"Fail" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... tell you of still more trying scenes than that, Sally. I know far more than you. But if I knew ten times as much, I should still believe that my plan is the only one. Of course I may fail. It is all in God's hands. We none of us know how much discipline we need. But I know one thing: if I do not regain John in this way, I cannot in any. If I stay I shall annoy, vex, disturb, torture him! Once the barriers of my silence and concealment are ...
— Saxe Holm's Stories • Helen Hunt Jackson
... know, and may appear to disadvantage when they are talking together; though you appear behind the rest of the world; though you be called a coward, or a child, or narrow-minded, or superstitious; whatever insulting words be applied to you, fear not, falter not, fail not; stand firm, quit you like men; be strong. They think that in the devil's service there are secrets worthy our inquiry, which you share not: yes, there are secrets, and such that it is a shame even to speak of them; and in like manner ...
— Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VIII (of 8) • John Henry Newman
... unfortunate experience of Kansas has enforced the lesson, so often already taught, that resistance to lawful authority under our form of government can not fail in the end to prove disastrous to its authors. Had the people of the Territory yielded obedience to the laws enacted by their legislature, it would at the present moment have contained a large additional population of ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 4 (of 4) of Volume 5: James Buchanan • James D. Richardson
... baseball and football. Their children, through the influence of the school and their intercourse with the American children, quickly become interested in the American sports, so much so that the parents fail to understand and appreciate their enthusiasm. "It's all right to a certain degree, but my boys seem to be already crazy for baseball, neglecting everything else. I am afraid for their future!" complained an elderly ...
— A Stake in the Land • Peter Alexander Speek
... intensity of imagination with which he pictures to himself the apparatus of the scaffold and the hideous circumstance of his death. His effort, as far as it is rational, is to transfer the guilt of his deeds to anyone or everyone but himself. When all other resources fail he boldly lays the offence upon God, who has made him what he is. It was a fine audacity of Browning in imagining the last desperate shriek of the wretched man, uttered as the black-hatted Brotherhood of Death descend the stairs singing their accursed psalm, to carry the climax of appeal to ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden
... trampled in the dirt; on blundered and thundered the heavy-sterned fugitives, the Swedes pressing on their rear and applying their feet a parte poste of the Van Arsdales and the Van Bummels with a vigor that prodigiously accelerated their movements, nor did the renowned Michael Paw himself fail to receive divers grievous ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 8 • Charles H. Sylvester
... disparagement. It is better for mankind to be impressionable than reflective. Nothing humanely great—great, I mean, as affecting a whole mass of lives—has come from reflection. On the other hand, you cannot fail to see the power of mere words; such words as Glory, for instance, or Pity. I won't mention any more. They are not far to seek. Shouted with perseverance, with ardour, with conviction, these two by their sound alone have set whole nations in motion and upheaved ...
— Notes on My Books • Joseph Conrad
... no wiser Law revoke The Edict that foredestined me to Smoke, My stump to be a Byword and a Jest? - But if a Jest I fail ...
— The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam Jr. (The Rubiyt of Omar Khayym Jr.) • Wallace Irwin
... parted for a quick retort; then in a surprising way the retort seemed to fail him. "Oh, because the thing isn't feasible, isn't practicable ...
— The Masquerader • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... West, who had never been his personal enemy, and was now become the object of his contempt. Our sympathy is the most forcibly excited by the misfortunes to which we are exposed; and the spectacle of a proud competitor, now prostrate at his feet, could not fail of producing very serious and solemn thoughts in the mind of the victorious emperor. But the feeble emotion of involuntary pity was checked by his regard for public justice, and the memory of Gratian; and he ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon
... opportunities of witnessing to it, will take care that it shall not perish—notwithstanding all the premature jubilation of anti-Christian literature and thought in this day—until it has done its work. We need have no fear for ourselves, for though our blind eyes often fail to see, and our bleeding hearts often fail to accept, the conviction that there are no unfinished lives for His servants, yet we may be sure that He will watch over each of His children till they have finished the work that He ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren
... churches a pattern, transmit to posterity an example, and erect to all ages a monument of self denying, zeal and wisdom; a work to be paralleled with the glories of former times. If herein our hopes shall fail us, we shall not know whether to wish, we had died with our brethren, by the enemies hand, and had never seen this reviving in our bondage; for it will be a death to us, and not a reviving, if there be not a returning together ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie
... generals who will not fail me," the Czar is reported to have said when he heard of Menschikoff's last defeat, "Generals January and February." General February fulfilled his task, but he smote the Czar too. In the first days of March a new monarch inherited the Russian crown. [474] Alexander II. ascended the throne, ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... so pure. and a life so useful and well-directed in all its aims, could scarcely fail to win respect among those who were acquainted with the facts. As the prince became better known, public mistrust began to give way. In 1847, but only after a significantly keen contest with Earl Powis, he was elected chancellor of the ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... them for their stupidity, and tell the following story: They have no wells in the village, and the little fountain is not sufficient for their cattle, so they water them from the Ramet or pool, which is filled by the rains and lasts nearly all summer. One year the water in the Ramet began to fail, and there was a quarrel between the two quarters of the village, as to which part should have the first right to the water. Finally they decided to divide the pool into two parts, by making a fence of poles across ...
