"Adept" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... with his hand on his collar, and his whip lifted. The whip did not look formidable. Mason received the threat as a joke, and laughed in Turkey's face. Perceiving, however, that Turkey looked dangerous, with a sudden wriggle, at which he was an adept, he broke free, and, trusting to his tried speed of foot, turned his head and made a grimace as he took to his heels. Before, however, he could widen the space between them sufficiently, Turkey's whip came down upon him. With a howl ...
— Ranald Bannerman's Boyhood • George MacDonald
... improve effectually, he at least gains the credit of having their names mentioned together, by a particular set, and in a particular way—which nine times out of ten is the full accomplishment of modern gallantry. Dang. Egad, Sneer, you will be quite an adept in the business. Puff. Now, Sir, the puff collateral is much used as an appendage to advertisements, and may take the form of anecdote,— "Yesterday, as the celebrated George Bonmot was sauntering ...
— Scarborough and the Critic • Sheridan
... street the Piper stepped, Smiling first a little smile, As if he knew what magic slept In his quiet pipe the while; Then, like a musical adept, To blow the pipe his lips he wrinkled, And green and blue his sharp eyes twinkled, Like a candle-flame where salt is sprinkled; And ere three shrill notes the pipe uttered, You heard as if an army muttered; And the muttering grew to a grumbling; And the grumbling grew to a mighty ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various
... glow of satisfaction upon the face of the lieutenant, and I knew that his principal was an adept in the use of the sword as well as though he had told me in ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... when his accession to the German throne had not seemed probable. His coronation as Charles VI. was, therefore, one cause of the peace. Leopold, born in 1640, and educated by the Jesuits, became Emperor in 1658, and reigned 49 years. He was an adept in metaphysics and theology, as well as in wood-turning, but a feeble and oppressive ruler, whose empire was twice saved for him; by Sobiesld from the Turks, and ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... love: yet one adept Brings more for Me to accept."— I mould my will to match with Thine, My wishes ...
— Poems • Christina G. Rossetti
... this discourse, that it emanated from the same sculptor who is mentioned, in "Nathaniel Hawthorne and His Wife," as having traduced Margaret Fuller and her husband Count Ossoli. As Tennyson says, "A lie that is half a truth is ever the blackest of lies," and this fellow would seem to have been an adept in unveracious exaggeration. It is remarkable that Hawthorne should have given serious attention to such a man; but an English critic said in regard to this same incident that if Hawthorne had been a more communicative person, if he had talked freely to ...
— The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne • Frank Preston Stearns
... (according to numerous records) not only in Ancient Egypt but also in Europe, during the Middle Ages. In no case do the powers attributed to him exceed those which are claimed for a fully equipped Adept. ...
— Brood of the Witch-Queen • Sax Rohmer
... a draper's shop in Birmingham: but his feet, or his pride, were so much hurt by walking, that he could scarcely travel ten doors from his own without a post-chaise—the result was, he became such an adept in riding, that in a few months, he rode triumphant into the Gazette. Being quickly scoured bright by the ill-judged laws of bankruptcy, he rode, for the last time, out of Birmingham, where he had so often rode in: but his injured creditors were obliged to walk after the slender ...
— An History of Birmingham (1783) • William Hutton
... pertinent thoughts. This was a great victory for the Catholics, whose lands had been confiscated in England, and La Fosse felt he had dealt a master stroke for his religion. But no mortal man can equal Time as an adept in chicanery. He brings forth truths unheard of ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... sternly enough, and kept that gentleman occupied as he drove him from point to point. Among other things he touched upon Conway's character with sharp irony, saying, "It is, however, greatly to be lamented that this adept in military science did not employ his abilities in the progress of the campaign, in pointing out those wise measures which were calculated to give us 'that degree of success we could ...
— George Washington, Vol. I • Henry Cabot Lodge
... afraid Stepan Arkadyevitch might be mistaken in saying "the right side." Surely Snetkov was the enemy. As he went up, he held the ball in his right hand, but thinking he was wrong, just at the box he changed to the left hand, and undoubtedly put the ball to the left. An adept in the business, standing at the box and seeing by the mere action of the elbow where each put his ball, scowled with annoyance. It was no good for ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... ("George Eliot") was born Nov. 22, 1819, at South Farm, Arbury, Warwickshire, England, where her father was agent on the Newdigate estate. In her youth, she was adept at butter-making and similar rural work, but she found time to master Italian and German. Her first important literary work was the translation of Strauss's "Life of Jesus" in 1844, and shortly after her father's death in 1849 she was writing in the "Westminster Review." ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IV. • Editors: Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... sheer want of room, much has to be taken for granted which might readily enough be proved; and hence, while the adept, who can supply the missing links in the evidence from his own knowledge, discovers fresh proof of the singular thoroughness with which all difficulties have been considered and all unjustifiable suppositions avoided, at every ...
— The Origin of Species - From 'The Westminster Review', April 1860 • Thomas H. Huxley
... real Manushi Buddhas—thus, too, we must account for the fact that genuine Buddhism has no priesthood; the saint despises the priest; the saint scorns the aid of mediators, whether on earth or in heaven; 'conquer (exclaims the adept or Buddha to the novice or BodhiSattwa)—conquer the importunities of the body, urge your mind to the meditation of abstraction, and you shall, in time, discover the great secret (Sunyata) of nature: know this, and you become, on the instant, whatever priests have ...
— The Religions of Japan - From the Dawn of History to the Era of Meiji • William Elliot Griffis
... of dead leaves and twigs, she may well produce a very inaccurate piece of work; but compel her to labour when free from all impediment: she will then—I am convinced of it beforehand—apply her talents without constraint and show herself an adept in the building of ...
— The Life of the Spider • J. Henri Fabre
... word—the name of town, river, state, or empire—any word, in short, upon the motley and perplexed surface of the chart. A novice in the game generally seeks to embarrass his opponents by giving them the most minutely lettered names; but the adept selects such words as stretch, in large characters, from one end of the chart to the other. These, like the over-largely lettered signs and placards of the street, escape observation by dint of being ...
— The Short-story • William Patterson Atkinson
... kings of Greece and Italy, who, like their fellows in Africa down to modern times, may have been expected to produce rain and thunder for the good of the crops. The priestly king Numa passed for an adept in the art of drawing down lightning from the sky. Mock thunder, we know, has been made by various peoples as a rain-charm in modern times; why should it not have been made by kings ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... it was that Violet Strange—an adept in more ways than one—became installed at the bedside of this mysterious woman, whose days, if numbered, still held possibilities of action which those interested in young Helena Postlethwaite's fate ...
