"Lighten" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... did not allow a glint to lighten the grave kindliness of his glance. Perhaps he felt no amusement; she was his client ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... the loss of our mother, but that is not the only trouble. I think he has another, and I think also, Polly, that he had this other trouble before mother died, and that she helped him to bear it, and made plans to lighten it for him. You remember what one of her plans was, and how we weren't any of us too well pleased. But I have been thinking lately, since I began to guess father's trouble, that we ought to carry it out just the same as if our ...
— Polly - A New-Fashioned Girl • L. T. Meade
... began to lighten and more of the sunshine to come in between the two mountains. And before long they heard the "thump! thump! thump!" of the giant's hammer upon ...
— Ozma of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... troubles that had begun before his birth—and which did not lighten until after the passing of the Reform Bill, in June, 1832—had then attained a proportion which taxed the utmost energies of both private charities ...
— Winter Evening Tales • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... corn, and made a clear hole of the prize. At 9 P.M. it began to thunder & lighten very hard. Our sloop received great damage from a thunderbolt that struck our mast & shivered it very much, besides tearing a large piece off the hounds. As it fell, it tore up the bitts, broke in the hatch way, and burst through both our sides, starting the planks under ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 48, October, 1861 • Various
... said Nogher, wiping his own eyes; "it will lighten your heart; an' who knows but it's his mother's prayers that brought you to yourself, and got this relief for you. Go, Biddy," said he, in a whisper, to the servant-maid, "and tell the mistress to come here; she'll know best how to manage him, now ...
— Fardorougha, The Miser - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... After going some miles we found the channel nearly blocked up with coral, so that our boat grated along the bottom, crunching what may truly be called the living rock. Sometimes all hands had to get out and wade, to lighten the vessel and lift it over the shallowest places; but at length we overcame all obstacles and reached a wide bay or estuary studded with little rocks and islets, and opening to the western sea and the numerous islands of the "blakang-tuna." I now found ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume II. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... stronger children are called upon to take up; and now that he is fainting under it, be Thou his stay, and do Thou succor him that is tempted! Let his manifold infirmities come between him and Thy judgment; in wrath remember mercy! If his eyes are not opened to all Thy truth, let Thy compassion lighten the darkness that rests upon him, even as it came through the word of thy Son to blind Bartimeus, who sat by the ...
— The Professor at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes (Sr.)
... obtain the atmosphere of Brittany and in order that he may read these tales without feeling that he is perusing matter relating to a race of which he is otherwise ignorant, I have afforded him a slight sketch of the Breton environment and historical development, and in an attempt to lighten his passage through the volume I have here and there told a tale in verse, ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... indeed pregnable to no assault I could devise. Not even did she lighten when I said to her mother, in open mockery of that reserve, "Well, she cost you a lot of furniture that was really most companionable about the house," and paused with a sigh betokening a regretful comparison ...
— The Boss of Little Arcady • Harry Leon Wilson
... that before long the first black cloud of mourning would lighten a little over the house, and she had been taught at the convent to be patient under difficulties and troubles. The memory of that teaching was still near, and in her genuine sorrow, with the youthfully fervent religious thoughts thereby re-enlivened, ...
— Taquisara • F. Marion Crawford
... sad, 'I will not deny that this is a great trouble, and that my life will not be as easy and as happy as it used to be. The shadow of my poor boy's sorrow will be a heavy burden for me to bear; but we must ask God to lighten it for both of us. I tell you this to-night because you are my own dear mother, and such confidence is your due; but after to-night I shall not say it again. If you and father wish to help me, it will be by allowing ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... of heathenism, and win them to the truth. It is a glorious work which they have so piously undertaken, and blessed is every one who lends them a helping hand. Nothing is needed in their simple life, except one thing. They have no women to help to lighten the labor, and so Brother Joseph begs that his wife Christina, whom he left behind, may follow him; and Brother Daniel desires that we choose a helpmate for him, who may be sent out in company with Sister Christina. This request is very proper, and a beautiful field of work ...
— Sister Carmen • M. Corvus
... had better lie still and feign to be dead. In his turn he was visited by the marauders; but, as fame goes, it turned out that while they were hunting after the few pence he possessed, he contrived to lighten their pockets of their accumulated spoil. He had grown tired of war, however, and had settled in Constantinople, where he embarked in all manner of speculations, being bent, among other things, upon establishing a theatre at Pera. In all reverses he came down, like a cat, on his feet: ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various
... it of the fact that a young lady visitor is stopping at So-and-so's. The district incontinently throws itself at her feet, and worships Beauty in her person. Each of the few married ladies round invites the stranger to come and stop with her, after a bit, and to lighten her heavy load of solitude, and her craving for a companion of her own sex. And Miss Ada finds it impossible to refuse these invitations; and so the district entraps her, ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay
... "I'm not dead yet. But I'm obliged to you for being so enterprising. You've cleared my head. Quit that talk, Russ Genesmere." He went to the mule that had given out during the night. "Poor Jeff! We must lighten your pack. Now if that hunchback had died here, the birds would have done his business for him without help from any of your cats. Am I saying that, now, or only thinking it? I know I'm alone. I've travelled that way in this world. Why?" He turned his ...
— Red Men and White • Owen Wister
... for all who are feeling themselves burdened by the possessions and the opportunities with which God has enriched them. Let them remember that they hold them only in trust, and in helping to bear others' burdens, they will actually, strange to say, lighten their own. ...
— Men of the Bible; Some Lesser-Known Characters • George Milligan, J. G. Greenhough, Alfred Rowland, Walter F.
... reef. Picking their way through the pass, with the surf on either hand roaring in their ears, they slowly penetrated the lagoon and headed for the king's house. The shelving beach brought them to a stop, and all jumping out to lighten the boat, they drew her over the shingle and made her painter fast to a pandanus tree. Then, acting in accordance with a preconcerted plan, Winterslea was sent forward to track down their prey, while the rest huddled together ...
— Wild Justice: Stories of the South Seas • Lloyd Osbourne
... labour a point so universally admitted by all students of the Gospels as that Christ and His Apostles did not set out to abolish the slavery which they found everywhere around them, but rather aimed, by preaching charity to the master and patience to the slave, at the same time to lighten the burden of servitude, and to render its acceptance a merit rather than a disgrace. 'What, in fact,' says Janet, 'is the teaching of St. Peter, St. Paul, and the Apostles in general? It is, in the first place, that in Christ there are no slaves, and that all men are free and ...
— An Essay on Mediaeval Economic Teaching • George O'Brien
... saying, "How, in this tower, shall I do the will of Love the Lord, seeing here are only my fellow Pain and I? and the tower is full of seams and cracks, so that the wind blows cold upon my fire, and would fain quench it; and in no case can I lighten ...
— The Silver Crown - Another Book of Fables • Laura E. Richards
... Nobody knew, and nobody knows, what Eustache Dauger had done. It was one of the arcana imperii. It is the secret enforced ever since Dauger's arrest in 1669. Saint-Mars (1669) was not to ask. Louis XIV. could only lighten the captivity of Fouquet (1678) if his valet, La Riviere, did not know what Dauger had done. La Riviere (apparently a harmless man) lived and died in confinement, the sole reason being that he might perhaps know what Dauger had done. Consequently there is the strongest presumption that ...
— The Valet's Tragedy and Other Stories • Andrew Lang
... stage of their journey, while their horses were baiting, West walked on alone. It was a beautiful morning; the air was perfectly placid, not a speck of vapour in the sky, and a profound tranquillity seemed almost sensibly diffused over the landscape. The appearance of Nature was calculated to lighten and elevate the spirits; but the general silence and nakedness of the scene touched the feelings with solemnity approaching to awe. Filled with the idea of the metropolitan city, the Artist hastened forward till he reached an elevated part of the high road, which ...
— The Life, Studies, And Works Of Benjamin West, Esq. • John Galt
... beings,—whom Genius has left to us as a priceless bequest; push them not from the daily walks of the world's life: let them scatter some humanities in the sullen marts of business; let them glide in through the open doors of the heart; let their glee lighten up the feast, and ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... gone from the home he loved! With what compassion are his comrades moved For those who sit alone With memories of him! Gracious memories all! A thought to lighten, like that flower, his pall, ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101. October 24, 1891 • Various
... had arisen from oppressive tariff-laws enacted by some of the states against others. By taking away from the states the power of taxing imports, the new Constitution removed this source of irritation. It became possible to lighten the burden of custom-house duties, while by turning the full stream of them into the federal treasury an abundant national revenue was secured at once. Thus this part of Hamilton's policy met with general approval. The tariff has always been our favourite device for obtaining ...
— Civil Government in the United States Considered with - Some Reference to Its Origins • John Fiske
... the Roman people may get over the evil consequences of the jealousy of the gods with as little detriment as possible to either: populi Romani seems preferable here: i. e. "that it might be allowed to lighten that jealousy, by the least possible injury to his own private interest, and to the public interests of the Roman people." There were certainly two persons concerned in the invidia and incommodum here, Camillus himself, ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius
... stated in the context, and affirmed by Matthew, it is he that should bring light to the Gentiles. There is only one who is himself "a light to lighten the Gentiles and the glory of thy people Israel." (Luke ii. 32.) He said of himself: "I am the light of the ...
— The Testimony of the Bible Concerning the Assumptions of Destructive Criticism • S. E. Wishard
... burden seem to lighten best, Could I but weep my heart's blood, I might rest. My spirit bows with mighty grief oppressed, I utter forth my ...
— The Poems of Emma Lazarus - Vol. II. (of II.), Jewish Poems: Translations • Emma Lazarus
... for roots or manure, has not the most suitable shape for brick-carting. Probably, too, its wide wheels, which were intended for the softness of ploughed land, are needlessly clumsy for the hard road. Soon, therefore, the local wheelwright begins to lighten his spokes and felloes, and to make the wheels a trifle less 'dished'; while his blacksmith binds them in a narrower but thicker tyre, to which he gives a shade more tightness. For the wheelwright learns from the carter—that ignorant fellow—the answer to ...
— Progress and History • Various
... went to Holland to tell the directors that they could neither farm nor trade with profit unless the burdens were lightened; the directors thought otherwise, and the consequence was that devices were practiced to lighten them illicitly. This added to the interest of life, but subverted the welfare of the state. Where political rights are not secured to all men by constitutional right, those who are unable to get them by privilege, intrigue to steal what such rights would guarantee. At this ...
— The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 • Julian Hawthorne
... however, and my men ever after reminded me to keep out my wind-cap and my mackintosh, partly to lighten their loads, of course, and partly on account of the good omen it seemed ...
— Across China on Foot • Edwin Dingle
... sister! when the beggar-boy Returns, think still on hunger's pain; Lighten his little heart with joy, And fill his basket up again. Who pities wretchedness does well, But who relieves it, doth excel. Then ever, till the common end, Let Misery find in ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, May 1844 - Volume 23, Number 5 • Various
... the present comfort and pleasure of his friends, but of their highest and best good. Too often human friendship in its most generous and lavish kindness is really most unkind. It thinks that its first duty is to give relief from pain, to lighten burdens, to alleviate hardship, to smoothe the rough path. Too often serious hurt is done by this over-tenderness of ...
— Personal Friendships of Jesus • J. R. Miller
... had begun to lighten as she progressed, and had entirely cleared when he learned why he had been sent for. He had been afraid, when he received her note, that it had been about the mortgage. Cobb was chairman of the Loan Committee at the bank, had personally called attention ...
— The Fortunes of Oliver Horn • F. Hopkinson Smith
... nursed the head of a club called significantly the "lawbreaker's canes of crime," with a distant air of the fop sucking his clouded amber knob or silver shepherd's-crook. In more than one group were horse-copers, and their kin the market-gardeners' thieves and country wagoners' pests, who not only lighten the loads on the way to the city market on the road, but plunder the drivers after they receive their salesmoney ...
— The Son of Clemenceau • Alexandre (fils) Dumas
... men got out. They jacked up the rear wheels of the trailer, then started to unload. By so doing, they had a perfect reason for being there. If a police car came along, they had only to explain that they had broken an axle and were replacing it, and that they had taken out part of their cargo to lighten the load until ...
— Smugglers' Reef • John Blaine
... striking up to the left, but I felt that it was not safe. Better be slow and sure. Look, my lad, it is more open yonder, and seems like a way down to the torrent. We've earned a rest, and we must have one. Let's get down to where we can reach water, and lighten our load by making ...
— Fix Bay'nets - The Regiment in the Hills • George Manville Fenn
... schoolmaster, and certainly had been gently and carefully nurtured. They had one child, a sprightly, curly-haired, bright-eyed boy, nearly four years old. The wife, Ellen Irwin, was reputed to be a first-rate hand at some of the lighter parts of her husband's business; and her efforts to lighten his toil, and compensate by increased exertion for his daily diminishing capacity for labour, were unwearying and incessant. Never have I seen a more gentle, thoughtful tenderness, than was displayed by that young wife ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 434 - Volume 17, New Series, April 24, 1852 • Various
... "Seven Treatises," which were the only two books he had, and meditate and read, and sometimes pray; in which his anguish made him often invert Elijah's petition,—that he might die, because his life was a burden to him. God, though He was pleased to prolong his life, yet He found a way to lighten his grief, by removing his ague, and granting him a desire which above all things was acceptable to him. He had read his two books over so often that he had both almost by heart; and though they were both ...
— The Life, Adventures & Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton • Daniel Defoe
... provided at too infrequent intervals to affect the general result. The fact is, however, that Coleridge's own theory of his duty as a public instructor was in itself fatal to any hope of his venture proving a commercial success. Even when entreated by Southey to lighten the character of the periodical, he accompanies his admission of the worldly wisdom of the advice with something like a protest against such a departure from the severity of his original plan. His ...
— English Men of Letters: Coleridge • H. D. Traill
... Poesy might wake her heav'n-taught lyre, And look through Nature with creative fire; Here, to the wrongs of fate half reconcil'd, Misfortune's lighten'd steps might wander wild; And Disappointment, in these lonely bounds, Find balm to soothe her bitter—rankling wounds: Here heart-struck Grief might heav'nward stretch her scan, And injur'd Worth forget ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... Lanse. He nodded without speaking, but she did not lighten her pressure. She saw that he was ...
— The Second Violin • Grace S. Richmond
... it's myself that would, Mogue, but you see, as I'm out for a while, an' so near my poor mother's, throth I'll slip over and see how she is, the crature; only for that, Mogue, I'd lighten you of the shootin' things wid a ...
— The Tithe-Proctor - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... to me. What is the metaphysical being who prevents me from slaying myself? It is Nature. What is the other being who enjoins me to lighten the burdens of that life which brings me only feeble pleasures and heavy pains? It is Reason. Nature is a coward which, demanding only conservation, orders me to sacrifice all to its existence. Reason is a being which gives me resemblance to God, which treads instinct ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... Before proceeding to lighten the ship, the captain had taken steps to put himself in a position of defence. For some distance along the centre of the bay the ground rose abruptly, at a distance of some thirty yards from the shore, forming a sort of natural terrace. Behind this a steep ...
— With Clive in India - Or, The Beginnings of an Empire • G. A. Henty
... filled James with delight and hope. Had he been wise, they would have excited in him only aversion and distrust. It was absurd to imagine that a man really heartbroken by remorse and shame for one act of perfidy would determine to lighten his conscience by committing a second act of perfidy as odious and as disgraceful as the first. The promised atonement was so wicked and base that it never could be made by any man sincerely desirous to atone for past wickedness and baseness. The truth was that, when Marlborough ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... all the worlds lay under a deep shadow, and from every quarter came those who had loved or feared Balder. There at the very water's edge stood Odin himself, the ravens flying about his head, and on his majestic face a gloom that no sun would ever lighten again; and there was Frigg, the desolate mother, whose son had already gone so far that he would never come back to her; there was Frey standing sad and stern in his chariot; there was Freyja, the goddess ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... daughter-in-law soon made a place for herself in the Queen's heart, by her grace and amiability. I have heard a pretty little story of an attempt of hers to lighten somewhat Her Majesty's heavy cloud of mourning. Millinery being one of her accomplishments, she prevailed upon the Queen to let her remodel her bonnet, which she did, principally by removing a small basketful of sombre weeds. The Queen saw through ...
— Queen Victoria, her girlhood and womanhood • Grace Greenwood
... be freed from hard physical labour," said I. "We must lighten their yoke, let them have time to breathe, that they may not spend all their lives at the stove, at the wash-tub, and in the fields, but may also have time to think of their souls, of God—may have time to develop their spiritual ...
— The Darling and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... gone; the banks were composed of black and rugged rocks, and the course of the river was frequently intercepted by sand-banks and low islands. On the following morning, the channel became so much obstructed, that, at one part, they were obliged to land in order to lighten the canoe, which, after much trouble, was lifted over a ridge into deeper water. Though they often struck upon concealed rocks and sandbanks, yet the canoe, from its peculiar structure, seemed to sustain ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park
... 13. "Lighten" is used in the Prayer Book in two senses, both derived from Anglo-Saxon words,—to illuminate, as in the 3rd Evening Collect, Lighten our darkness, and in the Ordination Hymn, Lighten with celestial fire:—but here, to ...
— The Prayer Book Explained • Percival Jackson
... if hoping to lighten their labours—lovers of music as these people are—a shrill, musical, woman's voice arose, starting a familiar chorus, which was taken up directly by the young, to rise and fall and swell along the valley, the sweet soprano tones supported by ...
— Will of the Mill • George Manville Fenn
... through Rome and is of great value to the city and in the highest degree useful to the Romans. Amulius, a descendant of Tiberinus, displayed an overweening pride and had the audacity to deify himself, pretending an ability to answer thunder with thunder by mechanical contrivances and to lighten in response to the lightnings and to hurl thunderbolts. He met his end by the overflow of the lake beside which his palace was set, and both he and the palace were submerged in the sudden rush of waters. Aventinus his son ...
— Dio's Rome, Volume 1 (of 6) • Cassius Dio
... admiration with a nod and a wink. I read on.) Times were cruel bad out there for a poor boy that lived by his industry, but thank GOD he'd been spared the worst pangs of starvation (I glanced round the pop-shop, but, as Micky himself would have said, No matther!); and didn't it lighten his heart to hear of his dear mother sitting content and comfortable at her own coffee-stall. It was murderously hot in these parts, and New York—bad luck to it—was a mighty different place from the dear old Ballywhack ...
— We and the World, Part II. (of II.) - A Book for Boys • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... before, bearing N.N.W. Thus, then, fortune once more befriended our movements, by enabling us to push on another day in advance, without being dependent on our own resources. Morgan was too glad to empty the casks again, and to lighten the cart-load, with which, on the morning of the 9th, we left the glen, and gradually turned to the westward, until the hill we had walked to on the 7th, and which bore west by north from the place where we had left Morgan with the cart, ...
— Expedition into Central Australia • Charles Sturt
... Wolf's character possessed no redeeming point of any kind, while Brownie though a little too genteel for very hard work was charming as a pet, and it may also be said of him that he never lost an opportunity of using his pleasant appearance and delightful ways to lighten his afflictions. The load for this dog team after Depot A had been passed was 1,850 lbs., which, considering that some of the dogs were of little use, was heavy. But it must not be forgotten that the men also expected to pull, and that each ...
— The Voyages of Captain Scott - Retold from 'The Voyage of the "Discovery"' and 'Scott's - Last Expedition' • Charles Turley
... meal, and I gave orders that all hands might eat as much as they pleased, this concession being due partly to a realization that we would have to jettison some of our stores when we reached open sea in order to lighten the boats. I hoped, moreover, that a full meal of cold rations would compensate to some extent for the lack of warm food and shelter. Unfortunately, some of the men were unable to take advantage of the extra ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... restricted space which it offered for the full expansion of the theme. Mr. Asquith excels in swift and rapid flights, but even for him the Victorian Age is too broad a province to be explored within one hour. He endeavoured to lighten his task by excluding theology and politics, and indeed but for such self-denial he could scarcely have moved at all in so dense an air. He was able, however, having thrown out so much formidable ballast, to rise above his subject, and gazing ...
— Some Diversions of a Man of Letters • Edmund William Gosse
... wherein often we see ourselves in masquerade,—the droll disguises only magnifying and enhancing a real element and forcing it on our distinct notice,—we shall catch many hints that will broaden and lighten into knowledge of the secret of nature. All goes to show that the soul in man is not an organ, but animates and exercises all the organs; is not a function, like the power of memory, of calculation, of comparison, but uses these as hands ...
— Essays, First Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... penetrated out from some enormous forest of the tropics, the wild beasts would become fewer, the gloom would lighten, and the horror of the place would slowly lift. Yet as one emerges nearer to the edge of London, and nearer to the beautiful influence of the hills, the houses become uglier, the streets viler, the gloom deepens, the errors of ...
— A Dreamer's Tales • Lord Dunsany [Edward J. M. D. Plunkett]
... lighten ship!" called the captain, when he had looked over what the boat contained. They made short work of carrying the things from the lockers well up on the beach. With the boat thus made lighter, it was pulled out of ...
— Bob the Castaway • Frank V. Webster
... sorry for the widow with her two little boys, and the people of the country-side did all that they could to cheer her loneliness and lighten her grief. But, as I have said, she was a stranger among them, and she seems to have been naturally of a reserved disposition, preferring solitude in her affliction; for she so repelled their attentions, that, one by one, even her husband's ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 39, January, 1861 • Various
... meaning the peace of Vervins, which was just concluded. "Faith! I don't understand this sort of peace," answered the waterman; "there are taxes on every thing, and even, on this miserable boat, with which I have a hard matter to earn my bread."—"And does not the king," continued Henry, "intend to lighten these taxes?"—"The king is a good kind of man enough," replied the waterman; "but he has a lady who must needs have so many fine gowns and gewgaws; and 'tis we who pay for all that. One would not think so much of it either, if she ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... worse in proportion as he had spent upon it too great an amount of time. Without being positively stupid, his intellect was somewhat dull, and as his manner was shy and awkward he had not been quite understood at first, and no master had taken him specially in hand to lighten his burdens. His bitterest trial, therefore, was to fail completely every now and then, and be reproached for it by some master who little knew the hours of weary work which he had devoted to the unsuccessful attempt. This was particularly the case during his first half-year, ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar
... slowly, "your courage and your goodness to me have made my task a heavy one. Can I lighten it ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers
... which the king accorded him in ever- increasing measure, he made use of to lighten the burden laid upon the children of Israel. One day he came into the presence of Pharaoh, and said: "O my lord, I have a request to make of thee, and my hope is that thou wilt not deny it." "Speak," replied the ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg
... to lighten the darkness of his mind, and he pressed his hands against his temples hard, telling himself not to go mad—that everything would come out all right. No one was in sight, the fires were almost dead, the cabin ...
— The Wilderness Trail • Frank Williams
... And cannot will my will, nor work my work Wholly, nor make myself in mine own realm Victor and lord. But were I join'd with her, Then might we live together as one life, And reigning with one will in everything Have power on this dark land to lighten it, And power on this dead world ...
— Famous Tales of Fact and Fancy - Myths and Legends of the Nations of the World Retold for Boys and Girls • Various
... rise above the river under the cold and witching moon—soon the misty veil of fantasy would lighten the tedious and commonplace life, and behind the veil of mist there would rise in dim outlines another kind of life, ...
— The Created Legend • Feodor Sologub
... she sent for her father. In the night-time he came and sailed with her over the water in an oomiak. The deserted fulmar-bridegroom, taking a leaf out of Prospero's book, raised a storm. The father, to lighten the craft and propitiate the storm-spirit at the same time, threw the poor bride over-board, and cut off her fingers as she clung to the boat. As the four fingers dropped into the sea they changed respectively into beluga the white whale, nutchook the common seal, oog-zook the big seal, and ...
— The New North • Agnes Deans Cameron
... poverty; and unless I can lighten the burden of my mother's life by returning, I shall never ...
— Leah Mordecai • Mrs. Belle Kendrick Abbott
... slowly by. What would happen next? The Englishman felt that his frightful ordeal was not over. To his surprise the darkness began to lighten till he could see dimly the outlines of the chamber. It was bare save for the chair he occupied against a wall, and a couch on the opposite side of the room. The couch held something which looked like ...
— The Land of the Changing Sun • William N. Harben
... horse every knight who lay under the stigma of any thing base and dishonourable; but passing over the names of those knights who were only guilty of venial faults, in calling over the list of the order. To lighten the labours of the judges, he added a fifth class to the former four. He attempted likewise to restore to the people their ancient right of voting in the choice of magistrates [406]. He paid very honourably, and without ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus
... a favourite pupil, and the relation of master and scholar did not cease when the latter saw that he ought to do something to lighten the burden of his grandfather, and so left the school and betook himself to the life of a fisherman—with the slow leave of Duncan, who had set his heart on making a scholar of him, and would never, indeed, had Gaelic been amongst his studies, have been won by the ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... the airly Fall, Whin the sunshine had no chance at all— No chance at all for to gleam and shine And lighten up this ...
— Complete Works of James Whitcomb Riley • James Whitcomb Riley
... to detect the difficulties of early attempts, and the indifferent success which sometimes attends them in their first state. Bayle, to lighten the fatigue of correcting the second edition of his Dictionary, wrote the first volume of "Reponses aux Questions d'un Provincial," a supposititious correspondence with a country gentleman. It was a work of mere literary curiosity, and of a better ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli
... pursued the abbot triumphantly, "can a sinner open his heavy heart until you have given him something to lighten it? Oh, many and many a wretched man have I comforted spiritually over a flagon of stout ale; and many a good legacy to the Church hath come out of a friendly wassail between watchful shepherd and strayed sheep! But what hast thou there?" resumed the abbot, ...
— Harold, Complete - The Last Of The Saxon Kings • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... spoiling for action now. He didn't really care what happened that evening, what was planned. His question was simply a bored protest at a too tame existence—a wistful hope that Denny might lighten his ...
— The Raid on the Termites • Paul Ernst
... Acres of Dead I wonder how often the mute voices said: "I will do a kind deed or will lighten a sorrow Or rise to a ...
— The Path to Home • Edgar A. Guest
... persistence in his unwelcome attentions. To all her hospitable intimations that he and his family had brought an immense addition to her cares and labors,—which certainly was true,—he opposed smiles and caresses, and assurances that so long as he was there he would share and lighten all these; appearing to think that she complained and scolded only to draw ...
— Uncle Rutherford's Nieces - A Story for Girls • Joanna H. Mathews
... and growl with want and discontent. The expenses of the late war with France had added the weight of another AEtna or Sinai to the already staggering load that chafed her back; and, sorely grieved thereat, she began casting in her mind what might be done to lighten it a little. ...
— The Farmer Boy, and How He Became Commander-In-Chief • Morrison Heady
... that was to be only a temporary deprivation. We had stores sufficient to last for six months of rice, sago, tapioca, tea, coffee, sugar, raisins, and all those kind of things; but the ship's provisions, which had been mostly left behind to lighten the vessel (the Captain having only taken what was just necessary) were greatly damaged by the rain; they had not been in good tin cases like ours, and eventually were of little use. The packets of seeds ...
— Yr Ynys Unyg - The Lonely Island • Julia de Winton
... those lonely, loveless years. They took the silver crucifix from the wall and laid it upon her breast; for although they were not of her creed, they respected her devotion. They felt thankful that in her lifetime they had done all they could to lighten her burden. They felt still more thankful for her own sake, that her pilgrimage was ended, and that she had gone to join the babes who were so ...
— Peak's Island - A Romance of Buccaneer Days • Ford Paul
... proved to be unwise, was their distrust of the success of the Union arms. The prospect had grown steadily discouraging ever since the adjournment of Congress in the preceding July, and with the exception of General McClellan's success at Antietam there had been nothing to lighten the gloom which deeply beclouded the military situation. The daily expenditures of the nation were enormous, and the Secretary of the Treasury had at the opening of the season estimated that the National ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... chapters on that head are so many inestimable corollaries from his general doctrines, and could never have been obtained without them, yet these general doctrines have no sort of reciprocal dependency upon what concerns Taxation. Consequently, it will greatly lighten the burden to a student if these fourteen chapters are sequestered from the rest of the work, and reserved for a separate and after investigation, which may furnish a commentary on the first. The chapters on Taxation deducted, there remain, therefore, ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... and, more horrible still, drunken women; but this was not all, for so strong was the temptation thrust upon them, that the workman's hardly earned week's wages went in drink, and the children were left without bread and not a penny was saved to lighten future distress. The coarse animal natures of the only half-human beings became coarser and more animal through the degrading passion for drink that only too often has murder in its train, and murder in its ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... reverence and pleasurable emotion through the ordered armory, where the lances lie, with none to wield; through the lofty hall, where the crested scutcheons glow with the honor of the dead: but we turn sickly away from the arbor which has no hand to tend it, and the boudoir which has no life to lighten it, and the smooth sward which has no light feet to dance on it. So it is in the villa: the more memory, the more sorrow; and, therefore, the less adaptation to its present purpose. But, though cheerful, it should be ethereal in ...
— The Poetry of Architecture • John Ruskin
... articles which had been condemned by the bull. He takes his stand upon God's word in Scripture against the dogmas of the earthly God;—upon the revelation by God Himself, which, to everyone who studies it deeply and with devotion, will lighten his understanding, and make clear its substance and meaning. What though, as he is reminded, he is only a solitary, humble man, he is sure of this, that God's Word is ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin
... lighten the gloom. Necessary requests for the sugar or the milk or the stewed apples are phrased with a curtly formal civility. We shall be other men at noon or at night, vastly other, sunnier men, with abundance of quip and jest and playful ...
— Ma Pettengill • Harry Leon Wilson
... Island, took on one of the largest cargoes ever started on a filibustering expedition to Cuba. The cause is not known, but soon after starting a leak developed, beyond the capacity of the pumps. A heavy sea was running, and disaster was soon inevitable. The cargo was thrown overboard to lighten the ship and the vessel was headed for the shore on the chance that it might float until it could be beached. The water in the ship increased rapidly, and extinguished the fires under the boilers; the wind, blowing a high gale, swung into the northwest, thus ...
— Cuba, Old and New • Albert Gardner Robinson
... firm resolution in all honest men, to be closely united and active in shewing their love to their country, by preferring the public interest to their present private advantage. If a passenger, in a great storm at sea, should hide his goods that they might not be thrown overboard to lighten the ship, what would be the consequence? The ship is cast away, and he loses his life and ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IV: - Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Volume II • Jonathan Swift
... from his seat and calling upon her to halt. It seemed a survival of the dark ages that one immortal soul should spend her life hunting for the spectacles of another. To Mr. Bennett, a soul was a soul in any colour; to the Major the sons of Ham were under a curse which the Lord would lighten in His ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow
... not such an amount of information be obtained as will not only induce, but enable the Board of Trade immediately to frame some plain, practical measure, the enforcement of which would tend to lighten the appalling yearly death-list from shipwreck? The plan I would suggest is that the Board of Trade should prepare a chart of the British and Irish coasts, on which every lifeboat, rocket-apparatus, and mortar station should be laid down and along with this a sort of guide-book, ...
— Saved by the Lifeboat • R.M. Ballantyne
... mere personal help to affect the load of injustice laid upon them from without, and pressing them earthwards. She had learned but not yet sufficiently learned that, until a man has begun to throw off the weights that hold him down, it is a wrong done him to attempt to lighten those weights. Why seek a better situation for the man whose increase of wages will only go into the pocket of the brewer or distiller? While the tree is evil, its fruit will ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald
... trustful appeal, the feeling of dependence, the consciousness of weakness, of sin, and the longing for deliverance from them—these are all very different from the pompous phrases of empty praise and sterile admiration; they are things which flow from the heart, not the fancy, which lighten its weight of sorrow and self-reproach, brighten it with hope and good resolutions, in short, make it happier and better—what no mere imaginative poetry, however fine, ...
— Chaldea - From the Earliest Times to the Rise of Assyria • Znade A. Ragozin
... before this movement began, to cut down the baggage of officers and men to the lowest point possible. Notwithstanding this I saw scattered along the road from Culpeper to Germania Ford wagon-loads of new blankets and overcoats, thrown away by the troops to lighten their knapsacks; an improvidence I ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... be served from a mould, remove it when you do the beater. Fill the mould and work the cream up and down with a spoon. This will press the cream into every part, and lighten it. Cover the top of the mould with thick white paper, put on the tin cover, and bury in ...
— Miss Parloa's New Cook Book • Maria Parloa
... seeing why it should. The parish in which I live makes me pay my share for the paving and lighting of a great many streets that I never pass through; [230] and I might plead that I am robbed to smooth the way and lighten the darkness of other people. But I am afraid the parochial authorities would not let me off on this plea; and I must confess I do ...
— Evolution and Ethics and Other Essays • Thomas H. Huxley
... but when, in mysterious but unquestionable mercy, it lays the cross upon our shoulder, it also gives the support of its divine strength, "making the rough places plain to our feet, and the darkness to be light about our path." He who bore a cross, "the heaviest cross," can also lighten the burden of all our trials; and although he may not see good to remove them, he can remove their oppressive weight by the bestowment of the spirit of patience, which teaches implicit obedience to our heavenly Father's will. And now, ...
— Watch—Work—Wait - Or, The Orphan's Victory • Sarah A. Myers
... replaced by an ordinary hat and veil of plain black net bordered with thin black silk. Widows wear neck and cuff bands of unstarched white book muslin, this being the only sort of white permitted during the first period of mourning. Young widows, especially those who must lead an active life, often lighten their mourning during the second year and discard it at the end of the second year. Of course the conventional period of mourning for a widow is three years, but, if there should be any indication that a second marriage is contemplated, black should ...
— The Handy Cyclopedia of Things Worth Knowing - A Manual of Ready Reference • Joseph Triemens
... the broad jaws will—according to all laws of reasoning—seem to be narrower. A few dainty puffs towering up prettily and a soft, fluffy fringe left flying out over the ears will not only add grace to the forehead but lighten the heaviness of the lower part of the face. A bow of ribbon or any other perky little headdress will detract from the ...
— The Woman Beautiful - or, The Art of Beauty Culture • Helen Follett Stevans
... near them that the gunwale and the two upper streaks of their boat had been stove by their last whale, and the officer was about to throw all the whaling implements overboard, in order to lighten her, for the crew were desperately bailing out the water, which was pouring in through the broken ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... found to-day, the jerking of the meat finished, and preparations for a final start on the morrow completed. The unfortunate horses were in such wretched condition, that it was found necessary to lighten the loads to the Settlement. Four pack-saddles, two police saddles, and the two belonging to the Brothers were therefore abandoned, with the remainder of the odds and ends. The prospect before them was not very bright. With no provision save jerked meat, ...
— The Overland Expedition of The Messrs. Jardine • Frank Jardine and Alexander Jardine
... had a huge camp-fire tended by the Bishop's numerous children. Near by was a smaller fire over which the good man's four wives, able-bodied, glowing, and cordial, cooked the supper. In little ways they sought to lighten his sorrow or to put his mind away from it. To this end the Bishop contributed by pouring him drink from a large ...
— The Lions of the Lord - A Tale of the Old West • Harry Leon Wilson
... Belford.— A letter of deep distress, remorse, and impatience. Yet would he fain lighten his own guilt by reflections on the cruelty of ...
— Clarissa, Or The History Of A Young Lady, Volume 8 • Samuel Richardson
... mouth, is the hand, and one of these is of use all day long. Faith is to see, to receive, to work, or to eat; and a Christian should be seeing, or receiving, or working, or feeding all day long. Let it rain, let it blow, let it thunder, let it lighten, a Christian must still believe. At 'what time,' said the good man, 'I am afraid, I will trust in ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... she passed all her time at Jacques' bedside, allowed no rest either day or night, superior to annoyance, yet unable always to control herself when her whole soul was given to the care of her child, Henriette needed the support of a friendship which might lighten the burden of her life, were it only by diverting her husband's mind. Though I was now most impatient to rival the career of my brother, who had lately been sent to the Congress of Vienna, and was anxious at any risk to justify Henriette's appeal and become a man ...
— The Lily of the Valley • Honore de Balzac
... east began to lighten; a deepening glow rimmed West Hill, picking out in silver the trees along its edge. If she meant to come she must come soon, he thought, but the rising moon distinctly showed the bare stile. She had written a long time ago. She ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson
... two streets, terraced one behind the other; quiet, heavily-built houses, a small shop or two, another hotel, a little church, and the bathing establishment. The latter, large and substantial, overlooks the Gave a few steps up the road. We stroll inquisitively down through the village, lighten a dull little shop with a trifling investment, strike out upon the hill above for the reward of a view, descend to the bed of the torrent, and finally drift together again into the streetside near the hotel. Most of the houses are pensions or boarding-places during the summer, and while the ...
— A Midsummer Drive Through The Pyrenees • Edwin Asa Dix
... ordered the Mediterranean and the King William to put on all sail, and away they went after the big ship. The retreating pirates did everything they could to effect escape, throwing over their cannon, and even their boats, in order to lighten their ship, but it was of no use. The Governor's vessels were the faster sailers, and when the King William got near enough to fire a few cannon balls into the flying ship, the latter hauled down the black flag and without hesitation lay to ...
— Buccaneers and Pirates of Our Coasts • Frank Richard Stockton
... wait!——But what notes down the wind, hark! are driving? 'Tis he! 'tis their flag, shooting round by the trees! —Let my turn, if it will come, be swift in arriving! Ah! hope cannot long lighten torments like these. ...
— Poetical Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold
... this; just so strong, but different, and if my memory sarves me—even wuss. And if 'twas a whale, the gulls'd be swarmin' about un, fillin' the air wi' their cries, but I don't hear a sound. And, as to seein'—well, I wish 'twould come on to lighten a ...
— The Cruise of the Nonsuch Buccaneer • Harry Collingwood
... that falls on all whose sadness is a fruitful sadness, and who instead of yielding to bitter repining would try to make others happier. If he heard of a sorrow or a distress, his thought was no longer how to put it out of his mind as soon as he might, but of how he might lighten it. So his heart grew wider day ...
— Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories - Reprinted from The Hill of Trouble and The Isles of Sunset • Arthur Christopher Benson
... Phipps, however, was not a man to be intimidated; he seized the ringleaders, and sent the others back to their duty. It became necessary to bring the ship to anchor close to a small island for the purpose of repairs; and, to lighten her, the chief part of the stores was landed. Discontent still increasing among the crew, a new plot was laid among the men on shore to seize the ship, throw Phipps overboard, and start on a piratical cruise against the Spaniards in the South Seas. ...
— How to Get on in the World - A Ladder to Practical Success • Major A.R. Calhoon
... across the bare country northwards, and the spray leaped white and phosphorescent into the night like flakes of wind-hurled snow. I stood as close to the sea as I dared, and I prayed. Once I saw morning lighten the mass of clouds eastwards, and the grey dawn break over the empty waters. I heard the winds die away, and I watched the sea grow calm. Far across on the horizon there was faint glimmer of cold ...
— The Betrayal • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... how to recognize and deal with the nervous disturbances to which overtasked women are so liable. He saw well enough that Helen Darley would certainly kill herself or lose her wits, if he could not lighten her labors and lift off a large part of her weight of cares. The worst of it was, that she was one of those women who naturally overwork themselves, like those horses who will go at the top of their pace until they drop. Such women are dreadfully unmanageable. ...
— Elsie Venner • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... and Philip also (waiting to resume his mining operations in the spring); and Ruth would not be an assistant in a Philadelphia hospital, taxing her strength with arduous routine duties, day by day, in order to lighten a little the burdens that weigh ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 6. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... nothing human can withstand it. In the dry season, when it is low and the sun is shining, it is placid and benign with a bright and smiling countenance. Stately temples, set amidst sacred groves and graceful palms, lighten the banks. On the broad steps of the bathing ghats are assembled crowds of pious worshippers in clothes of every brilliant hue. The river has an aspect of kindliness and geniality and life-givingness. Its waters ...
— The Heart of Nature - or, The Quest for Natural Beauty • Francis Younghusband
... thousand years ago. It is our duty, so far as we can, to keep it so. There will always be enough about it that is solemn, and more than enough, alas! that is saddening. But how much there is in our times to lighten its burdens! If they that look out at the windows be darkened, the optician is happy to supply them with eye-glasses for use before the public, and spectacles for their hours of privacy. If the grinders cease because they are few, they can be made many again by a third ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... Nucingen. The Countess shone in all the glory of her magnificent diamonds; every stone must have scorched like fire, she was never to wear them again. Strong as love and pride might be in her, she found it difficult to meet her husband's eyes. The sight of her was scarcely calculated to lighten Rastignac's sad thoughts; through the blaze of those diamonds he seemed to see the wretched pallet-bed on which Father Goriot was lying. The Vicomtesse misread his melancholy; she withdrew her hand from ...
— Father Goriot • Honore de Balzac
... listener—was to lean forward, and clasp his left knee with both hands, as if fondling it, and his face would then wear a sad and wearied look. But when the time came for him to give an opinion on what he had heard, or to tell a story which something 'reminded him of,' his face would lighten up with its homely, rugged smile, and he would run his fingers through his bristly black hair, which would stand out in every direction like that ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... sent on shore, and who waited there; at the same time, he gave them a letter from Gow to Mr. Fea, for now he was humbled enough to write, which before he refused. Gow's letter to Mr. Fea was to let him have some men and boats, to take out the best of the cargo, in order to lighten the ship, and set her afloat; offering himself to come on shore and be hostage for the security of men and boats and to give Mr. Fea a thousand pounds in goods for the service. He declared at the same time, that if this small succour was refused him, he would take care nobody ...
— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward
... one resolution:—"Your sub-committee believe You can lighten the curse of Adam when you've lightened the curse of Eve. But till we are built like angels, with hammer and chisel and pen, We will work for ourself and a woman, for ever ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... the warm Beverage; for indeed it will dry the hideous flow of moisture Which oppresses your limbs, and sends forth streams of perspiration from your whole body. And in a short time, the swelling of your fat belly will Gradually begin to decrease, and it will lighten your members, now oppressed by ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... found, and much as I wanted to hear what she had to tell me, I could not listen comfortably if I thought she were really betraying a trust. I was still turned in my saddle, watching her face, and I saw it lighten at once, and something like a great sigh of relief seemed to come from the ...
— The Rose of Old St. Louis • Mary Dillon
... were increasingly left to settle themselves. This reversed the policy long and successfully pursued by the whigs, who fostered trade as the basis of national prosperity. The tories on the other hand held that national prosperity was based on land, and desired to lighten its burdens by taxing personal property, and we shall find Pitt distributing his taxation widely and so as to fall mainly on the moneyed class.[182] Laissez-faire reached its full development in the establishment ...
— The Political History of England - Vol. X. • William Hunt
... them, and puzzled before them as he remembered he was puzzled before the Greek rudiments as a child when he cried over o kai hae alaethaes kai to alaethaes. Whereas when Clive came to look at these same things his eyes would lighten up with pleasure, and his cheeks flush with enthusiasm. He seemed to drink in colour as he would a feast of wine. Before the statues he would wave his finger, following the line of grace, and burst into ejaculations of delight and admiration. "Why can't I love the things which ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... sternly, "whom you will treat with respect. He brings me a blessing to lighten my loss. One harsh word to this child, and you quit ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 3 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... this story receives important modifications. It appears that Armand Bertin, the wealthy proprietor of the Journal des Debates, had a high regard for Berlioz, who was on his staff, and knew of his struggles, which he was anxious to lighten. He resolved, therefore, to make him a present of twenty thousand francs, and to enhance the moral effect of this gift he persuaded Paganini to appear as the donor of the money. What would have appeared as a simple gratuity from a rich and powerful editor toward one of his staff, became a ...
— Famous Violinists of To-day and Yesterday • Henry C. Lahee
... argue. Thoughts come into my head that I'm sure are as true as Gospel, though maybe they don't follow each other like the Q.E.D. of a Proposition. The masters has it on their own conscience,—you have it on yours, sir, to answer for to God whether you've done, and are doing all in your power to lighten the evils that seem always to hang on the trades by which you make your fortunes. It's no business of mine, thank God. John Barton took the question in hand, and his answer to it was NO! Then he grew bitter, and angry, and mad; and in his madness ...
— Mary Barton • Elizabeth Gaskell
... the whole time on the Muddy. I lost three or four head of cattle, all within a day and a night. Mrs. Erkson walked to lighten the load, and would pick all the bunches of grass she saw and put them on the wagon to feed the oxen when we stopped. I let them pass me and stopped and fed the cattle, and slept ourselves. It was said that we ran great risks from Indians, but we did not see any. I had at this time only ...
— Death Valley in '49 • William Lewis Manly
... Great Britain. In order to draw a great revenue from them, it would not probably be necessary to introduce any new system of taxation into countries which are already sufficiently, and more than sufficiently, taxed. It might, perhaps, be more proper to lighten than to aggravate the burden of those unfortunate countries, and to endeavour to draw a revenue from them, not by imposing new taxes, but by preventing the embezzlement and misapplication of the greater part of those ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... these enterprises provided work for men only. The women, in the main, were without occupation. With the approach of winter the men in active control of the camp's affairs realized that something would have to be done to relieve the strain,—at least, to lighten it until spring came to the rescue with toil ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon
... your federal towers my bank adorn, And hail with me the great millennial morn That gilds your capitol. Thence earth shall draw Her first clear codes of liberty and law; There public right a settled form shall find, Truth trim her lamp to lighten humankind, Old Afric's sons their shameful fetters cast, Our wild Hesperians humanize at last, All men participate, all time expand The source of good my ...
— The Columbiad • Joel Barlow
... and will lighten the burden of taxation and modify the strain and stress of life, it ...
— The Fertility of the Unfit • William Allan Chapple
... to actual settlers to the payment of the national debt, is worth consideration. Texas alone, on whose public lands our assumption of her indebtedness gives us an equitable claim, would suffice to secure our liabilities and to lighten our taxation, and in all cases of land granted to freedmen no title should vest till a fair price had been paid,—a principle no less essential to their true interests than our own. That these people, ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell
... immovable: nothing that Boucher could do or say appeared to lighten the pressure of the orthodox theological opinion behind it; not even his belief that these fossils were remains of men drowned at the Deluge of Noah, and that they were proofs of the literal exactness of Genesis seemed to help the matter. His opponents felt ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... it more firmly as she spoke. Irene looked at her for a moment, and her small, wild, charming face seemed to lighten as though with sudden passion. Then she broke into ...
— A Modern Tomboy - A Story for Girls • L. T. Meade
... pianist drew with her pencil four little upright lines on the paper, representing the relative natural weight of the four fingers. "The fifth finger," she said, "figures very little in scale or passage playing. By correct methods of study the pupil learns to lighten the pressure of the stronger fingers and proportionately increase the ...
— Piano Mastery - Talks with Master Pianists and Teachers • Harriette Brower
... a new plan. We would now proceed by day as well as by night, for the shallop could not leave the river, and, besides, I did not care to trust my prisoners on shore. I threw from the shallop into the stream enough wheat to lighten her, and now, well stored and trimmed, we pushed away upon our course, the Chevalier and his men rowing, while my men rested and tended the sail, which was now set. I was much loath to cut our good canoe adrift, but she stopped the shallop's way, ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... gone to bed, and put out the candles, and all were at rest and in their first sleep, that he heard the sound of some one stealing through the house, and coming cautiously towards his bed; whereat he thought it must be some chamber-boy coming to lighten his purse for him, or some mischievous imp to pull the bed-clothes off him. But as he was a bold fellow, whom none could frighten, he acted the dead cat, waiting to see the upshot of the affair. When he perceived the object approach nearer, and stretching out his hand felt something ...
— Stories from Pentamerone • Giambattista Basile
... are wearing a yoke, will you slip from under it, instead of struggling with them to lighten it? There is hunger and misery in our streets, yet you say, 'I care not; I have my own sorrows; I will go away, if peradventure I can ease them.' The servants of God are struggling after a law of justice, ...
— George Eliot; A Critical Study of Her Life, Writings & Philosophy • George Willis Cooke
... the name of the business to Family Ghosts, Incorporated," she said, with an attempt to lighten his seriousness. ...
— Youth Challenges • Clarence B Kelland
... the power of Imagination, ... and by this power we can lighten the darkness which surrounds the world of the senses. There are tories even in science who regard imagination as a faculty to be feared and avoided rather than employed. They had observed its action in weak vessels and were unduly impressed by its disasters. But ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman
... dark eyes seemed to lighten the ghastly pallor of her face, and her lips trembled. "Yes," she acknowledged simply, "but ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish
... boy of fourteen, and a general favorite in the village. While his mother lived he had done all he could to lighten her tasks, and he grieved deeply for her loss now that she was gone. His father had ten years before failed in business in the city of New York, and, in a fit of depression, had emigrated to this obscure country village, where he had invested the few hundred dollars remaining to ...
— Try and Trust • Horatio Alger
... true, but is not all the truth. Remove the economic pressure and no woman will be driven, or be likely to be trapped, into entering the oldest profession in the world; but this does not say that she will not enter it. The establishment of a minimum wage will assuredly lighten the evil, but it will not end prostitution. The economic factor is by no means the only factor. It is quite true that poverty drives many women into the profession—that this should be so is one of the social crimes that ...
— The Truth About Woman • C. Gasquoine Hartley
... fixed barbettes, and with better provision for all-around fire. Ordnance improved in penetrating power, until the old wrought-iron armor had to be 20 inches thick and confined to waterline and batteries. Steel "facing" and the later plates of Krupp or Harveyized steel made it possible again to lighten and spread out the armor, and during the last decade of the century it steadily increased its ascendancy over ...
— A History of Sea Power • William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott
... whooping cough continued and all of us were nauseated again in the morning. We felt so badly and were able to take so little nourishment that it was determined to get to a lower altitude as fast as possible. To lighten our loads we left behind some of our supplies. We broke camp at 9:20. Eighteen minutes later, without having to rest, the cache was reached and the few remnants were picked up. Although many things had been abandoned, our loads seemed heavier than ever. We had some difficulty in negotiating the crevasses, ...
— Inca Land - Explorations in the Highlands of Peru • Hiram Bingham
... 366. In order to lighten the severe physical strain inseparable from infantry service in campaign, constant efforts must be made to spare the troops unnecessary hardship and fatigue; but when necessity arises, the limit of ...
— Infantry Drill Regulations, United States Army, 1911 - Corrected to April 15, 1917 (Changes Nos. 1 to 19) • United States War Department
... in such sorrow as cannot be warded off one only wastes one's body and gladdens one's foes. Then, again, no one can lighten another's sorrow by taking any portion of it upon oneself. For these reasons, O Sakra, I do not indulge in sorrow. All this that thou seest hath one end.[849] Indulgence in sorrow destroys personal comeliness, prosperity, life, and virtue itself, O chief ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... which just before His triumphs on distended pinions bore. Rushing from out the gate, the people stand, Each with a fun'ral flambeau in his hand. Wildly they stare, distracted with amaze: The fields are lighten'd with a fiery blaze, That cast a sullen splendor on their friends, The marching troop which their dead prince attends. Both parties meet: they raise a doleful cry; The matrons from the walls with shrieks reply, And their mix'd mourning rends the vaulted sky. The town is fill'd with ...
— The Aeneid • Virgil
... so like a bundle of untidy sticks that, but for the sadness upon the weary face, they could have burst out laughing. The perfume of the wistaria outside the open window came in sweetly, yet could not lighten the air of heavy gloom that clothed her like a garment. Her atmosphere was dull, all streaked with greys and black, for her mind, steeped in anxiety even while she slept, gave forth cloudy vapours of depression and disquietude that ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood
... it: why? Because I feel the love of God constraining me? Sometimes far otherwise. Because I feel benevolence towards the poor? No; for the thing itself is a task; but because it is my duty; because I would justify myself; because I would lighten my conscience. I have called this feeling independent of religion; but perhaps it is most intense when religion is faintest. This latter supplies, evidently, the only true motive for benevolent actions. Then they are a pleasure: then the divergence ...
— A Brief Memoir with Portions of the Diary, Letters, and Other Remains, - of Eliza Southall, Late of Birmingham, England • Eliza Southall
... are not as great, probably, as those originating in impatience and want of temper. The fretfulness of human life, it seems not hard to believe, is a greater evil, and destroys more happiness, than all the bloody scenes of the battle-field. The evils of war have generally something to lighten the burden of them in a sense of necessity, or of rights or honour invaded; but there is nothing of like importance to alleviate the sufferings caused by fretfulness, impatience, want of temper. The excitable peevishness which kindles ...
— Friends and Neighbors - or Two Ways of Living in the World • Anonymous
... rode through this wonderful woodland for a long time very greatly wondering, for everywhere about him was perfect silence, with not so much as a single note of a bird of the woodlands to lighten that stillness. Now, as Sir Percival rode through that silence, he presently became aware of the sound of voices talking together, and shortly thereafter he perceived a knight with a lady riding amid the thin trees that grew there. And the knight rode upon ...
— The Story of the Champions of the Round Table • Howard Pyle
... spray, and the paragondola dashed ahead faster and faster, until at last Dorothy could no longer hear the sound of the voices, and she could just see that they were throwing the big watch overboard as if to lighten the ship. Then she caught sight of the Highlander trying to climb up the handle, and Sir Walter frantically beating him on the back with the tobacco-plant, and the next moment there was another wild plunge and the paragondola and ...
— The Admiral's Caravan • Charles E. Carryl
... arrivals walk through the town in a mass, and make straight for the exhibition ground. The way thereto is lined with shows, stalls, and hawkers on foot, who make a market-place of the whole roadway to the show proper, and lead some of the improvident to lighten their pockets appreciably before they reach the gates of the exhibition they ...
— Jude the Obscure • Thomas Hardy
... immediately seized a large sack of sand, but had not time to throw it over before we were all in the water, gallery and all. In the first moment of fright, we threw into the sea everything that would lighten the balloon—our ballast, all our instruments, a portion of our clothing, our money, and the oars. As, in spite of all this, the balloon did not rise, we threw over our lamp also. After having torn ...
— Wonderful Balloon Ascents - or, the Conquest of the Skies • Fulgence Marion
... very miserable. And how did she endeavour to lighten the burden of her misery? Was it by counting over her jewels,—looking at the costly and beautiful things which adorned her dwelling,—thinking of her carriages and horses and glittering plate, or the number of her rich and titled friends? No; she sought ...
— False Friends, and The Sailor's Resolve • Unknown
... countenance and voice harmonising with the arch hilarity of the subject, Plantagenet for a moment believed that he beheld the little Venetia of his youth, that sunny child so full of mirth and grace, the very recollection of whose lively and bright existence might enliven the gloomiest hour and lighten ...
— Venetia • Benjamin Disraeli
... moon, thou cruel pale moon, That night hadst never the grace To lighten two dying Christian men To see ...
— Andromeda and Other Poems • Charles Kingsley
... physical or moral, in an instantaneous change of habit to complete abstinence. Instead of feeling any depressing want of what I had relinquished, I have found a direct refreshment and satisfaction in the simpler modes of life. Few things, I believe, do more, at a minimum of cost, to lighten the spirits and sweeten the temper of families and of society, than ...
— Study and Stimulants • A. Arthur Reade
... the second. To the priest, indeed, she made herself very agreeable, perhaps to show Leonard how charming she could be when she chose. She conversed with him by the hour together as though he were a woman friend, and his melancholy eyes would lighten with pleasure at her talk. Indeed Francisco had something of the feminine in his nature; his very gentleness was womanly, and his slight stature, delicate hands and features heightened this impression. In face he was not unlike Juanna herself, and as time ...
— The People Of The Mist • H. Rider Haggard
... with its gesticulations, its eccentricities, its harlequinades, that left the lookers-on gaping with amazement; and the other his secret life, which he revealed only to Mme. Hanska, day by day,—his slave-like toil, his burden of debts which no amount of effort seemed to lighten, his prodigious hopes, and from time ...
— Honor de Balzac • Albert Keim and Louis Lumet
... softened considerably whilst he spoke, and those who were watching him so anxiously saw the ugly dark frown gradually lighten on his brow. No wonder! since he was just a man face to face with an exceptionally beautiful woman, to whose pity he was endeavouring to make appeal. At all times an easy and a pleasant task, it must have been doubly so now when the object of mercy was so deserving. Taurus Antinor looked straight ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy |
