"Obstacle" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... that had enveloped her was fast disappearing, leaving them without an obstacle to the happiness he proposed. Woolfolk ...
— Wild Oranges • Joseph Hergesheimer
... with these dream-fancies, or imaginings, went those of a young man facing the world gallantly; surmounting every obstacle easily, and conquering hearts as if by a spell. There was success for him in every scene on which he entered: he was proud and admired, and very haughty, ...
— Drolls From Shadowland • J. H. Pearce
... The last obstacle they came to that day was a roaring waterfall about thirty feet high. Here, it might have been thought, was an effectual check to them at last. Nothing without wings could have gone up that waterfall, which filled the woods with the thunder of ...
— Away in the Wilderness • R.M. Ballantyne
... for all the ills to which their downtrodden brethren were heirs. As their pious coreligionists deemed it the universal duty to be well-versed in the Talmud, so the Maskilim thought it incumbent upon everybody to be highly cultured. No obstacle was great enough to discourage them. They were willing martyrs to the goddess of Wisdom, at whose shrine they worshipped, and whose cult they spread in the ...
— The Haskalah Movement in Russia • Jacob S. Raisin
... request still remained in full vigor in the lovers; and Isabel now, with many blushes and some hesitation of utterance, made George fully acquainted with the state of her heart, giving him at the same time to understand that he was the only obstacle to her happiness. ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper
... obstacle to true wisdom is the self-confidence inspired by that which is false. The first step toward this precious knowledge is earnestly to desire it, to feel the want of it, and to be convinced that they who seek it must address themselves to the Father of lights, who freely gives ...
— The World's Great Sermons, Vol. 2 (of 10) • Grenville Kleiser
... might have been inclined to rebel against this system of carrying constant intelligence to headquarters, which she had long ago felt as an insurmountable obstacle to any free communication with her mother; but now, her father's means of acquiring knowledge faded into insignificance before the nature of the information he imparted. She stood quite still, grasping the chair-back, longing ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... had always been beside her, and whose face she could not see, was still in the Tower, but he was far away, with his back toward her. He seemed to be suffering and Barbara tried to get to him to comfort him, but some unforeseen obstacle inevitably ...
— Flower of the Dusk • Myrtle Reed
... believe this; as an educated workman he was better armed for the fray than Moreau or Clerambault himself. Nothing depressed him for long; "fall down, pick yourself up again, and try once more," he would say, and he always believed he could surmount any obstacle that barred his way. He was ready to march against them on his one leg, the quicker the better. Like the others, he was devoted to the idea of revolution and found means to reconcile it with his optimism; everything was to pass off quietly according to him, ...
— Clerambault - The Story Of An Independent Spirit During The War • Rolland, Romain
... sledges, which it was thought would, when lined with buffalo-skins, furnish a very comfortable kind of vehicle for the journey; and I was still inclined to think a good, deep bed of snow over the whole country no great obstacle to a sleigh-ride. The whole matter was, however, cut short by the commanding officer, who from the first had violently opposed the scheme, declaring that he would order the sentinels to fire on us if we attempted to ...
— Wau-bun - The Early Day in the Northwest • Juliette Augusta Magill Kinzie
... who did not concur in the propriety of stating them. I would entreat, however, that should you think it right to introduce my name into any statement made to Lord Byron, you will not do it without assuring him of my unwillingness to oppose the smallest obstacle to his wishes, or give the slightest pain to his mind. The injury which, in my judgment, he is from day to day inflicting upon society is no justification for measures of retaliation ...
— A Publisher and His Friends • Samuel Smiles
... in place of a window for the entrance of daylight, and banking up its walls all round with thick layers of earth. The house must have a door, however, which must open outwards and easily, so that no obstacle may prevent a hurried exit in emergencies. Such a door can hardly be made very thick or double without rendering it heavy and difficult to open; and the single door will be scarcely capable of protecting the interior if the ...
— Acetylene, The Principles Of Its Generation And Use • F. H. Leeds and W. J. Atkinson Butterfield
... distance is not an insuperable obstacle to the transfer of thought. My companion was in communication with our friends, and from time to time conveyed to me messages of anguish from my dear love; for, being well aware of the nature of the currents and the unapproachableness of the islands, ...
— To Whom This May Come - 1898 • Edward Bellamy
... a short laugh, curiously resembling in its malice the bleating of the little goats, "I perceive that which constitutes the obstacle to our ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... No obstacle stood in the way of her free choice of alternatives. After their early dinner at three o'clock, Miss Pink habitually retired to her own room "to meditate," as she expressed it. Her "meditations" inevitably ended in a sound sleep of some hours; and ...
— My Lady's Money • Wilkie Collins
... sentiment and created business optimism. And it was the building of the Canadian Pacific that opened up the West and bound it fast to the distant East. Certainly not least among the makers of Canada were the men who undertook that doubtful enterprise and carried it through every obstacle to success; and not least {168} among the generations whose toil and faith have made possible the nation of to-day were the four millions of the Canada of the eighties who flung a great railway across the vast unpeopled spaces of a ...
— The Railway Builders - A Chronicle of Overland Highways • Oscar D. Skelton
... of national conviction. The whole history affords a remarkable instance of persistent policy, pursued consecutively for five or six generations. No better evidence could be given of its hold upon the minds of the people, or of the serious nature of the obstacle encountered by any other state that came into collision with it; as the United States during the Napoleonic period did, in matters of trade and carriage, but especially in the closely related ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 1 • Alfred Thayer Mahan
... beginning it had been a bewildering part of her—a clean, swift, unhesitating courage that had leaped bounds where his own volition and judgment would have hung waveringly; that one courage in all the world—a woman's courage—which finds in the effort of its achievement no obstacle too high and no abyss too wide though death waits with outreaching arms on the other side. And, surely, where there had been all this, there must also have been some deeper and finer impulse than one of destruction, of physical gain, ...
— The Alaskan • James Oliver Curwood
... explanation of his patron, and rising from his seat under the fence, he looked over into the garden, and listened for any sounds which might indicate an obstacle in the way of the enterprise; but not a sound could be heard except the chirping of the crickets and the piping of the frogs. With a great deal of care, he climbed to the top of the fence, ...
— In School and Out - or, The Conquest of Richard Grant. • Oliver Optic
... commonly, the more they become convinced that these mysteries lie beyond their attainment. I am not aware of any treatise which makes a serious effort to teach the uninitiated. Putting technical expressions on one side—though that obstacle is grave enough—every one of those which have come under my notice takes the mechanical preliminaries for granted. All are written by experts for experts. My purpose is contrary. I wish to show how it is done so clearly that a child or the dullest gardener may be able to perform the operations—so ...
— About Orchids - A Chat • Frederick Boyle
... not the money, Grace; I could let that go. It is that I have nothing to live for,—nobody and nothing. My wife, Gracie! she is worse than nothing,—worse, oh! infinitely worse than nothing! She is a chain and a shackle. She is my obstacle. She tortures me and hinders me every way and everywhere. There will never be a home for me where she is; and, because she is there, no other woman can make a home for me. Oh, I wish she would go away, and stay away! I would not care if I never ...
— Pink and White Tyranny - A Society Novel • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... Spectabilis Vivianus and his superior knowledge of the laws, an unjust judgment was obtained against you, in default, in the Court of the Vicarius of the City of Rome: that Vivianus himself has now renounced the world, repents of his injustice to you, and interposes no obstacle to the restitution of your rights. We therefore (if your statements shall prove to be correct) quash the sentence against you, restore you to your country and your property, and that you may be preserved from future molestation, founded on the old sentence against ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)
... in life. We jog quietly along, meeting the same faces, grinding over the same thoughts, the gravel of the soul's highway,—now and then jarred against an obstacle we cannot crush, but must ride over or round as we best may, sometimes bringing short up against a disappointment, but still working along with the creaking and rattling and grating and jerking that belong ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... over and take Care of every Thing that relates to it; which has made the Number of them equal with, if not superiour to that of the Pagan Deities. She knew, that the Incredibility of Things is no Obstacle to Faith among Multitudes; and that in believing of Mysteries, Propositions will not be the less swallow'd for ...
— An Enquiry into the Origin of Honour, and the Usefulness of Christianity in War • Bernard Mandeville
... that the water, rising inside the ant-hill, has compressed the air in the upper part, and that this air now makes an obstacle to prevent the water from rising higher. But if we pierce a hole in the wall by which the air would escape, either the water would still rise till it reached the outside level, or if it passed the hole, it would rise to that point where the compressed air would again keep it back. We must ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne
... in their efforts by the hope and belief that their labors will be crowned with success. Destroy that hope and you take away from society the most powerful of all the incentives to material development; you place in the pathway of progress an obstacle which it is impossible ...
— American Eloquence, Volume IV. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1897) • Various
... moon was rising behind the woods. That was a serious obstacle; but are there any serious obstacles for a man over-excited by drink? He did not even think of it; his mind was cheerful and content. If anyone encountered him in the night, wandering along the ...
— The Grip of Desire • Hector France
... achieve, as it has undertaken and achieved every other like task amongst us in the past, with admirable enterprise, intelligence, and vigor; and it seems to me a manifest dictate of wisdom that we should promptly remove every legal obstacle that may stand in the way of this much to be desired revival of our old independence and should facilitate in every possible way the building, purchase, and American registration of ships. But capital cannot accomplish this great task of a sudden. It must embark upon it ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Woodrow Wilson • Woodrow Wilson
... for four hours, stopping only once to refresh themselves, they came in sight of the entrance, and saw daylight beyond. A feeling of joy now came over the men, and three hearty cheers were given that echoed curiously through the arches overhead. Still there was another and serious obstacle to contend with. A boar, or tidal wave, had made at the entrance, and was rushing in with a roaring noise and such force that the boat could not have stemmed it for a minute. It was therefore, necessary to seek safety ...
— The Von Toodleburgs - Or, The History of a Very Distinguished Family • F. Colburn Adams
... for her what she did not say for herself. "There's Zoe," I said. And then Dorothy quite lost control of herself. She wept piteously. And then she grew calmer. She had faced the reluctant fact when I spoke Zoe's name. We had stumbled up and over that roughness in the road. Any rut or obstacle in it might now be easier endured ... if ...
— Children of the Market Place • Edgar Lee Masters
... these tops—two to fifty boys at one time. Each whips his top until it hums; then one takes the lead and the rest follow in a sort of obstacle race. The top must spin all the way through. There were bars of snow over which we must pilot our top in the spoon end of our whip; then again we would toss it in the air on to another open spot of ice or smooth snowcrust from twenty to fifty paces away. The ...
— Indian Boyhood • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... rushing noise of a whirlwind, the mass of heavier and less speedy animals closed upon us: buffaloes and wild horses, all mixed together, an immense dark body, miles in front, miles in depth; on they came, trampling and dashing through every obstacle. This phalanx was but two miles from us. Our horses were nearly exhausted; we gave ourselves up for lost; a few minutes more, and we should be crushed ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat
... The chief obstacle to peace was the mutual distrust with which each of the three parties regarded the others. Korea hated the Japanese with a perfect and justifiable hatred; she also feared and despised the pompous and pretentious pride of China. But in the negotiations which ensued the country which had ...
— Japan • David Murray
... intellectual field also. She does not propose to wait till it please man to develop her brain functions and to clear the way for her. The movement is well under way. Already has woman brushed aside many an obstacle, and stepped upon the intellectual arena,—and quite successfully in more countries than one. The movement, ever more noticeable, among women for admission to the Universities and High Schools, as well as for admission to the functions that correspond to these ...
— Woman under socialism • August Bebel
... also in getting a locality to run in, for Timothy Scourgefield, of Broom Hill, whose farm commanded a good circular three miles of country, with every variety of obstacle, having thrown up his lease for a thirty-per-cent reduction—a giving up that had been most unhandsomely accepted by his landlord—Timothy was most anxious to pay him off by doing every conceivable injury to the farm, than which nothing can be more promising than having a steeple-chase ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... sighting, and aimed very carefully at a blue back that was dodging about in the corn. At first I couldn't satisfy myself and didn't shoot, his movements were so spasmodic and uncertain; then I think he came to a ditch or some such obstacle and halted for a moment. "GOT you," I whispered, and ...
— The World Set Free • Herbert George Wells
... had it, with a very sombre reality to give it an added charm. No Juliet ever welcomed her Romeo more joyfully than she welcomed David when he paid her a flying visit unexpectedly; no Bayard ever had a more devoted lady in his tent than David, when his wife came through every obstacle to bring him comforts or to nurse the few wounds he received. Love-letters, written beside watch-fires and sick-beds, flew to and fro like carrier-doves with wondrous speed; and nowhere in all the brave and busy land was there a fonder pair than this, although their honeymoon ...
— Work: A Story of Experience • Louisa May Alcott
... what they were most bent on, had the sinister effect upon Victor, of obscuring his mental hold of the beloved woman, drifting her away from him. In communicating Fenellan's news through the lawyer Carling of Mrs. Burman's intentions, he was aware that there was an obstacle to his being huggingly genial, even candidly genial with her, until he could deal out further news, corroborative and consecutive, to show the action of things as progressive. Fenellan had sunk into his usual apathy:—and might plead the impossibility of his moving faster ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... lawyer tenderly pressed the youth into a chair and sighing deeply, thus continued: "You fell in love with the daughter of a great family and she with you. You got acquainted at a dance and the intimacy did not stop there. Every conceivable obstacle intervened between you, but love is artful and inventive and you found a way. The rich girl had a neglected brother whom his relations sent to the grammar school and the rascal frequently took refuge with me, the family attorney, when he was ill-treated at home, and here you came across ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai
... that belonged to him there. Jarl Eric had vanished with all his war forces towards England, leaving only a boy, Hakon, as successor, and Svein, his own brother,—a quiet man, who had always avoided war. Olaf landed in Norway without obstacle; but decided to be quiet till he had himself ...
— Early Kings of Norway • Thomas Carlyle
... the Rim, landing squarely across the trail a hundred feet below. It was the only trail, but it never occurred to the Noble Red Man to remove the dead horse. No indeed! If it proved impossible to get around the obstacle, why, stay off the trail until Providence cleared the way. In other words let Nature take its course. The Chief procured a few pounds of TNT from the Government warehouse located there, and with the aid of that soon ...
— I Married a Ranger • Dama Margaret Smith
... imagination is not without difficulties. First of all, it has not hitherto attracted psychologists, so that we enter the field at random, and wander unguided in an unexplored region. But the principal obstacle is in the lack of determination of this form of imagination, and in the absence of boundary lines. Where does it begin, and where does it end? Penetrating all our life even in its least details, it is likely to lead us astray through the diversity, often insignificant, of its manifestations. ...
— Essay on the Creative Imagination • Th. Ribot
... simply, she would get the credit of abusing the little girl. There seemed no way out of it. She stalked on grimly, and when she came to Reid's lot she promptly and dexterously climbed its fence and continued her way in silence. But the fence proved an insurmountable obstacle to Ruth. She stood outside and wailed dismally. The sound smote Nan, and made ...
— The Governess • Julie M. Lippmann
... will be sent to America, by whom we shall have an opportunity, I hope, of conveying the final determination of the Court with respect to our affairs. The navigation of the Mississippi appears to be the great, and if we can credit the assertions of men in power, the sole obstacle. ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. IX • Various
... feet, and its maximum breadth is twenty-six feet. It is not built quite like your long-voyage steamers, but its lines are sufficiently long, and its curves prolonged enough, to allow the water to slide off easily, and oppose no obstacle to its passage. These two dimensions enable you to obtain by a simple calculation the surface and cubic contents of the Nautilus. Its area measures 6,032 feet; and its contents about 1,500 cubic yards; that is to say, when completely immersed it displaces 50,000 ...
— Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea • Jules Verne
... most prominent leader, with new ability to defend their rights and to advocate their cause. It is a singular illustration of the hopeless corruption of the times, that the notorious profligacy of Marguerite seems to have been considered, even by Henry himself, as no obstacle ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... the widowed mother, had long ago planned this marriage for her son, in spite of a tremendous obstacle which took the shape of one Cochin, Matifat's partner's son, a young clerk in the adult department. M. and Mme. Matifat were of the opinion that an attorney's position 'gave some guarantee for a wife's happiness,' to use their own expression; and as for ...
— The Firm of Nucingen • Honore de Balzac
... beyond description. These valleys are limited both in length and breadth, but are level and clear; their soil is a rich alluvial deposit, and the plough can be driven from one end to the other without meeting a single obstacle to check its progress. Independently of these valleys, there are other portions of good grazing land in the Mount Barker district, but there are, nevertheless, very many stony ranges that are entirely useless even to stock. The Mount Barker district may be ...
— Expedition into Central Australia • Charles Sturt
... tears were in her eyes, and though her voice faltered, the dignity of all she uttered impressed every one who was present. "I respond to all the sentiments of the emperor," she said, "in consenting to the dissolution of a marriage which henceforth is an obstacle to the happiness of France, by depriving it of the blessing of being one day governed by the descendants of that great man, evidently raised up by Providence to efface the evils of a terrible revolution, and restore the altar, the throne, and social order I know," she went on to say, ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... walls of prejudice was growing larger and larger, and as time went by, the ancient stones of ignorance came crumbling down. The eager crusaders of a new and happier social order rushed forward. Suddenly they found themselves facing a new obstacle. Out of the ruins of a long-gone past, another citadel of reaction had been erected, and millions of men had to give their lives before this ...
— The Story of Mankind • Hendrik van Loon
... romance or poetry of war. War to-day is a grim business—but "business" before all else. It has to mobilize all the resources of a nation and generate power to the limit of its capacity. The conduct of war to-day is a technological affair—its methods have to be engineering methods. To crush an obstacle, there is need of a giant hammer, and the more mass that can be given it and the greater the force put behind it, the more deadly will be the blow. Prior to the World War technology had not been mobilized on so vast a scale nor ...
— Manhood of Humanity. • Alfred Korzybski
... are backed by virtue. Their mind is kept ever on the alert by their ambition, which sounds a charge in front and urges them to the assault of the future; incessantly at war with necessity, their invention always marching with lighted match blows up the obstacle almost before it incommodes them. Their daily existence is a work of genius, a daily problem which they always succeed in solving by the aid of audacious mathematics. They would have forced Harpagon to lend them ...
— Bohemians of the Latin Quarter • Henry Murger
... his long gun and fired, and the horsemen at once drew up, and after a little consultation two or three of them rode off on each flank so as to make a circuit of this unlooked-for obstacle, while one of the others rode back at full speed to meet the camel train. As soon as it arrived the riders, of whom there were two on each animal, dismounted. The camels were led back to a hollow where they would be safe from any stray bullet, and ...
— The Dash for Khartoum - A Tale of Nile Expedition • George Alfred Henty
... like the late John Ericsson, who did so much to improve the caloric engine, and the steam-ship as applied to war-like purposes, meets with failure in the attempt to carry such an idea to a commercially successful issue, there is at least prima facie evidence of some obstacle which places the proposed machine at a disadvantage ...
— Twentieth Century Inventions - A Forecast • George Sutherland
... delicate, incapable of fighting against difficulties. When he came up against an obstacle he drew back, not from fear, but something from timidity, and more from disgust with the brutal and coarse means he would have to employ to overcome it. He earned his living by giving classes, and writing ...
— Jean Christophe: In Paris - The Market-Place, Antoinette, The House • Romain Rolland
... which he had set out was one which might clear away the initial obstacle in the pathway of his love; he might locate the hiding-place of the Rider; might secure a clue to his identity; might, by great good fortune, ...
— The Rider of Waroona • Firth Scott
... suffered a lapse of memory. Twenty-four hours would elapse before he returned, and Frobisher's absence was discovered, and the latter hoped by that time to be far away, if he could but find some mode of escaping undetected from the building. The first and most serious obstacle in the way, the cell door, was overcome; now to find whether his luck would still hold, and if he could find another ...
— A Chinese Command - A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas • Harry Collingwood
... north is a serious obstacle to development; cyclonic storms form east of the Rocky Mountains, a result of the mixing of air masses from the Arctic, Pacific, and North American interior, and produce most of the country's rain and ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... that the number of trials for murder is the best test of the prevalence of this offence, it is not meant that the test is in all respects indisputable. At most it is merely approximate. One obstacle in the way of its entire accuracy consists in the circumstance that the proportion of persons tried, as compared with the amount of crime committed, is in no two countries precisely the same. In France, for instance, more murders are perpetrated, for which no one is ultimately ...
— Crime and Its Causes • William Douglas Morrison
... the holy table even on the greatest solemnity; but that such persons ought to be in a course of penance, and consequently not at mass with the rest of the faithful: and he terrifies them by exaggerating the danger and crime of delaying to do penance. Those who are not excluded by such an obstacle, he exhorts strongly to frequent communion, seeming desirous that many would communicate at every day's mass. "With a pure conscience," says he, "approach always; without this disposition, never. In vain is the daily sacrifice offered; to no purpose do we assist at the altar: no one communicates. ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... if the first obstacle was not great enough, I must add another which is even greater: we have not the disposition to follow England had we the ...
— A Comparative Study of the Negro Problem - The American Negro Academy. Occasional Papers No. 4 • Charles C. Cook
... and better weapons, perfecting his knowledge of the girl's language and teaching her to speak and to write English—anything that would keep them both occupied. He still sought new plans for escape, but with ever-lessening enthusiasm, since each new scheme presented some insurmountable obstacle. ...
— Out of Time's Abyss • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... reflected in precisely the same manner from a mirror. Accordingly, Newton perceived that if he could construct a telescope the action of which depended upon reflection, instead of upon refraction, the difficulty which had hitherto proved an insuperable obstacle to the improvement of ...
— Great Astronomers • R. S. Ball
... replied the crier, 'and will own as much when you come to know that whoever sits on this piece of carpet may be transported in an instant wherever he desires to go without being stopped by any obstacle.' ...
— Fairy Tales From The Arabian Nights • E. Dixon
... his sleepiness seemed suddenly to have disappeared, so he asked for the chance to wash and shave; and half an hour later he came down all slicked up and spruce, with a very visible intention of paying court to the lady of the house. Irish, you see,—white hairs no obstacle. I could not help laughing. "Hoity-toity," I said to myself, "I am getting all kinds of impressions ...
— A Hilltop on the Marne • Mildred Aldrich
... on the power of the Pope over the sovereign in the Middle Ages[2] is full of research. It was written at a time when the works of Voigt and Hurter revealed to the Catholics the greatness of the Roman pontiffs in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. This greatness was rather an awkward obstacle for the Gallicans, as there could be no doubt that the conduct of Gregory VII. and Innocent III. was not at all in conformity with the maxims of 1682. M. Gosselin thought that by means of a principle of public ...
— Recollections of My Youth • Ernest Renan
... employer, especially the impecunious employer; in the struggle women always get worsted. Again, in whatever trade or calling they attempt, the great majority of women are hopelessly incompetent. As in the lower occupations, so in the higher, the greatest obstacle to success is incompetence. How should gentlewomen be anything but incompetent? They have not been taught anything special, they have not been 'put through the mill'; mostly, they are fit only for those employments which require the single quality that everybody can claim—general ...
— As We Are and As We May Be • Sir Walter Besant
... the independent Cavalry Divisions, it follows from all that has been said above, that to divide them in equal proportions among the several Armies, according to their numerical strength, can only be considered as an obstacle to the full utilization of their potential fighting capacity. It would be better to arrange this distribution at the beginning of each War, in accordance with the conditions which the situation imposes. ...
— Cavalry in Future Wars • Frederick von Bernhardi
... and assured her, with a warmth of speech that must have made some impression upon her, that rudeness to her would be an action impossible to me. I said a great deal upon the subject, and implored her to believe that if it were not for a certain obstacle I could speak to her so plainly that ...
— A Chosen Few - Short Stories • Frank R. Stockton
... he never learned dancing, never even learned how to wear the court suit properly, and soon gave up both in disgust. The principle on which he now conducted his life was to give his genius full play, to obey its every mandate, to allow no obstacle to come in the way of its fullest development. That this idea controlled him throughout life, is apparent in many ways, but most of all in his journal. "Make once more the sacrifice of all the petty necessities of life for the glory of thy art. God before all," he wrote in ...
— Beethoven • George Alexander Fischer
... dwells is holy too. This is the only attribute of God which He can communicate to His house; but this one He can and does communicate. Among men there is a very close link between the character of a house and its occupants. When there is no obstacle to prevent it, the house unintentionally reflects the master's likeness. Holiness expresses not so much an attribute as the very being of God in His infinite perfection, and His house testifies to this one truth, that He is holy, that where He dwells He must ...
— Holy in Christ - Thoughts on the Calling of God's Children to be Holy as He is Holy • Andrew Murray
... you don't consider a timber toe as any obstacle to matrimony; but, I fear, having a wife already may be considered by ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... tendront sans cesse a empecher. L'attention impartiale avec laquelle j'ai suivi les causes qui ont fait echouer jusqu'a present toutes les tentatives de conciliation, me donne la ferme conviction qu'il n'existe pas d'obstacle reel qui ne puisse etre ecarte ou promptement surmonte ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria
... the modesty of your young wife and the virginity of your daughter as food for that envious celibate, you leave them alone in the mysterious tete-a-tete of the confessional, with no obstacle between his burning lust and the object of that lost, between those mouths ...
— The Grip of Desire • Hector France
... The first obstacle was cleared. Subduing a sigh of relief, Homer Crawford turned to Cliff. "This, O Amenokal of all the Ahaggar, is Clif ben Jackson, my Vizier ...
— Border, Breed Nor Birth • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... and do all that he wished. He gave her credit for no principle; indeed, like many in his day, he would have laughed at the bare idea of a woman having any principle, or being able to stand calmly and firmly without being instigated and supported by a man. Roger, therefore, in his eyes, was the obstacle in the way of Alice's submission. He did not in the least realise that the real obstacle against which he was striving was the Holy Spirit ...
— All's Well - Alice's Victory • Emily Sarah Holt
... with the head of the column, now that the tenacity of the rebel skirmishers made it seem probable that there would be serious work. But though the firing kept up as the Union forces advanced, no obstacle more, serious than the thin lines of ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... always more or less self-made. This man pleads his own wrong act as a reason why he should not do right now. He himself has raised the obstacle which now stands in the way of obedience. He ought not to have sought the help of an idolatrous king. He ought not to have bargained for these hirelings, he ought not to have paid the money. God had not put the difficulty in his ...
— Men of the Bible; Some Lesser-Known Characters • George Milligan, J. G. Greenhough, Alfred Rowland, Walter F.
... loss of gas, is a proportionate general loss of ascending power; so that, in a comparatively brief period, the best-constructed balloon must necessarily exhaust all its resources, and come to the earth. This was the great obstacle to voyages ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 1 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... Brahma Rakshasas, employed in obstructing all sacrifices, always search for loop-holes when this great sacrifice is commenced. On the commencement of such a sacrifice a war may take place destroying the Kshatriyas and even furnishing occasion for the destruction of the whole Earth. A slight obstacle may involve the whole Earth in ruin. Reflecting upon all this, O king of kings do what is for thy good. Be thou watchful and ready in protecting the four orders of thy subjects. Grow, thou in prosperity, and enjoy thou felicity. Gratify thou the Brahmanas ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Part 2 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa
... upon Enghien, though no doubt the marshal will throw every obstacle in the way. In the first place, there can be no denying that the Spanish infantry are superb, and that Fuentes, who commands them, is a fine old soldier, while our infantry are largely composed of new levies. Thus, though the armies are ...
— Won by the Sword - A Story of the Thirty Years' War • G.A. Henty
... arrival at Upernavik the fleet began the dangerous navigation of Melville Bay, and in spite of every obstacle reached Littleton Island on June 22, a fortnight earlier than any vessel had before attained that point. On the same day it crossed over to Cape Sabine, where Lieutenant Greely and the other survivors of his party were discovered. After taking on board the living and ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... directions and touch at these points in the reverse order. Each captain was allowed to choose his own course, and take such short cuts as he would, the three points being especially chosen with a view to keeping the men off the road and giving them plenty of fence-jumping, ditch-taking, and obstacle-leaping of all sorts. ...
— The Dozen from Lakerim • Rupert Hughes
... both to the king and to the Woodvilles; as though to announce his conversion to the Burgundian alliance he rode before the new Duchess Margaret on her way to the sea. His submission removed the last obstacle to the king's action, and Edward declared his purpose to take the field in person against the king ...
— History of the English People, Volume III (of 8) - The Parliament, 1399-1461; The Monarchy 1461-1540 • John Richard Green
... nothing. Nevertheless she must tread the dark and mysterious way that was to lead her to freedom, and she made a few steps forward. Suddenly she grew faint and dizzy, and a shudder ran through her limbs; she tried to rally her strength and put out her foot. It encountered some obstacle which sent her reeling backward; and, murmuring a prayer to Heaven, she swooned and fell. When she recovered her senses, she was lying, she knew not where, perhaps she had fallen from the battlements to the ground, ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... voyage was resumed. On the 17th/6th June they came to the depot formed the preceding year. At first ice formed an obstacle, but on the 31st/20th July it broke up, and the navigable water became clear. The crew had now begun to suffer so severely from scurvy, that of 53 only 17 were in good health; Owzyn therefore turned, that he might bring his sick men to Tobolsk. He reached this town ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold
... is wily, but he is not able, and he is exceedingly ignorant; this ignorance even extends to matters in which he is directly and personally interested. In most men this defect would have proved an insuperable obstacle to success, but it has not been so with Sir Matthew because he is aware of his own shortcomings, and when he can't do a thing himself he is exceedingly good at getting some one to do ...
— War-time Silhouettes • Stephen Hudson
... not generally (if ever) applied to one of the 'forks' which unite to form the main stream, but to some considerable tributary received by the main stream, or to the division of the stream by some obstacle, near its mouth, which makes of it a 'double river.' The primary meaning of the (adjectival) root is 'to divide in two,' and the secondary, 'to split,' 'to divide forcibly, or abruptly.' These shades of meaning are not likely ...
— The Composition of Indian Geographical Names - Illustrated from the Algonkin Languages • J. Hammond Trumbull
... old soldier's angry shout, the driver drew one rein sharply, making the ponies swerve right for another far more dangerous obstacle and but for Marcus' readiness in snatching at the other rein, a worse mishap ...
— Marcus: the Young Centurion • George Manville Fenn
... wealthiest marriage. She had dreamed at times of a marriage that should make her friends wild with envy—of a title, a high title. Alice had beauty, style, wealth, and vivacity; she would grace a coronet, and mamma would be "Madam, the Countess's mother." But mamma encountered an unexpected obstacle. ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... others rode to and fro, like men engaged in a local enquiry of much interest. Happily, for the hidden party, the grass in which they were concealed, not only served to skreen them from the eyes of the savages, but opposed an obstacle to prevent their horses, which were no less rude and untrained than their riders, from trampling on them, in their ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper
... was no obstacle. She looked up toward the figure in the door, said: "A young lady to see you, Mr. Chester," and withdrew. Eleanor stood alone by the foot of the bed, looking into the eyes ...
— The Readjustment • Will Irwin
... the home of Madame Bercher that your son met Marie Doressany and fell in love with her. Everybody spoke in the highest praise of this young lady. I did not know her, for I came to Dacca after she left. Why there should have been any obstacle to this union I cannot say. That is a matter I must not discuss. Although there were, however, objections, the marriage took place and in our own Chapel. The Reverend Father Leclerc bestowed the nuptial blessing upon the marriage ...
— Nobody's Girl - (En Famille) • Hector Malot
... of the materials for writing, and the difficulty of procuring them, must also have been a great obstacle to the multiplication of books. When copies could only be procured by the slow and expensive process of transcription, it seems impossible to suppose that a large number could have been usually prepared of any ordinary work. Those of our readers who ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 3, February, 1851 • Various
... looked as if they might have pulled one foot from the grave in order to reach the Casino, hobbled wildly across the slippery floor. Fat elderly ladies waddled with indomitable speed, like women tied up in bags for an obstacle race; and an invalid gentleman, a famous player, with his attendant—the first to get in—was swept along in a small bath chair ahead of the crowd, an expression of fierce exhilaration on a gaunt face white as bleached bone. But the young and healthy gamblers ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... could not hear unmoved his flattering praises of the elegance of the house, and of the nobility, piety, and august magnificence of its mistress. With Don Inocencio he was hand and glove. Neither her mother nor the Penitentiary placed any obstacle in the way of his speaking with Rosario (who had been restored to liberty on the departure of her ferocious cousin); and, with his delicate compliments, his skilful flattery, and great address, he had acquired in the house of Polentinos considerable ascendency, ...
— Dona Perfecta • B. Perez Galdos
... The great obstacle to the proper use of the Will, in the case of the majority of people, is the lack of ability to focus the attention. The Yogis clearly understand this point, and many of the Raja Yoga exercises which are given to the students by the teachers, are designed to overcome this difficulty. Attention ...
— A Series of Lessons in Raja Yoga • Yogi Ramacharaka
... be forcing you? or doing you a kindness? What are the fruits of Christian Science? What are the results of the directions of this wise, loving leader who can come so close to God that He teaches her to help us to come, too. Oh, father, this obstacle, this foolish argument, meets nearly every one in the path you are treading, and tries to turn him back. I do hope, for your sake, you will decline to give that very flabby error-fairy a backbone, or let it detain you longer. It is marvelous how, without one element of truth or reason, it ...
— Jewel's Story Book • Clara Louise Burnham
... a worldly, Pharoah-like policy beneath the dignity of a magnanimous and Christian people;—a system which receives much of its vitality from ad captandum appeals to popular prejudices, and to the unholy, grovelling passions of the canaille;—a system that interposes every possible obstacle in the way of the improvement and elevation of the colored man in the land of his birth;—that instigates the enactment of laws whose design and tendency are obviously to annoy him, to make him feel, while at home, that he is a stranger and a pilgrim—nay ...
— Autographs for Freedom, Volume 2 (of 2) (1854) • Various
... now set before me my desires in their proper colours, and immediately helped me to expel them. Yes, I thank Heaven and my pride, I have now perfectly conquered this unworthy passion; and if there was no obstacle in its way, my pride would disdain any pleasures which could be the consequence of so base, so mean, so vulgar—" Slipslop returned at this instant in a violent hurry, and with the utmost eagerness cryed out, "O madam! I have strange news. Tom ...
— Joseph Andrews, Vol. 2 • Henry Fielding
... we must admit the legitimacy of coercion, avowedly not in the interests of freedom but in furtherance, without regard to freedom, of other ends which the community deems good. Or we must admit limitations which may cramp the development of the general will, and perchance prove a serious obstacle to collective progress. Is there any means of avoiding this conflict? Must we leave the question to be fought out in each case by a balance of advantages and disadvantages, or are there any general considerations which help us to ...
— Liberalism • L. T. Hobhouse
... he encountered an obstacle. The group of men upset by Duval rose to their feet, very angry. At the sight of a second running man, not realizing the seriousness of the chase, they lined up and stopped ...
— The Boy Allies in the Trenches - Midst Shot and Shell Along the Aisne • Clair Wallace Hayes
... to Gussie, everything was in train. Jeeves's morbid scruples about lacing the chap's orange juice had put me to a good deal of trouble, but I had surmounted every obstacle in the old Wooster way. I had secured an abundance of the necessary spirit, and it was now lying in its flask in the drawer of the dressing-table. I had also ascertained that the jug, duly filled, would be ...
— Right Ho, Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse
... this only that I might have a profession, and that you promised, should I be able to make my way in the career of letters and natural history, you would not oppose my wishes. I am indeed aware that in the latter case you see but one obstacle, that of absence from my country and separation from all who are dear to me. But you know me too well to think that I would voluntarily impose upon myself such an exile. Let us see whether we cannot resolve these difficulties to our mutual ...
— Louis Agassiz: His Life and Correspondence • Louis Agassiz
... theology" reached its conclusion were admitted even by those who denied those conclusions, an apologetic such as we are speaking of had an undoubted practical value—not indeed as sufficing to bring conviction to the unwilling or ill-disposed, not as a cause of faith, but as removing an obstacle which existed in the supposed incompatibility of revealed truth with these same ...
— The Faith of the Millions (2nd series) • George Tyrrell
... branches is by no means of uncommon occurrence, the inducing causes being often some restriction to growth in certain directions, or the undue or disproportionate growth in one direction, as contrasted with that in another. Hence it may arise from insect-puncture, parasitic growth, or any obstacle to the natural development. Frequently it exists in conjunction with fasciation, the ends of the branches being curved round like a shepherd's crook, from the growth on one side being so much greater than on the other. Sometimes it ...
— Vegetable Teratology - An Account of the Principal Deviations from the Usual Construction of Plants • Maxwell T. Masters
... thus generously encouraged the "squire of low degree;" and Edith, though of kingly blood, was no king's daughter, any more than her lover was of low degree —fortune had put no such extreme barrier in obstacle to their affections. Something, however, within the maiden's bosom—that modest pride which throws fetters even on love itself forbade her, notwithstanding the superiority of her condition, to make those advances, which, ...
— The Talisman • Sir Walter Scott
... in many ways, whether in creating in men's minds that impersonal notion of a sovereign law which exercises its imaginative force on human action, or in furnishing by the accumulation and sacredness of precedents a barrier against the invasion of arbitrary power. But it threw a terrible obstacle in the way of the actual redress of wrong. The increasing complexity of human action as civilization advanced outstripped the efforts of the law. Sometimes ancient custom furnished no redress for a wrong which sprang from modern ...
— History of the English People, Volume II (of 8) - The Charter, 1216-1307; The Parliament, 1307-1400 • John Richard Green
... seem to consist in gaining a knowledge of the actual workings of our social organization, with some illuminating notions of its origin, together with a full realization of its defects and their apparent sources. But here we encounter an obstacle that is unimportant in the older types of education, but which may prove altogether fatal to any good results in our efforts to make better citizens. Subjects of instruction like reading and writing, mathematics, Latin and Greek, chemistry ...
— The Mind in the Making - The Relation of Intelligence to Social Reform • James Harvey Robinson
... myself that you would lend me the assistance of your judgment, your incomparable penetration, your experienced eye; that you would aid me in unmasking this Pole, in detecting in him some irremediable vice that would at once prove an insurmountable obstacle to the marriage. Be good, for once in your life; may ...
— Samuel Brohl & Company • Victor Cherbuliez
... people do not get along in worldly accumulation faster is because they do not observe this Divine rule. God says: "Well, if that man is not satisfied with ninety cents out of a dollar, then I will take the whole dollar, and I will give it to the man or woman who is honest with me." The greatest obstacle to charity in the Christian church to-day is the fact that men expend so much on their table, and women so much on their dress, they have got nothing left for the work of ...
— The Wedding Ring - A Series of Discourses for Husbands and Wives and Those - Contemplating Matrimony • T. De Witt Talmage
... believer an ideal of a life beyond death is diametrically opposed to the ideal of Bolshevism, which tempts the masses by promising the immediate realization of the earthly paradise. From that point of view Christianity is not only a false conception of life; it is an obstacle to the realization of the Communist ideal. It detaches souls from the objects of sense and diverts them from the struggle to get the good things of this life. According to the Bolshevist formula, religion is opium for the people: and serves as ...
— Communism and Christianism - Analyzed and Contrasted from the Marxian and Darwinian Points of View • William Montgomery Brown
... brought us close to the new battery, at the very moment that the train of a mine under the houses in front of it had been fired. The instant the obstacle was removed, the artillerymen had opened a tremendous fire on the fort. The Spaniards were not slow to return the compliment, and fortunate it was that a solid fragment of wall intervened between us and their fire, or all our ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various
... our weakness, and they were liable to the reproach that they never proposed a Home Rule measure except when they could not dispense with the Irish vote. Still, from this embarrassing position we achieved an extraordinary result. Right across our path was the obstacle of the House of Lords. It was not an impassable barrier for measures in which the British working classes were keenly interested—for it let the Trades Disputes Bill go through; but it was wholly regardless of Irish and of Welsh popular opinion. Under Redmond's leadership we smashed the House ...
— John Redmond's Last Years • Stephen Gwynn
... prejudice, though sanctioned by custom, that learning unfits men for the labors of life. The schools may sometimes do this, but learning never. We cannot, however, conceal from our view the fact that this prejudice is a great obstacle to progress, even in New England; an obstacle which may not be overcome without delay and conflict, in many states of this Union; and especially in Great Britain is it an obstacle in the way of those who demand ...
— Thoughts on Educational Topics and Institutions • George S. Boutwell
... over this series of disasters. The German papers in particular, filled their pages with the most atrocious insults and jibes. Such was the situation in "Black Week." There was much ominous talk on the Continent about "the flowing tide." Only one obstacle prevented these dire prophecies from coming true. French and his little force possibly stayed the tide of a world conflict, through checking the rebel torrent between ...
— Sir John French - An Authentic Biography • Cecil Chisholm |
