"Double-edged" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... ancient pythoness now but provoke the scientific smile: but no tripod ever mounted by the prophetess of old was so shaky as the chronological trinity of points upon which this Orientalist stands to deliver his oracles. Moreover, his arguments are double-edged, as shown. If the citadel of Buddhism can be undermined by Professor Max Muller's critical engineering, then pari passu that of Christianity must crumble in the same ruins. Or have the Christians alone the monopoly of absurd religious "inventions" and the ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various
... (Ravana), in his very sight. And beholding the enemy slaughtering his troops, the Rakshasa king, Ravana, possessed of great powers of illusion, began to put them forth. And forth from his body began to spring hundreds and thousands of Rakshasas armed with arrows and lances and double-edged swords in hand. Rama, however, with a celestial weapon slew all those Rakshasas. The king of the Rakshasas then once more put forth his prowess of illusion. The Ten-faced, producing from his body numerous warriors resembling, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa Bk. 3 Pt. 2 • Translated by Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... when was it written? Its editor, the Conde de Sabugosa, to whom all Vicente lovers owe so deep a debt of gratitude[16], assigned it to 1535, while Senhor Braamcamp Freire, who uses Vicente's age as a double-edged weapon[17], places it twenty years earlier, in 1515. This was indeed necessary if the year 1452 was to be maintained as the date of his birth. The theory of the exact date 1452 was due to another passage of ...
— Four Plays of Gil Vicente • Gil Vicente
... Supernatural Religion has a right to suppose, though he cannot prove, that the fourth and fifth were written during the episcopate of Victor (A.D. 190-198 or 199). But in his partiality for late dates he forgets that the weapon which he wields is double-edged. If the fourth and fifth books 'must,' as he confidently asserts, have been written some years after the third, it follows by parity of reasoning, that the first and second must have been written some years ...
— Essays on "Supernatural Religion" • Joseph B. Lightfoot
... inquirers then went on to reveal the story of her "voices," and she firmly repeated her refusal to bind herself by a general oath as to every answer, saying that she had more fear of God and of her "voices," than of her conduct in that trial. Asked whether she was sure of the favour of God (a double-edged question at which some even of her judges murmured) she passed the danger by saying, "If I am not, may God help me to it; and if I am, may ...
— The Story of Rouen • Sir Theodore Andrea Cook
... with the action, and plunged the dagger, which he suddenly displayed, into the broad breast of the English yeoman, with such fatal certainty and force that the hilt made a hollow sound against the breast-bone, and the double-edged point split the very heart of his victim. Harry Wakefield fell and expired with a single groan. His assassin next seized the bailiff by the collar, and offered the bloody poniard to his throat, whilst dread and surprise rendered ...
— Chronicles of the Canongate • Sir Walter Scott
... was named Socht, son of Fithel. Socht had a wonderful sword, named "The Hard-headed Steeling," which was said to have been long ago the sword of Cuchulain. It had a hilt of gold and a belt of silver, and its point was double-edged. At night it shone like a candle. If its point were bent back to the hilt it would fly back again and be as straight as before. If it was held in running water and a hair were floated down against the edge, it would sever the hair. It was a saying that this sword would make two halves ...
— The High Deeds of Finn and other Bardic Romances of Ancient Ireland • T. W. Rolleston
... late, that the speech he had just made was like the sword of the archangel, double-edged; if Sieyes was unfrocked, Talleyrand was unmitred. He cast a rapid glance at his companion's face; the ex-bishop of Autun was smiling ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere
... there. The master-workman must train these notions and vagaries with his two-handed hammer. They twist out of the way of the sword-thrusts; and are invulnerable all over, even in the heel, against logic. The martel or mace, the battle-axe, the great double-edged two-handed sword must deal with follies; the rapier is no better against them than a wand, unless it be the rapier ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... and conquest as any rudely civilized people: we, therefore, meet with remains of their weapons. The principal ones were swords, daggers, spear-heads, and arrows. The swords are always more or less leaf-like in shape, double-edged, sharp-pointed, and intended more for stabbing and thrusting, rather than cutting. ...
