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Swear in   /swɛr ɪn/   Listen
Swear in

verb
1.
Administer on oath to.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Swear in" Quotes from Famous Books



... into one of the wagons, where he'd be out of the way; for we know'd there was going to be considerable more fighting before night. We know'd, too, we Americans would have to do the heft of it, as them Mexican bull-whackers warn't much account, nohow, except to cavort around and swear in Spanish, which they hadn't done nothing else since we'd come up to the train; besides, their miserable guns warn't much better than ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman

... a contemplation of his carcass. Yet with sorrow I must say that the seaman's religion appeared to have all worked into his skin, so that very little was left for inner use. It had broken out upon the surface, like the spotted fever, but his system was clear of it elsewhere. He could swear in eleven languages and three-and-twenty dialects, nor did he ever let his great powers rust for want of practice. He would swear when he was happy or when he was sad, when he was angry or when he was loving, but this swearing was so mere ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle

... and whose behaviour is exceedingly wicked. Thou shalt have to dwell in the stomach of a vulture or in Hastinapura. O scum of human kind, I shall assuredly fulfil the vow I have made in the midst of the assembly. I swear in the name of Truth, slaying Dussasana in battle, I shall quaff his life-blood! Slaying also thy (other) brothers, I shall smash thy own thighs. Without doubt, O Suyodhana, I am the destroyer of all the sons of Dhritarashtra, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... was caught. To have refused would have been shameful: so, clearing up his face, he stretched out his hand to Ammalat. "I will willingly go with you," he replied. "Let us not delay—let us swear in the mosque, and go to the fight together! Allah will judge whether we are to bring back his skin for a housing, or whether he ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various

... gentle smile of peace, and talk about good will to men. Such virtue doesn't greatly weigh, in making up the books of life; the man who cheerful is and gay, in times of sorrow and of strife, is better worth a word of praise, than all the gents of smiling mien, who swear in forty different ways when life has ceased to be serene. This morning, as I ambled down, a neighbor fell (the walk was slick) and slid half-way across the town, and landed on a pile of brick. He slid along at such a rate the ice ...
— Rippling Rhymes • Walt Mason

... "let us not forget that this Bartle—this—but I will not say it—let us not forget that God can asily turn his plans against himself. To God, then, let us lave him. Now, hear me—you must swear in His presence that you will have neither act nor part in doing him an injury—that you will not shed his blood, nor allow it to be shed by others, as far as ...
— Fardorougha, The Miser - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton

... short-handed ships, shots exchanged, and the smoke (and the company) dispersing from the doors of the saloon. I have heard cold-minded Polacks debate upon the readiest method of burning San Francisco to the ground, hot-headed working men and women bawl and swear in the tribune at the Sandlot, and Kearney himself open his subscription for a gallows, name the manufacturers who were to grace it with their dangling bodies, and read aloud to the delighted multitude ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... be"—but he did not say what he would "be." He always halted before an oath, unless angry, which was seldom, but then beware!—he had learned to swear in Flanders. "How she did fly at me the other morning. I never was more surprised in all my life. For once I was almost caught with my guard down, and did not know how to parry the thrust. I mumbled over some sort of a lame retaliation and beat a retreat. It was so unjust and uncalled-for that ...
— When Knighthood Was in Flower • Charles Major

... that useth much swearing shall be filled with iniquity, and the plague shall never depart from his house: if he shall offend, his sin shall be upon him: and if he acknowledge not his sin, he maketh a double offence: and if he swear in vain, he shall not be innocent, but his house shall ...
— Deuteronomical Books of the Bible - Apocrypha • Anonymous

... of the common course, and for that reason your story would find no favor with him. I doubt whether he ever read a novel in his life. If you should take all the public officers in St. Louis to Chicago with you, and let them swear in court that you were the long-lost son of Edward and Louise Farringford, he would not believe them. He may be convinced, but not by anything you ...
— Desk and Debit - or, The Catastrophes of a Clerk • Oliver Optic

... when each hour appears to be grudged if not devoted to toil. At night, fires mark the spots where work is most brisk, and the warehouses along the line are frequently illuminated from the street to the upper story: crowds of labourers, sailors, bargemen, and draymen cheer, and order, and swear in every language in use amongst this mixed population; and, above all, at regular intervals, rises the wild chorus of the slaves labouring in gangs, who, if miserable, are certainly the merriest ...
— Impressions of America - During The Years 1833, 1834, and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Tyrone Power

... is horrible," I said blankly. That he was beginning to chafe, to fret, and shuffle his feet only added to my dismay. He might begin at any moment to swear in Spanish, and that was sure to bring a shower of lead, blind, fired blindly. "We have nothing to expect from the people of that ship. We cannot even ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer

... him that he could not think of doing so, for the Doge knew him and would not trust himself with anybody else. At length when Antonio, his mind excited by all the tortures of love, began to give way to unbridled anger, and violently importune him, and to swear in an insane and ridiculous fashion that he would leap after the gondola and drag it down under the sea, Pietro replied laughing, "Why, Signor Antonio, Signor Antonio, why, I declare you have quite lost yourself in the Dogess's beautiful eyes." But he consented to allow Antonio to ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann

... "Don't swear in the presence of the dead," he said solemnly. "You're drunk, Alf; go home!" And Alf, news and all was hustled from the schoolhouse by ...
— The Daughter of Anderson Crow • George Barr McCutcheon

... which the general expressed great anxiety, offering to put up at least a thousand dollars as a reward to any person who would clear up the mystery. One declared he had seen Tickler in company with General Sam Houston; another was willing to swear in court that he saw him last in the company of Senator Douglas; and still another would have sworn he saw him on the day after his departure in the company of one Dabney Grimkey, a writer of sensation novels; and that both ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"

... cried Burgsdorf, "that was spoken like a man! Begin the good work in earnest, and command the Stadtholder without delay to swear in the other governors ...
— The Youth of the Great Elector • L. Muhlbach

... with the rage, and fear, and madness of great courage, before they died or fell, and it left some living men, and others who relieved them in Big Willie and Little Willie trenches, so close to the enemy that one could hear them cough, or swear in ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs

... Who lye and swear in jest, To cheat unguarded Creatures Of Virtue, Fame, and Rest! Whoever steals a Shilling, Through Shame the Guilt conceals: In Love the perjur'd Villain ...
— The Beggar's Opera • John Gay

... variegated, marvelous cryptographic chapter headings: Trumbull was the most learned man that ever lived in Hartford. He was familiar with all literary and scientific data, and according to Clemens could swear in twenty-seven languages. It was thought to be a choice idea to get Trumbull to supply a lingual medley of quotations to precede the chapters in the new book, the purpose being to excite interest and possibly to amuse the reader—a ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... "I, Tadeusz Kosciuszko, swear in the sight of God to the whole Polish nation that I will use the power entrusted to me for the personal oppression of none, but will only use it for the defence of the integrity of the boundaries, the regaining of the independence of the nation, and ...
— Kosciuszko - A Biography • Monica Mary Gardner

... returned to his supper. Just as he was finishing it, he said aloud: "I don't see how it can be that, either. For if it's due to any trouble of that kind they want big, husky fellows, and Merritt can swear in any one he needs." So giving up the problem as temporarily insoluble, Wilbur went to bed early so as to make a quick start in ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Foresters • Francis Rolt-Wheeler

... make a print on a soft pile carpet," he answered. "As fer finger-marks—Sanson T. Wrangler's ready ter swear in court as the criminals both wore gloves, fully provin' that they wasn't novices ...
— Kiddie the Scout • Robert Leighton

... conspicuous. Independently of their judicial duties, the Court of Aldermen constitute the executive department of the Corporation; with them rests the cognizance of the return of every civic officer elected at a wardmote court, and also of the election of common-councillors. They swear in brokers and other officers, and investigate the validity of claims to civic freedom. For the proper discharge of these and similar duties, they are singularly adapted through their local knowledge, which ...
— The Corporation of London: Its Rights and Privileges • William Ferneley Allen

... said David to himself at this juncture of the letter—he was training himself to swear in a moderate, gentlemanly way—"Damn it all! Whatever I do, it seems I cannot ...
— Mrs. Warren's Daughter - A Story of the Woman's Movement • Sir Harry Johnston

... reply to that telegram swear in forty deputies and announce that they's a price on Barry's head. So long, Gus. This little play'll make the boys figger you're the most efficient sheriff that never ...
— The Untamed • Max Brand

... Dansowich!" said the Proveditore sternly. "Did you not proclaim and swear in the public market-place of the Austrian town of Segna, that you were the friends and allies of Venice? This you would never have dared to do, but with the approval and connivance ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various

... to swear in French, which, as I have remarked in one of our previous adventures, was his mother's native tongue, to which he resorted when so excited that he couldn't express himself further ...
— The Adventures of the Eleven Cuff-Buttons • James Francis Thierry

... annoyance by clicks of his tongue: "You are insolent when you swear in my presence. You are insolent when you impute to my cats a ...
— Once Aboard The Lugger • Arthur Stuart-Menteth Hutchinson

... began to swear in his turn. "These police agents are all alike," he grumbled. "They question you, you tell them all they desire to know; and afterward, if you venture to ask them anything, they reply: 'nothing,' or 'because.' They have too much authority; ...
— Monsieur Lecoq • Emile Gaboriau

... realities. We can imagine to what desperation she was brought when her Quaker prudishness could hail an emphatic oath in English from a French official with the exclamation, "Well, it sounds good to hear someone even swear in old Anglo-Saxon!" After two months of enforced silence, she was buoyant in reaching the British Islands once more, where she could enjoy public speaking and general conversation. Here she was the recipient of many generous social attentions, and, on May ...
— Eighty Years And More; Reminiscences 1815-1897 • Elizabeth Cady Stanton

... to be a Council, to swear in Privy Councillors and Lords-Lieutenant, and receive Oxford and Cambridge addresses. The review made it an hour later, and the Lieutenants, who had been summoned at one, and who are great, selfish, pampered aristocrats, were furious ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. II • Charles C. F. Greville

... Sacrament of the Altar after the consecration was material bread. And that images should in no wise be worshipped. And that men should not go on any pilgrimages. And that priests have no title to tithes. And that it is not lawful to swear in any wise. ...
— Fifteenth Century Prose and Verse • Various

... the owners of property and the elected men of the hundreds or townships; in other words, by the public opinion of the neighbourhood. If the accused man were of bad character by common report, or if he could find no friends to swear in his behalf, "the oath burst," and there remained for him only the ordeal or trial by battle, which he might accept or refuse at his own peril. In the simple ordeal he dipped his hand in boiling water to the wrist, or carried a bar of redhot iron three paces. If in consequence of his lord's testimony ...
— Henry the Second • Mrs. J. R. Green

... of the Napos is a mixture of Paganism and Christianity. In common with all the other orient tribes, they believe in good and evil principles, and in metempsychosis. They swear in the name of the devil. They bury their dead horizontally, in a coffin made of a part of a canoe, with a lid of bamboo. They are very kind to the aged. Monogamy is the rule: the usual age of wedlock is sixteen or seventeen. The parents negotiate the marriage, and the curate's fee ...
— The Andes and the Amazon - Across the Continent of South America • James Orton

... private. Then, all persons being ordered to withdraw to a distance, he draws his dagger; and standing over the couch with his dagger ready to strike, he threatens that he would immediately stab him, unless he would swear in the words which he would dictate, that "he never would hold a meeting of the commons for the purpose of prosecuting his father." The tribune alarmed, (for he saw the steel glittering before his eyes, ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius

... But he never made war upon any nation without just and necessary cause; and was so far from being ambitious either to extend the empire, or advance his own military glory, that he obliged the chiefs of some barbarous tribes to swear in the temple of Mars the Avenger [140], that they would faithfully observe their engagements, and not violate the peace which they had implored. Of some he demanded a new description of hostages, their women, having found from experience that they cared little for their ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus

... forgiving in his temper, and greatly esteemed among the more serious portion of our hands. He used to snatch every occasion to talk to the lewd and vicious about the concerns of their souls, and to advise them to fix their minds upon the Savior, as their only helper. Some I have heard curse and swear in answer, and others would say that they could not keep their minds upon God and the devil (meaning Huckstep) at the same time: that it was of no use to try to be religious—they had no time—that the overseer wouldn't ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society



Words linked to "Swear in" :   inaugurate, kick off



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