"Misuse" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... mischievous example to—if not actually misleading—his companions.' That's a pleasant account for a father to read! Here am I, sending you to an expensive school, furnishing you with great natural capacity and excellent abilities, and—and—every other school requisite, and all you do is to misuse them! It's disgraceful! And misleading your companions, too! Why, at your age, they ought to mislead you—No, I don't mean that—but what I may tell you is that I've written a very strong letter ...
— Vice Versa - or A Lesson to Fathers • F. Anstey
... is made free!—Man by birthright is free, Though the tyrant may deem him but born for his tool. Whatever the shout of the rabble may be— Whatever the ranting misuse of the fool— Still fear not the slave, when he breaks from his chain, For the man made a freeman grows safe in ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... been another attempt to misuse and pervert this part of the face which I scarcely dare to touch upon, for it is so utterly fantastic and mystical that I fear the charge of heresy if I give words to my thoughts. It occurs among bats, a tribe of obscure creatures about which common ...
— Concerning Animals and Other Matters • E.H. Aitken, (AKA Edward Hamilton)
... pursued by the Ministry, and its effect upon the condition of the country; and said that public distress had been aggravated by continual shocks from neglected legislation at home, "while abroad they had strained the prerogative by gross misuse, had weakened the Empire by needless wars, and dishonored it in the eyes of Europe by their clandestine acquisition of the Island ...
— The Grand Old Man • Richard B. Cook
... being. But it was likely that the bootlegging operations had no connection whatever with the missing money and that the evidence Wade wanted was merely an additional net with which to close in on this man who had usurped control of the Interprovincial Loan & Savings Company—misuse of trust funds ...
— Every Man for Himself • Hopkins Moorhouse
... Shop. There were shelves of machines, duly boxed and equipped with Mahon units, but not yet activated. Activation meant turning them on and giving them a sort of basic training in the tasks they were designed to do. But also there were machines which had broken down—invariably through misuse, said Sergeant Bellews acidly—and had been sent to the Rehab Shop to be re-trained in ...
— The Machine That Saved The World • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... the evil we can do. When we, acknowledging our own vileness, desire to return into His grace, He remembers our ingratitude no more,—no, not even the graces He has given us, for the purpose of chastising us, because of our misuse of them; yea, rather, they help to procure our pardon the sooner, as of persons who have been members of His household, and who, as they say, ...
— The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus • Teresa of Avila
... expected to be more reverent than other men to those divine beings of whose nature he partook, whose society he might enjoy even here on earth. He might be unfaithful to his own high lineage; he might misuse his gifts by selfishness and self-will; he might, like Ajax, rage with mere jealousy and wounded pride till his rage ended in shameful madness and suicide. He might rebel against the very gods, and all laws of right and wrong, till he ...
— Health and Education • Charles Kingsley
... aggravated me by his insolence." To aggravate is to augment the disagreeableness of something already disagreeable, or the badness of something bad. But a person cannot be aggravated, even if disagreeable or bad. Women are singularly prone to misuse of ...
— Write It Right - A Little Blacklist of Literary Faults • Ambrose Bierce
... that you confess to the true and only source of all help. You Christians, as you call yourselves, have ever seemed to me unwilling to mention the name of God save when cursing your fellows, and then you misuse it glibly enough. Yet there are some among you who are more consistent in their professions. Go, fulfil your commission. I ...
— The Middy and the Moors - An Algerine Story • R.M. Ballantyne
... one of us who disobeys that command must suffer. Let us see how it works. Bishop Vincent says: 'Sunday is ill-spent if it sends us back to our weekly work irritated, weary and reluctant'—and Sunday will never do that for us unless we misuse the day which God has given us. If we spend the day in worrying about our everyday affairs, if we spend it in chasing around after senseless amusements which weary the body without enlightening the heart and the mind, if we allow ourselves to follow paths which lead away from truth and right, ...
— Crayon and Character: Truth Made Clear Through Eye and Ear - Or, Ten-Minute Talks with Colored Chalks • B.J. Griswold
... schools we need to-day more than ever,—the training of deft hands, quick eyes and ears, and the broader, deeper, higher culture of gifted minds. The power of the ballot we need in sheer self-defense, and as a guarantee of good faith. We may misuse it, but we can scarce do worse in this respect than our whilom masters. Freedom, too, the long-sought, we still seek,—the freedom of life and limb, the freedom to work and think. Work, culture, and liberty,—all ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various
... indulgent God would be an unjust God, and a cruel God likewise. If God be just, as He is, then He has boundless pity for those who are weak, but boundless wrath for the strong who misuse the weak. Boundless pity for those who are ignorant, misled, and out of the right way; but boundless wrath for those who mislead them and put them out of the ...
— Daily Thoughts - selected from the writings of Charles Kingsley by his wife • Charles Kingsley
... understand. The only thing I can think of is that when that will was made he feared there might be some person or persons, possibly relatives, into whose hands she might fall, when she was young, and who might misuse her fortune. This is surmise. Anyway, after providing for her mother he leaves everything to Rosebud. But the legacy is not to take effect until ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... art twice forsworn, to me love swearing; In act thy bed-vow broke, and new faith torn, In vowing new hate after new love bearing: But why of two oaths' breach do I accuse thee, When I break twenty? I am perjur'd most; For all my vows are oaths but to misuse thee, And all my honest faith in thee is lost: For I have sworn deep oaths of thy deep kindness, Oaths of thy love, thy truth, thy constancy; And, to enlighten thee, gave eyes to blindness, Or made them swear against the thing they see; For I have ...
— Shakespeare's Sonnets • William Shakespeare
... of their private store to mitigate the pangs of the sufferers, no gratitude was entertained to the British public or to the government. Starving Ireland armed to strike down her benefactors with weapons procured by the misuse of the boon whicli these benefactors had extended. However painful it may be to relate the story of such turpitude, truth constrains it: the Irish peasant begged, that he might arm against the charitable hand that succoured him. Persons actually perished leaving ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... list synonyms, and in some cases, actually adds a discussion to define the various limits. For fuller, more careful discrimination a good book of synonyms should be consulted. Except for some general consideration of words which everyone is certain to use or misuse, it is better to consult a treatise on synonyms when need arises than to study it consecutively. In consultation the material will be fixed by instant use. In study it may fade before being employed; ...
— Public Speaking • Clarence Stratton
... has been greatly misused in the sense of little love for work and lack of energy, while ridicule has concealed the misuse. This much-discussed question has met with the same fate as certain panaceas and specifies of the quacks who by ascribing to them impossible virtues have discredited them. In the Middle Ages, and even in some Catholic ...
— The Indolence of the Filipino • Jose Rizal
... of physical nature as the condition of life—environment; the other is constituted by the phenomena of life and the relations of lives. Those who sincerely believe in preparedness for war as a preventive measure, misconceive and attempt to misuse the emotion of fear and its modes of expression. It is as though we should strive tirelessly to develop machinery and methods for educating our children, the while ignorant of the laws of child development and branding ...
— Popular Science Monthly Volume 86
... wearing a venerable aspect. Before dinner he gathered wild roses to adorn the table, and even gave a careful touch himself to the arrangement of the wines and fruits. He was in excellent spirits, full of wit and lively talk. Speaking of the use and misuse of words, he quoted Chateaubriand's mistake (afterwards corrected) in his translation of 'Paradise Lost,' when ...
— Authors and Friends • Annie Fields
... possessions. Austere faces, inexorable discipline, penance in this world and terror in the next—nothing graceful or gentle anywhere, and the void in my cowed heart everywhere—this was my childhood, if I may so misuse the word as to apply it to such a beginning ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... that their extravagance is keeping people at the other end of the scale in drudgery and dulness. Of course the difficulty of it is, that if we offered the lowest stratum of workers a great increase of leisure, they would largely misuse it; and that is why I believe that in the future a large part of the education of workers will be devoted to teaching them how to employ their leisure agreeably and not noxiously. And I believe that there are thousands of cases in the world which are infinitely worse than the case of Keats—who, ...
— Father Payne • Arthur Christopher Benson
... is still, my children, and so it will be to the end. In those old Greeks, and in us also, all strength and virtue come from God. But if men grow proud and self-willed, and misuse God's fair gifts, He lets them go their own ways, and fall pitifully, that the glory may be His alone. God help us all, and give us wisdom, and courage to do noble deeds! but God keep pride from us when we have done them, lest we fall, ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes
... are attentive and attracted to us in the same degree in which they believe we are befriended by France. Confidence in us they will never have, every glance at the map prevents that; and they know that their separate interests and the misuse of their sovereignty always stand in the way of the whole tendency of Prussian policy. They clearly recognise the danger which lies in this; it is one against which the unselfishness of our Most Gracious Master alone gives them a temporary security. The opinions of the King, which ought at least ...
— Bismarck and the Foundation of the German Empire • James Wycliffe Headlam
... exchange for my mother and me," gloomily laughed Ebbo, "to lose thee, my sublimated self, for a rude, savage lord, who would straightway undo all our work, and rate and misuse our sweet mother for ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge
... follow you," he admitted. "You will not accept my offer because you are afraid that when the effect of these beans has worn off, you will misuse the wealth which will come ...
— The Double Life Of Mr. Alfred Burton • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Accordingly, it may be copied freely without permission of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). The official seal of the CIA, however, may NOT be copied without permission as required by the CIA Act of 1949 (50 U.S.C. section 403m). Misuse of the official seal of the CIA could result in civil and ...
— The 2003 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... Management 2. what we have defined as the "Transitory" plan of management 3. management which not only is not striving to be scientific, but which confounds "science" with "system." Both its advocates and opponents have been guilty of misuse of the word. Still, in spite of this, the very fact that the word has had a wide use, that it has become habitual to think of the new type of management as "Scientific," makes its choice advisable. We shall use it, but restrict its content. With us "Scientific Management" is used to mean ...
— The Psychology of Management - The Function of the Mind in Determining, Teaching and - Installing Methods of Least Waste • L. M. Gilbreth
... Satan, you cannot delude me into thinking I am holy. The truth is, I am all sin. My sins are not imaginary transgressions, but sins against the first table, unbelief, doubt, despair, contempt, hatred, ignorance of God, ingratitude towards Him, misuse of His name, neglect of His Word, etc.; and sins against the second table, dishonor of parents, disobedience of government, coveting of another's possessions, etc. Granted that I have not committed murder, adultery, theft, and similar sins in deed, nevertheless I have committed them ...
— Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians • Martin Luther
... disciple," said the sages, "may chain himself to a tree, and gaze upon the sun until he is deprived of the faculty of vision. He may drive an iron bar through his cheeks and tongue, thus preventing all misuse of the gift of speech. It is open to him to bury himself in the earth up to his waist, relying for his maintenance on the alms of pious donors. He may recline upon a couch studded with spikes, until from the induration of his skin he shall have merited the title of a rhinoceros among ...
— The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales • Richard Garnett
... of pleasure. For instance, if a man sees that he is too keen in the pursuit of honour, let him think over its right use, the end for which it should be pursued, and the means whereby he may attain it. Let him not think of its misuse, and its emptiness, and the fickleness of mankind, and the like, whereof no man thinks except through a morbidness of disposition; with thoughts like these do the most ambitious most torment themselves, when they despair of gaining ...
— The Ethics • Benedict de Spinoza
... malevolence: so shalt thou be loved of Allah. Adorn thine inner man and Allah shall adorn thine outer man. Accept the excuse of him who excuseth self to thee and hate not any one of the Moslems. Draw near unto those who withdraw from thee and excuse those that misuse thee: so shalt thou be the friend of the Prophets. Let thine affairs, both public and private, be in Allah's charge, and fear Him with the fear of one who knoweth he is dead and who fareth towards Resurrection and Judgement stead between the hands of the Lord of Dread; and remember that to ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... brought the architect's plans with him and explained them with care. They were clever plans which made the most of a limited area. He did not even faintly smile when it revealed itself to him, as it unconsciously did, that Mrs. Gareth-Lawless regarded their adroit arrangement as a singular misuse of space which could have been much better employed for necessities of her own. She was much depressed by the ground floor addition which might have enlarged her dining-room, but which was made into a sitting-room for Robin and ...
— The Head of the House of Coombe • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... has made, in past generations, to escape from the evil conditions into which she has fallen. For she has been convicted more than once of her sins of omission, of the perversion of her powers, and the misuse of her opportunities, and has bestirred herself to cast off the yokes that were oppressing her, and the bands that were impeding her progress. It cannot be said that she has ever yet become fully conscious ...
— The Church and Modern Life • Washington Gladden
... they are only what I conceive to be necessary precautions. Acrimony and anger have long since died away; and I have but too much cause to condemn those actions of my life in which they were indulged. The relation, whom I hope to find, I may unfortunately discover to be more likely to misuse the wealth, that has devolved to me by the death of the elder branches of my family, than to make it a blessing to himself and others. It is true he is not my heir at law. I have no heir: what I possess is at my own disposal. ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... are nearer than their fellows to the divine working principle. It is not necessary for us to be conscious of that principle in order to get much of its result, though consciousness enables us to get more of it. The strong are strong because of harmony with God, at least to some extent. They may misuse their strength, as we can misuse anything; but the mere fact of possessing it shows a certain degree of touch with the Universal. But I am speaking chiefly of the weak, of those who think first of all in terms of restriction ...
— The Conquest of Fear • Basil King
... keen interest in the possibilities of eugenics. This has led some sex hygienists, child welfare workers, and persons similarly engaged, to attempt to capitalize the interest in eugenics by appropriating the name for their own use. We strongly object to any such misuse of the word, which should designate the application of genetics to the human race. Sex hygiene, child welfare, and other sanitary and sociological movements should stand on their own feet and leave to eugenics the scope which its Greek derivation ...
— Applied Eugenics • Paul Popenoe and Roswell Hill Johnson
... Leete's reply, "but the conditions of human life have changed, and with them the motives of human action. The organization of society with you was such that officials were under a constant temptation to misuse their power for the private profit of themselves or others. Under such circumstances it seems almost strange that you dared entrust them with any of your affairs. Nowadays, on the contrary, society is so constituted that there is absolutely no way ...
— Looking Backward - 2000-1887 • Edward Bellamy
... make out—Cap Meagher, he mumbles so," confessed the doorkeeper. "Somethin' about misuse of police property, I take it ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... and unrecorded quite By those who might have touched with Raphael's hand The large imperial legend of our race, Ere it brought forth the braggarts of an hour, Self-worshippers who love their imaged strength, And as a symbol for their own proud selves Misuse the sacred name of this dear land, While England to the Empire of her soul Like some great Prophet passes through the crowd That cannot understand; for he must climb Up to that sovran thunder-smitten peak Where he shall grave and trench on adamant The ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... scholar, I am not one of those who misuse the English speech, and, being foolishly led by the hasty custom of scriveners and printers to write the letters "T" and "H" joined together, which resembleth a "Y," do incontinently jump to the conclusion the THE is pronounced "Ye,"—the like ...
— New Burlesques • Bret Harte
... be emphasized that FBI identification records are for the OFFICIAL use of law enforcement and governmental agencies and misuse of such records by disseminating them to unauthorized persons may result in cancellation of FBI ...
— The Science of Fingerprints - Classification and Uses • Federal Bureau of Investigation
... my dear boy; but we never know what is in store for us. Should any of us ever return, I presume it would be to live in a more humble way; and for my part, I should prefer that it were so, for although I trust I did not greatly misuse that wealth which I so long supposed to be mine, I should not be sorry to have much less, and therefore ...
— The Settlers in Canada • Frederick Marryat
... may be seen in the cases of the Black Magicians spoken of in the occult writings, and also in the cases of well known characters in history and in modern life, who manifest an enormous Will which they misuse. All of this class of people of great Will have stumbled or grown blindly into a consciousness (or partial consciousness) of the real nature, but lack the restraining influence of the higher teachings. But such misuse of the Will brings pain and unrest to the user, and he is eventually driven ...
— A Series of Lessons in Raja Yoga • Yogi Ramacharaka
... principles which, if properly applied, may serve to correct this misuse of our American soil. The careful tiller should note that all soils whatever which lie on declivities having a slope of more than one foot in thirty inevitably and rapidly waste when subject to plough tillage. This instrument tends to smear and consolidate ...
— Outlines of the Earth's History - A Popular Study in Physiography • Nathaniel Southgate Shaler
... been lowered by his comrades and he could not get out without their help. In the early days some of the Turkish officers who could talk English even took the extreme risk of mixing among the troops and passing false orders. One of these spies was only discovered through misuse of a well-known Australian slang-word. No one in the Australian army but knows the meaning of "dinkum." Its meaning is something the same as the American "on the level!" and is probably the commonest ...
— "Over There" with the Australians • R. Hugh Knyvett
... proposition, I say that one can see clearly how the Latin would have given its good gift to few, but the Mother Tongue will serve many. For the willingness of heart which awaits this service, is in those who, through misuse of the world, have left Literature to men who have made of her a harlot; and these nobles are princes, barons, knights, and many other noble people, not only men, but women, whose language is that of the people and unlearned. Again, the Latin would not have been giver of a useful gift, as ...
— The Banquet (Il Convito) • Dante Alighieri
... invisible corpuscles. This is the mental poverty into which the enemies of religious faith unwittingly fall. They pervert that instrument of reason whose true use is to supplement and fortify imperfect intelligence, and misuse it to discredit and overthrow ...
— Delsarte System of Oratory • Various
... past and future which we may conceive to exist, but of the existence of which it is impossible we should achieve any proof, much less any detailed knowledge, appears to me an unprofitable and unsatisfactory misuse of time and talent.... ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... contradiction, that the people who constructed these works had only stone tools. Now to call a people "civilized" who have only stone tools is utterly misleading. Nothing but confusion of ideas and darkening of counsel can come from such a misuse of words. Such a people may be in a high degree interesting and entitled to credit for what they have achieved, but the grade of culture which they have reached ...
— The Discovery of America Vol. 1 (of 2) - with some account of Ancient America and the Spanish Conquest • John Fiske
... all the sources of human interest, to be successfully treated by any modern author. Mr. Keats has unquestionably a very beautiful imagination, and a great familiarity with the finest diction of English poetry; but he must learn not to misuse or misapply these advantages; and neither to waste the good gifts of nature and study on intractable themes, nor to luxuriate too recklessly on such as ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... this. For the rest, the critic, in speaking of a plot, may have meant what young ladies call by that name—a love intrigue, in which case he is to be blamed solely for misuse of a good word. I am consoled by the New York Dial calling my plot "rightly filmy." Nobody could have expressed ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas
... forever in assault. In the present condition of the earth, evil is a more active principle than good, and the evil would prevail. It is for these reasons that we are not only solemnly bound to administer our lore only to those who will not misuse and pervert it, but that we place our ordeal in tests that purify the passions and elevate the desires. And Nature in this controls and assists us: for it places awful guardians and insurmountable barriers between the ambition of vice and the heaven of ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... deepest respect for his undoubted position, the two things are not quite identical. "Biology, like theology, has its dogmas. Leaders have their disciples and blind followers." Wise words! They are those of the author with whom we are dealing. To say "we know" when really we only surmise is a misuse of language, just as it is also a misuse to ask the question "Does nature make a departure from its previously ordered procedure and substitute chance for law?" since the ordinary reader is all too apt to forget that "Nature" is a mere abstraction, and that to speak of Nature doing ...
— Science and Morals and Other Essays • Bertram Coghill Alan Windle
... partly through the operation of other causes. It has been plausibly argued that most things worth saying have been said already; that even the words best fitted for poetic expression have been worn out, have been weakened by familiar usage or soiled by misuse, and that the resources of language for adequate presentation of ideas and feelings are running very low. Nevertheless, we all look forward hopefully to the coming of the original genius who is to strike ...
