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Counteract   Listen
verb
Counteract  v. t.  (past & past part. counteracted; pres. part. counteracting)  To act in opposition to; to hinder, defeat, or frustrate, by contrary agency or influence; as, to counteract the effect of medicines; to counteract good advice.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Counteract" Quotes from Famous Books



... man returns home after a long absence, before he is allowed to visit his wife, he must wash his person with a particular fluid, and receive from the sorcerer a certain mark on his forehead, in order to counteract any magic spell which a stranger woman may have cast on him in his absence, and which might be communicated through him to the women of his village. Two Hindoo ambassadors, who had been sent to England by a native prince and had returned to India, were considered to have so polluted themselves ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer

... boat before the freeze-up had long since gone. A month earlier the same steamer had taken down in a mail sack the preliminary report of Elliot to his department chief. One of the passengers on that trip had been Selfridge, sent out to counteract the influence of the evidence against the claimants submitted by the field agent. An information had been filed against Gordon for highway robbery and attempted murder. Wally was to see that the ...
— The Yukon Trail - A Tale of the North • William MacLeod Raine

... commerce and industry? We are to allow great differences of personal possession. Even to-day the large companies count with hundred-thousand-dollar salaries, and there is nothing in the socialistic principle which would counteract this tendency. The differences may even grow, if the economic callings are to attract the great talents at all in such a future state. But just the one decisive value of the possessions for the development of industry and commerce—namely, the transforming ...
— Psychology and Social Sanity • Hugo Muensterberg

... of a family, being reduced to great penury by the persecution of a malignant and powerful man, from whom she had protected the honor of one of her protegees, Lord Byron, to whom the lady and her persecutor were equally unknown, sent her assistance, which was powerful enough to counteract the evil designs of her foes. He adds that, having learnt at Pisa that a great number of vessels had been shipwrecked during a violent storm, in the very harbor of Genoa, and that several respectable families were ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli

... its idiom—everything has an idiom and tongue; He resolves all tongues into his own, and bestows it upon men, and any man translates, and any man translates himself also; One part does not counteract another part—he is the ...
— Poems By Walt Whitman • Walt Whitman

... To counteract this tendency, and to do so in the right way, is one of the very noblest tasks set before the younger Clergy of the English Church in our time. It is for them, under God, in a pre-eminent degree, to find out the secret, and then to live it out, how to be at once ...
— To My Younger Brethren - Chapters on Pastoral Life and Work • Handley C. G. Moule

... lifted up and strengthened by open commendation; of no use to except to the mysterious female,—to picture her as rearing a thin-blooded generation on selfish and mechanically repeated axioms,—all this failed to counteract the monotonous repetition of this sentence. There was nothing to do but to give in, and I was about to accept it weakly, as we too often treat other illusions of darkness and necessity, for the time being, when I became aware of some other annoyance ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte

... have a Christian home, in which their religious life can be daily strengthened and fostered, they cannot be what they ought," she said to herself. "In continual contact with the world, with nothing to counteract, it's not strange that they act and feel ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe

... them, and which were much like those of the mother country. Carthage possessed the finest harbor on the coast of Africa, situated in the middle of the Mediterranean, where all the trade routes crossed. To counteract these attractions of the sea there was nothing but the arid and mountainous character of the interior. It was inevitable, therefore, that the Carthaginians, like their ancestors, should build an empire of ...
— A History of Sea Power • William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott

... which are addressed to their pupils, they can, in a great measure, prevent the bad effects of inaccurate or imprudent conversation; they can explain to their pupils what was left unintelligible, and they can counteract false associations, either at the moment they perceive them, or at some well-chosen opportunity. But there is a class of acquaintance with whom it will be more difficult to manage; persons who are, perhaps, on an intimate footing with the family, who are valued for ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth

... hoods, and pelisses of the guests. It was an arsenal where each arrival left his baggage on arriving, and took it up when departing. Along each wall was a bench for the servants who arrived with lanterns, and a large stove, to counteract the north wind, which blew through this hall from the garden to ...
— An Old Maid • Honore de Balzac

... the stock of wine is gone, chrysanthemums then use to scour away the smell. So as to counteract their properties of gath'ring cold, fresh ginger you should take. Alas! now that they have been dropped into the boiling pot, what good do they derive? About the moonlit river banks there but remains the ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... painful experience, and I suffered the full penalty of my rashness. As an awn from a bearded head of barley will win its disputed way up one's sleeve, and gain a point in advance despite all effort to stop or expel it, so did every resolution, every reflection, counteract the very purpose it was summoned to oppose, and to my sorrow I would taste the drastic, turnip-shaped corm wherever ...
— Popular Science Monthly Volume 86

... the great man. 'Macchiavellian. I pin all my hopes on your being able to counteract the pernicious influence of my opponent's ...
— The Convert • Elizabeth Robins

... "Then to counteract that we must shape our course for a point four miles above that which marks the entrance to the creek—must we not, ...
— The Congo Rovers - A Story of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood

... double disk appear of the same tint," he explained. "If it has rotary power, the halves appear of different tints and the degree of rotation is measured by the alteration of thickness of this double quartz plate necessary to counteract it. It is, as I told Mr. Jameson early to-day, a rather abstruse subject, this of polarized light. I shall not bore you with it, but I think you will see in a moment why it is necessary, perhaps why some one who knew thought ...
— The Treasure-Train • Arthur B. Reeve

... possessed that somewhat rare though valuable faculty, the ability to recognise instantly, and instantly to accept, the inevitable. Also when he had made a false move, he knew it, and was preparing to counteract it almost before his opponent ...
— The White Ladies of Worcester - A Romance of the Twelfth Century • Florence L. Barclay

