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Bear witness   /bɛr wˈɪtnəs/   Listen
Bear witness

verb
1.
Provide evidence for.  Synonyms: evidence, prove, show, testify.  "Her behavior testified to her incompetence"
2.
Give testimony in a court of law.  Synonyms: attest, take the stand, testify.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Bear witness" Quotes from Famous Books



... Thomas Herbert, Robert Cary, Denzil Lord Holles, and many other valuable contemporary evidences now scarcely to be had, and when found usually in ancient tattered calf. Why is it, too, that the great mass of French chroniclers who bear witness to English doings in the wars of Normandy, Brittany, Burgundy, Anjou and Touraine remain still untranslated and ...
— The Book-Hunter at Home • P. B. M. Allan

... that passage in Froissart, when, masked in the snowy symbol of their faction, the desperate White Hoods of Ghent murder their bailiff in the market-place! Nor, in some things, does the common, hereditary experience of all mankind fail to bear witness to the supernaturalism of this hue. It cannot well be doubted, that the one visible quality in the aspect of the dead which most appals the gazer, is the marble pallor lingering there; as if indeed that pallor were as much like the badge ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville

... when the sand in his glass seemed run. I am for the Raj in this and in any other hour! I refuse to obey or to accept apology! Let the explanation be made me at court martial, with Colonel Kirby sahib present to bear witness to my character!" ...
— Winds of the World • Talbot Mundy

... cried energetically; "the sun and the heavens, who have viewed my operations, can bear witness of my truth. I am the assassin of those most innocent victims; they died by my machinations. A thousand times would I have shed my own blood, drop by drop, to have saved their lives; but I could not, my father, indeed I could not sacrifice the ...
— Frankenstein - or The Modern Prometheus • Mary Wollstonecraft (Godwin) Shelley

... breath of his lips' (Isa 11:4). And also, 'The sword of his mouth' (Rev 2:16). By 'the brightness of his coming,' I also understand, not only his presence, but an increase of light by his presence; not only to help Christians to begin to bear witness against some parts and pieces of the errors of Antichrist, but until the whole is rooted out of the world. By this, I say, must the soul, spirit, or life of Antichrist be taken away. But how shall Christ by this rod, sword, or spirit of his mouth, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... you must be wearied, my father, by the tedious history of this monastery; and yet it is most concise, if you compare it with our labours, and the wonders which our Lord has wrought here. There are many who can bear witness to this on oath. I therefore beg of your reverence, for the love of God, should you think fit to destroy the rest of this my writing, to preserve that part of it which relates to this monastery, and give it, when I am dead, to the sisters ...
— The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus • Teresa of Avila

... particular purpose)—on any point within my habit of thought, I should greatly prefer a subject I had never lectured on, to one which I had repeatedly given; and those who have attended me for any two seasons successively will bear witness, that the lecture given at the London Philosophical Society, on the 'Romeo and Juliet', for instance, was as different from that given at the Crown and Anchor, as if they had been by two individuals who, without any communication ...
— Literary Remains, Vol. 2 • Coleridge

... weather) had never been visited since the commission of the crime by the perpetrator, or by his unwilling accomplice; though time had destroyed all besides, the hair and the bones of the victim would still be left to bear witness to the truth—if truth had indeed been spoken. As this conviction grew on him, the young man's cheek paled; and he stopped irresolute half-way between the hearth and the door. Then he looked down doubtfully at the corpse on the ...
— After Dark • Wilkie Collins

... be worshipped. No matter how black his offence, the touch of the constabulary washes him whiter than snow, purifies him from every earthly taint, surrounds him with a halo of sanctity. Those whom he has injured will not bear witness against him, because their temerity might cost them their lives, the loss of their property, the esteem of their fellow-men. What this means we shall shortly see. The cases I have examined will speak for themselves. And let it be remembered that close proximity to the scenes described produces ...
— Ireland as It Is - And as It Would be Under Home Rule • Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.)

... that I am enabled to bear witness to the liberal spirit with which the Republic of Colombia has made satisfaction for well-established claims of a similar character, and among the documents now communicated to Congress will be distinguished a treaty of commerce and navigation with that Republic, the ratifications ...
— State of the Union Addresses of John Quincy Adams • John Quincy Adams

... visibly terrified at the sight of the old wretch; while I (sincerely affected) appealed, Bear witness, Mrs. Sinclair!—bear witness, Miss Martin!—Miss Horton!—Every one bear witness, that I offer not violence to this ...
— Clarissa, Volume 6 (of 9) - The History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson

... of treatment, we know that the trouble cannot be in the body. Let it be said, then, with all the emphasis we can command, "nerves" are not physical. Laboratory investigation, contradictory symptoms, and response to treatment all bear witness to this fact. Whatever symptoms of disturbance there may be in pure nervousness, the nerves and organs can in no way be shown to ...
— Outwitting Our Nerves - A Primer of Psychotherapy • Josephine A. Jackson and Helen M. Salisbury

