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Signify   Listen
verb
Signify  v. t.  (past & past part. signified; pres. part. signifying)  
1.
To show by a sign; to communicate by any conventional token, as words, gestures, signals, or the like; to announce; to make known; to declare; to express; as, a signified his desire to be present. "I 'll to the king; and signify to him That thus I have resign'd my charge to you." "The government should signify to the Protestants of Ireland that want of silver is not to be remedied."
2.
To mean; to import; to denote; to betoken. "He bade her tell him what it signified." "A tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing." Note: Signify is often used impersonally; as, it signifies nothing, it does not signify, that is, it is of no importance.
Synonyms: To express; manifest; declare; utter; intimate; betoken; denote; imply; mean.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Signify" Quotes from Famous Books



... one hundred and fifty feet above the clearing, and was held by a rope. In this way the platform commanded the excited crowd. Uncle Prudent and Phil Evans stood upright and placed their left hands on their hearts, to signify how deeply they were touched by their reception. Then they extended their right hands towards the zenith, to signify that the greatest of known balloons was about to take possession ...
— Rubur the Conqueror • Jules Verne

... begins to blossom into the rich bloom of luxury. He is greeted with a new respect. He is courted with an eagerness he never knew before. Friends gather about him. His word has weight. His name means money. He is successful. What is the result? Those facts in themselves signify nothing, let us remember, but material capable of being made into one thing or another wholly its opposite. These are the gift of the Father, every one of them, all that profusion of life. But there is a possible effect ...
— The world's great sermons, Volume 8 - Talmage to Knox Little • Grenville Kleiser

... little children, I suppose, understands it; but there's no explaining those sorts of words, if you don't take them at once. There's to be famous doings upon the Downs the first of September; that is, grand, fine. In short, what does it signify talking any longer, Patty, about the matter? Give me my bow; for I must go upon the Downs, ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry

... to signify by the expression 'popular ballads'? Far the most important point is to maintain an antithesis between the poetry of the people and the consciously artistic poetry of the schools. Wilhelm Grimm, the less didactic of the ...
— Ballads of Romance and Chivalry - Popular Ballads of the Olden Times - First Series • Frank Sidgwick

... though accelerated, motion: but its general direction was sometimes checked, and sometimes diverted, by the accidental circumstances of the times, and by the prudence, or possibly by the caprice, of the monarch. His ministers were permitted to signify the intentions of their master in the various language which was best adapted to their respective principles; [7] and he artfully balanced the hopes and fears of his subjects, by publishing in the same year two edicts; the first of which enjoined the solemn observance of Sunday, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon

... Kundry takes from her bosom a golden phial, and, having poured ointment on his feet, dries them, in the custom of the day when she was Herodias, with her long hair; by this repetition of a famous act intending perhaps to signify that she is a sinner and that he has raised her from sin. "You have anointed my feet," speaks Parsifal again; "let now the brother-at-arms of Titurel anoint my head, for on this day he shall hail me as king." Whereupon ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall

... from A.-S. feoh, cattle. "Cattle," says Bosworth, "was the first kind of property; and, by bartering, this word came to signify money in general." So, too, the word penny is from A.-S. penig, Icelandic peningr, cattle. The word penny, as in this country the word dollar, is ...
— Six Centuries of English Poetry - Tennyson to Chaucer • James Baldwin

... Letters; I can less approve of this Explanation than the former; because though many ancient Writers (as we just now said) frequently used the Expression, Uti litteris for Scribere; yet I never observ'd, that any of them ever used it to signify the Forms and Fashions of the Characters. Neither does it make at all for their Opinion, what Caesar says in the First Book of his Commentaries, viz. That there were found in the Helvetian Camp, Tablets, literis Graecis conscriptas; ...
— Franco-Gallia • Francis Hotoman

... found her girl secreted with four others in a loft, to which she had been removed because the brothel-keeper feared an attempt at rescue. She was so carefully guarded and watched that the poor thing dared not signify to the missionary that she was the one who wished to be taken, and all five struggled with equal apparent fierceness against rescue. What was the missionary to do! She lifted her heart in the despairing cry, "Oh, God, if ever ...
— Heathen Slaves and Christian Rulers • Elizabeth Wheeler Andrew and Katharine Caroline Bushnell

... eyes a thief and a robber. But in these days she was not fit to reason much about her fate; she could only wait for the problems to make themselves understood, and for the whole influence of her character and of the preparatory years to shape and signify themselves into a simple chart and unmistakable command. And until the power was given to "see life steadily and see it whole," she busied herself aimlessly with such details as were evidently her duty, and sometimes following the right road and often wandering from it in willful ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett

... through a crevice into it. "This is the place," he said. "Enter." They did so; then the Rabbit ran away. They found in the cabin an old woman, who was very kind, but who, on seeing them, burst into tears. "Ah, my dear grandchildren," [Footnote: The terms grandchildren, grandmother, etc., do not here signify actual relationship, but only friendship between elderly and young people.] she cried, "your death is following you rapidly, for the kewahqu' is on your track, and will soon be here. But run down to the river, where you will find ...
— The Algonquin Legends of New England • Charles Godfrey Leland

... instruments in Daniel iii. 5 and 15, the sixth, generally but wrongly rendered "dulcimer," is thought by many scholars to signify a kind of bag-pipe (see commentaries on Daniel and the theological encyc.). This belief is based on the supposition that the Aramaic sump[o]ny[a] is a loan-word from the Greek, being a mispronunciation of [Greek: sumphonia]. The argument ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various

... hear from Mr. Warricombe a few days ago, he continued. Sidwell was not aware that her father had written, but her pleased smile seemed to signify the contrary. ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing

... account of this change, which he knew did not signify any falling off in hospitable feeling, and which, indeed, he rather appreciated so far as the reduced fare was concerned, reverse his judgment that he had fallen among kind-hearted folk. It had been a ...
— Cleo The Magnificent - The Muse of the Real • Louis Zangwill

... not signify what I know or what I don't. Those preliminary questions I have been obliged to ask as my justification for coming to you on the present occasion. Mr. Kennedy has I ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope

... to public scorn for lack of a word. What word? they asked testily; but even now he could not tell. He had wanted a Scotch word that would signify how many people were in church, and it was on the tip of his tongue, but would come no farther. Puckle was nearly the word, but it did not mean so many people as he meant. The hour had gone by just like winking; he had forgotten all ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein

... other very authoritative critics who say that the ancient Israelite [6] who wrote the passage was not likely to have been capable of such abstract thinking; and that, as a matter of philology, bara is commonly used to signify the "fashioning," or "forming," of that which already exists. Now it appears to me that the scientific investigator is wholly incompetent to say anything at all about the first origin of the material ...
— Mr. Gladstone and Genesis - Essay #5 from "Science and Hebrew Tradition" • Thomas Henry Huxley

... term 'Moa' the natives signify a family of birds, that we know merely from bones and skeletons, a family of real giant-birds compared ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris

... until the 25th of the month, when the danger signals seemed to have disappeared. Whereupon he set out immediately for his post in Boston to be at the head of his forces. He found the city in one of those strange pauses of popular excitement, which might signify the ebb of the tide or only the retreat of the billows. He was not inclined to let the anti-Abolition agitation subside so soon, before it had carried on its flood Abolition principles to wider fields and more abundant ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke

... himself to be an able and skilful commander, as well as a prudent and successful leader in several difficult situations. He is the right person for the position. Question! Those in favor of the amendment of Mr. Scott will signify it by raising ...
— Four Young Explorers - Sight-Seeing in the Tropics • Oliver Optic

... would not. There are providences unto which we would have the blessings entailed; but they are not. And these are providences that smile upon the flesh, such as cast into the lap health, wealth, plenty, ease, friends, and abundance of this world's good: because these, as Manasseh's name doth signify, have in them an aptness to make us forget our toil, our low estate, and from whence we were; but the great blessing is ...
— The Riches of Bunyan • Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin

... it signify, my dear, whether he understands it or not?" said Mrs. Armadale. "What we have to do, is what the Lord tells us to do. That is ...
— Nobody • Susan Warner

... that, Perseverance is taken in three ways. First, to signify a habit of the mind whereby a man stands steadfastly, lest he be moved by the assault of sadness from what is virtuous. And thus perseverance is to sadness as continence is to concupiscence and pleasure, as the Philosopher says (Ethic. vii, 7). Secondly, perseverance may be called ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I-II (Pars Prima Secundae) - From the Complete American Edition • Saint Thomas Aquinas

... called him a "nut", a "poor cheese"; they told him that he was "cuckoo", that his "trolley was twisted"; they made whirling motions with their hands to indicate that he had "wheels in his head", they made flapping motions over him to signify that there were "bats in his belfry". So Jimmie subsided, and let them talk their own talk—imploring one another to "have a heart", or to "get wise", or to "make it snappy", or to "cut out the rough stuff". And he would sit and listen while they sang with zest a song telling ...
— Jimmie Higgins • Upton Sinclair

... you like to come and live here as my servant? You are not fit for such a place, I know—at all events, not at present; and I should not put you with the other servants, and upstairs you could do nothing. However that does not signify. The thing is this. If you would like to come and live with me you must stay here now, and never go back to those places where you have lived, and try if possible ...
— Fan • Henry Harford

... them to the new succession, and when the last of the ejected bishops had withdrawn all claim on their obedience, many moderate Nonjurors were once more seen in church. They agreed that the offence of the State prayers should be no longer an insuperable bar.[108] They could at all events sufficiently signify their objection to the obnoxious words by declining to say Amen, or by rising from their knees, or by various other more or less demonstrative signs of disapprobation. Some indeed of the Nonjurors, among whom Bishop Frampton was prominent, ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton

... amount of ice which good judges declared them to cut was but small. They would "stick up" an occasional wayfarer for his "cush," and they carried "canisters" and sometimes fired them off, but these things do not signify the cutting of ice. In matters political there were only four gangs which counted, the East Side, the Groome Street, the Three Points and the Table Hill. Greatest of these, by virtue of their numbers, were the East ...
— The Prince and Betty - (American edition) • P. G. Wodehouse

... a more transparent narrative than this. The Iroquois tradition is very similar. In it appear twin brothers, [136] born of a virgin mother, daughter of the Moon, who died in giving them life. Their names, Ioskeha and Tawiskara, signify in the Oneida dialect the White One and the Dark One. Under the influence of Christian ideas the contest between the brothers has been made to assume a moral character, like the strife between Ormuzd and Ahriman. But no such intention ...
— Myths and Myth-Makers - Old Tales and Superstitions Interpreted by Comparative Mythology • John Fiske

... his mother and sisters, and perform glorious deeds, such as would make his name be remembered for ever. Then it would be seen what he was worth; in the meantime he lived a dull life, with nothing to do, and he must have some fun. It did not signify if he was not particular about little things, they were women's affairs, and all very well for Rose, but when some really important matter came, that would be his time ...
— The Pigeon Pie • Charlotte M. Yonge

... stands, and there a crowd Of worshippers with love-lit eyes appear, Like stars down-gazing through a fleecy cloud, Dimly discerned as morning draweth near Spreading a radiant pall upon night's bier. The blessed thing the Sign doth signify They partly know, ...
— A Christmas Faggot • Alfred Gurney

... effort; nothing could escape his penetrating eye; it detected those faint vanishing traces of fraud, which were invisible to all other eyes. If there be genius in advocacy, Sir William Follett was undoubtedly a man of genius; and genius may perhaps be taken to signify great natural powers, accidentally directed—or, a disposition of nature, by which any one is qualified for some peculiar employment. What intellectual qualifications and resources are not requisite to constitute a first-rate advocate? If the Duke of Wellington has a genius for military ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various

... explained that her reason for not doing so was the necessity that she should have assistance and advice at this period of her trouble. She did not say that she misdoubted the wisdom of her son's counsels; but it appeared to him that she intended to signify to him that she did so, and he answered her in words that were sore and almost bitter. "I am sorry," he said, "that you and I cannot agree about a matter that is of such vital concern to both of us; but as it is so, we can only act as each thinks ...
— Orley Farm • Anthony Trollope

... looked with annoyance across the stretch of lawn to the house. "I think I would better go to see where Arnold is," she said. Her tone seemed to signify more to the man than her colorless words. He frowned and said, "Oh, ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield

... with a clean heart and be sorrowful, for so it is decreed. Only in this matter do not dare to be double-minded, lest the last evil overtake you and her, and your children and hers. Now I have done, and, my lord Marcus, be so good as to signify your pleasure to your slave, Pearl-Maiden, and your servant, Nehushta ...
— Pearl-Maiden • H. Rider Haggard

... all power must have depended on the consent of those subject to it, how could any one exercise a tyranny against the will of the majority, as well as against the authority of the Apostles? And [Greek: ta prostassomena upo tou plaethous] must signify, I think, "the bidding of the society at large." Compare for this use of [Greek: plaethos], Ignatius, Smyrna. 8; Trallian. 1, 8. A conjecture might be offered as to the solution of this difficulty, but it would lead mo ...
— The Christian Life - Its Course, Its Hindrances, And Its Helps • Thomas Arnold

... necessity a spiritual content. There cannot be any poetry whatsoever without a spiritual meaning of some sort: good or bad, moral, immoral, or non-moral, obscure or lucid, noble or ignoble, slight or weighty—such distinctions do not signify. In poetry we are not met by questions whether the poet intended to convey a meaning when he made it. Quite meaningless poetry (as some critics would fain find melody quite meaningless, or a statue meaningless, or a Venetian picture meaningless) is a contradiction in terms. ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds

... that the Hunter was correct. He had been trying to elude the charge of the beast, only, fear and that desperate desire had occupied his mind at that moment. But what did that signify? ...
— Star Hunter • Andre Alice Norton

... should pass without an emperor; that the citizens' representatives present should nominate Yuan Shih-kai as the Great Emperor of the Chinese Empire; and that if they are in favour of the proposal, they should signify their assent by standing up. This done, the text of the proposed letter of nomination from the citizens should be handed to the representatives for their signatures; after which you should again address them to the effect that in all matters ...
— The Fight For The Republic In China • B.L. Putnam Weale

... imperturbable Thornton, "it does not signify; he won't be affronted at my lagging a little. However," (and here he caught my eye, which was assuming a sternness that perhaps little pleased him,) "however, as it gets late, and my mare is none of the best, ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... commencement of this war. I have never had leave of absence one hour, nor paid the least attention to my own private affairs. Your State is invaded—your all is at stake. What has been done will signify nothing, unless we persevere to the end. I left a family in distress, and everything dear and valuable, to come and afford you all the assistance in my power, to promote the service. It must throw a damp upon the spirits of the army, to find ...
— The Life of Francis Marion • William Gilmore Simms

... pretend to guide my actions by the rules laid down in the Sermon on the Mount. But it's certainly surprising to hear you who profess to be a follower of Christ—advocating selfishness. Or, rather, it would be surprising if it were not that the name of "Christian" has ceased to signify one who follows Christ, and has come to mean only liar ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell

... blood; and I shall find them, too, and having chastised them once, will chastise them again—those lieutenants of yours, those judicial supporters of the ambuscade, those soilers of the ermine,—Baroche, Suin, Royer, Mongis, Rouher, and Troplong, deserters from the law,—all those names which signify nothing more than the utmost ...
— Napoleon the Little • Victor Hugo

... on my nerves was coming, and I had no power to resist its influence. I could feel the tears rolling down my cheeks and falling on my hands without caring to wipe them away; the more so as there was no one to see them. What did my tears signify to any one? I was cold, and hungry, and miserable. How lonely I was! how poor! with neither a home nor a friend in the world!—a mere castaway upon the ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton

... objects, with which we are utterly unacquainted; and if we please to call these POWER or EFFICACY, it will be of little consequence to the world. But when, instead of meaning these unknown qualities, we make the terms of power and efficacy signify something, of which we have a clear idea, and which is incompatible with those objects, to which we apply it, obscurity and error begin then to take place, and we are led astray by a false philosophy. This is the ...
— A Treatise of Human Nature • David Hume

... signify to me whom my stepdaughter marries?" asked Philip, coolly. "Of course I wish her well; but I will not have the responsibility of controlling her choice. If this young man suits her, ...
— Birds of Prey • M. E. Braddon

... office of Praetorian Prefect. We learn that he had great herds of horses, bred in the Bruttian forests, and that Theodoric was indebted to him for the mounting of troops of cavalry. He and his ancestry would signify little now-a-days but for the life-work of his greater son—Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator, statesman, historian, monk. Senator was not a title, but a personal name; the name our Cassiodorus always used when speaking of himself. But history calls him otherwise, ...
— By the Ionian Sea - Notes of a Ramble in Southern Italy • George Gissing

... family ghosts are varied and distinct, and consequently there are many and varying forms of the banshee. To a member of our clan, a single wail signifies the advent of the banshee, which, when materialised, is not beautiful to look upon. The banshee does not necessarily signify its advent by one wail—that of a clan allied to us wails three times. Another banshee does not wail at all, but moans, and yet another heralds its approach with music. When materialised, to quote only a few instances, one banshee ...
— Byways of Ghost-Land • Elliott O'Donnell

... ombrements et la couronne jaune!" Translated as literally as such doubtful language and construction can be, this signifies: "A count's coronet, the escutcheon with two bends sinister and two stars, bearing the letters B. P., which signify Buonaparte, the field of the arms red, the bends and stars blue, the letters and coronet yellow!" In heraldic parlance this would be: Gules, two bends sinister between two estoiles azure charged with B. P. for Buona Parte, or; surmounted by a count's coronet ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. I. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane

... time of Edward Lhwyd, as shown by the figure of it in his sketch. (See woodcut, No. 15.) Sibbald prints it as a K, a letter without any attachable meaning. Lhwyd read it as an F (followed apparently by a linear point or stop), and held it to signify—what F so often does signify in the common established formula of these old inscriptions—F(ILIVS). The upright limb of this F appears still well cut and distinct; but the stone is much hollowed out and destroyed immediately to the right, where the two cross bars of the letter should ...
— Archaeological Essays, Vol. 1 • James Y. Simpson

... word barditus is of Gallic origin, being derived from bardi, "bards;" it being a custom with the Gauls for bards to accompany the army, and celebrate the heroic deeds of their great warriors; so that barditum would thus signify "the fulfilment of the bard's office." Hence it is clear that barditum could not be used correctly here, inasmuch as amongst the Germans not any particular, appointed, body of men, but the whole army chanted forth ...
— The Germany and the Agricola of Tacitus • Tacitus

... scarcely have spoken more foolishly, or asked sillier questions; but what did all that signify when her daughter looked over her shoulder with that ...
— The Sand-Hills of Jutland • Hans Christian Andersen

... her friends, in spite of her own physical debility. One night she had promised to sing at the house of her friend, Mme. Merlin, and was amazed at the refusal of her manager to permit her absence from the theatre on a benefit-night. She said to him: "It does not signify; I sing at the theatre because it is my duty, but afterward I sing at Mme. Merlin's because it is my pleasure." And so after one o'clock in the morning, wearied from the arduous performance of "Semiramide," she appeared at her friend's and sang, supped, ...
— Great Singers, Second Series - Malibran To Titiens • George T. Ferris

... sought. He wrote on a thousand subjects, but never on the subject of Vereker. His special line was to tell truths that other people either "funked," as he said, or overlooked, but he never told the only truth that seemed to me in these days to signify. I met the couple in those literary circles referred to in the papers: I have sufficiently intimated that it was only in such circles we were all constructed to revolve. Gwendolen was more than ever committed to them by the publication ...
— The Figure in the Carpet • Henry James

... rapt devotion. As he rose—his forehead sprinkled with dust, and his eyes sparkling with tears—he opened the volume, and pointed out to me and his people his own handwriting, which he translated to signify that "Mami-de-Yong gave this word of God to Ahmah-de-Bellah, his kinsman." At the reading of the sentence, all the Fullahs shouted, "Glory to Allah and Mahomet his Prophet!" Then, coming forward again ...
— Captain Canot - or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver • Brantz Mayer

... new-laid egg is broken into a glass of water, and the shapes which it assumes foreshadow the fate of the person concerned. Again, seven saucers are placed in a row, filled respectively with water, earth, ashes, keys, a thimble, money, and grass, which things signify travel, death, widowhood, housekeeping, spinsterhood, riches, and farming. A blindfolded person touches one or other of the saucers with a wand and so discovers his or her fate. Again, three broad beans are taken; one is left in its skin, one is ...
— Balder The Beautiful, Vol. I. • Sir James George Frazer

... things, as you know, coming to us, are matter of worldly wealth. And, taken from us by fortune or by force or the fear of losing them, they are matter of adversity and tribulation. For tribulation seemeth generally to signify nothing else but some kind of grief, either pain of the body or heaviness of the mind. Now that the body should not feel what it feeleth, all the wit in the world cannot bring that about. But that the ...
— Dialogue of Comfort Against Tribulation - With Modifications To Obsolete Language By Monica Stevens • Thomas More

... intend to be partakers of the holy Communion shall signify their names to the Curate, at least some time the day before. And if any of those be an open and notorious evil liver, or have done any wrong to his neighbours by word or deed, so that the Congregation be thereby offended; the Curate, having knowledge ...
— The Book of Common Prayer - and The Scottish Liturgy • Church of England

... had the very look of the old houses of his native city with their curved and pierced gables, he would see names that were familiar to him from olden times, which seemed to him to signify something tender and precious, and at the same time included something like reproach, lament, and longing for things lost. And everywhere, while breathing in retarded, meditative draughts the moist sea-air, ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various

... Maanen, on the next day issued a circular calling upon all civil officials to signify their adherence to the principles of the message within 24 hours. Several functionaries, who had taken part in the petition-agitation, were summarily dismissed; and prosecutions against the press were instituted with renewed energy. From this time ...
— History of Holland • George Edmundson

... "What does it signify?" he replied, evasively. "A shock has broken one of the levers of the engine, which struck myself. But your opinion as ...
— Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea • Jules Verne

... the Sioux have no expression to signify, "I thank you," although other Indians have. When they receive a present, they always say, Wash ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)

... nominating parish and township officers; an Act for securing the titles to lands; an Act for the regulation of ferries; an Act to incorporate the legal profession; the word "clergyman" in land grants to signify clergy; felons from other Provinces to be apprehended, and the trade between the United States and the Province to be temporarily provided for, by the suspension of an Act repugnant to the free intercourse ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger

... venture to coin this concise term to signify the direct inheritance of the effects of use and disuse in kind. Having a name for a thing is highly convenient; it facilitates clearness and accuracy in reasoning, and in this particular inquiry it may save some confusion of thought ...
— Are the Effects of Use and Disuse Inherited? - An Examination of the View Held by Spencer and Darwin • William Platt Ball

... kneels and holds up his hands with the palms joined, he represents a captive who proves the completeness of his submission by offering up his hands to be bound by the victor. It is the pictorial representation of the Latin dare manus, to signify submission." Hence it is not probable that either the uplifting of the eyes or the joining of the open hands, under the influence of devotional feelings, are innate or truly expressive actions; and this could hardly have been expected, for it is very doubtful ...
— The Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals • Charles Darwin

... further examination at some future time, let us proceed with our laws about education, for in this manner we may probably throw light upon our present difficulty. 'Let us do as you say.' The ancients used the term nomoi to signify harmonious strains, and perhaps they fancied that there was a connexion between the songs and laws of a country. And we say—Whosoever shall transgress the strains by law established is a transgressor of the laws, and shall be punished by the guardians of the law and by the priests ...
— Laws • Plato

... object to your daughter marrying Sir Pearce Ripley because his father was a boatswain. I tell you I was for many years of inferior rank to a boatswain. I entered the navy as captain's servant. What do you say to that? It does not signify what a man has been, it is what he is should be considered. Now, my dear general, just clap all such nonsense under hatches, and the next time young Ripley asks your daughter to marry him, let her, and be thankful that ...
— The Grateful Indian - And other Stories • W.H.G. Kingston

... with the business at which Armitage had left them; and his immediate affair was with the Servian alone. The fellow continued to mumble his threats; but Armitage had resolved to play the part of an Englishman who understood no German, and he addressed the man sharply in English several times to signify ...
— The Port of Missing Men • Meredith Nicholson

... this I drew a deep breath; and when I turned to seek Ann, with a lighter heart, to the end that she should signify her consent, on a sudden me seemed as though the floor of the chamber rose up beneath my feet, and I was nigh falling, by reason that the fine hangings which hid the Cardinal's chamber from my eyes were ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... cold; what does it signify? How can one feel well with all these worrying thoughts? It is work that I want, Bessie—work that will take me out of myself ...
— Our Bessie • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... not sure that I have designated the different kinds of vertebrae correctly: but I observe that different anatomists follow in this respect different rules, and, as I use the same terms in the comparison of all the skeletons, this, I hope, will not signify. ...
— The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, Vol. I. • Charles Darwin

... taking care of,' she replied. 'I have thought of having them down and dusting the place out, but it would be such a job! and the dust don't signify upon old books. They ain't of much count in this house. ...
— Wilfrid Cumbermede • George MacDonald

... this last night could not rest for the remembrance of Aliena; insomuch that he framed a sweet conceited sonnet to content his humor, which he put in his bosom, being requested by his brother Rosader to go to Aliena and Ganymede, to signify unto them that his wounds were not dangerous. A more happy message could not happen to Saladyne, that taking his forest bill on his neck, he trudgeth in all haste towards the plains where Aliena's flocks did feed, coming just ...
— Rosalynde - or, Euphues' Golden Legacy • Thomas Lodge

... wait for you, on my honor as an old Commissioner-General of Police, you can go to the hotel and question Contenson. Not only will Contenson confirm what I have the honor of stating, but you may see Madame du Val-Noble's waiting-maid, who is to come this morning to signify her mistress' acceptance of my offers, ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac

... inhabitants of this kingdom (see a similar explanation of water in chap. 17:15) as the earth does the inhabitants of the empire, or the ten kingdoms. The living creatures in the sea, therefore, could signify the rulers and princes of the kingdom, as they bear an analagous relation to the people that fishes do to the waters. The statement that the waters of the sea became "as the blood of a dead man" is doubtless intended to signify a much ...
— The Revelation Explained • F. Smith

... upon me. I was supremely indifferent. Life was at an end so far as I was concerned. I had ruined the one chance of real happiness that had ever been held out to me, and if the gentlemen of the courts of Toulouse were pleased to send me unheeded to the scaffold, what should it signify? ...
— Bardelys the Magnificent • Rafael Sabatini

... to bear patiently whatever reproach may be laid upon you, than you do even by suffering and dying for him? The questions you have here agitated are not for this hour and place. What now does it signify whether one be a follower of Paul, of Origen, of Sabellius, or Novatian, when we are each and all so shortly to be called upon to confess our allegiance to neither of these—but to a greater, even Jesus, the master and head of us all! And what has ...
— Aurelian - or, Rome in the Third Century • William Ware

... out!' said Mr. Childers, thrusting his young friend from the room, rather in the prairie manner. 'Tight-Jeff or Slack-Jeff, it don't much signify: it's only tight-rope and slack- rope. You were going to give me a ...
— Hard Times • Charles Dickens*

... what there was for supper, and how many times Dick and Tom had their plates replenished with—never mind what—and—it does not signify. Suffice it to say that for the space of half an hour the wheelwright's wife was exceedingly busy; and when at the end of an hour the trio rose from the table, and Hickathrift filled his pipe, both of his visitors seemed as if they had gone through a process of taming. For though ...
— Dick o' the Fens - A Tale of the Great East Swamp • George Manville Fenn

... hung up the 'phone, his forehead wrinkled into little lines of absorbed concentration. He sat at his desk for fully five minutes almost motionless, trying to figure it out. What did the accident to Dean signify? How was the sudden disappearance of Jane Strong to be accounted for? Had she fled from the scene after Dean was disabled, fearing that her name might be coupled with his in an account of the accident? It did not seem like the sort of thing she would do. The impression ...
— The Apartment Next Door • William Andrew Johnston

... again, in vain; and it was a quarter of an hour before the door was opened by a thin, yellow-faced youth chewing gum, who looked at me without a sign of recognition or a word of greeting. I have learnt by this time that absence of manners in an American is intended to signify not surliness but independence, so I asked to be allowed to enter. He admitted me, and resumed his operations. I listened to the clicking, while the sleet fell faster and the evening began to close in. What messages were they, I wondered, that were passing across the mountains? ...
— Appearances - Being Notes of Travel • Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson

... not without authority that I have thus rendered {kreion mega}. Homer's banquets are never stewed or boiled; it cannot therefore signify a kettle. It was probably a kitchen-table, dresser, or tray, on which the meat was prepared for the spit. Accordingly we find that this very meat was spitted ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer

... named Isabella, was at a good harbour about thirty miles east of Monte Christi. It was chosen because Columbus understood from the natives that it was not far from there to the gold-bearing mountains of Cibao, a name which still seemed to signify Cipango. Quite a neat little town was presently built, with church, marketplace, public granary, and dwelling-houses, the whole encompassed with a stone wall. An exploring party led by Ojeda into the mountains of Cibao found gold dust and pieces of gold ore in the beds of the brooks, and ...
— The Discovery of America Vol. 1 (of 2) - with some account of Ancient America and the Spanish Conquest • John Fiske

... to signify that I understood and would comply with his request; noting, as I did so, the name and the port of registry of the vessel, which were painted on her stern in white letters: ...
— For Treasure Bound • Harry Collingwood

... that they should not be absolutely in the power of lazy, dissipated or worthless husbands. But I cannot see clearly how the possession of the ballot would help women in the reform indicated. If, however, a majority of the women of Ohio should signify by means proving their active interest in the subject that they wanted to acquire the right of suffrage, I don't think ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various

... read it. Then I said to myself, 'What a funny thing! Pipelet is a cobbler by trade, and he informs the passer-by that he is engaged in a commerce d'amitie with Cabrion. What does it signify? There is something concealed, it is clear; but as the sign says inquire within, Mrs. Pipelet will explain it." "But look there," cried Mrs. Seraphin, suddenly, "your husband looks as if he was sick; take care, he ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue

... the eye of Fred Sanders, and he significantly tapped his own forehead to signify that the captain was not exactly right, mentally. And, when he did so, the kind-hearted ...
— Adrift on the Pacific • Edward S. Ellis

... tied a piece of coarse paper, and on each paper was rudely traced the likeness of a crab. This crab, as Captain Cortland already knew, was the sign manual of that arch scoundrel of brown skin, the Datto Hakkut. The crab was meant to signify that, while the datto could move forward, he could also crawl sideways or backward—that he was strategist enough to crawl out of any trap that the soldiers might set ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys in the Philippines - or, Following the Flag against the Moros • H. Irving Hancock

... Ars longa, vita brevis, it is intended to signify, that we cannot in any art arrive at perfection; that in reality all the progress we can make is insignificant; and that, as St. Paul says, we must "not count ourselves to have already attained; but that, forgetting the things that are behind, it becomes us to press forward ...
— Thoughts on Man - His Nature, Productions and Discoveries, Interspersed with - Some Particulars Respecting the Author • William Godwin

... the second, that it is necessary to pray to Hasjelti that the earth may be watered; the third, that the earth must be embraced by the sun in order to have vegetation; the fourth, that pollen is essential in all religious ceremonies. The Etsethle signify doubling the essential things by which names they are known, corn, grain, etc., they are the mystic people who dwell in canyon sides unseen. After the song the invalid with meal basket in hand passed hurriedly down the line of gods and sprinkled each one with ...
— Ceremonial of Hasjelti Dailjis and Mythical Sand Painting of the - Navajo Indians • James Stevenson

... hearken, boy, when thy father calls thee?" Whereupon Ruediger followed him in much displeasure, and we saw from a distance how the old lord seemed to threaten his son, and spat out before him; but knew not what this might signify: we were to learn it soon enough, though, more's the pity! Soon after the two Lepels of Gnitze came from the Damerow; and the noblemen saluted one other on the green sward close beside us, but without looking on us. And I heard the Lepels ...
— The Amber Witch • Wilhelm Meinhold

... exercised these twenty years, to suffer and to bear evil reports and lies, and have not been much grieved thereat, and have borne all things quietly; yet where untrue reports and lies turn to the hindrance of God's truth, they be in no ways to be tolerated and suffered. Wherefore these be to signify to the world that it was not I that did set up the mass at Canterbury, but a false, flattering, lying, and dissembling monk, which caused the mass to be set up there without my advice and counsel: and as for offering myself to say mass before the Queen's Highness, or in any other ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude

... protested Berg, his eyes twinkling, "McChesney's necktie and socks and handkerchief may form one lovely, blissful color scheme, but that doesn't signify that his advertising schemes are not just as carefully and ...
— Personality Plus - Some Experiences of Emma McChesney and Her Son, Jock • Edna Ferber

... which he has honoured with so much attention in his Journey. He is, however, mistaken in thinking that the Celtick name, Auchinleck, has no relation to the natural appearance of it. I believe every Celtick name of a place will be found very descriptive. Auchinleck does not signify a stony field, as he has said, but a field of flag stones; and this place has a number of rocks, which abound in strata of that kind. The 'sullen dignity of the old castle,' as he has forcibly expressed it, delighted ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell

... shouted Peter; and the mahout winced again as he drew his ankus from where he had tucked it in the folds of his sarong, as if to signify that he was ready to perform any duties his ...
— Trapped by Malays - A Tale of Bayonet and Kris • George Manville Fenn

... with small-pox. They seemed to wish to know where we were going, and when I pointed west, and by shaking my fingers intimated a long way, many of them pulled their beards and pointed to us, and the old man gave my beard a slight pull and pointed west; this I took to signify that they were aware that other white people like us lived in that direction. The conference ended, and they departed over the hills on the east side of the pass, but it was two hours ...
— Australia Twice Traversed, The Romance of Exploration • Ernest Giles

... two or three of the more highly-coloured hyperboles, at which the Golden Friars of those days sniffed and tittered. They don't signify now; there is no contemporary left to laugh or whisper. And if there be not much that is true in the letter of that inscription, it at least perpetuates something that is true—that wonderful glorificaion of partisanship, the affection of an ...
— J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 3 • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

... really signify, unless that Voltaire feels it may be thought extraordinary that he should dedicate his work to a woman who possesses but a small share of the public esteem, and that the sentiment of gratitude must plead his excuse? Why should he ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre

... to," and Seth gave his head a flirt in the quarter where Eben was anxiously gripping his bugle, as if in momentary expectation of getting a signal from the patrol leader to blow the call that would signify a halt. ...
— Boy Scouts on a Long Hike - Or, To the Rescue in the Black Water Swamps • Archibald Lee Fletcher

... therefore set a restraint upon these vanities and keep you mindful of your dignity, and prevent that you be known for a gallant among married and unmarried women. But should similar facts recur, we shall be compelled to signify that they have happened against our will and to our sorrow, and our censure must be attended by your shame. We have always loved you, and we have held you worthy of our favour as a man of upright and honest nature. Act therefore ...
— The Life of Cesare Borgia • Raphael Sabatini

... her thinking, and knelt down and prayed for light. It is of all prayers the most sincere, but she was not answered—at least not then. The next Sunday she went again to mass, and she had half a mind to signify her wish to confess, but what could she confess? She was burdened with no sins, and in confession she could not fully explain her case. She determined she would write to the priest and ask him to grant her ...
— More Pages from a Journal • Mark Rutherford

... Congressman of the district, in behalf of Ulysses, although the two men were on opposite political sides and had quarreled bitterly: "If you have no other person in view and feel willing to consent to the appointment of Ulysses, you will please signify that consent to ...
— Boys' Book of Famous Soldiers • J. Walker McSpadden

... B. had "staked her existence" that night that she had heard the area gate "go." When I consider the extremely free and unconstrained manner in which I was received, poker and all, by that assembly, my only surprise is that they did not signify their arrivals by double knocks at ...
— Successful Recitations • Various

... shaggy and spurred. He kept raising his feet as gingerly as if he were walking on eggs, and not for all the world would he have looked on either side of him, still less upon the gipsy minstrels behind his back; only when he came in front of the door of any burgher or town councillor he would signify, by raising his stick, that they were to walk more slowly, while the ...
— A Hungarian Nabob • Maurus Jokai

... scorch'd my finger, but did spare The burning of my heart; To signify in love my share ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick

... borne with you as a miss, because you've not been upsetting; but still, when I've lived with him for all those years without anything of the kind, it has set me hard sometimes. As married to him, I wouldn't put up with you; so I tell you fairly. But that don't signify. It ain't you as signifies or me as signifies. It's only him. You have got to bring yourself to think of that. What's the meaning of your duty to your neighbour, and doing unto others, and all the rest of it? You ain't got to think ...
— An Old Man's Love • Anthony Trollope

... words precisely as they mean—"This bread is essentially, by a real presence, my body." The forcing of Scripture to meet one's own opinions cannot be tolerated. A clear text proving that the infinitive "to be" is equivalent to "signify" would be needed; and, even though this might be proven in a few instances, it would not suffice. It would still have to be indisputably shown true in the place in question. This can never be done. Now, the proposition being impossible, we must surrender to the Word ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. II - Epiphany, Easter and Pentecost • Martin Luther

... Tertullian's frightful accusations in de pudic. (10) and de ieiun. (fin) against the "Psychici", i.e., the Catholic Christians. He says that with them the saying had really come to signify "peccando promeremur," by which, however, he does not mean ...
— History of Dogma, Volume 2 (of 7) • Adolph Harnack

... of the road spread their arms to signify their willingness to be searched. Mortlake groaned. It was evident that neither of the tatterdermalions had the papers. But what had become of them? In his distress and chagrin, ...
— The Girl Aviators' Sky Cruise • Margaret Burnham

... the bishop; and he drew a cross under these four letters, which signify ad majorem Dei gloriam, "to the greater glory of God;" and thus he continued: "It is our pleasure that the order brought to M. de Baisemeaux de Montlezun, governor, for the king, of the castle of ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... known him almost since we were infants, and of course we take an interest in his welfare. There has never been anything more than that. Arabella is nothing more to him than I am. Once, indeed—; but, however—; that does not signify. It would be nothing to us, if he really liked Dorothy Stanbury. But as far as we can see,—and we do see a good deal of him,—there is no such feeling on his part. Of course we haven't asked. We should not think of such a thing. Mr. Gibson may do just as he likes ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope

... feasted themselves with it, and ate it all up together. Hence, also, they carry in procession an olive branch bound about with wool (such as they then made use of in their supplications), which they call Eiresione, crowned with all sorts of fruits, to signify that scarcity and barrenness was ceased, singing in ...
— The Boys' and Girls' Plutarch - Being Parts of The "Lives" of Plutarch • Plutarch

... Christian scholars began the investigations, formulated the principles, collected the materials and reared the already splendid fabric of the science of Comparative Religion, because the spirit of Christ which was in them did signify this. Jesus bade his disciples search, inquire, discern and compare. Paul, the greatest of the apostolic Christian college, taught: "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." In our day one of Christ's loving ...
— The Religions of Japan - From the Dawn of History to the Era of Meiji • William Elliot Griffis

... you—and mayn't I then?" She waited, however, for no response to signify to her servant "Let him come," and her companion could but exhale a groan of reluctant accommodation as if he wondered at the point she made of it. It enlightened him indeed perhaps a little that she went ...
— The Outcry • Henry James

... "that you will at least signify your consent that I may return to beg my bread in England, and to die amongst my own children." In terms as strong and moving he besought the mediation of the Duke of York. But these appeals, which might have touched ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik

... followers give due credit to other observers, but as the Freudian mechanisms have opened up so many new fields for investigation, we naturally give most of our time to this work. That does not at all signify that we ignore everything else, as some believe. Freud himself continually urges that the psychoanalytic problems should be taken up by observers in other fields than medicine and I was, therefore, extremely pleased to hear Prof. Hall's formulations of anger. I do not believe, ...
— The Journal of Abnormal Psychology - Volume 10

... have in five years coined ten thousand pounds, let them give public notice that they will proceed no further, but shut up their mint, and dismiss their workmen; unless the real, universal, unsolicited, declaration of the nobility and gentry of the kingdom shall signify a desire that they shall go on for a ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift

... as there's only monkeys and jaguars, and sich like to see me, it don't much signify; but my moustaches is gittin' mighty long, for I've been two ...
— Martin Rattler • R.M. Ballantyne

... mean that they are passionless, but quite The contrary; but then 't is in the head; Yet as the consequences are as bright As if they acted with the heart instead, What after all can signify the site Of ladies' lucubrations? So they lead In safety to the place for which you start, What matters if the road be head ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron

... at the bully. He even half thrust out a hand, as though to signify that he was ready to bridge the chasm that had always existed between them, if the other would come the rest of the way to ...
— Fred Fenton on the Track - or, The Athletes of Riverport School • Allen Chapman

... dethronement, no forces can long sustain them. The age of Queen Mary was the period of the most unchecked absolutism in England. Mary was apparently a powerless woman when Lady Jane Grey was proclaimed queen by the party of Northumberland, and still she had but to signify her intentions to claim her rights, and the nation was prostrate at her feet. The Protestant party dreaded her accession; but loyalty was a stronger principle than even Protestantism, and she was soon firmly established in the ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord

... Galleries belonged to privileged houses, which paid for the right of exposing women dressed like princesses under such and such an arch, or in the corresponding space of garden; but the Wooden Galleries were the common ground of women of the streets. This was the Palais, a word which used to signify the temple of prostitution. A woman might come and go, taking away her prey whithersoever seemed good to her. So great was the crowd attracted thither at night by the women, that it was impossible to move except at a slow pace, as in a procession or at a masked ball. ...
— A Distinguished Provincial at Paris • Honore de Balzac

... help is needed not so much in order to explain the music as to supplement its shortcomings. But in the earlier stages of musical training in this higher sense, purely musical observation (not so much technical as esthetic) comes first, since without this all our rhapsodies upon the greater works signify nothing. ...
— The Masters and their Music - A series of illustrative programs with biographical, - esthetical, and critical annotations • W. S. B. Mathews

... compelled you to an act of barbarous cruelty, you regretted the necessity, and we would have dropped the subject; but you have chosen to indulge in statements which I feel compelled to notice, at least so far as to signify my dissent, and not allow silence in regard to them to be construed ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan

... of La Vendee kneeling on the coffin of her good master, the Marquis de Civrac, cried out: "O my God, repay to him all the good he has done to us!" Does not this fervent cry of grateful affection signify: "My God, some rays are perchance wanting in the crown of our benefactor; supply them, we beseech Thee, in consideration of our prayer and all he has done for us?" and this is precisely ...
— Purgatory • Mary Anne Madden Sadlier

... is considered by many careful investigators—so also by Richard Wagner, who founded his famous music-drama on it—to have been a Nature myth, upon which real events became engrafted. From this point of view, the earliest meaning of Siegfried's victory over the Dragon would signify the triumph of the God of Light over the monster of the chaotic aboriginal Night. It would be, on German ground, the overthrow of Python by Apollon. In this connection it is to be pointed out that Sigurd appears in the "Edda" ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 5 of 8 • Various

... clarion call to guard our personal and democratic liberties against the attacks of State absolutism." The idea of guarding "democratic liberties" against democracy itself is, of course, mere nonsense—one of those point-blank contradictions in terms which, though full of sound and fury, signify nothing. It is, however, unfortunately, typical of much of the loose thinking and vague talking indulged in by the leaders of those pestilent anti-patriotic unions and fellowships which infest and harass the country at the present moment. The idea of guarding "personal liberties" against ...
— Freedom In Service - Six Essays on Matters Concerning Britain's Safety and Good Government • Fossey John Cobb Hearnshaw

... Eustace Hignett laughed mirthlessly. "Oh, nothing. Nothing much. Nothing to signify. Only my heart's broken." He eyed with considerable malignity the bottle of water in the rack above his head, a harmless object provided by the White Star Company for clients who might desire to clean their teeth ...
— Three Men and a Maid • P. G. Wodehouse

... your publications—they are plain and explicit and need no comment. It is my duty, and I shall do it with regret, to transmit to the king true copies of your proceedings: and that his majesty may have an opportunity to signify his pleasure thereon before you meet again, I think it necessary to prorogue this general court immediately, to the usual time ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... Hacket of Lichfield, 1670; Creggleton of Wells, Lamplugh of York, 1691; Sheldon, 1677; Hoadley of Winton, and Porteus of London. Their croziers (made of gilt metal) were suspended over the tombs of Morley, 1684, and Mews, 1706. The bishop's staff had its crook bent outwards to signify that his jurisdiction extended over his diocese; that of the abbot inwards, as his authority was limited to his house. The crozier of Matthew Wren was of silver {314} with the head gilt. When Bp. Fox's tomb was opened at Winchester some few years since, his staff of oak was found ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 50. Saturday, October 12, 1850 • Various

... used invidiously; and folly in the vocabulary of envy or baseness may signify courage and magnanimity. Hardihood and fool-hardiness are indeed as different as green and yellow, yet will appear the same to the jaundiced eye. Courage multiplies the chances of success by sometimes making ...
— Confessions of an Inquiring Spirit etc. • by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... cannot signify. Tell her we shall not half enjoy the evening unless she comes down." The officers now arrived in the entrance hall, where my uncle and aunt were standing to welcome their guests. Of course they received them ...
— Ben Burton - Born and Bred at Sea • W. H. G. Kingston

... sail from Brest with an armament to invade Ireland. They forthwith resolved to assist his majesty with their lives and fortunes; they voted a temporary aid of four hundred and twenty thousand pounds, to be levied by monthly assessments, and both houses waited on the king to signify this resolution. But this unanimity did not take place till several lords spiritual as well as temporal had, rather than take the oaths, absented themselves from parliament. The nonjuring prelates were Sancroft, archbishop of Canterbury; ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett

... was being continually fretted by the two mice, to which the man clung, is the course of every man's life, that spendeth and consuming itself hour by hour, day and night, and gradually draweth nigh its severance. The fourfold asps signify the structure of man's body upon four treacherous and unstable elements which, being disordered and disturbed, bring that body to destruction. Furthermore, the fiery cruel dragon betokeneth the maw of hell ...
— Barlaam and Ioasaph • St. John of Damascus

... from Anglo-Saxon, "impian," German, "impfen," to implant, ingraft. The word is now used in a very restricted sense, to signify the ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer

... reproduction, stand, and must stand, at a somewhat differing angle. The physical creation of human life, which, in as far as the male is concerned, consists in a few moments of physical pleasure; to the female must always signify months of pressure and physical endurance, crowned with danger to life. To the male, the giving of life is a laugh; to the female, blood, anguish, and sometimes death. Here we touch one of the few yet important differences between man and woman ...
— Woman and Labour • Olive Schreiner

... justification of a profound and disastrous error. A gap in a man's vocabulary is a hole and tatter in his mind; words he has may indeed be weakly connected or wrongly connected—one may find the whole keyboard jerry-built, for example, in the English-speaking Baboo—but words he has not signify ideas that he has no means of clearly apprehending, they are patches of imperfect mental existence, factors in the total amount of his personal failure ...
— Mankind in the Making • H. G. Wells

... constitutes happiness or misery, and becomes a motive of action. To this he refers our impressions of beauty and deformity, vice and virtue. He has, accordingly, distinctly asserted that the words right and wrong signify nothing more than sweet or sour, pleasant or painful, being only effects upon the mind of the spectator produced by the contemplation of certain conduct,—and this, as we have already seen, resolves itself into the impression of its usefulness. ...
— The Philosophy of the Moral Feelings • John Abercrombie

... 160: Ua o Hilo. Hilo is a very rainy country. The name Hilo seems to be used here as almost a synonym of violent rain. It calls to mind the use of the word Hilo to signify a strong wind: ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson

... is a wonderful scene in Julius Caesar." Again, the word is used sometimes to mark the division of a play, as when we speak of the second scene in the first act of Macbeth. For our purposes, however, in our early reading with children, let us use it to signify only the place ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 10 - The Guide • Charles Herbert Sylvester

... is to be seen in Jacob Behmen's books by him that hath nothing else to do, than to bestow a great deal of time to understand him that was not willing to be easily understood, and to know that his bombasted words do signify nothing more than before was easily known ...
— Coleridge's Literary Remains, Volume 4. • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... is unintelligible, having no similar name in modern geography. From the context, it seems to signify the maritime coast of Tinnevelly and Marwar, or the most southern part of the Carnatic, opposite to Ceylon; and may possibly be ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VII • Robert Kerr

... believed God must be very angry with me; for you often told us, that God would not be mocked; and that Christ said, if we were not converted, we could not go to heaven. Sometimes I thought I was so young it did not signify: and then, again, it seemed to me a great sin to think so; for I knew I was old enough to see what was right and what was wrong; and so God had a just right to be angry when I did wrong. Besides, I could see that my heart was not right; and how could such a heart ...
— The Annals of the Poor • Legh Richmond

... and liberty at home, while abroad the Roman name would have been rendered more glorious, the disgrace of Crassus revenged, and the Empire extended beyond the utmost ambition of our forefathers by the greatest general that ever led the armies of Rome, or, perhaps, of any other nation! What did it signify whether in Asia, and among the barbarians, that general bore the name of King or Dictator? Nothing could be more puerile in you and your friends than to start so much at the proposition of his taking that name in Italy itself, when you had suffered him to enjoy all the power of royalty, ...
— Dialogues of the Dead • Lord Lyttelton

... young, warrior lifted his cap to the school-master with a quiet laugh; and the girl smiled at him and shook a warning finger to remind him he was not to betray them. He smiled back with a deprecating gesture to signify that he could be trusted. He would have liked it better if he could have said more plainly that he too had the same occupation now; and as he gazed after them, lingering along the path side by side, the long-stifled cravings of his heart rose to his unworldly, ...
— The Choir Invisible • James Lane Allen

... cried Hugh, brightening. "You know what I feel, mother; and you don't keep telling me, as Aunt Shaw does (and even Agnes sometimes), that it wont signify much, and that I shall not care, and all that; making out that it is no misfortune hardly, when I know what ...
— The Crofton Boys • Harriet Martineau

... proper to have the firmness to keep to this, don't signify, or whether any female eye, and if any, how many, was really present when the opening of the Luggage came off. Somebody's Luggage is the question at present: Nobody's ...
— Somebody's Luggage • Charles Dickens

... of his degree. The expression Speciali Gratia is so peculiar to the university of Dublin, that when Mr. Swift exhibited his testimonium at Oxford, the members of the English university concluded, that the words Speciali Grata must signify a degree conferred in reward of extraordinary diligence and learning. It is natural to imagine that he did not try to undeceive them; he was entered in Hart-Hall, now Hartford-College, where he resided till he took his degree of master of arts ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753),Vol. V. • Theophilus Cibber

... prisoners, but the others mistaking them, thought they were desirous to have some of them to carry away for their own eating. So they beckoned to them, pointing to the setting of the sun, and then to the rising; which was to signify, that the next morning at sun-rising they would bring some for them; and accordingly the next morning they brought down five women and eleven men, and gave them to the Englishmen to carry with them on their voyage, just as we would bring so many cows ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808) • Daniel Defoe

... for a moment looking on the ground, as if he were ransacking his ingenuity to see what else he could do to save his father's reputation. Then, with a little cold sigh, he seemed to signify that he regretfully surrendered the late marquis to the penalty of his turpitude. He gave a hardly perceptible shrug, took his neat umbrella from the servant in the vestibule, and, with his gentlemanly ...
— The American • Henry James

... "there is another who is not up to the mark;" and he uttered a sigh which might signify, "Oh! the men of our stamp, where are ...
— Louise de la Valliere • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... "if he does so, it shall signify war and victory. If he does not do so, it shall signify peace, and we will bow our heads before the Amalungwana basi bodwe" (i.e., "the little English," used as ...
— Finished • H. Rider Haggard

... a striking symbol. People were convinced that God desired to signify in this manner that he poured out upon the apostles his most precious gifts of eloquence and of inspiration. But they did not stop there. Jerusalem was, like the majority of the large cities of the East, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 03 • Various

... word, mother, I don't know and scarcely care; I tried to persuade Daddy Loriot, who chatters like a magpie, to return to his cellar, since it could signify as little to him as to me, whether a spy watched him or not." So saying, Agricola went and placed the little leathern sack, containing his wages, on a shelf, ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue

... towards him, then half-consciousness returning told her she was not in Guestrow. Where was she? She moved, tried to sit up; on her brow a hand, cool and soothing, pressed her backwards, closing her aching eyes. Once more her thoughts sank downwards—flickered, as it were. What did it signify where she was, after all? Everything was far off. What scent was that? Wonderful! She drew it in to her lungs, and it seemed to fill her breast with fragrant freshness. With a sigh, she came back from some dim world ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay

... debasing that I could scarcely discuss the matter when I compared myself with others, but had to remain quiet and think: they do not understand. I was the more able to remain quiet when I recalled how men were praised who signify little among those who know, and who have almost disappeared despite their good points. Well, pax vobiscum, peace to them and me,—I would never have mentioned a syllable ...
— Beethoven: the Man and the Artist - As Revealed in his own Words • Ludwig van Beethoven

... procedure, undoubtedly, is for the beginner to become familiar with two or three of the most common gestures, learning how to make them and just what they signify. He should then use them. They may seem mechanical and ungainly at first, but constant practice both in private and before a class will soon enable him to make them with considerable emphasis and ease. From ...
— Practical Argumentation • George K. Pattee

... of gunpowder, by my conscience! What a devil will it signify talking, if thus you are to blow one another up ...
— Clarissa, Or The History Of A Young Lady, Volume 8 • Samuel Richardson

... there's only monkeys and jaguars, and sich like to see me, it don't much signify; but my mustaches is gitin' mighty long, for I've been two ...
— Martin Rattler • Robert Michael Ballantyne

... the recommendation of the prime minister election results: Blaise COMPAORE reelected president with 87.5% percent of the vote note: recent charges against a former member of his Presidential Guard in the 1998 assassination of a newspaper editor signify an attempt to defuse chronic areas of dissatisfaction elections: president elected by popular vote for a five-year term; election last held 15 November 1998 (next to be held NA 2005); in April 2000, the constitution was amended reducing the presidential term from seven to five years, ...
— The 2002 CIA World Factbook • US Government

... scarlet with anger, jerked her arm at Maurice, to signify that he might do the rest for himself, and, retreating into her kitchen, slammed the door. Left thus, with no alternative, Maurice drew his heels together, gave the customary rap, and ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson

... ask you a few questions. Your answers won't signify much one way or the other, but I'm curious. Why did you make such a fight—just to live? It must have been a devil of ...
— The Place Beyond the Winds • Harriet T. Comstock

... in America to signify an Indian village newly consecrated to the Christian religion, and evidently transferred from there to ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume VI, 1583-1588 • Emma Helen Blair

... Having fully considered the matter, we are prepared to offer you a place on our staff. The work required was explained to you yesterday. For this we offer a salary of 200 pounds per annum. Should you signify your acceptance of these terms, we will send you our usual form of agreement. I am ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall

... said Sam, in a tone not at all displeased—"but it don't signify much. Have you seen him ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner

... made from your want of right to keep what you grant? Or does it lessen the grace or dignity of relaxing in the exercise of an odious claim because you have your evidence-room full of titles, and your magazines stuffed with arms to enforce them? What signify all those titles, and all those arms? Of what avail are they, when the reason of the thing tells me that the assertion of my title is the loss of my suit, and that I could do nothing but wound myself by the ...
— Burke's Speech on Conciliation with America • Edmund Burke



Words linked to "Signify" :   denote, signification, indicate, intend, significant, refer



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