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Vow   Listen
verb
Vow  v. t.  (past & past part. vowed; pres. part. vowing)  
1.
To give, consecrate, or dedicate to God, or to some deity, by a solemn promise; to devote; to promise solemnly. "When thou vowest a vow unto God, defer not to pay it." "(Men) that vow a long and weary pilgrimage."
2.
To assert solemnly; to asseverate.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Vow" Quotes from Famous Books



... occasion, long awaited, of publishing the story of my life, in order to show how my poor soul has been tortured by the hypocritical laws of England. On two occasions, already, some Mice, whom I have made a vow to respect since the bill passed by your august parliament, have taken me to Colburn's, where, observing old ladies, spinsters of uncertain years, and even young married women, correcting proofs, I have asked myself why, having claws, ...
— Lords of the Housetops - Thirteen Cat Tales • Various

... cincture the city, Froissart found three centuries later so amazingly "strong, full of drapery and merchandise, rich citizens, noble dames, damsels, and fine churches," for this girdle of the Conqueror's great bastions the eye looks in vain. But William's vow still proclaims its fulfilment; the spire of l'Abbaye aux Hommes, and the Romanesque towers of its twin, l'Abbaye aux Dames, face each other, as did William and Mathilde at the altar—that union that had to be expiated by the penance ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd

... birds come to Mr. Ruskin's idea that "a girl worth anything ought to have always half a dozen or so of suitors under vow for her." ...
— Birds in the Bush • Bradford Torrey

... of St. Mary Ratcliffe now stands. Mr. Barrett has a small leaf of vellum (given to him by Chatterton as one of Rowley's original MSS.), entitled, "Vita de Simon de Bourton," in which Sir Simon is said, as in the poem, to have begun his foundation in consequence of a vow made at ...
— The Rowley Poems • Thomas Chatterton

... my reckless hands so much? With no vow spoken, You gave me a goblet, which at a touch Were utterly broken! Your smile replied: "Since the glass was filled It little mattered Whether the wine were drunk or spilled ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Marjorie Allen Seiffert

... come near me, I am lost." Raymond adduced many arguments and fervent persuasions to overcome her feeling, but she remained unconvinced; and, agitated by the discussion, she wildly and passionately made a solemn vow, to fly and hide herself where he never could discover her, where famine would soon bring death to conclude her woes, if he persisted in his to her disgracing offers. She could support herself, she said. And then she shewed him how, by executing various designs and paintings, she ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley

... straight in the eye. I looked at him. I was unutterably sad about that tough sister of mine, and I vow I looked holy then, though I never did before and may ...
— In the Bishop's Carriage • Miriam Michelson

... to Knight, as his thoughts travelled heavily along the past, that no other woman but Annesley Grayle, this fragile white rose that had freely given its sweetness, could have turned him from the vow of vengeance for his parents' fate which as a boy he had sworn against the world. Day by day, week by week, month by month, the fragrance of the white rose had so changed him that looking back at himself, he saw ...
— The Second Latchkey • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson

... laughs at the lover's vow— At the lover's vow that must break some day— Still we smiled as we loved in a distant May When the blooms were heavy ...
— The Rose-Jar • Thomas S. (Thomas Samuel) Jones

... chap," resumed Peter, sipping his whisky and water, "to return to our lambs, I bow to your patrician prejudices in favour of forks. But your patriotic prejudices are on a different level. There, I am on the same ground as you, and I vow I see nothing inherently superior in the British combination of beef and beetroot, to the German amalgam of lamb ...
— Merely Mary Ann • Israel Zangwill

... a vow as well as an Invocation, binding us to supreme love to Him, to obedience to Him, to moral conformity with Him. Be ye perfect as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. The ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren

... book of fate before me lay, But to tear out the journal of that day. Or, if the order of the world below Will not the gap of one whole day allow, Give me that minute when she made her vow. —Conquest of Granada. ] ...
— Miscellanies, Volume 2 (from Works, Volume 12) • Henry Fielding

... yet many days took leave of the brothers, and sailed to Syria; and Priscilla was with him, and Aquila, having shaved his head at Cenchrea; for he had a vow. [18:19]And they came to Ephesus, and he left them there, and entering himself into the synagogue reasoned with the Jews. [18:20]And they asking him to stay a longer time with them he did not consent, [18:21]but taking leave of them and saying, ...
— The New Testament • Various

... vow to be celibate for seven years, and Lord Bateman escapes. At the end of the period, Sophia sets out for Northumberland, urged, perhaps, by some telepathic admonition. For, on arriving at Lord Bateman's palace (Alnwick Castle?), she summons the proud porter, ...
— The Valet's Tragedy and Other Stories • Andrew Lang

... another wonder was worked, by no means inferior to the last. For among those who had believed in the saving name of the Lord Christ, an Ishmaelite, of no humble rank, had made a vow to God, with Simeon as witness. Now his promise was this, that he would henceforth to the end abstain from animal food. Transgressing this promise once, I know not how, he slew a bird, and dared to eat it. But God being minded to bring him by reproof to conversion, and to honour ...
— The Hermits • Charles Kingsley

... that room, where she dwelt continually in those days, she made no vow, she registered no resolution, she imposed no one self upon another self within her to thrust out evil and implant good. She had no need of that. It was all as simply natural as the growth of a flower, effortless, rising heavenward by its own ...
— Taquisara • F. Marion Crawford

... time they were far away from that point in Charmian's romance where the faithful friend of the heroine remains forever constant to her vow not to speak to the heroine of the hero's passion for her, and in fact rather finds it a duty to break her vow, and enjoys being snubbed for it. As the transaction of the whole affair took place in Charmian's ...
— The Coast of Bohemia • William Dean Howells

... novelists altogether displace this same persistent fact, and a woman lives, in all capacities of suffering and happiness, not only her wonted, but a double life, when legally and religiously she binds herself with bond and vow to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various

... good to hear. There was not a fellow there that didn't feel, at that moment, more than a match for any two men Robinson could set up against him. And many a hand clenched involuntarily, and many a player registered his silent vow to fight, as Mills had said, long after he couldn't fight any more, and, if it depended on him, win the ...
— Behind the Line • Ralph Henry Barbour

... think I'd give up now, 'n' let the minister see 't my marryin' depended on his say-so? Well, I guess not! I'm more dead-set 'n' ever, 'n' I vow 'n' declare 't I'll never draw breath till after I've stood up right in the face o' the minister 'n' the whole congregation 'n' had 'n' held some man, no matter who nor when nor where. Marryin' was goin' to ...
— Susan Clegg and Her Friend Mrs. Lathrop • Anne Warner

... Cross is falling over us, one generation after another of the boys of this school gather here, and in the face of the congregation, young and old, they take upon them the vows of a Christian life. So we met last Thursday, and your vow is still fresh upon a great many of you, as indeed it can hardly fail to be fresh in the memory of every one in this congregation who has ever taken it. Let us pause for a moment and repeat its plain words. You have declared your faith in God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, ...
— Sermons at Rugby • John Percival

... futile and meaningless unless love should light it, unless he could win Berenice; and he protested feverishly against any vow that would thwart or restrain him. He had crippled his youth with a creed unnatural and deforming; it was time for the manhood within him to shake off its fetters and assert its strength. He told himself wildly that now for the first ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates

... and his vow were, for the first time since he fell in with the robbers, recalled to his recollection, and a shade passed ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat

... plans? Stretch out your hand in power. Do you hear me?" There was no answer to his appeal, neither tap nor rustle of reply. In the silence his heart contracted with fear. "Have you deserted me, too?" Then his brain waxed hot with mad hate. His hand clinched in a savage vow. "I swear I will kill her before I will let her go to that man! Together we will enter ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland

... you have denounced so many of our citizens, causing them to be put to death, I vow, if you accuse me, I will break ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott

... Merwan was buried, and I fell asleep by him and saw him in a dream given over to one of the punishments of God, to whom belong might and majesty. This terrified me and made me tremble, and I vowed to God that, if ever I came to the throne, I would not do as the dead man had done. This vow I have striven to fulfil all the days of my life, and I hope to be received into the mercy of my Lord.' Quoth Meslemeh, 'A certain man died and I was present at his funeral. I fell asleep and meseemed I saw him, ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume II • Anonymous

... children nine To follow our ancestral line, I'd vow that in the lot we'd strike No two among them just alike. And that's the way it ought to be; The larger grows the family, The more we own of joy and bliss, For each brings ...
— The Path to Home • Edgar A. Guest

... of life, because he could not submit to acknowledge to himself the possibility of error on his own part. For that, in truth, was the condition of his mind. He had never hitherto believed that she had been false to her vow, and had sinned against him irredeemably; but he had thought that in her regard for another man she had slighted him; and, so thinking, he had subjected her to a severity of rebuke which no high-spirited woman could have borne. ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope

... of brewis swimming in clarified butter; and he set the platter before Kanmakan, saying "Favour us by eating of our victual." But he refused and quoth the young man to him, "What aileth thee, O man, that thou wilt not eat?" Quoth Kanmakan, "I have a vow upon me." The youth asked, "What is the cause of thy vow?", and Kanmakan answered, "Know that King Sasan seized upon my kingdom like a tyrant and an enemy, although it was my father's and my grand father's ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton

... in the small hours, everyone settled down again to slumber. Nevertheless the girls woke with the birds. Many of them had registered a solemn vow the night before that they would watch the sun rise, and each was pledged to arouse the others at all costs; so at the first hint of dawn heads began to pop out of tents, and the camp was astir. Addie Knighton, still half-dazed with sleep, was led firmly by ...
— For the Sake of the School • Angela Brazil

... hear grave accents, while his face is sprinkled? Shall I be grave myself, and tell a lie to him? Or shall I laugh, and teach him to insult the feelings of his fellow men? Besides, are we not all in this present hour, fainting beneath the duty of Hope? From such thoughts I stand up, and vow a book of severe analysis, in which I shall tell "all" I believe to be truth in the nakedest language in which it can ...
— Biographia Epistolaris, Volume 1. • Coleridge, ed. Turnbull

... distinctly. He has brought papers to me. I vow but he should have a good budget of news. If we could retire to the shade and escape this ...
— A Virginia Scout • Hugh Pendexter

... now. The Squire means to propose for me to-morrow, and he thinks I have accepted him. What shall I do? Mrs. Haycock—Kate Haycock—Catherine Haycock. No, I can't make it look well, write it how I will; and then, to vow never to think of any one else; I suppose I mightn't even speak to Frank. Never, no, never; but what a scrape I have got into, and how I wish to-morrow ...
— Kate Coventry - An Autobiography • G. J. Whyte-Melville

... dialogue that the two learned men have compiled in praise of the owl and the cuckoo." The ladies are [164] lodged in tents, because the king, like the princess of the modern poet's fancy, has taken a vow ...
— Appreciations, with an Essay on Style • Walter Horatio Pater

... narrowed, and alms' right diminished. It goes on and on, the terrible list of wrongs that have brought God's wrath on the land. The sermon is not for the building-up of faithful ones, but for the rousing and stirring up of those whose baptismal vow has been terribly and shamefully broken, His words are clashed out as he brings men face to ...
— Our Catholic Heritage in English Literature of Pre-Conquest Days • Emily Hickey

... had a severe illness, which was attended with danger to his life. During the progress of it, he vowed to undertake a new crusade should he recover. The fulfilment of this vow was opposed by Blanche of Castile (who still had great influence over her son) and many of his best counsellors; but Louis was inflexible where religion ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 5 of 8 • Various

... equal to this burst unless it be the first speech of Prometheus in the Greek drama, after the exit of Vulcan and the two Afrites. But Shakspeare alone could have produced the vow of Hamlet to make his memory a blank of all maxims and generalized truths, that 'observation had copied there,'—followed immediately by the speaker noting down the ...
— Literary Remains, Vol. 2 • Coleridge

... Careless. Not perhaps what such ladies might expect, but passable. And—I know men. There's not a man will look at their gowns for looking at their faces, though the suits are well enough when all's said. I vow, Madam, you have so long lived beside the two that you forget what beauties they are. I wager my next benefit to a China orange that you'll have no more care once they are seen, but all the women mad with jealousy and the men with love. Indeed, your young madams are what ...
— The Ladies - A Shining Constellation of Wit and Beauty • E. Barrington

... get them ready and started in for the rest of the winter. He himself would have to work every day to help with the support of the family. No time now for him to think of going to school, but the younger five should have a better opportunity than he had been given. Such was his vow as he started them off the next Monday morning. The children were delighted to be back in Sunday-school and to begin their school-year. The time spent in the opens had greatly increased their appreciation ...
— The Hero of Hill House • Mable Hale

... before you defenseless—smiling on his murderer. I thought myself courageous and strong; but it must be thus with every conspirator who undertakes what I have done. In a moment of excitement, of pride, of enthusiasm, or of hatred, we take a fatal vow; then there is a vast extent of time between us and our victim; but the oath taken, the fever is calmed, the enthusiasm cools, the hatred diminishes. Every day brings us nearer the end to which we are tending, and then we shudder when we feel what a crime we have undertaken. And yet ...
— The Regent's Daughter • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)

... not being able to swallow the pie, swallowed his resentment, making a mental vow to get even, if he ...
— The Rushton Boys at Rally Hall - Or, Great Days in School and Out • Spencer Davenport

... profession of recruiting had led him through all lands. This iron no longer needed bending; but how fiercely the flames of suffering which melted her obstinate nature must have burned! Surely he had not seen her for the last time, and perhaps Fate would now help him to perform the vow that he had made before her door in the dark entry of the house ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... victorious general on occasion of filling up the magistracies; the hero of six consulships could not even venture to become a candidate in 656 for the censorship. He went away to the east, ostensibly for the purpose of fulfilling a vow there, but in reality that he might not be a witness of the triumphant return of his mortal foe Quintus Metellus; he was allowed to go. He returned and opened his house; his halls stood empty. He always ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen

... intoxicated by Rousseau's creation to such a pitch that they would pay any price for a glass out of which Rousseau had drunk, they would kiss a scrap of paper that contained a piece of his handwriting, and vow that no woman of true sensibility could hesitate to consecrate her life to him, if she were only certain to be rewarded by his attachment.[48] The booksellers were unable to meet the demand. The book was let out at the rate of twelve sous a volume, and the volume could ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley

... Christians, a glorifying and uplifted drive, a drive worthy of remembrance for ever. The moon has shone on but few like it though she is old; the lake of Bolsena has glittered beneath none like it since the Etruscans here unbended after the solemnities of a triumph. It broke my vow to pieces; there was not a shadow of excuse for this use of wheels: it was done openly and wantonly in the face of the wide sky for pleasure. And what is there else but pleasure, and to what else does beauty move on? Not I hope to contemplation! ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc

... Westermain should meet him after the tournament he would burn a tall candle at Canterbury before Michaelmas. But this had escaped his mind, for it had been tossed hither and thither during days of conflict which had come later, and he was not loth to believe that the neglect of this service and the idle vow had been corner-stone of his misfortunes, and had helped to ...
— Orpheus in Mayfair and Other Stories and Sketches • Maurice Baring

... interposed in his turn. "Your fingers, Craigie, seem to itch for that same piece of green network," said he; "but I make my vow to God, that if they offer to close upon it, I will chop them off with my whinger. Since the Master has changed his mind, I suppose we need stay here no longer; but in the first place I beg ...
— Bride of Lammermoor • Sir Walter Scott

... oneself of one partner merely to be happier with another must surely always be wrong, because it must entail the degradation of conscious personal motive, in the knowledge that one had taken advantage of a law to gain an end, and to help one to break a vow solely for one's own gratification. The enormous responsibility of so taking fate into their own hands would frighten most people, if they gave themselves time to think—but they do not. Nine-tenths of them have no compunction in ...
— Three Things • Elinor Glyn

... inexperience of life, it would not be easy. At any rate, she would dash herself down some gray-precipice into that lake below rather than remain here as the bride of Archibald Toovey. Just as she was registering a desperate vow to that effect a man came climbing up the woodland way to the left, a long-legged man in a knickerbocker suit and gaiters. He stepped briskly out of the pinewood on to the snowy platform below, and seeing her at the window, looked up, ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods

... that is thee own, dear,' the quaker he said, 'I ne'er saw a maiden I sooner would wed; And I have another five hundred just now, In the padding that's under my saddle-bow, And I'll settle it all upon thee, I vow!' Heigho! yea thee ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover

... Perthe (now commonly called Saint Johns Town), by trade of life a Baker of bread and thereby got his living: in charity so aboundant, that he gave to the poore the tenth loafe of his workmanship: in zeale so fervent, that in vow he promised, and in deede attempted, to visit the holy land (as they called it) and the places where Christ was conversant on earth: in which journey, as he passed through Kent, hee made Rochester his way: ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Rochester - A Description of its Fabric and a Brief History of the Episcopal See • G. H. Palmer

... husband, who told her that it was buffalo meat. When she had finished her meal, her husband told her of the trick, and seemed to enjoy the terror with which she contemplated the consequences of the involuntary breach of her vow. Vows of this nature are often made by a Cree before he joins a war party, and they sometimes, like the eastern bonzes, walk for a certain number of days on all fours, or impose upon themselves some other ...
— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the Years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 1 • John Franklin

... He had already discovered North America, and made a second voyage there, when he determined to explore the land south of the West Indies. He sailed south through the tropical seas while the heat melted the tar of the rigging. But Columbus never noticed danger and discomfort. He had made a vow to call the first land he saw after the Holy Trinity, and when at last he caught sight of three peaks jutting up from an island he gave the island the name of La Trinidad, and "Trinidad" it remains to this day, though it now belongs to the British. As he sailed south Columbus caught sight ...
— Stories That Words Tell Us • Elizabeth O'Neill

... worthy to be compared with you. My advice is, never yield to the Romans. When they reigned over us, they oppressed our principal men, and laid heavy and extortionate burdens upon the land. For that cause I, standing here, solemnly vow vengeance upon them for the evil they then did, and, to support you in your quarrel, I will at my own cost furnish twenty thousand good fighting men. This force I will command in person, and I will bring it to your aid whenever you choose ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12) • Various

... a mere accident, happened to look at the pan of his rifle and saw that the priming had been removed. A moment's reflection convinced him that this had been done by Zeke Hunt, not accidentally, but on purpose. The hunter managed to reprime without being noticed, and he made a vow that this apparent lubber should henceforth be watched with ...
— The Riflemen of the Miami • Edward S. Ellis

... good," thought Humphrey as he went along, every now and then looking back to ascertain if the men had come out and seen him. "That Corbould we know has vowed vengeance against Edward, and all of us; and has, no doubt, joined those robbers—for robbers they must be —that he may fulfill his vow. It is fortunate that I have made the discovery and I will send over immediately to the intendant." As soon as a clump of trees had shut out the thicket, and he had no longer any fear of being seen by ...
— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat

... Rome, and there "was damnably delighted" with the gladiatorial combats, being "made drunk with a delight in blood." Augustine followed him to Rome, and there lost the girl of his heart, "so that my heart was wounded, as that the very blood did follow." The lady had made a vow of eternal chastity, "having left me with a son by her." But he fell to a new love as the old one was departed, and yet the ancient wound pained him still "after a more desperate and ...
— Adventures among Books • Andrew Lang

... lasts, they were so sweet, Made promise, that whatever bride I brought, Herself would clothe her like the sun in Heaven. Thereafter, when I reach'd this ruin'd hall, Beholding one so bright in dark estate, I vow'd that could I gain her, our fair Queen, No hand but hers, should make your Enid burst Sunlike from cloud—and likewise thought perhaps, That service done so graciously would bind The two together; fain I would the two Should love each other: how ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester

... although an old man at the time (he died in 1174), is said to have taken a vow that he would not go from within twelve leucas of the cathedral, unless compelled by the direst necessity, until the ravages of the flames had been repaired. He is reported to have seated himself ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Norwich - A Description of Its Fabric and A Brief History of the Episcopal See • C. H. B. Quennell

... really so? He recorded, silently, his own determination to remember that. It had for him, also, the consecration of a vow. ...
— The Creators - A Comedy • May Sinclair

... may enter and distribute this provaunt among the prisoners, for that I have obliged myself to such course by oath, and the cause is that when suffering from a sickness which brought me nigh to death's door I vowed a vow and sware a strong swear that, an Almighty Allah deign heal me, I would buy somewhat of bread and dole it out to the inmates of the gaol[FN334]. So here am I come for such purpose." Upon this the man opened to him the door and he went in and divided all the bread amongst the captives yet he ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton

... when convenient, and always as hard and unrelenting as possible to all others. They quibbled, and dissolved their vows, with experienced casuistry. Jesus reproaches the Pharisees in Matthew xv. and Mark vii. for flagrantly violating the fifth commandment, by allowing the vow of a son, perhaps made in hasty anger, its full force, when he had sworn that his father should never be the better for him, or anything he had, and by which an indigent father might be suffered to starve. There is an express ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... canoes and camp-stuff over the terrible road that leads to the lake, with much creaking and groaning of wagons, and complaining of men, who declared that the mud grew deeper and the hills steeper every year, and vowed their customary vow never to come that way again. At last our tents were pitched in a green copse of balsam trees, close beside the water. The delightful sense of peace and freedom descended upon our souls. Prosper and Ovide were cutting wood for the camp-fire; Francois was ...
— The Ruling Passion • Henry van Dyke

... hospitable temper, she whose page I am; but a great lady, over self-sure to be dudgeoned by wry faces in the refectory. As for the little sister (if she did have finger in the concoction)—no fear of offence there! I dare vow, who know somewhat the fashion of her, she will but trill a pretty titter ...
— A Christmas Garland • Max Beerbohm

... great canvas. Sweet to him it was as the unexpected face of one dearly loved to the wanderer; and startling in a measure also, for, remembering his oath, to see Newlyn no more until his enemy was dead, it seemed as though the vow was broken by some miracle and that from the heart of the roaring city he had magically plunged through space to the threshold of the home ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts

... "what was it that Harry was telling you a little while ago? It sounded to me like rank nonsense; and men will talk nonsense to young girls, as I have so often warned you, child. You must never listen to their nonsense, Rosy; but remember your catechism and confirmation vow, and be a ...
— Jack Tier or The Florida Reef • James Fenimore Cooper

... before God in the light of the living'; that is God's purpose in all His deliverances, that we may thereby be impelled to trustful and grateful service. And David makes that purpose into a vow, for the words might almost as well be translated, 'I will walk before Him.' Let us see to it that God's purpose is our resolve, and that we do not lose the good of any of the troubles or discipline through which He passes us; for the worst ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... Bridge, and who pretended to be deaf and dumb. It is said that, though clothed in rags, he was a Swiss gentleman of means who, stung by remorse, had vowed not to open his lips for ten years, to go bareheaded and barefooted, and to abandon for twenty years all the advantages of his fortune. His vow was rigidly kept, and at the period of his death he was in the fourteenth year of ...
— Little Folks (Septemeber 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various

... Marriage Service in which the man and the woman join hands and give their troth (i.e., truth or promise of fidelity) each to the other. This is the Marriage Vow and is usually said at the foot of the chancel steps, the marriage proper (with the ring) taking ...
— The American Church Dictionary and Cyclopedia • William James Miller

... 'The vow of Moses twice repeat; The principles of life and heat; The squares of chess, in order due, Must take their place between these two; When thus arranged, a name appears, Which every Muslim ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 429 - Volume 17, New Series, March 20, 1852 • Various

... meal over all. Next, supplicate the unsubstantial forms Fervently of the dead, vowing to slay, (Return'd to Ithaca) in thy own house, An heifer barren yet, fairest and best Of all thy herds, and to enrich the pile With delicacies such as please the shades; But, in peculiar, to Tiresias vow A sable ram, noblest of all thy flocks. When thus thou hast propitiated with pray'r 640 All the illustrious nations of the dead, Next, thou shalt sacrifice to them a ram And sable ewe, turning the face of each Right toward Erebus, and ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer

... his Grace should promise so to enter religion on vows of chastity for his part, only thereby to conduce the queen thereunto, whether in that case the Pope's Holiness may dispense with the King's Highness for the same promise, oath, or vow, discharging his ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude

... a youth, and many a maiden Meekly and devoutly bow, And from worldly cares unladen Ratify a Christian's vow. ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various

... quite devoid of ambition, he soon came to loathe the daily grind. Through that, as through, the later vicissitudes of his career, his mind clung, with a curious, mechanical persistency, to that troublesome vow ...
— Peak and Prairie - From a Colorado Sketch-book • Anna Fuller

... said Marjorie. "You must hold up both hands, and say 'I promise or vow to be a good Queen and not get mad at my courtiers.' ...
— Marjorie at Seacote • Carolyn Wells

... child grew up and Ariston repented of that which he had said, for he thought Demaratos was certainly his own son; and he gave him the name "Demaratos" for this reason, namely because before these things took place the Spartan people all in a body 49 had made a vow 50 praying that a son might be born to Ariston, as one who was pre-eminent in renown over all the kings who had ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 2 (of 2) • Herodotus

... the city. They would greatly admire, for instance, the beauty of Westminster Abbey, and would probably ask its history. Then they would be told how it originated with St. Edward the Confessor. How he had made a vow to go on a pilgrimage to the tomb of the Apostles at Rome, like a loyal Catholic, in order to pay homage to the successor of St. Peter, whom Christ appointed as head of the Church; how the pious King, ...
— The Purpose of the Papacy • John S. Vaughan

... fathers, are bursting with rage and spite, And old ladies vow that the students are tight. ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall

... Circumference of the several stems, in number fifty or sixty, 921 feet. Under this tree sat a naked Fakir, who had occupied that situation for twenty-five years; but he did not continue there the whole year through, for his vow obliged him to lie, during the four cold months, up to his neck in the waters of the ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden

... no lover of her youth, that the marriage-vow had been a hideous, shameless cheat, is on the face of Moore's account; yet the 'Blackwood' does not see it nor feel it, and brings up against Lady Byron this touching story of a poor widow, who really had had a true lover once,—a lover ...
— Lady Byron Vindicated • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... Theodore de Beze destroyed the old cathedral, the building as it now stands was the work of his former chief, for it was Henry of Navarre who laid the corner stone of the new edifice, in 1601, to fulfill a vow made to Pope Clement VIII who had absolved him from ...
— In Chteau Land • Anne Hollingsworth Wharton

... intense joy. In Egypt she had blossomed, fading woman though she had been. She had renewed her powers of physical fascination. Then she must emerge from the trap and go to fulfil her destiny. She would do so. Silently, and as if making the vow to the Egyptian Aphrodite in the darkness of her temple, she swore to do so. Nigel had brought her there—had he not?—that Hathor might bless her voyage. Moved by a fierce impulse, and casting away pity, ...
— Bella Donna - A Novel • Robert Hichens

... there, and at home again, we'll have, please God, the old kind of evenings and the old life again, as it used to be before those daily nooses caught us by the legs and sometimes tripped us up. Make a vow (as I have done) never to go down that court with the little news-shop at the corner, any more, and let us swear by Jack Straw as in the ancient times. . . . I am beginning to get over my sorrow for your nights up aloft in Whitefriars, and ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster

... troubles long ago, When each man's neighbor was his dearest foe, And of the trials he himself had passed, And the high purpose that from first to last Had been his stay and spur, he scarce knew how, Since on Excalibur he took the vow. He told of his own hopes for future days, And how he wrought and fought not for men's praise, (Though like all good men Gawayne held that dear), Yet trusting, when men laid him on his bier, They might ...
— Gawayne And The Green Knight - A Fairy Tale • Charlton Miner Lewis

... Acts xxi. 23. "We have four men which have a vow on them; them take, and purify thyself with them that they may ...
— Evidences of Christianity • William Paley

... she strike the darling of my thoughts? By Saturnes soule, and this earth threatning aire, That shaken thrise, makes Natures buildings quake, I vow, if she but once frowne on thee more, To hang her meteor like twixt heauen and earth, And bind her hand and foote with golden cordes, As once I did for ...
— The Tragedy of Dido Queene of Carthage • Christopher Marlowe

... morals, good order, and happiness of the domestic life. Montesquieu, Pothier, and Dr. Taylor all insist that the cases of husband and wife ought to be distinguished, and that the violation of the marriage vow, on the part of the wife, is the most mischievous, and the prosecution ought to be confined to the offense on her part. ("Esprit des Lois," tom. 3, 186; "Traite du Contrat de Mariage," No. 516; "Elements of Civil ...
— Eighty Years And More; Reminiscences 1815-1897 • Elizabeth Cady Stanton

... partiality for the Tory faction; and both had, in their spleen, listened to agents from Saint Germains. Russell had vowed by all that was most sacred that he would himself bring back his exiled Sovereign. But the vow was broken as soon as it had been uttered; and he to whom the royal family had looked as to a second Monk had crushed the hopes of that family at La Hogue. Shrewsbury had not gone such lengths. Yet he ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... preserved and propagated with unusual facility. Pigeons, differently from any other domesticated animal, can easily be mated for life, and, though kept with other pigeons, they rarely prove unfaithful to each other. Even when the {207} male does break his marriage-vow, he does not permanently desert his mate. I have bred in the same aviaries many pigeons of different kinds, and never reared a single bird of an impure strain. Hence a fancier can with the greatest ease select and match his birds. He will also soon see the good results of his care; ...
— The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, Vol. I. • Charles Darwin

... rose from Wallace's followers, and they repeated his words as though it had been a vow: "Tonight we will take Lanark." The notes of a bugle rang through the air, and Archie could hear them repeated as by an echo by others far ...
— In Freedom's Cause • G. A. Henty

... I should ever happen to be in Alsace all I'd have to do would be to show it to any French people and they'd help me. He said it was a kind of—a kind of a vow all the French people had—that the Germans didn't know anything about. And 'specially families that had men in the Franco-Prussian War. He told me how he escaped, too, and got to America, and about how he hit the German soldier that came to arrest ...
— Tom Slade with the Boys Over There • Percy K. Fitzhugh

... chapter on the tragedies of marriage, Chesterton remarks that 'the broad-minded are extremely bitter because a Christian, who wishes to have several wives when his own promise bound him to one, is not allowed to violate his vow at the same altar at which he made it.' What most people who wish for a divorce want is that they shall have, not several wives, but one, who shall prove that Christian marriage is not a horrible farce, that the words ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Patrick Braybrooke

... flattered himself that he made a sensation as he strutted down Bittlestone with his richly gilt knobbed cane (and indeed I vow I saw heads looking at me from Miss Squilsby's, the brass-plated milliner opposite Raymond Gray's, who has three silver-paper bonnets, and two fly-blown prints of fashion in the window), yet what was the emotion produced by my arrival, compared to that which the little street ...
— The Book of Snobs • William Makepeace Thackeray

... watershed from which the streams flow to both oceans. Nothing could be seen through the jungle of undergrowth; but Drake climbed a tall tree, saw from the top of it the Pacific glittering below him, and made a vow that one day he would himself sail a ...
— English Seamen in the Sixteenth Century - Lectures Delivered at Oxford Easter Terms 1893-4 • James Anthony Froude

... and she now prayed earnestly to God to spare the life of this her last and dearest child, and vowed in her anguish that, if the babe were ever restored to her, she would break through all restrictions, and bring her up a true believer. This vow ...
— History of King Charles II of England • Jacob Abbott

... and rubbed his eyes. "Now you have disturbed my midday nap," he growled angrily, "and I declare that I will have my revenge. When I come back I will bring some Beech nuts with me, and I vow you will all turn yellow with jealousy when you see how pretty the new ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten

... marked relief that whenever I felt my misery insupportable I turned to the bottle. At no time in my life was I ever the worse for liquor, but I soon found the craving for it was getting the better of me. I resolved never to touch it except at night, and kept my vow; but the consequence was, that I looked forward to the night, and waited for it with such eagerness that the day seemed to exist only for the sake of the evening, when I might hope at least for rest. For the wine as wine I cared nothing; anything that would have dulled ...
— The Autobiography of Mark Rutherford • Mark Rutherford

... through the strength which results from their coalition and the resistance which is born out of their interests." ii—That of the clergy, besides, is inherently bad,[2252] because "its system is in constant antagonism to the rights of man." An institution in which a vow of obedience is necessary is "incompatible" with the constitution. Congregations "subject to independent chiefs are out of the social pale and incompatible with public spirit." As to the right of society ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 2 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 1 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... the suns of Europe; it jumps up behind the horseman who scours the woods of Michigan; it throws its scowling glances on the attempt at present enjoyment; it scares the epicurean from his voluptuousness, and when the ascetic has finished his vow, it compels him once more to repeat the ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various

... careful thou dost not speak a lie in thy prayers, which though not observed is frequently practised by careless persons, especially in the forms of confession, affirming things which they have not thought, professing sorrow which is not, making a vow they mean not.' Taylor's Works, ed. ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 4 (of 6) • Boswell

... nephew. I vowed I'd have your life, Peter, but your father had a few friends and one of these spirited you away. So temporarily you escaped. But now I have you where I can keep that vow. You, too, shall die. By the vibration. But first—ha! ha!—I'll give you a taste of the purple. Just so ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, December 1930 • Various

... my vow, and grant me fair glory at Mantinea, bear witness I have been not ungrateful. I have offered to thee a white sheep, spotless and undefiled. And now I have it in my mind to attempt the pentathlon at the next ...
— A Day In Old Athens • William Stearns Davis

... Achaians. But come, let us now inquire of some soothsayer or priest, yea, or an interpreter of dreams—seeing that a dream too is of Zeus—who shall say wherefore Phoebus Apollo is so wroth, whether he blame us by reason of vow or hecatomb; if perchance he would accept the savour of lambs or unblemished goats, and so would take ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer (Lang, Leaf, Myers trans.)

... baptisms, exorcisms, prayers, purifications and consecrations. For a name carried with it, for those who were so blessed as to be acquainted with it, whatever power and influence its owner wielded in heaven or on earth or under the earth. A vow or prayer formulated in or through a certain name was fraught with the prestige of him whose name it was. Thus the psalmist addressing Jehovah cries (Ps. liv. 1): "Save me, O God, by Thy name, and judge ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various

... of fireworks; while the dialogue, for the most part, is in the same hurried style in which the passing masks at a carnival attempt to banter each other. The young king of Navarre, with three of his courtiers, has made a vow to pass three years in rigid retirement, and devote them to the study of wisdom; for that purpose he has banished all female society from his court, and imposed a penalty on the intercourse with women. But scarcely has he, in a pompous harangue, worthy of the most heroic achievements, ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black

... a different man. The Almighty had his word for it. Still sitting with his back against the wall and his cramped legs extended in front of him, Rufus rolled his eyes in supplication to the circular blue space above him and registered this vow with all the fervour and sincerity of which ...
— The Dude Wrangler • Caroline Lockhart

... he, "I made a vow, to our Lady of the Grotto not to cut my hair or beard for ten years if I were saved in a moment of danger; but to-day the ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... this work, to do which the Minister is placed under vow, and for which he is given authority, is one of his most solemn obligations. The pulpit should, then, ever remind us of the loving care on the part of Christ and His Church for {47} our soul's health and our growth in grace, which ...
— The Worship of the Church - and The Beauty of Holiness • Jacob A. Regester

... had been chosen on the suggestion of Miss Heredith, who told Merrington the facts. What was unknown was the addition of the inscription, "Semper Fidelis," which must have been scratched on the brooch subsequently by the girl herself as a girlish vow of love and ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees

... great for long continuance. The toil, fatigue and numerous disappointments, (The sure attendants on a life of business) Were sooth'd and sweeten'd by the fond endearments, With which she met me in the hours of leisure. Oft hath she vow'd, that she despis'd the profit, How great soe'er, that sunder'd us at times. But all the halcyon days I once enjoy'd, Do but conspire to aggravate the misery, Which now ...
— The Female Gamester • Gorges Edmond Howard

... Jake moving about, first among the aspens and later on the sage hill. The savage oaths that reached her now and again were evidence enough that the fellow was in a vile temper. If he should find her now, she felt sure he would carry out his vow ...
— The Fighting Edge • William MacLeod Raine

... before us, I think we shall best gather their significance, and lay it upon our own hearts, if we simply follow the windings of the dialogue. There are three points: the audacious question, the rash vow, and the ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. John Chapters I to XIV • Alexander Maclaren

... years More held his readership; then he seems to have had a wish to become a priest, and, in his son-in-law's words, 'gave himself to devotion and prayer in the Charterhouse of London, religiously living there, without vow, about ...
— The Red Book of Heroes • Leonora Blanche Lang

... affection to that Beauty of the world, her Majesty's divine Daughter the Princess Amelia (a very paragon of young women, to judge by her picture and one's own imagination); and likewise the firm resolution he, Friedrich Crown-Prince, has formed, and the vow he hereby makes, Either to wed that celestial creature when permitted, or else never any of the Daughters of Eve in this world. Congresses of Soissons, Smoking Parliaments, Preliminaries of the Pardo and Treaties of Seville may go how they can. If well, it shall be ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. VI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... the warriors there; In the name of all Ireland the Delegates swore: "We've suffered too long, and we'll suffer no more— Unconquered by Force, we were vanquished by Fraud; And now, in God's temple, we vow unto God That never again shall the Englishman bind His chains on our limbs, or his laws on ...
— Thomas Davis, Selections from his Prose and Poetry • Thomas Davis

... with mademoiselle. She will not speak; she will not eat. She lies there hour after hour with her beautiful face turned toward the wall and her white hands clasped together. She might be a dead woman for all the interest she evinces in anything. I very much fear, sir, that she will keep her vow—never to speak again—never ...
— Kidnapped at the Altar - or, The Romance of that Saucy Jessie Bain • Laura Jean Libbey

... of body, for, whatever she said, the other was plainly exceedingly vexed and mortified. She covered her face with her hands. At one time she made a movement as if to leave. She looked earnest and troubled. I could vow she was about to burst into tears. Her face was very expressive. No one who shows such sudden changes can help being a person of rare sensibility. I am almost out of conceit of making her the heroine of my story, though, to be sure, I am not likely to interfere ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, September, 1885 • Various

... daylight hours come to be haunted with misgivings, and now her heart was never light except in the evenings. And combat any such direct thought as she might, she felt dimly that in giving over her purpose to square her conduct with the right, she had doubled and trebled the original wrong. Unvowing a vow must be equivalent to signing a covenant with the powers of darkness. Now and again lines from the poem Cousin Julia had repeated to her so impressively that she could never forget it, came to her suddenly in uncanny fashion. At such times, if ...
— Elsie Marley, Honey • Joslyn Gray

... of their death appear, unto Our shame perpetual. Once a day I'll visit The chapel where they lie; and tears shed there Shall be my recreation: so long as nature Will bear up with this exercise, so long I daily vow to use it.—Come, and lead me ...
— The Winter's Tale - [Collins Edition] • William Shakespeare

... and honesty intensely, but he had no strength of will nor belief in his right to organize an intelligent and honest life about him. He was absolutely unable to give orders, to forbid things, and to insist. It seemed as though he had taken a vow never to raise his voice and never to make use of the imperative. It was difficult for him to say. "Fetch" or "Bring"; when he wanted his meals he would cough hesitatingly and say to the cook, "How about tea?. . ." or "How about dinner? ...
— The Horse-Stealers and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... and Vow three Things in my Name: First, That I should renounce the Devil and all his Works, the Pomp and Vanity of this wicked World, and all the sinful Lusts of the Flesh: Secondly, That I should believe all the Articles of the Christian Faith: ...
— The A, B, C. With the Church of England Catechism • Unknown

... health. Great was her affliction on beholding him upon his bed, pale, and apparently in a state of rapid decay. After many kind questions, to which he returned no answers, she entreated earnestly, by the vow of brotherly and sisterly adoption which had past between them, that he would inform her of the cause of his unhappy dejection; assuring him that she would use every exertion to remove it, and gratify his wishes, be they what they might, however difficult to be obtained. Mazin upon this, in a ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous

... but while she spoke, our still more passionate lover devoured her with his eyes, fixed his very soul upon her charms of speaking and looking, and was a thousand times (urged by transporting passion) ready to break all her dictates, and vow himself her eternal slave; but he feared the result, and therefore kept himself within the bounds of seeming friendship; so that after a thousand things she said of Philander, he took his leave to go to dinner; but as he was going out he saw Brilliard enter, who, as I said, had forgot he left ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn

... case, it was an English girl who entangled him. She was a beauty whom he first met at a ball at Torlonia's; he danced with her again at the Palazzo Albani. But music held him fast through all, though he could on occasion impatiently vow that he would be more serious and no longer alter his compositions to suit the whims ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 • Rupert Hughes

... to his. "Dyke, it was generally my fault," she said contritely, "but I was bound to scold when you'd get careless about your own self. I vow," the little old lady turned to me, "he took no thought of his health nor his life nor limb. There was nothing he feared—man nor beast nor weather. In the early days there were no roads in this country and he rode horseback from one church to another through the wilderness. In the ...
— Blue Ridge Country • Jean Thomas

... no baseness that those people were ashamed to stoop to in their hunt for that friendless girl's life. What they wanted to show was this—that she had committed the sin of relapsing from her vow and ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain



Words linked to "Vow" :   plight, vower, swear, profess, commit, assurance, give, affiance, pledge, consecrate



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