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Affirm   Listen
verb
Affirm  v. t.  (past & past part. affirmed; pres. part. affirming)  
1.
To make firm; to confirm, or ratify; esp. (Law), To assert or confirm, as a judgment, decree, or order, brought before an appellate court for review.
2.
To assert positively; to tell with confidence; to aver; to maintain as true; opposed to deny. "Jesus,... whom Paul affirmed to be alive."
3.
(Law) To declare, as a fact, solemnly, under judicial sanction. See Affirmation, 4.
Synonyms: To assert; aver; declare; asseverate; assure; pronounce; protest; avouch; confirm; establish; ratify. To Affirm, Asseverate, Aver, Protest. We affirm when we declare a thing as a fact or a proposition. We asseverate it in a peculiarly earnest manner, or with increased positiveness as what can not be disputed. We aver it, or formally declare it to be true, when we have positive knowledge of it. We protest in a more public manner and with the energy of perfect sincerity. People asseverate in order to produce a conviction of their veracity; they aver when they are peculiarly desirous to be believed; they protest when they wish to free themselves from imputations, or to produce a conviction of their innocence.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Affirm" Quotes from Famous Books



... to and fro between gloom and splendor, appeared faces that would be seen next day at the council board of the province, and others which, Sabbath after Sabbath, looked devoutly heavenward, and benignantly over the crowded pews, from the holiest pulpits in the land. Some affirm that the lady of the governor was there. At least there were high dames well known to her, and wives of honored husbands, and widows, a great multitude, and ancient maidens, all of excellent repute, and fair young ...
— Mosses from an Old Manse and Other Stories • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... the Malays—experience a taste of our just dealing, truthfulness, frankness and mildness, and come to know of the instructions of the King Dom Manoel, our Lord, wherein he commands that all his subjects in these parts be very well treated, I venture to affirm that they will all return and take up their abode in the city again, yea, and build the walls of their houses with gold; and all these matters which here I lay before you may be secured to us by this half-turn of the key, which is that we build a fortress ...
— Rulers of India: Albuquerque • Henry Morse Stephens

... the warmest admirer of the eminent man whose character is sketched in the following pages would think it needful to affirm that he alone regenerated his country. Many forces were at work; the energising impulse of moral enthusiasm, the spell of heroism, the ancient and still unextinguished potency of kingly headship. But Cavour's hand controlled the working of these forces, ...
— Cavour • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco

... Merchants are much like other men,—wise and unwise, far-sighted and short-sighted, selfish and unselfish, honest and dishonest. But that they are as a class more dishonest than other men is so far from being true, that I much doubt if we should overstrain the matter, if we should affirm that they are the most honest class of men in the community. There is much in their training which contributes directly, and most efficiently, to this result. Their very first lessons are in feet and inches, in pounds and ounces, in exact calculations, ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 40, February, 1861 • Various

... was challenged to give evidence of the assertion, but he preferred to maintain what is called "a dignified silence." Mr. Waugh was challenged to produce proofs from the Society's archives, and he also declined. It is enough to affirm infamy against Freethinkers; proof is unnecessary; or, rather, it is unobtainable. Singularly, there have been several striking cases of brutal treatment of children since Mr. Waugh and Bishop Jayne committed ...
— Flowers of Freethought - (Second Series) • George W. Foote

... that planetary globe from whose chemistry it drew its elemental life and from whose chemistry, although the form of it has changed, it still draws its life. For it is no fantastic speculation to affirm that every living thing whether human or otherwise plays, while it lives, a triple part ...
— The Complex Vision • John Cowper Powys

... from Pharamond: "In terram Salicam mulieres ne succedant," "No woman shall succeed in Salique land;" Which Salique land the French unjustly gloze To be the realm of France, and Pharamond The founder of this law and female bar. Yet their own authors faithfully affirm That the land Salique is in Germany, Between the floods of Sala and of Elbe; Where Charles the Great, having subdu'd the Saxons, There left behind and settled certain French; Who, holding in disdain the German women For some dishonest manners of their life, Establish'd then this law, to wit, ...
— The Life of King Henry V • William Shakespeare [Tudor edition]

... of the enemy, and taken wholly by surprise were unable to oppose a vigorous resistance, and all were killed or captured. Some accounts say that the English soldiers were made prisoners, and the renegade Scots fighting with them were put to the sword; while others affirm that all who were taken ...
— In Freedom's Cause • G. A. Henty

... that "the great middle class" does not own the most valuable lots in New York and London; but I have the "chilled steel" hardihood to affirm that not only the bulk of the land but of the land values are in the possession of people who are poor as compared with the occupants of those sumptuous palaces which the George conspiracy for the further enrichment if ...
— Volume 10 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann

... two or three doses of dark liquid remaining in it, contained a powerful solution of ergotoxine—a much less innocent drug. Who should presume to doubt its administration by the Prisoner, when the label bore directions in his own characteristic handwriting? Who should dare to affirm his innocence, seeing that to him his victim had hastened, almost in the act of death, begging him, with her expiring breath, "not to be hard on a woman," who had ignorantly trusted him, Gentlemen of the Jury! only to find, too late, the deceptive nature of his specious promises? A whip, cried ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves

... it to be a duty resting upon the State to furnish to children of Indian, Mongolian, Chinese, or Japanese descent the same facilities and opportunities as are furnished to children of other races and affirm that no more can be required and that nothing different is contemplated by said Act. That said Act gives to children of Indian, Mongolian, Chinese, or Japanese descent who are subjects of other countries the same rights and privileges as are given to native born citizens ...
— Story of the Session of the California Legislature of 1909 • Franklin Hichborn

... me observe, you are Perverse—in short—" "Sir," said the other, sucking his cigar, And then his port— "If you will say impossibles are true, You may affirm just anything you please— That swans are quadrupeds, and lions blue, And elephants inhabit Stilton cheese! Only you must not force me to believe What's propagated ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various

... To affirm that the cliff dwellers were driven from their strongholds and dispersed by force is pure fiction, nor is there any evidence to support such a theory. That they had enemies no one doubts, but, being in possession of an impregnable position where one man could successfully withstand ...
— Arizona Sketches • Joseph A. Munk

... I intended. He gave permission to tell the woman her child was alive; and, if need be for her good, to affirm it over ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... "respectable," by which it was made to appear deliberately offensive. Whether it was used with the design of reflecting upon the licentious violence of the blood-hounds, we pretend not to say, but we can safely affirm that the word in the original document was never underlined by Hartley. Lord Cumber, like his old father, was no coward, and the consequence was, that having once conceived the belief that the offensive ...
— Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton

... Lady, tis but the induction too'te. You may believe my strains, I strike all true, And if your conscience would leap up to your tongue, your self would affirm it: and that you shall perceive I know of things to come as well as I do of what is present, a Brother of your husband's shall ...
— The Puritain Widow • William Shakespeare [Apocrypha]

... people whose vocation it is to speak without doubt or hesitation whenever they speak—experts assure us that London was never more free from cholera than during this present summer. Other experts— they too speaking with authority—confidently affirm that our time is coming, that a severe visitation is impending; that all we have heard of hitherto of the ravages of the epidemic elsewhere, will prove but child's play in comparison with that which we shall hear ...
— The Coming of the Friars • Augustus Jessopp

... each time with renewed pleasure, I ascended this tower, and would sit there for hours, in admiration of the works of the created and of the Creator. Exhausted and weary with gazing was I each time I returned to my home. I think I may affirm that no spot in the world can present such a view, or any thing that can be compared with it. I found how right I had been in undertaking this journey in preference to any other. Here another world lies unfolded before my view. Every ...
— A Visit to the Holy Land • Ida Pfeiffer

... less on the nature of the excitant producing it than on that of the sensory organ which collects it, the nerve which propagates it, or the centre which receives it. It would perhaps be going a little too far to affirm that the external object has no kind of resemblance to the sensations it gives us. It is safer to say that we are ignorant of the degree in which the two resemble or differ ...
— The Mind and the Brain - Being the Authorised Translation of L'me et le Corps • Alfred Binet

... Prof. I affirm that your willing to touch that chair or not to touch it, your actual touching it, or not touching it; your possession or non-possession of ...
— Dolly Reforming Herself - A Comedy in Four Acts • Henry Arthur Jones

... ditto, amen to, say aye to. acknowledge, own, admit, allow, avow, confess; concede &c. (yield) 762; come round to; abide by; permit &c. 760. arrive at an understanding, come to an understanding, come to terms, come to an agreement. confirm, affirm; ratify, appprove, indorse, countersign; corroborate &c. 467. go with the stream, swim with the stream, go with the flow, blow with the wind; be in fashion, join in the chorus, join the crowd, be one of the guys, be part of the group, go with the crowd, don't make waves; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... of the landlady's daughters, who watched your wife from an inner room, and saw her put on the disguise; who can speak to her identity, and to the identity of her companion, Mrs. Bygrave; and who has furnished me, at my own request, with a written statement of facts, which she is ready to affirm on oath if any person ventures to contradict her. You shall read the statement, Mr. Noel, if you like, when you are fitter to understand it. You shall also read a letter in the handwriting of Miss Garth—who will repeat to you personally every ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins

... expressed my astonishment and I explained my doubts: I found that they differed upon matters of detail alone; and that they mainly attributed the peaceable dominion of religion in their country, to the separation of church and state. I do not hesitate to affirm that during my stay in America, I did not meet with a single individual, of the clergy or of the laity, who was not of the ...
— American Institutions and Their Influence • Alexis de Tocqueville et al

... these facts could be given to the world to show the rich what the poor have done for suffering Ireland, and especially that the Irish landlords might be made aware of what their former tenants are doing for their present ones. I can affirm on my own responsibility that the amount stated is not exaggerated, and also that from Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and New Orleans, similar remittances are made, though not to the same amount.' With regard to the feeling in America upon the calamity under which the Irish people ...
— Facts for the Kind-Hearted of England! - As to the Wretchedness of the Irish Peasantry, and the Means for their Regeneration • Jasper W. Rogers

... their hands to heaven; and perceive, on the other side, King Pharaoh with the Egyptians frighted and confounded at the sight of the waves that join again to swallow them up. Now, in good earnest, who would be so bold as to affirm that a chambermaid, having by chance daubed that piece of cloth, the colours had of their own accord ranged themselves in order to produce that lively colouring, those various attitudes, those looks so well expressing ...
— The Existence of God • Francois de Salignac de La Mothe- Fenelon

... is generally agreed upon to be the Wrist. The question then arising is about the menage of the Elbow Joint; concerning which there are two different opinions. Some will have it kept stiff; insomuch, that I have heard a judicious violist positively affirm, that if a Scholar can but attain to the playing of Quavers with his Wrist, keeping his Arm streight and stiff in the Elbow-Joint, he hath got the mastery of the Bow-Hand. Others contend that the motion ...
— The Bow, Its History, Manufacture and Use - 'The Strad' Library, No. III. • Henry Saint-George

... slight ostentation and exaggeration. He is only genuine so far as he can be objective; only in his serene totality is he still "nature" and "natural." His mirroring and eternally self-polishing soul no longer knows how to affirm, no longer how to deny; he does not command; neither does he destroy. "JE NE MEPRISE PRESQUE RIEN"—he says, with Leibniz: let us not overlook nor undervalue the PRESQUE! Neither is he a model man; he does not go in advance of any one, nor after, either; he places himself generally too far off ...
— Beyond Good and Evil • Friedrich Nietzsche

... is desirous to state it as low as possible, exceeded forty thousand pounds; and incomes of forty thousand pounds at the time of the accession of George the Third were at least as rare as incomes of a hundred thousand pounds now. We may safely affirm that no Englishman who started with nothing has ever, in any line of life, created such a fortune at the ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... her arms. The doll, as I have said before, was "got up" wonderfully like its mistress. It had a miniature coat and cape and frills, it had leggings, it had a white plush bonnet (so my wife enables me to affirm), it had hair just the colour of ...
— A Flat Iron for a Farthing - or Some Passages in the Life of an only Son • Juliana Horatia Ewing

... enterpryse should not be prosperous because the beginning appeyred to bring with it some contempt of God and of His word. Other places, said they, had been more apt for such preparations than where the people convened to common prayer and unto preaching, and they did not hesitate to affirm that God would not suffer such contempt of His word." Whether these objections stole the heart out of the fighting men, who had hitherto felt themselves emphatically the soldiers of God, it is impossible to ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant

... from you, sir, the responsibility of the act, if, as I infer, the wanton destruction of this town is intended," replied Neville, with significant emphasis. "I make bold to affirm that the act will be as unwise as it will be cruel. It will provoke bitter retaliation. It will tenfold intensify hostile feeling. I know these people. I have travelled largely through this province, and mingled with all ...
— Neville Trueman the Pioneer Preacher • William Henry Withrow

... of these institutions is not what the uninitiated, judging from its name, might suppose. The writer, though not a club-member, can affirm of her own knowledge, that at the weekly gatherings questions are discussed which have a direct bearing on the interests of the family and household. From these gatherings, members return to their homes strengthened, refreshed, enlightened. All teachers can testify that from teachers' ...
— A Domestic Problem • Abby Morton Diaz

... representative of Friesz's later work; and if it cannot be said quite to summarize a stage of his career, at least it is a milestone. Friesz has arrived: that is to say, what he has already achieved suffices to affirm the existence of a distinct, personal talent entitled to its place in the republic of painting. At that point we leave him. But we may be sure that, with his remarkable gift and even more remarkable power of turning it to account, his energy, his patience, and his manifest ambition, ...
— Since Cezanne • Clive Bell

... certainly have said, "Go on with that game over again, old boy; it's quite to my taste—the jolliest thing in life, I assure you!" At least, if we may not positively assert that he would have said that, no one else can absolutely affirm that he wouldn't. ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne

... love of gain, the other cannot. The very speech and intonation of the one has melody, of the other harshness. And with regard to things divine, the one set know no obstacle to their impiety, the others are of all men the most pious. Indeed ancient tales affirm (28) that the very gods themselves take joy in this work (29) as actors and spectators. So that, (30) with due reflection on these things, the young who act upon my admonitions will be found, perchance, beloved of heaven and reverent of soul, checked by the thought that ...
— The Sportsman - On Hunting, A Sportsman's Manual, Commonly Called Cynegeticus • Xenophon

... tending to make you conceited: to encourage in you a belief that you can do things, when it were better that you merely admired. Well I would not dishearten you by telling to what a shred of conceit, even of hope, a man can be reduced after twenty-odd years of the discipline. But I can, and do, affirm that the farther you penetrate in these discoveries the more sacred the ultimate mystery will become for you: that the better you understand the great authors as exemplars of practice, the more certainly you will realise what is the ...
— On the Art of Writing - Lectures delivered in the University of Cambridge 1913-1914 • Arthur Quiller-Couch

... doctors affirm and deny almost every possible proposition as to disease and treatment. I can remember the time when doctors no more dreamt of consumption and pneumonia being infectious than they now dream of sea-sickness being infectious, or than so great a clinical observer as ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma: Preface on Doctors • George Bernard Shaw

... I desire to affirm that loyalty and patriotism have not as yet gained any solid foundation among the white population of the States, and such cannot be expected until the relations between employers and laborers have become a fixed and acknowledged fact; then, and not before, ...
— Report on the Condition of the South • Carl Schurz

... sensibility, every day of his life. Hear, on the other hand, a modern oath, and (what is most remarkable) an oath sworn in the pulpit. A dissenting clergyman (I believe, a Baptist), preaching at Cambridge, and having occasion to affirm or to deny something or other, upon his general confidence in the grandeur of man's nature, the magnificence of his conceptions, the immensity of his aspirations, &c., delivered himself thus:—'By the greatness of human ideals—by the greatness of human aspirations—by the immortality of human creations—by ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey—Vol. 1 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey

... this time, that the creature referred to is an amphibious biped and inhabits the ocean near this coast. More I cannot say, for I personally have not seen the animal, but I have a witness who has, and there are many who affirm that they have seen the creature. You will naturally say that my statement amounts to nothing; but when your representative arrives, if he be free from prejudice, I expect his reports to you concerning this sea-biped ...
— In Search of the Unknown • Robert W. Chambers

... their marriage might not fall, like an unexpected tempest, on those that were unwilling to have it so; and that pre-apprehensions might make it the less enormous when it was known, it was purposely whispered into the ears of many that it was so, yet by none that could affirm it. But, to put a period to the jealousies of Sir George—doubt often begetting more restless thoughts than the certain knowledge of what we fear—the news was, in favour to Mr. Donne, and with his allowance, made known to Sir George, by his honourable friend and neighbour Henry, Earl ...
— Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions - Together with Death's Duel • John Donne

... are in style, they contain a few passages which are very grand and noble. For example, the address to the poets: 'Best of strangers, we also are poets of the best and noblest tragedy; for our whole state is an imitation of the best and noblest life, which we affirm to be indeed the very truth of tragedy.' Or again, the sight of young men and maidens in friendly intercourse with one another, suggesting the dangers to which youth is liable from the violence of passion; or the eloquent denunciation of unnatural lusts in the same passage; or the charming ...
— Laws • Plato

... jurisdictions the law has been declared unconstitutional, and in three jurisdictions its constitutionality has been affirmed. The question has been carried to the Supreme Court, the case has been heard by that tribunal, and a decision is expected at an early date. In the event that the court should affirm the constitutionality of the act, I urge further legislation along the lines advocated in my Message to the preceding Congress. The practice of putting the entire burden of loss to life or limb upon ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... blood, the Scriptures affirm that they are present in the sacrament. The passage which sets forth the double presence, that of the earthly and heavenly elements, which indeed sums up and states the Bible doctrine in a few words, is 1 Cor. x. 16. There Paul affirms ...
— The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church • G. H. Gerberding

... itself, and turning upwards and backwards in the form of a thick, sharp-pointed horn, somewhat resembling the horn of the rhinoceros. The use of this strange proboscis is by some supposed to be that of enabling the bird more easily to tear out the entrails of its prey; but others affirm that it is not of a predaceous nature, feeding only on vegetable substances. This bird is principally found in the East Indian Islands. A remarkably fine specimen was preserved in ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19, Issue 547, May 19, 1832 • Various

... corruption, or other high crimes, may be impeached by the house of delegates: in some constitutions no offences are specified, in order to subject the public functionaries to an unlimited responsibility.[117] But I will venture to affirm, that it is precisely their mildness which renders the American laws most formidable in this respect. We have shown that in Europe the removal of a functionary and his political interdiction are consequences of the penalty he is to undergo, and that in America they ...
— American Institutions and Their Influence • Alexis de Tocqueville et al

... gentlemen, what befell her!" The old soldier looked as if he could annihilate the Intendant with the lightning of his eyes. "I affirm and will maintain that no saint in heaven was holier in her purity than she was in her fall! Chevalier Bigot, it is for you to answer these despatches! This is your work! If Caroline de St. Castin be lost, you know ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby

... leaf-like portion being blue in the original to indicate water. In regard to the origin of the character, Seler remarks: "If the Maya character agrees with the Mexican (atl), we must look upon it as a water vessel." Yet after a number of illustrations and references he declares: "I by no means affirm that the vessel is expressed by the form of this character. The form seems to me to express rather the ...
— Day Symbols of the Maya Year • Cyrus Thomas

... must be put on," thought Jeanne. So she answered, in a grave tone, "Madame, I have the honor to affirm to your majesty that M. ...
— The Queen's Necklace • Alexandre Dumas pere

... The craftsmen of design remained therewith astonished and dumbfounded, recognising the fullest reaches of their art revealed to them by this unrivalled masterpiece. Those who examined the forms I have described, painters who inspected and compared them with works hardly less divine, affirm that never in the history of human achievement was any product of man's brain seen like to them in mere supremacy. And certainly we have the right to believe this; for when the cartoon was finished and carried to the hall of the Pope, amid the acclamation ...
— Michael Angelo Buonarroti • Charles Holroyd

... road between Calais and Boulogne, we began to perceive the peculiarities of the husbandry of this part of France. These are just what were described by Arthur Young; and although it is possible, as the natives uniformly affirm, that the agriculture has improved since the revolution, this improvement must be in the details of the operations, and in the extent of land under tillage, not in the principles of the art. The most striking to the eye of a stranger are the want of enclosures, ...
— Travels in France during the years 1814-1815 • Archibald Alison

... "Praised be the Lord," and so went back with him. That same day Spur was arrested, charged with the crime of succoring a heretic. Then said the undaunted Spur: "Obediah Holmes I do look upon as a godly man: and do affirm that he carried himself as did become a Christian, under so sad an affliction." "We will deal with you as we have dealt with him," said Endicott. "I am in the hands of God," answered Spur; and then his keeper took him to his prison. ...
— The Emancipation of Massachusetts • Brooks Adams

... weeks in a man's life of which he can say that one was without a flaw, that it could not have been improved upon in company, comfort, or surroundings. And all these things, my dear Mr. Eno, I can affirm of the days spent with you. I have a better opinion of my fellows and of my country because of them. Perhaps, after all, that is as complete a test as any other. As I look back I think of but one thing that gives occasion ...
— The Letters of Franklin K. Lane • Franklin K. Lane

... break forth, For while I pay this ancient Debt of Vengeance, I'll serve my Country, and advance myself. He loves Monelia—Hendrick must be won— Monelia and her Brother both must bleed— This is my Vengeance on her Lover's Head— Then I'll affirm, 'twas done by Englishmen— And to gain Credit both with Friends and Foes, I'll wound myself, and say that I receiv'd it By striving to assist them in the Combat. This will rouse Hendrick's Wrath, and arm his Troops To Blood and Vengeance on the common Foe. And further still my Profit may extend; ...
— Ponteach - The Savages of America • Robert Rogers

... between your profession and practice, then in your profession itself,—your practice is directly cross to the very general profession of Christianity. But besides that, there is a contradiction in the bosom of your profession. You affirm you are Christians, and yet refuse the profession of holiness. You say ye hope for heaven, and yet do not so much as pretend to godliness and walking spiritually. Nay, these you disjoin in your profession, which are really one, without which the name of Christianity is an ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning

... what is agreeable to them. But both the former and the latter approve it as conformable to the national character. And whatever may be the religious system which shall govern our descendants twenty centuries hence, I venture to affirm that the exterior forms of it will be pretty nearly the same as those which prevail at present, and which did prevail twenty centuries ago." Mr. Trollope generously dissents from the "pessimism" of these views. The views are discouraging for ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells

... William J. Graves, a prominent Whig member of the House. Mr. Cilley in his letter to Mr. Graves, in which he declined to receive the challenge of Webb, said: "I decline to receive it because I choose to be drawn into no controversy with him. I neither affirm nor deny anything in regard to his character, but I now repeat what I have said to you, that I intended by the refusal ...
— Something of Men I Have Known - With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective • Adlai E. Stevenson

... all that I intend to say on a subject which has tired me, and perhaps you; the Jacobites affirm that the indirect assistances which they desired, might have been obtained; and I confess that I am inexcusable if this fact be true. To prove it, they appeal to the little politicians of whom I have spoken so often. I affirm, on the contrary, that nothing could be obtained ...
— Letters to Sir William Windham and Mr. Pope • Lord Bolingbroke

... Jarvis himself. "I have on my part to assure the public," he writes, "that so far from being indemnified by the contributions which from various motives were made for our relief, the burthen fell heavily upon such of us as had the means of paying anything; and I affirm that the share of the verdict which I myself had to defray, from no very abundant means, was such that if Mr. Mackenzie had made as much clear profit by his press during the whole time he has employed it in the work of detraction, ...
— The Story of the Upper Canada Rebellion, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent

... themselves. The grasses also are allowed to grow without any attention or industry being employed in grafting. Apples and pears grow naturally in the woods, and in such abundance as it is hard to comprehend how they could have so multiplied since the conquest, as they affirm there were none ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr

... much I knew even in that hasty shrouded glance. Writers of history affirm my opponent was Peesotum, the same fierce warrior whose cruel hand slew the brave Captain Wells and wrenched his still beating heart from out the mutilated body. All I realized then were his broad sinewy shoulders, his naked brawny body, his eyes ablaze with malignant hate. He was ...
— When Wilderness Was King - A Tale of the Illinois Country • Randall Parrish

... character in which Luke especially delights that he could not leave it out. It opens many large questions which cannot be dealt with here. All sin has in it an element of ignorance, but it is not wholly ignorance as some modern teachers affirm. If the ignorance were complete, the sin would be nonexistent. The persons covered by the ample folds of this prayer were ignorant in very different degrees, and had had very different opportunities of changing ignorance for knowledge. The soldiers ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... gentleman a match, Britton," I said, thereby giving my valet an opportunity to do his exploding in the pantry. "I can only affirm, sir, that it is common history that Pontius Pilate spent a portion of his exile here in the sixth century. It is reasonable to assume that he sat in this seat, being an old man unused to difficult ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon

... is fully aware, that the laws under which the laborer is now placed are tyrannical and unjust in the extreme; laws, we hesitate not to affirm, which are a disgrace to those who framed them, and which, if acted upon by a local magistracy, will entail upon the oft-cheated, over-patient negro some of the worst features of that degrading state of vassalage from which he has just escaped. ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society

... Portugal, that is to say, above One Thousand Miles, which now lye wast and desolate, and are absolutely ruined, when as formerly no other Country whatsoever was more populous. Nay we dare boldly affirm, that during the Forty Years space, wherein they exercised their sanguinary and detestable Tyranny in these Regions, above Twelve Millions (computing Men, Women, and Children) have undeservedly perished; nor do I conceive that I should deviate from the Truth by saying that above ...
— A Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies • Bartolome de las Casas

... war, of congresses in place of armies, of harmony, cooperation, and solidarity among the American peoples, in place of hostile rivalries, we may, on seeing seated here today at the right of our President, the Secretary of State of the United States, affirm to him, as Henry Clay did on the reception of Lafayette, with a different intention but just as truthfully, that he is seated in ...
— Latin America and the United States - Addresses by Elihu Root • Elihu Root

... on the other hand, that His manhood, passing through the process of human development, and increasing in wisdom, was necessarily in its earlier stages void of the consciousness of His Messianic mission. I dare not affirm either 'yes' or 'no' about that matter; but this I am sure of, that if ever there was a time in the development of the Manhood of Jesus Christ when He began to know Himself as the Messias, at that same time He began ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren

... Catholics of the empire which now universally prevails. We may not be supposed to know much, here in Canada, about the state of sentiment or opinion in England. But when we appeal to the testimony of so eminent an Englishman as Cardinal Newman, what we affirm cannot be easily gainsaid. In a discourse recently delivered at Birmingham, on the growth of the Catholic Church in England, the very learned cardinal noted the striking contrast between the feeling towards ...
— Pius IX. And His Time • The Rev. AEneas MacDonell

... say what I know of the virtue of it, for the exposing of rheums, raw humours, crudities, obstructions, with a thousand of this kind; but I profess myself no quack-salver. Only thus much; by Hercules, I do hold it, and will affirm it (before any Prince in Europe) to be the most sovereign and precious herb that ever the earth tendered ...
— Every Man In His Humour • Ben Jonson

... works in the world. Friend, if they that know God, because he doth shew himself to them by his works in the world, have the Spirit of Christ, then the same argument will serve to speak thus much; that the devils themselves have the Spirit of Christ, which would be wonderful blasphemy once to affirm. And friend, the very devils, both for the knowledge of sin, and also for the knowledge of God's eternal power and Godhead, have more experience than all the unregenerate men in the world; and yet have not the least spark of the Spirit of ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... being not a negative notion, not merely the denial of limits, but a positive one. The unconditioned is that of which all our thoughts and ideas are manifestations, but which we never can know, with regard to which we cannot affirm anything but that it exists. This definition like that last noticed traces religion to the defects in man's knowledge, and rather to a negative than a positive element in his experience. It also comes under the objection that it traces religion rather to an intellectual than a practical motive, ...
— History of Religion - A Sketch of Primitive Religious Beliefs and Practices, and of the Origin and Character of the Great Systems • Allan Menzies

... should prepare a little surprise for the returning Milly? Let her find herself planted in Araby the Blest with Maxwell Davison? Mildred chuckled, wondering to herself which would be in the biggest rage, Milly or Max; for however Tims might affirm the contrary, Mildred had a fixed impression that Milly ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods

... these events, these plans for my enthralment, with a view to convey anything like personal vanity, for I can with truth affirm that I never thought myself entitled to admiration that could endanger my security or tempt the libertine to undermine my husband's honour. But I attribute the snares that were laid for me to three causes: the first, my youth and inexperience, my girlish appearance and simplicity of manners; ...
— Beaux and Belles of England • Mary Robinson

... as the present state of our knowledge goes we can affirm with certainty that the Fish is a Life symbol of immemorial antiquity, and that the title of Fisher has, from the earliest ages, been associated with Deities who were held to be specially connected with the origin and ...
— From Ritual to Romance • Jessie L. Weston

... their brains; for we have vainly swept phantoms away with the light of analysis, the supernatural has resumed hostilities, the spirit of the legends rebels and wants to conquer us, while we are halting with fatigue and anguish. Ah! I certainly don't affirm anything; I myself am tortured. Only it seems to me that this last convulsion of the old religious terrors was to be foreseen. We are not the end, we are but a transition, a beginning of something else. It calms me and ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola

... passages corroborate the opinions I had formed. "With respect to the Menangkabaus, after a good deal of inquiry, I have not yet been able decidedly to ascertain the relation between those of that name in the peninsula and the Menangkabaus of Pulo Percha. The Malays affirm without hesitation that they all came originally from the latter island." In a recent communication he adds, "I am more confident than ever that the Menangkabaus of the peninsula derive their origin from the country of that name in Sumatra. ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden

... this result to his companions, and taking into consideration errors of observation, as he had done for the latitude, he believed he could positively affirm that the position of Lincoln Island was between the thirty-fifth and the thirty-seventh parallel, and between the hundred and fiftieth and the hundred and fifty-fifth meridian to the west of ...
— The Mysterious Island • Jules Verne

... conviction that he knew all there was to be known. 'Encouraged by the public,' he says, 'I would not abandon my purpose of making still further exertions to advance and complete an art, the discovery of the TRUE PRINCIPLES (the italics are Walker's own) of which, I trust, I can with certainty affirm ...
— A History of Aeronautics • E. Charles Vivian

... Mr. Pewtap," he said, "I am human, and it would be disingenuous for me to pretend that I am not pleased by the fact that my name has been mentioned in connection with the bishopric. I can conscientiously affirm, however, that the good of the church is more dear to me than ambition. Even were it not, I hardly think that I am capable of being offended with any man who felt it his duty ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates

... your lecture, and are waiting for the hour to strike, test its merit by this question: Does it contain enough valuable information to make a distinct addition to the education of an average listener? If you cannot affirm this, whatever merits otherwise it may have, fundamentally, it fails. When the enthusiasm has worn off, your audience should be able to decide that, in its acquaintance with modern knowledge, a distinct step forward has been made. Anything ...
— The Art of Lecturing - Revised Edition • Arthur M. (Arthur Morrow) Lewis

... each category; and when we see the dues, say three times as large in the first as in the second, then we can say with certitude that the first was much more important than the second; how much more important we cannot say. We can, to repeat an argument already advanced, affirm the inhabitants of any given manor to be at the very least not less than five times the number of holdings, and thus fix a minimum everywhere. For instance, we can be certain that William's rural England had not less than 2,000,000, though we ...
— The Historic Thames • Hilaire Belloc

... them? The longevity of our antediluvians would say, No! and the criminal records of today utter their voices little in favor of such a conclusion. Not that we would deny to Caesar the things that are his, but that we ask for the things that belong to Truth; and safely affirm, from the demonstrations we have been able to make, that the science of man understood would have eradicated sin, sickness, and death, in a less period than six thousand years. We find great difficulties in ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... Conjugation, the same Particle do is prefixed to the Preterite through all the Moods and Voices, and to the Fut. Subj. excepting only the Subjunctive Tenses after ni, mur, nach, gu, an, am. In this {77} Conjugation, do always loses the o to avoid a hiatus, and the d is aspirated in the Affirm. and ...
— Elements of Gaelic Grammar • Alexander Stewart

... glory of the long process of God's self-manifestation to Israel is that, while it emphasises all that nature and history affirm of Him, it sets Him forth as restoring the weak, as well as sustaining the strong. The sad contrast between the untroubled and unwearied strength of the calm heavens and the soon-exhausted strength of struggling and often beaten men strikes the poet prophet's sensitive soul. He did ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren

... time, through the madness and folly of the people. But now they were silent; many of them went to their long home, not able to foretell their own fate or to calculate their own nativities. Some have been critical enough to say that every one of them died. I dare not affirm that; but this I must own, that I never heard of one of them that ever appeared after ...
— A Journal of the Plague Year • Daniel Defoe

... "That I cannot affirm, Madame," said Rouquin, with infinite regret in his voice. "It is possible, even probable, that Monsieur Rousseau is a direct descendant, but I am not in a position to say so with authority. I shall make it a point to repeat your question ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon

... be observed that while the author appears to recognize and affirm with conviction a general demoralization of standards among the aristocracy, he does not attempt to suggest any visible cause for it. It may be gathered, in a way, that he takes for granted that, somehow, it is a consequence of the World War. This notion, as we have seen, is so apt to be fallen back ...
— Heart and Soul • Victor Mapes (AKA Maveric Post)

... exaggeration of a butchery sufficiently tragic in its real proportions, and in a later tract (Eikonoklastes) he reduces it to 154,000. Though the savage Irish are barbarians, uncivilised and uncivilisable, the Observations distinctly affirm the new principle of toleration. Though popery be a superstition, the death of all true religion, still conscience is not within the cognisance of the magistrate. The civil sword is to be employed ...
— Milton • Mark Pattison

... necessary to know what are the trains of symptoms excited by different substances, when administered to persons in health, if any such can be shown to exist. Hahnemann and his disciples give catalogues of the symptoms which they affirm were produced upon themselves or others by a large number of drugs which they ...
— Medical Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... sneezing should be accompanied with forms of blessings, and vows for the persons who sneezed. Thus the custom of blessing persons who sneeze is of higher antiquity than some authors suppose, for several writers affirm that it commenced in the year 750, under Pope Gregory the Great, when a pestilence occurred in which those who sneezed died; whence the pontiff appointed a form of prayer, and a wish to be said to persons sneezing, for averting this fatality ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 13, No. 354, Saturday, January 31, 1829. • Various

... Professor Budger. I do not undertake to unravel these knots. I can only say that when I was a canvasser I was told by the little card, with every circumstance of seriousness and authority, that I was not to persuade anybody to personate a voter: and I can lay my hand upon my heart and affirm that I never did. ...
— All Things Considered • G. K. Chesterton

... then strain the liquor, and sprinkle it on the trees infected with caterpillars, the black-flea, &c. in two or three times it will clear them, and should be us'd about the time of blossoming. Another, is to choak and dry them with smoak of galbanum, shoo-soals, hair; and some affirm that planting the pionie near them, is a certain remedy; but there is no remedy so facile, as the burning them off with small wisps of dry straw, which in a moment ...
— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn

... same melodies were ever heard, but addicted to them, as some people are addicted to vices equally deleterious. These devotees would have had trouble with their conscience or their instincts had they not, by coming to the concert, put themselves in a position to affirm exactly and positively what manner of a performer Musa was. They had no hope of being pleased by him. Indeed they knew beforehand that he was yet another false star, but they had to ascertain the truth for themselves, because—you ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett

... the hearts of the more susceptible sex; and, without the aid of stronger intellects, they will run a risk of following after delusive lights, and may be found as often to be the votaries of an amiable and attractive error, as the assertors of a severe and sober truth. We would take leave to affirm, that a religious creed or constitution among whose supporters a vast preponderance of females was to be found, stood in a dubious position, and was open to the suspicion that its principles cannot stand examination by ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 358, August 1845 • Various

... and apparently about to die there is another ceremony, called "a'-fat," and it never fails in its object, they affirm — the afflicted always recovers. Property equal to a full year's wages is taken outside the pueblo to the spot where the affliction was received, if it is known, and the departing soul is invited to return in exchange for the articles ...
— The Bontoc Igorot • Albert Ernest Jenks

... for the nations in this respect. You are not free from the stain, as you imagine yourself. You have a larger population of gamblers,—horse-gamblers if you will, than any other people; and, however noble be your game, I make bold to affirm that your gamesters are the seediest, snobbiest, and most revolting of the tribe. There is something indescribably mean in the life and habits of those hungry-looking vultures who hang about the corners of Coventry Street and the Haymarket, out at elbows, out at heels, sneaking from tavern ...
— The Quadroon - Adventures in the Far West • Mayne Reid

... endeavor was made to exclude a man who had been elected because he refused to take the oath which is administered to all members of Parliament before they can take their seats. This was Charles Bradlaugh. He said he did not believe in an oath, but offered to affirm, or give his word instead. The House of Commons refused to accept this, and Mr. Bradlaugh was not allowed to take his seat. He afterward stated that he was willing to take the oath as a matter of form, but this was again objected to. For six years he struggled for his seat, and at last was ...
— The Great Round World And What Is Going On In It, Vol. 1, November 4, 1897, No. 52 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various

... writers affirm, that this war was conducted by the consuls, and that they triumphed over the Samnites; and also, that Fabius advanced into Apulia, and carried off from thence abundance of spoil. But that Aulus Cornelius ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius

... had been Lord Chancellor (S339), and the aged Bishop Fisher were executed because they could not affirm that they conscientiously believed that Henry was morally and spiritually entitled to be the head ...
— The Leading Facts of English History • D.H. Montgomery

... of a personal, moral God-witness, sanction, and judge,—is virtually extinct; and yet hardly a word is said, or a line written, or a gesture made, in public or private life, which does not ever affirm that chimera. This may have its uses perchance, but it is nevertheless despicable. Slip forth from the common herd, my son, think for yourself, and write your own catechism upon ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... 'There is no doubt, Sir, a general report and belief of their having existed[528].' JOHNSON. 'You have not only the general report and belief, but you have many voluntary solemn confessions.' He did not affirm anything positively upon a subject which it is the fashion of the times to laugh at as a matter of absurd credulity. He only seemed willing, as a candid enquirer after truth, however strange and inexplicable, to shew that he understood what might be ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell

... spoke of London's men of genius I referred, of course, to such as are duly accredited, certificated, so to say, by public opinion; but of those others whose shining is under the bushel of obscurity, few or many, how can one affirm? That there are such, any man with any happy experience of living should be able to testify; and I should say, for fear of misunderstanding, that I do not use the word genius in any technical sense, not only of men who can do in the ...
— The Book-Bills of Narcissus - An Account Rendered by Richard Le Gallienne • Le Gallienne, Richard

... his gait. Now, in the midst of these intestine disquiets, we are threatened with an invasion from the island of Blefuscu, which is the other great empire of the universe, almost as large and powerful as this of his majesty. For, as to what we have heard you affirm, that there are other kingdoms and states in the world, inhabited by human creatures as large as yourself, our philosophers are in much doubt, and would rather conjecture that you dropped from the moon or one of the stars, because it is certain, ...
— Gulliver's Travels - Into Several Remote Regions of the World • Jonathan Swift

... to resignation by the example of these good people, I cannot, although I am his biographer, undertake to affirm with any degree of confidence; but I can most distinctly say, that for many months he continued meekly to submit to the domination and ill-treatment of Noah Claypole: who used him far worse than before, now that his jealousy was roused by seeing the new boy ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens

... rope girdle, and the immodest foot-wear, because a learned doctor in Santo Tomas [75] may have once recalled that Pope Innocent III described the statutes of that order as more fit for hogs than men, don't believe but that all of them work hand in hand to affirm what a preacher once said, 'The most insignificant lay brother can do more than the government with all its soldiers!' Cave ne cadas! [76] Gold is powerful—the golden calf has thrown God down from His altars many times, and ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal

... described Voltaire alone; not because he was isolated by any interval of time from a general movement, but because his attack is more rudimentary, being directed rather to disintegrate Christianity than dogmatically to affirm unbelief. He was perhaps rather logically prior to the others than chronologically; being really connected with two bodies of men, which formed the centres of two infidel movements, the one in Paris, the other at the ...
— History of Free Thought in Reference to The Christian Religion • Adam Storey Farrar

... greater than should separate any two classes of men. He is often doubtful when you address, and suspicious when you question him; he is seemingly oppressed with the interview, while it lasts, and obviously relieved when it is over. These are the traits which I can affirm them to possess as a class, after having come in contact with many hundreds of farm laborers. They belong to a generation for whose intellectual culture little or nothing was done. As a class, they have no amusements ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various

... no more dignified or important than a policy game in an American town, and seems to be but the Western idea clouded by its adaptation to Asiatic uses, tourists affirm. ...
— East of Suez - Ceylon, India, China and Japan • Frederic Courtland Penfield

... certain without reference to the records of the trial itself, as Mather's bias is apt to distort the evidence: 'She now testifi'd, that this Bishop tempted her to Sign the Book again, and to deny what she had confess'd. She affirm'd, that it was the Shape of this Prisoner, which whipped her with Iron Rods, to compel her thereunto.'[827] Elizabeth Anderson in Renfrewshire (1696) went with her father to a witch-meeting, 'severals of them being affraid that the Declarant would Confess, and tell of them ...
— The Witch-cult in Western Europe - A Study in Anthropology • Margaret Alice Murray

... jail. This terrified her, and she consented to be sworn. But after taking the oath, she refused to say anything about the fire. A theft had been traced to Hughson, and she told all she knew about that, but about the fires would neither deny nor affirm anything. They then appealed to her conscience painted before her the terrors of the final judgment, and the torments of hell, till at last she broke down, and proposed to make a clean breast of it. She commenced by saying that Hughson ...
— The Great Riots of New York 1712 to 1873 • J.T. Headley

... who affirm, that, while her double charge was carried about in this situation, her keg was furnished with a long and slender flexible tube, which, when the child began to be clamorous, she conveyed into his mouth, and straight he stilled ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett

... rock's naked face, where the record shall go 180 In great characters cut by the scribe,—Such was Saul, so he did; With the sages directing the work, by the populace chid,— For not half, they'll affirm, is comprised there! Which fault to amend, In the grove with his kind grows the cedar, whereon they shall spend (See, in tablets 'tis level before them) their praise, and record With the gold of the graver, Saul's story,—the ...
— Browning's Shorter Poems • Robert Browning

... is an enemy to the body. And yet, strange to say, men of good sense, clear judgment and quick perception in all moral questions and in the general affairs of life, are often so blind, or infatuated here, as to affirm that this substance, alcohol, which they use under the various forms of wine, brandy, whisky, gin, ale or beer, is not only harmless, when taken in moderation—each being his own judge as to what "moderation" means—but ...
— Grappling with the Monster • T. S. Arthur

... to, defer to; say yes to, say ditto, amen to, say aye to. acknowledge, own, admit, allow, avow, confess; concede &c. (yield) 762; come round to; abide by; permit &c. 760. arrive at an understanding, come to an understanding, come to terms, come to an agreement. confirm, affirm; ratify, approve, indorse, countersign; corroborate &c. 467. go with the stream, swim with the stream, go with the flow, blow with the wind; be in fashion, join in the chorus, join the crowd, be one of the guys, be part of the group, go with the crowd, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget



Words linked to "Affirm" :   back, defend, protest, declare, back up, validate, show, support, maintain, shew, affirmatory, aver, reassert, swan, substantiate, confirm, prove, affirmer, assure, corroborate, tell, establish, assert, swear



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