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Circumstance   Listen
noun
circumstance  n.  
1.
That which attends, or relates to, or in some way affects, a fact or event; an attendant thing or state of things. "The circumstances are well known in the country where they happened."
2.
An event; a fact; a particular incident. "The sculptor had in his thoughts the conqueror weeping for new worlds, or the like circumstances in history."
3.
Circumlocution; detail. (Obs.) "So without more circumstance at all I hold it fit that we shake hands and part."
4.
pl. Condition in regard to worldly estate; state of property; situation; surroundings. "When men are easy in their circumstances, they are naturally enemies to innovations."
Not a circumstance, of no account. (Colloq.)
Under the circumstances, taking all things into consideration.
Synonyms: Event; occurrence; incident; situation; condition; position; fact; detail; item. See Event.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Circumstance" Quotes from Famous Books



... was a fortunate circumstance, as it put the Indians in great good-humour, and inclined them to hold friendly intercourse with the trappers, who for some time continued to drive a brisk trade in furs. Having no market for the disposal ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne

... region of pastoral luxuriance, is very striking. A curious series of chambers, communicating with each other, has been at some distant period beyond tradition excavated in that portion of the rock which is most naked and precipitous; and from this circumstance the site has been designated Anchor Church, signifying the residence of a hermit. At a distance it bears a very close resemblance to a Gothic ruin; the rude openings formed to admit light into the several cells, and the ruggedly ...
— Castles and Cave Dwellings of Europe • Sabine Baring-Gould

... knew what he was saying; yet what he did say, utterly as it defied all checks of law or circumstance, had so gallant a ring, had so kingly a wrath, that it awed and impressed even Baroni in ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]

... position of trust, as a eunuch, having no incentive either to run away or to embezzle, would naturally be a valued and trusted servant. In the days of eunuchism there were no defaulting bank, city, or county cashiers,—a circumstance which would suggest that such a condition should form one of the qualifications for eligibility to such offices, the very opposition to any such proposal that the class would make showing in itself the benefits that would follow such an innovation, as it would show that the class is not possessed ...
— History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present - Moral and Physical Reasons for its Performance • Peter Charles Remondino

... accomplished fact, although it might be null and void, and the female mind has a great respect for accomplished facts. To a woman of Juanna's somewhat haughty nature this was very galling. Already she felt it to be so, and as time went on the chain of its remembrance irked her more and more, a circumstance which accounts for much of ...
— The People Of The Mist • H. Rider Haggard

... certain demand upon human ethics which had been almost callous in its insistence, and while he believed that something very real and very stern in the way of necessity had driven Mary Standish north, he was now anxious to be given the privilege of gripping with any force of circumstance that had turned against her. He wanted to know the truth, yet he had dreaded the moment when the girl herself must tell it to him, and the fact that Stampede had in some way discovered this truth, and was about to make ...
— The Alaskan • James Oliver Curwood

... General Burgoyne, is not it a singular circumstance, that the enemy should allow us to take possession of a point like that without opposition,—so trifling a detachment, too? Why, that hill commands ...
— The Bride of Fort Edward • Delia Bacon

... of the assembly seemed favourable to the poet's demand, but one man "observed that if they were to feed Homers, they would be encumbered with a multitude of useless people." "From this circumstance," says the writer, "Melesigenes acquired the name of Homer, for the Cumans call blind men Homers." With a love of economy, which shows how similar the world has always been in its treatment of literary men, the pension was denied, and the poet vented his ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer, translated by Alexander Pope

... lawyers of Italy and Germany, and modestly compared themselves to the descendants of King David, whose prerogatives were not impaired by the lapse of ages or the trade of a carpenter. [76] But every ear was deaf, and every circumstance was adverse, to their lawful claims. The Bourbon kings were justified by the neglect of the Valois; the princes of the blood, more recent and lofty, disdained the alliance of his humble kindred: the parliament, without denying their proofs, eluded ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon

... members, moreover, this talk of the great future of the West seemed hardly worthy of consideration. It was "an unmeasurable wilderness," and "when it would be settled was past calculation," Fisher Ames said. "It was," he added, "perfectly romantic to make this decision depend upon that circumstance. Probably it will be near a century before these people will be considerable." He was nearer right when he said in the same speech "that trade and manufactures will accumulate people in the Eastern States in proportion of five to three, compared with the Southern. The disproportion will, doubtless, ...
— James Madison • Sydney Howard Gay

... strayed about twelve miles from the camp, and had fairly lost themselves. Their trackers had to ride over seventy miles, before they came up to them, and they would certainly have perished, had not Charley been able to track them: it was indeed a providential circumstance that he had not left us. According to their statement, the country is very open, with a fine large creek, which flows down to the Condamine; this is the creek which we passed on the 10th Oct., and which I called ...
— Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia • Ludwig Leichhardt

... of this, his big underlip drooped rather weakly and his double chin slightly receded, giving a judge of character reason for suspecting that a certain obstinate positiveness observable in Mr. Bultitude's manner might possibly be due less to the possession of an unusually strong will than to the circumstance that, by some fortunate chance, that will had hitherto ...
— Vice Versa - or A Lesson to Fathers • F. Anstey

... dressed and wreathed for the banquet, had learned that the gods had bereft of their only child the couple whose hospitality had promised him such a delightful evening, he had been equally shocked and grieved. Caesar was deeply distressed at the unfortunate circumstance that he should have happened in his ignorance to intrude on the seclusion which was the prerogative of grief. He begged to assure her and her husband of the high favor of the ruler of the world. As for himself, Theocritus, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... William Upcott, of the London Institution, drew up a complete catalogue. Upcott's appearance on the scene synchronized with the disappearance of a number of volumes from the Evelyn Library; it has been suggested that Lady Evelyn presented them to him 'or something of that sort,' although the circumstance has never been officially explained. Certain it is that a large number of books formerly in the possession of the diarist have at times appeared in the auction-room. The most important which occurred during the last few years are two ...
— The Book-Hunter in London - Historical and Other Studies of Collectors and Collecting • William Roberts

... was six years of age, his father, the only real friend he had in the world, was brought home dead, killed in a mine disaster. In speaking of this period in his life Mr. Mitchell says: "The poverty and hardships that followed were marked by one circumstance that is imprinted indelibly upon my memory and which has had an impelling influence upon my whole life. My father had served a full term of enlistment as a volunteer in the Civil War. When he was discharged from the army he brought home with him his soldier's clothes, and I remember ...
— Modern Americans - A Biographical School Reader for the Upper Grades • Chester Sanford