— The Women of the Arabs • Henry Harris Jessup
... nothing without faculty of observation: though the whole social world, old or new, lay bare under the eyes of some men, not one idea could they extract from it; and who, wanting also the descriptive power, still more rare, fail in any attempt to give to the world the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... with me: fast falls the eventide; The darkness deepens; Lord, with me abide; When other helpers fail, and comforts flee, Help of the ...
— Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... plenty of very fine novels," he said cheerily. "And no one need be ashamed of liking that form of story-telling. I always fail to understand the attitude of the person who says 'I never read novels!' as though he were claiming a tremendous superiority, whereas he's only showing himself a narrow-minded ...
— The Making of a Soul • Kathlyn Rhodes
... eye, and head; knowledge of when to strike and how to do it; knowledge of water and of rock, and of the one hundred combinations which rock and watercan assume—for these two things, rock and water, taken in the abstract, fail as completely to convey any idea of their fierce embracings in the throes of a rapid as the fire burning quietly in a drawing-room fireplace fails to convey the idea of a house wrapped and sheeted in flames. Above the rapid all is still ...
— The Great Lone Land - A Narrative of Travel and Adventure in the North-West of America • W. F. Butler
... more Conspiracy, With Treason linked and Anarchy, Shall dig, with secret joy, their country's grave. No more thy waning cheek shall pale, Thy trembling limbs with terror fail, Thy bleeding wounds Heaven's balsam vainly crave. Uplift thy forehead fair, And mark the monstrous snare Of subtle foes, who sucked thy fainting breath, And yielding thee to the embrace of death, Awaited the fulfilment of their reign, To shed thy lovely limbs dismembered ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No. V, May, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... see there is where the prospective bride or groom, in that case has a chance. If, in the first test he should speak, or in the last trial she should fail to keep up the conversation, then ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Adventures on Strange Islands • Roger Thompson Finlay
... this," he said. "That no man ever had a better friend! I know you, old Button-Moulder. I know your ambition to make of me a 'shining button on the vest of the world!' You thought that Lorna might help. But I failed you there. I'm sorry. That was really the bitterness of the whole thing—-to fail you!" ...
— Up the Hill and Over • Isabel Ecclestone Mackay
... methods have accomplished. No, replies Cheve: they are exceptional organizations. The methods have not produced them. They have, on the contrary, arrived at their proficiency despite the methods, while thousands fail who might reach a high degree of excellence but for the obstacles presented by a false system to a clear understanding of the theory of music, which in itself is so simple and precise. In the study of harmony especially, says the same authority, does the want of a clear ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, August, 1878 • Various
... groups of factors; mental and bodily hereditary dispositions, and faculties acquired by education and instruction. Without sufficient hereditary dispositions, all efforts expended in learning a certain subject will generally fail more or less. Without instruction and without exercise, the best hereditary dispositions will become atrophied, or will give indifferent results. But hereditary dispositions not only influence the different domains of knowledge, as the traditional pedagogues of ...
— The Sexual Question - A Scientific, psychological, hygienic and sociological study • August Forel
... very seldom now, you were so busy I wanted to speak of it, but fancied you had as much on your hands as you could manage. It would delight the dear woman to teach you all her delicate handicraft, especially button-holes, for I believe that is where young ladies fail; at least, I've heard them say so. So, do you devote your mind to button-holes; make 'em all over my clothes if you want something to practice ...
— Eight Cousins • Louisa M. Alcott
... the conviction awoke that already the love that had hitherto been the chief joy of my being, had begun to pale and fade. Was it possible I was ceasing to love my uncle? What could any love be worth if mine should fail my uncle! Love itself must be a mockery, and life but a ceaseless sliding down to the death of indifference! Even if I never ceased to love him, it was just as bad to love him less! Had he not been everything ...
