"Acquiring" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... because my language was much simpler than theirs, comprising far less of complex ideas; and partly because their organisation was, by hereditary culture, much more ductile and more readily capable of acquiring knowledge than mine. At this I secretly demurred; and having had in the course of a practical life, to sharpen my wits, whether at home or in travel, I could not allow that my cerebral organisation could possibly ...
— The Coming Race • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... his hand," says Squire Godbey, "he was sitting astride Jake Bates's woodpile in New Salem. Says I, 'Abe, what are you studying?' 'Law,' says Abe. 'Good God Almighty!' responded I." It was too much for Godbey; he could not suppress the exclamation of surprise at seeing such a figure acquiring learning in such an odd situation. Mr. Arnold states that Lincoln made a practice of reading in his walks between Springfield and New Salem; and so intense was his application and so absorbed was ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... pretended they themselves did from the earth, would not this autokopros[A] have been justly entitled to all the praise arising from his own virtues? Would it not be hard that a man who hath no ancestors should therefore be rendered incapable of acquiring honour; when we see so many who have no virtues enjoying the honour of their forefathers? At ten years old (by which time his education was advanced to writing and reading) he was bound an apprentice, ...
— Joseph Andrews Vol. 1 • Henry Fielding
... experience from actual facts of the difference between the one class of qualities and the other. In old times, then, those who had once been chosen to the royal office continued to hold it until they grew old, fortifying and enclosing fine strongholds with walls and acquiring lands, in the one case for the sake of the security of their subjects and in the other to provide them with abundance of the necessities of life. And while pursuing these aims, they were exempt from all vituperation or jealousy, as neither in their ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... one species, when they range {133} into the zone of habitation of other species, often acquiring in a very slight degree some of the characters of such species, accords with our view that species of all kinds are only well-marked and permanent varieties. Thus the species of shells which are confined to tropical and shallow seas are generally brighter-coloured ...
— On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection • Charles Darwin
... Hill withal; of attaining mastership, discipleship, in Art and Philosophy;—or in candor let us call it, what it truly was, that of enlightening and fortifying himself with clear knowledge, clear belief, on all sides; and acquiring some spiritual panoply in which to front the coming practicalities of life. This, he feels well, will be a noble use of his seclusion in those still places; and it must be owned, he struggles and endeavors towards this, with great perseverance, by all the methods ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. X. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—At Reinsberg—1736-1740 • Thomas Carlyle
... tradesman or free workman, who by some accident had become involved in debt, seldom escaped this progressive impoverishment except by strenuous efforts and incessant labour. Foreign commerce, it is true, entailed considerable risk, but the chances of acquiring wealth were so great that many individuals launched upon it in preference to more sure but less lucrative undertakings. They would set off alone or in companies for Elam or the northern regions, for Syria, or even for ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 3 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... of a moderate number of representatives, does not in any respect contradict what was urged on another occasion with regard to the extensive information which the representatives ought to possess, and the time that might be necessary for acquiring it. This information, so far as it may relate to local objects, is rendered necessary and difficult, not by a difference of laws and local circumstances within a single State, but of those among different States. Taking each State ...
— The Federalist Papers
... sub- valleys of its north-bank tributaries) was also in 842 B.C. colonized by an ancient Chinese family—not of imperial extraction so far as the reigning house was concerned—which, by adopting Tartar, or perhaps Tartar—Tibetan, manners, had for many generations succeeded in acquiring a predominant influence in that region. Assuming that—which is not at all improbable—the nomad horsemen in unchallenged possession of the whole desert and Tartar expanse had at any time, as a consequence of their raids ...
— Ancient China Simplified • Edward Harper Parker
... which constitute that other tenth will aggregate in actual numbers far more than the common words which form the chief part of everyday speech, and as they are selected at random from a vastly larger number, the only possible way to master them is by acquiring principles, consciously or unconsciously, which will serve as a key to them. Some people have the faculty of unconsciously formulating principles from their everyday observations, but it is a slow process, and many never acquire it ...
— The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language - Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric • Sherwin Cody
... remain for life in abject slavery from an ignorance of the mode of acquiring their emancipation, notwithstanding they may be justly entitled to their freedom by birth ...
— Anti-Slavery Opinions before the Year 1800 - Read before the Cincinnati Literary Club, November 16, 1872 • William Frederick Poole
... to ask," was the answer; "perhaps it were best to propound the most difficult one first, instead of reserving it till the last. What, in your opinion, goes into the acquiring of Vocal Mastery?" ...
— Vocal Mastery - Talks with Master Singers and Teachers • Harriette Brower
... could, to a certain extent, if you had a permit," said Graham, thoughtfully; "but I think you would accomplish more by remaining in one hospital and acquiring skill by regular work. It would be a source of indescribable anxiety to me to think of your going about alone. If I know just where you are, I can find you and write ...