... of the banquet, when her presence had been required by the Signoria. Only so much had her father—the giver of the gift—and Marcantonio, on this day of honor to his name—been able to obtain of the imperious Republic. There were rumors afloat, questions were asked, and the body of nobles must bear witness to the clemency of the State, who could be gracious in forgiving. If the Lady of the Giustiniani might not have the custody of her child, it was not that because of her transgressions they would refuse her ...
— A Golden Book of Venice • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull

... altars of the church. This was the case even in the narrow aisles of the twelfth and thirteenth century, many of which, like the north aisle of Great Easton church in Leicestershire, provided with a drain, aumbry, or a corbel for a statue, bear witness to the existence of a contemporary altar. At Harringworth in Northamptonshire there had been an aisleless church, to which a tower had been added at the end of the twelfth, and aisles early in the thirteenth ...
— The Ground Plan of the English Parish Church • A. Hamilton Thompson

... Thou alone, The Most Great, the Omnipotent, the All-Conquering, Quickener of the dead, Creator of man's need and Granter thereof, Resolver of his difficulties and duresse and Bringer of joy not of annoy. Thou art my sufficiency and Thou art the Truest of Trustees. And I bear witness that Mohammed is Thy servant and Thine Apostle and I supplicate Thee, O my God, by his favour with Thee to free me from this my foul plight." And whilst he implored the Lord and was chafing his hands in the soreness of his sorrow for that had befallen him of ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton

... two venerable friars, simple monks, vowed to poverty and having nothing to hope or fear in this world, bear witness to the scene we have just described: "We heard her," they say, "in the midst of the flames invoke her saints, her archangel; several times she called on her Saviour. At the last, as her head sunk on her ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... father, sent messengers to the head men of Agger, telling them of all that he and his House had suffered at the hands of Steinar, whereof those of their folk who had been present at the feast could bear witness. He added that if they stood by Steinar in his wickedness and treachery, thenceforward he and the men of the North would be their foes and work them mischief ...
— The Wanderer's Necklace • H. Rider Haggard

... not flinch before any of the consequences of the resolution which I have once adopted; there are still threads which attach me to that Jean Valjean; they must be broken; in this very room there are objects which would betray me, dumb things which would bear witness against me; it is settled; all these things ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

... circumstantially and fully; by adding earnest and pathetic assurances of your innocence; by showing all the letters that have passed between us, the contents of which will show that such guilt was impossible; by making your girl bear witness to the precaution you used on that night to preclude misconstructions, surely you may hope to disarm ...
— Jane Talbot • Charles Brockden Brown

... of the Lord Jesus Christ, I will preach there to- day, and not a dog will raise his voice against me; you shall bear witness to it." ...
— The Mormon Menace - The Confessions of John Doyle Lee, Danite • John Doyle Lee

... well as the church, testify of Christ: "Search the Scriptures," said the Saviour, speaking of those then written; "they are they which testify [or bear witness] of me," (John 5:39); and of the New Testament, he said: "This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations," Matt. 24:4. Like two olive-trees supplying the candlesticks ...
— A Brief Commentary on the Apocalypse • Sylvester Bliss

... Sandwich; but for my part sometimes I am apt to think they cannot do him much harm, he telling me that there is no great fear of the business of Resumption. This day Poundy the waterman was with me, to let me know that he was summoned to bear witness against me to Prince Rupert's people (who have a commission to look after the business of prize-goods), about the business of the prize-goods I was concerned in: but I did desire him to speak all he knew, and not to spare me, ...
— The Diary of Samuel Pepys • Samuel Pepys

... as it may be her pleasure, and I may have her good will. So dearly do I love her that I wish not even that any will should come to me to renounce her love, and God is so sweet and so full of right merciful mildness, as good men bear witness, that He will have pity upon us, for never no treason have I done toward her, ...
— High History of the Holy Graal • Unknown

... therefore in the gluttonous and idle feeding of its own over luxuriance, at the expense of other creatures utterly destroyed and rooted out for its good alone; but in its right doing of its hard duty, and forward climbing into those spots of forlorn hope where it alone can bear witness to the kindness and presence of the Spirit that cutteth out rivers among the rocks, as He covers the valleys with corn; and there, in its vanward place, and only there, where nothing is withdrawn for it, nor hurt by it, and ...
— Frondes Agrestes - Readings in 'Modern Painters' • John Ruskin

... think that all Arabs are cruel; very far from it, but we hold that, as a race, they are so. Their great prophet taught them cruelty by example and precept, and the records of history, as well as of the African slave-trade, bear witness to the fact that their "tender mercies" are not and never ...
— Blue Lights - Hot Work in the Soudan • R.M. Ballantyne

... for further words," said Lord Kew, taking his cigar out of his mouth. "If you don't drop that glove, upon my word I will pitch you out of the window. Ha!—Pick the man up, somebody. You'll bear witness, gentlemen, I couldn't help myself. If he wants me in the morning, he ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray

... people, that when she passed along the way, persons ran to see her; which gave me wonderful joy. And when she was near any one, such modesty came into his heart that he dared not raise his eyes, or return her salutation; and of this many, as having experienced it, could bear witness for me to whoso might not believe it. She, crowned and clothed with humility, took her way, showing no pride in that which she saw and heard. Many said, when she had passed: "This is not a woman; rather ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various

... while he retired to an obscure corner thereof and practiced legerdemain for the edification of a few half- civilized people? If we adopt the internal instead of the external view of the origin of Judaism and Christianity, all the other Sacred Books range themselves about the Bible and with it bear witness that man is the creature of Design and not a freak of Chance. We bring to confirm the teachings of Moses and Christ and the wise Zoroaster, the loving Gautama, the patient Mahomet, the priests and prophets of every clime, the altars of every ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann

... to be realized, and none were to harm or make afraid. No violence was to be offered to any bird or beast, no ax was to be carried into its primitive forests, and the streams were to flow on forever unpolluted by mill or mine. All things were to bear witness that such as this was the West ...
— The Biography of a Grizzly • Ernest Seton-Thompson

... can rule the lower worlds," replied Eliphaz, with a smile. "For to that I can bear witness, seeing that I have stayed with him in a town where there is a congregation of Chassidim, which was in his hands as putty in the glazier's. For, you see, he travels from place to place to instruct his inferiors in the society. The elders of the ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... than his death. Already he hears the cruel cry, "Crucify him, crucify him." His badge of kingship is the crown of suffering. Were his kingdom of this world, his servants would deliver him from his enemies. As the ruler of a heavenly kingdom, he was born "to bear witness unto the truth." ...
— Correggio - A Collection Of Fifteen Pictures And A Portrait Of The - Painter With Introduction And Interpretation • Estelle M. Hurll

... never explain that he had let his old comrade slip back into the sea, and at the very place and under the very circumstances in which that comrade had saved his own life. He hoped by one bold lie to set the matter at rest for ever. There was no one to bear witness—and if he should have to carry that still white face in his eyes and that despairing cry in his ears for evermore—at least none should know of it. 'No one,' he cried, more loudly still. 'I slipped on ...
— Dracula's Guest • Bram Stoker

... be bond and born in bondage, and such have many pains by law. For they may not sell nor give away their own good and cattle, nother make contracts, nother take office of dignity, nother bear witness without leave of their lords. Wherefore though they be not in childhood, they be oft punished with pains of childhood. Other servants there be, the which being taken with strangers and aliens and with enemies be bought and sold, and held low under the yoke of thraldom. The third ...
— Mediaeval Lore from Bartholomew Anglicus • Robert Steele

... garden, which adjoined thereto, and there making the minor ablution. Now there were in this garden two old men, its keepers, and both Shaykhs fell in love with her and sought her favours; but she refused, whereupon said they, "Unless thou yield thy body to us, we will bear witness against thee of fornication." Quoth she, "Allah will preserve me from your frowardness!" Then they opened the garden-gate and cried out, and the folk came to them from all places, saying "What aileth you?" Quoth they, "We found this damsel in company ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton

... the others," he said. "I have no desire to humiliate you unnecessarily. Those who are here shall bear witness that you have apologised, and so I shall not insist on the presence of the laggards, but will receive your apology to-morrow at high noon in the ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr

... how far human wickedness could be carried by a professing Christian. The whole thing had been shocking and offensive to her, and only a stern sense of duty had sustained her in looking on, that she might be qualified to bear witness against the offender. She had recognized his face, his clothes, his voice, his walk—there could be no shadow of doubt that it was Brother Sandy. This testimony was confirmed by one of the deacons, whose son, a waiter at the hotel, had also seen ...
— The Marrow of Tradition • Charles W. Chesnutt

... appeals, or suffer all this to divert them from their purpose of denouncing the system. There are persons high in rank among the best servants of the crown, who know the facts from their own observations, and who are ready to bear witness to the truth, in spite of all the attempts that have been made ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson

... of France had penetrated deep into the hitherto unknown wildness of the West and had wandered far and wide within the boundaries of what is now our mighty country. The very cities themselves—St. Louis, New Orleans, Santa Fe, N. Mex.—bear witness by their titles to the nationalities of their founders. It was not until the Revolution had begun that the English-speaking settlers pushed west across the Alleghanies, and not until a century ago that they entered in to possess the land upon ...
— Final Report of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission • Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission

... somewhat completer version of the ordinary representation given in illuminated missals and other conventual work, suggesting, as if they had happened at the same moment, the answer, "If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil," and the accusation of blasphemy which causes the high-priest to rend ...
— Giotto and his works in Padua • John Ruskin

... inaccessible by the rust of conservatism or party-spirit, and to open the fountain of every generous affection, which is not closed with impenetrable ice. With this key may every one become familiar, who would know, and both in word and deed "bear witness ...
— Autographs for Freedom, Volume 2 (of 2) (1854) • Various

