"Impotent" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... before the tide of the north channel carried them to the English fleet, the magnificent flotilla, upon which Quebec had squandered a million livres, had become a squadron of blazing hulks which the British sailors grappled and towed to shore. All night long their impotent fires lit up the Bay, and by sunrise another hope of New France had turned ...
— Old Quebec - The Fortress of New France • Sir Gilbert Parker and Claude Glennon Bryan
... from meekness and partly from the animal contentment of present security, he accepted the situation. Fortunately for him it was purely passive. The Great Chief of the Minyo tribe was simply an expressionless idol of flesh and blood. The previous incumbent of that office had been an old man, impotent and senseless of late years through age and disease. The chieftains and braves had consulted in council before him, and perfunctorily submitted their decisions, like offerings, to his unresponsive shrine. In the same way, all material events—expeditions, ...
— A Drift from Redwood Camp • Bret Harte
... Impotent to resist the power that was drawing them down, Shad Trowbridge and Ungava Bob were certain beyond a doubt that presently they were to be hurled into this awful chasm, and that in all human probability but a few minutes more of life ...
— The Gaunt Gray Wolf - A Tale of Adventure With Ungava Bob • Dillon Wallace
... moment by the Druids' Tower when the vitriol had been flung upon Elaine, he had lived through a nightmare. Up on the hillside he was impotent to relieve her agony. No house around to take her to. Without a moment's delay he must get her into the ...
— Swirling Waters • Max Rittenberg
... of the Senses—live the Ideal life free Thought can give; And, lo, the gulf shall vanish, and the chill Of the soul's impotent despair be gone! And with divinity thou sharest the throne, Let but divinity become thy will! Scorn not the Law—permit its iron band The sense (it cannot chain the soul) to thrall. Let man no more the will of Jove withstand, And ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various
... of society when we first came to this district, was everything but friendly or agreeable. The ferment occasioned by the impotent rebellion of W.L. Mackenzie had hardly subsided. The public mind was in a sore and excited state. Men looked distrustfully upon each other, and the demon of party reigned preeminent, as much in the ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... discovered that the gate was shut. A great shout went up. The Indians ran to their lodges for spears and hatchets, though the weapons of many were within the Fort, and soon they were about the place, shouting in impotent rage. They could not tell how many invaders were in the Fort; they suspected it was the Little Skins, their ancient enemies. But Young Eye, they saw, had not been scalped. This was brought to the old chief, ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... absence, and clearly foreseeing that against the Duke of Burgundy, flushed with victory and present in person, she would obtain nothing of what she had asked. For spirits of the best mettle, and especially for a woman's heart, impotent passion is a heavy burden to bear; and Valentine Visconti, beautiful, amiable, and unhappy even in her best days through the fault of the husband she loved, sank under this trial. At the close of her life she had taken for device, "Nought have I more; more hold I nought" ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume III. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... in this light, we submit the following remarks as a sufficient antidote to this daring but impotent attempt to exclude Theology from the ...
— Modern Atheism under its forms of Pantheism, Materialism, Secularism, Development, and Natural Laws • James Buchanan
... the total dissolution of these, the inconvenience of thus encouraging the poor in habits of indolence and beggary was quickly felt throughout the kingdom: and abundance of statutes were made in the reign of king Henry the eighth, for providing for the poor and impotent; which, the preambles to some of them recite, had of late years strangely increased. These poor were principally of two sorts: sick and impotent, and therefore unable to work; idle and sturdy, and therefore ...
— Commentaries on the Laws of England - Book the First • William Blackstone
... nigh, down fell his ears Clapped close, and with his tail glad signs he gave Of gratulation, impotent to rise, And to approach his master as of old. Ulysses, noting him, wiped off a tear Unmarked. . . . Then his destiny released Old Argus, soon as he had lived to see Ulysses ...
— TITLE • AUTHOR
... to be taken—it had to be realised not only that the Labour movement could give the secret of success to the woman movement by its method and organization, but that on the other hand, woman held the secret without which labour is impotent to reach its ends. Woman, by virtue of motherhood is the regulator of the birthrate, the sacred disposer of human production. It is in the deliberate restraint and measurement of human production that the fundamental problems of the family, the nation, ...
— Woman and the New Race • Margaret Sanger
... turn in the road compelled them to turn off almost at right angles from the course taken by the air-craft. As a last farewell bullet whizzed harmlessly by, Harry, through the glasses, saw a familiar figure spring upright in the tonneau and shake his fist upward in impotent rage. ...
— The Boy Aviators' Treasure Quest • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... trade or be bound as apprentices. Servants and laborers may not carry arms nor play at foot-ball or tennis; they are encouraged, however, to have bows and arrows and use the same on Sundays and holidays. Impotent beggars are to be supported by the ...
— Popular Law-making • Frederic Jesup Stimson
... hovering over the prize, had finally closed upon it, and he was about to slip it into his pocket without more ado, when a strong brown hand descended upon his wrist. The shell was quietly taken from him, and looking up in impotent rage, he met the dark eyes of the Skipper gazing at ...
— Nautilus • Laura E. Richards
... escape. Many more must have been wounded and probably drowned, for fifty nine rounds were counted as discharged. On the return of the party to the cattle an incident occurred which nearly cost one of them his life. One of the routed natives, probably burning with revengeful and impotent hate, got into the water under the river bank, and waited for the returning party, and as they passed threw a spear at Scrutton, before any one was aware of his proximity. The audacious savage had much better have left it alone, for he paid for his temerity with his life. Although the ...
— The Overland Expedition of The Messrs. Jardine • Frank Jardine and Alexander Jardine
... as a prince and as a man, it was impossible that Robert should forgive. He escaped from the guilty city to implore the justice or compassion of the pope: the emperor was coolly exhorted to return to his station; before he could obey, he sunk under the weight of grief, shame, and impotent ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon
... wound his self-love forever? But he has a wife and family. You respect their feelings, smile and smile, and are villain enough to be civil with your lips, and hide the poison of asps under your tongue, till you have a chance to relieve your o'ercharged heart by shaking your fist in impotent wrath at his retreating form. You will receive the reward of your hypocrisy, as you richly deserve, for ten to one he will drop in again when he comes back from his office, and arrest you wandering in ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IV. (of X.) • Various
... powers about Schleswig-Holstein, few persons who judge by the event can doubt that an isolated intervention of England on behalf of Denmark against the combined forces of Austria and Prussia would have been absolutely impotent to effect the object that was desired, and that even if France had consented to join in the struggle it would have led to a military disaster hardly less than that of the war of Sedan. If, contrary to all probability, the combined forces of France and England had proved stronger than ...
— Historical and Political Essays • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... that Theodore's face became distorted and dreadful with pain. He raised two impotent, shaking arms high above his head. "That's just it! That's just it! You don't know what love is. You don't know what hate is. You don't know how I hate myself. Loathe myself. She's all that's miserable, all that's unspeakable, all that's vile. And if she called me to-day I'd ...
— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber
... the front of my doublet, feeling I must surely choke from the suffocating pressure upon my chest; I retain memory of glaring violently into the darkness; how I fondled the sharp edge of the hunting knife, crying and shouting impotent curses, which I trust God has long ago forgiven, at that incarnate devil who had hurled me down to such living death. Terror dominated my brain, pulsed like molten fire through my blood, until, as the desperation of my situation became more clearly defined, I tottered upon the ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... stood watching the impotent rage with which Chris kicked the lamp-post, as though he thought it was one of the enemies he wished to punish, a policeman came suddenly round the corner. Chris made a sort of rush at him with ...
— Archie's Mistake • G. E. Wyatt
... a terrible blow to Harold; when he had first realised the permanent nature of his injuries, he had cursed his fate; his impotent rage had been pitiful to behold. This travail occurred in the first year of his affliction; later, he discovered, as so many others have done in a like extremity, that time accustoms the mind to anything: he was now resigned to his misfortune. ...
— Sparrows - The Story of an Unprotected Girl • Horace W. C. Newte
... as he realized this comforting fact, and at the same time thought of his own great store of honey-pots—there were hundreds of them now—all ready and waiting to his hand. But his feeling of satisfaction passed quickly to one of impotent rage as he recognized his own powerlessness, for all his wealth of honey-pots, to make lebkuchen which would be eaten by anybody but the tough-palated children from St. Bridget's School. He was alone, smoking, in the little room back of the shop as this bitter thought came to ...
— A Romance Of Tompkins Square - 1891 • Thomas A. Janvier
... expended her breath and exhausted her epithets, was fain to pause a moment, though both her fists were shaken in the prisoner's face, and the whole of her wrinkled countenance was filled with fierce resentment. Deerslayer looked upon these impotent attempts to arouse him as indifferently as a gentleman in our own state of society regards the vituperative terms of a blackguard: the one party feeling that the tongue of an old woman could never injure a ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper
... from under my hat-brim that the solemn, hollow voice had penetrated the cold exterior of the plainsman. He could not speak; he clasped and unclasped his big hands in helpless fashion. Frank was as white as a sheet. This was simply delightful to me. But the expression of miserable, impotent distress on old Jim's sun-browned face was more than I could stand, and I could no longer keep up the deception. Just as Wallace cried out to Jones to pray—I wished then I had not weakened so soon—I got up and walked ...
— The Last of the Plainsmen • Zane Grey
... my Women; but in all Cases which come into Debate, there are certain things previously to be done before we can have a true Light into the Subject Matter; therefore it will, in the first Place, be necessary to consider the impotent Wenchers and industrious Haggs, who are supplied with, and are constantly supplying new Sacrifices to the Devil of Lust. You are to know then, if you are so happy as not to know it already, that the great Havock which is made in the Habitations of Beauty ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele
... primordial egg or organic germ, from which a living being would arise. A connecting link—a vital spark, or animating soul—is always wanting to complete the existence of the Prometheus of the laboratory. Mark, too, the "if," and the "might," in this most lame and impotent hypothesis:—"If, therefore, these globules be identical with the cells which are held to be reproductive, it might be said," &c. Globules can be easily produced; the passage of the electric fluid through water will produce aerial globules in rapid and expansive ...
— An Expository Outline of the "Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation" • Anonymous
... the State, and had in fact been set by the Texas Railway Commission. The Court found that the Interstate Commerce Commission had not exceeded its statutory powers. The constitutional objection to the Commission's action was stated thus: "That Congress is impotent to control the intrastate charges of an interstate carrier even to the extent necessary to prevent injurious discrimination against interstate traffic." This objection the Court met, as follows: "Wherever the interstate ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... though you should descend to something more despicable, more cowardly than ordinary treason, to wrest her from me. You reproach me with the failures of my life. Great they may have been, but if you attempt this you will find that I am not yet an impotent person." ...
— The Yellow Crayon • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... train windows, on my way back from Weybridge, at the countless lights, the endless huddled roofs of London; and, seeing in these a representation of the huge populace of the city, I would stretch out my arms in an impotent ...
— The Message • Alec John Dawson
... memorandum-book in which to write down my daily disbursements. Frequent visits to the opera (oh, the torture of those evenings!) had been an invariable rule with the Mountchessingtons; and, at the risk of rendering impotent the tympanum of both ears, I was compelled to continue that respectable custom. Persons occupying our position should be careful with whom they associated; and the character of my companions underwent a severe investigation. She even interfered with my business, and declared ...
— Trifles for the Christmas Holidays • H. S. Armstrong
... and generous cooperation the editor is greatly indebted to the authors and publishers of all the plays included. He is equally grateful to other dramatists who were personally as cordial in intention but quite impotent to grant copyright privileges. In addition, he has received most friendly and cordial criticism from friends and friendly strangers to whom he appealed—among others, from Mr. Harold Brighouse; ...
— The Atlantic Book of Modern Plays • Various
... infallibly gets into high society, she has the triumph of refusing many matches and securing the best, and she wears some family jewels or other as a sort of crown of righteousness at the end. Rakish men either bite their lips in impotent confusion at her repartees, or are touched to penitence by her reproofs, which, on appropriate occasions, rise to a lofty strain of rhetoric; indeed, there is a general propensity in her to make speeches, and to rhapsodize at some length when she retires to her bedroom. In her recorded ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot
... howls of the captured fugitive, nor the triumphant and accusing remark to us, shouted by the terrible capturer as he dragged off his victim: "Now ye see what liars ye are!" For, of course, we had done our impotent best to throw the hunter off the track. It was several days before I could lie again ...
— Herbert Hoover - The Man and His Work • Vernon Kellogg
... turned, and saw what trap he had blundered into; then stood transfixed, impotent, alternately scarlet with rage and white with the vital shame of discovery. M. Beaucaire remarked, indicating the silent figures by a polite wave of the hand, "Is it not a compliment to monsieur that I procure six large men to subdue him? They ...
— Monsieur Beaucaire • Booth Tarkington
... in a state of revolt. This idea soothes my nerves, and I lie close against the humid wall, behind which I feel there is an unknown but blessed protection, and with my face pressed into the hard horsehair pillow, I give vent to my first prisoner's tears; tears of agony and impotent revolt, tears ...
— The Idler Magazine, Volume III, June 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... next man up soaked out a Wright Brothers beauty among the trees over beyond left field, and cleared the bases amid the perfectly frantic rejoicing of the fickle Miss Josephine Stevens and all the negligible balance of Hollis Creek. Oh, it was disgraceful! Sam Turner ground his teeth in impotent rage. ...
— The Early Bird - A Business Man's Love Story • George Randolph Chester
... the Channel carrying Sir John French's little army to the Continent, while the boasted German fleet, impotent to menace the safety of our transports, lay helpless—bottled up, to quote Mr. Asquith's phrase, "in the inglorious seclusion of ...
— Tommy Atkins at War - As Told in His Own Letters • James Alexander Kilpatrick
... a venerable head whose crown occasionally appears beyond, at about its level. The apparition of a very small hand—whose fingers are bunchy and have the appearance of being slightly webbed—which is frequently lifted above the table in a vain and impotent attempt to reach the inkstand, always affects me as a novelty at each recurrence of the phenomenon. Yet both the venerable head and bunchy fingers belong to an individual with whom I am familiar, and to whom, for certain reasons hereafter described, I choose to ...
— Urban Sketches • Bret Harte
... result of Richelieu's gigantic efforts to consolidate the regal power. "Sixty-three kings," it said, "had preceded him in rule of the realm, but he alone had rendered it absolute, and what all collectively had been impotent to achieve in the course of twelve centuries for the grandeur of France, he had accomplished in the short space of thirty-three years." It was against that absolute power incarnate in Richelieu, which from the steps of the throne hurled men to the earth with its bolts rather than governed ...
— Political Women (Vol. 1 of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... mujerado. At first the sound organ responds in a natural manner to any stimulus that may affect it, but soon a local satyriacal condition is set up, which, running a more or less rapid period of intense activity, soon leaves its victim completely, permanently, and hopelessly impotent, even as much so as if eunuchized in the most approved manner. Hammond's description of the manner in which these unfortunates are manufactured is an interesting addition to the facts contained in the natural history of man, and is as follows: ...
— History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present - Moral and Physical Reasons for its Performance • Peter Charles Remondino
... and who care so little for facts that they treat fantastic declarations for immediate universal arbitration as being valuable, instead of detrimental, to the cause they profess to champion, and who seek to make the United States impotent for international good under the pretense of making us impotent for international evil. All the men of this kind, and all of the organizations they have controlled, since we began our career as a nation, all put together, have not ...
— Theodore Roosevelt - An Autobiography by Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt
... from his communion. But it was soon evident that the Church was not prepared for such an exercise of authority, for the Asiatics refused to yield; and as some of Victor's best friends protested against the imprudence of his procedure, the ecclesiastical thunderbolt proved an impotent demonstration. ...
— The Ancient Church - Its History, Doctrine, Worship, and Constitution • W.D. [William Dool] Killen
... these questions the French would appear to have aimed throughout at reducing the knights to as impotent a position as possible. The British, on the other hand, ostensibly desiring to see the strength of the order maintained, were chiefly interested in securing its neutrality. At the time of the signature of the preliminary treaty, ...
— The Political History of England - Vol XI - From Addington's Administration to the close of William - IV.'s Reign (1801-1837) • George Brodrick
... single day from first to last. Indeed I should have felt far more impatient of delay had it not been for the continuance of foul weather, and recurrence of heavy storms, which made armies no less than individuals, impotent to act or move. On the morning following my arrival, I took counsel with one who was, perhaps, better able to advise me as to my future course than any one then resident in Baltimore: certainly none could have been ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence
... through fatigue, it was restless and dreamful. She fancied she saw John Ayliffe holding Sir Philip on the ground, trying to strangle him. She strove to scream for help, but her lips seemed paralyzed, and there was no sound. That strange anguish of sleep—the anguish of impotent strong will—of powerless passion—of effort without effect, was upon her, and soon burst the bonds of slumber. It would have been impossible to endure it long. All must have felt that it is greater than any mortal agony; and ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various
... the closest connection with this that we must chew our food fine before we can digest it, and that the same food given in large lumps will choke and kill which in small pieces feeds us; or, again, that that which is impotent as a pellet may be potent as a gas. Food is very thoughtful: through thought it comes, and back through thought it shall return; the process of its conversion and comprehension within our own system is mental as well as physical, ...
— Luck or Cunning? • Samuel Butler
... imagine with what frantic but impotent hope, as the sinking decks and menacing plash of waters within told of the imminent last plunge, those thousands of eyes strained at the misty wall of grayish black that enclosed them on every hand. Not one gleam of light in any ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor
... means by which a government can effect its ends? Two only, reward and punishment; powerful means, indeed, for influencing the exterior act, but altogether impotent for the purpose of touching the heart. A public functionary who is told that he will be promoted if he is a devout Catholic, and turned out of his place if he is not, will probably go to mass every morning, exclude meat from his table on Fridays, ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... went swiftly round the room; they alighted for an instant upon Morna Woodgate, leaning forward upon the sofa where they had sat together, eager, enthusiastic, but impotent as a woman must be; they passed over the vicar, looking stolid as usual, and more than a little puzzled; but at last they rested on Langholm's thin, stooping figure, with untidy head thrust forward towards her, and a light in his dreamy eyes that ...
— The Shadow of the Rope • E. W. Hornung
... that the process issued was to take Davis, and not to detain the Montauk; that, once out of British waters, American law governs, and the English functionary became an intruder of whom he had every right to rid himself, and that the process by which he got his power to act at all became impotent the instant it was without the jurisdiction under which it ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper
... defence of the "Holy Catholic Church." But this greatest of papal gifts made no impression on the age which read Montesquieu and Voltaire. A flood of satirical pamphlets inundated Christendom, and the world laughed at the impotent weapons which had once been thunderbolts in the hands of Hildebrand ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... exhausting effort or hopeless sighing, 'Who shall ascend into heaven, that is, to bring Christ down from above?' It is a life that is meant for the sinful and the weary, for the unworthy and the impotent. It is a life that is the gift of the Father's love, and that He Himself will reveal in each one who comes in childlike trust to Him. It is a life that is meant for our every-day life, that in every varying circumstance and situation will make and ...
— Holy in Christ - Thoughts on the Calling of God's Children to be Holy as He is Holy • Andrew Murray
... of this last class. For boys: Ab'beng, a child's song; Agdalpen, name of a spirit; Baguio, a storm; Bakileg, a glutton; Kabato, from bato, a stone; Tabau, this name is a slur, yet is not uncommon; it signifies "a man who is a little crazy, who is sexually impotent, and who will mind all the women say;" Otang, the sprout of a vine; Zapalan, from zapal, the crotch of a tree. For girls: Bangonan, from bangon, "to rise, to get up;" Igai, from nigai, a fish; Giaben, a song; Magilai, from gilai the identifying slit made in an animal's ...
— The Tinguian - Social, Religious, and Economic Life of a Philippine Tribe • Fay-Cooper Cole
... can be made between all the plunderers. It is not thus with tariffs. They are by nature impotent to protect certain classes of society, such as artizans, merchants, literary men, lawyers, soldiers, ...
— Sophisms of the Protectionists • Frederic Bastiat
... was made: "It is our sense and judgment that truth not only requires the young of capacity and ability, but likewise the aged and impotent, and also all in a state of infancy and nonage, among Friends, to be discharged and set free from a state of slavery, that we do no more claim property in the human race, as we do in ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... throne," said the young heir of Buchan, as he brandished his own weapon above his head, and then rested his arms upon its broad hilt, despondingly. "But where is that king? Men speak of my most gentle kinsman Sir John Comyn, called the Red—bah! The sceptre were the same jewelled bauble in his impotent hand as in his sapient uncle's; a gem, a toy, forsooth, the loan of crafty Edward. No! the Red Comyn is no king for Scotland; and who is there besides? The rightful heir—a cold, dull-blooded neutral—a wild and wavering ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar
... shaking his fist in impotent wrath at the sturdy hunter, whom he would have attacked had he dared. "It's your fault, and you shall pay for it if ...
— Try and Trust • Horatio Alger
... frequent Bishops, Deans, and other High Churchmen; and to appear, once in the quarter at the least, at some melodrame, opera, pantomime, or other light scenical representation; in short, we will gratify the love of insolence and power; we will enjoy the old orthodox sport of witnessing the impotent anger of men compelled to submit to civil degradation, or to sacrifice their notions of truth to ours. And all this we may do without the slightest risk, because their numbers are, as yet, not very considerable. Cruelty and injustice must, ...
— Peter Plymley's Letters and Selected Essays • Sydney Smith
... incident of the feeding-cup was the climax, somehow. It struck him as an intolerable humiliation and outrage that Richard Calmady, splendid fellow as he was, gifted, high-bred gentleman, should, of all men, come to this sorry pass! He was filled with impotent fury. And was it this pass, indeed, he asked himself, to which every human creature must needs come one day? Would he, Roger Ormiston, one day, find himself thus weak and broken; his body—now so lively a source of ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... dream of pressing danger and impotent flight to marvel where he was in darkness; fancied himself at first in some wayside inn mid-way over Scotland, and sat up suddenly with an exclamation of assurance that he was awake to the suppositious landlord who had called, for the sense of some sound ...
— Doom Castle • Neil Munro
... helplessness, he regarded them with feelings of commiseration, like those which a kind master might feel for the poor animals committed to his charge, or—to do justice to the beneficent character attributed to many of the Incas—that a parent might feel for his young and impotent offspring. The laws were carefully directed to their preservation and personal comfort. The people were not allowed to be employed on works pernicious to their health, nor to pine— a sad contrast to their ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... persons. The old-fashioned Fourth-of-July boastings had ceased to be heard in the land. All agreed that somehow republican forms of government had not fulfilled their promise as guarantees of the popular welfare, but were showing themselves impotent to prevent the recrudescence in the New World of all the Old World's evils, especially those of class and caste, which it had been supposed could never exist in the atmosphere of a republic. It was recognized on all sides that the old order was changing for the worse, ...
— Equality • Edward Bellamy
... and there gathered snuffing and whining. Presently one caught sight of the two figures above them, and with an angry yelp sprang up in the air, and immediately all were growling, snarling, and leaping. Charlie laughed out loud at their impotent efforts. ...
— A Jacobite Exile - Being the Adventures of a Young Englishman in the Service of Charles the Twelfth of Sweden • G. A. Henty
... toward me, and I shall never forget the expression which flashed into those glorious eyes; but, seeing me intolerant of her appeal, she drew back and quickly turned her head aside. Even in this hour of extremity, of impotent wrath, I could find no contempt in my heart for her feeble hypocrisy; with all the old wonder I watched that exquisite profile, and Karamaneh's very deceitfulness was a salve—for had she not cared she would not ...
— The Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer
... proportion to their powers of attainment. Many envy and desire wealth, who can never procure it by honest industry or useful knowledge. They therefore turn their eyes about to examine what other methods can be found of gaining that which none, however impotent or worthless, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson
... since they are not unindigent. For they stand in need of their proper elements, and of that which conducts them to the generation of one form. For body cannot effect this, since it is of itself impotent; nor quality, since it is not able to subsist separate from the body in which it is, or together with which it has its being. The composite therefore either produces itself, which is impossible, for it does not converge to itself, but the whole of it is multifariously dispersed, or it ...
— Introduction to the Philosophy and Writings of Plato • Thomas Taylor
... a little more hesitant, but altogether, by no means unhappy. He was invited into her father's office for a long discussion. The result was that the two lovers fell into each others' arms while her father, trembling with impotent rage, hurled at them the ...
— The Indian Lily and Other Stories • Hermann Sudermann
... heart overflowing with bitterness and impotent protest against the condition to which his own act had reduced him, Haldane was learning to indulge in such bitter soliloquy with increasing frequency. It is ever the tendency of those who find themselves at odds with the world, and in conflict with the established order of ...
— A Knight Of The Nineteenth Century • E. P. Roe
... it's useless to attempt description. Mortal man cannot conceive of the delicate shades of sentiment expressible by a dog's tail, unless he has studied the subject—the wag, the waggle, the cock, the droop, the slope, the wriggle! Away with description—it is impotent and valueless here! ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... smother his wrath during the brief moments he was giving his orders; but no sooner had the seemingly pliant tools of his will left, than he again foamed over, and pacing back and forth, continued his cursing, as though he would spend his impotent fury in blasphemy. ...
— Eveline Mandeville - The Horse Thief Rival • Alvin Addison
... Behind his voiceless misery was immeasurable hatred of those who had struck him this blow; at moments a revengeful fury all but maddened him. He held his mother's band; if he could but feel one pressure of the slight fingers before they were impotent for ever! And this much was granted him. Shortly before midday the open eyes trembled to consciousness, the lips moved in endeavour to speak. To Hubert it seemed that his intense gaze had worked a miracle, effecting that which his will ...
— Demos • George Gissing
... 'tis borne Emblem of justice, by the sons of Greece, Who guard the sacred ministry of law Before the face of Jove! a mighty oath! The time shall come, when all the sons of Greece Shall mourn Achilles' loss; and thou the while, Heart-rent, shalt be all-impotent to aid, When by the warrior-slayer Hector's hand Many shall fall; and then thy soul shall mourn The slight on Grecia's ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... had hardly passed his lips, when two score of the mountaineers, shouting 'Deen, deen,—Kill, kill,' had swarmed over the silver railings surrounding the throne. There was the momentary clash of steel on steel, the impotent curse of an angry man, a shrill pitiful cry of anguish from the youth who in his terror had crouched behind the awnings descending from the canopy. And when the tribesmen again faced the multitude, the soldierly figure of Todar Rao had disappeared, and the throne was ...
— Tales of Destiny • Edmund Mitchell
... usurpation the violated Constitution of his country, and that is his crime. He preserved that instrument, in form, and substance, and spirit, a precious inheritance for generations to come, and for this he can never be forgiven. How vain and impotent is party rage, directed against such a man. He is not more elevated by his lofty residence, upon the summit of his own favorite mountain, than he is lifted, by the serenity of his mind, and the consciousness of a well-spent life, above the malignant passions and ...
— American Eloquence, Volume I. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1896) • Various
... the solitude of a stateroom that tormented him with desires of impotent revenge. Near Toni on deck or on the bridge he felt better.... And with a humble condescension, such as his mate had never known before, he would talk and talk, enjoying the attention of his simple-hearted ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... out on the table, and a brand new scourge lay somewhat ostentatiously beside the platter. The visitors stood nonplussed, looked at each other, then eyed the landscape. Between barren sea and barren downs the beach stretched away, with not a human shape in sight. St. Petroc, choking with impotent wrath, appeared to study the hollow green breakers from between the long ears of his mule, but with quick sidelong glances right and left, ready to jump down the throat of the first saint ...
— The Delectable Duchy • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... subsequent epoch. Moreover, their aspirations were, as we have seen, more reactionary than experimental; for the rights for which they conspired had been in a great measure enjoyed under Europe's modern conqueror, then impotent in action, but most efficient in remembrance, although isolated on his prison-rock. Foresti's companion in misfortune has made their mutual wrongs "familiar as household words"; and to be associated in captivity with the author of "Le Mie Prigioni" was of itself a passport ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... their tens of thousands could easily dispense with the services of any particular miner. The miner, on the other hand, however expert, could not dispense with the companies. He needed a job; his wife and children would starve if he did not get one.... Individually the miners were impotent when they sought to enter a wage contract with the great companies; they could make fair terms only by uniting into trade unions to bargain collectively." It was of this state of affairs that President Taft spoke when he favored the modification of the common law "so ...
— History of the United States • Charles A. Beard and Mary R. Beard
... tell 'e, cum whoam,' replied the Yorkshireman, sternly. And as he delivered the reply, Miss Squeers burst into a shower of tears; arising in part from desperate vexation, and in part from an impotent desire to lacerate somebody's countenance ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... which neither gains the victory. I venture to submit that the new forms now at work in the world are not forms that will do their work by halves. When once the age shall have mastered them, they will be either one thing or the other—they will be either impotent or omnipotent. Their public exponents at present boast that they will be omnipotent; and more and more the world about us is beginning to believe the boast. But the world feels uneasily that the import of it will be very different from what we are assured ...
— Is Life Worth Living? • William Hurrell Mallock
... elastic mind, impatient of impotent sorrow, and burning for some kind of action, seized upon vengeance as the only thing left ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... helplessly struggling within its merciless clutch. A prayer trembled on my lips, but remained unuttered, for I could only stare upward at the mighty, crawling thing now overshadowing us, my arms uplifted in impotent effort ...
— When Wilderness Was King - A Tale of the Illinois Country • Randall Parrish
... Had you a grain of Honesty, or intended ever to be thought so, wou'd you have the impudence to marry an old Coxcomb, a Fellow that will not so much as serve you for a Cloke, he is so visibly and undeniably impotent? ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn
... voice and clean-cut syllables fanned the flame of Jimmy's rage. He felt impotent, moreover, which never serves as a poultice to anger. But he got himself in hand, though imitation courtesy was not much in his line. He tuned his big hearty voice to a pitch with the Frenchman's nasal pipe, and clipped off his words ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... disease, and stupified with spleen; Fain to implore the aid of Flattery's screen, Even from thyself thy loathsome heart to hide, (The mansion, then, no more of joy serene) Where fear, distrust, malevolence, abide, And impotent desire, and disappointed pride? ...
— The Minstrel; or the Progress of Genius - with some other poems • James Beattie
... this behalfe see verie clearlie. For the causes be so manifest, that they can not be hid. For who can denie but it repugneth to nature, that the blind shal be appointed to leade and conduct such as do see? That the weake, the sicke, and impotent persones[1] shall norishe and kepe the hole and strong, and finallie, that the foolishe, madde and phrenetike shal gouerne the discrete, and giue counsel to such as be sober of mind? And such be al women, compared vnto man in bearing of authoritie. For their sight in ciuile ...
— The First Blast of the Trumpet against the monstrous regiment - of Women • John Knox
... it is surmised that a certain person is so impotent and non compos mentis that he is unable to take care of himself or his goods, and inquiry is simply directed to the point whether he is an idiot and non compos, as asserted ...
— Chapters in the History of the Insane in the British Isles • Daniel Hack Tuke
... shocked at the unmistakable evidence of the gin-shop which the man's appearance and voice betrayed. How dreadful to the sight are those watery eyes; that red, uneven, pimpled nose; those fallen cheeks; and that hanging, slobbered mouth! Look at the uncombed hair, the beard half shorn, the weak, impotent gait of the man, and the tattered raiment, all eloquent of gin! You would fain hold your nose when he comes nigh you, he carries with him so foul an evidence of his only and his hourly indulgence. You would do so, had you not still a respect ...
— Orley Farm • Anthony Trollope
... you commend yourself to your patron saint. "You must not address yourself to me, that one answers. Go to the other office. See St. Marcel (or Marchel), to make the impotent walk ...
— The Grip of Desire • Hector France
... new and irresistible charge, a shrill and warning command to die or surrender, and, with a sullen and tearful impulse, five thousand muskets are flung upon the ground, and five thousand hot, exhausted, and impotent men are Sheridan's prisoners ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... up and down the door, foaming with impotent rage, as well as trembling with a vague and awful terror. He had a practical and scientific mind, and could understand everything that might be governed by known laws. But he could not understand ...
— Cruel As The Grave • Mrs. Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... murders sufficiently important to have been kept in remembrance by history; and during that space of time formal civil war, religious and partisan, broke out, stopped and recommenced in four campaigns, signalized, each of them, by great battles, and four times terminated by impotent or deceptive treaties of peace which, on the 24th of August, 1572, ended, for their sole result, in the greatest massacre of French ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume IV. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... military capability is a fundamental and necessary component of Rapid Dominance. Our intent, however, is to field a range of capabilities to induce sufficient Shock and Awe to render the adversary impotent. This means that physical and ...
— Shock and Awe - Achieving Rapid Dominance • Harlan K. Ullman and James P. Wade
... consequence of the passion manifested by my child, and I speak and strike again. He is weak and I am strong; but, though he bow his head, crushed into silence, I may be sure that there is a sullen heart in the little bosom, and anger the more bitter because it is impotent. I put the child away from me, and think of what I have done. I am full of relentings. I long to ask his pardon, for I know that I have offended and deeply injured one of Christ's little ones. I call him to me again, press his head to my breast, kiss him, and weep. No word is spoken, ...
— Lessons in Life - A Series of Familiar Essays • Timothy Titcomb
... exhibited few or none of the symptoms generally characteristic of that state. He was not lying down, but sitting up. His face wore the expression not of one dead or dying, but of a man transfixed with rage and horror. His eyes wide open were staring upon us with an expression of impotent rage, as though he were witnessing some outrage which he was powerless to prevent. His mouth was opened as though uttering a cry, but no cry came out of his mouth. He did not breathe heavily, he did not appear to breathe at all. He had the appearance of a man who in the midst of some violent ...
— Tales of the Caliph • H. N. Crellin
... and the laughter beat on his sullen brain with a mocking insistence, and he trembled with impotent anger at the apparent happiness of humanity. Why should these people be merry when he was miserable, what right had the orchestra to play a chorus of triumph over the stinging emblems of his defeat? He drank brandy after brandy, vainly ...
— The Ghost Ship • Richard Middleton
... financial, railway, fiscal and commercial questions, military legislation and the laws relating to the roads and rivers in which both were interested—all these subjects they reserved for the Parliament at Buda-Pest, in which, of course, the Croats formed an impotent minority. Francis Joseph on May 1, 1867, sent a message to Zagreb in which he stated that "the pourparlers with the Kingdom of Hungary, which to him was always dear and faithful, had led to the desired results." He ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 1 • Henry Baerlein
... to look by myself upon this scene of horror and disgust—should here wait the severing of this vessel's timbers,—the loss of life which must accompany it,—the only one calm and collected, or aware of what must soon take place. God forgive me, but I appear, useless and impotent as I am, to stand here like the master of the storm,—separated as it were from my brother mortals by my own peculiar destiny. It must be so. This wreck then must not be for me,—I feel that it is not,—that I have a charmed life, or rather a protracted one, to fulfil the oath I registered ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat
... one is the hero of one's own dreams, but at times I have dreamt a dream entirely in the third person—a dream with the incidents of which I have had no connection whatever, except as an unseen and impotent spectator. One of these I have often thought about since, wondering if it could not be worked up into a story. But, perhaps, it would be too ...
— Novel Notes • Jerome K. Jerome
... knowledge came also a sense of hopeless, impotent rebellion against the unreasonableness of it all. There were scores of men no better than I whose punishments had at least been reserved for another world; and I felt that it was bitterly, cruelly unfair ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... this is the last time I attempt anything of the kind. How in the world we are going to get out of this scrape I do not know. The tickets are so high, and so much has been said, that the people are expecting a great deal, and there is every prospect of a most lame and impotent conclusion." ...
— Barriers Burned Away • E. P. Roe |
