"Contentious" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... at odds, set together by the ears; set against, pit against. get into hot water, fish in troubled waters, brawl; kick up a row, kick up a dust; turn the house out of window. Adj. discordant; disagreeing &c v.; out of tune, ajar, on bad terms, dissentient &c 489; unreconciled, unpacified; contentious &c 720. quarrelsome, unpacific^; gladiatorial, controversial, polemic, disputatious; factious; litigious, litigant; pettifogging. at odds, at loggerheads, at daggers drawn, at variance, at issue, at ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... both in their ministry and civil administration, ... had lately made Acomenticus (a poor village) a corporation, and had made a taylor their mayor, and had entertained one Hull, an excommunicated person and very contentious, for their minister." Rhode Island, as a seat of separatism and heresy, was not invited and perhaps not even considered. For managing the affairs of the confederation, the main objects of which were friendship ...
— The Fathers of New England - A Chronicle of the Puritan Commonwealths • Charles M. Andrews
... She was a contentious blonde, with a thin, aquiline nose and a pair of flashing steel-blue eyes. Several wisps of straw-colored hair blew about ...
— With the Procession • Henry B. Fuller
... themselves Christians openly reject certain vital doctrines of Evangelical faith,—are Unitarians, in fact, but will not say so. But the whole question of religious belief in Germany is a difficult and contentious one, for according to the people you meet you will be told that the nation lacks faith or possesses it. If you use your own judgment you must conclude that there is immensely more scepticism there than here, and that there is also a good deal of vague belief, a belief, ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... to arrive at the one itself, always employing for this purpose steps of ascent, and at last beautifully ends in the nature of the good. Very different therefore is it from the merely logical method, which presides over the demonstrative phantasy, is of a secondary nature, and is alone pleased with contentious discussions. For the dialectic of Plato for the most part employs divisions and analyses as primary sciences, and as imitating the progression of beings from the one, and their conversion to it again. It likewise sometimes uses definitions ...
— Introduction to the Philosophy and Writings of Plato • Thomas Taylor
... city-home, through letters from the minister and Colonel Prowley, I had been kept informed of the progress of that wild ferment going on in Foxden. At length the contentious spirit there evoked seemed ready to summon to trial all ancient and reputable things. My friends of the protesting minority were surely to be credited with good Puritan pluck; though there was also something admirable in the vigor which had marshalled a party for ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 72, October, 1863 • Various
... have had in consenting to circumcise Timothy. He there shut the window-shutters, and lighted an exhausted lamp, for a time, though he knew the sun was up, to gratify some who had not opened their eyes to the morning. How far from a contentious, ambitious spirit, was he, even with his intense convictions. There are many good people, in all communions, who are longing for the time when all the old walls of separation between true Christians will have as many gates in them, at least, as heaven has,—on the east three gates, on the ...
— Bertha and Her Baptism • Nehemiah Adams
... studying them conscientiously, but making just those mistakes, which a clever examination candidate would perpetrate, were he to be asked of a sudden to turn his studies to practical account. The very robustness of his sense of duty led him naturally to the two most contentious questions in the field—those which concerned the responsibility of the colonial executive government, and the place of party in dictating to the governor-general his policy and the use to be made ...
— British Supremacy & Canadian Self-Government - 1839-1854 • J. L. Morison
... comment as to their being "hard." Neither did he try to boastingly minimize them as nothing at all—another wretched pose. From him I learned that throughout his youth he had been carried here and there by the iron woman who was his mother and whom he seemed to adore in some grim contentious way, smothering his comments as though he disliked to say anything at all, and yet describing her at times as coarse and vulgar, but a mother to him "all right," someone who had made marked ...
— Twelve Men • Theodore Dreiser
... military controversies, and if they were not, I should be precluded from dealing with them by the fact that I intend to avoid as far as possible matters which concern living men, unless these are non-contentious. Horas non numero nisi serenas. Again, and even if it were desirable to add fresh fuel to the controversial fire, I could not, speaking generally, add to ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey
... Elkanah, which flowed unceasingly like a crystal stream. Why was she thus loved? We believe because of the lovely spirit which she had received from that gentleness of the eternal Son which maketh great; and, like him, her voice was not heard in the streets. Instead of the contentious temper of the women of this age, we find in her a meek and quiet spirit; instead of pride, humility; and instead of anger, patience; she was kind, pleasant, and abounding in other graces. Shall not such a ...
— Woman And Her Saviour In Persia • A Returned Missionary
... herself teach you that if a man wears long hair it is a disgrace to him? [11:15]but if a woman wears long hair it is her glory; for the hair is given her for a covering. [11:16]But if any one is disposed to be contentious, we have no such custom neither ...
— The New Testament • Various
... regard you as a guide, but now all this is at an end. Our monarchs in past times were wont to decide matters by specific ordinance, and had no prepared statutes, fearing lest the people should grow contentious. Yet even so it was impossible to suppress wrong-doing; for which reason they employed justice as a preventive, administration to bring things into line, external formality to secure respect, good faith as an ...
— Ancient China Simplified • Edward Harper Parker
... "Their bodies in the hollow fen; now raise "Their heads, and skim the surface of the pool, "Often they rest upon the margin's brink, "And oft light-springing, in the cool lake plunge. "Now still their rude contentious tongues they use, "Still squabbling, lost to shame beneath the waves: "Beneath the waves they still abusings strive "To utter. Hoarsely still their voice is heard, "Through their wide-bloated throats. Their railing words, "Their jaws more wide dilate. ...
— The Metamorphoses of Publius Ovidus Naso in English blank verse Vols. I & II • Ovid
... offence, tells us in reply, in the first place, that this passage is not of the nature of a precept, but merely of an admonition; that it does not enjoin any particular method of proceeding, but simply describes the natural consequences of cruel and contentious conduct; and that it amounts only to this: that quarrelsome, violent, and bloodthirsty persons will be apt to meet the same fate they bring upon others; that the duellist will be likely to fall in private ...
— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham
... Mrs. Transley arose, and the men moved out into the living-room to chat on less contentious subjects. After a time the women joined them, and Grant presently found himself absorbed in conversation with the old rancher's wife. Zen seemed to pay but little attention to him, and for the first time he began to realize what consummate actresses ...
— Dennison Grant - A Novel of To-day • Robert Stead
... was hardly a fit candidate for canonisation yet. Either it was too early for that—or it was too late. She was unreasonable, she was crotchety, she was contentious, she was incredibly intolerant of the opinions of others, and she was incredibly hardheaded. She had always been masterful and arrogant; now more and more each day she was becoming a shrew and a tyrant and a wrangler. She was frightfully noisy; she ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... allowance for the high colours with which a tale that has grown stale is apt to be daubed, I am forced to admit the inference that a mean, sordid, contentious woman probably did as much as was in her power to harass and fret one of the best men in Germany, or in the world. Luckily for himself, Albrecht was a severe student, had much engrossing work which carried him abroad, and travelled once at ...
— The Old Masters and Their Pictures - For the Use of Schools and Learners in Art • Sarah Tytler
... living like a drone, an old man not devout, Youth disobedient, rich men that are charity without, A shameless woman, vicious lords, a poor man proudly stout, Contentious Christians, pastors that their functions do neglect, A wicked king, no discipline, no laws men to direct, Are twelve the foulest ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 379, Saturday, July 4, 1829. • Various
... weeks rushed by. The first and comparatively non-contentious sections of the Bill passed with a good deal of talk and delay. George spoke once or twice, without expecting to speak, instinctively pleasing Fontenoy where he could. They had now but little direct intercourse. But George did not feel that his leader had ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. II • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... the appearance of house and garden. Three ugly blotched and snorting pigs ran out from under some bushes and followed him. He saw no smoke arising, no face at any window, heard no lively bustle in the farm-yard, no amusing and contentious chatter in Canadian French from the barns and out-buildings which sheltered the various members of the Archambault family. A curious feeling rushed over him and with it a conviction—the place was deserted. ...
