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Ask   /æsk/   Listen
Ask

verb
(past & past part. asked; pres. part. asking)
1.
Inquire about.  Synonyms: enquire, inquire.  "He had to ask directions several times"
2.
Make a request or demand for something to somebody.
3.
Direct or put; seek an answer to.
4.
Consider obligatory; request and expect.  Synonyms: expect, require.  "Aren't we asking too much of these children?" , "I expect my students to arrive in time for their lessons"
5.
Address a question to and expect an answer from.  "The children asked me about their dead grandmother"
6.
Require as useful, just, or proper.  Synonyms: call for, demand, involve, necessitate, need, postulate, require, take.  "Success usually requires hard work" , "This job asks a lot of patience and skill" , "This position demands a lot of personal sacrifice" , "This dinner calls for a spectacular dessert" , "This intervention does not postulate a patient's consent"
7.
Require or ask for as a price or condition.  "The kidnappers are asking a million dollars in return for the release of their hostage"



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"Ask" Quotes from Famous Books



... men in prison must bear. They are deprived of liberty, separated from friends, no social intercourse, and constantly maintaining an unnatural position. The convict's place is lower than the most degraded menial; he must ask for permission even to get a drink of water. No serf of earth, no slave, however wretched, has a sadder lot. These unhappy mortals have yielded to temptation, have fallen, and are paying the penalty of violated law. Who can think of these degraded beings, without, to some extent, its ...
— The Twin Hells • John N. Reynolds

... ring-master. "But there's one thing, though. If they ask to have Sim Dobley back again I'll tell 'em it can't be done. I won't have that fellow around. That's ...
— Joe Strong, the Boy Fish - or Marvelous Doings in a Big Tank • Vance Barnum

... was tired of hiding, tired of playing his game. One look at the face he had loved from its babyhood had turned the tide. Lawson had never before been so long shut away from his guiding star. And she had said that he might ask again when he dared—and so he came forth from his cave-place. Once outside, he drew a deep, free breath, turned his handsome face to the sky, and felt the prayer that another might ...
— The Man Thou Gavest • Harriet T. Comstock

... what has happened," replied Harry Somerville, who was the first to recover his composure; "I presume you intended to ask, 'What has caused it to happen?' Perhaps the skipper will ...
— The Young Fur Traders • R.M. Ballantyne

... began, nothing loth, and I must confess even I was struck by Evesham's reckless folly in the wild and threatening words he had used. And this messenger they had sent to me not only told me of Evesham's speech, but went on to ask counsel and to point out what need they had of me. While he talked, my lady sat a little forward and ...
— The Door in the Wall And Other Stories • H. G. Wells

... he was attentive until I had finished, and then burst out laughing again, and asked me if I was sore afterwards? I didn't ask him if he was, for my conviction on ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens

... burning heat. I experienced a horrible suffering and believed I felt a hand on my body. I cried out and pushed with my feet, and as I lay there in a half consciousness it was as if many of my dormitory companions were awake and I heard them ask, 'What is it? Who has called out this way?' A voice, 'Some one has been dreaming!' And another voice, 'Silence in the dormitory!' And all was gone from me as if under a heavy veil. Once again quiet. Am I asleep or am I awake? A wild beating in the arteries of my neck, a roaring in my ears. Yet ...
— Sleep Walking and Moon Walking - A Medico-Literary Study • Isidor Isaak Sadger

... the driver and talked in a low tone. Sometimes he sat quiet, looking ahead. He seemed, somehow, older, more careworn. His boyishness had gone. Now and then he turned to ask if she was comfortable, but in the intervals she felt that he had entirely forgotten her. Once, at something Jean said, he got out a pocket map and went over it carefully. It was a long time after that before he turned to see ...
— The Amazing Interlude • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... Canto Gallo. I had now to rely upon the hospitality of the proprietors of the fazendas. Custom requires that, on reaching a fazenda, any person who desires to stop the middle of the day or the night there, should wait outside and ask, through the servant, permission to do so. It is not until his application is granted, which is almost always the case, that the traveller dismounts from his mule, and enters ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer

... said: "Now I am about to call upon the band for a tune that our adversaries over the way have endeavored to appropriate. But we fairly captured it yesterday and the Attorney-General gave me his legal opinion that it is now our property. So I ask the band to ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore

... his credit none the less. Going or not going to Shanghai was all one to Tarascon. Tartarin's journey was so much talked about that people got to believe he had done it and returned, and at the club in the evening members would actually ask for information on life at Shanghai, the manners and customs and climate, about ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various

... antipathy to me as a husband for your niece. Give your consent—she'll do it for you—and, on my wedding day, I burn those mortgages and I'll settle 100,000 dollars upon Jacky. Besides this I'll put 200,000 dollars into your ranch to develop it, and only ask ten per cent, of the profits. Can I speak fairer? That girl of yours is a good girl, John; too good to kick about the prairie. I'll make her a good husband. She shall do as she pleases, live where she likes. You can always be with us if you choose. It's ...
— The Story of the Foss River Ranch • Ridgwell Cullum

... very sick, like to die with a Flux. Aug. 13.—I go to see him, went in with his son Thomas and Mr. Lewis. His Son spake to him and he knew him not; I spake to him and he bid me speak again; then he said, Now I know you, and speaking cheerily mentioned my name. I ask'd his Blessing for me and my family; He said I was Bless'd, and it could not be Reversed. Yet at my going away He pray'd for a ...
— Bay State Monthly, Volume I, No. 2, February, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various

... the strongest language in regard to the intolerable burden of the Law as a means of salvation(xv. 10 f., cf. 1). Not a word is said of any difference of opinion between Peter and Paul at Antioch (Gal. ii. 11 ff.). The brethren in Antioch send Paul and Barnabas up to Jerusalem to ask the opinion of the apostles and elders: they state their case, and carry back the decision to Antioch. Throughout the whole of Acts Paul never stands forth as the unbending champion of the Gentiles. He seems continually anxious to reconcile the Jewish Christians to himself by personally observing ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... then he often gives me pretty things, and then sometimes he says he must take them away again, because they are worth so much money. I don't mind, you know, if he wants them; but I will ask him ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter

... your house, Lady Lansmere. I heard you were here; pardon me if I have followed you. I have called at Knightsbridge to see Violante, learned that she had left you. I implore you to tell me how or wherefore. I have the right to ask: her father has promised me her hand." Harley's falcon eye had brightened tip at Randal's entrance. It watched steadily the young man's face. It was clouded for a moment by his knitted brows at Randal's closing words; but he left it ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... himself so disconcerted as when she advanced upon him with the caustic query, "Why did you not ask Mrs. Keene for her husband's keys? Surely that is simple enough!" She flung a bunch of keys on a steel ring down upon the table. "Heavens! to be roused from my well-earned slumbers at daybreak to solve this problem! 'Hurryf Hurry! Hurry!'" ...
— The Phantom Of Bogue Holauba - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)

... in words, in humble guise I speak my thanks, and ask, "How may it be That thou shouldst know my wretched state?" and she "Thy floods of tears perpetual, and thy sighs Breathed forth unceasing, to high heaven arise. And there disturb thy blissful state serene; ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch

... would have given us material aid; much in the way of duties, much in the way of trade and navigation. A good ministry would have considered how a renewal of the Assiento might have been obtained. We had as much right to ask it at the treaty of Paris as at the treaty of Utrecht. We had incomparably more in our hands to purchase it. Floods of treasure would have poured into this kingdom from such a source; and, under proper management, no small part of it would have ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. I. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... get me to climb any more trees after your balls, and my cat won't catch any of your mice, so you needn't ask me." ...
— Under the Lilacs • Louisa May Alcott

... sharply that they had better consider anew the theatrical practises and prejudices which seemed to them absurdly out-worn, and which they disdained as born of mere chance and surviving only by tradition. He bade them ask themselves if these tricks of the trade, so to style them, were not due to the fact that the dramatist's art is a special art, having its own laws, its own conditions, its own conventions, inherent in the nature of the art itself. When they exprest their conviction that the method of ...
— Inquiries and Opinions • Brander Matthews

... perceive your action. His mind, acting on the principle of the gyroscope, will resist by greater opposition any push of the personal plea. If you ask a decision as a personal favor, your prospect will lose confidence in the true weight of the ideas on your side that you have already registered in his mind. You are much more likely to hurt than to help your chances for success by making a personal plea. Even if it should prove effective, what ...
— Certain Success • Norval A. Hawkins

... a fool, and saw nothing but Priscilla, and felt nothing but his love for her. He took John Alden by the arm, and, leading him apart into the forest, proposed to him to go to young Mistress Mullens and ask her if she would become the wife of Captain Standish. Alden was honest, too; but he was dominated by his older friend, and lacked the courage to tell him that he had hoped for Priscilla for himself; he let the critical moment for this explanation pass, and then there was nothing ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne

... me next week to the Merrimans'," she said. "I don't at all know whether I shall be able to endure it. You think me greatly improved, but I don't know that I am improved. Be that as it may, however, I want to ask you ...
— A Modern Tomboy - A Story for Girls • L. T. Meade

... voice whispered, "I have come to ask your help...." It was so dark, he could not see her; he knew where she was only by the glitter of the jewel on her neck-chain as it arced through ...
— The Blue Tower • Evelyn E. Smith

... felt tempted to join her, but his better judgment came to his aid, and he answered: "Yes, Maggie, I am afraid, having never tried such an experiment. But I wish to be with you in some way, and as I cannot come to you I ask you to come to me. You seem ...
— Maggie Miller • Mary J. Holmes

... life has seemed to go into yours. I have never told you. I was sure you knew it, without any telling, and I have been waiting until the war was over, before asking you to go home with me, as my wife. The—" he caught his breath sharply, "the war is over for me now, dearest. I can't ask you to go home with me; but—Tell me, Ethel, I have not been mistaken, all these months? You have cared for me, as I have cared for you?" The last words came out with the roundness of tone he had used in health; but there ...
— On the Firing Line • Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller

... "When I ask you to do a thing, Fritz, you might have the decency to do it," she said sharply. "You're forgetting what's due to ...
— The Woman With The Fan • Robert Hichens

... dramatic glory what she thought it meant. Presuming it to be incumbent upon a prospective prima donna to have uppermost in her mind the grand passion, she replied, in a sentimental tone, "Love!" Promptly Karl Formes sounded the solution to the chord. "There is your answer," quoth he. "I ask a question, and it is thought I speak of love. Go home, my good girl, and seek some other avocation. You have a fair voice, but you are tone-deaf. You can never ...
— For Every Music Lover - A Series of Practical Essays on Music • Aubertine Woodward Moore

... make them acquainted with his condition, and also do to them these three things. 1. Let him heartily and unfeignedly ask them forgiveness for the wrong that he has done them. 2. Let him proffer them ALL, and the whole ALL that ever he has in the world; let him hide nothing, let him strip himself to his raiment for them; ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... matter disgusted Fitz-Thedmar, the city alderman and chronicler, who complains that he "so pampered the city populace," that they styled themselves the "commons of the city," and had obtained the first voice in the city. The mayor would ask them their will as to whether this or that thing should be done; and if they answered "ya" "ya," it was done, without consulting the aldermen or chief citizens, whose very existence was ignored.(242) It is not surprising that, ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume I • Reginald R. Sharpe

... first instance by telling us that the cells of the iris cannot grow and develop as long as they are pigmented; that the operation wounds the iris, allows pigment to escape, and thus permits of proliferation. We may accept this, and yet ask why it takes on a form of growth familiar to us only in connection with epiblast? The reply is: "Young cells when put into the optic cup always become transparent, no matter what their origin; it looks as if this were due to a chemical ...
— Science and Morals and Other Essays • Bertram Coghill Alan Windle

... agreeing about EVERYthing they should ask. Few men are capable of understanding such love as theirs, of understanding the love of David and Jonathan, of Shakspere to W. H., of Tennyson and Hallam. Every such love, nevertheless, is a possession of the race; what has once been is, in possibility to come, as well as in fact that has ...
— What's Mine's Mine • George MacDonald

... watched the dark figure of Stewart and his black outline against the sky. There came over her a thought not by any means new or strange—she wondered what was in Stewart's mind as he stood there in the solitude and faced the desert and the darkening west. Some day she meant to ask him. Presently he turned the horse and rode down into the shadow ...
— The Light of Western Stars • Zane Grey

... Swan Geese Brant Ducks & Gulls in this great bend which is Crouded with low Islands covered with weeds grass &c. and overflowed every flood tide The people of the last village is- they ask emence prices for what they have to Sel Blue Beeds is their great trade they are fond of Clothes or blankits of Blue red or brown We are now decending to see if a favourable place should offer on the ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al

... began to read. Elnora did not know what he was reading, and she felt that she did not care. Wildly she was racking her brain to decide whether she should sit still when the others left the room or follow, and ask some one ...
— A Girl Of The Limberlost • Gene Stratton Porter

