"Abstention" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... any pledge to the contrary, and resorted to a shallow artifice for achieving their end. A story was started that authenticated copies of the same papers had been received from England by somebody. There was a prudent abstention from any inquiry into the truth of this statement. "I know," said Franklin, "that could not be. It was an expedient to disengage the House." Dishonest as it obviously was, it was successful; members accepted it as a removal of the ...
— Benjamin Franklin • John Torrey Morse, Jr.
... persecution, those who insist on the removal and those who insist on the retention of religious disabilities, those who are in favour of and those who are opposed to a relaxation of the marriage laws, those who advocate a total abstention from intoxicating liquors and those who allow of a moderate use of them,—men on both sides in these controversies, or, at least, the majority of them, doubtless act conscientiously, and yet, as they arrive at opposite conclusions, the conscience of one side or ...
— Progressive Morality - An Essay in Ethics • Thomas Fowler
... into thinking that his fears of her acuteness had been false alarms. If so, he could only be thankful. He wanted to forget. If he had had a prayer to put up on the subject, it would have been that she would allow him to forget. So, as day followed day, regularly, peacefully, with an abstention on her part from comment that could give him pain, he began to indulge the hope—a hope which he knew in his heart to be baseless—that ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King
... of avoiding death, cast his riches into the sea, he will none the less remain avaricious; so, also, if a lustful man is downcast, because he cannot follow his bent, he does not, on the ground of abstention, cease to be lustful. In fact, these emotions are not so much concerned with the actual feasting, drinking, &c., as with the appetite and love of such. Nothing, therefore, can be opposed to these emotions, but high—mindedness and valour, whereof ...
— The Ethics • Benedict de Spinoza
... realised for the first time what he was to realise yet further in connection with this strange business, namely, that the many who go through life refusing to act the part of good Samaritans have at any rate excellent reasons for their abstention. ...
— The End of Her Honeymoon • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... any polygonal angles. Let me say rather it WOULD be difficult: for, as I have shown above, Recognition by Feeling is unknown among the highest society, and to FEEL a Circle would be considered a most audacious insult. This habit of abstention from Feeling in the best society enables a Circle the more easily to sustain the veil of mystery in which, from his earliest years, he is wont to enwrap the exact nature of his Perimeter or Circumference. Three feet being the average Perimeter ...
— Flatland • Edwin A. Abbott
... essential to the success of the operation.(2) A period of fasting prior to the experiment was also frequently prescribed as necessary, which, by weakening the body, must have been conducive to hallucination. Furthermore, abstention from the gratification of the sexual appetite was stipulated in certain cases, and this, no doubt, had a similar effect, especially as concerns magical evocations directed to the satisfaction of the sexual impulse. Add to these factors the details of the ritual itself, the nocturnal ...
— Bygone Beliefs • H. Stanley Redgrove
... lived in the backwoods where any guest is welcome, it might be my duty to act differently. But my ways are cast in places where there is no need for social press-gangs, and the highways and hedges are left unsearched. If therefore by abstention I gain a qualified peace for myself, and confer positive benefit on others, I may go ...
— Apologia Diffidentis • W. Compton Leith
... that he is not justified in aiding to carry on the race, the eugenist will be content to make himself, in the words of Jesus, "a eunuch for the kingdom of Heaven's sake," whether, under modern conditions, that means abstention in marriage from procreation, or voluntary sterilization by operative methods.[43] For, as Giddings has put it, the goal of the race lies, not in the ruthless exaltation of a super-man, but in the evolution of ...
— The Task of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... surprisingly, and until Professor Raleigh's chapter on the subject there was little of a satisfactory kind to be found about it anywhere. It must, however, be admitted that the abstainers from it have been to some extent justified in their abstention. The subject is a curious one: and it has an important place in the history of the Novel, because it shows at once how strong was the nisus towards prose fiction and how surprisingly difficult writers seem, nevertheless, to have found it to hit upon anything really good, ...
— The English Novel • George Saintsbury
... 'The relative merits of these virtues, truth and alms-giving, kind speech and abstention from injury to any creature, are known (measured) by their objective gravity (utility). Truth is (sometimes) more praiseworthy than some acts of charity; some of the latter again are more commendable than true speech. Similarly, O mighty king, and lord of the earth, abstention from doing injury ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa Bk. 3 Pt. 2 • Translated by Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... at Cambridge I had rather surprised the evangelical section of my college (Corpus Christi) by the part I played in founding a short-lived institution called the Anonymous Society, the choicest spirits in which affected canvas shirts and abstention from the use of neckties. As Socialists, we invited the waiters of the college to a soiree, at which a judicious blend of revolutionary economics and bitter beer was relied upon to provide a flow of reasonable and inexpensive entertainment. The society ...
— The Message • Alec John Dawson
... development of slight social differences between the members. For instance, several castes have been created by the degradation of members of the existing castes on account of their marriage of widows. The Pandarams of South India are held in distinction among the begging castes because of their abstention from meat, alcohol, and widow marriage. Indeed, it is interesting to note that a former caste status has been more frequently lost by, and degradation to a new caste has been consequent upon, the adoption of widow ...
— India, Its Life and Thought • John P. Jones
... who attain these heights, through pain of upward toil and the rigors of abstention, are as the demigods, secure above evil and ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... pagan conception of life it was possible to carry out the will of the temporal authorities, without infringing the law of God expressed in circumcisions, Sabbaths, fixed times of prayer, abstention from certain kinds of food, and so on. The one law was not opposed to the other. But that is just the distinction between the Christian religion and heathen religion. Christianity does not require of a man ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy
... violated law of nations, met at Warsaw; and Napoleon III. presented to them a memorandum by which he engaged to abandon Piedmont in the event of her attacking Venice. But "he presupposed that the German Powers would also confine themselves to an attitude of abstention, and would avoid furnishing a pretext for an Italian attack of Austria." At length, the Piedmontese fleet, under Admiral Persano, succeeded in demolishing the more important portion of the fortifications ...
— Pius IX. And His Time • The Rev. AEneas MacDonell
... is this: When whole races and peoples conspire to propagate gigantic mute lies in the interest of tyrannies and shams, why should we care anything about the trifling lies told by individuals? Why should we try to make it appear that abstention from lying is a virtue? Why should we want to beguile ourselves in that way? Why should we without shame help the nation lie, and then be ashamed to do a little lying on our own account? Why shouldn't we be honest and honourable, and lie every time we get a chance? That is to say, why ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... States General held at Blois in 1576 proved highly favorable to the League. The chief reason for their overwhelming success was the abstention of the Protestants from voting. In continental Europe it has always been and is now common for minorities to refuse to vote, the idea being that this refusal is in itself a protest more effective than a definite minority vote would be. ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... practitioner. She remarked, "Oh! Ce n'est rien; papa dit que c'est la sante des enfants"! Parasitic worms of various kinds, though they often cause disease and death, are accepted and tolerated even by the most refined and luxurious, who risk infection rather than submit to the precaution of abstention from raw vegetables and fruits, or to the expenditure of trouble in cleansing those nests of infective germs. It is only within the last thirty or forty years that such cleanliness of body and of clothing and of house-fittings ...
— More Science From an Easy Chair • Sir E. Ray (Edwin Ray) Lankester
... his powers to no single statesman, but held the reins in his own hand. His ability as a ruler consisted in his tact and moderation in managing the conflicting parties, and in his honest abstention from encroaching on the liberties of the people in rare emergencies; so that his reign was peaceable and tolerably successful. It required no inconsiderable ability to preserve the throne to his successor amid such a war of factions, and such a disposition for ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IX • John Lord
... always interesting, in any line of study. In this work its charm is carefully preserved. The sturdy toil of the people, their quaint characteristics, their conservative retention of old dress and customs, their quiet abstention from taking part in the great affairs of the world are clearly reflected in this faithful mirror. The illustrations are of a high grade of ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street
... then the man half rose and faced her. She was startled at his expression. He was facing the most dreadful, not mere thought of ruin to him and his—"Suzuki San is liar and thief. Fifty ryo[u] in hand the promise was for abstention. Now he demands twenty ryo[u] more—the interest on the debt in full." His voice rose to a harsh scream. He laughed despairingly. "Seventy-five ryo[u] interest, for the loan of a month; and that loan forced ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... the necessity sooner or later of putting a check to the increase of monasticism, but it may be a matter of regret that in Italy, the toleration granted to the learned community of Monte Cassino was not extended to more of the historic monasteries. The abstention of the Clerical party from the voting urns deprived them of an influence which, on such points as these, they might have exercised legitimately and perhaps beneficially. To that abstention, the disequilibrium of Italian political life, from first ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... two gentlemen at the table besides the count and myself, but they were both Italians, and had no notion of the English custom of sitting over their wine after dinner. The count was a total abstainer, for his long-enforced abstention had taught him a curious delicacy of palate, so that all wines were actually distasteful to him. When the ladies had retired we smoked a cigarette, drank a cup of black coffee, and made our way to the drawing-room, ...
— In Direst Peril • David Christie Murray
... would I better know, Thou Glorious One! The very truth—Heart's Lord!—of Sannyas, Abstention; and enunciation, Lord! Tyaga; and what separates ...
— The Bhagavad-Gita • Sir Edwin Arnold
... all the public offices to be filled with greedy adventurers, and have been accustomed to consider work of any kind beneath us. The country is paying dearly for it, now. I trust, when the war is over, seeing how the country has suffered by our abstention from politics, and from the affairs of our provinces, we shall put ourselves forward to aid in the ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty
... for this in vain. None offered. It was also in vain that he waited to hear that the Queen had worn the necklace. But he does not appear to have been anxious on that score. Moreover, the Queen's abstention was credibly explained by Madame de la Motte to Laporte with the statement that Her Majesty did not wish to wear the necklace until ...
— The Historical Nights' Entertainment • Rafael Sabatini
... either safe for you or fair to us. Practically it is not as fair as it pretends to be. If the vanquished be defeated, and the victor conquer, through your refusing to join, what is the effect of your abstention but to leave the former to perish unaided, and to allow the latter to offend unhindered? And yet it were more honourable to join those who are not only the injured party, but your own kindred, and by so doing to defend the common interests of Sicily and save your friends the Athenians ...
— The History of the Peloponnesian War • Thucydides
... prevents the evil which would be produced by his apostasy; and very frequently in life, when we abstain from doing wrong, we have to be satisfied with a negative result and with the simple absence (which nobody notices) of some direct mischief, although the abstention may cost more than positive well-doing. This too, however, is but cold consolation when the cord is brought and the grave ...
— Pages from a Journal with Other Papers • Mark Rutherford
... it was distinctly audible, but the tones strengthened and deepened as he proceeded. His audience hung upon his every word, and so he discoursed for half an hour. It was not a great speech,—a series of calm, unimpassioned statements in which clearness of phrase and absolute abstention from aggressive attack upon his opponents were the most marked characteristics. It was courteous toward friend and foe, and foes no less than friends received each clear-cut sentence with attention most respectful. I ...
— The Last Leaf - Observations, during Seventy-Five Years, of Men and Events in America - and Europe • James Kendall Hosmer
... ABSTENTION.—It is no doubt difficult for some men to fully abstain from sexual intercourse and be entirely chaste in mind. The great majority of men experience frequent strong sexual desire. Abstention is very apt to produce in their ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis
... just what I am telling you now. This almost general abstention of electors, compared with the eagerness of former times, is but the avowal of the error to which your masquerade has given rise. And what does it prove but the resolution to mix in your carnival no more? We see clearly through it now, I tell you, that the saturnalia is wearing to its end. In vain ...
— Paris under the Commune • John Leighton
... of Fano may have refrained from offering themselves to the duke's dominion when, in the previous October, he had afforded them by his presence the opportunity of doing so, their conduct now hardly indicated that the earlier abstention had been born of reluctance, or else their minds had undergone, in the meanwhile, a considerable change. For, when they received the brief appointing him their lord, they celebrated the event by public rejoicings and illuminations; whilst on July ...
— The Life of Cesare Borgia • Raphael Sabatini
... bicarbonate towards the end of the period of digestion, in order to neutralise the acid in the stomach. This gives relief, but does not cure, as the dose has to be repeated after each meal; in course of time the quantity of soda has sometimes to be increased to an alarming extent. Fourth; the abstention from starchy foods and the substitution of an exclusive flesh dietary. In the "Salisbury" treatment, raw minced beef is given. This method often gives immediate relief, but its ultimate effect on the kidneys and other ...
— The Chemistry of Food and Nutrition • A. W. Duncan
... purposely encumbered himself with this stranger to make it plain that, hover as he might, he waived all claim to her attention. What better could a man do? And now he forbore even to look her way. The abstention was as marked as any look could have been. As they passed, Hugh was silent, but Ramsey spoke, her speech a light blend of ...
— Gideon's Band - A Tale of the Mississippi • George W. Cable
... to terms was used twice by the Roman proletariat over two thousand years ago. The plebeians, so the story goes, unable to get their economic and political rights, stopped work and withdrew from the city to the Sacred Mount. Their abstention from labor did not mean the going out of street lamps, the suspension of street-car traffic, and the closing of factories and shops, but, besides the loss of fighting men, it meant that no more shoes could be had, no more carpentry ...
— The Common People of Ancient Rome - Studies of Roman Life and Literature • Frank Frost Abbott
... contracts or participates in collective bargaining is to be ostracized. And even those who are disinclined to battle will be forced into the ranks by compulsion. "Those who continue to work will be compelled to quit," says Guerard. The strike is not to be merely a peaceable abstention from work. The very machines are to be made to strike by being rendered incapable of production. These are the methods ...
— Violence and the Labor Movement • Robert Hunter
... rewarded for working well than that they should be punished for working badly. This system is already in operation in the civil service, where a man is only dismissed for some exceptional degree of vice or virtue, such as murder or illegal abstention from it. Sufficient pay to ensure a livelihood ought to be given to every person who is willing to work, independently of the question whether the particular work at which he is skilled is wanted at the moment or not. If ...
— Political Ideals • Bertrand Russell
... in the Caribbean. In the Far East the United States claimed an equality of status with the European powers. In the rest of the world, Europe, Africa, the Levant, the traditional American policy of abstention held good absolutely, at least until the close of ...
— Woodrow Wilson and the World War - A Chronicle of Our Own Times. • Charles Seymour
... always been assigned for abstention: (1) the sentiment which disposes men to leave the relics of the dead to their rest in the tomb: (2) the prohibition contained in the four lines inscribed upon Shakespeare's gravestone. With the former of these I have sufficiently dealt ...
— Shakespeare's Bones • C. M. Ingleby
... himself. He knew that no one would be particularly concerned on his account, for he was an indifferent player, and also a prefect might on a pinch excuse himself. After a week's abstention, during which, rather to his disappointment, no notice was taken of his defection, he began to talk about it to one and another of the more studious boys of the house, boys very keen on winning the school prizes at the end of the term for which they were entered. Sherriff of the ...
— The Master of the Shell • Talbot Baines Reed
... and if the British could not work out their own salvation then it were well that empire should pass from such a race. The magnificent Indian army of 150,000 soldiers, many of them seasoned veterans, was for the same reason left untouched. England has claimed no credit or consideration for such abstention, but an irresponsible writer may well ask how many of those foreign critics whose respect for our public morality appears to be as limited as their knowledge of our principles and history would have advocated such self denial had their own countries ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle
... all this Redmond said no word in public. He threatened disclosure in debate at one period; yet on a strong representation from Mr. Tennant—in whose friendliness, as in the Prime Minister's, he had confidence—he refrained. To this abstention he added the most practical proof of good will. Lord Wimborne, now Lord-Lieutenant, seriously concerned at the continued drop in recruiting, which had not shown any sign of recovery since the Coalition Government was formed, came to him with the proposal for a conference ...
— John Redmond's Last Years • Stephen Gwynn
... should predominate. Free institutions do not settle the question; it is most manifestly rife to-day in a free country, Canada. In Italy itself a great clerical party is working silently but ceaselessly, under the mask of abstention from the elections, to recover its political power. The Sardinian Government could not withdraw from the duel at will; the Church in Piedmont was a political force constantly on the lookout for an opening to retake the position ...
— Cavour • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... dearest Franz, you will cause me the deepest anxiety unless you satisfy me on this point, and every rational person will see that this can be done only by a long and careful cure, together with absolute rest and abstention from every effort and excitement. To speak plainly, you dear people cannot long go on as you do now. Others would be ruined very soon by this kind of thing, which, at last, must become detrimental to you also. Listen, my Franz, come to me. No one ...
— Correspondence of Wagner and Liszt, Volume 2 • Francis Hueffer (translator)
... of January he was goaded to the verge of frenzy by the action of the enemy in shelling the district on the left bank of the river. He had come to credit the Prussians with reasons of humanity for their abstention, which was in fact due simply to the difficulties they experienced in bringing up their guns and getting them in position. Now that a shell had killed two little girls at the Val-de-Grace, his scorn and hatred knew no bounds for those barbarous ruffians who murdered little children and threatened ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... extensive and important patronage by the vast number of petty posts which the system employed for collecting tickets places at their disposal. The tobacco monopoly is farmed out to a company, on whom any loss would fall in the first instance; but if the abstention from tobacco were continued long, the Government would soon feel the effects, through the inability of the company to keep up ...
— Rome in 1860 • Edward Dicey
... hurry. It would expire with dignity and leave a rich inheritance of stench. Meanwhile, its decadence was marked enough to frank the Major in neglecting "Harry Lorrequer" for the rest of the time, and also served to persuade him that he had really been reading. Abstention from a book under compulsion has something of the character of perusal. Gibbon could not have collected his materials on those lines, certainly. But the Major felt his conscience clearer from believing that he meant to go on where he had been obliged to stop. He cancelled "Harry Lorrequer," ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... at heart of my [forced] abstention from calling on the name of God; so I said, "There is no god but God and Mohammed is His apostle." Whereupon the shining one smote the Marid with his javelin and he melted away and became ashes; whilst I was precipitated from his back and fell headlong toward the earth, till I dropped into the midst ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume IV • Anonymous
... hour when all but one ceased suddenly from wine; that one, who still continued to drink as he saw fit, was the host. He knew the reason of their abstention; he had heard the trumpet in the harbour that told the hour and proclaimed the fast and vigil, and he felt, as all did, that at last the figure and the presence of which none would speak—the figure and ...
— Hilaire Belloc - The Man and His Work • C. Creighton Mandell
... austerity also were means calculated to promote faith in the sincerity of the priest, and consequently in the truth of their assertions and divine interpretations. The abstention from sexual intercourse was strictly enjoined on all who had received a Magbabya, and observance of the restriction was rigid apparently. The priests and their wives slept in the religious building, but did not cohabit, ...
— The Manbos of Mindano - Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXIII, First Memoir • John M. Garvan
... land—a fact which shows how little the romantic imagination tells as against cheapness and comfort of hotels and the notion that a heart strained by climbing is good for the health. And this fact does but make our Sovereign's abstention the more remarkable. Switzerland is not 'smart,' but a King is not the figure-head merely of his entourage: he is the whole nation's figure-head. Switzerland, alone among nations, is a British institution, and King Edward ought not to snub her. That ...
— Yet Again • Max Beerbohm
... clock on the mantelpiece in the parlour pointed only to a little better than three o'clock they were obliged to eat heartily, for fear of giving pain to Uncle Meshach; to drink much was not essential, but nothing could have excused abstention from the solid fare. The repast, actively conducted by the mourning host, was not finished until nearly half-past four. Then Twemlow and the doctor said ...
— Leonora • Arnold Bennett
... an oath had, for the last few weeks, been a rare thing in the camp. We made up for our temporary abstention during the next half-hour. Never was heard such symmetrical and heartfelt blasphemy. When at last we succeeded in getting the door off its hinges all sight of both rangers and treasure had disappeared, nor ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Gauri, the wife of the great god Siva. When he comes to know that Garuda, the bird celebrated in mythology, is used to eat up one snake each day, he makes up his mind to offer himself to the bird as a victim, and eventually succeeds in converting Garuda to the principle of Ahimsa or abstention from slaughter; but he himself is on the point of succumbing to the wounds he has received, when, through the timely intervention of ...
— Tales from the Hindu Dramatists • R. N. Dutta
... peace was not a noble one. We had indeed reached one of the lowest and flattest levels of all our undulating history; and it must be admitted that the contemptuous calculation with which Germany counted on our submission and abstention was not altogether unfounded, though it was, thank God, unfulfilled. The full fruition of our alliances against freedom had come. The meek acceptance of Kultur in our books and schools had stiffened what ...
— The Crimes of England • G.K. Chesterton
... be borne in mind that abstention from active political life had been in no sense required, or even thought desirable, in members of the Royal House. George III. himself had waged a life-long struggle with the Whig party, that powerful oligarchy that since the accession of the House of Hanover had virtually ruled the country; ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria
... him, and if she had not been in love she might easily have found a cure for her misfortune as her husband allowed her perfect liberty. She grieved bitterly, for she did not know that my brother was impotent, and fancied that the reason of his abstention was that he did not return her love; and the mistake was an excusable one, for he was like a Hercules, and indeed he was one, except where it was most to be desired. Her grief threw her into a consumption of which she died five or six years later. She did ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... had never got up in the morning without looking forward to seeing her and hearing her voice before he should lie down again. A man more like others would have said to himself that no promise could bind him to anything more than the performance of an action, or the abstention from one, and that the right of dreaming was his own for ever. But Zorzi judged differently. He had a sensitiveness that was rather manly than masculine; he had scruples of which he was not ashamed, but which most ...
— Marietta - A Maid of Venice • F. Marion Crawford
... fruitless vexations, dull anxieties, sordid designs. To detach oneself, not from life, but from the scum and foam of life; to realise that the secret lay in the middle of it all, and that it was to be discerned not by fastidious abstention, not by a chilly asceticism, but by welcoming all nobler impulses, all spiritual influences; not by starving body or mind, but by selecting one's food carefully and temperately. If a man, Hugh thought, could live life ...