— The Golden Slipper • Anna Katharine Green
... trouve a Saragosse, by a certain Count John Polowsky [Potocki?], a Pole. It seems betwixt the style of Cazotti, Count Hamilton and Le Sage. The Count was a toiler after supernatural secrets, an adept, and understood the cabbala. He put himself to death, with many odd circumstances, inferring derangement. I am to get a sight of the book if it be possible. At Glasgow (Buck's Head) we met Mrs. Maclean Clephane and her two daughters, and there was much joy. After the dinner the ladies ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... some surprise, that I was far from being an adept in that direction, but that possibly I might manage a rough sketch; whereupon he pulled a pad and pencil from his pocket and requested me to make some sort of attempt to reproduce, on paper, my memory of ...
— The Woman in the Alcove • Anna Katharine Green
... knowledge for which so great a price is paid as a knowledge of the world; and no one ever became an adept in it except at the expense of a hardened or a ...
— Many Thoughts of Many Minds - A Treasury of Quotations from the Literature of Every Land and Every Age • Various
... lips I slept Dreaming like a love-adept In the sound his breathing kept; Nor seeks nor finds he mortal blisses, 740 But feeds on the aereal kisses Of shapes that haunt thought's wildernesses. He will watch from dawn to gloom The lake-reflected sun illume The yellow bees in the ivy-bloom, 745 Nor heed nor see, what ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... dare not turn my art to such a purpose. If I take the gold of the wealthy, it is but to bestow it on the poor; nor do I ever accept more than the sum I have already received from your servant. Put up your purse, madam; an adept needs ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... when, in the exultation of his heart to see each new accession of force come in, he ordered "a new volie" against the stout outstanding walls, the excitement of the discharge, the eagerness of an adept to watch the effect, no doubt made this dangerous expression of satisfaction a real ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant
... his mother's chimney-corner when he was a boy, and to doubt her knowledge of charms and conjuring was to him nothing short of heresy. She knew the value of every herb and simple that grew in Hurricane Hollow. She was an adept in getting people into the world and getting them out of it. She was constantly consulted about weaning calves, and planting crops according to the stage of the moon. And for everything in the heavens above and the earth beneath and the waters under the earth ...
— Miss Mink's Soldier and Other Stories • Alice Hegan Rice
... has absorbed what he found good among the Europeans. He is passionately fond of music, wild over poetry, inquisitive about paintings, a connoisseur in everything—I cannot remember all. He has friends who know architecture, and though skilled in his own profession, he is an adept in others. ...
— Life, Letters, and Epicurean Philosophy of Ninon de L'Enclos, - the Celebrated Beauty of the Seventeenth Century • Robinson [and] Overton, ed. and translation.
... found in Glasgow, but Watt entered the service of a kind of jack-of-all-trades, who called himself an "optician" and sold and mended spectacles, repaired fiddles, tuned spinets, made fishing-rods and tackle, etc. Watt, as a devoted brother of the angle, was an adept at dressing trout and salmon flies, and handy at so many things that he proved most useful to his employer, but there was nothing to be ...
— James Watt • Andrew Carnegie
... decree of the Court of Session in the schoolmaster's cause was reversed in the House of Lords, after a very eloquent speech by Lord Mansfield, who shewed himself an adept in school discipline, but I thought was too rigorous towards my client[544]. On the evening of the next day I supped with Dr. Johnson, at the Crown and Anchor tavern, in the Strand, in company with Mr. Langton and his brother-in-law, ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell
... "Your friend performs delightfully," he continued after a pause, on seeing Bingley join the group; "and I doubt not that you are an adept in the science yourself, ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... was forced into the boat. Churchill was quite right as to the motive of keeping these young officers; but Christian had no doubt another and a stronger motive: he knew how necessary it was to interpose a sort of barrier between himself and his mutinous gang; he was too good an adept not to know that seamen will always pay a more ready and cheerful obedience to officers who are gentlemen, than to those who may have risen to command from among themselves. It is indeed a common observation in the service, that officers who have risen from ...
— The Eventful History Of The Mutiny And Piratical Seizure - Of H.M.S. Bounty: Its Cause And Consequences • Sir John Barrow
... breeds proficiency; and the native servant is an adept in the art of so oiling the wheels that his master shall accomplish his appointed pilgrimage with the least possible damage to his ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver
... liturgies that I have read need is felt for a mediator between the seeker after God and his goal. Mithras himself saw a Mesites, a Mediator, between Ormuzd and Ahriman, but the ordinary mediator is more like an interpreter or an adept with inner knowledge which he reveals to the outsider. The circumstances out of which these systems grew have left their mark on the new gods themselves. As usual, the social structure of the worshippers is reflected in their objects of worship. When the Chaldaeans came to Cos, ...
— Five Stages of Greek Religion • Gilbert Murray
... disorder. This was actually the circumstance that turned the scale of battle. The Austrians pursued their good fortune with uncommon impetuosity, and in a few minutes left the field clear for the mother of our hero, who was such an adept in the art of stripping, that in the twinkling of an eye the bodies of the aga and his Arabian lay naked to the skin. It would have been happy for her, had she been contented with these first-fruits, reaped from the fortune of the day, and retired with her spoils, which were not ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... observed a fact than he must find a theory which would bring it into relation with the whole of his knowledge; and if the facts would not harmonise of themselves he invented a scheme of things by which they were forced into harmony. He was indeed a Darwinian before his time, an adept in the art of inventing causes to fit facts, and then proving that the facts sprang from the causes; but his origins were tangible, immovable things of rock and soil that could be seen and visited by other men, and their true ...
— Christopher Columbus, Complete • Filson Young
... is very often indirect. It is compact of wiles and subtleties and stratagems. It is adept at taking cover. It does not make a frontal attack unless the obvious state of the soul's defences justifies such a method of attempting a conquest. The stronger a man is, the more subtle and difficult are the ways of sin, as it seeks to enter and to master his life. There ...
— The Threshold Grace • Percy C. Ainsworth
... seem something of a predicament! To common minds; there are no such things as scrapes for gentlemen with Mr. Rigby's talents for action. He had indeed, in the world, the credit of being an adept in machinations, and was supposed ever to be involved in profound and complicated contrivances. This was quite a mistake. There was nothing profound about Mr. Rigby; and his intellect was totally incapable of devising or sustaining an intricate or continuous scheme. He was, in short, ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli
... a mere adept of the Rosy Cross Spent his life to consummate the Great Work, Would not we start to see the stuff it touched Yield not a grain more than the vulgar got By the old smelting-process years ago? If this were sad to see in just the sage Who should profess so much, perform no more, ...
— Studies in Literature • John Morley
... idol was greatly changed, and nowise for the better; that her nose was broader and more club-like, her eyelids fatter and thicker, her under lip more prominent, her voice harsher, and her manner coarser. He did not notice that she was an adept in judging of men's dress, and that she looked with admiration upon all swordsmen, especially upon those who fought upon horses and elephants. The charm of memory, the curious faculty of making past time present caused all he viewed to be enchanting ...
— Vikram and the Vampire • Sir Richard F. Burton
... they tormented him thus. To this they made answer, "Didst thou not tell us that he was a very learned man, and he does not even know how to explain a text of Scripture?" "Yes, I did so say," replied Rabbi Abhu; "he is an adept in the Talmud only, but not in the Scriptures." "Thou knowest the Scriptures;" they replied, "and why ought he not to know them as well?" "I have daily intercourse with you," said the Rabbi, "and therefore I am obliged to study the Scriptures, but he, having ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various
... her age. 'But after all,'... you have the good looks, so what does it matter? Such was her thought, but she did not express it. A brilliant talker, perfectly trained in the fibs and commonplaces of society, a perfect adept in expression and suggestion, she was left without words for the only real feeling which she had ever experienced. And indeed she really was not one of those women who cannot make up their minds to grow old. Long before the hour of curfew—though indeed there had perhaps never been ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet
... made the most of, and his mental horizon broadened continually. Until his sixteenth year he had lived amongst the Indians almost exclusively and had little English and could not read nor write. He was adept in all wilderness arts. An axe, a rifle, a flaying knife, a skin needle with its sinew thread—with all these he was at home; he could construct a sled or a pair of snow-shoes, going to the woods for his birch, drying it and steaming it and bending it; and could pitch ...
— Ten Thousand Miles with a Dog Sled - A Narrative of Winter Travel in Interior Alaska • Hudson Stuck
... and, as I have already said in the introduction, took one more for the black and white stripes. When nearing the keeper, if he were fortunate enough to pass the backs, he generally looked about for one of his companions to follow up, and was quite an adept at the "screw-kick." Lambie appeared against England in 1888, and is now an active ...
— Scottish Football Reminiscences and Sketches • David Drummond Bone
... other and be the first King, and be taken up to Jupiter in storm and lightning at the last. The legend of wise Numa, next, taught by Egeria; her stony image still weeps trickling tears for her royal adept, and his earthen cup, jealously guarded, was worshipped for more than a thousand years; legends of the first Arval brotherhood, dim as the story of Melchisedec, King and priest, but lasting as Rome itself. Tales of King Tullus, when the three ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 1 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... whereupon the Memon hies him homewards as full of satisfaction as Thackeray's Jew. In many cases the mother of the house or the sister, if old, widowed and in the words of the Koran "despairing of a marriage," performs the business of shopping and proves herself no less adept than her kinsman at driving ...
— By-Ways of Bombay • S. M. Edwardes, C.V.O.
... articles should become adept in the use of a camera. With a little study and practice, any one can take photographs that will reproduce well for illustrations. One advantage to a writer of operating his own camera is that he ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer
... military matters. George had the wars of Eugene and Marlborough down from his bookshelves, all the military books of his grandfather, and the most warlike of Plutarch's lives. He and Dempster were practising with the foils again. The old Scotchman was an adept in the military art, though somewhat shy of saying ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... just as Letheby or Taylor might do those of a new chalybeate spring. A fearful power, is it not, and fatal, if used tyrannously? Well, I remember hearing a very beautiful and charming person speak of an evening she had spent in the society of The Adept, during which she was conscious of being subjected to the action of his microscope, stethoscope, and other engines of science. She said "It did not hurt her much," and, on the whole, seemed by no means so impressed with awe and admiration as could be wished. Indeed, before ...
— Sword and Gown - A Novel • George A. Lawrence
... days had followed his master, Peel, out of the old Tory lines into the camp of the free traders, and had been Russell's chief lieutenant, and Palmerston's financial minister for the last half-dozen years. He was a man of splendid intellectual power, sterling morality, an adept at parliamentary management, a shrewd financier, and held a deep conviction that it was the part of statesmanship to embody in law what he conceived to be the proper demands of the nation. His opponent ...
— Ten Englishmen of the Nineteenth Century • James Richard Joy
... had an admirable facility for learning languages, and read with great ease both in Italian and French. She had begun to apply herself to Latin; and having such a critical knowledge of her own tongue, and such a foundation from the two others, would soon have made herself an adept in it. ...
— Clarissa Harlowe, Volume 9 (of 9) - The History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... the Italian war, whither he also went in furtherance of journalism. Among our quill cavalry-men was a fat gentleman from Philadelphia, who had great fear of death, and who used to "tear" to White House, if the man "Pat" shot a duck in the garden. He was a hearty, humorous person, however, and an adept at searching ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... I was still an adept in the old Venetian fashion of attending upon ladies, and the young countess thought me rather awkward, though I believed myself very fashionable when I placed my hand under her arm, but she drew it back in high merriment. Her mother turned round to ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... qualities make him every way redoubtable. He is of the mixed race, half white and Hindoo, has long inhabited towns in which are European factories and speaks English and French very well. The other two chiefs are a Negro and a Hindoo; the adept is ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... the latter, showed authority over his adept, in whom a practised eye would at once have recognized the joyous pupil of a painter, called in the argot ...
— A Start in Life • Honore de Balzac
... I do a bit of sketching," he said, fidgeting in his coat-pocket for his fountain-pen. He then snapped open the flap of the note-book and began to sketch rapidly as they moved forward. Cleek was an adept in drawing to scale. The thing took shape as they continued their progress, keeping this time to the left instead of to the right. Cleek paced off the distance and stopped every now and then to check ...
— The Riddle of the Frozen Flame • Mary E. Hanshew
... custom of late I spent the evening at the residence of Mr. Hamm; the time being devoted to the pleasures of conversation, riddles, anagrams—at which I am adept—interchange of views upon current events, ...
— Fibble, D. D. • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... were spent by me at Alexandria and Cairo in thoroughly familiarising myself once again with Moslem tongues and usages, partly forgotten during a four years' stay in the West. I diligently studied the Koran, and became an adept at Mohammedan religious practices; and my knowledge of medicine, by enabling me to set up as a doctor, brought me into the close contact with all classes of Moslems that I required for my purpose. I soon dropped the character of a Persian for that of a wandering dervish; but afterwards ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various
... small trouble for Snana to keep her trust. As may well be supposed, all the dogs of the teepee village must be watched and kept at a distance. Neither was it easy to feed the little captive; but in gaining its confidence the girl was an adept. The fawn soon followed her everywhere, and called to her when hungry exactly as she had called to ...
— Indian Child Life • Charles A. Eastman
... metropolitan life; the other had gone to nature, and now acted as if her foot were on her native heath. Her step was light, yet never uncertain. Her progress was easy, and, although different, was quite as graceful as if she were promenading the piazza, proving that she was an adept in mountain-climbing. It was evident, however, that to Miss Wildmere a mountain was a terra incognita. She trod uncertainly, her feet turned on loose stones that hurt her, and before the first steep ascent ...
— A Young Girl's Wooing • E. P. Roe
... been sent for. An Italian singer strove to reproduce in the Kremlin the evening entertainments of the Tuileries. By such means Napoleon expected to dupe a government, which the habit of reigning over error and ignorance had rendered an adept in all ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur
... exoteric and esoteric doctrine (the "true word") and the various phases of Buddhist thought are arranged in ten classes. Of these the first nine are merely preparatory, but in the last or esoteric phase, the adept becomes a living Buddha and receives full intuitive knowledge. In this respect the Tantric school resembles the teaching of Bodhidharma but not in detail. It teaches that Vairocana is the whole world, which is divided into Garbhadhatu (material) and Vajradhatu (indestructible), ...
— Hinduism and Buddhism, An Historical Sketch, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Charles Eliot
... dinner Ella idled about the shore with the children till dusk, thinking of the yet uncovered photograph in her room, with a serene sense of something ecstatic to come. For, with the subtle luxuriousness of fancy in which this young woman was an adept, on learning that her husband was to be absent that night she had refrained from incontinently rushing upstairs and opening the picture-frame, preferring to reserve the inspection till she could be alone, and a more romantic tinge be ...
— Wessex Tales • Thomas Hardy
... be which every player should possess," he added in the same tone. "For the woman, beauty—or if not this, a cleverness which is clever enough to manifest itself only in results. Also, if a woman hath not beauty, it is imperative that she be an adept at the game. Innocence, in one party, not in both, is a valuable asset, since one of the objects of the game is the winning of it. Were both to have it, it would become in very truth a child's game. Wealth is also a good thing to have,—and ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor
... adept is informed that the object of the degree which he has just received is to recover the word lost by the death of Adoniram, and to revenge this ...
— Alvira: the Heroine of Vesuvius • A. J. O'Reilly
... Miss Tuttle's quiet answer. Certainly this woman was a thoroughbred or else she was an adept in deception such as few of us had ever encountered. The gentleness of her manner, the easy tone, the quiet eyes, eyes in whose dark depths great passions were visible, but passions that were under the control of an equally ...
— The Filigree Ball • Anna Katharine Green
... a woman of the world so long for naught. She was an adept in hiding her heart far out of sight. When Harry returned she could calmly ask him, "Whom he had found ...
— Divers Women • Pansy and Mrs. C.M. Livingston
... poet of the ultra-modern school who gives promise of greater work than he has yet done. Jessie Fauset shows that she possesses the lyric gift, and she works with care and finish. Miss Fauset is especially adept in her translations from the French. Georgia Douglas Johnson is a poet neither afraid nor ashamed of her emotions. She limits herself to the purely conventional forms, rhythms and rhymes, but through them she achieves striking effects. The principal theme of Mrs. Johnson's poems is the secret ...
— The Book of American Negro Poetry • Edited by James Weldon Johnson
... mediumship became a profession with a great increase of performers; slate writing was introduced and finally materialization was achieved. All this might mean that the spirits were growing more adept in "getting through," the mediums more adept in technique, or else, which is more likely, that latent abnormal aspects of personality were being brought to light through suggestion, imitation and exercise. But no concerted effort was made by trained ...
— Modern Religious Cults and Movements • Gaius Glenn Atkins
... character of men who are given to various exertions and many plans, he was accurate and profound. He was an adept in classical literature and the use of the classical tongues; his writings are adorned with their finest passages. He was familiar with a number of modern languages; his own style is one of the best examples ...
— The Book of Religions • John Hayward
... seem stupid or perhaps suspicious. And of the subtle ways of women "sharpers" Dorothy had often heard. It was, she decided, almost impossible to be sufficiently alert to offset their cunning. Perhaps this woman was one of that class—an adept at it. ...
— Dorothy Dale's Queer Holidays • Margaret Penrose
... in more than one encounter with antagonists, whose feebleness placed them at his mercy, and rendered them unworthy of his wrath. For in the use of arms, as in all manly exercises, Federico was an adept; and whether with Toledo blade, or Majo's knife, there were few men in Spain who would not have found in him a formidable and ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 379, May, 1847 • Various
... usually after giving many years' credit, while many other years were needed by his heirs to get in the balance of the royal indebtedness. Philippe's younger brother, Jean Jacques Caffieri (1725-1792), was a sculptor, but was sufficiently adept in the treatment of metals to design the fine rampe d'escalier which still adorns ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... muffle down his chagrin and resentment at the outcome of his trip. Of necessity he was a judge of men and it did not take him long to place Sandy. Keith was an adept at ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn
... they must have undergone, every hour, every minute demanding a stretch of thought and an adroitness of discrimination which have justly classed the dialectics of the bar above all the dialectics of the schools; and the moral as well as intellectual qualities necessary in an adept in the varying practice of municipal law; and here, too, we will yield to the general opinion which places excellence in this single department one of the highest achievements of mind; and then recall what such a judge as Spencer Roane, the ablest and sternest judge of the age, ...
— Discourse of the Life and Character of the Hon. Littleton Waller Tazewell • Hugh Blair Grigsby
... one, required to be cleared, and in this labor the young lad did his full share, manifesting always the most indefatigable industry. The family remained on the farm some seven or eight years, during which time James became an adept in ...
— Cleveland Past and Present - Its Representative Men, etc. • Maurice Joblin
... of contrast in language, character, etc., may also be applied to contrasts in any small detail, incident, or even simile. Let us examine a few of the contrasts in Maupassant, for he is a great adept in their use. ...
— The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language - Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric • Sherwin Cody
... of his uncanny knowledge, for although he had never before killed a deer, and might be supposed to know nothing of the verderer's art, he at once set to work to skin and "break up" the animal with all the skill of an adept. So that night they feasted sumptuously upon venison steaks, grilled upon the embers of a fire which, with a further display of his strange knowledge, Phil kindled by the apparently simple but really exceedingly difficult process of rubbing two sticks together! And that night, too, they heard ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... mysteries were Hermetic. Enterable only after a prolonged novitiate, the adept then beheld an unfolding of the theosophy of the soul. In visions, possibly ecstatic, he saw the series of its incarnations, the seven cycles through which it passed, the Ship of a Million Years on which the migrations are effected and on which, at last, from the Valley of the ...
— The Lords of the Ghostland - A History of the Ideal • Edgar Saltus
... butternut bark, nor the proper proportion of sweet fern and indigo to produce green, so that our wool, on its return from the carding mill, had been left with this person—lady, "par courtesie,"—who was a perfect adept in the art, to be spun and wove: and the business on which I now call is to arrange with her as to its different proportions and purposes. What for blankets, for clothing, or for socks and mittens, which all require a different style of manufacture, and are all items of such importance during ...
— Sketches And Tales Illustrative Of Life In The Backwoods Of New Brunswick • Mrs. F. Beavan
... the questions for Eli to answer, who was far more adept at such matters than I, and who seemed to satisfy the curiosity of the fisher people without trouble. Perhaps they thought we were smugglers like themselves, for I suppose that almost all the men on the islands were in some way interested in deceiving the king's officers. They ...
— The Birthright • Joseph Hocking
... dish, requiring, as it did, but one vessel for all the courses, and the more ingredients it contained, the more it was relished. Merrick claimed to be an adept in the culinary art, and proposed to several of us that if we would "club in" with him he would concoct a pot that would be food for the gods. He was to remain in camp, have the water boiling, and the meat sufficiently cooked ...
— The Story of a Cannoneer Under Stonewall Jackson • Edward A. Moore
... on the wonders to be seen, he brushed Geoffrey's clothes and arranged them with the care of a trained valet. In the evening, when they returned to the hotel and Asako complained of pains in her shoulder, Tanaka showed himself to be an adept ...
— Kimono • John Paris
... their lives compelled the pioneers to become self-sustaining. Every immigrant was an adept at many trades. He built his own house, forged his own tools, and made his own clothes. At a very early date rifles were manufactured at the High Shoals of the Yadkin; Squire Boone, Daniel's brother, was an expert gunsmith. ...
— The Conquest of the Old Southwest • Archibald Henderson
... these little domesticities come for their due appreciation (for they disclose, often, elements of really baffling complexity) not less than their ventilation and unravelling, is an eminently peace-loving man, and quite an adept at patching up such-like conjugal trifles. He will dispense from his tribunal sage advice, and prescribe remedial measures, which shall have untold efficacy, in dispelling mutual mistrust, restoring mutual ...
— A Treatise on the Six-Nation Indians • James Bovell Mackenzie
... are visible. This is the way in which Vasava, and Yama, and Varuna, and all the great royal sages have acted. Do thou observe the same conduct. Do thou, O great king, adopt this behaviour which was followed by those royal sages. Do thou soon, O bull of Bharata's race, adept this heavenly road. The gods, the Rishis, the Pitris, and the Gandharvas, possessed of great energy, sing the praises, both here and hereafter, of that king whose ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... you are a great diplomatist," cried Schwarzenberg, "and many an one who esteems himself an old adept in this art might take lessons from you. How cleverly you managed to evade the question I put to you, and lead the conversation into a different channel! But I must recur to my question, and, since ...
— The Youth of the Great Elector • L. Muhlbach
... Rieux, who one and all agreed in identifying the accused as the same Arnauld du Thill who had been born and had grown up under their very eyes. Several deposed that as he grew up he had taken to evil courses, and become an adept in theft and lying, not fearing even to take the sacred name of God in vain, in order to cover the untruth of his daring assertions. From such testimony the judge naturally concluded that Arnauld du Thill was quite capable of carrying ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... Persian barber has multifarious occupations. He is surgeon, dentist and masseur, besides being an adept with comb and razor. He is—like his brother of the West—an incessant talker, and knows all the scandal of the town. While at work he has a bowl of clean water by his side which he uses on the patient's ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... their mechanical march-movement should fall out into a kind of highly expressive dramatic action; and with the utmost possible emphasis of dumb motion, their long swords weaving a silvery network in the air, they danced the Death of Paris. The young Commodus, already an adept in these matters, who had condescended to [80] welcome the eminent Apuleius at the banquet, had mysteriously dropped from his place to take his share in the performance; and at its conclusion reappeared, ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume Two • Walter Horatio Pater
... was a splendid specimen of the people—tall, broad-shouldered, gifted by nature and trained by wind and wave to the very perfection of his craft; positive, nonchalant, and masterful; affable when not thwarted; of fewer words than most Venetians; an adept at all the intricacies of gondolier intrigue, and fitted by intimate knowledge to circumvent the tosi. Moreover, he was in favor with the government, a crowning grace to other qualities not valueless in one of ...
— A Golden Book of Venice • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... great degree on the sufficiency and comfort of the good things of the world which he provided. The beer was of the best; the boys were not made to eat fat; their taste in the selection of joints was consulted. The morning coffee was excellent. The cook was a great adept at cakes and puddings. The Doctor would not himself have been satisfied unless everything had been plentiful, and everything of the best. He would have hated a butcher who had attempted to seduce him with meat beneath ...
— Dr. Wortle's School • Anthony Trollope
... suffocated, as it infallibly would have been but for me. Baby, in future years you may thank your uncle Leon for saving your life. Perhaps if I whistle it will stop howling. I'll try," said Leon, whistling, in which art he was a great adept. ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII, No. 354, October 9, 1886 • Various
... never lied to my wife, M'sieu—except upon rare occasions," Mr. La Branche chuckled merrily. "And even then only about trifles. So, the result? Absolute trust; supreme confidence on her part. A happy state for man and wife, is it not? Ha! I am a very good liar, an adept, as you shall see, for I am not calloused by practice and therefore liable to forgetfulness. With me a lie is always fresh in my mind; it is a matter of absorbing interest, hence I do not forget myself. Heaven knows the excitement of nursing an innocent deceit ...
— The Net • Rex Beach
... persisted in making Pamela her heroine, she would have to supply from her own resources a large supplement of passion. Pamela was far too deficient in the commodity to be made anything of without such re-enforcement, even by an art more adept at making much out of nothing than Miss Liston's straightforward ...
— Frivolous Cupid • Anthony Hope
... it up like an antelope. Mivins depended for success on his almost superhuman activity. His tall, slight frame could not stand the shocks of his comrades, but no one could equal or come near to him in speed, and he was quite an adept at dodging a charge, and allowing his opponent to rush far past the ball by the force of his own momentum. Such a charge did Peter Grim make at ...
— The World of Ice • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... she exclaimed, "your education is progressing indeed! It is positively the first evening I have ever heard you attempt to make pretty speeches, and you are quite an adept already." ...
— The Tempting of Tavernake • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Collins, who was a wondrous adept at "daping, dapping, or dibbling" with a grasshopper, and who once brought in a string of trout which he laid out head to tail on the grass before the house in a line of beauty forty-seven feet long. A mighty bass voice had this Collins also, and could ...
— Little Rivers - A Book Of Essays In Profitable Idleness • Henry van Dyke
... the cold barrels of two revolvers were leveled at his head and, with the address and skill of a practiced adept, Sam passed his twisted steel wire "come alongs" around the outlaw's wrist, and Jim Cummings' career stopped short. Any attempt at escape was hopeless, and in silent surrender he held out his other hand and Chip snapped the hand-cuffs ...
— Jim Cummings • Frank Pinkerton
... instructing him in this and in that, applauding when he made an especially good dash and enjoying themselves immensely when he took one of his frequent tumbles into the snow. By noon Rod secretly believed that he was becoming quite an adept. ...
— The Wolf Hunters - A Tale of Adventure in the Wilderness • James Oliver Curwood
... advance was slow and hazardous; every hill had to be searched, a task difficult of accomplishment by reason of the innumerable caves and boulders capable of sheltering snipers. The Turk had become an adept at sniping, and left parties in the hills to carry on by themselves. When the 6th Brigade got within two miles of the south-west of Beitunia they were opposed by 5000 Turks well screened by woods on the slopes and the wadi. Both sides strove all day without gaining ground. ...
— How Jerusalem Was Won - Being the Record of Allenby's Campaign in Palestine • W.T. Massey
... apt, dexterous, happy, proficient, adept, clever, expert, ingenious, skilled, adroit, ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... before you were twenty-one. There are so many ways of letting the life out of a woman's heart, when it is already faint from disappointment! The spirit is oftener broken by unyielding, but not seemingly cruel pressure, than by outrageous violence. And Winston would show himself an adept in such arts, ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... capital of Ecuador, that the following passage at correspondence took place. Having occasion to buy a pair of shoes in a shop six feet by eight in size and with walls three feet thick, I noticed a mangy leopard skin on the floor. I had no Spanish. The shop-keeper had no English. But I was an adept at sign language. I wanted to know where I should go to buy leopard skins. On my scribble- pad I drew the interesting streets of a city. Then I drew a small shop, which, after much effort, I persuaded the proprietor into recognising as his shop. Next, I indicated in my drawing ...
— The Human Drift • Jack London
... not occur to him that he was as great an adept at sleeping as the guide, and he turned away, half ill-humouredly, to finish his rough toilet, and then he busied himself in making preparations for breakfast, which entailed a severe fight with self, for a sensation ...
— The Crystal Hunters - A Boy's Adventures in the Higher Alps • George Manville Fenn
... me a carpet and a coverlet. I tarried with him three days; at the end of which time he said to me, "Knowest thou no calling whereby to win thy living, O my son?" "I am learned in the law," I replied, "and a doctor of doctrine; an adept in art and science, a mathematician and a notable penman." He rejoined, "Thy calling is of no account in our city, where not a soul under standeth science or even writing or aught save money making." Then said I, "By Allah, I know ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... singer strove to reproduce in the Kremlin the evening entertainments of the Tuileries. By such means Napoleon expected to dupe a government which the habit of reigning over ignorance and error had rendered an adept in ...
— The Two Great Retreats of History • George Grote
... the public 'excuse my untaught manner' is on this account to be regarded as a literary ingenu. His simplicity awakens distrust. The fact that he professes to be a layman is a reason for suspecting him. He is probably an adept, a master of the wiles ...
— The Bibliotaph - and Other People • Leon H. Vincent
... out he heard his instructions being executed while an adept hand safely banked the bill inside her shirt-waist. Within two minutes his taxi set him down at the Grantham; and knowing that whatever risks he ran would be lessened by his acting swiftly and without any suspicious hesitation, ...
— Children of the Whirlwind • Leroy Scott
... captain's cabin been in such good order. She learned all the lessons he set her, and read whenever she had time; she plied her needle diligently; and Mr Shobbrok took especial delight in teaching her embroidery, in which, notwithstanding the roughness of his hands, he was an adept. Indeed, not a moment of her time was idly spent. She took her walks regularly on deck during the day, with her father or Walter: and when they were engaged, Nub followed her about like her shadow; not that he often spoke to her, but he seemed ...
— The South Sea Whaler • W.H.G. Kingston
... jumps are sudden and unexpected, the surer the success. Laura understands this, and at the same time is conscious that to do this would be as easy for her as to dance on a rope. She considers me an adept in these kinds of gymnastics, ...
— Without Dogma • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... the murder cases Gottlieb defended in person, and in this he was so singularly successful that there was hardly a celebrated trial in which he was not retained in some capacity or other. For he was an adept in all those little arts that make a jury feel well disposed toward a lawyer, and as a word artist he was unsurpassed. Gottlieb could, I believe, have wrung tears from a lump of pig iron, and his own capacity ...
— The Confessions of Artemas Quibble • Arthur Train
... not making much progress among the young girls. Almost everything people talked about outside his cadet life was unknown to him; what he could talk about seemed to have no interest for any one, unless indeed it might interest Giselle, who was an adept in the art of sympathetic listening, never having herself anything ...
— Jacqueline, v1 • Th. Bentzon (Mme. Blanc)
... same, though Betty was more thickly built, except in the strongest light it would not have been easy to distinguish them apart, even unveiled, for at all such arts of the altering of the looks of women, Inez was an adept, and she had done ...
— Fair Margaret • H. Rider Haggard
... Corner—the last a famous and much loathed spot. There were grids to walk on, but these more resembled greasy poles, for the slabs had been placed longitudinally on cross runners, and many of us used to slide off the end into some swampy hole. One of "B" Company's officers was a particular adept at this, and fell into some hole or other almost every night. These parties often managed to add to our general excitement by discovering some real or supposed spy along their route, and on one occasion there was quite ...
— The Fifth Leicestershire - A Record Of The 1/5th Battalion The Leicestershire Regiment, - T.F., During The War, 1914-1919. • J.D. Hills
... after"—could the composer triumphantly answer, and he would be right. What kind of music is this, without melody, in the ordinary sense; without themes, yet every acorn of a phrase contrapuntally developed by an adept; without a harmony that does not smite the ears, lacerate, figuratively speaking, the ear-drums; keys forced into hateful marriage that are miles asunder, or else too closely related for aural matrimony; no form, that is, in the scholastic formal sense, and rhythms that are so persistently ...
— Ivory Apes and Peacocks • James Huneker
... his insistence, the old captain yielded the wheel whenever it came his turn to toss, and he proved to be an adept at the game, ...
— The Boy Scouts on Picket Duty • Robert Shaler
... an ultra-fashionable modiste, looked at Patty with interest, recognising in her costume the work of adept hands. ...
— Patty's Success • Carolyn Wells
... in sacks, some tin cups and a coffee pot, frying pan and some few other necessary articles. All these things were "packed" on the back of a led horse—and whoever has not been taught, by a Spanish adept, to pack an animal, let him never hope to do the thing by natural smartness. That is impossible. Higbie had had some experience, but was not perfect. He put on the pack saddle (a thing like a saw-buck), piled the property ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... clay shale is named "keele" in Scotland, and has always been considered as an indication of gold; but the only thing we discovered was that it had given rise to a very slippery clay soil, so different from that which we had just left that Mashauana, who always prided himself on being an adept at balancing himself in the canoe on water, and so sure of foot on land that he could afford to express contempt for any one less gifted, came down in a very sudden and undignified manner, to the delight of all whom he had previously ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone
... report. He had no fear of being misunderstood, for it was Dick Crawford, the Assistant Scout-Master and his good friend, who was holding the flags at the other end, and not some novice who was getting practice in signaling, one of the pieces of Scout lore in which Jack had speedily become an adept. ...
— The Boy Scout Fire Fighters - or Jack Danby's Bravest Deed • Robert Maitland
... Louisville he upsets a carboy of sulphuric acid which ruins the handsome furniture of a broker's office on the floor below, and again finds himself adrift in an unappreciative world. Yet he had proved himself, in spite of all drawbacks, an adept of uncommon skill in telegraphy; and so widespread in scientific circles was his reputation, that he was sent for to Boston to take charge of the main New York wire. The impression made by the records of his life at this time is, that he looked upon all these employments merely ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 6 of 8 • Various
... Persians, who have many traditions regarding Solomon, invariably represent him as adept in necromancy, and as being intimately acquainted with the language of beasts and birds. Josephus, the great Jewish historian, distinctly states that Solomon possessed the art of expelling demons, that he composed such incantations also by which distempers are alleviated, ...
— Flowers from a Persian Garden and Other Papers • W. A. Clouston
... one. The difference and discrepancy, however, which is at first felt, is soon seen to proceed not from the reason but from a want of flexibility in the imagination. This want is far from surprising. Not only may a man naturally be expected to be an adept in his own art, but at the same time to show an incapacity for a very different mode of activity.[281] We rarely find an artist who takes much interest in jurisprudence, or {268} a prizefighter who is an acute ...
— On the Genesis of Species • St. George Mivart
... gentlemen of the party threw themselves down beside the stream, upon a little grassy rise shadowed by a huge sugar-tree. A mound of turf, flanked by two spreading roots, was the Governor's chair of state, and Alce and Molly he must needs seat beside him. Not one of his gay company but seemed an adept in the high-flown compliment of the age; out of very idleness and the mirth born of that summer hour they followed his Excellency's lead, and plied the two simple women with all the wordy ammunition that a tolerable acquaintance ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston
... spare chair for visitors having business with the parson is in the middle, turned to his end. Within reach of his hand is a stationery case, and a cabinet photograph in a frame. Behind him the right hand wall, recessed above the fireplace, is fitted with bookshelves, on which an adept eye can measure the parson's divinity and casuistry by a complete set of Browning's poems and Maurice's Theological Essays, and guess at his politics from a yellow backed Progress and Poverty, Fabian Essays, a Dream of John Ball, Marx's Capital, and half a dozen other literary ...
— Candida • George Bernard Shaw
... it would be well if everybody cultivated this power. Mr. Galton mentions an electrical engineer who was able to recall forms with great precision, but not color. But after some exercise of his color memory he became quite an adept in that, too, and declared that the newly-acquired power was a source of ...
— Chopin and Other Musical Essays • Henry T. Finck
... observed by a profound adept in human physiology that if a woman waxes fat with the progress of years her tenure of life is somewhat precarious, but if haply she withers as she grows old, she lives for ever. Such promised to be the case with William ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... convincing to any one who has not had experience in weighing testimony in regard to spiritualistic manifestations, or brought this testimony alongside of that in behalf of the "occult phenomena" of Adept ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... and colourless as ever, yet still more poised, more socially adept than Nina, and with Amy innocently diverting Saunders's bashful attentions, Nina returned to thoughts of Royal. The "to-morrow" for which the white organdie had been selected was to bring Royal for his first visit to Huntington. He was coming down with Madame ...
— Harriet and the Piper - (Norris Volume XI) • Kathleen Norris
... the Thessalian, who thought he was a perfect adept in discourse, and, to borrow the language of Empedocles, "had attained the heights of wisdom," was asked by Socrates, what virtue was, and upon his answering quickly and glibly, that virtue was a different thing in boy and old man, and in man and woman, and in magistrate and private person, ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... Capellmeister or Musik-director who, be it with good or bad voice, can really sing a melody. These people look upon music as a singularly abstract sort of thing, an amalgam of grammar, arithmetic, and digital gymnastics;—to be an adept in which may fit a man for a mastership at a conservatory or a musical gymnasium; but it does not follow from this that he will be able to put life and soul into a musical performance. The whole duty of a conductor is comprised in his ability always to indicate the right TEMPO. His choice of tempi ...
— On Conducting (Ueber das Dirigiren): - A Treatise on Style in the Execution of Classical Music • Richard Wagner (translated by Edward Dannreuther)
... like a true adept in his art, by lulling all Parley's suspicions asleep, and instead of openly abusing his master, which would have opened Parley's eyes at once, he pretended rather to commend him in a general way, as a person who meant well ...
— Stories for the Young - Or, Cheap Repository Tracts: Entertaining, Moral, and Religious. Vol. VI. • Hannah More
... intents and purposes, carte blanche to work out the construction of the device they would need for an enlarged Confusor with a real thrust, even though they would have to appear to co-operate with a multitude of other interested parties. Mike and Ishie were both becoming adept students of the mythical Dr. Confusion, and neither doubted their combined ability to handle that ...
— Where I Wasn't Going • Walt Richmond
... Piper stept, Smiling first a little smile, As if he knew what magic slept In his quiet pipe the while; Then like a musical adept, To blow the pipe his lips he wrinkled, And green and blue his sharp eyes twinkled, Like a candle flame where salt is sprinkled; And ere three shrill notes the pipe had uttered, You heard as if an army muttered; And the muttering ...
— The Children's Garland from the Best Poets • Various
... early days are contradictory. By his schoolfellows he seems to have been regarded as stupid and heavy,—'little better than a fool'; but they admitted that he was remarkably active and athletic, and that he was an adept in all boyish sports. At home, notwithstanding a variable disposition, and occasional fits of depression, he showed to greater advantage. He scribbled verses early; and sometimes startled those about him by unexpected ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Oliver Goldsmith • Oliver Goldsmith
... then, truly; yet, adept as thou art, thou knowest little of men, if thou doubtest the strength of one who has set himself free from the bonds which nature has drawn so tightly round our hearts. How gentle did they appear to me once, when the eye of my youth clothed men and the world in the pure colours of morning! ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger
... his bride, Halemano makes himself an adept in the art of singing and dancing (the hula). His fame travels about Kohala and the young chiefess Kikekaala falls in love with him. Meanwhile the seduced wife has overheard his wonderful singing and her love is restored. When his new mistress gives a kilu singing ...
— The Hawaiian Romance Of Laieikawai • Anonymous
... Perestrello's and Correo's charts and accounts of their voyages, corresponding with Toscanelli and other savans, himself an adept in drawing maps and sea-charts, for a time his occupation in Lisbon, cruising here and there, once far northward to Iceland, and talking with navigators from every Atlantic port, Columbus became acquainted with the best ...
— History of the United States, Vol. I (of VI) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... to be tapping half-carelessly, half-nervously, with her key on the panel of her door. It meant nothing to her comrade, but to the passing man it resolved itself into an intelligible and coherent message. For it was in Morse, and to his trained and adept ...
— Phantom Wires - A Novel • Arthur Stringer
... Pythagoras, "an adept in the Orphic philosophy," "the soul of the world is the Divine energy which interpenetrates every portion of the mass, and the soul of man is an efflux of that energy. The world, too, is an exact impress of the Eternal Idea, which is the mind of God." ...
— God the Known and God the Unknown • Samuel Butler
... a man of many friends among men; he was small and excitable, but was counted handsome. He was versatile to an unusual degree, being an adept at painting, as well as billiards, chess, riding, swimming, and general athletics. He was also something of a scholar in Greek and Latin, and his correspondence was so enthusiastically kept up that his published ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 • Rupert Hughes
... within a few minutes. Stubby maneuvered himself close to Etta Robbin-Steele. Stubby was not quite so adept at repression as most of his class. He was a little more naive, more prone to act upon his natural, instinctive impulses. MacRae was aware of that. He saw now a swift by-play that escaped the rest. Nothing of any ...
— Poor Man's Rock • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... was offered by the bureau to any one who would betray his accomplices, and Monsieur Favart was placed at the head of a commission of inquiry. This person had himself been a faux monnoyer, and was an adept in the art, and it was he who had discovered the redoubted coiner who had brought the crime into such notoriety. Monsieur Favart was a man of the most vigilant acuteness, the most indefatigable research, and of a courage which; perhaps, is ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... names of Sannasis, Yogis, Sevras, Qualanders, Hakims, and Cufis have devoted their lives to the study of the mysteries of the Buddhist faith. He is, I take it, a theosophist, or worshipper of the God of knowledge, the highest grade of which is the adept. This man and his companions have not attained this high position or they could not have crossed the sea without contamination. It is probable that they are all advanced chelas who hope in time to attain to the ...
— The Mystery of Cloomber • Arthur Conan Doyle
... frequently called the philosophical sciences; moreover, it is regarded as quite proper that the teacher of philosophy should concern himself with the problems of religion, and should pry into the methods and fundamental assumptions of special sciences in all of which it is impossible that he should be an adept. The question naturally arises: Why has his task come to be circumscribed as it is? Why should he teach just ...
— An Introduction to Philosophy • George Stuart Fullerton
... took his father aback; it was a perfectly dignified and proper attitude to take in the face of ridicule, and Lord Ashbridge, though somewhat an adept at the art of self-deception—as, for instance, when he habitually beat the golf professional—could not disguise from himself that his policy had been to laugh and blow away Michael's absurd ideas. But it was abundantly clear at this moment that this apparently easy operation ...
— Michael • E. F. Benson
... replied, lying with a tone of careless sincerity. I had to control all my real feelings of either anger or pleasure for so long in Mrs. Carruthers's presence that I am now an adept. ...
— Red Hair • Elinor Glyn
... Mr. Montfort. "Does this come of visiting Mrs. Peyton? She used to be an adept in the art. But what do our two other Margarets say? Has Peggy set the prairies on fire yet? She will some ...
— Margaret Montfort • Laura E. Richards
... with a most engaging modesty, that the spirit moved her to entertain them on the subject she had chosen. She treated it with great propriety, as a moral useful discourse, and delivered it without theological parade or the ostentation of learning. Either she must have been a great adept in public speaking, or had studiously prepared herself; a circumstance that cannot well be supposed, as it is a point, in their profession, to utter nothing but what arises from spontaneous impulse: or else the great spirit of the world, the patronage and influence ...
— Letters from an American Farmer • Hector St. John de Crevecoeur
... extremes,—all, at least, that marks the excess above mediocrity,—all that constitutes true beauty, harmony, refinement, grandeur, is lost upon the common observer. But it is from this point that the delight, the glowing raptures of the true adept commence. An uninformed spectator may like an ordinary drawing better than the ablest connoisseur; but for that very reason he cannot like the highest specimens of art so well. The refinements not only of execution but of truth and nature are inaccessible to unpractised eyes. ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... highly evolved parts of the system, but as soon as men can be trained to the necessary level of power and wisdom these offices are held by them. In order to be fit to hold such an office a man must raise himself to a very high level, and must become what is called an Adept—a being of goodness, power and wisdom so great that He towers above the rest of humanity, for He has already attained the summit of ordinary human evolution; He has achieved that which the plan of the Deity marked out for Him to achieve during this age or dispensation. But His evolution later ...
— A Textbook of Theosophy • C.W. Leadbeater
... analytical memoir on the first murder, that of ABEL by CAIN. With all his well-known thoroughness he reconstructs the crime and shows in what particulars CAIN, although an innovator, proved himself also an adept. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, March 19, 1919 • Various
... renewed every time you relight your pipe. This involves a sad loss of time, and in my case it afforded a butt for the dull wit of visitors. Otherwise I found it satisfactory, and I was soon astonishingly adept at making paper screws. Eventually my brier became as serviceable as formerly, though not, perhaps, so handsome. I fastened on the holder with sealing-wax, and often a week passed without my having to ...
— My Lady Nicotine - A Study in Smoke • J. M. Barrie |