... honestly earned. And it's taught me one thing. I'll quit idling. I shall never be a scholar like long-legged Jim, but I'll do things, I mean it. I'll find out what I can do best, and I think I can guess that, and then I'm going ahead to do it. I'm going to ask Papa to stop giving me money. I'm going to shock my mother by going to work. But—that Prex is a wise old chap. He's taught hundreds, likely thousands, of boys to make decent men and he's trying to teach me. ...
— Dorothy's Travels • Evelyn Raymond

... "Yes, sure. Ask Joan to fix you up; she'll find a place for you to work. And if you're going to be working late, I'll order some dinner for you from the cafeteria. I'm going to be here ...
— Day of the Moron • Henry Beam Piper

... remarkably coherent; they seem to arise naturally from each other. Vidocq's, on the contrary, contain so many marvellous escapes from prisons, so many perils from contests with ruffians and bravoes, and such varied turns of fortune, that the reader is necessitated to ask,—can this be true? Here, however, both Vaux and Ward offer him some assistance; the similarity of their accounts, though destitute of so many wonders, corroborating the probability of his. The ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various

... liability is very strict. For instance, if one should ask another to accompany him on a journey and the latter should fall sick or die, the former would be liable for his death. If one should die in the house, thereby causing the abandonment of it, the relatives of the dead man ...
— The Manbos of Mindano - Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXIII, First Memoir • John M. Garvan

... message, he said very angrily that Don Antonio Rodriguez and I were always excusing ourselves from your Majesty's service by feigning to be sick. [That he said] in the presence of many people who were there, besides other quite unreasonable language. For that reason I was forced to ask him why, if your Majesty gave credit to an auditor when he excused himself, did not he have to do the same, all this with the intention to calm and satisfy him. He abandoned himself to a flow of words, somewhat disconnected, to which I replied, saying that your Majesty ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XX, 1621-1624 • Various

... at supper with her hostess, the blacksmith's wife, it came to Miss Mary to ask, demurely, if her husband ever got drunk. "Abner," responded Mrs. Stidger, reflectively, "let's see: Abner hasn't been tight since last 'lection." Miss Mary would have liked to ask if he preferred lying in the sun on these occasions, and if a cold bath would ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte

... to the provincial forces. But above all, his royal highness, both verbally and in this writing, frequently cautioned him carefully to beware of an ambush or surprise. Instead of regarding this salutary caution, his conceit of his own abilities made him disdain to ask the opinion of any under his command; and the Indians, who would have been his safest guards against this danger in particular, were so disgusted by the haughtiness of his behaviour, that most of them forsook his banners. Under these disadvantages he began his march from Fort Cumberland ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett

... them.—At this moment, one Asselin, an obscure individual, starting from the crowd, exclaimed with a loud voice, "the ground upon which you are standing, was the site of my father's dwelling. This man, for whom you ask our prayers, took it by force from my parent; by violence he seized, by violence he retained it; and, contrary to all law and justice, he built upon it this church, where we are assembled. Publicly, therefore, in the sight of God and man, do I claim my inheritance, ...
— Account of a Tour in Normandy, Vol. II. (of 2) • Dawson Turner

... excuses were, on the following morning, repeated by Rochester. Barillon received them civilly. Rochester, grown bolder, proceeded to ask for money. "It will be well laid out," he said: "your master cannot employ his revenues better. Represent to him strongly how important it is that the King of England should be dependent, not on his own people, but on the ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... is," said she, going straight to a cab in waiting. "Now, don't stop to ask questions or I'll be wicked. ...
— Mlle. Fouchette - A Novel of French Life • Charles Theodore Murray

... one of the white-veiled sisters approached us with a very mysterious air, and put down her white veil close to our ears and whispered. Were we doing anything wrong, I wondered? Were they come to that part of the service where heretics and infidels ought to quit the church? What have you to ask, ...
— Little Travels and Roadside Sketches • William Makepeace Thackeray

... soon as she was able to control her emotion, "one does not need to ask where our little Leonore comes from. It seems to me as if old times had come back again. Yes, she looked exactly like that when she came to the castle; only she was not ...
— Maezli - A Story of the Swiss Valleys • Johanna Spyri

... the composition of sentences, a master began: "If I ask you," said he, "what have I in my hand? you must not say simply 'Chalk,' but make a full sentence of it, and say, 'You have chalk in your hand.' Now I will proceed. What have I on my feet?" The answer came immediately, "Boots." "Wrong; you haven't been observing my directions," he rebukingly ...
— Children's Rhymes, Children's Games, Children's Songs, Children's Stories - A Book for Bairns and Big Folk • Robert Ford

... came across the street to ask Mrs. Parton if she had ever heard Dr. Hollingsworth ...
— Mr. Pat's Little Girl - A Story of the Arden Foresters • Mary F. Leonard

... 'Ask me no reason why I love you; for though Love use Reason for his physician, he admits him not for his counsellor. You are 5 not young, no more am I; go to, then, there's sympathy: you are merry, so ...
— The Merry Wives of Windsor - The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.] • William Shakespeare

... and could oversee the providing for the entire household. She astonishes me over and over. But there is no doubt about her age. Both my sisters were with me when she was born and Nemestronia too. Ask any of the three. Or I can tell you a dozen other ladies who know just as well. Brinnaria will not be ten years old ...
— The Unwilling Vestal • Edward Lucas White

... ask you for some of that time, all precious as it is," said he in French, and with a serious gravity that I had ...
— Cornelius O'Dowd Upon Men And Women And Other Things In General - Originally Published In Blackwood's Magazine - 1864 • Charles Lever

... about it is that, he didn't ask your advice. They chewed the old one to pieces, so he put a new one in its place exactly like it; Yes, just exactly like the one in which the saint lay before. Remember us in heaven where thou dwellest, O Saint! (He crosses himself and yawns) You ...
— Savva and The Life of Man • Leonid Andreyev

... that a nameless youth came up at nightfall from the valley of the Saco, and opened his heart to you in the evening, and passed through the Notch by sunrise, and was seen no more. Not a soul would ask, 'Who was he? Whither did the wanderer go? But I cannot die till I have achieved my destiny. Then, let Death come! I shall ...
— The Great Stone Face - And Other Tales Of The White Mountains • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... Penhallow said to himself, "until he felt pretty sure that it was going to be a paying business. If he was only a young minister now, there'd be no difficulty about it. Let any man, young or old, in a clerical white cravat, step up to Myrtle Hazard, and ask her to be miserable in his company through this wretched life, and Aunt Silence would very likely give them her blessing, and add something to it that the man in the white cravat would think worth even more than that was. But I don't know ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various

... simply pronounce six letters,—Revoco—I retract. Urbanus asked him with a smile if he thought his sovereign would risk his country for his sake. 'God forbid!' answered Luther. 'Where then do you mean to take refuge?' he went on to ask him. 'Under Heaven,' ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin

... ask me to cook no bloaters or bacon for you no more,' added Bert, tearfully, 'cos ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell

... held a somewhat prolonged conference with Lord Strathern, in which the other gentlemen were, at times, called upon to take part. When compelled to speak, L'Isle distinguished himself by giving admirable specimens of the lapidary style, not one spare word. Sir Rowland had many questions to ask and instructions to give; but, these over, he gave a less professional turn to the conversation, and then said: "I hope, my lord, you and these gentlemen will share my poor dinner to-day; but remember, I am not at home in Alcantara, and cannot feast you, as you do your friends at ...
— The Actress in High Life - An Episode in Winter Quarters • Sue Petigru Bowen

... the fundamental truth of Christianity, and it holds good not only for the contemporaries of Jesus, but for all times. Those who see in this view an overestimate of human nature, need only ask themselves what man could be, if he were not a partaker of the divine nature. This excludes the difference between human and divine nature as little as the difference between the physical father and the physical son. Even in this case we speak figuratively, ...
— The Silesian Horseherd - Questions of the Hour • Friedrich Max Mueller

... fell out as if the fates had arranged things for Hugo. They saw very few people in the village; only one old woman accompanied them in the bus; he heard his father ask for a ticket to the junction, and they arrived without incident ...
— Jan and Her Job • L. Allen Harker

... Amos; "it's very kind of you to ask me, I'm sure. I should have liked it had I been able to undertake it, but I am sorry to say ...
— Amos Huntingdon • T.P. Wilson

... shoulders petulantly, and yet could not resist the merry up-glance which she knew went straight to the big fellow's heart. Then she began to fold up her knitting. While Tris was talking to her father, she would ask for permission to go and see Elizabeth. While Tris was present, she did not think he would refuse her request, for if he did so she could ask him for reasons and he would not like ...
— A Singer from the Sea • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr

... to ascertain what pleases them. "The foreigner seems to make it the business of her life to discover some abnormal mode of sexual gratification for her consort." For their own pleasure also foreign prostitutes frequently ask for cunnilinctus, in preference to normal coitus, while anal coitus is also common. The difference evidently is that the British women, when they seek gratification, find it in normal coitus, while the foreign women prefer more ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... have meaning. This is a significant fact. It means that as material approaches nonsense, it is difficult to memorize. Therefore we should always try to grasp the meaning of a thing, its significance. In science, let us always ask, what is the meaning of this fact? What bearing does it have on other facts? How does it affect the meaning ...
— The Science of Human Nature - A Psychology for Beginners • William Henry Pyle

... I had to ask my way more than once before I could find out the tavern, which lay down on the quay, over against the river Yare. By this I soon saw that the "Three-decker" had a reputation not over and above savoury among the townsfolk, for the ...
— Athelstane Ford • Allen Upward

... true meaning of those words), and therefore must come. Conceive him seeing around him estates destroyed, farms burnt, ladies and gentlemen, his own friends and relations, reduced in an hour to beggary, plundered, stript, driven off in gangs—I do not choose to finish the picture: but ask yourselves, would an honourable man wish to bring sons—much more daughters—into ...
— The Roman and the Teuton - A Series of Lectures delivered before the University of Cambridge • Charles Kingsley

... otherwise quite complimentary published by the Viscount de Romanet (see Moniteur Industriel of the 15th and 18th of May, 1845), he intimates that I ask for the suppression of custom houses. Mr. de Romanet is mistaken. I ask for the suppression of the protective policy. We do not dispute the right of government to impose taxes, but would, if possible, dissuade ...
— Sophisms of the Protectionists • Frederic Bastiat

... forget not, that if you have become a great man, 'tis thanks to me; I ask but a little thing; appoint me secretary of the law-court in the room ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al

... have to ask you, but I hope not. 'Twould be a dangerous undertaking," she said, leaning ...
— Yankee Girl at Fort Sumter • Alice Turner Curtis

... not come to fan the fire of your affection for me, or to instil courage into your hearts: in both those qualities you are more than rich. No, I have come to ask you to moderate your courage and to set some bounds to your affection. These recent disturbances did not originate in those passions of greed or violence, which so often cause dissension in an army; nor was it that you feared some danger and tried to shirk ...
— Tacitus: The Histories, Volumes I and II • Caius Cornelius Tacitus

... to ask what tidings. Winter is the first to throw himself from his steaming horse, and followed by Percy, the two Wrights and Robert Keyes, staggers into the room. They are covered with mud and streaming ...
— The Fifth of November - A Romance of the Stuarts • Charles S. Bentley

... was all right," said Geoff, who was in high excitement, the chief spokesman, and extremely eager to tell his own story before any one could interfere. "I knew the way quite well. I wanted to see Theo, you know, to ask him if he really meant it. I wanted to speak to him all by himself; for Theo is never the same, mamma, when you are there. I knew which turn to take as well as any one. I wasn't in a hurry; it was such a nice day. But pony was not interested about Theo, like me, and ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant

... very interesting!" the latter remarked. "Is it the custom, sir, always, may I ask, in this country, to have so ...
— Peter Ruff and the Double Four • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... Mrs. Gibbons's cousin subsequently remarked by way of explanation. "I saw it—I have seen it before. Don't ask me to describe it. I dare not—I dare not even think of it. Whenever it appears, a certain thing happens shortly afterwards. Don't, don't on any account say a word about it to any one here." And Mrs. Gibbons, my mother told me, came away from Glamis ...
— Scottish Ghost Stories • Elliott O'Donnell

... was almost a moan in the words. Muriel's head sank a little lower. "Heaven knows I'm not proud," she said. "I am ashamed—miserably ashamed. I have trampled on his love so often—so often. How could I ask him ...
— The Way of an Eagle • Ethel M. Dell

... thought of that,' rejoined Newman, his countenance falling more and more. 'I came to ask you to receive his sister in case he brought ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens

... will be crowded from morn to night, but I shall leave it all to Fanny. Only tell me how much to ask." ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... to know why you have no bread?" snarled he. "You ask why you starve? Well, my friends and brothers, the answer is an easy one to give. The baker of France has shut up his storehouse because the baker's wife has told him to do so, because she hates the people and wants them to starve! But she does not intend to starve, and so she has called ...
— Marie Antoinette And Her Son • Louise Muhlbach

... She looked on calmly, too, while the little girls, treating them like daisies, pulled several to pieces, petal by petal. Only the boy Roderick had appeared to attach any worth to them. He rescued some from under the table, and was overheard to ask ardently if he might have three for his own. The answer that he might have them all if he liked was not missed by any one in the room, though spoken in Miss Chaine's usual quiet tones. It might have been an accident that she walked over some of the spilled roses as she left the room, ...
— Blue Aloes - Stories of South Africa • Cynthia Stockley

... to be looked after, and it is not uninteresting to follow its effects, expansion, action, and to ask: ...
— The Physiology of Taste • Brillat Savarin

... blazed in her blue eyes. She talked, she rattled in her childish way. She uttered, in the course of her rhapsody, a hint—an intimation—so terrible that the truth flashed across me in a moment. Did I ask her? She would lie to me. But I knew how to make falsehood impossible. And I ordered her to go ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.

... same dependence I soon ran away to Knoxville. Writing to a certain place from there I learned of my father's death. These were dark days for me. I was strolling about in the cold world without home or friends. I would often ask myself, "What am I living for when there is no heart beating for me?" I began to drift with the current and even thought I would take to drinking. Then the thought came to me that I would be a coward to come so far and then give up. I arose with this thought and determined to act like ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 7, 1922 • Various

... ask how Mother Corey had acquired the dope. When Earth had deported all addicts two decades before, it had practically begged for ...
— Police Your Planet • Lester del Rey

... when time is abundant, but never slight the essential points of information that will give valuable help to your chief. Always try to put yourself in his place—not seeing what you see and read your message—and then ask yourself, What will he ...
— Manual of Military Training - Second, Revised Edition • James A. Moss

... that case there would be a very delicious pleasure in giving an absolute refusal—a pleasure one could taste in anticipation and linger over in execution. One could play with the girl a little—pretend to be influenced, hesitate, ask for time to consider, raise hopes, fan them, and then ...
— Swirling Waters • Max Rittenberg

... journeyed away from the Hill of the White Field, and when she had come some way she spoke to her people and said, "Kill me, I pray ye, the four children of Lir, who have taken the love of their father from me, and ye may ask of me what reward ye will." "Not so," said they, "by us they shall never be killed; it is an evil deed that you have thought of, and evil it is but to have ...
— The High Deeds of Finn and other Bardic Romances of Ancient Ireland • T. W. Rolleston

... geometrical figures by which space is limited. I was pleased with the Cartesian opinion, that the idea of God is distinguished from all other ideas by involving its reality; but I was not wholly satisfied. I began then to ask myself, what proof I had of the outward existence of anything? Of this sheet of paper for instance, as a thing in itself, separate from the phaenomenon or image in my perception. I saw, that in the nature of things such proof is impossible; ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... hurry, a man without a hat was seen walking very composedly before the door. One crying out, "Here is the fellow who killed the duke;" every body ran to ask, "Which is he?" The man very sedately answered, "I am he." The more furious immediately rushed upon him with drawn swords: others, more deliberate, defended and protected him: he himself, with open arms, calmly and cheerfully exposed his breast to the swords of the most enraged; being willing ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part E. - From Charles I. to Cromwell • David Hume

... bidding of his brain. He stood on crutches, hat in hand, at church-doors, and asked for alms. Sometimes he would make bold to tell people of wonderful pictures within, over the altar or upon the walls; and he would say that they were his, and then his hearers would laugh aloud, and ask him to repeat his words, that others, too, might laugh. Thus dwindled the passing days; and for him who had painted the "Spring" there came the chilling neglect of Winter, until Death in mercy laid an icy hand upon him, and ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 6 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Artists • Elbert Hubbard

... said Esau, uneasily. "I don't want to show no white feathers, but I ask any one—Is that a nice place to tackle after being walking all the morning with ...
— To The West • George Manville Fenn

... the business rather heavily, but I have done it without advice, and you must do the same. It isn't right for any man to lead another into experiments of this sort, and it is hardly the fair thing to ask him to do it. I've looked for myself, but the fact that I am satisfied is no good reason for ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland

... a minute, trying to screw up courage to speak to her. She wanted to ask her if she had seen the advertisement. She did not know why she wanted to ask her this, but she wanted to. How stupid not to be able to speak to her. She looked so kind. She looked so unhappy. Why couldn't two unhappy people refresh each other on their way through this dusty business of life by a ...
— The Enchanted April • Elizabeth von Arnim

... like you who make the trouble," he stormed. "Damn fools who say they didn't mean to. It isn't enough not to mean to. They should MEAN NOT TO! I don't ask you to think. I just want you to do what I tell you, and you can't even ...
— The Blazed Trail • Stewart Edward White

... for this is, they regard not the promise of God, but their own work and worthiness, whereby they despise God and reproach Him with lying, and therefore they receive nothing. As St. James says [1, 6]: But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering; for he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea, driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord. Behold, such importance God attaches to the fact that we are sure we do not pray in vain, and ...
— The Large Catechism by Dr. Martin Luther

... ask you, Gentlemen, to bear in mind, that the philosophy of an imperial intellect, for such I am considering a University to be, is based, not so much on simplification as on discrimination. Its true representative ...
— The Idea of a University Defined and Illustrated: In Nine - Discourses Delivered to the Catholics of Dublin • John Henry Newman

... sceptical reader sneer, and ask where she got, or who brought the swords and pistols. Some kind deity, willing to assist the purposes of her just revenge, interposed and brought her arms. Surely Horace would allow that this was "dignus vindice nodus." But ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 6, June 1810 • Various

... Eckfenster, In the works here named we have the best fruits of Hoffmann's pen. And if instead of asking in the mistaken spirit of competition which is now so much in vogue. What is Hoffmann's position in literature? we ask rather, Has he written anything that deserves to be read? we shall have already had our answer. The works here singled out are worthy of being preserved and read; and of them Das Majorat and Meister ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann

... Arcot smiling, "you haven't stated the terms correctly. Actually, I have a fully equipped lab to putter around in, all the time I want for my own amusement, and all the money I want. What more could I ask?" ...
— The Black Star Passes • John W Campbell

... fitness of the nominees placed before them for their action, both when they are proposed to fill vacancies and to take the place of suspended officials. Upon a refusal to confirm I shall not assume the right to ask the reasons for the action of the Senate nor question its determination. I can not think that anything more is required to secure worthy incumbents in public office than a careful and independent discharge of our respective ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 3) of Volume 8: Grover Cleveland, First Term. • Grover Cleveland

... that a large proportion, I might perhaps say the majority, of the European residents in Japan do not trouble to attend the Christian places of worship, while many of them make no disguise of their contempt for Christianity in general and the missionaries in particular. What conclusion, may I ask, can the logical, reasoning Japanese come to ...
— The Empire of the East • H. B. Montgomery

... higher culture has gradually been developed by causes still in operation." To trace the history of civilisation, therefore, it is necessary to go back to the earliest knowledge we have of human life upon the earth, and to ask what germs and rudiments can be discovered among savages of law, of institutions, of arts and sciences. Such works as Maine's Ancient Law, Tylor's Primitive Culture, Lubbock's Origin of Civilisation, show how fruitful this method is, and what floods of light it pours on the history ...
— History of Religion - A Sketch of Primitive Religious Beliefs and Practices, and of the Origin and Character of the Great Systems • Allan Menzies

... rather interesting inquiry, whenever we are dealing with a building material, if we ask what can we best do with it, and for what is it ill fitted. The purposes for which brick can be best used depend, of course, upon its qualities. Speaking generally, such purposes are very numerous and very various, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 601, July 9, 1887 • Various

... know something of you. Our friend, Mr. Ricardo, told me your history; I asked him for it when I saw you at his dinner. You are of those about whom one does ask questions, and I know that you are not a romantic boy, but who shall say that he is safe from the appeal of beauty? I have seen women, monsieur, for whose purity of soul I would myself have stood security, condemned ...
— At the Villa Rose • A. E. W. Mason

... demanding why? 'Oh, sir, He thought that nothing new was said, or else 30 Something so said 'twas nothing—-that a truth Looks freshest in the fashion of the day: God knows: he has a mint of reasons: ask. It pleased me well enough,' 'Nay, nay,' said Hall, 'Why take the style of those heroic times? 35 For nature brings not back the Mastodon, Nor we those times; and why should any man Remodel models? these twelve books of mine Were faint Homeric ...
— Selections from Wordsworth and Tennyson • William Wordsworth and Alfred Lord Tennyson



Words linked to "Ask" :   govern, draw, question, cry for, cost, request, consult, pry, interrogate, intercommunicate, confer with, give voice, address, word, turn to, communicate, solicit, formulate, claim, obviate, compel, postulate, quest, phrase, inquire, ask over, exact, query, cry out for, call, bespeak, articulate



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