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Intrinsic   Listen
adjective
Intrinsic  adj.  
1.
Inward; internal; hence, true; genuine; real; essential; inherent; not merely apparent or accidental; opposed to extrinsic; as, the intrinsic value of gold or silver; the intrinsic merit of an action; the intrinsic worth or goodness of a person. "He was better qualified than they to estimate justly the intrinsic value of Grecian philosophy and refinement."
2.
(Anat.) Included wholly within an organ or limb, as certain groups of muscles; opposed to extrinsic.
Intrinsic energy of a body (Physics), the work it can do in virtue of its actual condition, without any supply of energy from without.
Intrinsic equation of a curve (Geom.), the equation which expresses the relation which the length of a curve, measured from a given point of it, to a movable point, has to the angle which the tangent to the curve at the movable point makes with a fixed line.
Intrinsic value. See the Note under Value, n.
Synonyms: Inherent; innate; natural; real; genuine.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Intrinsic" Quotes from Famous Books



... objection is true of an intrinsic form. But it is not thus that charity is the form of faith, but in the sense that it quickens the act of ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas

... now to a very interesting incident, giving proof of the remarkable knowledge which the writers had of some intrinsic laws and the power of transmission which, even to-day, are known and adhered to only by a very small minority of wise, thoughtful mothers. However, the wife of Manoah, the future mother of Samson, is visited by an angel, giving her instructions as to her way of living during pregnancy. It appears ...
— The Woman's Bible. • Elizabeth Cady Stanton

... spittle of such vulgar specimens of humanity. But if the Boss had purchased these rugs himself, with money earned by his own brow-sweat, I am sure he would appreciate them better. He would then know, if not their intrinsic worth, at least their market value. Yes, and they were presented to him by some one needing, I suppose, police connivance and protection. The first half of this statement I had from the Boss himself; the second, I base on Khalid's knowingness ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani

... cannot but be fully alive to the value of such a point on the north-west coast of Borneo with reference to the protection and security of the vast trade carried on by British subjects to and from China; not to mention the great intrinsic advantages of an establishment on one of the largest and most valuable islands in the world. Little or nothing is yet known of the interior of this vast country; but what we do know already with regard to several portions of its coast must lead us to the conclusion that it will one day become ...
— Trade and Travel in the Far East - or Recollections of twenty-one years passed in Java, - Singapore, Australia and China. • G. F. Davidson

... of a perilous voyage, and expose ourselves, our wives, and our little ones, to the deleterious influences of an uncongenial sun, for the enjoyment of a liberty divested of its usual accompaniments, surrounded with circumstances which diminish its intrinsic value, and render it indeed "a dear earned morsel"? * ...
— Thoughts on African Colonization • William Lloyd Garrison

... fall in with the same people and make them join in the funny chorus. She had friends who didn't know each other but who inevitably and punctually recommended him. She had also the sort of originality, the intrinsic interest that led her to be kept by each of us as a kind of private resource, cultivated jealously, more or less in secret, as a person whom one didn't meet in society, whom it was not for every one—whom ...
— Embarrassments • Henry James

... practical inferences from them? Is every other idea to yield precedence and empire to existing circumstances, and is the immediate and universal workableness of a policy to be the main test of its intrinsic fitness? ...
— On Compromise • John Morley

... of Commagene introduced into Europe, it does not appear that she ever received the homage of many strangers; it does not appear, above all, that druidism ever assumed the shape of "mysteries of Epona" into which Greeks and Romans would have asked to be initiated. It was too deficient in the intrinsic strength of the ...
— The Oriental Religions in Roman Paganism • Franz Cumont

... to advise their clients in accordance with Lord Holt's opinion. It was not long before it was universally practiced upon, and no case in the English language touching contract relations of that nature is of greater importance as a precedent. Yet it became such not because of its intrinsic authority as a judgment, so much as on account of its orderly and scientific statement of a whole body of law of a kind that the people needed and for the origin of which—whether at Rome or London—they cared little, so long as it had been accepted by the highest ...
— The American Judiciary • Simeon E. Baldwin, LLD

... Americans regard this fact with pride, rather than with envy. They accept the principle that some unusual advantage should attend exceptional and unremitting responsibility. Whatever path an American officer may walk, he enjoys prestige. Though little is known of his intrinsic merit, he will be given the respect of his fellow citizens, unless he ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense

... stock a company's post!" he exclaimed. But its real intrinsic value was quite beyond ...
— Ungava Bob - A Winter's Tale • Dillon Wallace

... nonsense to say that, being very much an incarnation of the modern international spirit (he might be a Frenchman in New York were he not an American in Paris), the moral of his work is possibly the inevitable want of finality, of intrinsic character, in that sweet freedom? Does the cosmopolite necessarily pay for his freedom by a want of function—the impersonality of not being representative? Must one be a little narrow to have a sentiment, and very local to have a quality, or at least a ...
— Picture and Text - 1893 • Henry James

... community. An absurdity which no man in his senses will offer to maintain. — Riches are certainly no proof of merit: nay they are often (if not most commonly) acquired by persons of sordid minds and mean talents: nor do they give any intrinsic worth to the possessor; but, on the contrary, tend to pervert his understanding, and render his morals more depraved. But, granting that poverty were really matter of reproach, it cannot be justly imputed to Scotland. No country is poor that can supply its inhabitants with the ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett

... to the bridemaids on her wedding-day, they generally consist of some articles of jewelry, not costly, and given more as a memento of the occasion than for their own intrinsic worth. The bridegroom sometimes gives the groomsmen a scarf pin of some quaint device, or some other slight memento of the day, as a ...
— Our Deportment - Or the Manners, Conduct and Dress of the Most Refined Society • John H. Young

... and shawls and laces of very great value. Eighty thousand louis d'or in ready money; a service of gold plate of twenty covers, which formerly belonged to the Kings of France; two small boxes full of diamonds and brilliants, the intrinsic worth of which was estimated at forty-eight millions of livres—and a great number of jewels; among others, the crown diamond, called here the Regents', and in your country the Pitt Diamond, fell, with other riches, into the hands of the captors. ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton

... is in their principle of association. Some men classify objects by color and size and other accidents of appearance; others by intrinsic likeness, or by the relation of cause and effect. The progress of the intellect is to the clearer vision of causes, which neglects surface differences. To the poet, to the philosopher, to the saint, all things are ...
— Essays, First Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... history of calamity. The changes which break up at short intervals the prosperity of men are advertisements of a nature whose law is growth. Every soul is by this intrinsic necessity quitting its whole system of things, its friends, and home, and laws, and faith, as the shellfish crawls out of its beautiful but stony case, because it no longer admits of its growth, and slowly forms a new house. In proportion to the vigor of the individual, these revolutions ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... Nevertheless, it may be no impiety to regard Hancock not precisely as a real personage, but as a majestic figure, useful and necessary in its way, but producing its effect far more by an ornamental outside than by any intrinsic force or virtue. The page of all history would be half unpeopled if all such characters ...
— A Book of Autographs - (From: "The Doliver Romance and Other Pieces: Tales and Sketches") • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... not long before Mrs. Hamilton discovered her loss. She valued the missing opera glass, for reasons which need not be mentioned, far beyond its intrinsic value, and though she could readily have supplied its place, so far as money was concerned, she would not have been as well pleased with any new glass, though precisely similar, as with the one she had used for years. She remembered that she had not replaced the glass in the drawer, and, therefore, ...
— The Store Boy • Horatio Alger, Jr.

... to attain, and there be several equally innocent modes of attaining it, the question for us is, by which of these modes we may find the least difficulty or gain the highest enjoyment or advantage. If there be several duties incumbent upon us at the same time and place, all of which have equal intrinsic claims, yet one of which must necessarily take precedence of the rest, the question which shall have precedence is a question of expediency, that by which we may do the most ...
— A Manual of Moral Philosophy • Andrew Preston Peabody

... jurisdiction than that of the select men of the town, should then have been a question publicly discussed, and on which statesmen of eminence took sides. At that epoch of pristine simplicity, however, matters of even slighter public interest, and of far less intrinsic weight than the welfare of Hester and her child, were strangely mixed up with the deliberations of legislators and acts of state. The period was hardly, if at all, earlier than that of our story, when a dispute concerning the right of property in a pig not only ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... there was no occasion for such an extraordinary repetition, as everybody from the first welcomed her into it with the cordial confidence she merited. I have spread out this proceeding to your view, not altogether from its intrinsic interest, but because, perhaps, it affords the key to interpret the course of this ill-starred man in his wrangles with his congregation, and his terrible prominency in the awful scenes of the witchcraft delusion. He seemed to have had a love of excitement that was irrepressible, ...
— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham

... intrinsic interest of the subject, and the fullness of detail which is spread before the reader, to a very wide circulation. The idea of ascending Mount Ararat seems to have risen with the traveler to a passion; previous travelers had never accomplished ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel

... the backs of the rest present a white surface, in this case the back or paper is of a decidedly purplish hue. In my opinion this stamp is a good one to pick up now, as its present value is far below its intrinsic worth. ...
— The Stamps of Canada • Bertram Poole

... apothecaries to terms of reason in relation to the poor, an instrument was subscribed by divers charitably-disposed members of the college, now in numbers about fifty, wherein they obliged themselves to pay ten pounds apiece towards the preparing and delivering medicines at their intrinsic value." ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury

... seen so near, with their long, aristocratic faces, dull, lifeless, almost gray by dint of rice-powder, and their mouths painted heart-shape in vivid carmine. Withal they have an undeniable look of good breeding that strongly impresses us, notwithstanding the intrinsic differences of ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... greater degree of influence which the State governments if they administer their affairs with uprightness and prudence, will generally possess over the people; a circumstance which at the same time teaches us that there is an inherent and intrinsic weakness in all federal constitutions; and that too much pains cannot be taken in their organization, to give them all the force which is compatible with the ...
— The Federalist Papers • Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison

... conceive, impossible to avoid it. There were intrinsic difficulties in the thing, an artificial embarrassment from the manner of proceeding on the part ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IX (of X) - America - I • Various

... ornament used, whether embroidered band, a ribbon, a cord that laces, a diamond pin, or a jeweled buckle, though it may possess great intrinsic value and beauty, it cannot be considered of real worth as an ornament unless it fulfills the ...
— Textiles and Clothing • Kate Heintz Watson

... trifle and not one that a family like ours should hanker after. And were we to depute two special persons (to attend to the garden), the least permission given by them to any one to turn anything to improper uses, would, since there be so many things of intrinsic value, be tantamount to a reckless destruction of the gifts of heaven. So would it not be preferable to select several quiet, steady and experienced old matrons, out of those stationed in the grounds, and appoint them to put them in order and look after things? Neither will there be any need ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... Sisley and Pissarro appear scarcely to their advantage, and finally it is to be regretted, that Manet is only represented by a study in black in his first manner, the Balcony, which does not count among his best pictures, and the famous Olympia whose importance is more historical than intrinsic. The gallery has separately acquired a Young Girl in Ball Dress by Berthe Morisot, which is a delicate marvel of grace and freshness. And in the place of honour of the gallery is to be seen Fantin-Latour's great picture Hommage ...
— The French Impressionists (1860-1900) • Camille Mauclair

... of right hand to Sigismund. Frederick (Friedrich), the younger Burggraf, and ultimately the survivor and inheritor (Johann having left no sons), is the famed Burggraf Friedrich VI the last and notablest of all the Burggraves—a man of distinguished importance, extrinsic and intrinsic; chief or among the very chief of German public men in his time; and memorable to Posterity, and to this history, on still other grounds! ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... say yourself it is a noteworthy fact. Now, how is the historian to tell whether a fact is noteworthy or not? He judges it arbitrarily, according to his tastes and his caprices and his ideas—in short, as an artist? For facts cannot by reason of their own intrinsic character be divided into historical facts and non-historical facts. But any fact is something exceedingly complex. Will the historian represent facts in all their complexity? No, that is impossible. Then he will represent them stripped of the greater part of the peculiarities ...
— The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard • Anatole France

... precious a morsel he held between his fingers,—precious, not only on account of its intrinsic goodness, but from its rarity; for although the aard-vark is a common animal in South Africa, and in some districts even numerous, it is not every day the hunter can lay his hands upon one. On the contrary, the creature ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid

... indirect.[251] The rule of uniformity for indirect taxes is easy to obey. It exacts only that the subject matter of a levy be taxed at the same rate wherever found in the United States; or, as it is sometimes phrased, the uniformity required is "geographical," not "intrinsic."[252] The clause accordingly places no obstacle in the way of legislative classification for the purpose of taxation, nor in the way of what is called progressive taxation.[253] A taxing statute does not fail of the prescribed ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin

... replies to this, that the apathy of the early Christians to the intrinsic iniquity of the slave system rose out of "their expectation of an immediate close of this world's affairs. The only reason why Paul sanctioned contentment with his condition in the converted slave, was, that for so short a time it was not ...
— Phases of Faith - Passages from the History of My Creed • Francis William Newman

... profound, semicircular, and terraced, dosed at either end by a passage so narrow that it might well be called a defile. The suddenness with which it burst upon me, like the South Sea upon Balboa, the feeling of remoteness inspired by its isolation, and its own intrinsic beauty, struck home so forcible a prepossession that it remained a favorite resort, to which I guided several others; for it must be borne in mind that up to our coming the hill tracks of Kobe knew not the feet of foreigners, ...
— From Sail to Steam, Recollections of Naval Life • Captain A. T. Mahan

... its intrinsic value, copiousness of information, and impartiality, it is likely to take the place of all other guides to Canada which we ...
— A Romantic Young Lady • Robert Grant

... pre-eminence to the potent moody, reverses the position between the driven and the driver. Poetry, however erratic, is less a servant of the bully Present, or pomlious Past, than History. The Muse of History has neither the same divination of the intrinsic nor the devotion to it, though truly, she has possession of all the positive matter and holds us faster ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... mention (all of them are more or less employed by the prominent penmen), and a partiality for particular ones will soon develop itself. He is reminded, however, that it is easily possible to exaggerate the intrinsic values of pens and papers; in fact the beginner invariably expects too much from them. Of course, he should not use any but the best,—even Vierge could not make a good drawing with a bad pen,—but the artistic virtues of a particular instrument are not likely ...
— Pen Drawing - An Illustrated Treatise • Charles Maginnis

... her daughter, our mother's cousin Helen and ours, would have had to come to her in middle life to account for it, or did antiquity at that time set in earlier and was surrender of appearance and dress, matching the intrinsic decay, only more complacent, more submissive and, as who should say, more abject? I have my choice of these suppositions, each in its way of so lively an interest that I scarce know which to prefer, though inclining perhaps ...
— A Small Boy and Others • Henry James

... representing nothing, is made more clear by the inscription written upon it—an inscription placed there, consciously or unconsciously, that it might have that very effect. The composition is magnificent, whether for its intrinsic beauty of arrangement—its balancing of lines and spaces—or for its perfect expressiveness. The rhythmic step of marching men is perfectly rendered, and the guns fill the middle of the panel in an admirable pattern, without ...
— Artist and Public - And Other Essays On Art Subjects • Kenyon Cox

... course in the evil conduct of others. Thou hast already reached the middle period of life—the future is uncertain. By thy hopes of peace here and hereafter, let me urge thee to abandon this occupation. It is not necessary to argue its intrinsic wickedness, for thou knowest it already. I would therefore beseech thee to listen to that voice which, I am persuaded, sometimes urges thee to 'put away the evil of thy doings,' to 'do justice and love mercy,' and thus cease to ...
— A Visit To The United States In 1841 • Joseph Sturge

... career, if treasured up, to show posterity that he was every inch a man. Let his fragmentary printed speeches—let the reminiscences of his friends that treat of his power as an orator, be brought together, and unsatisfactory as they may be, there will be found left intrinsic value enough to accomplish the object. There will be in the fluted column, though shattered and defaced, an Ionian beauty that will tell unerringly of the magnificent temple ...
— The International Weekly Miscellany, Volume I. No. 9. - Of Literature, Art, and Science, August 26, 1850 • Various

... the church to the state. Not that I think the action of the latter can be harmonised to the laws of the former. We have passed the point at which that was possible.... But it would be much if the state would honestly aim at enabling the church to develop her own intrinsic means. To this I look. The second is, unfolding the catholic system within her in some establishment or machinery looking both towards the higher life, and towards the external warfare against ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley

... answered, "I believe you were right when you said that the Little Brass God meant something more than intrinsic value to at least one of the men who are chasing it up. Now," the boy went on, "if this brass-faced fellow has the sacred idol nut in his head, he won't leave this section of the ...
— Boy Scouts in Northern Wilds • Archibald Lee Fletcher

... rust-coloured powder. The grub or mite, or whatever it is, may do so at its pleasure, and flourish and grow fat, and rear a numerous family, and get them out if it can; but all these corroding processes and changes going on inside the shell do not in the least diminish my nut's intrinsic value. ...
— A Traveller in Little Things • W. H. Hudson

... may be some extravagance in this assertion; but we may nevertheless agree with Mr. Ritso that "there is no knowledge of this kind, which may not, sooner or later, be in fresh demand; there is no length of time or change of circumstances, that can entirely defeat its operation or destroy its intrinsic authority. Like the old specie withdrawn from circulation upon the introduction of a new coinage, it has always its inherent value; the ore is still sterling and may be moulded into modern currency." The opinions of American lawyers confirm this conclusion. It is well known that C. J. ...
— An Essay on Professional Ethics - Second Edition • George Sharswood

... everything, and the more we habituate ourselves to live in that Center of the Innermost where conditions do not exist, the more we shall find ourselves gaining control over outward conditions, because the stream of conditioned life flows out from the Center of Unconditioned Life, and therefore this intrinsic principle of Worship has in it the promise both of the life that now is and of that which is to come. Only we must remember that the really availing worship is that of the Undifferentiated Source because It is the Source, and ...
— The Creative Process in the Individual • Thomas Troward

... to enter upon a systematic and effectual arrangement for the regular redemption and discharge of the public debt, according to the right which has been reserved to the Government. No measure can be more desirable, whether viewed with an eye to its intrinsic importance or to the general sentiment and wish of ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... on the one hand the intrinsic preciousness of the Gospel, and on the other the high esteem in which that precious thing is held by a spiritually quickened man. They set forth first how valuable the kingdom of God is, and next how much it is valued by ...
— The Parables of Our Lord • William Arnot

... of a house is a matter so dependent upon aesthetic conditions that it is never within the scope of the electrician. It is a problem for a decorator alone to solve. Intense and glaring lights of unusual power must be avoided. Luminants of low intrinsic brilliancy are preferable. ...
— Color Value • C. R. Clifford

... been to see Phyllis since her father had delivered his opinion to her touching the intrinsic merits of that young man, and she ...
— Southern Lights and Shadows • Edited by William Dean Howells & Henry Mills Alden

... with the nobler forces of life and make him one with them. For they stand beyond the powers of this earth and the laws of this universe. Here lies man's only hope of success in the great effort; to leap right away from his present standpoint to his next and at once become an intrinsic part of the divine power as he has been an intrinsic part of the intellectual power, of the great nature to which he belongs. He stands always in advance of himself, if such a contradiction can be ...
— Light On The Path and Through the Gates of Gold • Mabel Collins

... of all to signify the begetting of living beings, which is called "birth" or "sprouting forth," the word "natura" meaning, as it were, "nascitura." Afterwards this word "nature" was taken to signify the principle of this begetting; and because in living things the principle of generation is an intrinsic principle, this word "nature" was further employed to signify any intrinsic principle of motion: thus the Philosopher says (Phys. ii) that "nature is the principle of motion in that in which it is essentially and not accidentally." Now this principle is either form ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas

... see, quite as extensively as in our own day, and a possession was only valuable while it was the property of the fortunate few. The instant it came within the reach of everybody it was no longer desirable in their eyes. Your snob always treasures a thing less for its intrinsic value than because other people cannot have it. So it was among the snobs that lived hundreds of years ago; the species has not materially changed. No sooner did learning become general through the use of the printing press, and become accessible to the man in moderate circumstances than ...
— Paul and the Printing Press • Sara Ware Bassett

... those who would have women act just like men in all externals, but those who are conscious that all men are born of women. In this lies women's strength in the past and in this must be their strength in that glad future that is to be. But only if motherhood is regarded as an intrinsic glory, and children are born in freedom. Think what this means. The birth of a child, in so far as its mother has not received the sanction of a man, is subject to the fire and brimstone of public scorn. And this scorn is the most pitiful result in all the patriarchal record. A woman's natural ...
— The Position of Woman in Primitive Society - A Study of the Matriarchy • C. Gasquoine Hartley

... enlivening contrast of marble lintels and sills and white-painted wood trim, in which paneled shutters play a prominent part, form a picture of rare charm, rendered all the more satisfying by an appearance of obvious comfort, permanence and intrinsic worth which wood construction, however good, ...
— The Colonial Architecture of Philadelphia • Frank Cousins

... sorts abounded. They carried such weight as their author's name or their intrinsic worth imparted to them. Even the most valuable were not so prized or guarded as to prevent some of them from being lost. Paul's own letters suffered from this neglect. Had a few copies of these inestimable letters been made by the churches to whom they ...
— The Right and Wrong Uses of the Bible • R. Heber Newton

... wane—we can hear no better proof that true religion and good sense are coming into fashion. The sketch of Mrs. Vehicle, by the same hand, is said to have been a true copy of a well-known female gambler; it is like a portrait of Sir Joshua Reynolds, a picture worthy of preservation from its intrinsic merits, long after the original has ceased to exist: how readily might it be applied to half a score card-table devotees of the present day! "Observe that ton of beauty, Mrs. Vehicle, who is sailing ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle

... from childhood he had regarded as powers in the ideal world, and in some instances as representing the eternities of human speculation, since their names had perhaps dawned upon his mind in concurrence with the very earliest suggestion of topics which they had treated, should overrate their intrinsic grandeur. Hazlitt accordingly is styled "The great thinker." But had he been such potentially, there was an absolute bar to his achievement of that station in act and consummation. No man can be a great thinker in our days upon large and elaborate ...
— Biographical Essays • Thomas de Quincey

... sense of compassion, which often is the acme of intrinsic craft. Glancing at the poor cot on which a sick girl is lying, he kindly inquires as to her ailment. Learning that it is some sort of low fever, about which the doctor has not expressed any positive opinion, Sir Donald suggests changes involving outlay of money, and says ...
— Oswald Langdon - or, Pierre and Paul Lanier. A Romance of 1894-1898 • Carson Jay Lee

... arguments employed to prove any point will be just and forcible; the stability of a work will be principally considered, and little regard will be payed to its exterior ornament. Such a work however, though it may be valued by a few for its intrinsic excellence, yet can never be productive of general improvement, as attention can only be fixed by entertainment, and entertainment ...
— An Essay on the Lyric Poetry of the Ancients • John Ogilvie

... In the merciless morning light Julia saw all the deficiencies; the way things were set best side foremost, though, to her, the worst side contrived still to show; the display there was everywhere, the trumpery silver ornaments, all tarnished for want of rubbing, and of no more intrinsic value and beauty than the tinfoil off champagne bottles; the cracked pieces of china—rummage sale relics, she called them—set forth in a glass-doored cabinet, as if they were heirlooms. Mrs. Polkington had a romance about several of them that made them seem like heirlooms ...
— The Good Comrade • Una L. Silberrad

... blue waterways reflected stately palms and golden minarets. Other souls, like myself, less simple and sufficiently salted to know that these Turnerian dreams are generally the magical accidents of changing light and seldom the result of any intrinsic interest in the places themselves—even they had a grievance when they saw the real Basra. Was this the Venice of the East, this squalid place beside soup-coloured waters? Was this the city that reveals the past splendours of Haroun ...
— A Dweller in Mesopotamia - Being the Adventures of an Official Artist in the Garden of Eden • Donald Maxwell

... words were suffocated with the supreme anguish of their utterance. As she heard it, the generosity, the faith, the inherent justice, and the intrinsic sweetness that were latent in her beneath the negligence and the chillness of external semblance rose at once to reject the baser, to accept the nobler, belief offered to her choice. She had lived much in the world, but it had not corroded her; she had ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]

... reaction required to set right the over-specialization of recent minds thoughtful only of some little branch of knowledge. Just in proportion as one esteems "authority" will one give heed to the pronouncement of the presidential address before the British Association, yet for its own intrinsic sake it is a piece of work ...
— The Journal of Abnormal Psychology - Volume 10

... her own father and sisters, but by all her husband's family, showed that her fascination was of that best kind which, like charity, "begins at home;" and that while her beauty and music enchanted the world, she had charms more intrinsic and lasting for those who came nearer to her. We have already seen with what pliant sympathy she followed her husband through his various pursuits,— identifying herself with the politician as warmly and readily as with the author, and keeping Love still attendant on Genius ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Vol 2 • Thomas Moore

... stands in the calm, unchanging strength that yonder mountain would maintain, were it surrounded by children shooting against it with arrows. Believe me, I do not fear for the Bible. If all the light of human knowledge were turned upon it in one burning focus, its intrinsic truth would only be revealed more clearly; and if superstition, as in the past, or infidelity, as was the case in France, creates temporary darkness, the moment that, in the light of returning reason, men look for the Bible, they find it like a great ...
— From Jest to Earnest • E. P. Roe

... delivered at the rate of five hundred words a minute, and apparently covering seven or eight subjects not necessarily corollary or collateral to each other, at once, and watched him simultaneously bringing down with unerring aim this tremendous bag of game, something of the man's intrinsic nature was revealed to me. His strength, of which we had heard much from travelers in his own land, lay in an almost scientific lack of concentration, backed up by a vocabulary of tremendous scope, and a condition of optical ...
— The Autobiography of Methuselah • John Kendrick Bangs

... tombs, there were deposited in certain parts within the walls objects now technically known as deposits. We do not know whether, in selecting these objects, the ancient Egyptian had regard to what he considered their intrinsic value, or whether, as was most probable, it was some religious motive that prompted his action. Often the objects thus deposited come under the designation of pottery, although the vases were sometimes shaped of stone and not of clay. Within such vases ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 12 (of 12) • S. Rappoport

... It is written in our own land and by one of our own beloved brethren, and is therefore entitled on the ground of country and patriotism, as well as of religion, to all that kindness and favor of reception, which may be justified by its intrinsic merits. The work is published in a highly creditable style by the house of Leavitt, Lord ...
— Ups and Downs in the Life of a Distressed Gentleman • William L. Stone

... I'm off to get it first thing in the morning," said the little fellow gleefully. "I prize that stone far above its intrinsic value, for it was given to me by my beautiful Princess, you know, and I would not lose it for anything. But, I say! what's that curious-looking old lamp in your hand? May I ...
— The Mysterious Shin Shira • George Edward Farrow

... dream-haunted nightmares of her, he nevertheless was aware of the cosmic verity of sex that animated her and that made her own life of less value than the happiness of her lover with whom she hoped to mate. Juliet or Balatta? Where was the intrinsic difference? The soft and tender product of ultra- civilization, or her bestial prototype of a hundred thousand years before ...
— The Red One • Jack London

... this fine, wise, Spartan Northland had been here, and he had never known. What puzzled him was, that, with such intrinsic fitness, he had never heard the slightest calling whisper, had not himself gone forth to seek. But this, too, ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London

... action. Its operative power, in fact, appears to bear some direct relation to the intimacy with which naval and military action can be combined to give the contingent a weight and mobility that are beyond its intrinsic power. ...
— Some Principles of Maritime Strategy • Julian Stafford Corbett

... last reached an outskirt of the fair, where no person appeared to know me. Here I stood, looking vacantly on what was going on, musing on the strange infatuation of my species, who judge of a person's words, not from their intrinsic merit, but from the opinion—generally an erroneous one—which they have formed of the person. From this reverie I was roused by certain words which sounded near me, uttered in a strange tone, and in a strange cadence—the words were, "Them that ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow

... Aside from the intrinsic value of presenting archaeological material from the little-known area of Baja California, the Palmer Collection has particular importance because of its immediate geographic source. Bahia de Los Angeles lies in that part of Baja California most accessible to the Mexican mainland ...
— A Burial Cave in Baja California - The Palmer Collection, 1887 • William C. Massey

... gratification of the artistic sense amongst things useful; the works of artists sought for indeed, but too often as a profitable merchandise, or a vehicle of speculation, too often on grounds wholly foreign to their intrinsic worth as productions of a distinctive form of human genius, with laws and conditions ...
— Frederic Lord Leighton - An Illustrated Record of His Life and Work • Ernest Rhys

... the whole milk can be materially reduced by rejecting the fore milk, but it is questionable whether such rejection is worth while, except in the case of "sanitary" dairies where milk is produced with as low a germ content as possible. The intrinsic loss in butter fat in the fore milk is inconsiderable as the first few streams contain only about one-fifth the normal ...
— Outlines of Dairy Bacteriology, 8th edition - A Concise Manual for the Use of Students in Dairying • H. L. Russell

... principle of our republic. So long as you and I and all women are political slaves, it ill becomes us to meddle with the weightier discussions of our sovereign masters. It will be quite time enough for us, with self-respect, to declare ourselves for or against any party upon the intrinsic merit of its policy, when men shall recognize us as their political equals, duly register our names and respectfully count our opinions at the ballot-box, as a constitutional right—not as a high crime, punishable with "$500 fine or six months' imprisonment, ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper

... which this song was received were, it need scarcely be remarked, due more to the vigour of the chorus and the enthusiasm of the audience than to intrinsic merit. Even Robin Wright was carried off his legs for the moment, and, modest though he was, broke in at the chorus with such effect—his voice being shrill and clear—that, he unintentionally outyelled all the rest, ...
— The Battery and the Boiler - Adventures in Laying of Submarine Electric Cables • R.M. Ballantyne

... engaged for a more limited term; for the acceptance of volunteer corps, whose patriotic ardor may court a participation in urgent services; for detachments as they may be wanted of other portions of the militia, and for such a preparation of the great body as will proportion its usefulness to its intrinsic capacities. Nor can the occasion fail to remind you of the importance of those military seminaries which in every event will form a valuable and frugal ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 4 (of 4) of Volume 1: James Madison • Edited by James D. Richardson

... Troubadours. "The fame of the Troubadours," remarks Mr Hallam, "depends less on their positive excellence than on the darkness of preceding ages, the temporary sensation they excited, and their permanent influence on the state of European poetry." The intrinsic merit of the music of this period may be collected from the following observation of Dr Burney:—"However barbarous and wretched the melody and harmony of the secular songs of this period may have been, they were ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various

... The various intrinsic interest of these Rules is much enhanced by the curious story of their migration from an old Jesuit College in France to the copy-book of George Washington. In Backer's Jesuit Bibliography it is related that the "pensionnaires" of the College of La Fleche sent to those of the College at Pont-a-Mousson, ...
— George Washington's Rules of Civility - Traced to their Sources and Restored by Moncure D. Conway • Moncure D. Conway

... to shine by his own intrinsic powers, certainly owed much of his excellence to the wonderful merits of Homer. His susceptible imagination, vivid and correct, was (170) impregnated by the Odyssey, and warmed with the fire of the Iliad. Rivalling, ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus

... nature, and on that account contemplated them with admiration. They valued them (for such is the indestructible character of the human mind) for the pains they had bestowed on them. The sweat of their brow grew into a part as it were of the intrinsic merit of the articles; and that which had with so much pains been attained by them, they could not but regard ...
— Lives of the Necromancers • William Godwin

... principle to take one of its oval and one of its round figures, call them egg and apple, and make them the symbols of eternity. In fact, not depending wholly for significance upon the order of courses of a feast or the accident of alphabetical position, but having intrinsic characteristics in reference to the origin and fruition of life, the egg and apple translation, would be more acceptable to the general judgment, and it is recommended to enthusiasts who insist on finding symbols ...
— Sign Language Among North American Indians Compared With That Among Other Peoples And Deaf-Mutes • Garrick Mallery

... the defeat of Montcalm and Pontiac than before. The French had held adverse possession in spite of them for sixty years; the British held similar possession for fifteen more. The mere statement of the facts is enough to show the intrinsic worthlessness of the titles. The Northwest was acquired from France by Great Britain through conquest and treaty; in a precisely similar way—Clark taking the place of Wolfe—it was afterwards won from Britain by the United States. We ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume One - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1769-1776 • Theodore Roosevelt

... more natural explanation is that, from some cause or another, development at the apex of the petiole or on the surface of the nerves, instead of taking place in one plane only, as usual, takes place in more than one, thus showing the close relationship, if not the intrinsic identity, between the leaf-stalk and its continuation, the midrib, with the branch and its subdivisions. The form of the leaf-stalk and the arrangement of the vascular bundles in a circle in the case of the hazel, ...
— Vegetable Teratology - An Account of the Principal Deviations from the Usual Construction of Plants • Maxwell T. Masters

... feel that to me, the only living representative of the family name once borne by their lost darling, belonged all the rights and privileges which would have fallen to their own Amy Rutherford. It may be imagined how I had prized a gift precious, not only for its own intrinsic value, but for the many associations which ...
— Uncle Rutherford's Nieces - A Story for Girls • Joanna H. Mathews

... merchandise, will follow the same rules of exchange, and will be attracted to those parts where they bear a greater exchangeable or market value. The actual value of a coin in currency must be that of its intrinsic value; and if temporary circumstances cause it to bear a greater value elsewhere, thither it will tend, till the balance is restored, in defiance of any ...
— The Coinages of the Channel Islands • B. Lowsley

... had buckled on his grandson's heels on mounting his noble charger for his first field. There was a peculiar pang in parting with these—a sort of last relic of what he had been! But there was no alternative: all that had any intrinsic value must ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter

... keep the dramatis personae apart. But I did not grudge my friend the pleasure he took in his composition; I only grudged the time I was obliged to spend in listening to it. The novel was not worth writing from the point of view of its intrinsic merits; but it gave my old friend an occupation; he was never bored; he flew back to his book whenever he had an hour to spare. It saved him from dulness and ennui; it gave him, I doubt not, many a glowing hour of secret joy; it was an unmixed benefit to himself and ...
— From a College Window • Arthur Christopher Benson

... which burns at a lower temperature than acetylene itself. Manifestly, therefore, the ideal diluent for acetylene is a substance which possesses as high a flame temperature as acetylene and a certain degree of intrinsic illuminating power, while the lower the flame temperature of the diluent and the less its intrinsic illuminating power, the less efficiently will the acetylene act as an enriching material. According to Love, Hempel, Wedding, and others, if acetylene is mixed with coal-gas ...
— Acetylene, The Principles Of Its Generation And Use • F. H. Leeds and W. J. Atkinson Butterfield

... persons while you lash the crimes Steady assurance, with seeming modesty Suspicion of age, no woman, let her be ever so old, ever forgive Take the hue of the company you are with Taking up adventitious, proves their want of intrinsic merit The present moments are the only ones we are sure of Those whom you can make like themselves better Timidity and diffidence To be heard with success, you must be heard with pleasure To be pleased one must please Trifle only with triflers; ...
— Widger's Quotations from Chesterfield's Letters to his Son • David Widger

... where the wool is not bought from traders, but carded, spun and dyed by the weaver, the Navajo blanket is a perfect production of its kind, and I cannot help wondering that the manufacture of these rug-like blankets—some of which are of great intrinsic value—should have been so long confined to a primitive race, living at our very doors. The whole process of spinning, dyeing and weaving could be carried on in any farmhouse, using the coarsest and least valuable wool, and by reliable and well-chosen colour, good weight ...
— How to make rugs • Candace Wheeler

... decide for themselves;' adding that, 'whether true or false, the narrative is written with consummate ability and possesses intense interest.' But others were more credulous. According to the 'Mercantile Advertiser' the story carried 'intrinsic evidence of being an authentic document.' The 'Albany Daily Advertiser' had read the article 'with unspeakable emotions of pleasure and astonishment.' The 'New York Times' announced that 'the writer (Dr. Andrew Grant) displays the most extensive and accurate knowledge of astronomy; ...
— Myths and Marvels of Astronomy • Richard A. Proctor

... his efforts were successful, and the incredulous Robert beheld his uncle invert his precious burden and send a clinking, intrinsic shower of coin to ...
— The Flaw in the Sapphire • Charles M. Snyder

... which differ from that of every other. Silver dollars coined in Mexico, and British dollars coined in Bombay, also circulate freely at the open ports of trade and for some distance inland, passing at a little above their intrinsic value. Carolus dollars, introduced long ago and no longer coined, are retained in current use in several parts of the interior, chiefly the tea-growing districts. Being preferred by the people, and as the supply cannot be added ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various

... Miss Rooth." He felt, however, that this was scarcely adequate and he continued: "The truth is that its being important for me to go is a matter quite independent of that young lady's wishing it or not wishing it. There happens to be a definite intrinsic propriety in it which determines the thing and which it would take me long ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James

... which he accomplished, remarkable as it is from its intrinsic qualities, is also surprising from the rapidity with which it was performed, in spite of the distractions and obstacles that attended it. It would seem that in less than two years from the date of Clement's ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, No. 38, December, 1860 • Various

... in leading the way which it was necessary for the literary language to follow. Philologists and dictionary makers appear, however, to have hitherto overlooked Barclay's works, doubtless owing to their rarity, but their intrinsic value as well as their position in relation to the history of the language demand ...
— The Ship of Fools, Volume 1 • Sebastian Brandt

... have lost the war it is utterly inconceivable that they would ever have defaulted upon that particular portion of their debt, because, being their foreign debt, it has a special standing and intrinsic security. ...
— Right Above Race • Otto Hermann Kahn

... excellent Editor, however, has unquestionably referred them to an earlier date than can be truly assigned to them.[160] Independently of the material fact which they are intended to establish, they carry with them much intrinsic interest of their own; and although the detail of the (p. 167) evidence in the body of the work might seem to impede unnecessarily the progress of the narrative, the dissertation in its detached form is recommended to the reader's careful ...
— Henry of Monmouth, Volume 1 - Memoirs of Henry the Fifth • J. Endell Tyler

... they compose their sermons with such art and eloquence, and introduce into them the strange doctrine of justification by faith, that they do not know whether good ought to be done or not. They preach faith as intrinsic good, and separate this from the good of charity, which they call meritorious, and thus not acceptable to God. But, when those who dwell in the eastern and southern quarters of the city hear such sermons, they go out of the temples; and the preachers afterwards are ...
— The Book of Religions • John Hayward

... premature disclosures. Ultimately satisfied as to the origin of the fragments, he entreats the reader not, indeed, to surrender, but simply to suspend his judgment until he has carefully examined them, conceiving that, apart from all external proof, they rest upon an intrinsic evidence, the force of which it will be difficult to resist. Nay, he is even of opinion that an impartial student will find it easier to believe in their planetary origin than in their emanating from an ordinary human brain. The practical value of the facts, ...
— Another World - Fragments from the Star City of Montalluyah • Benjamin Lumley (AKA Hermes)

... investigation to acquire.... Commencing with this address as a political pamphlet, the reader will leave it as an historical work, brief, complete, profound, truthful—which will survive the time and occasion that called it forth and be esteemed hereafter, no less for its intrinsic worth than its unpretending modesty." [Footnote: Pamphlet edition with notes and prefaces by C. C. Nott and Cephas Brainerd, September, 1860. Quoted in Nicolay and Hay, "Abraham ...
— The French in the Heart of America • John Finley

... Such rebellious movements are highly contagious; from the confines of one municipality they sweep on to other sections, stimulating action and inspiring emulation. The New York labor campaign of 1886 was an intrinsic part and result of the general labor movement throughout the United States. And it was the most significant manifestation of the onward march of the workers; elsewhere the labor unions had not gone beyond the ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers

... Hyperion occupied his evenings his mornings were spent over a satirical fairy-poem, The Cap and Bells, in the metre of the Faerie Queene. This metre, however, was ill-suited to the subject; satire was not natural to him, and the poem has little intrinsic merit. ...
— Keats: Poems Published in 1820 • John Keats

... cognitive in the specific sense, then, it must be self-transcendent; and we must prevail upon the god to CREATE A REALITY OUTSIDE OF IT to correspond to its intrinsic quality Q. Thus only can it be redeemed from the condition of being a solipsism. If now the new created reality RESEMBLE the feeling's quality Q I say that the feeling may be held by us TO BE COGNIZANT ...
— The Meaning of Truth • William James

... Sandwich Islanders, the North American Indians, also have their legends of the origin and altered fortunes of the human race. The resemblances between many of these stories are better accounted for by the intrinsic similarities of the subject, of the mind, of nature, and of mental action, than by the supposition of ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger

... somehow come to be constituted, through its entire mass, on Cromwell's extraordinary principle, announced by him to Hampden at the beginning of the war, that the power of an army depends ultimately on the "spirit," or intrinsic moral mood, of the individuals composing it. Imagine that the atoms of this army were all "men of a spirit," men who had not fought as hirelings, but as earnest partakers in a great cause. Imagine them, if you like, as an army of fanatics. This ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson

... envy, hatred, malice, are in themselves bad, irrespective of results, that such a thing as slander is ipso facto stamped as irredeemably bad long before any of its evil consequences may be manifest. We look not so much to consequence, but to the intention of the doer, and the intrinsic nature of the action performed. Pleasure and pain considerations are the last things we take into account when we weigh an action in the scales of justice. The theory is therefore hopelessly inadequate to our needs; it breaks ...
— Morality as a Religion - An exposition of some first principles • W. R. Washington Sullivan

... French peasantry in their field occupations, and is still patronized by a large portion of Queen Victoria's loving subjects, is of the highest antiquity, and based, we have no doubt, on utility. We must be candid enough to say, that we give up the argument as to the intrinsic beauty of this species of cap—truly we think it the very type of all that is slovenly; but for use, there is not a more comfortable, portable, pliable, buyable, and washable a commodity, than your—nightcap are we to say? no—than ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various

... there is in colours and petticoats; and now I fear they are drugs in the market. It is hard to say why a good story should not have a fair chance of success whatever may be its bent; why it should not be reckoned to be good by its own intrinsic merits alone; but such is by no means the case. I was waiting once, when I was young at the work, in the back parlour of an eminent publisher, hoping to see his eminence on a small matter of business touching a three—volumed manuscript which I held in my hand. The eminent publisher, having probably ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope



Words linked to "Intrinsic" :   intrinsic factor, extrinsic, essential, anatomy, intrinsic fraud, integral, constitutional, internal



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