— The Flight of the Shadow • George MacDonald
... baronial era, lifting its ponderous turrets in the gleaming sunshine; and on another elevation contiguous to the sea, is the castle of the eccentric Lord Henry Seymour, a venerable pile of antique beauty. Here the spectator, however critical in landscape scenery, cannot fail to be gratified; the blended and harmonizing shades of wood, rock, and water; the diversities of architecture, displayed in castle, cottage, and villa; the far-off heights of St. George's and St. Catherine's overtopping the valley; the fine harbour of Cowes, filled with the sails of divers countries, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 13, No. 374 • Various
... these varieties which has been planted extensively in California is the Rupestris St. George. There can be little doubt, however, that it will fail to give satisfaction in many soils, and though we may not find something better for all our soils it is probable that we will repeat the experience of Southern France and find that in most soils there is some other variety that gives better results. ...
— Manual of American Grape-Growing • U. P. Hedrick
... the others who were the first to fail in their love. They got broken; they disappeared. The separation, at all events, was invariably their fault. Why was it? She herself never changed. When she loved any one, her love lasted all her life. Her mind could not grasp ...
— A Love Episode • Emile Zola
... Scriptures as the book which reveals the will of God and His wondrous works for the welfare of mankind, but how many fail to give any time or thought to reading the book of nature! Thousands may travel and admire beautiful scenery, and derive a certain amount of pleasure from nature, just glancing at each object, but really observing nothing, and thus failing to learn any of the lessons this world's beauty is intended ...
— Wild Nature Won By Kindness • Elizabeth Brightwen
... materialist must confess that man should be able to produce a better book to-day than man, unaided, could have produced in any previous age. The fact that they have tried, time and time again, only to fail each time more hopelessly, explains why they will not—why they cannot—accept the challenge thrown down by the Christian world to produce a book worthy to take the ...
— In His Image • William Jennings Bryan
... Oppressions on the most innocent Indian Nation, and diverting themselves with delights in new sorts of Torment, did in time improve in Barbarism and Cruelty; wherewith the Omnipotent being incensed suffered them to fail by a more desperate and dangerous lapse into a ...
— A Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies • Bartolome de las Casas
... despite the arduous demands of his patriotic duties, found time to answer some questions of the writer in the interests of "Violin Mastery" which, representing the views and opinions of so eminent and distinctively American a violinist, cannot fail to interest every lover of the Art. Writing from Rome (Sept. 9, 1918), Lieutenant Spalding modestly said that his answers to the questions asked "will have to be simple and short, because my time is very limited, and then, too, having been out of music for more than ...
— Violin Mastery - Talks with Master Violinists and Teachers • Frederick H. Martens
... gambling is inherent in every Oriental mind, and the merest beggar with but a few pice in his wallet to buy his daily food will invest them in a small number of oyster-shells, hoping to find a pearl of great value; and, should he fail to do so, he contents himself with eating the oyster and hoping for better luck next time. The shells are generally left on the sand in carefully guarded heaps till they die and open, when the pearls are extracted, and the fish left to decay. Some ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey
... and fraud; charlatans and fools were attracted to it by purely mercenary objects, who knew nothing of the high aims of the genuine alchemists, and scientific men looked elsewhere for solutions of Nature's problems. Why did alchemy fail? Was it because its fundamental theorems were erroneous? I think not. I consider the failure of the alchemical theory of Nature to be due rather to the misapplication of these fundamental concepts, to the erroneous use of a priori ...
— Bygone Beliefs • H. Stanley Redgrove
... go home, Jem. I'll try and not fail now in what's right. There are things we must not speak on" (lowering her voice), "but you'll be really kind if you'll not speak against my going home. Let us say no more about it, dear Jem. I must go home, and ...
— Mary Barton • Elizabeth Gaskell
... away from our duty, even if it does involve far more trouble than we foresaw when we plunged into the war that entailed it. The call to duty, when once plainly understood, is a call Americans never fail to answer, while to calls of interest they have often shown themselves incredulous ...
— Problems of Expansion - As Considered In Papers and Addresses • Whitelaw Reid
... another from different tables. She did not much care. But she would at least have the painful joy of the Brahmin woman's hope, who trusts by some fresh incantation to secure a blessing, formerly vouchsafed her by the gods, but which now old-time petitions fail to renew. It seemed cold-blooded, the entire arrangement, and yet I knew it was not. She was far braver than I could have been, even to win ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various
... disappointed—deeply pained," said Lady Roehampton, "if Endymion is not in this parliament, but if we fail I will not utterly despair. I will continue to do what I have done all my life, exert my utmost will and ...
