"Self-defense" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... for themselves, they were doubtless much to blame, but their miseries were infinitely more than they deserved. The punishments that fell upon them fell upon the wrong shoulders. The English, who treated them for a long time with the most patient forbearance, were compelled at length, in self-defense, to adopt an attitude of rigorous severity; and by the French, in whose cause they suffered everything, they were regarded as mere tools, to be used till destroyed. At the door of the corrupt officials of France may be ...
— The Raid From Beausejour; And How The Carter Boys Lifted The Mortgage • Charles G. D. Roberts
... Miss Tancred's society would be the only entertainment offered to him during his stay, and the most outrageous flirtation would be justifiable in the circumstances; he had seen himself driven to it in sheer desperation and self-defense; he had longed hopelessly, inexpressibly, for the return of the absconding deity; he had looked on Miss Tancred as his hope, his angel, his deliverer. That she had not been at home to receive him seemed ...
— The Return of the Prodigal • May Sinclair
... to the conclusion that writers have somewhat exaggerated the quarrelsome disposition of this bird. I have never, or very rarely, known it to molest or attack any other birds than those which its own instinct prompts it to drive away in self-defense, such as Hawks, Owls, Eagles, Crows, Jays, Cuckoos, and Grackles." That Dr. Coues is a friend of the Kingbird, his language amply proves: "The Kingbird is not quarrelsome—simply very lively. He is the very picture of dash and daring in defending ...
— Birds Illustrated by Colour Photography, Vol II. No. 4, October, 1897 • Various
... literary, but wrong, since Marat, Mirabeau, Robespierre, got their arguments directly from Rousseau, and no one I have ever heard made an appeal to Scripture as a defense for murdering thirty thousand men, women and children. Mirabeau quotes this from Rousseau in self-defense: "No true believer can be a persecutor. If I were a magistrate and the law inflicted death on an atheist, I should begin to put it into execution by burning the first man who should ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 9 - Subtitle: Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Reformers • Elbert Hubbard
... fathers, husbands, sons—well, that is the fortune of any war; but they are beginning to understand that they have lost them, not in a war of self-defense, but to gratify the insane ambitions and greed of a dynasty and a military caste that are out of date in the twentieth century. Their parents, when over sixty, have died from the same cause as the children. Their daughters, both unmarried ...
— The White Morning • Gertrude Atherton
... all departments of life as a rule of welfare. The courts of Toulouse at first, not recognizing the forces against the Albigenses, tried to protect their subjects, but "to the public law of the period [Raymond II of Toulouse] was an outlaw, without even the right of self-defense against the first-comer, for his very self-defense was rated among his crimes. In the popular faith of the age he was an accursed thing, without hope, here or hereafter. The only way of readmission into ...
— Folkways - A Study of the Sociological Importance of Usages, Manners, Customs, Mores, and Morals • William Graham Sumner
... setting this colossal stage for death, the entire peasant population had been mobilized to assist the soldiers. In self-defense Belgium was thus obliged to drive the dagger deep into her own bosom. It seemed indeed as if she suffered as much at her own hands, as at the hands of the enemy. To arrest the advancing scourge she impressed into her service dynamite, fire and flood. I saw the sluice-gates lifted and meadows ...
— In the Claws of the German Eagle • Albert Rhys Williams
... got bitterer ev'ry day. He laid his defeat when he wuz runnin' fur the Legislatur at our door. He hired bullies ter git inter a quarrel with David, at public getherin's, an' kill him in sech a way ez ter have a plea o' self-defense ter cla'r themselves on, but David tuck too good keer o' hisself ter git ketched that a-way, an' he hurt one o' the bullies so bad thet he niver quite got over hit. He an' Kunnel Pennington leveled ther weepons on each other at a barbecue ...
— The Red Acorn • John McElroy
... he would meet on the way; and I have heard Enos Mills say that when he was snow inspector of Colorado he traveled the crest of the Rockies from one end of the state to the other without a gun or any means of self-defense." ...
— Her Father's Daughter • Gene Stratton-Porter
... first place, the hall was narrow, and gave small scope for a contest on broad, generous lines—even had One-Eye and Big Tom known how to wage such a bout; and both men knew little concerning the science of self-defense. What happened—without any further abusive language—was this: the longshoreman and the cowboy (while using due caution against coming too close to the flimsy railing of the stairs) each set about throwing ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates
... his folly has no other proof than an adoration of your daughter," the colonel protested, "I must in self-defense beg leave ...
— The Rivet in Grandfather's Neck - A Comedy of Limitations • James Branch Cabell
... prove that they were received by misadventure; upon the whole, matters promised favorably for this, and were in other respects as satisfactory as could reasonably be expected. The blood of Solomon Coe was upon his own head. Richard had no need even to reproach himself with having struck in self-defense the blow that killed his enemy; and he did not reflect that he was still to blame for having, in the first instance, placed him in the mine. He had at least done his best to extricate him, and his conscience was (perhaps naturally) not very tender respecting the ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn
... another, he must not be admitted to the ranks of the clergy: and if he has succeeded in creeping in, he must be turned out. In like manner, if anyone after Baptism be guilty of homicide, whether by deed, or by command, or by counsel, or in self-defense." But this is in consequence not ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... leaves on Sunday immediately after the dinner work is done and does not return to prepare tea. If she prefers to spend her leisure time quietly at home reading or sewing, she should be encouraged to do so and not be forced to go out in self-defense to escape calls for extra work at that time. The mistress has no claim ...
— The Complete Home • Various
... fugitives, hunted like partridges upon the mountains, or like the timid fox by the eager sportsman, were obliged in self-defense to meet cunning with cunning, and to borrow from the birds and animals their mode of eluding their pursuers by any device which in the exigency of the case might present itself to them. They had a creed of their own, and a code of morals which ...
— Harriet, The Moses of Her People • Sarah H. Bradford
... a moment in speechless wonder. Then: "I'll whistle that dirrty Tomfool, until he answers me in self-defense," he announced'to the main motor, and forthwith blew a mighty blast. Almost instantly Michael J. Murphy ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... recovered with difficulty under the kind treatment of his master's sister; but was never able thereafter to raise his hands to his head. The culprit did not suffer for this offense, as the court acquitted him on the grounds of self-defense. ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 3, 1918 • Various
... necessary to summon more than half that number; among these was Lovejoy. It was, therefore, you perceive, Sir, the police of the city resisting rioters—civil government breasting itself to the shock of lawless men. Here is no question about the right of self-defense. It is, in fact, simply this: Has the civil magistrate a right to put down a riot? Some persons seem to imagine that anarchy existed at Alton from the commencement of these disputes. Not at all. "No one of us," says an eye-witness ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 7 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Orators • Elbert Hubbard
... 1898 on the eve of their war with Spain, and again in 1914 during the trouble with Mexico, must have clearly recognized the change. There was so much deeper sense of the tragedy of war, so much clearer appreciation of the gap between aggressive assault and necessary self-defense, so definite a recognition of the fact that murder remains murder, even though it be misnamed glory and committed by wholesale, and that any one who does not strive to stop it becomes a party ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor
... than 5,400 cases of ammunition destined for the destruction of brave German soldiers who are fulfilling with self-sacrifice and devotion their duty in the service of the Fatherland. The German Government believes that it acts in just self-defense when it seeks to protect the lives of its soldiers by destroying ammunition destined for the enemy with the means of war at its command. The English steamship company must have been aware of the dangers to which passengers on board the ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... this point of the conversation, suddenly turned round, and sprang upon the lieutenant, bearing him to the ground before the latter could even make a movement in self-defense. Together they rolled upon the earth, at the foot of the tree whose sheltering branches had protected them from the intense heat of the sun. Somers, as the reader already knows, was bold and belligerent before an attack; and, on the impulse ...
— The Young Lieutenant - or, The Adventures of an Army Officer • Oliver Optic
... certain boredom in these monotonously voluptuous days. His senses were becoming blunted with so many indulgences mechanically repeated. Besides, a monstrous debilitation was making him think in self-defense of the tranquil life of the hearth. He timidly began calculating the time of his seclusion. How long had he been living with her?... His confused and crowded ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... somehow had lost its menace. If the disks were space ships, at least they had shown no sign of hostility, so far as I knew. Of course, there was Mantell; but if he had been downed by some weapon on the disk, it could have been self-defense. In most cases, the saucers retreated at the first ...
— The Flying Saucers are Real • Donald Keyhoe
... some family friends, who were of my opinion, tried to influence him, he persisted that I must go to Leipzig. I was now resolved, contrary to his views and wishes, to choose a line of studies and of life for myself, by way of self-defense. The obstinacy of my father, who, without knowing it, opposed himself to my plans, strengthened me in my impiety; so that I made no scruple to listen to him by the hour, while he described and repeated to me the course of study and of ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... savagery he emerges into close contact with one of the most ambitious and progressive of peoples. Life at once becomes far more secure and wrongs are revenged by the self-interest of the whites as well as by the feeble means of self-defense in possession of the blacks. That there were cruelties and mistreatment under slavery goes without saying, but the woes and sufferings under it were as nothing compared to those of the life in the African forests. This fact is sometimes ...
— The Negro Farmer • Carl Kelsey
... to reply: "The smaller a man's brain the more enveloping his mere male arrogance. Instinct of self-defense like the turtle's shell or the porcupine's quills or the mephitic weasel's extravasations." But she never quarreled with Morty, and to have shared with him her opinion of his endowments would have been to deprive herself of a ...
— The Sisters-In-Law • Gertrude Atherton
... returned the Harvard man. "Our forefathers killed in self-defense. You folks are killing out ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow
... to rustle cattle—the man was harmless. He never had been known to draw a gun, even in self-defense, and Lawler was convinced that there was not sufficient provocation for him to break one of the rules that had governed him until now. Hamlin might be goaded, or frightened, into using the rifle, but Lawler had no intention of goading or frightening him. In fact, being aware ...
— The Trail Horde • Charles Alden Seltzer
... natural weapon of self-defense he developed a system of searching examination before which no subterfuge could stand. It was minute, persistent, comprehensive and ingenious in the last degree. It might begin to-day, reach an apparent conclusion, and be renewed after a month's silence. In the meantime, while the whole matter ...
— An Adventure With A Genius • Alleyne Ireland
... numerous literary lairs, and ransacks the pages of the Past for plunder befitting his pen and party. When he is about to write an editorial article on Protection, he invariably prepares his mind by reading several chapters on the "Manly Art of Self-Defense," which accounts for the wisdom and brilliancy displayed by him on the subject of tariffs. In order to approach a discussion of the subject of vegetarianism without prejudice, H.G. repairs to the wheezy WINDUST'S, where, for hours at a time, he literally "crams" ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 1, Saturday, April 2, 1870 • Various
... long talk with her father and much preparation he and Stone rode off, two of the men from the bunk-house with them. Her father plainly let Kate see that he himself had no intention of entertaining her. He was outside most of the time and Kelly, the cook, being the only man to talk to, Kate in self-defense ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman
... the governor to assure him that in taking up arms he was acting only in self-defense and for the country's safety. But now he sent another letter reiterating that he had no evil intentions to him or the government. "I am now going out to seek a more agreeable destiny than you are pleased to design me," he added. As ...
— Bacon's Rebellion, 1676 • Thomas Jefferson Wertenbaker
... and here is a carbon of the letter I sent her, not with any encouragement to come to New York at all," and in self-defense he handed out to Mr. Vandeford a copy of the letter Roger had delivered to Patricia among her roses and young onions ...
— Blue-grass and Broadway • Maria Thompson Daviess
... France had entered into alliance with Russia, and was waiting her chance to grab at Alsace-Lorraine. Italy was ready for betrayal. England hated the power of Germany and was in secret alliance with France and Russia. Germany had struck to save herself. "It was a war of self-defense, ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs
... reddish brown, closely resembling the color of the Malays and Dyaks who live in the Bornean forests. Though very large and powerful, it is a harmless creature, feeding on fruit, and never attacking any other animal except in self-defense. A full-grown male orang-outang is rather more than four feet high, but with a body as large as that of a stout man, and with enormously long and ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 344, August 5, 1882 • Various
... say it was a very common fault," replied Errington. "It is a means of self-defense against the impertinent curiosity of outsiders. But Lorimer is free from it,—he has nothing to hide. At any rate, he has no secrets from me,—I'm sure of that!" And he clapped his hand ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... furious with anger at this baiting. Without abandoning a jot her suspicions she realized she was powerless to prove her case at this time. With a few bitter and cutting remarks—made, she afterward said, in "self-defense"—she retreated as gracefully as possible ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in Society • Edith Van Dyne
... in self-defense or in order to prevent the enemy's patrols from gaining valuable information, or when necessary in order to accomplish their mission. In such cases, a patrol should fight resolutely ...
— Infantry Drill Regulations, United States Army, 1911 - Corrected to April 15, 1917 (Changes Nos. 1 to 19) • United States War Department
... For Lad was anything but a fool. And, like other wise collies, he had sense enough to realize that a swimming dog is one of the most helpless creatures in the universe; when it comes to self-defense. ...
— Further Adventures of Lad • Albert Payson Terhune
... martyr. Nevertheless, one cannot but feel that through his earlier weakness and indecision he brought untold misery upon his own kingdom and upon Europe at large. The French people had not dreamed of a republic until his absolute incompetence forced them, in self-defense, to abolish the monarchy in the hope of securing a ...
— An Introduction to the History of Western Europe • James Harvey Robinson
... the life of your assailant, you will pass into the custody of the criminal Law ... under an indictment for murder; but the verdict of the community, and the verdict of almost any jury will be, justifiable homicide in self-defense.... Or should a different verdict be found, and you be condemned to die as a murderer, your ignominious death shall be luminous with the halo of a martyr, and your sacrifice shall be for the deliverance ...
— The Religious Duty of Obedience to Law • Ichabod S. Spencer
... Another example—he watched faces like a woman, and yet he could look you in the face like a man, especially when he was lying. In the present conjuncture a crafty woman would have bristled with all the arts of self-defense, but stayed at home and kept close to Zoe. Not so our master of arts; he went manfully to meet Rhoda Gale, and so secure a te'te-'a-te'te, and learn, if possible, what she meant to do, and whether she could be cannily propitiated. He reached the station before her, and wired a very ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... that, knowing who he was, Terry would try to bluff him out of the road, counting confidently upon his leaping to safety at the last moment; there was the other possibility that she mistook his motives and would run him down in a sort of panic of self-defense. ...
— Man to Man • Jackson Gregory
... and robbed in business hours; and by night, men were murdered in the streets; and thefts escaped punishment. Then it was that men, caught in the commission of crime, were hanged in the open streets, and combinations were formed for self-defense. But when a new Legislature gave efficiency to the laws, the community yielded a willing obedience to the magistrate. From an early day there had been "miners' courts," which, with their alcaldes, had conciliated differences. But when magistrates were elected, these courts disappeared. ...
— Mexico and its Religion • Robert A. Wilson
... when I found I was burning my electric lamp by daylight. Listen: A pearl is nothing more or less than nacre, a fluid secretion of a certain variety of oyster—not the eatable kind. A grain of sand gets between the folds of the oyster and its shell and irritates the beast. In self-defense the oyster covers the sand with a fluid which hardens ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces Out West • Edith Van Dyne
... fight his way by physical force to the front ranks. Bruised, disfigured, or killed, he is forced back even beyond the lines again. A religiously inclined youth asked his pastor, "Do you think it would be wrong for me to learn the noble art of self-defense?" "Certainly not," replied the pastor, "I learned it in youth myself, and I have found it of great value in my life." "Indeed, sir, did you learn the Old English system or the Sullivan system" "Neither; I learned Solomon's system!" replied the minister. ...
— The Upward Path - A Reader For Colored Children • Various
... principal a liar! And then most folks are so darn crooked themselves that they expect a fellow to do a little lying, so if I was fool enough to never whoop the ante I'd get the credit for lying anyway! In self-defense I got to toot my own horn, like a lawyer defending a client—his bounden duty, ain't it, to bring out the poor dub's good points? Why, the Judge himself would bawl out a lawyer that didn't, even if they both knew the guy was guilty! But even so, ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... organism is loaded to the danger point with morbid matter, it may arouse itself in self-defense to an acute eliminative effort in the shape of cold, catarrh, fever, inflammation, skin eruption, etc. In these instances, the disease conditions bring about the crisis and the organism is on the defensive. These are ...
— Nature Cure • Henry Lindlahr
... impetus which has carried European nations so far along the road toward an organized attack on syphilis and gonorrhea, as has been said, is undoubtedly due to the realization that war in the past has been the ally of these diseases, and that a campaign against them is as essential to national self-defense as the organization of a vast army. Conflicting reports are coming from various sources as to the prevalence of syphilis and gonorrhea among European troops, although hopeful indications seem to be that troops in the field may ...
— The Third Great Plague - A Discussion of Syphilis for Everyday People • John H. Stokes
... word to the sheriff that he would be coming in to give himself up. It would not have been etiquette for the sheriff to come for him. He came in, well guarded on the way by certain of his clan, pleaded self-defense before a friendly county judge and was locked up in a one-cell log jail. His own cousin was the jailer and ministered to him kindly. He avoided passing the single barred window of the jail in the daytime or at night when there was a light behind him, and he expected to "come clear" shortly, ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... 2: Such like precepts, as Augustine observes (De Serm. Dom. in Monte i, 19), should always be borne in readiness of mind, so that we be ready to obey them, and, if necessary, to refrain from resistance or self-defense. Nevertheless it is necessary sometimes for a man to act otherwise for the common good, or for the good of those with whom he is fighting. Hence Augustine says (Ep. ad Marcellin. cxxxviii): "Those whom we have to punish with a kindly severity, it is necessary to handle in many ways against their ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... high responsibilities of his office and save the life of the nation at all hazards. The so-called reconstruction acts, though as plainly unconstitutional as any that can be imagined, were not believed to be within the class last mentioned. The people were not wholly disarmed of the power of self-defense. In all the Northern States they still held in their hands the sacred right of the ballot, and it was safe to believe that in due time they would come to the rescue of their own institutions. It gives me pleasure to add that the appeal to our common constituents ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Volume 6: Andrew Johnson • James D. Richardson
... "no non-commissioned officer has any right to strike you, unless it be strictly in self-defense, or in defense of an officer who is threatened by you. You have the same remedy of complaint, if any non-commissioned officer strikes you, or lays violent hands on you, as in the case of vile or profane language. ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys in the Ranks - or, Two Recruits in the United States Army • H. Irving Hancock
... fourth plague was as miraculous as the plague itself. The very animals that had been slain by the Egyptians in self-defense returned to life and departed from the land with the rest. This was ordained to prevent the wicked oppressors from profiting by the punishment even so much as the value of the hides and the flesh of the ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg
... in every state may understand how far the national government will protect them in the enjoyment of their rights, or, if it is helpless or listless, that, no longer relying upon the barren declarations of the constitution, each man for himself may appeal to the right of self-defense, or to the boasted American right of ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... engaged in these specialties, and I owe myself to blame for not asking more about the local industries; but it is not too late for the reader, whom I could do no greater favor than sending him there, to repair my deficiency. In self-defense I urge my knowledge of a military school in the Alcazar, where and in the street leading up to it we saw some companies of the comely and kindly-looking cadets. I know also that there are public night schools ...
— Familiar Spanish Travels • W. D. Howells
... nausea assailed him and he laid tender hands upon his abdomen. "'Laughing Bill' Hyde! That's why he went down so easy! Why, he killed a feller I knew—ribboned him up from underneath, just that way—and the jury called it self-defense." A shudder racked ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... to stop your friends from going fishing," Warren informed her. "That's the whole trouble with reform—no one is willing to improve himself and let his neighbor alone; for all you know, Sarah, you drive Jack Welles fishing in self-defense. Perhaps, if you let him alone, he wouldn't ...
— Rainbow Hill • Josephine Lawrence
... impossible attitudes; Phosphurous winning the Derby; the Death of Grimaldi (the famous steeple-chase horse, not poor old Joe); an American Trotting Match, and Jem Belcher and Deaf Burke in attitudes of self-defense. Several tandem and riding whips, mounted in heavy silver, and a double-barrelled gun, and fishing rods, occupied one corner, and a polished copper cask, holding about five gallons of mild ale, stood in another. In short, ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... into his mind—this sobbing might be part of a prearranged plan. Tears are the jiu-jitsu of woman's art of self-defense. To the world at large the man is always a villain who has caused them. "But I didn't cause them," he protested to himself. And then, "Dash it all! There's nothing gained by sitting here. ...
— The Kingdom Round the Corner - A Novel • Coningsby Dawson
... it proceeds from a contempt of life. And therefore Homer always takes care to bring his bravest and most daring heroes well armed into battle; and the Greek lawgivers punished those that threw away their shields, but not him that lost his sword or spear; intimating that self-defense is more a man's business than offense. This is especially true of a governor of a city, or a general; for if, as Iphicrates divides it out, the light-armed are the hands; the horse the feet; the infantry the breast; and ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... he held resisted his baby strength. He pulled and he grunted, he kicked Bud in the chest and grabbed again. Bud was patient, and let him fuss—though in self-defense he kept his head down and his eyes away from ...
— Cabin Fever • B. M. Bower
... ours, my dear Sophie," he said with meaning, "one uses all weapons, even the most primitive, in sheer self-defense." ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... Lamborn wanted Zoe and I had her in my house and kept him from seeing her, was it for a good or a selfish reason? Were we not rivals for the same favor? Did one have her and one lose her? Had I killed Lamborn for jealousy, or in self-defense? The single fact that I had shot him stood against the background of all this gossip and village understanding, and was necessarily read into it for ...
— Children of the Market Place • Edgar Lee Masters
... Thank God his child was born dead. But he lies in my heart, Lilly like a saint washed clean. He sinned for love, and because stronger forces than he wanted him for a tool. May every man on his jury live to carry that truth to his grave. He killed in self-defense and he sinned for love. I'll exonerate him in a play, yet! I will! I'll tell ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst
... better go in now; this night air is bad for you." The moon blazed scornfully down on Norman Mann as he said this. She had had a wide experience, and had rarely seen such a stupid, cowardly fellow, so she thought. Yet, after all, Norman only acted in self-defense. Here was a girl by his side who gloried, as it seemed to him, in her freedom, and that being so, he must get away as soon as possible from that window, that moon, and ...
— Mae Madden • Mary Murdoch Mason
... myself. I cannot admit that we should carry out our respect for the weaker sex so far as to lend ourselves to every caprice and every enterprise it may please a woman to direct against our peace or our dignity; but our right of legitimate self-defense in such encounters is circumscribed within narrow and delicate limits, which I feared I had over-stepped. It was enough that Madame de Palme should be alone in the world, and without any other protection than her sex, to ...
— Led Astray and The Sphinx - Two Novellas In One Volume • Octave Feuillet
... apply!" said Thal, shocked. "A man who has been disgraced has no rights! Any man may plunder him, any man may kill him at will. But if he resists plundering or kills anybody else in self-defense, ...
— The Pirates of Ersatz • Murray Leinster
... ground near the line of observation which might afford cover for troops, or for scouts or spies, and the approach to which can not be observed by sentinels, is searched frequently by patrols. Definite information concerning the enemy is reported at once. Patrols fire only in self-defense or to give the alarm. Supports on the flank of an outpost position patrol the country on the exposed flank. Visiting patrols and reliefs should not march in the open, and thereby expose the ...
— Manual for Noncommissioned Officers and Privates of Infantry • War Department
... afterward, when you were captured, refused to drag me in, because I happen to be a girl! But it's not worth mentioning that you did all this for strangers, and that later you did not tell even me, because you knew it would trouble me that I had killed him, though in self-defense. And to think that all the time I've been full of hateful suspicions about you! Oh, you don't ...
— A Texas Ranger • William MacLeod Raine
... to get around it, that they read between the lines; and if they should meet now to form a creed, they might fail to agree; and the creed is now so that they can say as they please, except in public. Whenever they do so in public, the church, in self-defense, must try them; and I believe in trying every minister that doesn't preach the doctrine as he agrees to. I have not the slightest sympathy with a Presbyterian preacher who endeavors to preach infidelity from his pulpit ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll - Latest • Robert Green Ingersoll
... shot," the perplexed and alarmed detective expostulated. He fairly stuttered in the earnestness of his self-defense. "I tell you, Chief, there hasn't ...
— Within the Law - From the Play of Bayard Veiller • Marvin Dana
... that's so," said Puss confidentially to Elsie. "I reckon we'll have to take our share now, or not at all. We've got to eat in self-defense." ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. V, August, 1878, No 10. - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... out to an open place without the castle wall to be beheaded. The executioners brought a log and an axe, and the victims were slaughtered one after another, without any ceremony, and without being allowed to say a word in self-defense. ...
— Richard III - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... battery. He said I had abused his person, and that he was sore and scarcely able to walk. The Justice told the Colonel that it seemed to him that he was the one who made the assault; for he snapped a loaded gun at me and attempted to take my life, while what I had done was in self-defense. He told Col. Tucker he would talk with him again. He then beckoned me to follow him, and I did so. We went into a room by ourselves, when ...
— The Mormon Menace - The Confessions of John Doyle Lee, Danite • John Doyle Lee
... have anything to say about it, did I? I did not ask to be born a minister's son. It was foreordained, and now I've got to live up to it in self-defense. There may be forgiveness for other erring ones, but I tell you our ...
— Sunny Slopes • Ethel Hueston
... black bear, who is looking so lively and seemingly inviting the young folks to have a romp, which they will be only too willing to join in. The black bear is of a timid disposition, and seldom attacks man except in self-defense. The female bear is a most affectionate mother, and many stories are related showing her care and love for her young, and her sorrow and mournful cries when any evil befalls them. On one occasion a black bear with her two cubs was ...
— Chatterbox Stories of Natural History • Anonymous
... also kept anxious and uneasy silence while the lictors bound Zminis's hands, and, in spite of his attempts to raise his voice once more in self-defense, dragged him away and thrust him out across the threshold of the dining-hall. The door closed behind him, and no applause followed, though every one approved of the Egyptian's condemnation, for Caracalla ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... is to place Mr. Denman under parole once more, to give him and the lady the run of the deck abaft the galley hatch, and to leave them both the possession of their guns for self-defense, in case"—he looked humorously around at the others—"these inebriates get ...
— The Wreck of the Titan - or, Futility • Morgan Robertson
... bucolic-this little surprise party of welcome!" But Howard with his native ear and eye had no such pleasing illusion. He knew too well these suggestions of despair and bitterness. He knew that, like the smile of the slave, this cheerfulness was self-defense; deep down ...
— Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... Indian is in a manner civilized, peaceable and industrious. He is brave in self-defense, but never seeks war nor bloodshed. Quite different is his near neighbor, the bloodthirsty Apache, who seems to delight only in robbing and killing people. Cunning and revenge are pronounced traits of his character and the Government has found him difficult to conquer or control. The Mexican ...
— Arizona Sketches • Joseph A. Munk
... not because they planned to, but because the synagogue was not large enough to hold them, had to leave the synagogue. They began building creeds; they had to. Every one of the first Christian creeds was written in sheer self-defense. If we had been Christians in those first centuries, when a powerful movement was under way called Gnosticism, which denied that God, the Father Almighty, had made both the heaven and the earth, which said that God had made heaven indeed but that a demigod had made the world, and ...
— Christianity and Progress • Harry Emerson Fosdick
... and has received evidence too complete that they are only to be preserved by her own vigilance ever to permit herself to be seduced by a love of ease or by other considerations into that deadly disregard of the means of self-defense which could only result from a carelessness as criminal as it would be fatal concerning the future destinies of our growing Republic. The result of the mission to France is indeed, sir, uncertain. It depends not on America alone. The most pacific temper will not always insure peace. We should therefore ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 4) of Volume 1: John Adams • Edited by James D. Richardson
... as attractive, vivacious, and clever as you are, would have to marry—in self-defense, if for no other reason. Marriage need not interfere. It might help. With that hazard and gamble out of the way, it would allow you to expand your talents in planning, executing, and managing in any line ...
— David Lannarck, Midget - An Adventure Story • George S. Harney
... did it," he said, reassuringly; "or if you did, it has been justifiable, and I know it. If it was necessary to do it in any self-defense, don't be afraid to tell it all plainly. No one would blame you. It is only this mystery that makes them want to hear ...
— That Girl Montana • Marah Ellis Ryan
... shooting over our heads purposely. If they deliberately attempt to pot us later, then go for them, but to do it now would only draw their fire upon us. I doubt if they wish to harm your highness, but they certainly would fire to hit in self-defense." ...
— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... difficult to do anything," said Val sadly. "She does not understand the state of the case properly, though I've tried to make it plain to her. The fellow is an avowed Free Mason. He can not practise his religion, and in a kind of self-defense he rails against it—though not openly to Catholics, I believe. She is deluded enough to imagine that the influence of herself and the children will win him over to the right path again. But it's far more likely that he will win the children over to unbelief, ...
— Up in Ardmuirland • Michael Barrett
... most sacred and most dear—home, the esteem and love of friends, the protection of truth, and, above all, and worst of all, her own self-respect. All these in exchange for a baffled, angry, selfish man, at whose mercy she would be, with only one word to speak in self-defense and justification; and it was much to be feared that he would, considering the circumstances, reject and scoff at even that. The one word was—she loved him! and, if there be any redeeming virtue in it, let her, in Heaven's name, have ...
— Bressant • Julian Hawthorne
... he could not bear to think that way about his little daughter, about his Fanutza. He also feared that she could feel his thoughts. He was ashamed of what passed through his mind. Rapidly enough in self-defense he turned against her the sharp edge of the argument. Why had she given him ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... after Carey went to the Flats he was lonelier than he had ever imagined it possible to be, even in the Great Lone Land. If it had not been for teaching Paul Dumont the telegraphic code, Carey believed he would have been driven to suicide in self-defense. ...
— Further Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... better until late that night, when suddenly he realized that life was real and life was earnest, because a panting man was trying to strangle Joe with his bare hands. Joe was hampered in his self-defense because a large number of battling figures trampled over him and his antagonist together. They were underneath the Platform, and Joe expected to be blown to ...
— Space Platform • Murray Leinster
... uncle, was not a little vexed that he had managed matters so as to get her talked of with Mr. Talboys. Her natural modesty and reserve prevented her from remonstrating; nor was there any positive necessity. She was one of those young ladies who seem born mistresses of the art of self-defense. Deriving the art not from experience, but from instinct, they are as adroit at seventeen as they are at twenty-seven; so a last year's bird constructs her first nest as cunningly as can ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... train inhale deeply several times. This will be your last chance of getting any fresh air until you reach your destination. For self-defense against the germ life prevailing in the atmosphere of the unventilated compartments, smoke a German cigar. A German cigar keeps off any disease except the cholera; ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... not say this boastfully, but with a quiet confidence in his own powers in which he was justified. Though by no means quarrelsome, he had on several occasions been forced in self-defense into a contest with boys of his own size, and in some instances larger, and in every case he had acquitted himself manfully, and ...
— Phil the Fiddler • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... delusion and an instrument of death, for the eyes of man are blind to incipient or crescent dangers; content, self-secure, lost in a vain dream of manifest destiny they are deaf to warnings, incapable even of the primary gestures of self-defense. Such was one of the results of nineteenth-century evolutionism, and the generation that saw the last years of the nineteenth century and the first part of the new, basking in its day dreams of self-complacency, made no move to avert the dangers that threatened it then and now ...
— Towards the Great Peace • Ralph Adams Cram
... The instinct of self-defense and gravity of his position precluded sympathetic feeling for friends innocently involved in results of the tragedy. Such sentiments will come when present stress ...
— Oswald Langdon - or, Pierre and Paul Lanier. A Romance of 1894-1898 • Carson Jay Lee
... went on lightly, "to deny anything, however small, to a young lady who has always had her own way. But in self-defense I must ...
— The Conflict • David Graham Phillips
... in these days, but for ten years or more after the close of the War of 1812 the West Indies were infested by them. Our Government saw that in self-defense they must be wiped out, for they grew bolder with every month and made it unsafe for our commerce ...
— Dewey and Other Naval Commanders • Edward S. Ellis
... by the dissensions between the two great Departments of the Government. The bitterness engendered resembled that which always distinguishes a family quarrel. The measure was resorted to as one of self-defense against the alleged aggressions and the unrestrained power of the Executive Department. But the history of its operation, and of its subsequent modification, which practically amounted to its repeal, is one to which the Republican party cannot recur with any sense of pride ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... soil of secrecy, repression, and unveracity sprang noxious weeds. False reports and mendacious insinuations were launched, spread, and credited, impairing such prestige as the Conference still enjoyed, while the fragmentary announcements ventured on now and again by the delegates, in sheer self-defense, were summarily dismissed as "eye-wash" ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... daring to breathe lest that act somehow defeat his intent, and more than ever unable to remove his eyes from the rifle, which might perhaps now hasten to improve its waning opportunity. Something at least had been gained: in the occupation of his mind in this attempt at self-defense he was less sensible of the pain in his head and had ceased to wince. But he was still dreadfully frightened and his teeth rattled ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce
... killed for revenge, or in self-defense, he did that also without hysteria, for it was a very businesslike proceeding which admitted ...
— Tarzan of the Apes • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... a northern girl, trained to self-defense. As he freed her, her strong, slender arm swung out and up—with really startling force. Her half-closed hand struck with a sharp, drawing motion across his lips, a blow that extinguished his laughter as the ...
— The Sky Line of Spruce • Edison Marshall
... Spaniards and the Portuguese have since become empires. Civil war and oppression now lay waste those extensive regions. Population does not increase, and the thinly scattered inhabitants are too much absorbed in the cares of self-defense even to attempt any amelioration of their condition. Such, however, will not always be the case. Europe has succeeded by her own efforts in piercing the gloom of the Middle Ages; South America has the same Christian laws and Christian manners as we have; she contains all ...
— Democracy In America, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alexis de Tocqueville
... beat rapidly. He felt that he was taking upon himself a fearful responsibility in shooting this man, as he would probably be obliged to do in self-defense. But one thing he resolved upon. He would not take his life. He would only use such a degree of violence as should be absolutely necessary. He would even give him a chance by firing the first barrel in the air, in hope of frightening the robber. If that failed, he must wound him. There ...
— Try and Trust • Horatio Alger
... as I said, of a righteous war is the self-defense of the prince or of his subjects. This ground also is matter of both natural and divine right; for even as self-defense is a natural right, on which right is founded the rule of vim vi repellere, so too in the ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume VIII (of 55), 1591-1593 • Emma Helen Blair
... plight alone would have been enough to bring us into the conflict. We fight also for France, because she is wrongfully attacked, and because she is by her civilization and culture one of the world's treasures. We fight for the all-sufficient reason of self-defense. ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various
... "No, but then I have merely done as you wished, have I not, sir? I have focused on myself the enmity of a dangerous man, and now you hope I shall be forced, in self-defense, to remove him from ...
— Voodoo Planet • Andrew North
... the tribal frontiers were usually palisaded, but those more remote from invasion were unprotected. All these Indians were brave but not warlike in the violent fashion of the Five Nations. The Choctaws would fight only in self-defense, it was said, but the Creeks and especially the Chickasaws were more aggressive. In their government these Muskhogean tribes appear to have attained a position corresponding to their somewhat advanced culture in other respects. Yet their confederacies were loose ...
— The Red Man's Continent - A Chronicle of Aboriginal America, Volume 1 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Ellsworth Huntington
... I will, 'Nita!" McCauley backed against a shelf case in mock self-defense. "Every time you 've got anything you want to get rid of, you come in here and shove it off on me. I 'll be gosh gim-swiggled if I will. There 's only four in my family and four 's all I 'm going to take. Fork 'em over—I 've got a prescription to fill." He tossed four silver dollars on the showcase ...
— The Cross-Cut • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... what circumstances may human life be lawfully taken? A. Human life may be lawfully taken (1) In self-defense, when we are unjustly attacked and have no other means of saving our own lives; (2) in a just war, when the safety or rights of the nation require it; (3) by the lawful execution of a criminal, fairly tried and found ...
— Baltimore Catechism No. 3 (of 4) • Anonymous
... that way. Suppose we call it the endeavor on your part to conceal something you don't want known—the instinct of self-defense. Morally, doubtless, it is the same thing. But I am not concerned just now with the moral nature of the thing itself. I am much concerned, however, for Mildred's sake, with the nature of the ...
— The Fate of Felix Brand • Florence Finch Kelly
... in a lecture on "Means of Self-Defense among Plants," delivered lately at the London Institution, said that one of the most curious forms of defense known is afforded by a recently discovered class of plants, which, being stingless themselves, are protected by stinging ...
— Scientific American, Volume 40, No. 13, March 29, 1879 • Various |
