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Accomplished fact   /əkˈɑmplɪʃt fækt/   Listen
Accomplished fact

noun
1.
An irreversible accomplishment.  Synonym: fait accompli.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Accomplished fact" Quotes from Famous Books



... loaded with the fearful curses contained in the greater excommunication, who can tell when her guilt would be expiated? As the secular powers were merely instruments of the ecclesiastical authorities, sentence of death by burning against the Maid of Orleans soon became an accomplished fact. Fastened to a stake, without much delay, the flames consumed her fair form, at the age of nineteen years. To the very last she believed in the reality of her visions, and intercourse with the spirits of departed saints. Her dying agonies were witnessed ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant

... returned to the hospital the "English Invasion" of the town was an accomplished fact, and the Casino had been taken over as a hospital for our men. In the rush after Festubert, we were very proud to be called upon to assist for the time-being in transporting wounded, as the British Red Cross ...
— Fanny Goes to War • Pat Beauchamp

... the chivalrously delicate gentleman who was limp with emotion. Every one could see the happiness in her face. She walked in with an open-hearted air, wearing a magnificent dress. She seemed to be at the very pinnacle of her heart's desires, the fete—the goal and crown of her diplomacy—was an accomplished fact. As they walked to their seats in front of the platform, the Lembkes bowed in all directions and responded to greetings. They were at once surrounded. The marshal's wife got up ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... 31, 1910, the Union of South Africa became an accomplished fact. The four provinces of Cape Colony, Natal, the Orange Free State (which bears again its old-time name), and the Transvaal are henceforth joined, one might almost say amalgamated, under a single government. They will bear to the central government of the British Empire ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor

... matters well in hand: the gas works surrounded by a cordon of troops, the house under close watch, and—best of all—a sworn confession from an Irish Member of Parliament whom Victor had managed to buy with a promise to free Ireland once Soviet England was an accomplished fact. So I left Karslake to wind up loose ends in London, and posted back with my heart in my mouth for fear I'd be ...
— Red Masquerade • Louis Joseph Vance

... moment of this time should be darkened for him by the tears and prayers of his bride. When she should hear, later on, of her husband's bloody vengeance upon his enemies, she would have to accept it as an accomplished fact; and means, no doubt, would be found ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... Block-that-kick! BLOCK-THAT-KICK!" The kneeling quarter back opened his muddy hands; the muddied oval came sailing lazily into them.... There was the gentle thud of Gridley's toe against the leather, and then—unbelievably, unbearably, it was an accomplished fact, a finished thing. Gridley had executed his place kick. They were scored on. It stood there on the board, glaring white letters and figures ...
— Play the Game! • Ruth Comfort Mitchell

... the news to him while I was waiting for Alathea to come. He was not surprised, he pretended, and now that the marriage is an accomplished fact, he is too well bred not to fall into the attitude of delight about it. Maurice has no intention of dropping ...
— Man and Maid • Elinor Glyn

... which even there found expression only illustrates the gulf that lies between the present and the past. It is a marvel, indeed, that the human sentiment of that earlier period, before the dominance of Continental ideals became an accomplished fact in America and England, can be so utterly forgotten by the medical journals and medical teachers of ...
— An Ethical Problem - Or, Sidelights upon Scientific Experimentation on Man and Animals • Albert Leffingwell

... intention to secede was first announced. They proceeded to sustain their purpose of secession by arms against the force which the United States brought to bear against them. Were their arms victorious? If they were, then their secession was an accomplished fact. If not, it was nothing more than an abortive attempt—a purpose unfulfilled. They failed to maintain their ground by force of arms. In other words, they failed ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine

... policies in Central America were dropped—although American troops continued to dominate Nicaragua—and in 1914 the Administration successfully discouraged American participation in a six-power loan to China. The Russo-Japanese absorption of Manchuria was to be treated as the accomplished fact that it was; and in general the policy of the new Administration was anything but aggressive. It would not use diplomacy to advance American commercial interests, nor was it prepared to accept the assistance of American financiers in promoting the ...
— Woodrow Wilson's Administration and Achievements • Frank B. Lord and James William Bryan

... clearly,—it consisted in Georgina's being in his power now, in place of his being in hers. He laughed as he sat there alone in the darkness at the thought of what she had done. It had occurred to him more than once that she would do it,—he believed her capable of anything; but the accomplished fact had a freshness of comicality. He thought of Mr. William Roy, of his big income, of his being "quite affectionate," of his blooming son and heir, of his having found such a worthy successor to poor Mrs. Dora. He wondered whether Georgina ...
— Georgina's Reasons • Henry James