... invited to contemplate a series of moments; and if the subject is impiety and swift retribution, we are left to infer the fact from the evidence presented; there is neither editorial introduction nor moralizing conclusion. Similarly with The Two Grenadiers, a presentation of character in circumstance, a translation of pictorial details into terms of action and prophecy; and most strikingly in The Pilgrimage to Kevlaar, a poem of such fundamentally pictorial quality that it has been called a triptych, three depicted scenes in ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... for the forage?" we asked. It would be an insult under any circumstance to offer to pay a Boer for a meal, "paying guests" being still unknown to our ...
— With Steyn and De Wet • Philip Pienaar

... English, by a war both civil and religious, that great destroyer of humanity, all the events of this period are less distinguished by atrocious deeds either of treachery or cruelty, than were ever any intestine discords which had so long a continuance; a circumstance which will be found to reflect great praise on the national character of that people now ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part E. - From Charles I. to Cromwell • David Hume

... still loved me, if it were circumstance that kept our lives apart, I could send for him then; but to die in arms that held me only out of compassion—glad to relinquish their burden as soon as might be—no, I must go without seeing ...
— A Village Ophelia and Other Stories • Anne Reeve Aldrich

... ancestors was fined for cutting oaks on the common. When this fact was discovered, he was asked if he would wish this circumstance to be omitted in his biography. "By no means," he said, "tell the whole story. It shows we had some enterprising ancestors, even if a ...
— Whittier-land - A Handbook of North Essex • Samuel T. Pickard

... youngest, I was by far the healthiest. Consequently, I had to pretty much raise myself while my single mother struggled to earn a living in rural western Canada. This circumstance probably reinforced my constitutional predilection for independent thought and action. Early on I started to protect my "little" brother, making sure the local bullies didn't take advantage of him. I learned to fight big boys and win. I also helped him acquire simple skills, ones that most kids ...
— How and When to Be Your Own Doctor • Dr. Isabelle A. Moser with Steve Solomon

... doubt, is material. Memory and imagination often act unbidden by the will; imagination often when we are asleep. We may find a material element even in the character as moulded by physical or social circumstance or need. But is there not also a conscious effort of self-improvement not dependent on these? That all is material, nothing spiritual, does not seem yet to have ...
— No Refuge but in Truth • Goldwin Smith

... there lived a King and Queen who would have been as happy as the day was long had it not been for this one circumstance, —they had ...
— Tales Of The Punjab • Flora Annie Steel

... the last-mentioned circumstance; nay, it seemed a relief to her worn mind to be at any certainty; and the words, "then by this time it is all settled," passed internally, without more evidence of emotion than ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen

... park-like groves and pretentious country villas where he had once trailed Nance Jane through the "dark woods," and his father told him the names and circumstance of the owners as they drove up the pike. There was Rockwood, the summer home of the Stanleys, and The Dell, owned, and inhabited at intervals, by Mr. Young-Dickson, of the South Tredegar potteries. Farther ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde

... night. She left me, and I pondered over the lucky chance that had put so desirable and fine a woman into my arms, and also congratulated myself on the stratagem by which I had fully convinced her that she was my first instructress in the art of love, a circumstance ever dear to the ardent imagination of the darling sex. I easily fell asleep again, wondering how Harry in the meantime had got on with his cousin. My dear mamma would not allow me to be disturbed. She had entered my room once or twice, ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous

... representatives to a stranger of the Bavaro-Hellenic kingdom of Otho the gleaner, and the three donative powers, informed me that it consisted of charioteers. Each member of the society speaking on his own account, and all at the same time—a circumstance I afterwards found not uncommon in other antiquarian and literary societies at Athens—asked me if I was going to Athens: eis Athenas was the phrase. The Arab and a couple of Maltese alone said "Ees teen Atheena." Entrapped into a reply by the classic sound, I unwittingly ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 344, June, 1844 • Various

... that you owe a grudge to," replies Muff; whereat all the class laugh, except the last comer, who takes it all for granted, and makes a note of the circumstance in his interleaved manual. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various

... of strong feelings had been offended by some trifle, and expressed sensations of hatred against the offender obviously too violent for the occasion; to bring the angry boy's imagination to a temperate state, we might recall some circumstance of his former affection for the offender; or the general idea, that it is amiable and noble to command our passion, and to forgive those who have injured us. At the sight of his mother, with whom he had many agreeable associations, the imagination of Coriolanus raised up instantly a train ...
— Practical Education, Volume II • Maria Edgeworth

... while Uncle Billy dealt the cards, turning up the Jack or right bower—but WITHOUT that exclamation of delight which always accompanied his good fortune, nor did Uncle Jim respond with the usual corresponding simulation of deep disgust. Such a circumstance had not occurred before in the history of their partnership. They both played in silence—a silence only interrupted by a larger splash of raindrops ...
— Stories in Light and Shadow • Bret Harte

... the average. Year after year, however, passed away, and not a farthing of dividend came to the shareholders; promises only of large profits at some future period—that was all. It happened that none of the shareholders had invested any very large sums, and this was thought a fortunate circumstance, as none of them felt very deeply involved. The rich had speculated with their superfluity, and they could bear to joke on the subject of the Romantic Valley, though they shook their heads when the supposed value of the shares was hinted at. The poor felt it more, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 460 - Volume 18, New Series, October 23, 1852 • Various

... in early winter you might have seen them together in a different vehicle—a first-class compartment of the express from Knype to Liverpool. They had the compartment to themselves, and they were installed therein with every circumstance of luxury. Both were enwrapped in furs, and a fur rug united their knees in its shelter. Magazines and newspapers were scattered about to the value of a labourer's hire for a whole day; and when Denry's eye met the guard's it said "shilling." In short, nobody could possibly be more ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett

... my return of the visit of MM.Schneider and Bourdon, but the circumstance of their having inspected the designs in my Scheme Book, and especially my original design of the steam hammer, was regarded by my partner as too ordinary and trivial an incident of their visit to be mentioned to me. The exhibition of my mechanical designs ...
— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth

... unlikely that Perkins would have achieved success with his enterprise but for one unfortunate circumstance: he was totally unfamiliar with the preparations, excepting in so far as the pharmacopoeia instructed him; and as ill-luck would have it, in putting them up he got the labels of the liver regulator on the hair vigor ...
— Elbow-Room - A Novel Without a Plot • Charles Heber Clark (AKA Max Adeler)

... with sharpers and pickpockets. My only consolation was the sum was small; for I had been cautioned not to travel with much money about me, lest we should meet robbers on the road; and the advice happened to be serviceable. That I had not my watch in my pocket was another lucky circumstance, or it would have disappeared. The fear of highwaymen had induced me to pack it up in my trunk. As for my handkerchief, it was gone, in the company of ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft

... to me probable that the man who had induced me to commit this nefarious deed, as it now appeared to me, might not denounce me. I immediately resolved to set to work in my vaulted room, and if possible to assume an indifferent look. But alas! an additional circumstance, which I only now noticed, increased my anxiety still more. My cap and my girdle, as well as my instruments, were wanting, and I was uncertain as to whether I had left them in the room of the murdered girl, or whether I had lost them in my flight. The former seemed ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: German (V.2) • Various

... In 1670, Count Orazio and his younger brother are the sole representatives of the family of Montorio. Orazio has married Erminia di Vivaldi, whom he loves devotedly. She does not return his love. The younger brother determines to take advantage of this circumstance to gain the title and estates for himself, and succeeds in arousing Orazio's jealousy against a young officer, Verdoni, to whom Erminia had formerly been deeply attached. In a violent passion Orazio slays Verdoni ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead

... confidence in their superior wisdom, and of registering without amendment, any bill which they may send us. To that humiliating situation we are, I grieve to say, fast approaching. I was much struck by a circumstance which occurred a few days ago. I heard the honourable Member for Montrose, who, by the by, is one of the supporters of this bill, urge the House to pass the Combination Bill, for a most extraordinary reason. "We really," he said, "cannot tell how the law about combinations ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 4 (of 4) - Lord Macaulay's Speeches • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... their nature are possessed, as you know, of a very subtle flavour. The larger music, the more majestic lengths of verse called epics, the exact in sculpture, the classic drama, the most absolute kinds of wine, require a perfect harmony of circumstance for their appreciation. Whatever is strong, poignant, and immediate in its effect is not so difficult to suit; farce, horror, rage, or what not, these a man can find in the arts, even when his mood may be heavy ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc

... exhausted all who had anything to do with it. He had made 5000 pounds by this work alone, and would very likely make another 5000 pounds before he died. A man who had done all this and wanted a piece of bread and butter had a right to announce the fact with some pomp and circumstance. Nor should his words be taken without searching for what he used to call a "deeper and more hidden meaning." Those who searched for this even in his lightest utterances would not be without their reward. They would find that "bread and butter" was Skinnerese for oyster-patties and apple tart, and ...
— The Way of All Flesh • Samuel Butler

... in looking for one thing another has been chanced on. A reasoning process has yet to be invented by which to go straight to the desired end. For now the slightest particle is enough to throw the search aside, and the most minute circumstance sufficient to conceal obvious and brilliantly shining truths. One summer evening sitting by my window I watched for the first star to appear, knowing the position of the brightest in the southern sky. The dusk came ...
— The Story of My Heart • Richard Jefferies

... amiable Goddess, who is said by Eupolis to have dwelt on the lips of Pericles. This Cethegus was joint-consul with P. Tuditanus in the second Punic war; at which time also M. Cato was Quaestor, about one hundred and forty years before I myself was promoted to the consulship; which circumstance would have been absolutely lost, if it had not been recorded by Ennius; and the memory of that illustrious citizen, as has probably been the case of many others, would have been obliterated by the rust of antiquity. ...
— Cicero's Brutus or History of Famous Orators; also His Orator, or Accomplished Speaker. • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... engaged about a year he began to insist on sex relations. Though of a refined and noble character, she was of a passionate nature and she did not offer much resistance. Many girls who would under no circumstance indulge in illicit relations, considering it a great sin, have no compunctions about having relations with their fiances. They lived together for about a year. They were together almost daily, except now and then, when he would go away for a week or two on business. Once he went ...
— Woman - Her Sex and Love Life • William J. Robinson

... people in regard to the Quaker infant and his protectors had not undergone a favorable change, in spite of the momentary triumph which the desolate mother had obtained over their sympathies. The scorn and bitterness of which he was the object were very grievous to Ilbrahim, especially when any circumstance made him sensible that the children his equals in age partook of the enmity of their parents. His tender and social nature had already overflowed in attachments to everything about him, and still there was a residue ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... way. He did not speak, and he did not dodge. One circumstance overjoyed him. He saw no signs of a military expedition on foot. Was Lysander going alone with him to the mountains? "I sushpect I can find some trick for him, shmart as he ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge

... vault, but the greater portion of the building, which was evidently of great proportions, is now buried in sand. The exact spot is pointed out where the manger stood, and so is the point where the heel ropes of this famous horse were tied. This circumstance misled one traveller into stating in 1872 that "two hills, one mile apart to the south-west, denoted the places where the manger and the spot where the head of this famous horse were tied." This error has been ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor

... as his word. At nine o'clock next evening—about the hour of his former visit—Frances ushered him into my parlour. The similarity of circumstance may have suggested to me to draw the comparison; at any rate I observed then for the first time that rapid ageing of his features which afterwards became a matter of common remark. The face was no longer that of the young man who had entered my parlour ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... not once depart from the ready kindness that he had shown. In the most obliging manner, patient over the minutest trifles, and remembering most happily, he went over every circumstance, putting himself at my disposal like a professional guide. At last, when every particular about Sand had been sucked dry, I began to ask him about the manner in which executions were performed. "As to that," said he, "I can offer you an introduction to someone at Heidelberg who can give you all ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... place; and, in crossing a point of land, had the misfortune to lose one of the dogs, which set off in pursuit of some rein-deer. Arriving at the bay, we only found a stream that fell into it from the north-east, and looked in vain for the Copper-Mine River. This circumstance confused the guide, and he confessed that he was now doubtful of the proper route; we, therefore, halted, and despatched him, with two men, to look for the river from the top of the high hills near the Rock-nest. During this delay a slight injury ...
— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 2 • John Franklin

... heaven give us a peaceable night and rest, like other mortals!' was the exclamation of the monk who had accompanied us from the Rio Negro, as he lay down to repose in our bivouac. It is a singular circumstance to be reduced to such a petition in the midst of the solitude of the woods. In the hotels of Spain, the traveller fears the sound of the guitar from the neighbouring apartment: in the bivouacs of the Orinoco, which are spread on the open sand, or under the shade of a single tree, what you have to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various

... when Big Meg, the village cannon, was brought down to the cliff and planted ready for invaders. Her grandmother had spoken often of the time when all the men from the Ratcliffe property, away west, had followed somebody that wanted to send the King away, but Mary's knowledge of this circumstance was severely indefinite. The lads in the place would have followed their Squire had he chosen to imitate "Ratcliffe," but the Squire of that day was a quiet man who liked the notion of keeping his head on his shoulders. Mary knew of one country beyond England, ...
— The Romance of the Coast • James Runciman

... that case at the time from Harper himself?-Yes, I was acquainted with the circumstance, and the day before I came here the man told me he had to ...
— Second Shetland Truck System Report • William Guthrie

... joint or knee, which from acquiring chlorophyll becomes green, and increases in size. In rarely or never becoming perfectly straight, these cotyledons differ remarkably from the ultimate condition of the arched hypocotyls or epicotyls of dicotyledons. It is, also, a singular circumstance that the attenuated extremity of the upper bent portion invariably withers ...
— The Power of Movement in Plants • Charles Darwin

... Peabodys in Boston was a centre of transcendentalism, "The Dial" being published there; and Hawthorne's attention may have been drawn to the movement for a practical application of the new social ideas by this circumstance, and he may well have made the acquaintance of Ripley, the chief projector, through these family friends. It is to be remembered, too, that he had been interested previously in the community idea, in the case of the Shakers, and had twice written tales on motives suggested by their ...
— Nathaniel Hawthorne • George E. Woodberry

... trouble, from her pug's asthma to the annihilation of a multitude in warfare or disaster. She had the kindest heart, and no doubt it was rather her misfortune than her fault that she could not clearly realize any circumstance or situation which did not impinge in some way ...
— The Message • Alec John Dawson

... One circumstance affected me in this part of Pink's story. I was a student in Oxford at that time. By comparing dates, there was no doubt whatever that I, who held my guardians in abhorrence, and, above all things, admired my brother for his conduct, might have rescued him ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey

... romance; if Michael Angelo's Penseroso translate in marble the dark broodings of a despot's soul; if Della Porta's Julia Farnese be the Roman courtesan magnificently throned in nonchalance at a pope's footstool; if Verocchio's Colleoni on his horse at Venice impersonate the pomp and circumstance of scientific war—surely this Medea exhales the flower-like graces, the sweet sanctities of human life, that even in that turbid age were found among high-bred Italian ladies. Such power have mighty sculptors, even in our modern world, to make the mute stone speak in poems and clasp the soul's life ...
— New Italian sketches • John Addington Symonds

... behaved with the greatest courtesy to their captives, their conduct presenting an extraordinary contrast to that of the Spaniards under similar circumstance in the Netherlands. The women were treated with the greatest courtesy, and five thousand inhabitants, including women and priests, were allowed to leave the town with their clothes. The terms were ...
— By England's Aid or The Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604) • G.A. Henty

... resemblance to a drawing of it in my first work. As I have since been on the spot, I am sorry to say that it is not at all like the place, because it obliges me to reject the only praise Sir Thomas Mitchell ever gave me; but I mention the circumstance because it gives me the opportunity to relate an anecdote, connected with the drawing, in which my worthy and amiable friend, Mr. Shannon, a clergyman of Edinburgh, and a very popular preacher there, but who is now no more, took a chief part. ...
— Expedition into Central Australia • Charles Sturt

... struggle, the importance of which had wholly escaped him, Paul's only auxiliary was the old notary, Mathias. Both were about to be confronted, unaware and defenceless, by a most unexpected circumstance; to be pressed by an enemy whose strategy was planned, and driven to decide on a course without having time to reflect upon it. Where is the man who would not have succumbed, even though assisted by Cujas and Barthole? How should he look for deceit and treachery where all seemed compliant ...
— The Marriage Contract • Honore de Balzac

... philosophers it should have been expressly disavowed. Even in the Canonical Scriptures, the words "immortal" and "immortality" occur only in the Epistles of the Apostle Paul, and consequently not till "life and immortality had been brought to light through the Gospel." It is a remarkable circumstance that these words are met with more frequently in the Apocryphal Books, 2 Esdras, Wisdom of Solomon, and Ecclesiasticus, than in the Canonical Scriptures. The {2} explanation of the apparent silence of the Scriptures, especially those of the Old Testament, on so essential a doctrine, will, I ...
— An Essay on the Scriptural Doctrine of Immortality • James Challis

... Medenham was driving from Cavendish Square to Charing Cross, Cynthia was crossing London on a converging line from St. Pancras to the Savoy Hotel. Strange, indeed, was the play of Fate's shuttle that it should have so nearly reunited the unseen threads of their destinies! Again, a trifling circumstance conspired to detain Vanrenen in London. One of his business associates in Paris, rendered impatient by the failure of the great man to return as quickly as he had promised, arrived in England by the afternoon service from the Gare du Nord, and was actually standing in the foyer of the hotel ...
— Cynthia's Chauffeur • Louis Tracy

... children chiefly claim him as their patron saint, but he also guards sailors, and legend asserts that many a ship on the point of being wrecked or stranded has been saved by his timely influence. During his lifetime the circumstance took place for which he was ever afterwards recognized as the maidens' guardian. A certain man had lost all his money, and to rid himself from his miserable situation he determined to sell his three beautiful ...
— Dutch Life in Town and Country • P. M. Hough

... 9, we fulfilled our purpose of dining by ourselves at the Mitre, according to old custom. There was, on these occasions, a little circumstance of kind attention to Mrs. Williams, which must not be omitted. Before coming out, and leaving her to dine alone, he gave her her choice of a chicken, a sweetbread, or any other little nice thing, which was carefully sent to her from the ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell

... the great repute in which they were held by the Babylonians. He says, that the noblest of them were styled the royal Palms; and supposes that they were so called from their being set apart for the king's use. But they were very early an emblem of royalty: and it is a circumstance included in their original name. We find from Apuleius, that Mercury, the [4]Hermes of Egypt, was represented with a palm branch in his hand: and his priests at Hermopolis used to have them stuck in their [5]sandals, ...
— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume II. (of VI.) • Jacob Bryant

... charity, Sarah's brother Tom went there, easily set Mrs. Pipelet jabbering, and learned that a young lady, on the point of being surprised by her husband, had been saved, thanks to a lodger in the house named Rudolph. Informed of this circumstance, Sarah, possessing no material proof of the rendezvous that Lady d'Harville had given to Charles Robert, conceived another odious plan. It was concocted to send an anonymous letter to the marquis, in order to effect a complete rupture between him and Rudolph, or, at least, to make the ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue

... of his life which he had spent among the people of Carlingford. Meanwhile John stood at the door and watched him, and of course thought it was very "queer." "It aint as if he'd a-been sitting up all night, like our young ladies," said John to himself, and unconsciously noted the circumstance down in his memory against ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant

... affirms That by our senses we're deceived, Another[28] swears, in plainest terms, The senses are to be believed. The twain are right. Philosophy Correctly calls us dupes whene'er Upon mere senses we rely. But when we wisely rectify The raw report of eye or ear, By distance, medium, circumstance, In real knowledge we advance. These things hath nature wisely plann'd— Whereof the proof shall be at hand. I see the sun: its dazzling glow Seems but a hand-breadth here below; But should I see it in its home, That azure, star-besprinkled dome, Of all the universe the eye, Its blaze ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine

... the bar. By this means, small weights up to 7lb. could be put on while hanging, but when these had to be taken off and a large weight put on, the scale was lowered to the rest, and again raised after the change was made. I may here state that a curious circumstance occurred twice, which seems to indicate that mere raising of the weight, without the slightest apparent vibration, was equal in effect to an additional weight. 33/4 cwts. were on the scale, a 14lb. weight was added, then 7lb., then 4lb., 2lb., 1lb., and 1lb., making 4cwts. ...
— Scientific American, Volume XXIV., No. 12, March 18, 1871 • Various

... peril when we can relieve him, even though we may not have been instrumental in placing him where he is. If he is hungry and we do not feed him when it is in our power to do so, we practically permit him to die of hunger. We should take this view concerning any perilous condition, any adverse circumstance, with our neighbors. How love is the fulfilment of the Law, we ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. II - Epiphany, Easter and Pentecost • Martin Luther

... theism. Granting the facts, we fail to see how they are explained by the current theory which makes the highest god the latest in evolution from a ghost. That theory wrecks itself again on the circumstance that, whereas the tribal or national highest divine being, as latest in evolution, ought to be the most potent, he is, in fact, among barbaric races, usually the most disregarded. A new idea, of course, ...
— Myth, Ritual, and Religion, Vol. 1 • Andrew Lang

... see that my dislike for Krak was pleasanter to my mother than my liking for the Countess. Women seem to me to have the instinct of monopoly, and not to care for a share of affection. Such, at least, was my mother's temperament, intensified no doubt by the circumstance that in future days my favour and liking might be matters of importance. She feared from another woman just what she feared from Hammerfeldt, his governor, and his tutors; probably her knowledge of the world made her dread another woman more than any number of men. ...
— The King's Mirror • Anthony Hope

... husband. In the inferior races and lower animals this obscure metamorphosis is still more apparent. A negress who has borne her first child to a white man, will ever after have children of a color lighter than her own. Count Strzelewski, in his Travels in Australia, narrates this curious circumstance: A native woman who has once had offspring by a white man, can never more have children by a male of her own race. Dr. Darwin relates that a male zebra was once brought to England, and a hybrid race, marked by the zebra's stripes, was produced from certain ...
— The Physical Life of Woman: - Advice to the Maiden, Wife and Mother • Dr. George H Napheys

... fly quite prettily. Yet, your true fisherman is born, not made; it is not a question of environment, but it is, very often, one of heredity; for the tendency comes out when, apparently, every adverse circumstance has combined to ...
— Jan and Her Job • L. Allen Harker

... Such answer household ends; but she will have Souls straight and clear, of toughest fibre, sound Down to the heart of heat; from these she strips All needless stuff, all sapwood; hardens them, From circumstance untoward feathers plucks Crumpled and cheap, and barbs with iron will: The hour that passes is her quiver-boy; When she draws bow, 'tis not across the wind, Nor 'gainst the sun, her haste-snatched arrow sings, For sun and wind have plighted faith to her: ...
— Told by the Northmen: - Stories from the Eddas and Sagas • E. M. [Ethel Mary] Wilmot-Buxton

... not be set till six o'clock the next morning, as no surgeon was to be had before that time, and she now lies at our house in a very doubtful and dangerous state. Of course we are all exceedingly distressed at the circumstance, for she was like one of our own family. Since the event we have been almost without assistance—a person has dropped in now and then to do the drudgery, but we have as yet been able to procure no ...
— The Life of Charlotte Bronte - Volume 1 • Elizabeth Gaskell

... (H.M.S.), circumstance of Darwin joining. -Darwin's views on species when on. -FitzRoy and voyage ...
— More Letters of Charles Darwin Volume II - Volume II (of II) • Charles Darwin

... anticipating a delightful day: he was to have called, with Glover, on Mrs Edmonstone, and he hoped to have met Miss Armytage, who was staying with her; but his first thought on waking was the disagreeable circumstance which had occurred at the conclusion of the previous evening, and the still more disagreeable events to which it would ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston

... the nature of the fight; who had been hurt; and how badly had any body been hurt; and what other harm had been done. The answers to all these questions were given with a fair amount of truth, except that the little circumstance of the origin of the fire was not explained. Both Boscobel and Joe had seen the torch put down, but it could hardly have been expected that they should have been explicit as to such a detail as that. Nor did they mention the names of either their brother ...
— Harry Heathcote of Gangoil • Anthony Trollope

... curious minute circumstance which struck me, in comparing the various editions of Johnson's imitations of Juvenal. In the tenth Satire, one of the couplets upon the vanity of wishes even for literary ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell

... the workings was selected by circumstance rather than by the diggers. At this particular point of its course there had been some hesitation on the part of the river in choosing its bed, and with but a little coaxing it had been diverted into an old channel—which ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace

... hours the jerks continue without results. I profit by the circumstance to learn the manner in which the work is performed. The bare brick allows me to see what the excavated soil would conceal from me. When it is necessary to move the body, the Beetle turns over; with his six claws he grips the hair of the dead animal, props himself upon his back ...
— The Glow-Worm and Other Beetles • Jean Henri Fabre

... blindness threw much of the responsibility of management and direction upon Harriet and Mary, though theirs was an early age at which to be so placed. For though, it is true, they could ask his advice on every passing circumstance, they very often refrained from doing so, because, in their changed condition, most of these very occurrences would, if related to Mr. Mannering, have had the effect of reminding him, very ...
— The Young Lord and Other Tales - to which is added Victorine Durocher • Camilla Toulmin

... thought of her approaching separation from her husband; she lamented it, but feeling his departure to be an imperious duty, and having it ever in her mind, she bore up against her feelings, and submitted, without repining, to what could not be averted. There was, however, one circumstance, which caused her much uneasiness—that was the temper and conduct of her father. Amine, who knew his character well, perceived that he already secretly hated Philip, whom he regarded as an obstacle to his obtaining ...
— The Phantom Ship • Frederick Marryat

... not long survived the husband who had given her a pomp and circumstance for which she was ill fitted. They were buried in the same grave, and Hertfordshire sent its thousands ...
— The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley • Louis Tracy

... we have the Age of Trilobites. Later there is the Age of Fishes, then of Cryptogams and Amphibia, and then of Cycads and Reptiles, and there will afterwards be an Age of Birds and Mammals, and finally an Age of Man. But there is no ground for mystic speculation on this circumstance of a group of organisms fording the earth for a few million years, and then perishing or dwindling into insignificance. We shall see that a very plain and substantial process put an end to the Age of the Cycads, Ammonites, ...
— The Story of Evolution • Joseph McCabe

... apartments, there to consult their note-books until the wonted hour for repairing to the meadow was come. When it had arrived they were not slow to make the pleasant excursion, and those who were prepared to tell of some merry circumstance already showed mirthful faces that gave promise of much laughter. When they were seated, they asked Saffredent to whom he would give his vote for the ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. III. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre

... sentiment, the kindly impulse, the social instincts which had invested that stalwart shape with dangerous fascination, which had implied the hope of ultimate repentance, of redemption even in this world. The HOUR and the CIRCUMSTANCE had seized their prey; and the self-defence, which a lawless career rendered a necessity, left the eternal die of blood ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... was to break through the brush and run forward. But his caution of the day commanded by circumstance, though never a part of the man's headlong nature, remained with him, counselling cool thought instead of hot haste. The man down was dead or as good as dead; him King could not help. So he held back ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory

... tired before that thrilling moment they quite forgot the circumstance in their wild anxiety to learn what had happened to the strange boy. Fortunately the spot where they had last seen the other vanish was not far away, and they soon came to ...
— The Outdoor Chums at Cabin Point - or The Golden Cup Mystery • Quincy Allen

... family; but, an thou press me for the tithe outside the city, the load will sell but for one dirham and thou wilt take it and I shall abide without food, I and my family. Indeed, thou and I in this circumstance are like unto David and Solomon (on the twain be the Peace!)" "How so?" asked the Tither, and the woodcutter answered, ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... Already, at hungry twenty-six, Gravener looked as blank and parliamentary as if he were fifty and popular. In my scrap of a residence—he had a worldling's eye for its futile conveniences, but never a comrade's joke—I sounded Frank Saltram in his ears; a circumstance I mention in order to note that even then I was surprised at his impatience of my enlivenment. As he had never before heard of the personage it took indeed the form of impatience of the preposterous Mulvilles, his relation to whom, like mine, had had its origin in an early, a childish intimacy ...
— The Coxon Fund • Henry James

... scribblers of the day, however, thought proper to remedy this lack of information, and accused him of possessing so little of the amor patriae, as to make the addition in order that he might not be taken for an Englishman; though this idea could have had no other foundation than the circumstance of his having, in consequence of his zeal for King William, attacked the prejudices of his ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808) • Daniel Defoe

... friend and fellow-student of our author, and who always spoke of his writings with admiration, tinctured with wonder) used to mention a circumstance with respect to the last-mentioned work, which may throw some light on the history and progress of Mr. Godwin's mind. He was anxious to make his biographical account as complete as he could, and applied for this purpose to many of his acquaintance to furnish him with anecdotes or to suggest criticisms. ...
— The Spirit of the Age - Contemporary Portraits • William Hazlitt

... or formed part of, the suburb called Augustus Felix. It is worthy of remark that the plan of this edifice is in close accord with the descriptions of country houses given us by Vitruvius and others—a circumstance which tends strongly to confirm the belief already expressed, that the houses of the city are built upon the Roman system of arrangement, although the Greek taste may predominate in their decoration. We will commence by extracting the ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy

... Perhaps they owed their safety principally to Captain Clerke's walking with a pistol in his hand, which he once fired. This circumstance is omitted both in Captain Cook's and Mr Andersen's journal, but it is here mentioned on the authority ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr

... father fell into dumb, despairing rage. His rigid face and smoldering eyes, his grim lips, terrified us all. It seemed to him (as to us), that the entire farm was about to take flight and the bitterest part of the tragic circumstance lay in the reflection that our loss (which was much greater than any of our neighbors) was due to the extra care with which we had pulverized ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland

... renders the subject furious; a word, a look, or some trivial circumstance are enough for him to prove the infidelity of his wife. The latter has to avoid the slightest thing which might arouse jealousy, but all in vain; reserve and even prudery are regarded by the jealous ...
— The Sexual Question - A Scientific, psychological, hygienic and sociological study • August Forel

... place in the universe apart from my thought one such figure, it remains true, nevertheless, that this figure possesses a certain determinate nature, form, or essence, which is immutable and eternal, and not framed by me, nor in any degree dependent on my thought; as appears from the circumstance, that diverse properties of the triangle may be demonstrated, viz., that its three angles are equal to two right, that its greatest side is subtended by its greatest angle, and the like, which, whether I will or not, I now clearly ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VII (of X)—Continental Europe I • Various

... Great-ones of the Cittie, (In personall suite to make me his Lieutenant) Off-capt to him: and by the faith of man I know my price, I am worth no worsse a place. But he (as louing his owne pride, and purposes) Euades them, with a bumbast Circumstance, Horribly stufft with Epithites of warre, Non-suites my Mediators. For certes, saies he, I haue already chose my Officer. And what was he? For-sooth, a great Arithmatician, One Michaell Cassio, a Florentine, (A Fellow almost damn'd in a faire Wife) That neuer set a Squadron in the ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... people names, and tries to transfix a character with an epithet, which does not stick, because it has no other foundation than his own petulance and spite; or he endeavours to degrade by alluding to some circumstance of external situation. He says of Mr. Wordsworth's poetry, that "it is his aversion." That may be: but whose fault is it? This is the satire of a lord, who is accustomed to have all his whims or dislikes taken for gospel, ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin

... that they would buy sugar in proportion to the quantity of tea that they consume; the circumstance of a smaller sum being requisite for their weekly stock of tea, would enable them to spend a larger amount in other articles, among which sugar would, undoubtedly, be one of the most important. ...
— The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom • P. L. Simmonds

... disturb the truth that some must serve and some must direct; that some shall have charge over many things, and some over but few. It does not supersede the outward order of society. But it affirms that to no man or body of men, no matter how highly endowed by nature or circumstance with intellect, position or riches, shall be accorded the right to dispose arbitrarily of the lives and welfare of the masses. Not elsewhere than in the hands of the entire community shall be lodged the reins of ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne

... that Rigby offered his congratulations to his patron. He praised the judicious alliance, accompanied by every circumstance conducive to worldly happiness; distinguished beauty, perfect temper, princely rank. Rigby, who had hardly got out of his hustings' vein, was most eloquent in his praises ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli

... that dreamest an Event, While Circumstance is but a waste of sand, Arise, take up thy fortunes in thy hand, And daily forward ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... me an ascendancy over all not greatly older than myself;—over all with a single exception. This exception was found in the person of a scholar, who, although no relation, bore the same Christian and surname as myself;—a circumstance, in fact, little remarkable; for, notwithstanding a noble descent, mine was one of those everyday appellations which seem, by prescriptive right, to have been, time out of mind, the common property of the mob. In this ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe

... winter. In the few moments of leisure which my preparations for that journey admitted, I have read some detached parts, and find that it would have been very interesting to me. In one of these (page 60), I have taken the liberty of noting a circumstance which is not true, and to which I believe M. d'Aubertueil first gave a place in history. In page 75, I observe it says that Congress removed to Hartford, but this is a misinformation. They never sat there. In general, I would observe to you, that where ...
— The Writings of Thomas Jefferson - Library Edition - Vol. 6 (of 20) • Thomas Jefferson

