"Waste of time" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... even in the free States, caused mourning, lamentation, and woe. Remove slavery, and the country, the whole country, will recover its natural vigor, and our peace and future prosperity will be placed on a more extensive, safe, and sure foundation. It is a waste of time to answer the allegations that the emancipation of the negro race would induce them to make war on the white race. Every fact in the history of emancipation proves the reverse; and he that will not believe ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... at this time I often preferred taking a book under the trees by the river-side, to throwing a line; but towards the middle of my life I became a fanatical fisherwoman, and was obliged to limit my waste of time to one day in the week, spent on the Lenox lakes, or I should infallibly have wandered thither and dreamed away my hours on their charming ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... simple. To go in search of the layer-out of bodies, who exists only here and there in the country-side, would be almost always waste of time; the favourable month, April, would elapse before my cage was suitably populated. To run after him is to trust too much to accident; so we will make him come to us by scattering in the orchard an abundant collection of dead Moles. ...
— The Wonders of Instinct • J. H. Fabre
... man sneered. "But you didn't fool the South! They are past masters in the art of politics. The South is seceding because they know that the Republican Party was organized to destroy Slavery—and that its triumph is a challenge to a life and death fight on that issue. It's a waste of time to beat the devil round the stump. We've got to face it. I hate a trimmer and a coward!—But don't you dare print that for ...
— The Southerner - A Romance of the Real Lincoln • Thomas Dixon
... was at length formed to work the copper mountain, a Portuguese merchant of Singapore supplying most of the capital. So confident were they of the existence of the copper, that they thought it would be waste of time and money to have any exploration made first; and accordingly, sent to England for a mining engineer, who was to bring out all necessary tools, machinery, laboratory, utensils, a number of mechanics, and stores of all kinds for ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume I. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... version, is, says Scott, 'one of the few to which popular tradition has ascribed complete locality.' The ascribed locality, if more complete, is no more probable than any other: to ascribe any definite locality to a ballad is in all cases a waste of time and labour. ...
— Ballads of Romance and Chivalry - Popular Ballads of the Olden Times - First Series • Frank Sidgwick
... that we could devise and successfully apply exact and accurate standards of measurement for human beings, our work would be only partially done. Any mechanic knows that it is a sad waste of time and pains to standardize tenons, with micrometer and emery paper, to a thousandth of an inch, so long as the mortises are left unstandardized. A valuable man makes an unusual record on the staff of some employer. Other employers ...
— Analyzing Character • Katherine M. H. Blackford and Arthur Newcomb
... I ruminated thoughtfully upon this tribute as we went away. We had learned through the innocent prattle of our hostess's busy tongue that she desired a garden, but that Hans thought it a waste of time; that she had suggested open plumbing, and that Hans declined to go to the expense; that she saw little of her brothers nowadays, as Hans did not approve of them; that her old friends came to see her rarely since her marriage, as, for some reason unaccountable ...
— Many Kingdoms • Elizabeth Jordan
... best a wearisome business, a criminal waste of time, useless for practical purposes. It was well enough when Parliament was not overburdened with work, and when the members balloting for places rarely exceeded a score. But when, as happened on the opening day of the Session, two of the freshest hours of the sitting are occupied by the performance, ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 28, April 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... trees. Some of them seemed to grow all right for six or seven years, and then froze down to the ground, and so far as I have been able to find out, experiments with southern trees in the North have been practically a waste of time and money. So it is necessary to bear in mind that these northern varieties must be grafted or budded on trees grown ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Second Annual Meeting - Ithaca, New York, December 14 and 15, 1911 • Northern Nut Growers Association
... would be a waste of time. They could never hope to be much more than we see them here. And they are ...
— 'Me-Smith' • Caroline Lockhart
... correct and true by the practical work which is based upon these principles. It is no hard thing to see how true it is that of all men throughout the history of the world, none have had greater influence than the religious teachers of a people, and it is just as true to-day, and it is a waste of time to argue that a race or nation can be lifted any higher than the religious principles of that race or nation will allow it to go. History fails to record an instance of this sort, and it is very evident there never ...
— The Demand and the Supply of Increased Efficiency in the Negro Ministry - The American Negro Academy. Occasional Papers No. 13 • Jesse E. Moorland
... on his heel. In his heart he was inclined to a kind of contempt for the monarch's humours. When there was a chance of hanging a man, it seemed to him a waste of time to play the fool in this fashion. The cat and mouse policy was never Tristan's way. He was ever for the dog's way with ...
— If I Were King • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... communicate with the planet Mars, at its nearest only some thirty-five million miles from us, and this is a mere nothing in measuring the space between us and the stars. To express the distances of the stars in figures is really a waste of time, so astronomers have invented another way. You know that light can go round the world eight times in a second; that is a speed quite beyond our comprehension, but we just accept it. Then think what a distance it could travel in an hour, in a day; and what ...
— The Children's Book of Stars • G.E. Mitton
... Wolseley says, "he was no longer the thin, sleek, active little man he had been at Rivoli. His now bloated face, large stomach, and fat and rounded legs bespoke a man unfitted for hard work on horseback." His fatal delay in pursuing Bluecher on the 17th, and his equally fatal waste of time in attacking Wellington on the 18th, proved how his quality as a general had decayed. It is a curious fact that, during the battle of Waterloo, Napoleon remained for hours motionless at a table placed for him in the open air, ...
— Deeds that Won the Empire - Historic Battle Scenes • W. H. Fitchett
... planning, especially to be sure that the story is told in sympathy with the child's world. People who are too busy to tell their children stories are, perhaps fortunately, coming to realize that they are too busy to have children. If it looks like a waste of time to turn off the lights and sit by the firelight for from twenty to thirty minutes, we shall need to revise our estimates of the value of child-character. Nor must we shrink from the investment of time in preparation for the narration of the story; ...
— Religious Education in the Family • Henry F. Cope
... Immortality becomes a necessity to any man who seriously sets himself to become like Jesus. Our mistakes and follies, the false starts we make, the tasks we attempt for which we discover ourselves unfit, the waste of time and energy we cannot repair, the tangled snarls into which we wind ourselves and which require years to straighten out, render this life absurd, if it be final. It cannot be more than a series of tentative beginnings, and if there be no continuation, the scheme of things is a gigantic ...
— Some Christian Convictions - A Practical Restatement in Terms of Present-Day Thinking • Henry Sloane Coffin
... to tell you that I've never believed in dolls. I've always thought they were a waste of time and kept children from learning to do useful things. I've brought Rebecca Mary up ...
— Rebecca Mary • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... to his post. There must be no waste of time. This gentle pastor had little of gentleness about him now. A good Christian in every way, he still had no thought of turning the other cheek when women ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... is appropriated to the use of receiving and curing this crop, is not, in the manner of other barns, connected with the farm yard, so that the whole occupation may be rendered snug and compact, and occasion little waste of time by inconsiderate and useless locomotion; but it is constructed to suit the particular occasion in point of size, and is generally erected in, or by the side of, each respective piece of tobacco ground; or sometimes in ...
— Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce • E. R. Billings
... which for nearly a week kept Venice in a state of continual brilliant gala. All the days were spent on the water, only landing now and then to look at some famous building or picture, or to eat ices in the Piazza with the lovely facade of St. Mark's before them. Dining or sleeping seemed a sheer waste of time! The evenings were spent on the water too; for every night, immediately after sunset, a beautiful drifting pageant started from the front of the Doge's Palace to make the tour of the Grand Canal, and our friends ...
— What Katy Did Next • Susan Coolidge
... be a waste of time to seek any satisfactory explanation from the writings of economists. They have not thrown much light upon the reasons of the existence of interest. For this they are not to be blamed; for at the time they wrote, its lawfulness was not called in question. Now, however, times ...
— Sophisms of the Protectionists • Frederic Bastiat
... this night of Christmas Eve he lay awake; and no dreams had ever been as half as sweet as the thoughts that came to him then. It would have been a hideous waste of time to sleep, when he could lie there and live over again each moment of his evening, beginning at the beginning, when She had come into the room, and going on to the end when he had brought her and Rosemary to the door of the Hotel Pension Beau Soleil, to say "goodbye until to-morrow." ...
— Rosemary - A Christmas story • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... thing in a hundred ways, and although I confess that I voted for Home Rule, yet when we have time to consider it, and to watch the debate on every point, we may be excused if we become doubtful as to the good it will do. The people round here are so ignorant, that talking sense to them is waste of time. They will put their trust in coal mines and the like of that. Now, I have gone into the subject of Irish mines. I have read the subject up from beginning to end. Wicklow gold would cost us a pound for ten shillings' worth. The silver mines wouldn't ...
— Ireland as It Is - And as It Would be Under Home Rule • Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.)
... John, I'm going to say something that'll make you angry, but I can't help that. When Tom Arthurs was showing us over the Island, I couldn't help thinking that all that Gaelic movement was a frightful waste of time!" Marsh made a gesture, but Henry would not let him speak. "No, don't interrupt me, John," he said. "I must say what I feel. Look at the Language class at Ballymartin. What's been the good of all the work you put ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine
... seems a waste of time to sleep, doesn't it?" she said, her eyes filled with dreams. "And yet all the while, whether we're awake or asleep, talking or working, he's getting nearer and nearer—without our doing anything towards it!" Her eyes, as she spoke, were out seeking ...
— Captivity • M. Leonora Eyles
... which, once crossed, if it does not altogether debar from the pleasures of maiden and bachelorhood, at least makes it necessary for married folk to shift for themselves. To talk or dance with a married man would be a terrible waste of time; and as for married women, she expects to join that holy army of martyrs in the course of time, and will then be quite contented with the same treatment as she has meted out to others. The politeness which springs from a sense of duty to others is little known to the Australian ...
— Town Life in Australia - 1883 • R. E. N. (Richard) Twopeny
... authority of those in close touch with the daily operations of the Fleet to put forward plans for operations which necessarily involved the use of the same vessels and material, as such a procedure must inevitably lead to impracticable suggestions and consequent waste of time; the system which I favoured was that in use in the Army, where the Operations Section of the Staff dealt also with the ...
— The Crisis of the Naval War • John Rushworth Jellicoe
... in itself absurd, and carries with it its own refutation. It would be manifestly impossible for the city to be "built" in so short a time, and, moreover, it would have been sheer waste of time for the Prince to have employed himself in such a way. The sentence was probably introduced merely to account for that city having been built ABOUT ...
— A Forgotten Empire: Vijayanagar; A Contribution to the History of India • Robert Sewell
... fellows there in the college. With a good many of 'em, going to college seems to be just nothing but a sort of ceremony; they go because they're sent, and don't learn anything more'n they can help. That's what I call waste of time ...
— The Pearl of Orr's Island - A Story of the Coast of Maine • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... your step. Wear rubber heels of quiet manners. Simplify your work. Keep it straight, after a little it will keep you straight. Don't fall over your work, nor step on it, or sit on it. Simplify by stopping the waste of words, waste of material, waste of time. Jollify your work. Put fun into each day's round of toil. Be original in plans ...
— Supreme Personality • Delmer Eugene Croft
... as this science is cultivated to professional precision. And hence, independently of any arguments, which the Quakers may advance against it, it must be acknowledged by the sober world to be chargeable with a criminal waste of time. And this waste of time is the more to be deprecated, because it frequently happens, that, when young females marry, music is thrown aside, after all the years that have been spent in its acquisition, as an employment, either then unnecessary, or as an ...
— A Portraiture of Quakerism, Volume I (of 3) • Thomas Clarkson
... have a diseased condition of the brain—these cases, too, are very rare. I have met but a comparatively few. Where a lesion of the brain has occurred, and a distinct change has thus been brought about in the physical structure of that organ, an attempt to bring about a cure would be a waste of time—hopeless from the start. ...
— Stammering, Its Cause and Cure • Benjamin Nathaniel Bogue
... pony's rough coat, I vowed a vow, boy as I was, to be at Branksome by the morning, or die in the attempt. I knew that it was no use going home to Kinmont for a man to ride with me, for it was out of my way, and would only be a waste of time. ...
— Tales From Scottish Ballads • Elizabeth W. Grierson
... ago how many of us had given any serious thought to what was then a phrase, a dream, on which in the dark days of last spring it seemed a mere waste of time to dwell? And yet, week by week, since the New Year began, the dream has been slowly taking to itself body ...
— Fields of Victory • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... such a feeling should have heretofore existed is not, perhaps, surprising. The possibility of such an emergency as has come upon us has seemed so improbable, not to say impossible, that it has appeared like a waste of time and labor to prepare for it; and the result has been, that we had come to look upon military education with much the same feeling as that with which we regard the pugilistic art, as of questionable, if not decidedly disreputable character, and such as a nation of our respectability could by no possibility ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... impatient and angry interruption, "if you think that a jargon of this kind be worthy a man of your acquirements and station, it is at least a waste of time to address it to me. I am led to conclude that you desire to make use of me for some purpose which I have a right to suppose honest and blameless, because all you know of me is, that I rendered to your relation services which can ...