... was implicated in any treasonable designs, but he was undoubtedly the leader of a group of youthful writers whose aspirations went far beyond the intentions of the Government, and it was thought desirable to counteract his influence by shutting him up in prison. Here he wrote and published, with the permission of the authorities and the imprimatur of the Press censure, a novel called "Shto delat'?" ("What is to be Done?"), which was regarded at first as a most harmless ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace

... nucleus. Such was the influence of the name of Sparta, and such were his own abilities and activity, that he succeeded in raising a force of about two thousand fully armed infantry, with a larger number of irregular troops. Nicias, as if infatuated, made no attempt to counteract his operation, nor, when Gylippus marched his little army toward Syracuse, did the Athenian commander endeavor to check him. The Syracusans marched out to meet him; and while the Athenians were solely intent on completing their fortifications on the southern ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 2 • Various

... fading process at work in my father. Its end I did not foresee. It would have gone hard with me indeed to have been consciously facing that. But I was sadly enough conscious of the process; and a competent housewife would have found humorous pathos, no doubt, in my efforts, by culinary means, to counteract this. My father's appetite was capricious, and never vigorous. There was a considerable period in which I am sure quite half my waking hours (not to mention dream fancies and half waking meditations in bed) ...
— The Record of Nicholas Freydon - An Autobiography • A. J. (Alec John) Dawson

... lapping and whispering as if waiting to receive the unfortunate. It is then that the nerves weaken and begin to communicate with and paralyse the muscles, unless there is sufficient strength of mind to counteract the horror, setting ...
— Charge! - A Story of Briton and Boer • George Manville Fenn

... methods of business have since been made illegal, and the Standard is compelled to do business on the same basis as its competitors, but its vast resources and occupancy of the field give it an advantage which nothing can counteract. ...
— American Men of Mind • Burton E. Stevenson

... not seen." (The work was a humorous romance, unique in its kind, and I am told is much tasted in a Cherokee translation, where the jokes are rendered with all the serious eloquence characteristic of the Red races.) This sort of distinction, as a writer nobody is likely to have read, can hardly counteract an indistinctness in my articulation, which the best-intentioned loudness will not remedy. Then, in some quarters my awkward feet are against me, the length of my upper lip, and an inveterate way I have of ...
— Impressions of Theophrastus Such • George Eliot

... At last I lie, my wits my own; And in my hand I clasp the flower To counteract that magic power; The cuckoo-flower, in a lilac sheet Under body, head and feet. Above me apple-blossoms fleck The cloudless sky, a neighbouring beck With many a happy gurgle goes Down to the farm through alder-rows. Strange it is, and it is sweet, To hear the distant mill-wheel beat, And the kindly ...
— Georgian Poetry 1911-12 • Various

... few words were accompanied by a little laugh, to counteract the suspicion of flattery that clung to them. But for that feminine interpretation Evan might not have so fully appreciated her meaning. He got a suggestion from her words: would it not be a good idea ...
— A Canadian Bankclerk • J. P. Buschlen

... dream, denotes threatening enemies. If you wrench the dagger from the hand of another, it denotes that you will be able to counteract the influence of your enemies and ...
— 10,000 Dreams Interpreted • Gustavus Hindman Miller

... beat. He began, then, to rub his feet with vinegar, and applied the same several times to his head and shoulders. After which, in the absence of his servants, he poured water also over himself; so that, when they returned after a few moments, they found him quite wet. To counteract the bad effect of this proceeding, they began to rub him with a little oil. In the evening he took a little food, and tried to sleep; but notwithstanding that he seems to have taken something to bring on sleep, he threw himself restless from one side to the other, calling ...
— Narrative of a Mission to Central Africa Performed in the Years 1850-51, Volume 1 • James Richardson

... the women might enjoy—say now and then of an afternoon—there were not many circumstances to counteract the hardness contracted at their work. These off times were opportunities for social intercourse between them. They did not leave home, however, and go out "paying calls." Unless on Sunday evenings visiting one another's cottages was not desirable. ...
— Change in the Village • (AKA George Bourne) George Sturt

... shining pillow for her head, and veiled the nudity of her shoulders with its thick ringlets; her beautiful hands, purer, more diaphanous, than the Host, were crossed on her bosom in an attitude of pious rest and silent prayer, which served to counteract all that might have proven otherwise too alluring—even after death—in the exquisite roundness and ivory polish of her bare arms from which the pearl bracelets had not yet been removed. I remained long in mute contemplation, and the more I gazed, the less could ...
— Clarimonde • Theophile Gautier

... I have often heard speak on the subject, dreaded nothing so much as these ideas of liberty, in conjunction with a monarchy. He regarded them as reveries, called the members of the committee idle dreamers, but nevertheless feared the triumph of their ideas. He confessed to me that it was to counteract the possible influence of the Royalist committee that he showed himself so indulgent to those of the emigrants whose monarchical prejudices he knew were incompatible with liberal opinions. By the presence of emigrants who acknowledged nothing short of absolute power, he thought he ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne

... position of this venerable matron created an impression, which called, to the utmost, all the arts and efforts of the prosecution to counteract. Many who had gone fully and earnestly in support of the proceedings against others paused and hesitated in reference to her; and large numbers who had been overawed into silence before, bravely came forward in her defence. The character of Nathaniel Putnam has ...
— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham

... for a fountain into the bargain; but that does not prevent his acquiescence in any proposition for getting rid of a National Debt, which he certainly never agreed to pay, and which he is told makes sugar and tea so shamefully dear. No. I tell you what does a little counteract those eloquent incentives to break his own head against the strong walls of the Social System—it is, that he has two eyes in that head, which are not always employed in reading. And, having been told in print that masters are tyrants, parsons ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 • Various

... Queen's tells me that on the whole he considers the Lee-Metford superior, and that the Boers he has met have told him they hold it to be a harder shooter at long ranges. However, it seems to me that the better balance and magazine of the Mauser counteract this ...
— With the Naval Brigade in Natal (1899-1900) - Journal of Active Service • Charles Richard Newdigate Burne

... before another chief took on himself the office of refutation. The second orator, though past the prime of his days, was far less aged than the one who had preceded him. He felt the disadvantage of this circumstance, and endeavoured to counteract it, as far as possible, by ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper

... thae pages to judge hoo far it was calculated to soothe my previously harassed feelins, an' to afford me the relaxation an' amusement I sought, an' o' which I had sae much need. At first, I resolved on takin every possible public an' private measure that could be commanded to counteract the evil reports, o' ae kind an' anither, under which baith mysel personally an' my family were labourin. I thocht on gaun roun to a' the acquaintances on whom I had just been ca'in, an' explainin to them the real state o' the case; an' then followin up this ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume III • Various

... efface them, and as they expressed an equal hatred for the monarchy and the papacy, neither laity nor clergy may have felt obliged to interfere. Perhaps, however, it was rightly inferred that the ferocity of one inscription might be best left to counteract the influence of the other. I know that with regard to the priests you experience some such effect from the atrocious attacks in the chief satirical paper of Rome, The name of this paper was given me, with a deprecation not unmixed with recognition of its cleverness, by an Italian friend ...
— Roman Holidays and Others • W. D. Howells

... individuals which superior intellect, greater industry and a thousand other uncontrollable forces have ever created and will ever create. It has been reserved to railroad managers to demonstrate to the public that a power has been allowed to grow up which has assumed the right to counteract the dispensations of Providence, to enrich the slothful, to impoverish the industrious, to curtail the profits of remunerative industries and revive by bounties those languishing for want of vitality, to humble proud and self-reliant marts of trade and to build up cities in ...
— The Railroad Question - A historical and practical treatise on railroads, and - remedies for their abuses • William Larrabee

... already come to the conclusion that after 1. P-K4, P- K4 White does well to try to force the exchange of Black's centre pawn on Q4 or KB4, and that Black will try to counteract this, unless by allowing the exchange he gets a chance of exerting pressure in the centre ...
— Chess Strategy • Edward Lasker

... situation—speaking politically—she has been in since those dramatic days of the advance on Paris. The British effort is only just beginning to bear fruit, and we are called on to strain every nerve in our national body to counteract the superb organisation of the Boches. That can only be done by getting the right man in the right job. Men with special qualifications must be given the chance to exercise them. All A.S.C. officers should be business ...
— War Letters of a Public-School Boy • Henry Paul Mainwaring Jones

... vizir in person appeared at the head of a formidable force in the Ukraine, bringing with him George Khmielnicki, son of the former ataman, who had long been confined as a state prisoner in the Seven Towers, but was now released to counteract, by his hereditary influence with the Cossacks, the adverse agency of Doroszenko. Czehryn, after a close investment of a month, was carried by storm, the garrison put to the sword, and the fortifications razed. But though the war was continued through ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 334, August 1843 • Various

... the individuals whom the figures represented. We have it from more than one learned writer, that the cruel and gloomy worship of Egypt arose from a belief that Typhon was labouring incessantly to counteract the happiness of mankind. He was considered to be greedy and voracious, and that it was necessary to glut his altars with blood in order to appease ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant

... them that England only consented to leave to the Irish in two or three instances the use of the natural faculties which God had given them. He asked them whether Ireland was united to Great Britain for no other purpose than that we should counteract the bounty of Providence in her favour; and whether, in proportion as that bounty had been liberal, we were to regard it as an evil to be met with every possible corrective? In our day there is nobody of any school who doubts that Burke's view of our trade policy ...
— Burke • John Morley

... she had been the loveliest of Venuses lying uncarved in the lunar marble of Carrara. There are men to whom silliness is an absolute freezing mixture; to whose hearts a plain, sensible woman at once appeals as a woman, while no amount of beauty can serve as sweet oblivious antidote to counteract the nausea produced by folly. Malcolm had found Clementina irritating, and the more irritating that she was so beautiful. But at the first sound from her lips that indicated genuine and truthful thought, the atmosphere had begun to change; and ...
— The Marquis of Lossie • George MacDonald

... appears, had lent the first edition of Mr. Coleridge's poems to Lady Elizabeth Perceval,[25] in some parts of which volume the sentiments of an earlier day were rather too prominently displayed. To counteract the effect such parts were calculated to produce, Mr. Coleridge wrote the following letter, in the hope that by being shown to her ladyship, it might efface from her mind any unfavorable impression she might have received. ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle

... think of the intensity of the perturbing agencies which arise out of these and other conditions of modern European society, I confess that the attempt to counteract them by asking Governments to agree to a maximum military expenditure, does not appear to me to be worth making; indeed I think it might do harm by leading people to suppose that the desires of Governments are the ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 3 • Leonard Huxley

... Churchmen that they often took the part of the Indians; and a venerated name to this day among the natives of Michoacan is that of Quiroga, the first Bishop of that province, who penetrated there to endeavour to counteract the effect of the marked abuses of Guzman, president of the first Audiencia, who in 1527 burned to death their chief, because he would not, or could not, give up his gold. Velasquez, the second viceroy, succeeding Mendoza, also had grave questions with ...
— Mexico • Charles Reginald Enock

... characteristic disposition, and the physical activity necessarily connected with it, have been by some ascribed to the influence of our climate, to our moist and heavy atmosphere, and clouded skies, to counteract the influence of which, and to preserve a counterbalancing buoyancy of mind and body, an active habit of life is requisite. But this hypothesis is untenable; for Flanders, with a similar climate, and flourishing likewise by means of its native industry, affords sufficient proof how little these ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various

... is it that every individual sin may transmit his own peculiar type of weakness or wickedness to a whole race, disappearing in one generation, re-appearing in another, exactly the same as physical peculiarities do, requiring the utmost caution of education to counteract the terrible tendencies of nature—the "something in the blood" which is so difficult to eradicate: which may even make the third and fourth generation execrate the memory of him or her ...
— Mistress and Maid • Dinah Craik (aka: Miss Mulock)

... denouncing the South for her treatment of the colored man, whom she has extensively favored with office, Boston, at least, has now had the first opportunity of practicing her doctrine; and let us hope that the man's name—Homer—will be classical enough to counteract her surprise.—Baltimore ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 2, February 1886 • Various

... perfectly obvious, however, that a captive balloon in a wind is greatly at a disadvantage, and to counteract this, attempts have been made in the direction of a combination between the balloon and a kite. This endeavour has been attended with some measure of success in the German army. Mr. Douglas Archibald, in England, was one of the first to advocate the kite balloon. In 1888 he called attention to ...
— The Dominion of the Air • J. M. Bacon

... its lovely color and enticing fringe, lead one to suspect it of extraordinary desire to woo some insect that will carry its pollen from blossom to blossom and so enable the plant to produce cross-fertilized seed to counteract the evil tendencies resulting from the more prolific self-fertilized cleistogamous flowers buried in ...
— Wild Flowers Worth Knowing • Neltje Blanchan et al

... most frequent causes of disease. There are, indeed, comparatively few pathological conditions that do not bring with them congestion of some more or less important organ. A remedy then which more than any other has a tendency to equalize the circulation, and thus counteract a condition which as cause or effect, or both, is an almost universal concomitant of disease, and which in addition to this is so admirable and physiological a stimulant and tonic, can hardly be surpassed as a prophylactic by any ...
— The Electric Bath • George M. Schweig

... practice referred to steels and depraves, to a dreadful degree, a vast number of human beings immediately employed about it; and, as a spectacle, powerfully contributes to confirm, in a greater number, exactly that which it is, by eminence, the object of moral tuition to counteract—men's disposition to make-light of all suffering but their own. This one thing, this not caring for what may be endured by other beings made liable to suffering, is the very essence of the depravity which is so fatal to our race in their social constitution. This selfish ...
— An Essay on the Evils of Popular Ignorance • John Foster

... survival; and it is these two worn-out and reactionary ideas (if they can be described as "ideas") that are at present fighting their death-struggle. It was the ambition of Francis Ferdinand to achieve Serbo-Croat unity within the Monarchy, and thus simultaneously to counteract the attractions of Pan-Serb propaganda and to remove the most fertile source of friction between Austria-Hungary and Serbia. His death destroyed the last chance of such a solution; for the statesmen of Vienna and Budapest were not merely incapable but openly ...
— The War and Democracy • R.W. Seton-Watson, J. Dover Wilson, Alfred E. Zimmern,

... contrary, the better we are able to think of him as a man, while we are obliged to disapprove him as a theologian, the stronger will be the evidence for our conviction, that the tendency toward good in human nature has a force which no creed can utterly counteract, and which insures the ultimate triumph of that tendency ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot

... the empire from being usurped. Neither Delemy nor the Prince had funds to raise an army; so that neither of them knew what steps to take. Delemy, however, with the true spirit of a Bedouin Arab, supported his friend in his adversity, and promised to exert himself to counteract the operations of the arch-hypocrite Buhellesa. Collecting the sheiks of the various kabyls of Suse, he made an energetic harangue to them; and discussed with them the expediency of their uniting together, to repel the impostor. The sheiks were all loyal, and well affected ...
— An Account of Timbuctoo and Housa Territories in the Interior of Africa • Abd Salam Shabeeny

... to counteract any tendency to vibration that might be set up by the rapid reciprocation of the cross head, cutters, and their attendant parts. Mounted also on the main shaft is one of a pair of reversed cone drums. These, with their accompanying belt and its adjusting gear, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 613, October 1, 1887 • Various

... drew the attention of a Parliamentary Commission appointed to inquire into the matter. The Act of 10 Will. III. 2, c. 12 ordered the planting of a certain number of trees in every county, "but," remarks Lecky, "it was insufficient to counteract the destruction which was due to the cupidity or the fears of ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift

... disdainfully the dreams of youth as a luxury which they cannot afford to indulge, and to immerse themselves in practical cares, month after month, with perhaps the hope of a fairly careless and idle holiday at intervals. What I think tends to counteract this for many people is love and marriage, the wonder and amazement of having children of their own, and all the offices of tenderness that grow up naturally beside their path. But this again brings a whole host ...
— Where No Fear Was - A Book About Fear • Arthur Christopher Benson

... were necessary at the planting of cacao to counteract their ignorance of its requirements was long current also among the superstitious Spaniards, who similarly accounted for the early failures of the English, as witness the following amusing extract from a contribution to the Harleian Miscellany ...
— The Food of the Gods - A Popular Account of Cocoa • Brandon Head

... As to a particular providence you give up the reality of it, and I give it up too. But I cannot give up the argument, that if there were a God with all his allowed attributes of wisdom, power and justice, there ought to be a particular providence to counteract the general laws of nature, in favour of those who defend the interposition. Though the Deity should not interfere unless there be a worthy cause, agreeable to the ...
— Answer to Dr. Priestley's Letters to a Philosophical Unbeliever • Matthew Turner

... firm against the violence of the German reaction; this they met without assistance from the French, who had been called to oppose the German advance on the Marne. Pershing spoke of the "desperate efforts" of the enemy at Cantigny, "determined at all costs to counteract the most excellent effect the American success had produced." For three days guns of all calibers were vainly concentrated upon the new positions. Coming at the moment of extreme discouragement, Cantigny was of an importance ...
— Woodrow Wilson and the World War - A Chronicle of Our Own Times. • Charles Seymour

... be largely composed of those articles rich in the non-nitrogenized or carbonaceous elements. Fat meats, rich, sweet cream, good butter, and other similar articles of food, should comprise a large part of the diet. These elements, which are prolific in the production of animal heat counteract the predisposition to take cold, and thus become most valuable remedial agents—not less essential than the medical treatment that has been advised. The patient, suffering from chronic catarrh, should ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce

... persecutors, with what is called proof against leaden bullets, but against those only. During the battle of Pentland-hills Paton of Meadowhead conceived he saw the balls hop harmlessly down from General Dalziel's boots, and, to counteract the spell, loaded his pistol with a piece of silver coin. But Dalziel, having his eye on him, drew back behind his servant, who was shot dead.—Paton's Life. At a skirmish, in Ayrshire, some of the wanderers defended themselves ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3) • Walter Scott

... any motion takes place, this is evident, and this tendency is called centrifugal force. Sad is it for the State when this force is called into play, and the radical axis is a standing menace to the stability of States and nations. The only way to counteract its baneful, disturbing influence is to increase the attraction of the monarch on the individual, which nullifies the former force, and prevents further mischief. This is the method which nature itself adopts in the motions of the planetary worlds; the attraction ...
— The Romance of Mathematics • P. Hampson

... recovery of the two, in striking contrast to the deformed lineaments of his elder brother. Such an occurrence is sure to excite one of two feelings in the breast of every beholder—pity or disgust; and, unhappily for Francis, maternal tenderness, in his case, was unable to counteract the latter sensation. George become a favorite, and Francis a neutral. The effect was easy to be seen, and it was rapid, as it ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper

... necessary to adopt unusual but admittedly clever expedients to counteract the great torque irregularity caused by the excessive maximum pressure. The adoption of the lower pressure of 800 lbs. would have eliminated the necessity for the pivoted spring-mounted counterweights ...
— The First Airplane Diesel Engine: Packard Model DR-980 of 1928 • Robert B. Meyer

... witchcraft, but to these may be added many other well-known plants, such as the juniper, mistletoe, and blackthorn. Indeed, the list might be greatly extended—the vegetable kingdom having supplied in most parts of the world almost countless charms to counteract the evil designs of these malevolent beings. In our own country the little pimpernel, herb-paris, and cyclamen were formerly gathered for this purpose, and the angelica was thought to be specially noisome to witches. The snapdragon and the herb-betony had ...
— The Folk-lore of Plants • T. F. Thiselton-Dyer

... obstructions to the execution of the laws, all combinations and associations, under whatever plausible character, with the real design to direct, control, counteract, or awe the regular deliberation and action of the constituted authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle, and of fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force—to ...
— From Farm House to the White House • William M. Thayer

... water space, for generating steam by the radiating heat of the furnace, and arranged to envelope the cylinders with water to prevent injury by the gases and heat; also an improved arrangement of chambered pistons, for keeping the same filled with water to counteract the action of the heat upon the same, also, certain improvements in chambered valves, and valve operating devices, the said chambered valves and rods being supplied with water, also to prevent injury by the heat and ...
— Scientific American, Vol.22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 • Various

... investigation of truth alone, without reference to a side to be supported. No studies give such a power of distinguishing as metaphysical, and in their natural and unperverted tendency they are ennobling and exalting. Some such studies are wanted to counteract the operation of legal studies and practice, which sharpen, indeed, but, like a grinding-stone, narrow ...
— Specimens of the Table Talk of S.T.Coleridge • Coleridge

... Father Peter Faber, the first associate of St. Ignatius, was at Mainz, whither he had been sent by Pope Paul III. to counteract the spread of the new doctrines by all the means in his power. His reputation for holiness Was so great in the Society of Jesus, that St. Francis Xavier invoked him when in danger from a storm at sea, and ...
— Studies from Court and Cloister • J.M. Stone

... refused to sanction the practice, and the clergy in many cases preached against it as an "invention of Satan, intended to counteract the purposes of an all-wise Providence." But through the perseverance and good sense of Lady Montagu, with a few others, the new practice gradually gained ground. Subsequently Dr. Jenner began to make experiments of a different ...
— The Leading Facts of English History • D.H. Montgomery

... 1878-80.—In the course of the following year (1878) the Russian government, to counteract the interference of England with their advance upon Constantinople, sent an envoy to Kabul empowered to make a treaty with the amir. It was immediately notified to him from India that a British mission would ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... me, therefore, I own it seems to be more necessary than ever to make the most active exertions in order to counteract this new shape of evil; and I do hope and trust that, however ungracious and mortifying it may be to military habits and military education to be opposed to what may be deemed petty bands of robbers and incendiaries, Lord Cornwallis will feel the necessity of applying ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham

... old man, to counteract the unfavorable impression which the stories made upon the women, told them of the battle near Plowce, which put an end to the incursions of the Knights of the Cross, and in which he took part as a soldier in the infantry ...
— The Knights of the Cross • Henryk Sienkiewicz

... the stepmother, with an impatient gesture. "Who can do anything to counteract a bad disposition? You don't deny that hers is bad? She is a very devil for pride and obstinacy—she has no affection—she has proved it. I have no inclination to get myself wounded by ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... reach of all, as they cost but a cent apiece. Servants and their lovers, after satisfying their appetites with these 'oliebollen,' go and have a few turns in the roundabouts by way of a change, and then hurry to the fish stall, where they eat a raw salted herring to counteract the effects of the earlier dissipation. The more respectable servant, however, turns up her nose at the herrings, and goes in for smoked eel. These fish-stalls are very quaint in appearance, for they are hung with garlands of dried 'scharretje' (a white, thin, leathery-looking fish), which dangle ...
— Dutch Life in Town and Country • P. M. Hough

... To counteract this tendency she assumed a very professional air when they set out on the following morning. She was once more Eliza Appleton the reporter, and O'Neil, in recognition of this fact, explained rapidly the difficulties of construction which he had met and overcome. ...
— The Iron Trail • Rex Beach

... more than she gave in this strange friendship. Seeking to amuse the old nurse, she herself gained such an uplift of heart and mind that it began to counteract that spirit of sullenness that had entered into the Western girl when she had first come to this house and had been received so ...
— The Girl from Sunset Ranch - Alone in a Great City • Amy Bell Marlowe

... sources of unhappiness in this extraordinary case is, the very favour that, in any other, might counteract it—namely, that of the queen: for while, in a manner the most attractive, she seems inviting my confidence, and deigning to wish my happiness, she redoubles my conflicts never to shock her with murmurs against one who, ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay

... school had passed; Tasso had long been dead; and the Neapolitan Marini, called the Corrupter of Italian poetry, ruled from his grave the taste of the time. This taste was so bad as to require a very desperate remedy, and it was professedly to counteract it that the Academy of the ...
— Modern Italian Poets • W. D. Howells

... wanted to win Arezzo, if he could, as well. So, by his machinations, he arranged that the forces of Arezzo should be out to meet and overthrow the adventurous Florentines, whereafter they might march on Florence and take the city unawares. But, to counteract this, he made his arrangements with Messer Griffo, who was, in one and the same job, to massacre the Florentines of the Red and give battle to the Aretines unaware of his presence, and so, at a stroke, rid Simone of his enemies, and cover him with ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... the last chapter that the performance of Christian rites and the exhibition of Christian symbols and sacred books have a powerful effect against fairies. But further, the invocation, or indeed the simple utterance, of a sacred name has always been held to counteract enchantments and the wiles of all supernatural beings who are not themselves part and parcel of what I may, without offence and for want of a better term, call the Christian mythology, and who may therefore at times, if not constantly, be supposed ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland

... in the matter to the parents of Emperor William. The responsibility must rest rather with those people with whom Prince Bismarck, acting through the old emperor, surrounded the young prince. The mission of these nominees of the chancellor was to counteract the influence of the then crown prince and crown princess over their eldest son, and this was achieved by setting the boy against his parents. Every direction or command given by Frederick or by his consort to their ...
— The Secret Memoirs of the Courts of Europe: William II, Germany; Francis Joseph, Austria-Hungary, Volume I. (of 2) • Mme. La Marquise de Fontenoy

... was then he was bitterly taught to feel, when his people, without an exception, addressed his Lordship this pithy remonstrance - 'Reside amongst us and we shall pay your debts.' A variety of feelings and facts, unconnected with a difference, might have interposed to counteract this display of devotedness besides ingratitude, but these habits, or his Lordship's reluctance, rendered this expedient so hopeless that certain of the descendants of the original proprietors of that valuable locality were combining their respective ...
— History Of The Mackenzies • Alexander Mackenzie

... gun-powder, as described in the Paper; though that smoke could have no effect in drying, but only in remedying the corruption of the air, by means of the acid spirits from the sulphur and nitre, aided perhaps by some species of an aerial fluid, then disengaged from the fuel, to counteract putrefaction. But as these purifications by gun-powder, as well as by burning tar and other resinous substances, are sufficiently known, I shall not ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World Volume 2 • James Cook

... its value purely historical. The "Relacion" of Sancho gives much interesting ethnological information relative to the Inca dominion at the time of its demolition. Errors Pedro Sancho has in plenty; but the editor has striven to counteract them by footnotes. ...
— An Account of the Conquest of Peru • Pedro Sancho

... is still more rapid; it divides, distributes, and disperses both property and power. Alarmed by the rapidity of its progress, those who despair of arresting its motion endeavor to obstruct it by difficulties and impediments; they vainly seek to counteract its effect by contrary efforts; but it gradually reduces or destroys every obstacle, until by its incessant activity the bulwarks of the influence of wealth are ground down to the fine and shifting sand which is the ...
— Democracy In America, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alexis de Tocqueville

... this, Miss More says, "You not only do all you can to turn my head by printing my trumpery verses yourself. but you call in royal aid to complete my delirium. I comfort myself you will counteract some part of the injury you have done, my principles this summer, by a regular course of abuse when we meet in the winter: remember that you owe this to my moral health; next to being flattered I like to be scolded; but to be let quietly alone would be intolerable. Dr. Johnson once ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole

... about Christmas. Feeling uneasy in their present condition, they indulged in the expectation that government intended to make some further provision for their future welfare, especially by ordering distributions of land among them. To counteract this expectation, which had a tendency to interfere seriously with the making of contracts for the next season, it was considered necessary to send military officers, and especially agents of the Freedmen's Bureau, among them, who, by administering ...
— Report on the Condition of the South • Carl Schurz

... happened that a sorcerer would be secretly retained to work spells upon a victim, who, from his bodily sensations, suspecting something wrong, but knowing not what, would repair to that self-same sorcerer, engaging him to counteract any mischief that might be brewing. And this worthy would at once undertake the business; when, having both parties in his hands, he kept them forever in suspense; meanwhile seeing to it well, that they failed not in handsomely remunerating ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. II (of 2) • Herman Melville

... to interdict all neutrals from trading with the British ports in any commodities whatever, produced fresh retaliatory orders in council, intended to support England's maritime rights and commerce, and to counteract Bonaparte's continental system. The Berlin decree was a gross infringement of the law of nations and an outrage on neutral rights, which especially called for resistance from the Americans, a neutral and trading people; but they neither resisted nor seriously remonstrated against ...
— The Life and Correspondence of Sir Isaac Brock • Ferdinand Brock Tupper

... nations, nor control particular states from provoking war. The federal government has no constitutional power to check a quarrel between separate states; nor to suppress a rebellion in any one of them; nor to establish a productive impost; nor to counteract the commercial regulations of other nations; nor to defend itself against the encroachments of the states. From the manner in which it has been ratified in many of the states, it cannot be claimed to be paramount to the state constitutions; so that there is a prospect of anarchy from the ...
— The Critical Period of American History • John Fiske

... original purity; her person jealously protected against the designs of greedy fortune-hunters; and, to complete the catalogue of his paternal attentions and solicitudes, my vigilant and faithful ancestor, to prevent accidents, and to counteract the chances of life, so far as it might be done by human foresight, saw that she was legally married, the day she reached her nineteenth year, to the person whom, there is every reason to think, he believed to be the most unexceptionable man of his acquaintance—in other words, to himself. ...
— The Monikins • J. Fenimore Cooper

... forest, until, at the halfway point, my altimetre registered three hundred and fifty metres. Out of the corner of my eye I saw all the beautiful countryside spread out beneath me, but I was too busily occupied to take in the prospect. I was watching my wings, nervously, in order to anticipate and counteract the slightest pitch of the machine. But nothing happened, and I soon realized that this first grand tour was not going to be nearly so bad as we had been led to believe. I began to enjoy it. I even looked down over the side ...
— High Adventure - A Narrative of Air Fighting in France • James Norman Hall

... himself in those endless diggings? You are short-sighted, my friend; you do not look to the future; you will not turn your head to see what may have been the influences of the past. You have not examined your own breast to see whether the monitor there has not commanded you to do your part to counteract these influences; and yet the Irishman appeals to you, eye to eye. He is very personal himself,—he expects a personal interest from you. Nothing has been able to destroy this hope, which was the fruit of his nature. We were much touched by ...
— Woman in the Ninteenth Century - and Kindred Papers Relating to the Sphere, Condition - and Duties, of Woman. • Margaret Fuller Ossoli

... by turns carried away by the violence of a young man's passion, and held back by a wish to know and test the woman to whom he would be entrusting his happiness. His love had not hindered him from perceiving in Emilie the prejudices which marred her young nature; but before attempting to counteract them, he wished to be sure that she loved him, for he would no sooner risk the fate of his love than of his life. He had, therefore, persistently kept a silence to which his looks, his behavior, and his smallest actions gave ...
— The Ball at Sceaux • Honore de Balzac

... runs across to the other side to draw some in the opposite direction. These sudden changes of course are highly logical; they show us how proficient the Spider is in the mechanics of rope-construction. Were they to succeed one another regularly, the spokes of one group, having nothing as yet to counteract them, would distort the work by their straining, would even destroy it for lack of a stabler support. Before continuing, it is necessary to lay a converse group which will maintain the whole by its resistance. Any combination of forces acting in one direction must be forthwith neutralized by another ...
— The Life of the Spider • J. Henri Fabre

... chicken-pox or measles, very catching, and just as inevitable in its run; and very few of us escape it. It is severest, too, where the sanitary conditions are most favorable to its development. Where there is least thought and culture to counteract its influence slang words crowd out those of a more serious character, until, in time, the young and inexperienced speaker or writer is unable to distinguish between the counterfeit ...
— Slips of Speech • John H. Bechtel

... zenith was past, and her plain stage began. Her charm departed never to return, and she slipped back into insignificance. At eight she could no longer be considered a baby to play with, and a good deal of fault-finding was deemed necessary to counteract the previous spoiling. In Henrietta's youth, sixty years ago, fault-finding was administered unsparingly. She did not understand why she was more scolded than the others, and decided that it was because Ellen and Miss Weston ...
— The Third Miss Symons • Flora Macdonald Mayor

... her favourite diversion. I suffered her to enjoy it a while; then I expostulated: deriding and ridiculing all Mr. Heathcliff's assertions about his son, as if I were certain she would coincide. Alas! I hadn't skill to counteract the effect his account had produced: it was just what ...
— Wuthering Heights • Emily Bronte

... may counteract a policy so unfriendly to our prosperity in a variety of ways. By prohibitory regulations, extending, at the same time, throughout the States, we may oblige foreign countries to bid against each other, for the privileges of our markets. This assertion will not appear chimerical ...
— The Federalist Papers • Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison

... call him their lord; vast is his power and wealth; provinces would be her dowry. But would she not, herself, merely add another to his list of slaves? Secluded within his palace, with many rivals to counteract her, would she not gather thorns, as well as blossoms, in the Flowery Land? It is a ...
— Holidays at the Grange or A Week's Delight - Games and Stories for Parlor and Fireside • Emily Mayer Higgins

... Scotland, he would adopt efficient measures for changing the religion of the country from the Protestant to the Catholic faith. He made, too, every effort to organize a party in his favor in Scotland, and tried to defeat and counteract the influence of Mary's government by every means in his power. These things, and other trials and difficulties connected with them, weighed very heavily upon Mary's mind. She sunk gradually into a state of great dejection and despondency. She spent many hours in sighing and in ...
— Mary Queen of Scots, Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... spot enriched by their gore. A year or more before he was appointed commander-in-chief of all the Confederate forces, a bill passed Congress creating that office. It failed to become a law, the President having withheld his approval. Lee made no complaints; his friends solicited no votes to counteract the veto. When a bill for the same purpose was passed at a subsequent period, it was whispered about that he could not accept the position. To a committee of Virginians who had called on him to ascertain ...
— A Life of Gen. Robert E. Lee • John Esten Cooke

... in congenial alliance with many evil things, may strive to counteract this progressive self emancipation from cruel falsehoods and superstitions, but in vain. The terms of salvation are seen lying in the righteous will of a gracious God, not in the heartless caprice of a priesthood nor in the iron ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger

... like so many cattle. This want of self-respect of course interferes with the authority of the non-commissioned officers, which is always difficult to sustain, even in white regiments. "He needn't try to play de white man ober me," was the protest of a soldier against his corporal the other day. To counteract this, I have often to remind them that they do not obey their officers because they are white, but because they are their officers; and guard-duty is an admirable school for this, because they readily understand that the sergeant or corporal of the guard has for the time ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 86, December, 1864 • Various

... over which the old bridge stood, at which the battle was fought. Sometimes, but rarely, his boat accompanied another up the stream, and I recall the silence and preternatural vigor with which, on one occasion, he wielded his paddle to counteract the bad rowing of a friend who conscientiously considered it his duty to do something and not let Hawthorne work alone, but who, with every stroke, neutralized all Hawthorne's efforts. I suppose he would have struggled until he fell senseless, rather than ask his friend to desist. ...
— Early Letters of George Wm. Curtis • G. W. Curtis, ed. George Willis Cooke

... great deal of sickness in the garrison; but comparatively little of this was due to scurvy, for every available corner of ground was now cultivated, and the supply of vegetables—if not absolutely sufficient to counteract the effects of so long and monotonous a diet of salt meat—was yet ample to prevent any ...
— Held Fast For England - A Tale of the Siege of Gibraltar (1779-83) • G. A. Henty

... particular measures, especially by prohibiting the production of wine and oil beyond the Alps with a view to favour the great Italian landlords and merchants.(26) It is true that both the opposition and the section of the conservatives that entered into ideas of reform worked energetically to counteract the evil; the two Gracchi, by carrying out the distribution of almost the whole domain land, gave to the state 80,000 new Italian farmers; Sulla, by settling 120,000 colonists in Italy, filled up at least ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen

... greatest admirers have never attempted seriously to resort in practice. I confess them, that I have no sort of reliance upon either a Triennial Parliament or a Place-bill. With regard to the former, perhaps, it might rather serve to counteract than to promote the ends that are proposed by it. To say nothing of the horrible disorders among the people attending frequent elections, I should be fearful of committing, every three years, the independent gentlemen ...
— Thoughts on the Present Discontents - and Speeches • Edmund Burke

... of D'Auvergne became known to him, that it was less by the prayers of the culprit's sister, and by his own consideration for the children whom she had borne to him, than in the hope that he might, through the medium of the Count, be enabled to counteract the measures of his most subtle and dangerous enemy, that he had been induced on that occasion ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe

... professor of canons in the college of Santo Tomas of Manila, to whom I gave the manuscript of this chapter to read, wrote in the margin the following note, which is very just and timely; and as such I insert it, in order to counteract the statement which has given occasion for it, and which I wrote in the heat of composition, simply through heedlessness and inadvertence. "In no way can the cura make use of what he learns in the confessional ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 (Vol 28 of 55) • Various

... counteract The thousand ecstacies of love, That you may fix on base of fact The story hinted at above; But all on earth so doubtful is, Man knows so little here below, That, if you ask for proof of this, I cannot ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various

... impression where the ignorance of the people would allow them to venture the experiment; the king having resolved to fall back upon the support of his subjects, naturally desired the assistance of the country gentlemen and the nobles to counteract the efforts of disaffection, and provided them with accurate information in the simplest manner which he could ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude

... That squirms a limbless carcass o'er the ground. And where that inborn loathing is not found You'll find the serpent qualities instead. Who fears it not, himself is next of kin, And in his bosom holds some treacherous art Whereby to counteract its venomed sting. And all are sired by ...
— Maurine and Other Poems • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... diminishing its value, drove it from circulation. In 1650, it was refused in payment of country rates in Massachusetts.[45] This action of the government naturally created distrust among the people, to counteract which it was ordered that "peage" should still "remagne pawable from man to man, according to the law in force." Close upon this followed another decree, limiting it as a legal tender to 40 shillings.[46] These laws continued in force till 1661, when ...
— Wampum - A Paper Presented to the Numismatic and Antiquarian Society - of Philadelphia • Ashbel Woodward

... by sympathizing- -were too readily absorbed. Thus we learned once more, that, instead of sinking into effeminacy and fantastic delights, there was reason rather for hardening ourselves, in order either to bear or to counteract inevitable evils. ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

... you know that?" Roger countered feebly. "Yes, I substituted hydrogen. The metal-foil wrapping would have added just enough weight to counteract the greater buoyancy ...
— Bread Overhead • Fritz Reuter Leiber

... must be thoroughly removed; otherwise, it will destroy the paper. Crystallized soda, two parts, and distilled water, one hundred parts, in solution, will counteract the hydrochloric acid, if the document is allowed to float ...
— Disputed Handwriting • Jerome B. Lavay

... was delightful, therefore, to him, to find a man like Atlee to whom he could tell this—could tell for what an ungrateful country he toiled, what ignorance he sought to enlighten, what actual stupidity he had to counteract. He spoke of the Office—from his tone of horror it might have been the Holy Office—with a sort of tremulous terror and aversion: the absurd instructions they sent him, the impossible things he was to do, the inconceivable lines of policy he was to insist on; how but for him the king would ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever

... knowledge of Indian character would place him sufficiently on his guard to make abortive any attempts against him, and determined to keep a watchful eye upon his wild companion for the present, and until time should have blunted sensibility to the injury. For this reason, and in order also to counteract, as far as might be, the effect of the incidents at the house of the Assistant, after purchasing the articles which they came out to procure, he took the savage with him on the visit to the Governor, which he had promised the knight to make. Nor is this a circumstance ...
— The Knight of the Golden Melice - A Historical Romance • John Turvill Adams



Words linked to "Counteract" :   curb, act, override, hold, derail, cancel, neutralize, countercheck, counteractive, moderate, check, disobey, counterbalance, undermine



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