... visit of the Japanese consul general to the new president (no other foreign official has made an official visit), the former offered from his government the official recognition of Dr. Sun as president of all China, if the latter would recognize the Twenty-one Demands as an accomplished fact. From the Japanese standpoint the offer was a safe one, as this acceptance of Japanese claims is the one thing impossible to the new government. But meantime the offer naturally confirms the nationalists of Dr. ...
— China, Japan and the U.S.A. - Present-Day Conditions in the Far East and Their Bearing - on the Washington Conference • John Dewey

... Besides, I must add that even if the treaty contains clauses imposing a charge on the public revenue, it is the rule, since Washington's time, that the House of Representatives should not discuss the terms of the treaty adopted by the Senate, but accept it in silence as an accomplished fact, and simply vote the ...
— The Spirit of American Government - A Study Of The Constitution: Its Origin, Influence And - Relation To Democracy • J. Allen Smith

... much alike as to birth and fortune, with whom he had grown up in familiar communication. Timidity imposed restraints upon him which made his choice almost a matter of accident. As befalls often enough, the betrothal became an accomplished fact whilst he was still doubting whether he desired it or not. When the fervour of early wedlock was outlived, he had no difficulty in accepting as a matter of course that his life's companion should be hopelessly illogical and at heart indifferent to everything but the small graces and substantial ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing

... backwards and forwards amongst her guests to ascertain the current of opinions, found that her protegee's success was an accomplished fact before the evening ...
— Henry Dunbar - A Novel • M. E. Braddon

... against the annexation that has been an accomplished fact for 150 years!" exclaimed Mr. Smith. "How can your people suppose that I would do ...
— In the Year 2889 • Jules Verne and Michel Verne

... her house and hewn out her seven pillars; there could be no doubt, now, that the asylum for talent, the sanatorium of the arts, so long projected, was an accomplished fact. Her ambition had long ago outgrown the dimensions of her house on Prairie Avenue; besides, she had bitterly complained that in Chicago traditions were against her. Her project had been delayed by Arthur's doggedly standing out for the Michigan ...
— The Troll Garden and Selected Stories • Willa Cather

... there were other and higher things to be thought of. If he failed now, an enterprise must be lost in which he had labored for a year to induce others to invest millions. If he failed, the diversion of this railroad from its original course must become an accomplished fact, to the ruin of his adopted city and the paralysis of growth in all that region, for perhaps ten years to come. Thus his own career, the millions of other men's money, which had been risked upon faith in his power to achieve, and, worst of all, the development of all this fair, but very ...
— A Captain in the Ranks - A Romance of Affairs • George Cary Eggleston

... in him were absolute; could he take advantage of it for his own ends? And, for all these fine arguments, Waymark saw with perfect clearness how the matter would end. Self would triumph, and Ida, if the fates so willed it, would be sacrificed. It was detestable, but a fact; as good already as an accomplished fact. ...
— The Unclassed • George Gissing

... of the Latin and doubtless also of the other Italian languages was anterior to this period, and that even at its commencement the Latin language was substantially an accomplished fact, is evident from the fragments of the Twelve Tables, which, however, have been largely modernized by their semi-oral tradition. They contain doubtless a number of antiquated words and harsh combinations, ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen

... with abuse, had witnessed the abdication, the scenes in the Chamber, and the King's final departure. All the way across France, too, except at Toulon, where the strong hand of the navy made itself felt, Touchard had watched the eager speculations of the majority on the accomplished fact, and the struggle as to who should first offer his services to the Provisional Government, before the corpse of Constitutional Monarchy was cold—for dead it was, without having struck a blow ...
— Memoirs • Prince De Joinville

... antecedents were mysterious enough, in all conscience; but the antecedents of this wild ward of his were ten times more so. But, in spite of all, the engagement was an accomplished fact. ...
— The Unseen Bridgegroom - or, Wedded For a Week • May Agnes Fleming

... the scope of this enquiry to trace the various steps or indicate the various influences, the civilizing effect of the Church, the restraining power of the law, by which this complete amalgamation of two distinct races became an accomplished fact; we need only to note that the unity of the race was achieved. Even Macchiavelli recognizes this fact and, speaking of the time of the Carlovingian conquest, in the brief review of the history of all Italy which forms the first part of the first book of the "Florentine History," ...
— The Communes Of Lombardy From The VI. To The X. Century • William Klapp Williams

... is withheld no just government. * * * * The measure now before the House is necessary to the complete fulfillment of what has gone before it. To hesitate now is to put in peril all we have gained. Let this, too, pass into history as an accomplished fact. Let it be followed, in due course of time, by the last crowning act of the series—an amendment to the constitution securing to all citizens of full age, without regard to sex, an equal voice in making and amending the laws under which they ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various