— Endymion • Benjamin Disraeli
... and a part of their 'working,' but it is hardly a test of their objective truth. For a harmonious system of thoughts is conceivable which would either not apply to reality at all, or, if applied, would completely fail. On this theory systematic delusions, fictions, and dreams, might properly lay claim to truth. True, they might not be quite consistent: but neither are the systems of our sciences. If, then, this absolute coherence be insisted on, this test condemns our whole knowledge; if not, it remains formal, ...
— Pragmatism • D.L. Murray
... preliminary demands, just quit, it upset matters considerably. A little girl waist-maker may appear to be a very insignificant member of the community, but if you multiply her by four thousand, her absence makes an appreciable gap in the industrial machine, and its cogs fail to catch as accurately as heretofore. So that even the decent manufacturers felt pretty badly, not so much about the strike itself, as its, to them, inexplicable suddenness. Such men were suffering, of course, largely for the deeds of ...
— The Trade Union Woman • Alice Henry
... be as gods, knowers of this knowledge? The vision of God—that is to say, the vision of the Universe itself, in its soul, in its inmost essence—would not that appease all our longing? And this vision can fail to satisfy only men of a gross mind who do not perceive that the greatest joy of man is to be more man—that is, more God—and that man is more God the more consciousness ...
— Tragic Sense Of Life • Miguel de Unamuno
... Claudian (i. 154-170) mentions the guilt and exile of Abundantius; nor could he fail to quote the example of the artist, who made the first trial of the brazen bull, which he presented to Phalaris. See Zosimus, l. v. p. 302. Jerom, tom. i. p. 26. The difference of place is easily reconciled; but the decisive authority of Asterius of Amasia (Orat. iv. p. 76, apud Tillemont, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon
... division did not fail to bring about singular and unfortunate consequences. In a hospital such as La Salpetriere the tic sufferers, the impulsive, those beset with obsessions, the hysterical with fits and delirium were placed near the organic hemiplegics and the tabetics ...
— A Psychiatric Milestone - Bloomingdale Hospital Centenary, 1821-1921 • Various
... story papers of the present day. We commend the paper to parents who wish to get the best juvenile paper; and those of our young readers who wish to get and read serial stories of a pure and moral tendency should not fail to subscribe ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls - Volume XIII, No. 51: November 12, 1892 • Various
... wing. Maggie's nap, had she been able to snatch forty winks, would have been of the spirit rather than of the sense; yet as she subsided, near a lamp, with the last salmon-coloured French periodical, she was to fail, for refreshment, even of that sip ...
— The Golden Bowl • Henry James
... young man read the paper which Simeon had prepared for him, but did so in a voice low and partially inaudible. Then Simeon himself, taking the paper from him, read the apology in such tones that none could fail to hear. ...
— Beneath the Banner • F. J. Cross
... his own period alone might prove this. But it is easier to prove than to describe his modernity. To say that he takes the imagination afield into the margins of the world, where life still escapes standardization and there are fresh aspects of beauty, is to fail to differentiate him from Kipling or Masefield. To say that he strikes below the act and the will into realms of the sub- conscious, and studies the mechanism as well as the results of emotion, is but to place him, where indeed he belongs, among ...
— Definitions • Henry Seidel Canby
... not return to philosophy as if she were a master, but act like those who have sore eyes and apply a bit of sponge and egg, or as another applies a plaster, or drenching with water. For thus thou wilt not fail to obey reason, and thou wilt repose in it. And remember that philosophy requires only the things which thy nature requires; but thou wouldst have something else which is not according to nature.—It may be objected, Why, what is more agreeable ...
— The Thoughts Of The Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus • Marcus Aurelius
... class, thousands of good men are now working; hundreds of benevolent plans are being set on foot. Honour to them all; whether they succeed or fail, each of them does some good; each of them rescues at least a few fellow-men, dear to God as you and I are, out of the nether pit. Honour to them all, I say; but I should not be honest with you this night, if I did not assert most solemnly my conviction, ...
— Sanitary and Social Lectures and Essays • Charles Kingsley
... sometimes hear about these things seems to imply that while Christianity is indisputably true, it cannot stand nevertheless without bolt and shackle, as if the Author of our faith had left the evidence so weak that an honest investigation would fail ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude
... It is great The journey, and the flock forgets at last (Earth ever working to obliterate The landmarks) when it halted, where it passed; And words confuse, and time doth ruinate, And memory fail to hold a theme so vast; There is request for light, but the flock feeds, And slowly ever on ...
— Poems by Jean Ingelow, In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Jean Ingelow
... did my best to help him—marriage was the one thing he wanted; if he could only have been pushed into it, he would have made a perfect husband, because not only is he very much of a gentleman, but he could never bear to fail any one who depended on him; but he has got the unhappiest mind I know; the moment that he has formed a plan, and sees his way clear, he at once begins to think of all the reasons against it—not the selfish reasons, by any means; in this case he reflected, I am ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... face or had he fallen into their clutches, his poor mother would never have kissed her boy again! But he took good care to turn his eyes another way; and as he wore the helmet of invisibility, the Gorgons knew not in what direction to follow him; nor did he fail to make the best use of the winged slippers by soaring upward a perpendicular mile or so. At that height, when the screams of those abominable creatures sounded faintly beneath him, he made a straight course for the island of Seriphus, ...
— Myths and Legends of All Nations • Various
... terrible blow. Hans raised a vast commotion. He did not even fail to insinuate that it might be the interloper opposite—the Hippopotamus. Who so likely as he, who had his eye continually on Hans's door? But no matter—the thief was clear off; and the only comfort he got from his neighbors, was being rated for ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... Such reflections never fail effect. A tenderness of spirit is the first token of their presence; then memory and imagination begin striving; the latter to bring the beloved object back, and the former to surround it with sweetest circumstances. They wrought with Mirza as with everybody ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace
... by side; but intermarriages are rare, and conversions from Rome to rationalism infrequent. The Sunday services of the little Protestant church are often attended by Catholics. Strangers passing through Osse, market-folk, peasants and others, never fail to inspect it curiously. The Protestant pastor is looked up to with respect and affection alike by Catholic and Protestant neighbours. The rival churches neither lose nor gain adherents to any extent. This fact is curious, especially in a spot where Protestantism is ...
— In the Heart of the Vosges - And Other Sketches by a "Devious Traveller" • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... seek it. Here only the legend remains. It is not that the vines are wanting. The Bordelais, except in the sandy and pine-covered region of the landes, has again become one immense vineyard; but whether it be from the struggle to live, or the lust of prosperity, the people fail to impress the traveller with that communicative openness and joyousness of soul which he would like to find in them, if only that he might not have the vexation of convicting himself of laying up for his ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker
... when Papa Patoux returned to the bosom of his family, he, though a dull-witted man generally, did not fail to note the dove-like spirit of calm that reigned over his entire household. His wife's fat face was agreeably placid,—the children were in an orderly mood, and as he sat down to the neatly spread supper-table, he felt more convinced than ever that things were exceedingly well managed ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... not going to fail! But I will not permit any one to jest about the thing I am to do. It is a sacred duty with me. But, Madame Drovnask—all of you, listen—it is a cruel, diabolical thing, just the same. Were it not in behalf ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... with trustfulness in good, and optimistic outlook on the world, wins its way and succeeds in its undertakings, making its appeal to the will rather than to the mind. On the softer side of this type are found the disappointing people who ought to do well, and always fail, for whom the joie de vivre carries everything before it, who are always good natured, always obliging, always sweet-tempered, who cannot say no, especially to themselves, whose energy is exhausted in a very short burst of effort, though ever ready to direct itself into some ...
— The Education of Catholic Girls • Janet Erskine Stuart
... fail; 40 And what can these avail, To lift the smoth'ring weight from off my breast? It were a vain endeavour, Though I should gaze for ever On that green light that lingers in the west: 45 I may not hope from outward forms to win The passion and the ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... upon a posed figure. The fault of many pictures is that the proprieties just here are violated. Some of the lowest toned interiors of Israels are satisfactory when judged from the standpoint of light, while out of door attempts in high key fail to suggest the fact of a sun in nature. The fault is that the exact degree of illumination which the subject demands ...
