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Affirm   /əfˈərm/   Listen
Affirm

verb
(past & past part. affirmed; pres. part. affirming)
1.
Establish or strengthen as with new evidence or facts.  Synonyms: confirm, corroborate, substantiate, support, sustain.  "The evidence supports the defendant"
2.
To declare or affirm solemnly and formally as true.  Synonyms: assert, aver, avow, swan, swear, verify.
3.
Say yes to.



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"Affirm" Quotes from Famous Books



... of the cartouche are there to affirm his identity, albeit the sculptor, not knowing his actual physiognomy, has given him the traditional features, regular as those of the god Horus. During the centuries of the Roman domination the Western emperors used to send from home instructions ...
— Egypt (La Mort De Philae) • Pierre Loti

... city several times, and can affirm that its tranquillity is undisturbed. The Union soldiers who are stationed within its limits are as orderly as if they were in New York or Boston.... One effect of the march of General Sherman through Georgia has been to satisfy the people that their credulity has been imposed upon by the lying ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman

... haste and acquiescence, and ran, lest they should hear him groan. He told the cabman to drive Northward, instead of to the South-west. The question of the thousand pounds had been decided for him—"by fate," he chose to affirm. The consideration that one is pursued by fate, will not fail to impart a sense of dignity even to the meanest. "After all, if I stop in England," said he, "I can't afford to lose my position in society; anything's better ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... Whether this sameness of thought and expression, which I have quoted from them, proceeded from an agreement in their way of thinking, or whether they have borrowed from our author, I leave the reader to determine. I shall adventure to affirm this of the Sentiments of our author, that they are generally the most familiar which I have ever met with, and at the same time delivered with the highest dignity of phrase; which brings me to speak of his diction. Here I shall only beg one postulatum, viz., That the greatest ...
— Miscellanies, Volume 2 (from Works, Volume 12) • Henry Fielding

... lie on thy cheek in its roses, A lie echo'd back by thy glass, Thy necklace on greenhorns imposes, And the ring on thy finger is brass. Yet thy tongue, I affirm, without giving an inch back, Outdates the sham jewels, rouge, ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 53. Saturday, November 2, 1850 • Various

... affirm as much as this. In fact, the conversation, since Mrs. Willoughby liked to apply that term to the encounter, had induced in his stepmother, as far as he could see, a somewhat superior ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King

... be admitted into serious plays, is not now to be disputed: it is already in possession of the stage, and I dare confidently affirm, that very few tragedies, in this age, shall be received without it. All the arguments which are formed against it, can amount to no more than this, that it is not so near conversation as prose, and therefore ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Volume 4 (of 18) - Almanzor And Almahide, Marriage-a-la-Mode, The Assignation • John Dryden

... London; by which he appears to have deceived all his brother ministers without exception; and by which Mr. Fox in particular, was induced to make the same declaration with general Carleton to foreign courts, and to come forward in the commons peremptorily to affirm, that there was not a second opinion in the cabinet, upon this interesting subject. How must a man of his undisguised and manly character have felt, when, within a week from this time, he found the noble earl declaring that ...
— Four Early Pamphlets • William Godwin

... province to deal with other theories of development which followed from Darwin's Pangenesis, or to discuss their histological probabilities. We can, however, affirm that Charles Darwin's idea that invisible gemmules are the carriers of hereditary characters and that they multiply by division has been removed from the position of a provisional hypothesis to that of a well-founded ...
— Darwin and Modern Science • A.C. Seward and Others

... are as good merchants as the most secular and the most skilful tradesmen. It is because the two per cent affects and includes them all, as I have said, that the theological council finds fault with it, declaring that it is not just. It is fortunate that they do not directly affirm it to be unjust; but assert that I err in laying this assessment, which the laws themselves declare shall be laid for expenditures upon defenses and walls. From this it is plain that they desire to be jurists and theologians ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume VIII (of 55), 1591-1593 • Emma Helen Blair

... conveyed that he had left it of his own free will and not attempted to return to it, "I should have——" or, "If I had taken office——" or even sometimes, "If I were leading the Liberal party——" and no one, indeed, was in a position to affirm that these things might not have been. If a man's capacities are hinted at or even stated by himself to his fellow-creatures with a certain amount of discretion, and if he does not court failure by putting them to the proof, it does not occur to most people to contradict him, ...
— The Arbiter - A Novel • Lady F. E. E. Bell

... innocent creatures, on other grounds, some of which I think it is not uncharitable to suppose are in favour mainly because they weaken this branch of the evidence for the conformity of Christian truth with human necessities. But notwithstanding these, I venture to affirm, with all proper submission to wiser men, that you cannot legitimately explain the universal prevalence of sacrifice, unless you take into account as one—I should say the main—element in it, this universally diffused sense that things are wrong ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. John Chapters I to XIV • Alexander Maclaren

... of Living the Important Element.—The actual fact, as we may venture to affirm, is that the standards of living which need to be maintained in the future are the all-important element in the case. To the laboring man it is necessary to avoid starvation or the workhouse; to the well-paid artisan it seems necessary ...
— Essentials of Economic Theory - As Applied to Modern Problems of Industry and Public Policy • John Bates Clark

... under the eyes— they are dreadfully contused. Well, Rattlin, we are to go to Sheerness directly, and be paid off. You may depend upon it, the captain will think better about this arrest of yours, particularly as the two men at the wheel positively contradict the quarter-master, and affirm that the helm was put hard a-starboard, and not hard a-port. It appears to us that it was of little consequence, when the ship was first discovered, how the helm was put. The fault was evidently on ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard

... has observed, the larger workers have simple eyes (ocelli), which though small can be plainly distinguished, whereas the smaller workers have their ocelli rudimentary. Having carefully dissected several specimens of these workers, I can affirm that the eyes are far more rudimentary in the smaller workers than can be accounted for merely by their proportionally lesser size; and I fully believe, though I dare not assert so positively, that the workers of ...
— On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection • Charles Darwin

... as to break through the crowd to the Apostle and demand salvation; but on a sudden he saw before him, as it were, a precipice, the sight of which took strength from his feet. What if the Apostle were to confess his own weakness, affirm that the Roman Caesar was stronger than Christ the Nazarene? And at that thought terror raised the hair on his head, for he felt that in such a case not only the remnant of his hope would fall into that abyss, but with it he himself, and all through ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz

... and they had listened to the bold declaration with a surprise not unmingled with resentment, that so young a man should make, in their presence, an assertion touching matters of State which they could neither affirm nor deny! At a sign from one of the chancellors, one of the three counsellors at law of the Avvogadori di Commun, who had the keeping of the Golden Book, had been immediately summoned from adjoining chambers in the Palace and had confirmed the statement. ...
— A Golden Book of Venice • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull

... the whole of the plunder or not,—what partnership there was in this business,—what shares, what dividends were made, and who got them,—about all this public opinion varied, and we can with certainty affirm nothing; but there ended the life and exploits of Colonel Hannay, farmer-general, civil officer, and military commander of Baraitch and Goruckpore. But not so ended ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XI. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... send you Johnson's Life of Milton. My former feelings again return upon me, that Johnson did not mean to affirm that Milton prayed not upon any occasion or in any manner; but that he was engaged in no visible worship; that he prayed at no stated time; that he had not what we may call any regular return of family or private devotion. Pray read the sequel. That he lived without ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 210, November 5, 1853 • Various

... present state of our knowledge we are unable to affirm anything on this point. Practically, we are not much further advanced. It is very probable that the combination of hydraulic purification with a forced cultivation of the soil has sometimes determined ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 458, October 11, 1884 • Various

... administered. The coal-barge rolls and turns and drifts as chance and the varying current please. How huge must be the rent in the meshes of the law to let so large a fish go through! But in truth there is no law about it, and to this day no man can confidently affirm that he knows to whom the river belongs. These curious anomalies are part and parcel of our political system, and as I watched the black monster slowly go by with the stream it occurred to me that grimy bargee, with his short pipe and ...
— The Open Air • Richard Jefferies

... which it has been protected only in recent time by green screens. Still it does not seem to have suffered much from light during these four decades; at least two former officers of the library, who were appointed one in 1828 and the other in 1834, affirm that at that time the colors were not notably fresher than now. This remark is important, because the coloring in Humboldt, as well as in Lord Kingsborough, by its freshness gives a wrong impression of the coloring of the original, which in fact is but feeble; it may have ...
— Aids to the Study of the Maya Codices • Cyrus Thomas

... come on board my vessel. They will see you, gentlemen; they will see the forces we have at our disposal; they will consequently know to what they have to trust, and the fate that attends them, in case of rebellion. We will affirm to them, upon our honor, that M. Fouquet is a prisoner, and that all resistance can only be prejudicial to them. We will tell them that at the first cannon fired, there will be no further hope of mercy from the king. Then, or so at least I trust, ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... now proved, as you may remember, that no man could affirm a negative; for no one could affirm that which ...
— Euthydemus • Plato

... have any interests in their work or their home other than their pay and their food. But Huldah was patient, though she confessed that she had a feeling that she had been rudely "trampled all over." I suspect she had a good cry at the end of the first day. I can not affirm it, except from a ...
— Duffels • Edward Eggleston

... then to be acute. In that very week the Northampton member had been committed to custody for outraging Parliament, and released. And it was known that Gladstone meant immediately to bring in a resolution for permitting members to affirm, instead of taking oath by appealing to a God. Than this complication of theology and politics nothing could have been better devised to impassion an electorate which had but two genuine interests— theology and politics. The rumour of the feverish affair had spread to the most ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett

... inhabitants of less happy climates, should they suffer their intellectual powers to pine for want of exercise, not food: for here is enough to think upon, God knows, were they disposed so to employ their time; where one may justly affirm that, ...
— Observations and Reflections Made in the Course of a Journey through France, Italy, and Germany, Vol. I • Hester Lynch Piozzi

... him. When the toil of the day was over, he would gaze at it for hours, until he began to imagine that those vast features recognized him, and gave him a smile of kindness and encouragement, responsive to his own look of veneration. We must not take upon us to affirm that this was a mistake, although the Face may have looked no more kindly at Ernest than at all the world besides. But the secret was, that the boy's tender and confiding simplicity discerned what other people could not see; and thus ...
— Short Stories Old and New • Selected and Edited by C. Alphonso Smith

... testimony of the English. Nevertheless, it would betray scant knowledge of human nature to doubt, with her hopes so frustrated, her having wavered in her faith. Whether she confessed to this effect in words is uncertain; but I will confidently affirm that she owned it ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... maintain, that the only eye that we have—the only eye we can form any conception of, is the visible eye that belongs to the visible body, as a part does to a whole; whether this eye be originally revealed to us by the touch, by the sight, by the reason, or by the imagination. We maintain, that to affirm we never get beyond this eye in the exercise of vision, is equivalent to asserting, that a part is larger than the whole, of which it is only a part—is equivalent to asserting, that Y, which is contained between X and Z, is nevertheless of larger compass than X and Z, and comprehends them ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 337, November, 1843 • Various

... these charges, sentences and parts of sentences were selected from his reports, which expressed the valuable purposes to which a funded debt might be applied, and were alleged to affirm, as an abstract principle, "that a public debt was a public blessing." He was, it was added, the inveterate enemy of Mr. Jefferson, because, in the republican principles of that gentleman, he perceived an invincible obstacle ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 4 (of 5) • John Marshall

... humble Application to His Majesty, that he would be pleased to intercede with the Queen of Hungary for a Reversal of the Sentence passed upon Their Brethren in Bohemia (amounting, as They affirm, to no less than Sixty Thousand Families), by Her Majesty's late Edict, whereby They are ordered to depart that Kingdom in Six Months time, and His Majesty finding that the States General have already interposed Their Good Offices in Their Behalf; It is the King's Pleasure, that you ...
— Notes on the Diplomatic History of the Jewish Question • Lucien Wolf

... birth of Pri{a}pus allude to that radical moisture which supports all vegetable productions, and which is produced by Bacchus and Venus, that is, the solar heat, and the fluid whence Venus is said to have sprung. Some affirm that he was the same with the Baal of the ...
— Roman Antiquities, and Ancient Mythology - For Classical Schools (2nd ed) • Charles K. Dillaway

... other, which gives him a hobble in 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 ...
— Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift

... the conversation, as usual, became still more animated; many good things were broached which had been thought of during dinner, but which would not exactly do for a lady's ear; and though I cannot positively affirm that there was much wit uttered, yet I have certainly heard many contests of rare wit produce much less laughter. Wit, after all, is a mighty tart, pungent ingredient, and much too acid for some stomachs; but honest good humour ...
— Old Christmas From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving • Washington Irving

... "I affirm it, madam. And as you seem so mighty fond of Latin, remember what Horace says—Qui cupit opatam cursu contingere metam, Multa tulit fecitque puer, sudavit et ...
— The Prophet of Berkeley Square • Robert Hichens

... Attraction, and this term is frequently used by Sir Isaac Newton. But he gives repeated caution that he pretends not by the use of this term to define the nature of the power, or the manner in which it acts. Nor does he ever affirm or insinuate that a body can act upon another body at a distance, but by the intervention ...
— Aether and Gravitation • William George Hooper

... to some persons to inquire whether St. Paul, in a well-known place, does not affirm, (somewhat as it is affirmed in this Essay,) that "the heir, as long as he is a child, ... is under tutors and governors until the time appointed of the father?" And that, "Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world: but when ...
— Inspiration and Interpretation - Seven Sermons Preached Before the University of Oxford • John Burgon

... being the law of God, is higher than the law of man. Some of those who believe in the man-law and who stand over the mangled body of the victim, or who sit beside her bed, bringing her slowly back to life, affirm that the girl was careless and deserved her fate. Others, who believe in the God-law, maintain that the engine is run not to kill but to protect, not to maim but to educate, and that the fault lies in the wrong application of the force, not ...
— The Underdog • F. Hopkinson Smith

... does affirm that the colored race has been placed by the constitution of the United States and the States here represented, of the laws thereof, on a plane of absolute legal equality with the white race; and does declare that the colored ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 4, 1919 • Various

... the pacquett-boat not before eight the next morning; and when they came they did believe that, this vessel had been drowned, or at least behind, not thinking she could have lived in that sea. Strange things are told of this vessel, and he concludes his letter with this position, "I only affirm that the perfection of sayling lies in my principle, finde it out who can." Thence home, in my way meeting Mr. Rawlinson, who tells me that my uncle Wight is off of his Hampshire purchase and likes less of the Wights, and ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... around it is grouped the representation, i.e., its eventual influence on others. Within it occurs affection, i.e., its actual effort upon itself. It is because of this distinction between images and sensations that we affirm that the totality of perceived images subsists, even if our body disappears, whereas we cannot annihilate our body without destroying our sensations. In practice, our "pure" perception is adulterated with affection, as well as ...
— Bergson and His Philosophy • J. Alexander Gunn

... to the purple, chose this island for his residence. Many authors affirm that his wife Helena was a Briton. It is more certain that his son Constantine the Great was born here, and enabled to succeed his father principally by the helps which ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... contention that something cannot come out of nothing: but I no longer pretend that it can and I now see that the stones which have been thrown at me by you both and others have come from glass houses; for this is really the pretension of orthodox theologians. They affirm that the universe was created by God out of nothing, but produce no scrap of evidence for His existence, and even if they could prove that He exists, they would have to admit that He came out of nothing, or at least from something which ...
— Communism and Christianism - Analyzed and Contrasted from the Marxian and Darwinian Points of View • William Montgomery Brown

... to carry on the warlike education of our people—and we are resolved to do so—then we by that very fact affirm our constant readiness again to enter upon a war, as soon as our honour, our inward or outward growth, or the expansive tendencies rooted in the inmost nature of our people, demand it.—PASTOR D. BAUMGARTEN, ...
— Gems (?) of German Thought • Various

... serious. I will venture to affirm that, on this side the Alps, there is no country in Europe whose natives have so little to learn, or to unlearn, in acquiring a good Italian pronunciation, as the English. We have neither the gutturals of the German and the Spaniard, nor the mute vowels and nasal n's of the French ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 487 - Vol. 17, No. 487. Saturday, April 30, 1831 • Various

... distance; Altenburg, where Kunz von Kauffungen stole the two little Princes; centuries ago;—where we do not mean to pause at this time. On the morrow morning,—unless they chose to stay over Sunday; which I cannot affirm or deny,—Seckendorf also has made his packages; and joins himself to Friedrich. Wilhelm's august travelling party. Doing here a portion of the long space (length of the Terrestrial Equator in all) which he is fated to accomplish in the way of riding ...
— History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 7 • Thomas Carlyle

... forming an association to secure all the benefits of community life, and affirm the right of our community to each ...
— The Farmer and His Community • Dwight Sanderson

... Banks and Brenda. I had never lifted a finger to help them; I was not in their confidence; and since the early morning I had withdrawn a measure of my sympathy from them. But I could not prove any of these things. I could only affirm them, and this domineering bully, who stood glowering at me, wanted proof or nothing. He was too well accustomed to the methods ...
— The Jervaise Comedy • J. D. Beresford

... have, plus the five hundred thousand; the round sum, plus the odd money; you say so, prince, you affirm it, you swear it; ...
— Napoleon the Little • Victor Hugo

... troubled in so great happiness. I replied, O let me have the same grant given to Hezekiah, that I may live fifteen years, to see my daughter a woman: to which they answered, It is done; and then, at that instant, I awoke out of my trance;" and Dr. Howlsworth did there affirm, that that day she died made just fifteen years from that time. My dear mother was of excellent beauty and good understanding, a loving wife, and most tender mother; very pious, and charitable ...
— Memoirs of Lady Fanshawe • Lady Fanshawe

... of wonder to him that tenants of his own should be ungrateful. He did his duty by them, as the Rector, in whose keeping were their souls, would have been the first to affirm; the books of his estate showed this, recording year by year an average gross profit of some sixteen hundred pounds, and (deducting raw material incidental to the upkeep of Worsted Skeynes) a net loss ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... them. Edward Philips, Milton's nephew, writes a preface to them, and observes, 'that his poems are the effects of genius, the most polite and verdant that ever the Scots nation produced, and says, that if he should affirm, that neither Tasso, Guarini, or any of the most neat and refined spirits of Italy, nor even the choicest of our English poets can challenge any advantage above him, it could not be judged any attribute ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume I. • Theophilus Cibber

... are the lights—out all: And over each quivering form, The curtain, a funeral pall, Comes down with the rush of a storm— And the angels, all pallid and wan, Uprising, unveiling, affirm That the play is the tragedy, "Man," And its hero, ...
— Famous Modern Ghost Stories • Various

... particularly favourable conjunctures might have speedily ended the war. But so tight was Germany's grip on her that she not only withheld her own aid, but actually threatened to fall foul of any of the Balkan States that should tender theirs. It is, therefore, no exaggeration to affirm that the duration of this war and some of the most doleful events chronicled during the first year of its prosecution, are due to the insidious behaviour of Ferdinand of Coburg and his Bulgarian coadjutors. One may add that this behaviour constitutes a brilliant and lasting testimony ...
— England and Germany • Emile Joseph Dillon

... weavers, tinkers, tailors, sailors, and twenty other trades and professions. It must be the work of years to convert such settlers into good practical farmers. In such cases, how can a fair yield be extracted from land ignorantly cultivated? But I will venture to affirm, that wherever good farming is in practice, as good an average yield will be obtained, as in any country in ...
— Twenty-Seven Years in Canada West - The Experience of an Early Settler (Volume I) • Samuel Strickland

... large among all sciences. Whatever it is truly healthful for the heart of man to know, whatever befits his spiritual nature and immortal destiny, that is just as open to the mind of woman, and just as consistent with her nature. To deny this abstract truth, we must either affirm the sentiment falsely ascribed to Mahomet, although harmonizing well enough with his faith in general, that women have no souls; or take the ground that truth in this, its widest extent, is not as essential to their highest welfare as it is to ours; or assert, that possessing inferior intellects, ...
— Mrs Whittelsey's Magazine for Mothers and Daughters - Volume 3 • Various

... by Dr. Frobisher, from whose verdict in such matters there was at the time no appeal, by Dr. Dobie, and by Dr. Bruton, who had known Sir John from his infancy. It is possible that towards the close of his life he suffered occasionally from hallucination, though I could not positively affirm even so much; but this was only when his health had been completely undermined by causes which are very ...
— The Lost Stradivarius • John Meade Falkner

... affirm that since I lost it Never bower has seemed so fair; Never garden-creeper crossed it, With so deft and brave an air; Never bird sang in the summer, as I ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 107, September, 1866 • Various

... the text of the paper mentioned by Count Otto: "I, the undersigned, Ambassador of his Majesty the Emperor of the French, affirm that I have seen and read the originals of the two decisions of the two diocesan official boards, concerning the marriage between their Majesties, the Emperor and the Empress Josephine, and that it follows from these decisions that, in ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand

... find it? Old Welwyn-Baker calls himself a Christian, and so does his son. And I suppose the Rev. Scatchard Vialls calls himself a Christian! Let us have done with this disgusting hypocrisy! I say with all deliberation—I affirm it—that Radicalism must break with religion that has become a sham! Radicalism is a religion in itself. We have no right—no right, I say—to impose any such test ...
— Denzil Quarrier • George Gissing

... been defined to be artificial good-nature; but we may affirm, with much greater propriety, ...
— Many Thoughts of Many Minds - A Treasury of Quotations from the Literature of Every Land and Every Age • Various

... prospect of the Alps. Not to multiply instances of the indifference to the beauties of simple nature, which will, I think, be allowed to exist in the French, as contrasted with ourselves, I am inclined to extend the line of distinction still farther, and to affirm, that this deficiency in taste appears generally to distinguish the Teutonic from the Southern blood. It is no exaggeration to say, that for one French or Italian traveller in Switzerland, twenty English, or ten Germans, may be reckoned. The French ...
— Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone - Made During the Year 1819 • John Hughes

... primitive Christianity. Allied to the Hebrews, the Persians, and the Greeks, tinged by the older faiths of India, deeply coloured by Syrian and Egyptian thought, this later branch of the great religious stem could not do other than again re-affirm the ancient traditions, and place in the grasp of western races the full treasure of the ancient teaching. "The faith once delivered to the saints" would indeed have been shorn of its chief value if, when delivered to the West, the pearl of ...
— Esoteric Christianity, or The Lesser Mysteries • Annie Besant

... both in Church and Common weal. Now, if this Position of parity should be true, it would then follow that the ordinary Course of Divine Providence of God in the World should be wrong, and unjust, (which we must not dare to think, much less to affirm) and all the sacred Rules, Precepts and Commands of the Almighty which he hath given the Sons of Men to observe and keep in their respective Places, Orders and Degrees, would be to no purpose; which unaccountably ...
— History of the Negro Race in America From 1619 to 1880. Vol 1 - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George W. Williams

... —— do solemnly swear (or affirm), in presence of Almighty God, that I will henceforth faithfully support, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States and the Union of the States thereunder, and that I will in like manner abide by and faithfully support all laws and proclamations which have been made during ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Volume 6: Andrew Johnson • James D. Richardson

... and switch their tails and kick the wagons of well-meaning people to smithereens. That it may be better to have had a stellar joy-ride and be sent to hell for speeding than keep your boots forever in the clay, I will neither affirm nor deny; but the prudent man hitcheth ...
— Wings of the Wind • Credo Harris

... our love, of our desire, faith, remorse, submissions, revolt. The heaven and the earth must not be shaken, I suppose—at least, not by us who know so many truths about either. My last words about Jim shall be few. I affirm he had achieved greatness; but the thing would be dwarfed in the telling, or rather in the hearing. Frankly, it is not my words that I mistrust but your minds. I could be eloquent were I not afraid you fellows had starved your imaginations to feed your bodies. I do not mean to be offensive; it ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad

... of that queer crew; and, despite their rough motley aspect, I dare affirm, that not in Europe, not in America elsewhere, not upon the great globe's surface, can be found a band, of like numbers, to equal them in strength, daring, and warlike intelligence. Many of them have spent half a life in the sharpening practice of border warfare— Indian or Mexican—and ...
— The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid

... 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 starting this work right. Some shockingly false claims are already made to a metaphysical ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... the line, in conformity with good sense and good taste, should be actually drawn. I confess a leaning to the American school, but how far I am influenced by education it would not be easy for me to say myself. Foreigners affirm that we are squeamish, and that we wound delicacy oftener by the awkward attempts to protect it, than if we had more simplicity. There may be some truth in this, for though cherishing the notions of my youth, I never belonged to the ultra school at home, which, I ...
— Recollections of Europe • J. Fenimore Cooper

... Hilda,' continued Greif, and his voice trembled a little. If there were a phrase which he had not meant to pronounce, or to think of during the day, it was that. He found himself in a position which obliged him to affirm the strength of his love, and the mere sound of the words disturbed him so that he stopped short, to ...
— Greifenstein • F. Marion Crawford

... unquestionable evidence of the existence of birds, they are not known to occur in rocks earlier than the Trias, while indubitable remains of birds are to be met with only much later. Hence it follows that natural science does not "affirm" the statement that birds were made on the fifth day, and "everything that creepeth on the ground" on the sixth, on which Mr. Gladstone rests his order; for, as is shown by Leviticus, the "Mosaic writer" includes lizards among his ...
— Mr. Gladstone and Genesis - Essay #5 from "Science and Hebrew Tradition" • Thomas Henry Huxley

... CONQUEST OF NATURE AND THE WELL-BEING OF MAN.—It is evident that the successful exploitation of the resources of material nature is of enormous significance to the life of man. It may bring emancipation; it offers opportunity. One is tempted to affirm, without stopping to reflect, that the development of the arts and sciences, the increase of wealth and of knowledge, must in the nature of ...
— A Handbook of Ethical Theory • George Stuart Fullerton

... dust. Thus the atmosphere became a deadly poison to the next poor victim who was left to breathe the noxious effluvia of corruption and decay. I am well aware that my reader will hardly credit my statements, but I do solemnly affirm that I relate nothing but the truth. In this room were placed several large iron kettles, so deep that a person could sit in them, and many of them contained the remains of human beings. In one the corpse looked as though it had been dead but a short time. Others still sat erect in the kettle, ...
— Life in the Grey Nunnery at Montreal • Sarah J Richardson

... &c. 521; acceptation &c. (interpretation) 522. V. mean, signify, express; import, purport; convey, imply, breathe, indicate, bespeak, bear a sense; tell of, speak of; touch on; point to, allude to; drive at; involve &c. (latency) 526; declare &c. (affirm) 535. understand by &c. (interpret) 522. Adj. meaning &c. v.; expressive, suggestive, allusive; significant, significative[obs3], significatory[obs3]; pithy; full of meaning, pregnant with meaning. declaratory &c. 535; intelligible &c. 518; literal; synonymous; tantamount ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... "I venture to affirm that I have done something more than has been accomplished by my predecessors, or contemporaries, with the significant language under consideration. I have written a purely flash song; of which the great ...
— Musa Pedestris - Three Centuries of Canting Songs - and Slang Rhymes [1536 - 1896] • John S. Farmer

... (for some authors affirm his esoteric doctrines to have been dogmatic[152]), he brought forward these sceptical tenets in so unguarded a form, that it required all his argumentative powers, which were confessedly great, to maintain them against the obvious ...
— Historical Sketches, Volume I (of 3) • John Henry Newman

... not so acute as bitterly to envenom the struggle in the way that happened during the two following years. There was always some hope that the Ministry might permit the passing of an amendment to the Franchise Bill which would in some degree affirm the principle of Female Suffrage. It is true that a certain liveliness was maintained by the Suffragettes. The W.S.P.U. dared not relax in its militancy lest Ministers should think the struggle waning and Woman already tiring of her claims. The vaunted Manhood Suffrage ...
— Mrs. Warren's Daughter - A Story of the Woman's Movement • Sir Harry Johnston

... diverse accounts of the facts of a seance will be given by a believer and a sceptic. A whole party of believers will affirm that they saw Mr. Home float out of one window, and in at another, while a single honest sceptic declares that Mr. Home was sitting in his chair all the time. And in this last case we have an example of a fact, of which there is ample illustration, that during the prevalence ...
— Psychic Phenomena - A Brief Account of the Physical Manifestations Observed - in Psychical Research • Edward T. Bennett

... persons affirm that the first inhabitants ever seen in these regions were called Celts, after the name of their king, who was very popular among them, and sometimes also Galatae, after the name of his mother. For Galatae is the Greek translation of ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus

... would answer the critics, and triumphantly affirm Lanfear's theory, which had been ...
— Tales Of Men And Ghosts • Edith Wharton

... who 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 of the English ...
— The Leading Facts of English History • D.H. Montgomery

... nature of Spirit may be understood by a glance at its direct opposite—Matter. As the essence of Matter is gravity, so, on the other hand, we may affirm that the substance, the essence of Spirit is freedom. All will readily assent to the doctrine that Spirit, among other properties, is also endowed with freedom; but philosophy teaches that all the qualities of Spirit exist only through freedom; that all are but means ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VII. • Various

... rose. So, Theotimus, if with equal charity one should suffer death by martyrdom, and another suffer only hunger by fasting, who does not see that the value of this fasting will not, on that account, be equal to that of martyrdom? No, for who would dare to affirm that martrydom is not more excellent in itself than fasting.... Still, it is true that if love be ardent, powerful, and excellent, in a heart, it will also more enrich and perfect all the virtuous works which may proceed from it. One may suffer death ...
— The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales • Jean Pierre Camus

... story of the enchanted soldier remains one of the popular traditions of Granada, though told in a variety of ways; the common people affirm that he still mounts guard on mid-summer eve, beside the gigantic stone pomegranate on the bridge of the Darro; but remains invisible excepting to such lucky mortal as may possess ...
— Washington Irving • Charles Dudley Warner

... Gentleman, has affirm'd, I think too hastily, that in each particular Ode the Stanza's are alike, whereas the last Olympic has two Monostrophicks of different Measure, ...
— Discourse on Criticism and of Poetry (1707) - From Poems On Several Occasions (1707) • Samuel Cobb

... half the height of the tower. On the keystone of this arch is engraven a gigantic hand. Within the vestibule, on the keystone of the portal, is engraven, in like manner, a gigantic key. Those who pretend to some knowledge of Mohammedan symbols affirm that the hand is the emblem of doctrine, and the key of faith; the latter, they add, was emblazoned on the standard of the Moslems when they subdued Andalusia, in opposition to the Christian emblem ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 8 • Charles H. Sylvester

... Humour, Irony, and Ridicule, which they promote with great Zeal, as a Means to serve Religion: And I remember, that, among other things said in behalf of Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, upon the reprinting it lately by Subscription, it was affirm'd, and that, in my Opinion, truly, "that it had infinitely out-done The Tale of a Tub; which perhaps had not made one Convert to Infidelity, whereas the Pilgrim's Progress had ...
— A Discourse Concerning Ridicule and Irony in Writing (1729) • Anthony Collins

... truly: as convenient every whit as that of Daniel Burgess, a witty Presbyterian minister, devoted to the House of Brunswick and the principles of the Revolution, who was wont to affirm, as the reason the descendants of Jacob were called Israelites, and did not receive the original name of their progenitor, that Heaven was unwilling they should bear a name in every way so odious as ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 439 - Volume 17, New Series, May 29, 1852 • Various

... defended; yet had it not been for his course during the nullification trouble, his declaration, "Our Federal Union: It must be preserved," and his consistent and vigorous action in accordance with that sentiment it would be difficult to affirm that the influence of his two terms of office was good. It cannot be said that he increased permanently the power of the executive, but he showed its capabilities. It is somewhat curious, however, that Tocqueville, ...
— Historical Essays • James Ford Rhodes

... minister. He could not say that the Senate refused to confirm a proper appointee, for he would make no appointment to them. The Senate had declared that the reasons assigned for suspending Mr. Stanton did not make the case required by the tenure of office act, but I affirm as my conviction that the Senate would have confirmed any one of a great number of patriotic citizens if nominated to the Senate. I cannot resist the conclusion, from the evidence before us, that he was resolved to obtain a vacancy ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman

... these had been finally settled by the compromise measures of 1850; and, therefore, third, the committee had adhered not only to the spirit but to the very phraseology of that adjustment, and refused either to affirm or repeal the ...
— Abraham Lincoln: A History V1 • John G. Nicolay and John Hay

... was afterward found by trappers. The men themselves were never heard from, and it is believed that they, too, fell at the hands of the Indians. Old settlers used to affirm that on summer nights the cries of the murdered innocents could be heard in the little valley where the cabin stood, and when storms were coming up these cries were often blended with the yells of savages. More impressive are the death lights—the will-o'-the-wisps—that ...
— Myths And Legends Of Our Own Land, Complete • Charles M. Skinner

... 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 from ...
— The Mind and the Brain - Being the Authorised Translation of L'me et le Corps • Alfred Binet

... which is nothing more than barley or wheat burnt or malted, then ground, and afterwards made into paste. On this is sometimes poured a little oil or fat; but many cannot afford this luxury, and must content themselves with a little water to make up the meal into paste. I may safely affirm, there was not a bit of meat eaten, or a drop of tea or coffee drunk, in the whole caravan of merchants, with 200 camels, including, with the Arabs, some 150 persons, during the last four days, except what was eaten and drunk in my tent. I myself had only a little bit of fowl. The Sheikh Shabanee ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson

... treachery, and reproached with his ingratitude, he impudently declares that what he had done was no more than simple gallantry, considered in France as an indispensable duty on every man who pretended to good breeding. Nay, he will even affirm that his endeavours to corrupt your wife, or deflower your daughter, were the most genuine proofs he could give of his ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett

... miraculous ear of straw, since so highly celebrated, came, I know not how, into my hand. A considerable quantity of dry straw had been thrown with Garnet's head and quarters into the basket, but whether this ear came into my hand from the scaffold or from the basket I cannot venture to affirm; this only I can truly say, that a straw of this kind was thrown towards me before it had touched the ground. This straw I afterwards delivered to Mrs. N——, a matron of singular Catholic piety, who inclosed it in a bottle, which ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury

... appearance of neutral property. They allow, that a vessel under their circumstances is to be considered as an enemy's, and that by the law of nations, they should be subject to seizure and confiscation. They consider the cargo as unprotected by the laws of Congress, because (as they affirm) this vessel cannot be thought to be strictly neutral, that Congress meant to pay a regard to right of neutrality, that the right of neutrality only extends protection to the effects and goods of an enemy in neutral bottoms, not engaged ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. XI • Various

... expression in the text with M. Henri Poincare's remark in his last allocution to the Academie des Sciences, that "Mathematics are sometimes a nuisance, and even a danger, when they induce us to affirm more than we know" (Comptes-rendus, ...
— The New Physics and Its Evolution • Lucien Poincare

... 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 ...
— Latin America and the United States - Addresses by Elihu Root • Elihu Root

... Wordsworth's 'Peter Bell' was issued in 1819, another 'Peter Bell' was published by Messrs. Taylor and Hessey. It was a parody written by J. Hamilton Reynolds, and issued as 'Peter Bell, a Lyrical Ballad', with the sentence on its title page, "I do affirm that I am the real Simon Pure." The preface, which follows, is too paltry to quote; and the stanzas which make up the poem contain allusions to the more trivial of the early "Lyrical Ballads" (Betty ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. II. • William Wordsworth

... back the priests and informed them of our decision. Harut demanded that we should affirm it "by the Child," which we declined to do, saying that it was our custom to swear only in the name of our own God. Being a liberal-minded man who had travelled, Harut gave way on the point. So I swore first to the effect that I would fight for the White Kendah to ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard

... that you are required at your atelier so late. And as to any social engagement, I do not hesitate to affirm that my approaching death in life puts forth ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick

... and never at ours; and permission should not be given to make a way-station, or to maintain anyone to buy their goods. The advantage of that will be little, and the scarcity [of goods] general. I am not bold enough to say that the forts of the island of Hermosa should be abandoned, but I affirm stoutly that it would be well ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXIV, 1630-34 • Various

... 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 ...
— Day Symbols of the Maya Year • Cyrus Thomas

... alone am, I who see nothing in nature whose existence I can affirm with equal evidence to my own, behold now the semblance of my being, in all its height, variety, and curiosity reiterated in ...
— An English Grammar • W. M. Baskervill and J. W. Sewell

... the study of eloquence," said I, "and describe its force, and the great dignity it confers upon those who have acquired it, is neither our present design, nor has any necessary connection with it. But I will not hesitate to affirm, that whether it is acquired by art or practice, or the mere powers of nature, it is the most difficult of all attainments; for each of the five branches of which it is said to consist, is of itself a very important art; from whence ...
— Cicero's Brutus or History of Famous Orators; also His Orator, or Accomplished Speaker. • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... I deny that this is an illegitimate mode of appeal to an audience; I deny that the indispensability of knowing an opera thoroughly before you judge it is to imply that it is less than a very great work of art; I affirm that the nobler, profounder, more beautiful a work of art, the more necessary it is to be able to look at every passage with a full consciousness of all that is to come after, as well as of what has gone before. Wagner himself was compact of contradictions, and so, while trying to create ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman

... The word means entireness, wholeness. It may be rightly used to affirm possession of all the virtues, that ...
— Write It Right - A Little Blacklist of Literary Faults • Ambrose Bierce

... my amazement, I saw that, unlike most women, you understood your instincts; that you dared to define them, and were impious enough to follow them. You debased my ideal, you confused me, also, for I could never affirm that you were wrong; forcing me to consult abstractions, they gave a verdict in your favor, which almost unsexed you in my estimation. I must own that the man who is willing to marry you has more courage than I have. Is ...
— The Morgesons • Elizabeth Stoddard

... how the world is unified by its many systems, kinds, purposes, and dramas. That there is more union in all these ways than openly appears is certainly true. That there MAY be one sovereign purpose, system, kind, and story, is a legitimate hypothesis. All I say here is that it is rash to affirm this dogmatically without better evidence ...
— Pragmatism - A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking • William James

... accordingly he could not have been so completely altered as he was, had he not actually beheld the risen Christ: such is the argument which Mr. Rogers deems so conclusive. I do not know that from any of Paul's own assertions we are entitled to affirm that no shade of remorse had ever crossed his mind previous to the vision near Damascus. But waiving this point, I do maintain that, granting Paul's feelings to have been as Mr. Rogers thinks they were, his conversion is inexplicable, even on the hypothesis of a miracle. He that ...
— The Unseen World and Other Essays • John Fiske

... denying the necessity, in rare cases, of examinations of the uterus, or as being unappreciative of the aid afforded in such investigations by the speculum, and the beneficial effects of local applications made directly to the womb through that instrument. What we affirm is, that such examinations and applications are, in the practice of most modern physicians, made unnecessarily frequent, resulting many times in lasting injury ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce

... comes from the first. The rural school still needs a larger program. When it seriously undertakes to assume its function as the most effective of our social institutions, it will make radical changes in its program. To affirm this one need not forget or undervalue the changes already made. Additions have been made to the program. The spirit of the program has not been radically changed. We still provide an individualistic preparation—hopelessly ...
— Rural Problems of Today • Ernest R. Groves

... specification and claim shall not have been so modified as, in the opinion of the Commissioner, shall entitle the applicant to a patent, he may appeal to the Chief Justice of the United States Court for the District of Columbia, who may affirm or reverse the decision of the Commissioner of Patents, in whole or in part, and may order a patent to issue; or he may have remedy against the decision of the Commissioner of Patents, or the decision of the Chief Justice of the ...
— Scientific American magazine Vol 2. No. 3 Oct 10 1846 • Various

... understands, because written by men who chose to mistake madness for Inspiration, and style themselves 'Evangelicals?' However enough on this subject. Your 'piety' will be 'aghast,' and I wish for no proselytes. This much I will venture to affirm, that all the virtues and pious 'Deeds' performed on Earth can never entitle a man to Everlasting happiness in a future State; nor on the other hand can such a Scene as a Seat of eternal punishment exist, it is incompatible with the benign attributes ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron

... a notion Gorse'd be mad," he said, "but it looked to me as if they had it on us, Paret. I didn't see how we could do anything else but affirm without being too rank. Of course, if he feels that way, and you want to make a motion for a rehearing, I'll ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... jester, and his baggage, travel quietly along, I own the triumph of obtaining the passport was not a little tarnish'd by the figure I cut in it.—But there is nothing unmix'd in this world; and some of the gravest of our divines have carried it so far as to affirm, that enjoyment itself was attended even with a sigh,—and that the greatest THEY KNEW OF terminated, IN A GENERAL WAY, in little better ...
— A Sentimental Journey • Laurence Sterne

... that the most careless and ill-disposed youth would never be about to support the ridicule of his fellow students were he backward in obtaining prizes, but after all I have heard of the dissipation, lawlessness, and want of discipline at Leipzig, I can safely affirm that all these stories are grossly exaggerated: and I fancy there is little other dissipation going forward than amours with Stubenmaedchen. I do not hear of any drunkenness, gaming or horse racing; nor do the professors themselves, who ought to be the best judges ...
— After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819 • Major W. E Frye

... satisfaction, when he reads the moral precepts and wise instructions of the Chinese sages; he will find that virtue is in every place the same; and will look with new contempt on those wild reasoners, who affirm, that morality is merely ideal, and that the distinctions between good ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 6 - Reviews, Political Tracts, and Lives of Eminent Persons • Samuel Johnson

... purpose to criticize the seven pretty stories which make up this Christmas Number, part of the first of which only relates to Watts's Charity; but we will venture to affirm that the concluding portion of that story, referring to "Richard Doubledick," "who was a Poor Traveller with not a farthing in his pocket, and who came limping down on foot to this town of Chatham," is one of ...
— A Week's Tramp in Dickens-Land • William R. Hughes

... splendour or diminishing its glory. How a king may fare in such a condition, the author, knowing little of kings, will not pretend to say; nor yet will he offer an opinion whether a lowly match be fatally injurious to a marquess, duke, or earl; but this he will be bold to affirm, that a man from the ordinary ranks of the upper classes, who has had the nurture of a gentleman, prepares for himself a hell on earth in taking a wife from any rank much below his own—a hell on earth, ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope

... your pages, that the comprehensive words of Lord Bacon, "Antiquitas saeculi juventus mundi," were not borrowed from any author, ancient or modern. But it would be a compliment which that great genius would have been the first to ridicule, were we to affirm that no anterior writer had adopted analogous language in expressing the benefits of "the philosophy of time." On the contrary, he would have called our attention to the expressions of the Egyptian priest addressed to Solon, (see a few pages beyond ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 69, February 22, 1851 • Various

... build up a theory in this way is not to account for the work of creation by the natural agencies and inherent qualities of matter, as at present observable, but to fly off to the wild supposition, that matter and life were more richly endowed ages ago than they are in our own day. You affirm, that this higher principle of development did not override the inferior laws at the earlier periods in time's history, because, in the infancy of the universe, the conditions were wanting which are requisite for its manifestation,—because ...
— A Theory of Creation: A Review of 'Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation' • Francis Bowen

... he "thought there was two of them," which, under the circumstances, was not to be wondered at. Fitzroy declared that a moment later Rafferty rushed to the spot, recognized the lieutenant, and by him was sternly ordered to leave. As yet Rafferty was in no condition to affirm or deny. The excitement of the fire had brought on a relapse, and the wild Irishman was wilder than ever, "raving-like," as the steward said, in the ...
— Lanier of the Cavalry - or, A Week's Arrest • Charles King

... Priests argue, That our Senses in point of Transubstantiation ought not to be believed, for tho' the Consecrated Bread has all the accidents of Bread, yet they affirm, 'tis the Body of Christ, and not of ...
— The Sot-weed Factor: or, A Voyage to Maryland • Ebenezer Cook

... have been predicting all the time in a nebulous fashion what they themselves have to tell, and indeed to have written mainly with that object: so that Macaulay and Adam Smith, for example, constantly interrupt the thread of their discourse to affirm that what they tell us must be right because Walter Map or the author of "Piers Plowman" foretold ...
— On The Art of Reading • Arthur Quiller-Couch

... 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, ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves

... father did teach any scholars in his time, they would principally learn of him; he had Scorpio ascending, and was secretly envious to those he thought had more parts than himself; however, I must be ingenuous, and do affirm, that by frequent conversation with him, I came to know which were the best authors, and much to enlarge my judgment, especially in the art of directions: he visited me most days once after I became acquainted with him, and would communicate his most doubtful questions unto ...
— William Lilly's History of His Life and Times - From the Year 1602 to 1681 • William Lilly

... her: she greeted me with her mouth full, and graciously nodded her desire that I should take my seat in a chair by her side, when I witnessed, I think, the most extraordinary meal upon record. How much had passed the royal mouth before my entrance, I will not undertake to affirm; but it took in enough in my presence to have satisfied six men! Great as was my admiration at the quantity of food thus consumed, the scene which followed was calculated to increase it. Her appetite appearing satisfied ...
— A New Voyage Round the World, in the years 1823, 24, 25, and 26, Vol. 2 • Otto von Kotzebue

... people's bowels, mysticism fogs 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 does me good to believe ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola

... me, therefore, to the house of the "Dominic," as a newspaper-correspondent calls my kind host, and partook of the fare there furnished me. He withdrew with me to the apartment assigned for my slumbers, and slept sweetly on the same pillow where I waked and tossed. Nay, I do affirm that he did, unconsciously, I believe, encroach on that moiety of the couch which I had flattered myself was to be my own through the watches of the night, and that I was in serious doubt at one time whether I should not be gradually, but irresistibly, expelled from the bed which I had supposed ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 62, December, 1862 • Various

... my unbelief, the Bible was my favorite book, and the Psalms my adoration; and most truly can I affirm that my mental attitude has ever been one of reverence ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al

... consider that children under the age of seven should not receive a literary education... That Hesiod was of this opinion very many writers affirm who were earlier than the critic Aristophanes; for he was the first to reject the "Precepts", in which book this maxim occurs, as ...
— Hesiod, The Homeric Hymns, and Homerica • Homer and Hesiod

... I do honestly affirm that, in dilating on the several hardships of my own especial case, I have no idea of enlisting any sympathy, public or private. I simply wish to show what arbitrary oppression can be exercised upon British subjects with perfect impunity by a Government which will ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence

... [32] a holy man who died from the ill-treatment which they inflicted upon him. In short, without detailing at length the glorious ministries of the Society in Filipinas, suffice it to say that fathers who have been through it all affirm that Paraguai [33] was but matter for jest compared with this; for the Society has no field more glorious, nor more to the honor of our Lord. This is well seen through the marvelous events which his Majesty has brought ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 • Various

... as a direful attack upon their liberties, and loudly exclaim against the violation. What may be the result of this, and of some other (I think I may add) ill-judged measures, I will not undertake to determine; but this I may venture to affirm, that the advantage accruing to the mother country will fall greatly short of the expectations of the ministry; for certain it is, that an whole substance does already in a manner flow to Great Britain, and that whatsoever contributes to lessen ...
— George Washington • William Roscoe Thayer

... very well,' replied the old lady, 'and are certainly a droll and curious young man. I should not care to affirm that you were sane, for I have never found any one entirely so besides myself; but at least the nature of your madness entertains me, and I will reward you with some description of ...
— The Dynamiter • Robert Louis Stevenson and Fanny van de Grift Stevenson

... beginning to end during the course of the last Long Vacation—solicitae jucunda oblivia vitae." No one, he argued, could deny that the object and effects of Paradise Lost were "not to bring into disrepute," but "to promote reverence for our religion," and, per contra, no one could affirm that it was impossible to arrive at an opposite conclusion with regard to "the Preface, the poem, the general tone and manner of Cain." It was a question for a jury. A jury might decide that Cain was blasphemous, and ...
— The Works of Lord Byron - Poetry, Volume V. • Lord Byron

... condemnation to death or exile bore witness to a severity which it would have been our right to have exercised, but which the perfect unanimity which reigned amongst all the elements of the state rendered useless. I affirm that, except in the case of three or four priests, who had been guilty of firing upon our combatants, and who were killed by the people during the last days of the siege, not a single act of personal violence was committed ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various

... 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 ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various

... later inquiry proved Cooper right. In due time the debt was paid with a large gold, silver-filled seal. On its stone—a chrysoprase—appeared a baron's coronet and the old Scottish proverb: "He that will to Cupar maun to Cupar!" The incident serves to affirm Cooper's ...
— James Fenimore Cooper • Mary E. Phillips

... announced 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 ...
— The Mysterious Island • Jules Verne

... the third ground for war urged by the gentleman from Virginia, and I hope I do not misrepresent him when I say that I understood him to affirm that if he had the power he would prohibit the invasion of Texas by Mexico; and if Mexico would not submit to such a requirement, and should persist in her invasion, he would go to war. The gentleman stated, as a ground for war, that Santa Anna had avowed his determination ...
— Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams. • Josiah Quincy

... new, original, ingenious, in a word, felicitous. Are they undeniably true? What I can affirm is that none doubt it who hear the master make various applications of them by examples. Delsarte is ...
— Delsarte System of Oratory • Various

... has been proclaimed that those who should make known the king's murderers should have two thousand pounds sterling, I, who have made a strict search, affirm that the authors of the murder are the Earl of Bothwell, James Balfour, the priest of Flisk, David, Chambers, Blackmester, Jean Spens, and ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... fully tatued when he has taken a head; while the social status of a woman is marked by the degree of fineness of the tatuing.[124] It follows that death is neither greatly feared nor desired; but an old man will sometimes affirm that he is quite ready or even desirous to die, although he may seem cheerful ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall

... work are we not doing? What admirable expression of the highest truth do we not find in the best writers of our age! It is not all pure gold; but whether we take a religious, a moral, or an intellectual point of view, we may not affirm of the literature of any age or country that it is perfect. When man clothes in words what he thinks and loves, what he knows and believes, his work bears the marks of his defects not less than ...
— Education and the Higher Life • J. L. Spalding

... not feign it without a sense of sacrilege. In fact, this generous and magnanimous and gifted woman was without that faith, that trust in God which comes to us from living His law, and which I wonder any American can keep. She denied nothing; but she had lost the strength to affirm anything. She no longer tried to do good from her heart, though she kept on doing charity in what she said was a mere mechanical impulse from the belief of other days, but always with the ironical doubt that she was doing harm. ...
— Through the Eye of the Needle - A Romance • W. D. Howells

... can we refuse our belief that the tragical events of those days were ordered for our good? Acknowledging that the overthrow of a rotten throne was necessary for the building up of a throne that should have its sole stable foundation in the welfare of the people, can we affirm that the men who did the mightier portion of that work—sternly, unflinchingly, illegally, yet ever professing to "seek to know the mind of God in all that chain of Providence"—are quite correctly described, in the statute ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 11 • Various

... in the third and fourth centuries, else there would not have been bishops. If we take a narrow-minded and partisan view of bishops, we might say that they always have existed since the times of the apostles; the Episcopalians might affirm that the early churches were presided over by bishops, and the Presbyterians that every ordained minister was a bishop,—that elder and bishop are synonymous. But that is a contest about words, not things. In reality, ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IV • John Lord

... leg-pulling. For the sake of exercise and amusement I permitted them to conduct me on a wild-goose chase after an imaginary dump, which luckily led me to a sequestered little hotel where I was able to write my articles in peace and quietude. But to return to the main question. I unhesitatingly affirm..." ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. CLVIII, January 7, 1920 • Various

... coronation. If in one or two instances this was not done at the time when the king's own coronation took place, and supposing that there was an instance or two where the queen-consort became such after the coronation of the king, still he would affirm, that according to all the rules of argument, of law, and of common sense, those few instances, (admitting there were some, though in point of strict fact he believed there were none,) did not in any manner or degree affect his general argument, which he held upon the authorities ...
— Coronation Anecdotes • Giles Gossip

... was right enough in this; the house is detestable;—but as all houses of entertainment throughout the country are about equally so, it is scarcely fair to complain of one. I shall not fear to be more inclusive in my statement, and to affirm that in no part of the world does one get so little comfort for so much money as on the Island of Cuba. To wit: an early cup of black coffee, oftenest very bad; bread not to be had without an extra sputtering of Spanish, and darkening of the countenance;—to wit, a breakfast ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 20, June, 1859 • Various

... in it to a great title or to a great estate, or could anyhow contrive to be called up to public charges and employments of dignity and power; but that is not my case; and therefore every man will speak of the fair as his own market has gone in it; for which cause I affirm it over again to be one of the vilest worlds that ever was made; for I can truly say, that from the first hour I drew breath in it, to this—I can now scarce draw it at all, for an asthma I got in skating ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.

... growing organism. It is forever striving to realize its own best estate. This is the true goal for all individuals. It is saying the same thing if we affirm the goal to be Health—for worlds or man: Body-Health, ...
— Mastery of Self • Frank Channing Haddock

... moral sentiments it is hardly praise to affirm that they excel those of all other poets; for this superiority he was indebted to his acquaintance with the sacred writings. The ancient epick poets, wanting the light of revelation, were very unskilful teachers of virtue: ...
— Lives of the Poets, Vol. 1 • Samuel Johnson

... return to their homes: one of them was particularly eloquent in describing the horrors of the last few months; he concluded by saying, "that had things gone on in this way for a few months longer, Napoleon must have made the women march." They affirm, however, that there is a party favourable to Bonaparte, consisting of those whose trade is war, and who have lived by his continuance on the throne; but that this party is not strong, and little to be feared: Would that ...
— Travels in France during the years 1814-1815 • Archibald Alison

... But this I affirm to you, Elmer; of politics I am innocent like there never was a cherubim! Yes! And yet your Government has question me. Why? you ask so naturally. My God! I know no one in New York. I arrive. I repair to a recommended hotel. I make ...
— The Crimson Tide • Robert W. Chambers

... not like to maintain, Nicias, that any kind of knowledge is not to be learned; for all knowledge appears to be a good: and if, as Nicias and as the teachers of the art affirm, this use of arms is really a species of knowledge, then it ought to be learned; but if not, and if those who profess to teach it are deceivers only; or if it be knowledge, but not of a valuable sort, then what is the use of learning it? I say this, because I think that if it had been really ...
— Laches • Plato



Words linked to "Affirm" :   assure, reassert, show, take, protest, hold, declare, validate, attest, demonstrate, negate, maintain, shew, defend, prove, establish, vouch, back, claim, back up, document, tell



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