"Cubit" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... respectable. He descended from the omnibus nervously and went into the office. A clerk handed him a pen, and he registered his name in a clerkly hand, "A. Armstrong Webb." He had decided to acknowledge his debt to his uncle and add a cubit to his stature at the same time. The clerk wheeled the book round, glanced indifferently at the name, and handed a key to a bell-boy. Webb, conscious of a faint chill, followed the boy up-stairs. The room to which he was conducted was an ordinary one ...
— The Bell in the Fog and Other Stories • Gertrude Atherton
... measurement, the khalif caused another to be made near Cufa in Mesopotamia. His astronomers divided themselves into two parties, and, starting from a given point, each party measured an arc of one degree, the one northward, the other southward. Their result is given in cubits. If the cubit employed was that known as the royal cubit, the length of a degree was ascertained within one-third of a mile of its true value. From these measures the khalif concluded that the globular form ...
— History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science • John William Draper
... always to camp outside a village at a distance of not less than a mile. In the rains they make huts with a roof of bamboos sloping from a central ridge and walls of matting. The huts are built in one line and do not touch each other, at least a cubit's distance being left between each. Each hut has one door facing the east. As a rule they avoid the water of village wells and tanks, though it is not absolutely forbidden. Each man digs a shallow well in the sand behind his hut and drinks the water from it, and no man may drink the water of his ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell
... the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch. And this is the fashion which thou shalt make it of: The length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the height of it thirty cubits. A window shalt thou make to the ark, and in a cubit shalt thou finish it above; and the door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof; with lower, second, and third stories shalt thou make it. And, behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein ...
— The Antediluvian World • Ignatius Donnelly
... measure? Or could I indeed measure the motion of a body how long it were, and in how long space it could come from this place to that, without measuring the time in which it is moved? This same time then, how do I measure? do we by a shorter time measure a longer, as by the space of a cubit, the space of a rood? for so indeed we seem by the space of a short syllable, to measure the space of a long syllable, and to say that this is double the other. Thus measure we the spaces of stanzas, by the spaces of the verses, and the spaces of ...
— The Confessions of Saint Augustine • Saint Augustine
... believe I can inform you somewhat on that head. A scriptural cubit measures twenty-one inches, and it has been calculated according to the dimensions given in the 6th chapter of Genesis, that the ark must have been of the enormous ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne
... Noah built the ark according to the pattern given him by Jehovah. It was a sort of box-like boat 525 ft. long 87-1/2 ft. wide and 42-1/2 ft. deep, if we count a cubit at twenty-one inches. It was three stories high, and the building of it was a huge undertaking. We need not, however, think of it as an undertaking beyond the resources of the times. All those early people seem to have been fond of colossal works. The building ...
— The Bible Period by Period - A Manual for the Study of the Bible by Periods • Josiah Blake Tidwell
... yards (standardized strides) in this country, while those who engage in the immemorial art of knitting, and, in doing so, repeat designs found on neolithic pottery, continue to measure in finger breadths, finger lengths, and hand breadths as did the ancient folks who called an arm length a cubit. Nor has the span been forgotten, especially by boys in their games with marbles; the space from the end of the thumb to the end of the little finger when the hand is extended must have been an important ...
— Myths of Babylonia and Assyria • Donald A. Mackenzie
... certain Semitic king, probably no other than Melchizedek. By supernatural means, the architects were instructed to place the pyramid in latitude 30 deg. north; to select for its figure that of a square pyramid, carefully oriented; to employ for their unit of length the sacred cubit corresponding to the 20,000,000th part of the earth's polar axis; and to make the side of the square base equal to just so many of these sacred cubits as there are days and parts of a day in a year. They were further, by supernatural ...
— Myths and Marvels of Astronomy • Richard A. Proctor
... to be loyal to Hellas,—to strive valiantly for her freedom,—and now! Was the Nemesis coming upon him, not in one great clap, but stealthily, finger by finger, cubit by cubit, until his soul's price was to be utterly paid? Was this the beginning of the recompense for ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis
... bred in Ethiopia a certain strange beast about the bignesse of a sea-horse, being of colour blacke or brownish: it hath the cheeks of a Boare, the tayle of an Elephant, and hornes above a cubit long, which are moveable upon his head at his owne pleasure like eares; now standing one way, and anone moving another way, as he needeth in fighting with other Beastes, for they stand not stiffe but ...
— The Book-Hunter at Home • P. B. M. Allan
... the far more important and exciting post as keeper of the vices. It is not an ideal power which she thus acquires. But then none of this is about ideals. This is just a little practical 'study in what is going to happen, and why. Taboos never yet have added a cubit to the stature of the soul of humanity. They have nearly always been the chattering children of fear and pure idiocy. They have always tried to throw the race back on to all fours, and have left the nobility of standing ...
— Nonsenseorship • G. G. Putnam
... inquisitor's errand, his heart secure, as he thought, against all blandishments, his will steeled to break down all resistance. He had come armed with an instrument of torture worse than the thumb-screw, worse than the pulleys which attempt the miracle of adding a cubit to the stature, worse than the brazier of live coals brought close to the naked soles of the feet,—an instrument which, instead of trifling with the nerves, would clutch all the nerve-centres and the heart itself in ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air; for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they? Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature? And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field how they grow: they toil not, neither do they spin: and yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all his glory ...
— The Book of Common Prayer - and The Scottish Liturgy • Church of England
... hygiene which helped them to increase in weight, stature, and beauty, and improved their material development? Hygiene did not accomplish quite all this. Who, as the Gospel says, can by taking thought add one cubit to his stature? Hygiene merely delivered the child from the obstacles that impeded its growth. External restraints checked material development and all the natural evolution of life; hygiene burst these bonds. And every one felt that a liberation had been effected; every one repeated in view ...
— Spontaneous Activity in Education • Maria Montessori
... heaven; they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into store-houses; but your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much better than they? [6:27]Which of you by being anxious can add one cubit to his stature? [6:28]And why are you anxious concerning clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they perform no hard labor, neither do they spin; [6:29]but I tell you that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like ...
— The New Testament • Various
... hid behind a tawny mask Of drifting cloud, and from the ocean's marge Rose the red plume, the huge and horned casque, The seven-cubit spear, the brazen targe! And clad in bright and burnished panoply Athena strode across the stretch of ...
— Poems • Oscar Wilde
... unresting, trackless, all Our joys and griefs befall; In thy full sight our secret things go on; Step after step, thy wrath Follows the caitiff's path, And in his triumph breaks his vile neck bone. To all alike, thou meetest out their due, Cubit for cubit, ...
— The Squire of Sandal-Side - A Pastoral Romance • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... we cannot bring our experiences to an end, however petulantly and irritably we desire to do so, because it simply is not in our power to effect it. We talk about the power of the will, but no effort of will can obliterate the life that we have lived, or add a cubit to our stature; we cannot abrogate any law of nature, or destroy a single atom of matter. What it seems that we can do with the will is to make a certain choice, to select a certain line, to combine existing forces, to use them within very small limits. We can oblige ourselves to take a certain ...
— Where No Fear Was - A Book About Fear • Arthur Christopher Benson
... skimming before my keymerycal fansee, when Murfy sends his puppies to the heys of slipping mortals; and when Febus shines from his merry dying throne; whereupon I shall canseif old time has lost his pinners, as also cubit his harrows, until thou enjoy sweet propose in the loafseek harms of thy very faithfool to commend, Clayrender Wingar ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... foremost of them couched his lance, and rushed upon Geraint. And he received him, and that not feebly. But he let the thrust go by him, while he struck the horseman upon the centre of his shield in such a manner that his shield was split, and his armour broken, and so that a cubit's length of the shaft of Geraint's lance passed through his body, and sent him to the earth, the length of the lance over his horse's crupper. Then the second horseman attacked him furiously, being wroth at the death of his companion. But with one thrust Geraint overthrew him ...
— The Mabinogion • Lady Charlotte Guest
... altar was the altar of incense, which was in the holy place of the tabernacle. It was of similar construction to the altar of burnt-offering, but smaller, being 2 cubits high and 1 cubit square (Ex. xxx. 1-5). It was overlaid with gold. Solomon's altar of incense (1 K. vi. 20) is referred to in a problematical passage from which it would appear to have been of cedar. But the authenticity of the passages describing the altar of incense in the tabernacle, ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... a span is ascribed to the highest Lord, although omnipresent with reference to his abiding within the heart; just as to ether (space) the measure of a cubit is ascribed with reference to the joint of a bamboo. For, on the one hand, the measure of a span cannot be ascribed directly to the highest Self which exceeds all measure, and, on the other hand, it has been shown that none but the highest Lord can be meant ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 1 • George Thibaut
... Roderick's ready blade. Patient the sickening victim eyed The life-blood ebb in crimson tide Down his clogged beard and shaggy limb, Till darkness glazed his eyeballs dim. The grisly priest, with murmuring prayer, A slender crosslet framed with care, A cubit's length in measure due; The shaft and limbs were rods of yew, Whose parents in Inch-Cailliach wave Their shadows o'er Clan-Alpine's grave, And, answering Lomond's breezes deep, Soothe many a chieftain's endless sleep. The Cross thus formed ...
— The Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott
... little stalk of a cubit high, round, and joyned, whereupon do grow leaves very finely cut, like to those of Fennel, but much smaller." The herb is of the umbelliferous order, and its fruit chemically furnishes "anethol," a volatile empyreumatic oil similar to that contained ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie
... life which give the consciousness of the body, and there was therefore no reaction from it of those feelings of weakness and need which, to such a man as Cosmo, soon reveal the fact that he is not lord of his body, that he cannot add to it one cubit, or make one hair white or black, and must therefore leave the care of it to him who made it, he had to learn in other ways that his castle of stone was God's also. His truth and humility and love had not ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... troublesome,—but simply by looking at her. You can see the feeling in their faces. They are for the most part small in stature, well made little men, who are aware that they have something to be proud of, wearing close-packed, shining little hats, by which they seem to add more than a cubit to their stature; men endowed with certain gifts of personal—dignity I may perhaps call it, though the word rises somewhat too high. They look as though they would be able to say a clever thing; but their spoken thoughts seldom rise above a small, acrid sharpness. ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope
... be, save rebellion against God? But when we have done our utmost, how little shall we have done! Canst thou,—asks our Lord, looking with loving sadness on the hurry and the struggle of the human anthill—canst thou by taking thought add one cubit to thy stature? Why, is there a wise man or woman in this abbey, past fifty years of age, who does not know that, in spite of all their toil and struggle, they have gone not whither they willed, but whither ...
— All Saints' Day and Other Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... light the pavement shone, And all on fire appeared the glowing throne; The dome's high arch reflects the mingled blaze, And forms a rainbow of alternate rays. When on the Goddess first I cast my sight, Scarce seemed her stature of a cubit's height; But swelled to larger size the more I gazed, Till to the roof her towering front she raised; With her the Temple every moment grew, And ampler vistas opened to my view: Upward the columns shoot, the roofs ascend, And arches widen, and long aisles extend, Such was ...
— MacMillan's Reading Books - Book V • Anonymous
... and the body than raiment? (26)Behold the birds of the air, that they sow not, nor reap, nor gather into barns; and your heavenly Father feeds them. Are ye not much better than they? (27)And which of you by taking thought can add one cubit to his stature[6:27]? (28)And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow. They toil not, nor spin; (29)and I say to you, that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. (30)And if God so clothes the grass of the field, ...
— The New Testament of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. • Various
... with scrupulous regard to all the rules of art. When I had finished that part of my work, I raised the mold by windlasses and stout ropes to a perpendicular position, and suspending it with greatest care one cubit above the level of the furnace, so that it hung exactly above the middle of the pit, I next lowered it gently down into the very bottom of the furnace, and had it firmly placed with every possible precaution ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 6 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Artists • Elbert Hubbard
... a very tall standard, that touched the heavens, was set up on his car. A carnivorous and awful vulture of blood-red body perched on it. He came, forcibly drawing his bow whose twang resembled the thunder of Indra, and whose string was very hard, and which measured a dozen cubits in length and one cubit in breadth.[231] Filling all the points of the compass with shafts of the measure of the Aksha of a car, the Rakshasa rushed against Karna on that night that was so destructive of heroes. Staying ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... wilds of air! Freely as an angel fair Thou dost leave the solid earth, Man is bound to from his birth Scarce a cubit from the grass Springs the foot of lightest lass— Thou upon a cloud can'st leap, And o'er broadest rivers sweep, Climb up heaven's steepest height, Fluttering, twinkling, in the light, Soaring, singing, till, sweet bird, ...
— Flowers and Flower-Gardens • David Lester Richardson
... well baked, I began to dig a hole to bury my mold in, and observed all those fine methods of proceeding that are prescribed by our art. When I had completely dug my hole, I took my mold, and by means of levers and strong cables directed it with care, and suspended it a cubit above the level of the furnace, so that it hung exactly in the middle of the hole. I then let it gently down to the very bottom of the furnace, and placed it with all the care and exactness ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VIII (of X) - Continental Europe II. • Various
... discovered of irritating the aristocratic type of steam launch, was to mistake them for a beanfeast, and ask them if they were Messrs. Cubit's lot or the Bermondsey Good Templars, and could they lend ...
— Three Men in a Boa • Jerome K. Jerome
... thou art. Put on thy head a wig with countless locks, And to a cubit's height upraise thy socks, Still thou remainest ever, what ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... The most strange thing that ever struck me in connexion with this event, was, that the fish did not fall helter skelter, everywhere, or 'here and there;' but they fell in a straight line, not more than a cubit in breadth." Another shower is said to have taken place at a village near Allahabad, in the month of May. About noon, the wind being in the west, and a few distant clouds visible, a blast of high wind came on, accompanied with so much dust ...
— The Rain Cloud - or, An Account of the Nature, Properties, Dangers and Uses of Rain • Anonymous
... had a handkerchief round his head, a grey woollen blanket tied like a hood, and a six-cubit piece of cloth round his loins. Behind him came a flock of sheep, and behind the flock, in front, and on both sides there were barking dogs. The shepherd had a stick in his left hand, which he laid upon his left shoulder; in his right hand he had a long switch, and under the armpit ...
— Old Daniel • Thomas Hodson
... great energy. Stationed at the head of their divisions, all of them, remembering their great sufferings, without doubt, wander along the field like so many Indras! All of them are endued with high souls, and are tall in stature like the trunks of Sala trees. Taller than other men by half-a-cubit in stature, all the sons of Pandu are brave as lions and endued with great strength. All of them, O sire, have practised Brahmacharya vows and other ascetic austerities. Endued with modesty, those tigers among men are possessed ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... better and higher morality. Why, my Masters, it can not as much as purge its own channels. For what is the ballot box, I ask again, but a modern vehicle of corruption and debasement? The ballot box, believe me, can not add a cubit to your frame, nor can it shed a modicum of light on the deeper problems of life. Of course, it is the exponent of the will of the majority, that is to say, the will of the Party that has more money at its disposal. The majority, and Iblis, and Juhannam—ah, ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... anything that is wanted for its blessing and its power. You have had to trust Him for the greater; trust Him for the less. He has given you the greater—no doubt He will give you the less. 'The life is more than meat, and the body than raiment.' 'Which of you, by taking thought, can add one cubit unto his stature? And why take ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... feasts, and mourning of the women, and took away everything that was either unbecoming or immodest; when they walked abroad, no more than three articles of dress were allowed them; an obol's worth of meat and drink; and no basket above a cubit high; and at night they were not to go about unless in a chariot with a torch before them. Mourners tearing themselves to raise pity, and set wailings, and at one man's funeral to lament for another, he forbade. To offer an ox at the grave was not permitted, nor to bury above three pieces ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... so was its measure. He took the censer in his right hand, and the spoon in his left. He proceeded in the Sanctuary until he came between the two vails dividing between the holy and the holy of holies, and intermediate was a cubit. R. Joseph said, "there was one vail only," as He said, "the vail is the division for you between the Holy and the Holy of Holies" (Exod. xxvi. 33). Outside it was looped up southward, inside northward. He proceeded between them till he reached the north. ...
— Hebrew Literature
... observation may be obscure. Digestive thought is the only assimilative process. The whole art of telephony hangs on taking thought of things. Judge R.F. Taylor of Indiana said of Professor Bell, "It has been said that no man by taking thought may add a cubit to his stature, yet here is a man who, by taking thought, has added not cubits but miles to the lengths ...
— Cyclopedia of Telephony & Telegraphy Vol. 1 - A General Reference Work on Telephony, etc. etc. • Kempster Miller
... Sepulchre. The Grand Khan a tributary Prince. Argosies of gold, silk and spices, sailing steady, sailing fast over a waterway unblocked by Mahound and his soldans. All Europe burning bright, rising a rich Queen. Holy Church with another cubit to her stature. Christopherus Columbus, the Discoverer, the Enricher, the Deliverer! Queen Isabella, and on her cheeks a flush of gratitude; all the Spanish court bowing low. All the friends, the kindred, all so blessed! Sons, brothers; Genoa, and Domenico Colombo ...
— 1492 • Mary Johnston
... translated by Mr. Pinches throw light on the building and cost of the ships. One of them is as follows: "A ship of six by the cubit beam, twenty by the cubit the seat of its waters, which Nebo-baladan, the son of Labasi, the son of Nur-Papsukal, has sold to Sirikki, the son of Iddin, the son of Egibi, for four manehs, ten shekels of silver, in one-shekel pieces, ...
— Babylonians and Assyrians, Life and Customs • Rev. A. H. Sayce
... of Length.—A man should ascertain his height; height of his eye above ground; ditto, when kneeling: his fathom; his cubit; his average pace; the span, from ball of thumb to tip of one of his fingers; the length of the foot; the width of two, three, or four fingers; and the distance between his eyes. In all probability, some one of these ...
— The Art of Travel - Shifts and Contrivances Available in Wild Countries • Francis Galton
... vital force, mentality, aptitude for tool or industry, for art or science. These birth-gifts are quantities, fixed and unalterable. No heart-rendings can change the two-talent nature into a ten-talent man. No agony of effort can add a cubit to the stature. The eagle flies over the chasm as easily as an ant crawls over the crack in the ground. Shakespeare writes Hamlet as easily as Tupper wrote his tales. Once an oak, always an oak. Care and culture can thicken the girth of the tree, but no degree of culture can cause an oak bough ...
— A Man's Value to Society - Studies in Self Culture and Character • Newell Dwight Hillis
... the insects. I sleep outside till about six a.m., and then go indoors till dark again. This fortnight is the hottest time. To-day the drop falls into the Nile at its source, and it will now rise fast and cool the country. It has risen one cubit, and the water is green; next month it will be blood colour. My cough has been a little troublesome again, I suppose from the Simoom. The tooth does not ache now. Alhamdulillah! for I rather dreaded the muzeyinn (barber) with his tongs, ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon
... serpent, is described by Forskall as being wholly of that colour, a cubit in length, and as thick as a finger. Its bite is not incurable, but the wound swells severely; the application of a ligature prevents the venom from spreading; or certain plants, as the caper, may ...
— Palestine or the Holy Land - From the Earliest Period to the Present Time • Michael Russell
... possible defeat; and decided to defer it till he felt more physically fit for the strain. For he possessed the rapid recuperative power of his type; and, the fever once conquered, each day added a cubit to his returning vigour. ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver
... poet. Nothing can, but being a poet. Nor can these gifts make a great romancer or poet in prose. Nothing can, but being born to romance, being a prose poet. As the Gospel has it—"Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?" George Eliot had not sufficiently meditated on this scripture. She too often supposed that by taking thought—by enormous pains, profound thought, by putting this thought in exquisite and noble words—she might produce an immortal romance, ...
— Studies in Early Victorian Literature • Frederic Harrison
... of Z-li [3], And the cypresses of Hsin-f [3], Were cut down and measured, With the cubit line and the eight cubits' line. The projecting beams of pine were made very large; The grand inner apartments rose vast. Splendid look the new temples, The work of Hs-sze, Very wide and large, Answering to the ...
— The Shih King • James Legge
... in the month of Maug (January, February), the land is to be twice ploughed, and harrowed repeatedly, length and breadth ways; after which it is furrowed, the furrows half a cubit apart, in which the plants are to be set at about four fingers' distance from each other, when the furrows are filled up with the land that lay upon its ridges. The plants being thus set, the land is harrowed twice in different directions; fifteen ...
— The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom • P. L. Simmonds
... Mediterranean Sea. A galley may be 180 or 190 spans long—Furttenbach measures a ship by palmi, which varied from nine to ten inches in different places in Italy,—say 150 feet, the length of an old seventy-four frigate, but with hardly a fifth of its cubit contents—and its greatest beam is 25 spans broad. The one engraved on p. 37 is evidently an admiral's galley of the Knights of Malta. She carries two masts—the albero maestro or mainmast, and the trinchetto, or foremast, each with ...
— The Story of the Barbary Corsairs • Stanley Lane-Poole
... their predecessors for more than nine hundred years. As maple was the sacred wood in the Roman ritual, maple only was used for the holy fire. The size of the pieces used and their shape was also a matter of immemorial ordinance. Each piece was about a cubit long, about the length of the forearm of an average adult, measured from elbow to finger-tips. Each piece must be wedge-shaped, with the bark on the rounded side and the other two sides meeting at a sharp edge where ...
— The Unwilling Vestal • Edward Lucas White
... distinctly stated, that the wall was one hundred and forty and four cubits high, or two hundred and sixteen feet, a proper height for a wall; while it is said only that 'the length is as large as the breadth.'" This writer reckoned but eighteen inches for a cubit, whereas some figure twenty-two. A city one thousand and five hundred miles high with a wall only two hundred and sixteen or two hundred and sixty four feet high, would be altogether out ...
— The Revelation Explained • F. Smith
... very diverse corporations. Some, more industrious and equipped with better tools, remove the pith from the dry stem and thus obtain a vertical cylindrical gallery, the length of which may be nearly a cubit. This sheath is next divided, by partitions, into more or less numerous storeys, each of which forms the cell of a larva. Others, less well-endowed with strength and implements, avail themselves of the old galleries of other insects, ...
— Bramble-bees and Others • J. Henri Fabre |
