"Contradict" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... done,' said he, facing his victim savagely. 'The fellow pretends he didn't understand. She's here to corroborate. Richmond, there, my daughter, Dorothy Beltham, there's the last of your fools and dupes. She's a truthful woman, I'll own, and she'll contradict me if what I say is not the fact. That twenty-five thousand from "Government" came out ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... as the girls were ready to leave the table she broke her silence. "Wait a minute," she said. "I want to ask you please to forget all the foolish things I said last night at dinner. I've said them a good many times, and I can't contradict them to every one, but I can here—and I want to. I've thought more about it since yesterday, and I see that I hadn't at all the right idea of the situation. The students at a college are supposed to be old enough to do the right thing about vacations without the attaching of any childish ...
— Betty Wales Freshman • Edith K. Dunton
... of judging of an author's credibility is sometimes furnished, by learning whether any of his alleged facts have been contradicted by persons acquainted with them, especially if they are such as these persons would be glad to contradict. If a person is charged with being an accomplice in a crime, and he fails to rebut the accusation, we may infer that he is unable to do so. Or, if the narrator give place and date to certain memorable transactions, which, if false, might easily be shown ...
— The American Quarterly Review, No. 17, March 1831 • Various
... seemed to settle on me. This bragging did not make me angry, and I had no longer any wish to contradict him. It may have been the result of the fall, but my mind had stopped working. I heard his voice as one listens casually to the ...
— Mr. Standfast • John Buchan
... little countesses her sisters. Counts! every one of these wretches says he is a count. Guiscard, that stabbed Mr. Harvy, said he was a count; and I believe he was a barber. All Frenchmen are barbers—Fiddle-dee! don't contradict me—or else dancing-masters, or else priests;" and so ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... go free in a twinkling, but hear you shall. Before you boast of your power, you shall know all of mine. I will recite your condition. Contradict if I say anything amiss. Your father Myscelus was of the noble house of Codrus, a great name in Athens, but he left you no large estate. You were ambitious to shine as an orator and leader of the Athenians. To win popularity you have given great feasts. At the last ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis
... aware that by numerous statutes anterior to the act of 1841, provision is made for the authoritative selection of town sites in special cases; but such provisions do by no means exclude or contradict the later enactment of a general provision of law to comprehend all cases of selections for town sites, whether authoritative or voluntary. I think the act of 1841, construed in the light of the complementary act of 1844, ...
— Minnesota and Dacotah • C.C. Andrews
... 'Requiem,' the other having been delivered to the stranger immediately after Mozart's decease, published the score some years afterwards, claiming to have composed from the Sanctus to the end. As there was no one to contradict this extraordinary story, it found partial credit until 1839, when a full score of the 'Requiem' in Mozart's handwriting ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... there was pretty good reason to suppose was accurate, for it was written down in his presence by this friend, who enumerated each article aloud, and had some of them mentioned to him by Mr. Levett, in concert with whom it was made out; and Johnson, who heard all this, did not contradict it. But when I shewed a copy of this list to him, and mentioned the evidence for its exactness, he laughed, and said, 'I was willing to let them go on as they pleased, and never interfered.' Upon which I read it to him, article by article, ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell
... specimens of Bacon's two styles. In 1597, he wrote thus: "Crafty men contemn studies; simple men admire them; and wise men use them; for they teach not their own use: that is a wisdom without them, and won by observation. Read not to contradict, nor to believe, but to weigh and consider. Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested. Reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man. And therefore ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... subjective the picture it constructs from them. To take only one obvious example, artists and poets have given us plenty of hints that a real beauty and significance which we seldom notice lie at our very doors; and forbid us to contradict the statement of religion that God is standing ...
— The Life of the Spirit and the Life of To-day • Evelyn Underhill
... present moment the word has gone round:—"Let us get the bill, let us get the bill, and then!" But enough remains to show the general tone. Addressing the Irish National Literary Society, of Loughrea, Miss Gonne said that she must "contradict Lord Wolseley in his statement that England was never insulted by invasion since the days of William the Conqueror. It would be deeply interesting to the men and women of Connaught to hear once again how a gallant body of French troops, fighting ...
— Ireland as It Is - And as It Would be Under Home Rule • Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.)
... never contradict what I say, nor make an incorrect statement, nor draw a wrong conclusion, nor object to being contradicted when I think you are ...
— The Golden Dream - Adventures in the Far West • R.M. Ballantyne
... considered it an excellent joke, and then he would give such a tyrannical leer in the face of his next neighbor that the poor man would be fain to laugh out of sheer faint-heartedness. If anyone, however, pretended to contradict him in any of his stories, he was on fire in an instant. His very cocked hat assumed a momentary fierceness, and seemed to resent the contradiction. "How the devil should you know as well as I? I tell you it was as I say;" and he would at the same time let ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... strangely contrasted with the tenor of his General Order to the army, issued immediately before their disembarkation. "The people," he then said, "with whom we are about to live, are Mahometans; the first article of their faith is, There is no God but God, and Mahomet is his Prophet. Do not contradict them: deal with them as you have done with the Jews and the Italians. Respect their muphtis and imans, as you have done by the rabbis and the bishops elsewhere.... The Roman legions protected all religions. You will find here usages different from those of Europe: you must accustom ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... and in short, whatever is secret should be allowed to remain secret, or, at any rate, should be secretly reproved, as we shall hear. Therefore, if you encounter an idle tongue which betrays and slanders some one, contradict such a one promptly to his face, that he may blush thus many a one will hold his tongue who else would bring some poor man into bad repute from which he would not easily extricate himself. For honor and a good name are easily taken away, ...
— The Large Catechism by Dr. Martin Luther
... Valeria Du Prel, has to turn for a living, or to keep ennui at bay. But I, no, the inimical sex may possess their souls in peace, as far as I am concerned. They might retort that they never had felt nervous, but a letter has the same advantage as the pulpit: the adversary can never get up and contradict. ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... like to contradict him, because they felt he ought to know the nature of foxes better than men did; so they sat still and watched the play, and Button-Bright became so interested that for the time he forgot he ...
— The Road to Oz • L. Frank Baum
... intervening. Of course, my first row was a long one, quite through the city from west to east, including innumerable turnings and windings. After this, whomsoever may assert that the streets of Venice are dusty or not well watered, I shall be able to contradict ...
— Glances at Europe - In a Series of Letters from Great Britain, France, Italy, - Switzerland, &c. During the Summer of 1851. • Horace Greeley
... sent to me this morning, I see the correspondent mentions one ——, and records how I was wont to feast in the house of the said ——. As I never was in the man's house in my life, or within five miles of it that I know of, I beg you will do me the favour to contradict this. ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 3 (of 3), 1836-1870 • Charles Dickens
... sternly round, as if to say, "Contradict that if you dare!" Possibly he felt that the "something inside of him" might have stated the golden rule more simply. Returning to the ...
— The Crew of the Water Wagtail • R.M. Ballantyne
... appropriation of his car by an unknown young woman almost took Lord Chilminster's breath away. He had, at much inconvenience to himself, motored all the way to Lady Hartley's to contradict and sift an amazing and annoying report that he had discovered in the Morning Post. He had heard Lady Hartley mention the name of Urmy as that of a friend of hers, and naturally decided that she was the proper person to consult. ...
— Golden Stories - A Selection of the Best Fiction by the Foremost Writers • Various
... I could not contradict this; still I kept on hoping that we should ere long be seen. I had a white handkerchief in my pocket, although it was rolled into a ball by the wet. I pulled it out, and waved it above my head as high as I ...
— Peter Trawl - The Adventures of a Whaler • W. H. G. Kingston
... in doing so I challenge either Tory or Liberal to contradict me, that no Tory Government could have done what the Liberal Government did yesterday in bombarding those forts. If such a thing had been proposed, what would have happened? We should have had Sir William Harcourt stumping the country, ...
— Fifteen Chapters of Autobiography • George William Erskine Russell
... the mistake stops, nor what it is report has not scrupled to affirm. But I think I ought no longer to neglect it, and therefore I have presumed to solicit your advice in what manner I may most effectually contradict it." ...
— Cecilia Volume 1 • Frances Burney
... to dispute or to contradict any conclusion you may have reached," he spoke at length in a low, even voice. "I had not, as I said, intended this last, this most inexcusable intrusion. You have now only one course to pursue—" His gaze turned to the long silken bell-rope on the wall. ...
— Half A Chance • Frederic S. Isham
... off, I think—(for I am a thousand miles away from proof-sheets as I write, and, were I not writing the simple TRUTH, must contradict myself a thousand times in the course of my tale)—I think, I say, that I left off at that period of my story, when, Holkar being before Futtyghur, and I in command of that fortress, I had just been compelled to make away with his messenger; ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... thing," said Fanny, who usually thought it safest to contradict everything they said to her. "I'm a Demshur girl, born and bred, and my father and mother was the same before me. I ain't none of your Britons nor Cornish pasties neither, ...
— Kitty Trenire • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... we understand a thing imperfectly, when the essence of a thing or the truth of a proposition is not known as to its quiddity or mode of being, and yet we know that whatever be the outward appearances, they do not contradict the truth, in so far as we understand that we ought not to depart from matters of faith, for the sake of things that appear externally. In this way, even during the state of faith, nothing hinders us from understanding even those things which are ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... money, and the loss had thus fallen upon his lordship. The cheque had of course been traced, and inquiry had of course been made as to Mr Crawley's possession of it. When that gentleman declared that he had received it from Mr Soames, Mr Soames had been forced to contradict and to resent such an assertion. When Mr Crawley had afterwards said that the money had come to him from the dean, and when the dean had shown that this also was untrue, Mr Soames, confident as he was that he had ...
— The Last Chronicle of Barset • Anthony Trollope
... snap with his fingers of any shaver in London, and the care of a shop where starved apprentices flayed the faces of those who were boobies enough to trust them, the dame drove a separate and more lucrative trade, which yet had so many odd turns and windings, that it seemed in many respects to contradict itself. ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... serve? Coffin read it over. It didn't contradict the first one; it only changed a suggestion to a command, as if someone were growing more frantic by the hour. (And a picture of near-chaos in government wasn't attractive, was it?) The bit about "proper channels" underlined that speech was not free on Earth, ...
— The Burning Bridge • Poul William Anderson
... you?" he insisted. "Come, tell the truth! The advantage of telling the truth, young lady, is that neither God nor the devil can contradict you!" He laughed, eying her ...
— The Awakening of Helena Richie • Margaret Deland
... billiard-balls when so grouped as to represent consciousness generate some second motive power distinct from, at variance with, and often stronger than, the original impetus? Clearly no scientific thinker can admit this. To do so would be to undermine the entire fabric of science, to contradict what is its first axiom and its last conclusion. If then the motion of our six billiard balls has anything, when it corresponds to consciousness, distinct in kind from what it always had, it can only derive this from one cause. That cause is a second cue, tampering ...
— Is Life Worth Living? • William Hurrell Mallock
... strangely for a few moments. But the compulsion which she had felt upon her a moment ago to speak was gone. She no longer sought to contradict him. Without a word she ...