— Beside Still Waters • Arthur Christopher Benson
... Viborg—Preisler's and the Phoenix are all that can be desired. But my cousin, whose experiences I have to tell you now, went to the Golden Lion the first time that he visited Viborg. He has not been there since, and the following pages will, perhaps, explain the reason of his abstention. ...
— Ghost Stories of an Antiquary • Montague Rhodes James
... PREMIER'S motion allotting time for remaining stages of Budget Bill, he led his little flock into Opposition Lobby, assisting to reduce Ministerial majority to figure of 23. In this labour of love he found himself assisted by abstention of two groups of Ministerialists, one objecting to procedure on Finance Bill, the other thirsting for ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, July 15, 1914 • Various
... came to the conclusion that Prudence was right in the general effect of the suggestion. What I needed was a change of scene. Long abstention from travel and variety of incident had made me restless and discontented. I had not been in Europe for two years. Undoubtedly I was pining for a lazy tour of the Continent. The thought decided me. I should book my passage on the steamer that sailed the ...
— The Romance of an Old Fool • Roswell Field
... St. Stephen's Green Park. She knew every bird in the Park, those that had chickens and those that had had chickens, and those that never had any chickens at all—these latter were usually drakes, and had reason on their side for an abstention which might otherwise have appeared remarkable, but they did not deserve the pity which Mary lavished on their childlessness, nor the extra pieces of bread with which she sought to recompense them. She loved to watch the ducklings swimming ...
— Mary, Mary • James Stephens
... of our every day life with those who are not of our own Faith. Willingly or unwillingly we are bound to leave an impression of our belief in the business and social circles into which our life is cast. Our silence and abstention alone often militate against the Church. Let then the purity and spirituality of our lives, the honesty of our commercial relations, the sanctity of our home, bear witness to the sacredness of our religion and to the seriousness of ...
— Catholic Problems in Western Canada • George Thomas Daly
... life only for the purpose of originating such knowledge. This the Strakra declares in Ve. S. IV, 1, 12; 16; III, 4, 33, and other places. The Vkyakra also declares that steady remembrance results only from abstention, and so on; his words being 'This (viz. steady remembrance meditation) is obtained through abstention (viveka), freeness of mind (vimoka), repetition (abhysa), works (kriy), virtuous conduct (kalyna), freedom from dejection (anavasda), absence of exultation (anuddharsha); ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut
... India in March 1836. In reply to Dost Mahomed's letter of congratulation, his lordship wrote: 'You are aware that it is not the practice of the British Government to interfere with the affairs of other independent states;' an abstention which Lord Auckland was soon to violate. He had brought from England the feeling of disquietude in regard to the designs of Persia and Russia which the communications of our envoy in Persia had fostered in the Home ...
— The Afghan Wars 1839-42 and 1878-80 • Archibald Forbes
... a fact to be noted that of the entire household only Lady Wetherby could fairly be described as happy. It took very little to make Lady Wetherby happy. Fine weather, good food, and a complete abstention from classical dancing—give her these and she asked no more. She was, moreover, delighted at Claire's engagement. It seemed to her, for she had no knowledge of the existence of Lord Dawlish, a genuine ...
— Uneasy Money • P.G. Wodehouse
... went to take the admiral's orders. The fort surrendered during the night. The garrison, two thousand strong, evacuated the place, and a convention was concluded with the general in command at Vera Cruz for the abstention of both sides from further hostilities. We then occupied the fort, and the admiral gave me orders to moor the Creole under its walls, and together with Comte de Gourdon, commanding the Cuirassier, to put prize crews on board the vessels of the Mexican Navy ...
— Memoirs • Prince De Joinville
... to kindle nightly in their honor, however great a heretic you may be.... You adopt at once, and without reservation, those creole home habits which are the result of centuries of experience with climate,—abstention from solid food before the middle of the day, repose after the noon meal;—and you find each repast an experience as curious as it is agreeable. It is not at all difficult to accustom oneself to green ...
— Two Years in the French West Indies • Lafcadio Hearn
... Parrish's secretarial staff. Thrift had become with him more than a habit. It was a positive obsession. It revealed itself in such petty meannesses as a perpetual cadging for matches or small change and a careful abstention from any offer of hospitality. Never in the whole course of his service had Bruce Wright heard of Mr. Jeekes taking anybody out to lunch or extending any of the usual hospitalities of life. He was not a little surprised, therefore, to hear ...
— The Yellow Streak • Williams, Valentine
... careless way in which the chief spiritual food is treated. People go to the Holy Communion when they feel inclined, instead of according to a fixed rule, modifying the rule, just as they would in the case of their meals, by circumstances which may arise; spiritual sickness might dictate abstention from Communion for a while, just as bodily disease might require a ...
— The Discipline of War - Nine Addresses on the Lessons of the War in Connection with Lent • John Hasloch Potter
... felt ruffled—partly because his brother's voluntary abstention from experience always annoyed him, and partly because he knew that in this case the child was right and ...
— Joanna Godden • Sheila Kaye-Smith
... exciting and even romantic about them—they would not be so alluring if they had not—while the homely virtues of honesty, frankness, modesty, and self-restraint appear too often as a dull and priggish abstention from the more daring and adventurous joys of eager living. If evil were always ugly and goodness were always beautiful at first sight, there would be little of the trouble and havoc in the world that is ...
— Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories - Reprinted from The Hill of Trouble and The Isles of Sunset • Arthur Christopher Benson
... there were few who did not in their hearts dislike them. However much the young person might be shielded, he soon got to know that men and women of the world—often far nicer people than the prophets who preached abstention—continually spoke sneeringly of the new doctrinaire laws, and were believed to set them aside in secret, though they dared not do so openly. Small wonder, then, that the more human among the student classes were provoked by the touch- not, taste-not, handle-not precepts of ...
— Erewhon • Samuel Butler
... Menpes has continued to draw from photographs, and—the base of his artistic education being deficient from the first—the result of his long abstention from Nature is apparent, even to the least critical, in the some hundred and seventy paintings, etchings, and what he calls diamond-points on ivory, on exhibition at Messrs. Dowdeswell's. Diamond-points on ivory may astonish the unthinking public, ...
— Modern Painting • George Moore
... continually expressed my regret at what I thought the timidity of Mr. Gladstone's Government.' Thus, when it was beaten by the abstention of Liberals on Fawcett's Election Expenses Bill, which proposed to throw the necessary expenses of returning officers on the local rates, Charles Dilke 'was angry with the Government for not having so much as named the Bill upon their Whip.' ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke V1 • Stephen Gwynn
... Minister, nothing of importance would be done; organized Labour would then, so he hopes and believes, turn to revolution. On this ground, he wishes his supporters in this country to do everything in their power to secure a Labour majority in Parliament; he does not advocate abstention from Parliamentary contests, but participation with a view to making Parliament obviously contemptible. The reasons which make attempts at violent revolution seem to most of us both improbable and undesirable in this country carry ...
— The Practice and Theory of Bolshevism • Bertrand Russell
... he expect it to be? would he have us represent it as beautiful and gratifying? The answer to this question, I fear, must be a blunt Yes; for it seems impossible to root out of an Englishman's mind the notion that vice is delightful, and that abstention from it is privation. At all events, as long as the tempting side of it is kept towards the public, and softened by plenty of sentiment and sympathy, it is welcomed by our Censor, whereas the slightest attempt to place it in the light of the policeman's ...
— Mrs. Warren's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... ever reinforced in my already-expressed opinion that Mr. Carville was a man of more ability than ambition. There was to me something bizarre in his deliberate abstention from any contact, save books, with the larger intellectual sphere to which he by right belonged. His naive confession of culture showed that he was aware of his latent power, but I was not sure whether he had ever realized the stern law by which organs become atrophied by disuse. ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... are entitled to our respect: "Yes—birth control may be necessary, but the only birth control which is justifiable is voluntary abstention from connubial relations." Such abstention would be either ineffective or, if effective, impracticable and harmful to health ...
— Love—Marriage—Birth Control - Being a Speech delivered at the Church Congress at - Birmingham, October, 1921 • Bertrand Dawson
... has had the good fortune to be credited with habitual advocacy of truth and justice, if it has been praised for abstention from the less worthy kind of satire, if it has been trusted by those who keep guard over the purity of womanhood and of youth, we, the best witnesses, turn for a moment from our sorrow to bear the fullest and the most willing testimony ...
— Punch, Volume 101, Jubilee Issue, July 18, 1891 • Various
... August 8th, for the purpose of voting the war credits, the Social Democrats of both factions, Bolsheviki and Mensheviki, fourteen in number,[2] united upon a policy of abstention from voting. Valentin Khaustov, on behalf of the two factions, ...
— Bolshevism - The Enemy of Political and Industrial Democracy • John Spargo
... to the Council giving their version of the situation. This letter was not signed by the licentiate Herrera, one of the auditors, who afterwards wrote to the Emperor, explaining and justifying his abstention, by saying that he disapproved of the violent language used against the bishops and did not share the views of his associates concerning them. Although he found Las Casas over-zealous, he considered that the Indians were harshly treated and ...
— Bartholomew de Las Casas; his life, apostolate, and writings • Francis Augustus MacNutt
... words, "as a stepping-stone to ulterior objects, which they dared not avow till their power of carrying them into effect should be by this first acquisition secured." But the alarm which the spread of revolutionary ideas excited in his mind was displayed, not only passively in this abstention from the advocacy of measures the expediency of which must at all times in some degree depend on the tone of their introduction, but also in active measures of repression, some of which were not, indeed, unwarranted ...
— The Constitutional History of England From 1760 to 1860 • Charles Duke Yonge
... antarabhava; (3) merit accrues not only by gift (tyaganvaya) but also by the fact of the actual use and advantage reaped by the man to whom the thing was given (paribhoganvaya pu@nya); (4) not only abstention from evil deeds but a declaration of intention to that end produces merit by itself alone; (5) they believe in a pudgala (soul) as distinct from the skandhas from which it can be said to be either different or non-different. "The pudgala cannot be said to be transitory ...
— A History of Indian Philosophy, Vol. 1 • Surendranath Dasgupta
... seemed to like the lack of effusive words. Harry knew that his general had not tasted food. Neither had he. He had actually forgotten it in his keenness for his work, and now he was proud of the fact. He was proud, too, of the comradeship of abstention that it gave him with Stonewall Jackson. As he rode in silence by the side of the great commander he made for himself an ideal. He would strive in his own youthful way to show the zeal, the courage and the untiring ...
— The Scouts of Stonewall • Joseph A. Altsheler
... his such as we have quoted, were consistent with a perfectly blameless demeanour in regard to the forms of conduct and belief as prescribed by the Church, with an avoidance of criticism and argument on ecclesiastical matters, which he knew were not his vocation, and above all with a complete abstention from such talk in the presence of his children. As to what concerns further the positive religious influence which he exercised over his children, any such impressions as he might have given by what he said of the Count of Mansfeld, were fully counterbalanced by the severity ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin
... of same stock as the; effect of superstition on; abstention of, from swine's flesh; customs ...
— Essays and Miscellanies - The Complete Works Volume 3 • Plutarch
... lie upon it. This was their bed; and here they lay, each wrapped up in his blanket, Mick in the middle, with our two friends at the sides. Now it was not only on Mick's account, but quite as much in reference to Dick Shand, that Caldigate deprecated any reference to drink. The abstention hitherto had been marvellous. He himself would have gone daily to the store for a bottle of beer, but that he recognised the expediency of keeping them away from the place. He had heard that it was a peculiarity of the country that all labour was done without drink, even when it was done ...
— John Caldigate • Anthony Trollope
... importance came the affairs of Spain. It was certain that these, far more than the occupation of Naples, would supply the real business of the Congress of 1822. England had a far greater interest in both questions than in the Italian negotiations of the two previous years. It was felt that the system of abstention which England had then followed could be pursued no longer, and that the country must be represented not by some casual and wandering diplomatist, but by its leading Minister, Lord Castlereagh. The intentions of the other Powers in regard to Spain were ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... silently, as a sign of acquiescence. Naroumoff laughingly congratulated Hermann on his abjuration of that abstention from cards which he had practised for so long a period, and wished him ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne
... since Crabbe's last appearance as an author, and he seems to have thought it due to his readers to give some reason for his long abstention from the poet's 'idle trade.' He pleads a higher 'calling,' that of his professional duties, as sufficient excuse. Moreover, he offers the same excuse for his 'progress in the art of versification' being less marked than his readers might otherwise expect. He then proceeds to tell the ...
— Crabbe, (George) - English Men of Letters Series • Alfred Ainger
... All my supporters are detained voteless under arms, and the only votes cast will be those of the older and more timid men." How many supporters he had under arms the near future was to show. Meanwhile, he and his partizans reinforced this reason for abstention from the polls with ...
— Greece and the Allies 1914-1922 • G. F. Abbott
... Churches regularly formed in them, have generally been under a more sensible Protection of Heaven." "Sirs," he says, "a Church-State well form'd may fortify you wonderfully!" He recommends abstention from profane swearing, furious cursing, Sabbath breaking, unchastity, dishonesty, robbing of God by defrauding the ministers of their dues, drunkenness, and revels and he reminds them that even the Indians have family prayers! Like his successors who solicited missionary contributions ...
— The Frontier in American History • Frederick Jackson Turner
... dislike of rhetoric and moralising, the two main nerves of eighteenth-century verse. Left to themselves, these make sad work of poetry; yet poetry includes eloquence, and life includes morality. The poetry of Morris is sensuous, as upon the whole poetry should be; but in his resolute abstention from the generalizing habit of the previous century, the balance is lost between the general and the concrete, which all really great poetry preserves. Byron declaims and Wordsworth moralises, both of them perhaps too much; yet in the end to the advantage of their poetry, which is full of ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... the Government, they were absolutely terrified by this act of 'boycotting' (the slang word then current for such acts of abstention). Their counsels became wild and vacillating to the last degree: one hour they were for giving way for the present till they could hatch another plot; the next they all but sent an order for the arrest in the lump of all the workmen's committees; the ...
— News from Nowhere - or An Epoch of Rest, being some chapters from A Utopian Romance • William Morris
... not flee for protection to poverty against the loss of riches, nor to a lack of friendship against the loss of friends, nor by abstention from procreation against the death of children, but to ...
— Beethoven: the Man and the Artist - As Revealed in his own Words • Ludwig van Beethoven
... The constant assertions of the German statesmen, and of the Kaiser himself, that war had been forced upon them were declared untrue by their associate Italy in the very beginning, and the verdict of Italy was the verdict of the world. Not much was said in the beginning about Italy's abstention from war. The Germans, indeed, sneered a little and hinted that some day Italy would be made to regret her course, but now that the Teuton snake is scotched the importance of Italy's action has been perceived and appraised at its ...
— History of the World War - An Authentic Narrative of the World's Greatest War • Francis A. March and Richard J. Beamish
... upon by critics, I feel regret, although not repentance—namely, on any "anecdotic iconoclasm" where fact refuted fancy, and on my abstention from pronouncing judgments where the evidence was inconclusive. But how can a conscientious biographer help this ungraciousness and inaccommodativeness? Is it not his duty to tell the truth, and nothing but ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... day he spent most of his time in her society, and Miss Laura Lumley's recent habitation became the place in London to which his thoughts and his steps were most attached. He was highly conscious of his not now carrying out that principle of abstention he had brought to such maturity before leaving Paris; but he contented himself with a much cruder justification of this lapse than he would have thought adequate in advance. It consisted simply in the idea that to be identified with the first ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... and Millet are capital instances of the happy productiveness of an artist in sympathy with his public or of the difficulties, nobly conquered in this case, of an artist without public appreciation; the greatest merit attributed to "The American School" is an abstention from the extravagances of those who would make incomprehensibility a test of greatness. Finally, the work of Saint-Gaudens is a noble example of art fulfilling its social function in expressing and in elevating the ideals of its time ...
— Artist and Public - And Other Essays On Art Subjects • Kenyon Cox
... no objections, but there were reasons, positive ones—and all excellent, all charming." She spoke with an absence of all repudiation of his exposure of the spring of her conduct; and this abstention, clearly and effectively conscious, evidently cost her nothing. "It IS always the Prince; and it IS always, thank heaven, marriage. And these are the things, God grant, that it will always be. That I could help, a year ago, ...
— The Golden Bowl • Henry James
... ballots either for or against a convention, no convention could be held. Nowhere, however, was this plan of not voting fully carried out, for, though most whites abstained, enough of them voted (against the conventions, of course) to make the necessary majority in each State. The effect of the abstention policy upon the personnel of the conventions was unfortunate. In every convention there was a radical majority with a conservative and all but negligible minority. In South Carolina and Louisiana, there were Negro majorities. In every State except North ...
— The Sequel of Appomattox - A Chronicle of the Reunion of the States, Volume 32 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Walter Lynwood Fleming
... Scott did not often care to trust himself out of the last echoes of "the pipes that played for Charlie," and though his knowledge of contemporary life was infinitely wider than Stevenson's, we see many good reasons for his abstention from use of his knowledge. For example, it is obvious that he could not attempt a romance of the War in the Peninsula, and of life in London, let us say, while Wellington was holding Torres Vedras. Even among Stevenson's abandoned projects, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... diminishing bottle was circulated from hand to hand, the hilarity sensibly increasing with each passage. Their enforced abstention of late made them more than usually susceptible. Their faces were flushed, and their eyes began to be a little bloodshot. They continually forgot that the girl could not speak English, and their facetious remarks to each other were in reality for her benefit. ...
— The Huntress • Hulbert Footner
... residence, and precedence has been given to those who have shown a real desire to return to the land. Other essentials are a good character, both personal and as a worker, bodily and mental health, and total abstention from any form of alcohol. No creed test is required, and there are men of various religious faiths upon the Settlement, only a proportion of ...
— Regeneration • H. Rider Haggard
... of strong drink; teetotalism is absolute abstention therefrom. A man may be temperate without being a teetotaler; all teetotalers are temperate, at least as far as alcohol is concerned, although they are sometimes, some of them, accused of using temperance as a cloak for much intemperance of speech. If this be true—and ...
— Explanation of Catholic Morals - A Concise, Reasoned, and Popular Exposition of Catholic Morals • John H. Stapleton
... spirit. Puritanism overturned the balance of things, and by concentrating its condemnation on sexual derelictions became blind to the greater sins of pride, avarice and anger. We have inherited the prejudice without acquiring the abstention, but the Middle Ages had a clearer sense of comparative values and they could forgive, or even ignore, the sin of Abelard and Heloise when they could less easily excuse the sin of spiritual pride or deliberate cruelty. Moreover, these same Middle Ages believed very earnestly in ...
— Historia Calamitatum • Peter Abelard
... word "continence" is taken by various people in two ways. For some understand continence to denote abstention from all venereal pleasure: thus the Apostle joins continence to chastity (Gal. 5:23). In this sense perfect continence is virginity in the first place, and widowhood in the second. Wherefore the same applies to continence understood thus, as to virginity which we have ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... after eighteen months of abstention, and for the last time, I took the Sacrament. This statement will seem strange to my readers, but the matter happened ...
— Autobiographical Sketches • Annie Besant
... over, Katherine and Miles ran the boat down to the water's edge, and floated it, getting in and paddling up and down to see that there was no leakage, and to enjoy the novel sensation after the long abstention from boating. But there was work to be done, and they could not afford to spend even a part of the day in rowing for their own amusement. Stores had to be taken down to Seal Cove, and there was some bargaining to be done for some tusks of narwhal ivory which 'Duke Radford had ...
— A Countess from Canada - A Story of Life in the Backwoods • Bessie Marchant
... and went his way. If there was a thoughtfulness in the generosity of this action, the mode in which it was performed—the measured coldness of the words—the look of impassive examination that accompanied them, and the abstention from anything that savoured of apology for a liberty—were all ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever
... conference would be useless and dangerous unless a basis were laid down before. He refused to interfere in any way with the Cretan rebellion, and with the impending disputes between Turkey and Greece. His abstention on this question was blamed by some, but it met with the full approbation of his great opponent, Lord Russell, who declared that 'he had acted with much prudence and discretion.' He laid the foundation also of the settlement of the long outstanding ...
— Historical and Political Essays • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... revolutionists declared themselves in favor of the principle of absolutely no reelection. Meantime the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court handed down a decision that the action of the Congress in sustaining the President was illegal, since in reality no elections had been held because of the abstention of voters and the seizure of the polls by revolutionists or government forces. "Above the constitution, nothing; above the constitution, no one," he declared. But as this assumption of a power of judgment ...
— The Hispanic Nations of the New World - Volume 50 in The Chronicles Of America Series • William R. Shepherd
... into a positive cultivation of ignorance. In ignorance she could humour her fancy, and that proved a useful freedom. She could treat the little nameless object as indeed unnameable—she could make their abstention enormously definite. There might indeed have been for Strether the portent of this in ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... American books any longer, because they can get English works, mere printed rags, but paying nothing to English authors, for a few cents. The rags, of course, fall to pieces, and are tossed into the waste-paper basket, and thus a habit of desultoriness and of abstention from books worth styling books grows and grows, like a noxious and paralysing parasite, over the American intellect. In this way our pleasant vices are made instruments to plague us, and the condition of the law, which ...
— Lost Leaders • Andrew Lang
... their opposition to the adoption of any meridian which had a national character, which has given rise to the motion presented by Mr. JANSSEN, it follows that every measure voted by the Congress tending to the adoption of a national meridian, will be, by the very fact of the abstention of France, an incomplete measure, and which will not answer the purpose sought by the Conference. I hasten to add, in order to avoid all erroneous interpretations which could be given to my words, that it would be the same, if, for ...
— International Conference Held at Washington for the Purpose of Fixing a Prime Meridian and a Universal Day. October, 1884. • Various
... this abstention was that the chancellor, owing to his increasing weight and weakness, could not remain long on his feet, as people are expected to do on such occasions. Nor do I remember seeing him at any of the festivities attending the marriage ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... "Let him that is without sin cast the first stone," had been followed out there would never have been another stone cast. And one might ask if the world would have been, or could have been, the worse for that abstention. For, whatever else may be true, the venerable practices of justice have been ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes
... hospitable only to those reforms which spared their privileges. But their privileges could not be spared, provided Englishmen allowed rational ideas any decisive influence in their political life; and the consequence of this abstention from ideas was the gradual cultivation of a contempt for intelligence, an excessive worship of tradition, and a deep-rooted faith in the value of compromise. In the interest of domestic harmony ...
— The Promise Of American Life • Herbert David Croly
... vestments were developed from two pieces of ancient Roman dress—the tunic and the toga. [4] Thus the clergy were gradually separated from the people, or laity, by differences in dress, by their celibate lives, and by their abstention from worldly occupations. ...
— EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY • HUTTON WEBSTER
... directory in the course of Wagner's travail. But, as Wagner's most eminent English interpreter once put it to me at Bayreuth between the acts of Night Falls On The Gods, the master wanted to "Lohengrinize" again after his long abstention from opera; and Siegfried's Death (first sketched in 1848, the year before the rising in Dresden and the subsequent events which so deepened Wagner's sense of life and the seriousness of art) gave him exactly the libretto he required for that outbreak of the old operatic Adam in him. So he changed ...
— The Perfect Wagnerite - A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring • George Bernard Shaw
... For social justice is not revolutionary justice. They are both in perpetual antagonism: to serve the one is to oppose the other. As for me, my choice is made. I am for revolutionary justice as against social justice. Still, in the present case I am against abstention. I say that when a lucky chance brings us an affair like this we should be fools not to ...
— Penguin Island • Anatole France
... giving her time to recover her composure, and then continued coldly, with a careful abstention ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... to the abstention of the free-state people, the pro-slavery party had secured absolute control of the constitutional convention. Yet there was the most absolute assurance by the Governor in the name of the President of the United States that no constitution would be sent to Congress for approval which had not ...
— The Anti-Slavery Crusade - Volume 28 In The Chronicles Of America Series • Jesse Macy
... "puffing" grew on him until he came to regard even a sign as "puffing." Uninformed persons who wished to find Baines's must ask and learn. For Mr. Baines, to have replaced the sign would have been to condone, yea, to participate in, the modern craze for unscrupulous self-advertisement. This abstention of Mr. Baines's from indulgence in signboards was somehow accepted by the more thoughtful members of the community as evidence that the height of Mr. Baines's principles was greater even ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... more than abstention from definitely anti-social actions. It demands from every individual that he shall recognise the precepts of public morality as of superior obligation to those ...
— The Unexpurgated Case Against Woman Suffrage • Almroth E. Wright
... lesson, and I even went to the deportment class, at which poor old M. Elie, duly curled, powdered, and adorned with lace frills, presided. This was the most amusing lesson imaginable. Very few of us attended this class, and M. Elie avenged himself on us for the abstention of the others. At every lesson each one of us was called forward. He addressed us by the familiar term of thou, and considered us as his property. There were only five or six of us, but we all had to go on the stage. He always stood up with his ...
— My Double Life - The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt • Sarah Bernhardt
... Ford, which even in its own bizarre fashion was exceeded by the barbarous ostentation of the villas and private houses around them—but the double cabin under the trees, which now seemed to them almost aristocratic in its grave simplicity and abstention. In the mysterious forests of masts that thronged the city's quays they recalled the straight shafts of the pines on Devil's slopes, only to miss the sedate repose and infinite calm that used to environ them. In the feverish, ...
— Devil's Ford • Bret Harte
... boyhood days as Prince Iga but afterwards called Prince Otomo. For this lad his father conceived a strong affection, and would doubtless have named him heir apparent had he not been deterred by the consideration that during his own abstention from actually occupying the throne, administrative duties would have to be entrusted mainly to the hands of a Prince Imperial, and Otomo, being only thirteen years of age, could not undertake such a task. Thus, on Tenchi's younger brother, ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... before undertaking any of their enterprises. Hence arises the notion of a "state of grace," not the state produced by work in the workday world, but a state produced by abstinence from work, from enjoyment, and from the experience of good and ill. Abstention from wine, meat, other luxuries of food and drink, and from women gives power which is magical, because it has no real causal connection with desired results in war or industry. Uncivilized people almost always have some ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner
... them in Massachusetts by the obligatory abstention from labor on two days, on one day by conscience and the other by the rigorous laws of the Puritans, made Roger Williams's little state the paradise of the Sabbatarians, and the sect flourished greatly in it, ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I • Stillman, William James
... naturally associates this vegetable with meat of various kinds, poultry, game and fish, and in this proper association the root is probably capable of superseding all other vegetable foods, bread alone excepted. It is far from our intention to recommend abstention from Asparagus, Cauliflower, Peas, and Sea Kale, and to regard Potatoes as a sufficient substitute for these and other table delicacies; but it is well to remember that by virtue of its starchy compounds the Potato has a direct ...
— The Culture of Vegetables and Flowers From Seeds and Roots, 16th Edition • Sutton and Sons
... customary glance towards the servants as he began to read in a voice deeper and more hurried than usual. When he laid down the Bible and took up the book of prayers he remained standing, as he sometimes did if he had a touch of rheumatism; but he had none now, and his abstention from a kneeling position amounted to a declaration that he was willing to go through the form of family prayers for routine's sake but must really be excused from giving a mind to it which ...
— The Squire's Daughter - Being the First Book in the Chronicles of the Clintons • Archibald Marshall
... tribal gods, and though the classification is necessarily very arbitrary, the process can be clearly observed. Thus the Andhs, Kolis, Rautias and Halbas are now all Hindus, and the same remark applies to the Kols, Bhils and Korkus in several Districts. By strict abstention from beef, the adoption of Hindu rites, and to some extent of child-marriage, they get admission to the third group of castes from whom a Brahman cannot take water. It will be desirable here to digress from the main argument by noticing ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India—Volume I (of IV) • R.V. Russell
... I were attending the last coucher of some social sovereign. He was royally whimsical about his sufferings and not at all concerned—quite as if the Constitution provided for the case about his successor. He glided over OUR sufferings charmingly, and none of his jokes—it was a gallant abstention, some of them would have been so easy—were at our expense. Now and again, I confess, there was one at Brooksmith's, but so pathetically sociable as to make the excellent man look at me in a way that seemed to say: "Do exchange a glance with me, or I shan't ...
— Some Short Stories • Henry James
... dignified than the practice of the imperial Court. It is true that I had already received this impression in Louis Philippe's time, during whose reign it became quite the fashion in France to distinguish oneself in the direction of excessively free and easy manners, and of abstention from courtesy, especially towards ladies. Although it had become better in this respect during the Second Empire, the tone in official and Court society and the demeanor of the Court itself still remained below the standard ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... moment to the refusal of food, it would seem that the Earthman's apology in the foregoing narrative is, as too many human apologies are, a mere excuse. The real reason for the midwife's abstention was not that fairy food was distasteful, but that she durst not touch it, under penalty of never again returning to the light of day. A Danish tradition tells of a woman who was taken by an elf on Christmas Eve down into the ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland
... was soon cooked, and they breakfasted in silence. Maskull cast heavy, doubtful glances from time to time toward his companion. Whether it was due to the strange quality of the food, or to his long abstention, he did not know, but the meal tasted nauseous, and even cannibalistic. He ate little, and the moment he got ...
— A Voyage to Arcturus • David Lindsay
... science and art; and in spite of his earlier addictions to business-like speculations he appears to have been a singularly accomplished, high-bred gentleman. Some years before his son's marriage, Mr. Fletwode had been afflicted with partial paralysis, and his medical attendant enjoined rigid abstention from business. From that time he never interfered with his son's management of the bank. He had an only daughter, much younger than Alfred. Lord Eagleton, my mother's brother, was engaged to be married to ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... to Meat Substitutes. It is not necessary to be a vegetarian to desire a change from a meat diet. There are health reasons often demanding abstention from meats; or economy may be an impelling motive; or a desire for change and variety in the daily bill of fare may be warrant enough. However we look at it here is the wonder book to point the way to better and ...
— Sandwiches • Sarah Tyson Heston Rorer
... dim and squalid background. Nor was this all. The Preliminary Discourse and the host of articles marshalled behind it, showed that the triumphs of knowledge and true opinion had all been gained on two conditions. The first of these conditions was a firm disregard of authority; the second was an abstention from the premature concoction of system. The reign of ignorance and prejudice was made inveterate by deference to tradition: the reign of truth was hindered by the artificial boundary-marks set mischievously ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists (Vol 1 of 2) • John Morley
... that abstention from violence and persistence in the programme are our only and surest chance ...
— Freedom's Battle - Being a Comprehensive Collection of Writings and Speeches on the Present Situation • Mahatma Gandhi
... excess of duty to us when we hear of a German bride who will not go down to dinner with the man appointed by her hostess till she has asked her husband's permission; and when we hear of another writing from Germany that, although in England she had ardently believed in total abstention, she had now changed her opinion because her husband drank beer and desired her to approve of it. But it was an Englishwoman who, when asked about some question of politics, said quite simply and honestly, "I think what ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... for certain extravagances and some dangerous dogmas borrowed from other sects, their diffusion among the working-classes of the towns might even have been desirable. Sexual chastity was one of their main postulates, and they also recommended absolute abstention from meat, spirits, and tobacco. But at the same time ...
— Modern Saints and Seers • Jean Finot
... amount to that," I answered, "assuming that abstention from tobacco were counted ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, September 15, 1920 • Various
... emulation, that any inclination in this direction is practically overborne and any incentive to diligence tends to be of no effect. The most imperative of these secondary demands of emulation, as well as the one of widest scope, is the requirement of abstention from productive work. This is true in an especial degree for the barbarian stage of culture. During the predatory culture labour comes to be associated in men's habits of thought with weakness and subjection to a master. It is therefore a mark of inferiority, ...
— The Theory of the Leisure Class • Thorstein Veblen
... way and eat and drink and enjoy ourselves in moderation. To be sure, we must be always on our guard against slipping into the forbidden extreme, but it is not necessary for this purpose to inflict additional burdens upon ourselves or to practice mortification of the flesh and abstention from food and drink beyond what is prescribed in the Law. For many of the regulations in the Pentateuch have been laid down for this very purpose. The dietary laws, the laws of forbidden marriages, the laws of tithes, the laws prescribing that the corner of the ...
— A History of Mediaeval Jewish Philosophy • Isaac Husik
... persecutes his subjects by exacting hateful taxes, he that delights in the humiliation of others, and he that hates his own wives,—these seven are others that are also called wicked. Righteousness, truth (abstention from injury and truthfulness of speech), self-restraint, asceticism, delight in the happiness of others, modesty, forbearance, love of others, sacrifices, gifts, perseverance, knowledge of the scriptures,—these twelve constitute the ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... riding-schools for ladies, there is, of course, no resort to corporal punishment, but there is none of that careful abstention from telling disagreeable truths which popular ignorance extracts from American teachers in all schools, except in the military and naval academies. Indeed, the need of it is hardly felt, for that peculiar self-consciousness which makes an American awkward ...
— In the Riding-School; Chats With Esmeralda • Theo. Stephenson Browne
... all addressed to persons engaged in the life and the offices of the court, exposed to all the temptations of the world. It is no longer the desert of the penitents of PortRoyal, or the strict cloister of Mother Angelica; Fenelon is for only inward restrictions and an abstention purely spiritual; from afar and in his retreat at Cambrai, he watches over his faithful flock with a tender pre-occupation which does not make him overlook the duties of their position. "Take as penance for your sins," he wrote, "the disagreeable liabilities of ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume V. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... house lest the scholar's suspicions should be wakened. But to what purpose if he were not going to act? If he were not going to build on the ground so carefully prepared, to what end this wariness and this abstention? ...
— The Long Night • Stanley Weyman
... was the last that Dr. Chrystal would spend with his congregation previous to his going away, and as he appeared before them at the morning service it was the general opinion that his abstention from work was taking place none too soon, for he certainly ...
— Bert Lloyd's Boyhood - A Story from Nova Scotia • J. McDonald Oxley
... this is consumed as largely as funds will permit of at weddings, funerals and other social gatherings, and also if obtainable at other times. They have a tribal panchayat or committee which imposes penalties for social offences, one punishment being the abstention from meat for a fixed period. A girl going wrong with a man of the caste is punished by a fine, but cases of unchastity among unmarried Baiga girls are rare. Among their pastimes dancing is one of the chief, and in ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume II • R. V. Russell
... himself two, in the course of ten days; and the spirit moved him, after long abstention, to indulge in a rambling screed to Tara telling of his quest; revealing more than he quite realised of the inner stress he was trying to ignore. The quest, he emphasised, was a private affair, confided to her only, because he knew she ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... after Larry. I thought it was a shabby thing of the Unionists not to have supported him—" he stopped abruptly, remembering Major Talbot-Lowry's abstention, remembering also the feud, of which he knew only that he had never wholly divined its origin, between Coppinger's Court and Mount Music. He cursed himself for a fool. He had not meant to talk politics, but what he had come through the storm to say was so difficult. ...
— Mount Music • E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross
... such wholehearted desire after the one supreme good there must be resolute averting of desire from 'sinners.' In this world full of evil there will be no vigorous longing for good and God, unless there be determined abstention from the opposite. We have but a limited quantity of energy, and if it is frittered away on multifarious creatures, none will be left to consecrate to God. There are lakes which discharge their ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... desultory fashion up to that time, but he did not do a stroke of work during the concluding hours of his ordeal. It was observed by his partner, Budge Isham, that his appetite was unusually good and he seemed to be in high spirits. His friends attributed this to the closeness of his reward for his abstention, but he took several walks up the mountain side and was gone for a good while. He wore a smiling face and Vose Adams declared that he overheard him communing with himself, when he thought he was too far off for the ...
— A Waif of the Mountains • Edward S. Ellis
... recent action of the Holy See, but there were high-minded Catholics who liked to think that the controlling reason was religious—that the Pope and his counsellors had at last been persuaded that the old policy of abstention wrought irreparable harm to the religious life of millions of the ...
— The Saint • Antonio Fogazzaro |