... said. "Ill as I am, I shall walk. Bear witness that I have spent a precious hour trying to save you. If I live to see your father again, I shall tell him that you preferred to stay here and carry on disgracefully with a Yankee, that you let your own aunt risk her life alone ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... under the overwhelming power and sovereignty of the national government. What most of us are fighting for is to break up this very partnership between big business and the government. We call upon all intelligent men to bear witness that if this plan were consummated, the great employers and capitalists of the country would be under a more overpowering temptation than ever to take control of the government and keep it subservient to ...
— The New Freedom - A Call For the Emancipation of the Generous Energies of a People • Woodrow Wilson

... with his sleeve and begins hotly swearing and entreating. He crosses himself, holds out his hands to the ikon, calls his deceased father and mother to bear witness, but Semyon sighs and meekly looks as before at the string of bread rings. In the end Ignashka Ryabov, hitherto motionless, gets up impulsively and bows down to the ground before the innkeeper, but even that has ...
— Love and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... were a greater evidence of his divinity than the words of any prophet, although those words were the words of the Divine Spirit. Jesus said, "I have greater witness than that of John, for the works which the Father hath given me to finish, the same works that I do, bear witness of me that the Father hath sent me." "If I had not done among them the works which none other man did, they had not had sin; their rejection of my claims would be justifiable but for the fact that my divinity is demonstrated in ...
— The Christian Foundation, Or, Scientific and Religious Journal, Volume 1, January, 1880 • Various

... before the magistrates, matters did not go quite so easily as he had imagined. In the first place, he was not allowed to tell his own story; and in the next, the sealskin purse which was found on his person was in the most remarkable way brought to bear witness against him. For a young lady and her father appeared in the witness-box who both identified the purse as hers; and this young lady with the beautiful brown eyes looked very sorrowfully at Will, but also said with great clearness that it ...
— A Girl of the People • L. T. Meade

... you had no intention of killin' the skipper; I'll swear to that. It was an accident; neither more nor less. How was you to know that a great strong man, like he was, was goin' to stagger back and hit his head again' the rail, same as he did? And he provoked you; all hands 'll bear witness to that; he shot at ye, and you was quite justified in takin' his revolver away from him. Oh no, there'll be no puttin' of you in irons so long as I'm skipper o' this brig. But of course I shall have to ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood

... denied myself the pleasure of dwelling on Japanese scenic beauties, I may not pause to bear witness to the faery delights of cherry blossom which I enjoyed everywhere during this journey. But I may record two cherry-blossom poems I gathered by the way. The first is, "Why do you wear such a long sword, you ...
— The Foundations of Japan • J.W. Robertson Scott

... have excited resentment and scorn. The wretch who should have breathed a suspicion injurious to thy honor would have been regarded without anger: not hatred or envy could have prompted him; it would merely be an argument of madness. That my eyes, that my ears, should bear witness to thy fall! By no other way could detestable conviction ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne

... comparative peace. This period, unmarked by striking events, is, however, evidence of the exhaustion of the country rather than of the capacity of the Earl of Winchester and the lord of Glamorgan. The details of the history bear witness to the relaxation of the reins of government, the prevalence of riot and petty rebellion, the sordid personal struggles for place and power, the weakness which could neither collect the taxes, enforce obedience to the law, nor even save from humiliation ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout

... the personality of the poets, and it was the strong interest in humanity which led Lowell, when he was most diligent in the pursuit of literature, to apply himself also to history and politics. Several of his essays bear witness to this, such as Witchcraft, New England Two Centuries Ago, A Great Public Character (Josiah Quincy), Abraham Lincoln, and his great Political Essays. But the most remarkable of his writings of this order was the second series of The Biglow Papers, published during the war for the Union. ...
— The Vision of Sir Launfal - And Other Poems • James Russell Lowell

... extending from the Soudan toward the South, cattle are evidence of wealth; one tribe, for instance, having so many oxen that each village had ten or twelve thousand head. Lenz (1884), Bouet-Williaumez (1848), Hecquard (1854), Bosman (1805), and Baker (1868) all bear witness to this, and Schweinfurth (1878) tells us of great cattle parks with two to three thousand head, and of numerous agricultural and cattle-raising tribes . . . while Livingstone describes the busy cattle raising ...
— Native Life in South Africa, Before and Since • Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje

... you will be able to bear witness to him that I have already wasted several minutes of my valuable time in condescending to a mere faggot-splitter. Tell him this and the prize is mine. (Kissing the tips of his fingers) Princess, ...
— Second Plays • A. A. Milne

... Representative of the people and the star of the Legion of Honour on his breast, entered by the door on the right, ascended the tribune, repeated in a calm voice the words of the oath that President Marrast dictated to him, called upon God and men to bear witness, then read, with a foreign accent which was displeasing, a speech that was interrupted at rare intervals by murmurs of approval. He eulogized Cavaignac, and the eulogy was noted ...
— The Memoirs of Victor Hugo • Victor Hugo