— The Broken Road • A. E. W. Mason
... personal feeling and in public policy was deadly hostile to the President of the United States. Even those who insisted most warmly upon Mr. Stanton's being retained in his position, must have seen that such a course would contradict the theory of the National Constitution and be in direct contravention of the practice of the Federal Government. Every one could see that these circumstances had brought about an unnatural situation—a situation that must in some way be relieved. It presented a condition ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... modified Hutchinsonianism, which I have seen cited by several. Though rather dark on the subject, it seems not to contradict the motion of the earth, or the doctrine of gravitation. Mr. Kittle gives a list of some Hutchinsonians,—as Bishop Horne;[535] Dr. Stukeley;[536] the Rev. {237} W. Jones,[537] author of Physiological ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan
... flare or fireworks could have been lighted, drippings from a flare, or anything that shouldn't have been in a deserted area of woods. We looked at the trees; they hadn't been hit by lightning. The blades of grass under which the UFO supposedly hovered were not burned. We found nothing to contradict the story. We took a few photos of the area and went back to town. On the way back we talked to the constable and the deputy. All they could do was to confirm what ...
— The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects • Edward Ruppelt
... inherent in it. Life may be incalculable, and you can never know beforehand what a great man, indeed, what any man may achieve, but even the originality of a Leonardo or a Beethoven cannot effect the impossible or contradict the order of nature. The sculptor feels that the statue is already lying in the marble awaiting only his creative touch to bring it forth. The metal is alive in the worker's hands, coaxing him to make of it something beautiful.[11] ...
— Christianity and Ethics - A Handbook of Christian Ethics • Archibald B. C. Alexander
... instance of the kind, for that the celebrated pamphlet which had been attributed to Lady Canning had not been written by her, not a word of it, that it had been written by Stapleton. I said that I had it in my power to contradict this, for that I had been privy to the composition of it, had seen the manuscript, and had at her request undertaken the task of revising and correcting it. Thus were two mistakes accidentally cleared up, by the circumstance of the only persons who ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville
... shadow. Of Carlyle, as of Johnson, it might have been said, "There is no use arguing with him, for if his pistol misses fire he knocks you down with the butt": both men would have benefited by revolt from their dictation, but the power to contradict either was overborne by a superior power to assert. Swift's occasional insolence, in like manner, prevailed by reason of the colossal strength that made him a Gulliver in Lilliput. Carlyle in earlier, as in later ...
— Thomas Carlyle - Biography • John Nichol
... he would have remarked it; and then there had been some Colour for the Gloss. But 'tis unworthy to be believed of Aristotle, who was so wary and cautious, that he should in so short a passage, contradict himself: and after he had so positively affirmed the Truth of it, presently doubt it. His [Greek: hosper legetai] therefore must have a Reference to what follows, Pusillum genus, ut aiunt, ipsi atque etiam Equi, ...
— A Philological Essay Concerning the Pygmies of the Ancients • Edward Tyson
... property which his father had left him. He candidly confessed that he was wonderfully fond of gold, and said there was nothing like it for giving a person respectability and consideration in the world; to which assertion I made no answer, being not exactly prepared to contradict it. ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow
... to be rude, therefore I will not contradict you," he answered with a kind of groan, "or, indeed, say anything except that if any one else had spun me that yarn I should have told him he was a common liar. But, of course, as every schoolboy knows, Walda Nagasta—that is, Child of Kings in Ethiopic—is ...
— Queen Sheba's Ring • H. Rider Haggard
... away and we heard no more, and though we used every exertion to discover the truth, no one we met could contradict it. Next we heard that the successful French fleet had pursued Admiral Byron on his voyage to America, had brought him to action and completely dispersed and destroyed his fleet. We daily talked the matter over among ourselves. ...
— Hurricane Hurry • W.H.G. Kingston
... 325, 326) and Eunapius, (Vit. Sophist. in Proaeresio, p. 126.) Some students, whose expectations perhaps were groundless, or extravagant, retired in disgust, (Greg. Naz. Orat. iv. p. 120.) It is strange that we should not be able to contradict the title of one of Tillemont's chapters, (Hist. des Empereurs, tom. iv. p. 960,) "La Cour de Julien est pleine de philosphes et de ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... the reasonableness of tackling history from a lighter and more entertaining point of view. Again, as to the River Thames, one must really grant that a considerable amount of self-complacency and internal sunniness would result from the ability to contradict your friends as to the length in miles of some of its minor tributaries. In science, too, you are no Kepler or Linnaeus, and there is something satisfactory when pedants talk of orbits, planes, bulbs, or beetles, in being able to say that you have a big book at home ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes
... began to suspect that the whole proposal was only a snare to disarm the allies, and to betray the flower of their troops into the hands of the Emperor. Wallenstein's well-known character did not contradict the suspicion, and the inconsistencies in which he afterwards involved himself, entirely destroyed all confidence in his sincerity. While he was endeavouring to draw the Swedes into this alliance, and requiring the help of their best troops, he declared to Arnheim ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... Hindus show in observance of the precepts inculcated by Saint Manu. Manu was incontestably a great legislator and a great thinker, but he has written so much that it has happened to him frequently to contradict himself in the course of a single page. The Brahmins do not take the trouble to notice that, and the poor Hindus, whose labor supports the Brahminic caste, obey servilely their clergy, whose prescriptions enjoin upon them never to touch a man who does not belong to their caste, and also ...
— The Unknown Life of Jesus Christ - The Original Text of Nicolas Notovitch's 1887 Discovery • Nicolas Notovitch
... are. But you are right; that was the point on which he was most anxious. He wrote, you know, to me from Malta, when the account of his conversion first appeared, to take all necessary steps to contradict the announcement, and counteract its consequences. He gave me carte blanche, and was anxious to know precisely what I had done. I told him that a mere contradiction, anonymous, or from a third person, however unqualified its language, would have no effect in the face of a detailed narrative, ...
— Lothair • Benjamin Disraeli
... rightly, Ayesha, the events which you have been pleased first to describe to me, and then to qualify or contradict, took place when the Pharaohs reigned. Now no Pharaoh has sat upon the throne of Egypt for near two thousand years, for the last was a Grecian woman whom the Romans conquered and drove to death. And ...
— She and Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... for the definite teaching of absolute Oneness of Creator and Creation—Cause and Effect—and that nothing which may contradict or be in opposition to the above principles be admitted to the 'Higher ...
— The Hidden Power - And Other Papers upon Mental Science • Thomas Troward
... are truth itself, sir,' replied Ralph. 'You speak truth now, at all events, and I'll not contradict you. The favour is, at least, as unwelcome as it is unexpected. ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... philosophy is theoretically free to upset as much of popular belief of the persistent kind as it likes. Nor can science find fault with it so long as it keeps to its own sphere, and does not directly contradict any truth which science, by the methods proper to it, is able to establish. Thus, for example, if philosophy finds that there is nothing real independently of mind, science will be satisfied so long as it finds a meaning for its assumed entities, such as space, external ...
— Illusions - A Psychological Study • James Sully
... representative of their house had visited foreign parts, or served his country in the army, before he settled for life at Waverley-Honour, and she appealed for the truth of her assertion to the genealogical pedigree, an authority which Sir Everard was never known to contradict. In short, a proposal was made to Mr. Richard Waverley, that his son should travel, under the direction of his present tutor Mr. Pembroke, with a suitable allowance from the Baronet's liberality. The father himself ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... seven. Night comes. There are dreams and some uneasy sleep. Then a love scene.... The clock strikes seven in the morning. Everybody wakes up, and there is a merry discussion. We hear a double fugue in which the theme of the man and the theme of the woman contradict each other with exasperating and ludicrous obstinacy; and the man has the last word. Finally there is the apotheosis of ...
— Musicians of To-Day • Romain Rolland
... On the lee side, however, the boat found a sort of temporary harbour. Here they landed, but not altogether without mishap. Isaac Dorkin, who had made himself conspicuous, during the row out, for caustic remarks, and a tendency to contradict, slipped his foot on a piece of seaweed and fell into the water, to the great glee of ...
— The Story of the Rock • R.M. Ballantyne
... can be no doubt as to the efficacy of the method. It was not coddling—Mr. Dilke was too shrewd for that—and if at a certain stage it seemed as though excessive stimulus had been given, maturity went far to contradict ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke V1 • Stephen Gwynn
... beyond the reach of human skill, that we meet with but few and imperfect notices of the St. Vitus' dance in the second half of the fifteenth century. The highly colored descriptions of the sixteenth century contradict the notion that this mental plague had in any degree diminished in its severity, and not a single fact is to be found which supports the opinion that any one of the essential symptoms of the disease, not even excepting the tympany, had disappeared, or ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... they make, invent, and find, to hide and preserve their sweet sins with themselves and their souls, in the delights of them, to their own eternal perdition? Hence they endeavour to stifle conscience, to choke convictions, to forget God, to make themselves atheists, to contradict preachers that are plain and honest, and to heap to themselves such of them only as are like themselves, that speak unto them smooth things, and prophesy deceits; yea, they say themselves to such preachers, 'Get you out of the way; turn aside out of the path; cause ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... increase the pain, say in a swelled limb, and yet we should persevere in the treatment. This may seem to contradict our dictum that we should be guided by the feelings of the patient. The reason is that if some dead matter has lodged deep down in the limb, it will have to be brought up to the surface ere the diseased state can be remedied. If strong fomentation is used ...
— Papers on Health • John Kirk
... pleased, inasmuch as there was no God. What he did was to point so irresistibly in the right direction, that a reader of any intelligence should be in no doubt as to the road he ought to take, and then to contradict himself so flatly as to reassure those who would be shocked by a truth for which they were not yet ready. If I am right in the view which I have taken of Buffon's work, it is not easy to see how he could have formed a finer scheme, nor have carried ...
— Evolution, Old & New - Or, the Theories of Buffon, Dr. Erasmus Darwin and Lamarck, - as compared with that of Charles Darwin • Samuel Butler
... placed myself as he desired in the little dock, and a constable standing there obligingly clamped down a rail behind me to keep me there. Then the doctor, who, it turned out, was some official in the town, gave a garbled version of the whole affair, which I found it useless to try and contradict, as I was told to hold my tongue. The inspector's version of the affair was even more insulting than the doctor's. He did not hesitate to express his opinion that I was a very suspicious person, probably a lunatic at large. ...
— A Queen's Error • Henry Curties
... said she decisively, and the Captain did not feel himself in a position to contradict her. He contented himself with taking her hand again and pressing it softly. Certainly she made ...
— Captain Dieppe • Anthony Hope
... contradict Skim, though he couldn't even write his own name legibly. His monthly reports were actually works of art. "Seenyor Inspekter of constabulery," he would write, "i hav the honner to indite the following report. ...
— The Great White Tribe in Filipinia • Paul T. Gilbert
... false ideas, automatically know that fasting is nature's method of healing. Contrary to popular understanding, digestion, assimilation, and elimination require the expenditure of considerable energy. This fact may contradict the reader's experience because everyone has become tired when they have worked a long time without eating, and then experienced the lift after eating. But an ill body cannot digest efficiently so instead of providing energy extracted from foods, the ...
— How and When to Be Your Own Doctor • Dr. Isabelle A. Moser with Steve Solomon
... such thing as an impure gentleman. The two words contradict each other. A gentleman must be pure. He need not have fine clothes. He may have had few advantages. But he must be pure and clean. And, if he have all outward grace and gift and be inwardly unclean, though ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... certainly singular enough: he was wrapped in a large dressing-gown of flowered chintz; his head was adorned by a nightcap drawn up at the top and surmounted by a muslin frill. His appearance did not contradict his complaint of illness; he was barely four feet six in height, his limbs were bony, his face sharp, thin, and pale. Thus attired, coughing incessantly, dragging his feet as if he had no strength to lift them, holding a lighted candle in one ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - DERUES • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... who have been filled with the Holy Ghost from their mother's womb, and on the whole (with imperfections of course) remained God's servant all his life. For this is his own account of himself, which the father does not contradict. "Lo! these many ...
— Sermons Preached at Brighton - Third Series • Frederick W. Robertson
... Honour undervalue my Comedy. I should very unseasonably disoblige all the People of Paris, should I accuse them of having applauded a foolish Thing: as the Public is absolute Judge of such sort of Works, it would be Impertinence in me to contradict it; and even if I should have had the worst Opinion in the World of my Pretentious Young Ladies before they appeared upon the Stage, I must now believe them of some Value, since so many People agree to speak in their behalf. But as great ...
— The Pretentious Young Ladies • Moliere
... Pearlie said timidly, not wishing to contradict the lady, but still anxious to set her right, "it was just this blanket I had him ...
— Sowing Seeds in Danny • Nellie L. McClung
... the Weary Roue is of course bound to contradict as a matter of honour. I may mention that the Weary Roue is a man of the highest virtue and a model husband and father. His pose of evil experience has gained him his sarcastic nickname, but in no way has ...
— Modern marriage and how to bear it • Maud Churton Braby
... public, he has patronized the author, and seen his work in manuscript; if a criminal of eminence be condemned to die, he often predicted his fate, and endeavoured his reformation; and who that lives at a distance from the scene of action, will dare to contradict a man, who reports from his own eyes and ears, and to whom all persons and ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... but she did not dare to contradict him. Grace would have punished him on the spot by a dose of satire that would have brought him to reason and good nature in a moment; but Mattie ventured only on those laborious sighs which she jerked up from the bottom of ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... as we can know anything, that there is music and supermusic. Rubinstein wrote music; Beethoven wrote supermusic (Mr. Finck may contradict this statement). Bellini wrote operas; Mozart wrote superoperas. Jensen wrote songs; Schubert wrote supersongs. The superiority of Voi che sapete as a vocal melody over Ah! non giunge is not generally contested; neither ...
— The Merry-Go-Round • Carl Van Vechten
... the study and practice of medicine degrading women, he asked if it degraded men. No; it elevated them. They could not contradict him on that point. He declined to believe, without a particle of evidence, that any science could elevate the higher sex and degrade the lower. What evidence we had ran against it. Nurses are not, as a class, ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... to Napoleon's excellences as an administrator, a legislator, a constructor of public works, and a skilful financier, his nephew speaks with much diffuse praise, and few persons, we suppose, will be disposed to contradict him. Whether the Emperor composed his famous code, or borrowed it, is of little importance; but he established it, and made the law equal for every man in France except one. His vast public works and vaster wars were carried on without new loans ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... his hand to anything so unjust. He protested that the public would cry shame, would say John Massingbird had no human right to Verner's Pride, would suspect he had obtained it by fraud, or by some sort of underhand work. Mr. Verner replied that I—Matiss—could contradict that. At ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood
... persons and factions. This division has been one of the outstanding facts of Chinese history since the overthrow of the Manchus ten years ago and it has manifested itself in intermittent civil war. Yet there are two other statements which are equally true, although they flatly contradict each other and the one just made. One statement is that so far as the people of China are concerned there is no real division on geographical lines, but only the common division occurring everywhere between conservatives and progressives. The other is ...
— China, Japan and the U.S.A. - Present-Day Conditions in the Far East and Their Bearing - on the Washington Conference • John Dewey
... them. The dead and wounded were left together until the Germans got round to burying them, when practically all were dead. This was only one of several wholesale executions. The Germans do not seem to contradict the essential facts, but merely put forward the plea that most of the damage was incidental to the fighting which took place between the armed forces. Altogether more than eight hundred people were killed. Six hundred ...
— A Journal From Our Legation in Belgium • Hugh Gibson
... I did not feel disposed to contradict him, though I could make nothing of this sudden and ...
— Uncle Bernac - A Memory of the Empire • Arthur Conan Doyle
... chooses to prophesy and prohibit can tyrannise over the people. If he chooses to say that drinking is always wrong, or that kissing is always wrong, or that wearing buttons is always wrong, people are afraid to contradict him for fear they should be contradicting their own great-grandchild. For their superstition is an inversion of the ancestor-worship of China; and instead of vainly appealing to something that is dead, they appeal to something ...
— What I Saw in America • G. K. Chesterton
... after a progress in Upper Canada in which he was accompanied by his family, made a short tour in the Western districts, the stronghold of British feeling, attended only by one aide-de-camp and a servant, 'so as to contradict the allegation that he required protection.' Everywhere he was received with the utmost cordiality; the few indications of a different feeling, on the part of Orangemen and others, having only the effect of heightening the enthusiasm ...
— Letters and Journals of James, Eighth Earl of Elgin • James, Eighth Earl of Elgin
... know how far that assertion is based upon conclusive observation. But the passage from Brehm's Life of Animals, which is sometimes referred to, can hardly be taken as very conclusive. It occurs in his general description of monkeys; but his more detailed descriptions of separate species either contradict it or do not confirm it. Even as regards the cercopitheques, Brehm is affirmative in saying that they "nearly always live in bands, and very seldom in families" (French edition, p. 59). As to other species, the very numbers of their bands, always containing many ...
— Mutual Aid • P. Kropotkin
... of witchcraft is to flatly contradict the revealed word of God, and the thing itself is a truth to which every nation has in its turn ...
— Captains of Industry - or, Men of Business Who Did Something Besides Making Money • James Parton
... degree, and this, together with great obstinacy and tenacity, gained for him his world-wide reputation. 'Sitting Bull' claimed in his statement to me that he directed and led in the Custer fight; but all the other Indians with whom I have talked contradict it, and said that 'Sitting Bull' fled with his family as soon as the village was attacked by Major Reno's command, and that he was making his way to a place of safety, several miles out in the hills, when overtaken by some of his friends ...
— My Native Land • James Cox
... he loves you so." ("You are right there, mother!" struck in Dick, in a tone of ecstasy.) "Everything has come right, through Sir Henry's intercession and my Richard's goodness." ("Humph!" coughed Dick. "Well, it is not for the like of me to contradict you.") ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... of Chiltern is this, that even if he didn't like the man, and if he were tired of this sort of life, he would go on just the same because he thinks it a fine thing not to give way." This was so true that Phineas did not dare to contradict the statement, and therefore said nothing. "I had some faint hope," continued the Earl, "while Laura could always watch him; because, in his way, he was fond of his sister. But that is all over now. She will have enough to do to ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... objective examination, compare the indications with the statements of the patient, noting especially any discrepancies between his account of his symptoms and the real symptoms of disease; ask questions the reverse of the patient's statements, or take them for granted, and he will often be found to contradict himself; have all dressings and bandages removed; suggest, in the hearing of the patient, some heroic methods of treatment—the actual cautery, or severe surgical operation, for example; finally, chloroform will be found of great use in the ...
— Aids to Forensic Medicine and Toxicology • W. G. Aitchison Robertson
... amuse yourself; you have to let the game amuse you, without turning one trick for the sake of an extra smile; most of the humor comes in anyhow, from knowing more than the other fellow thinks you do. The more a man lies the less you want to contradict him, because if you do he'll know that you know he's lying and that's giving away information, ...
— Affair in Araby • Talbot Mundy
... to controvert your theory or contradict your facts," rejoined Colwyn coldly. "My visit is to bring under your notice a fresh fact in the case which needs investigation. Whether that fact squares with your own theory or not, it is too important to be disregarded or overlooked. That is why I left the moat-house immediately I ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees
... "Do not contradict it, sir," she said, rising from her seat now with her face ablaze with indignation. "I was watching you. I had heard that story, and had heard another story of how the boat of an antagonist of yours at Henley had been crippled before a race, and I watched you from the ...
— The Queen's Cup • G. A. Henty
... some one who spoke to you of me," she continued calmly. "You need not trouble to contradict me. Hadn't you better hurry away before I have the chance to do you any harm? There is one young man I know, of a melodramatic turn of mind, who persists in looking upon me as a sort of siren, calling my victims on to the rocks. ...
— The Survivor • E.Phillips Oppenheim
... profiting by these rumours. Every one thought I had a share in the Brady marriage; though no one could prove it. Every one thought I was well with the widowed Countess; though no one could show that I said so. But there is a way of proving a thing even while you contradict it, and I used to laugh and joke so apropos that all men began to wish me joy of my great fortune, and look up to me as the affianced husband of the greatest heiress in the kingdom. The papers took up the matter; the female friends of Lady Lyndon remonstrated ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... it belonged to the king of Portugal. I answered him that I had believed myself to be on land of his Majesty, but that, not being a cosmographer, and not possessing a commission from his Majesty in regard to it, I did not wish to contradict him or quarrel with him on that subject. I assured him that, on arriving in this land, I was obliged to go into winter-quarters here; and that I had despatched a ship to his Majesty with a relation of what had occurred on the voyage. I added that I had been expecting and still expected ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803 - Volume III, 1569-1576 • E.H. Blair
... not another word against it. Miss Page was under pay in his house, but for the last few weeks no one had undertaken to contradict her. In the interval since her first appearance on the porch, she had exchanged the light dress in which she had danced at the ball, for a darker and more serviceable one, and perhaps this token of her determination ...
— Agatha Webb • Anna Katharine Green
... the youth was chafed. "Pardon me, sir," he answered haughtily, "if I contradict you. No one of the least feeling would have thought of removing such an invalid as Mrs. Heywood is, without using every care her condition required. Have you any orders for me, Captain Headley?" he concluded, in a more respectful manner, for ...
— Hardscrabble - The Fall of Chicago: A Tale of Indian Warfare • John Richardson
... of the lawfulness thereof, by framing a plain and easy method for any person but of indifferent capacity to learn the art, and instruct himself therein, without any other master than my Introduction; by which means, when many understood it, I should have more partners and assistants to contradict all ...
— William Lilly's History of His Life and Times - From the Year 1602 to 1681 • William Lilly
... their hair is plastered to the sides of their faces, and meet bobs of hair at the back of their heads; their waists are as thin as their necks; and they all bear a strong family likeness to one another. The Times assertion is happily, however, so broad that it is easy to traverse and contradict it. George's handsome women are so few, that it is difficult at the moment to say where any of them may be found. I know at least of one amazingly handsome one—the London Barrow Woman in Hone's "Every-Day Book." Some pretty servant girls will be found in the etching of The Sergeant Introducing ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... of envy to my Father, and to godliness; of hatred to me and my people; and that thou mightest destroy others besides (I Chron 21:1). And now, what can this accuser say? Can he excuse himself? Can he contradict our Advocate? He cannot; he knows that he is a Satan, an enemy, and as an adversary has he sown his tares among the wheat, that it might be rooted up; but he shall not have his end; his malice has prevented9 him, and so has the care and grace of our Advocate. ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... deemed it worth while to contradict this wild yarn, and Jethro naturally supposed ...
— The Phantom of the River • Edward S. Ellis
... Koopman told her anxious friends that she had received such assurances from Rhodes that she could not disbelieve him, and that the best thing which they could do would be to contradict all statements on the subject of a raid on the Transvaal that might come to their ears. This occurred on an after-Christmas evening ...
— Cecil Rhodes - Man and Empire-Maker • Princess Catherine Radziwill
... aspect and the law of nature." True knowledge can be obtained only by the use of the senses; there is no other method. "From the senses first has proceeded the knowledge of the true, and the senses cannot be refuted. Shall reason, founded on false sense, be able to contradict [the senses], wholly founded as it is on the senses? And if they are not true, then all reason as well is rendered false." The first principle in nature is asserted by Lucretius to be that "Nothing is ever gotten out of nothing." "A thing never ...
— The Story of Alchemy and the Beginnings of Chemistry • M. M. Pattison Muir
... the law of the Fates, the thread of Destiny, is over all. No; so long as the poets are under the inspiration of the Muses, they speak truth: but once let those Goddesses leave them to their own devices, and they make blunders and contradict themselves. Nor can we blame them: they are but men; how should they know truth, when the divinity whose mouthpieces they were ...
— Works, V3 • Lucian of Samosata
... every drop of blood in her body for him? Over and over again I have heard him offer some criticism on a person or event, and the customary chime of approval would ensue, provoking him to such a degree that he would instantly contradict himself with much bitterness, leaving poor Mrs. M'Kay in much perplexity. Such a shot as this generally reduced her to timid silence. As a rule, he always discouraged any topic at his house which was likely to serve as an occasion for showing his wife's dependence on him. He designedly talked ...
— Mark Rutherford's Deliverance • Mark Rutherford
... inquiry after the author of it (which he suspected would not terminate in his favour) he impudently pretended to have been an eye witness of the fact, and then boldly charged it upon one or another of his school mates, who he knew had neither skill nor spirit enough to contradict his evidence in a satisfactory manner. By this means the bashful innocent was frequently punished instead of the guilty. But as bad boys are seldom able to conceal their faults long from the eye of justice, young Filch was soon detected in his wickedness, and being ...
— Vice in its Proper Shape • Anonymous
... know, but in nine cases out of ten they don't know," declared Owlett. "And if you contradict their lies, they're so savage at being put in the wrong that they'll blazon the lies all the more rather than confess them. That will do, Prindle! You ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... Sally McLean, author of "Cape Cod Folks," claims to have written the dialect poem, "Massa of de Sheep Fold," which the New York Sun pronounces a poetic masterpiece. We dislike to contradict Miss McLean, but candor compels us to say that we have reason to believe that she is not the author of the stanzas in question. According to the best of our recollection, this poem was dashed off in the wine-room of the Gault House, at Louisville, Ky., by Colonel John A. Joyce, ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... spoke in favor of Timoleon. Just as the battle began the gates of the temple of Adranus burst open, and the god himself appeared with brandished spear and perspiring face. So said the awe-struck Adranians, and there was no one to contradict their testimony. ...
— Historic Tales, vol 10 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... real owner, Reuben Moore, preferring to live abroad with his French wife,—gave to her least action an importance which her shy, if not appealing looks, and a certain strained expression most difficult to characterize, vainly attempted to contradict. I could not understand her, and soon gave up the attempt; but my admiration held firm, and by the time the evening was half over I was her obedient slave. I think from what I know of her now that she would have preferred to ...
— The Filigree Ball • Anna Katharine Green
... suchlike, to desist and cease from all preaching, ministration of the Sacraments, or using any way the office of pastours, while they receive de novo, admission from the generall Assembly, under the pain of excommunication to be used against them, wherein if they be found disobedient, or contradict this act in any point, the sentence of excommunication, after due admonition, ...
— The Acts Of The General Assemblies of the Church of Scotland
... Lady Wigton, she declared with tears that it was an "infamous story raised by Miss Molly Kerr, her cousin, in order to prejudice her brother against her, and that it had been so effectual that he had stopped her pension"; and she begged Lady Wigton "when she went to England to contradict it." ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall
... hypocrite and a living lie, through fear of the charge of 'inconsistency,' the accusation of change. 'Speak your opinions of to-day,' says Carlyle, 'in words hard as rocks, and your opinions of to-morrow in words just as hard, even though your opinions of to-morrow may contradict your opinions of to-day.' There is a fund of true wisdom in this beautiful maxim, if men would appreciate it. It would correct a vast deal of error in politics, in religion, in philosophy, in the social relations ...
— Wild Northern Scenes - Sporting Adventures with the Rifle and the Rod • S. H. Hammond
... always attached to study far into the night. The student's "midnight lamp" always claims for itself a certain veneration. But this is vanity. In the first place, it is injurious to contradict Nature by working through the night, which she has ordained for sleep; secondly, the question is not as to the number of hours spent in work and their position in the twenty-four, but as to the quality of the work. With regard to the value of my work, it is of ...
— Pedagogics as a System • Karl Rosenkranz
... contradict me, I'll punch your miserable little head, sir. No, I won't, I'll make Blacksmith do it; his fists are ...
— Blue Jackets - The Log of the Teaser • George Manville Fenn
... contradict you, Mr. Watson," remarked Tom Ruger, as he very carefully readjusted his hat. "Very sorry, Mr. Watson, and I do hope you'll pardon me when I repeat that I will defend ...
— Romance of California Life • John Habberton
... could be permitted on the flanks of the line of retreat; but a compliance with this demand would deprive an army of every means of taking a step in a hostile country; and there is not a campaign in recent wars, or in those of Marlborough and Eugene, which does not contradict this assertion. Was not General Moreau at the gates of Vienna when Fussen, Scharnitz, and all the Tyrol were in possession of the Austrians? Was not Napoleon at Piacenza when Turin, Genoa, and the Col-di-Tenda ...
— The Art of War • Baron Henri de Jomini
... though he bore the name in King Edward's reign. Kneeling before him, he laid the Bible upon their heads or shoulders, and bid them rise up and preach the word of God sincerely. 'This is,' added he, 'so evident a truth, that for the space of fifty years no Protestant durst contradict it.'" ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... that which I have just explained rests neither on systems nor on any hypothesis: it is only the very simple result of the observation of nature; hence I do not fear to advance the view that all that one can imagine, from any motives whatever, to contradict these great verities will always be destroyed by the evidence of the facts ...
— Lamarck, the Founder of Evolution - His Life and Work • Alpheus Spring Packard
... the fight take place in April; the Haldimand MSS. show that it was in September. Marshall is as valuable for early Kentucky history as Haywood for the corresponding periods in Tennessee; but both one and the other write largely from tradition, and can never be followed when they contradict contemporary reports.] Among the former was the head chief, a famous warrior; his death so discouraged the Indians that they straightway returned home with their scalps and plunder, resisting McKee's entreaty that they would first ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Two - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1777-1783 • Theodore Roosevelt
... "devil" needs yet to be learned. Its definition as an individual is too limited and contradictory. When the Scripture is understood, [15] the spiritual signification of its terms will be understood, and will contradict the interpretations that the senses give them; and these terms will be found to ...
— Miscellaneous Writings, 1883-1896 • Mary Baker Eddy
... by SIDNEY COOPER, R.A., is very interesting, as must almost always be the story of the early career of such an ancient mariner as is this well-known animal-painter. There must be a halo of romance about recollections which no one living can or cares to contradict. When these biographical reminiscences come within the memory of middle-aged men, then this said memory doth run somewhat to the contrary of that of the veteran painter who put the cart before the horse, so to speak, in his artistic career, seeing that he commenced with carriages ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., November 29, 1890 • Various
... ventures to state no act whatever done. He wishes, indeed, to asperse the conduct of Lady Edward Fitzgerald; but he well knew that, even were she in this country, she could not be called as a witness to contradict him. See therefore, if there be any one assertion to which credit can be given, except this—that he has sworn and forsworn—that he is a traitor—that he has received five hundred guineas to be an informer, and that his general reputation is, to be ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous
... and may never know, the causes—they cannot even see the absolute necessity for supposing that everything is caused. Scientific people tend to trust their senses and disbelieve their emotions when they contradict them; religious people tend to trust emotion even though sensual experience be against it. On the whole, the religious are the more open-minded. Their assumption that the senses may mislead is less arrogant than the assumption that through them alone can we ...
— Art • Clive Bell
... to be. The French have no word for home in their language, but they have homes in fact, which is much more worth while. We Americans have the lovely word "Home," but we haven't as a nation the article in fact. Americans have houses, but in truth we are a homeless race. Only the unenlightened will contradict me for saying that, and for the opinion of the unenlightened ...
— At Home with the Jardines • Lilian Bell
... The young man did not wish to contradict him, but he felt that he knew the ways and hours of the Head of the Firm very much better than a mere stranger arriving on foot just as the Bank was due to close for the day. He wondered who Coryndon was, and what his very pressing business could possibly be, but even ...
— The Pointing Man - A Burmese Mystery • Marjorie Douie
... delightful uncertainties that surround the military engineer when called upon to design a modern fort. The proving ground shows him that radical improvements are necessary, but actual service conditions are almost entirely wanting, and such as we have contradict many of the proving ground theories. Thus we have the records of shot going through 25 inches of iron or 25 feet of concrete on the proving ground; but such actual service tests as the bombardment of Fort Sumter, Fort Fisher, and the forts at ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 841, February 13, 1892 • Various
... For I was very well acquainted with Penn, and did, some years after, talk with him upon that pamphlet, and the impudence of the author, who spoke so many things in praise of the soil and climate, which Penn himself did absolutely contradict. For he did assure me that his country wanted the shelter of mountains, which left it open to the northern winds from Hudson's Bay and the Frozen Sea, which destroyed all plantations of trees, and was even pernicious to all common vegetables. But, indeed, New York, Virginia, ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... he had made a mistake; and I left the solution in my mother's hands, with the understanding that the definite promise should be made to her, and I knew too that this would hold him as completely as if made to a public authority. Nothing could bring her to contradict him openly, and in all my life I never saw her make a sign of disrespect for his mastery in domestic things, but I knew that once this promise was made to her I could count on his ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I • Stillman, William James
... serve two masters. If he is in entire sympathy with more than one individual he must sometimes not only contradict himself, as he would rightly do for one or the other alone, but he must also contradict one in favour of the other in case they disagree. In such a case he is no longer in entire sympathy with both, and either his love or his friendship must be imperfect." Claudius looked at the Countess ...
— Doctor Claudius, A True Story • F. Marion Crawford
... these sacred accounts of ours contradict each other. In that part of the first or Elohistic account given in the first chapter of Genesis the WATERS bring forth fishes, marine animals, and birds (Genesis, i, 20); but in that part of the second or Jehovistic account given in the second chapter ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... she said, "but I must contradict this. Becket was killed at five o'clock on a dreary December afternoon of 1170. Four years later, the cathedral was entirely destroyed by fire. Therefore, it is not possible that they can show visitors the exact spot where the ...
— John and Betty's History Visit • Margaret Williamson
... ambassador and I shall not continue much longer together. He is really growing past endurance. He transacts his business in so ridiculous a manner, that I am often compelled to contradict him, and do things my own way; and then, of course, he thinks them very ill done. He complained of me lately on this account at court; and the minister gave me a reprimand,—a gentle one it is true, but still a reprimand. In consequence of this, I was about to tender ...
— The Sorrows of Young Werther • J.W. von Goethe
... himself. A third point of rather minor interest is the peculiar character and large proportions taken on by the commerce-destroying and privateering warfare of the French, as their large fleets were disappearing. This, and the great effect produced by it, will appear at first to contradict what has been said as to the general inadequacy of such a warfare when not supported by fleets; but an examination of the conditions, which will be made later on, will show that the contradiction ...
— The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 • A. T. Mahan
... delayed to give me timely notice of your imprisonment, and who made us believe that you had been guilty, of an attempt upon the King's person. The Sacred College took fire at the news; but the French Ambassador being at liberty, to give out what he chose, because nobody, appeared here on your part to contradict him, Mazarin extinguished it, and half the Sacred College thought you were abandoned by the whole kingdom." In short, the Pope was so well disposed to me that he thought of adopting me as his nephew, but he ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre |
