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Brief   Listen
adjective
Brief  adj.  
1.
Short in duration. "How brief the life of man."
2.
Concise; terse; succinct. "The brief style is that which expresseth much in little."
3.
Rife; common; prevalent. (Prov. Eng.)
In brief. See under Brief, n.
Synonyms: Short; concise; succinct; summary; compendious; condensed; terse; curt; transitory; short-lived.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Brief" Quotes from Famous Books



... loved and true For a time was unconcealed; They saw the bullet had pierced him through That his pain was brief—ah! very few Die ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various

... of the firm, Mr. Quirk," said Gammon, with an air of disgust. "But I really must get on with the brief I'm drawing; so, Mr. Quirk, we can talk about ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren

... vain! Nor wilt thou so believe thine own blind wooing, Nor slake thy heart's thirst even with the cup Which at the last she brims for thee, undoing Her girdle of carved gold, and yielding up, Love's uttermost: brief the poor gain ...
— Indian Poetry • Edwin Arnold

... With these brief indications sufficient to satisfy the craving of our imagination for particulars of time and place, let us turn to her own account of the circumstances of her visions, as well as of their nature. She tells us that in her life previous to 1373, she had, at some time ...
— The Faith of the Millions (2nd series) • George Tyrrell

... into my cabinet, but be brief," said Frederick, stepping into the adjoining room. "Now speak," said he, as he ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach

... executed at the same time with her tongue. Also, how, having once tasted ink, she became thirsty in that regard, as tame tigers are said to be after tasting another sort of fluid, and wanted to sign everything, and put her name in all kinds of places. In brief, the Doctor was discharged of his trust and all its responsibilities; and Alfred, taking it on himself, was fairly started on ...
— The Battle of Life • Charles Dickens

... love a joke, particularly when it floors and flabbergasts some person he dislikes, but the only way he can himself take part in the priming and pointing of a new one is by acting as its target. In brief, his personal contact with humor tends to fill him with an accumulated sense of disadvantage, of pricked complacency, of sudden and crushing defeat; and so, by an easy psychological process, he is led into the idea that the thing itself is incompatible with true ...
— Damn! - A Book of Calumny • Henry Louis Mencken

... marble bust! Whether in our own case, or that of other men, it bids us sadly measure the little, little time during which our lineaments are likely to be of interest to any human being. It is especially singular that Americans should care about perpetuating themselves in this mode. The brief duration of our families, as a hereditary household, renders it next to a certainty that the great-grandchildren will not know their father's grandfather, and that half a century hence at furthest, the hammer of the auctioneer will thump its knock-down blow against his blockhead, ...
— The Marble Faun, Volume I. - The Romance of Monte Beni • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... took Felicity almost three-quarters of an hour to bring her round. In one brief interval of calm she managed to slip to the telephone and call a taxi. The rest of the time she spent on her knees beside the girl in the chair crooning softly. And she never knew that most of the words she set to her soothing, extemporaneous tune would have contaminated ...
— Winner Take All • Larry Evans

... was still fresh from his hand, when an infinity of copies were made of it, so anxious were all people to see anything that came from the hand of so holy a person. In this simple and brief exhortation they admired the candor of his soul and the extent of his charity, and, in reading it, they were moved by a power which penetrated the soul; for the words of the saints have a secret unction which ...
— The Life and Legends of Saint Francis of Assisi • Father Candide Chalippe

... PROSTATE, ETC.—Little can be said in this brief paragraph concerning the many operations that are now performed upon the different organs. What applies to one applies, in general, to all. Operations are now performed, and successfully, for pus in the kidney, floating kidney, etc. Ulcers ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter

... continuous fever, from voiding a hundred and twenty ounces of urine. As a boy he was a sleep-walker, and he never became warm below the knees till he had been in bed six hours, a circumstance which led his mother to predict that his time on earth would be brief. ...
— Jerome Cardan - A Biographical Study • William George Waters

... eminent in life and literature during the nineteenth century, from the days of Mary Wollstonecraft onwards. The Brontes, almost, yet not quite, strangled by the fetters placed upon them by their stern and narrow-minded father, and enabled to attain the full stature of their genius only by that brief sojourn in Brussels, are representative. Elizabeth Barrett, chained to a couch of invalidism under the eyes of an imperiously affectionate father until with Robert Browning's aid she secretly eloped ...
— Little Essays of Love and Virtue • Havelock Ellis

... capital book in the language, a book of fables by an old missionary of the unpromising name of Pratt, which is simply the best and the most literary version of the fables known to me. I suppose I should except La Fontaine, but L. F. takes a long time; these are brief as the books of our childhood, and full of wit and literary colour; and O, Colvin, what a tongue it would be to write, if one only knew it - and there were only readers. Its curse in common use is an ...
— Vailima Letters • Robert Louis Stevenson

... uncommon and unfamiliar. The specialist profits by the fact that his experience becomes enormous and his work advantaged by its definite limitations. On the other hand, and nowadays especially, he is too apt to be one who, after brief hospital work of general character, or without this, takes up, as we say, the eye, ear, throat, or uterine organs. Unless he has had at some time a larger and more varied experience, or unless he is a most unusual man, he is prone at last to ...
— Doctor and Patient • S. Weir Mitchell

... a plague on't, My conscience fools my wit! Well, I'll be brief, And so be thou, lest they should be before us: Go home, prepare him, tell him with what zeal And willingness I do it; swear it was On the first hearing, as thou mayst do, truly, ...
— Volpone; Or, The Fox • Ben Jonson

... a voyage of adventure with a fleet of three ships, and after three years and nine months returned to England, his fleet reduced to one vessel, but with L500,000 of Spanish treasure on board. Anson's "Voyage Round the World" contains a highly interesting account of this, "written in brief, perspicuous terms," witnesses Carlyle, "a real poem in its kind, or romance all fact; one of the pleasantest little books in the world's library ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... The rule is, in a few cases, to work in opposition to the action of the child, but in other cases work constructively; I mean provide the child with material to construct his own personality and then let him do this work of construction. This is, in brief, the art of education. The worst of all educational methods are threats. The only effective admonitions are short and infrequent ones. The greatest skill in the educator is to be silent for the moment and then so reprove the fault, indirectly, that the child is brought to correct ...
— The Education of the Child • Ellen Key

... before. When the child went to meet them, the woman quickened her pace a little, and took her hand; but no signs of emotion were perceptible. As they approached the cabin, Moppet appeared to be answering their brief questions without any signs of fear. "Poor little thing!" said Mrs. Wharton. "I am glad they are not angry with her. I was ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 65, March, 1863 • Various

... friends in an irregular circle, and brought them back to within a brief distance of the starting point. This was the camp fire from which they fled in such panic before the approach of the ...
— The Daughter of the Chieftain - The Story of an Indian Girl • Edward S. Ellis

... immediately preceded M. Zola's departure from France I shall here be brief; these incidents are only known to me by statements I have had from M. and Mme. Zola themselves. But the rest is well within my personal knowledge, as one of the first things which M. Zola did on arriving in England was to communicate with me and in certain respects ...
— With Zola in England • Ernest Alfred Vizetelly

... registration, the trial section, the parliamentary survey, the lithographed plans, the books of reference, the local deposits and notices, the application to Parliament, the passing Standing-Orders Committee, the first, second, and third readings: each of which brief heads indicates a multiplicity of transactions, and the development of sundry occupations—as those of engineers, surveyors, lithographers, parliamentary agents, share-brokers; and the creation of sundry others—as those ...
— Essays on Education and Kindred Subjects - Everyman's Library • Herbert Spencer

... afraid I lack the industry necessary for keeping a diary. It is now two months since I wrote the last entry. If I had made every night a brief note of the events of the day, I should now have a better view of my position. Has Mlle. de Porhoet betrayed my secret? There has certainly been a curious change in my relations with the Laroques. I fancy it began on the day when Marguerite ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IV. • Editors: Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton

... westward, so as to accommodate a larger audience than the Collegium proper. This removal the Restoration Committee of 1891 acquiesced in and accepted, but the change is one for which they are not responsible."[238] It will be interesting to give here a brief resume of what has been stated by the Principal regarding shields and symbolism in the restored chapel. (1) As to the treatment of the floor: no shield has been admitted into the floor but such as represent persons in close relation to the King's College, of a date antecedent to the Scottish ...
— Scottish Cathedrals and Abbeys • Dugald Butler and Herbert Story

... and with trembling lips and paling cheeks, in a few brief sentences she gave him the details. Then she said to Peter Morrison in a low voice: "And that is the why of Marian Thorne's white head. ...
— Her Father's Daughter • Gene Stratton-Porter

... justice; and his banishment to the colony where he had arrived about six months before, was the result; that he had not been more than a month in the country when he and several other convicts ran away from the master to whom they had been assigned, and took to the bush. Such was the brief but dismal history of ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, XXII • various

... directions, answering inquiries, or granting permission to the men to return home with their relations. Ralph Penrose was near, his countenance, as Eustace could plainly perceive, expressing little satisfaction at finding another authority in the court of Lynwood Keep; the references to himself short, brief, and rapid, and only made when ignorance of the locality compelled the stranger to apply for information. The French accent and occasional French phrases with which the Squire spoke, made him contract his brow more and more, and at last, just as Eustace ...
— The Lances of Lynwood • Charlotte M. Yonge

... one by one along the plank gangway and up the brown crumbling bank. Mr. Stephens led them, a thin, dry, serious figure, in an English straw hat. His red "Baedeker" gleamed under his arm, and in one hand he held a little paper of notes, as if it were a brief. He took Miss Sadie by one arm and her aunt by the other as they toiled up the bank, and the young girl's laughter rang frank and clear in the morning air as "Baedeker" came fluttering down at their feet. Mr. Belmont and Colonel Cochrane followed, the brims ...
— The Tragedy of The Korosko • Arthur Conan Doyle

... folk amongst the spectators were already cudgelling their brains for an explanation of his presence. But Brent, after a glance at Carstairs, transferred his attention to Carstairs's principal, at whom he had already looked once or twice during Mrs. Saumarez's brief occupancy of the witness-box. Wellesley, sitting in a corner seat a little to the rear of the solicitor's table, had manifested some signs of surprise and annoyance while Mrs. Saumarez was being questioned; now he showed blank wonder at hearing his ...
— In the Mayor's Parlour • J. S. (Joseph Smith) Fletcher

... and that she had only about six weeks' supply of food ahead of her at any one time. If Germany could cut the lines of communication and so prevent essential supplies from reaching British ports, the population of Great Britain could be starved into surrender in a very brief time, France would be overwhelmed, and the triumph of the Prussian cause would be complete. That the success of the German submarine campaign would accomplish this result was a fact that the popular mind readily grasped. What it did not so clearly see, however, was that ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume II • Burton J. Hendrick

... and talked of other things in short sentences, and parted with Mrs. Sturk with a grim brief kindness at the door, and so walked with his wiry step away towards the Brass Castle, where his breakfast awaited him, and he disappeared round the ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... etiquette. A good girl expects to be treated rather as a helper than as a hireling,—to be kindly considered, and trusted, and liked. In an old-fashioned household the maid is indeed so treated; and the relation is not a brief one—from three to five years being the term of service usually agreed upon. But when a girl is [408] taken into service at the age of eleven or twelve, she will probably remain for eight or ten years. Besides wages, she is entitled to receive from her employers the gift of a dress, twice ...
— Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation • Lafcadio Hearn

... and turnings, during which the king heard the sound of running water over his head, ended at last in a long corridor closed by an iron door. The figure with the lamp opened the door with one of the keys he wore suspended at his girdle, where, during the whole of the brief journey, the king had heard them rattle. As soon as the door was opened and admitted the air, Louis recognized the balmy odors that trees exhale in hot summer nights. He paused, hesitatingly, for a moment or two; but the huge sentinel who followed him thrust ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... the difficulty of getting answers of any kind from the publishers to whom we applied. Being greatly harassed by this obstacle, I ventured to apply to the Messrs. Chambers, of Edinburgh, for a word of advice; THEY may have forgotten the circumstance, but I have not, for from them I received a brief and business-like, but civil and sensible reply, on which we acted, and ...
— Charlotte Bronte's Notes on the pseudonyms used • Charlotte Bronte

... relished the conversation, and did not join in it, is more unlikely. In his charge to Boswell, he very likely pointed out that what was said within was not to be reported without. Boswell gives only brief reports of the talk at the Club, and these not openly. See ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill

... the table the king repaired to the grand saloon, where he tarried for a few moments, that persons of high distinction, who enjoyed the privilege of addressing him, might have an opportunity to do so. He then returned to his cabinet. The door was closed, and the king had a brief interview with his children, of whom he was very fond. He then repaired to the kennel of his dogs, of whom he was also fond, and amused himself, for a time, in feeding them and playing ...
— Louis XIV., Makers of History Series • John S. C. Abbott

... proved to be; and for eighteen successive years, as their honoured President he has ruled his people with an absoluteness no European potentate could possibly approach. By birth a British subject, and for a brief while after the annexation a paid official of the British Government, he yet seems all his life to have been a consistent hater of all things British. When only ten years old, a tattered, bare-legged, unlettered lad, he joined "The great Trek" which in 1837 sought on ...
— With the Guards' Brigade from Bloemfontein to Koomati Poort and Back • Edward P. Lowry

... selections, which have now grown quite desultory and miscellaneous, by the brief obituary of a 'remarkable' man, from the Chronicle of July 26, 1766: 'Thursday, died at his house near Hampstead, the Rev. Mr Southcote, remarkable for having a leg of mutton every night for supper during a course of forty years, smoking ten ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 424, New Series, February 14, 1852 • Various

... A brief conversation ensued, question and answer ending by Joe's declaration that he believed it was a brig; and then ...
— The Ocean Cat's Paw - The Story of a Strange Cruise • George Manville Fenn

... about the messages we send along the telephone wires from day to day. They are for the most part of two kinds. We have friendly talks with persons we know well, and we give brief business orders ...
— Modern Americans - A Biographical School Reader for the Upper Grades • Chester Sanford

... utterly." The hand did duty now for a moment, shading his eyes from the light. Presently he spoke more cheerily. "All over for myself, but not for you; so, Edward, what I want to say to-night, in brief, is this: You have talents, perseverance, and health; I have money,—the four combined cannot fail to speed you in your work. ...
— Tip Lewis and His Lamp • Pansy (aka Isabella Alden)

... thrown off that first lasso, which not only fetters, but chokes those whom it can hold, so that they give themselves up trembling and breathless to the great soul-subduer, who has them by the windpipe—had settled a brief creed for herself, in which love of the neighbor, whom we have seen, was the first article, and love of the Creator, whom we have not seen, grew out of this as its natural development, being necessarily second in order of time to the first unselfish emotions ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various

... the brief residence of Doctor Morse in this house comes a quaint letter from Reverend Jeremy Belknap, the staid old doctor of divinity, and the founder of the Massachusetts Historical Society, which shows that girls over a hundred years ago were quite as much interested ...
— The Romance of Old New England Rooftrees • Mary Caroline Crawford

... hand on his arm, and with an all-forgiving charity lifted him to his feet. They stood regarding each other in silence. All that their souls could reveal had been manifested in actions. The brief scene was terminated by a common impulse. They turned their faces toward the city and walked quietly, each reflecting silently upon the struggle that had been enacted and the denouement which was yet ...
— The Redemption of David Corson • Charles Frederic Goss

... where the beech-green spurts Like a storm of emerald snow, look, see A great bay stallion dances, skirts The bushes sumptuously, Going outward now in the spring to his brief deserts. ...
— Amores - Poems • D. H. Lawrence

... office were many faded plantation and household books, and he was able to glean enough from these to confirm the methodical carefulness of Freeman Hynds. There were, too, dry receipts for "monies Paid by Mr. Rich. Hynds" for some old slave; or a brief notice that "By Orders Mr. Richd. Hynds, no Women shall be Whipt"; or "Bought by Mr. R. Hynds & Charg'd to his Acct., one Crippl'd Black Childe namd Scipio from Vanham's Sale, & Given to Sukey his Mother." Another time it would be a list of Christmas gifts: "One Colour'd Head Kerchief for Nancy. ...
— A Woman Named Smith • Marie Conway Oemler

... 1051. A brief account of these results, with some of a corresponding character which I had observed in using long wires, was published in the Philosophical Magazine for 1834[A]; and I added to them some observations on their nature. Further ...
— Experimental Researches in Electricity, Volume 1 • Michael Faraday

... human right. And this for two reasons: first, because it would be impossible for the Pope to agree to a mere superiority iure humano, for in that case he must suffer his rule and estate to be overturned and destroyed together with all his laws and books; in brief, he cannot do it; in the second place, because even such a purely human superiority would only harm the Church. (473, 7. 8.) Melanchthon, on the other hand, still adhered to the position which he had occupied in the compromise discussions ...
— Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church • Friedrich Bente

... to vent the passion within him. A glance at his maddened features was sufficient for the musicians, and they did not delay. By the time they had resumed their duties, however, the curtains of composure had closed upon the Kid, masking his emotion again; but from her brief glimpse Cherry Malotte knew that this man was not of ice, as some supposed. He turned to her and said, "Do you mean ...
— The Spoilers • Rex Beach

... the door open quite silently—for it was the one Irma had used in her few and brief outgates. Then, shrouded in her school cloak of grey, and clad, I mean, in but little else, Agnes flitted out as silent as a shadow along ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett

... a brief silence, during which even my unpracticed eyes could see that an intense struggle was going on in his mind, "Anna, you will have to give up your ...
— All's for the Best • T. S. Arthur

... brief struggle on the face of the old woman. When it passed, her eyes were as dull as ever, but her ...
— Black Jack • Max Brand

... here a brief pause. Harrington suddenly resumed. "These are very perplexing considerations. One thing, I confess, has often puzzled me much; and that is,—what should we do, in what state of mind should we be, if ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers

... the money collected at Eton Montem for the Captain of the Colleges? Towards investigating the subject, I can only get as far as Salt Hill, near Slough, where there was a mount, on which, if I remember rightly, the Captain waved a flag on Montem day. A brief account of the origin of Montem would be interesting; and it is especially worth noting now that the pageant ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 24. Saturday, April 13. 1850 • Various

... neither to the east nor to the west, but has escaped to the vicinity of timber line, nearly two miles straight up in the air. Comparatively few people outside of the Sierra Club, that admirable open-air organization of "the Coast," have occasion to visit it, and such trips as they make are of brief duration. ...
— American Big Game in Its Haunts • Various

... time, though, he got command of his feelings again and, since there was nothing better to do, he seated himself at the window and watched as much of the football game as was visible from there. Once or twice he was able to forget his trouble for a brief moment. ...
— Left Guard Gilbert • Ralph Henry Barbour

... brief visit made two or three summers before in the course of a yachting cruise, a lover of Dunnet Landing returned to find the unchanged shores of the pointed firs, the same quaintness of the village with its elaborate ...
— The Country of the Pointed Firs • Sarah Orne Jewett

... faint, but there he erred— It was but a convulsion, which though short Can never be described; we all have heard,[hg] And some of us have felt thus "all amort"[362] When things beyond the common have occurred;— Gulbeyaz proved in that brief agony What she could ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron

... bench, where they could sit side by side and look the papers through, reading over each other's shoulder, and being impatient from page to page. The paragraph was indeed repeated, with trifling additions. Ederton of the "Sun" had followed the "Tribune" man's lead, and fabricated a brief interview, a marvel of art and discretion, but so general in its allusions that it could create no suspicion; it almost deceived Mr. Pinkham himself, so that he found unaffected pleasure in the fictitious occasion, and felt as if ...
— The Life of Nancy • Sarah Orne Jewett

... now twenty, Mr. Hamil; for ten years every winter he has been with us on our expeditions. A week before we start Eudo Stent goes to the north-west edge of the Everglades, and makes smoke talk until he gets a brief answer somewhere on the horizon. And always, when we arrive in camp, a Seminole fire is burning under a kettle and before it sits my Little Tiger wearing a new turban and blinking through the smoke haze like a tree-lynx ...
— The Firing Line • Robert W. Chambers

... inquired, with equal blandness, why a painter who had been on the hanging committee of the Societe Nationale des Beaux Arts at Paris should not have been found worthy to be even an A.R.A. in London. In brief, old England 'caught it', as occurred somewhere or other most nights in the columns of the Gazette. Fuge also received his deserts as a man. And the Gazette did not conceal that he had not been a man after the heart of the British ...
— The Grim Smile of the Five Towns • Arnold Bennett

... converse with me. I went out into the moonlight with him, and he took me away from the tents, under a tree, and told me he had been much interested in my story. I thanked him, and said I had been as brief as possible. He said, "I was interested, because I used to be something of a liar myself, before I reformed, and studied for the ministry." It occurred to me that possibly the chaplain did not believe my simple tale, and I asked him if he doubted my story. ...
— How Private George W. Peck Put Down The Rebellion - or, The Funny Experiences of a Raw Recruit - 1887 • George W. Peck

... Vindication of the Doctrine of the Holy and ever Blessed Trinity and the Incarnation of the Son of God, occasioned by the Brief Notes on the Creed of St Athanasius, and the Brief History of the Unitarians, or Socinians. and containing an answer to both. By Wm. ...
— Coleridge's Literary Remains, Volume 4. • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... Frenchwoman—maybe, sober matron—dons the pretty Alsatian dress, and dances the Alsatian dance with an exile like herself, the enthusiasm is too great to be described. Lookers-on weep, shake hands, embrace each other. For a brief moment the calmest are carried away by intensity of patriotic feeling. The social aspect of Vosges travel is one of its chief charms. You must here live with French people, whether you will or no. Insular reserve cannot resist the prevailing friendliness and good-fellowship. ...
— In the Heart of the Vosges - And Other Sketches by a "Devious Traveller" • Matilda Betham-Edwards

... martyrology he has elaborately treated of the vices and absurdities of papal hierarchy, of which the following is a brief enumeration. ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox

... Here he gave a brief account of our visit and the conditions that we observed, and was proceeding to furnish a list of the articles that we had found under the grate, when Mr. Winwood ...
— The Mystery of 31 New Inn • R. Austin Freeman

... an interesting point pertaining to short flashes of light. To the dark-adapted eye a brief flash is registered as of considerably higher intensity than if the light remained constant. In other words, the lookout on a vessel is adapted to darkness and a flash from a beam of light is much brighter than ...
— Artificial Light - Its Influence upon Civilization • M. Luckiesh

