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Decisive   Listen
adjective
Decisive  adj.  
1.
Having the power or quality of deciding a question or controversy; putting an end to contest or controversy; final; conclusive. "A decisive, irrevocable doom." "Decisive campaign." "Decisive proof."
2.
Marked by promptness and decision. "A noble instance of this attribute of the decisive character."
Synonyms: Decided; positive; conclusive. See Decided.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Decisive" Quotes from Famous Books



... Providence; imputes the misfortunes of the pilgrims to their own sins; and modestly insinuates, that his mission had been approved by signs and wonders. [34] Had the fact been certain, the argument would be decisive; and his faithful disciples, who enumerate twenty or thirty miracles in a day, appeal to the public assemblies of France and Germany, in which they were performed. [35] At the present hour, such prodigies will not obtain credit ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon

... miles away, at Stony Creek, lies the American army, out sentries posted at a church, artillery on a height commanding a field, officers and men asleep in the long grass. Humanly speaking, nothing could prevent a decisive battle the next day. The two American officers, Chandler and Winder, sit late into the night, candles alight over camp stools, mapping out what they think should be the campaign. It is a hot night,—muggy, with June showers lighted up by an occasional flash of sheet lightning. Then all candles ...
— Canada: the Empire of the North - Being the Romantic Story of the New Dominion's Growth from Colony to Kingdom • Agnes C. Laut

... raged through July 1st, 2nd and 3d, 1863, was called the "high water mark" of the Civil War, and one of the "fifteen decisive battles" of history. It was decisive because General Robert E. Lee, with his brave army, was driven back from Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. If Lee had been victorious there, he might have destroyed Philadelphia and New York. By such a brilliant stroke he could ...
— The Story of Young Abraham Lincoln • Wayne Whipple

... to control the evil passions of the soul, and no protection from the malice and enmity of Satan. The destruction of Jerusalem is a fearful and solemn warning to all who are trifling with the offers of divine grace, and resisting the pleadings of divine mercy. Never was there given a more decisive testimony to God's hatred of sin, and to the certain punishment that will fall ...
— The Great Controversy Between Christ and Satan • Ellen G. White

... I. "Let us go and find the Princess. Hers must be the decisive word;" and with my programme in one hand and my diamonds in the other I repaired to the Duchess's room, Bederhof following in ...
— The King's Mirror • Anthony Hope

... know, sir," returned his housekeeper in her decisive voice; "but she wants to see you. Name ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... Marcius; resolving, if he did not give them an opportunity of fighting, to proceed, through the territories of the Marsians and Sabines, into Etruria. The consul met them, and a battle was fought with great fury on both sides, but without a decisive issue. Although both parties suffered severely, yet the discredit of defeat fell on the Romans, because several of equestrian rank, some military tribunes, with one lieutenant-general, had fallen; and, what was more remarkable than all, the consul himself ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius

... neighbour. "If I heard aright, it is General Greene's intention to pursue Rawdon, and strike a more decisive blow." ...
— The Last Penny and Other Stories • T. S. Arthur

... you could favour me this evening with Mr. Sidney Wilton's address? We have always supported Mr. Wilton's views on the corn laws, and if put clearly and powerfully before the country at this junction, the effect might be great, perhaps even, if sustained, decisive." ...
— Endymion • Benjamin Disraeli

... denunciation recurred to her, and with it all the suspicion she had in vain rejected. The mother was unaware that for months there was taking place in her daughter a moral drama of which that scene formed a decisive episode, she was too shrewd not to understand that her emotion had been very imprudent, and that she must explain it. Moreover, the rupture with Maud was irreparable, and it was necessary that Alba should be ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... the tumult died away. Quarrier's measured step came, passed; Marion Page's cool, crisp voice and walk, and the giggle and amble of the twins, and Rena and Eileen,—the last laggards, with Ferrall's brisk, decisive tones and stride to close ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers

... palpable to eye and ear visions of beauty which, with less of superficial realism, were fed by far more exquisite and penetrating senses, and attached by more and subtler filaments to the truth of things. Beyond question this was the decisive literary experience of Browning's early years. Probably it had a chief part in making the poet's career his fixed ideal, and ultimately, with his father's willing consent, his definite choice. What we know of his inner and outer life during the important years which turned the ...
— Robert Browning • C. H. Herford

... fact of the slighter force of gravity, a man upon Mars could attain a much greater size, and consequently much greater muscular strength, than his fellows upon the earth possess without being oppressed by his own weight. In other words, as far as the force of gravity may be considered as the decisive factor, Mars could be inhabited by giants fifteen feet tall, who would be relatively just as active, and just as little impeded in their movements by the weight of their bodies, as a six-footer is upon ...
— Other Worlds - Their Nature, Possibilities and Habitability in the Light of the Latest Discoveries • Garrett P. Serviss

... Baillie, a veteran officer, was next routed by him, at the village of Alford, in Strathbogie. Encouraged by these repeated and splendid successes, Montrose now descended into the heart of Scotland, and fought a bloody and decisive battle, near Kilsyth, where four thousand covenanters ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3) • Walter Scott

... A decisive proof of the eligibility of Hong Kong as a place of trade, and of its importance in the eyes of the Chinese themselves, is afforded by the immense sums paid by some of them for ground on which to build Hongs, where they can deposit their goods with safety, beyond ...
— Trade and Travel in the Far East - or Recollections of twenty-one years passed in Java, - Singapore, Australia and China. • G. F. Davidson

... windows were separated by one rain pipe, every two porches sustained by one pillar, one diminutive magnificent purple pillar, simulating porphyry and crowned with a rich Corinthian capital in freestone, the outline of each porch being picked out and made clear and decisive with woodwork painted white. Then, and not till then, did you see that the all-important detail was the porphyry pillar, for it was as if every two houses sprang from it as ...
— The Combined Maze • May Sinclair

... said to be about 6,000 strong—in good spirits. Not many of the fugitives reached the camp. Talbot did not follow up this advantage by attempting an immediate attack upon the fortified position in the plain. He gave his men a rest after their toilsome march over rough ground, and put off the decisive battle until the morrow. In the meantime, he placed himself in communication with the garrison of Castillon, and arranged that a sortie in force should take place on the signal being given for the great tug-of-war. He made the ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker

... Of the decisive period of Wordsworth's life, when he was living with his sister Dorothy and with Coleridge at Alfoxden, we have already spoken. The importance of this decision to give himself to poetry is evident when we remember that, at thirty years of age, he was without money or any definite ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long

... listens attentively to each one, and decides quickly whether they shall be presented in the Herald, and at what time; and if he desires any subject to be written upon, he states his wish, and "sketches," in his peculiar and decisive manner, the various headings and the style ...
— The Secrets Of The Great City • Edward Winslow Martin

... Progress. Many have died remarkably happy in the Lord, who, till very near their last moments have been in bondage through the fear of death. We may be sure of this, that wherever the Lord has begun a work, He will carry it on to the great decisive day. The proof of this is 'he would not go back!' 'If ye continue in My Word, then ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... which he could not but regard as the decisive day of his fate, he prepared to deliver the message of Charlemagne. Clad in his armor, fortified with his ivory horn and his ring, he reached the palace of Gaudisso when the guests were assembled at the banquet. As he approached the gate ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch

... very weak; and said he hoped his complete recovery was now only a question of time. But when the young lady—with more hesitation than she usually displayed—preferred a request that she might be allowed to see Mr. Moore, Maurice met that by a gently decisive negative. ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black

... different. They are minutely sensitive to outside occurrences; always seeking signs and interpreting them as favourable or unfavourable as the case may be; and refraining from doing anything so decisive as to call the girl to order. Their game is to be plastic under the fingers of chance; the faintest breath of dubiety can sway them. I had been in so many minds about this thirty pound bet, which I could not really afford, that there was therefore nothing for ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, September 22, 1920 • Various

... truth in arithmetical demonstration, ruin his adversary, if he is to meet him and to fight with him every third year. It will be said I do not allow for the operation of character: but I do; and I know it will have its weight in most elections,—perhaps it may be decisive in some; but there are few in which it will prevent great expenses. The destruction of independent fortunes will be the consequence on the part of the candidate. What will be the consequence of triennial corruption, triennial drunkenness, triennial idleness, ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... the four winds, from the uttermost part of the earth, to the uttermost part of heaven Verily, I say unto you, that this generation shall not pass, till all these things be accomplished." This is decisive, and ...
— The Grounds of Christianity Examined by Comparing The New Testament with the Old • George Bethune English

... the spirit I' th' hour of need, and shudder when he rises. The great, the wonderful, must be accomplished Like a thing of course!—In war, in battle, A moment is decisive; on the spot Must be determin'd, in the instant done. With ev'ry noble quality of nature The leader must be gifted: let him live, then, In their noble sphere! The oracle within him, The living spirit, ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle

... to the language and the ideas of an eventful past marks a decisive stage in the perturbed career of the Jewish people. It indicates ...
— The Renascence of Hebrew Literature (1743-1885) • Nahum Slouschz

... Christianity. The legends of Ireland, too, are full of the terror of the men of "Lochlann," which is generally taken to mean Norway; and the great coast cities of Ireland—Dublin, Cork, Waterford, Wexford, and others—were so entirely Danish that only the decisive battle of Clontarf, in which the saintly and victorious Brian Boru was slain, saved Ireland to Christendom and curbed the ...
— Hero-Myths & Legends of the British Race • Maud Isabel Ebbutt

... depends, alas, on the caprice of a woman. I would lay my single spear in the rest against ten of the best lances in Christendom, rather than argue with a wilful wench who knows not what is for her own good. What answer, coz, am I to return to the Soldan? It must be decisive." ...
— The Talisman • Sir Walter Scott

... much in favour of the British army, had nevertheless reduced it to such a situation as made it very imprudent, if not altogether impracticable, to penetrate farther into those woods. The repulse was far from being decisive, for the enemy had only retired from one to another advantageous situation, in order to renew their attack when the army should again advance. Humanity would not suffer the commander to leave so many wounded men exposed to ...
— An Historical Account Of The Rise And Progress Of The Colonies Of South Carolina And Georgia, Volume 2 • Alexander Hewatt

... the decisive battle (August, 1806,) Kara Georg sent his cavalry round into a wood, with orders to fall on the enemy's flank as soon as the first shot ...
— Servia, Youngest Member of the European Family • Andrew Archibald Paton

... intellectual movement no doubt represents the decisive factor. The love of truth in the abstract is probably the weakest of human passions; but truth when attained ultimately gives the fulcrum for a reconstruction of the world. When a solid core of ascertained and verifiable ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume I. • Leslie Stephen

... we should all probably perish. I, for one, feel in duty bound to seek a safer way than this. I shall hitch up my oxen and return at once to the old trail. Boys (to his teamsters) get the cattle and we'll return." This was decisive, and Mr. Rynierson would tarry no longer. Many others now proceeded to get ready and follow, and as Mr. Rynierson drove out of camp quite a respectable train fell in behind him. As fast as the hunters came in and reported no ...
— Death Valley in '49 • William Lewis Manly

... them with means for war. Whereupon Pericles came out with a fleet a second time against them, and found them not idle nor slinking away, but manfully resolved to try for the dominion of the sea. The issue was, that, after a sharp sea-fight about the island called Tragia, Pericles obtained a decisive victory, having with forty-four ships routed seventy of the enemy's, twenty of which ...
— The Boys' and Girls' Plutarch - Being Parts of The "Lives" of Plutarch • Plutarch

... the destiny of the colony to be, now that the Pauillac was lost and so many of the Folk wiped out? Were there any hopes of ultimate success? And the Horde, what of that? How long a respite might be counted on before the inevitable, decisive battle? ...
— Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England

... persisted and took definite shape in spite of me. I strove to escape from it, to evade it, to stifle and smother it; an inward struggle ensued which brought the perspiration in beads upon my cheeks—a struggle short, sharp, decisive. It was useless—useless to try to put it from me—this idea so wretchedly bizarre, so grotesque and fantastic, so utterly inane—it was useless to deny that the cat bore a ...
— In Search of the Unknown • Robert W. Chambers

... New Zealand; and, perhaps, oouho of the Marquesas:* but at New Caledonia, which is situated between these places and Port Jackson, the same thing is expressed by poon, a sound totally distinct. And to render the anomaly still more decisive, it is only necessary to remark, that, within two hundred miles of Port Jackson, the natives of three tribes, Port Macquarie. Burrah-Burrah, and Limestone Creek, signify the hair, by the words wollack, mundar, ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King

... mistake?" the young man asked in a crisp, decisive voice. "This is Mr. Adam Gregg, is it not? I found your door on a crack and thought you ...
— Colonel Carter's Christmas and The Romance of an Old-Fashioned Gentleman • F. Hopkinson Smith

... express his utter separation from the world. Others, it is true, have chosen quieter methods, and found in that which St. Catherine calls the cell of self-knowledge the solitude they required; but some decisive break was imperative for all. History assures us that there is no easy sliding into ...
— The Life of the Spirit and the Life of To-day • Evelyn Underhill

... worthless; or, by mistake, they may permit wolves in sheep's clothing to take charge of the flock of Christ. The simple fact, therefore, that an individual holds a certain position in any section of the visible Church, is no decisive evidence that he is a true shepherd. Such, however, was not the doctrine of Catholicism. Whoever was accredited by the existing ecclesiastical authorities was, according to this system, the chosen of the Lord. When certain parties who had ...
— The Ancient Church - Its History, Doctrine, Worship, and Constitution • W.D. [William Dool] Killen

... X, soon repented of the peace he had made when the whole country was apparently at his mercy, and renewed the war in the hope of affixing the Danish crown to his own. This hope vanished in the desperate battle of Copenhagen in 1659, where the Swedish army suffered a decisive defeat by the hand of an aroused citizenry. But detachments of the defeated army still occupied large sections of the country districts where they, like all armies of that day, robbed, pillaged and murdered at will, driving thousands ...
— Hymns and Hymnwriters of Denmark • Jens Christian Aaberg

... were put on, and then the rivals advanced and shook hands. An instant later they were at it, and the decisive struggle between ...
— Frank Merriwell at Yale • Burt L. Standish

... Charles V's army, with the papal forces to assist, laid siege to her. The siege lasted for ten months, in which the city was most ably defended by Ferrucci, that gallant soldier whose portrait by Piero di Cosimo is in our National Gallery—No. 895—and then came a decisive battle in which the Emperor and Pope were conquerors, a thousand brave Florentines were put to death ...
— A Wanderer in Florence • E. V. Lucas

... but ingloriously failed to use it. He had conceived a good plan of action, and he successfully executed its initial movement; but when the decisive hour arrived his resolution failed. Instead of advancing aggressively on to Fredericksburg, as he had begun to do, he turned back and fortified his army with intrenchments. Did he mistrust himself, or his army, or both? His original scheme contemplated offensive tactics, and all its merit ...
— Reminiscences of a Rebel • Wayland Fuller Dunaway

... I was impressed with this representation, while I was a schoolboy, and was so led to propose a difficulty to the wife of the master. I said, "I find that we have millions of worlds round us peopled with rational creatures. I know not that we have any decisive reason for supposing these creatures more exalted, than the wonderful species of which we are individuals. We are imperfect; they are imperfect. We fell; it is reasonable to suppose that they have fallen also. It became necessary ...
— Thoughts on Man - His Nature, Productions and Discoveries, Interspersed with - Some Particulars Respecting the Author • William Godwin

... have been no less steadily and perseveringly gathering together the forces with which to recover back again all the fields and all the castles which have been lost, and to confound and overthrow, by one decisive blow, the betrayers of the Constitution and ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein

... manager, Mr. Walker, upon being advised as to the necessity of wearing a white vest to a party: "But, Mr. Daniel, suppose a man hasn't got a white vest and is too poor these war times to buy one?" "—— it, sir! let him stay at home," was the decisive answer. ...
— Literary Hearthstones of Dixie • La Salle Corbell Pickett

... said Euergetes at last, and with a decisive gesture of his hand he dismissed Eulaeus and his friend ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... the dark, had been thinking also, but (as women will at such times) with clearer perception, so that her ideas forming in logical sequence, and growing more clear and decisive (as an argument becomes more lively and conclusive by successful reasoning) served to stimulate her intellect and excite her activity. And the end of it was that she rose quickly from her bed and looked into the next room, where she saw her husband sitting, ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett

... felt that sympathetic tenderness which now preys upon my health, had not her misfortunes excited it? No." Yet the love which is the result of gratitude and pity only, he thought had little claim to rank with his; and after the most deliberate and deep reflection, he concluded with this decisive opinion—He had loved Lady Matilda, in whatever state, in whatever circumstances; and that the tenderness he felt towards her, and the anxiety for her happiness before he knew her, extreme as they were, were yet cool and dispassionate sensations, compared to those which ...
— A Simple Story • Mrs. Inchbald

... did not waver now. His voice was very quiet, but very decisive, as he replied: "My training, my habit of thinking, excludes all belief in the return of the dead either as good spirits or bad, but if there are spirits I should certainly think evil of them if they were to force you into a service you abhor. I do not pretend to pass judgment on your case—I ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland

... gave vent to that decisive utterance he climbed on board, and stood up on the stones and sand which filled the angle between the bulwarks ...
— Steve Young • George Manville Fenn

... to descend to the coast on the opposite side of a ridge from Rooney and his companions, just missed meeting them, and returned to their comrades shortly after the massacre. Grimlek knew that whatever course he should pursue must be prompt and decisive. He at once divided his men into two bands, one of which he sent to pursue and capture the women who had gone to fish; with the other, which he led in person, he resolved either to storm the camp or take it by surprise, ...
— Red Rooney - The Last of the Crew • R.M. Ballantyne

... and understood, their effect upon the practical handling of the problem of flight was immediate and decisive. The aeroplane, or gliding machine, had many rivals; they were all killed by Professor Langley's researches, which showed that the cheapest and best way to raise a plane in the air is to drive it ...
— The War in the Air; Vol. 1 - The Part played in the Great War by the Royal Air Force • Walter Raleigh

... line, C. The curve, D E F, shows the relative intensities of the phosphorescence at different distances from the negative pole, and the position inside the dark space at which phosphorescence does not occur. The height of the curve represents the degree of phosphorescence. The most decisive effects of phosphorescence are reached by making the tube so large that the walls are outside the dark space, while the material submitted to experiment is placed just at the edge of ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 795, March 28, 1891 • Various

... tried to force himself to look at the game. The play went on vigorously. La Teuse won her ace back, and then lost it again. On some evenings they would fight in this way over the aces for quite four hours, and often they would go off to bed, angry at having failed to bring the contest to a decisive issue. ...
— Abbe Mouret's Transgression - La Faute De L'abbe Mouret • Emile Zola

... beaten, she had the fortune to decide the event of the fifth,—that of 1814-15; and in 1815 she was as active against Napoleon as circumstances permitted any of the Allies to be, except England and Prussia. The effect of this pertinacity, and of her decisive part in 1813, was to secure for her a degree of consideration altogether disproportioned to her real power. Men took her for what she appeared to be, not as she was. In truth, very little was known of her condition, and the few ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 110, December, 1866 - A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics • Various

... under the superintendence of Colonel Brockridge. This place had been chosen, not because it was a military institution, but because its principal was a thorough disciplinarian. He had the reputation of being a just and fair man, and was very popular with boys of strong constitution and decisive temperaments. No "milk-and-water" boys were ever sent to him; or, if they were, they soon left the Institute, or became vigorous and ...
— In School and Out - or, The Conquest of Richard Grant. • Oliver Optic

... the proper place for a military work, and deemed it best to examine Cincinnati first. He was delighted with Cincinnati. He removed the troops thither, built a fort, and thus rendered the neighborhood the safest spot below Pittsburg. This event was decisive: Cincinnati took the lead of the Ohio ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 118, August, 1867 • Various

... contemplated by his parents. Their praises might simply have testified that love appreciates; the hand that wrought might have sanctified even a feeble work to their sight; but colder judgments pronounced Ronald's initiatory achievement a pledge of power, and all the more decisive because the execution of the youthful hand obviously had not kept pace with the strong conception ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie

... his shoulders, but he busied himself in selecting and wiping the instruments. Yet in spite of his decisive words the surgeon ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... this too well; but it would have cost her so much to break off with Lord Nelville, that she herself endeavoured to avoid, as much as he, a decisive explanation; and as she was not possessed of much foresight she was happy with the present, such as it was, although it was impossible for her to know what would be ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael

... never written anything good before, and a humorous essay on kittens by another junior that nobody had suspected of being literary. There was also a verse, or rather two verses; and it was these that caused the usually prompt and decisive Helen to hesitate and even to dawdle, wasting a precious afternoon in a futile attempt to square her conscience and still do as she pleased about those verses. One of them was Helen's own. It was good; ...
— Betty Wales Senior • Margaret Warde

... than its resentments, set the example of concord; and Athens, for a while, consented to reconciliation and amity with the hated Aegina. All the proceedings of this illustrious congress were characterized by vigilant prudence and decisive energy. As soon as Xerxes arrived in Sardis, emissaries were despatched to watch the movements of the Persian army, and at the same period, or rather some time before [61], ambassadors were sent to Corcyra, Crete, Argos, and to ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... Garland, and he had received orders to charge the lower batteries of the city, and carry them if he could without too much loss, for the purpose of creating a diversion in favor of Worth, who was conducting the movement which it was intended should be decisive. By a movement by the left flank Garland could have led his men beyond the range of the fire from Black Fort and advanced towards the northeast angle of the city, as well covered from fire as could be expected. ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan

... lace, (the uniform of a Staff Officer) a star on his breast, a silver medal suspended from his neck, a dark fur cap with a broad gold lace, and he had a small portmanteau; he announced himself as an Aid de Camp to Lord Cathcart, just arrived from Paris; that he was the bearer of glorious news, that a decisive battle had taken place, that Bonaparte was pursued and killed by the Cossacks, that the Allied Sovereigns were actually in Paris, and that now (that most welcome news to the Inhabitants of Dover) an immediate Peace was certain. He desired to have a sheet of paper, that ...
— The Trial of Charles Random de Berenger, Sir Thomas Cochrane, • William Brodie Gurney

... scrape, scrape of Peter's fiddle. He jumped up at last, suddenly, bow in hand, and went to the doorstep, where his stepdaughter sat sewing. From the words he had overheard in the next room he was sure that the decisive hour of life had just struck for the girl, and there she was stitching her flannel and singing about "Alpine horns, tra-la!" She ought to have known, he thought, without hearing. A woman ought to be of the kindred of the old seeresses, and by ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - April, 1873, Vol. XI, No. 25. • Various

... from the raw flesh. And now behold this gentleman, very wisely replaced in office by the French, paying us a morning visit in European clothes. He was the man of the most character we had yet seen: his manners genial and decisive, his person tall, his face rugged, astute, formidable, and with a certain similarity to Mr. Gladstone's—only for the brownness of the skin, and the high-chief's tattooing, all one side and much of the other being of an even blue. ...
— In the South Seas • Robert Louis Stevenson

... Etienne van der Hagen (or Haagen), that set out from Holland late in 1603 and early in 1604, had also decisive results that more completely established the Dutch power in the East Indies. This expedition was destined to come more intimately in contact with the Portuguese and Spaniards than any former expedition. From this time and even before, the Dutch expeditions overlapped, ...
— History of the Philippine Islands Vols 1 and 2 • Antonio de Morga

... field to promote the wise international policy which animates your mind. We being of similar conditions to our Latin American brothers, being linked to your country by the closest ties that can exist between two independent nations, you having the means of exerting decisive influence upon our future life and we being situated in the constant path of universal transit, shall be an evident, shining example of the benefit which your country can confer upon the countries ...
— Latin America and the United States - Addresses by Elihu Root • Elihu Root

... I regard your father's dream as a dream and nothing more. It cannot be realised. There is only one way in which world-peace can be secured—let your father consent to place this power in our hands, and there will be no more war—or, at most, only one very short and decisive war. If your father is in earnest, if he is not mad, he will consent to this proposal. I need hardly add that, if he does consent, he has only to name his own reward—Germany will pay it gladly. Wealth, position, the suzerainty of a nation—all ...
— The Destroyer - A Tale of International Intrigue • Burton Egbert Stevenson

... the House of Commons, from which he has this moment returned, has rejected the resolution for the increase of the House Tax, by a majority of either nineteen or twenty-one.[59] This majority is so decisive, especially having been taken on a question which was understood to involve the fate of the Government, as to leave Lord Derby no alternative as to the course which it will be his duty to pursue; and ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria

... character. Eager usually refers to some specific and immediate satisfaction, earnest to something permanent and enduring; the patriotic soldier is earnest in his devotion to his country, eager for a decisive battle. ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald

... M. Marcel Deprez have entered on a decisive phase. The dynamos are completed, and were put in place on the 20th October, when M. Deprez carried out some preliminary tests in the presence of a commission consisting of MM. Collignon, Inspector-General ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 520, December 19, 1885 • Various

... and in southern Italy and in the Levant, which had raged round the islands of the Mediterranean, or the passes of the Alps and Pyrenees, or the banks of the Loire and the Tiber,—was now, on the eve of the first Syrian Crusade of 1096, rapidly tending to decisive victory. Toledo was won back in 1084; the Norman dominion in the Two Sicilies had already taken the place of a weak and halting Christian defence against Arab emirs; pilgrims were going in thousands where there had been tens or units by the reopened land route through Hungary; only in the far ...
— Prince Henry the Navigator, the Hero of Portugal and of Modern Discovery, 1394-1460 A.D. • C. Raymond Beazley

... going on infinitely became in fact wearisome. The reply that it is legitimate, that punishment should be infinite, because rewards are so, was not decisive, since indeed it were the property of perfect goodness, to abridge the chastisements and prolong ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans

... strange stroke, had been made wholly master of the Legion, he did not show the old elation or radiance. Perhaps he saw more clearly than ever before. Still he was quick, decisive, strong, equal ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey

... utter want of preparation in the decisive acts of Massinger's characters, as in Camiola and Aurelia in the Maid of Honour. Why? Because the 'dramatis personae' were all planned each by itself. Whereas in Shakspeare, the play is 'syngenesia;' each character has, indeed, a life of its own, and is an 'individuum' of ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge

... He was in no hurry to part with the only joy he had, and, as Katrine was barely eighteen, he naturally thought there would be time enough to consider of her marriage hereafter. Hans hardly expected anything more decisive, and, as he had not been flatly refused, came frequently to the house and chatted with her father, while his eyes followed the vivacious Katrine as she tripped about her household duties. But Hans was perpetually kept at a distance; ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 12, October, 1858 • Various

... good and all. They might hold back the encroaching tide of immigration from the rough land along the river—that sounded like something exciting, to be sure. But they must hold back the tide with legal proceedings and by pastoral pursuits, and that promised little in the way of brisk, decisive action and strong nerves and all these qualities which set the Happy Family somewhat ...
— The Flying U's Last Stand • B. M. Bower

... nominally conquered Lowlands. Her rising was soon crushed, but the government was obviously afraid for a while to move its garrisons forward. Indeed, other needs of the empire caused the withdrawal of the Fourteenth Legion about 67. But the decade A.D. 70-80 was decisive. A series of three able generals commanded an army restored to its proper strength by the addition of Legio II. Adiutrix, and achieved the final subjugation of Wales and the first conquest of Yorkshire, where a legionary fortress at York was ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various

... time, I pointed a decisive forefinger in the direction in which I thought the count was concealed. The obsequious menial took our cards, bowed low, and invited us to enter ...
— Abroad with the Jimmies • Lilian Bell

... fairly succeeded in fastening its thread to the beam which it had so often in vain attempted to reach. Bruce seeing the success of the spider, resolved to try his own fortune; and as he had never before gained a victory, so he never afterward sustained any considerable or decisive check or defeat. I have often met with people of the name of Bruce, so completely persuaded of the truth of this story, that they would not on any account kill a spider, because it was that insect which had shown the example of perseverance, and given ...
— Heroes Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie

... jacket (which might have been his smoking-jacket, but was quite as like a part of his pyjamas), and had heard him then and there call out to his wife, who was looking out of the bedroom window on to the garden, these decisive ...
— Manalive • G. K. Chesterton

... national opulence, and adopting exactly the same policy in all their other affairs, but differing in this only, that one of them adopts a system of commercial restrictions, and the other adopts free trade. This would be a decisive experiment, similar to those which we can almost always obtain in experimental physics. Doubtless this would be the most conclusive evidence of all if we could get it. But let any one consider how infinitely numerous and various are the circumstances which either directly ...
— Essays on some unsettled Questions of Political Economy • John Stuart Mill

... . . At least nine out of ten have wasted their time and pains during several years of their life—telling, important, even decisive years. Among such are to be counted, first of all, the half or two-thirds of those who present themselves for examination—I refer to those who are rejected; and then among those who are successful, who ...
— The Crowd • Gustave le Bon

... still in the field; not even a part of it had as yet been captured or annihilated. And it is a military axiom that no matter how far an army may retreat and no matter how much territory may have been conquered, no battle is decisive until the enemy has been destroyed, either entirely or in large part. The Germans were to be reminded of this fact more than once on the ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume IV (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)

... he taken at bed-time. Avoidance of exposure to cold, and light vegetable diet, are advisable. In the more severe attacks, especially when complicated by laryngeal or bronchial symptoms, the most decisive measures should be employed. The Compound Extract of Smart-weed should be taken freely, together with hot drinks, or a hot general bath. The patient should be warmly covered in bed to encourage a continued perspiration, ...
— The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English • R. V. Pierce

... raised against him, and vows of vengeance were uttered, loud and deep, through the streets of Paris. His enemies in the Assembly took advantage of this to bring an act of accusation against him, which would relieve them of his presence by the decisive energy of the ax of the guillotine. Robespierre's danger was most imminent, and he was obliged to conceal himself. Madame Roland, inspired by those courageous impulses which ever ennobled her, went at midnight, accompanied by ...
— Madame Roland, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott

... truffles and of mushrooms are found associated with particular trees, without being, as is popularly supposed, parasites deriving their nutriment from the dying or dead roots of those trees. The success of Rousseau's experiments seem decisive on this point, for he obtains larger crops of truffles from ground covered with young seedling oaks than from that filled with roots of old trees. See an article on Mont Ventoux, by Charles Martins, in the Revue des Deux Mondes, Avril, ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh

... brother's gloom. Miss Henderson was engaged to Captain Ellesborough. There was therefore no question of her becoming Mrs. Shenstone, and a weight was lifted from the spirits of the vicar's sister. Towards Rachel, Eleanor Shenstone felt one of those instinctive antipathies of life which are far more decisive than any of the ordinary causes of quarrel. Miss Shenstone was thin, methodical, devoted; of small speech and great virtue. Such persons so securely anchored and self-determined can have but small sympathy for the drifters of this ...
— Harvest • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... eye fell on the wounded Iroquois with the bear above him, and he uttered a yell so intense in tone that the bear himself seemed to feel that something decisive was about to be done at last. Henri did not pause, but with a flying dash he sprang like a spread eagle, arms and legs extended, right into the bear's bosom. At the same moment he sent his long hunting-knife down into its heart. ...
— The Dog Crusoe and his Master • R.M. Ballantyne

... Hearing these decisive and terrible words, Lady Macbeth, who had been waiting for a sign of weakness or vacillation on the part of her son-in-law, rose and, with a scared look, left the library. Lady Jane looked up to her husband as if she would fain ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray

... the strength which he often displayed, it was strength of a clumsy and ungraceful character. His language and gestures were those of one seldom used to converse with equals, more seldom still with superiors; short, abrupt, and decisive, almost to the verge of sternness. In the judgment of those who were habitually acquainted with the Constable, there was both dignity and kindness in his keen eye and expanded brow; but such as saw him for the first time judged less favourably, and pretended to discover a harsh and passionate expression, ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott

... travel rapidly. It was published in the newspapers one week later, owing to the slow mail by sea from the South. By this means even Lincoln first learned of this decree, on account of which he was being assailed in many parts. When the news reached Lincoln he took decisive and prompt action. On May 19, he published a proclamation in which he revoked the order of emancipation and recited that the Government had no knowledge of such a decree nor had it authorized General Hunter to ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 7, 1922 • Various

... washing the carriage behind the barn in the back yard and though he had done this frequently before, and though there was nothing unusual about his appearance, Yura clearly felt something of the holiday in the decisive way in which the coachman splashed the water from the bucket with his sinewy arms, on which the sleeves of his red blouse were rolled up to his elbows. Yevmen only glanced askance at Yura, and suddenly Yura seemed to ...
— The Crushed Flower and Other Stories • Leonid Andreyev

... now that the characters have appeared, continues in the main with the second browsing in soft lower strings, while the first (in its later phase) sings above in the wood transformed in mildness, though for a nonce the first motive strikes with decisive vigor. Later is a new heroic mood of minor, quickly softened when the companion melody appears. A chapter of more sombre hue follows, all with the lilt and pace of romantic ballad. At last the main hero returns as at the beginning, only in ...
— Symphonies and Their Meaning; Third Series, Modern Symphonies • Philip H. Goepp

... at this intelligence. Her mind was filled with vague and uncertain fears and forebodings, which were none the less oppressive for being uncertain and vague. She had, however, no immediate cause for apprehension. Mary found that there was no decisive evidence against her, and did not dare to keep her a prisoner in the Tower too long. There was a large and influential part of the kingdom who were Protestants. They were jealous of the progress Mary was making toward bringing the Catholic religion in again. ...
— Queen Elizabeth - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... into dismay by this decisive answer. Yet loth to resign, they took counsel in their perplexity of Vaca de Castro, still detained on board of one of the vessels. But that commander had received too little favor at the hands of his successors to think it necessary to peril his life on their account by ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott

... for them. This man, who was intelligent and longed with all his might to finish his education, was cramped and fettered by poverty. He was conscious of latent powers in himself which were stifled by the difficulties of his existence: he could not take any decisive step. He was never alone. He was a bookkeeping clerk and had to spend his days over purely mechanical work in a room which he had to share with several of his colleagues who were vulgar chattering creatures: they were for ever talking of idiotic things and avenged ...
— Jean-Christophe Journey's End • Romain Rolland

... narratives of his life, we may easily acknowledge the incompleteness of our record of the three years of ministry, and wonder the more at the vividness of impression produced with such economy of material. This meagreness of material is not decisive for the shorter rather than the longer ministry, for it is evident that to effect such a change in conviction and feeling as Jesus wrought in the minds of the ardent Galileans who were his disciples, required time. Three ...
— The Life of Jesus of Nazareth • Rush Rhees

... fought, and other positions to be stormed. A youth with a predilection for hard knocks might have been content with the chances offered to the foot-soldier. But Jackson's partiality for his own arm was as marked as was Napoleon's, and the decisive effect of a well-placed battery appealed to his instincts with greater force than the wild rush of a charge of infantry. Skilful manoeuvring was more to his taste than the mere bludgeon work ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson

... his eighteenth year that an event occurred which he regards as decisive in his development. He read Plato. A new world opened, and he felt that his own nature had been revealed. Next year he formed a passionate, but pure, friendship with a boy of 15. Personal contact with the boy caused erection, extreme agitation, and aching pleasure, but not ejaculation. ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... restlessly for the expected news. In due time the coach rattled into the market-place, hung with branches, the now familiar token that a great battle had been fought and a victory won. Eager groups gathered. The guard, as he handed out his mail-bags, told of the decisive victory which had crowned and completed our efforts. And then the coachman cracked his whip, the guard's horn gave forth once more its notes of triumph, and the coach rolled away, bearing the thrilling news into ...
— A Hundred Years by Post - A Jubilee Retrospect • J. Wilson Hyde

... upon him. At the moment when he had met her he had felt specially downcast. The musical critic, with whom he had gone to the concert, had been a fellow student with him at the Royal College. Being young the critic was very critical, very sure of himself, very decisive in his worship of the new idols and in his scathing contempt for the old. He spoke of Mendelssohn as if the composer of Elijah had earned undying shame, of Gounod as if he ought to have been hanged for creating his Faust. His glorification of certain modern impressionists ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens

... every where put to the sword without distinction; and the Britons, by rendering the war thus bloody, seemed determined to cut off all hopes of peace or com- position with the enemy. But this cruelty was revenged by Suetonius in a great and decisive battle, where 80,000 of the Britons are said to have .perished; and Boadicea herself; rather than fall into the hands of the enraged victor, put an end to her own life by poison [m]. Nero soon after recalled Suetonius from a government, where, by suffering and ...
— The History of England, Volume I • David Hume

... Dan above her fur tippet, and he forgot her words in watching the animation come and go in her face. He fell to musing over her decisive little chin, the sensitive curves of her nostrils and sweet wide mouth, and above all over her kind yet ardent look, which gave the peculiar beauty to ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow

... in all who hear it for the first time, and it is not rare to hear it appealed to as an argument against the actual existence of the ether. It does not seem, however, that such an argument can be decisive. There is no reason for supposing that the ether ought to be a sort of extension of the bodies we are accustomed to handle. Its properties may astonish our ordinary way of thinking, but this rather unscientific astonishment is not a reason for doubting ...
— The New Physics and Its Evolution • Lucien Poincare

... know any bloody Indian story, and I wouldn't tell one if I did," said Nannie in her abrupt, decisive way. ...
— The Gentle Art of Cooking Wives • Elizabeth Strong Worthington

... from them a ray of inspiration; no author in the least distinguished has ventured formally to imitate them, except the boy Chatterton, on their first appearance. . . This incapability to amalgamate with the literature of the Island is, in my estimation, a decisive proof that the book is essentially unnatural; nor should I require any other to demonstrate it to be a forgery, audacious as worthless. Contrast, in this respect, the effect of MacPherson's publication with the 'Reliques' of Percy, so unassuming, ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century • Henry A. Beers

... Brandenburg: Eldest Son always to inherit the Electorate unbroken; after Anspach and Baireuth no more apanages, upon any cause or pretext whatsoever; and these themselves to lapse irrevocable to the main or Electoral House, should they ever fall vacant again. Fine fruit of the decisive sense that was in the Hohenzollerns; of their fine talent for annihilating rubbish,—which feat, if a man can do it, and keep doing it, will more than most others accelerate his course in this world. It was in this dim old Town of Gera, ...
— History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 7 • Thomas Carlyle

... extractive matter are without doubt the principal causes of the difficulty which is encountered in the formation of a perfect and durable ink and for a good ink the essential ingredients are gallic acid and a sesqui salt of iron." Owing to his working with galls he was unable to make decisive experiments, but he concludes, and that rightly, that in proportion as ink consists merely of gallate of iron, it is less liable to decomposition and any kind ...
— Forty Centuries of Ink • David N. Carvalho

... men will assemble at Sioux Falls, September 4, for the purpose of framing a constitution and pressing upon congress the formation of a State of the southern half of the territory. This is the moment for women to act; it is the decisive moment. There can never again come to the women of Dakota an hour like the present. A constitution is the fundamental law of the State; upon it all statute laws are based, and upon the fact whether woman is inside ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various

... beyond which the laws of nature seldom suffer life to be extended, otherwise than by a future state, he seems to have turned his mind upon preparation for the decisive hour, and, therefore, consecrated his poetry to devotion. It is pleasing to discover that his piety was without weakness; that his intellectual powers continued vigorous; and that the lines which he composed when "he, for age, could ...
— Lives of the Poets, Vol. 1 • Samuel Johnson

... before you. The India House is not yet in readiness to send it; I have therefore brought down my own copy, and there it lies for the use of any gentleman who may think such a matter worthy of his attention. It is indeed a noble map, and of noble things; but it is decisive against the golden dreams and sanguine speculations of avarice run mad. In addition to what you know must be the case in every part of the world (the necessity of a previous provision of habitation, seed, stock, capital), that map will show you, that the uses of the influences ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke

... The result was decisive enough to satisfy the riders, and they went off at a lively gallop. The work of that day was done; and though they saw other skulkers, they were not again attacked. At five o'clock in the afternoon they reached the vicinity ...
— A Lieutenant at Eighteen • Oliver Optic

... For a reversion to type, where the plate-licker goes back to hunting, see Mr. London's powerful story, The Call of the Wild. ... The "Rubicon" was a small stream separating Cisalpine Gaul from Italy. Caesar crossed it in 49 B. C, thus taking a decisive step in deliberately advancing into Italy. "Plutarch, in his life of Caesar, makes quite a dramatic scene out of the crossing of the Rubicon. Caesar does not even mention it."—B. Perrin's ed. of Caesar's Civil ...
— Essays of Robert Louis Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson

... deal him a base blow, but I threatened him most hideously with my revolver, and left the white teeth chattering in his black head as I took the stairs three at a time. Why I went upstairs in that decisive fashion, as though it were my only course, I cannot explain. But garden and ground floor seemed alive with men, and I might have ...
— The Amateur Cracksman • E. W. Hornung

... with a blood-thirsty instinct, a wanting to destroy life, to hunt it and shoot it down. They beg to go gunning almost before they are out of dresses and into trousers. Every mother knows there is a savage streak in her boy's nature. No," continued Mrs. Brown, with a decisive nod of her head, "I say let the man who is without sin among them be the first to cast stones now. Perhaps this very preacher spent all his Saturdays robbing birds' nests and clubbing birds when he was a little boy, and kept it up until he was ...
— Dickey Downy - The Autobiography of a Bird • Virginia Sharpe Patterson

... through years of faithful performance of sea duty have been trained to handle their formidable but complex and delicate weapons with the highest efficiency. In the late war with Spain the ships that dealt the decisive blows at Manila and Santiago had been launched from two to fourteen years, and they were able to do as they did because the men in the conning towers, the gun turrets, and the engine-rooms had through long years of practice at sea learned ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Supplemental Volume: Theodore Roosevelt, Supplement • Theodore Roosevelt

... themselves, their quarrels sometimes reaching to such a height that the authority of the husband can no longer preserve peace in his household,—in such cases the interposition of Mumbo Jumbo is called in and is always decisive. This strange minister of justice, who is supposed to be either the husband or some person instructed by him, disguised in the dress which has just been mentioned, and armed with the rod of public authority, announces his coming ...
— Great African Travellers - From Mungo Park to Livingstone and Stanley • W.H.G. Kingston

... from the main army. At first, the event seemed to justify their decision. Meeting a Roman army, commanded by the Praetor Arrius, on the borders of Samnium, the Gauls put it to rout, and the victory of Crixus was not less decisive than any of those which had been won by Spartacus. But this splendid dawn was soon overcast. Crixus was a drunkard, and, while sleeping off one of his fits of intoxication, he was set upon by a Roman army under the Consul Gellius. He was killed, and his ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various

... assisting at this conversation in motionless silence, seated on his haunches, and alternately looking up in his master's face to watch its expression and observing Dinah's movements about the kitchen. The kind smile with which Adam uttered the last words was apparently decisive with Gyp of the light in which the stranger was to be regarded, and as she turned round after putting aside her sweeping-brush, he trotted towards her and put up his muzzle against her hand in ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot

... fondness only saw he wept; Ah! fatal haste! then had I known The serpent, I had sav'd my son! Yet surely pardon frank as mine, A noble heart would more confine! When leaguing with my bitter foe, To strike some grand, decisive blow; Perhaps to rob me of my throne, And make it, ere the time, his own; Or, should wan guilt a danger dread, To humble this devoted head, Each throbbing pang of conscience drown, And seize, with bloody hands, the crown. O'er this offence I cast a veil, And fondly ...
— Elegies and Other Small Poems • Matilda Betham

... Jew proved my selling my clothes, purchasing those found in the bundle, and the stick, of which Armstrong possessed himself. The clothes I had on at the time of my capture were produced in court. As for Ogle, his case was decisive. We were then called upon for our defence. Ogle's was very short. "He had been accustomed to fits all his life—was walking to Hounslow, and had fallen down in a fit. It must have been somebody else who had committed the robbery and had made off, and he had been picked up in a mistake." This defence ...
— Japhet, In Search Of A Father • Frederick Marryat

... of sand and flung it toward the unseen enemy, in memory of the decisive pebbles thrown by Mohammed at the Battle of Bedr, so great a ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England

... many as he crouched there. He wanted to feel decisive; but the weary walk, heavily-laden as he was, had dulled his brain a little, and he could not come to a conclusion as to whether it would not be best to take the initiative and attack at once, trusting to their sudden appearance and the shots they could be creating a panic; for ...
— Fix Bay'nets - The Regiment in the Hills • George Manville Fenn

... has long been known for his accurate artillery and rifle fire, but the bayonet is his favorite arm in battle. Through all our wars it has proved a deciding, if not indeed the decisive, factor in the campaign. Once it has been stained in service he fondles it as, next to his pipe, his best friend. And it is the same with the Frenchman. He calls his bayonet his "little Rosalie," and lays its ruddy edges against his ...
— Tommy Atkins at War - As Told in His Own Letters • James Alexander Kilpatrick

... offence, by His influence with certain classes of the people, and by the danger thus presented of a popular movement which might arouse the suspicion of the imperial authorities, and lead to very decisive action on their part, He threatened the political position of the Sadducean aristocracy. So with complete absence of scruples, but with great political sagacity, Caiaphas uttered the momentous words, an unconscious prophecy, as St. ...
— Gloria Crucis - addresses delivered in Lichfield Cathedral Holy Week and Good Friday, 1907 • J. H. Beibitz

... merchant, who then rebounds like an india-rubber ball. The agent chooses the best-stocked crib, whether it leads him to cover the largest creditors and shear the debtor, or to sacrifice the creditors for the future prosperity of the restored merchant. The action of the agent is decisive. This man, together with the bankrupt's solicitor, plays the utility role in the drama, where it may be said neither the one nor the other would accept a part if not sure of their fees. Taking the average of a thousand failures, ...
— Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau • Honore de Balzac

... of the inconveniences of having two or three, or possibly more, foreigners in succession to the British throne? No!—they had a due sense of the evils which might happen from such foreign rule, and more than a due sense of them. But a more decisive proof cannot be given of the full conviction of the British nation that the principles of the Revolution did not authorize them to elect kings at their pleasure, and without any attention to the ancient fundamental principles of our ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. III. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... Kt-B4, in answer to 16. Q-Kt2. Black is still open to attack in consequence of his broken King's side, but there is no demonstrable advantage for White. The text move is a mistake, and gives White chances of a decisive attack. ...
— Chess Strategy • Edward Lasker

... cleverly-written narrative, in smooth verse, detailing the experience of a bride who took to flirting early in her matrimonial career, but was saved from coming to grief by the decisive action of a stern husband. The book contains a capital lesson for the Girl of the Period, whose follies are satirized in it with a ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 9, May 28, 1870 • Various

... demons would be compelled to confess their diabolical character when questioned by any Christians, and invited the pagans, if it were otherwise, to put the Christian immediately to death, for this, he thought, was the simplest and most decisive ...
— Three Thousand Years of Mental Healing • George Barton Cutten

... territory of Shirpurla. According to one account, the forces of Shirpurla were victorious, while on the cone of Ente-mena no mention is made of the issue of the combat. The result may not have been decisive, but Enannadu's action at least checked Urlumma's encroachments for ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, And Assyria In The Light Of Recent Discovery • L.W. King and H.R. Hall

... uniforms, with grimy hands and faces, and boots knee-deep in stains of mud, stood about or sat in the empty carts, talking, gesticulating, giving sundry, confused and contradictory accounts of the great battle—describing Napoleon's decisive victory—Wellington's rout—the prolonged absence of Bluecher and the Prussians, cause ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy

... As the "Jeffersons'" youthful quarter attempted to pass the ball, Silvey broke through and knocked the pigskin from his hands towards John, who grabbed it and ran to the other end of the field for the one and decisive touchdown of ...
— A Son of the City - A Story of Boy Life • Herman Gastrell Seely

... with a grave, solemn tone, Decisive and clear, without one if or but— That, whenever the Nose put his Spectacles on, By daylight or candlelight—Eyes should ...
— MacMillan's Reading Books - Book V • Anonymous

... forth, in a certain order which had been customary time immemorial in naming the States. In this order Tennessee had place after Kentucky and before Indiana. When the name of the last Representative from Kentucky had been called, the decisive moment arrived. The delegation from Tennessee were on the floor, ready to answer to their names. The Clerk passed over Tennessee and went direct to Indiana. As soon as the first member from Indiana had responded, there arose a tall, black-haired, dark-faced figure, that every body recognized ...
— History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States • Wiliam H. Barnes

... were doing at the time, and cannot recollect it now. Miss Matty and I sat assenting to accounts, and schemes, and reports, and documents, of which I do not believe we either of us understood a word; for my father was clear-headed and decisive, and a capital man of business, and if we made the slightest inquiry, or expressed the slightest want of comprehension, he had a sharp way of saying, "Eh? eh? it's as dear as daylight. What's your objection?" And as we had not comprehended anything of what he had proposed, we found it ...
— Cranford • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... Count Litorius, approaching in silence, and directing each horseman to carry behind him two sacks of flour, cut his way through the intrenchments of the besiegers. The siege was immediately raised; and the more decisive victory, which is ascribed to the personal conduct of Aetius himself, was marked with the blood of eight thousand Goths. But in the absence of the patrician, who was hastily summoned to Italy by some public ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon

... interference with the release of energy, which remains bound up, tugging for room for expression as much as a spring tightly coiled in a box. In the production of that tension an endocrine has often been decisive. The endocrine nature of the individual may decide whether a subconscious, i.e., visceral or vegetative tension, is to come into being, live or die, in the face of a given situation. If thereby, a permanent disturbance of the equilibrium between the components ...
— The Glands Regulating Personality • Louis Berman, M.D.

... meeting with Lord Orville was decisive. Lively, fearless, free from all other impressions, such a man as you describe him could not fail of exciting your admiration; and the more dangerously, because he seemed as unconscious of his power as you of your weakness; ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney

... This was decisive. Charlotte submitted, and Diana went alone to Omega Street. She found Gustave waiting for her. He proposed a walk, and Captain Paget was enthusiastic upon the subject of fresh air, and the benefits arising therefrom. ...
— Charlotte's Inheritance • M. E. Braddon

... empty, brilliantly-lit rooms seemed unusually large. She glanced round them with inward-looking eyes. Here she was at midnight sitting quite alone in her own house. And she wished to do something decisive, startling as the cannon shot sometimes fired from a ship to disperse a fog wreath. That was the reason why she had told the footman to come in ten minutes. She thought that in ten minutes she might make up her mind. If she decided upon doing something that required ...
— The Woman With The Fan • Robert Hichens

... alteration; for after all, a steady reformation is a more decisive test of the value of ...
— Sermons Preached at Brighton - Third Series • Frederick W. Robertson

... were then about to be chosen. Under a law passed by the expiring legislature, electors of the members were first to be chosen by the voters on August 26, and the electors thus chosen were to meet on September 2, and choose the members of the Convention. It was in view of this second and decisive election day that Marat and Danton settled the date at which the great patriotic work of 'emptying the prisons' should begin, and it was in view of this day also that the circular already mentioned of Marat, Panis and Sergent was sent forth to all places at which a lively administration ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert

... not so far forget the first law of human nature as not to debate and hesitate for a considerable while before taking the decisive step. ...
— The Phantom of the River • Edward S. Ellis

... and the Lensmand stayed the night, sleeping in the little room. In the morning, he brought out his flask again, and remarked: "I'm sure this journey's going to upset my stomach." For the rest, he was much the same as last time, kindly, decisive, but fussy, and little concerned about his own affairs. Possibly it might not be so bad after all. Isak ventured to point out that the hillside was not all under cultivation yet, but only some small squares here and there. The Lensmand took the information ...
— Growth of the Soil • Knut Hamsun

... house on this grant is not known. From his characteristic energy, activity, and promptitude, it is probable that he had begun to clear it. In agriculture, as in every thing else, he gave a decisive impulse. It is stated that he had a particular design to attempt the culture of hemp. He introduced many implements of labor, and started new methods of improvement. He disclosed to the producer of agricultural growths the idea of raising what the land was most capable ...
— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham

... to study my face without speech, his hand still on the button of the bell-rope, his eyes in mine; this was the decisive heat. My face seemed to myself to dislimn under his gaze, my expression to change, the smile (with which I had begun) to degenerate into the grin of the man upon the rack. I was besides harassed with doubts. An innocent man, I argued, would have resented the fellow's ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... calm, determined eye full upon her, and said, in a decisive manner: "You shall not strike, or scald, or skin her, as you call it, if she comes back again. Remember!" and he brought his hand down upon the table. "I have searched an hour for her now, and she is not to be found on the premises. ...
— Our Nig • Harriet E. Wilson

... through the darkening land he yielded to a deep satisfaction. He had struck one blow, a sudden and decisive one, and, though it had not landed on either of the Taggarts, it had at least shown them what they might expect. He intended to deliver other blows, and he was rather glad now that he had not been so weak as to allow Betty's dictatorial attitude to drive him from the ranch, for in that case he ...
— The Boss of the Lazy Y • Charles Alden Seltzer

... time and privileges, but she most certainly does. Her responsibility is great: she will either sway a circle or a household. Her influence will as surely affect her associates as did the influence of those celebrated French women whose salons were the places where battles were fought and decisive moments gained. Society is in great need of women: it always will be. Now this period of young womanhood is precisely the time for cultivating those principles which will later ...
— Hold Up Your Heads, Girls! • Annie H. Ryder

... part in routing Von Kluck. And on the next day (August 28) Joffre called Foch from Lorraine to head the new Ninth army, which was to hold the center at the Battle of the Marne and deal the smashing, decisive blow. ...
— Foch the Man - A Life of the Supreme Commander of the Allied Armies • Clara E. Laughlin

... the mind the great idea of Duty, the understanding of which, and not happiness, seemed to be the end of life. Life looked not clear to me otherwise. I entreated her to separate herself from V—— for a year, before doing anything decisive; she could then look at the subject from other points of view, and see the bearing on mankind as well as on herself alone. If she still found that happiness and V—— were her chief objects, she might be more sure of herself after such a trial. I was careful not to add one word of persuasion ...
— Woman in the Ninteenth Century - and Kindred Papers Relating to the Sphere, Condition - and Duties, of Woman. • Margaret Fuller Ossoli

... spot, and by acclamation, to whomsoever attains his object, in whatsoever it may consist. Let a notary transfigure himself into a deputy: let a false Corneille compose Tiridate; let a eunuch come to possess a harem; let a military Prudhomme accidentally win the decisive battle of an epoch; let an apothecary invent cardboard shoe-soles for the army of the Sambre-and-Meuse, and construct for himself, out of this cardboard, sold as leather, four hundred thousand francs of income; let a pork-packer espouse usury, and cause it to bring forth seven or eight ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

... and Swiss. At Bicocco he beat the famous Swiss infantry under Arnold of Winkelried, a descendant, doubtless, of one of the children whom Arnold Struthabn left to the care of his comrades. At Pavia a decisive charge of his turned the day against Francis I. And on the march to Rome, his unexpected death so inflamed the Lanzknechts that the meditated retreat of Bourbon became impossible, and the city was taken by assault. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various



Words linked to "Decisive" :   deciding, fateful, decide, fatal, crucial, decisiveness, conclusive, determinative, indecisive, important



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