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Impetus   /ˈɪmpətəs/   Listen
Impetus

noun
1.
A force that moves something along.  Synonyms: drift, impulsion.
2.
The act of applying force suddenly.  Synonyms: impulse, impulsion.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Impetus" Quotes from Famous Books



... high ground, and at this season it spreads out like the Ambriz in broad stagnant sheets, bordered with reeds and grass supplying fish and crabs, wild ducks and mosquitoes. Presently, when the Cacimbo ends in stormy rains and horrid rollers, its increased volume and impetus will burst the sand-strip which confines it, and the washed-away material ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton

... scarlet from rowing on the river with "Dora" Eweword, and she spoke of her jaunt as soon as we got outside, apparently pregnant with the knowledge innate in the dullest of her sex, that the most efficacious way of giving impetus to the love of one ...
— Some Everyday Folk and Dawn • Miles Franklin

... of this writhing soul raised many new speculations in Donaldson's mind especially in connection with its possible outcome. In the matter of religion he was negative, neither believing any professed creed nor denying any. He had received no early impetus, and had up to now been too preoccupied with his earthly interests, with no great grief or happiness to arouse him, to formulate any theory in his own mind. Even at the moment he had swallowed the poison the motive prompting him to it had been so intensely material that it had started but the most ...
— The Seventh Noon • Frederick Orin Bartlett

... in Teviotdale churchyard, and she was in the habit of stealing away from her friends at night, to weep over his grave. These melancholy visits had the effect of giving a new impetus to her malady, making her for a time the victim of any fancy that ...
— ZigZag Journeys in Northern Lands; - The Rhine to the Arctic • Hezekiah Butterworth

... racing horses as they approached a point where the slope terminated in two diverging canyons. Mrs. Ashwood gave a sharp pull upon her bit. To her consternation the mustang stopped short almost instantly,—planting his two fore feet rigidly in the dust and even sliding forward with the impetus. Had her seat been less firm she might have been thrown, but she recovered herself, although in doing so she still bore upon the bit, when to her astonishment the mustang deliberately stiffened himself as if for a shock, ...
— A First Family of Tasajara • Bret Harte

... given further impetus in the time of Lord Dalhousie. During his term of office (1848-1856) the present system of education, under a Director of Public Instruction, was introduced, and Government was empowered to make liberal educational grants, and to establish ...
— The Story of Madras • Glyn Barlow

... gave the movement a strong impetus and did much toward putting the teachings of Coornhert into practice. He was born at Middleburg in 1603. He was a man of good scholarship, being especially learned in Hebrew, and he was thoroughly impregnated with the views of the spiritualistic Humanists ...
— Spiritual Reformers in the 16th & 17th Centuries • Rufus M. Jones

... forward under the new impetus, but behind them the six canoes, particularly the two on which sails had been fitted, were coming fast. The night was so bright that they could see the warriors painted and naked to the waist sending their paddles in great sweeps through the water. It was evident also that they ...
— The Border Watch - A Story of the Great Chief's Last Stand • Joseph A. Altsheler

... soul, sir!" exclaimed the Reverend Doctor Folliott, throwing himself back into a chair, and flinging up his heels, with the premeditated design of giving emphasis to his exclamation; but by miscalculating his impetus, he overbalanced his chair, and laid himself on the carpet in a right angle, of which ...
— Crotchet Castle • Thomas Love Peacock

... light shone through the loop-holes of the tower. All rushed to the window. A dazzling light flamed up from the opposite side of the wagon, and a sudden impetus hurled the heavy mass against the wall of the house. A single man sprang back from the wagon; a dozen guns were pointed at him ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag

... fell. After a few moments the moon, then just past its full, rose behind the new-budding trees. The sluicing, under the impetus of a big crew, ...
— The Riverman • Stewart Edward White

... situation dramatically, as a painful and instructive penance. Hence arose the oldest of my extant dramatic labors, the little piece entitled, "Die Laune des Verliebten" ("The Lover's Caprice"), in the simple nature of which one may at the same time perceive the impetus of a ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

... the depths of the soul which Ruskin avowed as the impetus to his life's work is only possible when the mind is fired by a devotion to the mountains which brooks no rival. "For, to myself, mountains are the beginning and the end of all natural scenery," he wrote in The Mountain Glory; "in them, and in the forms of inferior landscape that lead ...
— Mountain Meditations - and some subjects of the day and the war • L. Lind-af-Hageby

... to give the plant a light touch of the plough. This eases the soil about the roots, lets in air and light, tends to clean the undergrowth of weeds, and gives it a great impetus. The operation is called Bedaheunee. By the beginning of June the tiny red flower is peeping from its leafy sheath, the lower leaves are turning yellowish and crisp, and it is almost time to begin the grandest and most important ...
— Sport and Work on the Nepaul Frontier - Twelve Years Sporting Reminiscences of an Indigo Planter • James Inglis

... with England by the Red Sea route has given to Bombay a great business impetus, and it possesses to-day more elements of future greatness than any other city of Asia. The two principal capitals of the country are situated on opposite sides of the great peninsula, Calcutta being on the Bay of Bengal, and Bombay on the Sea of Arabia. We have in the latter a population ...
— Foot-prints of Travel - or, Journeyings in Many Lands • Maturin M. Ballou

... had was one of those great men that God in His infinite wisdom brings into the world at stated intervals to exercise a dominating influence in human affairs and to give a fresh impetus to human progress. Of the great men that we class with him are the following: Confucius, Buddha, Julius Caesar, Oliver Cromwell, Abraham Lincoln. The first thing he did when he became Emperor was to summon sixty of the most liberal minded men and women in the empire to the palace to draw up ...
— Eurasia • Christopher Evans

... River. He said nothing, but he felt certain that he was now within twenty miles of Omaha. In less than an hour he left the rudder and furled his sails, whilst the sledge, carried forward by the great impetus the wind had given it, went on half a mile further with its ...
— Around the World in 80 Days • Jules Verne

... July, 1917, intended to appease the Slavs, had just the opposite effect: it only strengthened the Slav resistance which acquired fresh strength and impetus by the ...
— Independent Bohemia • Vladimir Nosek

... time, my lads, give way, and alongside," cried our hero. The men, reminded by his voice, obeyed—but the impetus already given to the boat was sufficient. Before they could drop their oars in the water they grazed against the vessel's sides, and, following Jack, were in a few seconds on the quarter-deck of the vessel. A dreadful sight presented itself—the ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Frederick Marryat

... leaped nimbly into the bushes, and the maddened bull was carried on by his own Impetus toward Clayton, who, with a quick spring, landed in safety in a gully below the road. When he picked himself up from the uneven ground where he had fallen, the beast had disappeared around the bowlder. The bag had fallen, and had broken open, and some of the meal was spilled on the ...
— A Mountain Europa • John Fox Jr.