— Ringfield - A Novel • Susie Frances Harrison
... men, and so deceive those employed. But they do it under a pretence. As a scorner reproacheth under a pretence of sport, so they, under other pretences, of wrongs done, of the country's defence, &c. Verses 20, 24, show the way to prevent trouble and keep peace. As a contentious turbulent person would inflame a whole country and put them by the ears, so a person, though not contentious in his own nature, yet having many contentious interests following him, which he will not quit, or commit to God's providence, as our king ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning
... great cities who are driven into surroundings which pervert and undermine character. And worse still, the good, instead of uniting to labor for a better state of things, misunderstand and thwart one another. They divide into parties, are jealous and contentious, and waste their time and exhaust their strength in foolish and futile controversies. They are not anxious that good be done, nor asking nor caring by whom; but they seek credit for themselves, and while they seem to be laboring ...
— Education and the Higher Life • J. L. Spalding
... doubt whether the house contained a printed volume, unless its head had had in hand a law-book or so: I to some extent recover Mr. Norcom as a lawyer who had come north on important, difficult business, on contentious, precarious grounds—a large bald political-looking man, very loose and ungirt, just as his wife was a desiccated, depressed lady who mystified me by always wearing her nightcap, a feebly-frilled but tightly-tied and unmistakable one, and the compass ...
— A Small Boy and Others • Henry James
... his office, and first of his councillors, spake unto the king, saying, "What was there to be done with thy son, O king, that we have not done, to induce him to follow our doctrines and serve our gods? But, as I perceive, we aim at the impossible. By nature, or, it may be, by chance, he is contentious and implacable. Now, if it be thy purpose to deliver him to torture and punishment, thou shalt do contrary to nature, and be no more called a father; and thou shalt lose thy son, willing, as he is, to lay down his life for Christ his sake. This, then, alone remaineth: ...
— Barlaam and Ioasaph • St. John of Damascus
... Men are hateful, teasty, unpleasant. contentious, angry, 7. cruel, 8. and implacable, Morosi homines, sunt odiosi, torvi, illepidi. contentiosi, iracundi, 7. crudeles, 8. ac implacabiles, (rather Wolves and Lions, than Men) and such as fall out among themselves, hereupon they ...
— The Orbis Pictus • John Amos Comenius
... Archdeacon, the strong testimony that Cushman bears against him in his Dartmouth letter of August 17, and the fact that there seems to have been early dissatisfaction with him as "governor" on the ship, a very self-sufficient, somewhat arrogant, and decidedly contentious individual. His selection as treasurer seems to have been very unfortunate, as Bradford indicates that his accounts were in unsatisfactory shape, and that he had no means of his own, while his rather ...
— The Mayflower and Her Log, Complete • Azel Ames
... spring was afterwards granted Williams, but he was admonished not to go about to draw others to his opinions. As Williams was one of those contentious people who must talk, this inhibition was futile. It is true that he no longer preached in his church, as the congregation had submitted to the will of those in power. But he conversed in private with some of his friends, ...
— England in America, 1580-1652 • Lyon Gardiner Tyler
... of old age, if we contemplate it in another point of view; if we consider it as delivering us from the tyranny of lust and ambition; from the angry and contentious passions; from every inordinate and irrational desire; in a word, as teaching us to retire within ourselves, and look for happiness in our own bosoms. If to these moral benefits naturally resulting from length of days be added that sweet food of the mind which is gathered ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... but very contentious. Day after day was wasted on the most unimportant questions. A member, one of those afflicted with the morbid rage of debate, of an ardent mind, prompt imagination, and copious flow of words, who heard with impatience any logic ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... he had controlled his men only by the force of his fierce will. Restlessness, little short of turbulence, had changed his six hundred from earnest recruits to bright-eyed, contentious, irresponsible enthusiasts whom only intimidation could manage. They seemed to be balanced, prepared, ready at the least whisper in the wind to scatter madly, each in his own direction, after a vagary, albeit the end ...
— The City of Delight - A Love Drama of the Siege and Fall of Jerusalem • Elizabeth Miller
... engendered numerous occasions for friction, especially with the civil authorities, whose rights and duties often overlapped his own. And he did not escape the danger of such bickerings with their resultant ill-feeling. There is nothing to indicate that he was contentious by nature. But he was no doubt zealous in defending the prerogatives of his office. His temper was quick and somewhat martial. "One could very well," one of his biographers declares, "envision him as a knight in full armor leading a troop in the charge." With the exception of his active enemies, ...
— Hymns and Hymnwriters of Denmark • Jens Christian Aaberg
... square. It was a little improvement, though nothing to brag of. What fitful zephyrs there might be, caused no doubt by the rapid passage to and fro on the roof above and fence-tops below of vagrant felines on Cupid's contentious battles bent, to the disturbance of the still air, soughed softly through the meshes of my hammock and gave some measure of relief, grateful enough for which I ceased the perfervid language I had been using practically since sunrise, and dozed off. And then there entered upon the scene ...
— R. Holmes & Co. • John Kendrick Bangs
... which permeated the raison d'etre of each noble lord in that great assembly. After the first wave of enthusiasm had passed, each man began to reflect that the best way, after all, for settling the contentious question of the Headship of the Republic, was to rule every one of the "magnificent six hundred" out of the running; and by taking the line of least resistance plump for the unassuming youths before them—Medici although ...
— The Tragedies of the Medici • Edgcumbe Staley
... first part of your late publication, which is no less an invective against me, than it is a defence of yourself, you have, with sufficient art, insisted on my remarkably contentious, factious,[D] and jealous spirit, which suffers no man, undisturbed, to enjoy his well-earned fame; a circumstance in my character you expected to derive considerable benefit from in the controversy between ...
— Nuts for Future Historians to Crack • Various
... was as follows: (a) a first president of a court of appeal or a retired one, or a president of a section of the council of state or of cassation; (b) two general officers of the navy; (c) a member of the "contentious part'' of the diplomatic service; (d) two councillors of a court of appeal; (e) a captain of a port, with a commissary of the government and a secretary; five to be a quorum. There was no appeal; but the ordinary right to have recourse to the Court of Cassation at Rome, if the prize commission ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... Ts'ain has already arrived, With the graceful motion of a silver carp gliding through a screen of rushes, she moves among those who are assembled. On the brow of her somewhat contentious father there rests the shadow of an ill-repressed sorrow; Doubtless the frequently-misjudged Ah-Ping is thinking of his lonely hearth, now that he is for ever parted from that which ...
— The Wallet of Kai Lung • Ernest Bramah
... motion is not to cut off debate (for which other motions are provided, see Sec. 37), but to enable the assembly to avoid altogether any question which it may deem irrelevant, unprofitable or contentious.* [In Congress, the introduction of such questions could be temporarily prevented by a majority vote under the 41st Rule of the House of Representatives, which is as follows: "Where any motion or proposition is made, the question, 'Will the House now ...
— Robert's Rules of Order - Pocket Manual of Rules Of Order For Deliberative Assemblies • Henry M. Robert
... excitedly interested in the discussion? Not at all. Spokesmen and penmen of the two contentious factions are victimized by their own perfervid imaginations. The electorate, the masses, are not so swayed. The Canadian people, essentially British no matter what their origins, are mainly, like all English-speaking democracies, of straight, primitive, uncomplicated emotions, and of essentially ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... and decisive battles, and where we all, at certain hours of the day, and with great gusto and despatch, stow a portion of victuals finally and irretrievably into the bag which contains us. And it would seem also, on a hasty view, that the attainment of as much as possible was the one goal of man's contentious life. And yet, as regards the spirit, this is but a semblance. We live in an ascending scale when we live happily, one thing leading to another in an endless series. There is always a new horizon for onward-looking men, and although we dwell on a small planet, ...
— Virginibus Puerisque • Robert Louis Stevenson
... seeking the full development of his bodily powers. Epaminondas was the example he set himself, and he came little behind that great warrior in activity, sagacity, and integrity, though he differed from him in being possessed of a hot, contentious temper, which often carried him beyond the bounds ...
— Historic Tales, vol 10 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... slender managing of the contentious quarrel between the two Irish earls did not make the way to cause these lines to pass my hand, this gibberish should hardly have cumbered your eyes; but warned by my former fault, and dreading worser hap to come, I rede ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... through abstract meditation, not through ecstatic visions. We want to know more of that man than we do; but, even with the little we know of him, he stands before us as a figure second only to one in the whole history of the world. We see his zeal for God, but we never see him contentious. Though Melchisedek worshipped God under a different name, invoking Him as Eliun, the Most High, Abraham at once acknowledged in Melchisedek a worshipper and priest of the true God, or Elohim, and paid him tithes. In the very name of Elohim we ...
— Chips From A German Workshop - Volume I - Essays on the Science of Religion • Friedrich Max Mueller
... day; true learning is undervalued, and almost disappears from among men. It would seem, as though the wise men of old frowned in anger on the turbulence of the petty passions, and withdrew from the noisy and contentious haunts, where wisdom has no votaries, and tranquillity no followers. In the days of ancient liberty, the public places rung with the nervous eloquence of sublime philosophy; and the streets of Athens offered nothing more attractive than the keen discussions, the piercing ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various
... number of knights, citizens, and burgesses returned to parliament for that part of the United Kingdom called England and Wales, ought not to be diminished." This motion was designed to get rid of the bill altogether, and it produced a violent and contentious debate. Mr. Sadler, who seconded it, delivered a long, argumentative, and learned speech against the general principles of the whole plan of reform. He was followed by the chancellor of the exchequer, who declared that he was quite sure that the amendment ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... commotion their minds grew more and more inflamed, exasperated, and contentious. And as an old hereditary hatred burned in them against the town of Mascalico, on the opposite bank of the river, Giacobbe said venomously, in ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Italian • Various
... through the operation simply of their fears, renounce their name and faith. Of the former, some have already made themselves conspicuous—conspicuous now by their cowardly and hasty apostacy, as they were before by a narrow, contentious, and restless zeal. Among others, the very one, who, on the evening when the Christians assembled near the baths of Macer, was so forward to assail the faith of Probus, and who ever before, on other occasions, when a display could by any possibility be made of devotion to his party, ...
— Aurelian - or, Rome in the Third Century • William Ware
... "Both conversation and public speaking became more simple and plain, such as we now find them."—Blair cor. "Idleness and ignorance, if they be suffered to proceed, &c."—Johnson and Priestley cor. "Avoid questions and strife: they show a busy and contentious disposition."—Penn cor. "To receive the gifts and benefits of God with thanksgiving, and witness them blessed and sanctified to us by the word and prayer, is owned by us."—Barclay cor. "Both minister and magistrate are compelled to choose between their duty and their reputation."—Junius ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... you, Mr. Flint, that the spirit which prompted my visit was not a contentious one. I cannot accept the pass, simply because I do not ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... to religion, which ought to be adopted voluntarily, not of compulsion, seeing that sacrifices are required of a willing mind. Thus, even if you compel us to sacrifice, you shall render no sacrifice thereby to your gods, for they will not desire sacrifices from unwilling givers, unless they are contentious; but God is not contentious." [310:2] When, however, the Church obtained possession of the throne of the empire, she soon ignored these lessons of toleration; and, snatching the weapons of her tormentors, she attempted, ...
— The Ancient Church - Its History, Doctrine, Worship, and Constitution • W.D. [William Dool] Killen
... first-formed group retained coherence, retained it beyond great natural cataclysms, retained it to historic ages, to wield long the smoothed stone weapons, and, afterward, the bronze axes, and to diverge in many branches of contentious defenders and invaders, to become Iberian and Gaul and Celt and Saxon, to fight family against family, and to commingle again in ...
— The Story of Ab - A Tale of the Time of the Cave Man • Stanley Waterloo
... were held by the followers of Mrs. Hutchinson, there was nourished and trained a keen, contentious spirit, and an unbridled license of tongue, of which the influence was speedily felt in the serious disturbance, first of domestic happiness, and then of the public peace. The matrons of Boston were transformed into a synod ...
— Anne Bradstreet and Her Time • Helen Campbell
... Republicans. Let us look at Mr. Hughes' first speech after accepting the nomination. [Footnote: Delivered at Carnegie Hall, New York City, July 31, 1916.] The context is still clear enough in our minds to obviate much explanation; yet the issues are no longer contentious. The candidate was a man of unusually plain speech, who had been out of politics for several years and was not personally committed on the issues of the recent past. He had, moreover, none of that wizardry which popular leaders like Roosevelt, Wilson, or Lloyd George possess, none ...
— Public Opinion • Walter Lippmann
... reports from private persons, private entreaties for inquiry, depositions of monks in official examinations, and other similar papers, which, in many instances, are too offensive to be produced, and may rest in obscurity, unless contentious persons compel us to bring them forward. Some of these, however, throw curious light on the habits of the time, and on the collateral disorders which accompanied the more gross enormities. They show us, too, that although the dark tints predominate, the picture was not wholly black; ...
— Froude's Essays in Literature and History - With Introduction by Hilaire Belloc • James Froude
... Byzantine. Tremulous flares of mist, rising around the dark hulls, become entangled in the cordage, and as if there were no other escape, resolve themselves into air. Fisher boats are bringing their owners home from night-work over in the shallows of Indjerkeui. Gulls and cormorants in contentious flocks, drive hither and thither, turning and tacking as the schools of small fish they are following turn and tack down in the warm blue-green depths to which they are native. The many wings, in quick eccentric motion, give sparkling life ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 1 • Lew. Wallace
... thou forgotten, or despis'd; And threat'nest now to wrest from me the prize I labour'd hard to win, and Greeks bestow'd. Nor does my portion ever equal thine, When on some populous town our troops have made Successful war; in the contentious fight The larger portion of the toil is mine; But when the day of distribution comes, Thine is the richest spoil; while I, forsooth, Must be too well content to bear on board Some paltry prize for all my warlike toil. To Phthia now I go; so better far, To steer my homeward course, and leave thee ...
— The Iliad • Homer
... Nazianzen says the same thing:—"We have bid farewell to contentious deviations of doctrine, and compensations on either side, neither Sabellianizing nor Arianizing. These are the sports of the evil one, who is a bad arbiter of our matters. But we, pacing along the middle ...
— Historical Sketches, Volume I (of 3) • John Henry Newman
... were unskilled in theological subtilties, to think he meant to limit duty to the simple act of belief. From the period of their opposition to Dr. Beaumont, a marked change was visible in the manners of the villagers; their time was devoted to contentious disputation, which is in truth the most dangerous sort of idleness, and as they became in their own ideas more enlightened, they became more miserable; a sullen morose gloom usurped the frank hilarity of satisfied rusticity, which formerly animated their countenances. Athletic ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West
... been developed at the expense of her other faculties, may be said to lead a dreamy, fictitious, contentious and agitated life. This state is rendered still more dangerous by the agreeable forms which it assumes, and which flatter the mind and senses by their rapid and constant changes. Hence it is that women endowed with this ...
— Serious Hours of a Young Lady • Charles Sainte-Foi
... In this very epistle, where the question is not concerning the meritorious ground of justification, but concerning that character which God will accept, the apostle lays down the great principle: "Unto them that are contentious, and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil; of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile; but glory, honor, and peace to every man that worketh good; to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile: ...
— Companion to the Bible • E. P. Barrows
... obligation made between persons who are not present with one another is void. This rule, however, afforded contentious persons opportunities of litigation, by alleging, after some interval, that they, or their adversaries, had not been present on the occasion in question; and we have therefore issued a constitution, addressed to ...
— The Institutes of Justinian • Caesar Flavius Justinian
... it is taken for granted in this paper that the young American wife is this kind of a woman—wise and gentle and good-natured—above all things good-natured. For says the Bible, "It is better to dwell in the wilderness than with a contentious and an angry woman." But read what is written in the Book of the right kind of a woman—one "in whose tongue is the law of kindness," as the Scriptures' ...
— The Young Man and the World • Albert J. Beveridge
... voluntary should be done involuntarily is a contradiction; wherefore he who maintains that injustice is involuntary will deem that the unjust does injustice involuntarily. I too admit that all men do injustice involuntarily, and if any contentious or disputatious person says that men are unjust against their will, and yet that many do injustice willingly, I do not agree with him. But, then, how can I avoid being inconsistent with myself, if you, Cleinias, and you, Megillus, say to me—Well, Stranger, if all this ...
— Laws • Plato
... mutiny Calm as thou sitt'st yon never-managed sea, Balk'st with his balking, fliest with his flight, Giv'st supple to his rearings and his falls, Nor dropp'st one coronal star about thy brow, Whilst ever dayward thou art steadfast drawn Yea, would I rode these mad contentious brawls, No damage taking from their If and How, Nor no result save galloping to ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various
... his friend, whom he usually found in bed. It was William Clerk who sat for the picture of Darsie Latimer, the hero of Redgauntlet,—whence we should suppose him to have been a lively, generous, susceptible, contentious, and rather helter-skelter young man, much alive to the ludicrous in all situations, very eager to see life in all its phases, and somewhat vain of his power of adapting himself equally to all these phases. Scott tells a story of Clerk's ...
— Sir Walter Scott - (English Men of Letters Series) • Richard H. Hutton
... our existence spots of time, That with distinct pre-eminence retain A renovating virtue, whence, depressed 210 By false opinion and contentious thought, Or aught of heavier or more deadly weight, In trivial occupations, and the round Of ordinary intercourse, our minds Are nourished and invisibly repaired; 215 A virtue, by which pleasure is enhanced, That penetrates, enables us to mount, When high, more high, ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. III • William Wordsworth
... hundred years after Buddha there were from time to time, such personages in the world, who attained the end of the Holy Path; but in these latter days people are more insincere, covetous and contentious, and the discipline is too hard for degenerate times and men. The three trainings already spoken of are the correct causes of deliverance; but if people think them as useless as last year's almanac, when can they complete their deliverance? H[o]-nen, ...
— The Religions of Japan - From the Dawn of History to the Era of Meiji • William Elliot Griffis
... the foot into a triumph over them, she abandoned herself to her impulse, climbed the gate, put her toe upon his instep, and scrambled into the saddle behind him. The pair were speeding away into the distant gray by the time that the contentious revellers became aware ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... her that he should care so much what adventures she had had. He had never for a moment allowed he was in love with her; therefore nothing could have surprised him more than to discover he was jealous. What but jealousy could give a man that sore contentious wish for the detail of what would make him suffer? Well enough he knew indeed that he should never have it from the only person who to-day could give it to him. She let him press her with his sombre eyes, only smiling at him ...
— The Altar of the Dead • Henry James
... erroneous and unreliable work as this could not be regarded as evidence upon which truly scientific argument could be founded for the purpose of deciding such a contentious question; yet mainly upon this very slender and unreliable evidence meetings of two of our leading astronomical associations endorsed the illusion theory, and for a long time it ...
— To Mars via The Moon - An Astronomical Story • Mark Wicks
... and Cypris addressed them both: "Hera and Athena, he will obey you rather than me. For unabashed though he is, there will be some slight shame in his eyes before you; but he has no respect for me, but ever slights me in contentious mood. And, overborne by his naughtiness, I purpose to break his ill-sounding arrows and his bow in his very sight. For in his anger he has threatened that if I shall not keep my hands off him while he still masters his temper, I shall have ...
— The Argonautica • Apollonius Rhodius
... tell me nothing more. I perceive your Berlin writers and poets are a malicious, contentious set of people. I may well fear you, and shall be glad to escape unharmed. Think kindly of me, and have pity upon me; if the others are too severe, raise your dear hand and hold back the scourge that it may not fall upon poor Wolfgang ...
— Old Fritz and the New Era • Louise Muhlbach
... made when the fighting stops; and months were to pass in the troubled twilight between the two, with millions of men under arms, with budgets more suggestive of war than peace and men's thoughts more attuned to a contentious past than prepared for a peaceful future. The first act of the British Government was, indeed, to transfer hostilities from its foes abroad to those at home, and to rout its domestic enemies at a general election. The Parliament elected in 1910 had, after limiting its existence ...
— A Short History of the Great War • A.F. Pollard
... of this curious structure; stone by stone must have been carved and lifted to its place. And yet the art is so great that I know no composition of the same length that has so perfect a unity of mood and atmosphere. There is never a false or alien note struck. It is never jubilant or contentious or assertive—and, best of all, it is wholly free from any touch of that complacency which is the shadow of virtue. The writer never takes any credit to himself for his firm adherence to the truth; he writes rather as one who has had a gift of immeasurable value entrusted to unworthy ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... smaller wing-tips and consequently less "spill." This, however, appears to be a rather inadequate reason for the high aspect ratio producing the high lift-drift ratio. Other reasons are also advanced, but they are of such a contentious nature I do not think it well to go into them here. They are of interest to designers, but this is written for the practical ...
— The Aeroplane Speaks - Fifth Edition • H. Barber
... functions of English royalty are for the most part latent, it fulfils this condition. It seems to order, but it never seems to struggle. It is commonly hidden like a mystery, and sometimes paraded like a pageant, but in neither case is it contentious. The nation is divided into parties, but the crown is of no party. Its apparent separation from business is that which removes it both from enmities and from desecration, which preserves its mystery, which enables it to combine the affection of conflicting parties—to ...
— The English Constitution • Walter Bagehot
... used, in 1911, as a corpus vile for facilitating the ratification of the Convention for an International Prize Court and of the Declaration of London; receiving, most fortunately, as so perverted, its coup de grace from the Lords. It should be passed as an artistic whole, apart from any contentious matter, account having, of course, been taken of recent legislation by which it may have been, ...
— Letters To "The Times" Upon War And Neutrality (1881-1920) • Thomas Erskine Holland
... serve to remind us of certain characters and circumstances with which we meet on the voyage of life? Who cannot call to mind many snags—men, rugged, stubborn, and contentious,—snags by all means to be avoided? D'Israeli was the snag of Peel—Russia was the snag of Napoleon—Slavery is the snag of ...
— American Scenes, and Christian Slavery - A Recent Tour of Four Thousand Miles in the United States • Ebenezer Davies
... humble followers of the Lamb, into one body only, where the peace of God rules in every heart. "Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God." Eph. 2:19. God has a household of saints here upon the earth where peace rules. A contentious, quarrelsome, divided family is no part of God's united household. One family in heaven and earth. Eph. 3:15. It is with great reluctancy that we pass by so many beautiful texts upon this subject, but we will only quote a few more lest this volume swell to too great proportions. ...
— The Gospel Day • Charles Ebert Orr
... the business. But look what chances there are before two statesmen of, I trust I may say without egotism, average intelligence, who take to gardening without, as you may say, knowing anything about it. Think of the charm of being able to call a spade a Hoe! without your companion, however contentious, capping the exclamation. Then think of the long vista of possible surprises. You dig a trench, and I ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., October 25, 1890 • Various
... individual who is unwilling to be instructed, who himself knows best in all things, who yields to no one and calls good whatever harmonizes with his ideas. The Christian should be more willing to make concession in temporal affairs. Let him not be contentious, but rather yielding, since the Word of God and faith are not involved, it being only a question of personal honor, of friends and of ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. II - Epiphany, Easter and Pentecost • Martin Luther
... a shade more, and I was silenced by the command: "Not another word! Positively, you would keep me standing here forever. I had no idea you were so—contentious. Please help me in, and please have my trunk brought over. Here is my check. Then, if you insist, we can discuss the propriety of trunks on our ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... 'Physics and Politics,' in the 'Fortnightly Review,' Nov. 1867; April 1, 1868; July 1, 1869, since separately published.), is of the highest value, for any form of government is better than none. Selfish and contentious people will not cohere, and without coherence nothing can be effected. A tribe rich in the above qualities would spread and be victorious over other tribes: but in the course of time it would, judging ...
— The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex • Charles Darwin
... despite its sub-title, and all the more delightful perhaps on that account. I hope that the translator may be persuaded, if the volume goes into the second edition it so richly deserves, to omit his very contentious preface, which can be of interest only to himself and two other people. Then our delight in this ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... acts of offence were committed in a contentious and spiteful vindication of the privileges of his manours, and a rigorous and relentless prosecution of every man that presumed to violate his game. As he happens to have no estate adjoining equal to his own, his oppressions are often borne without resistance, for fear of a long suit, of which ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson
... tell him so. 'I'm upon my death-bed and my consolation is the remembrance of our mutual faith plighted to each other a short time before our quarrel. 'Twas the bit of Scotch blood in thee that brought us to contentious wrangle. I 'minded thee at the time thou wouldst grieve for thy hot words, and 'tis a balm I send thee for thy grieved heart; 'tis my baby Kate'—Baby, baby of course I thought her so and sent her to a nurse's nookery at the top of the towers to silence the wench's squawkings, ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... he may live: I saw him beat the surges under him, And ride upon their backs; he trod the water. Whose enmity he flung aside, and breasted 110 The surge most swoln that met him; his bold head 'Bove the contentious waves he kept, and oar'd Himself with his good arms in lusty stroke To the shore, that o'er his wave-worn basis bow'd, As stooping to relieve him: I not doubt 115 He ...
— The Tempest - The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.] • William Shakespeare
... distant, ill-disposed, unfriendly, alienated, cold, estranged, indifferent, unkind, antagonistic, contentious, frigid, inimical, warlike. ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... already distinct sea-smell which has added speed to the precursive flight of your imagination; then the liquid level, edged afar off by its band of undiscriminated domes and spires, soon distinguished and proclaimed, however, as excited and contentious heads multiply at the windows of the train; then your long rumble on the immense white railway-bridge, which, in spite of the invidious contrast drawn, and very properly, by Mr. Ruskin between the old and the new approach, does truly, in a manner, shine across the green ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James
... One. There, as it has been well observed, "the Church stands upon her own merits, her own divine right; there all the attested grievances of the Dissenters, secular and political, are removed; no tithes, no church-rates, no exclusive state support." And yet there, it may be added, the fierce contentious spirit which rages in England is unchanged in character, and the way of the Church is just as evil spoken of in New South Wales as in the mother country. The only grievance the dissenters can complain of now in Australia is that assistance is afforded to the ...
— Australia, its history and present condition • William Pridden
... Beacon would want. To give it what it would want and to give it nothing else was not doubtless an inspiring, but it was a perfectly respectable task, especially for a man with an appealing bride and a contentious mother-in-law. I thought Lambert's first letters as charming as the type allowed, though I won't deny that in spite of my sense of the importance of concessions I was just a trifle disconcerted at the way he had caught the ...
— Embarrassments • Henry James
... The merchant by the same manoeuvre, expected to sell more goods; and the physician was aware that it would afford him an excellent opportunity to brother and sister himself into a better practice. The lawyer expected to get large fees from avaricious and contentious church litigants. For church members will engage in lawsuits, the authority of John Wesley, and the still higher authority of St. Paul to the contrary, notwithstanding. The mechanic too, must have the patronage and influence ...
— A Review of Uncle Tom's Cabin - or, An Essay on Slavery • A. Woodward
... continued a consideration of much worth. For however various are the forms of civil politics, there is but one form of polity in the sciences; and that always has been and always will be popular. Now the doctrines which find most favour with the populace are those which are either contentious and pugnacious, or specious and empty; such, I say, as either entangle assent or tickle it. And therefore no doubt the greatest wits in each successive age have been forced out of their own course, men of capacity and intellect above the vulgar having been fain, for reputation's sake, to bow ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot
... the King exceeding wroth, and at last were matters at such a pass that they disputed together with contentious words, Einar swearing that the peasants would not brook the lawlessness of the King if he should break the common law of the land. After this fashion did they fall out on sundry occasions. Then Einar started to have many men round him when he ...
— The Sagas of Olaf Tryggvason and of Harald The Tyrant (Harald Haardraade) • Snorri Sturluson
... 9—"But unto them that are contentious, and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil, of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile." "Wrath" indicates the settled mind of God towards the persistently ...
— The Great Doctrines of the Bible • Rev. William Evans
... respondent; but he has a difficulty in apprehending the higher education of Socrates, and makes some false hits in the course of the discussion. Once more Adeimantus returns with the allusion to his brother Glaucon whom he compares to the contentious State; in the next book he is again superseded, and ...
— The Republic • Plato
... grievances," in any accurate meaning of these words, but comprehends demands for an exercise by the government of its powers in furtherance of the interests and prosperity of the petitioners, and of their views on politically contentious matters. ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... haue obteined a kingdome among such a mightie people, I beseech thee to grant them victorie, health, and libertie, against these contentious, wicked, and vnsatiable men (if they maie be called men, which vse warme bathings, delicate fare, hot wines, sweet oiles, soft beds, fine musicke, and so vnkindlie lusts) who are altogither giuen to couetousnesse and crueltie, as their dooings doo declare. Let not ...
— Chronicles (1 of 6): The Historie of England (4 of 8) - The Fovrth Booke Of The Historie Of England • Raphael Holinshed
... was not my only way; every one told me the Epicureans were sensual and self-indulgent, the Peripatetics avaricious and contentious, the Platonists conceited and vain; about the Stoics, on the contrary, many said they had fortitude and an open mind; he who goes their way, I heard, was the true king and millionaire and wise man, ...
— Works, V2 • Lucian of Samosata
... workmen and servants, have lately died in the pestilence, many, seeing the necessity of masters and great scarcity of servants, will not serve unless they may receive excessive wages." A contemporary chronicler says that "laborers were so elated and contentious that they did not pay any attention to the command of the king, and if anybody wanted to hire them he was bound to pay them what they asked, and so he had his choice either to lose his harvest and crops or give in to the proud and covetous ...
— An Introduction to the Industrial and Social History of England • Edward Potts Cheyney
... the Gospel, according to our Solemn Engagements, neither proceeds it from irritation or inclination (by choice or pleasure) to discover our mother's nakedness or wickedeness, or that we love to be of a contentious spirit, for our witness is in heaven (whatever the world may say) that it would be the joy of our hearts, and as it were a resurrection from the dead, to have these grievances redressed and removed, ...
— The Covenants And The Covenanters - Covenants, Sermons, and Documents of the Covenanted Reformation • Various
... Business with the rest of Mankind but to look upon them. Under this Class of Men are comprehended all contemplative Tradesmen, titular Physicians, Fellows of the Royal Society, Templers that are not given to be contentious, and Statesmen that are out of business. In short, every one that considers the World as a Theatre, and desires to form a right Judgment of those who are the ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... James I, described the charlatan of that period as shameless, a mortal hater of all good men, an adept in cozening, legerdemain, conycatching,[223:1] and all other shifts and sleights; a cracking boaster, proud, insolent, a secret back-biter, a contentious wrangler, a common jester and liar, a runagate wanderer, a cogging[223:2] sychophant and covetous exactor, a wringer of his patients. In a word, a man, or rather monster, made of a mixture of ...
— Primitive Psycho-Therapy and Quackery • Robert Means Lawrence
... his best to conciliate the good opinion of his vigilant neighbours. Their character for contentious orthodoxy was well known. It was at Neuchatel that the controversy as to the eternal punishment of the wicked raged with a fury that ended in a civil outbreak. The peace of the town was violently disturbed, ministers were suspended, magistrates were interdicted, ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley
... into the Albanian question desires is that the Albanians shall pasture their flocks and market their sheepskins in peace, free of Serbian control. In every country at present at war, the desire of the majority of people is for a non-contentious solution that will neither crystallise a triumph nor propitiate an enemy, but which will embody the economic and ethnological and geographical common sense of the matter. But while the formulae of national belligerence are easy, familiar, blatant, and instantly present, ...
— War and the Future • H. G. Wells
... cold there were some days when his voice was little better than a very distinct, but also a very pathetic, whisper. But there is another side. Age has mellowed his style, so that now he can speak on even the most contentious subject with a gentleness and a freedom from anything like venom—with an elevation of tone—that make it almost impossible for even his bitterest opponent to listen to him without delight and, for the moment at least, with ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor
... the converse of some long-lost friend. Delightful stream! though now along thy shore, When spring returns in all her wonted pride, The distant pastoral pipe is heard no more;[9] Yet here while laverocks sing could I abide, Far from the stormy world's contentious roar, To muse ...
— The Poetical Works of William Lisle Bowles, Vol. 1 • William Lisle Bowles
... his real will done in public matters has been, with infinite management, and display of such good-humor as at least deserves credit, the nominal Sovereign Majesty of Poland. Anarchic Grandees have been kings over him; ambitious, contentious, unmanageable;—very fanatical too, and never persuaded that August's Apostasy was more than a sham one, not even when he made his Prince apostatize too. Their Sovereignty has been a mere peck of troubles, disgraces and vexations: for those thirty-five years, an ever-boiling ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. IX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... not fit with them to stir and toil, Nor is it discontent to keep the mind Deep in its fountain, lest it overboil In the hot throng, where we become the spoil Of our infection, till too late and long We may deplore and struggle with the coil, In wretched interchange of wrong for wrong 'Midst a contentious world, striving ...
— The Life of Lord Byron • John Galt
... dread, the irrevocable oath he swore, The immortal seats should ne'er behold her more; And whirled her headlong down, forever driven From bright Olympus and the starry heaven: Thence on the nether world the fury fell, Ordained with man's contentious race to dwell. Full oft the god his son's hard toils bemoaned, Cursed the dire folly, and in secret groaned. —HOMER'S Iliad, B. ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... became more simple and plain, such as we now find it."—Blair's Rhet., p. 59. "Idleness and ignorance, if it be suffered to proceed, &c."—JOHNSON: Priestley's Gram., p. 186. "Avoid questions and strife; it shows a busy and contentious disposition."—Wm. Penn. "To receive the gifts and benefits of God with thanksgiving, and witness it blessed and sanctified to us by the word and prayer, is owned by us."—Barclays Works, i, 213. "Both minister and magistrate are compelled to choose between his duty and ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... object of the descent of this high spirit on to our planet. If the human race had earnestly centred upon that instead of losing itself in vain dreams of vicarious sacrifices and imaginary falls, with all the mystical and contentious philosophy which has centred round the subject, how very different the level of human culture and happiness would be to-day! Such theories, with their absolute want of reason or morality, have been the main cause why the best minds have been so often alienated from the Christian system and proclaimed ...
— The Vital Message • Arthur Conan Doyle
... later. Subsequent missionaries found it best to adopt a policy of far greater secrecy and silence. If, however, we remember that Campion intended his paper to be published under quite different circumstances, we can see that he at least hardly deserves the reproach of being contentious, or if he does, his failing was venial when we consider the tastes of the age. The immediate result of the publication was without question a ...
— Ten Reasons Proposed to His Adversaries for Disputation in the Name • Edmund Campion
... stripes feebly defined. The bird I shot measured from the point of the beak to the end of the tail 1 foot 6-1/2 inches. Though these Gyr-Falcons live socially together, yet they are very greedy and contentious about their prey. They snap up, as food, all the offal thrown out of doors; and thus they render themselves serviceable to the inhabitants, who consequently do not destroy them. In some of the valleys of Peru, I met with these birds again, but very rarely and always single and solitary. ...
— Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests • J. J. von Tschudi
... comrade, Your mission is fulfill'd—but I, more warlike, Myself and this contentious soul of mine, Still on our own campaigning bound, Through untried roads with ambushes opponents lined, Through many a sharp defeat and many a crisis, often baffled, Here marching, ever marching on, a war fight out—aye here, To fiercer, ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman
... now a receptacle for dust and a withered sprig of rosemary. Immediately beneath this—in the company of a couple of tatterdemalions worthy of him—sat the giant who had mocked his escape from falling, and as Gonzaga took his seat he heard the fellow's voice, guttural, bottle-thickened and contentious. ...
— Love-at-Arms • Raphael Sabatini
... anything to Mrs. Tarbell's discredit," said the Honorable Pope. "Not a bit of it. Not a bit of it. Her feelings do her infinite honor. In her appearance on our wordy and contentious stage I see the commencement of a new era of things. Let her be guided by her feelings. Let her still preserve that beautiful sympathy which is one of the chiefest ornaments of the female sex. It will bring ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, November 1885 • Various
... said to Pitholaus (his son's tutor), 'We have only one doctor, and that an honest one,' and went on to describe me as the first of physicians and the only philosopher, for he had tried many before who were not only lovers of money, but also contentious, ambitious, envious, ...
— A History of Science, Volume 1(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams
... their eyes. They laughed once more. Their days were filled with work and cheerfulness. In November Sir Anthony was elected Mayor. Being a practical, hard-headed little man, loved and respected by everybody, he drove a hitherto contentious Town Council into paths of high patriotism like a flock of sheep. And no less energy did Lady Fenimore exhibit in the sphere of ...
— The Red Planet • William J. Locke
... deposited with thee on trust." Then turning to the boy who represented Ali Khwajah he cried, "Go thou and instantly produce the jar that I may inspect it." And when the vessel was brought the Kazi said to the two contentious, "See now and say me: be this the very jar which thou, the plaintiff, leftest with the defendant?" and both answered that it was and the same. Then said the self- constituted Judge, "Open now the jar and bring ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... ill-fame of another, and to show off in company, like the doctors that perform wonderful cures in the theatres as an advertisement.[469] And independently of the insult, which ought not to be an element in any cure, we must remember that vice is contentious and obstinate. For it is not merely "love," as Euripides says, that "if checked becomes more vehement," but an unsparing rebuke before many people makes every infirmity and vice more impudent. As then Plato[470] ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... ready to its hand. It is not difficult to make transcendence real and to reveal to men their consummate need of it when we speak of it in the language of experience and perception. What preaching should avoid is the abstractions of an archaic system of thought with all their provocative and contentious elements, the mingled dogmatism and incompleteness which any worked-out system contains. It is so foolish in the preacher to turn himself into a lay philosopher. Let him keep his insight clear, through moral discipline keep his intuitions high, ...
— Preaching and Paganism • Albert Parker Fitch
... possibly contentious subject of the modifications which such new revelations must produce in Christianity, let us try to follow what occurs to man after death. The evidence on this point is fairly full and consistent. Messages from the dead have been received in many lands at various times, ...
— The New Revelation • Arthur Conan Doyle
... occupied, and so it is no wonder that the attention of the audience becomes languid, when there are no external graces to charm them and no thrills to stimulate them. Moreover, the address I am talking about is a fighting speech and full of contentious matter, and Nature has so ordained it that we think, if a subject has given us trouble to write, it will give an audience trouble to listen to it. How few conscientious listeners there are who prefer a stiff, closely-reasoned argument to honeyed and ...
— The Letters of the Younger Pliny - Title: The Letters of Pliny the Younger - - Series 1, Volume 1 • Pliny the Younger
... has been purified by the influence of the gospel of Jesus the Christ. The great idols of this world are fame, pleasure and wealth, and the love of these is the strong passion of the heart. But it is the most prolific source of individual, social and public misfortune, the most mischievous, contentious and demoralizing passion. The ambitious, the voluptuous, the rich and the great are not necessarily happy. Alexander wept upon the throne of the world because there was not another world for him ...
— The Christian Foundation, Or, Scientific and Religious Journal, Volume I, No. 7, July, 1880 • Various
... whenever he may choose to do so, he is not, like the dramatist, prohibited from representing anything else. In covering this special province, the drama is undeniably more vivid and emphatic; but many momentous phases of human experience are not contentious but contemplative; and these the novel may reveal serenely, without employment of the sound ...
— A Manual of the Art of Fiction • Clayton Hamilton
... their reward. Think of the mother of St. Augustin! Her husband returned to her penitent after years of depravity. 'Every wise woman buildeth her house; but the foolish pluck it down,' and that is what you are doing. 'A continual dropping on a rainy day and a contentious woman are alike.' For Heaven's sake, my child, do not become a contentious woman. See also Prov. viii. If only you had read your Bible regularly every day, prayed humbly for a contrite heart, and obeyed your parents, as you have always been taught ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... became independent in 1908. Having fought on the losing side in both World Wars, Bulgaria fell within the Soviet sphere of influence and became a People's Republic in 1946. Communist domination ended in 1990, when Bulgaria held its first multiparty election since World War II and began the contentious process of moving toward political democracy and a market economy while combating inflation, unemployment, corruption, and crime. Today, reforms and democratization keep Bulgaria on a path toward eventual integration into the EU. The country joined ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... in Nova Scotia observed the proceedings in New Brunswick with a view to action at the proper moment. The agitation throughout the province had not affected the {115} position of parties in the legislature which met in February. The government continued to treat federation as a non-contentious subject. No reference to it was made in the governor's speech, and the legislature occupied itself with other business. The agitation in the country, with Howe leading it, and William Annand, member for East Halifax and editor of the Chronicle, as his chief associate, went on. ...
— The Fathers of Confederation - A Chronicle of the Birth of the Dominion • A. H. U. Colquhoun
... opinion, it is our duty, when we have the desires of the people before us, to pursue them, not in the spirit of literal obedience, which may militate with their very principle,—much less to treat them with a peevish and contentious litigation, as if we were adverse parties in a suit. It would, Sir, be most dishonorable for a faithful representative of the Commons to take advantage of any inartificial expression of the people's wishes, in order to frustrate their attainment ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... after all these mutinies, Seditions, murders and conspiracies, Imagine with impartial hearts at last, What fruits proceed from these contentious brawls. Your streets, where erst the fathers of your state In robes of purple walked up and down, Are strewed with mangled members, streaming blood: And why? the reasons of this ruthful wrack Are your seditious innovations, Your fickle minds inclin'd to ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various
... cottage, Stephen," says Gwen. "She would like to see you, I know." Thereon the old man turns to go. He looks ten years older than his rather contentious self of yesterday. The young lady says no word either way of his responsibility for this disaster. She cannot blame, but she cannot quite absolve him yet, without a grudge. Her mother can; ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... gave a little purring chuckle. "Ah, there we get upon contentious ground," he remarked. "Why should 'everybody' be supposed to know anything at all? What business is it of 'everybody's' to know things? The earth was just as round in the days when people supposed it to ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... advice, but it was not his custom to rely upon this contingency as a source of income, nor did he in any eventuality return the amount which had been agreed upon (and invariably deposited with him in advance) as the reward of his inspired efforts. To those who sought him in a contentious spirit, inquiring why he did not find it more profitable to secure the prizes for himself, Wang Ho replied that his enterprise consisted in forecasting the winning numbers for State Lotteries and not in solving enigmas, writing deprecatory odes, composing ...
— Kai Lung's Golden Hours • Ernest Bramah
... grace of finish and exactness of phrase and manner; and is, in equal degree, the output of a singularly sane and noble nature; but here the comparison ends; for, while his prose is often stormy and contentious, his poetry has always about it an atmosphere of entire repose. The cause of this difference is not far to seek. His poetry, written in early manhood, reflects his inner self, the more lovable side of his nature; ...
— Matthew Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum and Other Poems • Matthew Arnold
... opponents may then welcome him, that all may philippize[n] with one consent, and that he and they may march to Attica together. If, however, you follow my advice, and give your minds to the problem before us, instead of to contentious criticism of anything that I may say, I believe that I shall be able to win your approval for my proposals, and to dispel the danger which threatens the city. {177} What then must you do? You must first moderate your present alarm, and then change ...
— The Public Orations of Demosthenes, volume 2 • Demosthenes
... the long autumnal season came To that bleak, bitter coast, and when at night The deep was shaken, and the pent cloud broke Crashing among the lurid hills of heaven, And in brief sudden swoonings of the gale Contentious voices rose from the sand-dunes, Then to low sobs and murmurs died away, The fishwives, with their lean and sallow cheeks Lit by the flickering driftwood's ruddy glow, Drew closer to the crane, and under breath To awestruck maidens told ...
— Wyndham Towers • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... of corruption cannot be denied; but what prevention can be found? The present manners of the nation would deride authority; and, therefore, nothing is left but that every writer should criticise himself. All hopes of new literary institutions were quickly suppressed by the contentious turbulence of king James's reign; and Roscommon, foreseeing that some violent concussion of the state was at hand, purposed to retire to Rome, alleging, that "it was best to sit near the chimney when the chamber ...
— Lives of the Poets, Vol. 1 • Samuel Johnson
... friends would really do with me, if they had me in their power, I cannot say, but they express in their looks and words nothing which I can fairly interpret to proceed from ill-will. I have been lately not so contentious or abusive as formerly, no more than I have flattered them, and my appearance among them is from mere curiosity, and to amuse you by my recitals more ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... if he knew better than any one—was Gabriel Nash, who lacked no leisure for hatefully haunting Balaklava Place, or in other words appeared to enjoy the same command of his time as Peter Sherringham. The pilgrim from Paris regarded him with mingled feelings, for he had not forgotten the contentious character of their first meeting or the degree to which he had been moved to urge upon Nick Dormer's consideration that his talkative friend was probably one of the most eminent of asses. This personage ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... the sea, it receives greater and more numerous impurities the farther it gets from its source, until, at last, what was, in its rise, a gentle rilling through snows and over whitest stones, roars into the ocean a muddy and contentious river. Men soon long to touch and taste all that they see; savage-like, him whom to-day they deem a god and worship, they on the morrow get an appetite for and kill, to eat and barter. And thus art is degraded, made a thing of carnal desire—a commodity ...
— The Germ - Thoughts towards Nature in Poetry, Literature and Art • Various
... Chamber, as fearlessly as he always does when he is thinking of something else, I springing up to move one or two Chairs out of his Way. Hearing some high Voices in the Offices, he presently observed, "A contentious Woman is like a continuall Dropping. Shakspeare spoke well when he said that a sweet, low Voice is an excellent Thing in Woman. I wish you good Women would recollect that one Avenue of my Senses being stopt, makes me keener to any Impression ...
— Mary Powell & Deborah's Diary • Anne Manning
... the orator, "you do wrong to your liberty by calling it so often in doubt, and in claiming with so much contentious anxiety from your enemies a title-deed for your independence. You hold it by your own public decree. In virtue of that decree, confirmed by the success of your arms, you have enjoyed it long. Nor could anything obtained from your enemies be of use to you ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... ears; set against, pit against. get into hot water, fish in troubled waters, brawl; kick up a row, kick up a dust; turn the house out of window. Adj. discordant; disagreeing &c. v.; out of tune, ajar, on bad terms, dissentient &c. 489; unreconciled, unpacified; contentious &c. 720. quarrelsome, unpacific[obs3]; gladiatorial, controversial, polemic, disputatious; factious; litigious, litigant; pettifogging. at odds, at loggerheads, at daggers drawn, at variance, at issue, at cross purposes, at sixes and sevens, at feud, at high ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... afford the time for it, it seems hardly expedient that the immediate representative of the King-Emperor should be drawn into the arena of public controversies. Proceedings are bound to grow more and more contentious, and delicate questions of procedure will arise and have to be settled from the chair. These are all matters in which the Viceroy should not be committed to the premature exercise, on the spur of the moment, of ...
— Indian Unrest • Valentine Chirol
... more than they gained by the contentious purism which was long prevalent in Italy, and which marred the freshness and vigor of many an able writer. Others, again, who felt themselves masters of this magnificent language, were tempted to rely upon its harmony and flow, apart from the thought ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt
... in liquor is an irresponsible being, and Allyne, under the polish of education and training, possessed the nature of a bully—he was tyrannical and contentious. Choosing now to assume that Carnegie's partial turning away and low-voiced conversation were intended to insult him, he straightened up, and looking fiercely across the table, with eyes already watery from the heady fumes of ...
— All Aboard - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... table, or at fire. I wish thee all thy mother's graces, Thy father's fortunes, and his places. I wish thee friends, and one at court, Not to build on, but support To keep thee, not in doing many Oppressions, but from suffering any. I wish thee peace in all thy ways, Nor lazy nor contentious days; And when thy soul and body part As innocent as now ...
— A History of English Literature - Elizabethan Literature • George Saintsbury
... stimulant for drooping ambition—the only infallible remedy for damaged honor and wounded pride. When the scales shall have fallen from our eyes in that happy day, politics will become a delightful profession, the contentious spirit of man will cease from its bickerings, the tongue of woman will settle down into a steady and respectable trot, the golden age of duelling will retreat into the shadowy past until it shall seem contemporary with the half-fabulous chivalry of the middle ages, distracted maidens will no ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... which the drink will scarcely do. From Western Isles, ere fruits and delicacies Did rot maids' teeth and spoil their handsome faces, Or ere these times did chance the noise of war Was from our tines and hearts removed far, Then had the churches rest: as yet, the coals Were covered up in most contentious souls; Freeness in judgment, union in affection, Dear love, sound truth, they were our grand protection. Then were the times in which our Councils sat, These grave prognostics of our future state; If these be longer lived, our hopes increase, These wars will usher ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... Sun Tzu said: The art of war recognizes nine varieties of ground: (1) Dispersive ground; (2) facile ground; (3) contentious ground; (4) open ground; (5) ground of intersecting highways; (6) serious ground; (7) difficult ground; (8) hemmed-in ground; (9) desperate ground. 2. When a chieftain is fighting in his own territory, it is ...
— The Art of War • Sun Tzu
... worlds; at that illimitable expanse of silence. And I thought of those vast gaps and lapses of manless time, when all these starry hosts unrolled and marshaled themselves before the attentive eyes of God, and it had not yet entered into his heart to create that swarming, writhing, crawling, contentious mass we call humanity. And I said to myself, "Why should a God condescend to ...
— Caesar's Column • Ignatius Donnelly
... creation, discussed between him and his father long before they had been discussed by Government; he wanted to make notes for his next year's articles; but he had not a thought that, within three months, his world was to be upset, and he under it. Frank Palgrave came one day, more contentious, contemptuous, and paradoxical than ever, because Napoleon III seemed to be threatening war with Germany. Palgrave said that "Germany would beat France into scraps" if there was war. Adams thought not. The chances ...
— The Education of Henry Adams • Henry Adams
... Fletcher sent out. He was not a sodden imbecile, but he was ill-chosen for his office. He described the New Yorkers of that day as "divided, contentious and impoverished" and immediately began a conflict with them. His attitude may be judged from a passage in his remarks to the assembly soon afterward: "There never was an amendment desired by the council ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... Bill was less easily disposed of. It bristled with contentious points bearing upon the most equitable ways and means of raising supplementary imposts to meet the first year's war outlays. As submitted to the House it was designed to raise a revenue of $1,800,000,000; but the barometer of the Treasury's needs kept rising and ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume VI (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... not well escape the sagacity of M. Neckar, that the mode of 1614 would answer neither the purpose of the then government nor of the nation. As matters were at that time circumstanced it would have been too contentious to agree upon anything. The debates would have been endless upon privileges and exemptions, in which neither the wants of the Government nor the wishes of the nation for a Constitution would have been attended to. But as he did not choose to take the decision upon himself, he summoned ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... care to see again, though doubtless all have value in their way. One that attracted our attention was a picture of "Christ disputing with the Doctors," by Albert Duerer, in which was represented the ugliest, most evil-minded, stubborn, pragmatical, and contentious old Jew that ever lived under the law of Moses; and he and the child Jesus were arguing, not only with their tongues, but making hieroglyphics, as it were, by the motion of their hands and fingers. It is a very queer, as well as a very remarkable picture. But we passed ...
— Passages From the French and Italian Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... the end of the thirteenth century the bishop had been accustomed to delegate the contentious jurisdiction of his diocese to an ecclesiastical judge, taking the name of vicar, or more commonly official ("vicarius generalis officialis"). The court itself became known as the officialite. ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird
... determined, Coleridge's analysis is, it seems to me, final. I cannot, at least, after the most careful reflection upon it, conceive it as being other than the absolutely last word on the subject. Reasoning and illustration are alike so convincing that the reader, like the contentious student who listened unwillingly to his professor's demonstration of the first proposition of Euclid, is compelled to confess that "he has nothing to reply." To the judicious admirer of Wordsworth, to every one who, while recognising Wordsworth's ...
— English Men of Letters: Coleridge • H. D. Traill
... of the contentious Christian sects of the capital, both father and son remained heathen and worshippers of Isis; and when the old priest died at an advanced age, Horapollo moved to Memphis where he led the quiet and secluded life of a student, mingling only now and then with the astronomers, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... to budge. The history of their time is not yet an old almanac to me. Of course I maintain the value and authority of the "Schola," as one of the loci theologici; still I sympathise with Petavius in preferring to its "contentious and subtle theology" that "more elegant and fruitful teaching which is moulded after the image of erudite antiquity." The Fathers made me a Catholic, and I am not going to kick down the ladder by which I ascended into the Church. It is a ladder quite as serviceable for that purpose now ...
— Occasional Papers - Selected from The Guardian, The Times, and The Saturday Review, - 1846-1890 • R.W. Church |
