Online dictionaryOnline dictionary
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Aim   /eɪm/   Listen
Aim

noun
1.
An anticipated outcome that is intended or that guides your planned actions.  Synonyms: design, intent, intention, purpose.  "Good intentions are not enough" , "It was created with the conscious aim of answering immediate needs" , "He made no secret of his designs"
2.
The goal intended to be attained (and which is believed to be attainable).  Synonyms: object, objective, target.
3.
The action of directing something at an object.
4.
The direction or path along which something moves or along which it lies.  Synonyms: bearing, heading.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |
Add this dictionary
to your browser search bar





"Aim" Quotes from Famous Books



... overhead Giotto's tower soared; Behind, the Duomo rose all white and black; Then pealed a sudden jargoning of bells, And down the darkling street I wildly fled, Led by a little, cold, and wandering moon, Which seemed as lonely and as lost as I. I had no aim, save to reach warmth and light And human touch; but still my witless steps Led to my husband's door, and there I stopped, By instinct, knocked, ...
— Verses • Susan Coolidge

... woman on yon ship, on the poop, way aft. We don't fight with women; have a care, therefore, that none of you take deliberate aim at her, and spare that part of the deck where she stands in the fight, if you can. Pass ...
— For Love of Country - A Story of Land and Sea in the Days of the Revolution • Cyrus Townsend Brady

... Blanche flirted, in fact, more or less with all men, but her opportunity for playing her harmless batteries upon Bernard were of course exceptionally large. The poor fellow was perpetually under fire, and it was inevitable that he should reply with some precision of aim. It seemed to him all child's play, and it is certain that when his back was turned to his pretty hostess he never found himself thinking of her. He had not the least reason to suppose that she thought of him—excessive concentration of mind was the last vice of which he accused her. But ...
— Confidence • Henry James

... The aim of these inquiries was to determine if the person, whom two physicians and three assistants were endeavoring to nurse back to health on the top of a wild plateau in a remote district of New Mexico, was the man he had once entertained ...
— The Woman in the Alcove • Anna Katharine Green

... little one, 'tis an ancient war you are waging of woman versus woman; make your bullets; many are by who will pelt with true aim. ...
— A Heart-Song of To-day • Annie Gregg Savigny

... a wonderful exhibition of the efficiency of the sumpitan and of the accuracy of aim of the man who used the long heavy tube. The pipe, two metres long, is held by the native with his hands close to the mouth, quite contrary to the method we should naturally adopt. The man who coolly held the porcupine might not have been ...
— Through Central Borneo: - An Account of Two Years' Travel in the Land of Head-Hunters - Between the Years 1913 and 1917 • Carl Lumholtz

... our American citizenship. Let us leave this place with this feeling stimulated by the sentiments born of the occasion. Let us appreciate more keenly than ever how vitally necessary it is to our country's weal that everyone within its citizenship should be clean minded in political aim and aspiration, sincere and honest in his conception of our country's mission, and aroused to higher and more responsive patriotism by the reflection that it is a solemn thing to belong to a people ...
— Final Report of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission • Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission

... after so abrupt an assertion of his aim, he could only say rather dubiously in French that he wanted ...
— Manalive • G. K. Chesterton

... She talked to me about this elephant gun, and explained its mechanism. She told me the correct part of a hippopotamus to aim at, how to make a nourishing soup out of mangoes, and what to do when bitten by a Borneo wire-snake. You can imagine how she soothed my aching heart. My heart, if you recollect, was aching at the moment—quite unnecessarily ...
— The Girl on the Boat • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse

... wanderers, could scarcely see the rainbow wave of colored handkerchiefs, as, dissolved in tears, we were carried out of Plotzk, away from home, but nearer our longed-for haven of reunion; nearer, indeed, to everything that makes life beautiful and gives one an aim and an end—freedom, progress, knowledge, light and truth, with their glorious host of followers. But we did ...
— From Plotzk to Boston • Mary Antin

... hours the Poles kept the enemy at bay, standing steadily against his terrific fire with artillery that was no match for his. The Polish staff were covered with branches that the Russian balls sent crashing from the trees. Kosciuszko himself fired the cannon with an accuracy of aim under which the Russians wavered. It appeared as though they were about to retreat. But the enemy's superiority of numbers, the strength of his artillery, began to tell, and his heavy fire sowed death among the Polish ranks. A shell ...
— Kosciuszko - A Biography • Monica Mary Gardner

... his declared aim of editing the tales "for popular perusal", Purves has left nearly all Latin quotations untranslated. I have translated them as well as I could — any errors ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer

... rapidity the luggage of the Landers found its way into those of their opponents. This mode of proceeding was not relished by them at all, and Richard Lander's gun being loaded with two balls and four slugs, he took deliberate aim at the leader, and he would have paid for his temerity with his life in one moment more, had not three of his people sprung on Lander, and forced the gun from his hands. His jacket and shoes were now plundered from him, and observing some other fellows ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish

... the harder chocolates, took careful aim, and discharged it in the direction of her husband's face. It struck ...
— The Brother of Daphne • Dornford Yates

... was essentially a social philosopher. His work, indeed, is encyclopaedic—not one whit less so than Spencer's—but the aim he persistently kept in view was the service of man by the reconstruction, through philosophy and religion, of the foundations on which civilisation rests. It is impossible not to be impressed by the grandeur ...
— Morality as a Religion - An exposition of some first principles • W. R. Washington Sullivan

... the rocks, keeping ourselves concealed until we had got near enough to take a steady aim at the stag. I agreed to fire first, and, should I miss, Charley was to try his skill. In the meantime the dog kept advancing and retreating, seeking for an opportunity to fly at the stag's throat; but even then, should he succeed in fixing his fangs in the ...
— Adventures in the Far West • W.H.G. Kingston

... their various degrees of light and heat, the life of reason is that which some people may prefer. I confess I am one of these, and I am not inclined, even if I were able, to reproduce M. Bergson's sentiments as he feels them. He is his own perfect expositor. All a critic can aim at is to understand these sentiments as existing facts, and to give them the place that belongs to them in the moral world. To understand, in most cases, ...
— Winds Of Doctrine - Studies in Contemporary Opinion • George Santayana

... note of acceptance, and went out to mail it. Possibly all these people were right in reading the world, and the aim of life was to show one's power to get on. He was worried over that elementary aspect of things rather late ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... had clutched the tiny, beautiful pistol with which her father had trusted her, and which she had hidden inside her frock. True, she was shaking with the terrible excitement of the moment, she was nearly dragged off her feet by the horse's plunging backwards, and a correct aim seemed almost impossible—but her father had told her to defend Angelot's wife, and Riette was very sure that this wicked man should not carry away Helene, as long as she had life and a weapon to prevent it. And if she could have understood those words to Marie,—"send ...
— Angelot - A Story of the First Empire • Eleanor Price

... he dealt my vanity, for every tooth in my metaphorical jaw he knocked loose with stunning aim, I am grateful beyond any facility of expression. The hard core of human egotism is hardly to be dislodged except rudely. With its departure, the Divine finds at last an unobstructed channel. In vain It seeks to percolate through flinty hearts ...
— Autobiography of a YOGI • Paramhansa Yogananda

... The aim of the present work has been to gain insight into the real nature of both Japanese character and its ...
— Evolution Of The Japanese, Social And Psychic • Sidney L. Gulick

... Prickles's fancy had so turned, not lightly, for he was of an ancient and antediluvian race, heavy in thought, but certainly to love. And love, I want you to realize, in the wild, or anywhere else, for the matter of that, is the very devil. "Unite and multiply; there is no other law or aim than love," one great savant despairingly assorts is Nature's cry, and adds that she mutters to herself under her breath, "and exist afterwards if you can. That is no concern ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars

... dress, on landscape, even on broad hints of a man's occupation, putting a plan on the engineer's table, and a roll in the statesman's hands, like the old Greek who wrote 'this is an ox' under his picture. If they wish to give the face expression, though they seldom aim so high, all they can compass is a passing emotion; and one sitter goes down to posterity with an eternal frown, another with an ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley

... of organized labor, and, if the unions won, share in the benefits without incurring any of the responsibilities, risks or struggles. On May 1, 1886, forty thousand men and women in Chicago went on strike for an eight-hour day. Thus far, the aim of inciting violence on the part of the strikers ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers

... aim was unexpectedly difficult. Faulkner turned out to be an honest bookseller. Instead of sharing Curll's rapacity, he consented, at Mrs. Whiteway's request, to wait until Pope had an opportunity of expressing his wishes. Pope, if he consented, could no longer complain; ...
— Alexander Pope - English Men of Letters Series • Leslie Stephen

... material for the country's citizens. The upper-class Mexicans, like the Peruvians or other Spanish-Americans when they are of unmixed white descent, naturally pride themselves upon the fact, and to a certain extent aim to preserve this condition. This is the "colour-line" of the race, and the term "Indio" is still a term expressing something of contempt, notwithstanding the fact that some of the prominent, and even intellectual, men of Mexico's history have been drawn from the Mestizo class, and—in ...
— Mexico • Charles Reginald Enock

... force. Bring me another arrow of fierce energy. Ye lords of earth, behold my prowess now." And at these words of Dala, Vamadeva said, "This arrow of terrible mien and tempered with poison, that thou aimest at me, thou shall not, O ruler of men, be able to aim nor even to shoot." And thereupon the king said, "Ye men of Ikshvaku's race, behold me incapable of shooting the arrow that hath been taken up by me. I fail to compass the death of this Brahmana. Let Vamadeva who is blessed with a long life ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa Bk. 3 Pt. 2 • Translated by Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... the angry nations rise And aim their rage against the skies; Vain floods that aim their rage so high! At ...
— The Psalms of David - Imitated in the Language of The New Testament - And Applied to The Christian State and Worship • Isaac Watts

... they have been got up at a comparatively small cost. But the substantial difference of expense lies in our plan of leaving railway undertakings to private parties—rival speculators and jobbers, whose aim has too frequently been plunder. And how enormous has been that plunder let enriched engineers and lawyers—let impoverished victims—declare. Shame on the British legislature, to have tolerated and legalised ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 455 - Volume 18, New Series, September 18, 1852 • Various

... had for ever arrested the airy course of Mignon, had now, as fatally and as suddenly, terminated the career of the master of the carrier-pigeon. Vile Rufus, the huntsman, the murderous aim ...
— Sketches • Benjamin Disraeli

... a sense of being followed. He turned at the sound of footsteps. At sight of a samurai in deep hat, mechanically he stretched out hands and self in the roadway, begging an alms. The man drew apart, passing him in disgust and haste. Cho[u]bei went on. He had no aim. It was with surprise that he found himself, as often of late, on the embankment of the North Warigesui. He looked down on the foul place of O'Iwa's disappearance. "A foul ending; but after all an end. One night! One night's sleep! Deign, lady of Tamiya, to grant pardon ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville

... affliction is digested, consolation comes too soon; and after it is digested, it comes too late; but there is a mark between these two, as fine, almost, as a hair, for a comforter to take aim at.—Sterne. ...
— Pearls of Thought • Maturin M. Ballou

... sky was everywhere As clear as clear; there was no Cloud in sight. It looked to me, floating there calm and white. Like a great mother hen, and I a chick. She seemed to call me, and I scurried quick Behind her wing. That spoiled the Boche's game, And gave me time to turn and take good aim. I emptied my last drum, and saw him drop ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various

... inquiries as to the way in which this young girl was to spend her leisure. She herself was worn-out with the strain of the long term, and when the morrow came she intended to pack her bag, and start off for a sunny Swiss height, where for the next few weeks it would be her chief aim to forget that she had ever seen a school. But the new French mistress turned away with a heavy heart. It seemed at that moment as ...
— The Independence of Claire • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... information is presented in [8]Appendix C: International Organizations and Groups which includes the name, abbreviation, address, telephone, FAX, date established, aim, and ...
— The 2000 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... God, and the accomplishment of his holy will, the great object of all their petitions to their prayers, and their only aim in all their actions. "God," says St. Austin,[4] "in his promises to hear our prayers, is desirous to bestow himself upon us; if you find any thing better than him, ask it, but if you ask any thing beneath him, you put an ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... fix me thine; Thy soul completes the triumphs of thy face: I thought, forgive my fair, the noblest aim, The strongest effort of a female soul Was but to choose the graces of the day, To tune the tongue, to teach the eyes to roll, Dispose the colours of the flowing robe, And add new ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill

... region is of great extent. Sober calculation from facts already gleaned, makes a thousand Congregational churches in these mountains the possibility of the future, if only the strategic points can now be occupied. One church and one school to a county, should be our immediate aim; then we can throw upon these the work of developing native teachers and preachers for the rest. There are forty counties waiting for us, and all our mountain work so far is in three or four. I see this place ...
— The American Missionary, Vol. XLII. April, 1888. No. 4. • Various

... as the more perfect the fire is in strength, so much the more perfectly does it impress its own form, so also the more perfectly does it corrupt the contrary. Hence that evil and corruption befall air and water comes from the perfection of the fire: but this is accidental; because fire does not aim at the privation of the form of water, but at the bringing in of its own form, though by doing this it also accidentally causes the other. But if there is a defect in the proper effect of the fire—as, for instance, ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas

... there were few passers-by. Each individual wayfarer, however, received careful attention, Scott having divided the chestnuts, and the aim of both children ...
— The Danger Mark • Robert W. Chambers

... who are like-minded." Even in the simple plays with the first gift, group work is easily possible. The stringing of the first gift beads or the supplementary modeling in clay may be made into a cooperative exercise, the work with the balls at the sand-table may have a similar aim, and many of the ball games are well fitted to unite the whole community of children, older and younger, in a common ...
— Froebel's Gifts • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... she had condescended to be drawn by it to the window of the drawing-room overlooking Whitefriars Road, in order to ascertain its cause. The crowd filling the street was deeply in earnest, and the aim of those who were fighting their way through it was plainly the bank offices in the floor below her. The sole idea that occurred to her, for she was utterly ignorant of her husband's business, was that some unexpected crisis in the borough had ...
— Cobwebs and Cables • Hesba Stretton

... rules of happiness—1. A life full of work.—Happiness should not be the main object of pursuit 19 Carlyle on Ennui 20 2. Aim rather at avoiding suffering than attaining pleasure 21 3. The greatest pleasures and pains in spheres accessible to all 22 4. Importance and difficulty of realising our blessings while they last 24 Comparison and contrast 26 Content not the quality of progressive societies ...
— The Map of Life - Conduct and Character • William Edward Hartpole Lecky

... their appeal in vain. "God has called me," he cries; "these burning desires to know all are his voice in me; and if I stay and plod on here, I reject his call who has marked me from mankind. I must reach pure knowledge. That is my only aim, my only reward." ...
— The Poetry Of Robert Browning • Stopford A. Brooke

... Perhaps—they are such cowards!—they would fire at me through their loopholes. They wouldn't hit me. Then the thing would be done. They would have begun the attack, and the beaten party must take its chance. How is anybody to know which person's aim has been true, in a scuffle? Listen to your own sister, Orso! These lawyers who are coming will blacken lots of paper, and talk a great deal of useless stuff. Nothing will come of it all. That old fox will contrive to make them think they see stars in broad midday. Ah! ...
— Columba • Prosper Merimee

... needlessly alarm his companions, he continued to observe the Moon as carefully as he could, hoping every moment to find some grounds for believing that the deviation from the centre was only a slight one. He almost shuddered at the thought of what would be their situation, if the bullet, missing its aim, should pass the Moon, and plunge into the interplanetary space ...
— All Around the Moon • Jules Verne

... see clearly what I ought to do. Annie's happiness is my only aim. If this boy can create it, and I cannot—but he cannot: she was as utterly mine as it is possible for a woman to be. You none of you knew how utterly! Oh, my God, what shall I do!" and he walked away feebly and slowly like ...
— Saxe Holm's Stories • Helen Hunt Jackson

... vocation is to be an apostle; to go out amongst men; to be the light for their darkness, the salt for their corruption; the aim and goal of your operations are human hearts. This being granted, are you not bound to sweep from your path every impediment that prevents your arm from reaching these hearts? But the most effective barrier standing between you ...
— The Young Priest's Keepsake • Michael Phelan

... The great aim of American institutions is the protection of the individual. That is the principle which lies at the foundation of Anglo-Saxon liberty. It matters not with what power the individual is assailed, nor whether that power is represented by wealth or place or ...
— Have faith in Massachusetts; 2d ed. - A Collection of Speeches and Messages • Calvin Coolidge

... down!" bellowed Constable Dock, taking careful aim. An instant later the officer fired, but at that very instant Mr. Fits skimmed off at a sharp angle with his late course, and so he ...
— The Grammar School Boys Snowbound - or, Dick & Co. at Winter Sports • H. Irving Hancock

... them with our swords, aimed our arrows at them, and shot at them with our pop-guns. But, alas! our swords were dull as wood; and before we could set our bows, they had thrashed us. I say nothing of the guns. What can you do with a pop-gun if the foe will not wait until you have taken aim at him? They rushed forward and knocked the guns out of our hands. What ...
— Jewish Children • Sholem Naumovich Rabinovich

... through the destruction than through the preservation of the Union. If we could dare to believe that foreign nations are actuated by no higher principle than this, I am quite sure a sound argument could be made to show them that they can reach their aim more readily and easily by aiding to crush this rebellion than ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln

... crossbow and arquebus. The parapet was high and, while they exposed only their heads to fire, and were altogether sheltered while loading, the assailants were completely exposed. Orders were given that the defenders should entirely disregard the fire of the matchlock men, and should direct their aim upon the storming parties. These suffered heavily but, urged forward by their officers, they gained the edge of the moat, pushed the planks across, and placed the ladders; but as fast as these were put into position, ...
— Saint Bartholomew's Eve - A Tale of the Huguenot WarS • G. A. Henty

... addition of a lever ramrod fixed on to the barrel. Col. Colt came to the conclusion that the hammer-revolving cylinder was the more useful article, inasmuch as it enabled the person using it to take a more steady aim than with the other, which, revolving and firing by the action of the trigger, the moment of explosion could not be depended upon. To Col. Colt belongs the honour of so combining obsolete and modern inventions, and superadding such improvements of his own, ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray

... an exposed space, a deadly fire was opened upon them from the houses on all sides. The regulars, in perfect security themselves, and abundantly supplied with ammunition, shot them down with deadly unerring aim. The people soon found there was nothing for it but retreat, and carrying off as best they could their killed and wounded, they retired sorely discomfited. For alleged complicity in this attack, Sir Edward ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee

... we could direct upon them from the advantageous position which we should occupy. Moreover, we should possess the important advantage of being almost completely protected from their fire, and consequently should be able to take aim coolly and collectedly, while they would be fully exposed, there being no better cover for them than a few scattered bushes here and there, which I determined to remove, should there be time after our more ...
— A Middy of the King - A Romance of the Old British Navy • Harry Collingwood

... Lawson's arm, which flopped out from his side. Longstreth's eyes were the eyes of a man who meant to kill. There was never any mistaking the strange and terrible light of eyes like those. More than once Duane had a chance to aim at them, at the top of Longstreth's head, at a ...
— The Lone Star Ranger • Zane Grey

... and the intellectual resources and capacities set their mark upon the countenance. This puts us in a position to form a provisional notion of the degree and capacity of intelligence; which was in that case Socrates' aim. But in this connection it is to be observed, firstly, that the rule does not apply to moral qualities, which lie deeper, and in the second place, that what from an objective point of view we gain by the clearer development ...
— The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; Religion, A Dialogue, Etc. • Arthur Schopenhauer

... kiel", as Gxia uzado estas "tia sama, kiel" en la aliaj lingvoj, Its use is "the same as" in the other languages. Vi cxiam laboradas al tiu "sama" celo, "kiel" mi, You are always working towards that "same" end (aim) "as" I. ...
— The Esperanto Teacher - A Simple Course for Non-Grammarians • Helen Fryer

... is this life? It's a dream, is the reply; Like a dream that's soon ended, so life passes by. Pursue the thought further, still there's likeness in each, How constant our aim is at what we can't reach. E'en so in a dream, we've some object in view Unceasingly aimed at, but the thing we pursue Still eludes our fond grasp, and yet lures us ...
— The Kings and Queens of England with Other Poems • Mary Ann H. T. Bigelow

... thrilling scene was staged a little to the south of us. But this time there was no disappointment. The rapid "pu-pu-pu-pu-pu" of the machine gun told us that our pilot's gun was working perfectly, and a burst of flame from the enemy plane told also how true was his aim. ...
— The Fight for the Argonne - Personal Experiences of a 'Y' Man • William Benjamin West

... done that I wouldn't 'a been where I am to-dye. Many's the time, when I was no more than a poor little foundlin' boy in a 'ome I've said to myself, I'm fit for somethink big. Somethink big I always meant to be. When it didn't seem possible for me to aim so 'igh I'd myde up my mind to be a valet and a butler. It comes—your hambition does. What you've first got to do is to form it; and then you've got to stick to it ...
— The Dust Flower • Basil King

... on any but myself, thou hadst lost thy life without winning thy wish; but the truth of thine intent and thy fond affection and the excess of thy love-longing for thy wife and yearning for thy children, these it was that have brought thee to the attainment of thine aim. Didst thou not love her and love her to distraction, thou hadst not thus imperilled thyself, and Alhamdolillah—Praised be Allah—for thy safety! Wherefore it behoveth us to do thy desire and conduce to thy ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 8 • Richard F. Burton

... Again, Sir George organised a native police force, which paid a double debt. It not only waited upon law and order, but exercised a civilising influence towards the Maoris, through those who were trained in its ranks. That aim was at the end of all his plans; every road was marked ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne

... same instant Granville raised his revolver and pointed it at the man, who evidently had not yet perceived them. With a sudden gesture of horror, Guy knocked down his hand and prevented his taking aim. ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen

... dialogue—the type of perverted intellect, of mind without heart, of knowledge which had no aim but power—was in a state of anxious, perturbed gloom. He did not know whether wholly to believe Levy's assurance of his patron's ruin. He could not believe it when he saw that great house in Grosvenor Square, its hall crowded with ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... was to check the invasion of Belgium on the line Tongres-Liege-Longwy, where the Belgian Army, from a strictly military point of view, forming the advance guards of the French Army of the North, was holding strong positions, and with superior forces to strike at the German Army of Lorraine. The aim was, avoiding Metz, to reach the Moselle near Trier through the valley of the Saar, and to roll up the German Army of the North from its left wing. An invasion of Alsace was merely to ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 5, August, 1915 • Various

... extracts, such as sumac, myrabolam, divi, valonia, quebracho, oak, etc., it is the aim of the manufacturer, whenever such extracts are intended for the purposes of dyeing and printing, to obtain the tannin in a form in which it is best calculated to fix itself upon the fiber. The case is somewhat different when the ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 711, August 17, 1889 • Various

... difficult to read this or any other episode in our history whereby negro slavery was extended and fostered without burning indignation. But this is not the proper mood for the historian, whose aim is to interpret men's actions by the circumstances of their time, in order to judge their motives correctly. In 1787 slavery was the cloud like unto a man's hand which portended a deluge, but those who could truly read the signs were few. From north to south, ...
— The Critical Period of American History • John Fiske

... attempt be vain to reproduce the form or to represent its effect in a translation, yet the substance of a poem may have such worth that it deserves to be known by readers who must read it in their own tongue or not at all. In this case the aim of the translator should he to render the substance fully, exactly, and with as close a correspondence to the tone and style of the original as is possible between prose and poetry. Of the charm, of the power of the poem such a translation ...
— The Divine Comedy, Volume 1, Hell [The Inferno] • Dante Alighieri