... very ears. Your brother, ladies, has the reputation of being a polite man: bear witness to this instance of it. I am ...
— The History of Sir Charles Grandison, Volume 4 (of 7) • Samuel Richardson

... I suppose, by having me locked up—but you can't keep me there forever. I'll get out some time. I don't say I'm going to shoot Bob Grand. I want you all to bear witness to this statement: whatever I do to him will be with these two hands. See 'em? Don't they look competent? He didn't use weapons on me, and I'm not going to use 'em on him. It's just a case of who has the best hands ...
— The Rose in the Ring • George Barr McCutcheon

... and though he abandons her altogether in return, an old idea of her is not quite forgotten even by him. Let her flower-garden, in which he never sets his foot, but which is yet maintained, among all his costly alterations, as if she had quitted it but yesterday, bear witness! ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens

... his girdle, Donne with "that subtle wreath of hair about his arm," the mediaeval knight riding at tourney with his lady's sleeve at his helm, and all relic-worshipping lovers through the ages bear witness to that divine supernaturalism of woman. To touch the hem of that little frock, to kiss the mere imprint of those little feet, is to be purified and exalted. But when did man affect woman in that way? I am tolerably well read in the poetry of woman's emotions, but I recall no parallel ...
— Vanishing Roads and Other Essays • Richard Le Gallienne

... we may apply this text to our Lord Himself. We have His own authority for it. On one occasion when the jews cavilled at His actions, He said: "The works which the Father hath given me to finish, the same works that I do, bear witness of me, that the Father hath sent me." On another occasion they gathered round Him and asked, "How long dost thou hold us in suspense? If thou be the Christ, tell us plainly." Jesus answered: "I told ...
— Sowing and Reaping • Dwight Moody

... information about Lapland I go to an aristocracy of Laplanders; for the ways of rabbits to an aristocracy of naturalists or, preferably, an aristocracy of poachers. But only mankind itself can bear witness to the abstract first principles of mankind, and in matters of theory I would always consult the mob. Only the mass of men, for instance, have authority to say whether life is good. Whether life is good is an especially mystical and delicate question, and, like ...
— George Bernard Shaw • Gilbert K. Chesterton

... wild adventures amongst these desperate sea rovers were afterwards communicated in long letters to a female relative; and, even as letters, apart from the fearful burden of their contents, I can bear witness that they had very extraordinary merit. This, in fact, was the happy result of writing from his heart; feeling profoundly what he communicated, and anticipating the profoundest sympathy with all that he uttered from her whom he addressed. ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey

... the Indian woman could give up the creed of her nation. The marks of the wounds in her face and arms will to the grave bear witness of her belief in the faith of her fathers, which influenced her in youth. Yet the subduing of her passions, the quiet performance of her duties, the neatness of her person, and the order of her house, tell of the influence of a better faith, which sanctifies the sorrows of this life, and ...
— Dahcotah - Life and Legends of the Sioux Around Fort Snelling • Mary Eastman

... talk Grace! One might think you had never proven it at all, or that your work didn't bear witness to your own trust," reproved Mrs. ...
— The Right Knock - A Story • Helen Van-Anderson

... vulturine beak, picking out the elements of Manichaeism, of conceit, of discontent, of what not human frailty and ignorance, which may have been in them, let us honour the enormous moral force which enabled them so to bear witness that not the mortal animal, but the immortal spirit, is the Man; and that when all which outward circumstance can give is cast away, the Man still lives for ever, by ...
— The Roman and the Teuton - A Series of Lectures delivered before the University of Cambridge • Charles Kingsley

... the official mouthpiece and representative of the commune, and whose duty it is to render to government and to the human race a true narrative of the very wonderful facts to which every citizen of Semur can bear witness. In this capacity it has become my duty so to arrange and edit the different accounts of the mystery, as to present one coherent and ...
— A Beleaguered City • Mrs. Oliphant

... to more than one person that the spirit of the unfortunate huntsman had appeared to him, and told him he had been murdered by two Highlanders, natives of the country, named Duncan Terig alias Clerk, and Alexander Bane Macdonald. Proofs accumulated, and a person was even found to bear witness, that lying in concealment upon the hill of Christie, the spot where poor Davis was killed, he and another man, now dead, saw the crime committed with their own eyes. A girl whom Clerk afterwards married, was, nearly at the same time, seen in possession of two valuable rings which the ...
— Trial of Duncan Terig, alias Clerk, and Alexander Bane Macdonald • Sir Walter Scott

... the language and spirit of Christ himself, who expressly suspends his claims to men's belief and the authority of his doctrine on the fact of his miracles. 'The works that I do in my Father's name, they bear witness of me.' 'If ye believe not me, believe my works.' 'If I had not come among them, and done the works that none other man did, they had not had sin; but now they have no cloak for ...
— Reason and Faith; Their Claims and Conflicts • Henry Rogers

... For my taking up the cudgels for you, and advocating your claims, would seem in the eyes of most people to be the measure of my obligation to you rather than of my deliberate opinion. Besides these I am, in fact, not able to bear witness to any one of the consulars shewing zeal or kindness or friendly feeling towards you. For you are aware that Pompey, who is very frequently accustomed, not on my instigation but of his own accord, to confide in me about you, did not often attend the senate during these discussions. ...
— The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1 - The Whole Extant Correspodence in Chronological Order • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... peculiarity of these ruins, that which especially invites attention, is the evidence they furnish that their builders had remarkable skill in architecture and architectural ornamentation. All who have visited them bear witness that the workmanship was of a high order. The rooms and corridors in these edifices were finely and often elaborately finished, plaster, stucco, and sculpture being used. In one room of a great building at Uxmal Mr. Stephens says "the walls were coated with a very fine plaster ...
— Ancient America, in Notes on American Archaeology • John D. Baldwin

... political oratory and historic record. But their peculiar genius showed itself most in the applied arts which pressed Greek science into the ministry of life in architecture and engineering. Their roads and bridges and aqueducts still stand to bear witness of them. It would be a great error to deny to them fertile advance in the sciences, because their discoveries are so immediately put to the proof in practice and so little disengage themselves into express theory from ...
— The Unity of Civilization • Various

... hundred thousand dinars to her dower; but I have chosen thee before all men, that I may make thee the sword of my kingship and my shield against vengeance.''[FN353] Then he turned to his Chief Officers and said to them, "Bear witness[FN354] against me, O Lords of mine Empire, that I marry my daughter Fakhr Taj to my son Gharib."—And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton

... feeling has all passed away. You never injured us, and I know not what spirit of evil tempted us to injure you as we have done. We feel thankful to our teacher for the lenity he has shown us, and I hope our future conduct will bear witness that we appreciate his kindness, and, if you can forgive us and be friends again, I hope you will find that we are not ...
— Walter Harland - Or, Memories of the Past • Harriet S. Caswell

... lightly and liberally advanced, far from being well-founded, recoil upon themselves. It is impossible in a work like this, dealing with such voluminous materials, to escape errors of detail, as both of these gentlemen bear witness, but I have at least conscientiously endeavoured to be fair, and I venture to think that few writers have ever more fully laid before readers the actual means of judging of the accuracy of every statement which has ...
— A Reply to Dr. Lightfoot's Essays • Walter R. Cassels

... royalty}." With such words did Juno tutor the unsuspecting daughter of Cadmus. She requested of Jupiter a favor, without naming it. To her the God said, "Make thy choice, thou shalt suffer no denial; and that thou mayst believe it the more, let the majesty of the Stygian stream bear witness. He {is} the dread and the God of ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Vol. I, Books I-VII • Publius Ovidius Naso

... from their degrading, superstitious, abominable old religion to a knowledge of the one living and true God. They have not toiled in vain, as the true, noble, consistent lives of hundreds of their converts now bear witness. ...
— Winter Adventures of Three Boys • Egerton R. Young

... have mercy, Joseph, my spouse, so dear! All prophets hereto do bear witness The evry time now draweth near That my child will be born, which is King of bliss. Unto some place, Joseph, kindly me lead, That I might rest me with grace in this tide, The light of the Father over us both spread And the grace of my son with us ...
— Everyman and Other Old Religious Plays, with an Introduction • Anonymous

... you this evening, Mr Marrot, is not to give you an intrinsically valuable or useful present, but to present you with a characteristic ornament which may grace your dwelling while you live, and descend, after you are gone, to your children's children (here he glanced at Loo and her troop), to bear witness to them that you nobly did your duty in driving that great iron horse, whereof this little silver pony is a model and a memorial. To perform one's duty well in this life is the highest ambition that any ...
— The Iron Horse • R.M. Ballantyne

... ignorant of my failings and weaknesses, and I can bear witness with a clear conscience that I am not angry when they smile and nod the head; why should I be? But, John, it is known to myself only and Him before whom all hearts are open how great is my suffering in being among my neighbours as a sparrow upon ...
— Kate Carnegie and Those Ministers • Ian Maclaren

... malice, Sir; but my brother, who would scorn to tell a lie for his sister, can bear witness for me that there was no truth in ...
— Liber Amoris, or, The New Pygmalion • William Hazlitt

... laughing, "to make them go quietly. Miss Madge will bear witness they were beyond that at first. I want you to go with me. Come, Miss Lois! We must be home before Mrs. Wishart's tea. Miss Madge, give her your hood and cloak; that will ...
— Nobody • Susan Warner

... here to treat for conclusion of war, and on both embassies succeeded in arranging a mutually agreeable peace. Now for the third time I am come, and I flatter myself that to-day again I shall obtain a reconciliation, and on grounds exceptionally just. My eyes bear witness that our hearts are in accord; you and we alike are pained at the effacement of Plataeae and Thespiae. Is it not then reasonable that out of agreement should spring concord rather than discord? It is never the part, I take it, of wise men to raise the standard of war for the sake of ...
— Hellenica • Xenophon

... "Bear witness ye, whose thoughts that day In Yarrow's groves were centred, Who through the silent portal arch Of mouldering Newark enter'd; And clomb the winding stair that once Too timidly was mounted By the last Minstrel—not the last!— Ere he ...
— Sir Walter Scott - (English Men of Letters Series) • Richard H. Hutton

... desires to catch a train, to run that he may attain that end; his mind is little occupied with the desire to fly, nor does his longing center upon the carpet of Solomon. To the desirability of dismissing from the mind futile desires current moral maxims bear witness. ...
— A Handbook of Ethical Theory • George Stuart Fullerton

... examined, and gave her testimony with less hesitation. She was deathly pale, and weak and miserable. She spoke with difficulty, but was eager to bear witness to the noble character of Captain Dudleigh. She certainly showed nothing like hate toward Edith, but at the same time showed no hesitation to tell all about her. She told about Captain Dudleigh's first visits, and about the visits ...
— The Living Link • James De Mille

... 'Bear witness,' he muttered, looking upward, 'that I always said it; that I knew it, dreamed of it, felt it was the truth, and that it must be so! What money have we, Nell? Come! I saw you with money yesterday. What money have we? Give ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens

... It has been nearly thirty years, but there are still people who lived through that remarkable night. They can tell those who do not know what the man with the silver-headed cane did for the town on that night. And to what he set on foot the next day the stones themselves bear witness. Just outside of the town, on the road to Brambach, not far from the rifle-range there rises a stately building with a pleasant garden. It is the new town hospital. Every stranger who goes to it learns that its conception originated with Herr Nettenmair. He also has to listen ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various

... by plebeians enter'd, but the great Patrician dames; there were the spoils display'd Of the fair victress; there her palms she laid, And did commit them to the Tuscan youth, Whose marring scars bear witness of his truth: With others more, whose names I fully knew, (My guide instructed me,) that overthrew The power of Love: 'mongst whom, of all the rest, Hippolytus and Joseph ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch

... are, of course, familiar to you). I endeavored to explain to Mr. Seddon the injustice of the charge that General Morgan had made this expedition without proper authority (I felt this particularly to be my duty as I was the only person then living who could bear witness upon that point), but being unable to obtain a quiet hearing, I left his office disappointed ...
— History of Morgan's Cavalry • Basil W. Duke

... those "channels of the soul" lost their meaning, or do they only in their glare disclose the horrible tale of its aberrations? Does that voice no longer "discourse excellent music?" Horrible, most horrible! I veil my eyes in terror of the change, and gushing tears bear witness to my sympathy for ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley

... in his strait is heard on every side the wailing appeal to us, and to avoid the danger of impending death he shows the slight sign of the ancient tonsure which we bestowed upon him, begging that we may be called to his aid and bear witness to the privilege bestowed upon him. Then straightway touched with pity we run to meet the prodigal son and snatch the fugitive slave from the gates of death. The book he has not forgotten is handed to ...
— The Philobiblon of Richard de Bury • Richard de Bury

... the bed-rock of it all—the conviction of a just cause. What would it avail us—this pride of victory, of organisation, of science, to which these great despatches of our great Commander-in-Chief bear witness, without that spiritual certainty behind it all—the firm faith that England was fighting for the right, and, God helping her, ...
— Fields of Victory • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... be, and as the genius of all true poets, coupled with that period of life, will go far to make it. There must be early sunshine far the first nurture of that delicate plant: the storm comes afterward to perfect its life. Vaughan first saw the light in a rural district of great beauty. His songs bear witness to it. Indeed he is known by his own designation, a fragrant title in the sweet fields of English poesy, as the Swan of the Usk, though he veiled the title in the thin garb of the Latin, "Olor Iscanus." Another fortunate ...
— Gifts of Genius - A Miscellany of Prose and Poetry by American Authors • Various

... xviii. 34; xix. 11.) is delivered with the same unruffled temper as that which conducted him through the last scene of his life, as described by his other evangelists. His answer, in Saint John's Gospel, to the officer who struck him with the palm of his hand, "If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil; but if well, why smitest thou me?" (Chap. xviii. 23.) was such an answer as might have been looked for from the person who, as he proceeded to the place of execution, bid his companions (as we are told by Saint Luke; Chap. xxiii. 28.) ...
— Evidences of Christianity • William Paley

... chiefly by his portraits. He painted some historical and sacred pictures; but though they all bear witness to his genius, it can hardly be denied that they also show that that genius was not suited to such works. Holbein had an objective perception;—that is, his mind received impressions entirely uninfluenced ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 17, March, 1859 • Various

... relapsed into maudlin, hysterical protestations of innocence, calling upon the Deity to bear witness that he was innocent and had no knowledge whatever of how Blake ...
— The Luck of the Mounted - A Tale of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • Ralph S. Kendall

... rise up some day and bear witness against me. For the life of me I couldn't make up my mind what to say about them, so I sent the Byrd home by Tolly, who was going to take Edith out to see how her okra was progressing, and stayed in the safe shelter of my home. On the Byrd's ...
— Over Paradise Ridge - A Romance • Maria Thompson Daviess

... constant attendance for four and twenty hours. On the fifth day she died. During the progress of her disorder, Frederick and I (we were both at home) saw her repeatedly; and from our own observation can bear witness to her having received every possible attention which could spring from the affection of those about her, or which her situation in life could command. Poor Eleanor was absent, and at such a distance as to return only to see her mother in ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen

... the public benefit of the Church. 6. But though it should fall out that in all the former we should be utterly disappointed, we shall have this peace and comfort upon our own spirits, that we have not hid our talent in the earth, nor neglected to bear witness to this part of Christ's truth, touching the government of his Church, by his kingly power, wherein Christ was opposed so much in all ages, Psalm ii. 1, 2, 3; Luke xix. 14, 27; Acts iv., and for which Christ did suffer so much in a special and immediate manner, as[1] some have observed. ...
— The Divine Right of Church Government • Sundry Ministers Of Christ Within The City Of London

... Love? What view of the divine passion do they take as a rule? Let the millions of mistaken marriages answer! Let the savage lusts and treacheries and cruelties of merely brutish and unspiritualised humanity bear witness? And how few shall be found who have even the beginnings of the nature of true love—'the love of soul for soul, angel for angel, god for god!'—the love that accepts this world and its events as one phase only of divine and immortal existence—a phase ...
— The Life Everlasting: A Reality of Romance • Marie Corelli

... savannahs will bear witness, seemed forlorn enough. My eyes swam with weariness of these crested, earth-disdaining battalions. I sickened of the heat of the sun, the incessant sidelong jolting, the amazing green. But on we went, fleet ...
— Henry Brocken - His Travels and Adventures in the Rich, Strange, Scarce-Imaginable Regions of Romance • Walter J. de la Mare

... action. If Jem was innocent (and now of his guilt, even his slightest participation in, or knowledge of, the murder, she acquitted him with all her heart and soul), he must have been somewhere else when the crime was committed; probably with some others, who might bear witness to the fact, if she only knew where to find them. Everything rested on her. She had heard of an alibi, and believed it might mean the deliverance she wished to accomplish; but she was not quite sure, and determined to apply to Job, ...
— Mary Barton • Elizabeth Gaskell

... Society, there was yet no general conviction of the identity of life reactions in plant and animal. No amount of controversy can remove the tendency of the human mind to follow precedents. The only thing left was to make the plant itself bear witness before the scientific bodies in the West, by means of self-records. At the recommendation of the Minister of Education, and of the Government of Bengal, the Secretary of State sanctioned his scientific ...
— Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose - His Life and Speeches • Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose

... delay me, Give me leave not to interest such Wealth without Security. And I, Celinda, will instruct you how to satisfy my Fears. [Kneels, and takes her by the Hand. Bear witness to my Vows— May every Plague that Heaven inflicts on Sin, Fall down in Thunder on my Head, If e'er I marry any but Celinda Or if I do not ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. III • Aphra Behn

... dealing with literature that happens to be the way we should least admire. By that way we disassociate literature from life; 'what they said' from the men who said it and meant it, not seldom at the risk of their lives. My pupils will bear witness in their memories that when we talk together concerning poetry, for example, by 'poetry' we mean 'that which the poets wrote,' or (if you like) 'the stuff the poets wrote'; and their intelligence tells them, of course, that anyone who in the simple ...
— On The Art of Reading • Arthur Quiller-Couch

... are," replied my father, "and I do not like saying them, but there is no royal road to unlearning, and you have much to unlearn. Still, you Musical Bank people bear witness to the fact that beyond the kingdoms of this world there is another, within which the writs of this world's kingdoms do not run. This is the great service which our church does for us in England, and hence many of us uphold it, though we have no sympathy with the ...
— Erewhon Revisited • Samuel Butler

... is of higher advantage to the State and to the abbey than your stones, however beautiful they be, seeing that we have treasure wherewith to buy rare jewels, and that no treasure can establish customs and laws. I call upon the king's chamberlain to bear witness to the infinite pains which his majesty takes every day to fight for the establishment of ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 3 • Honore de Balzac

... not, we will bear witness against thee, that a young man was with thee: and therefore thou didst send away thy ...
— Deuteronomical Books of the Bible - Apocrypha • Anonymous



Words linked to "Bear witness" :   certify, presume, manifest, cite, declare, inform, adduce, demonstrate, testify, vouch, jurisprudence, law, abduce



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