... welcome with enthusiasm—or even with favour—the Empress Frederick, William II might justifiably conclude (without making allowance for the sympathy which the widow of the Emperor-Martyr inspires in Frenchwomen) that France had accepted the accomplished fact, abandoned her claims to Alsace-Lorraine, and the defence of her future interests in common with Russia. In that case, he would have treated France as he treats those who show him the greatest devotion. In order to get ...
— The Schemes of the Kaiser • Juliette Adam

... ignorance of many things—only, however, to make him say to himself, after the first angry blush, that here he would enter the game and here he would win it—so much Olive Chancellor could not know; what was sufficient for her was that he had rallied, as the French say, had accepted the accomplished fact, had admitted that North and South were a single, indivisible political organism. Their cousinship—that of Chancellors and Ransoms—was not very close; it was the kind of thing that one might take up or leave alone, as one pleased. It was "in the female line," as Basil ...
— The Bostonians, Vol. I (of II) • Henry James

... our time is a marvel, undreamed of a generation ago. Also, these achievements are a perfect example of the accomplished fact contradicting a prior prediction and criticism. For it was one of the accepted dogmas of the nineteenth century that the phenomena of living could never be subjected to accurate quantitative analysis." But the ethical dogmas of the past, no less ...
— The Pivot of Civilization • Margaret Sanger

... free myself from. By far the most important of these doubts, one which has not yet been touched upon, is the subject now before us for discussion. It refers not to the practicability, but to the durability of the work of universal freedom and prosperity. Economic justice must and will become an accomplished fact: that we know. But have we a right to infer that it will permanently assert itself? Economic justice will be followed by wealth for all living. Want and misery, with their retinue of destructive vices, will ...
— Freeland - A Social Anticipation • Theodor Hertzka

... for everything which might arise to support their suppositions. In such conjuncture, Madame des Ursins was wanting, as it appears to us, in prudence and address. Instead of postponing, until the cession had become an accomplished fact, the question of the exchange, she pursued the two objects simultaneously. To negotiate the second with Torcy, she sent D'Aubigny secretly to France, and the latter, after some overtures, gave her hopes of entire success. Transported with delight, she ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies

... worth while to go direct to the corral, where it might be supposed that the convicts had again taken refuge, either to pillage or to establish themselves there. But either the devastation of the corral would have been an accomplished fact by this time, and it would be too late to prevent it; or it had been the convicts' interest to intrench themselves there, and there would be still time to go and turn them out on ...
— The Secret of the Island • W.H.G. Kingston (translation from Jules Verne)

... sale of Joseph an accomplished fact than the sons of Jacob repented of their deed. They even hastened after the Midianites to ransom Joseph, but their efforts to overtake them were vain, and they had to accept the inevitable. Meantime Reuben had rejoined his brethren.[59] He had been so deeply absorbed ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg

... many of the laws of the Book of the Covenant (Exod. xx, 22-xxiii. 33), the oldest amongst the at all lengthy bodies of laws in the Pentateuch; and, again, this covenant appears to presuppose the Jewish settlement in Canaan (say in 1250 B.C.) as an accomplished fact. And, indeed, the Law and the books of Moses generally have undoubtedly passed through a long, deep, wide, and elaborate development, of which three chief stages, all considerably subsequent to the Covenant-Book, ...
— Progress and History • Various

... the Hymn of Zacharias upon the first beginning of the actual Coming of Messiah. "The horn of salvation was virtually raised up when the Incarnation became an accomplished fact" (Godet). The birth of S. John the Baptist was foretold to his father Zacharias, and the name by which he was to be {84} called. Zacharias showed his faith in the Angel's message by giving him this name—John—which ...
— The Prayer Book Explained • Percival Jackson

... say that the possible prospect which I outlined in the House to-night has become an accomplished fact. Two hundred and forty-three years ago London heard the sound of hostile guns. We have heard them to-night. This telegram is from Sheerness, and it tells, I most deeply regret to say, the same story, or something like it, as the messages from ...
— The World Peril of 1910 • George Griffith

... philanthropic gentlemen and ladies became interested in the enterprise. The necessary funds were collected mainly by the exertions of Miss J. Chandler and the ladies who had associated themselves with her, and the hospital became an accomplished fact. ...
— Woman: Man's Equal • Thomas Webster

... under our clothes, which clearly proved our equality. This was the simple, the beautiful programme; once carried out, peace, fraternal and eternal peace, would reign - till it ended, and the earthly Paradise would be an accomplished fact. ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke

... his heart, supposed that the doubts and delights of his soul were peculiar to men alone. He thought all women—at all events, all young and worthy women—regarded life and its accepted forms as an accomplished fact, not to be questioned, and, indeed, too delightful to need it. The young South Carolinian, in his ambitions, in his heart-longings and heart-sickenings, in his poetry, even in his emotions, had always been lonely; so that his loneliness ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various

... leading boat must be getting close to the schooner so that the transfer would soon be an accomplished fact, after which the return trip was due to be started which was when they meant ...
— Eagles of the Sky - With Jack Ralston Along the Air Lanes • Ambrose Newcomb

... assured; and this measured delay on their part was the best justification of Bismarck's sagacious deliberateness. The negotiations were tedious, but at length, on the evening of 23rd November 1870 the Convention with Bavaria was signed, and the unity of Germany was an accomplished fact. Busch vividly ...
— Camps, Quarters, and Casual Places • Archibald Forbes

... every measure of his self-sacrificing rule, Carleton served on devotedly through six weary months of 1778—the year in which a vindictive government of Bourbon France became the first of the several foreign enemies who made the new American republic an accomplished fact by taking sides in a British civil war. His burden was now far more than any man could bear. Yet he closed his answer to Germain's parting shot with words which are as noble ...
— The Father of British Canada: A Chronicle of Carleton • William Wood

... Parma, Modena, Romagna, and Tuscany expressed by universal suffrage their cordial desire for union with Sardinia, and a few days later the fusion of these provinces with the dominions of the house of Savoy was an accomplished fact. On April 2, 1860, at the opening of the new Parliament, Victor Emmanuel could thus sum up the results already obtained by the nationalist party: "In a very short space of time an invasion repulsed, Lombardy liberated by valiant feats of arms, Central Italy freed by her people's wonderful ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 17 • Charles Francis Horne

... ostracized in any Dutch village, the Boers pretending that the name outraged their feelings, and that distinctions between loyal and disloyal were invidious. Federation—Mr. Rhodes's great ideal—which has since come rapidly and triumphantly to be an accomplished fact, was then temporarily relegated to the background; the Bond, apparently, had not made up their minds to declare for it, but they were hard at work in their old shrewd way, obtaining influence by getting their own men appointed to vacancies at the post-office and in the railway departments, ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson

... Macauley, president of the Packard Motor Car Company, accepted the trophy, saying: "We do not claim, Mr. President, that we have reached the final development even though our diesel aircraft engine is an accomplished fact and we have the pioneer's joy of knowing that we have successfully accomplished what had not been done before...."[8] The amazing early success of the Packard diesel is illustrated by the ...
— The First Airplane Diesel Engine: Packard Model DR-980 of 1928 • Robert B. Meyer

... as it is possible to be about anything in this wicked world. Braithwaite tells me it's an accomplished fact. The deeds are signed, and the workmen are to begin putting the house in order next week. You may take it as settled this time, for the man really means to come. He is a certain Ernest Vanburgh by name, and has been living abroad for ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... movement in no wise checked the movement or discouraged its leaders. They redoubled their efforts among the separate states, and worked to such good purpose that the opposition presently began to take on the aspect of a forlorn hope. "Votes for Women" became an accomplished fact in many states, and appeared on the verge of accomplishment in most of the others. Some states, however, were still holding out when the leaders of the movement, impatient of further delay and determined to ...
— Our Changing Constitution • Charles Pierson

... anticipations. As a consequence of the illness of Tom Montjoy he was offered and accepted what promised to be for the time being a lucrative position as Tom Montjoy's substitute on the back end of one of Fowler & Givens' ice wagons. The Eighteenth Amendment was not as yet an accomplished fact, though the dread menace of it hung over that commonwealth which had within its confines the largest total number of distilleries and bonded warehouses to be found in any state of this union. Observing no hope of legislative relief, sundry local saloon ...
— Sundry Accounts • Irvin S. Cobb

... time, however, he did neglect it, for reasons which he would not admit to himself, for though he was far from imagining the consequences of his act, he was afraid of their objections, he did not feel sure enough to expose himself to them, and so preferred to confront them with the accomplished fact. ...
— Clerambault - The Story Of An Independent Spirit During The War • Rolland, Romain

... assumption of a new role was not all—it was not there that the difficulty lay; it was in gaining for Smarlinghue the confidence of the underworld that Larry the Bat had once held. And that had taken time—was not even yet an accomplished fact. The intimate, personal acquaintance of Larry the Bat with every crook and dive in Gangland had aided him, as Smarlinghue, to gain an initial foothold, but his complete establishment there had necessarily had to be of Smarlinghue's own making. And it had taken time. Six months had gone ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard

... as I can go at the moment. Nothing definite has yet taken place. When and if an arrangement of this kind should become an accomplished fact the House will have the fullest opportunity of expressing itself, if it so ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various

... We must not escape from this sharp and humiliating contrast by mentally annihilating the self, so as to make it impossible to say, "Look on this picture, and on this." Such false humility leads straight to its opposite—extreme arrogance. Moreover, to regard deification as an accomplished fact, involves, as I have said (p. 33), a contradiction. The process of unification with the Infinite must be a progressus ad infinitum. The pessimistic conclusion is escaped by remembering that the highest reality ...
— Christian Mysticism • William Ralph Inge

... saw my plans an accomplished fact. I put in bulkheads fore and aft, and pitched the canoe inside and out, making her heavier, but thoroughly water-tight—the end compartments being even air-tight. I raised the combing of the well to six inches in height, put on a deeper keel, shortened my mast, and added ...
— Jethou - or Crusoe Life in the Channel Isles • E. R. Suffling

... time, the Duke of Gloucester, who, with his party, had done every thing in his power to oppose the marriage, now, finding that it was an accomplished fact, and that all farther opposition would not only be useless, but would only tend to hasten and complete his own utter downfall, concluded to change his course, and join heartily himself in the general welcome which was given to the bride. ...
— Margaret of Anjou - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... amiably, articulating the consonants very indistinctly and thickly: 'hullo, my lad. Ah, my lad, when you weren't here ... he, he, he ...' Pyetushkov laughed and made a sudden duck forward with his nose. 'Yes, it's an accomplished fact, he, he, he.... However,' he added, trying to assume a dignified air, 'I'm all right.' He tried to lift his foot, but almost fell over, and to preserve his dignity pronounced in a deep bass, ...
— A Desperate Character and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev

... long-promised invasion—of which Kritzinger's and Hertzog's descent into Cape Colony had been the weather-signal—was now an accomplished fact. He had invaded with 2500 to 3000 men and some artillery. Plumer had located him at Philipstown, had effectually "bolted" him, and, in spite of heavy weather, had pressed him with the perseverance of a sleuth-hound in the direction of the De Aar-Orange River Railway into the arms of two ...
— On the Heels of De Wet • The Intelligence Officer

... send you, as a New Years' greeting, my hearty congratulations on your successful management of our national finances and on the resumption of specie payments, which I have no doubt will be an accomplished fact when this letter ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman

... said to have surprised any one; it was to be expected of a man in Northwick's position; it happened every day somewhere, and the day had come when it should happen there. They did not say God was good and that Mahomet was His prophet, but they were fatalists all the same. They accepted the accomplished fact, and, reflecting that the disaster did not really concern them, many of them regarded it dispassionately, even jocosely. They did not care for a lot of rich people in Boston who had been supplying Northwick with funds ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells

... accomplished fact in the actual relations of society long before it broke out in France; and it was only necessary to bring this reversal of conditions to outward recognition to give it legal sanction. This is always the case in all revolutions. You can never ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke

... over by success. Philosophy he lacked, for life had never turned his mind that way; religion was likewise absent from him; and his recent tremendous disappointment thus thundered upon a mind devoid of any machinery to resist it. The possession of Phoebe Lyddon had come to be an accepted and accomplished fact; he chose her for his own, to share the good things Fortune had showered into his lap—to share them and be a crowning glory of them. The overthrow of this scheme at the moment of realisation upset his ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts

... "Rule Britannia" and cheers for Old England. Cheers for Belfast and Newcastle alternated with such stentorian vigour, each side shouting for the other, that you might have been excused for imagining that the Union of Hearts was an accomplished fact, and that brotherly love had begun and must ever continue. Said a miner, "We're all surprised to see that the people here are just like Englishmen. An' I'm blest if they aren't more ...
— Ireland as It Is - And as It Would be Under Home Rule • Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.)

... California was now an accomplished fact. As long as hostilities should continue in Mexico, California must remain under a military government, and such control was at once inaugurated. The questions to be dealt with, as may well be imagined, ...
— The Forty-Niners - A Chronicle of the California Trail and El Dorado • Stewart Edward White

... had been accepted by the new British administration. "The visionary and impracticable idea had become an accomplished fact; the splendid phantom had become a glorious reality; the heptarchy-the old Irish constitution-had not been restored; yet Ireland had won ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud

... promised it to the impatient Chouans—the disembarkation of an Anglo-Russian army—the rising of the West—the entrance of Louis XVIII into his good town of Paris—and the return of the Corsican to his island! Predictions that were not so wild after all. Ten years later it was an accomplished fact in almost all its details. And what are ten years in politics? Frotte, Georges, Pichegru, d'Ache, would only have had to fold their arms. They would have seen the Empire crumble ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre

... died, but his will, in spite of the inevitable wrangling and litigation of disgusted relations, lived on, and the Snug Harbour for Tired Sailors is an accomplished fact. Randall had meant it to be built on his property there—a good "seeded-to-grass" farm land,—and thought that the grain and vegetables for the sailor inmates of this Snug Harbour on land could be grown ...
— Greenwich Village • Anna Alice Chapin

... frightful combination of unearthly sounds, faces splashed with floods of sea water, and noses stifled with clouds of scalding steam, the crew of the Susquehanna could hardly realize that their marvellous escape by a few feet from instant and certain destruction was an accomplished fact, not a frightful dream. They were still engaged in trying to open their eyes and to get the hot water out of their ears, when they suddenly heard the trumpet voice of Captain Bloomsbury crying, as he stood half dressed on the head of ...
— All Around the Moon • Jules Verne

... the scripture may be fulfilled, He that eateth bread with me hath lifted up his heel against me."[1203] The Lord was intent on impressing the fact of His foreknowledge as to what was to come, so that when the terrible development was an accomplished fact, the apostles would realize that thereby the scriptures had been fulfilled. Troubled in spirit, He reiterated the dreadful assertion that one of those present would betray Him. Peter made signs to John, who occupied the place next to Jesus and was at that moment leaning his head on the Lord's ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage

... tartly. "And here I am, my dear brother, and I am not blaming you for delays in the post. I merely remarked that it was too late now to consult me upon a marriage which is to all intents and purposes, an accomplished fact already." ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy

... of Catholicism appeared to be an accomplished fact from one end to the other of Africa. Quite recently a mere fraction of the Donatist party had been able to send three hundred and ten bishops to the Council of Bagai, who were to judge the recalcitrants of their own sect. Among these bishops, ...
— Saint Augustin • Louis Bertrand

... and he saw that she would betray him. He tied her up, therefore, that she might have no chance of warning Sir Henry, and he hoped, no doubt, that when the whole countryside put down the baronet's death to the curse of his family, as they certainly would do, he could win his wife back to accept an accomplished fact and to keep silent upon what she knew. In this I fancy that in any case he made a miscalculation, and that, if we had not been there, his doom would none the less have been sealed. A woman of Spanish blood ...
— The Hound of the Baskervilles • A. Conan Doyle

... Berkeley, wields the quaternions of Hamilton, uses the lightnings for his red sandaled messengers, holds his spectroscope to a star and tells what elements compose it, or to an outskirting nebula and declares it a mass of incandescent hydrogen. From such a background of accomplished fact he seems really to have a right to peer forth into the unbounded future and promise himself an unbounded destiny. The repetition of such a progress, nay much less, it may not unreasonably be imagined would raise the curtains from unsuspected secrets, bring the family of intelligences ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger

... no longer a mere party leader. Unlike Wellington and Eldon, he saw the necessity of accepting loyally the accomplished fact and shaping his future course in accordance with the nation's will. He, therefore, took an early opportunity of declaring that he regarded the reform act as irrevocable, and that he was prepared to participate in the dispassionate amendment of any institution that really ...
— The Political History of England - Vol XI - From Addington's Administration to the close of William - IV.'s Reign (1801-1837) • George Brodrick

... nerves—has risen up in revolt against what has been done. I do not know whether there can be a more desperate state of mind than when we do not agree with something, protest with every fibre of heart and brain, and at the same time feel powerless in presence of an accomplished fact. I understand that this is only a foretaste of what is awaiting me in the future. There is nothing to be done,—nothing. She is married, is Pani Kromitzka; she belongs to him, will always belong to him; and I who cannot consent, for to do so would mean ...
— Without Dogma • Henryk Sienkiewicz

... the peace was to become an accomplished fact, Venice outdid herself in preparing to honor the Emperor. The latter, too, was determined to spare no expense that could add to the splendor of the occasion. He had negotiated for a loan with the rich Venetians, and he now imposed a tax of one ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various

... wait and see it an accomplished fact," said Henderson. "And Edith, because I love you, with the sort of love it is worth a woman's while to inspire, I want your happiness before my own. So I am going to say this to you, for I never dreamed you were capable of ...
— A Girl Of The Limberlost • Gene Stratton Porter

... was a British naval officer—a man who, by training and the tradition of the Service, had acquired the habit of prompt resolution, and an equal promptitude of action in the conversion of such resolution into an accomplished fact. The helmsman of the Ludwig Gadd, therefore, had scarcely begun to revolve his steering-wheel ere the Flying Fish, with her speed accurately reduced to that of the other vessel, had sheered still closer, while von Schalckenberg, prompted by his companion, hailed in Russian, ...
— With Airship and Submarine - A Tale of Adventure • Harry Collingwood

... her being aware of it, was a perfectly enormous relief. The thing which, when she had first faced it as the only thoroughfare to the real life she so passionately wanted, had seemed such a veritable nightmare, was an accomplished fact. The week of acute agony she had lived through while she was forcing her sudden resolution on Rodney had been all but unendurable with the enforced contemplation of the moment of parting which it brought so ...
— The Real Adventure • Henry Kitchell Webster

... now an accomplished fact, as is generally known, and can therefore be explained in some detail without detriment. Mention will also be made of the gradual development up to Oct. 20 in the nature of the operations in this quarter of the theatre of war, which has ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol 1, Issue 4, January 23, 1915 • Various

... made to Antoinette. These promises, consecrated as they had been by the blessing of the Abbe Peretty, beside the deathbed of the Marquis de Chamondrin, seemed of so sacred a nature in the eyes of Antoinette that she really felt it her duty to treat Philip as if their marriage was an accomplished fact. ...
— Which? - or, Between Two Women • Ernest Daudet

... had the brilliant and seductive idea of marrying in secret. To slip away, and then to return, saying, "We are married. That's all!" ... Why not? No fuss! No ceremonial! The accomplished fact, which simplifies everything! ...
— The Matador of the Five Towns and Other Stories • Arnold Bennett

... not satisfied that the so-called discovery was an accomplished fact, and he forwarded a few fibers of the material to the division of which I have charge for investigation. I subjected them to my usual tests, and found them to consist of pure silk, and I so reported to Dr. Dyrenforth, who rejected the application for a patent. The microscope was thus usefully employed ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 530, February 27, 1886 • Various

... with the utmost self-control been passively watching the awful sufferings of their compatriots under Turkish misrule, gradually became exhausted. On September 28 the four Balkan Governments informed Russia that the Balkan League was an accomplished fact, and on the 30th the representatives of all four signed the alliance, and mobilization was ordered in Greece, Bulgaria, and Serbia. The population of Montenegro was habitually on a war footing, and it was left to the mountain kingdom from its geographically favourable position ...
— The Balkans - A History Of Bulgaria—Serbia—Greece—Rumania—Turkey • Nevill Forbes, Arnold J. Toynbee, D. Mitrany, D.G. Hogarth

... out with two men who loved her and the thought was an ache that remained with him. It was a natural reaction,—the lifelong training to guard against appearances which were open to criticism as religiously as against the accomplished fact. ...
— The Settling of the Sage • Hal G. Evarts

... "beginning of the end" was known. Radiant with joy, he announced that Nathaniel P. Banks, Jr., had received one hundred and three votes; William Aiken, one hundred; H. M. Fuller, six; L. D. Campbell, four; and Daniel Wells, Jr., of Wisconsin, one. The election was what a Frenchman would call an "accomplished fact," and hearty cheers ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore

... in the best possible spirits, for his running away was now an accomplished fact, and he was going toward Uncle Daniel and home just as fast as possible. He sang "Old Hundred" through five or six times by way of showing his happiness. It is quite likely that he would have sung something a little more lively had he known anything ...
— Toby Tyler • James Otis

... when the surface of life in Paris showed an unruffled aspect; but under the surface were heavings of inward agitation. On the morning of December 2nd the great stroke against the Republic was delivered; the coup d'etat was an accomplished fact. Later in the day Louis Napoleon rode under the windows of the apartment in the Avenue des Champs-Elysees, from the Carrousel to the Arc de l'Etoile. To Mrs Browning it seemed the grandest of spectacles—"he rode there in the name of the people after all." She and her husband ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden

... said, in a patient voice, "this that you call a lie is already an accomplished fact. I am not laying before you the fruits of idle speculation. I have upon me the most positive proof that such a result as was hoped for has already been reached. Gian Maria has received from his subjects ...
— Love-at-Arms • Raphael Sabatini

... supposed to lie in the direction of perjury. Have we, in the hour of our success, been invariably true to the promises made in the hour of our necessities? A study of the treaty we made with France in 1778, by the light of after years, would be useful to men who think that a treaty made is an accomplished fact. The people of the United States have to choose between the conquest of Mexico and non-intervention in Mexican affairs. There may be something to be said in favor of conquest, though the President's arguments in that direction—for such they are, disguised though they be—remind us ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 5, No. 28, February, 1860 • Various

... Garibaldi, raising bands of adventurers, made two or three attempts to capture it, but was repulsed by its French garrison, and it was not until 1870 that, the French troops being recalled to their own sorely distressed country, the union of Italy under Victor Emmanuel became an accomplished fact, though in the great liberator's absence. Garibaldi once more was seen in Rome, April, 1879. He was supposed to be proposing great purchases of arms, to be enlisting hosts of volunteers, to be ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 2 of 8 • Various

... elevated stations, from some of the oppressive conditions of low-level star-gazing; yet for a number of years nothing effectual was done for their realisation. Now, at last, however, mountain observatories are not only an admitted necessity but an accomplished fact; and Newton's long forecast of a time when astronomers would be compelled, by the developed powers of their telescopes, to mount high above the "grosser clouds" in order to use them,[1639] had ...
— A Popular History of Astronomy During the Nineteenth Century - Fourth Edition • Agnes M. (Agnes Mary) Clerke

... every spiritual medium, poetry, oratory, philosophy, political agitation. In the sunshine of the eighteenth century they finally matured, and at its close the rejuvenation of the Jewish race was an accomplished fact in every European country. Eagerly its sons entered into the new intellectual and literary movements of the nations permitted to enjoy another period of efflorescence, and Jewish humor has conquered a place ...
— Jewish Literature and Other Essays • Gustav Karpeles

... characteristic of Mrs. Browning, that she was significant alike in failure and success. Just as every marriage in the world, good or bad, is a marriage, dramatic, irrevocable, and big with coming events, so every one of her wild weddings between alien ideas is an accomplished fact which produces a certain effect on the imagination, which has for good or evil become part and parcel of our mental vision forever. She gives the reader the impression that she never declined a fancy, just as some gentlemen ...
— Varied Types • G. K. Chesterton

... that the treaty between England and the United Provinces was signed on January 23. Three days afterwards Dohna was able to announce the adhesion of the Swedish government; and on January 26, the Triple Alliance was an accomplished fact. It was essentially a defensive alliance, and its main object was to offer mediation between France and Spain in order to moderate the French claims and to back up their mediation, if necessity should arise, ...
— History of Holland • George Edmundson

... moment when the first feverish excitement seemed to wane. Time had gone on, and though there was a new Viceroy in India and a new Secretary of State at Whitehall, the Partition had remained an accomplished fact. The visit of the Prince and Princess of Wales to Calcutta had temporarily exercised a restraining influence on the political leaders, and the presence of Royalty in a country where reverence for the ...
— Indian Unrest • Valentine Chirol

... in the early part of the winter before the war. No one knew or even dreamed of the terrible times that were to come. No one believed that war was probable, or even possible; it was well enough, perhaps, to prepare for it; but secession was to be an accomplished fact, and the North and all the world would quietly acknowledge it. This was the general sentiment in the city; though secession, and what would, or what might come of it, was the general topic of talk in ...
— Seven Wives and Seven Prisons • L.A. Abbott

... he had arrived again at Portsmouth. At Portsmouth Bob seemed disposed to remain, for though some time elapsed without further intelligence, the gallant seaman never appeared at Overcombe. Then on a sudden John learnt that Bob's long-talked-of promotion for signal services rendered was to be an accomplished fact. The trumpet-major at once walked off to Overcombe, and reached the village in the early afternoon. Not one of the family was in the house at the moment, and John strolled onwards over the hill towards Casterbridge, ...
— The Trumpet-Major • Thomas Hardy

... of other girls, and could she suppose that one of them would not have the sense to snap up a treasure like Wally? A sense of blank desolation swept over Jill. Her quick imagination, leaping ahead, had made the vague possibility of a distant future an accomplished fact. She felt, absurdly, a sense ...
— The Little Warrior - (U.K. Title: Jill the Reckless) • P. G. Wodehouse

... It is clear to me, sir, that you, and you alone, must be this League of Nations. For if it is entirely in your hands there will be no delay. The plan will spring full fledged from the head of Jove, and this great and beneficial change in the lot of mankind will at once become an accomplished fact. There will be no need for keeping in touch with human nature, no call for patience and all that laborious upbuilding stone by stone which is so apt to discourage mankind and imperil the fruition of great reforms. No, sir; you—you must be this League, and we will ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... under the trees, and watched in solitude the decline of the sun in a cloudless sky. The memory of the happy years of her marriage had never been so sadly and persistently present to her mind as at this time, when the choice of another married life waited her decision to become an accomplished fact. Remembrances of the past, which she had such bitter reason to regret, and forebodings of the future, in which she was more than half inclined to believe, oppressed her at one and the same moment. She thought of the different circumstances, so widely separated by time, under ...
— The Evil Genius • Wilkie Collins

... which is an inherited hysteria will not yield to reason. It Bourbonises too much. It lives in the past, learning nothing and forgetting nothing. Argument runs off it like rain off a duck's back. These two types of thought we must leave to the grace of God, and the education of the accomplished fact. They represent a declining cause, and a decaying party. The Lodges once mustered more than 200,000 members; they have now less than 10,000. There is another kind of Orangeism, that which has begun to think, and the Orangeism that ...
— The Open Secret of Ireland • T. M. Kettle

... specialized class whose personal interests reach beyond the locality. This class is irresponsible, for it acts upon information that is not common property, in situations that the public at large does not conceive, and it can be held to account only on the accomplished fact. ...
— Public Opinion • Walter Lippmann



Words linked to "Accomplished fact" :   achievement, accomplishment



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