... of the great garden might be visible from there. I could see a large part of it, but not a soul anywhere in it. As I drew back in disappointment, I was suddenly startled by a low sound that seemed to come from somewhere beneath me—a single brief sound, which made my breath stop and ...
— The Bright Face of Danger • Robert Neilson Stephens

... John Martin's decision as he finished tea. An hour later he had changed his mind, and was speaking to Hamar on the telephone, expressing his willingness to grant him a brief interview ...
— The Sorcery Club • Elliott O'Donnell

... who seriously and courageously desired to. This was what they did in America. The S. L. P. (Socialist Labor Party), the Socialist Propaganda League, the I. W. W. and in the Socialist Party 'the followers of Debs!' Could they in a brief word open the door wider to American Socialists, unless they wished to admit prominent members of the Socialist Party who were known to have repudiated them, as Berger did, declaring his solidarity with the Mensheviks who were ...
— The Red Conspiracy • Joseph J. Mereto

... Catharine thus revealed was, in brief, that all her predecessors had been minors, women, and persons in situations not to make their rights valid. Finding herself more highly placed, she had advanced her claims, which had been so fully recognized in Portugal, that she had been received as Infanta of the kingdom. All pretensions ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... years of agony since he got out of bed, the actual passage of time, as he stood frozen to the door-handle, was but the duration of a few brief seconds, and then making a tremendous call on his courage he felt his way to his fireplace, and picked up the poker. The tongs and shovel rattled treacherously, and he hoped that had not been heard, for the essence of his plan (though he had yet no idea what that plan was) must ...
— Queen Lucia • E. F. Benson

... and he sank upon his knees, still gazing upward at the majesty that he adored. For a few brief moments the light illumined the divine visions that had been denied to him so long—light clear and sweet and strong as though it streamed from the throne of Heaven. Then suddenly it passed away: once more a great darkness ...
— A Dog of Flanders • Louisa de la Rame)

... away, and reappeared after a very brief interval. As she rushed up with the parcel, an awkward accident occurred. The lady heedlessly stepped backward. Cash dodged; but, alas! before she could stop herself, she had dashed into a pyramid of note-paper that stood upon the end of the counter, and sent the boxes scattering over ...
— Apples, Ripe and Rosy, Sir • Mary Catherine Crowley

... with their usual monotony for the occupants of the Nameless Castle, and September, with its delightfully warm weather drew on apace. In Hungary the long autumn makes ample amends for the brief spring—like the frugal mother who stores away in May gifts with which to surprise her ...
— The Nameless Castle • Maurus Jokai

... Thea temporarily, for it seemed to give her a chance. But a great deal of the time she was comfortless. Her letters to Dr. Archie were brief and businesslike. She was not apt to chatter much, even in the stimulating company of people she liked, and to chatter on paper was simply impossible for her. If she tried to write him anything definite about her work, she immediately scratched it out as being only partially true, or not true at ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather

... a few moments, reviewing the brief which the lawyer had taped and fed to the computer earlier. Time passed. Then the green panel lit, and the words, ...
— Starman's Quest • Robert Silverberg

... War Pendennis Castle was held for the King by its aged and gallant governor, John Arundel, and it afforded brief shelter both to the fugitive Charles II. and to his mother, the Queen Henrietta Maria. The Sheriff of Cornwall, who saw her at this time, described her as "the woefullest spectacle my eyes ever yet look'd on; the most ...
— The Cornwall Coast • Arthur L. Salmon

... less frequent by degrees, until silence was scarcely broken save by the bells in church towers, marking the progress—softer and more stealthy while the city slumbered—of that Great Watcher with the hoary head, who never sleeps or rests. In the brief interval of darkness and repose which feverish towns enjoy, all busy sounds were hushed; and those who awoke from dreams lay listening in their beds, and longed for dawn, and wished the dead of ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens

... Saint-Germain, are authentic. She was the widow of a poor man of noble family, and was one of two femmes de chambre of Madame de Pompadour. Her manuscript was written, she explains, by aid of a brief diary which she kept during her term of service. One day M. Senac de Meilhan found Madame de Pompadour's brother, M. de Marigny, about to burn a packet of papers. "It is the journal," he said, "of ...
— The Lock and Key Library/Real Life #2 • Julian Hawthorne

... While this brief scene was in progress in the chamber of Ralph, another, not less full of interest to that person, was passing in the neighborhood of the village-tavern; and, as this portion of our narrative yields some light which must tend greatly to our own, and ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms

... the meeting of the other friend, and all the rest, was not a sin: the sin was telling the lie, and that was all that should have been confessed. Therefore, tell only the sins. Then tell only your own sins, and be very careful not to mention anyone's name—even your own—in confession. Be brief, and do not say, I broke the First Commandment or the Second by doing so and so; tell the sin simply as it is, and the priest himself will know what Commandment you violated. Again, when you have committed a sin ...
— Baltimore Catechism No. 4 (of 4) - An Explanation Of The Baltimore Catechism of Christian Doctrine • Thomas L. Kinkead

... quote what they have not previously read. His "Troilus and Cressid" has only a very distant connexion indeed with Homer, whose "Iliad," before it furnished materials for the mediaeval Troilus-legend, had been filtered through a brief Latin epitome, and diluted into a Latin novel, and a journal kept at the seat of war, of altogether apocryphal value. And, indeed, it must in general be conceded that, if Chaucer had read much, he lays ...
— Chaucer • Adolphus William Ward

... with Jesus, He used this word "meek" in a brief crisp sentence, and not till some time later did He go on to explain it. In the same book of Matthew He tells us more about it and applies it to our lives. "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and ...
— The Pursuit of God • A. W. Tozer

... the curtain and recoiled with white faces and staring eyes. "Not me!" was the brief rejoinder of Jimmy. Cathy said, "Not much!" And she meant it, anyone ...
— The Enchanted Castle • E. Nesbit

... This brief sketch will give a little idea of the difficulties and dangers incident to the tubing of ...
— Saratoga and How to See It • R. F. Dearborn

... together, and that "such harmony is in immortal souls," it leaves to poet and philosopher. The timbre, loudness, pitch, of musical tones, is a concern of science; but for this a Beethoven symphony is no better than the latest ragtime air from the music halls. In brief, science deals only with phenomena, and its gift to man is power over ...
— Four-Dimensional Vistas • Claude Fayette Bragdon

... her lover, and sometimes she thought these glances were perceived, and even returned. Now and then she had seen them talking together; it was but for a moment or two, but much can be said in a brief space; it may have been on most unimportant topics, but how could she know that? The girl was lovely, but she had dared to raise her eyes to the loved one of the princess; and, with all the intensity of ...
— The Lady, or the Tiger? • Frank R. Stockton

... tide which bore him on to fame and fortune. He was an operator in the line of the Erie and Michigan Telegraph Company, at Milan, Ohio, when a conflagration destroyed all the materials and implements forming his stock in trade as a portrait painter. After a brief consideration of the subject, he decided not to replace the lost implements of his art, but to cut loose altogether from the career of an artist, and hereafter to devote himself solely to the business he had entered upon with fair ...
— Cleveland Past and Present - Its Representative Men, etc. • Maurice Joblin

... made a brief speech in the Martian language (which of course neither I nor my two companions understood), in which, as Mark afterwards explained to me, he gave a short account of how I had arrived there from the earth with my two colleagues—the first inhabitants of that world to set foot upon Mars! ...
— To Mars via The Moon - An Astronomical Story • Mark Wicks

... were bravely crossed; Edgar, with the boldness of heroic inexperience, bravely attacked his adversary. Raymond, compelled to defend himself, was astonished. At this terrible moment, when thought paralyzes action, he was absorbed in thought. The contest was brief. Edgar's sword, only half parried, pierced his rival's heart. The surgeon came to ...
— The Cross of Berny • Emile de Girardin

... by five bluejackets, one company Royal Dublin Fusiliers, and one company Durban Light Infantry, was again despatched to reconnoitre northward from Estcourt. Captain J. A. L. Haldane, Gordon Highlanders, was placed in command. The train, after a brief halt at Frere to communicate with the police post, pushed on to Chieveley station. No flanking patrols appear to have been sent out; but as Chieveley station was reached a party of 50 Boers was seen cantering southward ...
— History of the War in South Africa 1899-1902 v. 1 (of 4) - Compiled by Direction of His Majesty's Government • Frederick Maurice

... which had never come to me in ten years, seemed now perfectly natural. I would return at once to that far off village where, for a brief hour, I had dwelt in a "Fool's Paradise," through which my way had lain but a brief span, and where I had passed, like the fabled bird, that "floats through ...
— Told in a French Garden - August, 1914 • Mildred Aldrich

... tenderfoot would have had a difficult task getting the blaze started, though after that trouble had been surmounted it would not be so bad. But Jud knew just how to split open a log, and find the dry heart that would take fire easily; and in a brief time he had ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts Afloat • George A. Warren

... so many others, the earnest youth found here within the scriptures, admonition and counsel as directly applicable to his case and circumstances as if the lines had been addressed to him by name. A brief period of hesitation, in which he shrank from the thought that a mortal like himself, weak, youthful, and unlearned, should approach the Creator with a personal request, was followed by a humble and contrite resolution to act upon the counsel of ...
— The Story of "Mormonism" • James E. Talmage

... the bivouac, after his hour's turn of duty, that he learned the extent of the loss of the regiment. He knew by the smallness of the number who mustered for the search how much his own company had suffered, and in the brief intervals in the struggle he had heard something of what was doing elsewhere. Lieutenant Desmond had fallen early in the fight, shot through the heart as the light companies went out to oppose the French skirmishers. Captain O'Connor had received a lance wound through ...
— One of the 28th • G. A. Henty

... not improbable that the reader may leave this brief survey with the feeling that its admissions of ignorance exceed its affirmations of certainty, and such is indeed the case, for the law of scientific validity forbids the statement as fact, of that concerning which the ...
— American Big Game in Its Haunts • Various

... second class of citizens are those who are naturalized. That the rules should be uniform by which aliens become citizens, is self-evident. After a brief discussion, the Constitutional Convention provided in Section 8, Clause 4, that Congress shall have the power to establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the ...
— Our Government: Local, State, and National: Idaho Edition • J.A. James

... appeared in the collection called "Men and Women" were written at this period. They passed much time in the galleries and churches. They drove in the beautiful environs of Florence. The pictures, history, and legends entered into their lives to serve in later days as poetic material. In the brief twilight of winter days they often strolled into the old gray church of San Felice, on which their windows looked out, where Browning would gratify his passion for music by evolving from the throbbing keys of ...
— The Brownings - Their Life and Art • Lilian Whiting

... the higher classes of society, but would find its way into the midst of those moving in the humbler walks of life. To supply this want, the present work has been prepared. The endeavor has been made to compress within a brief compass, the principal events of the life of Mr. Adams, and the scenes in which he participated; and to portray the leading traits of character which distinguished him from his contemporaries. It has been the aim to present such an aspect of the history ...
— Life and Public Services of John Quincy Adams - Sixth President of the Unied States • William H. Seward

... sons of men when the frosts of winter come? If matter, mute and inanimate, though changed by the forces of nature into a multitude of forms, can never die, will the imperial spirit of man suffer annihilation when it has paid a brief visit like a royal guest to this tenement of clay? No, He who, notwithstanding His apparent prodigality, created nothing without a purpose, and wasted not a single atom in all His creation, has made provision for a future life in which man's universal longing for immortality will find its ...
— In His Image • William Jennings Bryan

... consists of an analysis of the types of behavior, a survey of individual traits and their significance in social life, a brief consideration of the nature and development of the self, individual differences, language and communication, racial and cultural continuity. Those fruits of psychological inquiry have been stressed which bear most strikingly on the relations of men in our present-day social and economic organization. ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman

... to more fitly close this book devoted to the brief presentation of the facts of the psychic world, and the world of spirit, than by quoting the following words uttered by a faithful laborer in the vineyard of spiritualism: "Spiritualism helps us to understand the 'unity of spirit' and 'the brotherhood ...
— Genuine Mediumship or The Invisible Powers • Bhakta Vishita

... photography I forgot the doom ahead. Appropriately, the sword I had hung up over my own cranium descended in the Necropolis, at that place of tombs called Umm el-Ka'ab, "Mother of Pots." Nobody wanted to see the fragments of this mother's pots, but I insisted on a brief visit, as important discoveries have been made there, among the most important in Egypt. It was a dreary place where Harry Snell strolled up and caught me alone, gazing at a desolation of sandy hillocks, full of ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson

... sun set, and the brief twilight came, and the exultation of the glory of Bar-Wul-Yann was gone, yet still the pink cliffs glowed, the fairest marvel that the eye beheld—and this in a land of wonders. And soon the twilight gave place to the coming out of stars, and the colours of Bar-Wul-Yann went dwindling ...
— Selections from the Writings of Lord Dunsay • Lord Dunsany

... Duke of Savoy, being pressed by many urgent public needs, had obtained from the Pope a Brief empowering him to levy contributions on the Church property in his dominions, Blessed Francis, finding some slackness and unwillingness on the part of the beneficed clergy of the diocese to yield obedience to this order, when he had called them together to settle what was to be done, ...
— The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales • Jean Pierre Camus

... assembled, roll-call followed and there was a brief inspection of arms. While this was going on the post adjutant appeared ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys in the Ranks - or, Two Recruits in the United States Army • H. Irving Hancock

... brief, and, such as they were, full of Arbuthnot. He was sailing as soon as he could find a berth. I gave the pair up, and went to an elder brother's place in Inverness-shire for rest and shooting and rain and family criticism and such-like ...
— The Mountebank • William J. Locke

... as broad Achilles. He keeps a table too, makes factious feasts, Rails on our state of war, and sets Thersites (A slanderous slave of an o'erflowing gall) To level us with low comparisons. They tax our policy with cowardice, Count wisdom of no moment in the war, In brief, esteem no act, but that of hand; The still and thoughtful parts, which move those hands, With them are but the tasks cut out by fear, ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden

... brief but faithful statement of my present situation; it is, as I before told your Lordship, in every respect an untenable one. I must relinquish it, and throw myself an outcast on society. Can you, will you, my Lord, exert your ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron

... Miss Peck the letter, and sprang up from a half-finished breakfast. The little spinster perused the brief communication ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan

... but is lodged and tended in a palace of its own. That it is a structure deeply fixed and rooted in the public spirit of this place, and built to last, I have no more doubt, judging from the spectacle I see before me, and from what I know of its brief history, than I have of the reality of these walls that hem us in, and the pillars ...
— Speeches: Literary and Social • Charles Dickens

... After a brief interval of peace war blazed out again over the question whether a French Bourbon should be king of Spain,—the War of the Spanish Succession, 1702-1713. England's aim in this war was to acquire some of the ...
— A History of Sea Power • William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott

... harvested my corn on the right bank of the river of my people, while I fought the pale-faces on the left." This history of a warfare protracted to four months—for the period between the planting and harvesting of maize is of that or greater duration—was beautiful, though brief, but it was literally true. A gentleman present assured me that the dignity of his manner, as well as the matter of his speech, sent a thrill of awe to the bosom of ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 3 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones

... have recollections of that "Father-Sky," whom our far-off ancestors adored, the bright, glad, cheerful sky, the "ancestor of all." Max Muller has summed up the facts of our inheritance in brief terms:— ...
— The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought • Alexander F. Chamberlain

... that it was Ernest who was at the bottom of all the inconvenience felt by Theobald, herself, Joey and everyone else, and she had actually got words out which should convey this; true, she had not dared to stick to them and had turned them off, but she had made them hers at any rate for one brief moment, and this was better than nothing. Ernest noticed throughout his mother's illness, that Charlotte found immediate occasion to make herself disagreeable to him whenever either doctor or nurse pronounced her mother ...
— The Way of All Flesh • Samuel Butler

... follows: but a material fallacy often underlies this form of argument in the tacit assumption that the alternatives offered in the minor constitute an exhaustive division. Thus the dilemma 'If pain is severe, it will be brief; and if it last long it will be slight,' &c., leaves out of sight the unfortunate fact that pain may both be severe and of long ...
— Deductive Logic • St. George Stock

... Sime was almost unconscious. He did not see its sudden dive into the saw-edge of the western mountains—knew only that night had come by the icy whistle of the sunset wind that stirred and moaned for a brief interval among the rocks. The keen, thin wind that first brought relief and then new tortures, to be followed by ...
— The Martian Cabal • Roman Frederick Starzl

... again they exchanged smiles. He noticed that her eyes had somehow become exceedingly blue instead of the clear gray which he had supposed was their color. And, after her brief slumber, there seemed to be a sort of dewy freshness about them, and about her slightly pink cheeks, which, at that time, he had no idea were at all perilous to him. All he was conscious of was a sensation of pleasure in looking at her, ...
— Blue-Bird Weather • Robert W. Chambers

... mysteriously as they had come, the devotees had vanished. Bare walls met the eyes of the searchers. Porton Abbey stood empty again after its brief return to life and warmth, and indeed it scarcely looked habitable. The few personal effects of the simple monks had been removed; the walls and stone floors were rigidly clean; the small chapel showed signs of recent repair. There was an ...
— The Slave Of The Lamp • Henry Seton Merriman

... great praise and respect for his courage and charity; and his preaching was listened to by many Protestants—indeed the subscriptions for the Church of the Holy Cross which he founded in 1803 were largely from non-Catholics. In 1808 the papal brief was issued making Boston a bishopric, suffragan to Baltimore, and Cheverus its bishop. He was consecrated on All Saints' day in 1810, at St Peter's, Baltimore, by Archbishop Carroll. On the death of the latter his assistant bishop, Neale, urged the appointment of Cheverus as assistant ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 1 - "Chtelet" to "Chicago" • Various

... declared that the brief time in which he was employed in consuming the few mouthfuls allowed him, was a moment of enjoyment that repaid him for all the ...
— The Boy Slaves • Mayne Reid

... were wondering at Fairoaks that the Major had not returned. Dr. Portman and his lady, on their way home to Clavering, stopped at Helen's lodge-gate, with a brief note for her from Major Pendennis, in which he said he should remain at Chatteris another day, being anxious to have some talk with Messrs. Tatham, the lawyers, whom he would meet that afternoon; but no mention was made ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray

... but scholarship and good sense had a large measure of success in banishing extravagance from art and literature. Yet, alas, the intellectual life of China lost more in fire and brilliancy than it gained in sanity. Probably the most critical times for literature and indeed for thought were those brief periods under the Sui and T'ang[641] when Buddhist and Taoist books were accepted as texts for the public examinations and the last half century of the Northern Sung, when the educational reforms of Wang An Shih were intermittently in force. The innovations were ...
— Hinduism and Buddhism, An Historical Sketch, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Charles Eliot

... not very high, was sufficiently so, with the aid of watch-fires, to protect them from tigers. From the summit, which rose just above the tree-tops, they had a magnificent view of the forest. Many of the trees were crowned with flowers among which the setting sun shone for a brief space ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne

... your table, Joe," commanded the young skipper, "and notify the 'Fulton' that we are going to hail her for a brief pow-wow." ...
— The Motor Boat Club and The Wireless - The Dot, Dash and Dare Cruise • H. Irving Hancock

... he shall not henceforth profit himself here, for all his sore anger. For how shalt thou learn concerning me, stranger, whether indeed I excel all women in wit and thrifty device, if all unkempt and evil clad thou sittest at supper in my halls? Man's life is brief enough! And if any be a hard man and hard at heart, all men cry evil on him for the time to come, while yet he lives, and all men mock him when he is dead. But if any be a blameless man and blameless of heart, his guests spread abroad his fame over the whole ...
— DONE INTO ENGLISH PROSE • S. H. BUTCHER, M.A.

... arises to open the case to the impanelled jury, very few, if any, of them have the slightest conception of the enormous expenditure of time, thought and labor which has gone into the preparation of the case and made possible his brief and easily delivered speech. For in this opening address of his there must be no flaw, since a single misstated or overstated fact may prejudice the jury against him and result in his defeat. Upon it also depends the jury's ...
— Courts and Criminals • Arthur Train

... One brief month earlier he had been a man of ambition, a man of promise. He'd even found his Dream. An Easterner had helped him to that foolishness; an -ologist from a university who expected to find prehistoric bones and ...
— Winner Take All • Larry Evans

... in the clear understanding of the difference between selfish and unselfish expenditure. It is not easy, by any course of reasoning, to enforce this on the generally unwilling hearer; yet the definition of unselfish expenditure is brief and simple. It is expenditure which, if you are a capitalist, does not pay you, but pays somebody else; and if you are a consumer, does not please you, but pleases somebody else. Take one special instance, in further illustration of the general type given above. ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin

... had stopped for, and said little or nothing of the incidents of the day. This was the second occasion on which I had met him in the midst of misfortune, for during the fight in the cedars at Stone River, when our prospects were most disheartening, we held a brief conversation respecting the line he was then taking up for the purpose of helping me. At other times, in periods of inactivity, I saw but little of him. He impressed me, now as he did in the cedars, his quiet, unobtrusive: demeanor communicating ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. I., Part 2 • P. H. Sheridan

... Zeeroover Will Kidd heeft gelieven te schryven, waerop uw Excell. met naervolgende Antwoort dienen Sall. voorschryven Will Kidd is voor deesen Haeven met zyn voerende Schip onder Engelse Vlagge buyten Schoot Van't Kooninghs Fortress ten Anker gekoomen, en heeft daerop zyn Chaloupe met een Brief aen My aen Lant gesonden, waerin hy Protectie van my was begehrende, Vaerder pretenderende onschuldigh te weesen in't Rooven van de Subjecten van den Mogol in Oostjndien. Zyn Bedryf my toenmaels nogh Onbekent Zynde, ...
— Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period - Illustrative Documents • Various

... asleep and she lay like a white dove on her pillows when he came to make his brief good-night visit. She was very still and seemed to be thinking. Her touch on his arm was as the touch of a butterfly when she at last put out her hand ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... Raphael, who painted the Sistine Madonna. Nay, we have known one such heretic go so far as to lay his hands upon the ark itself, so to speak, and to defend the startling paradox that, even in physical beauty, man is the superior. He admitted, indeed, that there was a brief period of early youth when it might be hard to say whether the prize should be awarded to the graceful undulations of the female figure, or the perfect balance and supple vigour of the male frame. But while our new Paris might hesitate between the youthful Bacchus ...
— Science & Education • Thomas H. Huxley



Words linked to "Brief" :   synopsis, law, legal document, apprize, instruct, legal brief, legal instrument, briefing, jurisprudence, concise, abstract, precis, outline, official document, brevity, apprise, short, amicus curiae brief, briefness



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