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Unbending   Listen
adjective
Unbending  adj.  
1.
Not bending; not suffering flexure; not yielding to pressure; stiff; applied to material things. "Flies o'er the unbending corn, and skims along the main."
2.
Unyielding in will; not subject to persuasion or influence; inflexible; resolute; applied to persons.
3.
Unyielding in nature; unchangeable; fixed; applied to abstract ideas; as, unbending truths.
4.
Devoted to relaxation or amusement. (R.) "It may entertain your lordships at an unbending hour."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Unbending" Quotes from Famous Books



... head" in the spelling-class. There is reason to believe that young Calhoun took the prediction of the Doctor very seriously. He took everything seriously. He never made a joke in his life, and was totally destitute of the sense of humor. It is doubtful if he was ever capable of unbending so far as to play ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton

... he?" She stood as straight and unbending as a young pine, courage regnant in the very poise of the fine head. "You daren't harm a hair of my head, and he knows it. For your life, ...
— Bucky O'Connor • William MacLeod Raine

... Corporal Biggs. Do not regret your lost position. The society shall find you work. This news you have brought is of the utmost—the most vital importance. Dash it!" he cried, unbending in his enthusiasm, "we've got 'em on the hop. If they aren't biting pieces out of each other in the next day or ...
— The Swoop! or How Clarence Saved England - A Tale of the Great Invasion • P. G. Wodehouse

... you," she said in the same unbending tone. "You have given me a fright, but now I am recovered and I bid ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler

... over the blaze, and almost started to see how young she was. Not more than sixteen I should say, and yet what an invincible will shone from her dark eyes and dignified her slender form; a will gentle as it was strong, elevated as it was unbending. I bowed my head as I watched her, in grateful thankfulness which I presently put ...
— A Strange Disappearance • Anna Katharine Green

... masters of the beautiful in art; but in architecture they sacrificed variety to unbending beauty. Their temples are all alike. How call you ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace

... tried to bow as well as he could in the press, and said something with a German accent which seemed to be courteous. But I was separated from Nino by him. Maestro Ercole sang, and all the others, turn and turn about, and so at last it came to the benediction. The tall old foreigner stood erect and unbending, but most of the people around him kneeled. As the crowd sank down I saw that on the other side of him sat a lady on a small folding stool, her feet crossed one over the other, and her hands folded on her knees. She was dressed entirely in black, and her fair face stood out wonderfully ...
— A Roman Singer • F. Marion Crawford

... where else, are governed by their own laws, and never have recourse to the whites to settle their disputes. That silent unbending spirit, which has always characterized the Indian, has alone kept in check the rapacious disposition of the whites. Several attempts have been made to induce the Indians to sell their lands, and go beyond the Mississippi, but hitherto without effect. The ...
— A Ramble of Six Thousand Miles through the United States of America • S. A. Ferrall

... by some scandal, only results were regarded by the Bakufu. But his household could not regard with any easiness a devotion of his lordship to the wine cup, which turned his court into a wine feast. Up to this time Aoyama Shu[u]zen in all official duty had shown himself hard, unbending, callous, conscientious. Now the element of cruelty appeared, to develop rapidly with exercise until it was the predominant tone. Some illustrations are to be given from events occurring in these first three ...
— Bakemono Yashiki (The Haunted House) - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 2 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville

... make the little fishes talk like whales." No man surely ever had so little talent for personation as Johnson. Whether he wrote in the character of a disappointed legacy-hunter or an empty town fop, of a crazy virtuoso or a flippant coquette, he wrote in the same pompous and unbending style. His speech, like Sir Piercy Shafton's Euphuistic eloquence, bewrayed him under every disguise. Euphelia and Rhodoclea talk as finely as Imlac the poet or Seged, Emperor of Ethiopia. The gay Cornelia describes her reception at the country-house of her relations in such terms ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie

... of affection in one to whose character it seemed an unusual attribute, was, at the same time, pleased and proud that he could have awakened an affection so genuine and so gentle in a soul so high-spirited and so unbending. ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott

... found cutting the fences in accordance with the many threats to serve them so. Contentions and feuds began, and battles and bloody encounters, which did not cease through many a turbulent year. Philbrook lived in the saddle, for he was a man of high courage and unbending determination, leaving his wife and child in the suspense and solitude of their grand home in which they ...
— The Duke Of Chimney Butte • G. W. Ogden

... outstanding men: the former was in a sense the old Republican leader, but was more and more coming to be regarded as the typical "Conservative," or cautious Republican; Chase on the other hand was a leader of the "Radicals," who were "stern and unbending" in their attitude towards slavery and towards the South. These two must be got and kept together if possible. Bates was a good and capable man who moreover came from Missouri, a border slave State, where his influence ...
— Abraham Lincoln • Lord Charnwood

... 1899, the Transvaal sent an unbending and defiant message to the British Government. On September 21st the Orange Free State, after forty years of closest friendship with England, officially resolved to cast in her lot with the Transvaal ...
— With the Guards' Brigade from Bloemfontein to Koomati Poort and Back • Edward P. Lowry

... for both of them at least a temporary awakening. It was he who saw them first coming down the room—Annabel in a wonderful white satin gown in front, and Sir John stiff, unbending, disapproving, bringing up the rear. He bent over to Anna ...
— Anna the Adventuress • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... reflections which these few weeks suggest! Now borne aloft upon the billows of hope, sparkling in the fitful brightness of a feverish sun, and then plunged into the slough of despair, his proud, dark soul disclaiming all human participation in a misery exaggerated by his own unbending pride. Let us not talk of denying sympathy to persons who create their own miseries; they endure agonies thrice told. The paltry remuneration he received for his productions is recorded by himself. Among the items is one as extraordinary as the indignant emotion ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 3, February, 1851 • Various

... to your leave, you're entitled to resign your commission if you want to," he said with a quick return to his more official attitude. Then, with a sudden unbending under the pressure of curiosity and even sympathy: "I'm sorry. I'm darn sorry. You're the one man in my command I'd just hate to lose. Still—What do ...
— The Heart of Unaga • Ridgwell Cullum

... country and which had ranged them politically on opposite sides. This change was specially noticeable in the elder of the two. Though allied to the party who prided themselves in being regarded as stiff, unbending Tories, Commodore Macleod had an acute sense of what was just and fair; and under a somewhat rough exterior he had a kindly, sympathetic heart. This latter virtue in the old gentleman made him keenly alive to the grievances ...
— An Algonquin Maiden - A Romance of the Early Days of Upper Canada • G. Mercer Adam

... slowly conducting his uncle toward the castle. The gray and unbending soldiers who, until then, had been ignoring the existence of Don Marcelo, looked at him with interest, now that he was in intimate conversation with a member of the General Staff. He perceived that these men were about to humanize themselves by casting aside temporarily their inexorable ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... Helena still sat in the minister's chair, with her small feet placed as his stiff boots had been, and a copy of his solemn expression before they came to speaking of Emerson and of the guitar. "I wish I had asked him if he would be so kind as to climb the cherry-tree," said Helena, unbending a little at the discovery that her cousin would consent to laugh no more. "There are all those ripe cherries on the top branches. I can climb as high as he, but I can't reach far enough from the last branch that will bear me. The minister is ...
— The Queen's Twin and Other Stories • Sarah Orne Jewett

... ago. She was stout and comely; the auburn hair was darker and arched away from her face in smooth, shining waves instead of the old-time curls. Her face was unlined and fresh-coloured, but no woman could live in subjection to her own unbending will for so many years and not show it. Nobody, looking at Theodosia now, would have found it hard to believe that a woman with such a determined, immoveable face could stick to a course of conduct ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... and heroes of an earlier age and the Jews in Persia, in whom national feeling was stronger than devotion. The picture of their characteristics deducible from this Book shows many of the traits which have marked them ever since,—accommodating flexibility, strangely united with unbending tenacity; a capacity for securing the favour of influential people, and willingness to stretch conscience in securing it; reticence and diplomacy; and, beneath all, unquenchable devotion to Israel, which burns alike in the politic Mordecai and the ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... too late. He had not yielded an inch to this man. He could still be stern and unbending. He felt proud of himself in that he had been stern and unbending, as far as the man was concerned. And as regarded Mary, he did feel sure of her. If there was to be weakness displayed, it would be in himself. Mary would be true to her ...
— An Old Man's Love • Anthony Trollope

... effort to be made. Always composed, the audience grew more quiet still. The very children felt the hush of expectation, and gazed wonderingly at the minister. Even that great man, the Governor, lost his air of unbending ...
— The Bridge of the Gods - A Romance of Indian Oregon. 19th Edition. • Frederic Homer Balch

... countryfolk to their cousins from beyond the sea; I grill in my blood over the silly rudeness of our newspaper articles; and I do not know where to look when I find myself in company with an American and see my countrymen unbending to him as to a performing dog. But in the case of Mr. Grant White example were better than precept. Wyoming is, after all, more readily accessible to Mr. White than Boston to the English, and the New England self-sufficiency no better justified than ...
— Memories and Portraits • Robert Louis Stevenson

... with troubles contending, Make labour and patience a sword and a shield, And win brighter laurels, with courage unbending, Than ever were gained on the blood-tainted field. As gay as the lark in the beam of the morning, When young hearts spring upward to do and to dare, The bright star of promise their future adorning, Will light them ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various

... leaving no one fit to wield the same resistless power. Never has stern denunciation been relieved by a tribute of more dignified admiration of unquestionable greatness. His warmest admirers could not place Cromwell on a higher pedestal of acknowledged grandeur, all untouched by sympathy and all unbending in condemnation though Hyde's ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik

... age. Besides, they have been condemned to be destroyers for so long that perhaps they feel a secret pleasure in creating, and seeing life spring up again: the beauty of weakness has a grace and an attraction the more for those who have been the agents of unbending force; and the watching over the frail germs of life has all the charms of novelty for ...
— An "Attic" Philosopher, Complete • Emile Souvestre

... minute Aguilar, gloomy and unbending, had received the keys of Flank Hall, and the procession crunched down the drive on its ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett

... up the history a little earlier; facts will prove that the defection of Sweden was as much attributable to the jealous ambition of Bernadotte as to the unbending pride of Napoleon. It will be seen that her new monarch assumed to himself a great part of the responsibility of the rupture, by offering his alliance at the price of ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur

... of the session, he returned to Pomerania with fresh laurels; he was now looked upon as the rising hope of the stern and unbending Tories. His marriage took place in August, and the young Hans Kleist, a cousin of the bride, as he proposed the bridegroom's health, foretold that in their friend had arisen a new Otto of Saxony who would do for his ...
— Bismarck and the Foundation of the German Empire • James Wycliffe Headlam

... the chest. To-day, they spread out their fichus more proudly, but there is no longer that sweet flower of old-fashioned pudicity in their costume that made them resemble Holbein's virgins. They are more coquettish, more graceful. The correct style in the old days was a sort of unbending stiffness which made their infrequent smiles more profound ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand

... find a keen delight in the fact that her identity, for the time being, was erased by a number; during each visit she made it a point to learn what this number was, treating the matter in a sportive spirit, unbending her wit to ridicule a practice which failed to discriminate among the host of patients who came to ...
— A Breath of Prairie and other stories • Will Lillibridge

... day, has not watched the wind blowing lustily across a marsh or the reedy margin of a lake, compelling all the reeds to stoop in the same direction? Has one resisted the current or stood stoutly forth in protesting non-compliance? Has one dared to adopt an unbending posture? Not one. They have been as obsequious as were all the king's servants that were in the king's gate to the imperious Haman when he ...
— John the Baptist • F. B. Meyer

... always been a little in awe of the Butcher. Not that the Butcher had not been friendly; but he was so blunt and rough and unbending that he rather repelled intimacy. He watched him covertly, admiring the bravado with which he pretended unconcern. It must be awful to be threatened with expulsion and actually to be expelled, to have your whole ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Stories • Various

... tragedy was ending That need not have come due Had she been less unbending. How near, near were we two At that last vital rending, - And neither ...
— Moments of Vision • Thomas Hardy

... and little frilled trousers, with a bag the size of a slack balloon dragging on the ground behind him, proceeding towards the neighbor's apple-tree, which bore fruit as large as the thief's head upon its unbending boughs. ...
— Jerome, A Poor Man - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... unbending, lynx-eyed and exacting, marched Cadet Corporal Spurlock, who was known as the "worst" (strictest) of ...
— Dick Prescott's First Year at West Point • H. Irving Hancock

... this volume is a young man of unblemished character, and of distinguished parliamentary talents, the rising hope of those stern and unbending Tories who follow, reluctantly and mutinously, a leader whose experience and eloquence are indispensable to them, but whose cautious temper and moderate opinions they abhor. It would not be at all strange if Mr. Gladstone were one of the most unpopular men in England. But we believe that we do ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... the sounding shore, The hoarse rough verse should like the torrent roar. When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw, The line too labours, and the words move slow: Not so when swift Camilla scours the plain, Flies o'er th' unbending corn, and ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett

... palpable truth in what Ned said; and the governor, unbending, expressed his readiness to receive and help them. He then asked a few more questions about the manner in which they had become separated from their friends; and seeing no advantage in concealing the truth, and thinking perhaps that it would be well, if an opportunity ...
— Under Drake's Flag - A Tale of the Spanish Main • G. A. Henty

... she couldn't expect him to continue that development. A different man might; and Nettie wasn't sure of her refusal to listen...to the end. But she was familiar with Gerrit's unbending conception of the necessity of truth alone. If he married a woman, yellow, black, anything, he would perform, the obligation to the entire boundary of his promise. Good and bad seemed equally united against her. Little flashes of resentment struck ...
— Java Head • Joseph Hergesheimer

... qualities of the different yachts entered, and expressed his opinion as to which would win, and why. From this he passed to the city government and the recent election—like a true New Yorker, his chief interest centred in the city politics and not in the national elections. Without the least unbending from his dignity, he told me many anecdotes about city politicians, which would have been amusing if I had not been ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... was begun in earnest, part of the men being engaged in unbending sails and sending down the upper spars, whilst a contingent under Williams landed and proceeded to cut down trees for the purpose of building stores, a dwelling-house, a kitchen, and so on, on shore. Williams' plans comprised no less than the entire stripping of ...
— The Missing Merchantman • Harry Collingwood

... throughout were marked by simplicity, reverence and freedom from strict and unbending forms; liberty characterized their every part, and room was left for the exercise of the guiding Spirit of God, in a measure not enjoyed by Churches tied to the use of a prescribed worship; at the same time there was a recognized order and a reverent devotion in all parts of the ...
— Presbyterian Worship - Its Spirit, Method and History • Robert Johnston

... this doctrine of salvation advanced by Luther that, by trusting to God's free mercy, and by undervaluing good works, it led to moral indolence. But, on the contrary, it was to the very unbending moral earnestness of a Christian conscience, which, indignant at the temptations offered to moral frivolity, to a deceitful feeling of ease in respect to sin and guilt, and to a contempt of the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various

... Which the frolic Muses sing, Jest, and Mirth's unruly brood Dancing to the Phrygian mood; Be it love, or be it wine, Myrtle wreath, or ivy twine, Or a garland made of both; Whether then Philosophy That would fill us full of glee Seeing that our breath we draw Under an unbending law, That our years are halting never; Quickly gone, and gone for ever, And would teach us thence to brave The conclusion in the grave; Whether it be these that give Strength and spirit so to live, Or the conquest best be made, By a sober course and staid, ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. III • William Wordsworth

... their cause before the Archbishop of Bordeaux, and finding themselves threatened by Grandier with a prosecution for libel and forgery, met together to consult as to the best means of defending themselves before the unbending severity of this man, who would, they felt, destroy them if ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - URBAIN GRANDIER—1634 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... substantial materials than at present. There was something about it that quickened an instinctive curiosity, and made me undo the faded red tape that tied up the package, with the sense that a treasure would here be brought to light. Unbending the rigid folds of the parchment cover, I found it to be a commission, under the hand and seal of Governor Shirley, in favour of one Jonathan Pue, as Surveyor of His Majesty's Customs for the Port of Salem, in the Province of Massachusetts Bay. ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... the royal coach, faced by two unbending officers of the Royal Guard. He was alone on the rear seat, and his brown, handsome face was aglow with smiles. Instead of a hat of silk, he lifted a gay and far from immaculate conception in straw; instead of a glittering uniform, he wore a suit of blue serge and ...
— The Prince of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon

... stream in smoother numbers flows. But when loud surges lash the sounding shore, The hoarse, rough verse, should like the torrent roar. When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw. The line too labors, and the words move slow: Not so when swift Camilla scours the plain, Flies o'er the unbending corn ...
— A Study of Fairy Tales • Laura F. Kready

... assumed the great lady, the heiress, the condescending patrician; Cassie flushed and trembled; and in a buzz of commonplaces the stewards served tea while the two women covertly took each other's measure. Florence grew ashamed of her own behavior, and, unbending a little, tried to put her guests at ease and led Cassie on to talk. Then it came out about the dance that Derwent and his daughter were to give ...
— Love, The Fiddler • Lloyd Osbourne

... as long as slavery existed by law in our country his influence, both publicly and privately, was exerted against it. He was strengthened in his course by a warm friendship and frequent intercourse with the late Abraham L. Pennock, a man whose unbending integrity and firm allegiance to duty were equalled only by his active benevolence, broad charity, and rare clearness of judgment. Samuel Rhoads, like him, while sympathizing with other phases of the Anti-slavery ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still

... the wall, exclaiming, "I would not have my daughter see such things." The king and the children soon fell soundly asleep; but no repose came to the agitated mind of Maria Antoinette. Her lofty and unbending spirit felt these indignities and atrocities too keenly. She spent the night in silent tears, and indulging in the most gloomy forebodings of the fate which ...
— Maria Antoinette - Makers of History • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott

... quivering tones, bade her trust in his innocence. "Mother, believe me, only believe me; I did not do it," and sped on in the darkness, an exile. She did believe in him. She would almost as soon have doubted her Savior's love. But her stern, unbending pride of race was wounded. Her loving heart was pierced in its tenderest spot, and in a few short weeks she was a fretful, peevish invalid, making wholesale but unconscious draughts upon her noble ...
— Idle Hour Stories • Eugenia Dunlap Potts

... without to the calm serenity that reigns within these walls. As we turn in horror and loathing from the unbridled fury of human beings, changed almost to beasts, so let us turn in hope and security to those things we can honor and respect, to the dignity of truth and the unbending strength of unquestioned right. ...
— An American Politician • F. Marion Crawford

... always paid to him. None can stand erect in his presence, and when he sits on a chair, all present (Europeans of course excepted) squat upon the ground. The highest seat is literally, with these people, the place of honour and the sign of rank. So unbending are the rules in this respect, that when an English carriage which the Rajah of Lombock bad sent for arrived, it was found impossible to use it because the driver's seat was the highest, and it had to be kept as a show in its coach house. ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume I. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace

... was unbending devotion to duty. With a genius for rule he forced men into one polity; and by levelling material barriers he enabled the nations to commune, and made a highway for the message of freedom and brotherhood. But, ...
— Christianity and Ethics - A Handbook of Christian Ethics • Archibald B. C. Alexander

... affairs at that place, sent to the regions in proximity garrisons sufficient for immediate needs, and repulsed a cavalry attack upon the city. Altogether, he displayed neither dejection nor terror, but with an unbending spirit, as if no serious evil had befallen them, he both planned and executed all measures of immediate benefit. (Valesius, ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol VI. • Cassius Dio

... and the path more stony and rough. Anna's evil spirit was in the ascendant that afternoon, steeling her heart against Lucy's doleful exclamations, as one after another her delicate slippers were torn, and the sharp thistles, of which the path was full, penetrated to her soft flesh. Straight and unbending as a young Indian, Anna walked on, shutting her ears against the sighs of weariness which reached them from time to time. But when there came a half sobbing cry of actual pain, she stopped suddenly and turned towards Lucy, whose breath ...
— The Rector of St. Mark's • Mary J. Holmes

... other hand, the fact that you, the third party, are a journalist, and could at a moment's notice give publicity to the whole thing, will be an additional safeguard. I have him as in a vice. And now put on your most formal manners and look as if you were impenetrable as the rock and unbending as cast iron, for we have reached ...
— Mr. Isaacs • F. Marion Crawford

... Indien, m., Indian. indigne, unworthy, shameful. indompt, wild, untamed, indomitable. invitable, unavoidable. inexorable, inexorable, unmovable. infecter, to pollute. infidle, faithless, infidel, heretic. inflexible, inflexible, unbending. infortun, unhappy, unfortunate. ingnieux, ingenious, skilful. ingrat, ungrateful. injure, f., wrong, insult, injury. innocent, innocent, pure. innombrable, innumerable. inou, unheard of. inqui-et, -te, anxious. inquiter, ...
— Esther • Jean Racine

... Timothy's sister's husband was dead, and that Timothy was sent for to take his place, hold the Nebraska claim, work the land, and be a father to his sister's children. Timothy was stunned with horror, but the unbending will of the never-contradicted parish priest ...
— Hillsboro People • Dorothy Canfield

... in Ireland: all the world knows what things are being wrought in that unhappy country, where the Lord Ormonde hath been another Cartwright and hath met with an overthrow the like of which I pretell for his Jersey antitype. Cartwright is as unbending and will hold out to ...
— St George's Cross • H. G. Keene

... is convinced that a Radical is still a direct emanation of the evil one. In the middle of these conflicting antagonisms the real road to national peace, prosperity, and security is missed by those who prefer prejudice to the lessons which reality teaches. The most infamous case of all to the unbending partisan is that of a man who has so far outlived the prejudices of party as to be able to criticise ...
— Success (Second Edition) • Max Aitken Beaverbrook

... dilapidated wharf and cheered us by their words and evident interest. Johnny Bowden and I were both rowing in haste to get out where we could catch the breeze and put up the small sail which lay clumsily furled along the gunwale. Mrs. Todd sat aft, a stern and unbending lawgiver. ...
— The Country of the Pointed Firs • Sarah Orne Jewett

... in Dublin than my first care was to present myself to Dr. Mooney, by whom I was received in the most cordial manner. In fact, in my utter ignorance of such persons, I had imagined a college fellow to be a character necessarily severe and unbending; and as the only two very great people I had ever seen in my life were the Archbishop of Tuam and the chief-baron when on circuit, I pictured to myself that a university fellow was, in all probability, a cross between the two, and ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever

... at the House of Commons has become, like the afternoon tea, one of the best recognized of London's social festivities. And so great is the run on these dinners that it takes a week's—or even two weeks'—notice to secure a table. Mr. Cobbe—a stern and unbending Radical, with a hot temper and unsparing tongue—might have been seen one of those June days with a menacing frown upon his rugged Radical forehead, and by-and-bye in serious converse with the Speaker. And the cause of his ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor

... sculptor. "Two centuries ago Egypt was unquestionably the first of the nations. In Art and Science she far excelled us; but we learnt their methods of working, improved on them, held firm to no prescribed proportions, but to the natural types alone, gave freedom and beauty to their unbending outlines, and now have left our masters far behind us. But how was this possible? simply because the Egyptians, bound by unalterable laws, could make no progress; we, on the contrary, were free to pursue our course in the wide arena of art as far as ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... it had a restless expression. He did not look like a man who had found peace. Lady Charteris told him of her last visit to Earlescourt—how his mother never ceased speaking of him, and his father still preserved the same rigid, unbending silence. ...
— Dora Thorne • Charlotte M. Braeme

... But it was asked by the son in such a tone of quiet, filial submission, that a whole volume could not contain all that it said to the old man's proud, unbending heart. ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman

... and Troians Many conflicts, men's limbs straining, When the knee in dust is crouching, And the spear-shaft in the onset Of the battle snaps asunder. But as things are now, so are they, So, as destined, shall the end be. Nor by tears nor yet libations Shall he soothe the wrath unbending {70} Caused by ...
— Story of Orestes - A Condensation of the Trilogy • Richard G. Moulton

... every time. Your lumber-jack likes to be met front to front, one strong man to another. As you value your authority, the love of your men, and the completion of your work, keep a bluff brow and an unbending singleness of purpose. ...
— The Blazed Trail • Stewart Edward White

... Joe, with unbending dignity and firmness, "if the information you ask of me was mine to give, freely and honorably, I'd give it. You can see that. Maybe something will turn up between now and Monday that will make a change, but if not, you'll have to do the best you can for me the ...
— The Bondboy • George W. (George Washington) Ogden

... yet too late," said Mrs. Clifford, unbending a little. "Take the offer of Mr. Clifford, Edward, and be one of us; ...
— Confession • W. Gilmore Simms

... "No," said Annie with unbending decision, "it shall not be said of me that I went and struck up a friendship, apart from our intercourse in the wards, with any doctor at St. Ebbe's—one of the medical students, the other day! I am not going to make his sister's acquaintance and get ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler

... soundness of Shakspeare's historical and biographical views, could he have done so safely and without a compromise of principle. He would have avoided such an inquiry, not only in deference to the acknowledged rule which does not suffer a poet to be fettered by the rigid shackles of unbending facts; but from a disinclination also to interfere, even in appearance, with the full and free enjoyment of those exquisite scenes of humour, wit, and nature, in which Henry is the hero, and his "riotous, reckless ...
— Henry of Monmouth, Volume 1 - Memoirs of Henry the Fifth • J. Endell Tyler

... nor the unbending from labour, was there among those poor Israelites—those people of the Lord in name; but only lawless mirth ...
— Tired Church Members • Anne Warner

... as the manager of certain rope-works. Mr. Mallard's state was not unprosperous, for he had invented a process put in use by his employers, and derived benefit from it. He was a man of habitual gravity, occasionally severe in the rule of his household, very seldom unbending to mirth. Though not particularly robust, he employed his leisure in long walks about the moors, walks sometimes prolonged till after midnight, sometimes begun long before dawn. His acquaintances called ...
— The Emancipated • George Gissing

... from that at Beersheba. Formerly there had been but little intercourse between the families. Deans was a sturdy Scotsman, with all sort of prejudices against the southern, and the spawn of the southern. Moreover, Deans was, as we have said, a stanch Presbyterian, of the most rigid and unbending adherence to what he conceived to be the only possible straight line, as he was wont to express himself, between right-hand heats and extremes and left-hand defections; and, therefore, he held in high dread and horror all Independents, and ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... lady, if I seem more eager To know this fact, than render unto you My love and duty.—From the world's scorn I've suffer'd much; and my unbending pride Would rather that my birth remain'd in doubt, Than find a parentage which was obscure. Now all is perfect, and to you I tender (Kneeling) My truth and love, still in their infancy, And therefore may they seem to you but feeble. (Rises.) ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat

... 155 Of fathers, but with patient mind enforced To acts of tenderness; and he had rocked His cradle, as with a woman's gentle hand. [26] And, in a later time, ere yet the Boy Had put on boy's attire, did Michael love, 160 Albeit of a stern unbending mind, To have the Young-one in his sight, when he Wrought in the field, or on his shepherd's stool Sate with a fettered sheep before him stretched Under the large old oak, that near his door 165 Stood single, and, from ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. II. • William Wordsworth

... Simon Willard, doubtless excelled him in culture, but no neighbor surpassed him in natural personal force, whether physical, mental or moral. Not only was he of commanding stature, stern of mien and strong of limb, but he had a heart devoid of fear, great physical endurance and an unbending will. These qualities his savage neighbors early recognized and bowed before in deep respect, and because of these no Lancaster enterprise but claimed him as its leader. His manual skill and dexterity must have been great, his mental capacity and business energy remarkable, for ...
— Bay State Monthly, Vol. II. No. 5, February, 1885 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various

... that her passionate gratitude to the man who restored her self-respect would be boundless. Not every man—not even every man who loved her—could do this. He must possess strong nerves who descends into a volcano. He must have a more unbending will who tames any wild thing; but what an intoxicating thrill of pride must come to him who, having confidence in his own powers, ...
— The Love Affairs of an Old Maid • Lilian Bell

... a live-oak growing, All alone stood it and the moss hung down from the branches, Without any companion it grew there uttering joyous of dark green, And its look, rude, unbending, lusty, made me think of myself, But I wonder'd how it could utter joyous leaves standing alone there without its friend near, for I knew I could not, And I broke off a twig with a certain number of leaves upon it and twined around it a little moss, And brought it ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman

... of his trained faculties, in the clear sight which pierced at once into the joint of fact, in the rude, unvarnished gibes with which he demolished every figment of defence. He took his ease and jested, unbending in that solemn place with some of the freedom of the tavern; and the rag of man with the flannel round his neck was ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson

... watched the unbending gravity of the other's face and since comment seemed expected he conceded, "There seems to be a germ of ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck

... of the fish she nearly lost her balance, scrambled hastily down from the parapet, propping the pole desperately against her body, and stood so, unbending, unyielding, her eyes fixed on the water where the taut line cut it ...
— The Dark Star • Robert W. Chambers

... and an ugly iron fence was there, to prevent passengers from tumbling over. On this elevated walk stood the offices of a celebrated character, "Old"—for I never heard him called by any other name—"Old Spurrier," the hard, unbending, crafty lawyer, who, being permanently retained by the Mint to prosecute all coiners in the district, had a busy time of it, and gained for himself a large fortune ...
— Personal Recollections of Birmingham and Birmingham Men • E. Edwards

... The thirst for action, and the impassioned thought Prolong my being; if I wake no more, 65 My life more actual living will contain Than some gray veteran's of the world's cold school, Whose listless hours unprofitably roll By one enthusiast feeling unredeemed, Virtue and Love! unbending Fortitude, 70 Freedom, Devotedness and Purity! That life ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley

... that purpose. The member for Westminster, and other members, were elected by universal suffrage (or what was in substance such); those members did, in their day, state what were the grievances and ideas—or were thought to be the grievances and ideas—of the working classes. It was the single, unbending franchise introduced in 1832 that has caused this difficulty, ...
— The English Constitution • Walter Bagehot

... follow a ship at sea, sailing round and round, in a brisk breeze, on unbending wing, only now and then righting itself with a single flap of its great pinions. It literally rides ...
— Under the Maples • John Burroughs

... of Noddle's Island, an early settler, was the first claimant of the land. Richard Bellingham, "the unbending, faithful old man, skilled from his youth in English law, perhaps the draughtsman of the charter [of the Massachusetts Colony], certainly familiar with it from its beginning, was chosen to succeed Endicott," as governor. About 1634, he came into possession ...
— Bay State Monthly, Volume I, No. 2, February, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various

... called upon Maurice to banish this "arch-heretic." It certainly served the purpose of Maurice well that he had to deal with Melanchthon, whose fear and vacillation made him as pliable as putty, and not with Luther, on whose unbending firmness all of his schemes would have foundered. However, it cannot have been mere temporary fear which induced Melanchthon to barter away eternal truth for temporal peace. For the theologians of Wittenberg and Leipzig did not only identify themselves with the ...
— Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church • Friedrich Bente

... of his Adagia, published in 1500, and of his early works, influenced by Thomas More (with whom he had been brought into contact during his stay in England as a protege of Lord Mountjoy), seems certainly strange in view of the unbending attitude taken by Charles V towards Lutheranism. But Humanism had become the fashion in high aristocratic and ecclesiastical circles, and neither the young emperor nor his gouvernante, Mary of Hungary, disguised their interest in the movement. It is true that Erasmus endeavoured to reconcile ...
— Belgium - From the Roman Invasion to the Present Day • Emile Cammaerts

... remained altogether unable to form a conjecture on the subject. He knew that the whole extensive estate of this ancient and powerful family had descended to the Countess, lately deceased, who inherited, in a most remarkable degree, the stern, fierce, and unbending character which had distinguished the house of Glenallan since they first figured in Scottish annals. Like the rest of her ancestors, she adhered zealously to the Roman Catholic faith, and was married to an English gentleman of the same communion, and of large ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott

... new degree and proportion, that their balance made a new force, a new generative force, in history—not in that one only, the one in whom this new historic form is visible and palpable already, but in the haughtier and more unbending historic attitude, at least, of his great 'co-mate and brother in exile.' It is here in the form of the great military chieftain of that new heroic line, who found himself, with all his strategy, involved in a single-handed contest with the state and its whole physical strength, in ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon

... Jove, With look indignant: "Come no more to me, Thou wav'ring turncoat, with thy whining pray'rs: Of all the Gods who on Olympus dwell I hate thee most; for thou delight'st in nought But strife and war; thou hast inherited Thy mother, Juno's, proud, unbending mood, Whom I can scarce control; and thou, methinks, To her suggestions ow'st thy present plight. Yet since thou art my offspring, and to me Thy mother bore thee, I must not permit That thou should'st long be doom'd to suffer pain; But had thy birth been other than it is, For thy misdoings thou ...
— The Iliad • Homer

... to the generations yet unborn. There is no good reason why we should fear the future, but there is every reason why we should face it seriously, neither hiding from ourselves the gravity of the problems before us nor fearing to approach these problems with the unbending, unflinching purpose to ...
— United States Presidents' Inaugural Speeches - From Washington to George W. Bush • Various

... with you, or whose mother has adopted an orphan, or taken charge of a missionary's daughter, or in some way or other have been brought for the first time in your life into daily and hourly collision with another young will just as strong and unbending as yours—can't you bear me witness that, in these little contests between Joy and Gypsy, I am telling no "made-up stories," ...
— Gypsy's Cousin Joy • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps

... was a dignity, a majesty, that he had not appreciated until now, when she jostled without rudeness in this jostling crowd. This dark background of submissive yielding, of hopeless patience, threw into full light the unbending resolution carved in every line of her passionate face and lithesome figure. Yet he noticed now on her forehead two faint wrinkles showing, and in the corners of her mouth an overhanging fold; and this he saw as if reflected in a thousand ill-made mirrors around, distorted ...
— The Workingman's Paradise - An Australian Labour Novel • John Miller

... beyond the German aristocrat, who could trace his ancestors back through six or seven centuries. Thus do extremes meet. In talents, in energy, in audacity, in arrogance, in firmness of will, and in unbending devotion to one great and leading purpose, Count von Bismark bears a strong resemblance to Baron von Stein, upon whom he seems to have modelled himself,—while Austrian ascendency in Germany was to him what French ascendency in that country was to his prototype, only ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 109, November, 1866 • Various

... "Think of that great house—Frank says she runs it admirably—filled with tinkers and tailors and candlestick-makers, not to mention touts and gamblers—when she might be entertaining—well, us, for example!" She laughed at the unbending face of her friend; then went on: "Dr. Cronk says the mother is a sweet old lady and of good New England family—a constitutional Methodist, he calls her. I wish she ...
— Money Magic - A Novel • Hamlin Garland

... thoughts to Heaven is sent, In faithful supplication; Her earthly stay 's Macallummore, The guardian o' the nation. A hero's heart—a sister's love— A martyr's truth unbending; They 're a' in Jeanie's tartan plaid— And she is gane, her leefu' lane, To Lunnon ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various

... every scale Form the bright terrors of his bristly male.— 165 So arm'd, immortal Moore uncharm'd the spell, And slew the wily dragon of the well.— Sudden with rage their injur'd bosoms burn, Retort the insult, or the wound return; Unwrong'd, as gentle as the breeze that sweeps 170 The unbending harvests or undimpled deeps, They guard, the Kings of Needwood's wide domains, Their sister-wives and fair infantine trains; Lead the lone pilgrim through the trackless glade, Or guide in leafy ...
— The Botanic Garden. Part II. - Containing The Loves of the Plants. A Poem. - With Philosophical Notes. • Erasmus Darwin

... prodigal nature to subdue all hearts to his love; men of all minds and dispositions tendered their services to lord Timon, from the glass-faced flatterer, whose face reflects as in a mirror the present humour of his patron, to the rough and unbending cynic, who affecting a contempt of men's persons, and an indifference to worldly things, yet could not stand out against the gracious manners and munificent soul of lord Timon, but would come (against his nature) to partake of his royal entertainments, and return most rich in his own estimation ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb

... chaplain was impressed, and now, seeing it all from every side, we too can watch order come out of chaos and mark the growth of an army under the guidance of a master-mind and the steady pressure of an unbending will. ...
— George Washington, Vol. I • Henry Cabot Lodge

... days. He showed it by an unwonted joviality of spirit, by a slight but evident unbending of his Spanish dignity. No longer did the splendour of the desert fill him with a vague yearning and uneasiness. He looked upon it confidently, noting its various phases with care, rejoicing in each new development of colour and light, ...
— Arizona Nights • Stewart Edward White

... Essenes, by no means testifies, as many would have us believe, to national disintegration, but rather to the intense spiritual activity of the people. The three tendencies afforded opportunity for the self-consciousness of the nation to express itself in all its variety and force. The unbending religious dogmatism of the Sadducees, the comprehensive practical sense of the Pharisees in religious and Rational concerns, the contemplative mysticism of the Essenes, they are the most important offshoots from the Jewish system as held at that time. In ...
— Jewish History • S. M. Dubnow

... futures which we conceive, both may now be really possible; and the one become impossible only at the very moment when the other excludes it by becoming real itself. Indeterminism thus denies the world to be one unbending unit of fact. It says there is a certain ultimate pluralism in it; and, so saying, it corroborates our ordinary unsophisticated view of things. To that view, actualities seem to float in a wider sea of possibilities ...
— The Will to Believe - and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy • William James

... expected his gossip to arouse Corinna, and in this he was not mistaken. Springing up from her relaxed position, she sat straight and unbending, with her indignant eyes on his face. "Why, I thought the war had ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow

... trace, and the incessant song of the trailing sled, fell to wondering at the change, and the pace they were called upon to make. It was not their nature to complain; their pride was the stubborn, unbending pride of savage power, and their reply to the wealing thong was always the reply their driver sought. Faster and faster they journeyed as the uncooling ardour ...
— In the Brooding Wild • Ridgwell Cullum

... and on the same day anchored in Holmes' Hole. On the following day a favourable opportunity offering to proceed to sea, we got under way, and after having cleared the land, discharged the pilot, made sail, and performed the necessary duties of stowing the anchors, unbending and coiling away the cables, &c.—On the 1st of January 1823, we experienced a heavy gale from N. W. which was but the first in the catalogue of difficulties we were fated to encounter.—As this was our first trial of a seaman's life, the scene presented to our view, "mid ...
— A Narrative of the Mutiny, on Board the Ship Globe, of Nantucket, in the Pacific Ocean, Jan. 1824 • William Lay

... than mine, and vice versa. To clear this difficulty, let us have that same statistical information which the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Vinton] suggested at the beginning of this session. In that information we shall have a stern, unbending basis of facts—a basis in no wise subject to whim, caprice, or local interest. The prelimited amount of means will save us from doing too much, and the statistics will save us from doing what we do in wrong places. Adopt and ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln

... Mr. Mallory a characteristic story of this period as to an incidental unbending from toil, which in itself illustrates the ever-present determination to conquer what is undertaken: "Along in the latter part of the nineties, when the work on the problem of concentrating iron ore was in progress, it became necessary when leaving the plant at Edison to wait over ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin

... or reinforced by grace. He prayed that the Infinite Compassion might enlighten his ignorance and solitude with a manifestation of the Spirit; in his very weakness he prayed for some special revelation, some sign or token, some visitation or gracious unbending from that coldly lifting sky. The low sun burned the black edge of the distant tules with dull eating fires as he prayed, lit the dwarfed hills with a brief but ineffectual radiance, and then died out. The lingering trade winds ...
— By Shore and Sedge • Bret Harte

... in its faded splendour, the clouded ruins of a god. The deformity of Satan is only in the depravity of his will; he has no bodily deformity to excite our loathing or disgust. The horns and tail are not there, poor emblems of the unbending, unconquered spirit, of the writhing agonies within. Milton was too magnanimous and open an antagonist to support his argument by the bye-tricks of a hump and cloven foot; to bring into the fair field of controversy the good old ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt

... unbending Lentulus, "when a Roman maiden disobeys, there is no expiation. You are no niece of mine. I care not how you came here. I accept nothing at your hands. I will not hear your story. If I must die, it is to die cursing your name. Go! I have no ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis

... but she merely stood up in her unbending dignity and said that she was glad to take advantage of ...
— The Californians • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton

... consolations of religion, and went through these pious and touching ceremonies with an apparently firm and undisturbed conscience. The man of blood knew no remorse. His acts had all been, he asserted, for his country's good; and the same unbending pride and unshaken confidence that had commanded the respect of men, seemed to accompany him into the presence of his Maker. He died like a hero of the Stoics, though clad in the trappings of a prince of the church. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 17, No. - 480, Saturday, March 12, 1831 • Various

... fellowship were not, as now, hereditary enemies in Oxford. If my graver companions, from the calm dignity of collegiate office, deign to look back upon the evenings thus spent with two undergraduates in a Christmas vacation, when, unbending from the formal and conventional dulness of term and its duties, they interchanged with us anecdote and jest, and mingled with the sparkling imaginations of youth the reminiscences of riper years—I am sure ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 350, December 1844 • Various

... child! Thou too hast lost a most affectionate godmother In the empress. Oh, that stern, unbending man! In this unhappy marriage what have I Not suffered, not endured? For even as if I had been linked on to some wheel of fire That restless, ceaseless, whirls impetuous onward, I have passed a life of frights and horrors with him, And ever ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... forehead, held his long hair back from his face, and stared about him; his eye wandering from Grosket to Jones, and around the room, and then resting on the floor. He sat for some time looking steadfastly down, his face gradually regaining its stern, unbending character; his thin lips compressing themselves, until his mouth had assumed its usual expression of bitterness, ...
— Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, March 1844 - Volume 23, Number 3 • Various

... same time, remove from the great international Socialist movement a shameful reproach. But the facts are incompatible with such a theory. Instead of being fanatical idealists, incapable of compromises and adjustments, the Bolsheviki have, from the very beginning, been loudly scornful of rigid and unbending idealism; have made numerous compromises, alliances, and "political deals," and have repeatedly shifted their ground in accordance with political expediency. They have been consistently loyal to no aim save one—the ...
— Bolshevism - The Enemy of Political and Industrial Democracy • John Spargo

... and Hessian mercenaries, to aid in reducing the American colonies to absolute submission to the will of the King and Parliament of Great Britain. It was supposed in England that the decisive Act of Parliament, the unbending and hostile attitude of the British Ministry, the formidable amount of naval and land forces, would awe the colonies into unresisting and immediate submission; but the effect of all these formidable preparations on the part of the British Government was to unite rather than ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 1 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Egerton Ryerson



Words linked to "Unbending" :   unadaptable, rigid



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