... schooner rolled sluggishly, and every now and then the water swashed across her cabin with extra impetus, making footing insecure. ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day

... effect of Kossuth's visit to the United States was an extraordinary impetus given to "The Order of United Americans," from which was evolved that political phenomenon, the American, or Know-Nothing, party. The mysterious movements of this organization attracted the curiosity of the people, and members of the old political organizations eagerly desired to learn ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore

... bridge on the other side; but in spite of all the warnings given to those who rushed towards the chance of salvation, not one among them could or would draw back. The overladen bridge gave way, and not only so, the impetus of the frantic living wave towards that fatal bank was such that a dense crowd of human beings was thrust into the water as if by an avalanche. The sound of a single human cry could not be distinguished; there was a dull crash as if an enormous stone had fallen into the water—and ...
— Farewell • Honore de Balzac

... early afternoon. Stooping forward a little she took the short leap across the three foot wide gulch at the base of the knoll upon which the house stood, and laughed aloud as she landed and with gathered impetus sped a score of feet up the ...
— The Short Cut • Jackson Gregory

... Pike's face, and closed with him in weak but final combat. They lurched and careened to and fro, with the giant Gulden swaying after them. Thus they struggled until Pike moved under Gulden's swinging club. The impetus of the blow carried Gulden off his balance. Kells seized the haft of the knife still protruding from the giant's neck, and he pulled upon it with all his might. Gulden heaved up again, and the movement enabled Kells to pull out the knife. A bursting gush of blood, thick and heavy, ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey

... A further impetus was given to the development of the secondary armament by the introduction of "smokeless" powder—which, however, gives a very slight smoke,—and the "quick-firing gun." By simplifying the breech mechanism, ...
— How Britannia Came to Rule the Waves - Updated to 1900 • W.H.G. Kingston

... place was Michael Angelo Buonarotti,[A] the sculptor—painter—architect—poet, whose universal mind appeared to fit him, not so much to shine in any one department—although shine he did in all—as to give an impetus to the whole Revival. But Michael Angelo, as a painter, excelled chiefly in design; while one who was his contemporary, and being a few years later in the field, has been supposed by some to be his imitator, was the painter ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 432 - Volume 17, New Series, April 10, 1852 • Various

... for Meg. His mind was harassed and absorbed. The fresh impetus which he had received was pounding like a sledge-hammer at his natural and supernatural forces. His natural self was the devil's advocate, and a very able one. It argued against the super-instincts which led him to the treasure. It made him practical. It made him, as ...
— There was a King in Egypt • Norma Lorimer

... made a large fortune as a timber merchant. Being nominated director of artillery during the war, he proved himself fertile in invention. Bold in his conceptions, he contributed powerfully to the progress of that arm and gave an immense impetus to experimental researches. ...
— Jules Verne's Classic Books • Jules Verne

... gold in the Black Hills has lately given it a great impetus, and as it is the chief point of departure for the diggings it is increasing in ...
— A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains • Isabella L. Bird

... on British sympathizers. He called this poem M'Fingal, after a Scotch Tory. The first part was published in 1775 and it gave a powerful impetus to the Continental cause. It has been said that the poem "is to be considered as one of the forces of the Revolution, because as a satire on the Tories it penetrated into every farmhouse, and sent the rustic volunteers laughing into the ranks ...
— History of American Literature • Reuben Post Halleck

... I felt, was the time for me to fire, or the young man would certainly be killed. I had, providentially, a rest for my gun, and pulling the trigger, my bullet hit the rhinoceros directly behind the ear. The impetus it had gained sent it on several paces. A loud shriek rent the air; but just before it reached the young chief over it fell, and lay perfectly still. We ran forward to help up our young friend. ...
— In the Wilds of Africa • W.H.G. Kingston

... the impetus from behind, and began to move forward. The voice above shouted a second warning. Healy answered with a derisive yell. Keller again stood ...
— Mavericks • William MacLeod Raine

... shove from behind precipitated me into the bosom of the speaker, who returned me with thanks, and before I could apologise, into the hands of the sender. Thence I found myself passed on by a side impetus to a knot of juveniles, who, not requiring my presence, passed me on to a senior standing by, who shot me back to a friend, who sent me forward among the boxes into the arms of the matron, who indignantly hustled me up the passage, where finally I pulled up short in the grasp of a gentleman ...
— Tom, Dick and Harry • Talbot Baines Reed

... Receiving the necessary impetus from above, Bertie and Lilla slithered down at a terrific pace, and shot over the jutting ridge—a good twenty feet drop. As they touched the ground, the toboggin ploughed up the snow, recovered without upsetting, and tore on, jumping down the lesser ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston

... houses to-day? If some one praises him, the majority of people will tell you that he is overrated. Does it not remind you of the reception which Ibsen's plays met when they were first produced here: when they gave an impetus to that new English drama which I understand is decaying, though it seems to me to be only beginning—the new English Drama of Mr. Granville Barker, Mr. Housman, Mr. Arnold Bennett, Mr. Galsworthy, and ...
— Masques & Phases • Robert Ross

... upon his endless and mysterious errands, starting off abruptly a little way, stopping suddenly, with one hand raised to his head, as if at that instant remembering a forgotten detail, and then turning with new impetus to walk swiftly in the ...
— The Lions of the Lord - A Tale of the Old West • Harry Leon Wilson

... she rejoined, for his particular delectation. 'Enough if he hesitates. I forgive him his nausea. He awaits the impetus, and it will reach him, and soon. He will not wait for the mob at his heels, I am certain. A Minister who does that, is a post, and goes down with the first bursting of the dam. He has tried compromise and discovered that it does not appease the Fates; ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... minutes later, before we had time to bring the runaway mules to a stop, the wire, unseen, was again met with a foot or so above the ground. It caught the mules on the legs, and as they were tied to one another, and were carried on by the impetus of the pace at which we were going, all the animals tumbled down one on the top of the other in a heap. The packs got mercilessly undone, and it took us the best part of an hour to disentangle all and get ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor

... memorable occasions, he has narrowly escaped pitching head first into the hall lamp. His favorite method of locomotion, however, consisted in a series of thumps, beginning with a gentle tread, and increasing in impetus by mathematical progression till it ended in a thunder-clap. A long hall to him was bliss unalloyed; the bare garret floor a dream of delight, and the plank walk in the woodshed an ecstasy. Still a fourth peculiarity was a pleasing habit when ...
— Gypsy Breynton • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps

... man, believed that fun was an intellectual impetus, for he read Artemus Ward to his Cabinet before reading his famous emancipation proclamation, and laying down his book marked the place ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various

... give an order, came one loud, flaming, whistling discharge from that living barrier. Harry's horse—Elizabeth Philipse's Cato—reared, as did others of his troop. Some of the men came to a quick stop, others were borne forward by the impetus of their former speed, but soon reined in for orders. No man fell, though one groaned, and ...
— The Continental Dragoon - A Love Story of Philipse Manor-House in 1778 • Robert Neilson Stephens

... other members of its own species. In a single day's activity we who are citizens of a great metropolis are forced into contact with almost countless other lives, glancing off from one and another after influencing them to some degree, and gaining ourselves some impetus and stimulus from our longer or shorter intercourse with each of them. Our varied social relations are so many and obvious that it is quite superfluous to specify them as essential things in human life. For the very reason that they are so obvious and constitute so large a part of our daily ...
— The Doctrine of Evolution - Its Basis and Its Scope • Henry Edward Crampton

... notice about Spiritualism is, that it is obeying the occult impetus of all great movements, and steadily going from east to west. From Hackney and Highbury it gravitates towards Belgravia and Tyburnia. I left the wilds of Hackney behind, and neared Hyde Park for my next Form. I must again conceal names and localities; I have no desire to ...
— Mystic London: - or, Phases of occult life in the metropolis • Charles Maurice Davies

... terror-stricken to see him turn and dart to the torrent like an arrow. With a long flying leap, he landed on the rock in the midst of the stream, and then, without a second's hesitation, with the impetus already acquired, sprang for the solid ground where she stood, struck it, wavered, and would have fallen backward into the water had not she, quick as thought, stepped forward ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe

... there, hauls him so that he cannot see, or exert himself to get out of them, and expecting chastisement, the horse springs and struggles to avoid it before he has recovered his feet, and goes down with a tremendous impetus. If he has to cross a rut to the right he probably forces his horse across it when the right foot is on the ground. In this case, unless the horse collects himself and jumps—if he attempts to step across it, the probability is that in crossing his legs he knocks one against ...
— Hints on Horsemanship, to a Nephew and Niece - or, Common Sense and Common Errors in Common Riding • George Greenwood

... the dense vegetation, I came upon a creek—a mere ditch—leading to the river, half full of marshy growth, when, walking back a few yards for impetus, I ran from the bank, and was in the act of leaping the creek when every nerve seemed to thrill with a horrible sense of chilling dread, as beneath my feet there was a rushing rustling noise, mingled with the splashing of mud and water, the reedy grass bent and waved in different directions, ...
— The Golden Magnet • George Manville Fenn

... fire line impetus. (2) To penetrate enemy lines. (3) To fill gaps and help reorganization. (4) To ...
— Military Instructors Manual • James P. Cole and Oliver Schoonmaker

... secondary occupation with me when the news of Weber's death and the longing to learn his music to Oberon fanned my enthusiasm into flame again. This received fresh impetus from the afternoon concerts in the Grosser Garten at Dresden, where I often heard my favourite music played by Zillmann's Town Band, as I thought, exceedingly well. The mysterious joy I felt in hearing an orchestra play quite close to me still remains one of my most ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner

... with a tremendous force. One could obtain some idea of the speed and impetus of the current from the swift vehemence with which logs and branches shot past, half hidden ...
— The Young Mountaineers - Short Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock

... unkeyed and had to compose themselves to the affair. But at last the visible world, the wall before him, commenced to dislimn; it shifted; it became mist, writhing and tinged with faint colors, that submerged his will and his consciousness, till they sank, gathering impetus, into a void below—the vacancy of the spirit that looses its hold on the body and is rudderless. He knew the blackness which is death, the momentary throe of entering it, the shock, the sense of ...
— The Second Class Passenger • Perceval Gibbon

... child. Breaking off the limb of a buckeye, he extemporized a lever. The first attempt failed. The second succeeded, and the long roots of the tree again, ascended. But as it required prolonged effort to keep the tree up, before the impetus was lost Aristides seized the opportunity to jump into the opening. At the same moment the tree slowly returned ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte

... and yet one wave causes another wave and transmits its form and movement. So are beings travelling through the world (samsara) not the same at any two points in a single life and still less the same in two consecutive lives: yet it is the impetus and form of the previous lives, the desire that urges them and the form that it takes, which determine the ...
— Hinduism and Buddhism, Vol I. (of 3) - An Historical Sketch • Charles Eliot

... uncomfortable-looking gaps appear. Some feet below the level of this ruined bridge a regular cataract is flowing. Across the frail scaffolding—you can call it no more—that spans the torrent, it is clearly Dandy Jack's intention to hurl the coach, trusting to the impetus to get it over. We shut our eyes in utter despair of a safe issue, and hold on to our seats with the clutch of drowning men. It is all that we ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay

... they were aware of it, they were careering past the western headland of the bay, when Eric, by a sudden turn of his steering oar, brought the bows of the whale-boat to bear towards the beach. The little craft partly obeyed the impetus of his nervous arm, veering round in the wished-for direction, in spite of the broken water, which just at that point was in a terrible state of commotion from a cross current that set the tide ...
— Fritz and Eric - The Brother Crusoes • John Conroy Hutcheson

... of suggestion is still powerful to control conduct and determine character in later childhood. The impetus given by the parents in this way is only gradually replaced by the driving power of his own self-respect—a self-respect based upon self-analysis in the light of the greater ...
— The Nervous Child • Hector Charles Cameron

... eight hundred and forty-five had begun with what appeared a fresh impetus to national prosperity—a new start full of life and vigour, by which the whole resources of the country should be at once stirred up and rendered ten times more available than they had ever been before. This was known afterwards as "the Railway Mania," ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen, (Victoria) Vol II • Sarah Tytler

... sleeve, and a good whirling weathercock of a brain, who reckons his life as a thing to be dashingly used and cheerfully hazarded, makes a very different acquaintance of the world, keeps all his pulses going true and fast, and gathers impetus as he runs, until, if he be running towards anything better than wildfire, he may shoot up and become a constellation in the end. Lord look after his health, Lord have a care of his soul, says he; and he has at the key of the position, and swashes through incongruity ...
— Virginibus Puerisque • Robert Louis Stevenson

... chamber reading Phaedon Platonis in Greeke and that with as much delite, as some gentlemen would read a merie tale in Bocase[90]"; and, when a Queen came to the throne who could talk Greek at Cambridge, the fashion of learning for ladies must have received an immense impetus. With a "blue stocking" showing on the royal footstool, all the ladies of the Court would at least lay claim to a certain amount of learning. Dr Landmann has attributed the vogue of euphuism, at least in part, to feminine influences, but in so far as England shared that affectation ...
— John Lyly • John Dover Wilson

... other sign of life, except a broad hat with a brown ribbon, buffeted about in an eddy, among the stones. The stream dipped now below the hill, and the current, still racing fast with the impetus he had given it, shot away among the hazel thickets which crowded close to the brink. He was obliged to make a detour by the orchard, and come out at the "mill-head" below;—a black, deep pool, with an ugly ...
— Stories by American Authors (Volume 4) • Constance Fenimore Woolson

... 'ruffles.' This chain is fastened by a 'trigger,' and when next the lugger is to be launched great flat blocks of wood called 'skids,' which are always well greased, are laid down in front of her stem, her crew climb on board, the mizzen is set, and the trigger is let go. By her own impetus the lugger rushes down the steep slope on the slippery skids into the sea. Even when a heavy sea is beating right on shore, the force acquired by the rush is sufficient to drive her safely into deep water. Lest too heavy a surf or any unforeseen accident should prevent ...
— Heroes of the Goodwin Sands • Thomas Stanley Treanor

... not opposed to this deduction, for quinquina, exciting all the vital powers, may give the circulation an impetus which troubles all, and dissipates, the gas destined to become fat. It is also shown that quinquina contains a portion of tannin which is powerful enough to close the cells which contain grease. It is possible that these two effects sustain ...
— The Physiology of Taste • Brillat Savarin

... of the united detachments had fallen already, and the hundred or so that now sought to face about, went down in a crushed and bleeding mass under the thousands of hoofs that overwhelmed them. Such was the weight and impetus of the pursuing force that there was no time even to strike, and most of the victims fell unwounded by spear or javelin. Sergius was vaguely conscious that he had seen the praefect cloven through the head by the short, swordlike Numidian knife, his own horse seemed ...
— The Lion's Brood • Duffield Osborne

... is really all that we can do when we fight something really stronger than ourselves; we can deal it its death-wound one moment; it deals us death in the end. It is something if we can shock and jar the unthinking impetus and enormous innocence of evil; just as a pebble on a railway can stagger the Scotch express. It is enough for the great martyrs and criminals of the French revolution, that they have surprised for all time the secret weakness of the strong. They have awakened and set leaping ...
— Tremendous Trifles • G. K. Chesterton

... the beginning of this broader sympathy with others, there follows the pleasure of freedom from antagonisms, keener delight in understanding others, individually and collectively, and greater ability to serve others; and all these must give an impetus which takes us steadily on to greater freedom, to clearer understanding, and to more power to serve ...
— As a Matter of Course • Annie Payson Call

... the like of which can never be reproduced. Socially, intellectually, politically and religiously, she stood pre-eminent, among nations. It was the spirit of the cavalier that created and sustained our greatness. Give the Puritan his due, and still the fact remains. The impetus that led to freedom from Great Britain, came from the South. A Southern General led the ragged Continentals on to victory. Southern jurists and Southern statesmanship guided the councils of wisdom. The genius of war pervaded ...
— Historic Papers on the Causes of the Civil War • Mrs. Eugenia Dunlap Potts

... be given to the American company engaged in the construction of the Nicaragua ship canal. It is impossible to overstate the value from every standpoint of this great enterprise, and I hope that there may be time, even in this Congress, to give to it an impetus that will insure the early completion of the canal and secure to the United States its proper relation ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... officers of the 81st, soon won the esteem of the citizens, and placed them on confidential and friendly terms within a short time after their arrival. Though not distinguished by the sporting propensities of their predecessors, the general tone of society received a loftier impetus, social intercourse on a moderate basis was the general feature of the present. Balls and parties were of greater importance than the sports of the turf or field. It must not be inferred the 81st Regiment was quiet and inactive from the facts thus stated. On the contrary, ...
— Lady Rosamond's Secret - A Romance of Fredericton • Rebecca Agatha Armour

... referred to failure of memory on the part of the organism, which in the embryonic stages, infancy, youth, and early manhood, leans upon the memory of what it did when it was in the persons of its ancestors; in middle life, carries its action onward by means of the impetus, already received, and by the force of habit; and in old age becomes puzzled, having no experience of any past existence at seventy-five, we will say, to guide it, and therefore forgetting itself more and more completely till it dies. ...
— Evolution, Old & New - Or, the Theories of Buffon, Dr. Erasmus Darwin and Lamarck, - as compared with that of Charles Darwin • Samuel Butler

... the United States, under the impetus of Western enterprise, rounded out the continental domain, its very existence as a nation was challenged by a fratricidal conflict between two sections. This storm had been long gathering upon the horizon. ...
— History of the United States • Charles A. Beard and Mary R. Beard

... is greatest on the advancing front of the wave, and least on its seaward side. The result is that the front moves more slowly than the rear, so that the wave is forced to gain in height; but for the fact that the total friction which the wave encounters takes away most of its impetus, we might have combers a hundred feet high rolling upon the shelving shores which almost everywhere face ...
— Outlines of the Earth's History - A Popular Study in Physiography • Nathaniel Southgate Shaler

... shocking way, to the great enjoyment of the little crowd of debased and brutal men and women who filled the dram-shop. But fearing a visit from the police, the owner of the den, a strong, coarse Irishman, interfered, and dragging the women apart, pushed Mother Hewitt out, giving her so violent an impetus that she fell forward into the middle of the narrow street, where she lay unable to rise, not from any hurt, ...
— Cast Adrift • T. S. Arthur

... having each received less than the original energy, have less to transmit; each of these balls in turn meets with others, and hence the motion becomes more and more distributed, and distant balls receive less and less impetus. The energy finally given becomes too slight to affect neighboring balls, and the system comes to rest. This is what occurs in the atmosphere; a moving air particle meets not one but many adjacent air particles, and each of these receives a portion of the original ...
— General Science • Bertha M. Clark

... came to the race. White Fell swirled about and leapt to the right, and Christian, unprepared for so prompt a lurch, found close at his feet a deep pit yawning, and his own impetus past control. But he snatched at her as he bore past, clasping her right arm with his one whole hand, and the two ...
— The Were-Wolf • Clemence Housman

... essential parts of the Regulations for the Military Academy, as they stand to this day, are some of the evidences of the indefatigable efforts of Major Thayer to insure method, order, and prosperity to the institution. When relieved, at his own request, the upward impetus given to the ...
— The History of Dartmouth College • Baxter Perry Smith

... more room for the vigorous development of national states, notably of France and England. At the same time intellectual life was enriched by a wealth of fresh views and new ideas, partly the result of the busy intercourse with the East to which the Crusades had given the first impetus, and which had been strengthened and extended by lively trade relations, partly of the revived study, eagerly pursued, of ancient philosophy and literature (see RENAISSANCE). Old forms became too narrow, ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various

... and enticing him further away): And then, the second way, To generate wind—for my impetus— To rarefy air, in a cedar case, By mirrors ...
— Cyrano de Bergerac • Edmond Rostand

... a shadow where there would otherwise have been no shadow, dimmed a brightness that, without her, had gone undimmed? She knew he was not weak naturally. He did not need any strengthening; only impetus, ambition, aim, and ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page

... of Mrs. Rooth and her daughter, found time just to look in, as he said, to spend a part of the evening with them and point the moral of the performance. The pieces, the successes of the winter, had entered the automatic phase: they went on by the force of the impetus acquired, deriving little fresh life from the interpretation, and in ordinary conditions their strong points, as rendered by the actors, would have been as wearisome to this student as an importunate repetition of a good story. But it was not long before he ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James

... which resembles the distant whistle of a big ocean steamer. The men at the rear would join in with wild shouts like those made by American cowboys, most of them rising in their prahus to be able to give more impetus to the paddles. The powerful strokes of our enthusiastic crew made my prahu jump with jerky movements, and we progressed rapidly, arriving early in the afternoon at Tandjong Selor. This time I was made comfortable in a government's ...
— Through Central Borneo: - An Account of Two Years' Travel in the Land of Head-Hunters - Between the Years 1913 and 1917 • Carl Lumholtz

... succeeded in spearing, after a combat which very nearly cost him his life. During the heat of the battle the brave little man's foot had slipped, and the desperately wounded monster, making a rush at the moment, overturned him into a crevice between two ice-blocks, fortunately the impetus of the rush caused the animal to shoot into another crevice beyond, and the man, proving more active than the bear, sprang out of his hole in time to meet his foe with a spear-thrust so deadly that it killed him on the spot. Immediately ...
— Red Rooney - The Last of the Crew • R.M. Ballantyne

... Sanderson lunged forward, twisting Sanderson around with the impetus of the movement. Off his balance, Sanderson saw three or four other men dive toward Colton. He saw Colton reach for the weapon he had previously sheathed; saw the ...
— Square Deal Sanderson • Charles Alden Seltzer

... happened. The Bishop, having backed Norris up for fifty yards at full speed, could not stop himself at once. His impetus carried him on when all need for expenditure of energy had come to an end. He was just slowing down, leaving Norris to complete the thing alone, when to his utter amazement he found the ball in his hands. Norris had passed to him. With a clear run in, and the nearest foeman yards ...
— A Prefect's Uncle • P. G. Wodehouse