... elsewhere, by a happy Providence is furnished to us by the natural divisions of meeting and parting in this place. To everyone of us, old and young, the long vacation on which we are now entering gives us a breathing space, and time to break the bonds which place and circumstance have woven round us during the year that is past. From all our petty cares, and confusions, and intrigues; from the dust and clatter of this huge machinery amidst which we labor and toil; from whatever cynical contempt of what is generous and devout; from ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes

... citizens of a colony came there originally in the humblest possible way; and how many of the dregs of colonial society—the occupiers of the lowest rung on the colonial ladder—reached their new home with all the pomp and circumstance of quarter-deck sublimity, and all the humbug and pretension of real or fancied aristocracy. Is the result we see—for these contrasts are to be found plentifully in all the colonies at the Antipodes—what it ought to be, or not? That ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay

... that I trust you, the very writing itself is proof. And I write this to you, who never can be to me what man must be to woman if either is to be happy—the man to whom I can never be what woman must be if she is to mean all to any man. Apart forever! We are estranged by circumstance, sundered by that, if you please, weak as those words seem. And yet something takes your soul to mine. Does something take mine to you, across all the wilderness, across all the miles, across all the long and ...
— The Magnificent Adventure - Being the Story of the World's Greatest Exploration and - the Romance of a Very Gallant Gentleman • Emerson Hough

... haughty assumption and oppression on the one hand, and the most abject servitude on the other. Descended from the same stern Saxon stock, separated only by purely artificial barriers, by the fortuitous circumstance of birth, the sturdy peasant could ill brook the tyranny of the privileged class—those 'lords rich in some dozen paltry villages.' That stern independence which has ever been the prominent characteristic ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No. V, May, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... not meet with any such serious obstruction as the last: indeed we imagined we could trace the course of the river nearly on a parallel line with us. We this day saw a solitary native, but I believe we were indebted for the sight rather to the circumstance of his being deprived of the use of his limbs than to his boldness or curiosity. Two or three families had been encamped on the spot where we found him, but they had all departed. He seemed more astonished than alarmed ...
— Journals of Two Expeditions into the Interior of New South Wales • John Oxley

... When these arrive, we shall know what is intended as to the article relating to the deputies of Congress, and shall see how these observations will be received at St Petersburg. It is for you to judge, Sir, whether you think this circumstance ought to withhold you or not from making ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. VIII • Various

... Rigby, while in the ministry, fought a duel with some political opponent. Mr. Rigby had taken great notice of the little French child treated with such affectionate familiarity by his sister, and she had attached herself so strongly to him that, on hearing the circumstance of his duel suddenly mentioned for the first time, she fainted away: a story that always reminded me of the little Spanish girl Florian mentions in his "Memoires d'un jeune Espagnol," who, at six years of age, having asked a young man of upward of five and twenty if he loved ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble

... were intelligent. I thought—since you exist—you would prove a reader of the heart. And yet you would propose to judge me by my acts! Think of it; my acts! I was born and I have lived in a land of giants; giants have dragged me by the wrists since I was born out of my mother—the giants of circumstance. And you would judge me by my acts! But can you not look within? Can you not understand that evil is hateful to me? Can you not see within me the clear writing of conscience, never blurred by any wilful sophistry[19] ...
— Short-Stories • Various

... The circumstance of Mr. Lulu Harcourt's unveiling a memorial to Mr. Joseph Chamberlain and Mr. Austen Chamberlain at the Albert Dock Hospital is not without precedent. On more than one occasion party differences have been similarly forgotten. Thus several golf-players ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, July 1, 1914 • Various

... eyes on Pratt. And Pratt suddenly felt a little afraid—there was anger in those eyes; anger of a curious sort. It might be against fate—against circumstance: it might not—why should it?—be against him personally, but it was there, and it was malign and almost evil, and it ...
— The Talleyrand Maxim • J. S. Fletcher

... really original collection, for, taking advantage of the circumstance that Mr. Imber had said nothing about the postcards being strictly of Stratford-on-Avon, he had bought only what pleased himself: all being what are called comic cards—dreadful pictures of mothers-in-law, and twins, and ...
— The Slowcoach • E. V. Lucas

... who had a verbal message from General Greene. Inclosed I send to your Excellency the letter I have received on the occasion. Perhaps, did he mean to propose an expedition towards Cape-fear or Georgetown, which might be made with the light squadron above mentioned. An additional circumstance is, that l'Eveill will now be commanded by Mr. de Lombard, captain Latouche's uncle, who is entirely under that ...
— Memoirs, Correspondence and Manuscripts of General Lafayette • Lafayette

... it for granted that when one tells a lie, he expects to be believed. There must, then, be some thing or circumstance which can help to make his lies credible. Now, my dear princess, in the present instance, while I was looking you in the face and counting the tears upon your very beautiful cheeks, you deliberately told me that you were not weeping. There was, therefore, not even the shadow ...
— Marzio's Crucifix and Zoroaster • F. Marion Crawford

... touch, n. 396, 397. In the degree in which innocence retires from infants, affection and conjunction also abate, and this successively, even to separation, n. 398. A state of rational innocence and peace with parents towards infants, is grounded in the circumstance, that they know nothing and can do nothing from themselves, but from others, especially from the father and mother; and this state successively retires, in proportion as they know and have ability from ...
— The Delights of Wisdom Pertaining to Conjugial Love • Emanuel Swedenborg

... a sign Larsan made to a railway employe, a young man with a chin decorated by a tiny blond and ill-kept beard. On the sign he rose, paid for his drink, bowed, and went out. I should not myself have attached any importance to the circumstance, if it had not been recalled to my mind, some months later, by the reappearance of the man with the beard at one of the most tragic moments of this case. I then learned that the youth was one of Larsan's assistants and had been charged by him to watch the going and coming of travellers at the ...
— The Mystery of the Yellow Room • Gaston Leroux

... in the depths of the wood, for the black ash swale is not tenanted by many birds and squirrels as are the ridges, and only the striped woodpecker or a wandering jay fluttered about at times, or a coon might seek the pools for frogs. Harlson had circumstance for thought. Only the hard labor cleared his blood and brain, and ...
— A Man and a Woman • Stanley Waterloo

... was the difficulty encountered by the Roman general in attempting to cope with his warlike enemy in his mountains and forests, where the arts of war as practised by the former were not so readily applicable as in the plains, or the more probable circumstance that Domitian had been unsuccessful in an expedition against two other tribes, the Quadi and Marcomanni, and needed the support of Julianus, certain it is that the overtures of Decebalus were at length received favourably, ...
— Roumania Past and Present • James Samuelson

... honour to declare to his Excellency the French Minister that, being neutral, Greece could not authorize measures which violated her neutrality. The Hellenic Government was therefore obliged to protest against the passage of foreign troops through Greek territory. The circumstance that those troops were destined solely to the assistance of Servia, who was Greece's ally, nowise altered the case; for, before the casus faederis was realized, the neutrality of Greece could not be affected by the ...
— Greece and the Allies 1914-1922 • G. F. Abbott

... may perhaps be disposed to form a mean estimate of these pages, because few, or no learned, or technical, terms are employed in them; but this circumstance, so far from operating to the disparagement of the work, must prove a strong recommendation to the Public in general. The chief aim, in fact, of the noble Authoress has been to furnish such plain directions, in every branch of the culinary ...
— The Lady's Own Cookery Book, and New Dinner-Table Directory; • Charlotte Campbell Bury

... be considered equal; and, indeed, I have known some people happy under all the changes of fortune, when they could find patient auditors. Tully wept over his dead daughter, but when he chanced to think of the excellent things he could say on the subject, he considered it, on the whole, a happy circumstance. But, for my own part, I cannot say with the ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier

... and Paris are lending American bankers less than $100,000,000 on 60 or 90 day bills, while the total frequently runs up to three or four times that amount. The sum of these floating loans is, indeed, changing all the time, a circumstance which in itself is responsible for a demand for very great amounts ...
— Elements of Foreign Exchange - A Foreign Exchange Primer • Franklin Escher

... tragedy should present more than a great change between the first and last scenes; the change should be lamentable. We should feel that a much better ending might, and would, have come but for the circumstance that forms the crisis, or for other circumstances at the beginning of the play. If we consider such tragic careers as those of Hamlet, Lear, Macbeth and Othello we recognize that each might have come to a different conclusion if it had not been for the blight of a father's death or a single act ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne

... choose. Even now he was loaded down with a dim collection of junk he had grabbed up in the dark, things he knew nothing of, empty bottles and seine-floats, rubbish he had probably passed by a hundred times in his daylight rounds. The saving circumstance was that he kept dropping them in his ardor for still other treasures his blind feet stumbled on. I followed in his wake and I know, for half a dozen times his discards got under my feet and sent me staggering. Once, moved by some bizarre, thousandth chance of curiosity, ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... attraction of the day to the assembled crowds was the Emperor, Li Shih-Ming. Never had he been seen in such pomp and circumstance as on this occasion. Close round him stood the princes of the royal family, the great officers of state and the members of the Cabinet in their rich and picturesque dresses. Immediately beyond were earls ...
— Chinese Folk-Lore Tales • J. Macgowan

... firmly in her mind that a fit of gout was impending. Dr. Ross had once had a touch of gout—a very slight touch, to be sure—but it had given him a wholesome fear of the complaint, and had implanted in him a deep distrust of other men's port wine; and his devoted wife had never forgotten the circumstance. ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... thet durned lubber Jim Chowder to thank fur thet," said Hiram, interrupting him to explain this fortunate circumstance, which I now recollected Captain Snaggs alluding to when I was waiting at table in the cabin the same evening, before the tragic occurrence happened. "It's the fust time I ever recomembers ez how an unsailorlike act like thet ever did ...
— The Island Treasure • John Conroy Hutcheson

... time considering the situation. And now and then his lips curled in that old, self-mocking smile; realizing that he was caught in the trap of circumstance, he found a curious ...
— When A Man's A Man • Harold Bell Wright

... booths for traders that they call 'hotels' there," he had remarked to some of "the boys." In his preoccupation with the new guest, he also became a little neglectful of his old chum and dependent, Larry Hawkins. Nor was this the only circumstance that filled the head of that shiftless loyal retainer of the colonel with bitterness and foreboding. Polly Swinger—the scornfully indifferent, the contemptuously inaccessible, the coldly capricious and petulant—was inclined to be polite to ...
— Mr. Jack Hamlin's Mediation and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... all-holy and all-loving will of God. Whatever befalls us, however it befalls us, we must receive as the will of God. If it befalls us through man's negligence, or ill-will, or anger, still it is, in every the least circumstance, to us the will of God. For if the least thing could happen to us without God's permission, it would be something out of God's control. God's providence or His love would not be what they are. Almighty God Himself would ...
— Daily Strength for Daily Needs • Mary W. Tileston

... returned his pressure; and they stood, as chance willed it, alone, free from circumambulant tourists, in the vast chamber, vivid with Paul Veronese's colour on wall and ceilings, with Tintoretto and Bassano' with the arrogant splendour of the battles and the pomp and circumstance of victorious armies of the proud and conquering republic, and their eyes were drawn from all this painted and riotous wonder by the long arresting frieze of portraits of serene, masterful ...
— The Fortunate Youth • William J. Locke

... with the lives of literary men, especially at the commencement of their career, always excites interest. I have been, therefore, the more particular in detailing this circumstance, (except for its connexion, of no consequence) and proceed further to state, that now, meeting Mr. Southey, I said to him, "I have engaged to give Mr. Coleridge thirty guineas for a volume of his ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle

... circumstance I haven't told you about. It happened only a few days ago. It was that, in fact, which crystallized my own ideas about Sylvia's education. A letter was sent to me by a stranger, offering money for Sylvia's schooling. The whole thing was ...
— A Hoosier Chronicle • Meredith Nicholson

... not explain to myself the deep interest I took in whatever was connected with (the so-called) Warburton, or whatever promised to discover more clearly any particulars respecting him. His behaviour in the gambling house; his conversation with the woman in the Jardin des Plantes; and the singular circumstance, that a man of so very aristocratic an appearance, should be connected with Thornton, and only seen in such low scenes, and with such low society, would not have been sufficient so strongly to occupy my mind, had it not been for certain dim recollections, and undefinable associations, ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... well-sworn Lie, franked to the world with all The circumstance of proof, Cringes abashed, and sneaks along the wall At ...
— In a Steamer Chair And Other Stories • Robert Barr

... in an ambitious imagination, recognized by the public. Such were the two devils, or rather the two forms of the one devil Vanity, that possessed him. He looked down on his parents, and the whole circumstance of their ordered existence, as unworthy of him, because old-fashioned and bucolic, occupied only with God's earth and God's animals, and having nothing to do with the shows of life. And yet to the simply honourable, ...
— Salted With Fire • George MacDonald

... am reminded of the awful fact that I have no means of igniting our cigarettes. When I mention this unfortunate circumstance to my companion, he smiles triumphantly, and after placing his ear to the door in melodramatic fashion, proceeds to raise a particular brick in the floor of our apartment under which at least half ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman



Words linked to "Circumstance" :   playing field, ceremony, ceremonial, setting, observance, condition, circumstantial, environment, conditions, mitigating circumstance, context, case, consideration



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