— His Sombre Rivals • E. P. Roe
... you are very competent to judge of the capacity of black men for acquiring knowledge—I want your opinion on that capacity as compared with ...
— A Life of Gen. Robert E. Lee • John Esten Cooke
... School does not profess to give instruction in reading and arithmetic, but to teach the art of teaching reading and arithmetic. So of all the elementary branches. But, as the art of teaching a subject cannot be acquired without at the same time acquiring a better knowledge of the subject itself, the pupil will always leave the Normal School better grounded than ever before in the elements and principles of learning. It is not, however, to be expected that complete success will be realized ...
— Thoughts on Educational Topics and Institutions • George S. Boutwell
... priest of Mother Kali took me {201} to the edge of the dirty, murky Hoogli (sacred as a part of the Ganges system), where in its consecrated filth scores of miserable pilgrims were washing away their sins or "acquiring merit" with the gods. On the way we passed the image of Juggernaut, the miserable stable-like shelters in which the pilgrims are lodged, and the image of Setola, "the Mother of the Smallpox," as the priest called her, to which smallpox victims come for cure. Back again to the temple, the priest ...
— Where Half The World Is Waking Up • Clarence Poe
... his steps in the direction of the Seneca village. Here, although he was received with a certain coolness, arising from his participation in the incident of the previous evening, no affront was offered him, and he had no difficulty in acquiring the information he desired. Thus he was able to report to Major Hester, on his return to Tawtry House, that Mahng not only lived, but was in a fair way to recover from his injury, and that by means of swift runners the grievance of the Indians had already been ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... Lieutenant-Colonel Bailey was promoted to the rank of brigadier-general and received the thanks of Congress. The stone cribs of the dam have long since been swept away, but the tree-dam has remained until this day, doubtless acquiring new strength from year to year by the washing of the river. Its position has forced the channel over to the south shore, encroaching seriously upon the solid land, especially when the water is high. A very large part of the ...
— The Gulf and Inland Waters - The Navy in the Civil War. Volume 3. • A. T. Mahan
... experience, who had never thought specially of the matter, but had blunderingly applied themselves to whatever form of art confronted them at the moment of their making a move, were by this time acquiring renown as new lights; while he was still unknown. He wished that some accident could have hemmed in his eyes between inexorable blinkers, and sped him on in a channel ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... These people had not yet learnt that amongst the whites, whose blood knew no alloy, they were regarded as a debased sort, and unfit socially to mix with those who had kept their race free from taint. The female fruitage of the mixture lost nothing by acquiring some of the Caucasian stock, but the men, in numerous cases, seemed to be inferior for the blending. In appearance they were inane, in speech laconic; they were shy in manners, and reserved, to boorishness, while in intellectual alertness they were inferior to the boisterous ...
— The Story of Louis Riel: The Rebel Chief • Joseph Edmund Collins
... I had no idea that I was public property in this way!" said the vicar, his face acquiring a hue somewhere between that of the rose and the peony. "Well, 'It is thought in ...
— Under the Greenwood Tree • Thomas Hardy
... usefully employed in acquiring and diffusing a competent knowledge of cosmopographical, nautical, and astronomical science, Don Henry resolved to devote a considerable portion of the revenue which he enjoyed as Grand Master of the Order of Christ, in continuing and extending those projects ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. II • Robert Kerr
... gold and slaves rendered maritime discovery profitable to the aristocratic class, all the nobles went into it—not only the aristocrats of Portugal, but those also of Spain, England, France, Holland, Italy. They all went into the trade of acquiring empires, and it is not to be wondered at if in this rivalry of greed and violence Portugal, exploited and burdened with serfdom and other features of bad government at home, was distanced and overcome. Her colonies were captured and reduced by foreign enemies, or invaded and ruined by ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 17, - No. 97, January, 1876 • Various
... was Billy during the next few days, acquiring her new domesticity, that she did not notice how little she was seeing of Cyril. Then she suddenly realized it, and asked herself the reason for it. Cyril was at the house certainly, just as frequently as he had been; but she saw that a new shyness in herself had developed which was causing ...
— Miss Billy • Eleanor H. Porter
... falling in with the prevailing fashion, have forsaken the shores of the great inland sea and pitched their tents with us; not to speak of the copper kings of Montana. Why is it that these interesting men, after acquiring fortune and fame elsewhere, are not content to remain upon the scene of their early triumphs? Why is it that they immediately pack their carpet-bags, take the first through train to our gates, and startle the investing public by the manner in which they bull ...
— The Spenders - A Tale of the Third Generation • Harry Leon Wilson
... in this country is wealth, his vast possessions and accumulated treasure could not easily be rivalled, while he had a matchless advantage over those who pass, or waste, their gray and withered lives in acquiring millions, in his consummate and healthy youth. He had bright abilities, and a brighter heart. And yet the unknown truth was, that this favored being, on the eve of this critical event, was pacing his chamber agitated and ...
— Lothair • Benjamin Disraeli
... so disagreeable there was the comfort that they could joke about his happiness; they had not felt free to make light of his misery when he was at home before. They began to ask all the questions they could think of as to how and when, and they assimilated the fact more and more in acquiring these particulars and making a mock of them ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... winter of 1799. It was more convenient for George to attend this school, as it was nearer to his work, and only a few minutes' walk from Jolly's Close. Besides, Andrew had the reputation of being a skilled arithmetician; and this branch of knowledge Stephenson was very desirous of acquiring. He accordingly began taking lessons from him, paying fourpence a week. Robert Gray, the junior fireman at the Water-row Pit, began arithmetic at the same time; and Gray afterwards told the author that George learnt "figuring" so much faster than he did, that he could not make ...
— Lives of the Engineers - The Locomotive. George and Robert Stephenson • Samuel Smiles
... could he do, for he was very much in their power, and unable to afford to fly in their faces? Abdullah often spoke thus, according to Neufeld, and, as the latter also said, frequently that leader of the fanatical dervishes exhibited keen interest in acquiring information about Europe and its people. He hoped to make peace some day with the outside world, and be allowed thereafter to rule the Soudan. All this, I submit, is rather puzzling, in view of the filthy den the Khalifa kept Neufeld shut up in, and the manner in which he loaded him with ...
— Khartoum Campaign, 1898 - or the Re-Conquest of the Soudan • Bennet Burleigh
... he was admirably suited to the position, accustomed to handle and make decisions promptly, no shilly-shallying or "wait and see" about his actions. Very few people were aware he possessed unique opportunities of getting behind the scenes, learning government moves, acquiring knowledge beforehand which was ...
— The Rider in Khaki - A Novel • Nat Gould
... neatness, quietness, order, and that kind thoughtfulness and courteous attention which spring from the heart—"in honor preferring one another." The purpose of eating should not be merely the appeasement of hunger or the gratification of the palate, but the acquiring of strength for labor or study, that we may be better fitted for usefulness in the world. Consequently, we should eat like responsible beings, and not like the lower orders ...
— Science in the Kitchen. • Mrs. E. E. Kellogg
... practical and perfect are the lessons given, that the acquiring of the art of playing any of the above Instruments ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous
... Rev. Dr. Hawes, of Hartford, Conn., was born in 1821. Following her course through her youth, we are no where surprised at the development of any remarkable power of mind. She was prayerful and conscientious, diligent in acquiring knowledge, enthusiastic in her love of nature, evincing in every thing a refined and feminine taste, and a quick perception of the beautiful in art, in literature, and in morals. But the charm of her character lay in the warmth of her heart. Love was the ...
— Mrs Whittelsey's Magazine for Mothers and Daughters - Volume 3 • Various
... they failed on this occasion, especially considering the improper season of the year. The Biscaneers, indeed, are robust enough fellows; and had the Leon Franco been manned with them, she had certainly doubled the cape along with the other three ships; but the Spaniards in general, since acquiring their possessions in America, have become so delicate and indolent, that it would be difficult to find an entire ship's company ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... great encouragement, not only to us but to our parents also, to know that we are acquiring an education from the hands of these Christian helpers, so that we can become useful in the world, good citizens, skilled in art and science, and in all branches of knowledge; to become recognized in the best society, and to secure comfortable homes for ourselves; to know that we are taught ...
— The American Missionary — Volume 39, No. 08, August, 1885 • Various
... services; for this would have hindered his freedom of action, and prevented his obeying any instructions that his uncle might send him. He therefore joined as a volunteer interpreter, and was made a member of the officers' mess. He was specially attached to the native levy and, soon acquiring their words of command, assisted its officers in drilling it into ...
— On the Irrawaddy - A Story of the First Burmese War • G. A. Henty
... collection of hints into confusion and thus made a study of construction as well as of style; or again he turned an essay into verse and after a while converted it back into prose. And this we believe to be the true method of acquiring a good style, more efficacious than any English course in ...
— Benjamin Franklin • Paul Elmer More
... all government secrets. You may take it from me that naval warfare becomes impossible withing the radius of a Bruce-Partington's operation. Two years ago a very large sum was smuggled through the Estimates and was expended in acquiring a monopoly of the invention. Every effort has been made to keep the secret. The plans, which are exceedingly intricate, comprising some thirty separate patents, each essential to the working of the whole, are kept in an elaborate safe in a confidential ...