— Pictorial Composition and the Critical Judgment of Pictures • Henry Rankin Poore
... Freed from the formalism of the schools, thrown upon the use of his own intellect, compelled to test each single object as the prevailing system and becomes, first a sceptic, and then an investigator. This change, which did not fail to affect Huxley, and through which arose that Huxley whom we commemorate to-day, is no unknown occurrence to one who is acquainted with the history, not only of knowledge, but also ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 1 • Leonard Huxley
... supererogatory and weak really unless they aid this and are constantly contributory to it. Egotistical predeterminations, however artfully intruded, are, alien to the full result, the unity which is finally craved: Stevenson fails, when he does fail, distinctly from excess of egotistic regards; he is, as Henley has said, in the French sense, too personnel, and cannot escape from it. And though these personal regards are exceedingly interesting and indeed fascinating from the point of view of autobiographical study, they ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson - a Record, an Estimate, and a Memorial • Alexander H. Japp
... not prolong this letter, I do not wish to bore you; but I promise you that I will never fail to let you know of my doings and I count on you ...
— Castellinaria - and Other Sicilian Diversions • Henry Festing Jones
... and she was glad to see me. She was more than glad to know that I had come as soon as I could. Said she had told herself I would not fail her—that it was the snow and the canon and not some other reason that kept me away. Said she thought she was going to die; and that she wanted me to know she was sorry she had done wrong. The doctor had told her she ...
— Forty-one Thieves - A Tale of California • Angelo Hall
... virtues, imperatively claim at his hands. Towards this end, indeed, he had purposed to introduce, in this place, a dissertation touching the divine right of beadles, and elucidative of the position, that a beadle can do no wrong: which could not fail to have been both pleasurable and profitable to the right-minded reader but which he is unfortunately compelled, by want of time and space, to postpone to some more convenient and fitting opportunity; on the arrival of which, he will be prepared to show, that a beadle properly constituted: ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... letter-box on the corner. She dallied with the towel until there was no further excuse, she brushed her hair into unaccustomed smoothness; finally she went slowly over to her little desk, and took up the envelope, at last sealing it hurriedly, lest her courage should utterly fail. She would slip out to the letter-box, and have the miserable business done ...
— Polly of Lady Gay Cottage • Emma C. Dowd
... not. The English police will take good care of that, especially if Ericson should marry Sir Rupert's daughter. No—and do you fancy that even if the police failed to find us, those that sent us out would fail to find us? Do you think they would let us carry their secrets about with us? Why, what a fool ...
— The Dictator • Justin McCarthy
... spirit with which Nature had endowed me, I flung myself into the ring? Who should be a gladiator if I were not? Is that a crime? What if, at a later period, with a brain for calculation which none can rival, I invariably succeeded in that in which the greatest men in the country fail! Am I to be branded because I have made half a million by a good book? What if I have kept a gambling-house? From the back parlour of an oyster-shop my hazard table has been removed to this palace. Had the play been foul, this metamorphosis would never have occurred. ...
— Henrietta Temple - A Love Story • Benjamin Disraeli
... disappointment, almost heart-break, delays and sorrows; but she loved him, and it would be her duty; and then, if she could be successful, how great, how full of joy would be the triumph! Even if she were to fail and perish in failing, it would be her duty. As for giving him up because he had the misfortune to be bad, she would as soon give him up on the score of any other misfortune;—because he might lose a leg, or become deformed, or be stricken deaf by God's hand! One ...
— Sir Harry Hotspur of Humblethwaite • Anthony Trollope
... of each man the bone was given to them. if neither it was nothing. if they guessed one which they might single out if they pleased they recived his bone, and lost on the other as they hapened to fail in guessing the also lose one if they fail guessing both The game is plaid at different numbers & each party has 5 sticks. Several of those games were played to day in which the Skillute won, indeed the won all the beeds and Som robes of the Skad ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al
... entered the Cabinet when his health began to fail. From one serious attack he recovered in the autumn; and his recovery was celebrated in Latin verses, worthy of his own pen, by Vincent Bourne, who was then at Trinity College, Cambridge. A relapse soon took place; ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... could not refrain from exposing to his patron a little plan he had conceived, which would enable him to obtain five or six hundred francs from London. Two letters and a telegram were all that was necessary, and the game was won. It was impossible to fail, and there was no ...
— Monsieur Lecoq • Emile Gaboriau
... and should by no means be disregarded. But, limiting the force to the objects particularly set forth in the preceding part of this message, we should not overlook the present magnitude and prospective extension of our commercial marine, nor fail to give due weight to the fact that besides the 2,000 miles of Atlantic seaboard we have now a Pacific coast stretching from Mexico to the British possessions in the north, teeming with wealth and enterprise and demanding the constant presence of ships of war. The ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... attained the peak of its curve at Austerlitz, Jena and Friedland. Thereafter, the descent begins. A rash, grandiose, speculative quality enters his projects, and divorces the elaborate coordination of means and end from his plans. That his thyroid energy capacity did not fail him is indicated by the fact that at St. Albans he would ride for three hours at the end of the day to tire himself sufficiently for sleep. That his adrenals were not affected is indicated by the brutality which remained characteristic to the ...
— The Glands Regulating Personality • Louis Berman, M.D.
... gemmules, as well as by the well-known method of self-division. If pangenesis occurs, the transmission of acquired characters ought to be a prominent fact. The size, strength, health and other good or evil qualities of the cells could hardly fail to exercise a marked and corresponding effect upon the size and quality of the reproductive gemmules thrown off by those cells. The direct evidence tends to show that these free gemmules do not exist. Transfusion of blood has failed to affect inheritance ...
— Are the Effects of Use and Disuse Inherited? - An Examination of the View Held by Spencer and Darwin • William Platt Ball
... they beat me down! (Pauses by machine.) There is no one but me to do it. If I fail they may have to wait another million years—out there—working, waiting. (Resumes walk.) I shall not fail. I have gone too far. God will take my part now. Be it His own eternal ...
— The Flutter of the Goldleaf; and Other Plays • Olive Tilford Dargan and Frederick Peterson
... that there is no great man on this earth except the man who conquers self, and that in some the accursed thing which is in all of us may be so strong that to battle with it and be beaten is not altogether to fail. It is foolish to demand complete success of those we want to love. We should rejoice when they rise for a moment above themselves, and sympathize with them when they fall. In their heyday young lovers ...
— Tommy and Grizel • J.M. Barrie
... decision, he expects to bring about results which, like powers of the Steam Engine are, as yet, only dreamed of. The grace of the Athenian beau and the dignity of the Roman senator shall be so intermingled in the grand contour of all who submit to his touch, that the toute ensemble cannot fail to ...
— The Olden Time Series, Vol. 4: Quaint and Curious Advertisements • Henry M. Brooks
... him. He even felt that it would be stealing for him to take it. In his father's sore embarrassment he was tempted to appropriate the treasure, and let him use it as a loan. But then, if his father should fail, and the heirs of Wallbridge should appear, he could not satisfy them, ...
— The Coming Wave - The Hidden Treasure of High Rock • Oliver Optic
... not fail to attract attention in the company street. The men were uneasy, for the colonel was noticeably a man of action as well as of temper. Their premonitions were fulfilled when at assembly the next morning, an official announcement was read to the attentive regiment. ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... Advocate, by thus pleading, doth turn things to our advantage, consider, (1.) That God is careful, that through our weakness, our spirits do not fail before him when he chides (Isa 57:16-18). (2.) "He stayeth his rough wind in the day of the east wind," and debates about the measure of affliction, when, for sin, we should be chastened, lest we should sink thereunder (Isa 27:7-9). (3.) He ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... will wait," said the cure with a sigh. He had determined to carry the thing through, and would not fail ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... thee forgetfulness too general, gross; Which now the public body, which doth seldom Play the recanter, feeling in itself A lack of Timon's aid, hath sense withal Of it own fail, restraining aid to Timon, And send forth us to make their sorrow'd render, Together with a recompense more fruitful Than their offence can weigh down by the dram; Ay, even such heaps and sums of love ...
— The Life of Timon of Athens • William Shakespeare [Craig edition]
... theologians and metaphysicians regarding the inner nature of THE ALL, as but the childish efforts of mortal minds to grasp the secret of the Infinite. Such efforts have always failed and will always fail, from the very nature of the task. One pursuing such inquiries travels around and around in the labyrinth of thought, until he is lost to all sane reasoning, action or conduct, and is utterly unfitted for the work of life. He is like the squirrel ...
— The Kybalion - A Study of The Hermetic Philosophy of Ancient Egypt and Greece • Three Initiates
... of the Negro slaves would kill snakes and skin them and wear these snake skins to prevent being voodooed they said. When some of the slaves would take sick and the home remedies would fail to cure them our Mistress would allow one of the Negro men slaves to go to the white doctor and get some medicine for the patient. The doctor would ask questions as to the actions of the patient and from said description would send medicine without ever ...
— Slave Narratives, Oklahoma - A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From - Interviews with Former Slaves • Various
... circuit carrying a current, a definite electro-motive force determined by Ohm's law from the resistance and current obtains in it. But if we attempt to define potential difference as proper to the circuit we may quite fail. Potential difference in a circuit is the difference in potential between defined points of such circuit. But no points in a closed circuit can be found which differ in potential by an amount equal to the entire electro-motive force of the circuit. Potential difference ...
— The Standard Electrical Dictionary - A Popular Dictionary of Words and Terms Used in the Practice - of Electrical Engineering • T. O'Conor Slone
... thinking and gazing, till she had gone much further than she intended, and the light had begun to fail. She would certainly be late for dinner. Looking round her for her bearings, she saw on the Scarfedale side of the hill, about three miles away, what she took to be her aunts' house. Surely there must be a short cut to it. Yes! there was a narrow road to be seen, winding down the hill, and across ...
— Lady Connie • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... shake my constancy. Nothing shall ever separate me from the love of Christ. This must be the sincere disposition of every Christian. Lying protestations of fidelity to God cost us nothing: but he sounds the heart. Is our constancy such as to bear evidence to our sincerity, that rather than to fail in the least duty to God, we are ready to resist to blood? and that we are always upon our guard to keep our ears shut to the voices of those syrens which never cease to lay snares ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... bound was completely hidden from their sight for some minutes. When they did catch sight of her, they found that they were not making rapid progress. They were still a long way from the ship, and when they had been swimming for a good time, Ping Wang's courage began to fail him. ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... their flight.] The People were very glad of our coming, and gave us an end of an open house to ly in: but at present they had no dryed Flesh, but desired us to stay two or three days and we should not fail: which we were very ready to consent to, hoping by that time to come to the knowledg of the way, and to learn where about the watch was placed. To Prevent the least surmise that we were Plotting to run away, we agreed, that Stephen should ...
— An Historical Relation Of The Island Ceylon In The East Indies • Robert Knox
... that I had with these chaps in 1918. It never failed—not one single, solitary time did it fail—that the functionary who took my order first tried to tell me what my order was going to be, and then, after a struggle, reluctantly consented to bring me the things I wanted and insisted on having. Never once did he omit the ceremony of impressing ...
— Eating in Two or Three Languages • Irvin S. Cobb
... very briefly, fail to confirm the theory that the sense of temperature has an apparatus of fixed spots for heat and other fixed spots for cold. For when he puts the different markings for heat together he finds that the spots are not the same, ...
— The Story of the Mind • James Mark Baldwin
... not meet me," she was mad. How could he fail to meet her when the rolling hours hung fire and buzzed about his head like loaded bees, unable to proceed; when in a lethargy of vision he signed his name at the bottom of the typewritten sheet, saying confusedly, "What does she think? Does ...
— The Happy Foreigner • Enid Bagnold
... are they? Poor old dears, it really is quite dreadful. You see, grandfather used to be a fearful tyrant, though he is so little, and grandmother was deathly afraid of him until his health began to fail. So now she is getting even with him. They adore each other, however. Isn't the house quaint? Have you seen ...
— The Halo • Bettina von Hutten
... delegates of the socialist societies decide that it is just," he said, in a hoarse, unpleasant tone, "I am willing to see that Falkenberg meets his reward. I can say no more. I do not fail. I move against no one save those who deserve death and against whom the death sentence has been pronounced. But when I ...
— The Mischief Maker • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... peace, the welfare and the happiness of men, would ever have established as the basis of His religion, such a fatal source of trouble and of eternal divisions among them. Such religions can not be true, neither could they have been instituted by God. But I see that our Christ-worshipers will not fail to have recourse to their pretended motives for credulity, and that they will say, that although their faith and belief may be blind in one sense, they are nevertheless supported by such clear and convincing testimonies of truth, that it would ...
— Superstition In All Ages (1732) - Common Sense • Jean Meslier
... with the knowledge that I must fail to give more than a few hints of what he was like. There isn't much more space at my command, and there were so many sides to him that to touch upon them all would fill a volume. There were the patriotism ...
— Appreciations of Richard Harding Davis • Various
... be overcome. Getting the money she would need for the preliminary work was perhaps the worst; and if the money could be raised, it would be a long time before she could look for much return. Still she was not alone; Thirlwell had promised to help and she knew he would not fail her. She meant to let him help, not because she wanted to get rich, but because she really knew what had influenced him, and suspected that he was not ...
— The Lure of the North • Harold Bindloss
... speaking suddenly with a start; and darted a quick alarmed glance at the face of Signor Fortini, who did not fail to remark it, and to be much ...
— A Siren • Thomas Adolphus Trollope |