— Studies in Literature and History • Sir Alfred Comyn Lyall
... that we have done wrong in going against public opinion concerning the book Frequent Communion and the teaching of Jansenius. It is true that there are only too many who misuse this Divine Sacrament. I myself am the most guilty, and I beg you to pray that God may pardon me . . . . You say also that as Jansenius read all the works of St. Augustine ten times, and his treatises on grace thirty times, the Mission Priests cannot safely question ...
— Life of St. Vincent de Paul • F.A. [Frances Alice] Forbes
... refreshings; but when you lay hold of him, pluck his pinions, pen him in a yard, and fall down and worship him—then, with the blessed vengeance of his master, he deals plague and confusion and terror, to stay the idolatry. If I misuse or waste or hoard the divine thing, I pray my Master to see to it—my God to punish me. Any fire rather than be given over to the mean idol! And now I will make an offer to my townsfolk in the face of this congregation—that, whoever ...
— Paul Faber, Surgeon • George MacDonald
... of the question. Had she plunged into 'gaiety' on New Year's night, the consequences would be other than instant starvation. They might have been 'guilty splendour.' She had been most abominably misused, and it was to the last degree improbable that any mortal should so misuse an honest quiet lass. But the grossly improbable had certainly occurred. It was next to impossible that, in 1856, a respectable-looking man should offer to take a little boy for a drive, and that, six weeks later, the naked body of the ...
— Historical Mysteries • Andrew Lang
... give him his due,— was afraid of no man. He was honest, and ashamed of nothing that he did. And after his fashion he had chivalrous ideas about women. He was willing to thrash any man that ill-used a woman, and would certainly be a most dangerous antagonist to any man who would misuse a woman belonging to him. But Ruby had told the truth of him in saying that he was slow of speech, and what the world calls stupid in regard to all forms of expression. He knew good meal from bad as well as any man, and the price at which he could buy it so as to leave ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... Lord Canning was an English statesman, and he was surpassingly magnanimous. There is another virtue which in Holy Writ is taken as the type and sum of all righteousness—Justice—and he was eminently just. The misuse of special powers granted early in the Mutiny called for Lord Canning's interference, and the consequence was a flood of savage abuse; the violence and bitterness of which it is now hard to realise." (Quarterly Review, April, ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... misuse St. John's doctrine, that if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves. We may deceive ourselves in ...
— The Good News of God • Charles Kingsley
... not believe it," he repeated reflectively. "There is no such thing as an angel 'passing'; it is a misuse of terms. If there are such things as angels, their changes of place cannot be described as motion, seeing that from the very nature of things such changes must be instantaneous, not involving time ...
— Mr. Isaacs • F. Marion Crawford
... in itself a sin, is in itself right; it is only in its misuse that it becomes reprehensible in a given case. Concealment is a prime duty of man; as truly a duty as truth-speaking, or chastity, or honesty. God, who cannot lie to his creatures, conceals much from his creatures. "The secret things ...
— A Lie Never Justifiable • H. Clay Trumbull
... to compare the tenant of a small holding in Mayo with an English farmer—properly so called. The latter is a man engaged in a large business, and must possess, or, as I regret to be obliged to write, have been possessed of capital. The misuse of the word farmer and its application to the little peasant cultivators here can only lead to confusion. The proper standard of comparison with the so-called Mayo farmer is the English farmer's labourer. ...
— Disturbed Ireland - Being the Letters Written During the Winter of 1880-81. • Bernard H. Becker
... these questions is that the cure for all that stolid insensibility, and its resulting misuse of capacity, and the absorption in daily visible things, is remembrance of His and our past—'Do ye not remember?' It was only that same morning, or the day before at the furthest, that one of the miracles of feeding the thousands had been performed. Christ wonders, as well He might, at the short ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Mark • Alexander Maclaren
... then, as the scholar is nothing without the historic sense, he will be apt to restore not really obsolete or really worn-out words, but the finer edge of words still in use: ascertain, communicate, discover—words like these it has been part of our "business" to misuse. And still, as language was made for man, he will be no authority for correctnesses which, limiting freedom of utterance, were yet but accidents in their origin; as if one vowed not to say "its," which ought to have been in ...
— Appreciations, with an Essay on Style • Walter Horatio Pater
... have been soldier, sailor, traveller, and adventurer; and these are all trades in which men enjoy to-day, because they have no surety of to-morrow. But though I may misuse mine own leisure, I have never neglected the duty ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... ostentatiously with expensive entertainments or anything striking, but in all small ways, scarcely noticeable except in general effect, but none the less expensive. They could not afford it; the past nine months had been very difficult, first the Captain's unfortunate misuse of the cheque, then Violet's engagement and the necessary entertainment that it involved, and then her wedding. Financially they were in a very bad way, but that did not prevent them spending—or owing—in a rather lordly ...
— The Good Comrade • Una L. Silberrad
... may lead many to imagine that the persons who use the name of God in one or other of these extended senses retain certain theological opinions which they may in fact have long abandoned. Thus the misuse of the name of God may resemble the stratagem in war of putting up dummies to make an enemy imagine that a fort is still held after it has been evacuated by the garrison. I am far from alleging or insinuating that the illegitimate extension of the divine name is deliberately ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer
... said Lestocq, after a moment's reflection, "that any one who dares so misuse his tongue as to revile the sublime majesty of his emperor or empress with irreverent language, such criminal shall have the instrument of his crime, his tongue, ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach
... saying it was for my sake. And then one of them shook him and said: 'O thou dog, to so misuse thine own wife! Now listen. In three days' time we two of the Trenton will have a day's liberty, and we shall come here and see if thou hast again beaten thy wife. And if thou hast but so much as mata pio'd her we shall each ...
— The Call Of The South - 1908 • Louis Becke
... thing. You should not insult the brutes by such a misuse of that word; they have not deserved it," and he went on talking like that. "It is like your paltry race—always lying, always claiming virtues which it hasn't got, always denying them to the higher animals, ...
— The Mysterious Stranger and Other Stories • Mark Twain
... development, above all things, lovers of truth: and that, therefore, at whatever risk of seeming to lend support to views which they disliked, they felt it their duty to take the first opportunity of publicly repudiating Professor Owen's misuse ...
— On the Relations of Man to the Lower Animals • Thomas H. Huxley
... for so is, in certain cases, almost universal. If authority could justify error and convert the faulty into the faultless, it were idle to expose a misuse in justification of which can be cited most of the best names in ...
— Essays AEsthetical • George Calvert
... the venereal act is consummated may be discordant with right reason in relation to other persons; and this in two ways. First, with regard to the woman, with whom a man has connection, by reason of due honor not being paid to her; and thus there is incest, which consists in the misuse of a woman who is related by consanguinity or affinity. Secondly, with regard to the person under whose authority the woman is placed: and if she be under the authority of a husband, it is adultery, if under the authority of her father, it is seduction, in the absence of violence, and ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... far better than Carlyle. And of this fact we can produce one plain evidence in the matter of which we speak. Carlyle, in his general dislike of the revolutionary movement, lumped liberty and democracy together and said that the chief objection to democracy was that it involved the excess and misuse of liberty; he called democracy "anarchy or no-rule." Dickens, with far more philosophical insight and spiritual delicacy, saw that the real danger of democracy is that it tends to the very opposite of anarchy; even to the very opposite of liberty. He lamented in America the freedom ...
— Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens • G. K. Chesterton
... shut his lips more obviously. The other men, who were in the plot, grinned, and this added the last touch to Captain Doane's indignation. He sprang to his feet. One of his peculiarities was a constant misuse of words, and now, in his excitement, he ...
— The Story of a Pioneer - With The Collaboration Of Elizabeth Jordan • Anna Howard Shaw
... have its importance," answered Professor Haddock, "but it is necessary to examine if when she surrenders herself to us she offers us a delicious fruit-garden or a plot of thistles and dandelions. And then, do we not misuse words? In love, a woman lends herself rather than gives herself. Look at the pretty Madame ...
— Penguin Island • Anatole France
... the idiot simile must have been merely the misuse of language so common among the ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... Joe, shaking him still. "You'll misuse the little lad before my face, will you? And squeal like a pig to be ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang
... to extend this kind of criticism to the Duomo of Milan. Speaking strictly, a more unlucky combination of different styles—the pyramidal facade of Lombard architecture and the long thin lights of German Gothic, for example—a clumsier misuse of ill-appropriated details in the heavy piers of the nave, or a more disastrous adjustment of the monster windows to the main lines of the nave and aisles, could scarcely be imagined. Yet no other church, perhaps, in Europe leaves ...
— Renaissance in Italy Vol. 3 - The Fine Arts • John Addington Symonds
... signify? That I am too young to manage my own affairs? That I must set my clock as others order? Good soul!" putting her arms around the older woman. "Don't worry about Elsa Chetwood. Her life is her own, but she will never misuse it." ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... times he allowed himself to be out of reach of the telephone were during Holy Week and possibly on Saturdays. Everyone who came to the office was able to see him without any formality. I remember showing him an article in a church paper on the misuse of the title "Reverend," and suggesting that it might be well to print it in the Sunday leaflet. He was amused and only said, "What does it matter what we are called as long as they call us." This intense desire to give of himself lay back of his disappointment when friends and parishioners ...
— Frank H. Nelson of Cincinnati • Warren C. Herrick
... and overflowing joy in creation, Traherne is conscious that the world has {332} its "dreggy parts," that it has been "muddied" by man's misuse of it, and that the havoc of sin is apparent. The light which shined in infancy becomes eclipsed as the customs and manners of life close down over it and cover it. Men's mouths are full of talk of fleeting, vulgar, and worthless things, and they speak no syllable of those ...
— Spiritual Reformers in the 16th & 17th Centuries • Rufus M. Jones
... claim a single supper; if he take more he is a thief (the mark of a prae-tabernal era when hospitality was waxing cold through misuse). ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... adds new weight to the conclusions reached in this book—that the causes of Bacon's Rebellion were deep-seated, that it grew out of the discontent caused by the Navigation Acts, the heavy taxes, the corrupting of the Assembly by Berkeley, and the misuse of the courts. It in no way shakes the conviction expressed by Thomas Mathews, who himself was involved in the rebellion, that the Indian war was the excuse for it ...
— Virginia under the Stuarts 1607-1688 • Thomas J. Wertenbaker
... I am not one of the feeble lambs whom you have beguiled by the misuse of your gifts and advantages; and who then are eager to kiss your hands. I am the daughter of Thomas; and another woman's betrothed, who craves my embraces on the way to his wedding, will learn to his rueing that there are women ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... enough to misuse the prince, to vex Claudio, to undo Hero, and kill Leonato: look you for ...
— Much Ado About Nothing • William Shakespeare [Knight edition]
... the State of Louisiana even after the other departments of the government had been taken from the Negroes, in as much as the term of service of the Treasurer was six years rather than four, was investigated with a view to finding out some act of misuse of the public funds that he might be impeached and thrown out of office. The committee, of which E.D. White, now Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, was chairman, reported after much deliberation that Dubuclet's funds had been honestly handled and that there were no grounds on which ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 5, 1920 • Various
... of his thought on their practical theory of life, upon their ideals of existence, upon the courage, faith, and hope which enable them to work and live, feeling that life is worth while. We must, however, guard against misuse of Bergson, particularly such misuse of him as that made in another sphere, by the Syndicalists. We find that in France he has been welcomed by the Modernists of the Roman Catholic Church as an ally, and by not a few liberal ...
— Bergson and His Philosophy • J. Alexander Gunn
... acquittal, but if not acquittal, then a verdict of manslaughter. He showed that the only real evidence which could convict his man of murder was that of the witness Crozier. If he had been content to discredit evidence of the witness by an adroit but guarded misuse of the facts he had brought out regarding Crozier's past, to emphasise the fact that he was living under an assumed name and that his bona fides was doubtful, he might have impressed the jury to some slight degree. He could not, however, control the malice he felt, and he was smarting from ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... he used to be! How full of golden plans for his own advancement! How terrified of failure, of disease, of money losses, of death—of all the temporary, external, non-essential things that have nothing to do with the spirit! War is in itself damnable—a profligate misuse of the accumulated brain-stuff of centuries. Nevertheless, there's many a man who has no love of war, who previous to the war had cramped his soul with littleness and was chased by the bayonet of duty into the blood-stained largeness of the ...
— The Glory of the Trenches • Coningsby Dawson
... "Catholic," a most honoured term in ancient times, has in modern days been very unfortunate. Even now the Romanists misuse it for "Papistical," the Dissenters occasionally use it to signify "Latitudinarian," and the members of the Church of England are either afraid to use it at all, or else are perpetually harping upon it, as though ...
— Australia, its history and present condition • William Pridden
... all this heat at the present moment? Grant that the propositions denounced as erroneous were so in very deed, why should criminals standing under the shadow of public vengeance ready to descend, so childishly misuse the interval, mercifully allowed for their own defence, in reading lectures upon abstract political speculations, confessedly bearing no relation to any militant interest now in question? Quite as impertinent it would be, when called upon for the answer upon 'Guilty or not Guilty?' to read a section ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. 1 (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... of the Christmas Eve (I supposed) she wore an evening dress of black lace, and the only word for what she looked has suffered such misuse that one hesitates over it: yet that is what she was—regal—and no less! There was a sort of splendor about her. It detracted nothing from this that her expression was a little sad: something not uncommon with her lately; a certain melancholy, faint ...
— Beasley's Christmas Party • Booth Tarkington
... General Buller found it necessary in face of such frequent treachery, officially to warn his whole army to be on their guard against the white flag, a flag which to his personal knowledge was already through such misuse stained with the blood of two gallant British ...
— With the Guards' Brigade from Bloemfontein to Koomati Poort and Back • Edward P. Lowry
... or altered outside manufacturer's authorized Service Stations in any way so as in the judgment of the manufacturer to affect its stability, or on parts not made or authorized by the manufacturer have been used for replacement or other purposes, nor which has been subject to misuse, ...
— Delco Manuals: Radio Model 633, Delcotron Generator - Delco Radio Owner's Manual Model 633, Delcotron Generator Installation • Delco-Remy Division
... left to a jury, there is a principal officer among the pirates, called the quartermaster, of the men's own choosing, who claims all authority this way, excepting in time of battle. If they disobey his command, are quarrelsome and mutinous with one another, misuse prisoners, plunder beyond his order, and in particular, if they be negligent of their arms, which he musters at discretion, he punishes at his own arbitrament, with drubbing or whipping, which no one else dare do without incurring the lash from all the ship's ...
— Great Pirate Stories • Various
... comparatively speaking, an untouched field; and now that the Celtic spirit has become the leaven of our politics, there is no reason why it should not contribute something to our decorative art. This result, however, will not be obtained by a patriotic misuse of old designs, and even the most enthusiastic Home Ruler must not be allowed to decorate his dining-room ...
— Reviews • Oscar Wilde
... might have been the way of the Chrestien that I know. Guinevere, when she meets her lover, rescuer, and doomsman, is no longer a girl, and Lancelot is almost a boy. It is not, in the common and cheap misuse of the term, the most "romantic" arrangement, but some not imperfect in love-lore have held that a woman's love is never so strong as when she is past girlhood and well approaching age, and that man's is never stronger than when he is just not a boy. Lancelot himself has loved no ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... remind me of something we want buried and forgotten," interrupted Stetson. "Too much chance for misuse ...
— Operation Haystack • Frank Patrick Herbert
... the utilitarian theory inconsistent with the fact that there are other things which interest us in persons besides the rightness and wrongness of their actions. The Stoics, indeed, with the paradoxical misuse of language which was part of their system, and by which they strove to raise themselves above all concern about anything but virtue, were fond of saying that he who has that has everything; that he, and only he, is rich, is beautiful, is a king. But no claim of this description is made for the ...
— Utilitarianism • John Stuart Mill
... their Eves are spiteful, too; probably more spiteful than the Adams; for Eve, you know, is generally smart enough and ambitious enough to outdo Adam in any line of endeavor—especially in the use or misuse of the tongue. ...
— Happiness and Marriage • Elizabeth (Jones) Towne
... possible, we sorrow to think, to misuse the Divine gift of artistic inspiration. The poet may devote his genius to animalism, like Byron, or to teach immoral license, like Swinburne; the painter may crowd his canvas with degrading ideas and vulgar representations, and ...
— Men of the Bible; Some Lesser-Known Characters • George Milligan, J. G. Greenhough, Alfred Rowland, Walter F.
... with a mere suggestion. We have, in the first place to keep our hold of the fact, disregarding all pleas to the contrary, that sin is a reality, and not a phantasm of our imagination; we shall then diagnose its nature as the misuse, the unfaithful administration, of the power which God has conferred upon us for employment in His holy service; and then, {33} lastly, we shall grow aware that the very pain, the sense of unhappiness and moral discord by which the consciousness of guilt is ever accompanied, is the protesting ...
— Problems of Immanence - Studies Critical and Constructive • J. Warschauer
... "Religion Within the Limits of Pure Reason," he is actively antagonistic to ecclesiasticism, so much so that, for publishing this work, he was censured by the Prussian king, who wrote, "Our highest person has been greatly displeased to observe how you misuse your philosophy to undermine and destroy many of the most important and fundamental doctrines of the Holy Scriptures and of Christianity." Indeed, many a man approaching Kant with a firm theistic belief finds his belief ...
— The Necessity of Atheism • Dr. D.M. Brooks
... have first the comparison between John and the candle, or lamp; then we have the necessary expenditure, burning to shine; and, thirdly, we have the misuse that people ...
— John the Baptist • F. B. Meyer
... of Helleston replied, tacitly admitting his misuse of language, but demanding to know if in the Vicar of Troy's opinion the new century would begin on January 1st, 1801: for his own part he had supposed, and was prepared to maintain, that it had begun ...
— The Mayor of Troy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... bristled at the misuse of his name, and he flushed slightly also; but there was always something engaging in the pleasure- loving master-carpenter. He had such an eloquent and warm temperament, the atmosphere of his personality was so genial, that his impertinence was insulated. Certainly the master-carpenter ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... authority increased by their consummate virtue and eloquence, which might serve as an ornament to these qualities, and as a protection to the republic. Wherefore, in my opinion at least, men ought not the less to devote themselves to eloquence, although some men both in private and public affairs misuse it in a perverse manner; but I think rather that they should apply themselves to it with the more eagerness, in order to prevent wicked men from getting the greatest power to the exceeding injury of the good, and the common calamity ...
— The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, Volume 4 • Cicero
... be said that if he appropriate to his use any of the common property of which books are made up, and so misuse his privilege as to impose upon his readers the payment of too heavy a tax, other persons may use the same facts and ideas, and enter into competition with him. In no other case, however, than in those of the owners of patents and copyrights, where the public recognizes the existence of exclusive ...
— Letters on International Copyright; Second Edition • Henry C. Carey
... names for trees of different kinds, not one of which corresponds botanically with the Sanskrit pala (Butea frondosa, a tree which is held by Hindus to be peculiarly venerable and holy). The preceding list affords several illustrations of a similar misuse of terms. To it might be added several words borrowed from other Indian languages, such as nnas, pine-apple (Hind. ananas), bilimbing ...
— A Manual of the Malay language - With an Introductory Sketch of the Sanskrit Element in Malay • William Edward Maxwell
... that, let a man live as he may, it yet shall be well with him in the end. The facts of experience are against it; the words of Christ are against it. "The very conception of human freedom involves the possibility of its permanent misuse, of what our Lord Himself calls 'eternal sin.'" If a man can go on successfully resisting Divine grace in this life, what reason have we for supposing that it would suddenly become irresistible in another life? Build what we may on the ...
— The Teaching of Jesus • George Jackson
... doting fondness of weak women; it was the appreciative and discriminating love by which a higher nature recognised god-like capabilities under all the dust and defilement of misuse and passion: and she never doubted that the love which in her was so strong, that no injury or insult could shake it, was yet stronger in the God who made her capable of such a devotion, and that in him it was accompanied by power to subdue all ...
— Lady Byron Vindicated • Harriet Beecher Stowe |