... also eminently forceful, and marked by very skilful emphasis and reiteration. One of his favorite devices is a pretense of great humility, which is only a shelter from which he shoots forth incessant and pitiless volleys of ironical raillery, light and innocent in appearance, but irresistible in aim and penetrating power. He has none of the gorgeousness of Ruskin or the titanic strength of Carlyle, but he can be finely eloquent, and he is certainly one of ...
— A History of English Literature • Robert Huntington Fletcher

... if permitted to summon spirits from the vasty deep, would base his choice upon personal qualities, and not on mere general reputation. There would be an elective affinity, a principle of natural selection, (not Darwinian,) by which each would aim to draw forth a spirit to his liking. One would not summon the author of such and such a book, but this or that man. Milton wrote an admirable epic, but he would be awful in society. Shakspeare was a splendid dramatist, but one would hardly ask him for a boon-companion. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 65, March, 1863 • Various

... filled up from flank to flank with the ghiara, or pebbly bottom, of the Taro. The Taro is not less wasteful than any other of the brotherhood of streams that pour from Alp or Apennine to swell the Po. It wanders, an impatient rivulet, through a wilderness of boulders, uncertain of its aim, shifting its course with the season of the year, unless the jaws of some deep-cloven gully hold it tight and show how insignificant it is. As we advance, the hills approach again; between their skirts there is nothing but the river-bed; and now on rising ground above the stream, ...
— New Italian sketches • John Addington Symonds

... to the Government, notes for which the bank would be compellable to give specie in exchange could not be kept in circulation. The most the bank could effect, and the most it could be expected to aim at, would be to keep the institution alive by limited and local transactions which, with the interest on the public stock in the bank, might yield a dividend sufficient for the purpose until a change from war to peace should enable it, by ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 4 (of 4) of Volume 1: James Madison • Edited by James D. Richardson

... told about Socrates which bears the stamp of historical truth indicates that he restricted himself to ethics and left theology alone. But this very fact is not without significance. It indicates that Socrates's aim was not to alter the religious views of his contemporaries. Since he did not do so we may reasonably believe it was because they did not inconvenience him in what was most ...
— Atheism in Pagan Antiquity • A. B. Drachmann

... of which Pythagoras never dreamed. I am no longer a reasoning creature, looking at everything within the circle of human investigation with a clear and self-sustained vision, but the cheated follower of metaphysical absurdities, a mere echo of scholastic subtilty. God knows that my aim has been a lofty and pure one, that I have buried myself in this living tomb, and counted the health of this His feeble and outward image as nothing in comparison with that of the immortal and inward representation ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier

... secret history of things hidden from the public gaze, but of the existence of which there can be no manner of doubt—are endowed with a more powerful and absorbing interest than any extravagant flight of imagination can be, it shall be my aim in the following pages to adhere as closely as possible to truth and reality; and to depict scenes and adventures which have actually occurred, and which have come to my knowledge in the course of an experience no means limited—an experience replete with facilities ...
— Venus in Boston; - A Romance of City Life • George Thompson

... been done out of her rights. It hurt the boy keenly, this feeling about her that she had never had her life's fulfilment: and his own incapability to make up to her hurt him with a sense of impotence, yet made him patiently dogged inside. It was his childish aim. ...
— Sons and Lovers • David Herbert Lawrence

... sin in all its forms should content the servant of God. Nothing short of it contents the Master for the servant. Nothing short of it corresponds to the power which Christ puts in operation in every heart that believes in Him. And nothing else should be our aim in our daily conflict with evil and growth in grace. Ah! I fear me that, for an immense number of professing Christians in this generation, the hope of—and, still more, the aim towards—anything approximating to entire deliverance from sin, have faded from their consciences ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... very young I yearned to know other people's opinion of me and all my works; now, my chief aim is to avoid hearing it. In those days, had any one told me there was half a line about myself in a newspaper, I should have tramped London to obtain that publication. Now, when I see a column headed ...
— Novel Notes • Jerome K. Jerome

... to strong impressions, that the policy of the mighty outlaw was in many respects pure and lofty. It was this same influence, though, which won for Father Claude his only enemy in Torn; the little, grim, gray, old man whose sole aim in life seemed to have been to smother every finer instinct of chivalry and manhood in the boy, to whose training he had devoted the past nineteen ...
— The Outlaw of Torn • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... ready to arrange lunch prettily, if she does take a fancy to stay for it. She is very fanciful, is dear Lady Harriet! I would not like her to think we made any difference in our meals because she stayed. "Simple elegance," as I tell her, "always is what we aim at." But still you could put out the best service, and arrange some flowers, and ask cook what there is for dinner that she could send us for lunch, and make it all look pretty, and impromptu, and natural. I think you had better stay at home, Cynthia, ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... now I cast that finer sense And sorer shame aside; Such dread of sin was indolence, Such aim at ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... in consequence of the exhalations from the earth, is moist and dark: but, when the soul has once got above this region, and falls in with, and recognizes, a nature like its own, it then rests upon fires composed of a combination of thin air and a moderate solar heat, and does not aim at any higher flight; for then, after it has attained a lightness and heat resembling its own, it moves no more, but remains steady, being balanced, as it were, between two equal weights. That, then, is its natural seat where it has penetrated ...
— Cicero's Tusculan Disputations - Also, Treatises On The Nature Of The Gods, And On The Commonwealth • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... broad principle of human brotherhood as the foundation for a democracy or a republic. It denies that the party is organized merely to free the slave. Slaveholding as the grossest form of despotism must indeed be attacked first, but the aim of the party is to carry the principle of equal rights into all social relations. It is not a sectional party nor a party organized for a single purpose. "It is not a new party, nor a third party, but it is the party of 1776, reviving the principles of that ...
— The Anti-Slavery Crusade - Volume 28 In The Chronicles Of America Series • Jesse Macy

... so, since which he has run true to form. He'll run around with lady typists, or girls from the cloak department, or most anything that wears skirts, until they discover what a tight-wad he is and give him the shunt. But his great aim in life is to acquire a lady-friend that he can point out in the second row and hang around for at the stage door ...
— Torchy and Vee • Sewell Ford

... messengers of good fortune from the city of cities. Prick up your ears, my friend, and summon all your strength, for there are instances of the fatal effect of especially lavish gifts from the blind and yet often sure aim of the goddess of Fortune. The Demeter, in whom you proved so marvellously that the art of a mortal is sufficient to create immortals, is beginning to show her gratitude. She is helping to twine wreaths ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... and, confident of his unerring aim, levelled his gun at the forehead of the lion, which had crouched in the act to spring, within sixteen paces of him; but as he fired, his horse, whose bridle was round his arm, started back, and, jerking him aside, caused ...
— The Mission; or Scenes in Africa • Captain Frederick Marryat

... at her, 'when was I a child? What childhood did you ever leave to me? I was a woman—artful, designing, mercenary, laying snares for men—before I knew myself, or you, or even understood the base and wretched aim of every new display I learnt You gave birth to a woman. Look upon her. She is in her ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens

... necessarily regarded as charitable.[513] Many of them hold the institutions to be educational, despite the charity connection, and few are unwilling to give recognition to their educational features. In none is there a desire to injure or stigmatize the deaf. The aim is to consider the matter in its practical bearings, and the question is held to be largely one of classification and administration. With all the fact weighs that board, lodging, etc., are given entirely free.[514] The clearest and fullest presentation of the point of view of the ...
— The Deaf - Their Position in Society and the Provision for Their - Education in the United States • Harry Best

... well to aim at the highest, but only when it is possible for us. And how can such a school exist in England now? You English must learn to understand your own history before you paint it. Rather follow in the steps of your Turners, and Landseers, and Standfields, and Creswicks, ...
— Yeast: A Problem • Charles Kingsley

... when he sat by a wood fire in a cabin of split boards and listened to his crippled-up father reciting the saga of the feud, with the tally of this one killed and that one maimed; for this he had been schooled when he practised with rifle and revolver until, even as a boy, his aim had become as near an infallible thing as anything human gets to be; for this he had been schooled still more when he rode, armed and watchful, to church or court or election. ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb

... the local dialect, and refuse to conform to the usage of the Felibres? Is it not useless, after all, to hope for a more perfect unification of the dialects of the langue d'oc, and, if unification is the aim, does not logical reasoning lead to the conclusion that the French language already exists, perfectly unified, and absolutely necessary? In the matter of politics, the most serious questions may arise if the desires of some find more general favor. Shall the Felibres aim at local self-government, ...
— Frederic Mistral - Poet and Leader in Provence • Charles Alfred Downer

... scared. Only the wild shooting of the sentry had saved him from being riddled. The guard itself, upon turning out, evidently thought that a rebellion had broken out or at least that a prisoner had escaped. Seizing their rifles they blazed away for dear life. They did not aim at anything in particular but shot haphazardly at the stars, haystacks, and trees in the most frantic manner imaginable and as rapidly as their magazine arms would let them. Undoubtedly the Germans were half-mad with fear. It rained bullets around the barracks and every man ...
— Sixteen Months in Four German Prisons - Wesel, Sennelager, Klingelputz, Ruhleben • Henry Charles Mahoney

... herself to carry on the battle with a smile. She would carry on the battle, using every wile she knew, straining every nerve to be victorious, encountering any and all dangers, and yet she had no definite aim before her. She herself did not know what she would be at. At this period of her career she did not want to marry her cousin,—having resolved that she would be Lady Fawn. Nor did she intend that her cousin should be her lover,—in the ordinary sense of love. She ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope

... fired. About the time he pulled trigger, a stray ball from some direction struck him in the side and he fell off dead, and his horse becoming frightened, galloped off, dragging him through the Confederate lines. His pistol had missed its aim. ...
— "Co. Aytch" - Maury Grays, First Tennessee Regiment - or, A Side Show of the Big Show • Sam R. Watkins

... This kind of aim in his work, of taking up the most fruitful idea of his time and bringing it home to all, is typified by his remark as he entered New York harbour on his visit to America in 1876, and watched the tugs hard at work as they traversed the bay.] ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 3 • Leonard Huxley

... We do not doubt you nor him, but for such work as ours—of which the aim is to return to France that liberty which has been stifled by the iron hand of Bonaparte and by the Bourbons—we need men who are ready to sacrifice their lives—to walk straight on, even if the scaffold stands ...
— The Son of Monte Cristo • Jules Lermina

... directions, the Europeans have much to teach us in the careful growing of good apples. In Europe, the definite training of the apple-tree begins in the nursery; quantity-production, with standardization, is not there the aim. ...
— The Apple-Tree - The Open Country Books—No. 1 • L. H. Bailey

... unhappy and uninterested. His book must be ready, but he was making no move to publish it. To Miss Maggie this could mean but one thing: some financial reverses had made it impossible for him to carry out his plans, and had left him stranded with no definite aim for the future. ...
— Oh, Money! Money! • Eleanor Hodgman Porter

... spake oft to one another of Things in Heaven and Things in Earth. Afterwards, our mutuall Reserves returned, and Robin, methinks, became shyer than before, but there can never cease to be a dearer Bond between us. Now we are apart, I aim to keep him mindfulle of the high and holie Resolutions he formed in his Sicknesse; and though he never answers these Portions of my Letters, I am avised to think he finds them ...
— Mary Powell & Deborah's Diary • Anne Manning

... imposition of a P50 poll tax. To compel them to take up agriculture was out of the question in a Colony where there was so little guarantee for their personal safety. The frugality, constant activity, and commendable ambition of the Celestial clashes with the dissipation, indolence and want of aim in life of the native. There is absolutely no harmony of thought, purpose, or habit between the Philippine Malay native and the Mongol race, and the consequence of Chinese coolies working on plantations without ample protection would be frequent assassinations and open affray. Moreover, ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman

... notable catalogues of early-printed books, which aim to cover all the issues of the press from the first invention of printing, up to a certain period. One of the most carefully edited and most readily useful of these is Hain, (L.) Repertorium Bibliographicum, ...
— A Book for All Readers • Ainsworth Rand Spofford

... advantage of events. He had directness of purpose, firmness of will, and always knew his own mind. From the beginning of his political career unto its end, he conscientiously and without swerving pursued a single aim. This was to rob the exchequer by every possible mode and at every instant of his life. Never was a more masterly financier in this respect. With a single eye to his own interests, he preserved a magnificent unity in ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... his head eroded by the ray, the serpent struck again, but this time his aim was wild. The mighty head half buried itself in the muck beside me, and I swung the projector tube down so that the full force of the ray tore into the region above and behind the eyes, where I imagined the brain to be. The heavy reddish dust fairly ...
— The Terror from the Depths • Sewell Peaslee Wright

... through secret channels, which would give them opportunity to concentrate and equip their forces. The immediate preparations before the outbreak of war dare not be instituted generally, but as soon as the decision for operations is conceived, they must be promptly inaugurated. The aim should be to keep the opponents in uncertainty for a short time, and then a rapidly executed operation would take them unawares. An unexpected attack depends largely upon rapidity of movement. Incidentally, diplomatic ...
— Operations Upon the Sea - A Study • Franz Edelsheim

... against the Protector. He and a man named CECIL, bribed one of his Life Guards to let them have good notice when he was going out—intending to shoot him from a window. But, owing either to his caution or his good fortune, they could never get an aim at him. Disappointed in this design, they got into the chapel in Whitehall, with a basketful of combustibles, which were to explode by means of a slow match in six hours; then, in the noise and confusion of the fire, they hoped to kill Oliver. But, the Life Guardsman ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens

... ingenuity to discover a mode of navigating the air; all kinds of imaginary projects have been suggested, some showing great mechanical ingenuity, but all indicating the want of more knowledge of the atmosphere itself. The first great aim of this society is the connecting the velocity of the air with its pressure on plane surfaces ...
— The Dominion of the Air • J. M. Bacon



Words linked to "Aim" :   design, sight, destine, view, steering, sake, aspire, way, will, thing, tack, think, direction, cross-purpose, grail, address, plan, mean, goal, propose, range in, overshoot, turn, idea, purpose, intent, guidance, swing, final cause, be after, zero in, intend, specify, designate, end, home in, point, target, business, position, hold, get, charge, mind, draw a bead on, level



Copyright © 2024 Dictionary One.com