— A Strange Story, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... up was one of his own kind—i.e., this was a false alarm—then at once, by showing his national colors, the mistake is made right. On the other hand, if it be a Coyote, Fox, or Dog, they see at once, this is a Jack-rabbit, and know that it would be waste of time for them to pursue him. They say in effect, "This is a Jack-rabbit, and I cannot catch a Jack in open race." They give it up, and that, of course, saves the Jack a great deal of unnecessary running and ...
— Animal Heroes • Ernest Thompson Seton
... Sardou wrote careful and detailed scenarios, Dumas fils held it a waste of time to do so. Pailleron wrote "enormous" scenarios, Meilhac very brief ones, or none at all. Mr. Galsworthy, rather to my surprise, disdains, and even condemns, the scenario, holding that a theme becomes lifeless when you put down its skeleton on paper. Sir Arthur Pinero says: "Before beginning ...
— Play-Making - A Manual of Craftsmanship • William Archer
... though in that instance his want of knowledge was shared by Fred and Scarlett, who, after resuming their jerkins, took, one the pole, the other the coil of neatly ringed rope, and trudged back to the Manor with Samson, who delivered quite a discourse upon waste of time; but he did not return to his digging, contenting himself with extracting his spade from the ground, wiping it carefully, and hanging it up in his tool-house, close ...
— Crown and Sceptre - A West Country Story • George Manville Fenn
... What a resource for hours after work, or when trade is dull, and regular work scarce! What a contrast and counteraction is the healthy, manly, employment which a cottage garden affords, to the close, impure, unwholesome air, the beastliness and obscenity, the waste of time, the destruction of morals, the loss of character, money, and health, which are the inmates of too many common ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 13, - Issue 372, Saturday, May 30, 1829 • Various
... sensitiveness to prevent the repair As little trouble as the heath when the woods are swept Bade his audience to beware of princes But the flower is a thing of the season; the flower drops off But to strangle craving is indeed to go through a death Is it any waste of time to write of love? Not to do things wholly is worse than not to do things at all Payment is no more so than to restore money held in trust Self, was digging pits for comfort to flow in Tears are the way of women and ...
— Quotations from the Works of George Meredith • David Widger
... now, and it is a waste of time to try. I can give you plenty of work to-day. Stay with me and serve as ...
— War from the Inside • Frederick L. (Frederick Lyman) Hitchcock
... most practised professors of their new art. Few that see or hear them think, that even in the midst of their revels their hearts are often far away, or are extracting good from the evil spread before them; and that all the waste of time and talent, so openly and ostentatiously exhibited, is compensated in secret by longer and intenser application to the true object of their pursuit, and by acts of atonement and self-denial, of which the conscious ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... so-called proofs, would be waste of time. They prove nothing except Pope's extreme anxiety to justify his wild hypothesis of a dark conspiracy. Pope was jealous, spiteful, and credulous. He was driven to fury by Tickell's publication, which had the appearance of a competition. ...
— Alexander Pope - English Men of Letters Series • Leslie Stephen
... the Gauchos believe that their camping-ground lies?" Mr. Jamieson asked after a pause; "because it appears to me that it is a waste of time to look for the trail, and that our only plan is to push straight on to their villages, which we may reach before they get there. And in that case, if we found them unguarded, we might seize all their women, and hold them as hostages until they ...
— On the Pampas • G. A. Henty
... hopefully for the loved ones who were "marching along." In Barton we knitted while we talked, and at the Lyceum lectures. Nay, we threatened even to take our knitting to meeting,—for it seemed, as we said, a great waste of time to be ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866 • Various
... time to come home at all," I added testily. "I am driven to death. I've got to go again in ten minutes. But I supposed you would worry if I didn't show myself. It is a foolish waste of time. I don't know how I am ever going to get through. ...
— The Gates Between • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... wanted most,' said Lance; 'and as for that, I'm disqualified enough by all this waste of time.' ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the universe is but an expression—of whose frame the stars are the infinite molecules—can be supposed ever to interfere with the laws of matter and reach down into the doings of men, would it not be to save from the wreck and waste of time the most sublime fruit of the civilization of the drowned Atlantis—a belief in the one, only, just God, the father of all life, the imposer of all ...
— The Antediluvian World • Ignatius Donnelly
... that he, suffering more from disease of mind than body, shuddered, through recollection of his wound, at arms and battle. But others ought not to sink into decrepitude together with a sick man. For why should there be any longer protraction or waste of time? What third consul, what other army did they wait for? The camp of the Carthaginians was in Italy, and almost in sight of the city. It was not Sicily and Sardinia, which had been taken from them when vanquished, nor Spain on this ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... Persuade your neighbors to compromise whenever you can. Point out to them how the nominal winner is often the real loser—in fees, expenses and waste of time. As a peacemaker a lawyer has a superior opportunity of becoming a good man. There will always be enough business. Never stir up litigation. A worse man can scarcely be found than one who does this. ...
— The Story of Young Abraham Lincoln • Wayne Whipple
... correct them. Besides, there has as yet been no thorough attempt at a consistent synthetic portraiture; and the differences of different critics' estimates need some common ground to meet and be harmonized upon. If this can be supplied, there will be less waste of time in future studies ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop
... poor novels, and it would be a waste of time to attempt to defend them. They are not to be despised, though, as regards their influence on the rest of George Sand's work, and also as regards the history of the French novel. They rendered great service to George Sand, inasmuch as they helped ...
— George Sand, Some Aspects of Her Life and Writings • Rene Doumic
... entailing a meal and endless gossip with Biddy Joyce, Sir Jocelyn soon became aware of his daughter's correspondence. He questioned her about it, and she, without the least demur, handed him Radway's letters. He sniffed at them. If that was all the fellow had to say it struck him as a waste of time and paper. Who was he, anyhow? Gabrielle explained that he had dined with them at the Halbertons, and Jocelyn, who naturally had no recollection of the event, was satisfied with these credentials. "I asked him to come and shoot here," said Gabrielle. Jocelyn stared at her ...
— The Tragic Bride • Francis Brett Young
... good hope. Hope gave us courage, and courage set Fred and Will hunting for a means of escape. We decided there and then that to wait for this Major Schunck to come from the coast and pass judgment on us was a ridiculous waste of time as well ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy
... the "Clipper," and tried to find the agents by looking over it as she stood beside the stand. This could not be done so easily. Thirteenth Street was a number of blocks off, but she went back, carrying the precious paper and regretting the waste of time. ...
— Sister Carrie • Theodore Dreiser
... and shake a little slit in your throat, and make mouths, and that shakes the air; and the air shakes a pair of little drums in my head—a very complicated arrangement, with lots of bones behind—and my brain seizes your meaning in the rough. What a roundabout way, and what a waste of time! ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al
... out. I may remark incidentally that it is he who invariably appears at our sessions last, and too late; and who, through want of attention and through subsequent participation in the discussion on the basis of misapprehensions, occasions further repetitions and waste of time. ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... flowers. It is a sinful waste of time, and we have no use for them, since they do but litter everything. And thou wilt some day be called to account for these ...
— A Little Girl in Old Philadelphia • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... quite dry, and a drum sieve is recommended for the sugar. The old way of beating the yelks and whites of eggs separate (except in very few cases), is not only useless, but a waste of time. They should be well incorporated with the other ingredients, and, in some instances, they cannot be beaten ...
— The Cook's Oracle; and Housekeeper's Manual • William Kitchiner
... places—poor old Bournemouth!—is to hand, and contains a statement of pleasure in my letters which I wish I could have rewarded with a long one. What has gone on? A vast of affairs, of a mingled, strenuous, inconclusive, desultory character; much waste of time, much riding to and fro, and little ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... futile defense against the only half-perceptible hostility of O'Connor, he would find himself seriously questioning whether he would not do more wisely to leave the Guardian and hazard a new fortune in another field. Yet all the while he knew that this course of speculation was idle and a waste of time and cerebral tissues. He was a Guardian man, and with the Guardian he was going to stay—unless the Company itself took a different view. Of course there was a time coming when Mr. Wintermuth would lay down his badge ...
— White Ashes • Sidney R. Kennedy and Alden C. Noble
... hand with practice. Viewed in this light, the Moscow results do not seem extraordinary at all, and still better results may be expected if the same principles are applied from the earliest years of education. Waste of time is the leading feature of our present education. Not only are we taught a mass of rubbish, but what is not rubbish is taught so as to make us waste over it as much time as possible. Our present methods of teaching originate from a time when the accomplishments required from an educated ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 4, June 1906 - Monthly Magazine Devoted to Social Science and Literature • Various
... child; then treat the eczema. This is the only plan that offers any success. It is not a simple matter to find out why a nursing child is having indigestion. The most minute care must be exercised to find out the element in the milk that is causing the eczema. It would, however, be foolish, and a waste of time, to apply pastes, etc., to an eczema of the face, while the real cause that produced it was still in existence. It will frequently be found necessary to change the food entirely. Strict attention to the bowels is essential, both in infants and in older children. Sometimes to cure the constipation ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Volume IV. (of IV.) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • Grant Hague
... no common ground on which to meet, speech is unavailing and mere waste of time. It is like shouting to a person at a distance whom it is impossible to approach. If he notices anything it will only be that, for some reasons of your own, you are making a ...
— The Danvers Jewels, and Sir Charles Danvers • Mary Cholmondeley
... the schoolmaster himself must be taken to task, and the watcher watched. I had been placed in one of the first boarding-schools near town; a most liberal stipend had been paid with me; I had every description of master; yet, after all this outlay of money, which is not dross—and waste of time, which is beyond price precious, what was I at leaving this academy? Let the good folks withinside of the Stickenham stage testify; by one trick or another I had contrived to make them all tolerably uncomfortable before the journey was ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... that the Winnebagos paid no attention to the two missing warriors, and yet, after all, it was not singular. They knew they were dead and it was therefore a waste of time to give heed to them. If by any possibility they were alive, they must take care of themselves, just as all brave Indians did: if unable to do so, the consequences must be on their ...
— The Hunters of the Ozark • Edward S. Ellis
... poulticing, anointing, and the applications of lotions, is but useless waste of time. The surgeon's knife should be used as early as possible, for it will be required sooner or later and the more promptly it can be applied, the less danger is there from the disease, and the more agony is spared to ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols
... he asked himself. "It is a sheer waste of time. Mrs. Sidney can do me no good, or I her. It must be the ...
— The Great God Success • John Graham (David Graham Phillips)
... of the system which General Armstrong had inaugurated at Hampton. To take the children of such people as I had been among for a month, and each day give them a few hours of mere book education, I felt would be almost a waste of time." ...
— Booker T. Washington - Builder of a Civilization • Emmett J. Scott and Lyman Beecher Stowe
... to be found in that list. Dancing was distinctly immoral; card-playing led directly to gambling with all its attendant evils; theatre-going characterized the conduct of the more disreputable denizens of great cities. Fiction was not absolutely forbidden; but the most lenient regarded it as a great waste of time, and the boy who desired its solace on any large scale was under the frequent necessity of seeking the ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... been so particular about that mending," she thought ruefully. "It was a shameful waste of time to do it at the studio. I was so particular to have everything done up to the last notch that there isn't a single letter to write, or button to sew on, or—or—anything. I simply can't sit down like a tame tabby this first exciting afternoon, when all ...
— Miss Pat at Artemis Lodge • Pemberton Ginther
... came to study, being compelled to return hastily to Moscow to suppress a rebellion. He returned a much wiser man; I doubt if any person ever was more improved than he by his travels. What an example to tourists in these times! All travelling (except explorations) is a dissipation and waste of time unless self-improvement is the main object. Pleasure-seeking is the greatest vanity on this earth, for he who seeks pleasure never finds it; but it comes when it ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VIII • John Lord
... innovation for our village, and frowned upon by many of the older and stricter inhabitants. However, most of the captain's boy friends were permitted to attend; young Cy was not. His father considered dancing a waste of time and, if not wicked, certainly frivolous and nonsensical. So the boy remained at home, but, in spite of the parental order, he practiced some of the figures of the quadrilles and the contra dances in his comrades' barns, learning them at second hand, ...
— Cy Whittaker's Place • Joseph C. Lincoln
... called to the waste of time and money involved in the calling of grand juries where there are only one or two trifling cases to be tried, and it is suggested that they might be able to combine their juridical functions with some useful employment. A correspondent who signs himself "Lifer" points out ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152. January 17, 1917 • Various
... all on the petition, was distressed at the rash talk that went on out of doors; and in this respect, no one distressed him more than his old friend, John Adams, who thought and said that a petition was a waste of time and who was all for the most vigorous measures (such, doubtless, as Demosthenes might have counseled),—the seizure of all crown officers, the formation of state governments, the raising of an army, and negotiations ...
— The Eve of the Revolution - A Chronicle of the Breach with England, Volume 11 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Carl Becker
... tranquil or less meditative than usual, he rose early and sallied forth at one of those unusual hours he generally chose for walking. The thing must be put right somehow, and at once, with as little waste of time and energy as possible, and Henslowe had shown himself not to be trusted; so telling a servant to follow him, the squire had made his way with difficulty to a place he ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Italian Painters entertaining as it is, for so much of each page is taken up by notes of different editors and commentators denying flatly the assertions of the text that to read him for information seems waste of time. Messrs. Crowe and Cavalcaselle's New History of Painting in Italy is the latest English authority. Mr. Charles Perkins's Tuscan Sculptors, of which we have reason to be very proud, is already the accepted standard work everywhere. Kugler's Handbook ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 90, June, 1875 • Various
... It were almost a waste of time to multiply arguments in order to prove how criminal the voluntary ignorance, of which we have been speaking, must appear in the sight of God. It must be confessed by all who believe that we are accountable creatures, and to such only the writer is addressing himself, that we shall have to answer ...
— A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Middle and Higher Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity. • William Wilberforce
... pursue the course, most of them did so in a parrot-like way, learning what was taught, but not seeming to appropriate the truth and import of their instruction, and graduating without sensible aim or valuable occupation for their future. The whole scheme has proved a waste of time, efforts, and the money ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various
... that he committed next to the expedition itself; for he ought to have advanced and to have secured Babylon and Seleukeia,[58] two cities which were always hostile to the Parthians; instead of which, he gave his enemies time to make preparation. The next thing the people blamed was his waste of time in Syria, which was employed more for purposes of money profit than for military purposes; for he did not occupy himself in reviewing the numbers of his troops, nor establishing games to keep the soldiers ...
— Plutarch's Lives Volume III. • Plutarch
... was not much of a believer in going to town, and she considered it a waste of time to drive about merely to be driving. The old-fashioned surrey, with its dark green felt upholstery, and its flapping curtains, was rarely taken out of the barn without a distinct objective point in view. Church and prayer-meeting at the tiny frame ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox
... Lyndhurst, although in declamatory force Lord Brougham's oration was perfect. All the bills passed in the session he described as bad ones. Many of those lost or abandoned, if introduced by government, he represented as useless, and their introduction as a waste of time. Every epithet of contempt furnished by the English language, and by any other which his lordship knew, however imperfectly, was heaped upon the defunct bills. They were consigned to the shades below, to that ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... an evil. It is assuming the frivolity, the waste of time, the coxcombry, and all the disadvantages of music, without any of its substantial benefits. That which Shakspeare praised, and Milton cultivated, and which is supposed to be the language of saints and angels when they hymn their Maker's ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various
... not see how he could possibly keep his good fortune to himself until his mother came home that night. His first impulse was to go over to the neighbor's house, and tell her all about it, but he was restrained by the thought that that would be a waste of time. He could make one trap in the hour and a half that it would take him to go and return, and the sooner his traps were all completed, the sooner he could get to work. His next thought was that he would let the traps rest for that day, go down to ...
— The Boy Trapper • Harry Castlemon
... that was made plain enough. We were too many doing general work. After six months of hard grubbing I decided that I had better seek my fortune elsewhere. Spring was coming, and it seemed a waste of time to stay where I was. I wrote out my resignation and left it on the city editor's desk. Some errand took me out of the office. When I returned it lay there still, unopened. I saw it, and thought I would try another week. I might make a strike. So I took the note away and ...
— The Making of an American • Jacob A. Riis
... can and cannot wear, from shoe leather to a feather in the hat (and the inventory includes even width of hem on a linen handkerchief), is by no means a frivolous, fruitless waste of time; it is a wise preparedness, which in the end saves time, vitality and money. And if it does not make one independent of expert advice (and why should one expect to be that, since technique in any art should improve with practice?) it certainly ...
— Woman as Decoration • Emily Burbank
... the Lord, in order that he might incarnate them in national life and practice. Wise doings always begin in clear seeing. We should be far more efficient in practice if we were more diligently assiduous in vision. It is never a waste of time to "look unto Him." Looking is a most needful part of our daily discipline. "What I say unto you, I say ...
— My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year • John Henry Jowett
... others, whom I knew to be good. I did not observe that they were much better than I was, and that an act which was perilous for me was not so perilous for them; and yet I have no doubt there was some danger in it, were it nothing else but a waste of time. ...
— The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus • Teresa of Avila
... who has travelled in Egypt will require to be told that it is a country in which a considerable amount of waiting and waste of time has to be endured. One makes an excursion by train to see some ruins, and, upon returning to the station, the train is found to be late, and an hour or more has to be dawdled away. Crossing the Nile in a rowing-boat the sailors ...
— The Treasury of Ancient Egypt - Miscellaneous Chapters on Ancient Egyptian History and Archaeology • Arthur E. P. B. Weigall
... that side of the brain which controls the right hand, which is, as you remember, the left hemisphere. What makes this more probable is that in persons who are "left-handed," the speech centre lies upon the opposite or right side of the brain. So it is waste of time and does more harm than good to try to "break" ...
— A Handbook of Health • Woods Hutchinson
... tremendously kind!" She looked at him with an eagerness that seemed to transform her. "But—but would you like it too? Wouldn't you—wouldn't you feel it was an awful waste of time?" ...
— The Obstacle Race • Ethel M. Dell
... the old predilection in favour of a true story, whenever it can be had. Mr Sims has written some tales under the title of "The Wigwam and the Cabin." They seem to be neither good nor bad;—it would be a waste of time to cast about for the exact epithet that should characterise them;—and in these tales we live much with the early settlers and the Red-skins. All his stories put together, had they twice their merit, are not equal in value to a few ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 385. November, 1847. • Various
... very gates another delay in that evening of delays occurred. This time it was a tyre-burst. Riviere, impatient of further waste of time, paid off the chauffeur and started on foot along the entrance drive. The drizzle of the afternoon had ceased, and a few stars shone halfheartedly through rents in the ragged curtain of cloud, as though performing a duty against ...
— Swirling Waters • Max Rittenberg
... I ought to stir about more—meet the men who lead in the city. But it seems such a waste of time when I can come and ...
— The Great God Success • John Graham (David Graham Phillips)
... plane high above them gave little thought to what passed below, engrossed with their papers or books, or engaged in casual conversation. This monotonous trip was boring to most of them. It seemed a waste of time to spend six good hours in a short 3,500 mile trip. There was nothing to do, nothing to see, except a slowly passing landscape ten miles below. No details could be distinguished, and the steady low throb of the engines, the whirring of the giant propellers, ...
— The Black Star Passes • John W Campbell
... Fortunately they had only one class that afternoon, and were able to leave school at half-past three. Garnet's cousins lived within a short tramcar ride. They were musical people, and sympathized with her project. Garnet led Winona into the drawing-room, and began without waste of time. ...
— The Luckiest Girl in the School • Angela Brazil
... Le Fabre both remained very calm about it all. Each from her own viewpoint regarded the work as more or less a waste of time. But I noticed that they did not take their ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint
... God, Ignatius began to deliberate on his future plan of action. He considered it a waste of time to remain at Salamanca, as the restriction laid upon him prevented him from assisting those for whose salvation he wished ...
— The Autobiography of St. Ignatius • Saint Ignatius Loyola
... shaved, he looked at the shower, hesitated a moment, then his face set stubbornly. I'm darned if I will, was his thought; a sheer waste of time. He did, however, change his shoes to a pair of heavy, high-laced ones fit for the roughness of hunting. He was at his desk again, looking over the notes in his scribble pads for the morning's work, when Paula ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London
... with the superior claims of religion. The care of a family cannot extenuate the guilt of neglecting private devotion or public duties; it cannot exculpate a neglect of the word or the ordinances of God; and to be "cumbered about much serving," is not only waste of time, but unfits the mind for profitable intercourse, and is likely to produce an unhappy effect upon ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. II • Francis Augustus Cox
... entered the camp at dawn, the light of determination in his eyes and a new set to his jaw. His first plan of the Pottawattomie was right. The turn toward Lawrence had been a waste of time. He selected six men to accompany him on his mission, his four sons who had made up the Surveyor's party, his son-in-law, Henry Thompson, and Theodore Weiner. Owen, Salmon, Oliver and Frederick Brown knew every foot of the ground. They had carried ...
— The Man in Gray • Thomas Dixon
... walk, and that the cold of the prairie was death to man. Pointing to a caravan of grain-carriers that awaited our escort, I then spoke of starting next morning. Still they hesitated. At length darkness came on, and knowing it to be a mere waste of time to debate over night about dangers to be faced next day, I ate my dates and drank my milk, and lay down to enjoy tranquil sleep in the deep silence ...
— First footsteps in East Africa • Richard F. Burton
... him, I'm sure!" retorted Val. "It is just this, Edward. He is vexed at what he calls my idle ways, and waste of time: as if I need plod on, like a city clerk, six days a week and no holidays! I know I must do something before I can win Anne; and I will do it: but the doctor need not begin to cry out about ...
— Elster's Folly • Mrs. Henry Wood
... Tommy. "What a waste of time! I was only over at Khanmulla. I spent the night at Barnes's bungalow because they wouldn't trust me in the ...
— The Lamp in the Desert • Ethel M. Dell
... various reading I now digested, according to the precept and model of Mr. Locke, into a large commonplace book—a practice, however, which I do not strenuously recommend. I much question whether the benefits of this laborious method are adequate to the waste of time, and I must agree with Dr. Johnson that what is twice read is commonly better ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IX. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... them stay there. He marvelled at his mood, and also rejoiced, for his worst fear had always been that he might prove a coward. Now he was puzzled to think how he could ever be frightened again, for his one object was to succeed, and in that absorption fear seemed to him merely a waste of time. "It all comes of treating the thing as a business proposition," he ...
— Huntingtower • John Buchan
... of Foveaux Straits. Again they had to run off, returning to near Dusky Bay, which he wished to enter as he thought it looked a likely harbour, but the difficulty of getting out again and consequent waste of time prevented him. Off Cape Foulwind—suggestive name—they were again blown out to sea, but soon recovered their position, and Cook describes ...
— The Life of Captain James Cook • Arthur Kitson
... is not the men most occupied who are usually most deaf to new ideas. It is the loungers of politics, the quidnuncs, gossips, bustling idlers, who are most industrious in stifling discussion by protests against the waste of time and the loss of force involved in talking about proposals which are not exactly ready to be voted on. As it is, everybody knows that questions are inadequately discussed, or often not discussed at all, on the ground that the ...
— On Compromise • John Morley
... been." Hugh yet sounded in some fashion indignant. "There never was any other possibility for me after I met her. I waited for her six mortal years. I'd have waited all my life. But she gave in at last. I think she realized that it was sheer waste of time to go on." ...
— The Safety Curtain, and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... of knowing something more; and this pleasure is a very different thing from amusement, though I read a great deal for mere amusement, as I do still, and to take my mind away from unhappy or harassing thoughts. There are very few things that I think it a waste of time to have read; I should probably have wasted the time if I had not read them, and at the period I speak of I do not think I ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... defect, and that, until the constructive powers of the arch came to be understood, it was almost impossible to erect a building that should be at once lofty and elegant. Height, moreover, if the buildings are for use, implies inconvenience, a waste of time and power being involved in the ascent and descent of steps. The ancient architects, studying utility more than effect, preferred spreading out their buildings to piling them up, and rarely, unless in thickly-peopled towns, even introduced a ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 5. (of 7): Persia • George Rawlinson
... knows the two young men. It would be waste of time for me to strive to make anything in common between John Sprague and Wesley Boone. Here, where they both grew up, that ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... ourselves." His voice was very soft and pleasant. The only thing at all strange about him was his smile, that came and went like the ripple of firelight on the wall. "You'd like to know all about us, wouldn't you? Well, until ten years ago I was selling corn in the City. Such a waste of time! But I took it very seriously then and worked, worked, worked. I worked too hard, you know, much too hard, and then I was ill—ill for a long time. When I was better corn didn't seem to be of any importance, and people thought that very odd of me. I was confused sometimes and called ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... any waste of time to write of love? The trials of life are in it, but in a narrow ring and a fierier. You may learn to know yourself through love, as you do after years of life, whether you are fit to lift them that are about you, or whether ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... "It is a waste of time and words to try to deceive me," said the red Captain. "A young gentleman who risks so much for a lady as you have done, and accomplishes so much for her,—yes, they were wonders of prowess and courage, I admit, and I compliment you upon them,—a young gentleman who ...
— The Bright Face of Danger • Robert Neilson Stephens
... certain type of clerical head master has often tried to impress upon his boys—he would try it on his staff also did he not know that it would be waste of time and energy—that the two hours devoted to "divinity" are the two most important school hours of the week. And he is quite right: they are the most important, or, rather, but for opportunities missed, they would be. For a liberal education without a foundation in religion is ...
— The School and the World • Victor Gollancz and David Somervell
... head-on eyeing us as we approached him, for we had found it a waste of time to attempt to escape the perpetual bestial rage which seems to possess these demon creatures, who rove the dismal north attacking every living thing that comes within the ...
— Warlord of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... significant that the beautiful romanza 'Spirto gentil,' to which the act and indeed the whole opera owes most of its popularity, was transferred from an earlier and unperformed work, 'Le Duc d'Albe.' It would be waste of time to describe the plots of any other serious works by this composer. Many of them, such as 'Betly,' 'Linda di Chamonix,' and 'Anna Bolena,' were successful when produced; but Donizetti aimed merely at satisfying the prevailing taste of the day, and when ...
— The Opera - A Sketch of the Development of Opera. With full Descriptions - of all Works in the Modern Repertory • R.A. Streatfeild
... silent; then he stretched his hand out with a franc in it. "It is folly, as I say, and evil waste of time; nevertheless, it is like Alois, and will please the house-mother. Take this silver bit for it ...
— Stories By English Authors: Germany • Various
... cords is concerned, "controlling" the breath has no influence whatever. The vocal cords respond to the effective air pressure; they are not affected in any way by the opposed contractions of the breath muscles. "Opposed-muscular" breath-control is a sheer waste of time ...
— The Psychology of Singing - A Rational Method of Voice Culture Based on a Scientific Analysis of All Systems, Ancient and Modern • David C. Taylor
... assume every boy to have the soul of a professor, and every girl a genius for music. We pack off our sons to cram themselves with Greek and Latin, and put our daughters down to strum at the piano. Nine times out of ten it is sheer waste of time. They sent me to Cambridge, and said I was lazy. I was not lazy. I was not intended by nature for a Senior Wrangler. I did not see the good of being a Senior Wrangler. Who wants a world of Senior Wranglers? Then ...
— They and I • Jerome K. Jerome
... thirty-one hundred calves the fall before, and while riding over the range I was delighted to see so many young steers in my different brands. But our jaunt had only whetted the appetite of my guest to see more of the country, and without any waste of time we started south with the buckboard, going as far as Comanche County. Every day's travel brought us in contact with cattle for sale; the prices were an incentive, but we turned east and came back up the valley of the Brazos. ...
— Reed Anthony, Cowman • Andy Adams
... be placed on a satisfactory basis until it is regulated by law. For the good of the service itself, for the protection of those who are intrusted with the appointing power against the waste of time and obstruction to the public business caused by the inordinate pressure for place, and for the protection of incumbents against intrigue and wrong, I shall at the proper time ask Congress to fix the tenure of the minor offices of the several Executive ...
— Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Vol. VIII.: James A. Garfield • James D. Richardson
... the Divine power; but God's will, because of his perfection, cannot be other than it is, and therefore things cannot be differently constituted. For to suppose otherwise is to subject God to fate, an absurdity which is not worth waste of time ...
— The World's Greatest Books—Volume 14—Philosophy and Economics • Various
... "Bah! It's waste of time!" I said; and I gave it up, not knowing that I should soon have something far more serious to think about. For just as I was deep in my cogitations I heard a step, and my father came into sight, ...
— Mass' George - A Boy's Adventures in the Old Savannah • George Manville Fenn
... lawful to exact from them, and that they do not waste their time in running about to markets and fairs'. Bodo and Ermentrude and the three children, all attired in their best, did not consider it waste of time to go to the fair even twice or three times. They pretended that they wanted to buy salt to salt down their winter meat, or some vermilion dye to colour a frock for the baby. What they really wanted was to wander along the little rows of booths and look at all the strange ...
— Medieval People • Eileen Edna Power
... "Still, what is the use of so many studies worked out, so many difficulties vanquished? It's mere waste of time! The New World seems to have made up its mind to live in peace; and our bellicose Tribune predicts some approaching catastrophes arising out of ...
— Jules Verne's Classic Books • Jules Verne
... of supplanting hand labor by machinery, but bids fair to be relatively small hereafter, since fewer men go through long and costly apprenticeships, and since the operator of one machine can usually learn to operate another with little waste of time. ...
— Essentials of Economic Theory - As Applied to Modern Problems of Industry and Public Policy • John Bates Clark
... of that. It would be rather a waste of time to take them before knowing that," said ...
— The Loudwater Mystery • Edgar Jepson
... special methods are adopted. Give nature time to work before you take over her business, lest you interfere with her dealings. You assert that you know the value of time and are afraid to waste it. You fail to perceive that it is a greater waste of time to use it ill than to do nothing, and that a child ill taught is further from virtue than a child who has learnt nothing at all. You are afraid to see him spending his early years doing nothing. What! is it nothing ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... being rectified without operation; (3) a condition of the general health which requires that the disease should be got rid of as speedily as possible; (4) progress or persistence of the disease in spite of conservative treatment. When there is no prospect of recovery with a movable joint it is a waste of time and a possible source of danger to persevere with conservative measures. Operation permits of the disease being eradicated and the restoration of a useful limb within a reasonable time, averaging ...
— Manual of Surgery Volume Second: Extremities—Head—Neck. Sixth Edition. • Alexander Miles
... and forever the duckling simile, the first thing I did on board the boat, after recovering from the excitement of seeing Mabel off by train with the Bronsons, was to wonder how I could make up for all this hideous waste of time when I might have been making love to Biddy. But there was no chance to say anything personal to her that night. I had to hear—and wanted to hear—the story of all that had happened from the moment ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson
... connected with the lines of steamers leaving the port, but with no more, luck than before. The case seemed rapidly going from bad to worse, and already it had been suggested that I should give it up and return to my duty without further waste of time. This, as you may naturally suppose, I had ...
— My Strangest Case • Guy Boothby
... with a light laugh, "thou knowest that it is merely waste of time to affect indignation. I know thee too well to be deceived. Come, what is it that ye would consult me about? not the forging of a battle-axe ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... the one prided himself on being unapproachable, the other rejoiced in being accessible to all the world; the one, with his airs and graces, was pleased to transact business slowly, the other was never so happy as when he could satisfy the demands of a petitioner without waste of time. (4) ...
— Agesilaus • Xenophon
... amusements, our apparent waste of time, our persistent indifference, our frequent punishments and aversion for our exercises and impositions, earned us a reputation, which no one cared to controvert, for being an idle and incorrigible pair. Our masters treated us with contempt, and we fell into utter ...
— Louis Lambert • Honore de Balzac
... skill at war," he said to Turlough that afternoon when they had seen the four ships weather past them and anchor a mile up the bay; "and since the Dark Master's troopers are also skilled at that game, they will fall to work without waste of time or men. We may look to have the dry moat filled with fascines to-night and our gates blown in with petards. At the worst, we can hold that tower, ...
— Nuala O'Malley • H. Bedford-Jones
... plausible theory, but not one mother in ten would tolerate a practice which they would consider as a degradation of their daughters.—But, (said I,) is not household economy the chief pursuit of nine of every ten of the sex; and is not the system of education incomplete, if not a waste of time, which does not embrace that pursuit as part of the plan? And just for that reason, (said she,) that one in every ten may not have occasion to concern herself in household affairs, the whole avoid them as degrading—each looks for the prize in the lottery of fortune, and therefore all pitch themselves ...
— A Morning's Walk from London to Kew • Richard Phillips
... the expedition to Neri di Gino and Alamanno Salviati, who, instead of overrunning the country, advanced near to Lucca. As the weather had become extremely cold, the forces established themselves at Campannole, which seemed to the commissaries waste of time; and wishing to draw nearer the place, the soldiery refused to comply, although the Ten had insisted they should pitch their camp before the city, and would not hear ...
— History Of Florence And Of The Affairs Of Italy - From The Earliest Times To The Death Of Lorenzo The Magnificent • Niccolo Machiavelli
... tables. The diplomatists are not, however, alone in their protest. Everybody has protested, and is still protesting. If it is a necessity of war to throw shells into a densely populated town like this; it is—to say the least—a barbarous necessity; but it seems to me that it is but waste of time and paper to register protests against it; and if it be thought desirable to do so, it would be far more reasonable to protest against human beings—women and children—being exposed to its effects, than ...
— Diary of the Besieged Resident in Paris • Henry Labouchere
... ordinary mortals sleep and consciousness are so nearly incompatible that the notion of actual mental achievement during sleep is unthought of. Dreams are allowed to run an absurd riot through the brain, disturbing physical rest. The remedy for this universal ailment and waste of time was to be found in "white sleep," a bit of Indian mysticism, purporting to accomplish a partial detachment of mind and body, so that the will, which is always the expression of the link between these two, is, for the time, dissolved. The body rests, but the unfettered ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... no grand and glittering success as a newspaper man, nevertheless had mighty little use for the pottering, ponderous old major. Devore did not believe that bricks could be made without straw. He considered it a waste of time and raw material to try. Through that summer he kept the major on the payroll solely because the chief so willed it. But, though he might not discharge the major, at least he could bait him—and bait him Devore did—not, mind you, with words, but with a silent, sublimated contempt more ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... great letter-writer. After he began, as he said, to write for print, he considered it waste of time to write anything which was not to be printed, except in briefest form. His letters to his wife and family during absences on the Continent or elsewhere, seldom contained more than a bare itinerary, ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... Hester's pile of letters over the top of her share of the morning's correspondence—namely, a list of Pryce Jones—"that you care to write so many letters, Hester. I am sure I never did such a thing when I was a girl. I should have regarded it as a waste of time." ...
— Red Pottage • Mary Cholmondeley
... second, how shall girls be thoroughly well? The laws of health are few and simple. They are so well understood by the parents of this generation that it may seem a waste of time to allude to them here. Yet I am writing for girls whose ...
— Girls and Women • Harriet E. Paine (AKA E. Chester}
... coarse and fine netting silk; second sized purse twist; plain silk; China silk; extra fine, and finest netting silk; second sized netting silk; coarse and fine chenille, and crochet silk. These are so well known that it would be a waste of time to describe them in detail. They are of a great variety of colors, and of different qualities; some sorts being much more durable, both in fabric and color, than others. No young lady should trust, at first, to her own judgment in making the selection: but a little ...
— The Ladies' Work-Table Book • Anonymous
... way. If a scholar is not prepared, it is not of much consequence whether it is because he forgot his book or mistook the lesson; or if it is ascertained that his answer is incorrect, it is ordinarily a mere waste of time to ...
— The Teacher • Jacob Abbott
... make a show on, and it is the rarest sort of person who can play on it. That's why, all those years, I have hated giving lessons. If one has to, as I have had to, one must take any awful miss with a pigtail, and make a sham pianist of her. One can always do that. But it would be waste of time for you and me; you wouldn't want to be made a sham pianist, and simply I wouldn't ...
— Michael • E. F. Benson
... my experience is, that the less stimulant I take, the better—I have given up beer with benefit to myself, and I have almost given up wine. I take, on an average, about five glasses of claret per week, more by way of luxury than of use. Tobacco I never use, as smoking seems to me to be rather a waste of time. ...
— Study and Stimulants • A. Arthur Reade
... chocolate is needed, draw a line across the two squares at the end, dividing them in halves. With a sharp knife, shave off the chocolate until you come to the line. By this method there is no waste of time or material. If you want two or more squares, all that is necessary is, of course, to shave off until you come to the dividing line already there. The pound packages of Baker's chocolate ...
— Miss Parloa's New Cook Book • Maria Parloa
... policy is its success, and it is a waste of time to enter into a vindication of the manner in which the Wilson Administration made war, or to trouble about the accusations of waste and extravagance, as if war were an economic process which could be carried on prudently ...
— Woodrow Wilson's Administration and Achievements • Frank B. Lord and James William Bryan
... Of course it was a mistake! Not a soul in London knew their telephone number. It had never been put on their notepaper. Still, she went on listening with the receiver held to her ear, and growing more and more annoyed at the futile interruption and waste of time. ...
— What Timmy Did • Marie Adelaide Belloc Lowndes
... quite so ridiculous as it seemed when, three months ago, Prince ARTHUR introduced it, and House laughed it off premises. Sensible course suggested at close of Sitting by WILFRID LAWSOW. "Scandalous waste of time," he said; "the sooner ...
— Punch Volume 102, May 28, 1892 - or the London Charivari • Various
... industrial work, do not require elaboration, though their cumulative effect is often very real. Many women-workers, the locality of whose home depends on the work of their husband or father, are obliged to travel every day long distances to and from their work. The waste of time, the weariness, and sometimes the expense of 'bus or train thus imposed on them, is in thousands of cases a heavy tax upon their industrial life. Women working in factories, or taking work home, suffer ...
— Problems of Poverty • John A. Hobson
... loved!" said she, "is that the summit of earthly happiness, the end of life—to love? I don't think it is. It may be the extreme of mortal misery, it may be sheer waste of time, and fruitless torture of feeling. If Schiller had said to be loved, he might have come nearer the truth. Is not that another ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... you or to me," said Lord Earle. "I am sorry for you, Helena—Heaven knows it wrings my heart—but I shall not break my word! I will not reproach you," he continued, turning to his son, "it would be a waste of time and words; you knew the alternative, and are ...
— Dora Thorne • Charlotte M. Braeme
... is not averse to Greek. In these days the classics are looked upon as waste of time. Political economy and profiteering are more useful. As he says, a man of the type of Carnegie would die in a Greek city. I am not sure whether this is not unfair. The real use of Greek is that it teaches culture. There is use in Plato's philosophy; it is quite as ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Patrick Braybrooke
... habits which especially moved his brother to anger. He was fond of roaming the country alone for hours together; he was fond of reading. To Richard each was a waste of time. He never opened a book, save a manual of husbandry or a ready reckoner; he could conceive of no reason for walking, unless it were the business of the farm. Nothing irritated him more than to see Desmond stretched at length with his ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang
... took me into her little sitting-room and I then said—I spare you the record of my emotions—that she was aware that I wished to marry Nancy; that she had seemed to favour my suit and that it appeared to be rather a waste of money upon tickets and rather a waste of time upon travel to let the girl go to India if Leonora thought that there was any chance ...
— The Good Soldier • Ford Madox Ford |