— The Prehistoric World - Vanished Races • E. A. Allen
... workmanship—protected his feet, and his waist was encircled by a broad leathern girdle, from one side of which depended a short hunting-knife, and from the other a flap, with a slit in it, to support his sword. The latter weapon—a heavy double-edged blade—stood leaning against the forge chimney, along with a huge battle-axe, within reach of his hand. The collar of his shirt was thrown well back, exposing to view a neck and chest whose muscles denoted extraordinary power, and ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... dagger, which he suddenly displayed, into the broad breast of the English yeoman, with such fatal certainty and force, that the hilt made a hollow sound against the breast bone, and the double-edged point split the very heart of his victim. Harry Wakefield fell, and expired with ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, - Issue 282, November 10, 1827 • Various
... Sikeliot cities in this age is, in the double-edged saying of Empedocles, connected with one of their noblest tastes. They built their houses as if they were going to live for ever. And if their houses, how much more their temples and other public buildings? In some of the Sikeliot cities, this was the most brilliant time of ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Vol VIII - Italy and Greece, Part Two • Various
... and his false Franks came down to see what they could get; all (save a few knights round the king) on foot, without bow or lance; but armed with sword, shield, and heavy short-handled double-edged francisc, or battle-axe. At the bridge over the Ticinus they (nominal Catholics) sacrificed Gothic women and children with horrid rites, fought alike Goths and Romans, lost a third of their army by ...
— The Roman and the Teuton - A Series of Lectures delivered before the University of Cambridge • Charles Kingsley
... probably, nay, almost certainly, have gone as Messer Simone desired if only Messer Simone had not been so bullishly besotted as to leave the name of a certain lady out of his table of calculations; for Messer Griffo liked the scheme well enough. Though it was, as it were, a double-edged weapon, cutting this way at the Florentines of one party and that way at Arezzo, it was a simple scheme enough that required no feigning to sustain it, no dissimulation—qualities these apparently repugnant to the English heart. ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... however, not. Life's too short to play with toys; and enmities are toys—double-edged ones at that. You ...
— The Dominant Dollar • Will Lillibridge
... a sight to curdle the blood about one's heart, this duel between husband and wife, with double-edged blades, wreathed with flowers. Mr. Aylett's attitude of lazy indifference was not exceeded by Clara's proud languor. He laughed a little ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... sarcastically. "And so have I. A six-inch, double-edged knife, sharp as a razor and pointed like a needle. They didn't have sense enough to search us, and we didn't have sense enough to realize it. I can feel mine under me now ...
— Under the Andes • Rex Stout
... catapulted into headlong attack. As he leaped forward he drew a curved, double-edged blade from under his robes. It plunged unerringly through the spot where Brion's body had been ...
— Planet of the Damned • Harry Harrison
... which, like the rest of his armour, were of bright steel. At the front of his military saddle hung a case of pistols, far beyond the ordinary size, nearly two feet in length, and carrying bullets of twenty to the pound. A buff belt, with a broad silver buckle, sustained on one side a long straight double-edged broadsword, with a strong guard, and a blade calculated either to strike or push. On the right side hung a dagger of about eighteen inches in length; a shoulder-belt sustained at his back a musketoon or blunderbuss, and was crossed by a bandelier containing his charges of ammunition. ...
— A Legend of Montrose • Sir Walter Scott
... for the first time. "That's rather a double-edged compliment, if I may say so! But I suppose it's true that I would do a good deal more for you than I would ...
— What Timmy Did • Marie Adelaide Belloc Lowndes
... friend Dr. Barnard, now Bishop of Killaloe, having once expressed to him an apprehension, that if he should visit Ireland he might treat the people of that country more unfavourably than he had done the Scotch; he answered, with strong pointed double-edged wit, 'Sir, you have no reason to be afraid of me. The Irish are not in a conspiracy to cheat the world by false representations of the merits of their countrymen[901]. No, Sir; the Irish are a FAIR PEOPLE;—they never speak well of ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... to pull it out with his right hand, and cut the sinews of his fingers with the double-edged point of the weapon; and, falling from his horse, he was borne with speed by the men around him to his tent; and the physician tried to ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus
... the vines of Madeira has also committed great havoc here, but the people have been saved from ruin by the discovery of a new article of export. The cactus, that thick-leaved, spiny plant used often in the south to form hedges, which look as if the ground was growing a crop of double-edged saws, flourishes in the most arid soil in Teneriffe. The cactus had some time before been introduced from Honduras with the cochineal insect, which feeds on it, by a native gentleman; but his fellow-islanders turned up their noses at the nasty little creature, and said that they would rather ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... a moment as if he might do some wild thing. His spirit, his devilry, pleased Doltaire, and he laughed. "Who would have thought our Voban had such wit? The trade of barber is double-edged. Razors should be in ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... a tissue. It is described by Dr. Agnew, the surgeon, as "a double-edged sword, cutting either way for good or for evil." The increased nutrition may be moderate and cause a growth of new tissue, a simple increase of quantity at first; or it may produce a new growth differing in quality; ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture
... her waist she cast a fair golden girdle, and a veil withal upon her head. Then she considered of the sending of Odysseus, the great-hearted. She gave him a great axe, fitted to his grasp, an axe of bronze double-edged, and with a goodly handle of olive wood fastened well. Next she gave him a polished adze, and she led the way to the border of the isle where tall trees grew, alder and poplar, and pine that reacheth unto heaven, seasoned long since and sere, that might lightly float for him. ...
— DONE INTO ENGLISH PROSE • S. H. BUTCHER, M.A.
... discharged on all sides. And mangled with the discus and wounded with swords, darts and maces, the Asuras in large numbers vomited blood and lay prostrate on the earth. Cut off from the trunks with sharp double-edged swords, heads adorned with bright gold, fell continually on the field of battle. Their bodies drenched in gore, the great Asuras lay dead everywhere. It seemed as if red-dyed mountain peaks lay scattered all around. And when the Sun rose in his splendour, thousands of warriors struck ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)
... the wielder, too, this weapon of wealth, double-edged with the cupidity and misery of mankind, steeped in all the vices of self-indulgence as in a concoction of poisonous roots, tainting the very cause for which it is drawn, always ready to turn awkwardly ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... as we paced to and fro in front of the house, "this marriage rather simplifies matters. The photograph becomes a double-edged weapon now. The chances are that she would be as averse to its being seen by Mr. Godfrey Norton, as our client is to its coming to the eyes of his princess. Now the question is, Where are we to ...
— The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... the corpse, and thrusting his hand into the inner breast-pocket, dragged out a roll of MSS., matted closely together and stained by the winter's rains. A further search eventuated in finding a roll of small gold coin, a set of derringer pistols, a rusted double-edged dirk, and a pair of silver-mounted spectacles. Hastily covering over the body with leaves and branches cut from the embowering shrubs, we shudderingly left ...
— The Case of Summerfield • William Henry Rhodes
... We are double-edged blades, and every time we whet our virtue the return stroke straps our vice. Where is the skilful swordsman who can give clean wounds, and not rip up his work with the ...
— A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers • Henry David Thoreau
... such a metaphor is always as distracting as a mixed metaphor. It is a double-edged tool that cuts both ways; and consequently opposite ways. We use the same word 'young' to mean two opposite extremes. We mean something at an early stage of growth, and also something having the latest fruits of growth. We might call a commonwealth young ...
— What I Saw in America • G. K. Chesterton
... eventually issued as imperative orders were often presented at first as polite suggestions. But, if my suggestions were not accorded a respectful hearing, and my demands acted upon at once, I invariably supplemented them with vituperative ultimatums. These were double-edged, and involved me in trouble quite as often as they gained the ends ...
— A Mind That Found Itself - An Autobiography • Clifford Whittingham Beers
... marked contrast between the neighbouring people of Nova Scotia and New England was quickly discerned by so good an observer as the author proved himself to be, while his national and partisan judgments made his characterization of the Yankee to be a double-edged sword, that cut with equal keenness the Colonist and the Democrat. While he has no liking for the United States politically, he is very glad to make their enterprise and industry put to shame the slow wits of his countrymen; and the quiet satire of United States ...
— The Clockmaker • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... there is no doubt that the short Roman sword, which was practically a large heavy dagger, sharp-pointed, double-edged, and straight-bladed, was extensively used for thrusting. For cutting purposes, however, it could not, from the absence of curve in the edge of the blade, have been equal to ...
— Broad-Sword and Single-Stick • R. G. Allanson-Winn
... to some extent double-edged since it is an implicit assertion of the point made in both Prefaces, that English writers had much to learn from the Roman dramatists. Echard uses the Prefaces to assess and compare Plautus and Terence, ...
— Prefaces to Terence's Comedies and Plautus's Comedies (1694) • Lawrence Echard
... help you to understand that correspondence is a double-edged weapon which is of as much advantage for the defence of the husband as for the inconsistency of the wife. You should therefore encourage correspondence for the same reason that the prefect of police takes special care that the street lamps ...
— The Physiology of Marriage, Part II. • Honore de Balzac
... answer no questions. On their return, Kaspar said, 'Went Court Garden—Man—had a knife—gave a bag—struck—I ran as I could—bag must lie there.' Kaspar was found to have a narrow wound, 'two inches and a half under the centre of the left breast,' clearly caused by a very sharp double-edged weapon. In three or four days he died, the heart had been injured. He was able to depose, but not on oath, that on the morning of the 14th a man in a blouse (who had addressed him some days earlier) ...
— Historical Mysteries • Andrew Lang
... shrink, even in imagination, from the uses to which arms must be put—a people in love with war, having a mystical feeling for its instruments, such as their remote ancestors had for their battle-axes and double-edged swords. ...
— Antwerp to Gallipoli - A Year of the War on Many Fronts—and Behind Them • Arthur Ruhl
... reason of the bloodlessness of their combats is the inefficiency of their offensive weapons, and the excellence of their defensive armor. Their offensive arms are merely a bow and arrow, and a kind of double-edged sabre, about two and a half feet long, and six inches wide in the blade: they rarely come to sufficiently close quarters to make use of the last. For defensive armor they wear a cassock or tunic of elk-skin double, descending to the ankles, with holes ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to the Northwest Coast of America in the years 1811, 1812, 1813, and 1814 or the First American Settlement on the Pacific • Gabriel Franchere
... Constantinople, where their attacks were bought off only on the payment of large sums by the degenerate emperors. From. 902 to the fall of the empire, the emperors retained a large body-guard of Scandinavians, who, armed with double-edged battle-axes, were renowned through the world, under the name of Varengar, or the Vaeringjar of the ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... a moment in which to reflect on what might be done to rescue her. In that moment I providentially spied a double-edged axe which lay beside me on the grass, having fallen from the hands of one of the natives. Snatching up this weapon, I rushed to the edge of the cliff, and looked down. It was almost a sheer precipice, broken only by narrow shelves and ...
— In the Wrong Paradise • Andrew Lang
... lower or southern shoulder of the jar the Third Austro-Hungarian Army pushes forward inside, supported on its right by Boehm-Ermolli, who had been just inside a long time, but could get no farther. They began to shepherd the Russian troops around and in the western passes toward the lower double-edged blade of Von Mackensen's terrible scissors. The Russian retreat to the Wisloka was a serious disaster for Dmitrieff; he had been caught napping, and had to pay dearly in men and guns for not having created a row of alternative positions. ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume III (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... literal point so sharp that it is like a vast granite bowsprit thrust out into the green plains far below, terminating in a sheer precipice of several hundred feet. Roughly, then, you may visualize this section of the Cumberlands as a giant double-edged saw, a thousand feet thick, laid down across the State, each tooth a "point," each V between the teeth a "cove." Standing far out on one of these rock bowsprits, in the soft, hazy air of the southern mountains, you look over the far valley lands below, you look north and south ...
— Penguin Persons & Peppermints • Walter Prichard Eaton
... driving out-pour then as to-day, when M. Carnot comes into Provence. The roofs of the cabins let in water, the sides of the caves ran down with moisture. Then the wind changed, the sun shone out hot, but the mistral tore over the country cold and sharp as a double-edged sword. Poor Calpurnia could not stand it. She shivered and coughed, lost appetite and spirits. Next came the tidings of the battle at Les Milles, and a couple of days later of the extermination of the enemy at Pourrieres. Now the refugees ...
— In Troubadour-Land - A Ramble in Provence and Languedoc • S. Baring-Gould
... differed in no essential particular from those in use in the light motor bicycles of the period. Below was a single large wheel. The rider sat astride of a saddle, as in the Butteridge machine, and he carried a large double-edged two-handed sword, in addition to ...
— The War in the Air • Herbert George Wells
... on business; but he waited for Contenson, he was dreaming of Esther, telling himself that before long he would see again the woman who had aroused in him such unhoped-for emotions, and he sent everybody away with vague replies and double-edged promises. Contenson was to him the most important person in Paris, and he looked out into the garden every minute. Finally, after giving orders that no one else was to be admitted, he had his breakfast served in the summer-house at one corner of the garden. In the banker's ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... words, did not wait, but walked in, where he found Don Silvio very busy removing a hone upon which he had been whetting a sharp double-edged stiletto. The Sicilian walked up to him, offering his hand with apparent cordiality; but Jack, with a look of defiance, said, "Don Silvio, we know you; my object now is to demand, on the part of my friend, the satisfaction which you do not deserve, but which our indignation ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Frederick Marryat
... mountaineers use angry imprecations and personal abuse of all kinds sparingly. Instead of standing and cursing one another like enraged Billingsgate fish-women, they promptly cut the Gordian knot of their misunderstanding with their long, double-edged daggers, and presently one of them is carried away on a ladder. When, as a Caucasian proverb asserts, "It is only a step from the bad word to the kinjal," even an angry man is apt to think twice before ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various
... would meet with some difficulties; that thought did but excite her ardor. No doubt Madame de Nailles would try to keep her with her, and Jacqueline had provided herself beforehand with some double-edged remarks by way of weapons, which she intended to use according to circumstances. But all these preparations for defense or attack proved unnecessary. When she told the Baroness of her plans she met with no opposition. She had expected that her project of separation would ...
— Jacqueline, Complete • (Mme. Blanc) Th. Bentzon
... "wretched matter and lame metre," and the necessity it often forces upon poets of either twisting unpleasantly what they have to say or of adding irrelevant matter. Besides these there is also what Cowper called "clock-work tintinnabulum"—mere empty jingle. But all the arguments are double-edged. For although many inferior poets have imposed for a while on readers and critics by the superficial melody of rime alone, "wretched matter and lame metre" were never long successfully concealed by it. And although, as Hobbes wrote, rime "forces a man sometimes for ...
— The Principles of English Versification • Paull Franklin Baum
... continued: "Silly, short-sighted child, who thought she could play with the sword, and did not see that she herself might feel the stroke of this double-edged blade! You wanted to be the servant of the Church, that you might thereby become mistress of the world. You would acquire glory, but this glory must not singe your head with its fiery rays. Silly child! he who plays with fire will be consumed. But ...
— Henry VIII And His Court • Louise Muhlbach
... in the afternoon, and left it at a convenient place. In the evening he rode to the theatre, and, leaving the animal in charge of an accomplice, entered the house. Making his way to the door of the President's box, and taking a small Derringer pistol in one hand and a double-edged dagger in the other, he thrust his arm into the entrance, where the President, sitting in an arm-chair, presented to his view the back and side of his head. A flash, a sharp report, a puff of smoke, and the fatal bullet had ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... longer he lived, the more did he insist upon it being not less true and not less important, that the Church must not intermeddle with the State, than that the State must not intermeddle with the Church. He used to say, "Go down into the world, with all its complications and confusions, with this double-edged weapon, and you can cut all the composite knots of Church and State." The element of God and of eternity predominates in the religious more than in the civil affairs of men, and thus far transcends them; but the principle of mutual independence is equally applicable ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown
... home, into home, hard home; make an impression. Adj. strong, energetic, forcible, active; intense, deep-dyed, severe, keen, vivid, sharp, acute, incisive, trenchant, brisk. rousing, irritation; poignant; virulent, caustic, corrosive, mordant, harsh, stringent; double-edged, double-shotted[obs3], double-distilled; drastic, escharotic|; racy &c. (pungent) 392. potent &c. (powerful) 157; radioactive. Adv. strongly &c. adj.; fortiter in re[Lat]; with telling effect. Phr. the steam is up; vires acquirit eundo[Lat]; "the race ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... had to walk miles up and down Glashgar. A mountain in storm is as hard to cross as a sea. Arrived, they did not therefore feel safe. The tendency of the Glashburn was indeed away from the cottage, as the grounds of Glashruach sadly witnessed; but a torrent is double-edged, and who could tell? The yielding of one stone in its channel might send it to them. All night Angus watched, peering out ever again into the darkness, but seeing nothing save three lights that burned above the water—one of them, he thought, at the Mains. The other two went out ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald
... The implications of standards for preservation * A major obstacle to successful cooperation * A hindrance to access in the digital environment * Standards a double-edged sword for those concerned with the preservation of the human record * Near-term prognosis for reliable archival standards * Preservation concerns for electronic media * Need for reconceptualizing our preservation principles * Standards in the real world ...
— LOC WORKSHOP ON ELECTRONIC TEXTS • James Daly
... of the body, which is nearly destitute of hair. It has a somewhat large head, short snout, and short, upright ears; while a fleshy protuberance is its representative for a tail. At the first glance it seems harmless enough, but inside its mouth are found some short tusks, double-edged, and as sharp as lancets, with which the creature is capable of inflicting the most deadly wounds. It is remarkable for a glandular orifice at the lower part of the back, surrounded by strong bristles. From ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... satisfaction regarding the status of our countrymen across the seas until we had put our own house in order. Helots in our own country, how could we do better outside? Mr. Petit wants systematic and severe retaliation. In my opinion, retaliation is a double-edged weapon. It does not fail to hurt the user if it also hurts the party against whom it is used. And who is to give effect to retaliation? It is too much to expect an English Government to adopt effective retaliation against their own people. They will expostulate, they will remonstrate, but they ...
— Freedom's Battle - Being a Comprehensive Collection of Writings and Speeches on the Present Situation • Mahatma Gandhi
... sword, the Panther then replied, Is double-edged, and cuts on either side. Some sons of mine, who bear upon their shield Three steeples argent in a sable field, Have sharply tax'd your converts, who unfed Have follow'd you for miracles of bread; Such who themselves of no religion are, Allured with gain, for any will declare. Bare ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... several zones, but our great men are ranged in two hostile camps. The Royalists are 'Romantics,' the Liberals are 'Classics.' The divergence of taste in matters literary and divergence of political opinion coincide; and the result is a war with weapons of every sort, double-edged witticisms, subtle calumnies and nicknames a outrance, between the rising and the waning glory, and ink is shed in torrents. The odd part of it is that the Royalist-Romantics are all for liberty in literature, and for repealing laws and conventions; while ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... Then I will shout with a very loud shout: Ho! Weep, you petty-usurers, both you and your principals, and your compound interests! For you can no longer do me any harm, because such a son is being reared for me in this house, shining with a double-edged tongue, for my guardian, the preserver of my house, a mischief to my enemies, ending the sadness of the great woes of his father. Him do thou run and summon from ...
— The Clouds • Aristophanes
... Williams, a wretch who used to prowl about London by night, armed with a double-edged knife, with which he mutilated women. He was condemned July ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... one-half inches in length and three and one-half in breadth; I found besides a number of silver goblets and cups. Upon and beside the gold and silver articles I found thirteen copper lances; also fourteen copper weapons, which are frequently met with here, and seven large double-edged copper daggers. ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... reader will perhaps excuse the reminder that the sense in which we (almost exclusively) use this word, and which it had gained in French itself by the time of Talleyrand's famous double-edged sarcasm on person and world (Il n'est pas parvenu: il est arrive), was not quite original. The parvenu was simply a person who had "got on": the disobliging slur of implication on his former position, and perhaps on his means of freeing himself from it, came later. ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... in the peaceful days of Numa, Rust eats the pointed spear and double-edged sword. No more is heard the trumpet's brazen roar, Sweet sleep is banished from our eyes ...
— The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic • Arthur Gilman
... inferred from the above remarks that there are no steel swords in Tibet, for indeed many fine blades of excellent Chinese steel can be seen all over the country in the possession of the richer officials, such as the huge two-handed, double-edged swords of Chinese importation, used ...
— In the Forbidden Land • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... mock curtsey. 'It's very good of you to say so,' she answered, half-saucily. 'Only the compliment is rather double-edged, you must confess, because it implies that up to now you've had a dreadfully low opinion of my poor ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... referred to the custom of all Eastern story-tellers to stop at the exciting moment and take up a collection of the country's smallest copper coins before finishing the tale. But the reference was double-edged. A penny for my thoughts, a penny for the West's interpretation of the East was what she ...
— Guns of the Gods • Talbot Mundy
... demagogues, the conservative disgust at licence, the jealousy of rival nobles, the venality of military leaders, threw daily fresh stumbling-blocks in his heroic path. It was not six months after the advent of Farnese to power, before that bold and subtle chieftain had seized the double-edged sword of religious dissension as firmly as he had grasped his celebrated brand when he boarded the galley of Muatapha Bey, and the Netherlands were cut in twain, to be re-united nevermore. The separate treaty of the Walloon provinces was soon ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley |
