beside this. To be your own black beast; to loathe your own soul; with a full heart to despise your own understanding—this is to start upon Despair's Last Journey in one sense or another, to find either the gulf or the gates of hope. For the alternative is eternal, and it will yet be known to all men—if not here, then elsewhere—that the way to the heights of spiritual wealth lies through the valley of spiritual bankruptcy, and that a man's follies are as ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray
... a severe disappointment to Bessy, and left her an alternative that required more than courage, but she did not vacillate. She sped swiftly on in the dark, for the electric lights were few and far between, until the black of the gloomy building, where the boys had their club, loomed up. On the corner Bessy ...
— The Day of the Beast • Zane Grey
... applicant for his daughter's hand. And he wrote it at once. He had acknowledged to himself that Tregear had shown a certain manliness in his appeal; but not on that account was such a man to have all that he demanded! It seemed to the Duke that there was no alternative between such a note as that given above and a ...
— The Duke's Children • Anthony Trollope
... other hand, the queen, whom he revered and loved, had commissioned him to conduct the Spaniards to her mother's abode. He did not dare to disobey her commands. Either alternative was more to be dreaded by him than death. The ingenuous young man had, therefore, endeavored to escape from the ...
— Ferdinand De Soto, The Discoverer of the Mississippi - American Pioneers and Patriots • John S. C. Abbott
... sole alternative of and hence the only escape from, the doctrine of absolute necessity (Stoica anagke) and from the absolute decree, which makes God responsible also for sin and eternal damnation, was the synergistic assumption of man's ...
— Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church • Friedrich Bente
... But there was no alternative, and presently he began his search by lighting matches one after another, permitting them to flare up sufficiently for a moment's vision, and then throwing them quickly to the floor, after the manner adopted by burglars when they were engaged in robbing a house ...
— A Woman at Bay - A Fiend in Skirts • Nicholas Carter
... experienced a little in his own person. Cast your whole vote, not a strip of paper merely, but your whole influence. A minority is powerless while it conforms to the majority; it is not even a minority then; but it is irresistible when it clogs by its whole weight. If the alternative is to keep all just men in prison, or give up war and slavery, the State will not hesitate which to choose. If a thousand men were not to pay their tax-bills this year, that would not be a violent and bloody measure, as it would be to pay them, and enable the State to commit violence ...
— Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience • Henry David Thoreau
... and had not Sheykh Yussuf come and explained the nature of the proceedings, the man would have been sent up to the mines in Fazogloo for life, out of civility to me, by the Moudir of Keneh, Ali Bey. There was no alternative between my 'forgiving him for the love of God' or sending him to a certain death by a climate insupportable to these people. Mustapha and Co. tried hard to prevent Sheykh Yussuf from speaking to me, for fear I should be angry and complain at Cairo, if my vengeance were not wreaked ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon
... raid the railway station and sidings at Frankfort; "intelligence" having reported important rail movements in that vicinity. The Bedouins were ordered to return if they found, after testing the air, the weather conditions unfavorable for a flight of such long distance. As an alternative target to Frankfort they were given the ...
— Night Bombing with the Bedouins • Robert Henry Reece
... in the cottages, and were thus spared the necessity of living in huts and tents on the down. Those who had not been so fortunate were not rendered more amiable by the success of their sisters-in-arms, and called them names which brought forth retorts and rejoinders; till the end of these alternative remarks seemed dependent upon the close ...
— The Trumpet-Major • Thomas Hardy
... Je vois avec Chagrin que vous vous tourmentes et mois aussi bien innutillement, et en tout sans [sens]. Ou vous voules me servire, ou vous ne Le voules pas; ou vous voules me protege, ou non; Il n'y a acune autre alternative en raison qui puis etre. Si vous voules me servire il ne faut pas me soutenire toujours que Blan [blanc] est noire, dans Les Chose Les plus palpable: et jamais Avouer que vous aves tort meme quant ...
— Pickle the Spy • Andrew Lang
... require, not the election of the candidate most in general favour with both parties, but the election by each party separately of its own most favoured candidates. But as it is impossible for both parties to be represented in a single-membered electorate, the best alternative is that both should contest the seat and one be represented. The present system of election has largely tended to realize this alternative, especially in those countries in which party government was strong, such as England and the United States; and representation ...
— Proportional Representation Applied To Party Government • T. R. Ashworth and H. P. C. Ashworth
... unhappy alternative is before you, Elizabeth. From this day you must be a stranger to one of your parents. Your mother will never see you again if you do not marry Mr. Collins, and I will never see ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... dark we encountered a mesquite thicket into which the lead cattle tore with a crashing of brush and a rattle of horns that sent a chill up and down my spine. But there was no time to hesitate, for our horses were in the thicket, and with the herd closing in on us there was no alternative but to go through it, every man for himself. I gave Nigger a free rein, shutting my eyes and clutching both cantle and pommel to hold my seat; the black responded to the rowel and tore through the thicket, in places higher than my head, and came out in an open space ...
— The Log of a Cowboy - A Narrative of the Old Trail Days • Andy Adams
... on that day the sun did not shine very brightly, and it was not hot enough for jerking meat. But Ossaroo was not to be beaten so easily. He knew an alternative which is adopted in such cases. He knew that the meat can be jerked by the fire as well as by the sun, and this plan he at once put into operation. Having gathered a large quantity of fagots, he kindled them into a fire, and then hung the beef upon ...
— The Plant Hunters - Adventures Among the Himalaya Mountains • Mayne Reid
... know what it means and you do not. Lovely butterfly"—the tenderness of his voice stirred her heart-strings—"do you think that I could bear to see you beaten to earth, your bright wings torn and faded by the cruel storms? Never. But," with one of his quick, mercurial changes of mood, "it's an alternative that we do not have to face. For it's coming out all right in the baking—that cake. The most beautiful cake you ever saw, Marcia, with a rich, brown crust, and more plums than you ever dreamed of in ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... have; debate we must have; we are goaded into debate; it is forced upon us; and from a quarter of the Union whence, I am frank to say, I did not look for it to come; and forced upon us in terms of dictation, which I cannot brook; since they leave to me no alternative of escape from debate, but in the passive surrender of some of the dearest of our birthrights, those of free petition, free speech, and free conscience. I say, of free speech and free conscience, both which are involved in the resolutions moved some time since by a gentleman ...
— Speech of Mr. Cushing, of Massachusetts, on the Right of Petition, • Caleb Cushing
... looked unutterable melancholy, and let her hand lie listlessly in his until he dropped it. He looked back at her when he reached the door. She seemed so sad that he was about to return to her side. She sighed heavily, gazed at him, and said, "Good-by, Arthur." After that he had no alternative. He went. "I must wait until she is calm," he said to himself. "She is ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips
... Wilkinson?" said the marquis, rising from his chair behind the study table, and putting out the ends of his fingers so as to touch the young clergyman's hand. "Pray take a seat." And Arthur seated himself—as, indeed, he had no alternative—on a straight-backed old horsehair-bottomed chair which stood immediately under a tall black book-case. He was miles asunder from the fire; and had he been nearer to it, it would have availed him but little; for the grate was one of ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... variety of shapes, and is at last about to run away in the disguise of a general. Would he rather be regarded as inspired or dishonest?' Ion, who has no suspicion of the irony of Socrates, eagerly embraces the alternative of inspiration. ...
— Ion • Plato
... a possible alternative. In case of accident to himself, and her ultimate escape, he must immediately write full details of his discovery, and entrust the document to her, to be opened only after his death or six months after ...
— The Wings of the Morning • Louis Tracy
... doomed; but the crusaders resolved to give him one chance of escape. Peter the Hermit was sent as their envoy to Kerboga to offer the alternative of departure from a land which St. Peter had bestowed on the faithful, or of baptism which should leave him master of the city and territory of Antioch. The reply was short and decisive. The Turk would not embrace an idolatry which he hated ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 5 • Various
... because I must! (earnestly and firmly). My passions, Walter, overcome my tenderness for you. My honor has no alternative. Our union is the talk of the whole city. Every eye, every shaft of ridicule is bent against me. 'Twere a stain which time could never efface should a subject of the prince reject my hand! Appease your father if you ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... to descend to particulars, I will add that plans were made of the Tram Stables Barracks, the Willow Bank Barracks, and the Victoria Barracks. As I have said, the instructions were marked Confidential, and the Irish Secretary may have relied on this magic word in formulating his denials. The alternative hypothesis is, of course, obvious enough. The work may have been ordered and executed without Mr. Morley's knowledge, but it has been done, and, after proper inquiry, he will not venture to deny it. The circumstance is a curious commentary on the Gladstonian affectation of perfect security, and ...
— Ireland as It Is - And as It Would be Under Home Rule • Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.)
... had moreover expressed his most earnest conviction that a modus vivendi upon the lines suggested would find ready consideration as an alternative to the five years' franchise demand, and that the British Government would hail with the utmost satisfaction and relief any tentative towards a sound rapprochement based upon the contentment of the Boer people within the areas ...
— Origin of the Anglo-Boer War Revealed (2nd ed.) - The Conspiracy of the 19th Century Unmasked • C. H. Thomas
... their attempt, had returned within their borders when intelligence was brought that Scipio was alive; nor did there now remain any person, whether countryman or foreigner, whom they could make their companion in their desperate enterprise. On examining every method, they had no alternative except that which afforded a retreat from wicked designs, which was not of the safest kind, namely, to commit themselves either to the just anger of the general, or to his clemency, of which they need not despair. For he had pardoned ...
— History of Rome, Vol III • Titus Livius
... to pay so much respect to the opinion of my fellow-citizens that the knowledge of their having given their unanimous suffrages in my favor scarcely leaves me the alternative for an option. I can not, I believe, give a greater evidence of my sensibility of the honor which they have done me than by ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 4) of Volume 1: George Washington • James D. Richardson
... Crown had no alternative but to seek foreign aid. The appeal to Catharine of Russia for twenty thousand men was met by the laconic response, "There are other ways of settling this dispute than by resort to arms." The Duke of ...
— Bay State Monthly, Vol. I, No. 3, March, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... her thoughts day and night, but she came to the conclusion that she could not conscientiously leave Miss Wright alone at Akpap. The station was too isolated for her, and if she became ill it might be weeks before any one knew. An alternative was to remain herself at Akpap, and allow Miss Wright to go to Itu, where she would be in touch with the Mission, and could canoe down to Calabar if anything went wrong. The plan she liked best was to hand the station over to a minister, so that both she and Miss Wright could establish themselves ...
— Mary Slessor of Calabar: Pioneer Missionary • W. P. Livingstone
... indolence, which I am afraid he inherits from me. If he does not overcome it, it will overcome him." In a later letter he said: "The school is not the best, but the people are kind to him, and his health leaves no alternative. He writes a good hand, is fond of figures, and is coming forward both in Latin and French. Yet he inherits a spice of indolence, and is a little impatient in his temper. His appearance—open, modest, and manly—is much in his ...
— A Publisher and His Friends • Samuel Smiles
... sense, vague and indefinable it is true, that a tragic impasse was closing on a situation over which had flashed a rainbow gleam of possible solution. Ahead lay the future with its sinister shadows—darker because of the alternative they had glimpsed ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... with the wishes of Germany, we have no alternative but to hasten on our own military preparations and to assume that war is probably inevitable. Please inform the French Government of this, and add that we are sincerely grateful to them for the declaration which the French ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume I (of 8) - Introductions; Special Articles; Causes of War; Diplomatic and State Papers • Various
... an alternative: Gil-Martin's ball had not taken effect, which was altogether wonderful, as the old man's breast was within a few yards of him. "Hilloa!" cried Blanchard, "what is that for, you dog!" and with that he came forward to look over the bush. I hesitated, as I said, and attempted to look behind me; ...
— The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner • James Hogg
... became necessary for the people either to disperse or to seek shelter under a roof. As the preacher had just reached the most interesting part of his sermon, the congregation did not hesitate an instant to take the latter alternative. The Church of St. Etienne du Capitole was quite near: someone present suggested that this building, if not the most suitable, as at least the most spacious for ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... A and D. Turning such a switch up or down connects the four contact pieces either diagonally as at C, or lengthwise as at B. The diagram shows connection from A to D, when the lamps will be on, but by turning either of these four switches into its alternative position, shown by the dotted lines, the circuit will be broken and the lights extinguished. When this has been done, the circuit may be restored and the lamps lighted again by altering either of the four switches in exactly the same way, and ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics
... faced a number of adventures of late, but for this newest one he had little stomach. Nevertheless, he gritted his teeth and prepared to go ahead and follow his companion's lead, since need left no alternative. ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck
... which we have termed parasitical, are in a state of progression, by which in time they will be joined to the main land, and form one continent; or that they are in a state of degradation, by which in time they will be made to disappear. There is no other supposition to be made; and, of that alternative, there is no room to hesitate a moment which to choose. This is not a matter of mere probability, it is the subject of physical demonstration. Should we find an old manuscript in a similar condition, we could not conclude with more certainty, that the deficient or intervening places ...
— Theory of the Earth, Volume 2 (of 4) • James Hutton
... head. Bodily exhaustion calmed her mind, and soothed her into a feeling which made even the last dread alternative less fearful. She felt a conviction that such "going home" would only be a prelude to the last going home of all, when she should never part from her husband more. She did not much mind now, even if all were to end so. Perhaps it would ...
— Agatha's Husband - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik (AKA: Dinah Maria Mulock)
... instead of legislating for them. 'True.' There is, however, one advantage which we possess—that being amateurs only, we may either take the most ideal, or the most necessary and utilitarian view. 'But why offer such an alternative? As if all our legislation must be done to-day, and nothing put off until the morrow. We may surely rough-hew our materials first, and shape and place them afterwards.' That will be the natural way of ...
— Laws • Plato
... things known only to an inner circle, things which were it known I had whispered to any one my life would be forfeited. On the other hand, if I keep silent I should doom you to a life of misery. I have resolved to take the former alternative. I may first tell you what you do not know, that I have long been viewed with suspicion by those of the higher priesthood who know my views, which are that the knowledge we possess should not be confined to ourselves, but should be disseminated, at least among that class of educated Egyptians ...
— The Cat of Bubastes - A Tale of Ancient Egypt • G. A. Henty
... country, long the basis of Roman military operations, was accessible by river and canal, The patriotic spirit which he had for a moment raised, had abandoned him; his allies had deserted him; he stood alone and at bay, encompassed by the hunters, with death or surrender as his only alternative. Under such circumstances, Hermann could not have shown more courage or conduct, nor have terminated the impossible struggle with greater dignity ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... land, at once followed me down and with its machine gun impressed on me that the sooner I landed the better. As I was then a long way over the lines, sinking fast towards the tree-tops, I had no alternative, so endeavoured to reach the village green. By this time the machine was literally riddled with bullets, though, luckily, I had not been touched. Before landing I overtook a German horseman, so thinking to introduce myself I dived ...
— 'Brother Bosch', an Airman's Escape from Germany • Gerald Featherstone Knight
... The only alternative is to declare with Von Hartmann that a living being may display a vast and varied information concerning all manner of details, and be able to perform most intricate operations, independently of experience and practice. Once admit knowledge independent of experience, ...
— Selections from Previous Works - and Remarks on Romanes' Mental Evolution in Animals • Samuel Butler
... a central position such as this, and to be alone, having no rival and admitting no alternative throughout an extensive tract, are conditions that at once fix the attention of the strategist,—it may be added, of the statesmen of commerce likewise. But to this striking combination are to be added the remarkable relations, borne by these singularly placed ...
— The Interest of America in Sea Power, Present and Future • A. T. Mahan
... were only two courses open. They must either go back by the path they had entered by—making up their minds to cross that dizzy ledge in the darkness—or he would have to leave the boy somewhere while he went for help. He gave up the latter alternative at once, and set his ...
— In Search of the Okapi - A Story of Adventure in Central Africa • Ernest Glanville
... friend looked a trifle dismayed at this selection, Count Bunker suggested the Triple Alliance as an alternative. ...
— Count Bunker • J. Storer Clouston
... satisfactory, and having taken care to see that the window was well closed, he returned to the supper-room. He was no sooner gone than the boy took the charcoal from the stove and threw it into the street; and when Adelaide came to undress, there was no fire. Cold as it was, however, she had no alternative but to go to bed without one, for there was not a bell in the apartment; and Mazzuolo, who had lighted her to the door, had locked her in, under pretence of caring for her safety. Karl, having watched this proceeding, accompanied him back to the supper-table, where they discussed the plans ...
— Tales for Young and Old • Various
... purpose better. I do not conceive, that out of a hundred human beings who had been thus confined for a year, one would be found at the end of it who would continue to linger on there, certain it was for ever, if the alternative of being hanged were offered to them. I had written a description of these horrible cells, but Captain Hall's picture of a similar building is so accurate, and so clear, that it is needless to ...
— Domestic Manners of the Americans • Fanny Trollope
... is no simile for him, outside himself. He turned it all masterfully to the advantage of the Light he loved. You all know how he cracked his grand solemn joke when the death sentence was passed on him. By Athenian law, he might suggest an alternative sentence; as, to pay a fine, or banishment. Well, said he; death was not certainly an evil; it might be a very good thing; whereas banishment was certainly an evil, and so was paying a fine. And besides, he had no money ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... Vron. Here Major Heslop and his party rejoined. These billets were not far from the coast, and it was expected that after the strenuous fortnight there would be a short rest. This was not to be, however, but, as an alternative, rumour suggested a tour of duty in an easy part of the line. This appeared to be confirmed when after two days the Battalion moved by 'bus ...
— The Story of the 6th Battalion, The Durham Light Infantry - France, April 1915-November 1918 • Unknown
... days before, it had been announced that the French government required of these poor fellows that they should either enlist at once in the regiments destined for service in Algiers, or immediately leave the country—offering them the alternative of military slavery, or banishment from the country in which they had hoped ...
— Letters of a Traveller - Notes of Things Seen in Europe and America • William Cullen Bryant
... The alternative, of course, was that he would in all probability have to leave Grandcourt. If the matter had rested only between him and the doctor, he might have made a private communication under pledge of secrecy, and so induced ...
— The Master of the Shell • Talbot Baines Reed
... matter to get back to Leh. The rise of the Shayok made it impossible to reach and return by the Digar Pass, and the alternative route over the Kharzong glacier continued for some time impracticable—that is, it was perfectly smooth ice. At length the news came that a fall of snow had roughened its surface. A number of men worked for two days at scaffolding a path, and with great difficulty, ...
— Among the Tibetans • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs Bishop)
... other hand, the alternative suggestions are not very convincing. We have noticed one of these suggestions in connection with the origin of the Angiosperms. It hints that this may be related to developments of the insect world. Most probably the development of the characteristic ...
— The Story of Evolution • Joseph McCabe
... There was no alternative but to fall in with whatever mad caprice might seize his brain. If I opposed him, it would lead to high and querulous words; and the hideous fact of his presence there—of his mere existence—I was bound to ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... an alternative to that somewhat extreme course,' he observed. 'Calm yourself, I beg of you, and I will see His Holiness as soon as possible. In the meantime, it would be well for you to take ...
— Stradella • F(rancis) Marion Crawford
... is now so feeble as to be carried up and down stairs. But very 'quiet,' which is considered a bad sign; but, as Spedding says, surely much better than the other alternative, into which one of Carlyle's temperament might so probably have fallen. Nay, were it not better for all of us? Mr. Froude ...
— Letters of Edward FitzGerald to Fanny Kemble (1871-1883) • Edward FitzGerald
... The alternative of surrender would never have crossed his mind, had he been able to think only of the political side of the matter. But there was another, on which Benham's threats played with equal force. The episode of Dick Derosne's banishment had opened his eyes more fully to what the revelation ...
— Half a Hero - A Novel • Anthony Hope
... Party is firmly resolved to continue its propaganda of fanning the fires of secession and of driving the European races apart from each other and ultimately into conflict with each other, the moderate elements of our population have no other alternative but to draw closer to one another in order ...
— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson
... some other class; and our friends, who affirm that pleasure is a generation, would laugh at the notion that pleasure is a good; and at that other notion, that pleasure is produced by generation, which is only the alternative of destruction. Who would prefer such an alternation to the equable life of pure thought? Here is one absurdity, and not the only one, to which the friends of pleasure are reduced. For is there not also an absurdity in affirming that good is of the soul only; or in declaring that the best ...
— Philebus • Plato
... arrived, his daughter brought a dumb shepherd whom they employed and bade her father take him to the Raja. The dewan thought it very unlikely that the dumb shepherd would succeed where others had failed, but he saw no alternative to following his ...
— Folklore of the Santal Parganas • Cecil Henry Bompas
... contrary, with that reluctance and timidity which were given me by an apprehension that both seemed to be offended by it:—but alas! already I have said what with grief I must repeat, I have no resource, no alternative, between receiving the honour of your hand in secret or foregoing ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... appeared to me that there were two passages, the one down the centre of the river, the other immediately under its right bank. A considerable rock stood directly in own way to the latter, so that I had no alternative but to descend the former. About forty yards below the rock, I noticed that a line of rocks occupied the space between the two channels, whilst a reef, projecting from the left bank, made the central passage distinctly visible, and the rapidity of the current proportionably ...
— Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia, Complete • Charles Sturt
... Boston; that seat of wretchedness will teach us wisdom, and instruct us forever to renounce a power in whom we can have no trust. The inhabitants of that unfortunate city, who but a few months ago were in ease and affluence, have now no other alternative than to stay and starve, or turn out to beg. Endangered by the fire of their friends if they continue within the city, and plundered by the soldiery if they leave it. In their present situation they are prisoners without the hope ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IX (of X) - America - I • Various
... struck into the valley of the Clyde, passed with his legions through Lanarkshire and Stirlingshire, then by the fords of the Forth and the Vale of the Allan into Strathearn, thence onward to the Tay. There was an alternative route. A fleet accompanied his movements. He might have crossed the Firth of Forth—the Bodotria Aestuarium—and penetrated through Fife to the Tay. But Tacitus usually mentions the crossing of estuaries, and he omits it in this case. Besides, he states that the natives on the north shore of the ...
— Chronicles of Strathearn • Various
... had no alternative, accepted his care, and tried to seem cheerful and brave while waiting for the husband who never ...
— Tracy Park • Mary Jane Holmes
... He had no alternative. He might struggle, and destroy a good deal of apparatus, but he could not hope to overwhelm them. He lay on the couch as directed. Almost instantly the overweight one was behind him, seizing his arm. He felt the sting of a needle. The thin one was at his ...
— The Memory of Mars • Raymond F. Jones
... that sticks in my mind is the alternative which she has promised to offer." Worth eyed the ceiling. "She said that if she failed at Monte Carlo she had another plan. What? Pawning her jewels? I think not. But whatever it is, I expect to ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... addressed looked at the ladies, and shrugged his shoulders slightly as much as to say. "You see I have no alternative." ...
— Witness to the Deed • George Manville Fenn
... 19th November General Hildyard found that it was necessary either to reinforce the mounted troops that were posted at Willow Grange, thus dividing the forces at his disposal, or to evacuate the place. He decided on the latter alternative, and thereupon the Boers, with delighted expedition, commenced to make preparation for ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... her bed-sitting-room a few streets off, was in no better case. She and a friend sat late last night, agreeing that the life they were living was no real life at all; but what was the alternative? Had the 'home duties' to which her High Church sister devoted herself with devastating self-sacrifice any more meaning? Ought she, with her eyes open, and without much hope of spontaneous love, to enter into the childless 'modern' marriage which alone seemed possible for her? Ought she to spend ...
— Human Nature In Politics - Third Edition • Graham Wallas
... may find well-paid employment directly. When a man takes a cadet's billet it is a tolerably sure symptom that he means half-and-half work, in which case he is much worse than useless. There is, however, another alternative which is a very different matter. Let a man pay not only for his board and lodging, but a good premium likewise, for the insight that he obtains into up-country life, then he is at liberty to work or not as he chooses; the station-hands cannot ...
— A First Year in Canterbury Settlement • Samuel Butler
... moment, if the choice were given me, I would rather have been the "Adam of that Eden" than the proudest of those generals that ever led a column to victory! Fortunately, or unfortunately—it would not be easy to decide which—the alternative was not open to me. It was while I was still musing, I found myself at the foot of a little eminence, on which stood a tower, whose height and position showed it had been built for the view it afforded over a vast tract of country. Even from where I stood, ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... "All that is truly grand in this enterprise, as well as all that is bold and extravagant, either in its conception or execution, belongs wholly to Bonaparte. The idea of it never occurred to the Directory nor to any of its members.... His ambition and his pride could not endure the alternative of no longer being prominent or of accepting a post which, however eminent, would have always subjected him to the ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 5 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 1 (of 2)(Napoleon I.) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... is said to have been brought to the Tower muffled, according to an odious practice of Spanish despotism introduced into the country during the reign of Mary. Under the terror of such a surprise the awful alternative "Comply or burn" was laid before him. Human frailty under these trying circumstances prevailed; and in an evil hour this champion of light and learning was tempted to subscribe his false assent to the doctrine ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... volition, smelted and shaped in the rolling mills of destiny, form the tramway along which already the car of doom thunders; and when they shall have been fully proved to you, by unassailable testimony, no alternative remains but the verdict of guilty. Mournful as is the duty, and awfully solemn the necessity that leaves the issue of life and death in your hands, remember, gentlemen, Curran's immortal words: 'A juror's oath is the adamantine chain that ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... covering. But when the cell has attained a certain size its life is suddenly threatened. The center of the cell is seen to be so far from the surface that it can no longer draw in the nutrition from without. The bulk has outrun the absorbing surface. "The alternative is very sharp," says the scientist, "the cell must divide or die." Only by losing its life and becoming two cells can it ...
— The Investment of Influence - A Study of Social Sympathy and Service • Newell Dwight Hillis
... his lines correspondingly, with the intention to make two strong assaults at points where success would give us the greatest advantage. I had consulted Generals Thomas, McPherson, and Schofield, and we all agreed that we could not with prudence stretch out any more, and therefore there was no alternative but to attack 'fortified lines'—a thing carefully avoided up to ...
— Forty-Six Years in the Army • John M. Schofield
... to obey—for, apart from the black woman's threat, she had no alternative but to put on the costly garments which had been procured for her, her own clothes being torn to pieces; and of course she did not wish to remain in a state of nudity. She therefore dressed herself—and in truth, the garments were well selected, ...
— Venus in Boston; - A Romance of City Life • George Thompson
... pass the Act and make the protective tariff the law of the land; or reject it, and run the risk of making a number of innocent people starve? It chose the latter alternative, and threw out the bill. The whole country became immensely excited, and seemed like one debating club, where men argued warmly either ...
— History of Australia and New Zealand - From 1606 to 1890 • Alexander Sutherland
... alternative contented Herbert Onslow, and at the time he did not resolve on either. He had some little present income from home, some fifty pounds a year or so, and he would be satisfied to marry on that and on his salary ...
— The House of Heine Brothers, in Munich • Anthony Trollope
... the principle of right, to solicit attention to the voice of reason, or to attempt to define the boundaries of influence, when no means exist of enforcing the attention of him who can command obedience. There is no alternative but submission or punishment. Upon this principle, the female sex may be expected to become the sport of human caprice, folly, and guilt. But Christianity tends to rectify the disorders which sin has introduced into the universe, and both ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. II • Francis Augustus Cox
... the theatre; the other half would have to be worked out of sight and support of our own ships and in view of the Turkish Fleet. Only one small dent in the rockbound coast offered a chance of landing but that was also heavily dug in. In a word, if Bulair had been the only way open to me and I had no alternative but to take it or wash my hands of the whole business, I should have to go right about turn and cable my master he had sent me on ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume I • Ian Hamilton
... that the situation was awkward. If the English General could not accept it there happened to be an alternative. It was that the English General should accompany the policeman through the streets, followed by the usual crowd, to the nearest prison, some three miles off. It being now four o'clock in the afternoon, they would probably find the judge departed. But the most comfortable thing ...
— Idle Ideas in 1905 • Jerome K. Jerome
... morality does his advocate commit in discharging that duty to the best of his learning and ability? What apology can he make for throwing up his brief? The truth he cannot disclose; the law seals his lips as to what has thus been communicated to him in confidence by his client. He has no alternative, then, but to perform his duty. It is his duty, however, as an advocate merely, as Baron Parke has well expressed it, to use ALL FAIR ARGUMENTS ARISING ON THE EVIDENCE. Beyond that, he is not bound to go in any case; in a case in which he is satisfied in his own mind ...
— An Essay on Professional Ethics - Second Edition • George Sharswood
... new masses, sensitive, intelligent, critical, irritable, as no common people have ever been before, these rulers and owners must be prepared to make themselves and display themselves wise, capable and heroic—beyond any aristocratic precedent. The alternative, if it is an alternative, is resignation—to the ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells
... expense of far superior powers. Yes, and the life of the freebooter is no less natural and appropriate to landsmen—I do not say, to those who can till and gather in the fruit of their fields, but to those who find themselves deprived of sustenance; since there is no alternative—either men must till their fields or live on the tillage of others, otherwise how will they find the means either of living or of ...
— The Cavalry General • Xenophon
... and then taking a sudden wind round the spot on which he stood, interposed its liquid fire,—a broad and impassable barrier between his resting-place and escape. There he stood, cut off from descent, and with no alternative but to retrace his steps towards the crater, and thence seek, without guide ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... The swashbuckling Jack Altshuler had know his many times commander even better than Cogswell had realized. Instead of three alternative maneuvers open to the wily cavalryman, he'd ferreted out a fourth and his full force, hauling mountain guns on mule back with them, were trailing over a supposedly impossible mountain path which originally could not have been more then ...
— Frigid Fracas • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... the alternative you offer me is this: I can protect myself by sacrificing Dorothea, or I can marry you, and Dorothea will ...
— The Inner Shrine • Basil King
... now no alternative but to retreat. Genghis Khan followed him, and it was in this way that, after a time, both the armies reached the banks of the Indus, on the borders ...
— Genghis Khan, Makers of History Series • Jacob Abbott
... went down to Louisville, when General Anderson said he could not stand the mental torture of his command any longer, and that he must go away, or it would kill him. On the 8th of October he actually published an order relinquishing the command, and, by reason of my seniority, I had no alternative but to assume command, though much against the grain, and in direct violation of Mr. Lincoln's promise to me. I am certain that, in my earliest communication to the War Department, I renewed the expression of my wish to remain in a subordinate ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... with the inevitability of a summons rather than an alternative, and so for a year or two he brought home rather precocious wages from his speed in a canning factory. Then he stoked his way to Sydney and back, returning fiery with ...
— The Vertical City • Fannie Hurst
... not like the word "dogma." Fortunately they are free, and there is an alternative for them. There are two things, and two things only, for the human mind, a dogma and a prejudice. The Middle Ages were a rational epoch, an age of doctrine. Our age is, at its best, a poetical epoch, an age of prejudice. A doctrine is a definite point; a prejudice is a direction. ...
— What's Wrong With The World • G.K. Chesterton
... alternative theory (3)—a combination of (1) and (2)—namely, that if one accepts (2) and the idea that at any given stage of human development there is a PREDISPOSITION to certain symbols and rites belonging to that stage, ...
— Pagan & Christian Creeds - Their Origin and Meaning • Edward Carpenter
... course be very desirable. The question, whether in that case encouragement and new strength, or grief, annoyance, and overexcitement would be the lasting effect upon me, I fear I must decide in favour of the latter alternative, and no external success, no applause, could make up for this. If I was sensitive before, I am so now to the verge of excessive irritation, and I dread every contact with theatrical matters, singers, conductors, ...
— Correspondence of Wagner and Liszt, Volume 2 • Francis Hueffer (translator)
... you any information she may acquire," interrupted Jones, and that left Colby no alternative but to ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces Out West • Edith Van Dyne
... The latter alternative was surely unthinkable! So Patty said, with exaggerated meekness, "Thank you, Little Billee, I accept it with pleasure. ...
— Patty Blossom • Carolyn Wells
... spirits began to rise, after all they knew so little about the Big Burn—it might afford them just the temporary sanctuary they needed. In the end they agreed to try it, mainly because none of them could see any alternative, except the too dangerous one of trying to contact the authorities and being summarily treated as a plague ship before they ...
— Plague Ship • Andre Norton
... presented to him, and he asked me, should I write anything about Bayreuth, to say that he objected very much to the Englishmen who came in knickerbockers—in bicycle costume. When I mildly suggested that if they came without knickerbockers or the customary alternative he would have better reason to complain, he asserted that he and his family had a great respect for the theatre, and it shocked them to find so many Englishmen who did not respect it. I mention this because it shows clearly the spirit in which Bayreuth is now being worked. The Wagner family ...
— Old Scores and New Readings • John F. Runciman
... it to the reader and to the lawmakers to pick out the correct alternative and to arrive at the one possible, decent, and ethical solution of ...
— The Sexual Question - A Scientific, psychological, hygienic and sociological study • August Forel
... daring this ordeal was not the fear of hell, to which she believed herself condemned; no, it was lest she should be reduced to the horrible alternative of hating God, whom she wished to love in time, if she could not in eternity. Humility was another of her characteristic virtues, for, after she had solidly established her institute, and formed the Sisters ...
— The Life of Venerable Sister Margaret Bourgeois • Anon.
... employment, harassed by uncertainty, compelled to pass under an assumed name, away from my family, and obliged to keep up a deceitful correspondence with Mary, who supposed I was in Bombay, became very miserable. Still there was no alternative. I dreaded any failure to comply with the wishes of the Laniers. They would hesitate at no crime to protect themselves. I believed they suspected me of thinking Paul had murdered Oswald Langdon and Alice ...
— Oswald Langdon - or, Pierre and Paul Lanier. A Romance of 1894-1898 • Carson Jay Lee
... French were broken, routed, and pursued through the woods, with great carnage. Among the prisoners taken were seventeen officers. The next day Sir William Johnson sent a trumpet, summoning the garrison to surrender, to spare the effusion of blood, and prevent outrages by the Indians. They had no alternative; were permitted to march out with the honors of war, and were protected by Sir William from his Indian allies. Thus was secured the key to the communication between Lakes Ontario and Erie, and to the vast interior region connected with them. The blow alarmed the French for ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving
... flushed. "Have you considered the alternative, Mr. President?" he cried. "It is civil war, war between brothers in blood. So soon as the South fires a shot against Sumter the sword is unsheathed. You cannot ...
— The Path of the King • John Buchan
... avoided this misfortune by giving up marriage; but the die was cast. His evil genius presented him with no other alternative than to rush on to ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli
... dispute, and civil dissension,—nay, liable to a civil war, upon any clashing of interests,—or they must constitute a general head, composed of representatives from all the States, and vested with the power of the whole continent to enforce their decisions. There is no other alternative. One of these events must inevitably take place, and the revolution of a few years will ...
— Noah Webster - American Men of Letters • Horace E. Scudder
... we had no hankering for further travels such as we had gone through. San Francisco was our destination; but though as unknown to us as Charles Lamb's 'Stranger,' we 'damned' the overland route 'at a venture'; and settled, as there was no alternative, to go in a trading ship to the Sandwich Islands thence, by the same means, ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke
... panic-stricken, in her fantastic little boudoir, when she reached home and found a note from Caroline, bidding her farewell, and stating that, not being able to comply with her wishes, she had accepted the other alternative, and left her house forever, in company with her father and the old servant, who had been so faithful to her. The note breathed of sadness and sorrow at the manner of her leaving, and, if firm, was entirely respectful; but it said nothing ...
— The Old Countess; or, The Two Proposals • Ann S. Stephens
... bishop,' said he, 'that I quite disagree with him—and shall not return to the hospital as such conditions are attached to it.' What he said was to that effect; indeed, his words were, if anything, stronger than those. I had no alternative but to repeat them to his lordship, who said that he could look on them in no other light than a refusal. He also had heard the report that your father did not wish for the appointment, and putting all these things together, he thought he had no choice but to look for someone else. He has consequently ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... of girl whose surroundings rub off on her; or was it rather that Mrs. Carstyle's idiosyncrasies were of a nature to color every one within reach? Vibart, looking across the table as this consolatory alternative occurred to him, was sure that they had not colored Mr. Carstyle; but that, perhaps, was only because they had bleached him instead. Mr. Carstyle was quite colorless; it would have been impossible to ...
— The Greater Inclination • Edith Wharton
... foot, dashed the door inwards. It was damp and tenantless. The stranger set down his bundle, kindled a fire, and remained in quiet possession. In a few hours the fisher returned. He started involuntarily at the sight of the intruder, who sprang to his feet, ready for any alternative. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, - Issue 286, December 8, 1827 • Various
... of having the bad taste to propose it," said I. "I merely stated the only alternative ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... bewildered and powerless over the intractable and the terrible team. We can only recover our strength by a full confession of our weakness. We can only lay hold on the beliefs that we see to be needful, by asking faith to join hands with reason. If we refuse to do this, there is but one alternative. Without faith we can perhaps explain things if we will; but we must first make them not worth explaining. We can only think them out entirely by regarding them as something not worth thinking ...
— Is Life Worth Living? • William Hurrell Mallock
... standard, was the very prototype of that sister-lover who must replace the seductive and abject womanhood, owned, mastered and deceiving, who waste the world to-day. And she was owned, she was mastered, she was forced into concealment. What alternative was there for her? What alternative is there for any woman? She might perhaps have kept her freedom by some ill-paid work and at the price of every other impulse in her swift and eager nature. She might have become one of those poor neuters, an independent woman.... Life ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells
... brought down my lesson to the lowest level of my dullest pupil's capacity—when I had shown myself the mildest, the most tolerant of masters—a word of impertinence, a movement of disobedience, changed me at once into a despot. I offered then but one alternative—submission and acknowledgment of error, or ignominious expulsion. This system answered, and my influence, by degrees, became established on a firm basis. "The boy is father to the man," it is said; and so I often thought when looked at my boys and remembered ...
— The Professor • (AKA Charlotte Bronte) Currer Bell
... to believe and how well and beneficently we have been brought up by our mother, the Church, and of what benefit was the milk given by the Apostle Paul to the little ones...." (It is beyond the scope of this book to give an account of the alternative method which is evolved from the Mystery Wisdom, enriched through the Christ event. The description of this method will be found in An Outline of Occult Science, see advt., front page.) Whereas in pre-Christian times ...
— Christianity As A Mystical Fact - And The Mysteries of Antiquity • Rudolf Steiner
... they had been, was to confirm, in the most satisfactory manner, the conviction that we were now in the only passage leading to the westward that existed in this neighbourhood. Notwithstanding, therefore, the present unpromising appearance of the ice, I had no alternative left me but patiently to await its disruption, and instantly to avail myself of any alteration that nature might yet ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry
... The only alternative scheme that suggested itself to my numbed mind was to commit another burglary. There was a path running down the side of the house, which apparently led round to the back, and it struck me that if I followed this I might possibly come across ...
— A Rogue by Compulsion • Victor Bridges
... were, but it would show whether they had been carried beyond the regions of space charted by Federation instruments. Which would mean the difference between having a chance—whether a good chance or a bad one—of getting home eventually, and the alternative of being ...
— The Winds of Time • James H. Schmitz
... but of equal patriotism and sincerity, will probably pass different verdicts on this incident for a long time to come. Mr. Leupp quotes a member of Roosevelt's Administration as stating four alternative courses the President might have followed. First, he might have let matters drift until Congress met, and then sent a message on the subject, shifting the responsibility from his own shoulders to those of the Congressmen. ...
— Theodore Roosevelt; An Intimate Biography, • William Roscoe Thayer
... astonishment if I distinctly deny it. Yet I must do this. Limiting the proposition to those epiperipheral feelings produced in us by external objects (for these are alone in question), I see no alternative but to affirm that the thing primarily known is not that a sensation has been experienced, but that ...
— An Introduction to Philosophy • George Stuart Fullerton
... boast of Bones, that he would "double the schoolmaster up, and lay him on a shelf of his own schoolhouse;" and he was too wary to give him an opportunity. There was something extremely provoking in this obstinately pacific system; it left Brom no alternative but to draw upon the funds of rustic waggery in his disposition, and to play off boorish practical jokes upon his rival. Ichabod became the object of whimsical persecution to Bones and his gang of rough riders. They harried his ...
— The Legend of Sleepy Hollow • Washington Irving
... told them was the remains of an ancient Fire- Temple, built by those Ghebers or Persians of the old religion, who many hundred years since had fled hither from the Arab conquerors, preferring liberty and their altars in a foreign land to the alternative of apostasy or persecution in their own. It was impossible, he added, not to feel interested in the many glorious but unsuccessful struggles which had been made by these original natives of Persia to cast off the yoke of their bigoted conquerors. ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... hard pulling over soft surfaces, and our stock of sledging food was very small. We had marched seven and a half miles in a direct line and at this rate it would take us over three hundred days to reach the land away to the west. As we only had food for forty-two days there was no alternative, therefore, but to camp once more on the floe and to possess our souls with what patience we could till conditions should appear more favourable for a renewal of the attempt to escape. To this end, we stacked our surplus provisions, the reserve sledging rations ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... would steal it whereas he, Rives, was anxious to restore it to the rightful owner. If Jimmy would help him to do this, get the money and turn it over to him, he would see that he was suitably rewarded. If Jimmy refused to fall in with the plan outlined, the alternative was a jail sentence; for it had been only with great difficulty that he had persuaded Nickleby to refrain from putting Stiles in jail on ...
— Every Man for Himself • Hopkins Moorhouse
... know the sad alternative. Is Leonora worth one pang or not? It hurts not me, my lord, but as I love you: Warmly as you I wish don Carlos well; But I am likewise don Alonzo's friend: There all the diff'rence lies between us two. In me, my lord, you hear another self; And, give me leave to ...
— The Revenge - A Tragedy • Edward Young
... a moment as he turned to the Indian, and ordered him to climb up a small tree near to which he stood. Mahtawa looked surprised, but there was no alternative. Joe's authoritative tone brooked no delay, so he sprang into the ...
— The Dog Crusoe and his Master • R.M. Ballantyne
... An alternative theory of the origin of the Inca race, although not authoritative, is worthy of note. W.B. Stevenson, in a work published in 1825, states that a curious tradition was related to him by the Indians in various parts of Peru. According to this the progenitor of the royal Incas was ...
— South America • W. H. Koebel
... truth, turned from it and refused to be set free. To him the time will come, God only knows its hour, when he will see the nature of his deed, with the knowledge that he was dimly seeing it so even when he did it: the alternative had been put before him. And all those months, or days, or hours, or moments, he might have been following the Master, hearing the words he spoke, through the windows of his eyes looking into the very gulfs ...
— Unspoken Sermons - Series I., II., and II. • George MacDonald
... place, and circumstances considered, and Fergus's spirits were extravagantly high. Regardless of danger, and sanguine from temper, youth, and ambition, he saw in imagination all his prospects crowned with success, and was totally indifferent to the probable alternative of a soldier's grave. The Baron apologized slightly for bringing Macwheeble. They had been providing, he said, for the expenses of the campaign. 'And, by my faith,' said the old man, 'as I think this will be my last, so I just end where I ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott
... the following shrewd remarks, in answering the question, "Whether have we here a mass of Lias clay, as originally deposited, or has it resulted from the breaking up of Lias-shale?" "The former alternative," says Mr. Longmuir, "we have heard, has been maintained; but we are inclined to adopt the latter, and that for the following reasons: 1. This clay, judging from other localities, is not in situ, but has every appearance of having been precipitated into a basin in the gneiss on which it ...
— The Cruise of the Betsey • Hugh Miller
... planned a week and a half previously to shoot into a parade they knew nothing about and whose line of march had not yet been disclosed. It was proved in court that the union men armed themselves at the very last moment, after everything else had failed and they had been left helpless to face the alternative of being driven out of town ...
— The Centralia Conspiracy • Ralph Chaplin |