— The Adventure of the Bruce-Partington Plans • Arthur Conan Doyle
... sakes!" gasped poor Sunny Boy, who was certainly acquiring a number of new words, much to his mother's worry. "I guess that water's as cold as—as our icebox ...
— Sunny Boy in the Country • Ramy Allison White
... Greek and Latin verse, I do not maintain that a knowledge of Comparative Philology will help us much. It is simply an art that must be acquired by practice, if in these our busy days it is still worth acquiring. Agood memory will no doubt enable us to say at a moment's notice whether certain syllables are long or short. But is it not far more interesting to know why certain vowels are long and others short, ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... and with these the capacity for breathing air directly. Some of them, like the Frogs and Newts, lose their gills altogether on attaining the adult condition; but others, such as the living Proteus and Menobranchus, retain their gills even after acquiring their lungs, and are thus fitted indifferently for an aquatic or terrestrial existence. The name of "Amphibia," though applied to the whole class, is thus not precisely appropriate except to these last-mentioned forms (Gr. amphi, both; bios, life). The Amphibians also differ ...
— The Ancient Life History of the Earth • Henry Alleyne Nicholson
... in the great metropolis had worked wonders in the boy. He no longer looked or felt "green," and he was fast acquiring a business way that was bound, sooner or later, to be highly beneficial ...
— Richard Dare's Venture • Edward Stratemeyer
... get the habit of drinking or opium-smoking— but in this case our assumption is deduced from their circumstances, and not from their personality. Hence, it is difficult to say with certainty that a person is incapable of acquiring this or that habit. So that it is of importance, when the question arises, to discover the existence of implied habits whenever these are asserted in the face of apparently contradictory conditions. There is a certain presumption for the correctness of the implication, ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden
... fortune, step into the shoes of; succeed to. get hold of, get between one's finger and thumb, get into one's hand, get at; take possession, come into possession, enter into possession. be profitable &c. adj.; pay, answer. accrue &c. (be received) 785. Adj. acquiring, acquired &c. v.; profitable, advantageous, gainful, remunerative, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... be a mine of general information. He knew nothing at all specific but evinced a candid willingness to overcome this by acquiring facts from Kenny. Nobody he knew had run away from an uncle. Why was Kenny seeking uncles? . . . Hum . . . Joel Ashley's boy had run away but the uncle there had been a stepmother. Was the runaway boy anybody's long lost heir? A pity! One read such ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... either.) Through a slight mistake about the county boundary I adopted Surrey for my loyalty, though as a matter of fact we were by some five hundred yards or so in Kent. It did quite as well for my purposes. I bowled rather straight and fast, and spent endless hours acquiring the skill to bowl Flack out. He was a bat in the Corinthian style, rich and voluminous, and succumbed very easily to a low shooter or an unexpected Yorker, but usually he was caught early by long leg. The difficulty was to bowl him before he got caught. He loved to ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells
... they said, by the formation of their harbour, forbade their becoming rivals with that convenient mart, and were it otherwise they must be dead to every idea of justice, and lost to all feelings of humanity, if they could indulge one thought of acquiring wealth, and building up their fortunes upon the ruin of their suffering neighbours. These certainly were sentiments honourable to humanity, but unfortunately they were coupled with others of a different character. ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... the gardener." I said deliberately, and with venom, "is fast acquiring notoriety in these parts as an idiot of purest ray, and he had his information from another whose continuance unhanged is ...
— The Guest of Quesnay • Booth Tarkington
... attempted to assume a protectorship of Chinese territory which does not belong to her historically. It is well also to note that although Japan wished it to appear to the world that this action was dictated by her desire to prevent Germany from acquiring a fresh foothold in China after the war, in reality Group IV was drafted as a general warning to the nations, one point being that she believed that the United States was contemplating the reorganization of the Foochow Arsenal in Fuhkien province, and that as a corollary to that reorganization ...
— The Fight For The Republic in China • Bertram Lenox Putnam Weale
... written for the consideration of that ever-increasing class of Americans who are interested in acquiring a greater familiarity with the habits and activities of wild birds. There are many valuable publications treating more or less exhaustively of the classification of birds, as well as of form, colour, distribution, migration, songs, and foods. Here an attempt is made to place ...
— The Bird Study Book • Thomas Gilbert Pearson
... yourself feel, as you feel it. You may no more endeavour to feel through other men's souls, than to see with other men's eyes. Whereas generally now in Europe and America, every man's energy is bent upon acquiring some false emotion, not his own, but belonging to the past, or to other persons, because he has been taught that such and such a result of it will be fine. Every attempted sentiment in relation to art is hypocritical; our notions ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... he decided to lay the foundation of a fortune for himself and his children by acquiring Fentress County land. Grants could be obtained in those days at the expense of less than a cent an acre, and John Clemens believed that the years lay not far distant when the land would increase in value ten thousand, ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... wonder how I amuse myself in the midst of this curious specimen of a social Macedoine—quite well—and am acquiring a taste for that true epicurean apathy which one enjoys in perfection, among people whom one expects neither to interest, nor to be interested by; and I sit down among them as calmly comfortable as I can conceive a growing cabbage to be in wet weather. I hold my tongue and watch ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 19, - Issue 553, June 23, 1832 • Various
... support of these views. These may be summed up by the statement that almost all those attributes which morphologists recognise as peculiar to one or the other organ respectively, may be and are manifested by both. We have the stem acquiring the characters of the leaf, and the leaf those of the stem. Thus we have seen leaves, leaf-buds, branches, and flower-buds springing from leaves or leaf-organs;[555] see pp. 174, 177, 445, &c. The structure that we are apt to associate exclusively with one is found ...
— Vegetable Teratology - An Account of the Principal Deviations from the Usual Construction of Plants • Maxwell T. Masters
... she stood at the door of her uncle, Yoemon. With this uncle and aunt she had but little to do. Matazaemon had been at daggers drawn with his brother, whom he accused of being a wretched miser, one acquiring wealth by very questionable means for a samurai. In old days Cho[u]bei had been a hired agent of Yoemon. The principal had escaped; the second had to leave Yotsuya and its neighbourhood. The Obasan (aunt) came out at O'Iwa's call. She ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... present volume are Meteorology and Astronomy, and they are illustrated with thirty-seven lithographic plates, and upwards of two hundred engravings on wood. The work was undertaken with the very popular object of supplying the means of acquiring a competent knowledge of the methods and results of the physical sciences, without any unusual acquaintance with mathematics; and in the methods of demonstration and illustration of this series of treatises, that principle has as far as possible, been adopted so that by ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 213, November 26, 1853 • Various
... Training Institution is a Home for girls of doubtful or bad antecedents, which I also visited. This Rescue Home is linked up with the Training School, so that the Cadets may have the opportunity of acquiring a practical knowledge of the class of work upon which they are to be engaged in after-life. Most of the girls in the Rescue Home have passed through the Police-courts, and been handed over to the care of the Army by magistrates. ...
— Regeneration • H. Rider Haggard
... joined in a peculiar cross-arrangement are called a piece of cloth, thus acquiring a new name, a new form, and new functions, so it is with ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut
... years have produced. In Parliament I shall look in vain for virtues which I loved, and for abilities which I admired. Often in debate, and never more than when we discuss those questions of colonial policy which are every day acquiring a new interest, I shall remember with regret how much eloquence and wit, how much acuteness and knowledge, how many engaging qualities, how many fair hopes, are buried in the grave of poor Charles Buller. There were other ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 4 (of 4) - Lord Macaulay's Speeches • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... them, when her back greatly resembles a piece of honeycomb, the cells of which are filled and closed. Here, in the course of about three months, the eggs are hatched, and the creatures undergo the usual change of the rest of the genus; first assuming the form of tadpoles, and gradually acquiring their complete shape. When perfected, and possessed of their limbs, they work their way out of the cells; and it is a curious sight to see them struggling out—their head and paws projecting in all directions from their mother's back—and sliding down on the ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... the hour of his Allies' need President Wilson had consented to the brigading of American with French and British troops, and to the employment of American divisions as supports for French and British generals. But with the American Army growing equal in size to the French and the British and acquiring an independent skill in war, there could be no hesitation about an American command on an equal footing with the armies of Haig and Ptain; and to the Americans under General Pershing had been allotted ...
— A Short History of the Great War • A.F. Pollard
... day merely with the general idea of acquiring information, or of increasing ability, was not in me." "Anything like passive receptivity is foreign to my nature; and there results an unusually small tendency to be affected by others' thoughts. It seems as though the fabric of my conclusions ...
— Memories and Studies • William James
... route that extended from away down near the site of the Bastille to a hotel away up near the Place Vendome. The driver was a congenital madman, the same as all Parisian taxicab drivers are; and in addition he was on this occasion acquiring special merit by being quite drunk. This last, however, was a detail that did not dawn on my perceptions until too late to cancel the contract. Once he had got me safely fastened inside his rickety, creaky devil-wagon he pulled all the stops ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... total European population of the Union, which was then about 1,400,000, was therefore only just over one to ten. But they had not remained merely indentured labourers as at the beginning. When their labour contracts expired many settled in the country, acquiring small plots of land as their own or becoming petty traders, artisans, etc., and, being frugal and hard-working and of a higher type than the Kaffir and other natives, they throve as a whole. The ...
— India, Old and New • Sir Valentine Chirol
... sacrifice. Those ministers in a body, thus asked by the wise Yudhishthira desirous of performing the sacrifice, then told him these words of grave import,—'One already in possession of a kingdom desireth all the attributes of an emperor by means of that sacrifice which aideth a king in acquiring the attributes of Varuna. O prince of Kuru race, thy friends think that as thou art worthy of the attributes of an emperor, the time is even come for thee for the performance of the Rajasuya sacrifice. The time for the performance of that sacrifice in which ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Part 2 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa
... the Duc de Rhetore, deigns to recognize me as a person of mark. As for my younger brother, The Comte de Chaulieu, this buckram warrior owes me everlasting gratitude. Before my father left, he spent my fortune in acquiring for the Count an estate of forty thousand francs a year, entailed on the title, and his marriage with Mlle. de Mortsauf, an heiress from Touraine, is definitely arranged. The King, in order to preserve the name and titles of the de Lenoncourt and ...
— Letters of Two Brides • Honore de Balzac
... {418a} laughed many a time at him coming talking his funny Welsh to him, and said he was glad he knew a few words of Spanish to answer him with. Borrow was, apparently, unconscious of any imperfection in his pronunciation of the "ll". He has written: "'Had you much difficulty in acquiring the sound of the "ll"?' I think I hear the reader inquire. None whatever: the double l of the Welsh is by no means the terrible guttural which English people generally suppose it to ...
— The Life of George Borrow • Herbert Jenkins
... came, has as pure a strain of Yankee blood as any in New England. But whoever looked into his sallow and bony face was struck with the effect of his large, serious eye, luminous with intelligence and will. Devotion to duty and perfect trustworthiness, with zeal in acquiring military knowledge, were the qualities which led to his selection for staff duty. When we were preparing for the great swing of the army to the south of Atlanta, my division had been advanced close to the enemy's position near East Point, where, from a strong salient ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... the person represented. Nor is a very different process of thought discernible in the belief that by eating human or other flesh the spirit (or at any rate some of the spiritual qualities) formerly animating it can be transferred to the eater. So a brave enemy is devoured in the hope of acquiring his bravery; and a pregnant woman is denied the flesh of hares and other animals whose qualities it is undesirable her children ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland
... armies, whom it was his duty to lead into the field against the public enemy. But, in the pursuit of fame, Justinian might have lost his present dominion over the age and weakness of his uncle; and instead of acquiring by Scythian or Persian trophies the applause of his countrymen, [9] the prudent warrior solicited their favor in the churches, the circus, and the senate, of Constantinople. The Catholics were attached to the nephew of Justin, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon
... with this, in his picture of the Ten Virgins, 'five of whom were wise, and five were foolish. They that were foolish took their lamps and took no oil with them, but the wise took oil.' By the oil he signifieth the acquiring of good works. 'And at midnight,' he saith, 'there was a cry made, "Behold the bridegroom cometh, go ye out to meet him."' By midnight he denoteth the uncertainty of that time. Then all those virgins arose. 'They that were ready went forth to meet the ...
— Barlaam and Ioasaph • St. John of Damascus
... alone in evil, blighting every fair hope, desolating families, the chief incentive to crime, we, the mothers, wives, and daughters, representing the moral and religious sentiment of our town, to save the loved members of our households from the temptation of strong drink, from acquiring an appetite for it, and to rescue, if possible, those that have already acquired it, earnestly request that you will pledge yourself to cease the traffic here in these drinks, forthwith and ...
— Two Decades - A History of the First Twenty Years' Work of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of the State of New York • Frances W. Graham and Georgeanna M. Gardenier
... these circumstances and conditions, opinions and peculiarities, would have descended to the son as certainly and really as any portion of his father's estate; and, as we have seen, he was actually in course of acquiring them, when the second saving event ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... come upon this great continent. Here we see the most wonderful republic in the world, born within a hundred years, a great community peopling a continent, having every facility in the world for homes—no land-locked monopoly, closing the door to the poor acquiring homes, or if it does, it should be broken down at every hazard by wise laws passed from time to time. I reverently thank God for our homes, for our great cities, for our state and, more than all else, for ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... all due modesty, of his early days at Kelso—the respectable friends by whom he was surrounded—his acquiring the reputation of a clever youth, and running nigh being a good deal spoilt in consequence. At nineteen, he went to London, to enter the counting-house of a mercantile uncle, and during two years spent there, formed an acquaintance with a group of young men, several of whom ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 441 - Volume 17, New Series, June 12, 1852 • Various
... succeed in their designs, whether in agriculture, traffic, or any other undertaking, are very contented in their minds. Now, do you think that from anything whatsoever there can proceed a satisfaction equal to the inward consciousness of improving daily in virtue, and acquiring the acquaintance and friendship of the best of men? And if we were to serve our friends or our country, would not a man who lives like me be more capable of it than one that should follow that course of life which you take to be so charming? ...
— The Memorable Thoughts of Socrates • Xenophon
... myself and I found that I was in fact very ignorant. I applied myself day and night to the study of Spanish and whatever concerned my profession. The old Sage lent me some books, and I read and pondered over everything that I could get hold of. With the new ideas that I have been acquiring in one place and another my point of view has changed and I have seen many things under a different aspect from what they had appeared to me before. I saw error where before I had seen only truth, and truth in many things where I had formerly seen only error. Corporal punishment, ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... the great Federal success in acquiring territory in North Carolina, Louisiana, Mississippi and elsewhere, and notwithstanding the increasing hardships everywhere felt, the government and people of the Confederate States were still undismayed and hopeful when the spring of 1863 permitted the vast armies of the United ...
— School History of North Carolina • John W. Moore
... city environment, I had a craving for Nature, a fondness for live stock, and for all that I should come in contact with while taking that course. I worked during the daytime the first year and attended school at night, thereby acquiring experience and accumulating a credit to apply to my board when I should enter the day-school. Soon after entering the agricultural department I had made such progress that I was placed in charge of the hotbeds and grew vegetables all winter. It was ...
— Tuskegee & Its People: Their Ideals and Achievements • Various
... I see. Come with us," said Hendricks. Then turning to his companion, he added, "The boy's wits have been sharpened by his life with the blacks. I have always noted that when a white man has the same necessity for acquiring knowledge as savages, he always surpasses them. In course of time, had that boy continued with the Zulus, he would have become a great chief among them, and would probably have made himself a terror to the settlers, had any ...
— Hendricks the Hunter - The Border Farm, a Tale of Zululand • W.H.G. Kingston
... we should allow the same Actions to be the proper Instruments, both of acquiring Fame, and of procuring this Happiness, they would nevertheless fail in the Attainment of this last End, if they proceeded from a Desire ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele
... betterment which may in time bring heaven and earth a little nearer. This is social power—it is gotten in many ways by experience, by social contact, by what we loosely call the chances of life. But the systematic method of acquiring and imparting it is by the training of youth to thought, power, and knowledge in the school and college. And that group of people whose mental grasp is by heredity weakest, and whose knowledge of the past is for historic reasons most imperfect, that group is the very one which ...
— Masterpieces of Negro Eloquence - The Best Speeches Delivered by the Negro from the days of - Slavery to the Present Time • Various
... the mere justice of its proposed ends, large numbers of respectable men, throughout the country, gave in their nominal adhesion. I am not aware that it has accomplished any other result than to favour some ambitious young gentlemen in acquiring the autographs of eminent persons abroad, with whom they opened an officious correspondence; for it has been very generally voted a humbug, and has served to disgust many with the very sound of "copyright," which has thus been degraded into ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 385. November, 1847. • Various
... time the great and fertile and immeasurably rich countries of South America are emerging from the conditions of internal warfare, of continual revolution, of disturbed and unsafe property conditions, and are acquiring stability in government, safety for property, capacity to protect enterprise. So that we may look with certainty to an enormous increase of population and of wealth throughout the continent of South America, ...
— Latin America and the United States - Addresses by Elihu Root • Elihu Root
... great girl; the child will not remember me, but kiss her and my godson for me, and give my love to them all. The Lymph shall come in my next letter for the young Yankee. I hope the juices of the English cow will prevent him from ever acquiring ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 1 • Leonard Huxley
... For near two centuries the continual and bloody wars with the Danes had exhausted the nation; the peace, which for a long time they were obliged to buy dearly, exhausted it yet more; and it had not sufficient leisure nor sufficient means of acquiring wealth to yield at this time any extraordinary resources. The new people, which after so long a struggle had mixed with the English, had not yet so thoroughly incorporated with the ancient inhabitants that a perfect union might be expected ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... deceased came by his death, and I think it must be perfectly clear that he came by it by his own act. You have heard how he was captured, that the spoils of the coach that he had just rifled were found upon him, and that the booty he had been acquiring from his deeds for months past also was seized; therefore, as the man was desperate, and knew well enough that his life was forfeited, there was ample motive for his putting an end to his wretched existence. I really do not think, ...
— Colonel Thorndyke's Secret • G. A. Henty
... Money is indispensable, even for going without money. But though that dross is necessary to any one who wishes to think in peace, I have not courage enough to make it the sole motive power of my thoughts. To make a fortune, I must take up a profession; in two words, I must, by acquiring some privilege of position or of self-advertisement, either legal or ingeniously contrived, purchase the right of taking day by day out of somebody else's purse a certain sum which, by the end of the year, would amount to a small capital; and this, in twenty years, ...
— Louis Lambert • Honore de Balzac
... Quickly acquiring momentum, the whale came on like a locomotive, spouting at intervals, the vapor from the blowholes looking not unlike ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Rifle • Victor Appleton
... the expedition under the command of Mr. Burke, or the acquiring a knowledge of its fate. This is the great object of ...
— Successful Exploration Through the Interior of Australia • William John Wills
... test tube, and this again into the water bath, which has been heated to 70 deg. C. The heat test reaction should not show in a shorter time than fifteen minutes. It will begin by the moist part of the paper acquiring a greenish yellow colour, and from this moment the paper should be carefully watched. After one or two minutes a dark blue mark will suddenly appear on the dividing line between the wet and dry part of the filter paper, and this is the ...
— Nitro-Explosives: A Practical Treatise • P. Gerald Sanford
... Charles Cowden Clarke, whom I have previously mentioned, was an undermaster, and paid particular attention to Keats. The latter did not show any remarkable talent at school, but learned easily, and was 'a very orderly scholar,' acquiring a fair amount of Latin but no Greek. He was active, pugnacious, and popular among his school-fellows. The father died of a fall from his horse in April, 1804: the mother, after re-marrying, succumbed to consumption in February, 1810. Before the close of the same year John left ...
— Adonais • Shelley
... of confessing ignorance, or making inquiries, so long as they show a proper solicitude for improvement. It is, in fact, a consciousness of ignorance that leads to the acquisition of knowledge. It inspires the desire of information, and stimulates to the use of every means of acquiring it; but a vain and conceited mind is really ignorant, and is likely to remain so, while it ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. I • Francis Augustus Cox
... former station in life. Next voyage, through the captain's interest with the owners, I was appointed chief mate of the Albion, Captain Rose's ship, for which I was found duly qualified, having employed all my spare hours at sea in acquiring a knowledge of the theory of navigation. Captain Rose was like a brother to me, introducing me to his family and friends as the saver of his life, and making quite a lion of me in Liverpool. We sailed in company with a large fleet, under convoy ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume VI • Various
... very much surprised and said: "Oh! how funny, they can talk the language as well as we do." We in turn were very much surprised to find such ignorant people in the Imperial Palace and concluded that their opportunities for acquiring knowledge were very limited. Then they told us Her Majesty was waiting to receive ...
— Two Years in the Forbidden City • The Princess Der Ling
... been regarded by historians as marking the end of the Middle Ages. The era of feudal chaos had drawn to a close and states were being welded together under the leadership of strong dynasties. With this consolidation came the desire for expansion, for acquiring new lands, and for opening up new channels of influence. Spain, Portugal, and England were first in the field of active exploration, searching for stores of precious metals and for new routes to the coasts of Ormuz and of India. In this quest for a short ...
— Crusaders of New France - A Chronicle of the Fleur-de-Lis in the Wilderness - Chronicles of America, Volume 4 • William Bennett Munro
... made camp, cooked the meals, and gave invaluable advice and "first aid" all for the munificent wage of five dollars a day! That sum made the replacement of climb-shattered cameras, the purchasing of a few coarse, cheap garments, and the acquiring of a Montgomery Ward library, ...
— A Mountain Boyhood • Joe Mills
... milder form the imposition of tribute, in its more desperate form the extermination of a tribe with the adoption of its remnants into the similarly-constituted tribe of the conquerors. There was therefore but little modification of the social structure while the people, gradually acquiring new arts, were passing through savagery and into a more or less advanced stage of barbarism. The symmetry of the structure and the relation of one institution to another ...
— The Discovery of America Vol. 1 (of 2) - with some account of Ancient America and the Spanish Conquest • John Fiske
... were fulfilling your ideas and ambitions in your own way, and, as I shall try to explain to you presently, my ambitions also. You were of so adventurous a nature that even my own widely-spread machinery of acquiring information—what I may call my private "intelligence department"—was inadequate. My machinery was fairly adequate for the East—in great part, at all events. But you went North and South, and West also, and, in addition, you essayed realms where commerce and purely ...
— The Lady of the Shroud • Bram Stoker
... this, they struggle on, constantly gaining property and homes, some of them acquiring wealth. If they are deceived on reaching some new Eldorado, losing their all in making the change, they do not give up, but strike in again. If they are not safe in some rural districts, they go to the cities. ...
— The American Missionary Vol. XLIV. No. 2. • Various
... which was eventually adopted by the family, which has multiplied exceedingly, for everywhere you find "des Petits," and so he will be called Petit in this narrative. I have given this etymology in order to throw a light on our language, and show how our citizens have finished by acquiring ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... it; but people's positions alter, sir. I don't deny that Sedley made my fortune, or rather put me in the way of acquiring, by my own talents and genius, that proud position, which, I may say, I occupy in the tallow trade and the City of London. I've shown my gratitude to Sedley; and he's tried it of late, sir, as my cheque-book can show. George! I tell you in confidence I don't like the ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray |
