"Expediency" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and of England towards the Acadians was based upon political expediency rather than upon any definite or well-conceived plan for the development of the country. The inhabitants, born to serve rather than to command, had honestly striven according to their light to maintain respect for constituted authority. But the state of unrest into which ...
— The Acadian Exiles - A Chronicle of the Land of Evangeline • Arthur G. Doughty
... sinful happiness throbbing at her heart while Francis Levison told her of his love, spoke plainly to Lady Isabel of the expediency of withdrawing entirely from his society, and his dangerous sophistries; she would be away from the very place that contained him; put the sea between them. So she dashed off a letter to her husband; ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... "What can I do? I am not a Christian." The judges looked at each other, as much as to say, "It is the old story; it is that inexplicable, hateful obstinacy, which will neither yield to reason, common sense, expediency, or fear." ...
— Callista • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... both rendering the typical character of Light more deeply felt than in Italy, and necessitating its admission in larger masses; the Italian, even at the period of his most exquisite art in glass, retaining the small Lombard window, whose expediency will hardly be doubted by anyone who has experienced the transition from the scorching reverberation of the white-hot marble front, to the cool depth of shade within, and whose beauty will not be soon forgotten by those ...
— On the Old Road Vol. 1 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin
... especially the struggles of the working classes. Moreover, in studying the lives of great men, he had grasped the principles on which they worked, and politics had become to him not a mere abstraction, not a matter of expediency, but something concrete, a great working philosophy. This fact had enriched his speeches, and thus it came about that when Mr. Bolitho read them, he discovered that he was fighting not with an ignoramus, but with a man ...
— The Day of Judgment • Joseph Hocking
... difference, however, that it was a heathen, not a Christian power, that Pilate represented, and that it was the spirit of ancient Rome, not that of modern England, which inspired his administration. Of this spirit—the spirit of worldliness, diplomacy and expediency—he was a typical exponent; and we shall see how true to it he proved on this ...
— The Trial and Death of Jesus Christ - A Devotional History of our Lord's Passion • James Stalker
... learned your lesson well, my lord, and ye will do your part in this day of expediency when men are more concerned about their safety and that of their children than that of the kirk of God and the cause of righteousness. I make sure that there will be much fair talk between you and your guests, but I cannot breathe this ...
— Graham of Claverhouse • Ian Maclaren
... beautifying, according to European standards, the Orthodox religious service (Germany 1810-20), and ended by abandoning the Messianic Restoration, the doctrine that Israel is in exile and that the prophecies are literally to be fulfilled. The expediency of these measures is apparent. To refute the anti-Semitic charge of racial inferiority, the existence of the race as a separate entity was denied, and the necessary scientific backing has lately been secured.[23] ...
— The Menorah Journal, Volume 1, 1915 • Various
... of foot, since a man serves himself with zeal. In addition, the French lords could make nothing of a politician so thick-witted that he replied to every consideration of expediency with a parrot-like reiteration of the circumstance that already the bargain was signed and sworn to: in consequence, while daily they fumed over his stupidity, daily he gained his point. During this period he was, upon one ...
— Chivalry • James Branch Cabell
... the arms of the Corn Law League. Neither of these views appears to be quite correct. The common, and it would seem, the more accurate opinion about him is, that he was a politician by profession—a man of expediency—and that on the question of the Corn Laws he did no more than he had previously done with regard to Catholic emancipation,—followed the current of public opinion, which he always watched with the most ...
— The History of the Great Irish Famine of 1847 (3rd ed.) (1902) - With Notices Of Earlier Irish Famines • John O'Rourke
... different scale. They had their alliances and their treaties, which, like the nations of Europe, they maintained, or they broke, upon reasons of state; and remained at peace from a sense of necessity or expediency, and went to war upon any emergence of ...
— An Essay on the History of Civil Society, Eighth Edition • Adam Ferguson, L.L.D.
... Duke's countrymen. But the Duke of Wellington was not in any case a cool, philosophic observer, and he lived at a time when the established or tolerated code of what was called personal honor seemed to have nothing to do either with Christian morals, with political expediency, or with ordinary common-sense. Wellington accepted without question the dictates of the supposed code of honor, and he sent his challenge. Lord Winchilsea, it will be seen, did not intend to stand by his gross and preposterous charge against ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume IV (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy
... which the moralist makes, and has to make in every age, against the practice of determining the expediency of a marriage by considerations of money or rank. There is a great abuse, he says, in the manner in which marriages are made without the two persons most concerned having any knowledge of one another, and solely under the authority ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 2 of 3) - Turgot • John Morley
... right of others to come to a different conclusion from his own, and while uniformly basing his total abstinence on the ground of Christian expediency and not on that of absolute Divine law, his view of it as a Christian duty grew clearer every year. And he carried his principles out rigidly wherever he went. He perplexed German waiters by his elaborate ...
— Principal Cairns • John Cairns
... accepted as beautiful—formulae that weaken rather than toughen up the musical-muscles. If the composer's sincere conception of his art and of its functions and ideals, coincide to such an extent with these groove-colored permutations of tried out progressions in expediency, that he can arrange them over and over again to his transcendent delight—has he or has he not been drugged with an overdose of habit-forming sounds? And as a result do not the muscles of his clientele ...
— Essays Before a Sonata • Charles Ives
... her very dear friend. They had grown up together from earliest childhood, and so it had been settled; for Ronald was left an orphan when almost a baby, and had been brought up with his cousin as a matter of expediency. Therefore, as Joe said, it had always seemed so very natural. They had plighted vows when still in pinafores with a ring of grass, and later they had spoken more serious things, which it hurt Joe to remember, and now they were suffering the consequence of it all, and the ...
— An American Politician • F. Marion Crawford
... idols in their secret meetings, and had been guilty of horrible and shameful offences against God, the Church, the State, and humanity itself. Philip professed the most pious horror at what he had discovered; he lamented the grievous necessity laid upon him, and urged upon the guilty men the expediency of a full and immediate confession of their wicked doings as the only way to secure pardon and escape the just and extreme penalty ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... Gough was urged by Sir Arthur Paget to withdraw the resignation. Sir Arthur Paget told them that the operations against Ulster were to be of a purely defensive nature. Unfortunately, Sir Arthur Paget based his appeal on expediency and private interest, and not sufficiently on the call of public duty. This failed to influence the officers. They persisted in their resignations, and only finally withdrew them on receiving a written ...
— John Redmond's Last Years • Stephen Gwynn
... only a dollar and a half. Ben calculated that his extra expenses, including dinner, might amount to fifty cents, thus making the cost of the trip two dollars. This sum, small as it was, appeared large both to Ben and his mother. Some doubts about the expediency of the journey suggested ...
— The Store Boy • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... Grant, if you really press for an answer, it is 'Yes' and 'No.' The Commissioner received a certain telegram, but he may have acted on other grounds. Even Commissioners can be creatures of impulse, or expediency, just as ...
— The Postmaster's Daughter • Louis Tracy
... under y'r banners, saying y' wrest the judgment to the highest bidder, aye to the supreme fountain head o' y'r courts! The fate o' this land, boys! Them's the stakes I'd play for, if I had lusty blows to spare. I'd up—I'd up—I'd strip me naked of every back-thought and expediency and self-interest and hold-back! I'd hurl the lie—in the teeth—of a scoffing world—I'd show all nations o' time that the people, the plain common good people, can keep the law sound as the Ark o' ...
— The Freebooters of the Wilderness • Agnes C. Laut
... slightest regard to the wants of the towns and the conveniences of commerce. Even the natural facilities for engineering operations were not allowed by that autocrat to be for a moment taken into consideration. His engineers were once consulting him as to the expediency of taking the line from St. Petersburg to Moscow by a slight detour, to avoid some very troublesome obstacles. The Tsar took up a ruler, and with his pencil drew a straight line from the old metropolis. Handing back the chart, he peremptorily said: "There, gentlemen, that ...
— Russia - As Seen and Described by Famous Writers • Various
... selfish gratification. Come, be a practical emancipationist to the extent of your ability; set the South an example; break every yoke." "They are better off with me," said I; "the hawks or cats would catch them, or they would die from exposure." "Expediency!" said one of them; "do justice, if the heavens fall." "Fye at justitia!" said one, who pretended to take my part. "Ruat coelum, Let them rush to heaven," replied the other. "Parse coelum, please, sir," said my boy in the Academy. "Yes, past the ceiling," said the ...
— The Sable Cloud - A Southern Tale With Northern Comments (1861) • Nehemiah Adams
... commensurate with the sacrifices required and the hazards incurred. Unfortunately, in our times there are so many doubtful and contested rights that most wars, though apparently based upon bequests, or wills, or marriages, are in reality but wars of expediency. The question of the succession to the Spanish crown under Louis XIV. was very clear, since it was plainly settled by a solemn will, and was supported by family ties and by the general consent of the Spanish nation; yet it was ...
— The Art of War • Baron Henri de Jomini
... unlike the general landscape, in that it had never been beautiful. In spite of globe-trotters' sentimental gush, not all villages of northern France were beautiful. Many were built for thrift and for comfort and for expediency; not for ...
— Bruce • Albert Payson Terhune
... for prudence and expediency. You're the slaves of your reason. You're dominated by the head, not by the heart. You're little better than calculating-machines. Are you ever known, now, for instance, to risk earth and heaven, and all things between them, on a sudden ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... are in want of bread?" was the remark of my friends, on being apprised of my resolution to return to the United States; and, in all humility, I must acknowledge that the same question suggested itself not unfrequently to my mind, when I discussed within me the expediency of my voyage. I have still in my possession a newspaper in which a correspondent states the depreciation of our currency to be such that he actually saw a baker refuse to take a dollar from a famished laborer in exchange for a loaf ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 91, May, 1865 • Various
... But do your thing, and I shall know you. Do your work, and you shall reinforce yourself. A man must consider what a blindman's-bluff is this game of conformity. If I know your sect I anticipate your argument. I hear a preacher announce for his text and topic the expediency of one of the institutions of his church. Do I not know beforehand that not possibly can he say a new and spontaneous word? Do I not know that with all this ostentation of examining the grounds of the institution he will ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)
... is being accomplished in the physical and the intellectual, principles are being apprehended that will finally enable the individual to distinguish between right and wrong, to organize on principle rather than upon expediency his relationships with his fellows, and eventually to become a free moral agent, self-controlled and self-directed. It is the period, therefore, when ideals are being formed, habits fixt, character shaped, life plans matured, ...
— On the Firing Line in Education • Adoniram Judson Ladd
... culminating expensively in Mansard roofs, cupolas and modern conveniences, and blossoming, in extreme instances, into Moorish fretwork and silk portieres for interior decoration. The Murchison house gained by force of contrast: one felt, stepping into it, under influences of less expediency and more dignity, wider scope and more leisured intention; its shabby spaces had a redundancy the pleasanter and its yellow plaster cornices a charm the greater for the numerous close-set examples of contemporary taste ...
— The Imperialist • (a.k.a. Mrs. Everard Cotes) Sara Jeannette Duncan
... third time, at need. But one can't very well refuse promotion in his regular profession; and, here, just as a true gentleman would depend on the principles of an officer, the hackneyed consciences of your courtiers have suggested the expediency of making Gervaise Oakes an admiral of the blue, by way of sop!—me, who was made vice-admiral of the red, only six months since, and who take an honest pride in boasting that every commission, from the lowest to the highest, has ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... alarm about his passenger, whose luggage remained on shipboard, but of whom nothing had been heard or seen since the moment of his departure from the Consulate. We conferred together, the captain and I, about the expediency of setting the police on the traces (if any were to be found) of our vanished friend; but it struck me that the good captain was singularly reticent, and that there was something a little mysterious in a few points that he hinted at rather than ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... promised to ratify the constitution. But, in 1664, Austria declared war against Turkey, and called for money and troops from Hungary. The Magyars, not having been consulted as to the expediency of the war, refused to have any thing to do with it. With the help of France, peace was made with the Porte; and, as soon as his foreign difficulties were settled, Leopold bethought himself of his turbulent Hungarians at home. Austrian troops were marched ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... her eyes, and met his close scrutiny. Against her will she answered him, breathlessly, out of a fevered sense of expediency. "Yes—yes, I do mean it! Oh, Max, you ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... — N. expedience, expediency; desirableness, desirability &c. adj.; fitness &c. (agreement) 23; utility &c. 644; propriety; opportunism; advantage. high time &c. (occasion) 134. V. be expedient &c. Adj.; suit &c. (agree) 23; befit; suit the time, befit the time, suit the season, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... common defense and common happiness. Immortal spirits of Hampden, Locke, and Sidney, will it not add to your benevolent joys to behold your posterity rising to the dignity of men, and evincing to the world the reality and expediency of your systems, and in the actual enjoyment of that equal liberty, which you were happy, when on earth, in delineating and ...
— The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10) • Various
... "purser's name" was a common thing among sailors. And although I felt unwilling to forego my claim to American citizenship, even for a brief period, I convinced myself that no evil to anyone, but much good to myself, would be likely to result from such a course. Expediency is a powerful casuist; the captain's kindness also touched my heart, and conquering an instinctive repugnance to sacrifice the truth under any circumstances, I rashly told him that in accordance with his suggestion, I would adopt ...
— Jack in the Forecastle • John Sherburne Sleeper
... of the government, or to intimidate any office-holder. The publishing of libels upon the government, or either house, or the President, was likewise made a crime. Against this proposition there were abundant arguments, on grounds both of constitutionality and expediency. It introduced the new principle of law that the United States should undertake the regulation of the press, which up to this time had been left solely to the States. That its main purpose was to silence the Republican journalists is plain from the argument of a leading Federalist: the ...
— Formation of the Union • Albert Bushnell Hart
... now came on board the Real to receive the last orders of the commander-in-chief. Even at this late hour there were some who ventured to intimate their doubts of the expediency of engaging the enemy in a position where he had a decided advantage. But Don John cut short the discussion. "Gentlemen," he said, "this is the time for combat, not for counsel." He then continued the dispositions he was ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... passive. Experience, however, soon taught the people that the law and the executive, when opposed, were anything but playthings, and the loss of several lives on the part of those who attempted, by force, to obstruct the execution of the former, led to the expediency of adopting the passive plan. A widow's son had been shot in a tithe-levy; and on the other side, a clergyman named Ryder had fallen a victim to the outrage of the people—as, we believe, had other reverend gentlemen also, together with a tithe-proctor, who was shot ...
— The Tithe-Proctor - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... scandal about this or that King George. But it was quite evident from the first, and ought to have been evident to the author long beforehand, that the enemy might think, and would say so. In fact, putting considerations of mere expediency aside, I think myself that he had much better not have done it. As for the justice of the general verdict, it is no doubt affected throughout by Thackeray's political incapacity, whatever side he might have taken, and by that quaint theoretical republicanism, with ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... very cold. There had been rainy weather, but it now appeared to be a settled frost. The roads were rough and hard, and the man who was driving them said a word now and again to his young master as to the expediency of getting frost nails put into the horse's shoes. "I'd better go gently, Mr. Herbert; it may be he might come down at some of these pitches." So they did go gently, and at ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope
... democracy, and substitute in their place the doctrines of the Satanic school of politics. They will not much longer consent to stand before the world as the slavery party of the United States, especially when policy and expediency, as well as principle, unite in recommending a position more congenial to the purposes of their organization, the principles of the fathers of their political faith, the spirit of the age, and ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... three, or four leeches at the very outset of these cases is often of great service, and sometimes cuts short symptoms which had seemed very threatening. The doctor, of course, must be the judge of its expediency, but I refer to it because I have known parents raise objections to it, and beg to have milder means tried first. It must be borne in mind then, that whenever leeches are of use it is at the beginning of an attack, and that the ...
— The Mother's Manual of Children's Diseases • Charles West, M.D.
... must have brought between them, and dreaded the time when they should be put side by side once more and compared. For David, too—the older of the boys by a year—had expected to go to college and till the time came had never doubted the expediency of it. But, as is so often the case, that merry-making force in human affairs that we call Circumstance—or is it Providence?—had it fixed up otherwise. Mr. Waring had suddenly lighted upon chronic poor health as a daily companion on ...
— A Williams Anthology - A Collection of the Verse and Prose of Williams College, 1798-1910 • Compiled by Edwin Partridge Lehman and Julian Park
... to have pursued them; to have sought at any rate some means of communicating with them? He was plainly reconciled to his present position, and felt that under these circumstances silence on his part was alike kindest and most discreet. Venetia had ceased, therefore, to question the justice or the expediency, or even the abstract propriety, of her mother's conduct. She viewed their condition now as the result of stern necessity. She pitied her mother, and for herself she ...
— Venetia • Benjamin Disraeli
... had no band wagon. The musicians were mounted on horses. This was all there was of the parade. Alfred has since learned that this feature was introduced into the circus as an expediency. G. G. Grady, an impecunious circus proprietor, found his colossal aggregation without a band wagon and no funds to purchase one. He hit upon the idea of mounting his band on horses. The innovation was heralded as a feature and to this day circuses ...
— Watch Yourself Go By • Al. G. Field
... his whole mind. He loved this girl and he loved his country, two simple passions which for the time absorbed his whole moral capacity. There was no room left for casuistry. To weigh one passion against the other, with the discordant voices of honour and expediency dinning in his ears, had too long involved him in fruitless torture. Both were right; neither could be surrendered. If the facts showed them irreconcilable, tant pis pour les faits. A way must be found to satisfy both ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers
... was almost as much grieved at the notion of the youth's persistence in denying such a crime, as at the danger in which it involved him, and felt that if he were to be brought to confession, it should be from repentance, not expediency. ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge
... representation in the national council," they said, "and we will cheerfully submit to the expressed will of the majority." Great Britain was too proud to listen to conditions from her children; too blind to perceive the expediency of fair concession. She haughtily refused the reciprocity asked, and menaced the recusants. In the war just closed, the colonists had discovered their inherent strength, and they were not easily frightened by ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... mysteries of life and love, never fouled his manhood in the stye of the beast—it is only that man who can see God, who can see duty where another sees useless sacrifice, who can see and grasp abiding principles in a world of expediency and self-interest, and discern ...
— The Power of Womanhood, or Mothers and Sons - A Book For Parents, And Those In Loco Parentis • Ellice Hopkins
... the best men in Virginia and North Carolina had voted against secession. Not one of them, in the face of this proclamation, would dispute longer with their brethren. Whatever they might think about the expediency of withdrawing from the Union, they were absolutely clear on two points. The President of the United States had no power under the charter of our Government to declare war. Congress only could do that. If the Cotton States were out of the Union, his act was illegal because ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon
... the whites, which would at once abolish the Round Valley and Tule River reservations; to place all the nomads on reservations, under the control of picked and intelligent army officers, and to require these to ignore, except for expediency's sake, all tribal distinctions and the authority of chiefs; to form every reservation into a military camp, adopting and maintaining military discipline, though not the drill, of course; to give to every Indian family an acre ...
— Northern California, Oregon, and the Sandwich Islands • Charles Nordhoff
... settled that of her own accord, and, without committing herself or others, had suggested a really sensible plan by which all trouble would be avoided in future. That was the common-sense way of looking at it. He would lay the plan before the colonel, have him judge of its expediency and its ethics—and even the question whether she already knew the real truth, or was self-deceived. That done, he would return to his own affairs in Sacramento. There was nothing difficult in ...
— A Ward of the Golden Gate • Bret Harte
... king, and may well gather round him all parties in the state. But your Majesty must make excuses for his humour. Young people are strong in their likes and dislikes. He has never heard you speak aught but ill of Warwick, and he knows how much harm the Earl has done to your House. The question of expediency does not weigh with the young as with their elders. While you see how great are the benefits that will accrue from an alliance with Warwick, and are ready to lay aside the hatred of years and to forget the wrongs you have suffered, ...
— A Knight of the White Cross • G.A. Henty
... architecture over all other styles, is a subject on which the general public is very ignorant, and with which it has little sympathy. The mediaeval architect is a sad and solitary man (who ever met a cheery one?), because his work is so little understood; yet if he would only meet the enemy of expediency and ugliness half-way, and condescend to teach us how to build not merely economically, but well at the same time, he would no longer be 'the waif and stray of ...
— Normandy Picturesque • Henry Blackburn
... excessive courtesy is neither instinctive nor genuine; it is camouflage for a ruthless, greedy, selfish, calculating nature. I have met many Japanese, but never one with nobility or generosity of soul. They are disciples of the principles of expediency. If a mutual agreement works out to their satisfaction, well and good. If it does not, they present a humble and saddened mien. 'So sorry. I zink you no understand me. I don't mean zat.' And their peculiar Oriental psychology leads them to believe they can get away with that sort of thing with ...
— The Pride of Palomar • Peter B. Kyne
... be arriving all night long with heavy luggage, and to be all, more or less, in trouble, I argue with him, and gently reprove him. To avoid the appearance of sermonising as much as possible, I put it on mere grounds of expediency. ...
— Diary of a Pilgrimage • Jerome K. Jerome
... The expediency of the motion, my lords, is, in my opinion, so obvious and incontestable, as to require no farther consideration, and, therefore, it is no argument against it, that we were not ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 10. - Parlimentary Debates I. • Samuel Johnson
... impassable roads. No sooner, however, was the rebellion put down, than Government directed its attention to the best means of securing the permanent subordination of the Highlands, and with this object the construction of good highways was declared to be indispensable. The expediency of opening up the communication between the capital and the principal towns of Scotland was also generally admitted; and from that time, though slowly, the construction of the main high routes between north and south made ...
— The Life of Thomas Telford by Smiles • Samuel Smiles
... alliance between that country and France. And the French War was in the first instance provoked by the aggressions of Philip, though Edward's assumption of the title of King of France, a measure of political expediency, rendered peace impossible. He was liberal in his gifts, magnificent in his doings, profuse in his expenditure, and, though not boastful, inordinately ostentatious. No sense of duty beyond what was then ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 1 of 8 • Various
... to the lines," Poltneck added. "It appears they had been driven back several times, leaving their dead and wounded in such numbers on the field—officers and men—that there was some hesitation about the expediency of trying it again. Not, however, in the bomb-proof pit. Kohlvihr was of a single mind, determined to make his reputation as man-indomitable at the expense of his division. A patchy old ...
— Red Fleece • Will Levington Comfort
... of expediency with you," he said hastily, "any further than to say that I'd cheerfully give ten years of my life to be able to consider it. Let me be perfectly plain: This evidence I am speaking of involves you personally. If the papers are put into Judge Hemingway's hands there ...
— The Honorable Senator Sage-Brush • Francis Lynde
... Wellington, and negatived; the Duke making the following memorandum on the subject: "There is nothing that I know of to prevent a soldier, equally with others of His Majesty's subjects, from investing his money in savings banks. If there be any impediment, it should be taken away; but I doubt the expediency of going further." ...
— Thrift • Samuel Smiles
... the world is growing to perceive that morality is separable from religion; that it arose independently, from a gradual study of the relations of man to man, from principles of equity inherent in the laws of thought, and from considerations of expediency which deprive its precepts of the character of universality. Religion is subjective, and that in which it exerts an influence on morality is not its contents, but the reception of them peculiar to the individual. Experience alone has taught man morals; pain and ...
— The Religious Sentiment - Its Source and Aim: A Contribution to the Science and - Philosophy of Religion • Daniel G. Brinton
... who is advised by the missionary to choose one of his two wives to have and to hold as a lawful spouse. When one has given his heart to Henry Esmond and the Heart of Midlothian he is in a strait, and begins to doubt the expediency of literary monogamy. Of course, if it go by technique and finish, then Esmond has it, which from first to last in conception and execution is an altogether lovely book; and if it go by heroes—Esmond and ...
— Books and Bookmen • Ian Maclaren
... that I should arouse both master and valet to the expediency of removing the treasure. It was growing late, and it behooved us to make exertion, that we might get everything housed before daylight. It was difficult to say what should be done, and much time was spent in deliberation—so confused were ...
— Short-Stories • Various
... escaped for the moment; or, which was quite the same, he did not know he was pursued. Another Northern city, with its full complement of grafting officials, was in the market for some train-loads of water-mains, and again Thomas Jefferson was fighting the old battle of conscience against expediency, this time in the evil-smelling ditches where the dead ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde
... leaders, all men of long experience and tested shrewdness, strengthened the Administration in quarters where it otherwise would have been weak, for there had been many who doubted whether the untried Liberal party could provide capable administrators. There had also been many who doubted the expediency of making Prime Minister a French-Canadian Catholic. Such doubters were reassured by the presence of Mowat and Fielding, until the Prime Minister himself had proved the wisdom of the choice. There were others who admitted Laurier's personal charm and grace but doubted ...
— The Canadian Dominion - A Chronicle of our Northern Neighbor • Oscar D. Skelton
... character of "Assemblies of Notables," and intended merely to assist in extricating the monarch from temporary embarrassment.[20] The repeated wars of Louis the Twelfth, of Francis the First, and of Henry the Second were waged without any reference of the questions of their expediency and of the mode of conducting them to the tribunal of popular opinion. Thousands of brave Frenchmen found bloody graves beyond the Alps; Francis the First fell into the hands of his enemies, and after a weary captivity ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird
... cost of suffering; let Banneker resign, if that were his rightful course, and tell The Searchlight to do its worst. Yes; such would be Io's idea of playing the game. He could not force it. He must argue with her, if at all, on the plea of expediency. And to her forthright and uncompromising fearlessness, expediency was in itself the poorest of expedients. At the last, there was her love for him to appeal to. But would Io love where she could not trust?... He turned ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... otherwise than most grateful for it. Weak people are seldom much given to gratitude: and even if they were, it is dearly that you purchase their allegiance; for there are few things which, on the long run, displease the public more than bad appointments. But, putting aside the political expediency either way, it is really a sacred duty in a statesman to choose fit agents. Observe the whirlpool of folly that a weak man contrives to create round him: and see, on the other hand, with what small means, a wise man manages to have ...
— The Claims of Labour - an essay on the duties of the employers to the employed • Arthur Helps
... Court. There was an alarming annual deficit, and the finances were utterly disordered. Successive ministers had exhausted all ordinary resources and the most ingenious forms of taxation. They made promises, and resorted to every kind of expediency, which had only a temporary effect. The primal evils remained. The national treasury was empty. Calonne and Necker pursued each a different policy, and with the same results. The extravagance of the one and the economy of the other were alike fatal. Nobody would make sacrifices in a ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IX • John Lord
... 'Die Entfuehrung' could permanently establish German opera in Vienna. The musical sympathies of the aristocracy were entirely Italian, and Mozart had to bow to expediency. His next work, 'Le Nozze de Figaro' (1786), was written to an adaptation of Beaumarchais's famous comedy 'Le Mariage de Figaro,' which had been produced in Paris a few years before. Da Ponte, the librettist, wisely omitted all the ...
— The Opera - A Sketch of the Development of Opera. With full Descriptions - of all Works in the Modern Repertory • R.A. Streatfeild
... women." The suffrage petitions this year had 5,741 signatures, the remonstrant petitions 81. On February 2 it was ordered in the House, on motion of Josiah Quincy, that the Committee on Woman Suffrage consider the expediency of submitting the question of Municipal Suffrage to the women of the different cities and towns, the right to be given to them in any city or town where the majority of those who voted on the question ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... a moment till Pansy came in sight on the arm of her cavalier; he stood just long enough to look her in the face. Then he walked away, holding up his head; and the manner in which he achieved this sacrifice to expediency convinced Isabel he ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 2 (of 2) • Henry James
... grounds and descending to those of expediency merely. Does capital punishment deter men from committing murder more effectually than perpetual imprisonment would? I believe that 999 out of every 1000 of our convicts even would not commit deliberate murder, although the penalty was only ...
— Six Years in the Prisons of England • A Merchant - Anonymous
... quality and the smallest possible quantity; then the charge of them before and after they are able to work is onerous, the cost of feeding and clothing them very considerable, and upon the whole he, a southern overseer, pronounced himself decidedly in favour of free labour, upon grounds of expediency. Having at the beginning of our conversation declined discussing the moral aspect of slavery, evidently not thinking that position tenable, I thought I had every right to consider Mr. ——'s slave-driver a ...
— Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation - 1838-1839 • Frances Anne Kemble
... illness, there is little doubt that the marriage would, ere now, have taken place. A fortnight had elapsed, and every day so completely filled him with alarm, that he proposed to Sir Thomas Gourlay the expediency of getting the license at once, and having the ceremony performed privately in her father's house. To this the father would have assented, were it not that he had taken it into his head that Lucy was rallying, and would soon be in a condition to go through it, in the ...
— The Black Baronet; or, The Chronicles Of Ballytrain - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... GRATULATIO. On the death of George the Second, and accession of George the Third, Mr. Bernard, Governor of Massachusetts, suggested to Harvard College "the expediency of expressing sympathy and congratulation on these events, in conformity with the practice of the English universities." Accordingly, on Saturday, March 14, 1761, there was placed in the Chapel of Harvard College the following ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... of the native character, so far as it goes, that women are not wholly without influence in the public councils. If, when a tribe is debating the expediency of going to war, the women come beneath the council-tree, and represent the evils that will result, their opinion will have great weight, and may probably turn the scale in favor of peace. On the other hand, if the women express a wish that they were men, in order that they might go to war, the ...
— Journal of an African Cruiser • Horatio Bridge
... Eleanor, who since her return to Barchester had done her best to avoid him. She would not give way to the Plumstead folk when they so ungenerously accused her of being in love with this odious man; but, nevertheless, knowing that she was so accused, she was fully alive to the expediency of keeping out of his way and dropping him by degrees. She had seen very little of him since her return. Her servant had been instructed to say to all visitors that she was out. She could not bring ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... Utilitarianism, in truth, being a body of principles applicable primarily to legislation and only secondarily to ethics, its doctrines hold far more obviously true in the field of politics than in the field of morals. On any wide view of large public questions expediency will be found to be only another name for justice. It can be neither the interest nor the duty of any nation to legislate in a way which produces more of suffering than of happiness. A policy opposed to the ...
— England's Case Against Home Rule • Albert Venn Dicey
... Brother-and-sister marriages, not uncommon in the Dry-towns, are based on expediency and suspicion, and are frequently, though not always loveless. It explained Dallisa's taunts, and it partly explained, only partly, why I found her in my arms. It did not explain Rakhal's part in this mysterious intrigue, ...
— The Door Through Space • Marion Zimmer Bradley
... and the northern countries. But in the east, while all our foreign affairs were quiet, great domestic evils were increasing in consequence of the conduct of the friends and relations of Valens, who had more regard to expediency than honesty; for they laboured with the utmost diligence to bring about the recall from his post a judge of rigid probity, who was fond of deciding lawsuits equitably, out of a fear lest, as in the times of Julian, ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus
... hold forth this time in Peckaby's shop. He did not in public urge the delights of New Jerusalem, or the expediency of departure for it. He kept himself quiet and retired, receiving visits in the privacy of his chamber. After dark, especially, friends would drop in; admitted without noise or bustle by Mrs. Peckaby; parties of ones, of twos, of threes, until there would be quite an assembly collected ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood
... to me almost impossible, Weighing the language of the noble lord, To catch its counsel,—whether peace of war. [Hear, hear.] If I translate his words to signify The high expediency of watch and ward, That we may not be taken unawares, I own concurrence; but if he propose Too plunge this realm into a sea of blood To reinstate the Bourbon line in France, I should but poorly do my ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... possible—having many years ago followed Waterton's instructions—to mount a bird entirely without wire, still it is at the best but an amateur's "dodge;" and I can fearlessly assert that it will not stand the test of work and expediency. It is, in fact, impossible to dispense with wire, if taxidermy is to be followed as a profession. As to putting cotton wool between the flesh and the skin, practice will enable one to do without this. To me it would be a great nuisance, unless in the case of much grease, of persistent ...
— Practical Taxidermy • Montagu Browne
... currents of popular prejudice and passion; statesmanship is too often weak and fluctuating, incapable of appreciating the true tendency of events, and too ready to yield to the force of present circumstances or dictates of expediency; but law, as worked out on English principles in all the dependencies of the empire and countries of English origin, as understood by Blackstone, Dicey, Story, Kent, and other great masters of constitutional and legal learning, gives the best possible ...
— Canada under British Rule 1760-1900 • John G. Bourinot
... abolished it, as is seen in modern race problems, in western countries to-day inheritance of property is the main legal form of status and it shades off into other forms of distribution. Private property must find its justification in social expediency.[3] There is no feature of it that is more questioned than is ...
— Modern Economic Problems - Economics Vol. II • Frank Albert Fetter
... for which His Majesty originally took up arms."[243] This gentle rebuke to Hood (an impetuous and opinionated officer), clearly shows the attitude of the Cabinet towards that problem. For Great Britain the re-establishment of monarchy was not an affair of principle, but solely of expediency. It is also noteworthy that the inhabitants of Toulon retained the tricolour flag, thus signifying their adhesion to constitutional ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... most useful exercise in a school for the purposes of relaxation and variety, and for invigorating their minds after a lengthened engagement in drier studies. It thus not only becomes desirable to teach music in the seminary as a branch of education for after life, but for the purposes of present expediency. ...
— A Practical Enquiry into the Philosophy of Education • James Gall
... after shaking him by the hand with the utmost cordiality and energy. He instantly conceived a lively hatred of old Mr. Quirk and his daughter, who seemed taking so unfair an advantage. What, however, could be done? Many times during his interview did he anxiously turn about in his mind the expediency of proffering to lend or give Titmouse a five-pound note, of which he had one or two in his pocket-book; but no—'twas too much for human nature—he could not bring himself to it; and quitted Titmouse as rich a man as he had ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... a topic of passing interest to the American people, while it affords the Trigger a text for a number of 'telling' articles relative to slave-emancipation, in which an appeal is made to the American Congress on the expediency of ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman
... as guiding faiths, and imperative notions about the conditions of success. The authority of religion and that of custom coalesced into one indivisible obligation. Therefore the simple statement of experiment and expediency in the first paragraph above is not derived directly from actual cases, but is a product of analysis and inference. It must also be added that vanity and ghost fear produced needs which man was as eager to satisfy as those of hunger or the family. ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner
... "I will take the liberty of advising such as are not 'thoroughly convinced,' and whose minds are yet open to conviction, to read the pieces and hear the arguments which have been adduced in favor of, as well as those against, the constitutionality and expediency of those laws, before they decide and consider to what lengths a certain description of men in our country have already driven, and seem resolved further to drive matters, and then ask themselves if it is not time and expedient to resort to protecting laws against aliens (for citizens, you certainly ...
— George Washington, Vol. II • Henry Cabot Lodge
... manner of belief is first to examine the truths proposed as coming from God, measure them with the rule of individual reason, of expediency, feeling, fancy, and thus to decide upon their merits. If this proposition suits, it is accepted. If that other is found wanting, it is forthwith rejected. And then it is in order to set out and prove them to be or not ...
— Explanation of Catholic Morals - A Concise, Reasoned, and Popular Exposition of Catholic Morals • John H. Stapleton
... infraction of treaties, it was usual to remove the offending population to a safer situation, separated from Rome by the Tiber; sometimes entirely to disperse and scatter it. But, where these extremities were not called for by expediency or the Roman maxims of justice, it was judged sufficient to interpolate, as it were, the hostile people by colonizations from Rome, which were completely organized [Footnote: That is indeed involved in the ...
— The Caesars • Thomas de Quincey
... associations, the rights of labour, and the welfare of the masses. Thrice he had quarrelled with his father;—but the old man loved his son, and though he was stern, strove to bring the young man into the ways of money-making. How was he to think of marrying Polly Neefit,—as to the expediency of which arrangement Mr. Moggs senior quite agreed with Mr. Moggs junior,—unless he would show himself to be a man of business? Did he think that old Neefit would give his money to be wasted upon strikes? Ontario, who was as honest a fool as ever lived, told his father that he didn't ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... prerogative, James found in his Attorney a ready and skilful advocate of his claims, who knew no limit to them but in the consideration of what was safe and prudent to assert. He was a better and more statesmanlike counsellor, in his unceasing endeavours to reconcile James to the expediency of establishing solid and good relations with his Parliament, and in his advice as to the wise and hopeful ways of dealing with it. Bacon had no sympathy with popular wants and claims; of popularity, of all that was called popular, he had the deepest suspicion ...
— Bacon - English Men Of Letters, Edited By John Morley • Richard William Church
... those of expediency, it might be objected that a bargain which on one side you allow to be discreditable leaves the legacy of an indestructible desire on that side to wipe out the discredit by tearing it up. Though Cavour became great by his connection with a movement ...
— Cavour • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... nations in the matter of neutrality by forbidding the exportation of arms or munitions of war of any kind from the United States to any part of the Republic of Mexico—a policy suggested by several interesting precedents and certainly dictated by many manifest considerations of practical expediency. We cannot in the circumstances be the partisans of either party to the contest that now distracts Mexico, or constitute ourselves the virtual umpire ...
— President Wilson's Addresses • Woodrow Wilson
... occult practices the Illumines in time became the third great masonic power in France, and the rival Orders perceived the expediency of joining forces. Accordingly in 1771 an amalgamation of all the masonic groups was effected at the new lodge of the ...
— Secret Societies And Subversive Movements • Nesta H. Webster
... bypath of the publishing business, and try to bring to my tasks some small measure of honest idealism. But what I love (I use this great word with care) in my friend is that his zeal for beauty and for truth is great enough to outweigh utterly the paltry considerations of expediency and comfort which sway most of us. To him his pen is as sacred as the scalpel to the surgeon. He would rather die than dishonour that ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley
... different opinions were announced by the successive speakers;[1043] but they could all be reduced to three. The more tolerant advocated the suspension of all punishments until the determination of the questions in dispute by a council. A second class, on the contrary, maintained the propriety and expediency of enforcing the laws which made death the penalty of heretical belief. The rest—and they mustered in the end a majority of three[1044] over the advocates of toleration, while they were much more numerous than the champions of bloody persecution—advised the king ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird
... when the proposition is made to abolish it entirely and at once; to prohibit the captain from ever, under any circumstances, inflicting corporal punishment; I am obliged to pause, and, I must say, to doubt exceedingly the expediency of making any positive enactment which shall have that effect. If the design of those who are writing on this subject is merely to draw public attention to it, and to discourage the practice of flogging, and ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... between me and the person who had inquired for me. I refused to go to the gate, however, to see who it was, and Jack was sent back to tell the woman that I had been left behind at Bermuda. He was directed to throw in a few hints about the expediency of her not coming back to look for me, and that it would be better if she never named me. All this was done, I getting a berth from which I could see the female. I knew her in a moment, although she was married, and had a son with her, and my heart was very near ...
— Ned Myers • James Fenimore Cooper
... Organic, a classification which is based on psychology—like the difference between the business man and the poet: talent and genius—whereas the classification which the reader is asked now to consider is based rather on the matter of expediency in the use of materials. Let us draw no invidious comparisons between Inherent and Incrusted architecture, but regard each as the adequate expression of an ideal type of beauty; the one masculine, since in the male figure the osseous ...
— Architecture and Democracy • Claude Fayette Bragdon |