... ironwork, all riveted together and lying in midair without support. It tore itself to pieces with roaring and grinding and noises that were like the shrieks of a steam whistle. There was no shock of any kind; the bridge had no impetus except from its own weight. It lurched neither to right nor left, but sank almost in a vertical line, snapping and breaking and tearing as it went, because no integral part could bear for an instant the enormous strain loosed upon it. Some of the men ...
— Alexander's Bridge and The Barrel Organ • Willa Cather and Alfred Noyes

... period when Bjoernson began to merge the artist in the thinker and prophet, his work has given a strong impetus to progress in religious, educational, and political affairs. As regards the first of these matters, it must be remembered that the sort of intolerance with which he has had to contend more resembles ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various

... subscribed to the paper. The judicial advertisements were divided between the "Bee-hive" and the "Courrier." The first issue of the latter contained a pompous eulogy on Rogron. He was presented to the community as the Laffitte of Provins. The public mind having thus received an impetus in this new direction, it was manifest, of course, that the coming elections would be contested. Madame Tiphaine, whose highest hope was to take her husband to Paris as deputy, was in despair. After reading an article in the new paper aimed at her and at Julliard junior, she remarked: "Unfortunately ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac

... years before, was represented in his famous attitude, with arms outstretched and down dropped, his head up and one foot slightly advanced, and to-day was decked, as was becoming more and more usual on such occasions, in his Masonic insignia. It was he who had given immense impetus to that secret movement by his declaration in the House that the key of future progress and brotherhood of nations was in the hands of the Order. It was through this alone that the false unity of ...
— Lord of the World • Robert Hugh Benson

... interest herself in the wrongs of her sex, she answered, "I cannot leave my work." Neither was Vassar College founded from any impulse or suggestion of Suffrage agitators, but in a spirit exactly the opposite. The real impetus to its founding came from Milo Parker Jewett, who was born in Vermont in 1808, and was graduated at Dartmouth College and at Andover Theological Seminary. He was active in the formation of the common-school system of Ohio, ...
— Woman and the Republic • Helen Kendrick Johnson

... and that from this cause a very serious diminution is to be apprehended in the total amount of production. That the first effect of this diminution will be an increase in the price of sugar, and the ultimate effect a greater extension to the growth of sugar in slave countries, and a greater impetus to slavery and the slave-trade." From the same report, we also learn that the prosperity of the Mauritius, no less than that of the West India Islands, had suffered a fearful blight, in consequence of the ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various

... constitutional groups sought to strengthen their position, the more pronounced became the reactionary tendencies in the official world, and these received in 1863 an immense impetus from the Polish insurrection, with which the Nihilists and even some of the Liberals sympathised.* That ill-advised attempt on the part of the Poles to recover their independence had a curious effect on Russian public opinion. Alexander II., ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace

... cotton, etc. etc. And Gen. Foster says the inhabitants (20,000) were "quiet, and well disposed." Most people believe Charleston will fall next, to be followed by a sweep of the entire sea-board; and grave men fear that the impetus thus given the invader cannot ...
— A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital • John Beauchamp Jones

... before Terence could recover its command, dashed at full speed among the French cavalry. Before he could strike a blow in defence, Terence was cut down. As he fell the cavalry passed over him but, fortunately, the impetus of his charge had carried him nearly through their ranks before he fell; and the horses of the rear rank leapt over his body, without touching him. It was the force of the blow that had felled him for, in the hurry of striking, the trooper's ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty

... Meade under Burnside. This made an ostensible reason for the next step, which was to take the field there in person and try what effect his own inflexible will might have in giving an aggressive impetus to that army. It seemed to him to be a choice between that and a continued dead-lock to the end of the chapter. Thus it was that Grant gave up his own desire to continue at the head of the western armies which he had led to successive ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox

... write a work to be called El Islam, or the History of Mohammedanism; which, however, he never finished. It opens with an account of the rise of Christianity, his attitude to which resembled that of Renan. [140] Of Christ he says: "He had given an impetus to the progress of mankind by systematizing a religion of the highest moral loveliness, showing what an imperfect race can and may become." He then dilates on St. Paul, who with a daring hand "rent asunder the ties connecting Christianity with ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright

... at Hugh, his face pale with hatred and anger. But a blow from Falconer's huge fist, travelling faster than the point of his weapon, stretched him on the floor. Such was Falconer's impetus, that it hurled both him and the table across the fallen villain. Falconer was up in a moment. Not so Funkelstein. There was plenty of time for Hugh to secure the rapier, and for Falconer to secure its owner, before he ...
— David Elginbrod • George MacDonald

... up an illiterate, headstrong youth. Yet, when he touched the soil of Africa, a new life seemed infused into his veins. For a while, his days are said to have been full of misery and trouble, but the Brazilian slave-trade happened to receive an extraordinary impetus about that period; and, gradually, the adventurous refugee managed to profit by his skill in dealing with the natives, or by acting as broker among his countrymen. Beginning in the humblest way, he stuck to trade with the utmost tenacity till he ripened into an opulent factor. The tinge of native ...
— Captain Canot - or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver • Brantz Mayer

... investment and foreign trade and partial government ownership of some large banks and industrial firms. Real growth in GNP has averaged about 9% a year during the past three decades. Export growth has been even faster and has provided the impetus for industrialization. Agriculture contributes about 4% to GNP, down from 35% in 1952. Taiwan currently ranks as number 13 among major trading countries. Traditional labor-intensive industries are steadily being replaced with more capital- ...
— The 1991 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... shoulders deep and give chance for a few strokes—breast stroke preferred—until the whole body in a vertical position is headed for the bottom. The elevation of the feet and lower legs in the air gives the body additional {286} impetus downward, and when the object is attained a push-off from the bottom with both feet sends the swimmer to the surface in quick order. To carry any weight ashore, it is necessary to carry it low on the body, hugged close to the waist line, allowing one hand and both feet for swimming, or if on the ...
— Boy Scouts Handbook - The First Edition, 1911 • Boy Scouts of America

... his passion. From the first he had been accustomed to watch his increasing intimacy with Kate Alden from the standpoint of a third person, analysing her actions and feelings no less than his own. And now this tendency gave the crowning impetus to a resolve which sprang originally from his necessity to find sure foothold somewhere amid ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason

... credit cards and mortgages increases. The current account deficit has declined to around 3% of GDP as demand for Czech products in the European Union has increased. Inflation is under control. Recent accession to the EU gives further impetus and direction to structural reform. In early 2004 the government passed increases in the Value Added Tax (VAT) and tightened eligibility for social benefits with the intention to bring the public finance gap down to 4% of GDP by 2006, but more ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States

... and holding on to the side-lines with both hands firmly. He pushed off as he cheered, and the next moment was flying down the hill at railway speed, with a cloud of snow-drift rolling like steam behind him. He reached the foot, and the impetus sent him up and over the snow-drift or wave, and far out upon the surface of the lake. It is true he made one or two violent swerves in this wild descent, owing to inequalities in the hill, but by a touch of his hands in the snow on either side, he ...
— Silver Lake • R.M. Ballantyne

... a means that brought land into use and made slavery profitable. Tobacco and slavery together led to the development of important characteristics of the whole social, political, and economic structure of the Old South. One of the immediate effects of tobacco culture in Virginia was the impetus it gave to the expansion of the area of settlement and to the number ...
— The First Seventeen Years: Virginia 1607-1624 • Charles E. Hatch

... of him, as the young man who was "going out West," while the great soft fluff of smoke in the room made the past a dream and the present an illusion and the future a phantasm.... Then the long journey overland, the little impetus toward the new life flickering drearily, while he gripped up his heart for any fate, growing quieter and quieter, but more and more determined to take Missouri as she came.... Then Missouri herself, the stop at St. Louis, the dip into the State ...
— Sally of Missouri • R. E. Young

... strictly impossible, Bergson attempts to describe it. He would have us picture it as a great current emerging from some central point, radiating in all directions, but diverted into eddies and backwaters. Life is an original impetus, une poussee formidable, not the mere heading affixed to a class of objects which live. We must not speak any longer of life in general as an abstraction or a category in which we may place all living beings. Life, or the vital impulse, consists in a demand for creation, we might almost ...
— Bergson and His Philosophy • J. Alexander Gunn

... of a letter from Mr. ROOSEVELT, censuring President WILSON for the prolixity and verbosity of his Presidential messages, will, it is believed, lend a powerful impetus to the campaign on behalf of brevity in ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, February 18, 1914 • Various

... avalanche overwhelmed it from without. In the seventh century A.D. there was another religious eruption in the Semitic world, this time in the heart of Arabia, where Hellenism had hardly penetrated, and under the impetus of Islam the Oriental burst his bounds again after a thousand years. Syria was reft away from the Empire, and Egypt, and North Africa as far as the Atlantic, and their political severance meant their cultural loss ...
— The Balkans - A History Of Bulgaria—Serbia—Greece—Rumania—Turkey • Nevill Forbes, Arnold J. Toynbee, D. Mitrany, D.G. Hogarth

... conscious time of nothingness. I did not know that I knew aught, or that I lived or acted or desired. I had neither will nor intellect. I was carried along to objects and acts by a certain blind natural impetus. I had a mind which caused me to feel anger, satisfaction, desire. These two facts led those about me to suppose that I willed and thought. I can remember all this, not because I knew that it was so, but because ...
— The World I Live In • Helen Keller

... of impact there was on our side a tall, handsome brigadier, whose black eyes glowed like coals. How he escaped so long was one of the mysteries of battle. His voice rang out above the horrid din as he rallied his men, who were not retreating, but were simply pushed back by the still unspent impetus of the rebel charge. I could not resist his appeal, or the example of his heroism, and, seizing a musket and some cartridges belonging to a fallen soldier, I was soon in the thick of it. I scarcely know what happened for the next few moments, ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe

... wars of competition for the destruction of French commerce and of French sea power; that under William III, the rule of the financial middle class received its first sanction through the establishment of the Bank of England, and the introduction of the national debt; that a new upward impetus was given to the manufacturing middle class through the consistent enforcement of the protective ...
— Selected Essays • Karl Marx

... dark line, skimmering there in the sunlight, the test that all must pass who go in for the Soldiers' Blue Ribbon. Forest King scented water, and went on with his ears pointed, and his greyhound stride lengthening, quickening, gathering up all its force and its impetus for the leap that was before—then like the rise and the swoop of the heron he spanned the water, and, landing clear, launched forward with the lunge of a spear darted through air. Brixworth was passed—the Scarlet and White, a mere gleam of bright colour, a mere speck ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida

... with 82 abstentions note: the European Council brings together heads of state and government and the president of the European Commission and meets at least twice a year; its aim is to provide the impetus for the major political issues relating to European integration and to issue ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency

... the Island of Montreal for the company of St. Sulpice, and to establish there a seminary on the model of that in Paris. This creation, with that of the hospital established by Mlle. Mance, gave a great impetus to the young city of Montreal. Moreover, religion was so truly the motive of the foundation of the colony by M. Olier and his associates, that the latter had placed the Island of Montreal under the protection of the Holy Virgin. The priests ...
— The Makers of Canada: Bishop Laval • A. Leblond de Brumath

... of the engine came rocking toward them, gathering impetus on the sharp grade. Had Scottie missed his trick? But when the thunder of the iron on iron was deafening Andrew, and the engine seemed almost upon them, there was a cloud of white vapor that burst out on either side of it and the brakes were jumped on; the wheels ...
— Way of the Lawless • Max Brand

... crowd was surging all over the room. Hats were smashed and coats were being stripped from their owners' backs as though made of paper, and now and then a particularly frantic buyer or seller would be borne to the floor by the impetus of those who sought to fill his bid or grab his offer. Through all the wild whirl, straight and erect and commanding was the form of Bob, his face cold and expressionless as an iceberg. In five minutes the human mass had worked back to the Sugar-pole and there ...
— Friday, the Thirteenth • Thomas W. Lawson

... leads them to value their lives less than Englishmen do [lives are really less worth living in a poor country], and partly because even the most cowardly Irishman feels obliged to outdo an Englishman in bravery if possible, and at least to set a perilous pace for him, Irish soldiers give impetus to those military operations which require for their spirited ...
— O'Flaherty V. C. • George Bernard Shaw

... which is owned and administered by that political anachronism, a chartered company. It was in the age of Elizabeth that the chartered company, in the modern sense of the term, had its rise. The discovery of the New World and the opening out of fresh trading routes to the Indies gave a tremendous impetus to shipping, commercial and industrial enterprises throughout western Europe and it was in order to encourage these enterprises that the British, Dutch and French governments granted charters to various trading associations. It was the Russia Company, for example, which received its first charter ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell

... a treat to watch Tom's magnificent physique when felling a big tree, stripped to his shirt, with sleeves rolled up, and his gleaming axe slowly raised and poised for a second above him before it fell with the gathered impetus of its own weight and his powerful stress. Biting time after time into the exact place aimed at, and at the most effective angle possible, the clean chips would fly in all directions until the necessary notch was cut and the basal outgrowths, ...
— Grain and Chaff from an English Manor • Arthur H. Savory

... influence to bear upon the young girl whom her son loved. She drearily said to herself, after many days, that her influence was weak, that it accomplished nothing. The strength of it pushed Susannah, who stood faltering at the parting of the ways, and the impetus of that push was felt in her rapid and unsteady step for many and many ...
— The Mormon Prophet • Lily Dougall

... individual inquiry. Education and custom use it as an unexamined but trusted foundation to build on by common assumptions. And so the historic impetus is not yet spent. But it certainly has diminished; and it will diminish more. When faced with dauntless eyes and approached by skeptical methods, it of course cannot have the silencing, all sufficient authority, now that it is buried in the dim remoteness of nineteen centuries and surrounded ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger

... flannel tends to keep the body at an equal temperature, thus obviating the effects of the sudden changes of the weather, and promotes by gentle friction the cutaneous circulation, thus warming the cold body, and giving an impetus to the languid circulation, and preventing an undue quantity of blood from being sent to the lungs, either to light up or to feed inflammation Fine flannel, of course, ought to be worn, which should be changed as frequently ...
— Advice to a Mother on the Management of her Children • Pye Henry Chavasse

... being tantamount to the bringing in of a new religion. When the Church brought to bear upon these recusants the pains and penalties everywhere employed against heretics, the only result was to give the schism martyrs, and with martyrs a fresh impetus. Ten years after the promulgation of the revised liturgy its rash author fell a victim to the jealousy of the boyards and to his own arrogance, and was solemnly deposed by a council. To the Raskol his deposition appeared in the light of a justification of their own course. The condemnation of ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, April 1875, Vol. XV., No. 88 • Various

... accomplished by disseminating an operating system that is apparently inexpensive and easily portable, but also relatively unreliable and insecure (so as to require continuing upgrades from AT&T). This theory was lent a substantial impetus in 1984 by the paper referenced ...
— THE JARGON FILE, VERSION 2.9.10

... on crying needs of ouah trade territory, is really unaccountably slow, all things considered. But I may say right hyah that things ah known to be in sto' foh us which will soon give ouah city an impetus which will cyahy us fo'ward by leaps and bounds—by leaps and bounds, ladies and gentlemen—to that highah and still mo' commandin' place in the galaxy of American cities which is ouahs by right! And now as you-all take youah leave, I propose ...
— Aladdin & Co. - A Romance of Yankee Magic • Herbert Quick

... cannon-shots; which shall mean, 'All ready here!' Then forward, you, on those Prussian posts by the front; I will attack them by the rear. With right fury, both of us! I am told, they are but weak in those posts; surely, by double impetus, and dead-lift effort from us both, they CAN be forced? Only force them,—you are in the open field again; and you march away with me, colors flying; your hunger-cage and all your tribulations ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVII. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Seven-Years War: First Campaign—1756-1757. • Thomas Carlyle

... attain, but by the multitude of individuals who are animated by them at the same time. Every one has had occasion to remark that his emotions in the midst of a sympathizing crowd are far greater than those which he would have felt in solitude. In great republics the impetus of political passion is irresistible, not only because it aims at gigantic purposes, but because it is felt and shared by millions of men ...
— Democracy In America, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alexis de Tocqueville

... accompanying the benevolent petition betokened her disbelief in the possibility of a favorable reply. In her articles of faith it was only by a miracle that a "no-account white man," picked up out of the highway, and whose pockets were barren as were those she had examined, could get an impetus in ...
— At Last • Marion Harland

... now as in years past. Most of the nuts were small and of little commercial value. When hybridizers and other nut enthusiasts started improving the size and quality of the native hazelnut and bringing in filberts from other countries, some impetus was added to the filbert planting program. Only a few took advantage of these new and promising seedlings, and aside from a few small plantings throughout the state the filbert is placed in the ornamental grouping of plants. Several areas in Indiana are suitable for more ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Forty-Second Annual Meeting • Northern Nut Growers Association

... the people in most of the townships in Chester County, has been decided by the Supreme Court to be unconstitutional; and this decision, by inspiring confidence in the dealers and consumers of the fatal poison, seems to have given a new impetus to this diabolical traffic. Wider and deeper its ravages threaten to extend themselves; and to every benevolent mind comes the earnest question, What must now be done? It is too late for women to excuse themselves from ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... Cossacks induced the crowd to raise the poles again. This time everybody's blood was up, and, urging one another on with short staccato shouts, dozens of willing men, stripped to the waist, jumped forward, and the timbers were driven with a tremendous impetus against the gates. As they crashed against the wood, and half splintered the stout entrances, a succession of shots rang out from the roofs, and I saw the French marauders sliding rapidly down and fall out of sight into the compound. The defence ...
— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale

... the plan, the preparation; the middle as the climax and turning point; the end as the consummation. Of course by the middle is not meant a mathematical point of division into equal parts, but a psychological point, which is usually nearer the end, because the impetus of action and purpose carry forward and beyond. Thus in a plot the beginning stands out as setting the problem and introducing the characters and situation; then the movement of the action, gathering force ...
— The Principles Of Aesthetics • Dewitt H. Parker

... spring-board, and we will try a few. Grasp these low pommels and vault over the horse, first to the right, then again to the left; then with one hand each way. Now spring to the top and stand; now spring between the hands forward, now backward; now take a good impetus, spread your feet far apart, and leap over it, letting go the hands. Grasp the pommels again and throw a somerset over it,—coming down on your feet, if the Fates permit. Now vault up and sit upon the horse, at one end, knees the same ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 41, March, 1861 • Various

... the extent of our merely rational horizon at any time? But for faith and imagination it would be a narrow one indeed! Even what we call experience is but a stupid kind of faith. It is a trusting in impetus instead of in love. And those days were fashioning an eternal joy to father and son, for they were loving each other a little more ere each day's close, and were thus putting time, despite of fortune, to its ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald

... that the crowning turret of the tower had fallen in. The huge square stones had broken through the ceiling and floor of the observatory-room, and then, carrying down in front of them a powerful beam that ran across the tower, they had dashed in with redoubled impetus the lower vaulted roof, and dragged down a portion of the castle walls and of the narrow connecting-passage. Not a single step could be taken beyond the postern threshold without risk of falling at least eighty ...
— Weird Tales. Vol. I • E. T. A. Hoffmann

... with a survey of Christmas poetry in England after the Reformation, it may be interesting to follow the developments in Protestant Germany. The Reformation gave a great impetus to German religious song, and we owe to it some of the finest of Christmas hymns. It is no doubt largely due to Luther, that passionate lover of music and folk-poetry, that hymns have practically become the liturgy of German Protestantism; ...
— Christmas in Ritual and Tradition, Christian and Pagan • Clement A. Miles

... felt in Scotland, in great measure through the monastic system, which received a great impetus under David I. (A.D. 1124-A.D. 1153). [Sidenote: Longings for reformation.] The constant wars with England, and the confusion and bloodshed they entailed, had a very unfavourable effect on the prosperity and spiritual activity of the Church of Scotland, so that from Scotland, ...
— A Key to the Knowledge of Church History (Ancient) • John Henry Blunt

... a residence among its beautiful and attractive suburbs. What the last ten years have accomplished in introducing rapid and reliable communication, and building up and improving the country about New York, will probably be repeated several times over in the next decade. An impetus has been given to rural life, that will increase with every facility that is offered, and it will not be many years before the suburbs of New York will compare with any city in the world; and we question, even now, if elsewhere can be found a suburban locality comparable ...
— Woodward's Country Homes • George E. Woodward

... winter, by giving back to the atmosphere the surplus heat stored up during the summer, they have revolutionized agriculture. By supplying motive power for aerial navigation, they have given to commerce a mighty impetus. To them we are indebted for the continuous production of electricity without batteries or dynamos, of light without combustion or incandescence, and for an unfailing supply of mechanical energy for all the ...
— In the Year 2889 • Jules Verne and Michel Verne

... and looked quite pleased at my condition. He said it was a sign that his management of my "terrible" wound, as he called it now, had been excellent. He little thought of how great an impetus to my recovery the coming of the dirty old fakir had been. For as soon as the learned doctor had gone, I went back into my tent, so that I might indulge in something that had now grown quite strange—that is to say, as soon as I was quite out of sight, I indulged ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn

... an epigram mildly twitting Varius for his insistence upon pure diction. The crusade for purity of speech had been given a new impetus a decade before by the Atticists, and we may here infer that Varius, the quondam friend of Catullus, was considered the guardian of that tradition. Vergil, despite his devotion to neat technique, may have had his misgivings about rules that in the end endanger ...
— Vergil - A Biography • Tenney Frank

... the looks of it?" asked the young inventor, as he wheeled the BUTTERFLY out of the shed, and began pumping up the tires of the bicycle wheels on which it ran over the ground, to get impetus enough with ...
— Tom Swift and his Wireless Message • Victor Appleton

... immediately. It was not so intended. First there would be a quick increase of vitality; a powerful impetus given to every organ and faculty. The heart would respond bravely to the fatal spur; the blood in the veins return ...
— Rolling Stones • O. Henry

... the promptings of self-love, a violent temper, pride and ambition could without difficulty overcome. As he rose higher in the social scale the reflection that he had owed the impetus to others was a constant source of annoyance to him. Our house was now but rarely visited by him, unless when some legal difficulties had arisen on which he wished to consult my father or some important ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 86, February, 1875 • Various

... seventh treatise, and enjoying so much delectation with her, he departed, in order to follow the upright and praiseworthy path fruitful of good works, even as it is written in the fourth book of the AEneid! What impetus was that when AEneas had the fortitude alone with Sybilla to enter into Hades, to search for the Soul of his father Anchises, in the face of so many dangers, as it is shown in the sixth book of the AEneid. Wherefore it appears that in ...
— The Banquet (Il Convito) • Dante Alighieri

... speak of the awful doom set forth in the last words here? It has two stages: one a lesser misery, which is the lot of him who stumbles against the stone, while it lies passive to be built on; one more dreadful, when it has acquired motion and comes down with irresistible impetus. To stumble at Christ, or to refuse His grace, and not to base our lives and hopes on Him is maiming and damage, in many ways, here and now. But suppose the stone endowed with motion, what can stand against it? And suppose that the Christ, ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren

... words "one on each arm," I put up first one and then the other of my own, and having got a satisfactory impetus during the rest of my sentence, I crossed the parlour as a catherine-wheel under my mother's nose. It was a new accomplishment, of which I was very proud, and poor Jem somewhat envious. He was clumsy and ...
— We and the World, Part I - A Book for Boys • Juliana Horatia Ewing

... middle in water, and oftentimes both sinking together below the surface, from weakness or from 25 struggles, and perishing in each other's arms. Did the Bashkirs at any point collect into a cluster for the sake of giving impetus to the assault? Thither were the camels driven in fiercely by those who rode them, generally women or boys; and even these quiet creatures were 30 forced into a share in this carnival of murder by ...
— De Quincey's Revolt of the Tartars • Thomas De Quincey

... prosecution of researches into both the character of the new force and its physiological possibilities. In the next few weeks these strange announcements will be trebled or quadrupled, giving the best evidence from all quarters of the great future that awaits the Roentgen rays, and the startling impetus to the universal search for knowledge that has come at the close of the nineteenth century from the modest little laboratory in the Pleicher ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. 6, No. 5, April, 1896 • Various

... it was shrewdly chosen. The pirates, still in compact formation as led by Ned Rackham, were directly abreast of this forward gun of the main deck battery. The deck inclined at a steep and giddy pitch. With a grinding roar the gun rolled from its station. It gathered impetus and lunged across the ship as an instrument of fell destruction. It was more to be feared than ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine

... tactical miss-fires entered Hankey. He has had a cable from his brother Secretary, Bonham Carter, saying the Prime Minister wishes him to stay on longer and that Lord K. would like to know if he can do anything to give an impetus to the operations. Hankey showed me ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume 2 • Ian Hamilton

... forces were mentioned as a factor tending to the adoption of arbitration. During recent times, under the impetus caused by the relatively modern innovations of steam, electricity, and the press, this class of causes has been unusually effective. Industry has overstepped international boundary lines. Through the division of labor we are passing from the independence ...
— Prize Orations of the Intercollegiate Peace Association • Intercollegiate Peace Association

... charging an enemy upon the field of battle. They come in vast bodies, sometimes consisting of many thousands, with the speed of the wind, the men flourishing their sabers and rending the air with the most unearthly cries, those in advance being driven irresistibly on by the weight and impetus of the masses behind. The dreadful torrent bears down and overwhelms every thing that attempts to resist its way. They trample one another and their enemies together promiscuously in the dust; the foremost of the column press on with ...
— Cyrus the Great - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... deceived. They knew that while this labor movement nominally confined itself to one for a shorter workday, yet its impetus was such that it contained the fullest potentialities for developing into a mighty uprising against the very system by which they were enabled to enrich ...
— Great Fortunes from Railroads • Gustavus Myers

... and well-devised; our publications are of a respect-worthy character and of a money-breeding species. Now then I think that the association with us of some one of great name and with capital would give our business a prodigious impetus—that ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... to Dangers from Other Countries.—Something of this kind is true of a number of countries which are in close communication with each other. If a rise of pay gave a great impetus to growth of population in Europe, and if this carried the pay down to its original level or a lower one, emigration would be quickened; and although the natural growth in America might be slower, the American worker might not be adequately protected. The influx ...
— Essentials of Economic Theory - As Applied to Modern Problems of Industry and Public Policy • John Bates Clark

... Labuan or Balambangan would, beyond doubt, give an impetus to trade, merely from the freedom from all restrictions, and the absence of all exactions, which the natives would enjoy; and (piracy being checked) countries which now lie fallow would, from their proximity, be induced to bring their produce ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel

... is to get into the right way, and then so to run that 'the devil, who is light of foot,' may not overtake and trip us up. Running to heaven does not prevent the true, the real enjoyment of earthly blessings, but sanctifies and heightens them. The great impetus in our course is love to the prize—to Christ, to heaven; 'having our affections set upon things above.' Looking unto Jesus. His righteousness imputed unto us by the shedding of his blood, marks all the road, and while we keep that in sight we cannot err. In all earthly things ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... toward compromise, and a distinct recognition of their political franchises. The events that followed so thickly were merely the consequences of causes which, once set in motion, soon attained an impetus that defied ordinary human control. It was doubtless one of the leading incidents of the great and mysterious scheme of Divine Providence for the government of the future destinies of man, that political separation ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper

... effect of her mother's letter remained with Grace. Her already deep interest in her house and her charges received new impetus, and when evening came, she felt, as she entered the big living room where the thirty-four girls were assembled, that she would willingly do anything that lay within her power to forward the prosperity and success ...
— Grace Harlowe's Problem • Jessie Graham Flower

... are supposed to have been basilican, with all the poverty of the older style. Charlemagne's architects, with San Vitale in mind, gave a slight impetus in the far-away chapel at Aix-la-Chapelle, and Gregory of Tours tells us that Bishop Perpetuus built a "glorious" church at Tours. But his description is meagre. After a few mathematical details, he returns to things ...
— Cathedrals and Cloisters of the South of France, Volume 1 • Elise Whitlock Rose

... of the sea and the two great waterways which flanked the Babylonian plain further gave an impetus to trade. The one opened the road to the spice-bearing coasts of Southern Arabia and the more distant shores of Egypt; the other led to the highlands of Western Asia. From the first the Babylonians were merchants and sailors as well as agriculturists. ...
— Babylonians and Assyrians, Life and Customs • Rev. A. H. Sayce



Words linked to "Impetus" :   thrust, drive, driving force, force



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